The Nation Newspaper

Category: Monday

  • Buhari’s curious comparison

    When President Buhari’s schedule of visits to some troubled states was unveiled last week, it attracted immediate criticisms from Governor Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State. The fiery governor lampooned the president for the delayed visits in the face of wanton killings and despoliation in parts of the country. For him, the proposed visits were an afterthought.

    Fayose who appeared to have appropriated the role of spokesman for the opposition PDP, accused the president of embarking on the belated visit due to stern criticisms and to achieve objectives of partisan political nature. He questioned what they were meant to achieve after much time had been lost. Those conversant with the Ekiti governor’s unrelenting criticisms are wont to dismiss him as a man who never sees anything good in the Buhari administration.

    But events from the president’s first outing in Taraba State appear to have shown that the whimsical governor saw the future. In the course of that visit, Buhari was reported to have said, he had his own way of getting intelligence on happenings across the country and so “should not be expected to always go out to the field to make noise and insult the sensibilities of Nigerians before it would be known that I am taking actions against the killings”.

    It can be discerned from the above that Buhari never believed in visiting these states where hundreds of those he governs are constantly under one form of instigated violence or the other. His view of such visits is that they amounted to playing to the gallery since he could as well handle their fallouts from the comfort of his office. That is the logical interpretation of his position.

    Nobody expects the president, given his schedule, to be in all parts of the country every time. But it is inherently wrong to suggest that visiting the scenes of violence where citizens are regularly mowed down while law enforcement agencies appear helpless has no positive value. That would be strange indeed given the frightening dimension the killings assumed in recent times. There is much to be gained from his visiting, commiserating with victims and undertaking on-the-spot assessment of the situation to find lasting solutions to them. If anything, it will portray him as one who cares for citizens. Such visits can neither be tagged jamborees nor completely ignored by any leader who has the overall welfare of his people at heart.

    If what the presidents said represents his understanding of the objective of such visits, those who criticize him for lack of sympathy for the families of victims are on strong point. And why the belated trip to Taraba and others in his plan if all there is to them is to make noise and insult the sensibilities of Nigerians? Could it now be construed there is no value in his trips to Taraba and Plateau states especially given his failure to visit the scenes of the unmitigated violence that has left the states a verity of the Hobbesian state of nature where life has at once become nasty, brutish and short?

    These posers underscore the contradiction Buhari courted for himself in an attempt to get even with critics over his serial failure to visit states where the killings appear to have defied solution. It is not just visiting for itself but to undertake critical appraisal of all the facts to the unmitigated killings with a view to providing lasting solutions to them. Governments exist to maintain law and order. A government loses relevance and legitimacy when this cardinal objective is observed in the breach. No sacrifice is too much for a government in ensuring the safety of lives and property of its citizens.

    It was also an irony of sorts that the president found that occasion auspicious to rehash the questionable success his government has made in stabilizing the security of the country and fighting corruption. His audience would be definitely amazed at the touted success on security challenges in the face of the stark dangers they face on account of recurring killings that have defied solution. As the president spoke, the killings were still going and many are still without homes as they languish in the various camps for internally displaced people. The visit had nothing for them as 24 people have since been killed in the neighboring Benue State as the president visited.

    Again, his comparison of the level of killings in the Mambilla plateau with those of Benue and Zamfara is very revealing and scandalous. Hear him, “there were more killings in Mambilla than Benue and Zamfara states. I chose to visit Taraba first, but I will be going to Benue and Zamfara after I return from Ghana to also condole with the people”.

    There are issues with the president’s position even as his unfettered access to information is not in doubt. If the number of killings in the Mambilla plateau is much higher than those of Benue and Zamfara, it all boils down to the fact that information on the killings had all along, been suppressed by the same government. Why he chose the visit to make that information public remains cloudy. It also demonstrates how fragile the security situation in the country has been. But that is beside the issue. The question is what to do with the comparison and why the president deemed it fit?

    My guess is that his choice of Taraba was because the killings in the Mambilla outnumbered those of Benue and Zamfara. Having assigned weight to the level of killings, he chose to start with the state where the impact was much higher. That may as well be. But his comparison is also fraught with some suspicion. Mambilla represents one of the flashpoints of violence in the Taraba crises where many Fulani people were said to have been killed by the Mambilla militia. There is also the crisis in the Lau Local Government Area of the state where 68 people were allegedly killed by Fulani herdsmen in January this year and given mass burial. In the same month, there were some killings at Gidin Dorowa in the Wukari local government by herdsmen. These represent the three centres of violence in the Taraba conundrum.

    Curiously, Buhari singled out the one in the Mambilla as the basis for comparison as if the Mambilla killings are all there is to the Taraba crises. Maybe it was a slip of the tongue. He may have had Taraba in mind as he spoke. Unfortunately what came out from him (twice) was Mambilla conveying the impression that what he knows of the Taraba killings is all about the Mambilla. Nobody has come out to clarify that the president actually meant Taraba and not Mambilla.

    This has again fuelled allegations of clannishness against the president. If all he knows of the killings in Taraba is all about the Mambilla plateau, then it exposes his inner mind. It is an uncanny coincidence that the Mambilla he referenced upon was where the Fulani people had more casualties in the senseless killings. Could it be that the Mambilla drew the attention of the president because most of those killed there were of the Fulani stock?

    It is not for nothing that the president has been accused of bias in his perception of the Taraba crisis. There was no need for such comparison as the loss of one life is sufficient for the president to show concern for the dead. Nations go to war because of the life of one of their citizens. Talking of numbers in the circumstance without even touching base with the bereaved and displaced, damaged the purpose of that visit.

