The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • Murder in Gbagada

    While we are still on the issue of promising Nigerians cut down in their prime, it is sad to report of a great tragedy that occurred in the Gbagada suburbs of Lagos last weekend. It was murder most foul. Like all freshly wedded people, Ugochukwu Ozuah looked forward to a life of bliss and prosperity with Joan, his fetching bride. With the home front firmly secured, his head must have been humming with a million brilliant ideas about the future. But this was not to be. The young man was cut down in a hail of bullets.

    His family insist that the police are the culprits. The police are insisting that the dastardly act was carried out by still unknown assailants, possibly armed robbers. Somebody must be lying. What is clear is that Ugochukwu did not kill himself. He did not commit suicide. Or perhaps he did by being born in the wrong country at the wrong time. When he was asked whether he had a conception of hell, Wole Soyinka famously retorted that having lived in Nigeria for over seventy years, he had a fair idea of what hell is like.

    But we deceive and make a big fool of ourselves if we think the rest of the world is not aware of what goes on in Nigeria. Contrary to days of yore when savagery and barbarity could be hidden, we now live in an open global village. Even before snooper received a plaintive report of the crime the following morning from one of Nigeria’s top female lawyers whose son was one of the groomsmen at the wedding, the internet, Facebook, Twitter and other global fora of enhanced social communication were already awash with report of the murder in all its chilling and horrendous details.

    This is one heinous murder too many, and it must not be allowed to be swept under the carpet. All those who have children of marrying age must rise as one to demand justice. In Latin America, they ended up with Mothers of the Disappeared. In Nigeria, Mothers of the Murdered (MOM) should rise as a group. As usual, the police have begun to muddy the water. They declared promptly and peremptorily that the poor chap was a victim of armed robbers. Then they resorted to the familiar Kayode Soyinka Syndrome by fingering a near victim as a principal suspect. This will not wash.

    It is just as well that the energetic, enterprising and proactive new Inspector General of police is reported to have requested for the file. Readers of this column will notice that we are always reluctant to damn the police. This is the first time in five and a half years that we are coming down hard on our police force. This is because we feel for the plight of an under-manned, under-paid and under-motivated police force. But there can be no denying that the Nigerian multi-ethnic underclass has sent its most homicidal and pathological elements to the force. These are the trigger-happy scoundrels and criminals in uniform. Nigeria will know no peace until they are de-coupled.

    Until the debate about state police is resolved one way or the other, the I-G has his work cut out for him. The list of victims of police elimination is long and lengthy, and so is the trail of proper justice. A few years back, Bayo Awosika, the son in law of the revered columnist, Allah De, was murdered in gruesome circumstances at a Police Check point in Lekki Phase 1. Nothing has been heard of the case. Mr Abubakar must be told that enough is enough.

  • Revisiting our unification policies (2)

    Revisiting our unification policies (2)

    About forty years of the NYSC had not produced any concrete evidence that the scheme has achieved its goals

    The title of last Sunday’s column should have been ‘Revisiting our unification policies1,’ and not ‘Piercing the Fog of Revolution’ that the column carried. Today’s piece is to provide more illustrations to support the thesis of last Sunday’s column; the tendency that our country is moving increasingly in the direction of a Union of policy rather than one of affection, largely because of the failure of civilian governments since 1999 to be more creative and freedom-affirming than the military governments before them.

    In an effort to unify a country that had been pushed close to the brinks by rigged elections in 1964 and 1965, the country’s military governments before, during, and after the civil war created policies they considered to be the best ways to create a united nation out of the diverse nationalities amalgamated in 1914. Before the war, the military government, as we posited last week, abolished local and native authority police systems across the country and put the country under one central police, on the excuse that state and local government leaders abused the local police system in the past and in the hope that one central police is better positioned to unify the country and bring justice, fairness, and efficiency to its law enforcement.

    The country has been at the mercy of a police force controlled by the central government ever since. This is despite the fact that the force is visibly incapable of securing citizens and their property or maintaining public order, more so since the emergence of Boko Haram. Even after forty-six years of federal monopoly of law enforcement, several retired military and police officers, as well as anti-federalist political leaders continue to state pontifically that establishing any other layer of police system in the country is tantamount to balkanizing the country.

    Three unification policies stand out to be revisited out of the legion initiated between 1973 and 1979: creation of Unity Schools; establishment of compulsory National Youth Service for graduates of tertiary institutions; and federalization of pre-existing regional universities. The rationale given for all of these policies is the same: “to encourage and develop common ties among the youths of the country and to promote national unity.” Military rulers believed that these policies would create a Nigerian Persona that they thought was lacking in all other spheres of the nation’s life apart from the armed forces.

    Just as there is no evidence that the centralisation of the police has worked for the citizens of the country, there is also no evidence that the three policies designed to promote unity have achieved the goals for which they were created. For example, after several decades of the existence of Unity Schools and with about half a million graduates from such schools, there is no statistical evidence that the country is more united than it was before the advent of Unity Schools. In addition, universities taken over from regional governments have over the years lost the international reputation and the high standards they had before they were transformed into Unity Schools at the tertiary level. Regions from which such universities were appropriated by the federal government have had, in the undying spirit of federalism, created new universities, adding in the final analysis to the pool of underfunded universities and impoverished tertiary institutions in the country.

    Similarly, about forty years of the NYSC (controlled even in a post-military era by a military officer) had not produced any concrete evidence that the scheme has achieved its goals, apart from anecdotal evidence that many graduates from the scheme married across state or ethnic lines. I grew up in colonial Nigeria and grew up to know that trans-ethnic marriage was part of the culture as far back as the 1940s. Whether it was in Lagos, Ibadan, and Ondo, where I lived as a young boy, one did not have to go to another street to identify men or women with spouses from other regions. There are several colleagues of my generation now in their 70s with Fulani mothers and Yoruba fathers, Igbo mothers and Hausa fathers, or Ebira fathers and Yoruba mothers, etc.

    Despite several calls for abolishment or re-conceptualisation of the NYSC, elected government leaders are ignoring citizens’ calls for policy reversal or change, on the anecdotal claims that the schemes enhance national unity. What is needed is for the government to set the Federal Bureau of Statistics to work to investigate the following points: percentage of increase in trans-ethnic marriages since the commencement of Unity Schools, Federal Universities, and National Youth Service Corps; percentage of former corpers offered employment in the states in which they served and had thus chosen to relocate to such states; number of NYSC hosts and corpers that see the scheme as a means of cheap but unappreciated labour to less developed states. Unless these questions are answered with statistical evidence, no one has a right to say that the NYSC, for example, has impacted on the political and social life of the country.

