Category: Emeka Omeihe

Those familiar with Southeast terrain must have been jolted when the leadership of cattle breeders alleged the rustling of 300 cows and kidnap of 10 herders in the Ogbaru Local Government Area of Anambra State.

The story re-enacted sad memories of the Chibok, Kankara and Kagara incidents where hundreds of students were abducted from their hostels and hurled into thick forests without any trace? The only difference being cows were more involved than humans. Could this be possible in that region given its terrain?

Even if it was possible to kidnap 10 herders and keep them out of public view, it appeared a remote possibility that 300 cows could just disappear in such environment without being traced in few hours.

Such was the feeling when Southeast chairman of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria MACBAN, Gidado Siddiki alleged the abduction of 10 herders and rustling of 300 cows by gunmen. He had also alleged the gunmen established contacts demanding N4million ransom and one gun from the families of the victims.

But Anambra State Police Command in a statement titled: “Update on the alleged gunmen attack on herders in Anambra State, kidnap of 10 and rustling of 300 cows”, said “on April 24, some of the victims were seen in the bush unharmed while one of the victims is still missing”. They also discovered some of the livestock in the bush even as they are intensifying efforts to locate the herder and livestock still missing. The police promised further update on the matter.

But as the update was being awaited, chairman of the Ogbaru Local Government Area, Arinzechukwu Awogu faulted the kidnap report when he said no herder was kidnapped neither were cows rustled in the area. The council boss described such reports as misleading even as he admitted there was a misunderstanding between farmers and herders which made the herders to flee the area for safety only to return to recover their cows when calm returned. Awogu who said he was personally involved with the leadership of MACBAN in returning normalcy to the area wondered why a case of abduction and cattle rustling would be peddled by Siddiki.

One may have ignored this story given that cattle rustling and kidnapping have become a regular occurrence in this country for which the law enforcement agencies are yet to find an appropriate handle. But that would amount to naivety of the most extreme hue.

Not with the intervention of the Ogbaru council chairman repudiating claims of the abduction and rustling. Not also with the tepid explanations offered by the police on the incident. There are weighty issues in the accounts of Siddiki and the police that should be interrogated further especially in view of the new angle offered by Awogu.

He did not only fault the kidnap and rustling allegation but also revealed the efforts he made with some MACBAN leaders to resolve the disagreement such that, by 11.30pm on the fateful day, calm had been restored as all the cows rejoined their herders.

And since he spoke nothing has come either from MACBAN or the police to the contrary. It is also instructive the police said they saw the herders and some of the cows on April 24, a day after the incident unharmed.

There are issues thrown up by the police account and the allegation by MACBAN that can only be ignored at a great risk especially given the nature of the allegation in contention. Police account of the incident appeared to have created more doubts than it set out to resolve. The disagreement took place on Saturday and resolved that same day. The police saw some of the victims and cows in the bush on Sunday unharmed. One herder was missing.

In a grave allegation of this nature, one had expected the police to have come clear on the number of herders they saw in the bush, their conditions and that of the cows. They should have come clear on whether it was a case of kidnapping and cattle rustling as alleged but they preferred to prevaricate.

The public deserves to know whether the bush the herders and cows were located by the police was the exact place of the disagreement or the dens of the alleged kidnappers. They should have come clear on whether the evidence they saw bore semblance with the allegations peddled by MACBAN or the account of the Ogbaru council boss. Surprisingly, they left those aspects of their investigation hanging.

But a cursory view of the title of police statement spoke of “alleged gunmen attack on herders…” My reading of this is that the police did not believe the allegation of an attack, kidnap and cattle rustling. Knowing that institution for what it is, they would not have had any difficulty reporting such if there was evidence to that effect.

Even then, the report that they saw the herders and the cows in the bush except one missing herder does not confer the kind of fatality the allegation of Siddiki conveyed. Neither did we see any evidence of the demand of N4million ransom and one gun each from the alleged victims.

So from where did the MACBAN leadership get the story of the money and gun ransom? And how come MACBAN went ahead to raise such an alarm when its leadership was involved in the resolution of the disagreement? How come?

