The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • A republic of a thousand kingdoms

    A republic of a thousand kingdoms

    The recent coronation of Oba Abimbola Akeem Owoade as the Alaafin of Oyo in a tumultuous celebration attended by thousands of his subjects brought to mind the tremendous support for traditional institutions by our people and raised the interesting issue of the superficiality of the republic imposed on our traditional institutions by purveyors of modernity. The abolition of the powers of the maharajahs in the republican constitution of India while leaving them their stupendous wealth paved the way and trajectory other countries in the Commonwealth have followed. Example of Malaysia is interesting as the diversity of combining traditional institutions with the modern system of democratic governance. In Malaysia the various sultans of constituent states rotate the presidency of the country amongst themselves while of course the headship of the government remains in the hands of the elected government. In Nigeria, each state is allowed to harmonise the various ways in which traditional institutions are harmonised with the power of elected governments. Nigeria is a republic which recognises the usefulness of traditional governmental institutions.

    A republic is by definition a country of democratic governance that is, where the people vote periodically to elect their governments and where the governments are subject to the will of the people. The constitution of Nigeria enshrines this principle in its basic law. But at the same time allows the constituent states to have local governments allowing the existence of kings and kinglets chosen by the local people as allowed by their traditions which predated the existence of Nigeria to function the way the ordinary people want subject to rules set out in the local government laws of the state under the local executive. In other words, there exists a symbiotic relationship at the local level of democracy and autocracy limited by the constitution. An outsider looking in may not understand this apparent confusion but it works in Nigeria. The system, where it exists, works for the state government to maintain peace and to communicate with the local people at their own level.

    The problem however is that not all states have these kings and kinglets like we have in northern part of the country where the monarchs have sufficient power to impose themselves on the environment either on their own or as agents of the state  government. The emirs in the north have political and spiritual authority as local Amir al muminin (leader of the faithful) but not all the people living in the north particularly in the Middle Belt and several communities in the far north are Muslims to whom the rule of the emirs are foreign and so foreign that they were ready to resist them and are still ready to resist the imposition of the emirs and chiefs representing them. Governments have found it necessary to accommodate their requests either by separating them as much as possible from under the rulership of the emirs and giving them their own institutions of local chiefs or allowing the rule of elected local government authorities to supervene.

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    In the southern part of the country in Yorubaland and Edoland or places influenced by Edo culture, we have centralised local authority institutions as represented in the various Oba, Obi and people bearing derivatives of these titles. The most powerful of the kings in these areas are the Alaafin of Oyo, the Oba of Benin, the Awujale of Ijebu land and the Owa of Ijesha land and the various other Obas in Ekiti and Osun, Owo and Egba land. Here power is diffused and several Obas wield considerable authority over their people as allowed by the local government laws.

    The recent coronation of the Alaafin Akeem Owoade Abimbola of Oyo in which millions of people participated is a mark of the significance and importance of the title of the Alaafin in Yoruba land. Before the British came and as far back as the 16th century, the Alaafin and the Oba of Benin ruled over vast territories and in the case of the Alaafin, his empire stretched over territories covering the southwest of Nigeria, Benin Republic and Togo Republic with influence in the southern part of Ghana while the Oba of Benin’s political influence covered the north-eastern and south-eastern part of Yoruba land stretching to Lagos and the western extremity of Igbo speaking people. In these areas, it was possible to anchor local government institutions on the traditional institutions. But in the southeast in Igbo speaking areas generally, the absence of traditional chiefly institutional foundations made it tricky for local governments to prevail thus allowing direct local governments to be the option. Where there were no local chiefs, government created them and gave them warrants to rule over their own people resulting in many cases to abuse of power and consequent revolts during the colonial regime and  which lead to their abolition.

    The interesting thing nowadays is the growth of instant chiefs with big money trading in the day time but parading themselves as chiefs in the evening but lacking traditional structures and resorting to force. In the riverine areas of the Southeast and the Niger Delta, we have city statelets and traditional chiefs who ridiculously parade themselves as “kings”. They enjoy very little local government usage except to parade themselves in Shakespearean attires at state functions!

    Where traditional institutions exist such as in the North and southwestern part of Nigeria, they play significant roles and they are adequately remunerated by force of the Nigerian constitution and where they do not exist, local government functioning is more done directly by elected or appointed functionaries of state governments.

    Finally I write as the Baapitan of Oyo to prevail on the government of Oyo State to build a befitting palace for the Alaafin either on the existing grounds or somewhere else in Oyo because the existing old palace doesn’t reflect the status of the political primacy of the Alaafin. Towards this project, a funds mobilisation can be launched, into which individuals and governments, particularly the federal government can be called upon to donate as previous federal governments have done in the case of northern emirs.  Even though there are still court cases against the process leading to the choice of the incumbent Alaafin and whatever the case may be, the post of the Alaafin institution remains sacrosanct.

  • NBA’s moral burden

    NBA’s moral burden

    A lawyer lives for the direction of his people and the advancement of the cause of his country – Sapara Williams

    To a large extent, the constitution of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) hereinafter referred to as the Bar or NBA, is hinged on this Christopher Sapara Williams’ creed. He was the first indigenous Nigerian lawyer who was called to the English Bar on November 17, 1879. He started practising in Nigeria on January 13, 1888. During his legal practice, he held on to the precepts of being an advocate of the people and society’s watchdog.

    Williams was a pathfinder whose creed has come to define the essence of legal practice and shaped the minds of other lawyers, many of who held him in awe, even though they never met him. One of such lawyers was the irrepressible Gani Fawehinmi who had Williams’ immortal words framed and well placed in his law chambers and Ikeja, Lagos home. Gani took Williams’ creed to heart. That was how he became the Senior Advocate of the Masses (SAM), and the people’s lawyer, an appellation which was the exclusive preserve of Kanmi Ishola-Osobu in the 70s and 80s.

    Sapara Williams was a leading light of the NBA which he chaired between 1900 and 1915, when he died. Under his watch, the Bar was the upholder of the truth. It never strayed from the right path. It took up causes that affected the masses at no cost to them, giving them a sense of belonging and being. NBA earned the people’s trust without lobbying for it. Under him, the Bar was never enmeshed in any scandal that besmeared it.

    The Bar was the Bar – upright and not beholden to any elected or appointed office holder. It earned the public’s respect for its integrity, decorum and decency, the cherished values held dear by lawyers like Gani and another Bar leader, Alao Aka-Bashorun, who both came after Williams. Though Gani was never an NBA leader, he lived his life for a Bar with a banner without stain. He was always quoting Sapara Williams in everything he did. He and his hero and Gani had few heroes who can be counted off the finger tips will be turning in their graves over the way the Bar is being run today.

    Even before the scandal over NBA’s collection of N300 million from the Rivers State Government for the hosting of its 2025 annual general conference in Port Harcourt, which has been shifted to Enugu blew open, the Bar was already treading on slippery grounds. It was always involved in one politically-motivated cause or the other, taking sides in matters in which it should be neutral. It must, however, be emphasised that the collection of ‘unconditional’ monetary gift for the hosting of its conferences did not start today.

