I am starting this piece on leadership with a hypothesis. And my hypothesis is founded not just on my perception of leadership over time, but specifically on how my understanding of Yoruba culture and philosophy has affected what I think about the nature, dynamics, and responsibility of leading a country like Nigeria. Leadership is a critical subject matter that brings political philosophers, political scientists and political theorists together, since it is the concept around which we try to understand how to facilitate human flourishing in a social and political space. And it is even more crucial for Nigerians since independence because that is the key to the transformation of the Nigerian state. And hence, this explains my ongoing curiosity, as a political theorist and public commentator, about how we can keep orienting and expanding our understanding of what leadership means. The 69th birthday celebration of the ubiquitous Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu provides me with yet another opportunity to test my ideas.
Asiwaju Ahmed Tinubu has become a curiosity in the Nigerian political firmament before the commencement of the democratic experiment in 1999. He has become a significant gladiator in the agitation concerning the future of the Nigerian state. His views, opinions and even silences have been subjected to heated debates that explore the boundaries of personal, political and cultural understanding of an average Nigerian politician. But Asiwaju is not an ordinary Nigerian politician. However, beyond any analysis of who they are and what possible understanding we can have of their motives, politicians should be studied in ways that enlighten us about leadership and its dynamics. And this is even more so in the case of Tinubu. I doubt that there is any “popular” leader in the sense of someone who enjoys consensual support across the many spectrums of political opinions and interests. Leadership popularity is even all the scarcer in Nigeria because of the acute nature of what is demanded from anyone wishing to lead in such a politically inflammable context.
Yet, Tinubu keeps resurfacing in almost all the discussion about Nigeria’s present and future. And all the more also because he is Yoruba. Even more critical: he is the fourth in the line of critical Yoruba politicians that had defined the Nigerian state—Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo and Chief MKO Abiola. By some kind of an unfathomable good fortune for my political understanding, I have had more than casual encounters with the four, though with MKO to a limited extent and therefore will not be focused in this reflection. My encounters and engagements with them have been in the service of my ongoing attempt to facilitate an institutional reform philosophy that could backstops Nigeria’s inherent possibilities as a state. Thus, it began to dawn on me to reflect on how these Yoruba national leaders have engaged with the Nigerian state from the perspective of their ethnic nationality. In other words, what is it about being a Yoruba that instigate the kind of notoriety each one of them symbolizes? To varying degrees, each of these political gladiators represents similar achievements. My observation reveals (a) an abiding respect for intellectual capital and the authority of knowledge and meritocracy in governance; and (b) a commitment to Nigeria and her possibilities, within their individual understanding of their responsibilities to the commonwealth. However, each of them had been embroiled in a dilemma that pitted their political principles against a rampaging populism that often sieve these principles through the prism of what the people think and expect from their leaders. But part of their enigmatic character has been due to their resilience in holding on to their belief about Nigeria, even in the face of the most scurrilous public opinion and political shenanigans.
The name “Asiwaju”—Tinubu’s popular title—is a Yoruba appellation that carries the burden of Yoruba ethical principles. It means “the one who leads.” Fundamentally, leadership is a moral responsibility which the Yoruba attach to being an omolúwàbí. As a moral imperative, being an omolúwàbí is an ontological and ethical idea. Omolúwàbí denotes a mode of being that lies behind the Yoruba understanding of iwa (character) and ewa (beauty). To be an ordinary Yoruba person demands being an omolúwàbí, a moral exemplar. But being a leader demands more. The beauty that iwa confers on a person’s existence is expected to manifest in how one relates with others in the human society. A leader is commendable when her actions contribute to the well-being of the collective. A leader that has ewa or beauty further signals such a leaders’ capacity for relational and social goodness.
From Awolowo to Asiwaju, we have Yoruba leaders that we have attempted to cast in the mold of an omolúwàbí. Awolowo was represented as the reincarnation of Oduduwa, the eponymous leader of the Yoruba. One of the most significant achievements of Awolowo is the unification of the Yoruba as one solid ethnonational group within Nigeria. That unification became significant within the context of the positioning for significance within the Nigerian national space. Awolowo became almost mythic in terms of his sociocultural force and political vision. He needed to unite the disparate Yoruba tribes as a critical issue in Nigeria’s national integration challenge. Awolowo’s deep philosophical intuition recognized that the Yoruba had to achieve self-respect as a precondition for a strategic place in the unity of Nigeria. Unfortunately, Awolowo failed to prevent the Yoruba factor which consumes its own force of being. Alaafin Aole was alleged, by Samuel Johnson’s reading of history, to not only have suffered the fate of being betrayed by his lieutenants, but he also allegedly left a curse that subjects the Yoruba race to persistent self-inflicted treachery. And it would seem that, in retrospect, the Yoruba nation has been left rudderless in its attempt at remaining a strong force for unity in Nigeria.
With Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, there was no antecedent mythic relationship with Oduduwa that Awolowo enjoyed. Indeed, his Yorubaness was questioned within the intrigues of politicking that characterized the Nigerian political class, as well as the political calculation that brought Obasanjo to power. There is no doubt that Obasanjo has a deep sense of Yoruba history and culture, yet he struggled with the imperative of a cultural capital that could have been a strong base for his governance performance. However, it had not been easy to balance a sense of national unity and an imperative of ethnic loyalty. This has always been the challenge of nation-building in any plural state. But Wale Adebanwi has argued before that the Yoruba vision of egalitarianism and social justice, especially within an ethnically divided Nigeria, is adoptable by other ethnic groups because of the humanistic basis of that vision. The problem is now that of first selling the vision to the Yoruba elite who have not necessarily bought into the selfless philosophy of unity and national integration. In other words, the general populace sometimes reacts to the whirls of what elite actions throw up, which are not often all that clear. A politician therefore has to face the often vicious recriminations of those who perceive their political principles differently.
Obasanjo has definitely regained his acerbic directness after he got out of the chokehold of Nigerian power politics. On the contrary, Asiwaju Tinubu is still caught in the grip of that excruciating context of power tussle and national dynamics of building a united Nigeria. And he is struggling to hard to live up to the responsibilities of his appellation as one who leads. But one must understand the demand of leadership as often an attempt to mediate between often contradictory principles and demands. Asiwaju has often been caught in between the demand to stand with his Yoruba credentials which requires that he pushes an agenda that he might be reading differently; and the need to attend to the imperatives of nation-building which has a civic prism through which all ethnic visions must be filtered. Well, we must also not forget the realm of personal ambition, and the aspiration to become anything anyone wants to become. If Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu wants to be the president of Nigeria, that should be seen as a legitimate aspiration for one who has invested so much into the Nigerian project. But all ethnic, national and personal agenda are constrained by the urgency of transiting to a pan-Nigerian political unity that everyone can accept and work with.
Every leader with an aspiration must thread what we can call the landmines of leadership. But then what character is required to traverse the landmines of politics in a place like Nigeria? The Yoruba culture demands relentlessly that such a leader must be an omolúwàbí, and the goodness generated by the beauty of that character must form the basis of governance. Lao Tzu, the Chinese philosopher, has a curious leadership advice: “A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.” There is an element of enigmatic quietness in this advice that seems to speak to Asiwaju’s reticence sometimes when there are issues demanding his voice. But there is equally in Lao Tzu’s advice the expectation of governance performance that must satisfy the yearning to unravel the enigmatic leader and his political prowess.
Democracy is such a beautiful thing. It enables the citizens to vote in a potential leader based on the mechanics of possibilities that such a candidate portend. Whatever the political aspiration of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, he is an embodiment of democratic possibilities, like every other person with similar aspirations. And in his travails as a political leader, we already learn how difficult it is to be a leader in a context where leadership is sorely needed.