These searing posers are at the centre of the feeling that there is more to the MACBAN conduct than ordinarily meets the eyes. Not unexpectedly, this has given rise to speculations that the allegation could be a subterfuge for an impending attack on the community by killer herdsmen. Nobody should dismiss this dimension. Not with experiences in parts of the country.

It was good the police and the military swung into quick action in a bid to rescue the cows and the herders. Had this dexterity and quick response been demonstrated in protecting innocent citizens from attacks by killer herdsmen/bandits, that phenomenon would have by now been history. Security agencies should sustain this momentum to put a lie to insinuations that they responded the way they did because cows and herders were involved.

Reservations trailing the decision by the federal government to conduct a national population census immediately after the 2023 general elections are not unexpected.

This is more so given the history of past censuses marred by intense controversy that robbed off negatively on their overall outcome and acceptance.  With this contentious background, the minimum expectation was that the authorities should have taken measures to eliminate all stumbling blocks to a credible and generally acceptable national headcount.

But this projection appears not to have been properly factored in when the Director-General (DG) of Nigeria Population Commission, NPC Nasir Isa-Kwarra announced after the National Council of State meeting that the exercise will hold a month after the 2023 general elections. Curiously also, the agency intends to hold a pilot census this June after the primaries by political parties.

The NPC boss sought to justify the imminence of the census on the ground that extant population data are obsolete projections and estimations with questionable value for planning purposes. It is an open secret that this country has no reliable census data. It is also not in doubt that previous attempts at a reliable census data were dogged by intense controversy, sometimes leading to the rejection of their outcome.

So the issue is not as much with the justification for a reliable national headcount as with its timing. Why the NPC scheduled its pilot scheme after primaries by political parties and the national census after the general elections remains unclear. Is there anything in the conduct of elections that promises to enhance the success and credibility of a national headcount? There is no evidence of that. Rather, the two engagements share common traits in their capacity to divide the country along the line. They are potentially rancorous and explosive.

Being potentially controversial and explosive engagements, there is the mortal risk of effectively managing eventualities arising from their outcome. Ours is a country where elections are synonymous with violence of unimaginable proportions leading to loss of lives and property. In some previous instances, it took considerable time before the crisis escalated by such elections could normalize.

It remains puzzling how a national census that may divide people along the line will fare immediately after usually disputed and rancorous polls. The probable scenario is one that will re-ignite the misgivings and distrusts usually generated by the outcome of such elections.

Their combined outcome will likely produce consequences nobody can predict. In effect, having the two incongruous and controversial national assignments close to each other may ignite crisis of proportions that will make a child’s play of extant insecurity in the country.

Even now, many local government areas across the country are inaccessible on accounts of festering insecurity levied by all manner of non-state actors. There are genuine worries on the prospects of elections holding in those communities and local governments if insecurity remains in its current form. It is for the same reason that many well-meaning Nigerians have expressed doubts as to whether the 2023 polls will even hold.

Even if we manage to gamble the elections as INEC has vowed, it will be counterproductive to treat a national headcount similarly. It will make a mess of the entire exercise if people in crisis-torn areas are neither reached nor counted. The suspension of the continuous voters’ registration exercise by INEC in some local government areas should drive home this point most poignantly.

When you add up the potentially disruptive effects of do-or-die elections to the unceasing insecurity that has reduced the worth of human life in this country, one is not left in doubt that the proposed census is ill-timed and ill-advised. It is loaded with frightening prospects for sliding the country closer to the precipice.

The country is currently assailed by existential challenges from all fronts. It is more divided and fragmented than ever before with rising suspicion and mistrust among the constituents. Such misgivings are bound to exacerbate given the high premium the constituents place on the headcount. Things are not remedied by the fact that both revenue sharing and representation in national and state legislatures are based on population.

The two last censuses in 1991 and 2006 did not mark any departure from previous ones as they were equally embroiled in intense disputations as sections sought to gain advantage over others. But while that of 1991 posted a figure of 88.9 million people its 2006 variant came up with 140 million people.

