The Nation Newspaper

Category: Korede Yishau

  • MicCom founder, Ponnle marries ex-Osun Deputy Gov

    His first wife, Mrs Comfort Olufunke Ponnle, died on October 29, 2012, less than a month to her 68th birthday. More than one month ago, MicCom Group of Companies founder Prince Tunde Ponnle remarried. His bride is the immediate past Osun State Deputy Governor Titi Laoye-Tomori. To both of them, who are septuagenarians, it is a second chance at finding love, writes Associate Editor OLUKOREDE YISHAU

     

    THEIR love was well-kept. Soft sell magazines and blogs would have given everything to have it. But, only the two of them saw its infancy and kept it until they were ready to say: ‘Yes, I do’. Now, everyone knows of their second chance at being struck by the cupid’s arrow. And posers are being raised. How? When?

    Welcome to the world of Tunde and Titi Ponnle. They are grandparents. Prince Ponnle is 78. He will be 79 in December. The new Mrs Ponnle is 70. She is a December daughter like her husband. She will be 71.

    The marriage was low key in Osogbo, the Osun State capital. The duo got the approval of their children before stepping into the union, according to a family source. It took place over a month ago, but the pictures only became public at the weekend.

    The wedding was solemnised in a church. The traditional ceremony was observed. Tubers of yams, salt and others were given out to the bride’s family. There was a best man and a chief bride’s maid.

    It was followed by a big party, which was exclusive – away from the prying eyes of the nosey reporters. Only few close friends, family members and relatives attended.

    They are no strangers to people in Osun State, where they hail from. They are well-known in Nigeria, their country. The husband is a pioneer industrialist, who gifted Nigeria the MicCom Cables and Wires. He also revolutionised the game of golf with the establishment of MicCom Golf Hotel and Resort Centre in Ada. The people of Ada will never forget the Ponnles in a hurry. The town was sleepy before they established what has become one of the best-known leisure and hospitality centres in Nigeria. MicCom Golf Hotel & Resort is the first privately-owned golf course facility in Nigeria.

    Until October 29, 2012, Prince Ponnle— who once donated a kidney to one of his sons, Kola— was married to Comfort Olufunke. Death ended this beautiful union, which gave Nigeria a lot in the form of the MicCom holdings. She died of cancer at the Ilandough Hospital, Cardiff, United Kingdom. Her death led her widower to start a foundation, which seeks to curtail the spread of some forms of cancer. Bishop Ayo Ladigbolu described the lives of the couple as a “study in diligence, honesty, integrity and dedication to the Christian faith”.

    The Ponnles spent decades empowering people and showing them the way to make their ways better. One of their phenomenal contributions to nation-building is a viable annual scholarship scheme – MicCom Foundation for Educational Development (MIFED).

    The late Mrs Ponnle attended the Anglican Girls Secondary Modern School, Ile-Ife from 1959 to 1961. It was in this school she met Tunde Ponnle, who later became her soulmate. He was a teacher at the school. They got married on Tuesday, April 26, 1966, in Ibadan.

    “I saw her at the school, I taught her as a student-teacher; and, of course, she was a very brilliant student; and the most brilliant in her class. I proposed to her after her final year, when she was to proceed to UMC at Ile-Ife,” said Ponnle.

    The late Mrs Ponnle added:“I didn’t want to marry him because he was my teacher. Again, because I wasn’t looking for a husband that I was going to answer sir, sir. When I agreed to marry him, I told him that I wasn’t going to address him as sir again and he agreed. And, before he left that day, I called him his name, Tunde, several times and he was very happy.”

    After modern school, the late Mrs. Ponnle proceeded to the United Missionary College, Ibadan for teacher’s training course from 1962 to 64. She obtained her Grade Two teachers certificate before moving to the University of Ife in 1969 for her associate diploma in Education, which she completed in 1970.

    Since her death, her husband has kept hope alive through the MicCom Cancer Foundation. The Ibokun Road, Ada, Osun State-based foundation is out to help women fight breast cancer and also help men who may have prostate cancer.

    The bride is a politician. Until last November, she was Osun State deputy governor. She grew up in Osogbo but was born in Oyo town. Her father was a primary school headmaster. She attended St. Catherine’s Anglican Girls Grammar School, Owo, Ondo State and was offered admission to read Law at the University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University. Her father did not like her choice of Law because he believed lawyers were liars. He wanted her to be a school principal. In deference to her father, she sought admission at the universities of Lagos, Ife and Ibadan and the University of Lagos offered her a place to read History and her father was happy.

    “After graduation, I expected them to send me back to teach; they moved me to the Ministry of Education. I, therefore, transferred my service to the University of Lagos later as an assistant registrar. Later, I was made the university’s Admission Officer. I was a faculty officer and that gave me an ample opportunity to interact with students. By nature, I love interacting with young people, more so as a teacher. I was even made hall mistress for Moremi and for that when students had problems, I was like their parents. If they had to go out for a long time, they would have to inform the hall warden and the mistress which would be documented. And also being adults, we could not discipline them; rather, we guided them, though that was not my core area of competence. It was a service to the university,” she told The Nation in a 2010 interview.

    While at the University of Lagos, she married Prof. Siyanbola Tomori.

    “We met at the university but he was not my lecturer. Meeting Prof. Tomori was not by accident. He is a first cousin to Prof. Jegede who is retired. Mind you, I said I worked in the library, Mrs Jegede, wife of Prof. Jegede, worked in the library and as an Ara-Oke (village girl), while in the university; they used to ask, ‘What is this girl always reading?’ Being the first child of my family and there was a long gap between myself and my brothers, for a long time, my family looked up to me that I must succeed educationally; so you could say that I was a bit anti-social after my HSC and when I joined the university. Instead, of enjoying myself, which I missed a lot at that time, I was always reading. And Mrs Jegede was working in the library. She called me and asked where I came from, which I told her and she acknowledged that fact that I loved reading.

    “After leaving the library, she would ask me to come to her house and by the time I got to know the Jegedes, I became very close to them. I used to read in their house at the weekend instead of jumping around. When Prof. Tomori came back from Canada, he lived with them before the university gave him accommodation; that was how we met. He would ask, ‘Sorry, what is your problem? Why are you always carrying your books around?’ I would ask whether it was a crime (laughs). He was a professor of Economy in the Social Sciences, while I was in the Faulty of Arts,” she told The Nation.

    The marriage before it collapsed was blessed with four children. Two of her children are medical doctors, the first and the last. Another one was a banker but later joined the Dangote Group.

    For the couple, they now have a second chance to hold and to cherish after years of biting loneliness.

     

    • Additional report: Soji Adeniyi, Osogbo and Musa Odosimokhe

  • Anglo-Nigerian author Evaristo, Atwood share Booker Prize

    For the third time since inception, Booker Prize judges last night announced two winners in a very competitive race with six amazing novels, writes OLUKOREDE YISHAU

     

    JUDGES last night broke the Booker Prize rules for the third time by declaring joint winners: Seventy-nine-year old Canadian author Margaret Atwood and Anglo-Nigerian author Bernardine Evaristo. Evaristo is the first black woman to win the Booker.

    Atwood won with Testaments and Evaristo with Girl, Woman, Other. The winners will share £50,000. The ceremony, which held at London’s Guildhall, was aired live on the BBC.

    Belfast-born author Anna Burns won last year’s prize with her coming-of-age novel Milkman.

    Winning one of the most prestigious literary awards in the English-speaking world increases book publicity and sales.

    The rules were changed after the last tie in 1992. The award was also shared in 1974.

    The organisers told this year’s judges not to pick two winners. But the judges said after five hours of deliberations, they had no choice but to break the rules.

    The chair of the judges, Peter Florence, said: “It was our decision to flout the rules.”

    Gaby Wood, literary director of the Booker Prize Foundation, said of the decision against splitting the prize: “The thinking was it just doesn’t work – it sort of detracts attention from both, rather than drawing attention to either.”

