The Nation Newspaper

Category: Monday

Pep talk to northern ministers

In my recent essay, Tinubu’s northerners, I had gingered northern members of the president’s cabinet to rise up to engage the north. They, apart from a few like the Vice president who is always in the news, have been quiet. Pate has also, though he has not focused on political economy. Since that piece, a few have found their voices, including the information minister. It turned out the north-based minister have been asked to join the train to sell the programmes of the government in sync with the content of my essay. The Punch headline: “Northern ministers get marching orders to defend President as opposition grows,” is in line with the context of my essay.

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As I stated, they are the government’s missionaries in the north. But they should not make it a riotous outburst. They should coordinate their voices so as to reinforce each other. They should also organize platforms for engaging both high and low, partisan or laity, urban and rural in the states. There is a lot to say. Who is talking about the ascendant naira and the gradual taming of inflation? Who is talking about the retreat of bandits and peace dividends, in Nasarawa, Kaduna, Plateau, Kogi, etc? Who is talking about the fellows with student loan, a higher percentage of them coming from the north? Who is telling us about those returning to farm after years of fear and trembling in the hearts of farmers?

Nobody, north or south, in a cabinet deserves their seat if they cannot tell the story of their government.

February 10, 2025
How Tinubu saved Atiku from OBJ, El-Rufai

Somehow, the fiction has gone around that Nasir El-Rufai backed Uba Sani to be governor. El-Rufai has allowed this untruth to fester for a number of reasons.

One, he wants them to call Governor Sani a traitor, so people who know El-Rufai’s biography of about-face would not focus on him, El-Rufai. Two, he wants to divert attention from the raft of questions over his handling of Kaduna State finances while he was governor. Three, he wants to make N150 billion bigger than N428 billion. It is his mathematics of duplicity.

That is his foul strategy. As a man who likes attention more than a god, he started this when he sat beside a man, Atiku, he first betrayed in public life. And, for irony, he was talking about loyalty. But on that panel, he emitted disloyalty. That is because he was too angry to know he was contradicting himself. It is the Shakespeare quote in his play Tempest: “I am vexed; bear with my weakness.”

To start with, Governor Uba Sani never enjoyed El-Rufai’s support to be governor. He won the primary in spite of him, just as President Tinubu won the APC primary in spite of Muhammadu Buhari. But this did not force Governor Sani into fury. As Churchill wrote, “in war, resolution; in victory, magnanimity.” That explained why he has never thrown any invective against his predecessor since he became governor. Last week, he described his relationship with El-Rufai as “cordial.” It turned out to be a bullet rather than an oil of gladness to the mallam. He fought back, rather than exchange the courtesy. For him any act of civility is dubious. Fight is better than nice.

It was then he threw a charge that the Tinubu government has given Kaduna N150 billion, and hence his successor has been in sync with the president.

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Governor Sani has not confirmed the charge. My investigation shows the mallam does not have the facts. But Governor Sani has decided to give El-Rufai an arm rather than an ammunition.

But El-Rufai loves turbulence more than tranquility. He is not the sort who loves brotherly love. He must be very angry he has heard nothing from his successor. Maybe Governor Sani would respond tomorrow. I don’t know. But up to the time of writing, he has chosen the path of Michelle Obama. “When they go low, we go high.” El-Rufai does not know much about height.

The charge of N150 billion is a clever-by-half ploy to divert attention from the over N400 billion , comprising projects he has not accounted for. For the sake of argument, if the state received N150 billion from the Tinubu government, should El-Rufai not be happy.

They are trying to clean up after his mess, yet he is angry. He is angry that Kaduna people are going to get a relief? Is it not strange that someone wants to save your people and you are up in arms? Is he so insensitive to the people? Is it not the same governor that is uniting the state after El-Rufai drove a wedge between north and south of the state, between Muslims and Christians, between rich and poor? Is he angry because he has worked to beat down prices? Is he angry at the peace dividends in the state? Is he boiling because Birnin Gwari is now calm?

What he is doing is the great betrayal: of his own people. Is he not the one betraying is successor by his claptrap tongue?

But he is now in the same boat with Atiku, and pretending he is still in the APC. That is pharisaic. It is an act of cowardice not to state where he is. With his tongue he draws himself to APC but we can decode his own heart from his lips. Maybe the nation’s memory is short about El-Rufai’s past.

The social media is circulating a quote on how the Owu chief or OBJ characterized the former Kaduna State governor in his memoirs.

But let me show how even the same Atiku was saved by then Governor Bola Tinubu from Obj’s clutches who was using El-Rufai as his point man.

Atiku was vice president and was at war with President Obasanjo, who took him to court to rid him of his immunity. Obj wanted to nail him for abandoning the PDP and moving over to the Action Congress.

Tinubu’s AC had penciled him down to run for president against Obasanjo’s pick, the late Umar Yar Adua.

With Tinubu’s backing, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN) defended Atiku showing that OBJ had no reason to undermine his immunity as vice president as guaranteed by the constitution. Those were the days that everyone accused OBJ of “overheating the polity.”

The Supreme Court ruled in Atiku’s favour. Miffed, Obj set up an administrative panel on Atiku, and who were those on the panel? Attorney general Bayo Ojo and, you guessed right, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, who was then the FCT minister. For Obidients’ information, our own Oby Ezekwesili was a member.

The panel recommended the banning of Atiku from public office for six years. But they made a mistake in the panel report. They nailed OBJ’s old friend turned adversary, Oyewole Fasawe, for financial impropriety, after deploying its EFCC to arrest him.

With Tinubu’s backing again, Chief Olanipekun took up the gauntlet and shredded the case against Fasawe as a way of discrediting the whole administrative panel’s report. The court upheld Olanipekun’s brilliance and threw away the case against Fasawe and the whole recommendation of the report, including the six-year ban on Atiku. It was a blow to OBJ. Tinubu saved Atiku and made it possible for him to run for president. Or else, the Adamawa chieftain would have sulked in limbo – as he is now – until the election cycle of 2015. So, we can see how much ingratitude flows in Atiku’s blood.

I recall in the period, during a book launch in Lagos, Atiku described Tinubu as more than a friend but a brother. And on the podium, Tinubu nodded. It was the same time, after securing the AC ticket, that he picked Ben Obi as his running mate to defy the man who saved him. Some people are not worthy of their salvation. Of course, that ticket was an electoral disaster. The rest, as they say, is history.