    Besides, it was inherently contradictory to appropriate credit for stabilizing the nation’s security in the face of what we are being made to believe on the quantum of lives that have been lost but which for obvious reasons, have been kept under wraps. It is unhelpful now to dwell on numbers. The lesson they serve will depend on the measures taken to ensure such killings do not repeat.

    More fundamentally, we need to understand that the character and texture of all these crises differ from one place to the other. Whereas Benue and Taraba states are contending with clashes arising from activities of the herdsmen, that of Zamfara is of a different dimension all together. It is called banditry. The leadership of Zamfara State fingers well-armed Fulani herdsmen and fleeing Boko Haram insurgents for the banditry. They fear if the indiscriminate killings for no just cause are not quickly curtailed, insecurity in that state will turn out a child’s play compared to the Boko Haram insurgency. Does that say anything about the country’s overall security status?

     

  • Shettima antidote

    The Dapchi girls story is beginning to retreat out of the Nigerian mind, just like the Chibok girls. What I cannot understand is that no one saw all the vulnerable girl schools in the north and thought about protecting them. I saw a good example of how to protect them in my visit to Borno State. The schools are fortified with strong and active military presence.

    Governor Shettima is building an array of model schools, 40 at least, that show that you can send your daughter there and go to sleep. One of such schools in Maiduguri is in an advanced stage of completion. It is a school with bulletproof facilities. The classrooms are not only fitted with air conditioners and fans but also with bulletproof doors and windows. Ditto to the dining rooms and the hostels. The school is billed for 1,300 girls. Gov Shettima wants to name it after one of four iconic world women: Angela Merkel, as the leader of the free world today with Trump’s abdication; Michelle Obama for her poise, integrity and revolutionary role as first lady and her role in Africa during her reign. She also gave international momentum for the search of the Chibok girls. Maya Angelou, the great American poet, African American role model and the poet laureate at Clinton’s inauguration. She has been a great encourager of African letters. And Oprah Winfrey, whose role in women’s empowerment is second to none around the world.

    No renegade band can break into such a school without being entrapped. I hope the presidency and other northeast governors learn from Shettima.

  • Perfect stooge

    Perfect stooge

    The word perfect was a perfect word until it lost its innocence. Perfect used to be pristine and flawless. So, we had a perfect soul, perfect strategy, a perfect dream and even a perfect society. Now the mind of humans has now perverted things.

    Even in the scriptures, God called for humans to be perfect. “I am God Almighty,” God told Abraham, “walk before me and be thou perfect.” But that was when the definition of perfect was straightforward.

    “The mind is its own place,” crooned poet John Milton in his Paradise Lost. “It can make hell of heaven and heaven of hell.” Because of the endless elasticity of the human intellect, we can pervert the perfect. So, we have the perfect murder, one in which the killer is never caught, nor even prosecuted. Just as we now have of the Dele Giwa letter bomb.

    Or the perfect escape, like the famous Alcataraz episode, where daredevil men manoeuvred into myth as no one has accounted for the men who were flesh and penned but turned ghosts for the rest of their lives. Or the perfect heist, like the theft of 50 million pounds from a Kent security depot over a decade ago. Or the perfect lie, like the serpent who slithered to Eve in Eden, or the perfect buffoon like Baba Sala or Mr. Magoo. Or the perfect savage like William Golding’s Lord of the Flies. The list goes on. It is the human capacity for invention. As the Bible says, “God has made man upright, but he has brought forth many inventions.”

    Politics cannot but inveigle itself into the fare. We just had one with a man who loves to wear a cap and sport a smile and carry the air of dignity. He has succeeded to become successful in gerrymandering. To be a stooge is not to be fool. It is a distinction. John Oyegun, former Edo State governor (if for a short span), APC chieftain, perennial hustler for relevance and now APC chairman, is the stooge of the era, a perfect stooge.

    He shot into prominence in this era when his name crested the list of contenders for the post of party chairman. He did not, on his own, have the human stature or political structure, or what scholars call the presence, charisma, or the financial chest to run for such a high office. But as a good tortoise of the African tale, he had to ride on the shoulders of others. He was humble enough to accept his acute limitations. He was not like typical politicians who exaggerate their influence. He learned to stoop. And he conquered by latching on to the structure of others to realise his ambition.

    He was faithful as an obedient servant. And that way he won, besting other contestants, including the quisling and self-indulgent Tom Ikimi, whose political obituary hung in effigy on his loss in that night of a thousand flames.

    But he was clever enough not stay in one corridor. He saw another master elsewhere. He is a perpetual obedient, and so he heard a call to service in the battle for the National Assembly. Swiftly, he joined the impunity that made “Eleyinmi” Saraki Senate President. That was the day he became a new stooge. Since then, he has played the role with great dramatic acuity. He has manoeuvred like James Bond, amused like Gringori, played the ominous straitlaced villain like hairless lord Talab Abass of the TV series  Ripples. Oyegun is no Talab Abass in size or influence but in reflected glory., etc. He has achieved this by being a serial and obedient servant.

    Give him the credit. He has perfected the art of anticipating who the master will be and how to ingratiate himself. Psycho-social thinker Daniel Goleman enunciated what he called emotional intelligence. He wrote it for those who knew how to succeed not by intellect or moral heft but by behaviour that suited the times. He comes from the tradition of the ethical philosophers of situationism. In order words, situation dictated attitude. To the just, you are just. To the cruel, you are cruel. To the opportunist, you are Paulo Rossi. That is the making of John Odigie Oyegun.

