The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • COP30: The way forward

    COP30: The way forward

    I was at the first Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN Convention on Climate Change in Berlin in 1995. I was then ambassador to the Federal Republic of Germany. It just happened that I was privy to the policy of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1995 after I had served as one of the two special advisers to the honourable minister of foreign affairs. Our delegation was led by the permanent secretary of the Federal Ministry of Works. It included myself as Nigeria’s ambassador to Germany, our representative in the Organization of Petroleum Producing Countries (OPEC,) one or two civil servants from the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (FEPA). This conference in Berlin was sequel to the first Earth Conference held in Rio de Janeiro Brazil in 1992. It was the first Earth conference which attracted the attention of the whole world to the dire situation of the world to the problem of environmental abuse and climate change and the need to reverse the degradation of the environment if humankind was to survive at all.

    After  Rio de Janeiro were to follow series of COP now numbering 30 again holding in Brazil  because of the importance of the Amazon forest mainly in Brazil as the global lungs, destruction of which may pose existential problems to humanity. The Earth conference was a natural progression from the Gro Harlo Brundtland’s commission. The commission was set up and known as the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED)  set up in 1983 and reported in 1987 raising the issue of sustainable development, that is to say, balancing the issue of development and environment. Gro Harlem Brundtland was a prominent Norwegian politician and physician who headed a UN commission which first raised in a systemic way that resources were not infinite and that for the world to remain viable and liveable, mankind must try to grow and develop without harming the environment unlike the slash and burn agricultural production and natural resources consumption the world was guilty of since the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century. The Brundtland report became a sing song in international environmental consciousness preceding the Earth Conference of 1992.

    Later, the emphasis shifted to climate change by 1995 which embraced larger subject than the issue of sustainability alone. I again was part of the Nigerian delegation to COP 15 which was held in Copenhagen, Denmark in December 2009. Over the years, the COP conferences had become more or less an annual jamboree holding in many places all over the continents of the world. The recurring issues were the sharp divisions between the global industrial North and the underdeveloped South, between the large countries and the threatened island countries; between those who were responsible for global pollution while developing and the undeveloped south which logically argued that those responsible for damaging the environment should pay for its cleaning on the principle of “polluter pays“ and on the unmet pledges of capital to be transferred to those who  are underdeveloped so that they  do not go along the polluting trajectory as the developed. 

    There is also the question of the amount to be transferred from the developed to the under developed. There is also the division between carbon resources-rich countries and those who do not have gas, carbon and petroleum and are still undeveloped and, finally, between technological innovators and others not able to manufacture products in which energy was needed in their production.

    Now let me go back to the beginning of COP 1. It was at the Berlin conference that the permanent headquarters of the commission was determined. The German government had gotten in touch with me soliciting our vote if nominated. By that time, German companies were involved in the building of our Aluminium complex in Ikosi Abasi, among other projects which included our electricity, telecommunications and railways and motor vehicles assembly in Enugu and Lagos. I made their request known to my minister, General Ike Nwachukwu who authorized our voting for Germany. I did not only nominate Bonn which would be most attractive for housing when the federal capital would have moved to Berlin, I also campaigned for Germany. When we voted, even the Americans who wanted Geneva could not carry the day. I have followed the movement for environmental abatement since 1995. I even formed an NGO named “Nigerian Environmental Protection Society” to make environmental awareness common knowledge in Nigeria. We had annual conferences focusing on the intelligentsia and we published our proceedings which were widely distributed to the media and the universities. Unfortunately the passion seemed to have waned after leaving the university.

    One of the greatest blows to the global campaign for environmental rehabilitation to ensure that we reverse the global warming to just 1.5% above the pre industrial level was the lukewarm attitude of the conservative elements in the USA and Western Europe and now the USA under Donald Trump has dismissed the whole campaign as a hoax and fraud and this presumably is the policy of the ruling Republican Party. This is in spite of international agreement signed in 1997 at the end of COP3 in Kyoto when an understanding by the international community led to agreed limits by industrialised countries of the amount each country was committed to while the developing countries were to make lesser commitments about their greenhouse gases emissions.to reverse global warming to pre-industrial level even though not legally enforceable. The non-actionable Kyoto agreement was made enforceable in COP21 in Paris in 2015. These two international agreements have been torn into pieces by President Trump because he has said the agreements were against the interest of the United States. He has gone further by denouncing the agreements as a fraud and hoax and said global warming was natural occurrence which will remedy itself. His lapdogs have even disputed the scientific basis of global warming.

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    This does not mean that the struggle is in vain. It is just delayed. This is because in the normal cycle of American politics, Trump and his Republican Party will be defeated electorally. Secondly, the sub national entities, the states and big cities in the USA are committed to policy of environmental enhancement and many of the polluting industrial giants like the automobile manufacturers are committed to it and are producing electric cars and trucks that are emitting less carbon dioxide. Thirdly, China the biggest polluters are producing more green renewable products like vehicles and solar roofs that get their heat from the sun. There are researches into other sources of power like tidal waves, burning methane which apart from carbon gases contributes to global warming. There are great strides in harnessing hydrogen and hydro power from natural falls and dams.

    In spite what some national governments may say and do, some countries are even cutting down on their cattle since it has been proved that cows emit methane, a greenhouse gas which is responsible for 9% of gas responsible for global warming. The campaign against global warming has become personal in civilized countries that are moving away from conspicuous consumption to responsible sustainable development. Despite all the positive progress in the campaign there are still great obstacles.

    From a personal experience, Nigeria like most members of OPEC will not support policies that will suddenly make their economies that are energy export dependent go down the drain by an international agreement that dismisses their concern. This was my personal experience in two COPs I have attended. There is a powerful OPEC lobby at every Conference of Parties to the UN Convention on Climate Change. The way to bring all nations into responsible climate policy is to share experiences and knowledge and innovation with all countries so that they are on the same plane.

    The current COP30 is deadlocked on who to contribute the one trillion dollars that is to be put in a special facility to fight global warming and if possible reverse environmental pollution with the application of abatement measures that all nations, small or big, islands that are sinking through no fault of theirs, developed and under developed countries can jointly embrace in the common cause.

    I sympathize with our Third World nations who argue on the grounds that those who were responsible ab initio for the problem should carry the can. However, we should make progress through shared and incremental gradation in payment so that no country should be put off though finger pointing. Nobody will be safe in a situation of global homicide if we don’t change our ways and collectively face and solve the problem of present and past pollution resulting into current climate change. The signs are clear because we now have overwhelming heat and cold, unseasonably excessive rainfall causing flooding, unusual heat and dryness causing bushfires, challenging changes causing a threat to biodiversity and rising heat in our oceans and melting icecaps in the North and South poles leading among other things, to unmanageable rise in our oceans and loss of habitats for small islands populations.

