The Nation Newspaper

Category: Friday

  • National integration and the challenge of origin

    National integration and the challenge of origin

    Two years ago, I reflected on the challenge of residency rights in the context of our fascination with, indeed, fetishisation of place of origin. This mindset is thoroughly human, but industrialisation and modernisation has virtually erased it from the landscape of the Western world. It is very much alive in Africa in general and Nigeria in particular. There is nothing inherently wrong with the mindset. In fact, it has been exploited profitably for developmental efforts in villages across the land. However, if there is an interest in the strengthening of national integration, fascination with place of origin is a real challenge. Now that the National Conference has waded into the issue, the collective wisdom of delegates may provide the breakthrough that we need.

    Pursuant to the declaration that the “motto of the Federal Republic of Nigeria shall be Unity and Faith, Peace and Progress”, the 1999 Constitution pledged that “national integration shall be actively encouraged, whilst discrimination on the grounds of place of origin, sex, religion, status, ethnic or linguistic association or ties shall be prohibited.” This is the central political objective of the document that constitutes the grundnorm of the nation’s existence.

    To the extent that the constitution recognises the importance of national integration as key to the realisation of unity and faith, peace and progress, its framers deserve credit. It may be argued that this recognition is only on paper. The answer to this charge is that the constitution is a written document, and its provision can only be on paper. It is the responsibility of those who pledged to uphold the spirit of the constitution to implement its provisions and transform it from an ordinary paper to a living reality in the lives of citizens.

    Indeed, the document goes on to enumerate the means to the realisation of the objective of national integration when it identifies the duty of the state to “provide adequate facilities for and encourage free mobility of people, goods and services throughout the Federation; secure full residence rights for every citizen in all parts of the Federation; encourage inter-marriage among persons from different places of origin or of different religious, ethnic or linguistic association or ties; and promote or encourage the formation of associations that cut across ethnic, linguistic, religious or other sectional barriers.”

    The framers of the constitution truly believed that the state, through its elected leaders, can make all the foregoing happen. After all, “ought implies can.” In light of the experience of the last thirteen years, it would appear that the optimism of the framers was a little bit misplaced. Of the group of four ideals that comprise the motto of the nation, we cannot pretend to be close to beginning the journey toward the realisation of three: unity, peace, and progress. The fourth, faith, is the most vague in what it includes and, therefore, perhaps the most difficult to know if we are inching towards it. Does it mean faith in the republic? Or does it mean faith in God, gods, humans or wealth and greed?

    The nation has moved from militancy to terrorism in fifteen years; it has found itself in the belly of ethnic and religious whales, and the god of its creation has not been able to deliver it. It is debatable whether that god is not somewhere having a belly laugh at the expense of its creature. Didn’t  he/she/it anticipate these outcomes?

    Two years ago, the National Assembly also took a bite into the complex tissue of this monstrous entity. In order to give teeth to the idealistic provisions of the constitution regarding national integration and residency, the National Assembly, as the beneficiary of the people’s sovereignty, flew again the kite of residency right. It is laudable in the context of the goal of national integration. The question was about its workability?

    The Federal Government can promulgate a residency requirement: if you live for ten years in a locality, discharging your full legal and civic responsibilities, you qualify for full residency rights including the right to vote and be voted for. This is what happens in other nations.

    Now, that proposal appears very reasonable until we identify one significant difference between this country (as well as many African nations) and the other countries where this works. America is a land of immigrants. Human movement is what gives the United States an edge. Mitt Romney’s father was governor of Michigan. Mitt moved to Massachusetts and became governor there. Barack Obama moved from his birthplace of Hawaii and became a Senator from Chicago. Bill Clinton was governor in Arkansas and from there he got elected as President of the United States. He then moved to New York where his wife was elected Senator. The list is long. The reason this is possible in the United States is that the idea of residency is not tied to any fundamental ideal of belonging concretised in the symbolism of umbilical cord burial.

    In the defense of some of our practices, we self-indict by referencing our level of development or maturity. They say, for instance, that we are not ripe for State Police because governors will abuse it. Of course, I think this is a spurious claim. But the fundamental ideal of belonging that we all cherish doesn’t even belong to that category of practices. Grant residency rights by law and empower individuals to be integral parts of the communities in which they reside. Grant them that right, and what do you have? At census time, they pack their families to their birthplace where they feel they truly belong. The right to free movement cannot prevent this from happening.  And what they fail to do in life, they choose to have done at death. For the Yoruba, royalty (and everyone is included here) deserves proper hometown internment (ori oye kii sun ta).

    This obsession with place of origin does not just relate to ethnic or state origins. It is an issue among members of the same ethnicity just as it is a challenge to intra-community harmony.

    Consider a typical small Yoruba community with a newly developed neighborhood settled by people from different parts of the community and surrounding towns. Significantly, in deference to their different origins, they name their new settlement Ilupeju (the assembly of many towns).  What is more, each settler family finds his or her way to their places of origin, probably on 6 km away for voter registration; for elections, and to their “home” churches and mosques for spiritual activities.  It doesn’t matter that they can access these facilities in their new homes. Were legal obstacles to national integration removed, this tendency for voluntary separation and identification with origin is a greater challenge to effective integration.

    In light of this, we should not be deluded into thinking that once we promulgate residency rights, national integration would be achieved. In the context of our cultural beliefs, it is the beneficiaries of full residency rights that are most likely to be its worst violators. Yet there is something unsettling about referencing negatively those cultural beliefs and practices that appear to counter our notion of national integration as violations. These practices have been recognised by the people as part of their being—what makes them who they are. They are what psychologists understand as identity markers. It would appear then that the objective of national integration can truly conflict with our fundamental notions of who we consider ourselves to be.

    Of course, the encouragement of national integration through residency rights does not force anyone to take advantage of such rights. Individuals and family members may choose to self segregate rather than integrate with their “host” communities. This raises a different set of issue. A settler who self-segregates in spite of the right to residency becomes suspect to the host community: what does he/she think of us? Why live with us and not integrate? More important than legality is an enabling environment that allows people to internalise the norms of citizenship through voluntary interactions so they can collectively develop relationships that supersede their various private and group enclaves.

  • Ode to Beauty Haram

    Beauty is transcendental. It is providence’s final testament to man’s elevated status. Beauty, no matter the form or configuration, is imbued with the divine: a bougainvillea tree in glorious bloom; a stream coursing merrily  through the country side; the setting sun in blazing orange radiance over white-caped kilimanjaro  and the mother of all beauties – a sculpted damsel set down all so delicately among earthlings by our creator. Yes, womanhood is the mother of all beauties ever created because it is the only kind of beauty with fluttering, seductive eyes. It is through femininity that our creator found a collocation between man and celestial beings.

    Supple, two-legged beauty is the ultimate weapon that can be deployed for good or for ill. Tried and tested over the ages, carnal beauty is therapy as well as  potent ammo in man’s arsenal. Humanity and his history are at their roots, the story of beauty on the wings of carnality. Races have been saved and races have been razed from the face of the earth on account of this phenomenon. Great wars have been waged and empires have been pulled back from the brinks just by the timely flash of a demure smile. Among carnal earthlings, there is nothing the heart cannot wreak while at play on the lush landscape of beauty’s canvas. Yes, kings have given away entire kingdoms; let the kingdom and all that is in it be damned! Let all souls therein perish!

     King Herod Antipas staked half the empire to his illegitimate wife’s daughter. I will give anything, up to half my kingdom, Herod vowed, bewitched by a dancing nubile beauty. No, the head of John the Baptiser it must be, insists the fiendish Queen Herodias. And pronto, it is served up to her on a platter, still dripping and still misting (Mark, 6v25). On the other hand, Queen Esther’s enthralling beauty saved her race from annihilation. After Esther had worked on the great King Xerxes who ruled over 127 provinces stretching from India to Ethiopia, he would sacrifice even his own race to sustain Esther’s as revealed in the Biblical book of Esther.

    Just as beauty is the most beautiful art of all creation, (excuse the tautology) it is also the most ruinous. From age to age, beauty never loses its potency or power to hold man in ruinous thrall. Every generation has its array of bevies and no one is ever inured to their magical powers. But may a people never be caught in the vortex of a catastrophic beauty  –  this must be the king of all prayers. Has beauty gripped Nigeria by the scrotum with her soft, manicured fingers? Are we all under the sedate sensation of a pleasurable pain; the kind of pain we seem too weak to resist? Are we under the spell of a most beguiling beauty? Beauty garnished with kleptomania is raw poison. Have we handed the purse strings of our economy to a buccaneering beauty only to watch the land go to waste in the last few years? Have we been bewitched into dumping our most prized assets on the lush laps of a queen of pearls? Remember what Cleopatra did to Anthony. In Shakespeare’s Anthony and Cleopatra, Mark Anthony, a member of the ruling Roman triumvirate was seduced by the Egyptian beauty whose perfume wafted right across from the Mediterranean. And Anthony went on a cruise … abandoning the empire.