    Never mind that he has not been a great leader of the APC as an organisation in any classic sense of a leader. Under him, the party, which was a hodgepodge to win an election, has not grown into a cohesive body either ideologically or architecturally. It has been a loose bond of a body, governors at odds with party apparatchik, president overthrown by lawmakers, state organs riven by the throes of ego and hero worship.

    In Kaduna State, the small man hews down a senator’s house because he can. Meanwhile a section of the party suspends the governor in a flourish that works only as spectacle. They know it cannot work, since the party at the centre will nullify it. But tempers flare all the same. In Kogi, parallel excos headline a party in which a besieged governor hedges its power because of an assurance in the centre. In Benue, the party is in tatters over the herdsmen’s crisis, and he has no word to bring the party to harmony or, shall I say, to existence. It is virtually dead in Benue State.

    There is virtually no state where the party is not in crisis, including  Ondo State where Goverenor Rotimi Akeredolu tries in vain to paper over the cracks. In Ogun, in Imo, in Oyo, the fire is coming next time. In Kano, Kwankwaso is looking at his political obituary but he will go down with the Samson complex, tearing down the edifice with him.

    It is not because Oyegun has done a great job that he was given a year by the governors. Because he has done a great job as stooge. He served lawmakers, served the president, served the governors. But he has not served the party, and that is why the party is in disarray. Power comes from above, but chaos from beneath. Historians will distinguish him as the greatest failure as party chairman in Nigerian history of democracy since 1960. His is a paradox of a failure that gets another chance. Which is actually the way of our democracy. We reward loyalty over principle or competence.

    But the party men had to do it through impunity. They had to break the law first and follow due process after. That is, they had to commit a crime and look for a law to legitimise it afterwards. As Samuel Butler noted, society creates the crime, the criminal commits it. That was the point that Zamfara State Governor Abdulaziz Yari made after Oyegun was given another year.

    The consequence of Oyegun is that he made the party a chaos so he can have the chance to lead it. If he were a good leader, he might not have earned a full and second term because he would have made way for another stooge. His “stoogeship” he will not share with anyone else.

    Oyegun is what sociologist William H. Whyte described as “the organisation man.”  He works to keep his job by not rocking the boat, but by following rules. Whyte explains in that classic that great organisations do not innovate or make ground breaking progress with such men, but with leaders of Daniel Defoe saw as “rugged individualists” like Robinson Crusoe. Or what Theodore Roosevelt called “the man in the arena.”

    Great leaders like Awo, Mandela, Che, Castro, Churchill were rugged individualists who followed tough paths and took their associates along those paths. Oyegun has no liver, lever or conscience for such sublimity.  So, Oyegun is contented to be a stuffed puppy, squealing and barking any which way the masters point.

  • Two weddings and a riot

    Two weddings and a riot

    In the past few weeks, we have witnessed two weddings and riot. It sounds like the title of a play or novel. But it is a reality. First was the wedding of the children of the Osinbajos and the Shagayas. It sparked a mini-controversy about inter-faith tryst. But it was clarified that it was a Christian-Christian fest, and the cross and crescent did not kiss. It was good thing for inter-tribal concord. The Osinbajos are Yoruba from the Southwest and the Shagayas from the Middle Belt.

    The other was last weekend between the son of Oyo State Governor Abiola Ajimobi and the daughter of GovernorAbdullahi Ganduje of Kano State. A society wedding, expectedly. Such weddings are less about the intending couples as about their fathers and mothers who turn the ceremonies into spectacles of glamour.

    But what struck me is the riot that tore the city of Kaduna into bloodshed and hate over inter-faith marriage. The crux? The Christians complain that when their daughter is married away to the Muslim, she is forced to surrender to the husband’s belief. But the Christian is forbidden such luxury. Iam looking towards a society wedding when it is a Christian-Muslim tie up with no pious pre-conditions. The Muslim and Christian should marry in freedom. There should be no compulsion. Apostle Paul wrote that if a Christian marries a non-believer, they should abide in peace and one can bless the other. Love is the first principle of marriage, but it is lost in all the bigotry of faith.

  • A nice terrorist

    A nice terrorist

    Believe it or not, there are terrorists who are not terrible. Among such unbelievable terrorists is Abu Musab Al-Barnawi, who leads a faction of the Islamist terrorist group Boko Haram, according to someone who claims to know.

    It is interesting that human rights activist Aisha Wakil paid tribute to Al-Barnawi when she spoke about the astonishing abduction of over 100 schoolgirls by Boko Haram from the Government Girls’ Science and Technical College (GGSTC), Dapchi, Yobe State, on February 19. Wakil, popularly known as Mama Boko Haram, is believed to have a rapport with the leadership of the group. She has been credited with helping the presidency to negotiate the release of persons kidnapped by Boko Haram in the past. She was a member of the Presidential Committee on Dialogue and Peaceful Resolution of Security Challenges in the North formed by former President Goodluck Jonathan.

    After she made a public plea for the release of the Dapchi schoolgirls, Wakil said the Al-Barnawi-led group contacted her: “They are even the ones that called me and said Mama, we heard what you have said and told me that they are with the girls and they are going to release them. I begged of them and said please let this not be another 1,000-plus days of Chibok girls, and they laughed and said no. I asked them where I can come and stay with them (girls) for two days, but they did not say anything.”

    She added: “I can assure Nigerians that so far they are with my son, Habib, and his friends; Habib is a nice guy, he is a very nice boy. He will not harm them, he will not touch them, and he will not kill them. He is going to listen to us, and so far, he indicated interest that he loves peace. And I love them for that and believe what they said on this. They will definitely give us the girls. All I am begging Nigerians is to calm down, be prayerful, everything will be over.”  Habib might be “a nice guy…a very nice boy.” But he is also a terrorist, which means that he is mean.