    I hope that COP 30 will focus on the climate change problem and not take on board issues that deviate from the main issues. The moment ideological issues of eradication of poverty, status of women just to mention a few non-climate issues that divert attention from the primary concerns; we should know diversions from core issues will undermine seriously the non-ideological question of the climate.

  • Undertaker journalism

    Undertaker journalism

    The Nigerian tragedy is seldom written in the ricochet of bullets alone. Sometimes, it is scripted in newsrooms, goaded by keypad confidence. Thus the journalistic frenzy to thump the “publish” button, a mania amplified by a press that forgets, that journalism, even at its freest, is never free of consequence.

    Today, Nigeria is locked in an existential struggle with terror, weakened by governmental missteps, and a press that often mistakes adversarial passion for professional duty.

    I do not, hereby, plead for capitulation or censorship. The media must never become lapdog to a captured state, nor submit to the patronage of criminal actors. But there is a difference between watchdog journalism and rabid barking that alerts the burglar to the location of the sleeping homeowner. In the case of Brigadier General Musa Uba, executed after being captured by ISWAP terrorists following an ambush, Nigeria witnessed the devastating consequences of a press that prioritised speed over discernment and exposure over prudence.

    Taiwo Adebayo, an investigative journalist, was one of the few to articulate the tragedy with clarity, dispassion, and professional responsibility. His reflections reveal uncomfortable truths about journalistic practice and the deeper malaise of contemporary reportage.

    His well articulated piece highlights the abandonment of social responsibility ethics in an age of hyper-competition, digital ego tripping, click-bait survival, and the commodification of despair.

    There is a lot that distinguishes terrorism reporting from random reportage; it is strategic terrain, in which a seemingly harmless sentence may save or destroy lives, where an innocuous headline or rider may either protect neighbourhoods or expose them to slaughter.

    Brigadier General Uba, Commander of the Nigerian Army’s 25 Task Force Brigade, in Borno, initially escaped the ISWAP ambush and communicated with colleagues, from his hiding in the forest, while awaiting rescue. But he was exposed by Nigeria’s digital media sphere. News media, raring to update and publish first; eager to sate the lust of a public addicted to breaking news, compromised Uba.

     The first wave of reports declared him missing or abducted. Another set, possibly published to reduce embarrassment within military circles, suggested that he had been rescued. But ISWAP, like every insurgent group with digital intelligence capability, was listening. They monitored the reports, identified the window of vulnerability, mobilised a unit, and swept the area. The general was recaptured near a village in Damboa. His phone confirmed his rank and value. Soon after, he was killed.

    While this manifests as military failure; it was also a newsroom-assisted catastrophe. The Nigerian newsroom must hold itself accountable for endangering Uba, for failing to ask the crucial questions in a conflict where human lives hang in the balance: Is this information confirmed? Could publishing it worsen the danger? Is the intelligence incomplete, unverified, or strategically sensitive? Does the public’s right to know in this moment outweigh the risk of losing a life?

    Had those questions guided the reporting, as Adebayo rightly observed, the press could still have informed the nation, without informing the enemy. Responsible editorial judgment is hardly censorship. It is the basic social duty journalism owes the society that protects its freedom.

    General Uba, therefore, was betrayed by the press that should have protected him through thoughtful, sequenced, ethically weighted reporting, until his rescue was complete or his fate was certain.

    But the problem exceeds procedural lapses, it is complex and deeply embedded. Vast segments of the Nigerian press have adopted a posture of reflexive cynicism, an adversarial tone that casts the nation as a perpetual disappointment and its institutions as irredeemable. In the process, patriotism has become outmoded, even suspicious. Love of country is treated as a sign of naivety or complicity.

    Thus, many journalists will celebrate the American military, the British special forces, the IDF, or the French Foreign Legion as the gold standards of military competence. But when reporting on Nigerian troops, they prefer frames of cowardice, incompetence, corruption, or buffoonery. Some of those criticisms are deserved, taking into cognizance, the tactical lapses and operational misconduct that have marred counterinsurgency operations.

    Yet to consistently strip one’s own defenders of dignity while upholding foreign counterparts as flawless heroes constitutes both irresponsible journalism and ideological self-harm. The Nigerian soldier—the one sleeping in foxholes in Sambisa and the one patrolling across vast, hostile terrain—may not be perfect. But those men and women are the living wall between Nigeria and fragmentation.

    The press that reports their battles, therefore, ought to do so with balance, sobriety, and an allegiance to peace above sensationalism.

    Yet media irresponsibility is an illness that extends beyond the newsroom. It is the symptom of a broader civic decay as the journalist is rarely the lone saboteur of the Nigerian enterprise.

    Doctors, engineers, bus conductors, teachers, bankers, students and unemployed youths, to mention a few, have adopted a bitter doctrine of mockery of their homeland. Too many Nigerians speak of the country as if it were a cursed burden rather than a shared project. Thus the gleeful taunt: “If Nigeria happens to you, you will learn the hard way.” This is despair masked as humour. It is helplessness weaponised into collective self-disdain. And until this disposition shifts, no reforms will yield enduring transformation.

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    That is why the media and the literary arts must be courted both as observers and active participants in national renewal. Nations that have overcome great crises, from post-war Japan to post-genocide Rwanda, did so through policy and narrative. They re-authored themselves, telling new stories about who they were and what futures they deserved.

    Nigeria must do the same. Our press and cultural institutions must become partners in reframing patriotism as a responsible civic posture, even as we replace mockery with narratives of ownership and duty. National progress is not a spectator sport thus the need for a practical national reorientation plan, anchored in Nigeria’s capacity to actualise radical reforms and sustain its proceeds.

    The stakes have grown higher amid internal threats posed by terrorists, bandits, separatist militias and external pressures. There are desperate actors abroad, including a missionary political lobby in the United States, agitating for intervention under the guise of protecting Nigerian Christians from targeted genocide. No serious student of geopolitics doubts that humanitarian pretexts have historically served as covers for invasion, regime change, and neo-imperial disruption.

    If Nigeria becomes the next theatre of “saving Africans from themselves,” the loss will be borne by Nigerians, not Washington. It’s our children whose classrooms will be shelled. Our farmlands will become battlefields and our cities will be bombed to rubble. The economy will collapse under artillery and sanctions, and the multi-ethnic federation that we are so proud of, will splinter beyond repair.

    Nigeria has far more to lose from foreign intervention, than it stands to gain. Thus, the press as a chronicler of national events must always protect the country’s security and sovereignty through socially responsible reporting. Going forward, journalists must weigh every revelation with the seriousness of a surgeon deciding where to cut.

    The media must collectively build stronger newsroom ethics for real-time conflict reporting; journalists must be trained on how insurgent groups mine media coverage for tactical intelligence; even as we build institutional structures for dialogue between the media and security agencies.

    The intent isn’t to turn the fourth estate into a propagandist arm of government, but to renew civic patriotism and remind journalists that freedom of the press exists so that society may live, not die prematurely.