    It is an age-long practice which predates the present NBA leadership. The only difference is the controversy that is dogging its decision to shift the conference to Enugu after collecting what the planning committee called the N300 million ‘unconditional gift’. Truly, no conditions are attached to such gifts and other miscellaneous and logistic freebies that the state where the event is billed for is always willing to dole out for reasons best known to it. But it is with the unwritten understanding of ‘you rub my back, I rub your back, tombo’.

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    Meaning the Bar, though a pressure group, will see no evil and speak no evil about the state, no matter how bad things may be there, at least during  preparations for the conference; as well as while the event is on and shortly after it. But the NBA breached this unwritten rule when it sou moto moved the conference to Enugu because of what it described as the ‘unconstitutional rule’ in Rivers. ‘Unconstitutional’? How did the Bar arrive at that conclusion? I am unaware of any court declaring the present administration in Rivers unconstitutional.

    What we have in Rivers is a state of emergency as provided for under Section 305 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended). The suspension of the democratic institutions under the emergency rule is galling to many people, among them lawyers. But until the court which has adjudicatory powers speaks on the Rivers emergency no other person no matter the number of SAN titles they may have, can declare it unconstitutional. At best, they like any other professionals, can only bellyache over the matter, no more, no less.

    The prerogative of holding the annual general conference in any part of the country is the NBA’s. So, it can decide to move it out of one state to the other, if it so wishes. But in so doing, it must be mindful of the fallout of its action, which we are all now witnessing. With the exception of its inner circle, many of its members and other Nigerians never knew that the Bar got N300 million from the Rivers government for the conference. So, having moved the conference to Enugu since it no longer finds Port Harcourt conducive, what should the NBA do with the gift cash?

    Retain it? Return it? For its own good and image, it is better it returns the cash. The money is not that of suspended Governor Siminalayi Fubara whose cause it is openly fighting by its insistence that it cannot gather in a state where there is no democracy. The money belongs to Rivers and whether NBA likes it or not, there is a government in place there. It may call the administration by whatever name it likes, but that will not detract from the fact of the government’s existence.

    The owner of the money, the government of Rivers is asking for a refund. Rather than run its mouth over the propriety or otherwise of its action, NBA should just quietly return the money the way it got the cash and stop ridiculing itself in public. Enough of its show of shame. As the self-styled voice of the voiceless and defender of the defenceless, NBA should not be seen engaged in matters belittling of a professional group of its stature. It is disheartening seeing the way it is defending its indefensible action.

    NBA messed up big time. Though the damage has been done, it is still not too late for the Bar to redeem itself by returning the money to its rightful owner. If its problem is Sole Administrator Ibok-Ette Ibas, NBA should not see itself as returning the N300 million to him, but to the government and people of Rivers that are the rightful owners of the money. NBA has not fared well at all in its handling of this case. How can the Bar say that it would not refund the money because it is an ‘unconditional gift’?

    Yet, it has attached condition to the hosting of the conference by moving it from Port Harcourt to Enugu on the grounds of unconstitutional government in Rivers. The Bar cannot have its cake and eat it. It is in its own enlightened self interest to return the money and make do with whatever the Enugu government provides for moving the conference there. The money belongs to Rivers and the rightful place to return the cash to is the state since it has a sitting government.

    NBA should not allow this matter to go to court because the outcome may not favour it. A giver, whether an individual or an institution can take back his or its gift, if the recipient is not appreciative. It is as simple as that.

  • Nigeria in age of economic reset

    Nigeria in age of economic reset

    The bounty winds have changed course. Across oceans and continents, the pillars of the old world buckle under the weight of new contradictions. Power is roaringly shifting, as nations once constrained by historic fetters jostle for inadequate pickings. Does Nigeria stand a chance in the unfolding world order?

    What are the chances of transforming hardship into strength, turning away from borrowed dreams and building something enduring from within?

    America is retreating. The model it exported to the world, consumer-driven, debt-fueled, and centred on speculative finance, is beginning to buckle. Trade wars, like those launched by Donald Trump, have severed the threads of global integration. The US-China trade split, and the anti-Russia sanctions fallout from the Ukraine war have also accelerated decoupling from Western financial systems and birthed new alliances like BRICS, which increasingly conduct trade outside the US dollar while consolidating independent technological and payment infrastructures.

    As supply chains rupture and flighty capital looks elsewhere, the Global South is becoming the new arena of relevance. This disruption is no accident, as Shahid Bolsen rightly observes, but the deliberate reordering of economic power, and it opens a door for countries bold enough to walk through. Will Nigeria walk through? Or would she maintain the knee, slurping unearned aid and benefits doled to her, piecemeal, by Western looters plundering her fertile fields?

    Yet entry into the new era will not be granted by default. It must be earned through clear thinking, determined leadership, and a cultural renaissance that prioritises indigeneity over imitation.

    The dominance of the Western economy is being challenged from every side. The pandemic, war, and shifting geopolitical alliances have revealed how fragile and unequal the global system has become. With the West turning inward, capital is moving outward. Nations that once waited in the wings are being called to the main stage.

    The rise of BRICS+, the slow decline of the dollar, and growing investments in African tech and infrastructure are signs of this shift. Nigeria has the population, the natural resources, and the strategic location to become a central player in this emerging world order. But opportunity does not guarantee success. It only favours those who are prepared.

    Thus, Nigeria must filter opportunity through bristling hardship. There is no gainsaying that the country’s struggles are real. Inflation is biting, the naira is volatile, and public infrastructure remains inadequate. But these challenges are also signals, telling us what we must fix, where we must innovate, and how we must grow.

    The countries that will lead in the next phase of global development are not those without problems. They are those who respond to their problems with clarity and courage. The persistent fear of fuel scarcity should push us to invest in alternative energy. Panic over food insecurity should drive us to reform agriculture through technology. And the recurrent talent drain should compel us to build institutions that reward merit and retain excellence.

    Every difficulty is a pointer. If we are willing to respond with discipline and focus, Nigeria can become a place where local solutions meet global demand. To rise upward, we must look inward. The time is ripe for cultural rebirth. No country can build a lasting future while borrowing its sense of self from others. For too long, Nigeria has copied the cultural, political, and economic ideas of other nations, even as they persistently fail to fit our peculiar context and serve our interests. The result is a mismatch between who we are and how we live.

    We need a reset, not just of our economy but of our mindset. We must embrace our nativity, nourishing its roots from the abstract to the concrete: our languages, philosophies, and prisms of seeing and engaging with the world must be deployed more consciously to serve our short- and long-term interests.

    This is an opportunity for us to step forward with something different. Something grounded in community, dignity, and shared responsibility. Nigerian culture is rich, layered, and capable of speaking to the modern age. We do not need to abandon our traditions to be relevant. We should rather adapt and use them to shape our institutions.

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    But the efforts to shape our public institutions must be built on a sturdy foundation of personal sovereignty. This is the only path to national glory. Real transformation does not begin in government offices. It begins in the private decisions of millions of citizens. The way we conduct business, teach our children, treat our neighbours. A country is only as strong as the character of its citizens. This is not a call to individualism. It is a call to citizenship; to see our personal choices as part of a wider story. To understand that nation-building is not a spectator sport.