Even then, the unreliability of these figures was brought to the fore by a former chairman of the NPC, Eze Festus Odimegwu. He had told officials of the INEC who approached his agency to officially release some certified data to them to assist in their planned constituency delimitation exercise that there were no officially certified data for all the localities in the country.

Hear him, “the enumeration centres we have, some of them do not exist in reality, some politicians bought them the way you will want to register voters and some people will buy voters’ cards in order to have advantage”. He said those who bought these enumeration areas, raised the figure from about ‘250 to 500 and if you later count and discover that the population is 10, they will say no, but we gave you 500, you have to raise it to that number that we gave you’.

Odimegwu lost his job for coming clear on the monumental fraud past censuses had been. But the issues raised illustrate how desperate our people can go on such issues and a measure of the level of controversy they engender. We can do with less of that crisis now.

Unless there is an agenda that must be executed before this regime exits office, the census should wait for the next government after it has satisfactorily addressed subsisting security challenges.

The suspension and eventual sack of Chief Imam of the National Assembly legislators’ quarters’ mosque, Sheikh Nuru Khalid have come and gone.

But the propriety of the punitive measures by the management committee of the mosque will continue to divide opinion. Khalid had during his penultimate Friday’s sermon, taken on the government for its inability to secure lives and properties in the country.

We will reproduce aspects of that sermon since they are at the centre of the dispute. Hear the Sheikh: “Most parts of the country are not secured. The government is always telling us that they are doing their best. But we deserve the best as citizens because we want a secured Nigeria”.

“You have been given four years and an addition, yet people are dying like fowls, killing is becoming the norm in Nigeria under your watch, Mr. President”.

He did not end there: “What you are telling us is that your concern is about the 2023 elections. And what I am telling the citizens is to send a message that we are going to vote under one condition. Nigerian masses should resort to only one term which is, protect our lives, we will come out to vote, let us be killed, we will not come out to vote”.

The Imam appeared mindful that his sermon might not go down well with the authorities when he said he was willing to take responsibility for calling out the president on his inability to tackle the security challenges in the country. And true to his prediction, he lost his job for it. But he struck as a man of conscience and conviction when he stood his grounds contending that his sermon is for the overall good of the country.

The first two passages of his sermon reproduced above are statements of fact. Most parts of the country are not secured as evident in the near state of anarchy. Killings and atrocious acts by bandits/ terrorists have reduced human life to nothing and continues to question the relevance and capacity of the government to live up to its primary duty of existence. It is inconceivable how anyone can pick holes in this.

There are no new issues in the first two passages that are not already within the public domain. Neither can the Imam be faulted for reminding President Buhari that he was captured in video while campaigning for votes promising Nigerians he would put an end to insurgency when he comes to power. Indeed, he had after three months in office claimed Boko Haram had been technically defeated. Today, not only is Boko Haram still much alive, insecurity has metastasized to dangerous dimensions.

Perhaps, the third passage dealing with conditions on which the electorate will vote could be the source of Khalid’s travails. Chairman of the mosque management committee, Saidu Dansadau said that much when he claimed the cleric’s teachings on political apathy are unIslamic among others.

“You are an influencer; your words carry a lot of weight, your words can make or mar our situation, your words can be taken advantage of by mischief makers or enemies of the country for their devilish agenda”, were some of the reasons Dansadau gave for sacking the cleric.

What can be deduced from the explanations of Dansadau is that aspects of the cleric’s sermon on conditions for the electorate to vote during the 2023 elections were clear calls for political apathy. It is difficult to fathom how this meaning could be ascribed to such a provisional statement.

The statement is meant to draw attention of the government to the absurdity in expecting high voters’ turn-out in a largely insecure environment. That is a statement of fact and a call for appropriate responses to secure the country and guarantee the success of the elections. The General Overseer, Redeemed Christian Church of God, Pastor Enoch Adeboye had last week not only criticized the government on escalating insecurity but raised fears on the prospects of the 2023 elections.

Khalid is genuinely worried by the seeming government’s obsession with the coming elections in the face of the ravaging insecurity.  Many states are so ravaged and pummelled by banditry/ terrorism that those cut down in the process, have become minuses from the election register. The dead cannot vote. Neither will those killed in the escalating kidnapping, banditry and terrorism be part of any election process.