    The chair of the Booker Prize Foundation, Baroness Kennedy, was against splitting when she was informed. She was quoted to have said: “Absolutely not.”

    But Florence said: “The more we talked about them, the more we found we loved them both so much we wanted them both to win. We all found that we were torn.”

    The judges said they tried voting, but it did not work. Florence said the winning books “have urgent things to say”.

    “They also happen to be wonderfully compelling, page-turning thrillers, which can speak to the most literary audience, to readers who maybe are only reading one, or in this case I hope two books a year, and can speak at different levels to all sorts of different readerships. So in that sense they are I hope and believe really valuable Booker Prize winners,” he told reporters.

    Journey to decision

    The long journey to picking a winner began months back with a long-listing and a shortlist.

    The shortlist had Atwood’s The Testaments, Chigozie Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities, Evaristo’s Girl, Woman, Other, Lucy Ellmann’s Ducks, Newburyport, Elif Shafak’s 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World and Salman Rushdie’s Quichotte.  Canadian author Atwood won the coveted prize in 2000 and Rushdie in 1981 with Midnight’s Children and made the shortlist again in 1983, 1988 and 1995.

    Atwood’s The Testaments is a sequel to her The Handmaid’s Tale, which was shortlisted for the 1986 Booker Prize. It is described as “a subtle, moral novel that is both a clear response to the urgency of the political moment and an attempt to reach beyond the headlines”.

    Set 15 years after the final scene of The Handmaid’s Tale, the characters are second generation of handmaids, with three women providing a different perspective on the Gilead’s patriarchal totalitarianism.

    Seventy-nine-year old Atwood won the 2000 Booker Prize for The Blind Assassin. She was also shortlisted for the prize in 1986, 1989, 1996 and 2003.

    The chair of the judges, Peter Florence, described The Testaments as “a savage and beautiful novel that speaks to us today with conviction and power”.

    Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities, compared to his debut The Fishermen, which also made the shortlist in 2015, is longer, more ambitious and, to some critics, better. It is narrated by the spirit of a chicken farmer. This sprit is known as chi in Igbo cosmology.

    The book tells the love story of Chinonso, a chicken farmer, who falls in love with Ndali, the daughter of a rich man who is also better educated. His rejection by Ndali’s family pushes him to seek better education overseas, but he falls into the hand of a fraudster who pretended to be a friend. He is imprisoned and by the time he is able to return to Nigeria, his love has slipped into the hand of another. His attempt to reclaim his love fails and tragedy sets in.

    This multilingual novel – English, Igbo and pidgin – is a superlative attainment for the 1986, Akure-born Obioma, who is an Assistant professor at University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

    “I see myself as a guy who is trying to preserve some of the culture that we used to have at pre-colonial times,” Obioma said about An Orchestra of Minorities.

    Evaristo’s Girl, Woman, Other is told from multi-perspectives. It is about twelve black British women. Their narratives are intertwined and in fluid lyrical sentences with poetic touches. Evaristo explores the hidden narratives of the African diaspora and subverts expectations and assumptions.

    A Judge, Xiaolu Guo, described it “an impressive, fierce novel… about modern Britain and womanhood” that “deserves to be read aloud”.

    A reviewer, Alex Preston, said of the book: “I was often reminded of great documentary historians such as Tony Parker and Studs Terkel – the lives presented here leap off the page, building into a tapestry that is at once moving and funny, deceptively simple and yet a powerful commentary on the state of our divided nation, taking in issues of race, gender identity, migration and colonialism. A novel that makes you question whether it should strictly be called a novel is by default a good thing – this is a book that pushes at the limits of the genre and leaves you feeling lucky to have spent time in the presence of a writer of such warm-hearted wisdom.”

    Anglo-Nigerian author Evaristo, who was born in London in 1959, is a first timer on the Booker Prize shortlist. This is her eighth book.

    Ellmann’s Ducks, Newburyport is one of those revolutionary novels. It breaks rules and his voluminous. This monologue by an Ohio housewife runs into over 1,020 pages tackling issues of interest to her folk.  She reflects on her past, her family and her country. One of the judges, Joanna MacGregor, described the book as “a genre-defying novel, a torrent on modern life [and] a hymn to loss and grief”.

    Ellmann, who was born in Illinois in 1956 and now based in Edinburgh, is the only U.S. author on this year’s shortlist.

    Elif Shafak’s 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World is the tale of Tequila Leila, a prostitute left for dead. In the last 10-and-a-half minutes of her life, she recalls an existence of depressing ruthlessness and abuse.

    Set in Istanbul, Judge Liz Calder, a publisher and editor, described the book “a work of fearless imagination”.

    Salman Rushdie’s Quichotte is a rewriting of Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote. It is Rushdie’s 14th novel.  It tells of an ageing travelling salesman driving across America to win over a TV star. The novel, according to jury chair Florence, “pushes the boundaries of fiction and satire”.

    Changing rules

    The current rules stipulate that the prize may not be divided. It also shows that to be considered for the award, the submitted book “must be a unified and substantial work,” thus making short stories ineligible. The late V.S. Naipaul won with a short story.

    In 2010, there was an interesting ceremony. An administrative decision which shifted the Booker Prize eligibility dates led to the exclusion of books published in 1970. To rectify the exclusion, 22 novels published in 1970 were considered for what was deemed “The Lost Booker Prize” in 2010, with the late J. G. Farrell’s Troubles receiving the prize posthumously.

    Another interesting development in the annals of the prize is the change, which saw American authors being eligible for the prize once their works are published in the UK and Ireland.

  • Cold, cold world

    By Olukorede Yishau

    It  is girl-child day. I have a daughter, Opemipo. She likes saying she is ‘basically 13’. Her brother, Toluwanimi, will be ten next February. I love them and I believe I can do anything legal for them to be a blessing to their generation, to the kingdom of God and to daddy and mummy.

    From time to time, I have refused attempts to make my daughter feel less important than her brother. Both of them are jewels of no mean value to me and neither is more important than the other. But I know our society does not see things my way. Long before the 2019 Gatekeepers Report shows that life is difficult the world over for a girl-child, I had known that this is a cold world for the female. A really cold, cold world!

    Our society’s foundation is laid in such a way that a girl is at a disadvantage. I hate it when a girl is repeatedly told and ‘you are a girl o’. This happens when she does things the society believes should not be done by a girl, or when she is refusing to do something that society has labelled chores for girls.

    In many homes, girls cook, wash clothes and keep the house clean. Boys watch television, play games and wait for the food to be served. So, these boys grow up to expect their wives to do everything.

    Most times, when a woman cheats, she is in trouble, and when her man cheats, she is still in trouble of ensuring the other chic does not take the man forever. What a world!

    Aside from the family unit, society also helps to put the female gender down. Our politicians are guilty in this respect. Women are made to play second fiddle.

    The marginalisation of women in politics is just one of the many injustices the female folks face in our country. It is so bad that when a woman is doing well many of us believe she must have used the ‘bottom power’. Brilliant women abound and even when we acknowledge their brilliance, we still find a way to rubbish their records by attributing their rise to extraneous factors.

    In Bisi Adjapon’s Of Women and Frogs, we see boys and men getting undue advantages just because of their gender. Esi, the heroine, rebels and is labelled a badly-behaved girl. Like many fathers in our society, her father, Edward, always sees a lady through her womanhood—her education counts less. He sees nothing wrong in Abena’s husband almost throwing her out of the window. All is well with Mansa’s husband pummelling her. To him, being a woman equals being the wrong one in any dispute with the man of the house. Ayodele Olofintuade’s amazing novel Lakiriboto Chronicles explores our biases against the female gender. A strong woman is considered rude and unfit for marriage.

    In Jennifer Nansubuga Makumbi’s Kintu, a Ugandan notes: “As a boy if you wander too often into the kitchen doubt is cast over you.”

    Fathers and mothers need to stand for their girls and make them feel equal to their brothers. We should give women equal opportunities; we should stop telling a girl to do all the chores while the boys play ludo, and we should, as husbands, support our wives to be the best they can be. They are our better halves and deserve to live their dreams. If they choose to be housewives, all well and good, but we should not force it on them. Each partner in a marriage deserves respect, which should be earned and not forced.

