The Nation Newspaper

Category: Monday

  • Coronavirus as corruption opportunity

    Coronavirus as corruption opportunity

    Femi Macaulay

     

    After the coronavirus crisis, there may well be a corruption crisis arising from the possible mismanagement of funds donated to combat the coronavirus in Nigeria.  Can the Federal Government ensure that such funds don’t end up in the pockets of corrupt government officials and their collaborators?

    This question is in order, considering the problem of political corruption in the country, which the President Muhammadu Buhari administration is fighting with its anti-corruption campaign.

    It is commendable that the Nigeria Private Sector Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID-19) Relief Fund had N19.488b as at last weekend.  The group intends to raise N120 billion from banks and private sector contributors to support the Federal Government in tackling the coronavirus crisis.

    The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and Alhaji Aliko Dangote of Dangote Industries had donated N2b each. Those who had donated one billion naira each are: Alhaji Abdulsamad Rabiu of Bua Sugar Refinery, Segun Agbaje of Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB), Tony Elumelu of United Bank for Africa (UBA), Oba Otudeko of First Bank, Jim Ovia of Zenith Bank, Herbert Wigwe of Access bank, Femi Otedola of Amperim Power Distribution Limited, Raj Gupta of African Steel Mills Nigeria Ltd and Modupe and Folorunso Alakija of Famfa Oil.

    Other donors include Pacific Holding Limited, Union Bank Plc., Sterling Bank Plc., Standard Chartered Bank Limited, Stanbic IBTC Bank, Citibank Nigeria Limited, First City Monument Bank, Fidelity Bank and Ecobank Plc.

    Public concern that the donations may be diverted reflects the unimpressive result of the war against corruption.  Minister of Information and Culture and member of the Presidential Task Force for the Control of Coronavirus (COVID-19), Alhaji Lai Mohammed, clarified the situation:
    ”I can say without any fear that as of this moment, the task force has not received a kobo from anybody…The Nigeria Economy Group-led private sector has said it is not going to give a penny to the task force; it says it will only raise the money and ask us what our needs are.”

    He added: “We have asked for more equipment and facilities…What we need now are equipment and bed facilities where those who have tested positive can be admitted because we do not want a situation where there will be no bed space. “ This clarification does not mean that the situation cannot be exploited by corrupt opportunists.

    The COVID-19 emergency has further exposed the country’s appalling health system. The authorities are now under pressure to provide things that should have been in place before now. An emergency should not mean that the country is caught totally unprepared.

    After declaring a lockdown in Lagos State, Ogun State, and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, in order to contain the coronavirus pandemic, the Federal Government should not delude itself into thinking that restricting population movement is the solution to the public health crisis.

    The Federal Government should listen to the World Health Organisation:  ”The answer depends on what countries do while these population-wide measures are in place. Asking people to stay at home and shutting down population movement is buying time and reducing the pressure on health systems, but on their own, these measures will not extinguish the epidemics.”

    According to the Director-General of the organisation, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, “more precise and targeted measures” are needed to stop transmission and save lives, and countries that have introduced “lockdown measures” should use the period to attack the virus.

    The WHO recommends six “key actions”: Expand, train, and deploy your health care and public health workforce; Implement a system to find every suspected case at the community level; Ramp up production capacity and availability of testing; Identify, adapt, and equip facilities you will use to treat patients; Develop a clear plan and process to quarantine contacts; Refocus the whole of government on suppressing and controlling COVID-19.

    These recommendations, particularly the ones that have to do with improving the healthcare and public health workforce, and developing facilities, will further expose how the authorities have neglected the country’s health system.

    Read Also: Coronavirus threatens N5tr corporate growth plans

     

    For instance, it is noteworthy that, in September last year, an American physician, Stephen Hunt of the University of Pennsylvania, USA, told journalists at the University of Ibadan, Oyo State: “More than $15bn is spent yearly by Nigerians to travel abroad for medical reasons. We can reduce that if people are trained here so they won’t have to spend a lot of money.”

    It is also worth mentioning that more and more medical doctors are leaving the country for greener pastures abroad because of the poor healthcare system, demoralising remuneration and deteriorating hospital facilities. The exodus of doctors has escalated in the last two years, according to an investigative report. Nigerian doctors are leaving the country to pursue professional and material fulfillment in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. Public hospitals, which serve the majority of the population, are at the centre of the crisis.

    The consequences of the failure to develop the country’s health system are glaring in this time of the coronavirus.  There is no excuse for neglecting the health system.  COVID-19 is an opportunity for the Buhari administration to improve the country’s health system in an unprecedented way.

    The suggestion by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) that the Federal Government should “encourage state governors to commit some parts of their security votes to provide additional resources towards strengthening the health systems within their states” makes a lot of sense.

    Last year, SERAP had drawn attention to the abuse of security votes: “Available evidence would seem to suggest that many of the tiers of government in Nigeria have used security votes as a conduit for grand corruption rather than spending the funds to improve and enhance national security and ensure full protection of Nigerians’ rights to life, physical integrity, and liberty.”

    The organisation had quoted a former governor of Kano State, Musa Kwankwaso, who it said “once described security votes as ‘another way of stealing public funds’.” It also said: “The current security realities in the country would seem to suggest massive political use, mismanagement or stealing of security votes by many governments.”

    COVID-19 is another matter. Alhaji Mohammed said, “The only money we will be able to account for is whatever money we receive from the federal government.” There should be no room for corruption in the fight against the coronavirus. The anti-corruption agencies should be ready to prosecute opportunists who see the coronavirus crisis as a corruption opportunity.

  • To lead

    To lead

    Sam Omatseye

     

    SOMETIMES leaders become nothing like you expect them to be. We are seeing this in this country as Covid-19 flares like a noxious meteor in the night. We saw the centre pussyfoot while Lagos pushed. We saw a governor with an imperial impulse. He proclaimed his immunity to a crowd, rallying the disease to a political cause against the foe.

    The Oyo State Governor Makinde forgot this was not his predecessor or the local government chairmen. The pandemic caught him in a cough. The peacock no longer struts. Not to laugh at him, but to caution him on the limits of a throne. So, to lead is not to bear a title or tattle but be humble.