  • Thanks CBN, EFCC; Corruption kills Nigeria

    Thanks CBN, EFCC; Corruption kills Nigeria

    Nigerians need to understand the value of the success in the Yemi Cardoso-led CBN and the macro-economy in stabilizing their lives, for now at least. The improved positive rating by Standard & Poor should be celebrated as a welcome signpost on the country’s long and difficult road, back from the edge of the economic abyss caused by the previous government to fiscal recovery.

    This government was held responsible for the catastrophic collapse of the naira with corresponding rise in prices and cost of living because it cancelled the so-called petrol subsidy. In fact, this government inherited a Trojan horse cake, empty inside by corruption with nothing inside so it collapsed in this government’s hands.  Unfortunately, too many are in such penury as to not believe that they are better off now than before this government took over.

    We must remember that Nigeria has been plagued with governments failing or refusing to pay salaries for months and pensions for years. It is this current government which has largely paid the backlog, even though at a lower naira value and unrelated to the exchange rate when the payments were due.  Also, unfortunately too many Nigerians disregard Nigeria as a country and a financial entity because they have made money mostly through greed and corruption.

    Many countries would have collapsed with far less corruption than exists ‘routinely and acceptably’ in Nigeria. However, we the babies, children, adults and aged in Nigeria have not escaped unscathed from the crippling corruption burden on development as easily measured against Sustainable Development Goals.

    Almost throughout our lives but at an increased pace, we periodically face previously unimaginable revelations by financial watchdogs like ICPC, EFCC, the police, banks and government agencies regarding huge totally unjustifiable financial fraud, outright theft and excesses, countrywide thefts amounting to frequent avalanches of stolen wealth. The thing about EFCC accusations and the regular freeing of the accused often due to technicalities, or the light sentencing when found guilty, is that until recently, the money or mansions for which they are accused remained missing in action, MIA. We are having an improved recovery rate of stolen funds at last…so much so that even the EFCC have had their strong room of recovered gold raided by their own men.

    The EFCC staff thieves have been caught and EFCC just dismissed 113 for various corruption crimes. Hopefully they will be prosecuted as they would have prosecuted others for similar offences. There is a responsibility by the EFCC authority to protect the amazing incorruptible members of staff at EFCC by regular supervisory corruption evaluation screening exercises on EFCC status. 

    Nigeria would be far better off if the Association of Corrupt and Corrupted Nigerians were to call a nationwide meeting to suspend indefinitely their assault on the Nigerian ‘Financial Wellbeing System’. The ACCN members should be informed that corruption at all levels and in every facet of life must be curbed and even stopped. If not, Nigeria will never join its 1960s independence mates like Malaysia, now well advanced, in achieving an acceptable level of development with the countywide provision of the most basic developed world human facilities of running water, regular electricity, good education, adequate health facilities and good motorable roads from village to villa. Of course we have made progress, increasing our number of health and education facilities since the 60s and coverage of the citizenry. However, we must be honest enough to admit that the quality of what is provided in those essential service areas would not qualify Nigeria to be a member of the Good Governance Providers Club for its population especially in relation to cumulative budgetary incomes since independence.

    Someone needs to just add up the sums involved in all the thefts stolen from Nigeria. The Abacha loot still trickles back from time to time. Estimates suggest around $600b or $600,000,000,000 /160,000,000 people (we are nearer 160m than the touted 200+m population) = $3,750/Nigerian =N5,625,000 per Nigerian=80 months of current minimum wage=6.6years. The ACCN members say that they are only stealing ‘no one’s’ money by budgetary fraud, budgetary inflation or padding, wages or ghost workers fraud, Constituency Project scams, extravagant political advertising fraudulent practices with huge multimillion mega-billboards next to hungry citizens and children and teachers lacking books, and toilets. But they are wrong.

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    Indeed, they are no different from armed robbers because they deny the citizens life-skills. Nigeria faces periodic cholera epidemics solely because the missing $600b has deprived citizens access to potable water resulting in gastro-intestinal diseases, like typhoid enteritis. Why can the thieves not understand the gravity of their actions and desist from stealing food, water, books, shelter, the road from underfoot and roof overhead, the medicines, equipment and the health of a country struggling to become a nation -Nigeria.

    There are politician, contractor, civil servant and scam thieves in every country. Organized, sporadic and institutionalized theft above 10% of revenues and services destroys and kills citizens, companies, and countries whether blood and bodies are seen or not.

    In medicine, we see real blood and real bodies caused by excessive maniacal corruption. Remember that many millions are honest Nigerians daily tempted to become dishonest in order to survive, to fit in or because the corrupt almost always get away.

    Kudos to the EFCC for the recent arrest and prosecution of over 900 local and foreign scammers with deportation of over 100. Why were foreign deportees allowed to leave with so much personal luggage?                                    

  • Lessons from Delta’s century of flight (1)

    Lessons from Delta’s century of flight (1)

    I recently took an early morning flight from Calgary, Canada, to Philadelphia, USA, with a stopover in Salt Lake City. The layover was so short that I could only have a cup of coffee at the Delta Lounge, hoping to have an early lunch on the 4-hour Philadelphia leg of the flight. The meal was so satisfying that I dosed off right afterwards. Upon waking up, I decided to watch a short movie since I still had nearly two hours to go. As I scrolled through the menu, my eyes caught a documentary, titled A Century of Flight. It is the story of Delta’s journey over the last 100 years, making it the first Airline in the United States to make the 100-year mark. The name Delta came from the Mississippi Delta region the airline originally served.

    The Delta story is one of courage, resilience, community, teamwork, accountability, authenticity, and exemplary corporate leadership. Founded in Atlanta in 1925 by C.E. Woolman as the first ever aerial crop-dusting company, Delta’s first commercial flight came about four years later. It was a bumpy 5-hour flight over a distance of only 427 miles. But it grew from there to become arguably the largest international airline in the world.

    In the course of its growth, Delta faced at least four major challenges, each of which could potentially drown the airline. The first major challenge was the aviation fuel shortages of the 1970s, one in 1973 due to the OPEC oil embargo as a result of the Yom Kippur War and the other in 1979 due to disruption of oil supplies because of the Iranian Revolution. About the same time, the Airline Deregulation Act was passed under the presidency of Jimmy Carter in 1978, which replaced federal control over airline fares, routes, hubs, and market entry with market competition. The intense competition that followed led to the failure of some airlines, including PanAm, TWA, and Eastern Airlines. Delta did not only survive; it gave its employees a pay raise, even when the Wall Street Journal said it was a bad idea in those challenging times. The employees responded by contributing toward the airline’s purchase of a new aircraft, a Boeing 767. It was named Spirit of Delta, which came to define the communal spirit driving the company.

    The second major challenge came during the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, which led airlines to shut down for four days. By this time, online booking sites, which began to take advantage of the Internet a few years earlier, had become very prominent. In the following years, Delta lost funds, buckled, and, in 2005, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, which gave room for reorganisation, rather than liquidation.