But at this time, El-Rufai was still OBJ’s boy, though it was Atiku, who nominated him to high office and the graces of the then President Obasanjo. For a man like El-Rufai, he likes the life of the moment. When Atiku was his man, he could have groveled before him and drooled with the Shakespearean phrase: “how fine my master is.” He would say the same about OBJ later. I wonder if he is not saying the same about Atiku today. Atiku could not accuse him because his own record of pirouettes are as sordid as the former Kaduna State governor. He probably wants Governor Sani to say same to him and he is upset the governor is not bowing. He wanted what historian Timothy Snyder calls “anticipatory obedience.”

Even the issue of the over N400 billion he has not accounted for was unveiled because, according to the governor and an investigation I conducted, the labour union wanted to shut down the state with industrial action. He had to show them the books, and explained the lack of finesse of his predecessor with the state’s resources. The labour leaders said so to this writer and was part of an over 5000-word expose in this newspaper last year. Governor Sani’s reluctance to cry out initially was part of his generosity to his friend and predecessor. But Mallam always has other ideas. Loyalty and conciliation are not part of them.

February 10, 2025
Evans’ metamorphosis

Three years after big-time kidnapper Chukwudimeme Onwuamadike, alias Evans, was jailed for life, he claims to be reformed. His lawyer, Emefo Etudo, on January 30, told the Lagos State High Court in Ikeja, in the course of another case involving Evans: “My client is now a repentant person. He was a young man consumed by crime but he is now remorseful.”

He also said: “Presently, he is a 200-level student at the National Open University of Nigeria. In fact, he made A1 in all his papers in NECO while in prison. All this was made possible through a scholarship given to him by the Federal Government.”

It would be interesting to know what Evans is studying in university, and why. But his lawyer did not provide such information.

He told Justice Adenike Coker: “We have asked the Lagos State Government to give him the opportunity to go around schools in the state to talk to youths about the dangers of crime.”

This new picture of the convict conflicted with charges of murder, attempt to murder and conspiracy to commit kidnapping, which Evans and his co-defendant were facing. The prosecution alleged that on or about August 27, 2013, at about 10 pm, along 3rd Avenue, FESTAC Town, Lagos, Evans and Joseph Emeka killed one Peter Nweke. They were also accused of killing one Chijioke Ngozi, on the same day. They pleaded not guilty. Both men have applied to the Lagos State government for a plea bargain, their counsel told the court.

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Outside the court, the lawyer had reinforced his argument regarding the reformation of Evans, telling journalists he “is now a changed man. He has been transformed.” He attributed the transformation to “the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) and the Federal Government which gave him a scholarship to study and become a better person.”

Evans is serving two jail terms. He was sentenced to life imprisonment in February 2022, for the kidnap of Donatus Dunu, CEO of Maydon Pharmaceuticals Ltd., Lagos. He was also sentenced to 21 years in prison, in September 2022, for kidnapping a businessman, Slyvanus Ahamonu, and collecting $420,000 as ransom from his family. In both cases, he was tried in Lagos. He was reported to be “standing trial in two other kidnapping cases.”

A native of Umudun, Nnewi, Anambra State, he was arrested in June 2017, in his classy home at Magodo, Lagos, about three weeks after the announcement of N30m bounty by the police, for information that could lead to his arrest. He had been on the wanted list of the police in three states, Edo, Anambra and Lagos, for over four years; and police interest in him was renewed by his alleged involvement in Dunu’s kidnap. The police described him as “the most brilliant, richest and craftiest kidnapper in the country’s history.”

At the time, the police said Evans had two mansions in upscale Magodo GRA Phase II, Lagos, worth about N300m. He was also said to have “two houses in the highbrow area of Accra, Ghana, among many other properties, such as exotic cars, expensive watches, jewellery he bought from ransom.” It was reported that the police recovered AK47 and AK49 rifles, double-barreled long guns, and magazines with ammunition from his gang. This showed the threat they posed to society.

After his arrest, he told the story of how he started kidnapping, which added flavour to the thriller: “I was into auto spare parts importation but lost all my money (over N25m) when Customs seized my goods. From there, I relocated to South Africa, where I started peddling drugs. But along the line, my business partner shot me and passed me off as dead. I recuperated, returned to Nigeria and decided to start kidnapping rich men for ransom.”

Within 10 years, he had acquired a reputation as a high-profile kidnapper. His victims included Chief Raymond Okoye, who was kidnapped in 2015 and detained for two months until his relatives raised $1m; a trader, Uche Okoroafor, who was kidnapped in 2015 and held captive for three months until his family paid $1m; another businessman, Elias Ukachukwu, who was kidnapped in November 2015, and paid $1m ransom. In Ukachukwu’s case, the kidnappers refused to release him after collecting the initial ransom. They demanded another $1m, alleging that the victim’s relatives were rude to them. He stayed in their den for several months and it was unclear how and when he regained freedom. Francis Umeh, an auto parts dealer, was kidnapped in July 2016 at Ago Palace Way, Okota, Lagos. He was caged for two months and paid an undisclosed sum in dollars.

Dunu’s kidnap led to the arrest of Evans. He was kidnapped in February 2017 in the Ilupeju area of Lagos. The victim was kept in a house at New Igando, Lagos, for 88 days. He eventually escaped and gave the police information which led to the arrest of Evans and others. In court, the prosecution said Evans and five others, armed with guns and other weapons, had captured Dunu, detained him and collected a ransom of 223,000 euros for his release.

Justice Hakeem Oshodi, who sentenced him to life imprisonment, observed that he was “seen laughing even when he was told that he must be a rich kidnapper,” adding, “He showed no remorse in the dock and tried to lie his way out of the crimes despite the video evidence.”

Three years later, Evans wants the public to believe that he is a different man. This is likely to be difficult, and will perhaps be seen as a contrivance, considering the scary scale of his involvement in kidnapping before his arrest, trial and conviction. Jailed for life, he has spent only three years in prison. Given the nature of his crime, is this period long enough as punishment, and does his alleged transformation justify a reconsideration of the sentence?

Kidnapping for ransom is a serious problem in the country, and the authorities must avoid sending an encouraging signal. For instance, more than 2,000 people were reported kidnapped across 24 states of the country between January and July 2024, according to SUNDAY PUNCH. The newspaper’s research focused on reports of kidnapping published in four Nigerian newspapers in the period, namely The PUNCH, The Guardian, The Nation, and Vanguard. Also, the research showed that the families of 62 kidnap victims paid N389m as ransom to kidnappers for the release of their relatives in the period.