    It is also necessary to juxtapose answers to the questions above with statistical evidence on the number of serving corpers that had been killed as a result of sectarian or religious violence; the number of corpers that had died on the road on their way to or from their posts; the number of corpers that would have participated in the scheme if it had not been tied to getting post-service jobs from federal and state government agencies; and percentage of leaders of Boko Haram that attended Unity Schools, federal universities, and fulfilled NYSC obligations. It is only after doing the cost and benefit analysis of NYSC and Unity Schools that any government can justifiably say that asking for a review of some of the policies bequeathed by unelected governments is tantamount to putting the hands of the clock of unity and development back.

    Largely because the country’s post-military government is afraid to revisit policies imposed on the nation by unelected governments before it, political and cultural leaders with the mindset of military rulers are already networking to start a new round of low-wattage but high-verbiage unification policies patterned after those whose impact is yet to be verified. They have started to prepare or programme citizens for a policy that empowers the federal government to award indigeneship of communities to members of other communities and another one that creates grazing corridors all over the country for the use of nomadic cattle breeders, something that is reminiscent of the nomadic education of the military era that is now replaced by elected governments with Almajiri education.

     

    To be continued

  • Global threats, signals and deterrence

    The world was awash with warnings, threats and signals either wrong or right, matched by nuances and body languages from statesmen, powerful technocrats and heads of states this week. It was not only at the UN General Assembly, the annual talk shop of the world body held this week, that this was so. This is because the verbal ritual of rhetoric started well before this at the a most expected place – Teheran, Iran at the revived Non Aligned Movement meeting during which Egypt stole the thunder of leadership of the Arab world from the host Iran. That really was the first round or sparring session for a global ‘rumble in the jungle’ of sorts in New York at the UN General Assembly – (UN-GA); after which US President Barak Obama could not wait for the usual UN dinner – leaving little to the imagination as to why he became the first US president in six years to allow re – election jitters to make him bolt from New York to Washington after addressing the world body.

    Let me attempt to catalogue the pot-pourri of ‘threats ‘and ‘wrong signals’ first before weighing them on a scale of deterrence to see if and how they can have the desired effect of leaving the world at peace. Which is another way of finding out that they are not, as Shakespeare said in Macbeth – a tale told by an idiot full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

    I start from the financial world where no less a person than the MD of the world body Christine Lagarde was blowing hot and cold this week first against her employers – the western world-and next against a nation that is widely regarded as the whipping boy of the international financial community – Argentina. Lagarde told the world, and a stunned Europe – or the euro zone in short, that the poor growth of their economies and high budget deficits together with the huge spending of the US economy pose a great threat to the peace of mind of the international financial community.

    This really was unheard of, given that Lagarde’s appointment as IMF MD was because the Americans and Europeans have ceded the top positions of the World Bank and IMF to themselves and Lagarde recently clinched her position because she is from the euro zone- France for that matter. On the positive side though that really showed she is brave and bold at her job. But it could also put her job on the line in a week during which there were huge protests and riots in Spain and Greece against new austerity measures of the governments there to shore their finances by cutting their high deficits. As for the Americans ,the Obama campaign team and administration would just conclude that Lagarde has just decided to campaign for Mitt Romney in the presidential election slated for November 6 and that puts her second term as IMF MD in immediate jeorpady if Obama wins reelection – and vice versa.

    However, it was in the way that Lagarde handled her warning to Argentina on that nation’s poor growth rate and unacceptably high inflation that she was at her imaginative best – although most unexpectedly, she met her match grit for verbal grit in the response of the Argentine President Kristina Fernandez Kirchener. Lagarde played soccer with Argentina’s sovereign fiscal and economic woes when she said she was giving Argentina a yellow card to wake up from fiscal non- performance because she knows the Argentine nation would understand because her citizens love soccer. If there was no improvement before December 17, Lagarde said she would give Argentina the red card which may include suspension from the IMF which really is a tall order for Argentina. But then the Argentine president Kristina Fernandez – Kirchener a woman of susbstance in her own right, who succeeded her husband as president, rose to the occasion at least rhetorically.

    Kirchener said- the rich nations don’t want to be friends or partners they want only destitute and subordinates. Argentina is a proud nation with dignity and pride. Which may not be an empty statement considering that Argentina has just found oil and may not be as financially vulnerable as she was a decade ago when she threatened to default on her debt and earned a negative reputation in the comity of nations. Either way Lagarde has made her point and it is for Argentina to perform before December 17 or face the music which really is the crux of the matter.

    In similar fashion World leaders in New York at the UN-GA spoke their minds on real and perceived global threats. Obama spoke up against violence and intolerance and condemned those that killed the US envoy in Libya. He stood by American right to freedom of speech and proclaimed democracy as the best ideology to move the world forward. The French president Francois Holland identified three global threats namely fanaticism, global financial crisis, and the environment.

    In addition Hollande identified the Sahel in sub Saharan Africa as a grave danger to global peace and asked the UN to intervene in Mali where fanatics have seized the northern part of the nation and have subjected it to Sharia law. This should be particularly helpful to the Nigeria ‘s President Goodluck Jonathan who has been given the responsibility by ECOWAS to bring sanity to Mali. Rapprochment with France post-Ivory Coast Crisis can start from the new French president ‘s concern voiced on such an important global platform as the UN- GA.

    Before the UN-GA three issues were touted to dominate discussion and these were Syria, Iran and its feared nuclear power acquisition, and the riots in the Middle East over a provocative video in the US and later parts of Europe on Islam. The billing however did not live up to expectation. On Syria the big powers were hamstrung by the no – fly-zone hangover over Libya and were not united on what to do in Syria as the daily slaughter of innocent civilians by the Assad government continued in Allepo and Damascus. It was left to Britain’s PM David Cameron to blame the UN for inaction, hypocritically though, when he knew it was the Russians and Chinese that had made the world body impotent for a decisive intervention in Syria to remove the murderous reign of the Assad dynasty in that unfortunate nation.

    On Iran there was no show down as expected between the well known combatants namely Iran, Israel the US and Europe. Even the Iranian President Ahmedinejad was a bit subdued as he addressed his last UN-GA as he is expected to leave office next year. Before that however Iran had been dealt a diplomatic below the belt blow by Egypt and the UN at the Non Aligned Movement – NAM -meeting hosted by Iran before the UN -GA this week. Iran had hosted the NAM to orchestrate views different from what the US and Europe had been propagating about its decision to make electricity from nuclear fossil and garner support for its ally, the Assad regime in Syria.