Olaopa is a tetired Federal Permanent Secretary & Professor of Public Administration/Policy, National Institute For Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Kuru, Jos, tolaopa2003@gmail.com
For a few crazy weeks between February and March, the Southwest was in an uproar over the separatist predilections of a number of south-westerners, chief among whom was Sunday Adeyemo, alias Sunday Igboho, a 48-yeare-old charismatic Oyo State indigene whose determination to free the Yoruba from herdsmen attacks quickly metamorphosed, over a few months, to outright campaign for secession. But by late March, the tempo of his campaign and the fiery rhetoric associated with it had begun to wane, regardless of the sustained ardour of some of his associates. Noticing that his campaign against rampaging and murderous herdsmen in the forests of the Southwest was extremely popular, but failing to properly decipher what that popularity meant or how limited it was in scope, he brazenly declared Yoruba secession.
Had Mr Igboho judged the campaign well, and sensibly and accurately approximated the intentions of the Yoruba whom he claimed to represent, he would have restricted his campaign, limited it to neutralizing the murderous campaign of herdsmen in Yoruba forests, and restricted himself to publicizing the damage the chaos in the region was causing farmers. Instead, encouraged by the waffling of the new Afenifere leader, Ayo Adebanjo, and perhaps mystified by the complexity of the campaign for Yoruba self-determination by Banji Akintoye, a professor of History, Mr Igboho simply went ballistic and began to set dates for Yoruba secession from Nigeria. He was not discomfited by the lack of regional consensus on the matter, nor the coolness, bordering on indifference, of the Yoruba who could not make up their minds whether the provocations in Nigeria had reached boiling point needing their resolve to secede.
Mr Igboho has been pilloried in the media for his brashness and presumptuousness, but it is doubtful whether he is as malevolent as his traducers paint him. He has a passionate heart, and his intentions are nothing but noble, especially set against the intolerable audaciousness of rampaging herdsmen who have exposed the pathetic helplessness of many Southwest communities engaged in hand-wringing as their farms are turned into death traps and no-go areas. Even the governors of the region have dithered badly as they hemmed and hawed over the herdsmen raids. It was such spinelessness, not to talk of the cobbling together of a considerably attenuated Amotekun community policing organ, that produced Mr Igboho and his fiery associates. They were merely filling a vacuum left dangerously open by indecisive Southwest leaders and governors, especially in the face of more cohesive, outspoken and provocative core North leaders and governors.
The insults leveled against Mr Igboho are excessive and uncharitable. He represents a noble cause, to wit the defence of the region’s farms, people and lands, and he shows true grit in risking his life to walk his talk, which is more than can be said for many of his accusers. There is also no doubting the passion and commitment of Mr Igboho. His problem, however, is the same crisis and dilemma bedeviling the Southeast in their dealings with Nnamdi Kanu and his Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB). To lead a people to freedom, as Mr Igboho desires, must be premised first on their consensus, and then secondly on their conclusion that there was no other way to deal with a cause they had admittedly judged as hopeless. Not only are the Yoruba unconvinced that the case of herdsmen rampage is hopeless, they have so far been unable to come to an agreement that secession, if it comes to that, is a commensurate and proportionate response.
The Yoruba whom Mr Igboho claims to represent know that the unduly parochial and nepotistic President Muhammadu Buhari, whose connivance herdsmen seemed to have second-guessed and acted upon to cause havoc everywhere, has just about two years more in the presidency. They know that after him, there will likely be no one quite as insular as he, just as there perhaps was none before him. They know that President Buhari’s nepotism is probably innate and has harmed many in the North as it has unnerved many in the South. They hope that in the years to come, Nigeria will be led by sensible politicians who will not allow their presidency to be hijacked, and who will drive sensible bargains in their political parties as well as build bridges across ethnic divides, especially given how terribly harmful the Buhari administration’s methods have been. On account of this hope, the Yoruba were wary of Mr Igboho’s brusqueness as well as disinterest in compromise. Even Chief Adebanjo and Prof. Akintoye suspected that Mr Igboho had probably overreached himself, and they have, therefore, hedged their bets and quibbled about their self-determination desires for the Yoruba.
More worrisomely, the Southwest flinched when Mr Igboho and his cohorts began to threaten and abuse those who either didn’t agree with their goals or hesitated about the goal of secession. An Oba was insulted as a quisling, and another threatened with death and arson. Southwest political leaders who differed from them were also derided in unprintable language. And when it became known that Mr Igboho himself was for a long time an enforcer for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), passions began to cool in many quarters, and some south-westerners began to wonder whether the whole gambit was not about some indirect kind of regime change in the Southwest.
But what really clinched the argument for the anti-Igboho campaign and doomed the secession bid was that the Yoruba immediately sensed from Mr Igboho’s rhetoric that, like IPOB’s Mr Kanu, he lacked the depth and judgement to take the Yoruba out of Nigeria. The separatists had not yet organized a successful secession, but they were already threatening to murder and destroy any opposition to their goals. Lacking in sophistication, and carrying the deadweight of poor education, it was not surprising that their loathsome methods could not match their noble objectives. Indeed, some have surmised that the separatists would be a disaster far in excess to what the Yoruba were experiencing in Nigeria. If the Yoruba must secede, they would want to be led by people whom they can trust, men of deep learning, sound judgement, ennobling democratic credentials, and incomparable personality – leaders in every way.
Mr Igboho and his associates may have doomed their campaign by their irrationality, temper and excesses, but the country must not think that is the end of the story. The atrocities which the Igboho group rail against have not abated, and the contradictions, insularity and chaos that fuelled their protest movement are still incandescent. If little or nothing is done to tackle these problems, it is a question of time before better and competent leaders begin to spearhead more dangerous and unstoppable rebellions, not just in the Southwest, but elsewhere. For as it is clear to everyone, the Buhari administration shares a big part of the blame for the centrifugal forces unleashed on the country, and the chaos and divisions that have inundated all the geopolitical zones. Mr Igboho is not the problem; he is just a misfit response to a problem whose complexities and many dimensions have proved to be beyond his ken.
The secession bids in the south are doubtless waning, but the Buhari administration, famous for its lack of judgement and inclusive governance, seem prepared to stoke them all over again, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. The police have extended a needless invitation to Mr Igboho, a ploy the aspiring separatist leader has interpreted as a move to incarcerate and neutralize him. He has ardent followers, many of them angry and dispirited. At the moment, however, they are confused by the unwillingness of the Yoruba to rally behind what they think is a noble undertaking. By turning Mr Igboho into a cause célèbre, which is what the heedless police invitation is doing, it will give his edgy supporters a cause to fight, and a grudge to mind and possibly avenge should harm come to him.
Speaking at the Bola Tinubu colloquium last week, President Buhari had gloated over his participation in the civil war, and spoken even more glowingly of the indispensability of peace and unity. His mindset is that the Igbohos and Kanus who deviate from his position on unity instantly become public enemy, far more dangerous than the thousands of bandits and insurgents wreaking havoc on the Northwest and Northeast. But by cuddling murderous herdsmen, who are described as one of the world’s most dangerous terrorists, the president has been adjudged by some Yoruba leaders as clearly a separatist leader himself. That conclusion permeates and energises the ranks of Mr Igboho’s supporters, and they may see the government’s bid to neutralize him as a call to arms.