    The management did something extraordinary at this point. Already demoralised employees were summoned to a meeting at which they were fully informed about the company’s plight and given a chance to ask questions and make suggestions for recovery. They were delighted that management answered their questions fully and outlined solutions to the problems identified. Above all, Ed Bastian, then Finance Controller, apologised for the situation of the company and assured them that the company would come out of bankruptcy. The employees, who had reluctantly attended the meeting, came out upbeat.

    The strategy paid off and allowed Delta to overcome the third major challenge in 2006, when US Airways made a hostile takeover bid for Delta Airlines. The management was able to rally the support of its employees, creditors, and even the public to oppose the bid. Delta employed two main strategies. One, the management, led by CEO Gerald Grinstein, brought to the Congressional hearings on the takeover some Board members, uniformed pilots, and uniformed flight attendants, all saying No, while US Airline’s management came with a bunch of lawyers. The optics was not lost on the Congressional committee. Delta also mounted successful rallies and media campaigns to oppose the bid. Delta succeeded, emerged from bankruptcy in 2007, and began to thrive.

    In that year, the company went public on the New York Stock Exchange and the following year, it merged with Northwest Airlines to become the largest commercial airline in the world, with 1,100 planes in its fleet. The Delta Airlines brand was retained. Eleven years later, Delta reported a $4.8 billion profit and distributed a profit share worth $1.6 billion, the highest of any company in the world at the time.

    The fourth challenge was COVID-19, which led to drastic reduction in passenger load. Drawing on the spirit of Delta again, Delta employees volunteered and took over a vaccination centre in Atlanta and were vaccinating about 5,000 people a day at peak. To Delta’s credit, not a single worker was laid off during the Covid years.

    Three major factors underlie Delta’s success. One is Delta’s unparalleled commitment to its workers. Through the years, Delta management developed and nurtured a value system of mutual respect between management and staff, which encouraged a communal spirit. This was made possible by the management’s accountability and openness, especially in challenging times, which helped to build trust in the company’s leaders.

    Two, since 2007, when the company went public, the company made sure that every worker got stock in the company but CEO Gerald Grinstein decline his share of $10 million. The company used the money to establish a Care Fund tapped to bail out employees in need. A profit-sharing programme also was developed, which has since paid out an average of $1 billion annually. More recently, the company established an Emergency Savings Programme. Participating employees earn $1,000 dollars to fund a rainy day account.

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    According to the current CEO, Ed Bastian, “At Delta, our No. 1 job is taking care of our people—our success flows from this simple concept. Sharing profits with our people, along with providing tools and education to help manage and grow their wealth, is part of our responsibility as a values-led organisation.”

    Three, the Delta management is top-notch. The leaders listened. They took every step to save the company and make it thrive. Former CEO Grinstein and current CEO Bastian could be credited for the current buoyant state of the company. Their people-oriented management style and resilience carried the company through major challenges. The employees paid back with hard work, dedication, and loyalty to the company and its leaders.

    Nigerian leaders and the Nigerian public have a lot to learn from Delta management and their workers, respectively. The company’s employees rewarded the responsiveness and accountability of Delta management with loyalty and hard work. The result is a values-led organisation built on mutual trust.

    Next week, I will examine Delta’s profit margins over the years, the place of the Nigerian route in Delta’s lucrative business, and necessary improvements to add value to the route and for the customers.

  • No, to military hauteur

    No, to military hauteur

    The Wike-Yerima face-off, over some Abuja plot of land, has again brought to the fore the vexed issue of military hauteur — that complex that spews and acts as though the civil majority are no more than contemptible “bloody civilians”!

    Any democracy worth its name must discount with such a temper without much ado. The military caste is honourable. Officers and soldiers should be loved and admired for their sacrifice to the state.  But that’s only when they too revere the civil authority.

    On that, there can be no quibbling — especially for Nigeria, that has had more than its fair share of ruinous military rule.

    Growing up on Lagos Island, if you drove against the traffic, the neighbourhood kids would flood in from nowhere and bawl: “one way!” “one way!”  Shame-faced you’d turn back — an adult being heckled by children before doing what was right!

    But then came soldiers — and they would drive against the traffic as they well damn liked!  With foreboding looks and guns at the ready, which child would shout them down with “one way!”?

    It was the beginning of the best-forgotten era of military rule.  Riding roughshod over such basic traffic mores began a comprehensive assault on basic urban decency — and they went on to shred the societal moral fabric — just because they wore a uniform, and could cork a gun!

    It was, Lady Macbeth-speak, the “eye of childhood that fears the painted devil”!  But unlike those child eyes in Shakespeare’s historical fiction of old Scotland, reasonable Nigerians have developed adult glares, very scornful of military hubris, with or without the threat of cocked guns!

    Indeed, arrogant military rule, at its tragic zenith, bred a band that figured it could cancel Basorun MKO Abiola’s June 12, 1993, presidential mandate, and live happily ever after!  It also bred another that pushed his martial sole right to sleaze, at the risk of hot death to fellow thieves!  Both grand delusions ended in grief!

    So, those military top brass, active or retired, serenading the martial hauteur of the young Navy Lt. A. M. Yerima, against Nyesom Wike, the FCT minister, miss the point. 

    Such conceit, laced with sinister threat and force, led their command ancestors astray, brought the military into disrepute and brought our dear country, Nigeria, to a sorry pass.  Such should never be repeated — or, if they are, instantly slammed.

    But back to the Wike-Yerima confrontation — a parallel of two riveting paradoxes: Yerima looked decent for a bad cause.  Wike appeared gross for a good cause! 

    Beyond those contrasting optics — for which not a few have boisterously nailed Wike — hardly any other thing can justify Lt.  Yerima!  Now, let’s break it down.

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    Navy Lt. Yerima looked every inch the golden soldier boy: cool, calm, polished and unruffled in the eye of a ministerial storm — this one, the ever brash Hurricane Wike, which violent bursts and fiery puffs know no end, until it has uprooted all in its sight!

    Yerima was supposedly the younger one.  Yet, he showed admirable composure, even as the far older Wike blew his tops to assert his ministerial authority.  Aside moving a sinister inch closer to the fuming minister, as things got to a head, hardly anyone can fault Yerima’s self-control.  Wike was the diametric opposite on all counts.

    Still, why would a fine, young military officer exercise such martial refinement, in a civil space, standing guard over a disputed piece of land?  That’s the critical question.

    A lawyer friend, more anti-Wike than he’s pro-Yerima, swore that were he on the same spot, as the retired Navy chief alleged to own the land, he would do “anything” to safeguard his land. He even dived into legal “proofs” to buttress his point. Fair enough!

    But what if, as emerging information seems to show, the Navy chief’s claim to the land could be tenuous?  There are claims that the original owners acquired the land on the proviso that it would be developed into a park — the purpose for which the area was designated — not residential houses.