    Indeed, Iran wanted the meeting to be its signal of the regional leadership of the Arab world and the Middle East. Things however did not turn out as the Iranians expected. Egypt’s new President Mohammed Mursi condemned the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad for murdering its own people – a view widely shared by the millions of Sunni Muslims in the Middle East who are in the majority against the minority Shiite Muslims led by Iran. In addition the UN Secretary General unexpectedly railed against Iran’s president well known and widely condemned views on Israel. In the presence of the Iranian president, the UN scribe told the NAM audience in Teheran that the UN would not condone statements that called for the annihilation of member states of the UN or those that say that the holocaust did not happen – which to me was like holding brief for Israel before Ahmadinejad, Iran’s president who had preached the opposite universally before.

    On the violence in the Middle East Obama spoke his mind and stood by American values on free speech ostensibly because he knew Mitt Romney was listening to make hay out of any mistake or misspeak on his part. Especially as Obama has always said on the presidential campaign trail that the Republican candidate is an ignoramus on diplomacy which too is an understatement given Mitt Romney’s track record of discordant tones on Israel, the Palestinians and the Middle East. But then, Obama could have granted audience to the Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu as is customary for US presidents visiting the UN at such occasions.

    All Netanyahu was asking for was assurance that the US president be more forth coming that Iran will not be allowed to have nuclear power and thus wipe out Israel as promised by the Iranian president. By snubbing Netanyahu, Obama risks losing the endorsement of the powerful Jewish lobby in the US. More importantly the snub of Israel in New York sends a cheering signal to Iran to proceed on what it has consistently denied but which Obama has also consistently vowed not to allow to happen by all means.Which boils down to the fact that on Iran it is not clear whether Obama is sending a red light or a green or amber one to the global community and on a balance of deterrence for global peace and stability that cannot be good enough.

  • Labaran Maku’s penance at National Assembly

    Labaran Maku’s penance at National Assembly

    It gladdens the heart to learn that after his boisterous dismissal of a resolution by the Senate on the threat by the Lamido Sanusi-led Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to release N5000 note into circulation next year as the personal opinion of members of the upper legislative chamber, the Minister of Information, Mr Labaran Maku realised his error and turned round to tender an unreserved apology to the lawmakers on Tuesday. In the heat of the public outrage against the proposed denomination, the Senate had lent its voice to the widespread belief that the new denomination would do more harm to the economy than good and asked the President Goodluck Jonathan to prevail on Sanusi, the CBN Governor, not to proceed further with the unpopular plan. But in a swift reaction to the Senate’s unanimous resolution, Maku waved it off as a mere advice Jonathan was not under any obligation to heed.

    As would be expected, Maku’s utterance jolted the lawmakers to the marrow, and they wasted no time in telling him that coming from an unelected public office holder, his comment was at best a gross act of impudence. “I don’t think we need the Minister of Information or any other minister to tell us that our resolutions are not binding; just as we don’t need to remind him that he was not elected,” the Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekweremadu, declared. On his part, the Senate President, Senator David Mark, elected to educate Maku on the statutory workings of the upper chamber. He said: “We know that our resolutions are not binding, but the positions we take in this Senate, especially regarding the resolutions, are all well thought out. They are borne out of patriotism, well researched and they are an amalgamation of the views of very responsible Nigerian. And to that extent, it is very persuasive, and any person who is ignoring the resolutions of this Senate is doing so at the expense of good governance, and we cannot encourage such a thing.”

    The astute politician that he is, Maku needed no one to tell him that an ominous cloud was gathering as the senators took turns to pour their verbal venoms. And that became more apparent when he received a summons from the Senate to appear before its Committee on Information and Media. But before the chamber could wield the big stick, Maku ate the humble pie. In optimum sobriety, he did not only withdraw his comment, he profusely apologised to the lawmakers, vowing never to disparage them. Maku said: “I have no reason to disrespect or disparage the Senate. I made the statement when the press pressed me to make a direct statement on whether the Federal Government would stop the introduction of the N5000 note. But I could say that because I had not received any position from the President. If that was interpreted to mean that the Federal Government or myself considers the resolutions of the Senate as of no effect, I apologise.”

    His apology, as well as the sober and pensive mien with which he tendered it, were evidence that he must have acted innocently, using the template of his boss, President Goodluck Jonathan, who travelled the same road in January without any serious consequence. In the heat of Federal Government’s nocturnal removal of the subsidy on fuel in January, the House of Representatives had added its voice to the calls for a reversal of the policy and passed a resolution requesting Jonathan to reverse the measure. But rather than heed the resolution of the lower chamber, the President waved it off as the lawmakers’ personal opinion. The best the lawmakers could do was to remind the President that it was the same resolution that crushed the barricade mounted by some influential Nigerians against his transition from Vice President to Acting President at a time his former boss, Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua, had become physically and mentally incapacitated and the nation’s presidency lay in the gutter.

    Jonathan, it must be said, had derived the temerity to deride the House from the inability of the National Assembly, particularly the Senate, to assert itself as an independent arm of government. Like I had a cause to state in this column a couple of weeks ago, the Senate under the leadership of Mark has acted more as a stooge and rubber stamp of the executive; a pawn on Jonathan’s chessboard, ever so willing to pander to the President’s promptings so that the boat would not be rocked. To the chagrin of concerned Nigerians, the Senate President has been proceeding on the flawed principle that a peaceful Senate is synonymous with a progressing Nigeria.

    Studiously avoiding the infamous banana peel on account of which his predecessors like Chuba Okadigbo and Adolphus Wabara fell, Mark has ensured that his fellow senators get their entitlements as and when due. But he seems to have over-protected his seat by submitting the rights of the legislative arm to the executive in the search for a peaceful reign; so much so that he looked the other way when the Presidency insulted the lower chamber during the fuel subsidy crisis in January.

    The result is that the Senate has been so dormant that more Nigerians would remember the highly eventful two-year tenure of Senator Ken Nnamani than the close to five years Mark has been in charge. But Maku’s utterance appears to have jolted the Senate out of its passive instincts. At the hallowed chamber of the Senate on Tuesday, he read the riot act to political office holders with a penchant for reckless utterances against the National Assembly, warning that the lawmakers would no longer hesitate to pass a resolution asking the President to remove such appointees. “Maku is a careless talker. He does not think properly before he talks. Maku cannot educate us, but we are to educate him. The President should caution him and the President must call his ministers to order. The next time a minister talks any how about the Senate, we shall pass a resolution that such a minister be removed,” he said.

    A new dawn seems to beckon in the upper legislative chamber. Its utterances in the past few days, including the ultimatum it issued the Federal Government to file an appeal against the World Court judgment which ceded the disputed Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroun, seem to suggest that Mark and his fellow lawmakers have woken up to the realisation that they are there to represent the people; not to patronise the President.