    It is not about your bulk or the flattery washing up on your face. Some leaders show their mettle when a crisis erupts. That is what we are seeing in the work of the BOS of Lagos, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, in the past few months even before the virus slithered into town.

    We have seen leaders over the ages demonstrate leadership in times of crisis. Churchill led with rhetoric and boyish bravura. Awo soared as an ascetic and seer. Charles de Gaulle made a virtue of nationalist defiance. Franklyn Roosevelt governed from his wheelchair. Mahatma Gandhi inspired with his frock. Lincoln impressed with compassion and cunning. Mandela tapped a people’s pride. Martin Luther turned faith into rebellion. Martin Luther King Jr. turned rebellion into a faith. Mother Theresa made a rebellion out of love. Alexander made a myth of youth. Washington conquered his age with charisma. Bismarck unfolded a brawn… the list goes on.

    Leadership comes in guises and beauties. But every leader patents their signature. In times of crisis, whether war, diseases or hunger, they must come up with their visceral powers. They include vision, anticipation, passion, imagination, action, example, empathy, communication, rhetoric, command of human and other resources, and gallantry. If a mystic like Gandhi or a soldier like Alexander or a freedom fighter like Dore Numa, a leader must have a reflex of these qualities.

    And in the handling of this crisis, we have seen leaders fail and others rise. Lagos has so far risen on the back of its governor. It is the nucleus of the disease but it is showing the greatest sense of readiness. Governor Sanwo-Olu demonstrated anticipation. He communicated and made a little playful drama of showing how we should wash our hands and shake legs rather than hands. We saw he had deployed his team, with the commissioner for health leading the medical team. We saw the beds in place.

    When the first story hit with the Italian, we were not in a panic. He led the centre that was still not sure whether to shut down the borders when more and more cases were flying in from London, the United States and Asia. It was a case shown by Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike, who said he had no control of the airport but anyone who flew in would not be allowed to move in a shutdown.

    But a shutdown was not in place in Lagos then; a dynamic of response ensured that the sick were quarantined and contacts traced. The citizens often are happy when they know the leader is on top of the problem even when it is not yet solved. He also at times became the chief communicator, updating us on the happenings per day. He was showing example by being at ground zero always, going about town assuring Lagosians ……… That was also empathy, and we saw that with the donations of food. Some have said it was not enough, but it is the beginning. But he has also been firm in his shutdown order.

    While empathy works, it becomes benign without a firm hand. Some citizens have not been happy with the shutdown, because of the hunger that looms in their households. It is a delicate matter. Those who live on daily wages may abide by the words of the character in Shakespeare play Coriolanus: “We would rather die than famish.” But all will die if the disease is not checked. We have to look out for the greatest good for greatest number of people, as utilitarian philosopher Jeremy Bentham puts it. So, the federal government has therefore decided to step in with palliatives, if nothing near the level of the United States and Britain.

    Governor Sanwo-Olu is playing that balancing act. We cannot forget that some lazy drones take advantage of this season to seek help as well. We have also seen imagination with the transformation of Onikan Stadium into a Covid-19 spot, in case it escalates. “Imagination,” as Einstein noted, “is more important than knowledge.” Thankfully Lagos has been able to garner resources to help in this matter. This is also expecting that whoever is disbursing the billions of Naira already gathered from the private sector and wealthy citizens will give Lagos State a good chunk as the epicenter to help its handling of the situation. With the shutdown of the city, its economy is going to suffer.

    We can see his passion. During the Second World War, Churchill often appeared in the ruins of London with his victory sign to besieged Londoners after the German bombardments. The passion was often seen as a risk for the first minister. But that was not just passion. It was also gallantry.

    Communicating also means galvanising your words. Gandhi communicated by fasting when crisis erupted. FDR admonished his people that the only thing to fear was fear itself. Churchill was praised for mobilizing the English language to battle. Sanwo-Olu has become a familiar speech maker, often speaking off the cuff.

    Awo’s great gift was not just to organize but as a seer. It is called mystically “the vision thing.” His greatest gift was courage. The centre has followed the lead of Lagos, and after shillyshallying, the federal government has risen to the game. We might not have this level of contagion if the airports were shut down after the Italian incident. Perhaps to rise in Osun State cases also followed border laxity over returnees from Ivory Coast.

    Of all the qualities, we can applaud courage, the prince of all qualities, which also fires vision. We need not only the audacity of action, but first the boldness of the mind, the thinking mind. As a man thinketh, says Solomon, so he is. If you do not think, you cannot act. The strategist is so because the mind is bold enough to think, and think audaciously. A callow mind is meaningless with a doughty heart. Sanwo-Olu was bold to take the lead.

    Hence in all of the Covid-19 response from Lagos, it is gallantry that has given birth to the other virtues. Hence Awo said, “it is not life that matters but the courage you bring into it.” Earl Nightingale says “everything begins with an idea.”

    But if it is a great one, a valiant heart has fertilised it.

  • VIPs and COVID-19 infection

    VIPs and COVID-19 infection

    By Emeka Omeihe

    Those privy to a recent letter by the Chief of Staff (COS) to President Buhari, Alhaji Abba Kyari directing legislators who just returned to the country to report to the nearest office of the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) for screening, would be surprised at the news that he (Kyari) tested positive to the lethal virus a few days after.

    In the letter to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Olufemi Gbajabiamila reference number SH/COS/TP/03 dated March 21, Kyari had justified the directive against the backdrop of reports to the office of the Minister of Health that federal lawmakers refused to submit themselves for the mandatory coronavirus screening upon arrival at the airports. He deprecated the attitude of those of them who refused screening on arrival as they posed a great threat to the health of others. He said it all.

    Ironically, as the nation was still contending with the reality of our legislators’ non-compliance with screening regulations and other safety measures at our entry ports, the sad new filtered that the very man who moved to halt this ruinous attitude has tested positive to the lethal virus. The reality of the situation got further complicated with the disclosure that he also recently returned to the country after an official foreign trip to Germany.

    Expectedly, this has raised questions as to whether the Chief of Staff was also guilty of the same malfeasance he accused some legislators of that prompted his letter to Gbajabiamila?  Did Kyari really submit himself for the compulsory screening at the airport on arrival from the foreign trip or is he also guilty of non-compliance just as the legislators he sought to rein in?