    This claim puts forth two points.  One: that the ex-Navy chief is a third-party claimant. And two: that he might have deviated from the FCT original plan for the area.  These points, if true, point at the age-old abuse of power and privilege, which often brings the otherwise cherished military caste into civil scorn.

    In any case, if the naval top gun has licit claim to the property, why cordon it off — a civil space — with a military truck, post a Navy lieutenant (an equivalent of an Army captain) there on guard duty, leading other lower ranks, guns a-popping? 

    To intimidate and scare off civil authority?  Are martial laws then superior to civil laws, in the civil space?  If so, can martial laws overwhelm general civil laws in a democracy?

    Except all these questions are answered in the affirmative, Navy Lt. Yerima, his guards and whoever posted them there, stand on slippery grounds.  Indeed, for the honour and dignity of the military, it would have been better for whoever that sent them there to have engaged thugs, on what appears a clearly illegal guard duty!

    That you can’t deploy licit guards, to an illicit space, trumps whatever might have been the ugly optics of Minister Wike’s rather brash intervention.

    Yes, not a few have weighed in with an emotive appeal to fear. What if the young naval officer had flipped in the passion of the moment, and Wike had become history?

    Yes, that would have been a catastrophe.  But it still would have showed the brazen illegality of trigger-happy fingers, which would still have attracted the direst lawful consequences. 

    That further reinforces the point: that the state gives you lawful arms doesn’t canonize you as gloried outlaws in uniform, free to kill fellow citizens, without question!  So long for that ad baculum appeal to fear!

    But that’s even at one level.  The other level, on citizen-to-citizen direct comparison, makes the military conceit clearer — and starker (read uglier).

    Citizen Wike, after his basic education (like the rest of the civil population) paid his way through university and Law School, even if the Nigerian state also subsidizes tertiary education.  Whatever he had after, he sweated hard to acquire.

    Citizen Yerima, on the other hand (as the rest of his military class), got his training absolutely free.  Any post-Defence Academy training, home or abroad, the state also fully bears.  His smart uniform, the fierce arms and ammo he carries, come courtesy of the state, preparing him for the grim duty of defending the state.

    So, how can such a pampered and beloved son of the state come challenging and obstructing (with state arms!) the Minister from doing the FCT work, which the President — that soldier’s commander-in-chief — has entrusted to the minister, as his FCT personal representative? Arrant indiscipline!

    Isn’t that rash power — wherever Lt. Yerima’s “orders” had come from — challenging a higher authority, especially in a civil space?  If the chips are down, can this act of martial bravado stand up to legal scrutiny?  This is a country of law. That’s the young officer’s cross right now.

    Still, beyond who is wrong or who is right, a civil state thrives on cherishing its military: the state is incomplete without its “teeth”.  But the military too have no choice: it must subject itself to civil order.  An unhinged military is a recipe for chaos.

    From Nigeria’s painful experience, any other way is anarchy.

  • The trial of Minister Wike

    The trial of Minister Wike

    Exactly a week after, it comes as no surprise that Nigeria and Nigerians are nowhere reaching agreement on what is substance and what is peripheral among the issues that led to last Tuesday’s face-off between Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike and Navy Lieutenant Ahmad Yerima, the young officer deployed on guard duties on the property said to belong to the immediate past Chief of Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Zubairu Gambo (retd.)

    For while the deliberate, if not entirely programmed, obfuscation by those for whom any opportunity to pillory Wike and the Tinubu government at whose behest he serves might ordinarily seem fair game, the way and manner the military establishment in particular, including their hordes of supporters within and outside of government have been carrying on, going as far as to tag the young officer a hero, not only typifies the institutional arrogance that has long been in the character of the Nigerian military, but betrays its poor grasp of the imperatives of military subordination to civilian control as one might imagine under democratic rule.     

    It is interesting how the military has since mounted a spirited rally in support of one of its own, which is not exactly a bad thing save for the opportunistic framing of the issue as one of disrespect to the military uniform, as against the legendary arrogance under which other national institutions get routinely undermined, assaulted, with our laws rendered impotent, and shredded by the military – a derivative of which is the pitting the citizens against our uniformed men.

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    Those who described the Tuesday event as horror scene have a point, considering that a minister with his hordes of directors in tow being engaged in verbal altercations with a young officer is not something one sees often. Yet, there is something in the subtext of the day’s outing that speaks to the state of the disorder even among our institutions, including those we often valorise.

    As in all cases, the pattern is always nearly the same with variances only in details: a brass hat wants or does something out of what the law could conveniently permit. When those in charge would neither endorse nor grant the permit to proceed, he draws upon brawn and muscle to give effect to his desire. In the process, those charged with the duty of control and management are not only prevented from undertaking their legitimate duty; they are actually hounded like felons – sometimes at the pain of losing limbs and lives.

    All of these, according to reports, were all in play in the build up to the Tuesday altercation. What Nigerians saw live on Tuesday November 11 was merely the climax of the not-so-subterranean battle that started days before: An enraged minister and his team storming the site – Bastille style – apparently to enforce the law only to meet a naval platoon, led by a Lieutenant on guard duty, to keep the law not only at bay, but in permanent abeyance if it comes to that! Little wonder that Wike’s enemies – and they are quite a number – have been all over town in celebration over what is supposed to be a brutal putdown of a man that they love to hate!

    You know the rest.

    Now, someone would have us accept that the issue at stake is about disrespect for the uniform! Not the disrespect that started with sending uniformed men to secure building sites in defiance of the law, or physical planning regulations and the authority of the president at the behest of whom Minister Wike serves? No concerns with the alleged crime of obstruction from the performance of lawful duty and the associated assault on the MFCT officials, an offence which in itself is punishable under the law? 

    And now the officer, who led the team that chased out the officials from performing their lawful duty, is being touted as a ‘hero’; not of the battle-field where the best of our gallant men and women are tested but in the defence of the private estate of a Nigerian big man! Talk of some Nigerians painting such as the stuff of which our heroes are made!  

    Meanwhile, the above is nothing compared with the reaction of the former Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, now a chieftain of the ADC. He demands that Wike publicly apologise to President Bola Tinubu, the Armed Forces, and the military officer.  He then goes on to equate what he called “disparagement of a uniformed officer of the Nigerian Armed Forces” with treason.

    To use his words: “A minister’s verbal assault on a military officer in uniform is an act of profound indiscipline that strikes at the core of our nation’s command and control structure. It deliberately undermines the chain of command, disrespects the authority of the Commander-in-Chief and grievously wounds the morale of every individual who serves under the Nigerian flag. Such actions erode the very foundation of discipline upon which our national security apparatus stands.”

    Discerning Nigerians know that this is arrant nonsense: the uniform does not make the fighting men any more patriotic than the well-starched khaki would automatically predispose them to citizens’ respect. How about the disorderly conduct of some of his men particularly when they wilfully insert themselves into civilian matters thus drawing opprobrium to their beloved institution? 

    Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor (retd.), was just as sanctimonious: “the uniform of military and security personnel symbolises the authority, dignity, and sovereignty of the Nigerian state, and that any act of disrespect towards those wearing it amounts to an insult to the country itself”.

    Agreed, but then, authority, far from being abstract, comes with responsibility. Fine; the two brass hats see nothing wrong with the deployment of the young officer to guard private property. We are supposed to accept this as norm – something permissible in the course of duty. Same with the use of men wearing uniforms as they pleased, and that, possibly, includes conversion of officers into non-regimental duties whenever it suited them! 

    As for the alleged outlawry, the unlawful expropriation and subsequent conversion of the property in question – parks and gardens – into such ends not so designated by the MFCT authorities; that apparently should be far more tolerable than the offence for which they seek the neck of Nyesom Wike!  

    And now the duo of Bello Matawalle and Mohammed Badaru, both cabinet-colleagues of Wike putting their colleague to the sword for fear of ruffling the feathers of a section of their beloved military. Talk of the perfect Nigerian metamorphosis: from entitlement to impunity, then outlawry, and inevitably, to legitimisation.  Talk of yet another riveting Nigerian story.    

  • Wike vs Yerima

    Wike vs Yerima

    The past week has been tetchy for the Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike. It started with a confrontation with a young Navy Lieutenant Ahmad Yerima, over access to a disputed land in Abuja. Wike who has tamed the high and mighty in the current political dispensation by his rambunctiousness, was dragged by the derring-do comportment of the young officer, Lt. Yerima. 

    While many social media enemies of the minister and even very knowledgeable commentators have been in a celebratory mode, that for once, Wike came away as the weaker person in a fight, the real issue in dispute have been relegated to the background. Wike as the overlord of the FCT, had gone to the site to chase away illegal military men sent to guard a disputed land owned by a retired Vice Admiral, but he came away with a bruised ego.

    In the video that went viral, Lt. Yerima showed himself, an example of officer and gentleman. While Wike appeared angry and querulous, Yerima was calm and comported. But for the circumstance surrounding his presence on the land, he would have become an instant hero and the face of how a young officer should behave when confronted in the line of duty, by an aggressive civilian superior. While the officer technically knocked out Wike in the confrontation, as captured by the social media, there is more to the issue at stake.

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    The ultimate question should be, between Minister Wike and Lieutenant Yerima, who has the right to be at the disputed site? By virtue of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (Delegation of Powers) Decree No 12 of 1985, the functions of a governor of a state have been delegated to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, in the current dispensation, Minister Nyesom Wike. And the powers of a governor or in this instance a minister, with regards to land under his care are very expansive.

    By virtue of section 5 of the Land Use Act, the Minister of the FCT, has powers to manage land in both urban and non-urban areas, primarily by granting statutory rights of occupancy for any purpose, granting easements, demanding and revising rent, and imposing penal rent for breach of covenants. Section 11 of the Act further empowers the minister or a designated public officer to enter and inspect land and its improvements, as part of the authority to manage and administer land in the FCT.

    The land is dispute was reportedly purchased by a former Chief of Naval Staff, retired Vice Admiral Awwal Gambo, from a private company. The company had applied for conversion of the use of land, but sold to the general before the approval, which was eventually rejected. While under the Armed Forces Act of Nigeria, the retired general is not entitled to security details, by convention and practice, he is entitled to armed personal security details, to watch over his residence.

    Having such armed guard to watch over his land in dispute, is a different kettle of fish. Clearly, no serving or retired general has right to commandeer junior officers to secure any land in dispute. So, Lt. Yerima was likely on an illegal duty. Those who sent him ought to know that. It is strange that when the land became a subject of dispute, instead of having recourse to the courts for redress, the general sent soldiers to guard the land.

    While the young officer came off as a hero to those who have one axe or another to grind with Minister Wike or even President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, he has exposed himself to conduct prejudicial to service discipline. Of course, with the ministers of defence jumping into the fray, politics may overshadow discipline in the line of duty. But for politics, that omnibus clause on service discipline would have caught him.

    Despite the excitement in the social media, this writer doubts if there was an official posting for Lt. Yerima and the soldiers stationed at the site, to prevent legitimate officials of the FCT from accessing the land. Even if Vice Admiral Gambo was a retired five-star general, no serving officer in the Navy would stick his head to post Lt. Yermia and other ranks as guards over a land, whether in dispute or not.

    That deal would likely be an under-the-table arrangement. And if a commissioned officer was posted to guard a construction site, when Nigeria is at war, then the Nigerian Navy deserves a total overhaul. But while the dispute lasts, the young officer is having his days in the sun. He has become a celebrity for Nigerians beleaguered by the harsh economic realities of our time. They see him as a hero who was able to slay one of the dragons afflicting their lives.

    The social media which has become an elixir for the economic tribulations of the present times will celebrate their young hero for a long time to come, even if the military laws should catch up with him. Like Wike, he has risen to fame, but I don’t know whether to fortune. If elections are done on the social media, this writer would have advised Yerima to resign his commission and plunge into politics. But alas, it is not. Minister Wike has many bruises to show for his own rise to stardom.           

    In the current democratic dispensation, few politicians have had as much impact in the last decade on national politics as the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike. While he was a neophyte (as politicians like to refer to smaller powers and principalities in politics) in the first one and half decades of this republic, he has grown to become one of the most talked about politician, since 2015, after he won the governorship election of Rivers State.

    He won that election, with the support of President Goodluck Jonathan, in spite of the strong opposition from then incumbent governor of the state, Rotimi Amaechi. While he won his governorship election, his principal, President Jonathan lost the presidential election.  With no political godfather breathing down his neck, he quickly grew in stature to become his own man.  In the very oily and slippery politics of Rivers State, he was able to cobble a coalition to steady the state politics against the incendiary attacks of Rotimi Amaechi’s All Progressive Congress (APC).

    With the PDP doddering nationally, Wike moved in as the deus ex machina, and cobbled a coalition of young Turks, that stood the withering attacks by the APC across the country. His predecessor, Amaechi, who President Buhari gave the juicy Ministry of Transportation, with an open cheque in his dealings with the Chinese, could not a make a dint in the subsequent elections in 2019 and 2023 in Rivers State. But Wike’s fight against APC is now in the distant past.

    The winner of the tango between Minister Wike and Lt. Yerima may depend on how the embarrassing confrontation is framed ultimately, in the mind of President Tinubu, who is the boss for both of them, as the chief executive and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. Unfortunately for the disputants, when the chips are down, those cheering on both sides would not be there to help.

  • Quest for state police

    Quest for state police

    Of all apparatuses of state power, the police have more influence and wield more power than judges, bishops, politicians and soldiers. It is also perhaps the most critical institution for the smooth running of communities and survival of society as we today know it. The alternative to public order, enforcement of law and protection of citizen and their property, is of course anarchy, where life becomes the survival of the fittest. It is the de facto government in most rural communities and to some extent in some urban settings. They perform the role of jurors, judges, priests, therapists, peace maker etc. Their station is the first port of call for the aggrieved, depraved, warring housewives and elite members eager to protect the disproportionate share of the nation’s resources they have cornered. This is why a nation that plays politics with its police often pay dearly for its folly.