  • Ondo state under the radar (2)

    Ondo state under the radar (2)

    You must give it to Dr. Olusegun Mimiko. There must be a reason why he was given the sobriquet, Iroko. The Iroko tree is a most interesting one in Yoruba cosmogony. To some, the Iroko is the king of trees. This is probably why King Sunny Ade famously sang that “Iroko ni baba igi, olomoshikata ni baba agbado, asesere bere ni o, ijo ti ya”. But then, in another context, the same Sunny Ade sang that “Bi sango paraba bon fa Iroko ya, bi ti igi nla ko”. There is the Iroko tree. There is ‘Igi nla’, the big tree. Mimiko had every opportunity in the world to transform himself from Iroko to the invincible ‘Igi nla’ but he blew it big time. The tiny but dangerous termites constitute the most destructive elements to the most formidable trees. The tree may look formidable from the outside. But if the termite has devoured it from within, it is but a shallow plank. Of course, there is an antidote to the insidious poison of the termites. It is the powerful insecticide devised by science. Now, what insecticides would have prevented the internal devouring that has rendered a once formidable Iroko of Ondo so electorally vulnerable? First, would be a formidable party structure. And second would be outstanding performance.

    It is no news that the Labour Party structure under Mimiko has fragmented badly. His party’s Chairman and Deputy Chairman are among those who have dumped both the governor and the party. Only last week, three of Mimiko’s key aides resigned. However, the governor’s highly efficient propaganda machine claims they were sacked. But does that not suggest serious internal haemorrhage within the government and the party? Would a confident governor have cause to sack three key aides barely a month to a critical election? Despite Mimiko’s immense executive powers, many of his key aides have abandoned him. The number of aspirants that sought to contest against him in the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), even if one or two of them later went back to their vomit with the emergence of the candidate, speaks volumes about his political and electoral vulnerability. Of course, no one can doubt that Mimiko is politically astute. But given his own record of serial political betrayals – Ajasin, Olumilua, Adefarati, Agagu – it is understandable that Mimiko would be unwilling to empower other individuals within the Labour Party. That has become a serious political albatross he has to contend with.

    One or two readers that responded to last week’s piece, asked if every state in the South West must belong to the ACN. Most certainly not. However, there are two critical issues germane to the liberation and development both of the South West and Nigeria. First, is devolution of powers, responsibilities and resources from the centre to the component parts of the federation and second is regional economic integration to stimulate faster national development. Mimiko’s Labour party in Ondo State believes in neither. If it did, I would certainly not be wasting my time and energy writing this piece.

    Now, the second insecticide that could have helped preserve Mimiko’s Iroko myth is performance. Has Mimiko performed? His die hard opponents will say he has done absolutely nothing. But his supporters sing his praises to the high heavens. I decide to take a more nuanced position. Ondo State is the only oil producing state in the South West. It therefore enjoys derivation funding from the Federal Government. Does the achievement of the Mimiko administration on the ground match the level of funding it has received? I doubt it. Its propagandists have made much of the Child and Maternal Care Centre built in Akure for instance. But then, is that enough for the health care sector of a state that receives derivation funding as an oil producing state? Fashola has built five Child and Maternal Care Centres! The Mimiko administration has not responded to criticisms that it has not completed more than two of its road construction projects. Even more disturbing is the triumphalism that has characterized the Mimiko re-election campaign. The governor seems convinced that he has performed creditably. He is satisfied with himself. Yet, even governors like Fashola, Oshiomhole, Amaechi, Lamido, Fayemi, Aregbesola, who have been lauded for good governance, have been subdued in acknowledging their performance. They know that they can do much more if we had a more equitable and just federation. The way Nigeria is structured today makes it inevitable for the country to perform at a low level of economic equilibrium no matter how brilliantly some governors try to perform. If Mimiko, therefore, is so self satisfied with his first term performance, it means he has set a low threshold of performance and can only lapse into complacency if given a second term.

    As I stated last week, the outcome of the Ondo elections will have implications far beyond the Sunshine state. It will be a referendum on whether or not we want Nigeria to continue in her present condition. The electorate in Edo State in the last election, against all odds, voted for change. The outcome of the polls was an indication that the people want a new Nigeria. Neither primordial sentiments nor intimidation could sway them. The Ondo State polls offer another opportunity for Nigerians to affirm their view on the state of the nation. The election is not just about Ondo State. It is about Nigeria. It is about regional integration. May God Almighty grant the people of the Sunshine state; the state where the revolutionary Action Group was born over five decades ago, the wisdom to make the right decision. A vote for the continuity of Nigeria in her present condition, which is what Mimiko stands for, will be suicidal.

  • National consciousness as camouflage

    National consciousness as camouflage

    It is time once again to mark (celebrate?) the flag independence of our dear country and to lament what turns out to be its unfulfilled promises. Yet while this lamentation comes natural to many who invested a sizeable amount of capital in the prospect of a strong, united, and democratic nation-state, many others are not surprised at the ugly turn of events. There are good reasons for both reactions, though as I would argue, the second group has the benefit of the facts.

    To the first group, it is the case that the struggle for freedom forged a united front against the colonial powers universally condemned as a rampaging force of racist exploiters responsible for the dismemberment of motherland Africa, first through the enslavement and physical separation of its sons and daughters, and second through the balkanisation of its land without the courtesy of involving any of its rulers.

    The resentment of the European master brought Africans to the realisation of their kinship as the dispossessed and, in the words of Frantz Fanon, the wretched of the earth. Pan-African ideas bolstered the resolve of Africans in the Diaspora and on the continent, and decolonisation became a rallying cry for the mobilisation of the people against imperialists and exploiters.

    Interestingly, for the masses of African colonies, it was the colonial factor that brought them together and developed in them the consciousness of a common bond. A semblance of national consciousness was thus generated as the direct outcome of the people’s encounter with the colonial system.

    To those who invested a lot of capital in the development of this consciousness as a result of their leadership of the anti-colonial struggle, and later in the newly independent country, Nigeria in our case, it was this semblance of national consciousness that enticed and entrapped. It enticed them to the possibilities of a truly new and bold experiment which, they thought had a great potential for becoming a reality. While the enthusiasm could be explained by appeal to the investment of time and resources, there were indications even right from the beginning of serious impediments.

    To the second group referenced above, the whole idea of a common nationality or national consciousness has been a ruse all along. The coming together of different groups and forces was motivated by different and in many cases, conflicting interests, with traces of these emerging during the “nationalist” struggles. Indeed, as some analysts have observed, it could be surmised that there was a conscious decision, independently or collectively arrived at, by the differing and conflicting forces, to first gloss over their divisions for the sake of working together to eliminate the common enemy.