     Yes, it can only be by the sheer power of feminine sorcery that more income only translates to more misery for the populace. It is only an overpowering feminine aura that would drill harsh conditions into the people while cruising the world in wanton and licentious opulence. Only a beguiling beauty would tell the people that the economy was crashing under the weight of subsidy while cold-blooded corruption prevailed. Our imperious beauty has charmed us all into a coma, yanking off our life support, quickening our demise while perpetuating a treasury-jacking never known in Nigeria.

     Oh, what Beauty Haram; deadlier than Boko Haram, one that cannot be summoned, probed or queried; one that has the presidency, the NASS and the judiciary under her wrapper. One that holds EFCC, ICPC and all critical institutions of state spellbound. Oh, who will save us from this calamitous beauty that has afflicted our land! The headlines may be at variance with the intention of the monarch but the headlines and pictures are what we have to draw our inferences from. He is probably the most respected royalty in the land. He is not known to meddle unduly in matters of state. Indeed, like the great king he is, his power lies in understated eminence and dignified distance from partisan frays. You never find him courting cheap photo opportunity with people in power. In fact he would tell truth to power when he must. Most important, he is known to seek the overall good of the people and he would err on the side of justice.

    Two quick examples: In the heady days of the military when our monarchs were made objects of mockery and were suborned in their dozens upon stepping on the seemingly diseased soil of Aso Rock, only one king in Nigeria is remembered to have kept his head above the muck. Various uniformed rascals wanted royal affirmation to stay forever in power; nearly all crown heads went to pay homage and genuflect to the ‘junta kings’ in Abuja except one. In fact he kept asking that the right thing be done at the risk of losing his crown.

    Again he bucked the trend in his state’s politics recently when he supported an ‘outsider’ against his ‘son’ because his ‘son’ wasn’t the choice of the people and probably not fit for the job. It was a rare show of courage and character uncommon in this age. But the monarch whose word still resonates like law in his domain stood up for the overall good of the people.

    Of course we speak of no other than the revered Oba of Benin, Omo N’oba N’edo Uku Akpolokpolo, Erediauwa. However, last weekend, our exemplary monarch acted out of character; he jumped into petty partisan fray. It may be argued that it wasn’t him as he was represented by the Crown Prince, Eheneden Erediauwa. The story, however, is that the prince had carried a royal missive from his dad to President Goodluck Jonathan in Aso Rock. The Omo N’oba reportedly urged Jonathan to run for a second term or as the headline captured it, he “put pressure on Jonathan to run”.

    Well, in an age that every iroko in the land has fallen, let’s just note that it’s quite un-Omo N’obaic? Is this a sign of the new Benin Kingdom?

  • Muslims and use of water

    Muslims and use of water

    In their deep-rooted research, scientists decided to coin a formula (H2O) and use it to analyse the natural contents of water. From such analysis, they identified the various types of water and its uses in an environment. They then concluded that water is actually the source of life for all living organisms. Water is ubiquitous in the environment. It comes from both the space and the earth.

    According to Encyclopedia Encarta (1993-2008 edition), water is the major constituent of any living matter as it constitutes about 50 to 90 percent of the weight of living organisms is water. The basic material of living cells called protoplasm consists of a solution in water of fats, carbohydrates, proteins, salts, and similar chemicals.

    Water acts as a solvent transporting, combining, and chemically breaking down these substances. Blood in animals and sap in plants consist largely of water and aids transportation of food and removal of waste material. It also plays a key role in the metabolic breakdown of such essential molecules as proteins and carbohydrates.

    This process, called hydrolysis, goes on continually in living cells.

    Composition

    Because of its capacity to dissolve numerous substances in large amounts, pure water rarely occurs in nature. During condensation and precipitation, rain or snow absorbs from the atmosphere varying amounts of carbon dioxide and other gases, as well as traces of organic and inorganic material. In addition, precipitation carries radioactive fallout to the earth’s surface.

    In its movement on and through the earth’s crust, water reacts with minerals in the soil and rocks. The principal dissolved constituents of surface and groundwater are sulfates, chlorides, and bicarbonates of sodium and potassium and the oxides of calcium and magnesium.

    Surface waters may also contain domestic sewage and industrial wastes while ground waters from shallow wells may contain large quantities of nitrogen compounds and chlorides derived from human and animal wastes.

    Waters from deep wells generally contain only minerals in solution.

    Almost all supplies of natural drinking water contain fluorides in varying amounts. The proper proportion of fluorides in drinking water has been found to reduce tooth decay and similar ailments.

    Apart from concentrated amounts of sodium chloride, or salt, seawater contains many other soluble compounds, as the impure waters of rivers and streams are constantly feeding the oceans. At the same time, pure water is continually lost by the process of evaporation, and as a result the proportion of the impurities that give the oceans their saline character is increased.

    Rainy season

    Now, in Nigeria, like in many other African countries, we are approaching another season of rains when, as usual, water will be found everywhere but none will be available for drinking. This is the season in which the sky opens up its generous bowl to pour down water in abundance. But the earth has no room to accommodate the gesture.

    This is a period when plants and animals feel that their needs for survival have been grossly exceeded. The world is often flooded with water everywhere and humanity becomes restive. The bounties of Allah seem to be too much for the need of man. In Europe, Asia, Africa and America, the story is one and the same. The world is grappling with a deluge.

    Blaming nature

    When this happens, the tendency is for the scientists to lay blame at the door-step of what they call global warming. They will give many reasons, including the depletion of the Ozone Layer, as the cause. But many centuries before scientists began their research, the unlettered Prophet Muhammad (SAW) had taught Muslims how to handle environmental dryness as well as deluge. One of such solutions is to thank Allah and request for a moderation of His largess. This is the time to realise that moderation rather than excess of anything is the best in man’s life. In Islam, there is no cause or effect of a matter that is not known or cannot be controlled by Allah. Whatever happens in the life of man is by Allah’s permission.

    The world is like a queue. You enter it at a point and come out of it at another point. This is one major lesson which every Muslim has come to learn through the observance of daily prayers (Salat). In Salat alone where queues are essential, a lot of lessons are there to learn.

    Ritual baths

    The very basic lesson to learn in Salat is hygiene. As a new convert to Islam, you have to undergo a ritual bath called Ghuslu-s-Shahadah or Ghuslu-d-dukhul fil Islam (convert’s ritual bath) is performed with water. When you want to observe any Salat, be it obligatory or supererogatory, you must perform ablution with water. This is called Wudu’. If there is no water, you take to Tayammam (dry ablution). As a Muslim, after an intercourse with your spouse, you must perform a ritual bath called Ghuslul Janabah before you can observe any Salat.

    When a Muslim woman completes her monthly menstrual period she must perform a ritual bath called Ghuslul Haydah before she can resume observance of Salat. A Muslim woman who has just completed her blood-dripping period following child delivery must perform a ritual bath called Ghuslu-n-Nifas before she can resume observance of Salat.

    A newly born baby in Islam must be taken through a mandatory bath called Ghuslul Wiladah which is also done with water.

    Muslim pilgrims must commence their Hajj or Umrah activities with a ritual bath called Ghuslul Hajj or Umrah at their respective Miqat before they enter the condition of Ihram. When a Muslim, male or female is dead, a ritual bath is performed on his or her body. This bath is called Ghuslul Janazah. Anybody who carries out a bath on a dead body must also undergo a ritual bath of purification called Ghuslu-t-Taharah mina-n-Najasah (bath for purifying self from filth).

    This is because a dead body in Islam is like a filth which must be disposed of as soon as possible before it starts to decompose and thereby constitute health hazard for the living. Whoever touches such filth has had a share of it and must therefore cleanse up before observing any Salat. Such a person cannot participate even in Salatul-Janazah on the body of the deceased person which he has just cleaned up until he has taken the purification bath.

    Unique hygiene

    Muslims are expected to clean up with water through ablution at least five times a day. And, as a prophetic tradition prescribes, they are also expected to perform ritual bath on Fridays in preparation for Salatul Jum’ah though such bath is Sunnah (optional) rather than Fard (obligation). Naturally, women, especially Muslim women utilise water much more than men. They are the ones who take care of the children and, in the process; they clean up for them many times a day. Besides, women are the ones who must clean up for menses every month. They are the ones who must clean up ritually after 40 days, following child delivery. They are the ones in charge of matrimonial kitchens where they use water day and night. Thus, when the demography of women in any society is compared to that of men one can imagine the quantity of water consumed daily or weekly by women.

    Given the fact that water plays a central role in the life of a Muslim therefore, two important conclusions can be reached. One is the fact that Islam is absolutely a religion of purity. And that is why Prophet Muhammad was reported to have said that “Allah is pure and He will not accept anything impure.” The second is that Muslims are the greatest consumers of domestic water in the world. This is because, besides using water socially, commercially or domestically like other human beings, an average Muslim uses additional one third of total water used by any non-Muslim on a daily basis.