    I have travelled this route today because of the University of Lagos lecturers accused of sex-for-grades. One of them is also a pastor. He has been suspended by both the school and the church for an investigation to be carried out. He reminds me of His Eminence, Reverend Pastor Dr Biodun Fatoyinbo, who is yet to extricate himself from Busola Dakolo’s rape allegation.

    In the video, Dr. Boniface Igheneghu, who is also a Foursquare pastor, promised to help a supposedly ‘17-year-old’, who was actually an undercover reporter. From their first meeting for ‘tutorials’, Igheneghu began to reveal creepy intentions.

    He told the girl: “How old are you? 17, and you look very big like this? Don’t you know you are a beautiful girl? Do you know that? You are not beautiful; you are a very beautiful girl. Do you know I am a pastor? And I am in my 50s. What will shock you is that even at my age, if I want a girl of 17, all I need is to sweet-tongue her; give small money and I will get her.”

    At a second meeting, Igheneghu prayed with the girl “to lead her to Christ”. He directed her to repeat after him: “Lord Jesus Christ; I confess the Lord Jesus Christ; I accept that you are my Lord and saviour. Guide me and direct me. Thank you, Jesus. Don’t worry about your admission. I will work on it.”

    He soon asked her: “Have you started knowing men?” When the girl asked what he meant by ‘knowing men’, he said point-blank: “Have you started having sex? Look anything that we discuss, you are sure that your mother will not hear?”

    At another meeting secretly filmed, Igheneghu spoke about a place lecturers take their prey for sexual escapades at the UNILAG Staff Club. He said: “There is an upper part of the staff club where lecturers carry out their deeds; they call it ‘cold room’.”

    In this cold room, girls are meant to experience another side of the cold world they are part of. Igheneghu also said ‘cooperating’ students are favoured with good grades. “She pays with her body,” he said, “You have to be obedient to have your admission.”

    Igheneghu told the undercover reporter to kiss him after locking the door and switching off the light in his office in an attempt to demonstrate what the cold room looked like.

    “Do you want me to kiss you? Lock the door; I will kiss you for a minute.”

    The girl asked: “Did you lock the door?”

    “Yes,” Igheneghu whispered.

    He asked her to come closer.

    Girl: “I am close to you already, sir.”

    Igheneghu added: “Sit down…Come close”

    Girl: “OK.”

    Igheneghu: “Look…(wrapping his arms around her)…”You are so stiff.”

    He concluded: “I can call you to come any day; if you don’t come, then you know you are gone. I will tell your Mom you are disobedient.”

    The girl responded: “Ok Sir”.

    In the video, two alumnae of UNILAG said they were abused by Igheneghu.

    The first victim said: “He will tell you to come to his office. He will lock the door. Sometimes, he will want to grope you; sometimes, he will dry hump you. He likes to pick on struggling students because he knows that they are very vulnerable and there is nothing they can do.”

    The second victim said: “I never ever gave my consent once. There was a time he was preparing for Bible study, and he was groping me and he was writing down scriptures.”

    Before the video evidence, there have been reports of lecturers victimising girls. What the video has done is to put faces to the randy ones. Brilliant girls are made to suffer. A senior colleague told me some days back that he had to help a female undergraduate pay a bribe demanded by a lecturer in place of sex.

    My final take: Lecturers are supposed to be fathers to their students. They ought to guide them and make them become the best they can be. A lecturer who sexually assaults his student is a fit and proper candidate for castration. He is not different from a rapist.

  • Searchlight on Nigeria, Africa at Gates summit

    The 2019 Goalkeepers Summit by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in New York, which coincided with the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA), was a forum for American business magnate Bill Gates, Africa’s richest man Aliko Dangote and others to chart the way forward for humanity, reports OLUKOREDE YISHAU from New York.

    Dangote Group President Aliko Dangote and Microsoft founder Aliko Dangote became friends some years back. Dangote runs the Dangote Foundation; Gates and his wife Melinda run the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. With challenges such as poverty, open defecation, education and health as focus, Gates had to look beyond the developed world to effect change. In Dangote they found an ally.

    Through its Gatekeepers Report, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation monitor the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) progress. This report was a major talking point at the 2019 Goalkeepers events in New York, where awards were given to people who helped in moving towards the achievements of the SDGs.

    Gates urged governments across the world to focus more on primary healthcare development and education as a means of achieving the SDGs. Using Nigeria as an example, he condemned uneven development in societies and called for sufficient spread of developmental efforts. Sudanese billionaire Mo Ibrahim also aligned with Gates on the need for inequality to be ended.

    The 2019 report shows that Nigeria’s health indicators have improved.  In the late 1990s, it was estimated that two of three Nigerians lived in poverty. That represented 68 per cent. Twenty years later, the figure has dropped to 32 per cent of the population or one in three Nigerians.

    Sixty-four per cent of children used to suffer from malnutrition in 2005. This went down to 37 per cent last year, according to figures supplied by the foundation.

    Only about half of Nigerians used unsafe or unimproved sanitation in 2018 compared to 80 per cent in 1990.

    As good as these improvements are, Nigeria still ranks 43rd of 52 African countries on a recently compiled sustainable development goal index. The implication is that the country has gone 47 per cent towards achieving sustainable development goals. The Gatekeepers Report lists the country as one of those who will not meet the SDGs 2030 deadline.

    Gatekeepers’ report 2018 says poverty is concentrating on just a handful of very fast-growing countries. Nigeria still has the second-highest number of deaths of children aged five and under. It tags behind India.

    The 2019 report says life is better for the boy-child. “No matter where you are born, your life will be harder if you are born a girl,” the report says.

    It adds that across sub-Saharan Africa, girls have an average of two fewer years of education than boys. In Nigeria, according to the World Bank, girls get an average of 7.6 years, and boys get 8.7 years.

    The report recommends that “human capital investments should be designed to reach girls and prioritise those countries and districts that have to make up the most ground”.

    The report also observes that education is not enough to bridge the gender divide.

    “In some countries where girls tend to be well-educated they are still underrepresented in the workforce because they also face discriminatory norms and policies.

    “Africa’s youth population (people aged 0 to 24 years) is booming while the rest of the world is shrinking,” says the report.

    The median age across Africa is 18; it is 35 in North America and 47 in Japan.

    The report also shows that in Nigeria, child mortality rate reduced from 109 per 1,000 births in 2017 to 104 per 1,000 live births in 2018 while child stunting reduced from 38.14 per cent in 2017 to 36.74 per cent last year.

    Death from malaria, the report shows, reduced from about 166 per 1,000 in 2017 to 160.72 per 1,000. Cases of tuberculosis reduced from 351.8 per 100,000 to 344.2 in 2018.

    Instances of Neglected Tropical Diseases, according to the report, went down from 52,566 per 100,000  in 2017 to 50,584 last year. On a sad note, the number of people living in poverty increased from 66.83 million in 2017 to 67.48 million in 2018.

    The report shows that Measles-Containing-Vaccine second dose (MCV2) was low at 39.27 per cent; Diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis (DTP3) immunisation coverage was 36.39 per cent.

    The report also reveals that the vaccine coverage for Pneumoccocal conjugate vaccines (PCV3) was at 35.67 per cent.

    The Gates in the 2019 Gatekeepers’ Report entitled: Examining inequality 2019 say: “Gaps between countries, districts, and boys and girls prove that the world’s investments in development aren’t reaching everyone.

    “Using new sub-national data, the report uncovers the vast inequalities within countries that are masked by averages.

    “Where you’re born is still the biggest predictor of your future and no matter where you’re born, life is harder if you’re a girl.

    “Despite gains in female educational attainment, opportunities for girls are limited by social norms, discriminatory laws and policies, and gender-based violence.

    “As we write, billions of people are projected to miss the targets that we all agreed represent a decent life.”

