The Nation Newspaper

Category: Columnists

  • Amupitan and godfathers

    Amupitan and godfathers

    This columnist doesn’t know whether Professor Joash Ojo Amupitan, the newly installed Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman, has ever read “The Godfather” by Mario Puzo. In that famous novel, Vito Corleone, the godfather, while making peace with the dons of the other mafia families, after a failed attempt to assassinate him, gave a near impossible condition for peace to reign. He told his bewildered underworld colleagues: “I am a superstitious man, a ridiculous falling, but I must confess it here.”

    He went on: “And so if some unlucky accident should befall my youngest son, if some police officer should accidentally shoot him, if he should hang himself in his cell, if new witnesses appear to testify to his guilt, my superstition will make me feel that it was the result of the ill-will still borne me by some people here. Let me go further. If my son is struck by a bolt of lightning I will blame some of the people here.”

    Corleone furthered on his terms of peace: “If his plane should fall into sea or his ship sink beneath the waves of ocean; if he should catch a mortal fever, if his automobile should be struck by a train, such is my superstition that I would blame the ill-will felt by people here. Gentlemen, that ill-will, that bad luck, I could never forgive.” As this writer read the encomiums that followed the distinguished professor of law, Joash Amupitan, to the exalted position of INEC chairman, the words of Don Corleone, reverberated.

    With his curriculum vitae, reading like a book, Amupitan, became the darling of hitherto die-hard antagonists of the nomination of INEC chairman, by a sitting president. In the senate, he spoke with such eloquence and candescence that after two hours, when the senate president following a motion, put a voice vote, whether Amupitan should be allowed to bow and go, the ayes had it. The few nay-sayers were not outraged, for they merely wanted an opportunity to speak to the legal giant.

    Within the civil society, the story was rife that Professor Amupitan was a member of the team of Senior Advocates of Nigeria that defended the president after the 2023 general election. Without engaging in any research, those who dominate the civil space with their diatribes swore that the 2027 presidential election was already compromised, before the due date, and they were determined to use all means available to them, to oppose the nomination of Amupitan, being the godfathers of the civil space. 

    Luckily for Amupitan, he was not a member of the team of SANs and he was in no way connected to the president. Indeed, there is also no evidence that he is connected to the ruling All Progressive Congress (APC). As a result, the nay-sayers have shown willingness to give him the benefit of doubt, as the new INEC helmsman. But while not a pessimist, this writer wonders how long the honeymoon with the self-appointed godfathers will last?

    So, far, in his statements, Amupitan appears to have struck the right cords. He said to his staff: “we should not compromise our values or processes that could have consequences. So the integrity of our elections is not even something we should negotiate, please.” He also said: “Mr. President, in his remark, also echoed the same, that we should do everything possible as we go into an Anambra election to give this country a free, fair and credible election.” He also promised that staff welfare will be a priority, since much will be expected from them.        

    But does the 1999 constitution (as amended), and the Electoral Act, 2022, give the INEC chairman the powers to guarantee a free, fair and credible election? According to paragraph 14(1) The Independent National Electoral Commission shall compromise the following members: – (a) a Chairman, who shall be the Chief Electoral Commissioner; and (b) twelve other members to be known as National Electoral Commissioners.” Section 14(3) further provides: – “There shall be for each State of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, a Resident Electoral Commission….” None of those are appointed by or can be sacked by the chairman.

    Among other ancillary responsibilities, paragraph 15 provides: – “The Commission shall have power to – (a) organize, undertake and supervise all elections to the offices of the President and Vice-President, the Governor and Deputy Governor of a State, and to the membership of the Senate, the House of Representatives and the House of Assembly of each State of the Federation.” While the duties are expansive, there are no legal provisions to guarantee the necessary powers to perform the functions.

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    For instance, INEC is not self-financing. It has to rely on the Federal Executive Council and National Assembly to get the necessary finances to perform the functions. While Section 3(3) of the Electoral Act, 2022, provides: “The election funds due to the Commission for any general elections are to be released to the Commission not later than one year before the next general election”, there is no provision that what is released must be adequate or according to the demands of the commission.

    The commission also does not have control over the nation’s underdeveloped infrastructure. While distribution of materials and collation of results from the towns and nearby villages can easily be dealt with by the commission, what can it do with remote parts of the country, some of which have no access roads or difficult means of connection? Will those clamouring that all election results be transmitted electronically real time, hold Amupitan responsible if it became practically impossible to do so?

    While sensitive electoral materials are usually delivered very close to the day of election and handed over to the electoral officers on the morning of election from secure custodies, would Amupitan be held accountable if there are no vehicles, or boats or even light aircrafts to ferry an electoral officer or some sensitive materials or results after the election, to and from the election any centre scattered across the length and breadth of our expansive country?

    With majority of the political actors grossly undisciplined, how would Amupitan rein in, those who seek to compromise the electoral officers or use brutal force to determine the outcome of the results, in several far flung voting centres across the country? Should the security agencies get induced to compromise in one of such remote places, would the INEC chairman be held accountable? While this column looks forward to further improvements in our elections, under Amupitan, there are enormous challenges bedevilling elections in our country. 

    Unfortunately, like Vito Corleone, the godfather, many Nigerians are superstitious when judging the INEC chairmen. For such people, it is only when their preferred candidates win that they accept that elections are free, fair and credible.

  • Uneasy times for the ‘Deep State’

    Uneasy times for the ‘Deep State’

    When in January 2024, the Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration issued a circular directing “automatic” 50 percent remittance of the total revenue of all its self-funded enterprises, not a few wondered if this was merely precursor to the overdue comprehensive fiscal governance reforms at the federal level or a mere touch up of the vice-ridden old ways of the Nigerian bureaucracy.