It is of course possible that the bid to neutralize Mr Igboho may ultimately achieve some headway if the government speedily and ingeniously rolls out its arsenal. However, that will not be the end of a matter that has deep roots watered by the government’s perpetration of injustice. His sympathizers will neither abandon him nor betray the cause. They will probably intensify their rebellion, and possibly embrace more forceful methods of ventilating their grievances. The Yoruba who have largely been indifferent to Mr Igboho, and have seen him as a fringe actor, and his cause as inchoate and precipitate, may gradually but reluctantly rally to his side in spite of themselves. Mr Igboho by all accounts was already imploding; the Buhari administration is foolishly extending a lifeline to him, and worse, even canonizing him. This column had long doubted the capacity of the Buhari administration to govern and hold the country together. It receives poor advice from incompetent aides, and it proceeds undisguisedly as an administration dedicated to the cause of the core North and audacious herdsmen. Its approach to the Igboho saga is one more proof that the administration receives poor advice and has no pretext to be called a national government, despite mouthing the catchphrase of unity and peace.
It is hard to explain why the Buhari administration is reluctant to let sleeping dogs lie. Its policies and methods have provoked the country into disunity and extreme divisiveness. If it cannot resolve the country’s national question, but has indeed exacerbated it, it should not now compound it by noisily proclaiming its preference for strong-arm tactics against those protesting the government’s parochialism, preferential treatment to herdsmen who admit exacting vengeance on their enemies, and lack of inclusiveness. Mr Igboho is a symptom of a terrible underlying problem, much of it provoked by the Buhari administration. It would be disingenuous and dishonest to cast the aspiring separatist advocate as that underlying problem.
It is indeed hardly surprising that in his six eventful and cataclysmic years in office, President Buhari has said nothing and done little to show that he understands the complexities of Nigeria’s existential problem, not to talk of what obnoxious role his government has played in deepening the crisis that had been building for decades. Given his government’s attitude to the grievances coalescing around the undeserving and grandiloquent Mr Kanu in the Southeast, and his handling of the new Igboho conundrum, not to say his indulgent treatment of herdsmen and bandits, there is little confidence that the president will give the country a reasonable explanation for the troubles, nay war, exploding all over the nation.
President Muhammadu Buhari consistently misses the point about the factors that conduce to Nigerian unity whenever he responds to fissiparous tendencies and politics. Speaking at the 12th Bola Tinubu Colloquium on the theme “Our Common Wealth: The Imperative of National Cohesion for Growth and Prosperity”, the president simply preferred admonitions rather than isolating and examining the factors that draw Nigerians apart. According to him, “Despite occasional inter-ethnic tensions in our national history, it seems to me that we have all agreed on one point , that notwithstanding our diversity or ethnicity, culture, language and religion, Nigerians are better, even stronger together…More importantly, I fought for the unity of Nigeria during the civil war – 1967 to 1970, and I saw first-hand the unspeakable horrors of war, not just from fellow soldiers from both sides but from civilians, innocent children, women and the elderly left behind.”
His narration of his war records, including an account of the horrors of war, has become jaded. Nigerians want to know why separatist movements are springing up everywhere, especially at a time when herdsmen are on rampage, and are unchecked. They want to know what his panaceas are. Perhaps soon, before his tenure is over, he will get round to giving the country his honest analysis. Hopefully, too, he will also explain why and how his policies, statements and style have provoked the separatists into fury, and why he futilely relies on arms rather than policies to checkmate separatism. It would be pessimistic to conclude that the president could not offer the desperately needed explanation. Sadly, that is probably the reality the country must contend with. If there is trouble anywhere, the president’s strategy is to declare war, never to seek peace, never to find the root causes of the problem, and never to administer the appropriate anodyne. When he was startled into the reality that the country was disintegrating before his very eyes, he directed that those wielding AK-47 be shot on sight. Bandits? Well, that they should be taken out, together with their sponsors.
The problems militating against peace and unity of the country are complex; but the president’s solutions are indescribably simplistic. If he were a surgeon, he would love amputation. Last week, the Zamfara State government explained the root cause of the banditry ravaging the state. It is a war between the Hausa and the Fulani, the government says, a war caused by the killing of a respected Fulani leader, Alhaji Ishe in 2013 by the Yansakai, a vigilante group rooted in the Hausa community. Now, says the government, the crisis has metamorphosed into all sorts of criminalities, including banditry and kidnapping. It adds that so far, some 2,619 people have been killed, over 100,000 displaced, 1,190 kidnapped, about 100 bandit camps established, some of them containing at least 300 militants, and bandits numbering more than 30,000 are roaming the bushes and wreaking havoc on the state.
Zamfara is just one of the states battling the banditry scourge. There are many more states in the Northwest, particularly Katsina and Kaduna, subjected to savage attacks, at the centre of which are Fulani and herdsmen. Does the Buhari administration have an answer to the scourge? Not exactly, except of course killing those wielding assault rifles and taking out sponsors of banditry, a knee-jerk response some Nigerians believe has been introduced to deal with the Igbohos and Kanus more than check herdsmen and bandits. Yes, some measure of force may be required, but it is important to first understand the crisis. That understanding was not forthcoming from the president at the colloquium.
If I see something better, I will quit police work
October 21, 2020; Jola Edewor wore his uniform with a frantic earnestness unlike the passion that drove him to enlist with the police. Few minutes before he gets to work, he would rip it off and renounce his calling. But he did not know that. The previous day, Edewor retired in bed with a heavy heart, having discovered that his salary had been short of N50, 000 for two years (about N1.2m). The following day, the 41-year-old set out for the force headquarters, eager to get to the root of his hardship.
• Sgt. Maina urging Babatunde to get off the street in order to feed him
But that fateful morning, he wouldn’t get to work. About 15 minutes after he left the barracks for his rendezvous with colleagues at Meiran, he beat a hasty retreat.
It was the 12th day of the #EndSARS protest and the streets pulsed with mayhem as irate youth ran it amok baying for blood of uniformed men. Few paces from his rendezvous, a riotous mob chased after a policeman until he tripped over a boulder and they pounced on him. They ripped his shirt off and rained punches on him, chanting “#EndSARS! #EndSARS!” said Edewor.
“From the distance, they didn’t look like protesters. They looked like hired killers out for blood. One of them railed that they would kill any police officer that they see and set him ablaze” he said.
Instantly, he retreated behind an empty food kiosk. From his hiding, he watched the mob batter his colleague till he was drenched in blood.
Fearfully, he tore his shirt off his body, ripping the buttons as he did, and he slipped out of his trouser. He would be naked, but for his improvised undies comprising a t-shirt and cycling short. He balled his left hand into a fist and rolled the uniform around it. Then he tucked it in a refuse bin behind the kiosk and walked away, coolly, in brisk, urgent strides.
Several metres ahead, he turned to look at the scene. He could not make out his colleague in the distance but he felt contrite leaving him to the mob. He was equally ashamed for discarding his uniform.
“I knew I could purchase another uniform. They sell everything to us anyway. But that officer (his lynched colleague). Till date, I don’t know what became of him. I never bothered to ask,” he said, arguing that even if he did, there was nothing he could do.
Still, he rued his helplessness leaving his uniform in the bin and watching his colleague fall to a lawless horde.
The melee resulted from the demonstrations triggered on Thursday, October 8, 2020 by videos circulated on social media, showing the highhandedness and extrajudicial killing by officers of the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery (SARS) Squad.
For the next two weeks, protests were held in various states across the country and by Nigerians in the diaspora calling for police reforms and an end to brutality. But before long, groups of hoodlums seized the opportunity to unleash staggering violence on members of the police force.