So the call on the government to secure the country and guarantee the success of the elections is a patriotic one. That is the positive side of his sermon. Unfortunately, Dansadau and his committee approached it from the negative angle. Their position is all part of the culture of intolerance to alternative views that has done no good to this supposedly democratic contraption.

Positions like these are part of the reasons little progress has been made in this country. At any rate, how does the gagging of the Imam or his sack address the festering insecurity? One had expected the committee to be more concerned with what a government being overwhelmed by unceasing insecurity is doing to stem the tide. But they would not have any of such. Theirs is morbid fear for criticisms and curious proclivity for regime protection.

There is also the tenuous suggestion that taking on the government for its inability to halt the unceasing killings and destruction of properties would worsen the situation. Maybe commendation will be the tonic that will stem the tide even when insecurity is overwhelming the leadership.

Given the fault-lines of this country and their disruptive effects in nation building, it is good the criticism came from a revered Imam. Had it been otherwise, apologists of the regime would have rushed to hurl invectives, ascribing primordial, partisan political and religious motives to the sermon.

Khalid spoke truth to power. His sack is of questionable value in diminishing the issues raised in his sermon.  This country has dire need for people above ethnic, religious and political leanings in addressing existential issues of our federal order.

Those still confounded by the ease with which bandits bombed an Abuja-Kaduna passenger train, killed eight people, injured many with several others abducted should hold it. The reasons for its successful execution and the general reign of terror that has reduced human life to nothing in Kaduna State and the northwest are beginning to emerge. If it takes the train calamity for us to get at the root of the festering banditry/terrorism that has consigned the country to a verity of the Hobbesian state of nature, the incident though condemnable, may be serving a useful purpose.

Before last week’s attack, there had been a similar attempt that destroyed the rail track on the same route though the train successfully manoeuvred its way out. But the level of mortal damage both in human and material capital from the recent terror attack exposed the vulnerability of the citizens to continuing onslaughts of bandits/terrorists.

The train attacks have been roundly condemned with blames heaped at the doorsteps of the federal government for its serial inability to guarantee the safety of lives and property. Not a few have also expressed frustrations with the seeming kid gloves the government treats the mortal danger posed by the activities of bandits/terrorists in this country.

Not long ago, fiery Islamic preacher, Sheikh Ahmad Gumi had warned that bandits were fast acquiring ant-aircraft guns. But the authorities never gave attention to that until they successfully brought down one of the Nigerian Air force jets. Gumi had also sought amnesty for the bandits as the only condition for them to come out of their evil ways.

The manner Gumi conducted himself in his interactions with bandits in Zamfara forests and elsewhere had raised suspicion that he knew more than he was making the rest of us to believe. Suspicion of complicity in the banditry in the northwest gave rise to calls on the Buhari government to have Gumi arrested.

Though the government never gave heed to such calls, something of significance emerged from Gumi s account of his interaction with the bandits in Zamfara forests. The two camps he had discussions with in the forests were those of the bandits and the Fulani.

According to Gumi, during the presentation of their grievances, leaders of the bandits listed them as cattle rustling and attacks on the Fulani by the military and indigenes of Zamfara. What emerged from the disclosure was that both the bandits and the Fulani herdsmen shared common identity and challenges. They are two sides of the same coin.

In this column in May last year titled “A Bandits’ Republic”, I had drawn copious attention to the increasing slide of the country to a verity of the sovereignty of the bandits. My position then was in part, based on the escalating kidnapping escapades and killings by the bandits in the face of the inability of the government to rein them in.

Additionally, Gumi’s account of his interaction with bandits which showed no difference between the grievances of the bandits and Fulani herdsmen had injected complications into the matter and diminished quick prospects of workable solution. It was envisioned that with such mixed identity, the challenge of banditry was bound to assume a complex dimension.

The body language of the federal government on the insurgency of the herdsmen did not help matters. So a bandits’ republic had become an emerging possibility in the face of the inability of the government to smoke them out of the ungoverned forests they had firmly established authority.