    The flurry of official engagements he was involved in soon after his return did not indicate either strict compliance with the mandatory screening at the point of arrival or the requirement to self-isolate for a period of 14 days. The impression one gets is that he may have also ignored those health procedures given his office. And that has turned out a grave error. Had he adhered to those health regulations, his health conditions could have been detected and necessary precaution taken to avert further spread of the deadly disease. But this did not happen and we are left with the current embarrassing situation.

    From available records, the COS travelled out of the country on Saturday March7, and returned on March 14. But he was in Kogi State on March 17, three days after his return to commiserate with governor, Yahaya Bello over the death of his mother. He also attended both the National Executive Council meeting as well as that of the Federal Executive Council a few days after his return.

    It is very clear from these activities that he did not self-isolate for the 14- day mandatory period. He could not have done so having travelled to Kogi State three days after his arrival into the country. Not also since he worked in his office on his return. The fact that three members of his staff have also tested positive to the lethal virus gives further fillip to the fact that he went into full official activities soon after his return. It is not surprising that governors and ministers who attended some of these functions and had close contacts with him have since been isolating and testing themselves for the virus.

    As unfortunate as the situation is, it would appear we are really contending with contradictions of sort. Events are opening our eyes to the stark realities of official disposition to the fight against the corona virus pandemic. And that speaks volumes on the kind of leadership we have in this country. Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State captured this contradiction very succinctly when he urged 35 of his colleagues to self-isolate and get tested, after he self-isolated and with Governor Bala Mohammed testing positive to the virus.

    The same feelings of official tardiness in the control of the ravaging pandemic were evoked by the altercations between Bauchi State governor, Bala Mohammed and Mohammed Atiku Abubakar, son of former vice president, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. Both tested positive to the virus.

    But the Bauchi State governor alleged that he contacted the virus from Mohammed Atiku whom he met in an Aero Contractors’ flight from Lagos to Abuja. According to the governor’s media aides, their boss met Mohammed and shook hands with him while on board the aircraft. They see the handshake as the source of the virus the governor contacted.

    Atiku’s son has repudiated the allegation claiming nothing of such happened. He said the seat where he and his wife sat in the aircraft was not very close to where the governor sat and therefore he could not have been the source of the virus that afflicted the governor. We are not in a position to offer definite opinion on the issues traded by the duo given their complexity.

    But available facts seem to indicate that the altercation was as avoidable as it was superfluous. Why do we say so? Indicators on the ground vividly show that both travelled outside the shores of the country and arrived almost around the same period. The countries they visited were also those at the epicentre of the Coronavirus pandemic. It is thus, difficult to say with degree of precision the source of their infection or which of them infected the other.

    The safest assumption is that they contacted the disease from the countries they visited. That is how far we can go on this. Why the Bauchi State governor did not factor his country of visit as the possible source of his ailment despite the contacts he would have been exposed to in the course of his travel is still curious.

    Sadly, the altercation between the two has again elevated to the fore the vexatious question as to whether they complied with the safety regulations requiring all returnees to submit themselves for screening test and self-isolate for 14 days. From all indications, they observed those safety rules in their breach. It is little surprising that a very close friend of Governor Mohammed has since tested positive to the virus. Even as one sympathizes with him in his current predicament, it would appear cheap blackmail singling out Atiku’s son as the purveyor of the virus while concealing the fact of his foreign trip.

    More fundamentally, the predicaments of Kyari and Mohammed have brought to the fore the lethargic attitude of our leaders to the COVID-19 pandemic – an attitude that is largely responsible for the current spread and possible escalation of the pandemic in the country. The same attitude accounted for the tardiness in rolling out preventive measures in the face of the spread and the challenges faced by countries where the pandemic was most prevalent. We refused to learn from their experiences.

    We trudged on and behaved in a manner suggesting that we are immune to its ravaging lethality. Even with the arrival of the indent case in February and the reality that the virus is being imported by returnees, we neither found it expedient to shut down our porous borders nor restrict flights into our international airports. By the time the nation’s leadership acted, it had become rather late. Fears are now that if the staccato of measures rolled out by both the federal and state governments do not quickly achieve desired result, we run the risk of an exponential explosion in the virus spread.

    We shudder at such prospects. The consequences would be too grave for a nation grappling with decrepit medical facilities, debilitating poverty and a burgeoning population. It is hoped that Thomas Malthus’ postulation on the inverse relationship between food production and population growth is not about to be set in motion by the coronavirus disease. Malthus had said that food production was growing in an arithmetic progression while population was growing in a geometric progression.

    He then postulated that unless nations take deliberate steps to stem the rate of population growth through a variety of measures, wars, pestilence or disease will put a natural stop to population explosion. We hope the coronavirus disease is not about to activate that process through the actions and inactions of our leaders.

  • Fafowora at 79

    Fafowora at 79

    By Femi Macaulay

    Birthdays bring back memories. Retired diplomat Dapo Fafowora’s 79th birthday on March 29 drew attention to his multidimensionality.

    An old boy of CMS Grammar School, Lagos (1954 -58), Fafowora had joined the Nigerian Diplomatic Service in 1964 after graduating in History from the then University College, Ibadan.  He earned a master’s degree from University of London in 1966, and a doctorate from Trinity College, Oxford University, in 1972.   He served as Second Secretary, Nigeria High Commission, London, from 1966 to 1968.  He was Ambassador and Deputy Permanent Representative of Nigeria to the United Nations from 1981 to 1984.

    Fafowora is a former president of the Association of Retired Career Ambassadors of Nigeria (ARCAN), which is a testimony to his distinguished professional life as an ambassador.

    He is a former Director General of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria.  A Fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Letters, he is the author of   Lord Lugard’s Political Memoranda and the Development of Indirect Rule in Nigeria; A History of the CMS Grammar School, Lagos (1859 – 2009); A Venture of Faith (An Official History of the Cathedral Church of Christ, Lagos (1867 – 2007); and Lest I Forget: Memoirs of a Nigerian Career Diplomat (2013).