    Frantz Fanon’s analysis of “The Pitfalls of National Consciousness” in The Wretched of the Earth captured vividly the imagery of a disjointed and inept national middle class at the dawn of independence. Of course, while Fanon saw something worth commending in the initial act of solidarity against the imperialists, he also worried that it could lead to an anomalous outcome of dog eating dog if and when national consciousness slides into ethnic consciousness: “National consciousness, instead of being the all-embracing crystallisation of the innermost hopes of the whole people, instead of being the immediate and most obvious result of the mobilisation of the people, will be in any case only an empty shell, a crude and fragile travesty of what it might have been.” Fanon laments the “facility with which, when dealing with young and independent nations, the nation is passed over for the race, and the tribe is preferred to the state.”

    The fear and the agony passionately expressed by Fanon are shared by many Africans in and outside of the continent who decry the post-independence rot. But while they blamed the slide into ethnic consciousness as culprit, I would suggest that we take another look at the issues. For this, we must acknowledge the groups that were involved in the original struggle: the masses, the elite, and the coloniser.

    For the most part, the masses were never unmindful of the reality of their primordial attachments. Indeed, for them the ethnic community—the original nation—was their only reality. They were never properly attuned to the reality of the new nation, which was more of an imposition than a voluntarily assumed consciousness. The masses were right at home with their ethnic nationalities.

    The elite, on the other hand, had a love-hate relationship with the new “national” reality. It promised a new lease on life with the prospect of taking over the perquisites of office at the departure of the colonial lords. On the other hand, there was the fear of the Other—the rivals from pre-existing primordial groups competing for the same perks. And so, while national consciousness meant little or nothing to the masses, it proved to have a dual meaning for the elite who must therefore present a bifurcated relationship to it: take full advantage of its promise for self-advancement, and at the same time undermine its potential for genuine national consciousness which supersede primordial attachments. Since national consciousness is an essential prerequisite for national unity, it is not a surprise that the latter has been so elusive.

    In the special case of Nigeria, recent history is no different from the now apparently ancient times of anti-colonial struggles. Consider the so-called North-South divide. It seems clear that the self-interest of the political elite has been the motivating factor of the crisis of mistrust. Northern governors want to re-open the litigated and adjudicated offshore-onshore controversy. They are against the creation of more states in the South and they reject the idea of embedding zonal arrangements in the constitution. The South is against the position of the North in every instance of these issues.

    I like to believe that northern governors believe sincerely that these issues have a direct bearing on the welfare of the northern masses and not just the interest of the elite. To that extent, they must also believe that it is their sacred responsibility to fight for their people. In the same way, the southern governors have similar belief about their position vis-à-vis the welfare of their people. Is there another group that is looking after that other entity that is named NIGERIA? Indeed, does any one of the antagonists in the current debate acknowledge the existence of that entity? National consciousness will be mouthed ad nauseam in this season of remembrance. But it is hard to not see it as a ruse.

    There is one more thing. Both northern and southern political elites get motivated by self-interest. It is human as psychological egoists would argue. But there is a difference. In the case of the Southwest in particular, precedence was created at the dawn of Western Nigeria’s self-government in 1957 when the foremost welfarist of our space, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, consciously aligned his self-interest with the interest of the masses. Awolowo was not a saint. But he knew the game of politics well and he made a calculated effort to ensure that the welfare of the masses was the measure by which his success would be judged. It paid huge dividends politically and morally.

    Since that successful experiment in political engineering, the political elite in the Southwest are hard-pressed to ensure the congruity of their elite motivation with the interests and welfare of the masses. Awolowo ensured that the struggle against colonialism culminated in massive investments in welfare institutions—education, health, employment, rural development—that cater to the basic needs of the people. This was how a fractious people, united only by a common language (with some dialects mutually unintelligible), came to see themselves as one. This was how a Yoruba nation was born out of a myriad of tribal enclaves. And it is a lesson for how a Nigerian nation can emerge out of a multitude of tribes and tongues. That is, if the train has not already left the station.

     

  • Golden Islam…the pursuit

    Golden Islam…the pursuit

    (A review of Governor Rauf Aregbesola’s quest for true Islam)

    I do not celebrate Rauf Aregbesola for this is hardly about him. I do not know the man nor do I intend to meet him; probably because I have met him many times over in his spirited reason. He calls it “Islam, Education and the Principles of Jihad,” but I would call it a gift, a cognizant bequest to the Muslim brotherhood.

    In his submission subsists caution, that proverbial depth of reason and understanding that has become forbidden fruit to a greater section of religious faithful cum humanity. He advocates peace, tolerance, the pursuit of knowledge for the collective good and sincere worship of Allah (SWT). In the lecture which he delivered recently at the 2012 (1433) National Unity Ramadan lecture of Al-Habibiyyah Islamic Society of Nigeria, Abuja, the Governor of Osun evoked those rare principles of spirituality and humaneness that constitutes the essence of Islam.

    The uneasy relationship between the Christian and Muslim worlds, he claims, is partly because they are competing faiths and partly due to gross misunderstanding of what Islam truly represents. Since September 11, 2001 when some terrorists flew fuel laden planes into buildings in the United States, killing about 3, 000 people in the worst terrorist attack in the country, there has been an unprecedented surge in what scholars now refer to as ‘Islamophobia,’ he acknowledges.

    Aregbesola condemns the unending cycle of violence and intolerance perpetrated in the name of religion, warning that it would lead to mutually assured destruction of adherents of both faiths. “This scenario is foreboding and should send cold shivers down our spines. Let nobody be under any illusion, it is an unwinnable war for any of the parties,” he warns.

    “In my part of Nigeria, Christians and Muslims are so interwoven in communal living that a religious war and forcible conversion are unthinkable. There is no family that does not have a generous mix of Christians, Muslims and traditional religious worshippers. Even though I am a Muslim, my uterine sister is a fervent Christian…I am proud of this heritage although it does not subtract anything from my Islamic faith,” he says.

    Any fairly honest Nigerian knows that the Boko Haram sect does not approximate Islam by any stretch of the imagination, the Governor avers and the issue, he says, “is about the dynamics within Islam and if not well managed, could affect its perception by the larger world and its fortunes in a changing world.”

    As panacea, Governor Aregbesola sensitizes the Muslim Ummah (community) to the inherent benefits in scorning violence and evolving a peaceful and highly progressive Islam and educational system. However, his effort no matter how heartfelt, would have amounted to an exercise in futility had he not sought to explain Islam’s true position on the oft misrepresented concept of Jihad – given the Christian disposition to equate every Islamic enterprise as an appendage of bloody and violent Jihad.