It is not surprising they subsequently grew in strength and sophistication to the extent of attacking the Kaduna International Airport killing one and disrupting flights. As if the airport attack was not grave enough, the train terror onslaught brought the reality of the mortal danger of armed banditry/ terrorism closer to the doorsteps of the authorities.

And for Kaduna State, it was the tonic for the truth to come out. It provided the window for equivocation and doublespeak to give way to truth. And that moment came when Governor Nasir El-Rufai received in audience, the Minister of Transport, Chibuike Amaechi.

El-Rufai was so devastated by the incident that he had to spill the beans only if that will prick the collective consciences of the authorities to halt the scourge. Hear him: “The bandits’ hideouts are known. We know where they are. We have enough intelligence for us to take action. The SSS have their phone numbers, they listen to them and they give me report. We know what they are planning.”

These disclosures are as weighty and grave as they are revealing. Even as they provide a lead to the unceasing insurgency of the bandits, the issues are not entirely new. It had long become evident that the camps of the bandits are known to Gumi, security agencies and government officials that were part of his trip.

Despite this weight of credible intelligence, the government failed to act citing the need to avoid harming innocent inhabitants of the camps. Yet, it is from the same camps the bandits levy terror on innocent citizens at their homes, on the roads and elsewhere killing and maiming them. That is why the Buhari regime has been accused of duplicity in the reign of terror that has held the country prostrate.

This lethargy allowed the bandits to perfect in sophistication to attack airports and passenger trains. It is good El-Rufai has been forced by frustrations to speak out. He had in the past justified duplicity in selective military responses to banditry and self-determination campaigns on the ground that the former was only in the business of collecting ransom.

He is now in a better stead to know there is no difference between banditry and terrorism and that bandits are terrorists. But it is late in the day as innocent citizens have had to pay dearly for this tardiness. Curiously, Kaduna State has been at the receiving end of banditry.

Its annual security report had it that 937 people were killed by terrorists in 2020 and 1,972 kidnapped. In 2021, 3,348 residents were kidnapped and 1,192 murdered. These are chilling statistics from just one state. But they speak volumes on the general slide to anarchy in the country. The cat has been let out of the bag. The government owes explanation on El-Rufai’s revelations.

It is not for nothing that the court verdict that sacked Governor Dave Umahi of Ebonyi state and his deputy, Kelechi Igwe generated intense public interest. This should be expected in view of the sensitive nature of the issue in dispute.

Justice Inyang Ekwo of a federal high court, Abuja had declared illegal, the defection of Umahi and Igwe from the Peoples Democratic Party PDP to the All Progressives Congress APC in a suit brought before him by the PDP. The court ruled that the offices of the governor and deputy governor of Ebonyi State belonged to the PDP and that the option for Umahi and his deputy is to vacate office and wait for the next election to contest under the platform of the new party.

The court restricted Umahi and Igwe from parading themselves as governor and deputy governor of Ebonyi State on the ground that by Section 221 of the constitution and the democratic system of government operated in Nigeria, votes are won by the political parties and not their candidates. By the same token, the votes won at an election by a political party cannot be transferred to or utilized for the benefit of another political party or member of another political party.

In another judgment, Justice Ekwo also sacked 16 members of the Ebonyi State House of Assembly who defected from the PDP to the APC on the same grounds the governor and his deputy got removed.

Surprisingly, Umahi reacted angrily to the court verdict bandying damaging allegations against Justice Ekwo and Nigerian judiciary. In an outburst, he described the judgment as “jungle justice” and Justice Ekwo as “a hatchet man” who was on a mission to embarrass the APC and the federal government. “I feel sorry for the Nigerian judiciary” he said at a press conference.

He did not just pass a vote of no confidence on the judiciary but arrogated to himself the powers of the appellate courts when he called on the people of Ebonyi State to “disregard the judgment because it’s null and void”.

But he appeared to have contradicted all these claims when he vowed to appeal the judgment. Why appeal a judgment you claimed to be null and void?