    Our paths had first crossed on the editorial board of The Nation.  I got to know Fafowora better when he agreed to deliver the inaugural Herbert Macaulay Gold Lecture in 2017. I coordinated the event. He helped to turn an idea into an event. He chose the topic: “Herbert Macaulay and his relevance to the excellence of Lagos.”  While we prepared for the event, which took place at the Lagos Country Club, Ikeja, Lagos, on May 25, 2017, we shared life beyond the boardroom.  It was an unforgettable time. I benefitted immensely from his immense experience. A man of striking decency and integrity, Fafowora deepened my understanding of decency and integrity.

    When he was leaving The Nation editorial board in January 2018, after 11 years of dedicated service, two months before his 77th birthday, Fafowora was the centre of attention in the newspaper’s boardroom at its head office in Lagos, which became a stage for valedictory tributes to him. Fafowora was also retiring from column writing.

    It is worth mentioning that Editorial Board Chairman Sam Omatseye had said to Fafowora on the occasion: “We have enjoyed your presence here over the years. You have enlightened us with your wisdom and taught us that age is not just a number. We cannot thank you enough. You have equipped us with your experience, we are going to miss you and please don’t forget us soon.”

    Fafowora’s autobiography, Lest I Forget, is worth quoting: “From 1991, twenty years ago, when I started writing with The Guardian, I have maintained a regular column in three different newspapers. In that period, I have written well over 300 articles, some of which were published by me in 2001 in my Selected Essays and Speeches on Nigerian Diplomacy, Politics, and Economics, to mark my 60th birthday. The publication was so successful that it soon ran out of print.

    “I have, on occasion, thought that I should stop writing as it is intellectually demanding. But I have not been able to do so as nothing gives me a greater pleasure than writing… Over the years, I have also had the distinct pleasure of being invited, both at home and abroad, to give public lectures on relevant public issues. In 1989 I was invited by the Confederation of British Industries (CBI) in London to speak on the Nigerian industrial sector. I have had the pleasure of giving public lectures at the University of Ibadan, the University of Ife, the University of Lagos, the Lagos State University (convocation), the University of Ilorin (convocation), the University of Benin, the Redeemers University, and the National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies, at Kuru, in Jos, among several others, often freely.

    “I have also received invitations from the Foreign Ministry to attend and present papers on Nigeria’s foreign policy. When Ojo Madueke was Foreign Minister he consulted me often on Nigeria’s foreign policy. I have sometimes been paid some honoraria in appreciation of my efforts, although this has never been my main consideration in writing. Over the years I have had the privilege of giving over 100 such public lectures at various fora.

    “I have on occasion been offered gratification to present a particular point of view in my column. I have had no hesitation whatsoever in promptly rejecting these offers as demeaning and a gratuitous insult to me. I cannot assess the value of my contributions to public debates over policy in Nigeria. But my writings have helped me in clarifying my own thoughts about public policy in Nigeria…

    ”Early in life, I set myself some objectives, of which the most important were my intellectual and moral development. I believe that I have achieved those two objectives. I have also achieved personal success in my public career with which I remain satisfied. I have, of course, always been interested and committed to Nigeria’s political and economic development. I have tried through my public articles and lectures to influence public opinion in a positive manner.  When I have held high public office, I have tried to the best of my ability to act solely in the public interest. I detest tribal politics and have attacked it at every opportunity. I considered it bad for the country.

    “I believe that, on some occasions, I have, through my public lectures and newspaper columns, been modestly successful in steering some major public policies in the right direction. A former secretary to the federal government once told me that a policy decision by the government was reversed after he had read my newspaper article. In all the public offices I have held my aim has been to lift Nigeria to a higher level. I am proud of my public service record. I have not compromised my moral principles or pubic career in any way. This gives me enormous satisfaction.”

    As he enters his final year as a septuagenarian, and prepares for his years as an octogenarian, I wish him many happy returns.

  • Prisoners of hope

    Prisoners of hope

    Sam Omatseye

    Please tell us, Covid-19, who you are serving, God or the Devil. Because both the followers of the good and the followers of the devil are claiming you as their avenging angel. It is still not clear. For most part, the poor are gloating. They are happy that the rich are crying. So far, the closest they are to suffering is to play the spectator. They are grieving vicariously. Elsewhere though, you respect neither rich nor poor, neither faithful nor atheist. In Nigeria, the story is different.

    They also say it is a white man’s disease, and the black sun forbids the germs. Covid-19 will yield to the African oven.

    But what is going on? Are the rich afraid of you? Is that why they are rolling out the billions into the fund to send you away? Is it because a few poor are shaking to the hoarse rhythms of the coughs, the collapse of lungs, stooping into sneezes and, ultimately, the wry guarantee of quarantines?

    Just a few weeks ago when you were raging outside our borders, a place called Soba fell to an oil-sired inferno. Homes were incinerated, skins morphed from brown to black, souls sailed out of their bodies. Mission schools and churches assumed one fate and fainted in the heat. The BOS of Lagos, Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, opened a N2 billion fund, and this essayist wondered why none of the rich enlisted their treasure. Today, we have not heard any of the rich doing so.

    But when you came here like a thief in the night with all your witches and wizards, we saw their fat wallets. So, were they afraid because the names of your victims are no small men, but the high horses in the land? The mighty are squeaking and quaking over your coming? You are touching them with your ominous breath. The rich also sneeze.

    I am under no illusion. I know you can wreak havoc simply by visiting Mushin market, Ariaria market or the Goron Dutse in Kano, and the predictions of some of a wild and fatal whirlwind of Covid-19 will devour Nigeria. God forbid, even if God sent you. Please don’t visit the poor. Neither remain with the rich. Just go.

    But when evil bit the poor, the rich did nothing. Now that the rich  feel your coming, their purses are bursting loose with money. So, tell me, why are you disgracing them like this? Why are you exposing them? So they had this amount of money hidden in their coffers and if you had not come, the money would either be stashed in their cosy coffers, or spent in the effervescence of vanity, like high society parties.

    They can’t unleash cash for Owambes, for fairy-tale weddings in Dubai, for birthday parties in London. They cannot swagger with their fantastic suites and    , or hats whisked from Manhattan? Everyone is coy and scared. So, are you doing this to show you are working for God? Does God hate the rich, or is it what the rich do with their money you loathe? They didn’t see Soba town, visible, inviting in their pathos. Being ubiquitous, you must know the words of the poet, W.B. Yeats, to wit, “But I, being poor, have only my dreams;/ I have spread my dreams under your feet…” that is the voice of Soba. Lazarus had crumbs, at least. Soba had nothing from the rich men.