In August 2024, the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, notably inaugurated a special intervention squad, saying it was created “to confront the most formidable challenges that beset our nation today — challenges like kidnapping, banditry, and other violent crimes…”

The country is facing a kidnapping crisis. The authorities must take action to stop kidnapping.

February 10, 2025
Puzzling killings in Ebonyi

How did suspected herdsmen succeed in wreaking havoc on three Ebonyi communities despite assurances of safety given to them by their state government and security agencies?

That is the big puzzle the federal government has to untangle in penultimate Sunday’s massacre by suspected herdsmen of 15 innocent people in the Amagu, Amaokwe and Umunesha villages of Nkalaha, Ishielu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State. The inquisition is made more compelling by indications that both the Ebonyi State government and the security agencies were privy to potential threats to law and order in the community prior to the unfortunate killings.

Why that threat could not be diffused such that it snowballed into the wanton killings and destructions witnessed in the three communities justifies a high-powered inquisition by the federal authorities. Accounts of what led to the killings are largely foggy. But it was said to be connected to alleged killing of some cows belonging to the herdsmen.

It is not certain the number of cows killed, the circumstance of the alleged killing, and those behind them. But while some reports blame the so-called Eastern Security Network (ESN), others suspect they were done from within the communities. The alleged killings of the cows had led to schism between the herdsmen and the communities with attempts by all parties including the state government and security agencies to resolve the matter.

But these efforts hit the rocks when suspected herdsmen attacked the communities as residents went to church penultimate Sunday, killing those in sight, burning a total of 25 houses, yam barns and other valuable properties. Reports from residents after the attacks expressed displeasure on the handling of the crisis by agents of the state government and the security agencies. The pervading feeling is that the killings could have been averted had the state government and the security agencies taken the necessary preventive measures when threats of a possible attack by the herdsmen hovered on the air.

The traditional ruler of Nkalaha community, Igwe Thompson Ebe showed obvious frustrations as he threw some insight into the duration of the crisis and efforts made to stem the tide. He said the trouble started on January 20, and dragged to January 31.

“We have continued to mediate between the Agila in Benue State and the Fulani herdsmen. I even invited them to my house in Abakaliki to talk to them about the cows that were allegedly killed. We have even made some arrests to ensure that the perpetrators are brought to book. As we were still talking, this ugly incident of killing took place on Sunday”, the traditional said with regrets.

If the traditional ruler’s account of the duration of the crisis and the prospects it presented for possible resolution does not throw up serious challenges on the handling of its possible threat to law and order, that of residents on the roles of the Ebonyi State government and security agencies lend themselves to serious interrogation.

A community leader from area, Elder Simon Idenyi who spoke to the media had reasonable cause to accuse the state government and security agencies of aiding the herdsmen in the atrocities they committed. He said that on February 1, officials of the Ebonyi State government, the military and police authorities came to them that they wanted to make peace between them and the Fulani herdsmen.

“After discussions with elders of the community, including women, they told us that the problem we had with the Fulani herdsmen had been resolved. They encouraged us not to leave our houses that the government and security agencies are here to protect us. They assured us that nothing will happen to us.

“Regrettably, at about 9.30 am, strange faces we understood were Fulani herdsmen wielding AK-47 rifles and machetes surrounded the community and started killing anyone on sight and burning houses randomly. There was no security agent in sight while the carnage lasted. The attack started at 9.30 am and till they left the community around 3.30 pm; no single security agent came until around 5pm”, he further lamented.

The community leader said the herdsmen took time to enter every nook and cranny to carry out their attack including a church where they killed two worshippers. Other residents alleged that security agencies left the area on Saturday only for the herdsmen to attack them the following day. Other allegations bordered on the seizure of their phones by soldiers preventing them from recording the gruesome killings with warnings of severe consequences should videos or pictures of the killings and destructions make their way into the social media space.

“They (soldiers) later returned the phones after residents had recovered 10 corpses including that of a retired policeman”, one other resident whose phone was seized recounted.

If the account of the meeting between officials of the state government, the military and the police during which they gave assurances of safety to the communities and asked them not to leave their homes is a true reflection of events, the eventual attack, killings and destructions raise serious questions. This is more so given their duration and magnitude.

The attack was said to have started around 9.30 am as people were in the churches and lasted till 3.30 pm. That should give ample time for information to get to the relevant security agencies to respond to the challenge. It is surprising that the attacks could go on for that long without the authorities coming for the help of the defenceless communities. And if the security agencies were promptly on ground to contain the attack as insinuated in some quarters, the gravity of the killings and destruction of properties weakens such claims.

In an attack of the magnitude that took place in the three communities, one would have expected to hear of the arrest and neutralisation of some of the invaders by the security agencies as the mayhem was on. That would have served as a clear evidence to countermand the claims of residents. But nothing of such is of public knowledge.

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Though the deputy governor of the state, Patricia Obila acknowledged that without the intervention of the security agencies, the casualty level would have been higher, she did not indicate at what point they arrived the scenes of the killings and culprits arrested for the heinous crimes.

But she could not have issued a 24-hour ultimatum to the security agencies to arrest the killers had some arrests been made in the course of the attacks. Frustrations were evident in her lamentations: “No government is happy to see their citizens being killed in a bloody manner. This is a horrific scene to behold. If you look at the corpses, they are a younger generation that were lost”.

The deputy governor hit the uncanny irony of the matter on the head when she lamented that most of the corpses lying out there did not even know what was happening – a reference to the alleged killing of cows that led to human killings and destruction of property. Incidentally, the killings in the Ebonyi communities epitomise the unfortunate fate of the country in disagreements between herders and host communities.

This is not the first time Ebonyi people have been mindlessly killed by suspected herdsmen over disagreements bordering on alleged destruction of farmlands, crops or the killings of cows. Unfortunately, in those earlier incidents just as in the present one, the invaders operated with an air of invincibility disappearing into the thin air after their atrocious escapades.

Neither were arrests made nor credible intelligence provided for unmasking the standing force avenging any alleged wrong to the herdsmen across the country. This seems to have emboldened those avenging perceived wrongs to the herdsmen into the mindless reprisal killings seen across the country. But this sordid profile only reinforces suspicion, resentment and conflict between host communities and the herders. Before now, it was thought that the herdsmen were able to carry out the attacks and go scot-free because of the sympathy of the last regime to their cause.