    “The Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF), subject to the categorization of agencies shall map and automatically effect direct deduction of 50% on gross revenue of self/partially funded agency/parastatals and 100% for fully funded agencies/ parastatals as interim remittance of amount due to the Consolidated Revenue Fund,” the circular had read at the time.

    The practice, hitherto, was for the agencies to retain up to 50 percent of their revenue as expenditure while keeping 20 percent of the balance as “operating surplus” —the balance apparently left for the principal to do as it pleased with.

    The move, according to the federal government, was meant to improve revenue generation, fiscal discipline, accountability and transparency in the management of government financial resources and prevention of waste and inefficiencies.

    Notable agencies affected included the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA), the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA), the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) and the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS).

    I recall Waziri Adio of Agora Policy, warning that “these cash-saturated agencies had become founts of mind-blowing profligacy and sleazy vehicles for patronage and rent-extraction!

    It was no exaggeration. In truth, these agencies had become a lot more! Aside the humongous sums they collectively deny the national exchequer in entitled funds, they evince the demonstrable power of the deep state together with their apparatus of subversion and institutional denudation!

    Imagine having an agency of government run recurrent and capital outlays that dwarf those of some state governments, and this without the strictures of appropriation by parliament; that Nigeria and Nigerians tolerated that practice that represents a clear affront not just to the law but of constitutionalism can only be in the realm of the usual Nigerian mystery. To think that the same Nigerians are only too eager to recite Section 162(1) of 1999 Constitution which requires that all revenues collected by the federal government be paid into a special account called the Federation Account, with a few exceptions in their never-ending ‘federalist expositions!

    Here is the thing: Aside the personal income tax of the personnel of the armed forces, the Nigeria Police Force, the ministry or department of government charged with responsibility for Foreign Affairs and the residents of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja which were singled out in the quoted section, nowhere in the document did it refer to our big spending parastatals as remotely qualifying for such privilege! And this is a document that has been in operation since 1999 together with all the amendments!

    Surely, if Olusegun Obasanjo in his holy rage did not blink an eye in snuffing out the life out of the Sani Abacha-created Petroleum Trust Fund, PTF, the wonder ought to be in the survival of related practices which expressly offend the letters and the spirit of the law. The agency, created in the wake of the removal of fuel subsidy at the time- was administered by select consultants under the direction of the late president, Muhammadu Buhari, and operated like a parallel government answerable only to Abacha – the Supremo. President Obasanjo merely on the ground of its incompatibility with the country’s supreme law, despite the pressures from the usual quarters of privilege, didn’t even need to confer with the judiciary let alone the parliament to terminate its incestuous existence!

    Call it pragmatic, we know that the referenced January 2024 circular, conceding the 50 percent revenue to the agencies, could only have been temporary for the reform-minded Tinubu administration. After all, ensuring that leakages are plugged at every level, and ensuring that every kobo due to the exchequer is accounted for, would seem the least that an administration sworn to overhaul the public finance system could pursue with uncommon vigour given the financial mess that the country has found itself. But in this, most Nigerians would appear to have been fixated on the tax reforms almost entirely to the exclusion of the needed wholesale reengineering particularly in the face of the obnoxious fiscal practices.

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    Thanks to the administration’s Economic Management Team, this obvious lacuna did not elude them.  Only that this time, no tanks are being rolled out and no concessions are being offered: only a simple directive with a definite timeline: All collections by the agencies must henceforth go straight into the federation account. The money, after all, belongs to Nigerians and not to any agency operating in silos. And so, the long-standing practice that allowed revenue agencies to deduct a share of funds as the cost of collection before remitting proceeds to the federation account has come to an end.

    The decision, since approved by President Bola Tinubu, is said to be aimed at tightening fiscal discipline, enhancing transparency and ensuring that all revenues are available for distribution among the three tiers of government.

    Even here, Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister of the Economy Wale Edun couldn’t resist a reminder on the anchor of the law: the constitutional requirement that all revenues be remitted into the federation account before distribution using the approved sharing formula.

    And then the sordid practices that have made our public finance practices such a joke: “When you look at the gross figure, you see all kinds of deductions before you get to the net distributable figure, which goes to the federal, state, and local governments. And I must inform you that even during the last FAAC allocation, most of those deductions have been removed once and for all”. Good riddance!

    Hopefully, Nigerians, with time, will come to appreciate the import of this new thinking when the stocks are finally taken of the trillions annually creamed off by members of Nigeria’s Greed Incorporated, and cost of the unfulfilled dreams of national renewal. For now, it suffices to stop the haemorrhage!

    Finally, say what you may: surely, no administration, past and present, has taken on so much within so short a time as we have seen in the last 28 months of the Bola Ahmed Tinubu presidency. Like a builder whose mastery of the game is unequalled, the administration plods on, with its eyes on legacy. Yes, it’s been a season of demolition: from the fraud-riddled infrastructure of subsidy, to that of arbitrage and now, to one of state licensed heist. Although the job might seem slow at the beginning, surely, there can be no denial of its rhyme and rhythm. That is – if only Nigerians will care to pay attention.

  • Enablers of Kanu self-destructive behaviour

    Enablers of Kanu self-destructive behaviour

    As seductive as the federal arrangement, a social  system that guarantees ‘unity in diversity’ is, it also has the prospect of producing arrogant leaders with inflated sense of self-importance as representative of groups with their own clear vision of society. By strange coincidence, all our three founding fathers suffered from this federalism’s major infirmity.

    Obafemi Awolowo was an efficient administrator and an unrepentant federalist. His unrivalled achievement in education, communication and industrialization and drive towards an egalitarian society in a world of endless class wars, placed his Western Region ahead of other regions.