    The foundation called for a new approach to development, targeting the poorest people in the countries and districts that need to make up the most ground to address persistent inequality.

    “Governments should prioritise primary healthcare to deliver a health system that works for the poorest.

    “Government should also deliver digital governance to ensure that governments are responsive to their least-empowered citizens, and more support for farmers to help them adapt to climate change’s worst effects,” it said.

    It added: “The report is designed to track progress in achieving the Global Goals, highlight examples of success, and inspire leaders around the world to accelerate their efforts.

    “The goal is to identify both what’s working and where we’re falling short,” it said.

    Speaking at a panel discussion with Gates last Wednesday at the fourth Gatekeepers Summit at the Lincoln Centre, New York, Dangote said he hoped to give out a chunk of his wealth like Gates. He is estimated to be worth $9.2billion.

    Dangote praised Gates for his love for Nigeria: “When I started my foundation in 1994, I never realised we had this massive challenge in the health sector.

    “Really, it was mind-boggling when we had this agreement to collaborate with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and that really opened my eyes to realise that there are a lot of challenges in health.

    “At that time I didn’t have the opportunity of meeting Bill but meeting Bill changed me into a different person. This is somebody that has nothing to do with us in Africa or Nigeria but he is putting his money and his soul into everything.

    “He is very committed to helping humanity and that really surprises me a lot and I realised that he is a simple person and I never knew Bill would be this simple. He is a very soft-spoken guy and kind-hearted.

    “It is very difficult to find people like Bill in this world. Bill, we are very grateful and I can assure you that with my association with Bill, my only prayer is that in the next few years, I will try and give my chunk of wealth to charity.”

    Gates, who noted that a place where a person is born could determine how long the person could live, thanked Dangote for connecting him with the governors in the North.

    He added that Africa’s richest man proved to him that one could make better impact by reaching out to powerful politicians in charge of policy.

    Gates said: “Aliko knows people; he has relationships and he is willing to reach out to people. He says ‘let’s reach out to the governor, let’s talk to him about this’ and the next thing you know, we’ve got the governor on the phone, talking.

    “So, this ability to reach out and draw on the broad relationships that Aliko has developed…you know I am pretty shy about calling people. I just want to mail them my charts.

    “So what has come out now is that Aliko and I do conference calls with six of the governors from the northern states where we look at vaccine coverage.

    “It is a big challenge but I’ve drawn from Aliko’s communication skills and he is not afraid to call anyone. Everyone likes to talk to him.”

    Gates said his new task was to close the gaps between nations towards achieving the SGDs by ensuring that all had access to quality health and education.

    Dangote said his company wanted the government to make it mandatory for companies to fortify all rice products consumed in the country.

    He said Nigerians eat rice in the morning, afternoon and night, adding that fortifying rice with the right vitamins would help combat malnutrition.

    “At the Aliko Dangote Foundation, we have what we call the Nutrition Integrated Programme, of which we are trying to make sure we take out two million children from malnutrition,” Dangote said at the Goalkeepers Summit.

    “Right now, Dangote is also in the process of rice milling. We are setting up about one million tonnes of rice, and all our rice will apply these nutritious vitamins.

    “The main food we eat in Nigeria is rice; people eat rice in the morning, they eat rice in the afternoon, they eat rice at night.

    “With this, we are now trying to introduce this, and also we are going to the government to make it mandatory for all the rice we consume in Nigeria to be fortified. This will help quite a lot,” Dangote said.

    He added that his company was the first in Africa to begin fortification of sugar, which he said has become the norm.

    Dangote said about two million children are malnourished in Nigeria — a trend the foundation is working to bring to zero.

    He appreciated the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for bringing companies in Nigeria together to sign up to food products fortification of battle malnutrition.

    In an interview before the summit, Gates said: “Nigeria is a super-important country and one that the foundation has an office there.  We did a lot of work in Nigeria on polio and we learned a lot doing that.  Nigeria has gone almost three years now without having a polio case.

    “The biggest priority we have, although making absolutely sure we’re done with polio remains a big priority, now we’re able to focus even more on the primary healthcare system.

    “If I had one wish for Nigeria, it would be that the quality and funding of the primary health care system would achieve the level of some other countries that are lower-income but have done a better job with the primary healthcare system.  So, it definitely is doable.

    “In Nigeria for a lot of the work we do there we’re partnered with Aliko Dangote, who helps us understand who the good partners are and exactly how we can reach out to groups like the traditional leaders and get them involved in these efforts as well.

    “So, Nigeria is important. I’m hopeful about Nigeria. As you see in the report, the disparities within Nigeria are quite stark.

    “Also, one challenge that Nigeria has is that the amount of money that the government raises domestically is quite small compared to other countries. A lot of countries at that level will be raising closer to 15 per cent of GDP and Nigeria is one of the lowest in the world down at about six per cent.  And so, it is a huge challenge that when you want to fund infrastructure, health, education, all those things, that over time the tax collection, the domestic resources are going to have to go up quite a bit.

    “That’s a long-term effort and I think partly by making sure the current resources are spent well like on primary healthcare, you gain the credibility that the citizens will say, okay, we want more of these things.  If we don’t raise the quality, you can get into a trap where they don’t feel like paying the taxes actually has that much impact, and so they’re not supportive of that.

    “So, we’re working hard.  I mentioned we do videoconferences with state governors.  If we can make the six states into exemplars, then these practices can be extended to all 18 of the northern states.  There are best practices down in the south as well that we can learn from as well.

    “Building on what we were able to achieve with polio and the relationships we’ve built there and our commitment, starting with primary healthcare, we think that Nigeria can tackle its inequality.”

    The awards

    The summit witnessed the presentation of awards to India Prime Minister Narendra Modi for reducing open defecation.

    Modi, in less than five years, led a mission which ensured that 600 million people stopped open defecation in one of the world’s most populous country.

    Gates said: “Managing human waste is one of the world’s oldest and toughest challenges and I will say most leaders are not willing to talk about it, in part because the solutions aren’t that easy, but we do have to talk about it.

    “We hear a lot about malaria and we should, because it’s devastating and we are making progress. But sanitation-related illnesses kill more kids every year than malaria does.

    “In 2014, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Swachh Bharat Mission, a programme with the very ambitious goal of eliminating open defecation in India.

    “Before the project, more than half a billion people were defecating in the open, but today, just five years later, thanks to the leadership of hundreds of thousands of people in communities across India, the vast majority now have access to safe sanitation.

    “This progress is critical to achieving SDG 6 for water and sanitation, which is lagging far behind.”

    Gates added that India is already serving as a model for other countries.

    The foundation’s Campaign Award was presented to Aya Chebbi, the first African Union Youth Envoy, for her work promoting youth empowerment, peace building, and non-violent mobilisation in Africa.

    Chebbi said: “We live in a world where politicians fuel xenophobia and violence and violate national and international laws, and even censor the only space we have to breathe, the internet.

    “We live in a world where it has become acceptable to trade human rights for sanitary projects; the reality we live in is dangerous. But you know what, a wise man told me the power of the people will always be more powerful than people in power.

    “When young people promise, young people deliver; the world we want is borderless and the future we want is about dignity and freedom, and our generation will continue to be radical, disruptive and challenge the status quo.”

    The foundation’s Changemaker Award was presented to youth activist Payal Jangid for her fight against child labor and child marriage in India.

    The Progress Award went to Gregory Rockson, co-founder and CEO of mPharma, for his work to increase access to high-quality drugs across community pharmacies in five African countries.

  • Americanah

    I cannot remember exactly when I outgrew my crush on Stella Damasus, the Atlanta-based Nigerian thespian who is a pioneer of our movie industry known as Nollywood. I remain her fan though. A week and some days ago, Stella was involved in a twitter battle over the pending adaptation of Americanah, the amazing love story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie.