But the killings have persisted though on a lower scale. President Tinubu has to do something substantially different to halt the frequent resort to lawlessness by suspected herdsmen each time there is disagreement between them and their host communities. It has become a huge national embarrassment that a group of people can easily go on rampage against their host communities killing and maiming them only to escape without any trace. There is definitely more to it than ordinarily meets the eyes.

February 10, 2025
Orisa in the spotlight

It must be noted that there was Orisa World Congress, organised by Orisaworld, which was founded in 1981 by Prof. Wande Abimbola, a retired academic and Yoruba culture exponent, before the annual World Orisa Congress planned by the National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO).

Orisaworld was described as “an organisation of practitioners and scholars of Orisa tradition, religion and culture.” The group was said to promote “culture, education and peace in a world where Orisa tradition and culture plays a central role in the day-to-day lives of over 100 million people,” and had “individual and institutional members from over 50 countries.” Its aim was “to revitalise and rejuvenate Orisa culture and all its traditions.”

Yoruba religion is also known as Orisa tradition or Orisa way of life. A multitude of gods or orisa makes up the Yoruba pantheon, with Ifa as the oracular mouthpiece of Olodumare, the Almighty in Yoruba religion. Abimbola described Ifa as “the heart and soul of the culture and philosophy of the Yoruba people.” In 2005, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) added the Ifa Divination system to its list of “Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.”

When NICO’s CEO, Biodun Ajiboye, announced the agency’s plan to organise the World Orisa Congress in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Diaspora Commission at a press conference in Abuja, on January 23, it evoked memories of Orisa World Congress.

However, it can be said that the institute failed the creativity test. Its project could have been given a dissimilar name to make the brand distinctly different from Orisa World Congress.

Ajiboye said the agency, intended “to tap into the vast treasure of … 500 million people of Orisa descent from Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil, and other Caribbean countries,” and “tap into the huge revenue stream of almost one million visitors annually on a sustainable basis,” which would translate into “increasing the GDP astronomically, and establish global creativity, innovation, and progress, create sustenance of traditional rituals, sacred practices, traditional craftsmanship, oral traditions, and festive events.”

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According to him, the project “is estimated to generate $5-6bn with Nigeria playing host to over one million visitors,” and “the Diaspora in the United States of America, Cuba, Trinidad and Tobago, Brazil, and other Caribbean countries are ready with materials and human resources for this project.”

I attended the five-day 10th Orisa World Congress held in July 2013 at Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU), Ile-Ife, Osun State, which attracted devotees of Yoruba religion as well as scholars and researchers across the globe. It was a festival of culture and ideas that not only reflected a rich heritage but also explored the place of indigenous faith and its challenges in a world of diversity and multiplicity of religions.

The 10th edition of Orisa World Congress in Ile-Ife, with the theme “Culture and Global Peace,” was the fourth in the ancient town, starting from the first one in 1981. Six others had been held in Brazil, USA, Trinidad and Tobago, and Cuba. Abimbola had announced that future congresses would be held in Nigeria, and that the next one would take place in 2016 in Ile-Ife. More than a decade after the 2013 edition, it remains to be seen when the next one will actually take place.

Ile-Ife, which is regarded as “the source” and cultural capital of the Yoruba race, was an appropriate setting for a focus on the challenges facing the Orisa way of life. The World Ifa Temple is situated at Oketase, Ile-Ife. The variegated gathering, which included participants from USA, Brazil, Cuba, Venezuela and Mexico, demonstrated the appeal of the Yoruba religion beyond its local provenance, and brought instructive international perspectives. An all-male family of four from Cuba, a Chinese couple who lived in Venezuela and a densely bearded white American were among the alluring sights.

Who would have thought Orisa tradition could be relevant to the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, in which two pressure cooker bombs killed three and injured 264? A woman who lived in Boston, Clemencia Lee, an American of Columbian origin initiated into the religion 10 years earlier, said being a devotee of Yoruba gods saved her and members of her family. She told me in an interview: “It was definitely the Orisa that watched over us to not be there and right where the bomb was.” She had attended the congress with her husband, Tony Van Der Meer, an American academic of Suriname-Dutch origin and Orisa devotee, and her second daughter who was also an initiate with a Yoruba name, Adetutu.

Stimulating discussions on various issues of interest in the context of Yoruba religion and culture took place at Oduduwa Hall and Institute of Cultural Studies on the campus, with wide-ranging topics including Ifa, Education and Culture; Youth Rights, Elder Rights: Generational Integration; Poverty Eradication; Youth, Education and Spiritual Development; Globalisation and Cultural Identity; and Nollywood versus Hollywood: Images of Orisa in Movies. It was a reflection of the times that the subject of homosexuality came up, and many were curious about the position of the religion on this controversial question. After a lively debate, it was Abimbola who had the last word. He said: “We cannot say exactly how Ifa views this. There is no need for us to get involved in this controversy.”

In July 2023, a notable collision of faiths in Ilorin, Kwara State, yet again raised questions about the state of secularism in Nigeria. The Emir of Ilorin had banned a planned three-day Yoruba traditional festival by a Yoruba priestess, scheduled for July 22 to July 24, 2023 in Ilorin. The emir’s spokesperson had said: “Our culture is Islamic-based, so we don’t promote idolatry at all.” The development forced the priestess to cancel the festival.

Nobelist and famed defender of freedoms Wole Soyinka, in a response to the drama, issued a statement titled “Isese festival: An open letter to Sulu Gambari.’’ “It is conduct like this that has bred Boko Haram, ISIS, ISWAP and other religious malformations that currently plague this nation… with their virulent brand of Islam,” he said.

“The issue,” he stressed, “is peaceful cohabitation, respect for other worldviews, their celebrations, their values and humanity. The issue is the acceptance of the multiple facets of human enlightenment.’’

Apart from the cultural tourism and money-making objectives, NICO’s World Orisa Congress should be used to promote inter-faith harmony in the pursuit of peace for social progress.

February 3, 2025
Compulsory voting bill ill-timed

If the bill sponsored by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Tajudeen Abbas eventually scales through, Nigerians of voting age will be compulsorily required to cast their votes during elections.

Titled, “Bill for an Act to amend the Electoral Act 2022 to make it mandatory for all Nigerians of majority age to vote in all national and state elections and for related matters”, it prescribes a maximum of six months imprisonment or fine of not more than N100,000 for any Nigerian of voting age who fails to vote during elections.