    But his audacity to dream he could replicate his West achievement all over the country, a crusade not shared by his more Yoruba irredentist deputy, Chief SL Akintola, the trusted ally he effectively used to keep the colonial masters and the feudal north at bay. This marked the beginning of the fall of the West as Ahmadu Bello who could not stand Awo’s arrogance put him out of circulation after independence courtesy NPC/NCNC alliance.

    Prof Banji Akintoye recently quoted a colleague with whom he was doing a project on Nigeria as saying “the Yoruba people are very proud; whoever told the north wanted free education?”

    Nnamdi Azikiwe, Zik was admired by Lagos intelligentsia for his erudition and worshipped by Lagos Igbo urban immigrants who had for long yearned for a spokesman. They believed whatever Zik said.  But the price the Igbo nation paid for Zik’s audacity to mislead his Igbo compatriots that unitary system is best for a multi-cultural society has been coups, pogroms, civil war and a nation that has remained ungovernable since independence.

    For Ahmadu Bello, a feudal lord, loyalty was feudalism first badge of honour. He did not forgive Awo for trying to undermine his authority among those that literarily worshiped him.  He had no apology for single handedly manipulating the constitution to remove one leg of Nigeria tripod holding Nigeria together. The consequence of Ahmadu Bello’s exploitation of innermost fears of his subjects is that the north has not moved far from where it was in 1966.

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    However, the battle today is against Nnamdi Kanu, an egocentric leader with inflated sense of self-importance but with neither a grand worldview nor even a clear vision of where he intends to take the Igbo nation to. In fact, his display of reckless power, arrogance and erratic outbursts such as “burn down Lagos”, burn down Oyigbo and kill all the policemen” when not railing against judges and lawyers old enough to be his grandfather, have led many to doubt if indeed he had enough time to imbibe the celebrated deep Igbo culture before moving to London to start his crusade.

    But his irascible behaviours have not stopped him from having millions of worshippers.  There are the Igbo youths with sense of siege and persecution complex arising from jaundiced narrative of Nigerian history of ethnic rivalries. There are also millions of children of anger in the social media who today swear by the name of Nnamdi Kanu, the long awaited messiah who will take Igbo out of the zoo run by Fulani illiterates supported by Yoruba who recently replaced Igbo as spare tyre.

    And topping the list Kanu’s enablers are a section of the media. And their award winning journalists, a segment of Igbo political elite with reputation for playing the ostrich and a section of the noble profession who has faith in the judiciary only when they are beneficiaries.

    As for Kanus media enablers, the central focus of the two platforms Channels TV and ARISE TV used for this piece was the failure of government to successfully prosecute Kanu they claimed was kept in detention for five years; that it was within the constitutional right of Sowore and Kanu’s defence lawyer to move to the street few days to Justice Omotosho’s six days accelerated hearing of Kanu’s case.

    They argued with intent to mislead the public that the court order obtained by the police banning Sowore and his group from some sensitive areas in Abuja was inferior to the constitution. They did not see Sowore’s refusal to obey court order as invitation to anarchy; for them the arrest and arraignment of Sowore and others who broke law by the police was immoral and constitute an anti-people behaviour on the part of the police.

    “If they did not say it was sub judice when Gani Fawehinmi-led demonstration’s years ago, why is it that it is now sub judice when Kanu’s lawyer is demonstration against a case in which he was a leading counsel”  Arise TV’s Rufai Oseni bellowed.  He continued “why is it that those who only yesterday demonstrated against Jonathan are today afraid of demonstration? This is exactly why we say Nigeria is a big joke”, he concluded.

    And his colleagues ominously reminded us of the Arab Spring without telling us if the nations involved are today better off for it. They did not forget to remind Nigerian government they alleged was anti-people, of the Gen-Z uprising across the globe.  They however failed to add that the current attention-seeking Sowore and a few others disturbing the peace of Abuja did not represent resourceful Nigerian youths who as far back as 1920 first demanded from the colonial masters that Nigeria federation be modelled after that of Switzerland.

    Neither could the current social media anarchists and those who called themselves ‘obidient’ be compared with our youth who in the sixties moved around the world where they engaged in debate about how to make the world better for humanity.

    I am not aware of any these platforms that covered Sowore frees Kanu’s s protest last week that informed their audience that Kanu was the architect of his own misfortune with his periodic attack and rejection of judges, intimidation of judicial officers  and abuse of the judicial process. All we got from a more restrained Laolu Akande was “Kanu wants a political solution”.

    But the leopard hardly changes its skin. With Kanu sacking his legal team, demand for 90 days as against six days of accelerated hearing granted by Justice Omotosho, his hypocritical anti-government and anti-Nigeria media enablers now understand that we now know those behind Nigeria’s nightmare even when they daily swear in the name patriotism, the last refuge of the scoundrels .

    Of course the critical enablers of Kanu are a segment of Igbo political elite. Channel TV’s Seun Okinbaloye and Charles Aniagolu last week spoke with two leading members of the group, Dan Iwuanyawu, a Labour Zenith chieftain and the other, an elected Labour Party member of the House of Representatives. 

    For Iwuanyawu, Kanu has not done anything against Nigerian state. Our problem, he insists is double standard. He tried to draw a parallel between Kanu’s IPOB and Fulani terrorist currently negotiating with government. He however failed to indicate the negotiation is at subnational level where tribal war between Fulani and their Hausa hosts which remained intractable despite thousands of deaths and over 12 years of federal government failed attempt to use force to install peace among siblings.