    Muslims’ attitude to dryness

    It thus becomes understandable why Muslims feel more worried when there is dryness and water cannot be easily accessed. This is what led to the idea of a special prayer called ‘Salatul Istisqai’ (rain-seeking prayer). This prayer randomly observed by Muslims when shortage of water becomes acute cannot be observed without water ablution. It is a way of reconfirming to Allah that the main purpose of our existence on earth is to worship Him just as the purpose of keeping domestic animals is to serve man. Salatul Istisqai which is usually followed by heavy rainfalls is a major evidence of an existing covenant between Allah and His faithful servants. The wonderful effect of that Salat contradicts any scientific theory. Non-Muslim meteorologists have always wondered how possible it is for rain to fall at an impossible time, following a congregational prayer by some Muslim faithful in a locality or region. But to their amazement, they have regularly seen the potency of such prayer in bringing rain not only for Muslims but for all and sundry. The question is: ‘can any other religious group do same to the advantage of mankind? This one trillion Naira question is still begging for answer even almost one and a half millennia after the introduction of Salatul Istisqai as a bringer of rain.

    Seeking rain water

    That Salatul Istisqai (special prayer for rain) actually brings rain even in a severely dry season remains a puzzle to unbelievers, especially in the West who see everything, including God, as a product of science. Yours sincerely first took part in the observance of Salatul Istisqai in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), as a student in that country, in 1976. The two rakat prayer had hardly been concluded when the sky opened its door and rain started falling in torrents. It rained for nine hours continuously in that desert country and flooded the entire Emirates like the historic deluge in Prophet Nuh’s  (Noah) time.

    It took more than a week before normal social and commercial activities could fully resume. I have since participated in the same exercise twice thereafter, once in Nigeria and once in Saudi Arabia.

    The effect of Salatul Istisqai is not necessarily immediate. At times, it may take a week or more before the rain starts pouring. And, if, after some time, following the observance of Salatul Istisqai, rain does not come, the Salat can be repeated. Allah has a design for everything. He knows when rainfall will best serve the need of man.

    And in seeking such a favour, Muslims must not try to jump the queue.

    Manner of observance

    Any participant in Salatul Istisqa’ is expected to be in a sober mood and be absolutely confident that the prayer would be accepted. The essence of raising one’s hands to Allah in prayer is to further confirm that there is no intermediary between man and Allah in worship and in prayer. Allah Himself emphasises this in the Qur’an by saying to Prophet Muhammad thus: “When my servants ask you about Me, tell them that I am very close to them. I accept the prayers of those who seek from Me but let such seekers expect the giving from Me alone; let them be confident in My ability to accept prayer so that they may be guided aright”. However, there is need to correct the wrong notion being spread around that dresses must be worn inside out by those who will partake in Salatul Istisqai. There is nothing like that in Islam.

    The effect of Salatul Istisqai in bringing rains is just symbolic of all other prayers by Muslims. No genuine Muslim prayer is ever turned down by Allah. Acceptance of prayer may not be exactly in accordance with human expectation, it may not be as promptly as man wants it but eventually, a Muslim will realise that his prayer has been accepted by Allah without an intermediary.

    The role of water in Hajj

    Unknown to the non-Islamic world, performance of Hajj every year is a great blessing to humanity rather than just a mere act of worship by Muslims. Hajj is the biggest congregation of human beings on earth.

    Allah loves and respects congregations of pious people who praise Him and pray to Him for the needs of the world. That congregation is essential for the continuity of human existence. There is no country in the world today without Muslim pilgrims joining their brethren from other parts of the world in requesting Allah to save the world from perishing. And each year, as such prayers are accepted, the world is confirmed saved despite the evil moves of Yajuj and Ma’juj (Gog and Magog) as well as their agents who are ignorantly pursuing their own destruction every minute. Thus, like Salatul Istisqai which brings water to everybody and not Muslims alone, Hajj is to the benefit of mankind and not Muslims alone. Thus, its preservation must be ensured by everybody in the interest of continued human existence.

    Conclusion

    Without water, it will be difficult to observe Salat or to fast in Ramadan or to give Zakah or to perform Hajj. Without water, it will be impossible to bear children and bring them up, or to keep farms and sustain them. Water is life. But this is not for Muslims alone. The difference is that Muslims use part of the water to show gratitude to Allah by worshipping Him. Others use it for mundane life alone which is sheer vanity.

    Knowledge is like water which softens the earth for seeds to germinate and for plants to be nourished to fruition. Knowledge in Islam is much more important than worship. No one can validly worship Allah without knowledge. And if for this reason alone, it should behoove the entire Muslim Ummah of the world to join and cooperate in using water to worship Allah. That is the essence of knowledge. It cannot be trivialised.

  • How do we restructure?

    How do we restructure?

    I know that I am going out on a limb here; but it is my considered view that the question now is not whether we must restructure the country. The question is “how do we restructure?” If I am right, the battle is half-won.

    Why am I so certain? For one thing, there is no formal protest against placing restructuring on the agenda of the ongoing confab. Neither has there been any objection to including a committee on restructuring as a committee of the conference. Yet, not too long ago, the very idea of restructuring was an abomination is some parts of the country, while in others it was the political equivalent of spiritual inspiration. It was unclear why the divide over the matter; knowing as should be clear to all, that every part of the country stands to benefit from a restructured polity, since no part of the country is unharmed by the present anomalous structure of centralised governance.

    Now, with a committee of the confab actively and thoughtfully engaged in options for restructuring the polity, we are in a more rational realm of discourse. Not that irrationality won’t ever intrude; rather, this is a realm in which it is not too difficult to expose irrationality for what it is, the counterfeit of argument.

    The simplicity and clarity of the principles that justify political restructuring along the line of true federalism can be shocking, viewed against the resistance:A nation exists to perform some functions which individuals cannot perform on their own for various reasons. With the combined forces of all, opportunities are created that empower individuals and groups for development and self-realisation. When this is the case, those individuals are able to use their creative genius to transform their societies. This was the driving force for the development and release of some of the most daring policies many years ago. Recognising this simple truth could be the magic wand that has eluded our reach for long.

    Here are some of the questions that beg for answers: Is it reasonable to have an interest in maximum opportunity for individual and community development? Shouldn’t every group of nationality aspire to such goals? If so, what kind of environment or political arrangement can provide such maximum opportunity? Can the goal of national unity justify the denial of opportunities for individual and community development? But what can justify national unity as an objective of a unitarised polity, if the means to the objective frustrates opportunities for individual and community development? Does national unity self-justify?

    Any group of people with an eye on the preparedness of its future generation to keep it safe from extinction must reject an arrangement that discriminates against their children. A structure that treats the youth as second-class citizens in the provision of employment and penalises, rather than reward their merit, must, therefore, be an anathema to any nationality or culture group.

    We have a common human nature. In search of the means of good livelihood, our people migrate from their locales to other parts of the country even when the prospect of their being victims of indiscriminate violence is great. A restructured polity does not discourage this human necessity; it enhances it. Centralisation aggravates prejudice and chauvinism because it pits one group against the other. When the centre is less attractive, attention is directed to the development of the regions and states. It seems to me that every individual and/or community shares the aspirations of a decent society where justice and fair-play rule and the dignity of every human being is guaranteed. Therefore any individual or group that subscribes to these fundamental principles of a federalised polity must not oppose the restructuring of the Nigerian political system.

    The issue that the Committee on Restructuring has opened up for rational discussion is “how to restructure” or what “model of restructuring”, which comes down to “what kind of federal structure.” Competing positions that have been canvassed inside the committee room include using regions or zones or states as the building blocks of a new federal system. As reported in the media, while some canvassed a central government with states as federating units, others opted for zones as federating units, while yet others argued for a three-region federation as it was at the beginning of the first republic. While one acknowledges that there is still much uncertainty and confusion about this confab, and there is justified skepticism about motives and intentions, the fact that we have been able to move the discourse to this level is a cause for joy. For, even assume the confab ultimately fails, no one can rationally brush aside or ignore the need for restructuring.

    Is it then state or zones or regions? Let us avoid multiplying entities without necessity. It appears to me that regional and zonal structures are one and the same. The argument for a zonal-based federal structure is identical with the argument for a regional-based structure, provided we avoid any specificity about numbers. Therefore, if the exponents of a three-region federal structure are willing to entertain a friendly amendment that does away with the number of regions, there is no reason they cannot share an agreement with the exponents of a zonal-based federation.