    The 2013 novel, for which Chimamanda won the 2013 National Book Critics Circle Fiction award, tells the story of a young Nigerian woman, Ifemelu, who immigrates to the United States to attend university. She is in love with Obinze, who eventually relocates to London but finds life as an illegal immigrant difficult. He is bundled back home and fortune later smile on him. Distance breaks them up. Ifemelu starts another relationsh, and then another one, but her heart remains with Obinze, who also moves on by getting married and starting a family. But for the two of them, what goes up must come down.

    Of Adichie’s three novels, Americanah seems to have made the most impact. Like her Half of a Yellow Sun, Americanah is set to go on the screen.

    Work on the television series, which the book is being adapted into, started five years ago. Oscar-winner Lupita Nyong’o is the brain behind it. Her Black Panther co-star Danai Gurira is serving as the series’ writer and show-runner. D2 Productions, Plan B Entertainment and Potboiler Television are actively involved in the project.

    The 10-part series is going to air on HBO Max. Its Head of Original Content, Sarah Aubrey, in a statement, said: “Americanah has sparked a cultural phenomenon and is revered by fans around the world. It has affected me deeply as one of the most moving, socially relevant and romantic stories of our time… This series will give viewers a uniquely heartfelt and unforgettable experience.”

    Lupita is going to play the lead role, Ifemelu — an Igbo lady. There lies the battle Stella had to do. She feels this is unfair and wonders why Genevieve Nnaji, Rita Dominic or Stephanie Linus cannot be chosen to play the role. Respected Nigerian writers, such as Lola Shoneyin, Chika Unigwe and Molara Woods, took on Stella and insults were traded.

    Over the years there have been many Hollywood movies with Nigerian characters played by people from other nations. Their interpretations of the roles have always been subjects of disagreements. This is where Stella is coming from and I am sure this will continue when the series goes on air. People will watch out to see how Lupita, who is from Kenya, will pronounce Igbo names. Will she speak Igbo?

    Biyi Bandele’s adaptation of Half of a Yellow Sun was enmeshed in a similar controversy. Not a few felt the twins should have been played by Nigerians instead of Thandie Newton (Olanna) and Anika Noni Rose (Kainene).

    Nollywood is an industry that is cash-challenged. Acquiring screen rights of internationally-published works, such as Americanah, does not come cheap. By some agreement, ace cinematographer and director Tunde Kelani adapted some literary works of the late Akinwunmi Isola, such as Kosegbe and Oleku. Jude Dibia’s Walking with Shadows is also set to become a movie. I am sure no one dictated the choice of lead actors to either Kelani or Funmi Iyanda, the force behind the adaptation of Dibia’s book.

    Unlike Nollywood, the adaptation of literary works is commonplace. Movies, such as The Hate U Give, Crazy Rich Asians, If Beale Street Could Talk and hundreds of others, are made from books. Unconfirmed reports say over half of Hollywood movies were first books.

    Like Stella, I believe Nollywood is blessed with great actors. She is one. So are Genevieve, Stephanie, Rita, Omoni Oboli, Richard Mofe-Damijo (RMD), Olu Jacobs, Adesua Etomi-Wellington and many others. There is one particular actor that I am crazy about: She is Toyin Abraham. If you go to the movies now and there are three Nigerian movies on display, chances are that Toyin will be in two. Mama Ire and World Best, as her fans call her, had a fantastic run in 2017. The Auchi, Edo State-born girl finds it easy acting in English, Yoruba and Pidgin English.

    In one of her promotional materials for the sequel to Wives on Strike, ace actor and director Omoni Oboli predicted that the world would celebrate Toyin for her role as Iya Bola in the flick. I saw the film and could not agree less. Toyin was simply crazy. Not that other actors were not good. They were. But Toyin was the life of that film, which showed that comedy could be full of messages for us all to learn from. There is no scene with this crazy girl that falls below standard. As they say, she simply killed the role and my mind was simply made up about who should earn my trophy for Actor of 2017.

    In Pathetic, Tatu, Alakada Reloaded, Okafor’s Law, The In-laws, Celebrity Marriage and Wives on Strike the Revolution, Toyin gave her all in 2017. She was like the most-sought-after actor of that year and she has remained a hot cake this year. I am not sure even Ire, her baby, can slow her down. She seems to have so much energy and she burns them on the set. Her performance in Tatu was in a different light. She interpreted the role so well that one but felt the pain the character was made to go through. The scene where she was put in a hole was well delivered.

    While the talents of Toyin and many others are not in doubt, it is not an automatic ticket that when Nigeria-centred roles are available in Hollywood it will be waiting for them. Genevieve and Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde have a measure of international fame, but, even at that, power (role) is never served a la carte. There are other considerations other than talents.

    My final take: He who pays the piper calls the tune. Movie-making, like publishing, is business and the investors are always concerned about how to recoup their investment. This is, for me, a genuine concern. They are not into charity. If they feel that they need Hollywood actors to get the return on their investment, we certainly cannot begrudge them.

    I have been told Nigerian novels, such as Night Dancer, On Black Sisters’ Street, The Fishermen, Secret Lives of Baba Segi’s Wives, In the Name of Our Father and Lakiriboto, will make good movies. I also believe Ayobami Adebayo’s Stay With Me will make a great screenplay. So, Nollywood should look for money, option these novels and decide who plays what role. It is ridiculous to tell a businessman how to recoup his money.

  • We are all beggars

    I am sure what will first occur to you on seeing the title of this piece is to raise a poser: Do Aliko Dangote, Bill Gates and Warren Buffet beg? They beg their customers, they beg God and, in some cases, financial institutions that give loans for their businesses to progress. They also beg governments and their agencies for policies that will keep them in business.

    Media organisations beg; they beg for advertisements. They cajole the public to buy their news. Even the most-critical of newspapers pile pressures on their advert department and sales departments to improve their fortunes. They know the importance of oxygen to their existence.

    Politicians also beg; they beg for votes — do not mind the fact that they also steal votes. Marketing communication is begging by style and advertising is specialised begging. For me, public relations is nothing but begging with facts. The ultimate goal is to have improved image or images that will keep the customers or clients coming back.

    As popular as Coca-Cola is, it remains a major spender in global advertising, public relations and marketing communications. Even firms with specialised services, such as construction companies, also bid for jobs. You can easily replace ‘bid’ with ‘beg’. So beggars are not just people who seek alms on the streets. We are all beggars one way or the other.

    On the micro-level, family members beg one another for money. Friends do the same. Colleagues beg colleagues for assistance, financial and otherwise. Church members beg pastors and vice versa for cash.

    When someone begs you for assistance, it should not be an excuse to insult him. A friend once called an old pal on phone for some financial help. After the call was supposed to have ended, the old pal was overheard telling someone: “Don’t mind her; she is begging me for money.” What he did not know was that the person who called him had not cut the call and she heard how he was shaming her. There is nothing wrong in lamenting if you cannot offer the help requested, but what is bad is to shame the person, especially when you have no fact to prove he or she was begging for no just cause.

    On another level, Nigerians are also a special kind of beggars. For years, we have been begging our governments to give us good leadership.

    The Goalkeepers Data Report released on Tuesday by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation shows that despite signs of progress, the health and education indexes in Nigeria are far from desirable. This is one development Nigerians have been begging successive governments to get right. The Gates’ observation tallies with a World Bank Human Capital Index, which shows that “children born in Nigeria today will be only 34 per cent as productive when they grow up as they could be.”

    Gatekeepers Report 2019 shows that one of three Nigerians live in poverty. That represents thirty-two per cent of the population. Thirty-seven per cent of children still suffers from malnutrition.

    Another interesting figure from the foundation borders on the situation where about half of Nigerians use unsafe or unimproved sanitation. Nigeria still ranks 43rd of 52 African countries on a recently compiled sustainable development goal index.

    Poverty, the report says, is concentrating in fast-growing countries like Nigeria and by 2050, more than 40 per cent of Nigeria will still be under poverty’s jackboot. No wonder we still have the second-highest number of deaths of children under the age of five.