    And for the Labour Party National Assembly member, the ongoing trial of Kanu was a carryover of Yoruba-Igbo war. And his reason which the news anchor did not try to correct was that the current president is Yoruba, the  Attorney General and Minister of Justice is Yoruba, the presiding judge  in Kanu’s case, Justice Omotosho is Yoruba and Kanu’s prosecuting Lawyers are Yoruba. Therefore, Kanu’s case which preceded Tinubu’s government by about seven years is a Yoruba war against Igbo!

    These Igbo leaders unfortunately live in denial claiming periodic mindless killing of policemen and innocent Igbos arising from Kanu and his recently jailed Finland based deputy, Simon Ekpa’s ‘sit at home order’ were sponsored from outside. But we have Governor Chukwuma Soludo of Anambra who recently disclosed to the world that “99.9% of those caught and indicted for mindless killing of Igbos, are Igbos”.

    From the outburst of some of Kanu’s defence lawyers who in the past openly spoke of persecution, it is not difficult to know from where Kanu derived his audacity and reckless bravery. These senior experienced lawyers hardly disagree with Kanu. Many have therefore argued that it may also not be difficult for them to also don the ethnic toga when Kanu insists what was going on was a persecution and not prosecution.

    Journalists as politicians pretending to be advocates of the people should be reminded that the primary role of the Fourth Estate of the Realm besides keeping government under watch is supporting all our institutions since the alternative is anarchy. The only reason there are journalists is because we have this “our own dear native land, where tribe and tongue may differ, but in brotherhood we stand” and an imperfect government trying to balance the interest of the people and that of the owners of society.

  • The prerogative of revenge

    The prerogative of revenge

    The problem with revenge is that it never succeeds. That, sometimes, is the problem of official justice. Everything often tends to be based on the law, but law is only a part of justice. We however tend to equate, tragically, law with justice.

     Henry David Thoreau pondered this when he wrote that, “The law never made anyone a whit more just.”

    The idea of the prerogative of mercy that the president exercises is to bring a human, softer element to the hard face of the law.

     It is the story of crime and punishment. No one wants a criminal, especially of the hardened variety, in their neighbourhood. The murderer, kidnapper, robber, drug baron, et al, represent the poisoned scum, the scoundrels in our bloodstream.

    We want them dead. We want them locked away. Not their faces, not their sound, not their scents, or their breaths must pollute the air in our garden. So, when the president pardoned some of them, the impulse to yell was overwhelming.

    Even though we would quote Alexander Pope’s line: “To err is human, to forgive is divine,” it becomes abstract, even cruel when it comes close to us. Yet, we are a religious people, and all the faiths applaud pardon. All love God for his forgiveness of our sins. But we are not willing to let it work for the worst among us. We want God to forgive man.

    But many do not understand a number of points. One, the prerogative means it is a special power granted by the law, and that means the president can exercise without being questioned. It also assumes that the president would not act without reason.

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     Two, mercy also means the beneficiary is not innocent. Mercy is for the sinner, not even the sinned against. In his case, he set a committee under the office of the attorney general, Lateef Fagbemi, and it unfurled a list of 175 citizens.

    Then the uproar. It shows our fears, and our sense of righteousness. But mercy is to cleanse, not to criminalise. We are seeing the list as endorsement. There is a reason the prison is called a correctional facility. It is to correct.

     In the United States, it had a puritan tone, and it was called a penitentiary; that is,  a place for bad folks to gain penitence.

    Prisons are not for saints. Mercy is not for saints. The best abode for mercy, therefore is for the sinner. Christ said: “I come not for the righteous, but sinners.”

    Many know little about the names. We do not know their journeys. We just know that they have done bad things. Have they turned the corner? Are they undergoing a process of penitence, or becoming better souls? The process of pardon is not random? They are recommended, and it is based on those who know them, and evidence of progress they might have undergone since their conviction.

    One sore point is Maryam Sanda, who slaughtered her husband. She was recommended for pardon on the request of her father in law, who said she should be released to care for her two children. Those who know her say she has exercised remorse. If justice is to revenge, then we are overlooking another definition of mercy. That is, mercy as a rescue effort. Shall we destroy the mother and the two children? Or shall we save the two children with the pardon of a possibly repentant mother?

    What we are showing is probably not justice, but revenge. The mob is angry because it is trying to exercise its own prerogative of revenge. That is why the best example is that of Christ and the adulterous woman. “He who has no sin should cast the first stone.” The law saw its restraint in mercy immediately.

    In another instant, Christ was about to die, the robber beside him asked, “Lord, remember me when thou comest to thy Kingdom.” The Lord replied, “I say unto thee today, thou shalt be with me in paradise.”

    He was reflecting the power of mercy over law and over judgment. Remember in the book of Exodus, the mercy seat is above the ark of covenant. That means we must have the law, but mercy is superior. If we do not accept mercy for the worst among us, it means judgment without mercy. Apostle James says mercy prevails over judgment. James and Christ reflected on the mercy seat.

    The law is good, but law is brutal. We often speak of the spirit of the law, because the letter of the law, like the ark of covenant, can kill. It killed Uzzah in the Old Testament. He did not enjoy mercy. Hence John said, the “law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.” We no longer live in the world of an eye for an eye, which makes everyone blind. But of the other cheek.

    In his novel, The Brothers Karamazov, Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoeyevsky muses on the meaning of the word jurisdiction.

     A character wondered if there could be a neat divide between church and state even if the law says it. The jurisdiction could be in the mind, and where the power of church may go beyond the temple. The temple is the mind and so it is difficult to define.

    For instance, if the magistrate is beholden to the mercy of his faith more than the strict adherence to law, shall we say the legal jurisdiction has power over the judge? The west borrowed the church and state concept from the Islamic States around the Crusades.