    Clearly, the latest evil by Boko Haram terrorists shows that Islamist terrorism is alive and well despite contrary claims by the country’s military authorities. The Dapchi attack happened after Chief of Army Staff Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai restated his order to troops to capture Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau dead or alive.  It is noteworthy that in 2017 the army chief gave his men a 40-day ultimatum to capture Shekau, and the army recently offered a N3 million reward for information on the elusive Shekau.

    Buratai was quoted as saying when he visited troops at Camp Zairo in the Sambisa Forest, which had served as headquarters of the terrorists before the military seized the camp in December 2016: “Let me say congratulations. But we must move across to wherever this criminal, Shekau, is and catch him…I want you to get him…You all know these criminals are still on the run; these guys are on the run, you must make sure that you get them wherever they are around this area…You must not allow them to escape. Every day, you must go on patrol, lay ambush for them and you go on raids.”

    A little less talk and a lot more action are needed as the Dapchi abduction compounded the still unresolved Chibok schoolgirls’ kidnapping in Borno State in April 2014.  Many of the Chibok captives are still in captivity.

    It is disturbing that the terrorists were able to carry out the Dapchi attack and kidnap over 100 schoolgirls. It calls into question the effectiveness of anti-terrorism troops in the region.  The northeastern states of Borno and Yobe have been vulnerable to Boko Haram attacks since the insurgency started in 2009, meaning that there was always a possibility the terrorists would strike again like they did in Chibok as long as they had not been defeated. Indeed, the Dapchi incident has exposed the overconfidence of the authorities that the worst is over.

    With the Al-Barnawi faction claiming responsibility for the Dapchi abduction, it remains to be seen whether the story would be different from the Chibok kidnapping attributed to Shekau’s leadership. The factionalisation of Boko Haram will make it harder to fight the group because it means that the anti-terror war will have to be fought against factions. Buratai wants Shekau captured. He should want Al-Barnawi captured too.

    Abubakar Shekau was among the “The World’s Most Influential People” listed by TIME in 2015. The identified influencers in the 2015 TIME 100 were diverse enough to include the anti-hero. The TIME portrait said:  “The citizens of Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, know Abubakar Shekau all too well: he is the most violent killer their country has ever seen.”  Shekau’s terrifying profile was worsened by his group’s outrageous seizure of more than 200 Chibok schoolgirls.

    Shekau has been reported dead, or more specifically, reported killed, on at least two occasions; and there is speculation that Shekau may have become “a brand name” for whoever is the leader of Boko Haram.

    Before the TIME ranking, an international think tank, the Project for the Study of the 21st Century, said the Boko Haram insurgency was the fourth deadliest conflict in the world in 2014 and was responsible for 11, 529 deaths.  The think tank added that the figure of fatalities could be underestimated.

    Al-Barnawi, reportedly in his twenties, is the first son of the late founder of Boko Haram, Mohammed Yusuf, who died in police custody in 2009 following a military operation against the group in Borno State, which further radicalised it. In August 2016, the extremist militant group, ISIS,   appointed Al-Barnawi as the head of Boko Haram, a recognition which was rejected by Shekau.

    A revealing profile of the actor at the centre of the Dapchi abduction says: “Little is known about Abu Mus’ab al-Barnawi, who appeared in a Boko Haram video in January 2015 as the group’s spokesman…He wore a turban and his face was blurred out and it was filmed as a sit-down studio interview… Barnawi pulled no punches, warning that towns which resisted Boko Haram in its mission to create an Islamic state would be flattened… He also spoke of being against democracy and foreign education.”

    This is not a portrait of the terrorist as a nice man.

     

     

     

  • Dapchi dialectics

    Dapchi dialectics

    It all started as speculation. As governments revelled in disbelief, doubt or deliberate suppression of information, narratives from the scene were unequivocal that Boko Haram insurgents attacked Dapchi Girl’s School, Yobe State and carted away female students in trucks as they screamed helplessly.

    Yobe State government was to issue a statement claiming some of the abducted girls had been rescued and under military protection. Governor Ibrahim Geidam shocked the nation the following day when he repudiated the statement on the ground that security information on which it was based was false. He even doubted if there was any abduction at all.

    The federal government team which first visited did not help matters. The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed who led the team has doubtful knowledge of security matters and did not interface with parents. It took nearly a week for the federal government to admit that 110 girls were actually missing. That was days after parents had put up about 105 names of missing girls. Perhaps, without the insistence of those parents to the extent of attacking their governors’ convoy, the entire affair would still be shrouded in secrecy.

    The above background is very instructive. For one, it bears an uncanny semblance with the turn of events in the abduction of Chibok girls some four years ago. And for another, it mirrors very vividly why immediate rescue action could not be taken by the military and other security agencies culminating in extant pass.

    And more fundamentally, the development brings to the fore the enigma Boko Haram and its serial abduction of school girls have become. There are other inherent contradictions the turn of events has exposed. These impinge heavily on the texture and character of the politics that is played on these shores. The abduction raises far-reaching posers not only on the claims hitherto bandied on the degradation and decimation of the Boko Haram insurgency, but more importantly, on other issues freely traded when we had the first encounter with the Chibok girls. It is a strange twist of fate that history has fast repeated itself placing some of those issues again on the front burner.

    Then, the regime of Jonathan was lampooned for initially doubting the abduction narrative such that he failed to take quick action. That tardiness and failure to give the insurgents hot pursuit was largely blamed for the inability to secure the release of the girls. We are contending with the same scenario again. That it took the federal government a week before accepting and coming public with the list of 110 missing Dapchi school girls, bears the footprints of the Chibok incident.