    Now, we hope we can build hospitals with this money. Even now, you have tied us all here at home. The rich who want to fly to Germany and New York and Israel for medicals will either do it here or die. This is no time to fly abroad, but to thrive inland. They are bringing home their kids and relatives. It looks like home is better than an American visa these days. First we had slavery; they forced us into their ships. Then we had poverty here and we voluntarily left for their land to foist our servitude on them.  Is this your revenge against the white man, that they cannot have us even if they wanted today? We know all these will pass? Is it a lesson to know what sweet home is, and that a home is sweet if you make it?

    About the white man. Do you remember, Covid-19, that one of your cousins, Malaria, ravaged the white man in the colonial era in West Africa? They started dying in droves. Locals celebrated. They did not have the humility to ask locals how they survived it? Well, West Africa was designated the “white man’s grave.” Some thought the disease would wipe the white man away. Our mosquitoes became a battalion of black defense, the precursor of the African high command, our unseen grenade against the invincible West Africa Frontier Force. Until one of them, one Dr. Baikie, was humble enough to turn our leaves into a bower of healing, into a drug called quinine and saved them. At first they did not have the courage to just ask. In the words of Shakespeare, they were “too proud to be valiant.” Until the likes of Baikie bowed to save the race. Herbs like dongoyaro were the bitter balms of the age.

    You also humbled pastors. When the year began, they all were full of prophesies and seeking followers to fast. None of them saw you coming. Some are claiming vicarious credits. How did you hide? One said God called for a holiday. We are not on a holiday. Holiday is a joyful thing. No one goes on holiday by coercion. We are on lockdown, on self-isolation. Self-isolation is self-immolation. It is time for sacerdotal humility. They did not see.  The Prophet Jeremiah said, “The prophet that hath a dream let him tell a dream; and he that hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully. What is the chaff to the wheat?”

    The church is praying now, which is good. But they have lots of money. They have built big cathedrals, although in this age it is not big temples we need. The church is the people, not buildings. Only in the Old Testament did God emphasise building. But now the people are the temple. So, take care of the people. They don’t build hospitals because they are not profitable like schools. You can turn back a person who can’t pay school fees. But you can’t turn back a sick without a scandal. The scandal is that the church, for most part, is after money rather than souls. Is it why you are here, Covid-19? To remind them of the Texas church that gave money to its members to tide over your torment in America. They gave cheques of $250, $500 and $1000.

    I can see that you are not done yet. You are still humiliating America, Russia, China, et al. They were bracing for a war with nuclear stockpiles. But when you arrived, they cannot even fire a shot for their own good. Is it the end of hubris?

    Again, I see many innocents going. A teenager passed in California without underlying disease. Manu Dibango was a good man, but not good to go. The Chinese doctor who warned before you exploded should not have died. Criminals are perfecting new forms of crime online. Hunger will cripple many families who have no work because of lockdowns.

    I know pestilence like you spares no one. We have had you and your cousins forever.  Egypt crouched, first sons perished, Pharoah believed a lie. The Bubonic plague humbled an era, the Spanish influenza revolutionized fear, ancient Athens locked its walls and the plague was more deadly than if it opened its portal. One whole army died, no one made whole.  We pray that this time mercy upturns sacrifice. But this is an age of pride. We have made nuclear weapons, conquered space and time, but now we cannot heal ourselves. A whole civilization has shrunken behind its doors. We are trembling in our closets. We had Sars, Mers, Ebola, lassa. But shall we outlast this? If you are from the devil, we pray to God. But these days, we have no answers as to what altar to kneel. We can only plead hope. We have no choice. We are its prisoner.

  • Time to be Soba

    Time to be Soba

    Sam Omatseye

     

    IT is about coronavirus but first about Soba town. But most importantly, about a people without a heart. That is, us.

    When Soba fell, a part of us as a nation went down with it. But only briefly. It seems it was a mere black Sunday that passed. A thunderstorm roared and eased into the distance, out of our ears. The blight was out of sight. So, we returned to the routine glories of our lives.

    Even the social media, with all its hoopla and trivial obsessions, saw and looked away. Houses bowed. Schools crouched. Businesses banished. Above all, lives evaporated. At least, 20 persons who saw Sunday will never see the sun again.

    Pictures depicted that part of Lagos as a sort of Aleppo in Syria, the debris of a war zone, where monster jets seized the sky and strafed the living. Today, Aleppo is on its knees as Soba is. Soba was a place of zest and magnificence to those who live there. Businesses flourished and a famous school reared the young. Shakespeare wrote about Aleppo as a place of big activity in his days. So was Soba.

    But what we saw that Sunday dawn abolished many hopes. But the hope that affects this essayist is the hope of charity. It seems we have no sense of charity as a people.  The BOS of Lagos, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, set the tone, and it seems to have ended there. He launched a N2 billion fund and placed a huge seed from the state’s coffers. He mobilised the zeal of workers from the state’s emergency agency LASEMA. NEMA also put in its effort. Fire fighters dueled the elemental rage to its quiet. The commissioner for special duties and LASEMA’s head spent whole days there. The Governor visited before jetting to Buhari and unveiled pictures that could pluck out an eye, to stress the urgency. Deputy governor Obafemi Hamzat visited and has been put in charge of reviving the place.

    It seems it is just the state government and Soba. The governors forum came by and donated N200 million, a good sum, but how far will it go? Governments can do something, but the place of charity in matters like this belongs to the civil society, to neighbours and to you and me.

    Where are the money men around us to donate money? Where are the rich men to give shelter, to donate food, and clothing, and to give succor to the wounded? We do not have to be rich, though, to give. We just have to feel. In an age of impunity, we are more absorbed in our creature comforts and private dreams than the pain and sufferings of others. IPOB ethnicised it but has it mobilised help for the deprived and dispossessed? The churches and mosques have shown little skin in this matter, but would hurriedly ask their followers to attend churches so tithes and offerings will not dry in the offertory boxes. We come from a communalistic root but the community is leaving us. We saw a few acts like the Reverend sister who died a selfless death.