    Shakespeare defined mercy in one of the soulful perorations of his poesy in Merchant of Venice. “The quality of mercy is not strained./ It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven/ Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed:/ It blesseth him that gives and him that takes. / ‘Tis mightiest in the mightiest. It becomes/ The thronèd monarch better than his crown./ His scepter shows the force of temporal power,/ The attribute to awe and majesty/ Wherein doth sit / the dread and fear of kings, / But mercy is above this sceptered sway. /It is enthronèd in the hearts of kings. /It is an attribute to God himself. /And earthly power doth then show likest God’s / When mercy seasons justice.”

    Here we go. If it is like the gentle rain, the place beneath is hard, like a hardened criminal. It is also a testament to a society that when it gives mercy, it receives mercy. A sour society shall not enjoy the clemency of time.

     After the First World War, Parisians mobbed the defeated German delegation for the Treaty of Versailes. They threw stones and hurled abuses, and asked for revenge. They said they should squeeze them till their “kids squeaked.” The air of revenge did not cleanse Europe. It brought the Second World War and Hitler and the bloodiest slaughter in history.

    The French also, under Charles de Gaulle, inaugurated what was known as epuration or the purges or purification when the society turned on the collaborators when Germany occupied France during World War II. Thousands were sentenced to execution, public disgrace, and women’s heads were shaved in public for sleeping with German soldiers.  It was not justice but revenge. Its scar still haunts the souls of the republic today.

    Nobel Laureate Albert Camus, who was for the purges until he recoiled at its bloodletting, said: “it is human justice with its tremendous defects.”

    Justice Minister Fagbemi has said the list may be reviewed. It is a response to feedback. The irony is that those in uproar are not even in the mood to forgive the forgiver if they made a few errors. Again, it is still within the prerogative of the president to review or not to. Whatever the case, those who are pardoned, may not take the disgrace off their images. It is a stain they will never overcome years after they step out of jail. It is like Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment when the murderer never knows peace even though he walks free on the streets. Or Hawthorne’s novel, The Scarlet Letter, in which the sinner carries the letter A on her chest as a forever indictment.

  • Atiku, Pitobi and their hero

    Atiku, Pitobi and their hero

    I wonder why Pitobi and Atiku are not saying anything today about their darling economist in Argentina. Remember not long ago, they made the Argentine President Javier Milei their hero. He is the rightwing fellow who would not float the currency, but decided to change the economy without the proper pills. Well, he is in trouble.

    He is now on his knees to President Donald Trump to help him or he will lose the election next time.

     The U.S. President decided to gift him with $20 billion just to keep the peso alive and pay some of the bills. The interest rates are high and inflation is roiling. Job reports are not flattering. That is what the fellows Pitobi and Atiku wanted to do here.

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    President Milei is a coward because he cannot do what President Tinubu has done. That is, to float the currency and face the inevitable headwinds head on. As they say, you can’t make omelettte without breaking an egg. He does not want the consequences of wise daring. He is not ready for the challenges of leadership, just like his cheerleaders on our soil.

  • Leaked DSS terror alert

    Leaked DSS terror alert

    What interest was the leaking of the security alert on the planned terror attack by Islamic State of West African Province (ISWAP) on Ondo and Kogi states meant to serve? And who was responsible for the leak?

    These are the puzzles raised by the circulation of a memo from the Department of State Services (DSS) to the 32 Artillery Brigade of the Nigerian Army, Akure, Ondo State on the planned terror attacks on the two states.

    In that memo, the DSS alerted the army in Ondo State of credible intelligence confirming plans by ISWAP to launch coordinated attacks on several communities. The agency specifically listed Eriti Akoko and Oyin Akoko in the Akoko North-West Local Government Area as well as Owo town in the Owo Local Government Area as possible targets.

    The terrorists were said to have already commenced surveillance on soft targets in the affected areas. “Intelligence confirmed plans by members of ISWAP to carry out coordinated attacks on communities in Ondo and Kogi states anytime soon. The level of security alert across the identified communities should be immediately scaled up to prevent loss of lives and property”, the memo stated.

    The leaked alert came at a time the authorities have been fighting strenuously, to correct reports in the international media of alleged genocide against Christians. This reality instructs that the leak should not be allowed to escape public scrutiny. Not with the current altercations between the special adviser to the president on Media and Policy Communication, Daniel Bwala and the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN). Both incidents share common link in view of their capacities to resurrect heated discussions on interfaith relations in the country.

     So, what interest was the leak meant to serve: reinforce such claims given the agenda of ISWAP or underscore the pro-activeness of the security agencies to nip such potential treats in the bud?

     Whichever prism the matter is viewed, the development is bound to evoke sad feelings of the heinous crimes of the terrorists while pursuing their weird agenda. Such feelings will do no good to current efforts to correct narratives in the foreign media on alleged Christian persecution in the country. ISWAP as a brand name is bound to reinforce such claims.

    Though the insurgent group had in 2022 attacked St Francis Catholic Church, Owo in Ondo State leaving in its trail the death of 40 worshippers and injuring many others, that was perhaps, the first time it was extending its attacks to the southern part of the country. With the said credible intelligence unveiling their plans to attack Ondo and Kogi states which shares borders with about 10 other states, the fear is that the terrorist group may be spreading to other states in the south.

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    That is the foreboding signal from the exposed DSS memo. It depicts ISWAP as unrelenting in pursuing its weird ideology despite the efforts of the security agencies to contain their menace. The report is said to be based on actionable intelligence. Good! What was required in the circumstance was for the relevant security agencies including the DSS to have moved into quick action and apprehend the masterminds of the plan. That is the standard expectation in such sensitive security threats.