    In Islam, Jihad is not all about war. Qital (war) is just one form of Jihad. Jihad in its broad sense implies all forms of striving, struggle or exertion of effort aimed at improving a situation or reaching perfection or attaining excellence. It could imply struggling against evil or against one’s limitations, weaknesses and excesses. To this end, all efforts aimed at attaining discipline, self-improvement, self-denial, self-restraint, excellence, patience and perfection for the sake of Allah (fee sabilillaah) constitute forms of Jihad.

    In this respect, Muslims need to learn, he admonishes, from the outstanding conduct of Khalifah Umar Ibn Al Kattab (R.A.) and Salahudeen Al-Ayyubi when they both took control of Jerusalem during their reign as leaders of the Muslim Ummah. They destroyed neither churches nor synagogues. Rather, Muslims were permitted, if need be, to pray in them. Besides, the Christian and Jewish inhabitants were accorded respect and nobody imposed Islam on them. It is also on record that the Prophet allowed the Christians from Najaran to worship in his mosque while on a visit to him in Madinah al Munawarah.

    “But what do we see today? Wanton destruction of churches and mosques, and the thoughtless killings of both Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Isn’t Islam itself now under a threat in the hands of villains who claim to be defending and promoting it?” laments Aregbesola.

    To those who only believe in imposing Islam on others, he remonstrates, Allah (SWT) asks a pointed question in Surah Yunus (10:99): ‘If it had been your Lord’s will, they would all have believed – all who are on earth! Will you then compel mankind, against their will, to believe?’

    Coercion has no place in Islam, argues Aregbesola; neither does hateful monotheism. Thus he counsels that a Muslim needs not live in an ideal Islamic society before he can diligently serve Allah and uplift his society. “Otherwise, Allah would have restricted Muslims only to certain parts of the world,” he said stressing the need for Muslims to learn to live, work and find fulfillment in a multi-religious and multi-cultural society no matter the odds. Pristine Islamic values and ethos must not be confined to the mosques and our homes. They must be on display in our social interactions and our committed effort towards the transformation of the society. Indeed, to be able to win the world to Islam, we must be in constant contact with people of other faiths and those who are not religious at all.

    In a nutshell, Aregbesola suggests a new template for Islamic propagation. According to him, every generation needs to respond to the needs of its time. Muslim scholars have to develop their capacity to address modern audiences and modern challenges. Modern tools of technology and communication must be legitimately used for the purpose of Islamic propagation. Most importantly, the voice of moderation and inclusion must now drown out the voice of extremism and exclusion.

    Aregbesola advocates a holistic agenda for the education and re-education of the Muslim mind and stresses the elimination of victimhood, the notion that Muslims are victims of western and Christian conspiracy, the tendency that predisposes Muslims to hatred and make them easy recruits of merchants of violence. Rather, where Muslims are in authority, they should use their positions to promote and enthrone good governance, mitigation of misery and poverty, promotion of justice and liberty for all people. It is unacceptable that ignorance, poverty and underdevelopment are somewhat pronounced in places where Muslims are in the majority in this country. This situation must change. History teaches us that Islam has nothing to do with misery, poverty and underdevelopment.

    While working with other communities, the Muslim must share the responsibility of making the world an abode of peace, justice and progress that the Muslim Ummah may once again become torchbearers of civilization and human progress emphasizes the Governor.

    No doubt, Aregbesola evokes glories attributable to the Muslim Ummah in the epoch widely acknowledged as the golden age of Islam. In that era also known as the time of the Abbasid Khilafah, from the 8th Century to 15th century, scientists, geographers, poets, engineers and philosophers amongst others, contributed significantly to their respective fields, by creating new inventions and by preserving and building upon earlier work. Their contribution till date, impact every major civilization that succeeded their era.

  • New Southeast State: Thanks Gov. Kwankwaso

    New Southeast State: Thanks Gov. Kwankwaso

    Such comforting irony it is that sometimes, adversary brings out the best in you and if you are lucky, some good fortune. This is what may happen to the age-long, half-hearted agitation by Ndigbo for equity and fairness in the distribution of Nigeria’s commonwealth among the federating units. The Igbo nation which was one of the three regions (Eastern Region) of Nigeria at Independence in 1960 has today been viciously carved and sculpted into a tiny appendage entity of southern Nigeria through the instrumentality of the Hausa-Fulani hegemony which held sway for over 35 years since 1960.

    Recently, the governor of Kano State, Alhaji Rabiu Kwankwaso kicked the doughty backsides of the Igbo elite when he let it be known in clear terms that Ndigbo agitating for an additional state is misguided and unreasonable. And one must say it here upfront that Ndigbo have this man to be grateful to who has let it out that the pre-civil war conditions, perceptions and even afflictions are still alive and well. Did our fathers not teach us that when evil persists for one year, it tends to become the norm? One noticed some Igbo leaders hee and haw about Kwankwaso’s statement but if it takes the Kano governor to stir us to life then we should show him nothing but gratitude.

    It was before our eyes that so many voodoo censuses have been held for the sole purpose of keeping the Igbo nation static at her post- independence population while other region’s population had been growing in leaps and bounds. Before our eyes, Southern Cameroun was excised from Southern Nigeria; before our eyes, the oil-rich Bakassi Peninsula was handed to Cameroun just to spite the Eastern Region. We watched as the hegemonistas in military uniform brazenly re-parceled the country into states, federal constituencies, local governments and even electoral wards to suit their design to continue to dominate in perpetuity.

    Never be a bedfellow to an unjust man, says an old adage for you will always wake up on the floor. Governor Kwankwaso is only acting true to type. Traditionally, he is not capable of fair play, equity and justice otherwise, he would have been restrained in his comments knowing that Nigeria’s population censuses, the premise on which his argument is built is deliberately skewed and therefore, unreliable. Kwankwaso would have been circumspect if he realized the deep hurt the entire Igbo nation bears for being subordinated to the size of old Kano State (today’s Kano and Jigawa States). These two states now have more local government councils, more federal constituencies and more INEC wards than the entire five Southeast states. What this means is that in the last 20 years or so, these two states have been getting more federal allocation than the whole of the Southeast put together.

    How could Governor Kwankwaso make such a callous, if not wayward statement knowing that Ndigbo make up about one-third of the phantom nine million population figure he claims that Kano has? It is the same way Ndigbo are littered across all Nigerian towns and cities; refugees in their land, partly because there is an unspoken national agenda to mark them out even when they do not have the ball. This is the punishment and pain Ndigbo have endured and lived with, albeit, gallantly since after the civil war.