    There are good arguments for regionalisation, the first of which is the obvious fact that we have had the state-based structure for almost forty years and it isn’t working. As presently constituted, we do not have a genuine federalism because the states are not equal partners and are only little more than appendages of the federal government. This is a structural imbalance that demands urgent attention. Ninety per cent of the states cannot call the bluff of the federal government in the matter of resources as Chief Awolowo did in 1958, simply because these states have no internally generated revenue to match the demands of their citizens and discharge their constitutional responsibilities. What this portends is the imminence of the collapse of the federal system and the emergence of a thorough going unitary system. Second, there is nothing in regionalism or zonalism that is antithetical to the Nigerian value or its primordial system. Federalists reference the importance of the “federal quality”, which inheres in a particular nation, disposing it favourably to the adoption of a federal system. Chief Awolowo referred to this as the linguistic or ethnic principle. The regional or zonal structure pretty much captures this quality in us and it cannot be wished away. The North itself is the most vivid example of the veneration of this quality. The reason that the North prefers a North-South rotational presidency is that it affirms the north as one. Even when the constitution provides for states as governing structures, the Northern states act in concert. A regional structure will only formally enhance the success of what is hitherto an informal arrangement between state birds of a feather.Third, one way a formal regional arrangement will promote success is in the matter of resource generation and integrated development. The present structure does not support regional coordination of development in many areas, including transportation, internal security, health delivery and education. For instance, if there are viable constituent units, such as regions or zones, the federal government has no business in education, including higher education. As regional university, the University of Ife (now O.A.U.) was doing extremely well before it was taken over by the Federal Government. Now there are a number of state universities that are no more than glorified secondary schools and are not ashamed of producing unemployable graduates. What becomes of our present states? We cannot wish away the reality of forty years history in the life of a nation. Therefore the states must still be reckoned with. Our pre- and post-independence systems included provincial administrations, which served as the intermediary between regions and district governments. Our present states are pretty much similar to the provincial administrations of that era. Indeed, there have been agitations for creation of states on the basis of the boundaries of erstwhile provincial administrations. In a new regional or zonal-based federation, this is the place of states.

  • T.A. and the Abia resurgence

    Following the orchestrated barrage of negative media assault on Governor T.A. Orji of Abia State, I intervened in this space early in the year in a piece, titled: “The most maligned governor in the land”. Of course the mindless propaganda was the handiwork of T.A.’s former boss, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu (OUK), who apparently still cannot live down the fact that his former ‘boy’ has grown into a man. It is a peculiarly Nigerian political conundrum that a predecessor would want to sit on the back of his successor like an ugly hunch. No leader around here breaks clean and lets the new guy do his thing (perhaps Peter Obi will buck that trend in Anambra).

    That is how come OUK has chosen to be an albatross to T.A. since 2007 after he handed over the leadership of Abia to him. Being a close observer, I knew how hellish the first three years in office (between 2007 and 2010) was for T.A. He was emasculated and made inconsequential, as power was located around OUK, his mother and brother. Imagine the asphyxiating frustration of being an executive governor only by name? This is a fact known to most Abians.

    Living in bondage

    But what Abians may not fully comprehend is that the state was not only in bondage for 11 years under OUK, it was in speedy regression into a Hobbessian entity where dog was virtually eating dog. There was so much activity and little governance; there were resources but hardly any development; a few power cabals grew fat while the people were famished. I had an inkling of the situation but didn’t realise the depth of the trauma until I met Eze Chikamnayo recently. Eze was in OUK’s cabinet and he is currently the Information Commissioner in Abia State. He is probably the best information commissioner in the land today. Lean like a lizard, but doughty and indefatigable with it. He is very passionate and lapses into poetry when he talks about the Abia situation past and present – OUK’s dark regime and TA’s liberating new era.

    The making of a modern Abia

    Showing some senior journalists around Umuahia, the state capital, Eze challenged them to identify one notable project accomplished by his former boss in eight years (plus three) and, if proven to be true, he would resign. He was emphatic that having served the two governors, he is in a position to know the difference and that he would be willing to debate his assertions with anyone on any television platform. In all his tribulations in the hands of the ancient regime, providence must have been preparing T.A. to break the yoke of a fiendish and fetish past and let in a blast of light and fresh air, Eze opined.

    Eze is much buoyed and, indeed, boisterous in showing off the new projects “erupting” all over Abia. He is proud that his state has finally found its bearing and that he is a part of the T.A. team building modern Abia. Abia will never be the same again after T.A., he declared. Never again the dark ages; the current ascendancy will have to be sustained by all means, Eze proclaimed tirelessly.

    Indeed, he showed off numerous landmark projects, most of them freshly minted and many more in stages of construction. There is indeed a commitment to revamp the state and leave lasting legacies. For instance, a new layout called Ogurube has become Abia’s new administrative base, hosting the new government house complex, new secretariat complex and new e-library, among over a dozen other MDA complexes. The state had ramshackle colonial sheds as government house and admin offices.

    There is an airport in the making in Umuahia North, a seaport coming up at Oboaku, new high court buildings in Aba and Umuahia, Aba International Auto Market, Abia New Industrial Market and a modern bus park in Umuahia. There is also a more laudable venture into commercial agric, like the revival of the state’s palm plantation, cocoa plantation and a cashew drying field. How to move a market

    One found two projects particularly spectacular and truly monumental. A sprawling, International Conference Centre, whose majesty seems to symbolise the emerging new spirit of Abia, and whose pillars would signpost the future of T.A.’s vision. But at that, this Centre is puny in size and economic impact compared to the all-new Umuahia Modern Market, which one may take liberty to describe as phenomenal. The Ubeku Main Market in the heart of Umuahia was as old as the ancient city. It is comparable in location to Balogun or Akpogbon on Lagos Island or Eke Ukwu in Owerri. These are markets that have grown to become sore spots to their host cities and in need of relocation.

    In achieving the most difficult task of moving Ubeku Main Market to the outskirts of town, T.A. earned his place in the history of Abia. Relocating major city markets are the most arduous of tasks. But he did not only do it, he did it in style, creating what is probably the biggest market in Nigeria today – more than 12,000 shops traversed by a dual-carriage road and tarred lanes. A 400-unit housing estate complements it.

    It is like developing from scratch a new town, but one with a huge commercial proposition. Who does not know the importance of a market to an Igbo man? To appreciate it, when fully operational, the market will probably yield more revenue for Abia than accrues from the federation account.

    It is quite obvious that Abia is on the ascendancy and that T.A. is the one who has been on a rescue mission and not his noisy neighbour in Imo State.

    Did Nyako truly pen that memo?

    You are not likely to have read the full memo (so-called) from Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State to northern governors; that is because no editor would publish such asinine and outright hate-ridden letter. It is difficult to believe that a sitting governor of Nigeria would put such poison to paper in 2014. I cannot believe that this fellow once headed the Nigerian Navy. How does he govern his state? How could a man who manifestly cannot govern his mind be left in charge of millions of people? Well, we await the northern governors’ response.

    A prayer for the girls

    Why is the matter of the over 100 little lasses abducted and held captive in a thick forest by hoodlums not attracting national attention? An indeterminate number of students were snatched from Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State by the Boko Haram gang about two weeks ago. Why are there no candle vigils; no release them protests and no prayer calls across the country? All who have little daughters will better understand the trauma of these girls’ parents. EXPRESSO hereby calls for a DAILY NOON PRAYER by all Nigerians for these girls till every one of them is released. Wherever you may be, let us all join in a little prayer for the girls at noon.

  • The seed of terror

    The seed of terror

    Preamble

    Yoruba language may have no plural or gender in its structural syntax.

    It may be poor in vocabulary and clumsy in grammar. But it is surely not lacking in proverbs and mythology. In that language, you can hardly express a sentence without enriching it with two or three proverbs. One of its famous proverbs has become an axiom in theory and practice. And many other languages have borrowed it for a token of experience. It goes thus: “A toddler who insists on preventing his mother from sleeping will surely not enjoy the serenity of the night rest”. This subtle axiom has its equivalence in English language. “A drastic problem requires a drastic solution”.

    Language is the root of all human cultures. It is the means of communicating thoughts, ideas and experiences. A people without language can be said to be without culture. Take a man out of his culture and he will immediately become like a fish out of water. His next action will be to rebel against the new but strange environment.

    That is the kind of situation that is cloaking the world in form of terrorism today.

    Language and Culture

    From time immemorial, language has been like a double edged sword. At a time it is used to attack. At another, it becomes an instrument of defence. Concord and conflict as well as love and hatred emanate from the use of language. Without language, there can be no marriage or divorce. Neither can there be business or even government. As a matter of fact, no tribe or nation can lay claim to civilisation in the absence of language.

    In Islam, language is everything human, including life and death. That is why a stammering prophet like Musa (Moses) would need an interpreter like Harun (Aaron) in his mission. Buddhists, Hindus, Judaists, Christians and Muslims, all proclaim Holy Books in one form or another, through their endowed languages. Not only must a prophet possess the power of language, he must also be eloquent in it. Prophet Muhammad (SAW) recognised the enormous power naturally embedded in language and warned the Muslims thus: ‘Tongue is like sword, if you fail to hold it, it may hold you”.