    Our government needs to uplift the girl-child. “No matter where you are born, your life will be harder if you are born a girl,” the report says. Girls have an average of two fewer years of education than boys. In Nigeria, according to the World Bank, girls get an average of 7.6 years, and boys get 8.7 years.

    Nigerians have been begging and are still begging for better security. The late M.D. Yusuf headed a committee in 2008 to look at what the police need to function well. According to the committee, the police need an estimated N2.8 trillion for capital development (N560 billion/year) within five years for effective reform. But what did we appropriate? In 2016, it was N16.1 billion and of this, only N10 billion was released.

    Between 2012 and 2016, the police requested for N1.164 trillion but a paltry N64.999 billion was appropriated. Sadly, only N40.477 billion was released. For overhead, N328.34 billion was requested, N39.43 billion was appropriated but only N32.22 billion was released in those four years.

    Of the N200 billion requested for investigations annually, only N121 million was released in 2016. For its 14,306 vehicles, including 3,115 motorcycles, the police require N19.9 billion to fuel them yearly, but it got only N809 million in 2016. No wonder there is never fuel in their vehicles when it matters most.

    “What is most worrisome is that though the budgetary allocations on paper are insufficient to meet the financial needs of the force, the actual releases are far below what is budgeted. The basic requirement to provide adequate and appropriate items of kits for police personnel annually is N14,583,671,264 as against the N1,752,500,000 earmarked in the 2017 Appropriation,” says a former police chief.

    In the advanced world, people do not have to beg for this. A 2007-2008 report by the British House of Commons Home Affairs Committee entitled “Policing in the 21st Century” shows clearly that we are still begging the question of proper policing. The United Kingdom spent 2.5 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on the police in 2004 and £12.6 billion on the police in 2007/08. For the United States, it spent 2.2 per cent of its GDP on police; Spain spent 1.8 per cent, Germany 1.6 per cent and France 1.4. These translate into billions of dollars. France, in 2016, gave additional €250 million to the police to boost anti-terrorism fight.

    Another area Nigerians have been begging is the epileptic power supply that we enjoy. In 2013, the Federal Government divested 60 per cent of its stake in the electricity distribution companies (DisCos) to 11 private investors. The belief was that the decision would make things better. But for political capital, the Federal Government has been unable to allow economic parameters to run the sector. The Power Purchase Agreements the government signed with the investors requires the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading (NBET) to pay for unused electricity. What this means is that when the DisCos reject the load allocated them by the System Operator, the Federal Government pays for it.

    My final take: In a nation like Nigeria, where the economy has never performed anywhere near optimum, a beggars’ republic cannot be avoided. And with one wobbling government after the other, the people are also bound to beg for amenities, which are taken for granted in saner climes.

  • Oh South Africa

    South Africa is beautiful. Very beautiful. Durban, one of its prominent cities where I once spent a week or so, so dazzled me that I longed for a replica back home in Nigeria. Abuja, our best, does not have Durban’s charm, not to talk of the glitz of Johannesburg, Cape Town or Pretoria.

    I have seen London, Liverpool, Singapore, Houston, Chicago, New York and many other great cities in the world and I dare say Durban can stand almost shoulder to shoulder with them all.

    Accra, the Ghanaian capital, is a work in progress. It does not even glow like Abuja. Nairobi, to the best of my knowledge, is not better than Abuja.

    What I am driving at is that South Africa remains a model in Africa and is a leader. On a continent with people struggling to make ends meet, South Africa is bound to entice people willing to escape the concentration camps that many an African nation is.

    When an average Nigerian has the opportunity to travel out, they always lament the poor state of things back home. Not a few have refused to return. Given South Africa’s elegance, it should not surprise anyone that many Nigerians have chosen it as their second home.

    America, the United Kingdom and other advanced nations are also homes to Nigerians. Like in South Africa, the Nigerians in those advanced democracies comprise of the good, the bad and the ugly. The good guys are always in the majority. The bad and the ugly are always in the minority. But, in a world, where evil sells, the bad boys catch the headlines all the time.

    The black-on-black violence in South Africa is blamed on the few Nigerians who are into drugs and other devilish enterprises. We have great Nigerians in the universities, hospitals and other sectors of the South African economy. We hear less of them and more of the bad eggs. Some of them are even known to kill themselves in gang-related violence.

    Since the violence broke out, I have had cause to watch and listen to some South African leaders, two of them ex-presidents. Jacob Zuma and his predecessor, Thabo Mbeki, who lived in Nigeria during the Apartheid madness, have spoken. Zuma impressed and amazed me with his response. Mbeki broke my heart by saying Nigerians were not attacked. He said only criminals were attacked. And I asked: Where are the criminals from?

    Mbeki claimed that the attackers had reported these criminals to the police and never got any good out of this. Who is to blame if South African police fail in their responsibility? And does South African laws allow citizens to take the law in their hands?

    I am also worried that in these attacks, business premises have been attacked. Auto shops were set ablaze. Is Mbeki telling us that the owners of these businesses are also into the hard drugs business? Were the looters of shops owned by foreigners also protesting against criminals? This, to me, is like criminals trying to fight criminals.

    Like Mbeki, South African Foreign Minister Naledi Pandor, in an interview, begged the Nigerian government to come and help them get rid of our criminals in their country. Shame! If she has evidence that these guys are criminals who are using hard drugs to lead astray their people, all Minister Pandor needs do is to activate the law against them and jail them if found guilty. Begging Nigeria to come get them out of South Africa is an admission of the failure of the country’s criminal justice system.

    The United States and the United Kingdom will never ask Nigeria to come and get out its few bad eggs in their system. What these two nations have kept doing is using the law to rein them in. Many of them are in jails in prisons across these nations. Not once have they sought Nigerians help in dealing with the few bad guys.

    Only some weeks back, the United States released a list of 77 Nigerians who are involved in scams. Before then, it arrested a popular Nigerian youth known as Invictus Obi over a number of scams and he is being detained while investigations are going on. Many of the indicted 77 have been nabbed in the U.S. and some have been picked up in Nigeria with the assistance of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). They should have been extradited to the U.S. to face the music.

    So, it is childish for Pandor to ask Nigeria to come and get the criminals out when it should have used South African laws against them. And if there are accomplices in Nigeria, our law enforcement agents can help fish them out and send to South Africa to face the law, if need be. That is what the United States has done. South Africa should take a cue.

    For Zuma, he said it was a shame that a few South Africans are calling fellow Africans foreigners. He also traced the assistance countries, including Nigeria, gave South Africa under the Apartheid regime.

    Though not a fan of ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, his position on black-on-black violence makes me admire him. I chanced on a video, which makes his position clear. The video was of an interview he granted while Zuma was in power and anti-foreigner violence broke out. Very instructive in what he said is the fact that South Africa is a leader and a model on the continent and naturally will attract people from other countries. He added that if South Africa was unwilling to play this role of accommodating other Africans, then it should not be regarded as a leader or a model.

    I must allude to a fact elucidated by ace South African comedian and author Trevor Noah. After the violence broke out, Noah said over 80 per cent of South African wealth is in the hands of the white. The rest is shared between the black and the coloured elites. The per cent in the hands of foreigners, including Nigerians, is less than one per cent. Why the hate, you may wonder.

    On a lighter note, a South African girl says their men are jealous of Nigerians because they have snatched all the fine babes in the cities. She accuses their guys of being lazy and unable to take good care of them. “Leave our Nigerian men alone,” she pleads. But the men accuse Nigerians of taking less money to take their jobs and corrupting their girls and youth with drugs.

    My final take: South Africa has had a troubled past. Many of its young population are still troubled and need to be redeemed. The laws are there to deal with criminals; South Africa should activate them instead of allowing mobs to combine the roles of prosecutors and judges.

  • Conmen, conmen everywhere

    Conmen are not only 419ners who send phoney e-mails promising heaven and earth to the greedy and gullible. Conmen are not only Yahoo boys who reap where they do not sow. Conmen are not also only those who promise old white ladies love in order to have access to their hard-earned cash or those who go into other people’s bank accounts and drain them. They certainly go beyond men who ask for plenty of cash to buy chemicals to wash supposed black currencies into crispy dollars and Pound Sterling.