    But there is no wallowing in self pity here. Ndigbo actually have themselves to blame for their current situation as this column had posited several times in the past. Fact: if Ndigbo by a certain consensus this instant, are asked to present a new Igbo State for adoption, one doubts if they are capable of presenting one in the next 10 years. Reason: every Amadi and Okoro who has a say wants the new state carved out of his backyard and the new capital sited in his front yard. In short, there is no critical Igbo elite therefore, there is no critical consensus on issues that matter to us. What a pity. Perhaps Kwankwaso has roused us?

    LAST MUG: PHCN sale: why would IBB, OBJ buy power plants they run down: there is something uncanny about former presidents buying up state facilities they allowed to be run down and decay under the guise that government cannot run anything. During the reign of President Ibrahim Babangida, over $12 billion oil revenue was unaccounted for. In the time of President Olusegun Obasanjo, again, over $12 billion was repaid as loan to some rich countries. Today, the country suffer untold infrastructure and power deficit and the nation’s meager power assets are unbundled and privatised to make them more efficient and guess who is buying them? To allow firms (North-South Power Coy and Transcorp) in which Babangida and Obasanjo have interests to buy Nigeria’s power plants is the limit of corruption in Nigeria.

    Right of Reply

    Re: Of Deathways, Highways and Onolememen’s N652 billion

    Ordinarily, one would not have bothered replying Steve Osuji over his article published in last Friday’s (14th September, 2012) edition of the Nation Newspaper titled “Of Deathways, highways and Onolememen’s N652 billion’ but for the malicious falsehood contained therein.

    Osuji apparently trying to create an unsupported parallelism between a recent accident along the Benin-Ore-Sagamu expressway in which four lecturers of the Igbinedion University plunged into Ovia River and the awarded contract for its rehabilitation, claimed that the Federal Executive Council has just approved the award of the repairs of the road to the tune of N652 billion. This is not only false, but a deliberate misrepresentation of facts.

    For the purposes of records, the rehabilitation of the third phase of the Benin-Ore-Sagamu expressway was only approved by the Federal Executive Council on the 5th of September, 2012 for award to RCC Limited at the cost of N65.223 billion and not N652 billion as claimed by Osuji. Our friend Osuji would have made a balanced and beautiful article if he attempted to delve into the recent past condition of the Benin-Ore-Shagamu expressway before the intervention of the present administration. If he did, he would have also told the reading public that barely six months after taking over as Minister of Works, Arc. Mike Onolememen substantively changed the condition of the road and commuters no longer have to spend over 9 hours to shuttle between Lagos and Benin City. Not only that, the on-going works in the first two sections of the road have reached 89% and 91% respectively, making it possible for travellers from Benin to Lagos to make the journey in about four hours. Expectedly, no road has attracted commendations from the public like the Benin-Ore-Sagamu expressway since Arc. Onolememen restored the perennial failed section at Ore.

    It is our joy that all contractors working at various locations of the nation’s roads including the Onitsha-Enugu dual carriageway which he also mentioned, have just been paid by the Federal Ministry of Works and massive works will soon resume in a matter of days as the rainy season ends.

    •Tony Ikpasaja

    S.A (MEDIA) to Hon Minister of Works

    Note: the wrong figure, N652 billion was picked from a national newspaper which reported the FEC meeting. It is simply an error which this column regrets. No malice or deliberate misrepresentation was intended. But the piece is about the rate of fatal accidents on our roads which has become a carnage. Who might the next victim be? Our Federal roads are still largely death traps. That is the story.

  • The humbling of Sanusi

    The humbling of Sanusi

    From the outset, everything about Project Cure, Mallam Lamido Sanusi’s much vaunted pill for restoring the naira, was defective. But he didn’t think so. That is the problem with this our almighty Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor; once, he makes up his mind on an issue, getting him to see reason with others who disagree with him becomes a fight, especially that variant called roforofo by the late Afrobeat icon, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti.

    Since Sanusi had decided on the so-called restructuring of the naira, there was no looking back for him. He was set to roll whether or not the people knew what he was talking about.

    He obtained President Goodluck Jonathan’s approval, no doubt, before unveiling his Poject Cure, but it should have occurred to him that it was an exercise that would generate heat because of the issues involved. Sanusi’s CBN was planning to, in one fell swoop, convert 50kobo, N1, N5, N10, N20, N50, N100, and N200 notes to coins.

    It also proposed to change polymer notes to paper notes. The big one was the printing of the N5000 note, and the mere mention of its coming irked the populace. The questions came pouring out in torrents as the people questioned the rationale behind its coming.

    The people were expecting Sanusi to educate them on why an economy like ours should be talking of having a N5000 bill considering our level of economic development, but he was not forthcoming on this. Rather than embark on enlightenment, he took to abusing and calling those opposed to the idea names.

    In a poverty stricken country like ours, what value will the N5000 note add to the life of the people. There were arguments that as part of the functions of money, it will enhance the measure of value of the naira. Good, but what about enhancing the value of the people. What value will there be in a currency, which cannot be accessed by majority of the people.

    Even, as of now, only a few people can access the N1000 note, but it is a manageable means of exchange compared to the N5000 note. This was why no two economists agreed on the planned introduction of the note before the president asked Sanusi to shelve the proposal to allow for wider consultation, something that the CBN should have done without being told in the first place.

    But because Sanusi was determined to have his way after clearing with the president, he gave no thought to the people who will be affected by the policy. The planned restructuring of the naira, he wanted us to believe, was for the economic good of the country.

     Hear the bank : ’’When the CBN introduced the N500 note in 2002, inflation dropped from 16.5% to 12.1% in 2003. Similarly, when the N1000 was introduced in 2005, the inflation actually dropped from 11.6% to 8.6% (single digit) in 2006 and dropped further to 6.6% in 2007″.

    But it forgot to tell us what the economic indices were then. It also forgot to tell us that there had never been an over 5000% increase in the oldest highest denomination and the new one as being contemplated before the proposed N5000 bill was stopped. We may be no economists but we are no fools. Likewise, Sanusi may be a good economist, but he is a bad mind reader, everything being equal.

     Without doubt, Sanusi is an arrogant man and he has been exhibiting his arrogance since he came to office. My problem with those who are haughty is that they tend to look down on others, including those superior to them. It is this attitude that led him to introduce non-interest (Islamic) banking without any feeling for the religious sensibilities of others.

    Then, he went to Kano to play Father Christmas with our money under the guise of helping those attacked by Boko Haram elements, again without caring for the feelings of many Nigerians. Sanusi’s supporters tend to say that he is highly misunderstood. I beg to disagree with them.