    A person’s first language is called mother tongue while a standardised dialect within a tribal language is said to be ‘received’. If there is one aspect of culture that is not substitutable, it is language. The greatest havoc ever done to any group of people in history, especially through slave trade and colonialism, is language substitution. Nothing is more enslaving than substitution of language. Once language is renounced or substituted, nothing else is left of culture. The black citizens of the world, outside Africa, otherwise classified as Diaspora, are victims of this indelible psychological trauma.

    There are only four countries in the world today with English language as their mother tongue. These are Britain, the United States, Australia and Ireland. What would have been the fifth country is only partially English speaking. And that is Canada. All other countries that speak English as lingua franca only adopted it. Believing English to be the language of modern civilisation, the rest of the world have tacitly adopted it either as a lingua franca or as language of business. Yet the natural speakers of the language don’t seem to be satisfied with this development.

    Evil Axis

    With the role which America played in bringing an end to slavery in the 19th century, the world had expected the self-styled ‘God’s own

    Country’ to be the messiah of the modern age. But that expectation has turned forlorn. Rather than championing the course of peace and tranquility, America has replaced Germany as the greatest threat to humanity in the 21st century. And she has found an inseparable ally in Britain to form an ‘Evil Axis’ of untamable aggressors.

    Both English speaking countries had jointly piloted the modern world into a technological civilisation culminating in what is now known as global village. But they have used the same technology to turn themselves into ‘policemen of the world’.

    There is no part of the world today where a suffocating effect of their presence is not felt. Like a pair of scissors, both countries have jointly subjected many nations and races to untold terror and humiliation forcing countries to disintegrate and compelling friendly tribes to become foes all to further the course of their capitalist interest. Thus, they have planted the seed of terrorism in all corners of the world either in the name of capitalism or under the disguise of democracy.

    In the process of doing this, they have drawn the wrath of many nations, groups and individuals who now tend to react with venomous reprisal. If the militant liberators in Ireland or the patriotic defenders of motherland in Falkland are quiet today, it is not because they have been placated. The fact is that they have not got the power with which to demand for their rights. When they do, the situation may change.

    And, from Vietnam to Cambodia; from Panama to Korea, the feelings are the same. Even Germany and Japan which were de feated in World War II by the American-led Allied Forces in 1945, are still nursing their wounds. Isn’t it amazing that, 69 years after that devastating war, American and British forces are still stationed in those two countries under the cover of North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO). Claiming to be maintaining regional security, these aggressive allies continue to lay siege on those countries despite throat-cutting reparation they had forced them to pay. Today, the entire Middle East is engulfed in a ceaseless turmoil at the instance of the ‘Evil Axis’, and the whole world has become hopelessly restive.

    Propaganda

    Now, using their propaganda machinery to bully the rest of the world, the US and Britain have almost succeeded in branding any revengeful reaction to their brigandage as religious terrorism. What is the religious connection in Britain’s claim of the Falkland Island far away in Argentina? What is religious in America’s capturing of the ruling President Noriega of Panama in his country and taking him for trial in the US where he was jailed and had to languish in prison for years? What is religious in forcing monolingual countries like Korea and Cambodia to break into North and South? What is religious in invading Iraq even after it became evident that the poor country was not harbouring any deadly weapons as alleged? What actually qualifies the US, Britain and other Western countries to be nuclear powered and disqualifies others?

    Even if a country chooses to use religion as her guide in governance as in the case of Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran how does that affect Britain and the US thousands of miles away? Is Northern Ireland not a Christian country like Britain? Why the aggression against that country? And is Britain not using religion as an instrument of governance? Why does the Queen of England combine the two designations of Head of State and Head of the Church of England?

    If the truth must be told, the real problem of the world today is the greedy willingness of Britain and America to dominate the economy of other countries in a manner of brigandage. And that has led the duo to adopt military might as a means of cowing down some countries while subjecting others to terrorism.

    It is rather unfortunate that those who are bearing the brunt of the evil actions are innocent people going about their businesses legitimately. Otherwise, neither America nor Britain would have deserved any sympathy for the various terrorist attacks on certain targets in the two countries. Their plight would have been taken for merely reaping the fruits of their labour.

    Religion is being used as a scapegoat in the world today, not by Afghanistan or Ireland, but by Britain and the US because that is their most convenient alibi for unbridled aggression against weaker countries.

    Who wants to die?

    No one loves to die deliberately in Palestine or in Iraq or in Afghanistan or in Ireland. But when you are forced to live without essence, the tendency is to ask yourself the need to live at all. And, to answer such a question some people might desperately conclude that if they must not live, those who are forcing them to die must also not live. “Man is not innately wicked, but when an attempt is made to consign him to the scrap-heap he shows resentment in no uncertain terms”. Terrorism begets terrorism. But what is one nation’s terrorism is another nation’s heroism. And it is the innocent world that will pay the price of peace. Unfortunately, what Nigerians know how to imitate most is evil machinations of other countries. That terrorism has become a conundrum in Nigeria today is an evidence of this assertion. But one fact is very clear about terrorism. It is incontrovertibly a product of corruption and the latter is a bigger terrorism. Those who want to end terrorism therefore must first endeavour to end corruption.

    Allah warns against corruption and the acts of brigandage in chapter 8:25 of the Qur’an thus: “And guard against calamity that may afflict not only the wrong doers (but even the innocent ones among you). Know that Allah’s punishment can be very severe”.

    Solution

    How can we change this evil trend? This, perhaps, is the new reality which dawned on the British Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, when he was about to exchange baton with his predecessor, Tony Blair, some years ago. In a chat with Labour Party members in Manchester shortly before he assumed office as Prime Minister, Brown said he recognised the fact that global extremism could never be defeated by military force alone.

    His words:

    “Our foreign policy in the years ahead will reflect the truth that to isolate and defeat terrorist extremism now involves more than military force….it (terrorism) is a struggle of ideas and ideals that in the coming years will be waged and won for the hearts and minds here at home and around the world”. Many well-meaning, foresighted Nigerians have drummed the same warning to the ears of Nigerian government. But a government that is wiser than its subjects will never heed such a warning.

    When he was making the above statement, Brown never thought that Britain would soon come under a new terrorist attack. But just a few days after that famous speech, Glasgow Airport became a target of terrorist attack. And that was on the very day he formally assumed office as Prime Minister. What became clearer especially with September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Centre and the Pentagon, was that no country is actually immune to terrorist attack.

    History has not cited a single example of terrorism which was conquered on the battle field. Thus, since no power on earth can claim to have monopoly of terror peace would better be achieved by sharing the wisdom of others through dialogue in ending terrorism.

    Reality

    That is the reality to which the West, especially Britain and the US, had deliberately been blind. If that reality now becomes the spectacle with which the West wants to view the world, then, peace may return to its rightful place as the reigning force of human universe. But then, the idea of manufacturing and supplying weapons to some people against others will have to stop permanently.

    The religious world was once peaceful until America renounced her policy of isolationism in 1945. It took that country to join Britain in using the Press to invent labelling names and acronyms to derogate certain religions (particularly Islam) and demoralise their adherents.

    The misfortune in this which the world is yet to realise is that every religion is built on the foundation of culture.

    Therefore, no religion can be attacked to the exclusion of its culture. And nothing in the life of man is called civilisation outside culture. That is why some people are ready to die when their religion comes under a violent attack from those who are ignorant of it.

    The Greeks, the Romans, the Assyrians and the Persians of the ancient world did not fight wars because of religion. Their motives were material but today they have all gone into irreversible oblivion.

    Those of today will eventually follow their way. Materialism is nothing but vanity which is invariably ephemeral. That is why Prophet Muhammad (SAW) or any of his disciples never crossed swords with Christians when they were alive.

    The very first international wars fought for religious reason which by necessity pitched Muslims against Christians were the Crusade Wars.

    And these were caused by sheer miscarriage of information. Yet, about one thousand years after those unwarranted wars, their scar still remains indelible in the world today.

    Violence on the basis of religion can terminate lives. It can destroy properties and ruin cities and towns as well as cause dislocations and relocations of people and settlements. But it can never win hearts nor change conviction. Truth is bitter and thus abhorrent to people of falsehood. But no matter how much it may be suppressed, Muslims are ready to join other oppressed people of the world in welcoming a new initiative from the West with a view to forging peace for all and sundry.

     

  • Still a question of structure

    Still a question of structure

    Long-distance penmanship has its strains and stresses, not the least of which is limited control over time and logistics. The piece that came out last week was the wrong one, and careful readers must have noticed its uncharacteristic incoherence. My apologies! Here’s the correct one.