Still smarting from his close shave with death, Edewor set back hurriedly for his barracks in Agege, chanting “#EndSARS! #EndSARS!”in solidarity with hoodlums prowling the streets in search of policemen.
Eventually, he ran into a group of teenagers wielding battle axes, machetes and clubs at the Oja Oba and Abule Egba junction.
While some of them kept watch for policemen and smashed empty beer and soda bottles on the street, others huddled in clusters around mobile phones, chatting animatedly about a trending video.
Intrigued, Edewor asked one of the horde what they were excited about. “He told me to switch on my Bluetooth device and shared the video with me,” Edewor said.
The video showed a police officer being clobbered by a mob in front of a burning police station at Orile, Lagos. The officer reportedly jumped the fence in order to escape being caught in flames as the mob set fire to the station, in protest against the alleged high handedness of the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) heading the station.
Unfortunately for him, he leapt into the hands of the mob. They pounced on him and beat him to a pulp. Amid the mayhem, a thickset youth stabbed him in the eye. The officer careened with the dagger stuck in his eye, bleeding profusely. As he reeled blindly, his assailants took turns hacking into his already bloodied frame with machetes. Eventually, he keeled over and the mob descended on him maniacally, finishing him off.
Edewor swallowed hard. He cringed, watching the mob hack the policeman to death. At that moment he wished to abdicate his position as a Police Inspector. An axe-wielding boy in his early teens railed that he was looking for a policeman to hack to death.
“How could I serve and protect members of a public that wants me dead?” thought Edewor. Suddenly, he felt vulnerable, exposed. “I feared one of the hoodlums might recognise me,” he said.
Thus he retreated cautiously, in anxious steps. Soon, he was dashing down the bypass behind Oja Oba market, en route Agege; an inexplicable yearning to live urging on his desperate feet.
“I was in survival mode,” he said, stressing that he thought nothing of his oath to protect and serve in that moment.
“I have no passion for this police work again. I just wish to make ends meet and care for my family. What kind of work is this, that your employer would steal N50, 000 from your salary for over two years and the public you serve seek to kill you,” he said, adding that were it not for a colleague who alerted him, he would continue living from hands to mouth.
Edewor was supposed to earn N130, 000 monthly but instead, he received N80, 000 for two years. Having spent over two decades on the job, he felt cheated.
He wondered how much had been stolen from my salary in the course of his 20-year-career as a police officer. He said, “When I approached people in the cash office, they told me point-blank that I must pay a bribe of N50, 000 to them, if I was serious about receiving my full salary.”
Faced with no choice, Edewor paid the bribe of N50, 000 and instantly, his salary was regularised. On next pay day, his account was credited with N130, 000.
His stolen salary and the events of Wednesday, October 21, 2020 shook him to the bones. They were ingenuously haunting episodes that rendered his heart a soiled, grey carapace for police work.
Recalling his travails with the police accounts department and the #EndSARS mob, his face darkened and crimped with furrows. His eyes eddied from white-black to a muddy capitulation, his lips parted and closed, forming an incongruous angle with his words. Softly, slightly distended, as if he would break into tears or start bawling.
“If I see something better, I will quit police work,” he said with submissive sternness.
Yet Edewor was lucky to escape with no physical hurt, unlike Sergeant Ajibola Adegoke and Corporal Rotimi Oladele. They were among the police officers killed in the wake of the #EndSARS protests that rocked Ibadan, Oyo State.
The duo, who were attached to the ‘B’ Operations office at the headquarters of the state police command at Eleyele, Ibadan were attacked and set ablaze while going on special duty to a fish depot at New Gbagi area with a superior, Inspector Osho Ojo, on Thursday, October 22, 2021.
To guarantee their safety, they reportedly wore mufti and rode in an unmarked vehicle; but for a minor accident with a motorcyclist, the team would have gone about its duty without incident.
A heated argument ensued with the motorcyclist, attracting hoodlums to the scene. Immediately they discovered that they were police officers, the hoodlums reportedly pounced on them.
Although they fled for safety, Adegoke and Oladele were eventually apprehended and the thugs descended on them with various weapons.
A viral video posted by one of the hoodlums showed the gory scene as the policemen were beaten to death and set ablaze on a heap of used tyres.
Not done, the hoodlums allegedly cut chunks from the burnt corpses and devoured them with chilled drinks.
Fortunately for Inspector Ojo, he was rescued by operatives of Operation Burst, while they recovered the pistols of his burnt colleagues.
Unnerved by the fate of the murdered officers, the Oyo State police authorities launched a manhunt for their assailants. The police subsequently arrested two men identified as Aliu Mubarak, 24, and Adewale Abiodun, 17, in connection with the killing, dismemberment and selling of decapitated heads of the policemen for N1,000.
The suspects were arrested after one Oladipupo Ifakorede, 45, confessed to buying the policemen’s heads from the duo for money-making ritual.
Recounting how he got the heads from Mubarak and Abiodun, Ifakorede said;
“I want to use them to prepare ritual to make money. It is for myself. They (other suspects) did not let me know where they saw the two heads. I did not ask them where they saw them.”
Five persons were arrested in connection with the crime. The police had earlier arrested Kemi Adeyemo and Saheed Oyedepo and they were both transferred to Abuja for further investigation.
Abiodun equally confessed that he and Mubarak sold the two heads to Ifakorede, stressing that they saw the two heads “while coming from Egbeda area of Ibadan.”
In Rivers State, three policemen also lost their lives to angry mobs. Police authorities in the state, however, accused members of the pro-Biafra group, Indigenous People of Biafra, (IPOB), of hiding under the #EndSARS protests to kill the three police officers.
The State Commissioner of Police (CP) Joseph Mukan, while briefing the press in Port Harcourt, gave the identity of the slain officers as: Sunday Dubon, an Inspector attached to the anti-kidnapping unit, whose corpse was said to have been burnt; Swawale Ornan, a Sergeant attached to the 19 Police Mobile Force on Special Duty at Oyigbo, whose corpse was also burnt; and Umunna Uchechukwu, a sergeant with Afam police station, whose legs and hands were cut off before he was burnt to ashes.
Uchechukwu was butchered, his legs and hands cut off, and his body was eventually burnt to ashes. Emotionally stricken by the presence of the grieving wives and children of the murdered policemen, the Governor of Rivers State, Nyesom Wike, decided to pay a N20 million compensation to each of the families of those killed by hoodlums in Oyigbo.
The Inspector General of Police (IGP) Mohammed Adamu, speaking through the Police Spokesman, Frank Mba, stated that, “available reports show that twenty-two (22) police personnel were extra-judicially killed by some rampaging protesters and scores injured during the protests. Many of the injured personnel are in life threatening conditions at the hospitals.”
He added that “two hundred and five (205) police stations and formations, including other critical private and public infrastructure, were also damaged by a section of the protesters.
“Despite these unprovoked attacks, our police officers never resorted to use of unlawful force or shooting at the protesters,” Mba said, even as civil society chide the police for excessive display of aggression and use of force on the #EndSARS protesters.
Human rights organizations blame the police for escalating the protests soon after it was hijacked by armed thugs, leading to the deaths of at least 51 civilians.
Our morale is low – Police
There is no gainsaying the #EndSARS protest and the mayhem triggered in its wake has strained relations between the police and the public. Speaking with The Nation, several officers – who pleaded anonymity – admitted that they have become less passionate about their work.
“Our morale is very low. Extremely low. Nobody bothered to ask of our own side to the story. Yes, there are bad eggs in the police but don’t we have bad eggs in every profession? We have bad doctors, teachers, engineers, accountants, civil servants, journalists and even our religious men…Every day, we deal with dangerous criminals among the public. But na police be everybody’s problem. Now, that they have killed policemen. Let them begin to protect themselves,” he said.