    He is not a misunderstood person; he just likes listening to his own voice whether or not he is making sense. Being CBN governor is not a licence to run one’s mouth. We have had CBN governors before and we know how they comported themselves. As CBN governor, Sanusi is not expected to talk any how, unfortunately, he does. Sanusi talks more like a politician than an economist.

    We know good economists through their thoughtful and profound policies and not harebrained remarks against those opposed to their ideas. What did former President Olusegun Obasanjo say to warrant his taking the general to the cleaners the way he did? Is it a sin to disagree with the CBN’s plan to introduce the N5000 note? What did Obasanjo say about the bill that had not been said before by others?

    By abusing Obasanjo, Sanusi was indirectly throwing barbs at all those opposed to the N5000 bill as ‘’very bad economists’’. Who are we to disagree with this Thomas Malthus of our time? But then, it takes a bad economist to know one because Mallam Sanusi’s Project Cure was not only bad, it was incurably bad ab initio. Let him return to the drawing board and do what is right and proper.

     Who killed Ozuah?

    The late Ugochukwu Ozuah’s

    story is one that touches the heart. Here was a man, who got married on September 15 and five days later, he was killed. What is worse; the circumstances of his death are now enmeshed in controversy. The late Ozuah was said to be in the company of his friend, Irikefe Omene, when the sad event happened. He was said to have driven Omene to the bus stop to take a cab. On their way, according to Omene, they were stopped by the police.

    The late Ozuah, he said, was trying to park the car properly when he was shot by a policeman. The policemen, he said, took off after the shooting. Omene then returned to the deceased’s home to inform the wife, Joan, who became a widow after five days of her wedding.

    By the time Omene returned to the scene, a crowd had gathered. Instead of rushing the late Ozuah to the hospital, they just milled around discussing the tragedy. Meanwhile, he was lying there on the ground in a pool of his own blood.

    The Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of Anthony Police Station had also arrived, following, according to him, a phone call. He said he was called by those who heard the sound of the gun shot. Omene in whose presence his friend was shot claims that the police pulled the trigger. The DPO disagrees, saying Ozuah was killed by robbers. I find it difficult to agree with the DPO that robbers killed Ozuah.

    Has the DPO concluded investigation into the case as to arrive at that conclusion? What gave him the impression that Ozuah was killed by robbers? Was there any report of robbery near that scene? Who were the robbery victims? At what time were they robbed? If those who killed Ozuah were robbers, what did they take from him? Was his friend, Omene, also robbed?  Why are the police so sure that it was a robbery? It is just as well as saying that it was an assassination without any prior investigation.

    I don’t think the police should discountenance Omene’s statement that Ozuah was killed by the police. His statement is worth investigating. I don’t see any reason why he would say the police killed his friend if it wasn’t so. What would he gain by making such a claim? For now, it is too hasty to conclude that Ozuah was killed by robbers or even hired assassins without thorough investigation of the incident.

  • Massacre of miners in South Africa: The price of liberty

    Massacre of miners in South Africa: The price of liberty

    Nigeria invested a lot of time and resources in the liberation of southern Africa and I personally was involved in this process. It is therefore reasonable for Nigerians to be concerned about development in South Africa. South Africa is the biggest economy on the continent while Nigeria has the second biggest economy in Africa south of the Sahara. There is no way the African Continent will realise its economic potentiality without a symbiotic relationship between the two countries. There is of course healthy rivalry between South Africa and Nigeria and there is nothing wrong with that. This rivalry as long as it is healthy should not disturb the amicable relations between the two countries. As a Nigerian, I would of course like us to represent the continent and black people in the most important forum of international organisations in the United Nations Security Council. Whether this pious hope will be realised in the future is in womb of time.

    This is why I felt very sad when 34 hapless miners were murdered by South African Police in Marikana Mines belonging to the London Group, Lonmin one of the largest producers of Platinum in the world. A tragedy of this proportion happening in the new South Africa is simply unbelievable and unacceptable. This is why critics of the new regime refer to it as a Neo-apartheid regime and that nothing has changed in South Africa except that a few black leaders have become stinkingly rich while the vast majority of the people remain in abject poverty.

    South Africa like Brazil manifests the reality of the first and third world living side by side in the same country. It was very sad to hear that ownership of the platinum mines involved in this tragedy is shared between the London group and family members of the ruling elite including even the grandson of Nelson Mandela. This is why Julius Malema, the outspoken former leader of the ANC Youth wing has been calling for nationalisation of all mines in South Africa and also redistribution of wealth. More than a decade after the ANC took over government, Black South Africans are still living in shacks and shanty towns and are at the margin of society. The incidence of crime is very high and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome in South Africa is the highest in the whole world and many South Africans are dying in drones of either violence or disease.

    The President of the Republic, Jacob Zuma is not providing the right leadership that South Africa requires rather he is indulging in sexual pleasures of renewing his harem regularly. It will be extremely sad if South Africa were to go the way of other African countries after independence. In terms of total GDP, South Africa is not doing badly but GDP per head is considerably lower than expected because of the unequal distribution of wealth – unfortunately along racial lines. While I will not support nationalisation of mines and other sectors of the South African White owned economy as advocated by Julius Malema, there has to be a concrete effort made to alleviate the suffering of the vast majority of the South African black population. Nationalisation is not the way out; we in Nigeria know the havoc the indigenization decree of the Yakubu Gowon era did to discourage foreign investment in Nigeria. I remember advising Thabo Mbeki, when the apartheid regime in South Africa was on the verge of collapse, that he should ensure that they did not make the same mistake of nationalisation as was made in Nigeria. He of course said ANC did not have that plan but no one would have believed that an ANC government would be murdering African people living under a so called non-racial majoritarian democracy.

    To make matters even more painful, after 34 striking miners were struck down in cold blood, 100 of their striking colleagues were rounded up, detained and taken to court to face charges of murder under a spurious old fashioned apartheid law of “common purpose”. This law says that demonstrating workers knew that they could be killed by police and by demonstration they had caused the death of their colleagues. Enforcing this rather insensitive code was met by criticism all over the world to the embarrassment of the South African government which quickly withdrew the cases from court. As a face saving measure, Jacob Zuma the President has now set up a judicial commission to probe the massacre of the 34 miners. After closing the mines for more than five weeks, the miners have returned to work with a raise of 20% in their salaries but at the cost of several lives.

    This wildcat strikes has now spread to other mines in South Africa thus threatening the extractive industry on which the South Africa economy depends. One hopes that all the issues will be amicably resolved and South Africa will once again take its rightful place among the BRICS countries.