    To create a functional Nigerian State, we must first sanitise our dreams and rid them of a hankering for ill-bliss. We must also reimagine how our institutions work. Our political and economic systems are not inevitable. They can be re-engineered and rebuilt. We need policies that prioritise productive enterprise, not rent-seeking. We need infrastructure that supports mobility, agriculture, trade, and communication. We need schools that exceed the routine of visionless exams and systems managers, to produce solutions and furnish our growth needs.

    Our foreign policy must become strategic. We should deepen our partnerships with countries in Asia, Latin America, and the rest of Africa, not from a position of desperation but from one of mutual respect. Nigeria must assert its stature as a country with value to offer.

    Our military and intelligence institutions should also be part of our economic future. Investment in defence can spur innovation in technology, logistics, and manufacturing. Let us learn from others, but not depend on them. Let us train our minds to solve our problems. We must modernise governance through digital systems, accountability mechanisms, and public service reform. The goal is not to chase some foreign ideal of development. The goal is to build a system that works for us.

    This is not just Nigeria’s moment. It is Africa’s. And Nigeria, by its size and potential, must lead. But leadership will not come from rhetoric. It will come from results. We must invest in regional infrastructure, trade agreements, and shared development goals. Nigeria’s cities must become hubs of innovation that connect easily with other African capitals. Our people must see themselves as part of a larger African identity that is confident and future-facing.

    More importantly, President Bola Tinubu’s youth empowerment drive must not be restricted to beneficiaries within the All Progressives Congress (APC), nor should it be deployed as a bargaining chip or currency to woo fiery critics and antagonists of his administration. Policies and appointments must never be used to buy opposition silence and allegiance.

    If we can achieve all these, we can be a foundational country. One that sets the pace and raises the bar. This is not a time to complain. It is a time to build. The economic reset now unfolding is not a threat. It is a signal. A chance to imagine something better and take the steps needed to get there.

    We must stop looking outside for answers and start building from within. We do not need permission to begin. We need focus, courage and perseverance.

    Shall this be the moment we remember as our turning point?

  • Itinerant hunters in southern forests

    Itinerant hunters in southern forests

    At the height of the herders-farmers conflicts across the country, we were told that cattle-rearing is the Fulani way of life. That is historically true.  Many ethnic groups in Africa were traditionally nomadic pastoralists, from the Mursi and Hamar of Ethiopia, through the Maasai and Karamojong of Uganda, to the Shona of Zimbabwe, the Fulani (or Fula) of Senegal, and the Fulani of Nigeria.

    However, while many pastoralists in other countries have adopted ranching or transitioned to communal livestock production, as in Zimbabwe, Nigerian Fulani herders have insisted on nomadic pastoralism. The result has been, and continues to be, fierce clashes with farmers, whose crops are eaten up or otherwise destroyed by cattle. What is worse, farm owners are killed, their wives raped, their children molested, and their property destroyed. Only last week, over 50 such victims were given mass burial in Plateau state. The atrocities of Fulani herders and Boko Haram have earned Nigeria a top 10 position on the Global Terrorism Index.

    Recent events would suggest that another group from the North has emerged in Southern forests. There was initial controversy as to their identity. However, if we go by their history, the Hausa, and not Fulani, were agriculturalists, fishermen, blacksmiths, hunters, salt-miners, and traders. The group’s self-identification as hunters lends support to their identity as Hausa.

    From news reports, they did have the paraphernalia of hunting, notably dane guns (and not the notorious AK-47 guns associated with Funani herdsmen) and dogs. It was a group of over twenty people in a trailer, which was double-crossed on a tip by another truck near Uromi, after refusing to stop for inspection by an earlier group of vigilantes. 16 of them were gruesomely murdered by the locals, who took them for gun-touting Fulani herders, kidnappers or bandits. Even if they were kidnappers, the law does not allow for extra-judicial killings. That’s why the murderers should be apprehended to face the full wrath of the law.

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    The anger from the North over the incident is understandable. Any ethnic group in the country would protest over the killing of their own. If the men were indeed Hausa, then the protest by Fulani leaders was hypocritical. These are the same Fulani leaders, whose cattle plunder Hausa-owned farms on their own ancestral land and would not allow any Hausa politician to be one, just one, of the 19 Governors from the North.

    Be that as it may, the background to the sad Uromi incident must also be fully understood. Here’s how the problem was summarised by Vanguard Newspaper, after a thorough investigation: “More than 24 other communities in Edo Central, Edo North, and Edo South senatorial districts have been sacked and under siege by criminally minded herders from northern Nigeria. The same could also have arisen in over 30 communities in Delta and Bayelsa States, where the residents, especially farmers, are terrified to go to farms because of some brazen Fulani herders who invade their farms, uproot crops they planted and feed their cows, rape women, and take the villagers hostage for ransom” (Uromi Killings: Untold story of how villagers identified some of them as kidnappers before lynching, Vanguard, April 5, 2025). The story went on to detail specific incidents within the Local Government and beyond.

    On the fateful day, the trailer ferrying the ill-fated group failed to stop for the first group of vigilantes at Ubiaja, which then sent a distress signal to the group in Uromi. The latter group then used a tipper with a full load of sand to double-cross the trailer. It was then discovered that the men in the trailer “covered themselves with a tarpaulin in a truck filled with palm kernel shells”. Suspicion began to mount. Tensions rose when weapons and dogs were discovered. Nevertheless, according to the Vanguard report, mayhem was said to have been let loose only when one of the men in the trailer “stabbed the vigilante with a dagger”. At the end of the day, 16 “hunters” were gruesomely killed.

    True, Governor Monday Okpebholo of Edo state moved quickly to douse tension following the incident, he could only provide temporary succour to affected families and prevent possible backlash. But his amelioration job was hardly completed when another set of four hunters was intercepted by the Edo Security Network “with three dane guns, six empty cartridges, three half filled cartridges, four cutlasses and two daggers” (Another Set of Hunters Arrested in Edo, Daily Trust, April 13, 2026). Like the first group of hunters, the new set was also travelling to Kano for the Sallah holidays.

    What is needed now is an enduring solution to this hunting problem before it escalates like kidnapping and banditry or turns into either or both. There are those who question the movement of hunters from faraway Kano to hunt in Port Harcourt. Would they just enter the forest without the knowledge of the landowners or host communities? If they are registered hunters, were they hunting in Port Harcourt with Kano hunting license or with one from Port Harcourt?

    Ideally, hunters should not cross state lines. However, if they must hunt across state lines, then it is necessary to device a measure by which such itinerant hunters could easily be identified. One way of handling this problem is to require itinerant hunters to register their weapons with the police station nearest to their hunting areas. Another method is to require them to register as hunters at the Local Government headquarters within the hunting area.

    The truth is that, given the precarious security situation in the country today, anyone carrying a weapon in any community could easily scare people, by raising the suspicion of being a kidnapper, bandit, or armed robber.