    But nothing of such is of public knowledge. Neither does the evidence in the public space give an inkling of that given the speed with which the leaked memo hit the pubic space with little time for the military to act. The memo was dated October 20 but barely two days after, it had already made media headlines. So, what time did the army have to act before the alert was leaked?

    Or was the memo deliberately leaked by to procure public confidence in the capacities of our security agencies to rise to the challenges posed by ISWAP? That objective is better served by the apprehension and possible public parading of those identified with the surveillance on soft targets. It takes humans to identify soft targets and mount surveillance on them. It also takes humans to detect those behind them.  Why no arrests were made is behind the suspicion that there may be more to the leak than ordinarily meets the eyes.

    Ironically, the leak only succeeded in creating panic among the public as evidenced by the confidence building meetings by the Ondo State Police Command and assurances from the governments of Ondo and Kogi states.

    Apparently worried by the impact of the leaked memo on its citizens, the Kogi State government had sought to rationalise the report “as a step towards victory noting that it demonstrates the proactive work of the DSS and other sister agencies in protecting Nigerians from criminal elements”. 

    Ondo State government said it is part of routine intelligence report shared regularly among security agencies and the government to identify and prevent potential threats. It touched on the propriety of the leak when it assured citizens that the report was already being acted upon by the relevant security agencies with adequate measures to ensure public safety and security in the state.

    The statements from Ondo and Kogi State governments contain obvious rationalizations for the leaked memo. The one commended it as evidence of the pro-activeness of the security agencies in identifying and eliminating potential threats. While the other said the memo was already being acted upon with adequate measures for safety and security taken.

    My reading of these interventions is that the memo may have been deliberately leaked to show that the security agencies are doing their work efficiently. That could as well be. But the leakage without evidence of arrested masterminds diminishes the credibility of the narrative.

    Even then, its timing is wrong. Coming at a time the government is contending with allegations of Christian persecution from the international community, the alert will only resurrect such feelings and throw spanners in the wheels of those efforts. That is perhaps, the dimension those who see the leaked memo as evidence of the pro-activeness of the security agencies may not have considered. The weight of this dimension diminishes whatever credit the security agencies may seek to take of the exposed plot.

    The overall interest of the country would have been better served had the memo been kept out of public view. But in seemingly seeking to take glory, we have succeeded in creating panic by drawing attention to the unrelenting weird desire by ISWAP to spread its terror agenda on the rest of the society.

    This also bears correlation with the avoidable altercation between Bwala and CAN on his interpretation of the outcome of their discussions when he visited their secretariat to get their view on alleged persecution and genocide against Christians in the country.  Things turned sour when CAN issued a statement describing the Presidency’s version of the meeting which gave the impression that the association dismissed claims of Christian genocide in Nigeria, as “completely untrue and unfair”.

    The clarification by CAN did not help whatever advantage Bwala sought to take of that visit. If that visit never held, CAN may have opted to maintain its silence and allow the authorities sort themselves out. Bwala’s apparent overzealousness dragged them into the fray with unpalatable outcomes.

  • SNAPSONG 271

    SNAPSONG 271

    When Eyes Are Four

    And now when eyes are four

         And the sky is full of stars

    We will count the dimples

         On the sacred moments of boundless banters

    When the stick has roused the drum to a roar

         In the throbbing edge of gathering crowds

    We will shake a leg and slay the silence

         That once ruled a sorority of sighs

     When our songs are summoned

         To sing the season

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    And wake the wind which braids the leaves

         On the heads of swaying trees

    We will count the stanzas

         In the rolling oriki which knew

    The ancestors  of the ants

         Before the earth was born

    Fast, flowing river

         Which never stops bowing

    To the rhythm of the rain as

         Trumpet flowers flaunt their delicate petals

     And so when eyes are four

         And the sky is full of stars

    We will watch green affirmations tickle

         Their way to the Orchard of Grace,

  • Aregbesola on God’s grace

    Aregbesola on God’s grace

    Still fully immersed in an ethical stench of his own making, and sometimes speaking as if the concept of God is alien to him, former Osun State governor and one-time Interior minister, Rauf Aregbesola, has now begun to speak knowingly and affectionately of God. In an interaction with reporters in Ilorin two Saturdays ago after commissioning the secretariat of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), his new party, he denounced the ruling party but conversely anchored the strength of his new party on God’s munificence. Hear him: “If APC is confident of its strength, it won’t be so hyped and charged as to be hounding and hunting the opposition all over the place. How can we interpret what APC is doing all over Nigeria to us? They are harassing and intimidating every one of our members, not just our leaders, but nationwide, be it in Lagos, Kebbi, or Kaduna. If indeed they are confident of the strength they are showcasing, one would expect that they will be so calm; but the reverse is the case; so what does that tell you? They themselves know that they are not popular and the party that will harvest their unpopularity is ADC. Regardless of the grandstanding, by the grace of God, ADC will take over the mantle of leadership in Nigeria and in most of the states.”

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    What is missing in his statement is not his misplaced confidence in a supposed ADC victory in the coming polls, but his unusual and unexpected foray into the domain of God. He speaks about God’s grace as the ultimate factor responsible for victory or defeat. That grace, he also presumes, is available to sinners and the dispossessed. But for a man so self-righteous, so implacable, and so adamantly discourteous, surely he should need some penance to attract that grace. Yes, grace is readily available, even to an embittered party and its malignant leaders; but how can they receive grace when they have continued to spurn it?