‘Now the police know how we feel’
While offering condolences to bereaved families of police officers, Kunle Atanda, a retired civil servant stated that, “Now, they feel our agony. Their wives and children know how we feel when their husbands torture and kill innocent members of the public. They understand the severity of the losses suffered by members of the public who have lost their loved ones to extrajudicial killing by policemen. An eye for an eye is never a welcome option but our social and security system is truly deserving of a corrective purge and I think the tragedies of the #EndSARS killings should guide us towards urgent solutions.”
Policing in squalor
Nationwide, policemen live in squalor within and outside the barracks. They patrol in rickety vehicles, often extorting commercial transporters and motorists for fuel money.
A combination of poor training, poor remuneration – recruits earn N9, 000 and less than N120, 000 annually – and a culture of corruption and impunity has allowed torture and other ill-treatment to become routine in criminal investigations by the police.
Suspects are tortured to extract confessions as the police are under pressure to solve serious crimes without adequate resources and specialised skills. With little investment in fingerprint databases, ballistics and other forensic expertise, investigations often rely on confessional statements not brilliant police work to solve cases.
Several policemen also complained of deplorable housing; some residents of the Agege and Pedro police barracks, for instance, lamented their squalid living conditions.
“The barracks are overcrowded. I live in a single room with my family of seven. There is too much heat, the septic tank is filled up and it really stinks. Cockroaches crawl all over our apartment, even our beds, and the whole place is rat-infested,” said a Police Sergeant, who lives at the barracks in Agege, Lagos.
Patricia Udom, 36, also complained of overcrowding, unsanitary toilets and surroundings. “The whole place smells like a toilet. It smells of human sweat, over-filled septic tanks,” said the Lance Corporal.
The Centre for Anti-Corruption and Open Leadership (CACOL) recently took the National Assembly and the executive arm of government in charge of the Police Trust Fund (PTF) to task on the present state of police barracks across the country, lamenting that police barracks could pass for rat holes and slums.
The Executive Chairman of the Centre, Debo Adeniran, stated that, for this reason, the Nigerian police was rated among the top five worst police organizations in the world in 2016 by the World Internal Security and Police Index.
Police barracks in Lagos are an eyesore. Most of the structures are collapsing, yet the barracks and accommodation department of the force has done nothing to rectify the situation.
“All they do is deduct N7, 000 or more from your salary as lodging allowance. The rooms are very bad, and you only get one room and parlour, no matter the size of your family and you are forced to share toilets and bath,” said a Sergeant at the Agege barracks. He lamented that police families struggle to construct and maintain septic tanks and drainage.
Plans have, however, been concluded to demolish all dilapidated and rebuild them for policemen and their families. This was disclosed recently by the Chairman, Nigeria Police Trust Fund (NPTF), Suleiman Abba, during his visit to the Ijeh Barracks, Obalende Barracks, MOPOL 20 Barracks and the Police College, Ikeja.
Abba, a former IGP, who was accompanied by the Lagos State Commissioner of Police (CP) Hakeem Odumosu, and other senior officers said, “We are going to demolish dilapidated barracks and renovate those that are still good to human habitable status, with the provision of modern toilets, flowing water, safe roofs where water will no longer leak into rooms as well as safe electricity. That is what policemen deserve.”
Travails of a failing force
With a staff strength of almost 400,000, the police is the primary law enforcer and security agency in the country consisting of 36 state commands grouped into 12 zones and seven administrative organs including special units such as the disbanded SARS and newly constituted SWAT.
Yet salaries of Nigerian policemen are abysmally poor with a recruit earning as low as N9, 000 monthly and N110, 000 annually. Jocelyn Nwiti, a Corporal said she earns N42, 200 per month, Niyi Orunkoyi, an Inspector, said his take-home salary is N78, 478 per month.
A 2008 Presidential Committee on Police Reform headed by Muhammed Yusuf recommended an estimated N2.8 trillion – or N560 billion annually – to effectively reform the police in five years.
The Parry Osayande Committee, constituted in 2012 by former President Goodluck Jonathan regime, made similar recommendation, and called for a special fund to transform the NPF which he described as the worst paid in the West African sub-region.
In November 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari approved an enhanced salary structure for the NPF but more than three years after the approval, police officers say they are yet to receive a pay rise.
Hostility begets hostility
The deplorable working conditions have been blamed for police officers’ poor attitude to the job. “Hostile work conditions breed hostile personnel. The slogan, ‘Police is your friend’ is very wrong. How can we be your friend when we are underpaid and our children play and sleep in filth? Many of our children have fewer choices to succeed; they either turn criminals or do police work. Many choose the former and become Yahoo Boys. It’s easier to be a Yahoo Boy (internet fraudster) these days. Many police officers even support their children to do internet fraud. Yes, its as bad as that,” said Nonso Michael, a Lance Corporal.
According to him, the many policemen resume their shift everyday, very angry, hungry and agitated. “That is why some get trigger happy when provoked. It’s not that they mean to kill but they are not in the right state of mind…And things have worsened since the #EndSARS. Many of us watched our colleagues get slaughtered for no just cause. We are not happy about it,” he said.
To watch the viral videos of police killings in the wake of the #EndSARS protests was to suddenly explore a dark facet of Nigerian life. Pundits argued that the development was a fallout of the persistent highhandedness and extrajudicial killings of innocent members of the public by the now defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the police.
Police officers, however, admit disillusionment at the backdrop of fears that the incident could make them apathetic on the job and undermine their work ethics.
Memories of the #EndSARS killings and police impunity dating farther, continually trigger hostility and despair among affected parties.
For many citizens, particularly bereaved families of slain policemen and victims of extrajudicial killings carried out by the police, the memories are too grisly for comfort, even as some victims receive compensation for their losses.
The Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu recently compensated the families of six police officers lynched in Lagos State, in the wake of the violence that trailed the #EndSARS protests, with N10 million each, totaling N60 million. Sanwo-Olu also announced scholarship awards to the children of the deceased officers up to the university level.
The slain officers include Yaro Edward, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), Inspector Ayodeji Erinfolami, Inspector Aderibigbe Adegbenro, Inspector Samsom Ehibor, Sergeant Bejide Abiodun and Inspector Igoche Cornelius. Sanwo-Olu described the slain officers as “heroes,” saying the deceased sacrificed their lives to secure lives and properties in the State.
The Lagos State judicial panel hearing cases of police brutality and SARS-related abuses also awarded N10 million each to two victims of police misconduct. Adebayo Abayomi — who received the compensation on behalf of Kudirat, his late mother, who was hit on April 4, 2017, as SARS officers raided the Onipanu area of Lagos.
Hannah Olugbodi was equally awarded N10 million for being hit by a stray bullet from a SARS officer’s rifle while police unit raided an Ijesha hotel shooting sporadically in the air; the bullet shattered Olugbodi’s left leg and left her in crutches. The duo received their cheques from Doris Okuwobi, chairperson of the panel, who presented the cheques to them on behalf of the Lagos State government.
Marc Chidiebere Nwadi was also awarded N7.5 million by the panel for his brutalisation by the Nigerian police in 1999. Nwadi first appeared before the panel on Saturday, November 28, 2020, where he testified, without legal counsel, that he was arrested by the police in 1999. He had just arrived in Lagos and he could not find his relative.
The 39-year-old told the judicial panel how he was detained and tortured, and later remanded at Kirikiri prison for six years, awaiting trial. This put paid to his dream of becoming a journalist, he said.