    The burning question before the National Conference is “what structure?” Thus far, however, President Goodluck Jonathan’s speech has taken a chunk of attention. But there has been more of commendation than analysis or debate. It is to be expected and the President must be very pleased. I only hope that in our native hagiographic tendencies, we do not lose sight of the basics. The President wants delegates to his conference to remake Nigeria in a way that enables her to fulfill what he regards as her destiny. Time is running out already.

    While I appreciate the caliber and antecedents of a sizeable number of the delegates to this conference and have no reason to doubt the integrity of many more, I am not very optimistic about the outcome. This is because of the mixed signals coming from the groups and entities that matter. One day, we are told that the conference’s resolutions will be subject to a referendum of all citizens. The next day, we are informed that there is no enabling law and the conference resolutions must have to go before the National Assembly and be debated as amendments to the constitution. I am wondering if our privileged legislators have seriously entertained the question of whether the fundamental question of “what structure?” is fixable by way of amendments.

    Of course, fixing anything by a patchwork of amendments is not utterly inconceivable. The challenge, however, is that if such amendments are extensive enough to cover all flaws, we may end up having the semblance of a completely new constitution. Isn’t it better then to discard an ill-fitting outfit than go through a process of alterations that destroy its beauty?

    But there is, at least, one more important consideration than the aesthetics of constitutional amendment. No matter how we dress it up with the fanciful language of legitimacy, it is obvious that the 1999 Constitution was an imposition by a military clique bent on having its will after a self-inflicted indictment in the court of the people. The fact that the nation has been contemptuously made to put up with it for the last 14 years simply shows the pretentiousness of its “democratic” awakening.

    It should have been a triumph of the people’s will over the dictatorship of the gun if in 1999, elected representatives opted for a new beginning that prioritises a genuine constitution of the people by the people and for the people. It didn’t happen because those who found themselves beneficiaries of the people’s revolution from 1993 to 1998 were not representatives of the people but sympathisers of the military cabal and its civilian clique. The long and short of the matter then is that a military-imposed democratic constitution is an absurdity that has to be excised.

    What has made governance in Nigeria ineffective and thoroughly detestable in the last fourteen years? I don’t know of any reasonable analysis that focuses on just one causal factor. There is a multiplicity of factors, including bad leadership, docile followership, poor accountability regime and an inadequate constitutional arrangement. However, since it is the foundation of all other factors, the constitution has a pride of place in the constellation of factors for the explanation of bad governance.

    For instance, the immunity clause in the constitution explains why bad leaders are difficult to get rid of. The revenue allocation formula ensures that the states are beggars at the table of the federal government, meaning effectively that a greedy governor with no moral qualm only has to be a mainstreamer and all is well for him. But that doesn’t translate to a buoyant welfare scheme for his people. Witnessing the opulence that is displayed in Abuja and the developmental eye-sore that confronts them from the Creeks to the Sahel, militancy has an unusual, if deadly, appeal to the hopeless youth.

    But there are reasonable people who think that the constitution is alright and the revenue formula is sacred. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s so-called National Political Reform Conference in Abuja of 2005 brought to light the sharp divisions among its component parts that this country has yet to overcome after fifty years of coexistence. What the North wanted, the South was against and vice-versa. It then appeared that the unity of the country was jeopardised more after the conference than before. Of course, as it turned out, there was a hidden presidential agenda that finally nailed the coffin of the conference.

    By putting it this way, however, we do a lot of injustice to ourselves. For it appears we blame ourselves for what others before us have not been able to achieve due to no fault of theirs. Scotland and England have been together for far longer and they cannot boast of eliminating divisions. The last elections showed that the Scottish National Party won more votes in Scottish Parliament than the Labor Party and may now opt for independence from the United Kingdom at the next opportunity. So divisions in a multi-national state are not abnormal and, indeed, they should be the foundation of our constitutional arrangements. This is the merit of a genuine federal system which we do not now have.

    This time around, it appears that some consensus is gradually emerging among delegates over the centrality of the question of structure. Speaker after speaker across the regions and zones have observed that our “fake federalism” is the bane of our ideals of democratic pluralism and national unity. Northern leaders, including delegates and non-delegates, have presented reasonable ideas to move the nation forward. We have heard about northern losses under the present yoke of unitarism. We have listened to the Middle Belt delegates and the leaders of the Southsouth. I have not read of any submissions from any of the speakers thus far hailing the present structure. This is a far cry from 2005 when the Northern position was firmly against any form of restructuring and all it wanted was to strengthen and re-affirm the corporate existence of Nigeria as an indivisible, indissoluble and plural national state under a Federal System, comprising three tiers of government – Federal, 36 states and 774 local governments.

    Of course, there is still a long road ahead. And while a good number of delegates favor restructuring, it is still not clear what each means or understands by that concept. The devil of what comes next is in the details of the proposals from zonal representatives and ethnic nations.

    How, for instance, would the idea of making geo-political zones the federating units be taken by the conference? Considering how statist we have all become and how jealously each state guards its mythical autonomy, I cannot even contemplate the reaction of state delegates, including those from zones that make it their foremost proposal. Yet, it is an idea that has to be given serious consideration because the state structure is clearly not working.

    Another hot button issue is resource control. While Section 44 (1.3) of the 1999 Constitution provides that the Federal Government should “hold in trust, control and facilitate the exploration and exploitation of all mineral resources in the country”, the provision has been a source of national malaise which has to be addressed and resolved. It is what makes the central government so arrogant and out of touch. And it accounts for the attraction of the center to treasury looters and political pirates. If we want a nation that prides itself in the strength of its component parts, and through their strength is also made strong, then we need to revisit the question of fiscal federalism and resource control.

    These two issues—regionalism and resource control—are capable of turning around our national fortune and creating a nation of patriots. The ball is in the court of conference delegates. But assume that they do their part, will their resolutions become law? Will we have a new constitution? Or will this exercise end in the way of others?

  • Enough is enough

    Enough is enough

    Indeed, only Allah knows the Hour (of death); He sends down the rain and knows what is contained in the wombs (of prospective mothers). No soul knows what it will earn tomorrow; no soul knows in what land it will die or be buried. Indeed, Allah alone is all-Knower and He is well acquainted with all things”.  Q. 31:34.

    Cries! Wailings! Tears! Sorrow! Those are the appropriate words with which to describe the tragic occurrence in Nyanya area of Abuja, last Monday morning, which fortuitously put the whole country on the extreme edge. The place was a popular motor park in the suburb of Abuja city. Like a devastating earthquake, a single bang of bomb blast erupted from devil’s own enclave and instantly sent scores of innocent people, including women and children, to the world beyond without any prior premonition.

    And when the electronic waves, especially the cable networks, throbbed with the sad news, the entire world shivered restlessly in frightful perplexity. The displayed pictures of the scene did not help the matter. It was indeed a devil’s day of action.

    But Oh God! Why this again? That was the common question on the lips of millions of Nigerians. Given that situation and its sudden occurrence, it became impossible to know the casualty figure immediately as families, friends and relatives trooped to the scene to look out for their beloved ones. But when the dust settled later, conflicting figures began to emerge from different sources. Some put them as 150, some said called them 200 and others estimated them to be 140. But the official figure which many Nigerians did not believe was 71.

    The fortuitous news of the misfortune simply mirrored the fang of destiny and precipitated untold agony across the African continent.

    The Global Mobile System (GSM) became unusually busy as parents, relatives, friends and business partners in Diaspora started to call in order to know whether or not their beloved ones were affected. All these were greeted by lamentations in the semblance of medicine applied to the corpse of a lifeless body. The rest is a story not meant for today.

     

    Irony of life

    If life is said to have an irony, this implacable tragedy is a typical example. Or how can one explain the situation whereby people who were innocently in pursuit of their daily bread; parents who were taking their children or wards to school; wives who saw off their travelling husbands to the garage; husbands who went to ‘drop’ theirs wives at the garage where they could join the buses that would convey them to their offices and newly employed youths who were going to resume work for the first time; all just fell to the claw of one destiny unplanned?

    Later in the day, it dawned on some parents who were expecting their children back from school that they had seen the last of them when the latter were going to school in the morning. Bachelors and spinsters who left home with the key of their rooms in their pockets would have the doors to those rooms broken after their demise. What a nightmare!

    What a dramatic turn of event! And the agents of Satan who precipitated that evil act would lurk in some corners to laugh away the agony of their victims not knowing what agony is awaiting them too. Our tears, our sorrow and our lamentations can only express our feeling. They can neither replace the lost lives nor bring restitution to their relatives. No amount of money can compensate for a lost life.

     

    Natural demarcation

    The demarcation between life and death is like the diaphragm between the  thoracic and abdominal cavities. It takes only the grace of Allah for that diaphragm to sustain the natural but mysterious demarcation that keeps man intact until the otherwise happens. Death, like birth, is a divinely scheduled programme in the life of man. It is a phenomenon specially shrouded in mystery. The circumstances that precede death are beyond the predictions or permutations of man. They cannot be foretold except by sheer deception. Every soothsayer will die with his soothsaying and no atom of the world will feel his exit.