    Incidentally, we have passed through this rough path before which should presuppose the lessons of the past should have been of value in handling the present. But that optimism proved futile given the muddle that is the fate of the Dapchi abduction. President Buhari must have been so rattled by the turn of events that he described the incident as a national disaster. The term national disaster conveys the erroneous impression that our security architecture was helpless. That is far from correct. And if one may ask, where are those who were pontificating about what and what Jonathan should have done and what he should not have done in the Chibok case? What have they to say now the same events have repeated themselves? Or are we going to blame the inability to get the Dapchi incident right on the poor example shown by Jonathan in the Chibok case? Maybe!

    Borno State governor, Kashim Shettima is rattled by this contradiction. He had advised during his sympathy visit to Geidam that we should separate the abduction from politics especially given the conspiracy theories that were woven around the Chibok case. He also drew parallels between government responses to the Chibok and the Dapchi incidents with a veiled verdict that the current case is being better managed. Lai Mohammed shares the same opinion. But, that is far from the truth. There is nothing in the current handling of the Dapchi abduction that is an improvement on the Chibok incident. Not with the disbelief, confusion and deliberate attempt to conceal information.  Not with the embarrassing altercations between Geidam, the army and the police. Not with security failure that enabled the insurgents successfully ferry the girls away without detection.

    Jonathan was accused of doubting that the abduction occurred thereby hampering response time. We have seen all of that in the instant case. Even now, the government is still reluctant to fully attribute the missing girls to Boko Haram abduction. How can they admit when they claimed the insurgent group had been decimated, driven out of Sambisa forest and degraded with no capacity to cause havoc? How can they when they are about to apprehend Shekau who is on the run? We shall return to this shortly.

    If Jonathan could be tolerated because that was a novel case, it is inexcusable a repeat should be subjected to the same muddle. Perhaps, Buhari can make the difference if he succeeds in freeing all the girls very quickly. But that will trigger off another round of theories.

    Jonathan was dealing with an opposition governor during that heated campaign period. Geidam and Buhari are on the same page. That should have led to quicker understanding and enhanced response time. The allegation by Geidam that withdrawal of troops from Dapchi facilitated the attack and subsequent abduction is instructive. The army explained that the withdrawal was to beef up their fighting strength in war theatres overstretching their capacities and that they handed over the security of the area to the police. But Yobe police authorities denied sole responsibility for a state that is still under security emergency.

    These disclosures are bound to trigger off another round of theories. This is especially so, since we have now been told by the army that troops’ withdrawal was to beef up their fighting strength at the Nigeria-Niger border where they came under serious attack. But we have all along, been fed with how the insurgents no longer possess the capacity to attack military formations except soft targets and all that. Where does that leave us now?

    So the attempt by Shettima and Mohammed to post a success verdict in handling extant case failed woefully. Their predicament can be understood. They were part of the complex web of politicking in the Chibok incident especially as Shettima was the host governor. Events of that abduction contributed in large measure to the downfall of Jonathan. Their position emanates from morbid fear that history is repeating itself in quick succession and may come with a domino effect.

    That is why they want security issues separated from politics and the incident detached from conspiratorial theories. It is difficult to fathom how that can happen given the contradictions already in public space. The interplay of this dialectics will inexorably rob off negatively or positively on our politics. And as fate would have it, both abductions took place when incumbent presidents were facing serious crises of relevance and credibility. They therefore fit into the most similar systems design and eminently qualify as good products for comparative analysis.

    They can be compared in terms of response time; in terms of the state of the war and prevailing political environment. They also qualify for comparison in terms of parameters deployed to appraise the first incident and possible motive. That 110 school girls were abducted despite the series of negotiations between the insurgents and the government leading to freeing over 100 Chibok girls among others and release of some Boko Haram commanders after money changed hands are contradictions that cannot be glossed over. What of the claim that the war had since ended with the defeat of Boko Haram? How come the same insurgent group successfully struck with several vehicles and trucks capturing our children undetected?

    There are issues to the Boko Haram tangle. We need to get really at the root of this thing called Boko Haram. Is it real or a business enterprise of some vested interests? It remains a puzzle that no key Nigerian or foreigner has been directly linked, arrested or convicted for their devious activities. Yet, the insurgents bestride the landscape like a colossus; often entering into spurious negotiations with agents of the government. It is time to unmask the faces behind the Boko Haram venture.

  • Heart of darkness

    Heart of darkness

    When I visited Bayelsa State recently, the sense of home hit me as an original of the Niger Delta. As I traversed lands, saw creeks and peeped through forest barks, I sank into a state of nostalgia. The term “my land,” the word “legitimacy,” the phrase “resource control” and the epithet “state rights” all percolated me like water through the sieves of the heart.

    My feeling deepened when I witnessed the ground breaking of a refinery, the first of such in the state and that region in a generation. Whole swaths of swamp land were being translated, by cash, technology and human brawn, into a manufacturer’s hub of refined oil and power.

    As I entered the premises, I recalled what my late father told me many years ago. ‘’Oti,” that was how he addressed me, “the last time I went to where I was born, I pointed to it from hard ground. It is now water. Thanks to government greed, neglect and bigger thanks to the destruction by the oil companies.” His face was a network of furrows and his lip at its verbal tether. No more to say.

    The dozy village on the outskirts of Yenagoa drew some of the mainstays of the oil industry, including former president Olusegun Obasanjo. The Owu chief’s soulful dance on stage was an eerie reminder of his famous former dance. The stellar percussions came from an internationally acclaimed child band from Akwa Ibom. This time, thankfully, no letter of explosive proportion was unleased from his undercroft of rage. For that region, rage is no stranger. For irony, Baba’s dance in Bayelsa lacked the militant gyrations that preceded his epistolary umbrage to the president.