  • Maintenance; NNPC; NOA drug education

    Maintenance; NNPC; NOA drug education

    Travelling on the newly refurbished Lagos-Ibadan Expressway glaringly demonstrates the beginnings of how decay creeps quickly in to destroy the best of projections and plans. After all those billions, we ask where are the few millions to keep the road clear of dirt which is already growing healthy sized weeds.

    At the Ibafo/Mowe area, there is a pedestrian bridge and beside it on the inbound Lagos side, there an avalanche of mud invading the outer lane expressway as there is a major water control area totally ignored to date by the road monitoring team from the Federal Ministry of Works and the contractors. Hopefully this will be attended to before there is a major accident at the area.

    The observer will also notice there are clearly visible tracks gauged by heavy duty vehicles into the tarmac of the Lagos-Ibadan side noticed just north of the Abeokuta Interchange and also again just before entering Ibadan. Both areas were under the same north of Sagamu contractor. This is suggesting the terrain was very difficult or the work was not up to the standard of the other contractor who executed the south of Abeokuta part of the contract. The same heavily overweight articulated vehicles ply both contractors’ jurisdictions. It is already time for the Federal Ministry of Works to reassess the work, so recently completed and explain why there are these dangerous ruts gauged out of the road – the Abeokuta Ibadan section. Yes, vehicles are severely overweight. But the road south of the Abeokuta intersection is strong enough to withstand the weight. Why is the road north of Abeokuta intersection not strong enough? Is it the difficult terrain in the area or a different standard of work ethic?

    The pain when reading the horrendously callous, careless and maybe, corruption-driven massive financial economic and administrative failures  revealed in the 2021 NNPC Plc Audit Report can only be compared to the pain of learning about the plight of 18 million out of school children. It is urgent for the federal government to open simultaneous audits for the last three years 2022, 2023 and especially 2024 in order to quickly establish and identify criminal patterns and procedures that can be immediately stopped, now for the remaining part of 2025. It must be understood that we have multi-layered and multifaceted corruption probably running from top to bottom of such huge unaudited companies with no punishments of  the guilty at all levels of the company. There are probably many corruption points quite independent of, and unknown to, each other. It is the audits which will bring out the facts.  The country has suffered hugely for the mismanagement of the oil sector over many years. We have yearned for change without results. Indeed, we have had negative growth specifically related to budgetary failures related to failed budget targeting quite apart from the non-oil sector corruption.

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    The NNPCL audit for 2024 is even more urgent in the light of the Tariff Trump’s created ‘tariff bomb’ turmoil throughout the world and the resultant rumble in the oil sector with tumbling oil prices. We must protect, interrogate and sanitise the oil sector in our own interest and for the 18million out of school children. We cannot afford another episode of ‘frequent fraud findings’ without any action. The audits are urgently required. We must stop, learn and act positively to begin the recovery of Nigeria from the precipice of poverty and fiscal fraud.  We cannot have another combination of mindboggling corruption in NNPCL and poor petrol prices internationally.

    Nigeria cannot endure this level of unbridled corruption combined with international collapse of oil prices. Stop the corruption by all means necessary so that the only thing we need to grapple with is the falling oil price and we will survive.

    The increase in Boko Haram activities and other terrorist organisations are a major cause for concern nationwide. To add to this dire situation, we must add local drug use as deliberate policy of cartels and others aimed at polluting the youth environment. Indeed, Nigeria desperately needs a huge impact in the fight against drugs and corruption, ensuring the protection of NAFDAC forces.

    The deadly Nigerian drug scene is growing and it will take a specific campaign at youth everywhere – in and outside formal education. The size of the drug seizures is a tribute to the security agencies but also speaks to the extent of the problem. Daily, we are all exposed to witnessing some youth somewhere exposed to the effects of drugs. These effects should be introduced into the curriculum of education institutions from an early age and certainly from secondary school. The School Assembly Talks can also be used to drive the message home. Health talks by NGOs are good but they are random and miss out a huge chunk of vulnerable youth. However, if the drug education programmes is ingrained in the curriculum for all students, a sizable population of youth will be enlightened enough to educate the other half out of school during social contacts. The out of school youth will have to depend on National Orientation Agency to get the message to them in markets and communities. At LGA level, funds need to be allocated to get to the grassroots about the dangers of drug abuse along with the unfortunate growing trend of sexual and other physical and mental abuse.  

  • America: Age of the illegitimates

    America: Age of the illegitimates

    Donald J. Trump, America’s huff-and-puff, hot-and-cold president, probably knows pretty little outside his contrived MAGA tribe, and its culture of fashionable chaos.

    If he did, this Yoruba saying should have tweaked his cocky ears: harmony reigns in a home, only because the illegitimates in there have not come of age! 

    America’s illegitimates have not only come of age, they are gung-ho under Trump: thinking their home-brewed chaos is some new global high culture!  Witness: Trump’s irrational tariff world war, which not a few of them hail. 

    How deluded — and may their feverish delusion endure! What empire lasts forever?

    The biting irony with Trump begins with his wild deportations.  How can the grandson of a settler German, that emigrated to the United States in 1885, expel other settlers? 

    The family’s original German name, from their Kallstadt nativity, was Drumpf, which morphed to Trumpff and later still to Trump, among its many variants.  Trump sounds more English than German. Then, to boot: Donald’s mum was a Scot! 

    Pray, were Germans and Scots then native Indian-Americans, that the savage White tribe cancelled to take over America?  Did Germans even count among the Anglo originals that staged the famous Boston Tea Party of 1773, on the unimpeachable basis of no taxation sans representation?

    That rebellion by colonists from the British Isles, against own British Crown, would drive the American Revolution that eventually birthed the United States in 1776.

    But if a man, 78, shows little introspection in contemporary things, how can he — and his ilk — drink and be chastened by the well of history?  Which explains why there appears no rime or reason to the many Trump executive bumbling — sorry — orders!

    But there is another layer of piquant irony, in the happy lunacy of Trump’s America — Elon Musk: Trump’s fixer-in-chief to smash Uncle Sam’s federal bureaucracy.

    You’re well and truly ripped — even if comically — at a Dutch/Afrikaan-born of apartheid-era South Africa, with its holy orthodoxy of White supremacism, bob up with a load of cash as an “American”, preaching present-day White victim-hood in his native country, a former blind den of White oppression!

    South Africa has given short shrift to Musk’s White cry-baby campaign — and just as well!  In truth, beyond bullying propaganda, there is nothing there.

    But again, the irony ripples with old man Trump’s characteristically knee-jerk reflex, on his so-called Truth Social: “They are taking the land of white farmers, and then killing them and their families …” — presidential tears, dip, dip!  What crap!  Truth social, indeed!  More of fibs anti-social!

    Trump then pushed his presidential jeremiad into an executive invite: South African White farmers should relocate to America — the same guy shooing Blacks, Asians, Hispanics and sundry folks, off the United States!  Any further proof that MAGA is nothing more than make America White again (MAWA)? The irony is totally lost on him!

    But as they say here, in our pidgin high street, “las, las, America go dey alright”!  America will fix own demons!  Elections, after all, do have consequences!