One would have expected the occupant of such elated office to have called for calm while arrangements were being made to appeal the ruling. But he would never have any of such as he spoke in a manner that cast serious slur on his leadership credentials. Is this brash reaction the temperament of a man aspiring to lead this beleaguered country?

He was to approach the appeal court the following day apparently to prevent the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC from issuing Certificate of Return to the candidates hurriedly forwarded by the PDP to replace him and his deputy in line with court directive. His tirade against the judge and the judiciary was so much so that the Nigerian Bar Association NBA had to challenge his claims, demanding apology.  He has since apologized.

But that is beside the point. The issue involved is very fundamental and at the heart of the survival of the democratic contraption this country is operating. It is a contention on the propriety or otherwise of governors and their deputies as well as legislators elected on the platform of a political party defecting to other political parties in manners that offend public conscience. We are dealing with the dearth of principles and ideology among elected political office holders that propel them to jump ship at will.

It is a concern for the survival of multi-party democracy driven by the conviction that something must be done to check mindless defections in our political process. It is nothing personal nor is the Ebonyi case different from events in some other states. But Ebonyi has become a test case and many are happy that serial defectors are being made to account for their scant regard for principles.

Umahi argued that the constitution provides three ways to remove a governor: death, resignation and impeachment. That is correct. But the judge also raised issues on the conflict in transferring the votes of a political party to another or using such votes for the benefit of another political party or individual. The contention that the constitution is put in jeopardy where the collective will of the electorate is brazenly merchandized by elected officials without consequences is unassailable.

That is the substance of the matter which the superior courts will have to determine. Whichever way it goes, jurisprudence will be better for it. But the overall objective should be to find effective therapeutic responses to the incalculable harm wrought on the democratic enterprise by politicians who take refuge in loopholes to compromise the mandate given them by the electorate for self-serving ends.

If Umahi is challenging the verdict on the basis that it is outside the constitutional grounds on which a governor can be removed from office, the same cannot be said of the 16 members of the Ebonyi State House of Assembly also sacked on the same ground.

Section 68(1) (g) and Section 109(1) (g) of the constitution provides conditions in which federal and state legislators can defect without losing their seats- division in the political party of which they were previously members, merger of two or more political parties or faction by one of which they were previously sponsored.

For the lawmakers, no such situations existed in their party prior to their defection. Neither did they adduce such reasons. The ruling is a landmark judgment. It is perhaps, the first time such defections have been seriously challenged. It may well signal the end of the madness called defections that compromise multi-party democracy and assail the collective will of the electorate as expressed at the ballot box. Concerns on the dangers of defections on these shores are not new.

There is a bill awaiting second reading at the House of Representatives which seeks amendments to the constitution to have a defecting president, vice president, governor and deputy governor expressly vacate their offices in the absence of the conditions stipulated in sections 68 and 109 of the constitution.

Nigeria urgently needs such laws to save our democracy. Before now, scholars have argued that the African culture abhors opposition. That appears the emerging tendency in the spate of defections. The danger of a one party state is real unless those who defect are compelled by law to vacate their offices.

The dispute between the airline, Air Peace and the Emir of Kano, Alhaji Aminu Ado Bayero could have been sorted out behind the scene but for its mishandling by his chief protocol officer, Isa Bayero.

What are the issues? The emir had arrived at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos from Banjul, Gambia at about 5.52am and wanted to connect the 6.15 am Air Peace flight to Kano. His cousin who doubles as his chief protocol officer, Isa placed a call to the chairman of the airline, Allen Onyema around 5.59am requesting that the flight be delayed for an hour to accommodate the emir and nine others in his entourage.

Onyema who was woken up by the early morning call, requested for some time to get across to his officials at the airport on the situation on the ground. On learning that the plane was already fully loaded and taxing to take-off, he got back to the emir’s cousin on the difficulty in acceding to his request. He then offered to accommodate the emir in the 7am flight to Abuja.

The suggestion was said to have been turned down outright by Isa who later wrote a petition to the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority NCAA against the airline over what he termed “disrespect to the Emir and the people of Kano”. In the petition, Isa demanded punitive measures from the NCAA against Air Peace.