    Kings die as much as slaves. Masters die as much as servants. And all together will lie helplessly beneath the earth without distinction.

    Because of its invisibility death is known only to the living as no dead person ever knows what has happened to him even as he cruises ahead in his dream-like sojourn to an unknown destination. The painful lamentations that follow the death of a person by his relatives and associates can never remedy that natural occurrence. Times and places may be different, but we shall all join the train of death one day.

     

    Parable of coffin

    From the very first day of man’s conception in the mother’s womb, a parable has occurred in his life. That parable is of a coffin. When a child is perfectly pearled in the womb of a mother, it hardly occurs to anybody that what we generally call pregnancy is a coffin in which the child lives all alone to enjoy the naturally provided facilities.

    While there, he knows neither the source of those facilities nor his next destination. But when he is eventually delivered into the world he feels ejected from the home of pleasure and cries out profusely in protest. Yet, it is that cry that gives assurances and comfort to those who usher him into the world.

    Yes, the world, in the eyes of sheer mortal beings, is quite large.

    But it remains a coffin for everybody as its large size is only to enable it to accommodate as many humans as possible which a woman’s womb cannot contain. Even as small as the womb of a mother is it sometimes accommodates two or three or four or even more children to confirm the concept of coffin in which man lives. Just as twins or triplets or quadruplets or even quintets are born on the same day and into the same hands so do people randomly die in singles or doubles or multiples sometimes at the same hour and at the same place even if they never knew one another.

    We only ignorantly move about in our individual coffins of life and behave as if the pendulum of death has nothing to do with us. And when the unexpected occurs the remembrance of whence we emanated or wither we are bound is completely lost on us. The entire planet called the earth is nothing but one big graveyard in which billions, even trillions of people had been buried through the millennia. There is no single piece of land (even one foot) on earth that has not served as a grave in which skeletons of humans have been buried. Yet the same earth keeps beckoning to us in drones, indicating that she still has space in abundance for those whose time is up for transiting from life to death. And as we had no say in the choice of the mothers who piloted us into this world so we have no say in the choice of that portion of the earth that will pilot us into the hereafter. Our world is a transit along the unknown journey that transforms us from the living to the dead. The choice of place and time of where death will occur are determined only by the Supreme Being who created us and will ask us for the account of our existence on this earth.

     

    Inseparable web

    Death is the inseparable web of life from which no man can escape.

    The time, the place and the mode are the factors that make it a mysterious phenomenon.

    Whenever we are inside or outside our residences we must be conscious that we are in a coffin.

    Whenever we are in a vehicle, in an aircraft, in a ship or a train, we must not forget that we are in a coffin. If that coffin has not been closed on us it is only because the time is not yet ripe for death to lay its icy hand on us. There is no armour against death. That is why the Almighty Allah says in the Qur’an thus: “Say, verily, the death from which you are fleeing is bound to overtake you and then you will be brought back unto Him who knows all that is beyond the reach of human perception as well as all that cannot be witnessed by a creatures’ senses or mind, whereupon He will make you truly understand all that you were brought to do in life”.  Q. 62: 8

     

    Experience

    Were an unborn baby to have a choice on whether or not to exit from its mother’s womb it would have preferred to stay put. But if the baby did not exit from its mother’s womb, how would it enjoy the pleasurable bounties of this world? This is the scenario which Nigeria’s first President, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, gave a deep thought in the introduction to his autobiography (My Odyssey) when he wrote thus:

    “Man comes into the world and while he lives, he embarks upon a series of activities absorbing experience which enables him to formulate a philosophy of life and to chart his causes of action; but then, he dies; nevertheless, his biography remains a guide for those of the living who may need guidance either as a warning on the vanity of human wishes or as an example or both….”. Incidentally, Dr. Azikiwe was a journalist.

     

    Public reactions

    No sooner that the Nyanya tragedy occurred last Monday morning than reactions started pouring from all parts of the country and even the Diaspora. Many Muslim organisations and individuals reacted bitterly and expressed deep concern about what the issue of insecurity in becoming in the country.

    The Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs in particular issued a press release in which it expressed sadness and condoled with the families of the victims. Read the full text of the press release below:

    Enough is Enough

    For the umpteen times the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA) is hereby lamenting and condemning the bomb blast that once again occurred in Nyanya, Abuja in which scores of innocent Nigerians were killed in cold blood.  For how long will these lamentations and condemnations continue in a country that is supposed to be guided by law is the capital question for now.

    We have a three tier government to which the citizenry look for protection and necessary provision of social amenities. Yet, feeling security look alien to an average Nigerian. Where is the place of loyalty and patriotism in this? Nigeria has consistently had a government in place for decades since independence (in civilian costume and military uniform) there has never been any difference. Is this a matter of carelessness or one of complacency? We need to ask ourselves where we are coming from and where are we going from here? Unless these questions are sincerely answered and the necessary decisions are taken at the appropriate time any hope of graduating from a country into a nation may end up in forlorn.

    Today’s precarious experience is not peculiar to Nigeria. Some other countries have passed through similar experience in their history. The only seeming difference is that while others were very serious in tackling such a horrible situation, the required seriousness is conspicuously absent in our own case. We prefer to pass the bulk even where bulk passing serves no purpose. It is strange that in a country which claims to be civilised is still applying an 18th Century solution to a 21st Century problem and yet expecting a deserving result. Treating the effect of an ailment while ignoring its cause as Nigeria seems to have been doing in the past three years is like scratching a monster on the head.

    While we do not necessarily need to repeat here that security is not about bayonets and tanks alone we are constrained to warn that with the current situation, Nigeria may have become engaged in a war of attrition with criminals who may have undisclosed scores to settle with country. And such a situation will rather require strategy and wisdom than military might to be tackled. We have lost enough lives to those who do not value their own lives let alone those of others.

    There is enough evidence to show that the same strategy used in the past three years has become obsolete for the problem at hand and it must be urgently changed.

    Condoling with victims of terrorism now and then can never proffer solution a seemingly insuperable problem like the one currently faced by Nigeria. Enough of losing lives of women, children and innocent Nigerians without any hope for a better option.

    As usual, we painfully condole with the families of the victims of this latest tragedy and all Nigerians who are directly or indirectly touched by the devastating effect of that tragedy believing that another one will not be allowed to occur soon. We pray the Almighty Allah to spare this country of a calamity which may not consume only those who wrought it but also the very innocent ones who know nothing about it. God save Nigeria for us and for those coming behind us.

    Amen!

  • Ekiti poll: between light and darkness

    Ekiti is a blank billboard in my head. That is to say, at the snap of a finger I do not have a brand icon to associate this state with. Not a great name like Obafemi Awolowo, Wole Soyinka, a Rufus Giwa or even a Lamidi Adedibu. Not institutions like U.I., O.A.U, I.I.T.A. No such socio- corporate entities like Omotoso, the national power hub; Ewekoro, the dusty, sprawling cement enclave and Cocoa House, that towers in her ancient majesty over Ibadan. Okay, Ekiti boasts of the vivacious Ikogosi Warm Springs, but that’s about it all. Even in monarchical stature, a neophyte like yours truly would remember first, the Alaafin, the Ooni, Soun, Olubadan and the Alake before he would pick on the Ewi if ever.

    What about great towns and cities of the west: count Oyo, Ogbomoso, Ede in Oyo; Ota, Ijebu-Ode, Sagamu in Ogun; Okiti-pupa, Ore, Ile-oluji in Ondo. But for Ekiti, a non-indigene would most probably pick out only Ado-Ekiti. Why, Ekiti is the land-locked, little cousin of the west.

    No disrespect to the great academic clan of Ekiti, notably our dear poet laureate Niyi Osundare and a teeming number of professors perhaps the highest in the land. But intellectual asset by itself will not do. Ekiti is a clime in dire need of a giant leap forward to be conceptualized and wrought by a man of stable mind, giant heart and gargantuan energy. Ekiti will be the setting for an epic gubernatorial battle come June 21, featuring the incumbent, Governor Kayode Fayemi of the All Progressives Congress, (APC); Ayo Fayose of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) and Opeyemi Bamidele of the Labour Party, (LP).

    Fayemi, who got to the government house after a tortuous post-election litigation, has brought elan and commonsense to statecraft. An intellectual and democracy activist, he has handled power with utmost dignity and aplomb that only a cultured mind could muster. Watching from afar, he has run a government with a human face, (or a nice smiling face if you like) creating a welfare environment for the aged and frail. He is reported to have revamped most city roads, upgraded the warm springs to attract visitors and impacted education. From my spot, however, his forte must be the order and peace he has brought to this hinterland state.