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    The victims here though, are the many Africans in the diaspora. As they are finding out, fleeing own country to dodge developmental pangs, for “easy life” in “saner climes”, has limited value.  Hurricane Trump is living proof!

    Still, how Trump treats those who elected him is an American problem — no dog in that fight.  But extending his American bullying, to the rest of the globe, is a grave concern. It’s potent tinder for wild blazes, in this season of global harmattan.

    Trump clearly thinks China is an outpost of America, much the same as Canada: which he deems its 51st state; its prime minister, who he nettles as “governor”; Mexico, a contemptible footstool; and Greenland, an ogled pearl he must snatch from Denmark!

    Trump’s China explosion on X, tells the story, unfiltered:

    “Yesterday, China issued retaliatory tariffs of 34%, on top of their already record setting tariffs, non-monetary tariffs, illegal subsidization of companies, and massive long-term currency manipulation, despite my warning that any country that retaliates, above and beyond their already existing long-term tariff abuse of our nation, will be immediately met with new and substantially higher tariffs, over and above those initially set.

    “Therefore, if China does not withdraw its 34% increase above their already long-term trading abuses by tomorrow, April 8th 2025, the United States will impose ADDITIONAL tariffs on China of 50%, effective April 9th.  Additionally, all talks with China concerning their requested meetings with us will be terminated! …”

    Insufferable, wasn’t that?  The global emperor had roared!  In another tweet, he moaned about how China “disrespects” the United States! But doesn’t respect beget respect?

    What China did — and admirably so — was confront the bully.  No matter what happens, Beijing had triumphed on that front — for Trump’s bully power is off. 

    As for respect, a bully doesn’t crave respect.  He thrives on fear.  But with the fear factor off, Trump lost his ace.  On tariff, it’s tit-for-tat.  We’ll see who blinks first!

    Tragically for Trump, the initial blinking — though in the dark! — appears from own corner.  First: exempting cell phones, computers and allied micro-chip products, where China and India hold the ace.  Then, freezing, for 90 days, the latest tariffs, earlier announced with aplomb!  So much for high-wire bluff and bluster!

    But it all goes back to old man Trump’s shallow core.  A more deliberative guy should have known that China — and others’ rise in Asia — resulted  from American capitalist greed.

    Voila! — they trumpeted globalization!  But that was a veil for cheap overseas labour, since they could no longer bear Americans’ high local wage bill. 

    Now, who will cover America’s flanks, from its president that knows little outside projecting raw power — as a minor showing off his latest audacious toy — and hankering after “deals”, no matter how obscene or soulless?

    Has anyone even told Trump that his tariff world war only cuts up the global trade order, hitherto infernally rigged to sate American capital greed?

    Or that his no-friend-no-foe tariff war only rips apart western cohesion — the most hegemonic tribe of this age that has imposed its ethos on other cultures? 

    Ironically, Trump’s hot labour should breed new trade alliances — and eventually throw overboard the bully, yet smiling, West?  About time!

    Trump swore to — open sesame! — end the Russia-Ukraine War.  But his peculiar magic is clear: reward the aggressor, bludgeon the victim!

    As for Israel versus Hamas in Gaza, all hail his El-dorado: an Arab riviera, built with US capital, but with native Gazans firmly shut out!  Sweet, isn’t that? 

    But since the Arab world wouldn’t  take that “deal”, from the ultimate deal-maker, war-hawk Benjamin ‘Bibi’ Nethanyahu, could continue his bombing spree — though Hamas’s hare-brained raid of Israel, on 7 October 2023, earns part-blame for that catastrophe.

    America’s illegitimates bay and roar to crash, in four years, alliances Uncle Sam had built over centuries!  To cash in, Nigeria must get its acts together!

  • NNPCL: Not yet back in business

    NNPCL: Not yet back in business

    It should not be difficult to understand why things oftentimes get animated, or better still, the adrenalin suddenly boils over, whenever the name of the behemoth – the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL pops up in public discourse. Ask the ordinary Nigerian on the street how much he/she knows about the entity in whom – to borrow the Biblical parlance – they live and have their being, and you will be surprised at how variegated the answers you will get. More often than not, you hear such dreary appellations as ‘Number one house of rent’, ‘Subsidy incorporated’, or worse, ‘Corruption Inc.’ to such other unflattering appellations that somehow sums up to how much the company has missed, not just its way but its essence as a going concern.

    Unfortunately, whereas most Nigerians would appear to be in broad agreement that their beloved state oil corporation is not only ailing but terminally so, the option of a corrective surgery to prevent a certain death would seem far from their minds!

    Here, I refer in part to the general reactions that have trailed the appointment of Bayo Ojulari as the new helmsman at the NNPCL a key highlight of which is the needless descent into Nigeria’s identity politics.  However, if it seems that the departure of the last helmsman, Mele Kyari, was the least that Nigerians should be asking for after more than six years of stewardship, nearly four of which saw him transition the entity into a commercial, service-driven one only in name, that Nigerians are soon after, more interested in the elite game of musical chairs as against the immense promises made since the advent of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) must be seen as the ultimate tragedy of these times!

    Perhaps the only thing that could be said to be worse is the situation of apparent disinterestedness, under which Nigerians appear so totally oblivious of the rapidly changing but nonetheless dire global dynamics of which their beloved national oil company is being challenged to operate as indeed the texture of the individuals required to drive the required change.

    Whether in its original coming as NNPC or its NNPCL mutation, the story of the behemoth has certainly been told so many countless times that it is now impossible to forget. Aside being everything that a national oil corporation should not be, it’s probably the most abused entity on planet earth. Pillaged on all fronts by various mechanics the most notable ones being the supply misalignment, mismanagement, opacity and the apparent lack of capacity of which Nigerians routinely debate; the existential nature of the battering forces, often more complex and deeper than Nigerians would care to know, are such that anything less than a massive overhaul can only but postpone the evil day.  

    I remember the story of NNPC’s early beginning, as told me by industry veterans, particularly at its take-off as Nigerian National Oil Corporation (NNOC) in the 50s. The founding fathers, even if it appeared more like a venture into the wild, still had a sufficient understanding of what their mission was. They envisioned an entity that was everything a state oil corporation should be, both in the way it carried out its business activities, and in its field operations. Then, the ministry and the bureaucrats in charge, approved and procured oil rigs more than the operators then required, with the extras meant to be taken apart in what was designed to be launch pads for the early birds in the industry – something that their counterparts like Algeria did and largely succeeded.

    Read Also: NNPCL: Lessons from Petrobras

    I guess that was an era in which public service counted for something!

    Unfortunately, if the successive inheritors of that legacy understood the goal, they chose rather to find satisfaction in what was convenient – the ignoble joint venture partnerships and the crude and the unfathomable alliances which bred the rentier culture under which the entire country not only chokes but are routinely gang-raped by unscrupulous nationals and foreigners alike!

    Interestingly, while the same bureaucrats of old still had the good sense to establish the ancillary infrastructures and institutions such as the NNPC Engineering and Technical Company, (NETCO), to address specific engineering gaps the industry, the National Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) to advance the nation’s aspirations in exploration and production, and then of course the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company (PPMC) and with it the countless depots spread across the nooks and corners of the country, to guarantee seamless petroleum products distribution, they would later become a huge avenue for creating jobs for the boys!