    But for our continued desecration of principles of federal arrangement, the huge expenses wasted on failed  ‘Operation Sharan Daji (Sweep the Forest)’, ‘Operation Harbin Kunama (Scorpion Sting) Operation Diran Mikiya (Eagle Fighting), “Operation Puff Adder,” “Operation Maximum Safety” aimed not only “at taking the battle to the doorsteps of the criminals” but to “rout-out, arrest and prosecute armed bandits, vicious kidnappers for ransom and cattle rustling gangs operating in Zamfara State, would have been saved. The relief nine years of bombing could not secure for besieged people of Zamfara is what community policing routinely secures for communities where they wield power and influence as representative of government.

    And the reason for this is simple. As against indiscriminate bombing of siblings in Zamfara for example, by strangers, local police recruits from the warring Hausa subsistence farmers and Fulani herders would have constituted themselves into a balance of terror faced with a choice of continued mindless killing of themselves or resolving their differences in the interest of their different communities that look up to them for direction.

    But beyond this, there are places in the north according to Governor Uba Sani of Kaduna State, where one can drive for three hours without sighting policemen who are expected to constitute government of such areas. Since there is no vacuum in nature, such areas become haven for insurgents and bandits. This is why for him – there is no alternative to decentralization of the police architecture in order to create state police if “we are sincere in addressing the problem of criminal activities of banditry and kidnapping”.

    Unfortunately, until recently, politicians from the south and the north have always taken irreconcilable positions on the issue of state police The Fulani ruling elite for fear of allowing children of the oppressed Hausa to operate in areas they have monopolized for long, opposed state and community policing even with most part of the north under siege.

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    The governor of Kaduna State, an advocate of state police, took the crusade to the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA) Distinguished Lecture Series, where he delivered a lecture titled, “The Role of State Governments in Overcoming Insecurity in Nigeria where he insisted “there is no alternative to creation of state police if we are sincere in addressing the problem criminal activities, banditry, kidnapping”.

    President Tinubu who seems to have his hands tied by political consideration has always been a crusader for decentralization and state police. Decentralisation was in fact part of his campaign promises.

    In February 2024, his government inaugurated a committee to develop a framework for state policing. Not long after, the National Economic Council (NEC) announced that nearly all the 36 states had submitted memoranda on the creation of state police, with most of them in agreement with the proposal. The president thereafter, reiterated that the creation of state police is no longer optional but a necessary step to strengthen Nigeria’s security architecture in the face of persistent threats across the country.

    In September this year, the president told the Council of State the need of a revisit to state police after hailing the performance of JTF helping people returning to their homes: “I have looked more carefully at the security situation. I see the efforts of civilian JTF and communities. This has again provoked my thinking on state police. We can work with the National Assembly to design a framework that guarantees local ownership while ensuring political neutrality,” the president declared.

    The president also used the occasion of a recent visit by a delegation of Katsina indigenes led by Governor Dikko Radda to the Presidential Villa in Abuja to assure them of his government’s commitment to the creation of state police. “I am reviewing all the aspects of security; I have to create state police. We are looking at that holistically”.

    It must be noted that the Buhari administration was not opposed to creation of state police following the general demand by majority of the state governors. His only fear according to Garba Shehu, his senior media adviser, was about the capacity of state governors in arrears of staff salaries to carry the burden of new salaries. That fear no more exist today with the humongous amount of money going to the states and local governments.

    Of course we cannot decree against some overbearing state governors from abusing state police.  The consolation is that there will be rule of engagement and there will be a system of check and balancing.

    Our major crisis of nation-building since the collapse of the first republic is non-adherence to principles of federal arrangement as enshrined in our constitution. Murtala Mohammed and Olusegun Obasanjo started the process of overloading the exclusive list with items removed from concurrent list to fulfil their ill-advised policy of ensuring ethnic nationalities at different levels of cultural development even before the advent of colonial rule, now operate at the same level. With the total disappearance of residual list, we started operating unitary rule in the name of federal arrangement.

    Unfortunately, neither the classical model builders that see federalism as “a form of government in which sovereignty or political power is divided between the central and local governments, in such a way that each of them is independent within its sphere”, nor modern proponents of cooperative federalism that emphasize cooperation between the centre and the federating states envisaged a situation where the centre which in any case, is not superior to the subunits, will usurp the power of the subunits to police themselves.

    How will states perform their primary role of protecting lives and properties of citizen if denied the right to police themselves?

    Abridging the constitutional right of the subunits to police themselves is the source of social dislocations we witness across the country. For instance, the sources of conflict in places like Zamfara, Katsina, Benue and Plateau is the rivalry between indigenes and settlers over control of political and economic resources. The cheapest approach since both groups have been condemned to live together would have been recruiting state and community police among the two warring groups. That outcome will be balance of terror that could force the two warring groups to sit down and address their common problem since the alternative to living in peace will be endless reprisal killings.

    Again, quest for state policing is a symptom of self-inflicted crisis of nation-building. The truth is that some of our powerful leaders have no faith in the country. They are more interested in what they can take out of the country than building a nation. All our self-proclaiming patriotic leaders including those who fraudulently claimed they “sacrificed their present for our future”, are responsible for the nation’s nightmare since the collapse of the first republic. After all, it was never lost on any of them that there is hardly any state with federal structure from India to Brazil, Canada to Germany and the US from where we copied our constitution that does not operate a decentralized police force.

    The president has expressed his commitment to creation of state police He must walk the talk by prevailing on the National Assembly to be on the side of the people. Instead of throwing bombs and deploying soldiers to fight warring siblings who live among themselves, I think it is time to allow local people under the supervision of local police who are stakeholders face their own demon. As Governor Uba Sani told us “when states take ownership of security and development, peace becomes sustainable”.

  • Wike again

    Wike again

    If you watched the skits, cartoons and the outpouring of vituperations on Minister Nyesom Wike, you would think he committed treason, or something near murder.

     A lawyer with an Obidient imprint threw the word alcohol and another writer spewed out words like drunken and inebriated as though they tossed a breathalyzer at the man and he tested positive to alcohol intake.

    In Journalism and historical scholarship, the mantra is, “facts are sacred and opinions are free.”

    These days peddlers of lies in the pretension of intellectual pursuit feel free to befoul the facts.

     If Wike takes either writer to court, I would predict financial windfall for Wike, except that the outlets would go bankrupt trying to pay.

    A general once known in public as Buratai, who left his command in an ethical cloud has mistaken a land dispute with national security.