  • Needless vacillation over pardons

    Needless vacillation over pardons

    A little over two weeks ago, President Bola Tinubu had, after consulting with the Council of State, granted clemency to some 175 persons convicted for various offences. The pardons immediately attracted huge controversy and ridicule. Shocked, Justice minister and Attorney-General of the Federation Lateef Fagbemi disclosed that the clemency committee chaired by him was not conclusive and its recommendations were subject to review. Days after, as part of his placatory effort, he announced a multi-agency review committee to take another look at the exercise. Some of the pardons, reports suggested, had been opposed by some of the agencies now included in the review exercise. It was also alleged that the list of pardons had been compromised somewhere along the line. These are, however, untenable excuses.

    If the clemency list had been as thorough as the committee charged with drawing it up had said, they would repose confidence in their work, and would not wilt so embarrassingly in the face of opposition coming from the anti-crime, anti-drug, and anti-graft agencies. By admitting the need for a review, the clemency committee inadvertently indicates it was derelict in carrying out its assignment. In addition, by immediately reversing itself, especially much after consulting with the Council of State in line with the constitution, the administration shows how deeply allergic to criticisms and blowbacks it has become. The clemency hiccup was, however, not the first reversal in the past few years, and may in all probability not be the last. The problem then is not just that a committee, such as the Fagbemi-led clemency committee, had encountered a policy or bureaucratic mishap, or that the administration has become needlessly allergic to public opinion which is sometimes fickle and misplaced; it speaks both to the sometimes tardy operations in the administration’s clearing house and a lack of steely resolve when it really matters.

    The argument that the anti-graft, anti-drug, and anti-crime agencies kicked against some of the pardons is both childish and indefensible. The aim of the prerogative of mercy is not for the president, or a governor as the case may be, to be finicky about the crimes committed by a law breaker but to demonstrate that no matter how serious the crime is, it can be pardoned if the right conditions are met. Furthermore, to suggest that a pardon for a serious crime necessarily vitiates anti-crime efforts is baffling and illogical. It does not. That a drug courier is pardoned does certainly not mean that the efforts of the Nigerian Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) are undermined. The controversy over the pardons is a reflection of how deeply judgemental and unforgiving the Nigerian soul has become. They prefer that only petty criminals should be pardoned. This is dispiriting. Murderers can indeed be pardoned, especially when families of their victims accent, among other things, to their pardon. So, too, drug offenders. Otherwise, the whole exercise would become tokenistic and even nugatory.

    The constitutional provision on prerogative of mercy does sensibly not indicate what crimes should qualify for clemency. This does not, however, mean that the administration should not constitute a multi-agency panel to help ensure that the right or best thing is done. But as far as the law stands, the administration has been guided. Chapter 6, Section 175 of the 1999 Constitution provides thus:

    (1) The President may –

    (a) grant any person concerned with or convicted of any offence created by an Act of the National Assembly a pardon, either free or subject to lawful conditions;

    (b) grant to any person a respite, either for an indefinite or for a specified period, of the execution of any punishment imposed on that person for such an offence;

    (c) substitute a less severe form of punishment for any punishment imposed on that person for such an offence; or

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    (d) remit the whole or any part of any punishment imposed on that person for such an offence or of any penalty or forfeiture otherwise due to the State on account of such an offence.

     (2) The powers of the President under subsection (1) of this section shall be exercised by him after consultation with the Council of State.

    (3) The President, acting in accordance with the advice of the Council of State, may exercise his powers under subsection (1) of this section in relation to persons concerned with offences against the army, naval or air-force law or convicted or sentenced by a court-martial.

    As many analysts have pointed out in recent weeks after the clemency story broke, pardons anywhere are by nature controversial. The October 9 pardons are no less controversial. The Council of State has given its accent to a list it believed the government had drawn up in line with constitutional provisions. In fact, by releasing the list to the public, many families have had their hopes raised. To rejig the list and remove some of the beneficiaries of the pardon is to play ducks and drakes with the feelings of many affected families. It is unfortunate. Should the list be significantly tampered with, it will not underscore the seriousness of the crimes committed by the offenders or the remorse they have shown, or even the appropriateness of their pardons. It will be an indication of how calloused the Nigerian soul has become. It is possible that the list was politicised, or that a few low-level officials allegedly smuggled a few names into it, though this is hard to fathom; but the vacillations do not indicate the resoluteness of the administration nor the supposed great image of the Nigerian.

  • ‘They thought I was a spy’: Journalist’s close shave with death’

    ‘They thought I was a spy’: Journalist’s close shave with death’

    On the fifth anniversary of #EndSARS, photo-journalist Isaac Jimoh Ayodele reflects on the most terrifying moment of his career. Beaten unconscious and seconds away from being set on fire, Ayodele says only his press ID card — and what he calls divine intervention — saved him from the mob’s fury. He shares his experience on that fateful day with Deputy Political Editor RAYMOND MORDI.

    Five years have passed since the #EndSARS protests swept across Nigeria. Still, for The Nation’s photo-journalist Isaac Jimoh Ayodele, the memories of that day in October 2020 remain engraved in his mind — the shouts, the blows, the smell of petrol, and the narrow escape from a mob who were seconds away from burning him alive.

    “When I close my eyes, I still hear someone shouting, ‘Bring the pure water bottle!’” he says. “It took me a few seconds to realise they meant petrol, and that I was on the verge of being killed.”

    A morning like any other

    The morning of October 20, 2020 began like any other. Ayodele, in his sixties, woke before dawn in Mafoluku-Oshodi, the area of Lagos where he lives, in a positive mood.

    “I said my morning prayers, went to the kitchen, and made tea,” he recalls. “After the first cup, I called a colleague who works with the Daily Trust newspaper to ask if there was any breaking news. He said, ‘Nothing yet.’”