    Yes; the generations that came after ensured that the facilities were either unable to deliver optimally or were allowed to rot away! 

    This is where my sympathy goes to Bayo Ojulari and his team. His job at this time is an unenviable one. True as might be that the rules and the terrains have since changed, still everyone expects the NNPCL be to all manner of things to all classes of men and deservedly so given the NNPCL’s pre-eminent status as the industry leader.

    True to its nature, the government expects it to deliver on its primary goal of oil exploration and production, to continue its role as the cash cow that it has always been, hopefully beyond its current exertion as mere collector of rents and royalties that must at every month’s end, share from the pool collected to its beneficiaries. Like other entities in the energy terrain, government expects it to play the lead in the quest for energy diversification.

    To the ordinary folk however, everything begins and perhaps ends with ensuring that petrol and perhaps diesel continues to flow at the pump and this in a sustainable manner. This is where things could get tricky in the middle term and in no distant future, given the total collapse of our depots and pipelines infrastructure. In fact, to suggest that the current model of fuel transportation is neither profitable let alone sustainable is merely to restate the truth that Nigerians have always known but have chosen to keep in abeyance for the more weighty matters of fuel supply itself! 

    Which is where the depots as indeed the sprawling network of fuel distribution pipelines covering several thousands of kilometres would seem the best place, if any, for the Ojulari-led NNPCL to make his golden mark. I refer to the pipelines running from the Atlas Cove to Ejigbo in Lagos, then to Mosinmi in Sagamu, to Ore in Ondo State and then to Benin on the Mid-west flanks; and then western flank running from Lagos to Ibadan to Ilorin proceeding to Suleija and Minna and to Kaduna and beyond; and then those running from Port Harcourt to Aba and Enugu and other parts of the east.

    Only thereafter could the NNPCL under his watch truly claim to be back in business!  

  • Buhari as bride

    Buhari as bride

    As Nigerian politicians turn their proboscis to the 2027 general elections, former President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) is being serenaded as the beautiful bride in other to garner votes in the north, particularly the northwest. Suitors who had scorned him in the past have put a veil on their past indiscretions and in a variegated marque dance, are determined to seduce the one advertised as having over 12 million votes stuck safely in his Babariga.

    While many believe that his poor performance as president from 2015 to 2023 may have whittled down his followership and influence in the north, the politicians, ever optimistic, are not leaving anything to chance. So, to Kaduna where the “sterile general” has been relocated to, from his native Kastina, the train of politicians are all headed to. The inimitable wily former governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, angrily hyperactive, since he was nominated as a minister and then dropped, was the first to visit the General for political blessing.

    According to El-Rufai, who has decamped to the Social Democratic Party (SDP), he sought the permission of the General before leaving the All Progressive Congress (APC). He claimed the General sanctioned his voyage and had in fact prayed for his success. Of course, that claim is a cryptic message to other disgruntled members of the APC to think PMB has tacitly encouraged them to move to SDP. El-Rufai must have calculated that Buhari in his usual aloofness to political matters that doesn’t concern him directly, would not comment, and allow him press that haze of uncertainty to his advantage.

    Perhaps, knowing who they are dealing with, Buhari’s spokesman, Garba Shehu, quickly reaffirmed his principal’s loyalty to APC on whose platform he won the presidency twice. This writer doubts if PMB, being a man who believes in the principle of an eye for an eye, would ever betray President Bola Ahmed Tinubu (PBAT). The inner core of PMB, is that the measure you give to him, is the measure you will receive. That explains why he justified sidelining the southeast by his infamous 97 versus five percent of votes, as the determinant of political appointments, even though he slightly mended his way later.

    Fearing that the El-Rufai’s storm in a tea cup may turn into a hurricane, governors elected on the platform of APC otherwise referred to as Progressive Governors Forum (PGF), quickly made a dash to the Kaduna residence of PMB, to pay homage. The governors had apparently gone to douse the claim that the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) bloc in the APC were planning to exit the party. Some leading lights of that block include the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Tajudeen Abbas. 

    Will Speaker Abass emulate the former speaker of the House of Representative, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, then a member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), but effectively in opposition until the end of his tenure, when he officially joined the APC, to contest as governor of Sokoto State? To successfully emulate Tambuwal, Tajudeen would have to join forces to orchestrate crisis in APC, knowing that he would automatically lose his speakership if he joins El-Rufai in SDP. 

    Read Also:APC applauds Buhari’s loyalty to party

    Agreed, he may be an acolyte of El-Rufai, since El-Rufai after the success of APC at the polls, had said that making Tajudeen speaker, was the only recompense he wanted for helping the party win at the 2023 polls. But will Tajudeen sacrifice the joy of his speakership, to make El-Rufai happy? He may rather cut his political kinship with El-Rufai, if that would free him to enjoy the spoils of his present office. 

    Across the northern states, the SDP is a neophyte, politically, and despite his pretenses, El-Rufai lacks the charisma to excite the talakawas, like Buhari. He also lacks the messaging ability or even the message that can resonate amongst any political demography. Unlike Peter Obi, of the Labour Party, who in the 2023 general elections, galvanized the youths and the Christians, as their preferred candidate in the elections. Obi was so successful that he gave the APC and the PDP with hundreds of notable personalities, a run for their money.

    Even though he belonged to the old order, having been a member of APGA, and later the PDP, Obi was able to sell himself as different from the rest of them, and presented himself as the candidate to kill the hegemon of corruption and waste in government. El-Rufai, who is leading the quarry against the APC, has not shown himself capable of reigniting any such messaging or capacity. That perhaps explains why he is desperately seeking a coalition, with those he believes are desperate to win the presidency, in 2027.

    Atiku Abubakar would have little chance of ever being a president if he misses 2027. Beyond 2027, Atiku may become unelectable because of his age. Currently 78, he would be 84 by 2031, and even with the best of health, the electorate would not likely look his way. On his part, Obi though less affected by age should PBAT serve a second term, knows the presidency would move north for eight years, to berth in the south in 2039. By then, Obi would be 73 years, and who knows whether his message will still resonate.

    So, El-Rufai is feeding on their fear, to position himself as the successor to both PMB and Atiku, when PBAT would likely finish his second tenure in 2031. Currently 65 years, El Rufai would be 71 years in 2031, and if he succeeds to give the impression that he did all he can to help Atiku and Obi succeed but they couldn’t, he can then offer Obi a vice presidency slot to fight whoever APC may nominate. Knowing that the northern power hegemons aside from Atiku Abubakar may not wish to truncate the southern presidency in 2027, El-Rufai may actually be working for 2031, for himself. 

    Interestingly, one of the northern power brokers, former military president, Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida, has already thrown his heavy weight in favour of PBAT, perhaps as a thank you for the emotional rehabilitation during his recent book lunch. Even as an ordinary politician, PBAT showed himself an expert in building coalitions for a long term goal, how much more as a sitting president. While 2027 will not be a walkover, defeating PBAT at the polls will be a very tall order, and the coalition to achieve that may likely not happen within two years.