    But to compare Fayose with Fayemi, to put it plainly, is to compare darkness with light. It is not because Fayose has limited education (HND) comparatively, and even a more limited record of structured work experience (he is a trader). Far from it, even a drop-out can excel as a leader if he is imbued with requisite talent and grooming. But Fayose showed no such traits in his first outing as governor (2003- 2006). He is possessed of the rabble mentality (which is a necessary ingredient for getting ahead in PDP, mark you) and he is a master at working up the hoi-polloi in his affected populism. For more than three years in office (before he was consumed by the rapscallions of the PDP that threw him up in the first place) he was the picture of an excitable child riding the wild-swirling carousel of power. You will remember him for his feisty hyperactivity and a woebegone poultry project. Would anyone with the appellation of ‘governor’ build a poultry farm in this age? It’s unpardonably obtuse.

    But a multi-billion naira ill-fated poultry is Fayose’s legacy for which he still faced trial until the super unscrupulous PDP sprung him once again and assaulted us with his candidacy. There are many such like him in the fold. Once, there used to be honour even among thieves. Why has PDP become decidedly amoral and contemptuous honour? Fayose’s candidacy is an affront not only to the people of Ekiti but to all discerning Nigerians.

    What is to be said of Opeyemi Bamidele? A lawyer and activist who may be deemed to be afflicted by an acute case of what Shakespeare described as ‘vaulting ambition’ and perhaps an illusion of grandeur? Spiting all entreaties, he broke ranks with his benefactor and a political family which afforded him everything and raised him to his current status. He doesn’t seem to stand much chance though, but to think that he could have easily strolled into this same office four years hence, if only he knew a thing about patience and gratefulness. Bamidele did not only chew the finger that nourished him, he would saw off the entire benevolent arm to sate his ambition. But there is a stench about treachery and ingratitude which lingers and reaches the heavens.

    Expresso pontificates, therefore, that this election is Fayemi’s to win or lose. Though the state is a very lean one, he had nearly four years to prepare. If he has any difficulty convincing Ekiti people to return him to office that could only mean he has not done enough. With his kindly mien and his pretty, activist spouse, Ekiti people almost got blessed with two governors for the price of one. But as much as the soft issues are important, the big matters as pointed out above require a gargantuan heart and energy. Ekiti is in dire need of big, nice sunny dreams such as building on one of its strengths and becoming the intellectual capital of Nigeria for instance; like hosting a world class university, model secondary schools and international vocational institutes. How’s that for a campaign call?

    The Nyanya massacre: woe unto murderers

    He who lives by the sword shall die by the sword…he who visits innocent men, women and children with gruesome death by the bomb shall meet the same fate. That is divine injunction. Nigerians who chose the peak period of a Monday morning (April 14) to let off bombs in a crowded motor park, to kill and maim hundreds of fellow compatriots will not go un-avenged. Especially so the architects, the hidden hands and the financiers – they will not go unpunished. The mass murderers will surely be unmasked.

    Some things to cheer:

    It’s not a fluke in Anambra!

    Former Governor Peter Obi’s revamp of education in Anambra continues to earn plaudits. National examination results consistently prove the quality of the reform. In the past three years, Anambra candidates have topped NECO-organised National Common Entrance examinations. Anambra students have also led in WASCE, NECO and UTME exams. It’s quite a feat to cheer for a state that had high (male) school drop-out rate before the Obi era. The new governor, Willie Obiano must raise the bar even higher.

    200 for Presidential Special Scholarship Scheme (PSSS)

    In the first edition, it was 101 first class graduates of Nigerian universities sponsored to 25 top universities across the world under the PSSS. In this second edition, 200 of Nigeria’s brightest and best have been shortlisted to go conquer the world – so to speak. Over 300 in two years; imagine the sheer number of this plucky group in about 10 years and the impact they are capable to bring to bear not only on Nigeria’s worlds. It’s the way to go.

  • Rebasing our pure-water economy

    Our dear Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has disappointed some of us so sorely that we come to tears each time we contemplate the persistent regress of our dear country into a non-economic entity. And in our private discussions we can’t stop wondering whatever happened to Ngozi? Could she have been weighed down by the oversized portfolios of Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister for the Economy? For sure, the Jonathan administration is less luminescent than Olusegun Obasanjo’s but… We dare say that if she scored a pass mark in her first coming under President Obasanjo’s regime, this time she’s mixed up the script entirely and cannot put a handle on neither the economy nor our finances.

    This so-called economy is in dire need of radical restructure to get the damaged ship back on sail; but it’s either that she cannot see it or she prefers to roll with the punches. For instance, the annual budget never comes on time anymore (2014 budget just passed after first quarter!); she has been unable to whip down recurrent expenditure which still gulps over 75 percent of total budget; industries continue to atrophy; the huge agric sector has become mere statistical confabulations by a smooth-talking agric minister and both power and oil and gas sectors, which ought to heave the turbines of the economy, are in perpetual recession under people without a vision for the nation. We thus have an economy which is prostrate and gasping for air.

    It is from this sad milieu that we were gleefully informed that Nigeria’ economy is now the biggest in Africa and ranks 26th globally. One could not help having a good laugh at this farce; we are a people without shame, a people intent on achieving greatness through the back door. We are told that by a magical re-jigging of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP) figures, we have suddenly become the big, bad, wolf; the economic tiger of Africa! To think that we could not sustain a vision 20-20-20- we willingly formulated: the so-called vision died a natural death because we are so unserious; the former Planning Minister had to pronounce the vision dead.

    For an economy that can at best be described as pure-water economy, not necessarily because it is terribly small, but because it is impure, embroiled in the mire, disheveled and uncoordinated. One quick indication that Nigeria does not have a properly structured economy is to check the back pages of The Economist, which publishes economic and financial indicators of major economies weekly. The only African countries worthy of mention have been Egypt and South Africa. The economic indices showcased by this London journal include: GDP, industrial production, unemployment rate, current account balance, interest rates, etc.

    Were we a serious people who appreciate our dire situation and who are hard at work seeking solution, we would have further down-graded our GDP to show the magnitude of our wretchedness. Here are some of the reasons why a downward review would have been more appropriate now:

    ONE: No defined economic agenda: The present government is merely tumbling along; it has no clearly defined economic vision or goal. All it does largely is collect rent from oil, shares it out like the national cake we call it. Most of it is eventually frittered away. In addition, the third tier of our polity, the LGAs, is near-moribund, thus a swathe of the land, more than half of the people and a chunk of the economy is left in the lurch. Who gives a damn; where then is the economy?

    TWO: No institutions: most of our social, political and economic institutions are in shambles. They are lacking in the capacity to steady the ship of state and make it sail smoothly. It is not possible to organise an economy to a world standard where these institutions have failed.

    THREE: Statistics, what statistics: The National Bureau of Statistics simply lacks the capacity to produce any valid and reliable data. That explains why it couldn’t do routine rebasing of GDP for 24 years.

    FOUR: No economic base: It is shocking that our economic managers deigned to compare Nigeria’s economy with South Africa’s. Apart from our abundance of crude oil and gas which we largely dispel into the seas, so to speak and expel into the atmosphere, we do not have an added-value production base; we are still highly import dependent including for our main food staple, rice. South Africa on the other hand is a massive industrial and agricultural entity that has proven that Africa can be first world. It is mischievous and in bad taste to compare these two economies by any indices whatsoever.

    FIVE: Wasting population: If we seek the harsh truth, Nigeria is but a mass of wasting population – comprising a horde of vibrant but impoverished youths, ill-educated, jobless and angry. What really have we done to earn the 26th position in the world? In the comity of nations, we probably have the worst power situation, we have the worse infrastructure situation, we have among the most endemic corruption and we have about the worst poverty and life expectancy indices.

    SIX: Bleak future: While the South African may have planned 20 years ahead, there are no socio-economic indices around here to bring a smile on the face of the Nigerian, yet we are told we have a big economy by our leaders. What this means is that they do not understand the magnitude of our troubles. What this means again is that we face a bleak future with no redemption in sight because nobody is working to change our situation. They fiddle and revel while our country dies.

    LAST MUG: Take heed Borno State Govt

    It was a beautiful and colourful photograph as published in the newspapers last week. Borno State Governor Kashim Shettima posed with a bevy of young ladies resplendent in their spotted orange hijab over dark flowing gowns. The young, beautiful Borno lasses have won the state’s scholarship to study medicine at the University of Khartoum, Sudan. Great idea (if you don’t mind that Sudan is strife-stricken). What troubles Expresso is that all the young ladies, by their attire, are all Muslims. Borno is not an all-Muslim State is it? Or are the non-Muslims in Borno second class citizens? Seemingly small matter like this goes a long way to brew rancor and disaffection.

    NOTE: Enquiries about the book, Blood on the Niger, by Emma Okocha may be directed to Toyin on 08065289740 or Deji on 08060205914