    But the speech that stirred the crowd came from the chief host, Governor Seriake Dickson. The walking stick twirling, heft of a figure, was for a space of 30 minutes, looking more like a spokesman for the Niger Delta, a tongue for oil for oil producers, for resource control, for legitimacy. He spoke not with the register of the creeks but indignant polish. But both creek renegades and city conformists cheered.

    No one could deny he said the truth when he thanked the President for granting the CEO of Azikel Group, Eruani Godbless, for installing the refinery. No one can deny, too, his truth when he questioned why licences were being given to install refineries “thousands of miles away” from where it is located. He lamented oil blocks given to persons who did not live there, feel the people’s entrails, thumb the pulse of their poverty, deprivation and dreams.

    No one could boo when he said oil majors were drawing wealth from beneath their earths but enjoying them in far-flung areas, in lavish life style while those who owned it only sniffed it, saw it, cringed at its environmental carnage, diseases and privations. In a similar interview with Governor Ifeanyi Okowa for my television show on TVC running on Saturday morning, the Delta State governor spoke on the decline of Warri and how the big companies, including Shell and Agip have packed up to Lagos and other safe havens. They only come to the place to tap oil and leave, their taxes are almost pittances. Agip, for instance, does half its business in Bayelsa but has no significant office there. This is selfish, cynical primitivity in the 21st century.

    The oil majors are a leech on us. As a native, I weep for Nigeria, and condemn all governments that we have had for treating the people as lost causes while they lust like carnivores for our inheritance.

    Said Dickson: “I do not know the business case that justifies the construction of expensive wells, expensive pipelines, crisscrossing rivers, creeks, rivulets and oceans from Bayelsa, Rivers, Delta, Edo, Ondo and Akwa Ibom down to several areas. I know but I don’t want to mention names. I am told that there are refineries being conceived and being built in Niger Republic.” Imagine: from Niger Delta to Niger Republic. Not a republican conscience, that move!

    This is the story of legitimacy. As Dickson noted, it is not about exclusive ownership of the oil resources. Others must be welcome to enjoy the wealth anywhere in a federating unit. But the locals must get the pride of place. This is not the case when the majority of the valued workers in the oil firms are not from the Niger Delta. They make them welders, cleaners, labourers, an act of contemptuous tokenism.

    Oil blocks go to those who have never moulded a block in the region. They see the Niger Delta like what the Jamaican writer John Hearne describes in his famous short story, Lost Country. Niger Delta is the lost country, where those who go and lust for gold but not the people’s good. It is where people go and never survive except those who control labour.

    Oil blocks put the region on the chopping block.

    If the advocates of the herdsmen’s rights to ancestral routes want to make their case, they should realise, as the Bayelsa State governor says, that “what you call an oil block is a piece of our ancestral property carved out by surveyors that you are giving away at our expense.”

    Dickson marked his six years in office showcasing some of his doings like the revolutionary Ijaw Academy, the diagnostic centre, boarding schools, roads and bridges, sprawling fish farms, all need resources to raise his people from the backwaters. They need to use their resources while they have them.

    Niger Delta is now Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Mr. Kurtz is the white man who represents the western, white interlopers, just like the herdsmen of rapine. The oil majors and their official collaborators come for the resources, while the inhabitants are dismissed as howling, dirty, ugly savages who should work for their leases and pleasure. I saw this when I visited the Niger Delta as a reporter for the African Concord, before insurgency blasted the nation. Gulf Oil, now Chevron in Arunton, was like a western suburb with electricity, pipe-borne water, television and other luxuries. The village beside them belonged to the middle ages, racked to a rump from exploitation. The youth had no jobs. The girls were whores for the white man. I wept, as I had to pass the night in a hut.

    The story of the 21st century has been about bread and blood. Those who do not belong to my blood line should not have bread. That is the savage reality of our century, and it has thrown up Trump in the United States and herdsmen in Nigeria. Both are savages who exaggerate human divisions instead of addressing fair play and justice.

  • Dapchi girls, enemy’s poison

    Dapchi girls, enemy’s poison

    Nothing can justify the Dapchi girls story, not after we were irate that Goodluck Jonathan was dancing Azonto in Kano while the goons carted away our Chibok schoolgirls. It is not enough that the President does not deny it like Jonathan or calls it a disaster. That is no solace for the mothers and fathers and the community who threw stones as Governor Ibrahim Gaidam’s convoy whirred by.

    Yobe Governor Gaidam may have displayed optimistic naivety with his first press statement celebrating the rescue of some girls. But the media was also naïve for using the word rescue when there was no narrative as to how it happened. Were there shootouts, casualties, arrests?

    I accept Gaidam’s apology but not stories of our security forces who had no inkling of what was happening in a long stretch of land. No security forces saw trucks carrying many school girls, even if we accept that they came looking harmless into the town.

    This is an era when the top men of Nigeria security forces are fighting turf wars in Abuja, while the president looks almost impotent.

    Gaidam is taking responsibility for what belongs to the DSS and inspector general of police all under the presidency. The governor does not control the police or intelligence forces yet we call him the chief security officer. Hence some of our northern governors now back state police. Facts, Charles Dickens writes, is compelling.

    Gaidam should save himself by naming those who misled his government. Or else he will bell another foe’s cat, or eat the enemy’s poison.

  • Ganduje and El-Rufai

    Ganduje and El-Rufai

    Reservations on the desirability of state police have largely hinged on prospects of its abuse by governors to emasculate opposition. Even with increasing inability of the centrally controlled police to rise to the peculiar security challenges in parts of the country, there are still genuine fears that state governors would abuse that institution for selfish ends.