Memories of the #EndSARS killings and police impunity dating farther, continually trigger hostility and despair among affected parties.
Inspector Edewor brusquely recalled the chain of incidents as a monumental tragedy, stressing that the impact will live with us for a long while.
The police Inspector is still traumatised by the incident. These days, he drinks “to forget” because the remembrance unnerves him. Edewor may have escaped with no physical hurt but he is undoubtedly one of the several victims of the #EndSARS protest, argued Bisi Ade-Iluyomade, a social psychologist.
She said, “Most people are battling Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) inflicted by their gruesome experiences in the hands of lawless police officers. On the flipside, we have a very traumatised police force whose orientation to the job has suffered a terrible mutation to an ‘us versus them,’ and ‘we against the world’ mentality. This is very bad for future relations between the police and the public that they were employed to serve.”
Notwithstanding the hideous work conditions, Sergeant Bulus Maina would never ‘betray’ his uniform and his oath to protect and serve the Nigerian public.
Just recently, The Nation encountered Maina working against the tide of bad blood and apprehensions about the police. On a Saturday afternoon in Ahmadiyya, Ijaiye, Lagos, Maina moved to save a destitute man sprawled in the middle of the road, in a puddle of spittle and pee.
From dawn through noon, flies hovered around him, darting back and forth his soiled pants and begrimed face. His soft breath chirred against the hard tarmac, like a dirge of dying locusts.
But while pedestrians and commuter traffic took great care to avoid him, Maina ventured closer. Good news: he wasn’t dead. But he had neither the strength nor the will to state his own name. He looked starved and spent as if life could depart him any minute.
Seeing his piteous state, Maina who was attached to the unit manning a roadblock along the bypass hurried to get him a rice meal. But the homeless man was too weak to feed.
He lifted his hand from its perch in the puddle of urine and proceeded to dip it in the food but Sergeant Maina prevented him from doing so, and instantly crouched to feed him.
With his belly full, a semblance of spunk spread through his hitherto lifeless body and he identified himself as Johnson Babatunde. Maina went on to get him off the street to the consternation of his colleagues who felt he was exposing himself, recklessly, to possible infection by COVID-19.
To some, Babatunde was a ticking time-bomb, a deadly pathogen in human form. Others saw him as a “junkie” and “drunk.” Ultimately, he was the creature that must be avoided by the sidewalk, the irritant laying supine, hugging the tarmac as his bed, his urine as bedsheet, and pedestrian scorn as blanket.
To Maina, however, Babatunde was simply a Nigerian in need, a “deserted husband, a forlorn father, and bankrupt carpenter.” He was a destitute Nigerian in need of help, and Maina endeavoured to feed him, wash him, and get him off the street.
Now, that is an image of the police we hardly see.
Some names have been changed to protect interviewees.
“You can measure a man by the opposition it takes to discourage him.” – Robert C. Savage
Ab initio, it is instructive to state succinctly and saliently that the opinion of the columnist in the Followership Challenge of this week is neither solicited nor a hatchet job like some analysts or critics would make readers to believe. It is borne out of a belief that in a polity, especially a nascent democracy, like Nigeria’s, any individual should feel free to voice his or her opinion whether there is a cacophony of opposition or congruence of opinion to that person’s stand and stake. Moreover, the opinion expressed here are as viewed by the lens of a followership scholar with minimal bias devoid of myopic or partisan view.
The race to 2023 presidency has started even though many of the supposed aspirants for the coveted seat are seemingly silent on their ambition. Indeed, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu who celebrated his birthday recently is rumored to be a leading contender. It is very vociferous in the grapevine that Tinubu adroitly is plotting his way through the stormy water of Nigeria’s politics to be a leading candidate of his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC). Asiwaju Tinubu has stoically been silent which many keen political analysts, pundits and observers are not comfortable with knowing Tinubu to be savvy, smart and strategic especially in his trajectory as a political colossus. The hullabaloo created as a result of the rumoured ambition of Tinubu is turning the former Lagos State Governor to becoming another stormy petrel of Nigeria’s politics after Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Owelle Nnamdi Azikiwe and Sardauna Ahmadu Bello. However, it is worrisome to some political analysts for such a seemingly maverick and mercurial man, of ‘timber and caliber’ (apology to late Dr Kingsley Mbadiwe) to keep mum over a monumental matter of this magnitude. Time is ticking!
Is Tinubu Dreaming of the Presidency?
It is both interesting and intriguing to say that many in the opposition are the ones putting words into the mouth of Bola Ahmed Tinubu and not even the core Tinubu’s fans and followers. It may be noteworthy to inquire at this juncture: Can I or anyone else dream of becoming a minister, governor or president of his country as a citizen? In the Bible, one man that was referred to as a dreamer, Joseph, dreamt of reigning over his brethren and even his parents. He was sorely hated by his brethren resulting in selling him into slavery. Unknown to them, they were packaging him into his palace where his rulership will extend beyond human reasoning and rationalization! However, this is Nigeria, and it is a digital age, where any voice could be so vociferously loud even when peddling fake news. All said and done, since anyone could dream, why not allow a Bola Ahmed Tinubu (BAT) to dream? If BAT will be sagaciously and strategically covert in his trajectory towards the 2023 presidency, there is a palpable phobia, though unspoken, that this seemingly maverick strategist may sail through lending credence to the word of the highly referred Nelson Mandela that “a winner is dreamer who never give up.” To many in the opposition, this man must be marched, marked and manacled such that his political engine ground to a halt not minding his political pedigree after all, it was Mo Dao Zu Shi who once declared that “hatred could blind a person’s eyes, making him unable to admit anything in favor of his enemy.” BAT is definitely in the eye of the storm.
Is it a sin to aspire to lead?
Tinubu was a Senator and two term Governor who has paid his due in the political arena of Nigeria. Not laundering his image, for that is not the purpose of this treatise, one can pointedly and poignantly ask some salient questions: Is a sin to aspire to lead one’s country after supporting some candidates in time past? Does BAT possess the pedigree to emerge as his party’s flag bearer? Having been a kingmaker, why does he now want to be a king? Will BAT allow himself to be checkmated, corrupted and crippled by any cabal if he is eventually offered the party’s ticket? This columnist will want many readers who are against his aspiring to run attempt answering these questions objectively.
Who is really afraid of Tinubu?
This is the first time in the history of Nigeria that I have personally perceived strident opposition to a man’s candidacy to the highest office in the land. In the past, all manner of people have aspired to the plum position of the president, some of them had no political pedigree. There was no fuss! Suddenly, Tinubu was rumoured to be interested and cacophony of voices want to douse it. Personally, I perceive, the mention of the name, Tinubu, is already sending shivers down the spines of some politicians, even within his party. Who is really afraid of Tinubu? My response to them is simple. Personally, as a follower, and in my own perception, knowing that like the Yoruba talking drum (gangan), when it faces me, another may likely be viewing the backside, I will opine that BAT should be allowed to run. In politics, there is nothing stopping a kingmaker from becoming a king – much depends on the followers! If you doubt, ask Dr Mahathir bin Mohamad, the 4th and 7th Prime Minister of Malaysia, who was recalled out of retirement to rescue a scandal – sinking nation. In his second coming, aged 92, he returned as the king – Prime Minister. The man, Tinubu, should be allowed to test the waters, after all, he has been supporting others for the No. 1 position. Why should this cacophony of voices cow him into submission? Who knows whether in the words of Constance Friday, “resistance is a sign that shows you’re going the right way.”