    Then, around noon, he heard three sharp gunshots — the kind that don’t get mistaken for anything else. “I said to myself, yes, it’s happening in my area. I quickly put on my clothes, packed my small camera bag, and got ready to leave.”

    His wife and daughter begged him not to go. “They said, ‘Please, don’t go out today.’ Maybe they had a premonition of what was going to take place that fateful day,” Ayodele says softly. “I was irritated by that plea, and I told them, it’s like you don’t know the nature of my job.”

    As a photojournalist, the only thing on his mind was capturing the story of the ongoing #EndSARS protest for posterity. He never expected to become part of the story. However, all that changed soon.

    At the door, he suddenly remembered the ID card he’d left on the table. “That small card later became my saving grace,” he says.

    Into the fire

    Outside, he noticed black smoke billowing from the direction of Makinde Police Station, where angry youths were confronting officers. He ran towards the scene.

    “The air was thick with suspense and expectation. I realised that bringing out my big camera could attract attention, so I used my phone instead.”

    He began taking quick shots of the burning station amidst the shouting youths and the chaos that had overtaken the street. When the tension became unbearable, he moved to an adjoining street and began sending the photos to his newsroom.

    “I was about 10 metres away, still uploading pictures, when I heard someone shout (in Yoruba), ‘Spy! Police! He’s one of them!’”

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    Before he could react, about a dozen young men descended on him. “They said I was a police officer in plain clothes, and that I was filming for the government. They asked for my phone. I tried to explain, but they had already started hitting me.”

    He was kicked to the ground, his cap flying off. “A hard object hit my head, and everything went dark for a while,” he says. “When I opened my eyes, I was on the ground, with people shouting, punching, and stepping on me.”

    ‘Bring the pure water!’

    In the confusion, someone shouted for “pure water.” Ayodele did not comprehend what it was meant for — until the smell hit him.

    “That’s when I realised it was petrol,” he says. “They were going to burn me alive.”

    At that moment, he forced out a desperate plea in English and Yoruba: “I am a journalist! I am not a policeman!”

    A man in the crowd asked for his ID card. With trembling hands, Ayodele fished it out of his pocket. “He looked at it and said, ‘He’s telling the truth. He’s a journalist.’ Then they all shouted, ‘Leave him! Leave him!’”

    One of them told him to run away. “As I tried to stand up, he suddenly screamed, ‘Ole! Ole!’ (thief! thief!)! Again I froze,” Ayodele says. “If I had run, others would have chased me, and I may still end up being killed.

    “So I just walked away slowly, praying under my breath. I was experiencing an admixture of sadness and joy at that moment. The only thought at the back of my mind was to get away from that environment. Somehow, I was feeling like someone who had just woken up from a bad dream.”

    The cap that almost killed him

    Safe at home later that evening, Ayodele examined his cap—and discovered that its insignia indeed resembled that of the Nigeria Police Force. “Mistaken identity nearly cost me my life,” he mused.

    In the process, he had lost his phone, and his camera was badly damaged. His jaw was swollen, and he could hardly open his mouth. “I tried to drink my leftover tea,” he says with a pained smile, “but I couldn’t. The pain was terrible.”

    Funnily enough, even while he was lying on the ground and being beaten, a thought flashed through his mind: who would document his own demise? He remembered his wife’s pleas, his daughter’s instincts, and—he says—divine intervention spared him.

    Afraid that he might be recognised on the street, he changed his clothes before heading to the hospital. “Even in pain, I kept thinking that someone might mistake me for a policeman again.”

    The day the nation bled

    Isaac’s brush with death did not take place in a vacuum. It unfolded within the larger drama of #EndSARS, a youth-led movement against the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) — a police unit long accused of torture, extortion, and extrajudicial killings.

    Across Lagos — and across the country — the #EndSARS protests that day reached their most violent point. What began as a peaceful protest had spiralled into chaos.

    The government had announced SARS’ dissolution a week earlier, but protesters doubted the promise. They demanded not just reform, but justice and accountability for years of abuse.

    That night, soldiers reportedly opened fire on demonstrators at Lekki Toll Gate, an event Amnesty International later described as a “massacre”.

    By the next morning, parts of Lagos were burning. Mobs turned on perceived enemies — including journalists. For many reporters, photographers, and citizen journalists, that day remains etched as both a professional and personal trauma.

    Five years on

    Today, Ayodele still carries the scars — not just the physical ones on his head, but also the psychological trauma that haunts him from time to time.

    “When I hear loud noises, I still flinch,” he admits. “I don’t wear caps with any logo anymore. I’ve learned that in Nigeria, even a piece of clothing can decide your fate.”

    He still believes journalism is a calling worth the risk, but his perspective has changed. “When I cover stories now, I think about my family first,” he says. “My wife’s voice that morning still rings in my head: ‘Don’t go out today’. But duty is duty.”

    For him, the fifth anniversary of #EndSARS isn’t only about remembering those killed or injured — it’s about survival, about the fragile line between witness and victim.

    “That day showed me how thin the line is between truth-telling and dying for it,” he says quietly. “If not for that ID card — and for God — I wouldn’t be here telling you this story.”

    The weight of memory

    As Nigeria reflects on #EndSARS five years later, Ayodele’s experience highlights how the chaos of that period consumed even those who attempted to document the story.

    His survival feels both miraculous and symbolic — a reminder that behind every photograph and headline were real people risking everything to make sure the world saw what was happening.

    He pauses when asked what he took away from that day. After a long silence, he says, “I learned that the truth can put you in danger. But silence can kill faster.”

    Then, as if to reassure himself, he adds, “Five years on, I thank God that I am still alive to tell it.”