It is not clear the type of punishment Isa wanted from the NCAA against the airline for alleged disrespect to the emir and the people of Kano. Neither is the public privy to the response he got from the aviation regulating authority on his petition. But comments from Isa as the altercation progressed indicated that the NCAA viewed his position as incitement to the people of Kano against the airline. Isa admitted that much when he said: “I wrote to the DG of the NCAA to complain but if someone claimed my statement is inciting, well they are entitled to their opinion”. We shall return to this.

In their reaction to the petition, the Chief Operating Officer of the airline, Toyin Olajide denied claims that the organization disrespected the emir. In a detailed account of what transpired between them and Isa, the company said their decision not to delay a fully loaded and taxing aircraft was rather to protect the image of the emir.

“If we had agreed to stop and delay an aircraft already set to take-off, for another one hour only for the doors to be opened and the emir to walk in, there would have been a very serious uproar in the media against the airline and the emir”, Olajide said.  The official further claimed they pleaded with Isa to understand the situation but he refused.

Apparently rattled by the reaction of the airline, Isa issued a 72-hour ultimatum to them to tender apology to the emir in a national daily first and then come down physically to Kano and show remorse or they will go extra miles to press home their dissatisfaction with the conduct of the airline.

Isa’s case is that the airline delayed their flight from Banjul to Lagos for over one hour resulting in their late arrival. He is contending that since the same airline was responsible for their late arrival, they should take responsibility for their inability to connect the Kano early morning flight.

To prove the point that they made bookings in that aircraft, he said when they wanted to re-book the next available flight to Kano billed for 7pm, the airline asked them to pay a “no show” fee.

But the airline had claimed that the Banjul-Lagos flight terminated in Lagos and had no connection with any other destination. These claims need to be proven conclusively.

Even as the emir’s chief protocol officer is yet to furnish evidence of bookings for that flight, there are salient issues of customer relationship that are thrown up by the dispute. If an airline delays a connection flight and makes it impossible for their passengers to meet up, the responsibility should be heaped at the shoulders of that airline and not the passengers. That point has to be made.

But that is beside the issue. The dispute is not about the airline denying responsibility for the delayed Banjul-Lagos flight. It is the propriety in tagging the refusal to stop a fully loaded and taxing aircraft for one hour as a mark of disrespect for the emir and the people of Kano. There is obviously, no positive correlation between the two. It is mischief in its extreme form to impute such motives into the incident. Isa failed to give the matter the professional handle required of it.

Rather, he escalated and politicized it by dragging the entire people of Kano State into a routine infraction common to our domestic airline operations. Ordinarily, the airline should have no difficulty tendering apology to the emir for the delay if that was the issue. But that was not the initial demand of the emir’s cousin. After all, a customer is always right, in business parlance. He was only bent on extracting punishment from the airline.

The dispute got to its current entanglement because of its obvious mishandling by the emir’s cousin. First, he wrote the NCAA bandying inciting and combustible allegations to procure undeserved punishment against the airline. But he failed and was rather cautioned by the NCAA on the implications of his letter but it made no difference to him.

Apparently dissatisfied with the position of the NCAA, he went further to issue royal ultimatum and award judgment for the publication of an apology in a national daily. The last time I read of such costs, they were issued by a court of competent jurisdiction. He has even threatened dire consequences should the airline fail to accede to his royal proclamation. Very strange indeed!

Isa even made veiled threats to incite the people of Kano State against patronizing the airline, all in the desire to avenge the alleged disrespect of the emir. He is free to patronize any airline of his choice if he is dissatisfied with the services of the one in question. But to drag in and incite the people of Kano on this singular issue is revealing of how many of the crises in those cities are generated by the elite.

Isa has already erected obstacles to a mutual resolution of the dispute through his brash and arrogant posturing. If Air Peace accedes to the condescending ultimatum, then, other airlines should be prepared to take orders from an Obi or Oba on similar matters.

What interests will suffer now that President Buhari assented to the Electoral Act amendment bill? This poser is still relevant even with the belated signing of the bill into law. Even then, the president’s reservations on section 84 (12) targeted largely at statutory delegates, cannot justify the time it took to assent to the bill.