In concluding this article, as a keen follower of Nigeria’s politicking, politics and polity, no one should be disenfranchised from aspiring, contesting or voting in a true democracy. If BAT wants to throw his hat into the ring with all his resources possibly going down the drain, so be it! However, in the words of Winston Churchill, his kite may fly against the wind, not with it (sic), then he has his way against all seeming odds. If the latter occurs, then, Tinubu’s stand and stake would be in sync and synergy with Matshona Dhliwayo, who opined:
“When they judge you, yawn.
When they misunderstand you, smile.
When they underestimate you, laugh.
When they condemn you, ignore.
When they envy you, rejoice.
When they oppose you, prevail.”
Dr. Ekundayo, J. M. O., can be reached via 08155262360 (SMS only) and drjmoekundayo@hotmail.com
Chioma Thompson is a first-generation Nigerian American designer, writer and multimedia artist. After leaving a career as a Quantitative analyst, she began writing poems, and songs for artists. Known to have worked with Jay Z, Pink, Post Malone, DaBaby and Davido, Chioma has completed work on a Nollywood feature and directorial debut. She speaks with SAMPSON UNAMKA on her experience as a showbiz impressario.
Okay, you’ve worked with Jay Z, Pink, what would say was the difference between working with an African act and a foreign act, like working with Davido and working with Jay Z?
Well, the bigger acts that we have worked with, in our production process, to be quite frank, we don’t deal with the artist very much. We deal with the music directors. I met Jay Z, I like the Jay Z video because we were making black friends. It was based on a show ‘Friend’, using an all-black cast it was a comedy, it was great. The video I worked on for Pink was called Beautiful Trauma, it was a period piece. It was about the 1950s and 1960s. It was a very difficult thing to work on.
The 1950s and 1960s blacks in America were considered to be one-sixth of a human being. We didn’t have basic civil rights, here I was creating a set to glorify what was the peak of America for some and the dirt of America from my view. Working with Davido. Hunter is Davido’s artist and repertoire. He is Jamaican. The vibe on set on ‘Russ’ featuring Davido’s ‘All I Want’ was exciting, everybody was happy. Our set was a Harvey in Atlanta, most of us were Africans, Nigerians, everyone who I got to work with on the project was either a Nigerian or African, except, for the director.
It turned from this thing of us having to make do and having to make peace with our position to us being able to express the liberating aspect of our arts, to us being able to celebrate certain portions of our culture that we wanted to share with the world, to us being able to position ourselves as yes black excellence, beautiful Africans and in-between our takes, we played the piano and we sang some of his greatest hits felt like a family. His girlfriend, Chioma she was on set as well. I think the difference in working with a Nigerian artists is that there’s a sense of pride, a sense of spiritual satisfaction that you get from enabling your fellow countryman to tell his tale, there’s a sense of joy that we get from seeing how far we have come against all odds. These small moments that we share in rented houses when we were creating stories, you know the co-artist was a white artist and he was learning how to speak pidgin and it was just like seeing how happy he was to learn this discarded piece of our culture. That’s the difference. For me, even though you could say that was one of my smaller jobs in terms of budget, in terms of exposures that was one of the jobs I was most proud of. I took more pictures on that set than any other set.
What is Stranded Janded about?
‘Stranded Janed’ is my nickname for the people who come back from abroad with nothing but an accent. When I was walking through the social circles in Lekki, I would often meet these people that have just come back. And they still had their accent. And I would ask them like what are you doing in Nigeria now? Nothing, right? There’s something I was saying about meritocracy.
So you find that many of them are just living in their parent’s mansions driving around their parents Range Rovers, they’re not working. And they went to America based on their privilege. They went to London based on their privilege. When they got there, they realized like, Oh my god, I’m going to be an average citizen. They couldn’t take that, so they came back home. Now they’re stranded, but they still hold on to that accent as if they never were from here. I call them the ‘Stranded Janded.’ The film was about the untimely return of a member of the ‘Stranded Janded.’ I was really eager about making this film.
Then in October, our government decided to massacre a bunch of our youth in the dark. That changed everything for me. I realized at that point that my work could no longer serve as a distraction from the reality that my work had to serve as a mirror for what was going on and that being that, I had this international audience theme that I had been given this gift of dialogue and this gift of being able to write. I have a duty to those who didn’t have these assets to use this to somehow elevate the dialogue about what it meant to be Nigerian. I found that most Nigerians feel that the antidote to the conditions in Nigeria is to escape. I come from what I consider to be a hopeless place full of glass ceilings and prejudice for blacks have come back.
Let my people know that the oppression you are running from in Nigeria in running abroad you are running directly into the hands of the same people that are robbing our nation and that until we take it upon ourselves to demand better, we will never receive better. Our government is their brokering their trading on our behalf and we are unaware of these terms of trade. That was the impetus behind my third book of poetry. I have written two books, the third one is called ‘Back to Black’.
How do you hope to combine it with writing scripts, or upcoming movies, your book as well, how do you hope to combine everything?
The same way I have been doing it for the last seven years. I have been doing this in America, just wake up every day put your foot in your shoe, one leg at a time and face what is in front of you. Like I said, I think if you get convoluted in reaching for results, you get overwhelmed. I am a process and planning, oriented person, and I am also not one but many. I have a great team of people that support me. In the united states, I have a great team of props makers, I have a great team of art directors that support me. There’s no shortage of excellence here in Nigeria. I have found a great team of people who are supporting me. So, what I am finding is that I actually have better talents here.
Gerety Awards has been billed to honour Nigerian creatives in 2021 with an all-female jury cast from the Nigerian advertising and marketing communications landscape as usual and Brand Spur Nigeria has been announced as the main media partner of the Gerety Awards in Nigeria
The Gerety awards is an event that rewards the highest and purest of creative excellence in advertising and communications; created to redefine Advertising and Communications by setting a new benchmark in global creative awards. This award has taken place in notable cities around the world, such as Paris, Singapore, Toronto, Los Angeles (L.A), London, Milan to name a few and it’s finally happening in Lagos.
Brand Spur Nigeria will partner with Gerety awards to host the Lagos jury panel which boasts of top marketing Communications women. The members of this panel include: Gbemi Adekanmbi – Founder- For Creative Girls, Adebola Williams – Category Lead, Gum & Candy, Mondelez, West Africa, Dolapo Otegbayi – Specialised Nutrition Director, FrieslandCampina WAMCO, and Solape Akinpelu – Head, Marketing & Corporate Communications, Meristem Nigeria. These women have earned their stripes in the field of brand building and marketing communication.
The Lagos jury panel is an event scheduled to hold in the second week of June after the judging has taken place to enable everyone to understand the factors that influenced the choice of the selected winners of the awards and what is expected to produce award winning creatives from the lens of the jury.
Bolaji Esan, the Editorial Director at Brand Spur Nigeria, says: “we are excited to be the media partner for the Gerety Awards, an award set out to recognise the impact of female voices in the creative industry while celebrating creativity, talent, innovation and resilience. We see this as a global movement to enable the conversation and further use our platform to build opportunities for women.”
Co-Founder of the Awards Joe Brooks says “We are thrilled to spotlight Nigerian creativity with this panel, the work discussed will set a benchmark for the industry through the female vision, and will be a great predictor for all other awards taking place later this year.”
It’s been a year since the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared the coronavirus outbreak pandemic, a year that most parts of the world shut down as they braced for the unexpected. In Nigeria, Lagos State was already under partial lockdown with venues of social gatherings compelled to close shops as a way of limiting the spread of the deadly virus. By the end of March, the president sent the state to a full lockdown for two weeks with the exemption of those in essential services.