    But some have countered that the federal police have not even fared better in this respect. They contend it would be counterproductive to wish away the imperative of state police on account of these fears especially as it is the way to go in a federal system of government. They point to the increasing inability of the federal police to protect lives and property in parts of the country as both the necessary and sufficient conditions for state police now.

    There are merits on both sides of the divide. Even then, state police is only an integral part of the structural reforms this country direly needs to be on the right and steady path to progress, peace and even development.

    If events from some of these states are anything to go by, fears of the governors manipulating state police for partisan advantage are real. Heightened intolerance of opposition in Kano, Kaduna and some other states do not give comfort that state police will not be severely abused. It would appear the culture of virile opposition that hallmarks democratic engagement is yet to be internalized by most of our political actors. Our understanding of politics as a quick route to material acquisition for ones benefit and that of his immediate primordial group accentuates do-or-die competition. Within this framework, anything – including the most ignoble is fair as the end would always justify the means. That accounts for the increasing intolerance that is rapidly burgeoning in many of the states.

    In Kano State, there was altercation between former governor of the state Rabiu Kwankwaso and the state police commissioner, Rabiu Yusuf over the former’s proposed visit to his constituents. The police commissioner had advised Kwankwaso to shelve the visit on the ground that it had prospects for ruffling public peace. He had claimed security reports at his disposal indicated there would be breakdown of law and order if the former governor made good his visit.

    But Kwankwaso smelt a rat in the position of the police chief. He saw it as a cover up to abridge his fundamental rights to freedom of movement and expression. Though he later aborted the visit, he saw the action of the police as a carefully scripted plan to deny him access to his supporters and whittle down his political influence. And what is left of a politician who cannot touch base with his constituents?

    However, those conversant with the politics of that state knew the order had some other undertone given the rivalry between the former governor and his successor Abdullahi Ganduje. It is no secret that since both former friends fell apart politically, they had been embroiled in bitter competition for the control of structures of the party-the APC.  Kwankwaso nurses presidential ambition while Ganduje would want a second term. And if Ganduje must succeed in his second term ambition, his structures should be independent of that of Kwankwaso who would perhaps be competing with the incumbent president. So their interests no longer tally.

    Given this scenario, it could be understood why the position of the police on the visit drew stern criticisms. It was seen as a subterfuge to promote the interest of the governor over and above that of his predecessor. The excuse that the visit should be aborted because of possible breakdown of law and order does not add up because all the police needed to do was to provide adequate security for it to hold. And since the police boss is privy to the quarters from which the threat would come; he should have moved to nip it in the bud.

    To rule out the visit entirely is a lazy way to go about such a seemingly sensitive matter. And for how long shall we continue to bar the former governor from visiting his state on such spurious security reports? The reality is that Kwankwaso would have to visit his state as regularly it pleased him. It will amount to consigning him to exile; albeit illegally if he can no longer visit his state. And if the police cannot provide him security when the campaigns are yet to kick off, what safeguards are there that they will live up to their statutory duties at the heat of the campaigns?

    It is evident there is more to the action than ordinarily meets the eyes. This is more so; given that before this incident, a house owned by the same former governor had been sealed by the same police to stop his supporters from conducting a mass wedding there.  And if the federal police can be found in such obviously partisan stance, it is to be imagined what the situation would be when we have state police.

    The Kano incident appears a child’s play when weighed against the destruction in Kaduna of the office of a faction of the APC by the state government. The destruction team which was allegedly led by the governor, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai came at night with bulldozers and levelled the one-storey building together with all that was inside. The building houses the office of a faction of the party opposed to El- Rufai. Days before the demolition, the faction had suspended the governor for six months.

    The owner of the building and key member of the faction, Senator Suleiman Hunkuyi has alleged political vendetta as the motive behind the action of the state government. But the state government which owned up to the demolition claimed the building was pulled down for failure to pay ground rent since 2010 and for constituting public nuisance by attracting thugs. By extrapolation, the Kaduna State government wants us to believe that the penalty for failure to pay ground rent is to have such houses destroyed. This is not correct.

    There is nowhere in the relevant laws the state government was given such draconian and sweeping powers. Neither would the allegation that the building attracted thugs be a sufficient ground for the state government to become law unto itself. Moreover, if the same building previously served as campaign office for El-Rufai as alleged by Hunkuyi, why is it now that he suddenly realized that the owner defaulted in the payment of ground rent? And why was the allegation of the building attracting thugs not an issue then? As if this was not enough embarrassment, the same state government has slammed a bill of N30 million on another building owned by Hunkuyi. They want him to pay the bill within 30 days or face severe repercussions. How much is that house worth to attract such a prohibitive bill? Why Hunkuyi again?

    There is every reason to align with Hunkuyi that the action of the state governor was just to get even with his rivals. This is especially so given that the leadership of that faction had before then, suspended him from the party. For daring to challenge the governor in such a humiliating manner, all manner of excuses had to be invented to destroy the structure where that suspension order was issued and obliterate all about the faction. That would send fears to the opposition and serve as a warning to any person that would give his house to that faction as an office.

    It is the height of political intolerance and a throwback to the savage and backward politics of the past that should have no place now. Democracy thrives on virile opposition and flourishes when contending issues are resolved within its ambit. Its course cannot be furthered either by resort to armed tactics, blackmail, outright intimidation and vengeance that are evident in the action of El-Rufai. It is sad the technology El-Rufai acquired while pulling down houses in Abuja during his ministerial tenure found quick application in ‘resolving’ intra-party squabbles. Ironically, that is not the end of the matter.