Not even the excuse of wider consultations would suffice since this bill had been sent to him before. But on each occasion, he found excuses to delay and decline. Perhaps, he may have capitalized on section 84 to refuse assent but for pressure from the public.

The Saraki-led National Assembly had before the 2019 elections, transmitted to him amendments to the electoral law which were to enhance the conduct of that election. But Buhari declined assent on the excuse that it came too close to the election. That election is now history. But the electoral malfeasances which the National Assembly wanted checked by amending sections of the Electoral Act, miserably featured prominently during that election.

Given this, expectations were that action would be on top gear after the elections to re-work that document to ensure that our electoral past characterized by rigging, alteration and falsification of election results are consigned to the dust bin of history. But that expectation was not fast in coming.

It took agitations from the larger society before the current National Assembly woke up from slumber. Even then, they disappointed not a few when they sought to subject the Independent National Electoral Commission’s INEC decision to deploy technology during elections to the approval of government agencies with no business in electoral matters.

Again, it took protestations from the public for the Lawan-led National Assembly to go back to the drawing board. They moved expeditiously and came up with provisions for direct party primaries and electronic transmission of election results among others.

But the president refused assent to the bill raising objections that direct primaries did not make for plurality of options; citing cost and logistic implications as some of his reservations. The National Assembly was faced with the choice of overriding the powers of the president by invoking extant constitutional provisions.

Apparently to avert possible confrontation or out of deference, the National Assembly was quick to re-work that document. In the new document, direct primaries did not feature as the indirect and consensus options were adopted.

Since the main objection of the president had been addressed by the new bill despite the limitations of indirect primaries, it was expected he would assent to it without delay. But again, that failed to happen. The body language of the presidency did not accord with the serious attention and urgency that document demanded.

Again, it took demonstrations from civil society groups and sundry allegations and accusations by the opposition for the presidency to come public with puerile excuses on the matter. That was a few days to the expiry of the mandatory period for presidential assent.

Yet, this is a president that had copiously been giving assurances for free, fair and credible elections. The impression we get from the foot-dragging is that the Buhari regime is not very comfortable with electronic transmission of election results despite claims and pontifications to the contrary. Now that he has assented to the bill, the feeling is that he is compelled to do so by the sheer weight of public pressure. So, he cannot possibly take all the credit for assenting to the bill

Only last December, during a virtual summit on democracy organized by President Joe Biden of the United State of America, Buhari promised to put in place and strengthen “all necessary mechanisms to ensure that Nigeria will not only record another peaceful transfer of power to an elected democratic government but will also ensure that elections are conducted in a free, fair and transparent manner”.

That promise has been in serious conflict with his serial prevarications in assenting to the electoral bill until last Friday when he seemed to have succumbed to pressure. In modern democracies, the National Assembly represents the aggregate of the total views of the electorate.

It is composed of elected representatives of the people and they speak on their behalf. They spoke clearly and eloquently on this matter and the president did not seem to have any choice than assenting to that bill if we are not contending with a verity of Robert Michel’s iron law of oligarchy.

Our legislators allayed the fears of the president by expunging direct primaries from the bill.  The new bill now provides for indirect primaries and consensus as well as the visionary electronic transmission of election results. The bill is both visionary and ambitious and in it can be found effective therapeutic responses to electoral fraud and associated vices.

It baffled that Buhari did not seem to have appreciated the urgency in giving that piece of legislation the utmost urgency required of it. Not even with warnings from INEC that delay in signing the bill would adversely affect its preparations for elections in two states in a few months’ time.

Yet, this is one piece of legislation that could derail constitutional democracy if not given the desired handle. And what remains of a putative democratic construct that cannot guarantee the sovereignty of the electorate?

Buhari touched on this contradiction when he lamented during the virtual summit that the democratic gains of the past decades are under threat of unconstitutional takeover of power…due to ‘unilateral amendment of constitutions by some African leaders’

Our democracy faced similar threats while he delayed and prevaricated on the electoral bill. The new law is most welcome. Those popular with their constituents have nothing to fear.