    We are seeing ourselves as receptacles of good things, not donors of goodwill. It is a test case for coronavirus, if it grips us the way it has left superpowers panting. It is the boa constrictor of the age. But we see stories of charity all over the United States and Europe. Companies are giving way their resources to help the vulnerable. A politician gave a million dollars a few days ago in the U.S. Basketball stars are paying salaries of workers who will become jobless because of the shutdown of the season. CEOs are donating huge sums. A company in the US decided to turn its alcohol work into making sanitisers. A woman donated free bottles. Football clubs are giving huge sums for food.

    This is not a season of the sort of heroism in Shakespeare’s play Coriolanus where a citizen says, “we rather die than famish.” That was a revolutionary ire. Here we would that nobody dies of famine. There are many in Soba town who have nowhere to go. Those who have cars cannot even become cab drivers. Even landlords have become tenants. I read of a person who owned three houses in the inferno.

    Oil was the source of this disaster. Many residents believe it was the story of a truck packed on a pipeline. One person’s folly has made us sorry. Apostle prayed that God should “deliver us from unreasonable and wicked men.” One person’s search for livelihood has cost us many lives. It has also cost us livelihoods.

    The oil that fathers our livelihoods, and gives us our lifestyles and decadence, has also given us disaster. Oil has done us evil aplenty before. We cannot forget Jesse in Delta where a whole settlement was wiped out. Nor all the other episodes where pipelines have become harbingers of disasters. There is often the turf war between state governments and the federal government over land control. This is politics. But when the fire rages, it recognises no authority but its own. We have enjoyed it but it takes advantage when it wills and can. “That which nourishes me, destroys me,” said Christopher Malowe, the English playwright. It’s oil’s pound o eping in, and we should not wait till it Italianises Nigeria. Lagos is rising up to the task, but the federal government dilly-dallied as if we are not in a globalis ed world. We need a republic of charity in place, so we don’t leave the issue to the government alone. Emergency responses are led by governments but most of the work comes from you and me.

    It is not helped when governors close down schools and places of worship are left out. Mosques and churches should not wait for governments to call for them to shut down before taking the initiatives. The Pope was not asked to shut down. He heard the hum of a pestilence. Our people are still tempting God. Even Jesus Christ saw the devil coming and responded by saying, “the prince of the world cometh. What has he with me… arise let us go.” The same scriptures urge that “discretion shall preserve thee…”

    We did not see Soba coming in the way we are seeing Covid-19 fatal signals. We can start putting resources aside. Trump was warned. He sidestepped it in his pesky way. Again to the scriptures and my late father’s – Moses – frequent reference to his children, “if thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself. But if thou snornest, thou alone shalt bear it.”

    We did not do it for Soba, although we still can. But we should be ready for Covid-19, the pestilence that has been compared to the devastation of the Second World War. It’s time to be Soba.

     

     

    Poetry as sacred trust

     

    ODIA Ofeimun often reminds me of a Sandinista elder known as Ernesto Cardenal. He was a priest, poet, politician, and a soldier with no uniforms. He became a Nicaraguan culture minister under President Daniel Ortega. As a priest, he was a cardinal thorn inside the Pope’s robe as a liberation theologist. As a politician, he ran afoul of his appointee who he accused of running a thieving dynasty. As a soldier, he acted like American slave revolutionary John Brown, who raided Harper’s Ferry. The Somoza regime’s revenge was irreversible: it wiped out his commune. He had formed a commune of poetry for fishermen and farmers to read subversive poetry and perform other works of art. He invoked the kingdom of heaven on earth.

    He did not share all these with Ofeimun, except one. He saw poetry as a sacred trust. Ofeimun is Nigeria’s best practitioner of poetry ever. Since he was discovered by Soyinka, he has proselitised poetry like a faith. Although his poems are not easy like Cardenal’s, he has helped popularise it more than anyone in the country. For poetry, he took a vow of what many see as poverty.

    In his tribute, my former teacher and literary critic, Professor Biodun Jeyifo, eulogised or even romanticised his life of poverty. But during the event, I had recalled in my head the words of Henry James in his novel The Portrait of a Lady, in his definition of wealth: “I call people rich when they are able to gratify their imagination.” No one would deny Ofeimun his wealth. He once used the expression “when I had no money…” and BJ quipped, “but you still have no money.” I recall Ofeimun’s story of his opportunity to be Otunba Subomi Balogun’s  chief of staff when he wanted to start FCMB. He had been assigned to recommend a person. He had suggested several people the banker spurned. “Then he called me back as I was walking out,” Ofeimun recalled. The chief offered him the job. Ofeimun said no. He had something more important he wanted out of life. What was it? To put together his work of poetry, and he achieved that a few years back, he said.

    Ofeimun has his wealth. It may scare others, but it is sacred to him. It is called poetry, if others cannot see it. Cardenal died at 95, so the Iruepken native still has many sacred years to match the irreverent priest. For that I say, happy 70th birthday.

  • Rising COVID-19 cases

    Rising COVID-19 cases

    By Emeka OMEIHE

     

    This article is perhaps, one of the most tasking to put together. The reason for this is neither that the necessary materials are hard to access nor the subject matter really difficult to handle.

    The challenge relates to the regularly evolving nature of official disclosures on the rate of infection of the subject matter, corona virus (COVID-19) in the country.

    The situation has been so dynamic that figures relating to the rate of infection and measures to contain it change hourly.

    There is therefore everything to expect that before this article is published, official figures on the infected and related responses would have overshot those captured here. These may impose constraints on some of our conclusions.

    Before Tuesday last week, the official figure on those infected was put at three. But by the following day’s afternoon, it went up to eight with the discovery of additional five infected victims. And by Thursday, the figure had gone up to 12.

    The figures increase as more samples are subjected to laboratory tests. Given the disclosure that about 1,300 people who flew in the same planes with the victims of COVID-19 or had contacts with them after disembarkation are still being traced, the figures are bound to escalate.

    And as these people are traced, there are further fears they may have had further contacts with other people wherever they may be.

    The implication is that we may be actually contending with a higher number of the infected than is readily available to official sources. The porosity of our land borders does not leave any one in comfort that the army of those regularly crossing through unmanned bush paths have not put the nation in further harm’s way.

    It is to obviate the inherent dangers of unchecked influx of foreigner given the raging pandemic that the Senate called on President Buhari to immediately address the nation on the challenge and close all the international airports in the country except those of Lagos and Abuja.