    Two ministers, one Matawalle, who was a disaster as governor and another one Badaru also a near disaster as chief executive of his state have turned a matter between a cabinet colleague and sullen naval lieutenant into a north-south matter, a semiotic confusion.

    As our Weekend Editor Festus Eriye reminded us last week, the umbrage against Wike had little to do with what Wike did.

     It was about what name they gave the masquerade before it came out to dance. Whether he performed well or not, the fact that they had given the dancer the name of a pariah, he could never have risen before the insult in their eyes.

     If they were not miffed because he turned the PDP on its head, they were not happy he upstaged a region with the sacrilege of being appointed the federal capital territory minister.

     Some, especially Obidients, flay him for “handing over Rivers State” to Tinubu in the 2023 polls. Recently, his sin was that he had the temerity to fight with Rivers State Governor Sim Fubara.

     In the words of Prophet Isaiah, it was “here a little, there a little.” His wrongs are the drips that became a poisoned pool.

    So much sentiment has beclouded many who should reason because of prejudice. It is often harrowing to read otherwise enlightened people chop logic with runaway drivels. It reminds one of Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy’s assertion to “educate the educated.” The saying, “Jack was sent to school to learn to be a fool,” comes out in bold relief.

    So, should Wike have called the fellow a fool? Of course not. But was that the crux of the matter? Of course not.

     Wike’s temperament was that of an elder provoked. We forget that there was an antecedent to the incident.

    Members of staff  of the FCT had visited the site, as the director in the ministry reported. They asked if they had papers and it was obvious they did not have the requisite papers for residential homes. This same sainted Lieutenant Yerima and his fellows had threatened to open fire on the officials for daring to question their roles.

    That was when the minister came in. Could he have settled the matter without going there? Yes. Was he wrong to do that? Of course not. Since I first knew anything about works and infrastructure, ministers, governors and commissioners have always visited sites. Why is this different? Is it because it was Wike? Tactile evidence often helps the executive hands-on knowledge of his stewardship.

    When, a few years ago, Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu had a similar spat with a police officer, news media and online interlocutors who deride Wike today also described Sanwo-Olu with words akin to a wimp. I call this the Ketekete syndrome, apologies to Ebenezer Obey’s song about how hard it is to please humans.

    In the cultural sense, we can say the fellow ought to show some respect to an older man. He did not. There is a wiser way to say, “I cannot let you in without even infuriating an elder.” Rather, you disarm him. He acted as the minister’s mate. The uniform is no excuse to disrespect an elder.

    A few issues have been repeated. One, in these days when we have not enough men in uniform, what is a military man doing guarding a road buffer? The effusions of Buratai, Irabor and others forget that the society made the army. The army did not make the society. We are in a democracy, not a military autocracy.

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    Our love for impunity draws from two sources, our monarchical past and military rule. The soldiers collapsed these two traits into the persona of a bully, and they tyranised over us for most of our history. What Wike did was to assert the constitution over the uniform. But because many have not cut themselves away from the military cloth, they still think under the spell of the army. No wonder some still call for coup just because they hate the man elected to be president. A few careless, malicious writers recently justified the rumoured coup attempt simply for that reason.

    We should not forget that Nigeria is a state with an army, and not an army with a state. The soldier was made by law and so cannot be a law unto himself. There is no such constitutional order as we the army. It is we the people.

    Then governor of example Babatunde Raji Fashola exemplified this when he arrested an Army colonel who was fined for violating BRT lane.

     This republic was born with a slew of soldiers at the top and they brought with them the tribunitian impulse of the barracks. If you can touch an elder’s hem, it does not put you at the helm.

    It is a war not in the battlefield but on the constitution, and the people ought to understand that it is mental slavery and it makes us look like buffoons to act as though we are in a soldier’s platoon.

    Another unanswered question is how many times will the story of land and generals permeate the news? Did anyone ask how a retired general had the resources to afford over two acres of land in Abuja? How did these men turn Abuja into a general’s paradise?

    Recently, a news report said 84 out of 1, 978 entry points into Nigeria are without security operatives. Some of such needed operatives are land supervisors. It is not today big men privatise our armed forces. Some of them cook, take their children to school and even carry their wives’ handbags.

    The pity of the Wike-Yerima standoff is that the concept of democracy is still gasping for popular oxygen.

  • The Kaduna model

    The Kaduna model

    Today, we see Kaduna State as the model of peace in a time of anxiety. We ask, how come one governor has been able to do it and others are grappling with it? is it because it has more money than others? No. Is it because the state was less battered than others? We cannot say so if we realise that in places like Giwa and Zango Kataf, it was blood and death. A cattle market that was abandoned for about a decade now carries lorries of cows daily to Lagos.

    In a lecture at the Nigerian Institute of International Affairs (NIIA), Governor Uba Sani says he did not do it with guns alone. It was bottom-up approach. There is no rage without grievance or malice. Some of it may also be poverty. He sat with the locals. “One of the traditional rulers said the bandits were born under his eyes,” reported the governor.

    With grassroots credibility as a human rights votary, Governor Sani mobilized without paying ransom to ransom the state from the clutches of the bad boys. If there is community consensus, it must be done with good faith. Good faith comes with development. Idleness fuels the problem. When the market was closed down and hundreds of schools were out of commission, the breeding ground thrived for recruits. Many devil’s workshops built on the devil’s workshop. A new industry of arms and the harm was born. He reopened over 500 schools that were in limbo.

    To take these people out of worklessness, the market was encouraged to thrive and the biggest skills acquisition hub in Africa was established with three institutes of vocational and skills development at Rigachikun, Samaru Kataf and Soba, all in 2025 by President Tinubu.

    It is here Gov. Sani speaks of “cooperative federalism,” demonstrating how state and the centre can lock hands to solve local challenges. He often stressed the work the National Security Adviser Nuhu Ribadu has done in this tie-up to drive the bandits away.

    Again, we must stress that Kaduna is multi-ethnic and multi-religious, and we recall that southern Kaduna was a flashpoint for a long time. Now, it is a different story.

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    He says sometimes they have incidents of violence and most of them are on the borders.

    Recently, the APC Chairman, Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda as well as Senate President Godswill Akpabio challenged the governors to turn the boon of allocations under President Tinubu for the people’s benefit.

    Security is the first job of a leader. Other governors should pay a visit to Kaduna to borrow how it can be done. It shows that the problem is not in the centre but in the locals. When Simon Lalong was governor, he built a template for peace with the locals and he sustained it for most of his time as governor.

    The difference with Kaduna is that Governor Sani has coupled local consensus with development projects like a flurry of infrastructure work, building new classrooms and giving jobs to many, and this has kept the young men busy.

    NIIA Director General Professor Eghosa  Osaghae  was enamoured of the idea of cooperative federalism, and asked governors to think of localizing their peace initiatives. States like Katsina and Zamfara are neighbours and they can learn a thing or two about how to make violence history in their domains.

    Many news reports took his lecture from the viewpoint of state police, but the governor explained that it is one part of the puzzle.