Ostensibly, the bill is spurred by the low percentage of registered voters that actually participate in that civic exercise during elections. The proposed legislation aims at addressing the large- scale voter apathy that has been the uncanny fate of our elections thereby enhancing the legitimacy of those elected. In the calculations of its sponsor, a legislation making it mandatory for all those of voting age to vote in all elections is all that is required to redress voter apathy.

That would amount to an underestimation of the complex issues promoting and sustaining that tendency in this country. Mandatory voting especially one that prescribes punishment for defaulters could improve voter participation during elections. But it is inherently defective as a solution for its inability to factor in other potent variables that frighten, threaten and prevent voters from exercising their franchise during elections in this country.

Abbas is right to be worried by the increasing voter apathy during elections especially because of the philosophical and legitimacy issues it engenders.

The level of legitimacy which an elected government enjoys is positively linked to the plurality of votes it gets during elections. The role of popular or citizen participation in promoting good governance is one of the justifications for which democracy draws more allure than other forms of governance construct. There is therefore good reason to eliminate all obstacles impeding citizen participation in elections.

Figures released by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the 2023 general elections showed that out of the 94.4 million registered voters in the country, 87.2 million collected their Permanent Voters Card (PVC). But during the February 25, 2023 presidential election, only 25 million people actually voted. And in the last Ondo State governorship election, 2.053 million voters registered but only 508,963 persons exercised their franchise.

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The voting figures from the last presidential election and the Ondo State governorship poll highlight the fears that motivated Abbas in proposing the bill. Those that voted merely added up to one quarter of registered voters. And when the population of the country estimated at more than 240 million people is taken into account, including that of qualified but unregistered voters, the number of those who do not vote during elections becomes even more glaring.

Situations like this raise fundamental and philosophical questions on democracy as a true reflection of the collective of the people as expressed at the ballot box. Democracy in the Greek city states involved the direct participation of all the people in decision-making and election of their leaders. Then, the sizes of the Greek city states were small and could accommodate direct participation.

But the sizes of modern states cannot permit of that. Thus, the concept of representative democracy. The underlying philosophy is for voters to have a say in governance through elected representatives. This presupposes that those who emerge as leaders must derive their mandate through the ultimate sovereign – the people. This pristine principle of popular sovereignty is circumscribed when a preponderance of the electorate is prevented from exercising their franchise by some acts of omission and commission.

There is a wide gamut of practices and challenges that reinforce voter apathy in this clime that should raise questions on the propriety of compulsory voting as an effective remedy. And unless these systemic dysfunctions are identified and realistically addressed, compulsory voting will amount to a colossal waste of valuable time and energy. It is inherently defective in comprehensively addressing the multifarious and hydra-headed challenges that frighten and even prevent those desirous of voting from venturing out during elections.

These have so negatively impacted on our elections that public confidence in its capacity to approximate and reflect the collective will of the electorate has considerably waned. There is the high level of violence arising from do-or-die competitions, sometimes leading to loss of lives and property.

This is in addition to an assortment of contrived subterfuge and designs by politicians in collaboration with their rogue sponsors to manipulate election outcome and render worthless the actual votes cast at the ballot box. Before the introduction of technology to enhance the outcome of elections, results were written in the comfort of the homes of politicians and hotels and announced before the arrival of the actual votes cast in the various constituencies.

Our electoral process is also contending with a variety of manipulative practices that question the rationale for the electorates’ continued participation in elections when votes cast will not count in determining those that purportedly emerged victorious. These are the real issues to voter apathy. Even the modifications made in the Electoral Act permitting of the use of technology have not fared better on account of sabotage.

The direct transfer of votes from the polling units to the result viewing portal geared to eliminate manipulation and falsification of election figures have in many instances turned out a huge aberration. During the last presidential election, the electoral umpire dashed the huge hopes reposed on that technological device when it claimed results could not be transmitted due to technical glitches.

Issues of this nature shake the confidence of the electorate in the capacity and commitment of the electoral umpire to credible, free and fair polls. The fears and misgivings they engender are reasons for voter apathy. Compulsory voting is inherently defective in addressing the damage to voter participation by such official bungle. And it remains to be conjectured how mandatory voting will address high-tech official electoral fraud.

The role of money in influencing the direction of voting is another key challenge. The modest progress made on account of the deployment of technology is suffering reverses because of what is commonly known as vote buying. In the last elections across the country, the influence of money in determining election outcome has been pervasive. Those with deep pockets especially governments in power at the various levels dole out huge sums of money to buy the votes and conscience of the electorate.

Capitalising on excruciating poverty in the land and greed, the electorate is bought over to vote against their conscience just for a mess of porridge. How citizen participation in the democratic process envisaged by the proposed legislation will address such dysfunctions is left to be seen. Mandatory voting will achieve little in an environment the citizens are prevented from casting their votes by a combination of systemic obstacles.

Yet, compulsory voting is not entirely strange to the democratic process. About 22 countries practice it. Switzerland, Australia, Belgium, Argentina, Egypt and the Democratic Republic of Congo fall into this category. Australia stands out as the most notable country that practices compulsory voting which fines defaulters $20. It is also reputed for recording about 92 per cent success in the exercise since it was put in place in1962.

But that law is highly rooted in that country’s history as a symbolic honour to the heroism of those who died during the World War one. Some other countries like Egypt and the Democratic Republic of Congo that practice it, are not known for any significant contribution to the progress of the democratic engagement.

The only attraction of such a law in the Nigerian situation is just to address voter apathy. But it will be difficult to address voter apathy in a system like ours where leaders of all hue aid and abet that tendency through devious activities for self-serving goals. It is not only incapable of redressing the wide range of infractions and practices that stand against the preferences of the electorate but strikes as a superfluous piece of legislation.

The real concerns of our leaders should be how to improve the credibility and integrity of our elections through legislations that ensure votes cast approximate the collective will of the electorate as freely expressed at the ballot box. That is the real challenge and in it lies much of the solution to voter apathy.

Compulsory voting is difficult to enforce; it is a piece of legislation whose time is yet to come.

February 3, 2025
The suicides

In a fine moment, Nasir El-Rufai was Atiku’s boy. Until he became Obasanjo’s boy and started to throw potshots at Atiku.

The moment was no longer fine enough. Moments later, when he became anti-Obasanjo, he ran to Atiku’s bosom until he nearly bit off the man’s nipples. He was thrust out again, neither for Atiku nor Obasanjo.