    This has now been done. Apparently, the exclusion of Lagos and Abuja international airports was informed by the thinking that they have facilities for screening travelers.

    Similar calls for the closure of our land borders have come from some other quarters. Those who made such calls are mindful of the reality that the country may not be able to cope with the challenges of a sudden exponential rise in Covid-19 infections given the decrepit state of our health facilities and tepid handling of the few cases before us.

    By the time the index case was reported, the nation was not prepared to handle the case despite what we knew of the pandemic and the fast manner it was spreading across the world.

    The same lack of preparedness was manifest in the handling of the case of the woman who returned from the UK and admitted at the Enugu State University Teaching Hospital ESUTH-TH on suspicion of the virus infection.

    Though the woman eventually tested negative, she unfortunately lost her life in circumstance her family is blaming on the negligent way she was treated by hospital staff.

    They claimed she was abandoned and stigmatized and this contributed to her death. But the hospital said in its defense that nothing of such happened.

    They claimed before the woman was brought to them, she had been rejected by the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital UNTH and that they withheld information that she just returned from the UK after their previous encounter.

    The intention is not to delve into the veracity or otherwise of the allegations, but one issue that seemed to have emerged from the altercation is the unpreparedness of our health institutions for the challenge of the corona virus.

    Lack of capacity to handle the disease is the reason for the abandonment and stigmatization of victims even when their status is yet to be confirmed. That appears to be the point the family of the woman that died in Enugu made especially since she had no such virus.

    As countries that had early contact with the disease rolled out measures to contain its spread, our leaders trudged on as if we are immune to it even when its mode of transmission should forewarn that proactive measures be taken to contain any eventuality. Of late, we are beginning to come to terms with that reality.

    It is increasingly dawning on us that we may have more case of the infection than official sources have admitted.

    Read Also: Covid-19: Sanwo-Olu directs civil servants to stay at home for 14 days

     

    In the absence of the tracing of the large number of those who had contacts with the recorded victims, there is everything to expect that the number would be much higher. We have also heard of the difficulty in tracing some of these persons due to wrong addresses and phone numbers supplied.

    These are avenues for further complications. Who knows how many of such untraced contacts would have contacted the virus and how many new people at their paces of residence or work would have come into further contact with the disease?

    The Federal government has come out with measures including placing 15 countries where the pandemic is most prevalent on travel ban. It also banned officials from travelling to countries prone to the ailment. Though steps in the right direction but they came belatedly. There was no point waiting for the affected to infiltrate our shores before the ban.

    All those who tested positive to the virus came from abroad, some of them foreign nationals. Perhaps, a more proactive handling of the matter would have insulated the country from the current panic arising from the speed with which the virus is infiltrating our shores.

    The World Health Organization (WHO) painted a sordid picture of the scourge when it revealed last Thursday that 17 deaths arising from the virus were recorded in Africa within 24 hours. This disclosure is frightening given that Africa trailed last in the list of continents to report cases of the virus.

    It is however, heart-warming that many state governments have now embarked on measures to check the spread. Apart from the closure of schools in the north-west, Kwara, Anambra, Lagos and some other states, limits have also been imposed on gatherings both for religious and other purposes.

    In both Lagos and Ogun states where a majority of the cases have been reported, religious gathering has been limited to 50 persons.

    Health advisory on how to contain the scourge should be stepped up in schools, markets, parks, work places and other avenues of public contact. But we have not seen commensurate steps to set up specialized health centers around the country in anticipation of a rise in infections.

    Though the minister of health, Dr. Osagie Ehanire tried to reassure on the existence of facilities to contain any sudden rise in the number of those afflicted, the facilities listed appear insufficient given the burgeoning population of the country.

    He said the Lagos Infectious Diseases Hospital has 100 standard bed spaces with provision for expansion and that the Abuja Teaching Hospital has 12 bed spaces. These appear grossly inadequate.

    We have also heard that there are fall back provisions even as some teaching and general hospitals have been told to make beds available at short notices and train doctors and nurses for the purpose.

    It serves no useful purpose talking in such general and vague terms. What Nigerians expect of their leaders at this crucial moment is a comprehensive list of health facilities available around them that they should report suspected cases of the virus.

    We should go beyond putting some health workers on alert to procuring the attendant facilities that will lead to effective management of cases.

    This will reduce the confusion arising from lack of information on where to take patients and the attendant stigmatization and possible death as patients run from one hospital to another in search of expert treatment. Governments must take the pandemic very seriously as its reality is here with us.

    The way we handle the matter has serious repercussions for our people especially given the ever growing population, debilitating poverty and the inability of a majority of our people to access the basic needs of life.

    It will be interesting to see how a very dependent country will live in isolation in the days ahead. There may be lessons to learn.

     

     

  • Sanwo-Olu: A governor as crisis manager

    Sanwo-Olu: A governor as crisis manager

    In the midst of challenges, Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu continues to show that he is made of sterner stuff.  In February, an Italian who works in Nigeria and returned from Milan, Italy to Lagos, Nigeria, was the first to be diagnosed with the coronavirus, also known as COVID-19, in the country.

    More new cases of the novel disease were confirmed in Lagos yesterday, bringing the number of confirmed cases in the state to 19. As things stand, the Lagos State government, according to a report, “now has more than 1,300 contacts to trace and the numbers of contacts to trace are increasing by the day.”

    The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) announced yesterday morning: “Till date, twenty-five (25) cases have been confirmed, two cases have been discharged and there has been no death from COVID-19 in Nigeria.”

    As at yesterday, there were 26 confirmed coronavirus cases in Nigeria, which was the first country in Sub-Saharan Africa to record the coronavirus since its outbreak in Wuhan, China in December 2019.  The coronavirus has spread to more than 20 countries of the world.  Sadly, the situation has worsened in Nigeria.

    Lagos is the most hit, but the Sanwo-Olu administration has demonstrated that it is on top of the situation. Indeed, other states are following the example of Lagos to prevent further spread of the coronavirus.

    Last week,   Sanwo-Olu “directed immediately the suspension of gatherings of not more than 50 people.”  Promoting “social distancing,” the state government later announced that it had “banned all religious or social gathering of over 20 people within the state.”