With the Nigerian health sector already riddled with poor infrastructure development to contain the ravaging virus, Nigeria was destined to be the worst-case scenario. But that was not to be the case as the federal government aided by the private sector, managed to keep the virus at bay. Companies like MultiChoice Nigeria made cash donations of N200 million and N50 million to the federal government and Lagos State government respectively. The company also donated 60,000 Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and 10,000 face masks to hospitals and non-governmental organisations as well as public education and enlightenment provided through regular highlighting of the helplines of the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) on more than 10 channels on DStv and GOtv platforms at a cost estimated to be in excess of N550 million.
For those in the creative industry, anxiety was almost palpable. The lockdown halted productions, sales and events. Quite a few jobs were lost while others were left to reimagine their modus operandi. Again, MultiChoice committed up to N400 million to the industry, keeping many employed despite the economic challenges at the time.
Perhaps, the biggest help to come from the company is its unwavering support in keeping Nigerians entertained without compromising the quality of their programmes.
The pandemic triggered TV watching as many looked for escapes to kill the boredom. MultiChoice rose to the occasion by churning out new entertainment content. From ‘Turn Up Friday’ to ‘Owambe Saturday’, the company kept many households lively. Despite all odds, the company premiered the fifth season of its popular TV show Big Brother Naija. The TV reality show was such a huge success that the company recorded 900 million votes.
It didn’t stop there. It kicked off the ‘We’ve Got You’ campaign between April and June when the country was still under lockdown. The campaign offered active and disconnected DStv and GOtv customers the opportunity to get an upgrade to the next viewing package when they renewed subscription on the packages they were on. The campaign enabled households undergoing financial challenges to still access their favourite news and other general entertainment content.
The new year arrived with the promise of better days as vaccines roll out began in earnest. The COVID-19 vaccines recently arrived in the country and vaccination is already in progress in some states.
Still committed to alleviating financial burdens on customers, the company started the new year with a Step Up campaign for DStv subscribers. The campaign enables subscribers on Compact, Yanga and Confam packages to pay for a package a step above their current package and get a boost to view programming on the next higher package. That is, a Compact bouquet subscriber can upgrade to Compact Plus to enjoy Premium content. The campaign also allowed GOtv subscribers on GOtv Jolli and Jinja to upgrade and enjoy GOtv Max at a discounted price of N2,999, instead of N3,600 per month.
In February, the company announced a hardware discount offer on its DStv and GOtv decoders. DStv HD decoder, dish kit with Compact package subscription dropped from N18,600 to N9,900 on Confam package, while GOtv decoder, GOtennae with GOtv Jolli package subscription now costs N6,900 from N8,400.
The price slash was subsequently followed by a GOtv campaign tagged, GOtv Dey Your Side, an offer borne out of the company’s desire to show support to subscribers who have remained loyal to the service by offering them more for less money in an economic situation worsened by the pandemic. With this, customers on GOtv Jolli and GOtv Jinja get to pay for the Jolli package (N2,460) and get upgraded to the highest package, GOtv Max worth N3,600 at no extra cost. Customers on its GOtv Max package were also not left out as the Awoof Overload promo in March catered to them. The promo gave Max customers a chance to win N100,000 for school fees, N50,000 cash prize, N10,000 shopping vouchers, N5,000 fuel vouchers and free airtime to call on all networks via a weekly draw.
In terms of content, MultiChoice has increased its content offering on its DStv and GOtv platforms. More programmes were unveiled for the year such as: the singing reality shows – Nigerian Idol and The Voice Nigeria; special curated channels – M-Net Pretty Deadly pop-up channel to mark Women’s History Month and the Hallelujah pop-up channel to commemorate the Easter celebrations. The Hallelujah channel premiered a new segment tagged ‘REJOICE!’ hosted by veteran gospel artiste, Segun Obe featuring live performances from top gospel artistes. The live worship experience continues Easter Sunday, 4 April also from 3pm to 7pm with performances from PITA, Frank Edwards and Tim Godfrey. All these in addition to live football matches from the Premier League, UEFA Champions League, La Liga, Serie A and other premium sporting content including the UFC, Formula 1, Tennis, NBA and WWE.
Other channels launched on the DStv platform this period include: Honey, a pan-African lifestyle channel offering an exhilarating blend of African lifestyle content from the continent launched in February; tvN Africa, Korea’s number 1 entertainment channel launched in March and WildEarth, a channel set to bring viewers face to face with the thrill of nature during daily LIVE safari shows from spectacular wildlife locations including The Greater Kruger, KZN, the Kalahari and the Maasai Mara.
No doubt, the coronavirus pandemic taxed our ingenuity and for MultiChoice, it was an opportunity to enrich more lives. One can only wonder what’s more to come in the next weeks and months from the video entertainment company.
Ibom Icon Hotel and Golf Resort is promising guests and diners a memorable experience this Easter season. To this end, the hotel has lined up an array of entertainment activities themed “Easter EGGSTRAVAGANZA.”
Activities for the Easter celebrations will commence with a Good Friday TGIF Party to be hosted at the Hotel’s Marina which is renowned for its serenity and attraction. The Good Friday TGIF Party would feature an outdoor disco setup, mouth-watering meals, as well as a Celebrity DJ appearance to play for entertainment.
Guests and diners will also be treated to an Easter Sunday Brunch at the hotel’s Vista Restaurant and Family Pool Party. Diners will be entertained with exciting games to win fantastic prices ranging from Sunday family fun day BBQ brunch voucher, discount on bills, and complimentary brunch vouchers. They can also request for a special table setup with Easter themed giveaways containing chocolates, candies, Easter-colored eggs, trinkets etc.
Speaking about the hotel’s activities, Head, Sales and Marketing, IBOM ICON Hotel & Golf Resort, Daniel Lordis, stated that the hotel is pleased and ready to receive visitors within and outside the state. “Our services during this period have been planned to cater for every single guest visiting the hotel and all activities/entertainment have been creatively designed for their delight. We are happy to also feature special packages suitable for families who intend spending their vacation at the hotel during the holidays.”
As part of its initiatives and ongoing strategic programmes for media engagement, 9mobile held a capacity-building session to equip journalists with the requisite skills knowledge needed to boost their reporting and adapt effectively to the dynamic media landscape.
The training session, which was held virtually via Zoom in observance of prescribed measures to limit the spread of COVID-19, was facilitated by multiple award-winning and two-time Emmy nominee investigative journalist and Regional Editor (West Africa), The Conversation Africa, Adejuwon Soyinka.
Speaking on the theme “Online Content Optimization – engaging millennial and Gen-Z audiences with storytelling,” Adejuwon remarked that disruption in news media creates better opportunities for journalists to leverage and tell good stories that connect with new audiences.
According to him, content optimisation entails making sure that stories are written and produced in a relatable way and can reach the largest possible target audience, in this case, the Millennials and the Gen-Z.
“But beyond this also, there is the question of how the journalist can match stories with the right and complimentary platforms. The truth is that there are certain kinds of stories meant for specific platforms, and this is where multimedia storytelling comes to play. By incorporating various types of media, you are creating a story that readers can engage with and possibly share,” he explained.
The Executive Director, Regulatory and Corporate Affairs, 9mobile, Abdulrahman Ado, represented by the Public Relations Lead, 9mobile, Chineze Amanfo, emphasised that 9mobile is committed to advancing the growth of the media profession in Nigeria. “9mobile will continue to provide robust platforms for journalists to upskill their profession to discharge their duties effectively. Given the level of experience of our resource person for this session, we strongly believe that there will be value for everyone to take away.”