    There are so many conmen in unexpected places. Checklist: conmen on the pulpit, conmen in power, conmen in banking halls, conmen in the newsroom, conmen in deeds and conmen in the markets.

    The conmen on the pulpits call themselves men of God but they are really men of god; their god is small and his only motivation is cash obtained by deceit. What do you call a ‘man of God’ who, during a church service, brings out his mobile phone and dials God? The confused man proceeds to ask ‘Is that heaven?’ He then begins to say all manners of nonsense and his excited congregants are in awe of him. They are excited that, finally, their woes are over. He then adds a clincher: He will soon release God’s phone number. Wow! And no one gets up and slaps the madness out of his head.

    There is also another one who engages a demon in a shouting match. The demon he employed for his deceit looks like one of those actors in a badly-scripted Nollywood home video. As expected, he defeats the boasting demon and declares the devil a liar when he is actually the liar and devil in human form.

    I was flabbergasted the day I saw another clip of a conman on the pulpit who practically strangles a woman with a stiff neck. How on earth can delivering someone with stiff neck involve squeezing the life out of the ailing neck? She collapses and after a few seconds the ‘pastor’ performs some abracadabra and the old woman jumps up shouting Hallelujah. She is healed. Just like that!

    Some of these conmen giving our dear Christianity and the Church a bad name charge fees for deliverance from the inability to have a baby, husband and a job. They charge for every human woe. They even charge and do special prayer on passport so that the United States, the United Kingdom and Canadian visas can be received with ease.

    The conmen in power are the worst. During electioneering campaigns, they go from Makoko to Ajegunle and other ghettos in the country. They promise better lives for the ghetto dwellers and disappear thereafter. The only time they will be seen again is during the next electioneering campaigns when they will come with rice and money to buy votes. They are deficient in integrity. They make promises they do not intend to keep. They do not plan before getting into power. It is after they get into office that they understand the situation of things, and when they are reminded of their promises, they either deny or begin to explain things that need no explanation.

    These conmen in power have made our education nothing to write home about. Universities are no longer great. Students are no longer tutored and mentored by star local and foreign lecturers. Hostels are now bedbug-invested. Our primary, secondary and tertiary health institutions are no longer world-class. Twenty years of democracy has not been able to reverse the brain drain. Only on Monday, a group of friends feted a psychiatrist turned poet who has just been poached to work in the United Kingdom! Until he got the juicy offer, he was working at the popular ‘Yaba left’, where doctors have been abandoned by the government and have been on strike for weeks.

    The conmen in the banking halls are those bankers who steal depositors’ money, do insider trading and other sharp practices. There are instances where some bankers have been known to target accounts of dead individuals and they ensure their survivors do not get their savings. I have seen a case of a man whose document was forged by a banker and a fraudster all in a bid to steal his property. The matter is still in court and I hope justice is served.

    The next set of conmen belongs to my beloved profession. These guys are blackmailers, pure and simple. When they have a negative story against a popular person, they contact the person and demand payment to kill the story. There are even cases when they do not have any strong evidence to back their allegations but they still insist on being paid or they go to press with a report that cannot be substantiated.

    You may wonder what I mean by conmen in deeds. Well, these are men and women who will make you feel special all because they want to keep you on a particular spot, but when chances for growth occur, they work to stifle your development. It is even worse when they now label you over-ambitious among other mundane allegations.

    The conmen in the markets are traders who lie for profit sake. They make you believe the goods they are selling to you are at the best price possible. Meanwhile, they have ripped you off. But, they also have categories – the worst of these men and women are the ones who sell counterfeit products as genuine goods, the ones who clean off expiry dates on goods. They are murderers. Only God knows how many people they have killed with expired products. They also remind me of another set of conmen who deserve to be shot. These guys sell chalk as drugs, they sell bad water as pure water, they sell nonsense as herbal medicine and they all smile to the banks.

    The agents who collect rent from people and never give them apartments are also conmen. The employer who makes money but denies employees of their salaries and emoluments are shameless conmen. As far as I am concerned, people who wrote books and claimed Mungo Park discovered River Niger were conmen. All those balderdash about some Caucasians discovering places in Africa when our forebears had lived there for centuries were products of fraudulent minds. They wanted to con us into believing we were nobodies. Fools!

    My final take: In Ayobami Adebayo’s 9Mobile Literature Prize-winning novel Stay With Me, Yejide says “a mother does not do what she wants, she does what is best for her child”. Nigeria is the mother of these conmen and what is best for them is that she must use the law to clip their wings and turn them on the right path. If they are left to always have their way, they will continue to bring shame to their mother. This also reminds me of a statement by a character played by the great Adebayo Faleti of blessed memory in a movie. The character says: “Sermons alone won’t stop robbers. Only force can curb their activities…It is strenuous rowing and paddling that can get us there.”

    There are, however, two sets of conmen the law cannot deal with. They are those who say A and change to B when it matters most and politicians who make empty promises to get votes. With them, watch your back!

     

  • A daring generation

    I was not raised in a face-me-I-face-you apartment. My siblings and I had the privilege of growing up in a flat complete with some modern amenities. But our home was still traditional. Father was a god. His words were law. When he spoke, we listened and obeyed. My mother constantly threatened us using our father’s name because she knew we would be afraid of falling on his wrong side.

    As kids, we knew the sound of his Peugeot salon car’s horn. At the hearing of the sound, we became cowed. His room was a holy land. We dared not go there frivolously and we must knock to announce our presence before going in. I have tried to search my memory to see if there was ever a time my father told me he loved me. He simply showed it by paying my fees and driving me to Isaga-Orile when I was still too young to find my way to my secondary school, Ansar-Ud-Deen Grammar School.

    I am a father now, thanks to Opemipo and Toluwanimi who chose to come through me. But my relationship with them is nothing like mine with my father. Things have changed. They do not see me as a god. My words are not law – when I speak, they listen but they ask questions before obeying. Even when I get angry for their audacity to query my instructions, the signs are always clear that they want answers to their questions.

    For me, the kids we are having now belong to the ‘why generation’. And here lies my dilemma. Their inquisitive mind, I believe, will help our country. They will ask people in government tough questions when the time comes and they will damn the consequences. They will ask questions about our economy, which an expert observed in this newspaper on Monday would experience another recession next March.

    Our leaders need to be queried. They do all kinds of nonsense. That does not mean many citizens do not also mess up. Our politicians are just a little better than the military. In a lot of sense, many of the players on the political scene are yet to be cured of the military hang-over. A sizeable number of the key players even have a garrison mentality. Ours is a democracy without democrats. Selfish interests are masqueraded as national interests. The good of one is sold as the good of all.

    Politicians abandon one party to join another and defend it as if it were based on sound principles. The defections and the reasons behind them are interesting, but if you scratch beyond the surface, you will see deceit and the love of self. I take it with a pinch of the salt when I hear a politician talk about building a solid foundation for the entrenchment of democracy. These funny chaps still talk about sacrificing their interests for our nation. They get ridiculous when they speak about commitment, transparency and accountability. All most of them know is how to destroy their opponents. The end always justifies the means. They just like it the Machiavellian way.

    One area where questions need to be asked is the state of our security. If we fail to ask the questions now and get action, the daring generation will. The late M.D. Yusuf headed a committee in 2008 to look at what the police needs to function well. According to the committee, the police needed an estimated N2.8 trillion for capital development (N560 billion/year) within five years for effective reform. But what did we appropriate? In 2016, it was N16.1 billion and of this, only N10 billion was released. Between 2012 and 2016, the police requested for N1.164 trillion but a paltry N64.999 billion was appropriated. Sadly, only N40.477 billion was released. For overhead, N328.34 billion was requested, N39.43 billion was appropriated but only N32.22 billion was released in those four years. Of the N200 billion requested for investigations annually, only N121 million was released in 2016.