You can call it a pirouette or an about-face, but the former governor of Kaduna State will tell you that both are his name, if he is sincere.

But he is only conditionally sincere.

Truth to him is not about beauty but utility. Sorry, Poet John Keats, who proclaimed that “truth is beauty/beauty truth.” If truth is not useful, El-Rufai can do with another option. He abides by his Machiavellian impulse. It comes naturally to him to switch from master to master, from idea to idea, from play to fray.

When he sat with Atiku on a panel last week, about-face sat side by side with pirouette. It is called political harlotry, and what better duo to play it in the public arena. He seemed to rhyme with the Adamawa chieftain again. In the pathology of politics, your past sins are forgiven so long as, today, we bear the same insignia.

So, they are both bedfellows. And the reason they are swooning as one is the president of the federal republic of Nigeria: Bola Tinubu. He gives them nightmares when awake in daytime. They gathered together because some so-called democratic non-profits put them together, and called it “strengthening democracy.” How do you strengthen democracy by corralling only one voice. Maybe it was terminological handicap. They were grasping for the appropriate language. Or else, they would have said: “strengthening the opposition.” All they amassed in the building was a cacophony of contrarian voices, including Kayode Fayemi and Rotimi Amaechi.

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Nothing they said in that meeting was about strengthening democracy. Is it what Atiku said? He griped about democracy and judiciary. He lamented the power of the courts in determining elections. Pray, was it not the same Atiku who gallivanted all over the world shopping for judgment about certificates of the president? Was it not the same man who wanted the courts to help him win the election? Is it because he suffered the “O lule” syndrome that he has now changed his pose about the courts? He forgets that he had certificates that conflicted with certificates in his school, if he did attend them.

Then without evidence, he said the government was giving his men N50 million. He needs to show proof. So, if the people said they collected N50 million, did he ask them to return the money? Can he name names please? If they collected, and they are still with him, does it not show that he has no reason to condemn corruption? He should have spat those who told him the story to either return it or stay out his squeaky-clean politics. He said no such thing. Rather he accused the administration of arresting Prof. Yusuf Ahmed, and described as muzzling critics and opposition. The prof was arrested for contract corruption, and awarding them to his family members. Obnoxiously, Atiku sees nothing wrong with that. Was he not the same fellow, I mean Atiku, who made the term SPV – special purpose vehicle – a household word? A vehicle for corruption. The term was innocent until the Adamawa chieftain spewed it into the public space. This man has been looking for the position of president since 1992, when he was a Customs officer of some degree of integrity, and now he is a near octogenarian. He wants to occupy the position in his 80’s so he can impose a Trump-like senility of anxiety on all of us.

He said he has lived his life, and all he wants is power. That is deception. It happens to some men who have acquired wealth. They focus on one desire: conquer their fellow humans. Hence Epicurus wrote: “If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches, but take away from his desires.” The man, however, still craves wealth at close to 80, and the people are not giving him the desire.

But the lighthearted moment was when Rotimi Amaechi stood up. I wish he just sat and watched. How could he say he has been in politics because of poverty. Is he poor now? He has been in power for 24 of the 26 years, and he was always in sync. Just two years out of power, he is angry? Maybe he was under the spell of Jesus when he said the thief comes to steal, kill and destroy. Amaechi’s version? Steal, maim and kill. It was a memorable assertion against all the speakers since he did not excuse all his fellow travelers. So, how are they the alternative? Shall we now elevate those vices as models of governance?

Nasir El Rufai is the comic figure, although he may not be the sort of comedian for the hour. He said he did not want to be minister. Haba. As Reno Omokri wrote, why did he spend all that time in the Senate. Just for show? He dressed well, prepared notes and ideas about power, and he was not interested? Hence, I wrote earlier that he has a Machiavellian attitude to facts. Even before he appeared before the Senate, he had embarked on a pilgrimage to Europe with his friend Jimi Lawal, and explored deals with firms on electricity. He should not lie to the public. Such lies do no respect to the Nigerian people.

The president wanted him to be minister. But he was not popular with the top brass of the party, including those who had worked with him. So, the president had to reconsider. I read a few posts from Joe Igbokwe about the man’s value. I don’t know where Joe got that idea. He should go to Kaduna, where some of his associates are behind bars, and they are finding it difficult to defend the findings of the House of Assembly on how he spent the state funds, including about power projects that went kaput. That Kaduna is standing and its Governor Uba Sani is earning accolades is a boon after El-Rufai’s era of error.

He also confessed on the panel that he could also oppose the government if he served. So, there. Someone once told me that he asserted that he loves to attack big men, so as to get attention and bring them down. It is the practice of some persons – not all of them – of a certain relationship with the earth.

All of them on that panel indicted themselves. It shows they are not looking at the clock, and what it is saying about today. They forget that, in the market, dollar is gradually peeping down from its peak. Inflation is high but prices of tomato, beans, dry fish, etc, are losing altitude. They forget that over 600,000 students are now benefitting from the student loans. They cannot see what happened in December. How many Nigerians came home and how much did they enjoy their country? El-Rufai, who failed to bring peace to Southern Kaduna must be marveling over how much calm has come as balm to the streets and heaths. He must wonder at the return of Birnin Gwari. The panelists did not see that the roof of their party, PDP, is on fire. Two hench men going to blows in public in Asaba. Did they not see that? Those who say they are still in the APC only exhibited a loose tongue.

What it shows is that they are suicides, looking at the backend of their political profiles. It is like the novel, Suicides, by Argentine writer Antonio Di Benedetto. The protagonist is a reporter who is reporting three suicides. He describes their profile this way: “There is terror in their eyes. But their mouths are grimacing in sombre pleasure.” Tells the story of our men on the panel.

February 3, 2025
The Ballad of Bala Mohammed

Nyesom Wike has been a generous man. In spite of all his acts of grace to Bauchi State Governor Bala Mohammed, he never said a word about the good he did to him. If former speaker Yakubu Dogara did not issue a statement, we may never have known that he once knelt and bowed to the same Wike for money.

Dogara’s writing is like a ballad over a bad act. It is not Bala’s kneeling that bothers this essayist, it is his ingratitude. He is also making a drama of his moral purity by calling Wike a traitor.

By the whole story, it was Wike that made him a governor. He is guilty of what psychologists call a fear of gratitude. Generosity elevated him, and having risen, he got too dizzy up there to remember he was once below and beggary.