    El-Rufai has set a very bad example. It is clear he targeted the means of livelihood of Hunkuyi just to get even with the opposition. If we have to muzzle opposition by hook or crook, then our democracy is doomed. El-Rufai must overcome the temptation of sowing wind so as not to reap whirlwind.

  • Ambode’s cultural leap

    Ambode’s cultural leap

    By signing into law on February 8 a legislation known as the Yoruba Language Preservation and Promotion Law, Lagos State Governor Akinwunmi Ambode demonstrated exemplary cultural consciousness and cultural conviction. The beauty of this new law is that it puts indigenous language on the front burner.

    By this move, the Ambode administration has shown that it is in tune with current international thinking on indigenous languages. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) observes: “Languages are the most powerful instruments of preserving and developing our tangible and intangible heritage. All moves to promote the dissemination of mother tongues will serve not only to encourage linguistic diversity and multilingual education but also to develop fuller awareness of linguistic and cultural traditions throughout the world and to inspire solidarity based on understanding, tolerance and dialogue.”

    The Lagos State House of Assembly had passed the bill in October 2017, after a process that involved input by stakeholders. The law is therefore a product of agreement between the legislative and executive arms of government on what should be done to preserve and promote Yoruba language, which is the main language in the state. It is believed that “in present-day Nigeria there are over 40 million Yoruba primary and secondary language speakers as well as several other millions of speakers outside Nigeria.”

    It was a notable coincidence that the law arrived when an influential populariser of Yoruba culture was preparing to depart. It is noteworthy that Prof. Akinwunmi Isola who died on February 17, aged 78, participated in the process that resulted in the language policy.

    In a paper by Isola at the Yoruba Summit organised by the Lagos State House of Assembly in June 2016, he shared his thoughts on the subject, ‘Making the Teaching of Yoruba Compulsory in Public and Private Schools in Lagos State.’ Isola, who was represented by Professor Duro Adeleke of the University of Ibadan, had argued:  “We should speak Yoruba in our institutions. Yoruba is one of the languages recommended to be taught in our schools to promote unity and it occupies a prominent position among languages in the world. If you lose your language, you will lose your culture. The language of a people has to do with their culture, dresses, hairstyle and some other things.”

    Oyo State Governor Abiola Ajimobi noted in a tribute:  “Prof. Isola was an unabashed believer in the promotion of the Yoruba language, which he once demonstrated by being the first person to deliver a university convocation lecture in Yoruba at the Adekunle Ajasin University, Akungba-Akoko, Ondo State, which was very unconventional.”

    Another striking coincidence: The Yoruba Language Preservation and Promotion Law arrived in the same month that the world celebrated   International Mother Language Day 2018 on February 21. This special day has been observed “every year since February 2000 to promote linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism.” The theme this year was “Linguistic diversity and multilingualism count for sustainable development.”

    Commissioner for Information and Strategy Kehinde Bamigbetan shed light on the law, saying Yoruba language “has become mandatory for all candidates seeking admission into our tertiary institutions.”  According to a report, “He said anyone seeking admission into the Lagos State University, Lagos State Polytechnic, Michael Otedola College of Primary Education, Adeniran Ogunsanya College of Education, Lagos State School of Nursing and Lagos State College of Health Technology, among others must have credit in Yoruba language.”  The law makes it compulsory for all primary and secondary schools – private or public – in the state to teach Yoruba Language as a core subject at all levels.

    Furthermore, the law stipulates that “all state-owned tertiary institutions are to incorporate the use of Yoruba Language in their General Studies (GNS) courses.”  Other highlights: The language will be an acceptable means of communication in business and government, and all laws will be translated into Yoruba language.

    There is no doubt that there will be problems to be solved as the law takes effect. It is important to focus on the advantages. UNESCO notes: “To foster sustainable development, learners must have access to education in their mother tongue and in other languages. It is through the mastery of the first language or mother tongue that the basic skills of reading, writing and numeracy are acquired. Local languages, especially minority and indigenous, transmit cultures, values and traditional knowledge, thus play an important role in promoting sustainable futures.”

    The UN specialised agency is expected to know what it is talking about. UNESCO’s position supports the Yoruba Language Law. The organisation says:  “Languages, with their complex implications for identity, communication, social integration, education and development, are of strategic importance for people and planet. Yet, due to globalisation processes, they are increasingly under threat, or disappearing altogether. When languages fade, so does the world’s rich tapestry of cultural diversity. Opportunities, traditions, memory, unique modes of thinking and expression — valuable resources for ensuring a better future — are also lost.”

    The organisation also states: “At least 43% of the estimated 6000 languages spoken in the world are endangered. Only a few hundred languages have genuinely been given a place in education systems and the public domain, and less than a hundred are used in the digital world.”

    It takes a thinking political administrator to grasp the cultural dimension of the pursuit of socio-economic development. By paying attention to the preservation and promotion of Yoruba language, Ambode has shown a holistic approach to governance.

    Cultural governance is usually overlooked by leaders, which is why Ambode’s critical cultural interventions in less than three years at the helm deserve to be properly situated.  It takes a culture-friendly mind to think culturally. Ambode’s cultural focus shows that his understanding of “needs in the society” is not narrow and simplistic.

    Now that Lagos has shown the way, despite its pronounced cultural diversity, it is expected that other states in the country’s southwest where Yoruba is the main language will emulate the language policy. It is clear that the Yoruba have a duty to preserve and promote their language.

    Indeed, every indigenous language deserves to be preserved and promoted. The question is: Where are the preservers and promoters?