    Sanwo-Olu also announced “the closure of all our public and private schools in Lagos State with effect from Monday, March 23, 2020. All our tertiary institutions are hereby also directed to shut down immediately.”

    The governor added that “gatherings around our event centres and clubs, both day clubs and night clubs, bars etc. are also affected by this directive. We must learn from other examples in South Korea and Singapore. Disease spread largely through gatherings both at religious and other spheres.”

    It is noteworthy that the Federal Government has placed travel restrictions on entries into the country from 15 countries with high numbers of coronavirus cases: China, Iran, South Korea, Germany, Italy, the United States, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Norway, Netherlands, Spain, France, Japan, Sweden and Austria.  In addition, the country announced suspension of its visa-on-arrival policy.

    The Federal Government’s decision to shut down the country’s international airports to curb the spread of the coronavirus is logical, considering the fact that most of the confirmed coronavirus cases had entered the country from overseas locations.

    After announcing that three international airports, Mallam Aminu Kano Airport, Kano State, Akanu Ibiam Airport, Enugu State and the Port Harcourt Airport, Rivers State would be closed till further notice, the government had added the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja and the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, which it had initially said would be open to flights not from the 15 coronavirus high-risk countries.

    The coronavirus pandemic has shown the vulnerability of every country in the global village, which means that COVID-19 could still have entered Lagos and Abuja from other countries not considered coronavirus high-risk countries.

    Read Also: COVID-19: Suspected case in Ibadan test positive – Oyo govt

     

    Significantly, the World Health Organisation (WHO) underlined the nature of the coronavirus crisis by declaring it a pandemic. Secretary-General of the United Nations (UN) António Guterres reinforced the characterisation in a statement.  “We are facing a health threat unlike any other in our lifetimes,” he said, adding, “countries have a responsibility to gear up, step up and scale up.”

    According to the statistics, the coronavirus has infected more than 275,000 people worldwide, there have been more than 11, 000 deaths, and 88,000 victims have recovered. Symptoms of the disease are runny nose, sore throat, cough, fever, and breathlessness in severe cases.

    This is the situation Sanwo-Olu has to deal with, and his response has been commendable. The proactive social measures introduced by his administration show that he is conscious of the gravity of the coronavirus crisis as well as the urgent need to take action to combat the disease. Importantly, he continues to demonstrate that his administration has a duty to check the coronavirus just as individuals also have a responsibility to ensure that the disease does not continue to spread.

    While he grappled with the COVID-19 challenge, Governor Sanwo-Olu’s capacity for crisis management was again highlighted by his response to another crisis situation last week when a devastating explosion happened at Abule Ado in Amuwo Odofin local government area of Lagos State, killing more than 20 people and destroying about 50 buildings. The March 15 blast was said to have occurred “after a truck hit some gas cylinders stacked in a gas processing plant.”

    At the explosion site the following day, Sanwo-Olu announced that his administration had set up a N2 billion Abule Ado/Soba Emergency Relief Fund for the victims. He also said the state government had donated N250 million to the fund and appealed for support.

    It is worth mentioning that when the Group Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Zenith Bank Plc, Mr Ebenezer Onyeagwu, visited the governor and donated N100 million to the fund, he described the response of the Lagos State government  to the incident as “quick, rapid and immediate.”

    Lagos State, which is Nigeria’s commercial capital, was in 2015 listed 12th among the world’s largest 35 cities. With more than 23 million people, the city has to grapple with mega challenges.  On account of its mega status, Lagos State is exposed to “chronic stresses” and “acute shocks.”

    “Chronic stresses,” which are said to “weaken the fabric of a city on a day-to-day or cyclical basis,” include “high unemployment, inefficient public transportation systems, endemic violence, and chronic food and water shortages.”

    “Acute shocks,” which are described as “sudden, sharp events that threaten a city,” include “earthquakes, floods, disease outbreaks, and terrorist attacks.”

    Lagos is faced with resilience challenges, including chronic energy shortages, coastal flooding, disease outbreak, infrastructure failure, overpopulation, overtaxation, underdevelopment, poor and unreliable transportation system, rainfall flooding, rising sea level and coastal erosion.

    However, as the Sanwo-Olu administration approaches its first anniversary in May, there is no doubt that it is on course. The point is that, under Governor Sanwo-Olu, Lagos is surviving and thriving, regardless of the challenge. It reflects the governor’s dynamism, and his elasticity to manage change and challenges.

     

  • Father and son

    Father and son

    By Sam Omatseye

    HE attended the event to cheer his son, Tosin, who enjoyed seven nominations with his first film at the Multi Choice Video and Movie Awards last Saturday. His first choice was to fly to Sokoto for the raucous glee of the annual Argungu Fishing festival. He settled for the genteel glamour of the movie night. His children urged daddy to dress well for his son.

    A coup it was. It turned out to be a father and son night, though. Son Tosin won in the editing category, and Igho the father bagged a lifetime award or industry merit award for setting the stage for Nollywood with his NTA classics like Cock Crow at Dawn, Mirror in the Sun, et al. It was the first time father and son won in the same night. Father and son were due for the deuce.

     

  • Watch out, Mr. President

    Watch out, Mr. President

    By Sam Omatseye

    HE ran for deputy governor. He lost. He became a candidate by illegal means. Victor Giadom and his sponsors did not follow the rules, and they ended up falling disgracefully at the polls. No, they fell before the whistle, because they did not even qualify. INEC blew the whistle, and Giadom and his friend Tonye Cole were not there to race. They wanted to triumph with impunity.

    It seems impunity is in Giadom’s spirit. Now he wants to be the party chairman. A man who has resigned from the National Working Committee wants to eat his cake and have it. He wants to chair a body of which he is not a member. He resigned to pursue the impunity in Rivers. He failed there and he is doing same at the centre. Impunity can only beget impunity. A vector of impunity. He is bearing failure like a halo and flag, and his backers should realize that APC is now under an undertaker’s care. Some of the anti-Adams forces who don’t want him have made him the thorn to divide the party dividers. If Giadom does not have it, his supporters will not yield. It gets tougher for the rebels. The implosion has just had its first tremor.

    If they think the party will survive the removal of Adams, they should beware. The party will slide into the mortuary. President Buhari should watch the rascals in his party.