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He is a caricature of the desperate politician.

He is also a creature of moral failure. The man who you did not give land in Abuja as FCT minister and you gave all others in the cabinet, the man who came to your office for office space request and you kept him waiting for hours but didn’t grant his request.

That same man helped you out in your quest for office. And he granted it. Bala may think he stooped to conquer. But he was a buffoon of a winner, and that is the definition of a loser. No wonder he has had no good response to Dogara’s revel

February 3, 2025
National census this year?

The senate appears bent on having a national headcount before the end of this year. Indication of this prospect emerged when the chairman, National Population Commission (NPC), Nasir Kwarra appeared before its committee on National Identity and Population to defend their allocation in the 2025 budget.

During the session, committee members took turns to express serious concerns over Nigeria’s continued dependence on estimated population data even as they stressed the imperative for accurate census statistics for national planning. For the committee chairman, Abdul Ningi, the lawmakers will formally engage President Tinubu through the office of the Senate President, Godswill Akpabio to discuss plans for the census.

“Our committee will have to write the president through the office of the senate president to know his view about the plan to conduct the census. We are not going to rest on our oars until this census takes place”, he stated.

Their preference for the conduct of the census this year is in part informed by the need to avoid holding it next year very close to the 2027 general elections. They cited past experiences when the exercise suffered postponements and cancellation due to their closeness to general elections.

Kwarra told the committee that his agency was also thinking along the same lines and had taken steps to engage the president on the issue. He disclosed that the president has indicated his preference for a census conducted with biometrics to guarantee its reliability especially given the prevailing security situation in the country.

He further explained that the type of census envisaged is not just all about enumeration but one in which biometrics will capture the face, the fingerprint and voice of those counted and sought the support of the senate to ensure the exercise comes a reality.

The concerns of the committee are genuine and patriotic. Though the crucial place of accurate national census has long been recognised, it remained a sour taste in the mouth that past attempts were mired in avoidable controversy leading to the discarding or outright cancellation of their outcomes.

Our policy makers have not been oblivious of the constraints inaccurate census data pose for national development plans. But attempts to redress the situation through headcounts had come out disappointing as efforts to have credible and reliable census were marred by controversy and disputations bordering on the credibility and integrity of the exercise.

The United Nations’ benchmark is for countries to have periodic headcounts every five or 10 years depending on available resources and political will. The last attempt at national census since the return to democracy in 1999 was in 2006 during the regime of Olusegun Obasanjo. It produced a population of 140 million people.

Before then, it was the 1991 census conducted under the military that put the population of the country at 88 million people. Like the ones before them, those attempts were not spared of the acrimony and allegations of figure inflation and manipulation. No thanks to the revenue sharing formula and representation into the national and state assemblies that are based on population.

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The Muhammadu Buhari administration equally saw the need to give the country accurate census data. But the timelines the regime set for its conduct, raised questions about his commitment to the exercise. Not a few Nigerians raised eyebrows, when Buhari in mid-2022 slated the census exercise a month after the general elections in 2023 and its pilot program before the primaries of the political parties.

This column had then raised issues on the propriety of the timing. Writing under the headline “Census in crises” in April 2022, I had faulted the timing on two grounds. The first was the inappropriateness in slating the census immediately after general elections while the other revolved around the prevailing insecurity across the country.

Fears were expressed that with the cascading insecurity that made it difficult for the federal government to establish firm presence in some local government areas and communities hrence slating the two serially rancorous and combustive exercises close to each other was a clear invitation to danger. It was inconceivable how a national census could hold a month after elections that are usually highly disputed leading to breakdown of law and order with huge toll in human and material capital. Unlike elections which could be gambled with or manipulated and results declared, a national headcount cannot lend itself to such gamble and manipulation without being rendered worthless.

The exercise involves physical and meticulous headcount of all citizens wherever they live. So, they must be reached by enumeration officers without let or hindrance. It has to capture these vital statistics to be accurate, reliable and to make the desired difference. Such a task would be highly circumscribed in a situation where enumeration officers are prevented by insecurity to access the nooks and cranes of the country, it was further argued.

The other plank of the argument had to do with the history of general elections in the country often characterised by violence and rancour that may take quite some time to settle. Post-election violence resulting in widespread demonstrations, destruction of properties and loss of lives are regular features of elections that may render any attempt to conduct a national census immediately after a near impossibility.

But the Buhari government in its characteristic manner never gave any serious consideration to these. That government realised lately, the incongruity in the two exercises holding close to the other when in mid-2023 Buhari announced the cancellation of the 2023 census exercise only to leave it for the incoming government to handle.

President Tinubu could not have possibly embarked on the census in his first year in office given the time it took to resolve litigations and manage post-election violence in keeping with predictions. The president is about to roundup his first two years in office and there are genuine fears that unless he commits himself to conduct the census this year, that exercise will possibly spill over to the next administration.

That prospect is very high and seems to lend credence to the position of the senate committee on population on the desirability of conducting the census this year. Next year will be too close to the elections especially as various political parties prepare for their primaries. And the election year is completely ruled out for the same reasons that led to the cancellation of the 2023 exercise.

But as attractive as the committee’s position is, it appears not to have taken into account extant challenges that may equally constrain the exercise and impugn its’ integrity – insecurity.

Though the level of decrease in the intensity of insecurity in the country can be argued with varying degrees of plausibility, the fact remains that there are local governments and communities still in the hands of non-state actors and marauding gangs. Borno, Zamfara and Katsina have a host of them. Imo is not left out. And just recently the people of Shiroro in Niger State had cause to cry out about the sovereignty of the bandits within their domain.

These do not exhaust the list of communities rendered unsafe and inaccessible by the devious activities of a coterie of bandits, insurgents and terrorists. It therefore remains to be conjectured how a national headcount that involves physical enumeration of all citizens will fare in the prevailing circumstance. Travellers are regularly kidnapped, dehumanised and made to pay ransom. Unlucky ones have had their lives terminated.

Just recently, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released startling statistics on the embarrassing level of kidnapping and ransom payment in the various geo-political zones between March 2023 and April 2024. The ripples of the NBS data are yet to settle. But they highlight the daunting challenges on the road to a seamless headcount.

It is good a thing the president is interested in the credibility and reliability of the exercise. He is routing for biometrics that will capture pictures, fingerprints and voice of those counted. This is the way to go given the rancorous and disputed outcomes of previous ones.