    Again, PBAT, having invested heavily in the Buhari presidency, on the two occasions he won, when other political power hegemons, were against his contest, those relying on the proverbial 12 million northern votes of PMB to shove PBAT aside in 2027, may be making a wrong political calculation. Even if he refuses to campaign for PBAT in 2027, PMB will likely not campaign against him.

  • Middle Belt leaders and the law of self-preservation

    Middle Belt leaders and the law of self-preservation

    Periodic harvest of death through mindless killing of innocent men, women and children by bandits which have unfortunately become regular feature of the Middle Belt region especially the Benue/Plateau axis, according to Governor Caleb Mutfwang occurred  again last week resulting in the massacre of over 50 people in Bokkos.

    But, as common with Middle Belt region leaders who got integrated into the power structure through either marriage, business or politics by the hegemonic power in the north, self-preservation is often the first law. This was why the governor was going to play the ostrich so as not to rock the boat until Channel TV’s Seun Okinbaloye’s probing question left him no room for equivocation. He was forced to declare – “as I speak to you there are not less than 64 communities taken over, renamed and people are living there on land they push people away from”. Writhing his hands in helplessness like his predecessors in office, he attributed the nightmare of his people to “genocide sponsored by terrorist from somewhere” and “proliferation of sophisticated arms”.

    Mutfwang cannot out of desire for self-preservation suppress facts about the killings in the Middle Belt and those behind the killings. It is on record that no less than 1,000 persons were killed in Jos and its environs as a result of ethno-religious conflagrations in n 2001, about 700 killed due to communal clashes in Yelwa, southern Plateau, in 2004; Scores in Jos in January 2010 as a result of sectarian clashes including the killing of nearly 150 Muslims in Kan Karama while December 2010’s Christmas eve explosions in two Christian neighbourhoods in Jos, followed by several days of sectarian violence, left at least 107 persons dead.

    We have also been told that the number of renamed communities in 2020 was about 102 while as at July 2023, we have  an estimated 18,751 internally displaced persons, many of them  condemned to IDP camps where they face hunger diseases and uncertain future .( Gideon and Funmi Para-Mallam Peace Foundation).

    The governor was hesitant when it came to disclosing the identities of those assailants sacking communities, confiscating land and sending victims to IDP camps. He can keep his peace as credible Fulani voices like Sheik Gumi, Nasir El Rufai, Aminu Masari and Abdullahi Ganduje have already identified them as disgruntled immigrant Fulani herders who want recognition and compensation after their heinous crimes. The tragedy of besieged people of Benue and Plateau is that they have continued to be betrayed by their leaders.

    For fear of antagonizing the hegemonic power in the north, the Justice Nikki Tobi Commission report that came out during Obasanjo’s presidency was for instance never implemented; Joshua Dariye’s introduction of vigilante groups- The Rainbow Boys – was not allowed to operate just as Jonah Jang’s anti-land grabbing and anti-kidnapping bills were never passed by the state House of Assembly.

    It was for the same reason successive leaders of the Middle Belt region who for a long time opposed state and community policing could not replicate the Southwest Amotekun security architecture model. It was the same reason they would rather listen to Shehu Garba’s criticism of community policing than the timely advice by Theophilus Danjuma, the crusader for Middle Belt self-actualization to the effect that those facing threat of genocide can defend themselves by procuring guns from where their tormentors got their own if government refused to give them licence to officially buy guns to protect themselves.

    The people of the Middle Belt have not changed. They remain the same people whose land was never conquered, the same brave warriors Uthman Dan Fodio hired as mercenaries to prosecute his wars and the same people who staged an insurrection immediately after independence to press their demand for self-actualisation. What changed are leaders driven more by consideration for self-preservation than patriotic zeal to serve their people.

    The nightmare of the people of Middle Belt region started with the death of Joseph Tarka, and Chief Obafemi Awolowo the greatest advocate for the creation of the Middle Belt Region. Awolowo remained the last man standing during the 1957 London constitutional debate following betrayal by Ahmadu Bello, the NPC leader and Nnamdi Azikiwe the NCNC leader, both of whom were driven by greed to corner land belonging to various Nigerian ethnic nationalities for the exclusive use of their own people.

    A brief journey through history will show how both shared a common philosophy of how to manage Nigerian land spaces.

    Ahmadu Bello and the hegemonic power in the north saw Nigeria as a land ordained by God for the stateless Fulani across West Africa with his great grandfathers capturing of Hausa land over which he imposed 13 of his kinsmen and one Hausa as Emirs. On his part, Zik who believed Igbo race had been ordained  by God to lead the children of Africa, was also convinced that everywhere in Nigeria and elsewhere in Africa should be home to his industrious and entrepreneurial Igbo people.

    It is therefore not difficult to see why Zik and his supporters did not see any contradiction in recommending a unitary system for a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural Nigeria or attempting to take over Yoruba nation in 1952 in the name of fake nationalism using his West African Pilot as tool of propaganda.

    And if further reasons are needed, Emeka Ojukwu’s strategy for the civil war which started as a war between the north and the east also said it all. For instance, instead of confronting the northern soldiers that attacked the Eastern Region from Makurdi, the Biafra Army overran Midwest, appointed an Igbo administrator and was on the way to Lagos before they were stopped at Ore, in Ondo State. But that was not before his insolent letter to Victor Banjo stating that he Ojukwu would decide who the administrator of Lagos would be after the pacification of Yoruba land.

    Not much has changed since the beginning of the Fourth Republic. The new campaign is no more unitarism but citizenship as the answer to the national question. In this regard, there is currently a bill in the National Assembly by Hon Benjamin Okezie Kalu which will legitimise immigrants’ takeover of ancestral home of host communities, a superior alternative to the ongoing bandits’ mindless killings in the Middle Belt region.

    The Fulani leaders never pretended about what they wanted out of Nigeria. With Uthman Dan Fodio’s subjugation of Hausa and sharing of their land among his siblings, his grandchildren believe Nigeria is a land ordained for stateless Fulani across West Africa. Ilorin was later to be seized through the help of Afonja, the Oyo Are Ona Kanakafo stationed in Ilorin. Oyo was later sacked by Fulani invaders who were stopped at Osogbo by the Ibadan army.

    What the Fulani leader could not get through war, they got through British colonial power. At the 1950 Ibadan constitutional conference, they insisted and secured 50% of membership of the Nigerian legislative house as condition for remaining part of post independent Nigeria.

    Read Also: Why Nigeria should not return to regionalism, by Middle Belt elder

    For the Fulani, like their Igbo rivals, not much have changed. It is still the same sense of entitlement over land that is fuelling the crisis in The Middle Belt and elsewhere in the country. Abubakar Malami, former Attorney General of the Federation once insisted that armed immigrant Fulani herders have right to occupy Ondo forest reserve. Sanusi Lamido Sanusi publicly encouraged Fulani herders to disobey Benue State’s anti-open grazing laws. Bauchi State governor, Bala Mohammed not too long ago passed a ‘fatwa’ through Channels TV, declaring any Fulani from any part of Africa, a Nigerian. Leaders of the herders wrote a 70-page letter to Muhammadu Buhari as president insisting open grazing is part of Fulani culture and threatened to make the country ungovernable if restricted from grazing in any part of the country.