    For its 14,306 vehicles, including 3,115 motorcycles, the police require N19.9 billion to fuel them yearly, but it got only N809 million in 2016. No wonder there is never fuel in their vehicles when it matters most. “What is most worrisome is that though the budgetary allocations on paper are insufficient to meet the financial needs of the force, the actual releases are far below what is budgeted. The basic requirement to provide adequate and appropriate items of kits for police personnel annually is N14,583,671,264 as against the N1,752,500,000 earmarked in the 2017 Appropriation,” says a former police chief.

    It is not done like we do abroad. A 2007-2008 report by the British House of Commons Home Affairs Committee entitled “Policing in the 21st Century” shows clearly that we are still begging the question of proper policing. The United Kingdom spent 2.5 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on the police in 2004 and £12.6 billion on the police in 2007/08. For the United States, it spent 2.2 per cent of its GDP on police; Spain spent 1.8 per cent, Germany 1.6 per cent and France 1.4. These translate to billions of dollars. France, in 2016, gave additional 250 million euros to the police to boost anti-terrorism fight.

    Another question we must ask and not leave to the daring generation is the epileptic power supply that we currently enjoy. In 2013, the Federal Government divested 60 per cent of its stake in the electricity distribution companies (DisCos) to 11 private investors. The belief was that the decision would make things better. But as noted by our John Ofikhenua in a special report a few days back, “for political capital, the Federal Government has been reluctant to base its decision on economic parameters. Therefore, it has remained an onlooker while the DisCos and the TCN trade the blame of who is responsible for the immutable darkness in the country”. The Power Purchase Agreements the government signed with the investors requires the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading (NBET) to pay for unused electricity. What this means is that when the DisCos reject the load allocated them by the System Operator, the Federal Government pays for it. All kinds of money have been thrown at the electricity challenge but we have not seen any real change and companies are dying because of prohibiting diesel cost.

    My final take: The generation we are raising now will not take excuses. I have no idea how far they will go to ensure Nigeria works. To whom much is given much is expected. Let the leaders and the led play our roles. Our country needs to stop being a developing nation; it is time to be developed.

  • Africa Ronu

    By Olukorede Yishau

    I saw a video a few days ago. I had seen it before, but seeing it this time around got me thinking. The speaker in the clip is no other than Mo Ibrahim, the esteemed Sudanese-British billionaire businessman. Ibrahim’s concern in the video is the average age of African leaders. After doing his analysis, he asked: “Are they leading us to the grave?” A study, which I came across some days back, says the average age of the 15 oldest African leaders is 77, compared to 52 for leaders of the world’s ten most-developed economies. A commentator wondered: “Could this be one of the major reasons for Africa’s under-development?”

    At the time he was unceremoniously kicked out of office, Robert Mugabe was 94. He led Zimbabwe for 37 years. The man who took over from him, Emmerson Mnangagwa, still qualifies as one of Africa’s oldest leader. Mnangagwa, also known as ‘Crocodile’, is about 77 years old. Yoweri Museveni, who has led Uganda since 1986, is over 75. The country’s constitution had limited the presidential age at 75, but to allow Museveni to continue in office beyond that age, the constitution was amended. The amendment engendered bitterness in the country, but Museveni was not moved. He got what he wanted and that was all that mattered.

    The situation in Tunisia was scandalous. Its late President, Beji Caid Essebsi, was 92. He was a beneficiary of the revolution in the country which led to the Arab Uprising in the Middle East. If not for death, he would still be in power. His 86-year-old ‘younger brother’, Paul Biya, has been the lord of the manor in Cameroon since 1982. He has survived coup after coup. Abdelaziz Bouteflika, 81, called the shot in Algeria. He had been in the position since 1999 and serving his fourth term before being forced to resign early this year. A man, who is two years younger, Arthur Peter Mutharika, is President in Malawi. Another age-mate of his, Alpha Conde, is in charge of Guinea. Sao Tome and Principe leader Evaristo Carvalho is 77. He became President in 2016 and will serve for five years if he doesn’t seek another term.

    Namibia, Ghana, and Nigeria also have presidents who are over 70. Hage Geingob of Namibia is 75. Ghana’s Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is 75. His Equatorial Guinea counterpart Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo is 77 years old. Ridiculously, his son, Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, is Vice President. Our dear President, Muhammadu Buhari, is 75 years and has just been re-elected for a tenure of four years. Ivory Coast leader Alassane Ouattara is 76 Years.

    I am not saying our old people should go and die. Far from it. We need their wisdom, but largely in the background. A few of them can be in the main arena, but what I abhor is a situation where they take over the arena — which is what is happening in the African political space. Under these leaders, Africa remains backward. Its people are daily trooping to the developed world. Its professionals are ever ready to emigrate to the United States, United Kingdom, and Canada. Australia has also welcomed a number of them.

    Corruption and illicit flow of funds are problems the continent is grappling with under these wise men. A joint report by the African Development Bank (AfDB) and Global Financial Integrity, a US research and advocacy group, says: “The illicit haemorrhage of resources from Africa is about four times Africa’s current external debt.” The report, Illicit Financial Flows and the Problem of Net Resource Transfers from Africa: 1980–2009, discovered that illicit outflows from Africa over 30 years ranged from $1.2 trillion to $1.4 trillion. I found something very instructive in the report. For many, Africa receives aids from the developed world. But what this report found out is that what the developed world gets from Africa indirectly far outweighs the aids the continent receives. This explains why Raymond Baker, the president of the Global Financial Integrity, argued that Africa has been a net creditor to the rest of the world for decades. He said: “The traditional thinking has always been that the West is pouring money into Africa through foreign aid and other private-sector flows, without receiving much in return.”

    Africa is rich. Very rich. Resource-wise. If the resources are well-harnessed, Africa can finance much of its development without any help from China, the United States, or the United Kingdom. We have gold, diamond, cocoa, crude oil, and many more. But, what do we do with them? In most cases, we are not mining them rightly, and even the ones that are mined, the cash is largely pocketed. In Nigeria, oil cash is stolen brazenly. Politicians jostle to become oil minister in Nigeria. Not because of their love for the country, but all in a bid to line their pockets.

    Ibrahim’s clip also makes me wonder if the present crop of leaders in Africa can take us on the China route.

    Last April, I was in Shenzhen, one of China’s top four cities. Until the early 80s, the city was on its knees. Like the bulk of China, poverty was a friend to many of its inhabitants. All it took to change this city’s fortune — and by extension, China’s fortune — was the right decision by a focused leadership. The government of the time had no money to spend in developing the city so it declared the city a special economic zone. Foreign investors were encouraged with all manners of incentives. The first focus was on how to reform the nation’s telecommunications sector, which was in a terrible state. Like it was in Nigeria and for the bulk of Africa at the time, the telephone was for the rich. The investors changed all that and in a few years, the telephone became for all. This era gave birth to Huawei, now a giant in the global telecommunications world.

    As at 1980, which marked the end of two decades of hardship and internal conflict in China, the country only had a telephone penetration rate of 0.22%, which was one of the lowest rates in the world at the time. Before the reforms, telephone lines were restricted only to senior government officials. This, according to the World Bank, was also at a time when the poverty rate was 88% and the number of registered vehicles stood at 365,000. I saw pictures of the old Shenzhen. There is no link between the pictures I saw and the Shenzhen I spent four days in. Like they say in Seven-Up commercials, the difference is clear. The architectures are a world apart; the infrastructures are incomparable. The people have become sophisticated. And the country is better for Shenzhen’s growth from the back of the world to being known as the technology and financial hub.

    We need to declare special economic zones in many cities in Africa. Studying and adopting the China model may go a long way. But, are our leaders ready to go that way? Africa must ronu. Seriously!

    My final take: The old leaders in Africa must give the young ones the chance to fix the mess they have put us all in. Being young is not a disease. Most of the time, it means strength; it means innovation; it means doggedness, and it means a determination to excel and prove a point. So Africa must encourage its young minds in governance, the corporate world, and elsewhere. If some young people have messed up, many old people have done the unthinkable.