Biometrics in a relatively safe and secure environment will make the desired difference by ensuring the accuracy and reliability of data so generated. But it should be a serious challenge to our leaders that elections have continued to stand on the way to credible census.

It has remained so because of the credibility and integrity issues that dent their outcome. So as the imperative for credible national census continues to worry our policy makers, the serial inability of our elections to pass integrity tests should also be a serious cause for concern. Had our elections been credible and less rancorous, it may have been easier to conduct censuses without much disruption. Maybe we have to get our elections right to guarantee hitch-free and credible national census. But a census this year would seem highly improbable.

January 27, 2025
Tinubu’s northerners

No one begrudges Bala Mohammed his right to rise, especially now that he eyes the presidency. But he does not have a right to lie. We just need a few morsels of truth from his mouth about some jibes from Foreign Minister Yusuf Tuggar, who has acted as a frontline minister and an avenger of a bigot.

He needs to account for two stewardships. One before, and the one now. He needs to cleanse all the charges against him.

Is it true that in May 2017, the former Minister was in Kuje Maximum Security Prison, facing charges of graft and breach of public trust after an EFCC investigation? Was his son, Shamsudeen, tackled by the EFCC for seizing 10 mansions, many plots of land, and a twin plaza in Wuse Zone 3 when Bala was Minister. Did he award fantastical contracts worth N1 billion? Did he allocate 12 choice plots of land to his son? Did he facilitate a N1 trillion Abuja land swap deal?

Tuggar is not sparing the man even now in Bauchi where he is governor. Tuggar implies Bala Mohammed is a land wanderer who goes about scooping up land from the poor. It is his version of Cyprian Ekwensi’s disease for wanderers known as Sokugo in his novel, The Burning Grass. In fact, he has wandered from the poor to the sacred. Now, he is accused of collapsing even a mosque to build a property for himself. He is a bulldozer, just like his Kano counterpart. He does not respect his God. How would he respect the people Allah made?

Tuggar has exposed the foul farts of a pharisee of a governor. Bala has taken it upon himself to be the voice of the north. But he is a phony voice. He is accusing the president of causing hardships by removing subsidies. Yet, he was on a television show saying that he had asked Buhari to remove the subsidies, even adding that the beneficiaries told him they were tired of benefitting from the scam. He was Abuja minister then, where his successor is making an exhibition on how to govern the city.

He should be quiet today, unless he goes to doff his hat to Nyesom Wike for repairing all his damages as the chief steward of the FCT. What Tuggar has done is to take Mohammed head-on. Mohammed once said the northern borders should be open because those coming through are his kinsmen. If that is the case, we should do same in the Southwest and Eastern borders and turn Nigeria into a dumping ground. Bala does not care about safety or security. He is an empty, noisy barrel who hears titillating rhythms from his coarse voice. It means he is an irridentist and bigot, a mind closed to the soothing symphonies of fact and social harmonies. A feudal upstart, Bala Mohammed loves the life of plenty without empathy, power as ally of contempt, rhetoric without reason, a cynic in mien and speech with the flamboyance of a man of politics even while he desecrates the house of worship.

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Men like him, Kano governor the bulldozer and his shadow master Kwakwanso , have been erring. Tinubu’s ministers need to emulate Tuggar. What the foreign affairs minister did was to use a medium that spoke to the people: the radio. It is the ear and sounding board of the talakawa.

This essayist has, in the past, drawn my readers to the strategy of President Bola Tinubu appointing ministers from the north in the critical areas of the region’s pain and fragility. Recently, Senator Shehu Sani did same, although the areas he focused were security, agriculture and education. But the breadth is even wider.

We have for security the Minister of Defence, Mohammed Abubakar Badaru, Minister of State Bello Matawalle. They will also work with Chief of Defence Staff from Southern Kaduna, General Chris Musa. The Minister of Police Affairs is Ibrahim Geidam. At the head of the security architecture is the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu.

Before Alausa was moved to education, the minster was from the north. But the Minister of State is Suwaiba Ahmad, also a northerner. Another critical area is agriculture, and the minister is Abubakar Kyari and the Minister of State is Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, both from the North. The third critical part is Health, and Muhammadu Ali Pate is the well-known minister in that forte. If all these people do the hard part, the soft and gentle touch is from the Humanitarian Minister and the person in charge is Imaan Suleiman, a northern woman.

The president has never conveyed it as strategy to tackle the problems of the north. But he does not have to. The men and women ought to take on that task themselves. They are the northern missionaries of the north from the Tinubu administration. They are to feed the poor, heal the sick, guard the weak, illumine the dark regions of the young mind.

Their tasks are not for the north alone. But they know that, in all the indices, the north lags by a mile behind the South. Governor Uba Sani of Kaduna State has been at this from the very beginning, asking his region to wake up from its slumber. He is urging his region to rise from its feudal somnolence and turn a kind eye to the poor. He is doing his task as governor.

But the ministers do not only have to work, they have to act like Tuggar and Governor Sani, and jump in the ring. This is so because of strident voices from that region who want to twist the narrative. They want to give a tendentious lie to the vision of the head of their cabinet.

They do not always have to contend in battle. They can do with a charm offensive. They can start by trying a northern summit, in which the cabinet members engage with critical stakeholders and organisations, and they can hold meetings to raise and answer questions. It is a northern town hall meeting. The street can fume there, and so the elite can explain to soothe. It should be a platform of understanding rather than rancour.

Dialogue supersedes demagogues. It segues from bitterness to a listening ear, from that to sympathy, and from that to empathy, and from that to action. As Fredrich Nietzsche wrote, a will to truth leads to a will to power. We have to know first before we act. Every actor of ignorance believes he knows the facts, hence ignorance is expensive. That is why dialogue predates action better than the bitterness that fuels rage.

The Information Minister, Mohammed Idris, is also a northerner, and he has the machine to roll the idea into a momentum.

Already they have a lot to say. On security, many need to know, even if they don’t know so well, how much has happened in the last year. How come Birnin Gwari in Kaduna State is back to life after over a decade of deathly fear. Many places that ran into ruins are alive again, including sour spots in Nasarawa, Zamfara, Kogi, etc. Ribadu and his men have a lot to exhale about and a lot to promise.

We have same in agriculture and health care, and Ali Pate has been doing a lot to tell his story. A story told together in various voices often reinforces itself. They will not just talk, they will also hear. And that is why a town hall or summit will help not only the cabinet’s cause but the north.

January 27, 2025