    And their strategy for managing power has not changed. Tafawa Balewa, a minority from southern Bauchi was picked as prime minister in the first republic. He did everything Ahmadu Bello wanted including ‘doing nothing’ because of self-preservation even as the West burned.

    Gowon was installed Head of State after the 1966 July military vengeance coup over his seniors in breach of military protocol.  It was not a surprise that when the rivalry between the Igbo and Fulani ended in a civil war, Gowon and other notable Middle Belt military officers including Danjuma who has today become a leading voice of resistance, fought like slaves because of self-preservation.

    Chiefs Solomon Lar, Barnabas Gemade, Audu Ogbe, Ahmadu Ali, Kawu Baraje were for 16 years chairmen of the then ruling PDP. But they all pretended not to see the daily harvest of death from their home. David Mark and Bukola Saraki jointly occupied the senate presidency, the third most powerful office for 12 years. But fear of Fulani hegemonic power blinded them to the daily misery of their people.

    For all Middle Belt politicians, it is always the law of self-preservation. 

  • What is federal character?

    What is federal character?

    A storm of numbers rent the past week over appointments. It is the sort of debate that focuses on the elite rather than the people. No one posed questions about the quality of the appointees, what have they accomplished, and where have they erred.

    Rather, tongues wagged about tribes. This sort of furore deviates from progress to the embers of greed.  It is hypocrisy and an elite distraction.

    I am not underplaying the value of inclusion. But this essayist wanted, at least, a level of sophistication in the fracas. I expected the captious barbs to levitate a little for ideas rather than sentiment. But as Oscar Wilde noted, man is a creature of sentiment and not of reason.

    The storm trooper is none other than Ali Ndume, the querulous senator who I discredited not long ago when I compelled him to confess his sins in public.

     In his last censorious fart, he queried the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s staff realignment. He cried not because he loved North or hated South. It was a disguised plea for his relatives there who might be moved South. He had played a nepotist card in giving jobs. After all, as a ‘senator concern’ how would they know that he is a big man if he cannot put his children or nieces or nephews etc, in the posh sweetness of jobs?

     He swiftly confessed after my challenge. But as a man who has no self-awareness, he was out again ranting a year later over appointments. In between, he had unfurled his forked tongue about the tax bill. It all had to do with spoils. But this is no time to batten down those details.

    Read Also: Reps name 19-member committee to oversee emergency rule in Rivers state

    On the issue of lopsided appointments, he seems to have revived his motor park hubris. He said it is not because he is against President Bola Tinubu. He was just being fair. Haba Malam.

    This man wants access to the president. He is not getting it. He has turned himself into the rottweiler at the gate, and has to bark all night so all who are asleep can open the gate and give him shelter and a bone.

     He should tell us when was the last time he had a one-on-one meeting with the president? He is just a bitter man. And then he is woofing and growling without figures.

    Ndume loves to speak to galleries with an empty-barrel vanity because there is always an audience for such full-throated extravagance.

    Now what are the facts? He probably did not like the fact that the NNPCL boss is named Ojulari, and he forgot that the man is from the north central. He forgot that the new chairman of the board is his kinsman. He is still angry that the FCT minister is from Rivers State and that the CBN governor is named Cardoso and not Ali. This is the sort of parochial torment in his soul.

    Maybe he should have visited the Federal Character Commission (FCC) and enquired, as this essayist has done, and obtained the facts.

    Does he know that under Bola Tinubu, the appointments are still skewed to the north? During the Buhari era, north central had 110 while Tinubu raised it to 137. The Northeast had 102, and now they have 91. The Northwest had 127 but have now 134. The Southeast stayed almost the same and fell from 71 under Buhari to 70 now. South-south rose marginally from 71 to 79. Southwest had a sharp rise from 91 to 146. In aggregate, the north has a total of 339 to the south’s 233.

    If anyone wants to complain, it is not a man like Ali Ndume. I would have said the South-south and Southeast should be up in arms. But they, too, and I am from the South-south, should exercise a sense of history.

    Not long ago when Goodluck Jonathan was president, our Southeast brothers called Jonathan Azikiwe on the ground of his favoritism. His main beneficiaries were either from the Southeast or South-south, and he had no compunction about it. No one complained at that time about a lopsided profile of jobs.

     In fact, the British press wrote vivid stories of Nigerians of a certain extraction on a shopping mania, buying up High Street in London. That was the Jonathan effect.

     Ayim was secretary to the federation and he should tell us if he did not give more jobs to his kinsmen and some South-south fellows than anywhere else. In fact, I know of an Urhobo man who he would not allow to do a second term because he had to replace him with his kinsman. We cannot forget Okonjo Iweala wailing that only Southeasterners qualified for jobs.

    The idea of federal character should not be seen as a snapshot in time. It has to be seen as balance over time. The Southwest may seem to have revved up its profile under Tinubu, but when was the last time that happened? Some said the premium jobs have gone to Yoruba. I ask, when was the last time a Yoruba man was CBN chief, or chief of army staff, or head of Customs or head of NNPCL?

    We have run a historically unbalanced profile of jobs. This is because our leaders over time prefer conclave of tribe to merit, or the abused word, Fairness. It is for this lack of fairness that we have accepted the idea of zoning the presidency.

     We don’t trust ourselves yet. Imagine if Tinubu were not president, the last time we might have had a Yoruba chief of army staff would be about three decades ago under Alani Akinrinade.

     Did the East not celebrate when Jonathan made Ihejirika the chief of army staff? The first since Ironsi. During a NIMASA anniversary, they gave out merit awards to staff who had served over decades.

    It turned out that when a northerner was director general, it was northerners on the staff; under a South-south DG, it was South-south staff, and under a Yoruba DG, it was Yoruba staff. Each DG to his own. It is typical in virtually all federal agencies. Time has been the tool for balancing, rather than attaining merit in a snapshot in time.

    Bigots like Ndume should look at the northern profile of Tinubu’s appointment. He addressed the main issues plaguing the north, health, poverty, security, housing and education. All the ministers heading those critical sectors are from the North. Except the deployment of Alausa to education. But the minister of state is also from the North. Is that not an opportunity to attack the issues through their appointees?

    Since 1999, when did appointees change the poverty or state of development in the regions of the presidents? Never. During Jonathan, the Southeast had its worst roads, and Fashola has been the best to have lifted eastern infrastructure. I stand to be corrected. Jonathan’s Second Niger Bridge never took off. Buhari redeemed it. Yet, the poverty index under Buhari was appalling up North, especially among the talakawa who swore by his name.

    What we should adduce is development, not elite allocation of offices. That is our bane. We call some offices juicy? Some did not want Wike in FCT because they thought it is “juicy.” It is a code word for corruption. This is pharisaic. The debate over lopsidedness is not the worry of the Fulani farmer or Igbo spare parts seller. It is an elite who craves a Dubai mansion.