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  • Malcolm muggeridge and the end of Christendom (2)

    Malcolm muggeridge and the end of Christendom (2)

    In the first part of this review of the inaugural Blaise Paschal Lectures on Christianity and the University delivered at the University of Waterloo by the great 20th century British journalist, Malcolm Muggeridge, in October, 1978, we observed the distinction that the lecturer made between ‘Christendom’ and the Christianity that can be traced directly to the founder of the faith, the simple and humble carpenter from Nazareth. While Christendom derived its origin from the adoption of the Roman State of Christianity as the formal religion of the empire by Emperor Constantine and has sourced its authority, influence and prestige from state patronage in diverse countries, Jesus stayed far from the palaces of the powerful or the courts of royalty or the citadels of the intellectual elite but turned the first century world upside down through the faith and proselytizing zeal of ordinary men and women with no earthly acclaim or appeal. He declared pointedly that his kingdom was not of this world.

    Malcolm was of the view that though the Christianity traceable to Christ has continued to thrive and turn around lives, the State-centric ‘Christendom’ had come to an end in any meaningful sense as at the time he delivered his Paschal inaugural lectures. Nearly five decades after he rendered his thoughts on the issue, it is difficult to fault Muggeridge’s conclusions – indeed the situation may have worsened for a steadily declining ‘Christendom’. Given his latter conversion to Christianity, first in its Anglican and later Catholic, varieties as he grew older and wearied of the aggressively immoral, pleasure -seeking pursuits of his early youth to middle ages, Muggeridge was fitting to deliver the lectures of a Paschal whose mores and values he had come to identify with.

    Muggeridge was enthusiastic about delivering the inaugural Paschal Lectures because he admired the humble disposition of the French mathematician, physicist, inventor, philosopher and Catholic writer of the 17th Century who refused to be associated with the secular arrogance and disdain for the spiritual and supernatural that was increasingly associated with the life of scholarship and the intellect. As he put it in the lecture, “Although Paschal was a very proud man, but he put aside his pride to bow himself down at the altar rail with his fellow Christians, whomsoever they might be, in perfect brotherliness”. He was of the view that although a superlatively great scientist, Paschal eschewed the overweening arrogance characteristic of many scientists in our contemporary world and “practiced true humility, which is the greatest of all virtues. Indeed, as he points out, humility is the very condition of virtue”.

    One thing that stands out strikingly in Muggeridge’s Blaise Lectures is his passionate love for the written word, which is not surprising given his legendary success as a life-long journalist who practiced mostly in the first half of the 20th century in the United Kingdom, United States, India and the early years of the communist Soviet Union. Referring to what he described as the extraordinary skill and beauty of the language of Paschal’s magisterial apologia in defense of the Christian religion, ‘Les Pensees’, he avers that “I have always had a sort of mania about words – it’s the only consistent and abiding passion I have ever had. For that reason, if for no other, Paschal made an immediate appeal. I think the most wonderful sentence ever penned is in the first chapter of St. John’s Gospel, “In the beginning was the Word…”. How tremendous are its implications”.

    Continuing, he writes enchantingly, “In the beginning was the Word…”. It had to be the Word. It couldn’t be, for instance, “In the beginning was the video tape…”, “In the beginning celluloid…”, or “In the beginning was a microphone…” – none of that. In the beginning was the Word, and one of the things that appalls me and saddens me about the world today is the condition of words. Words can be polluted even more dramatically and drastically than Rivers and land and sea. There has been a terrible destruction of words in our time”. He laments the easy pollution of words like love, freedom or liberation and submits that “The truth is that if we lose the meaning of words, it is far more serious in practice than losing our wealth or our power… Without our words, we are helpless and defenseless; their misuse is our undoing. For instance, we speak of liberalizing our abortion laws, which means simply facilitating more abortions. Or we speak of reforming our marriage laws, when we mean creating more facilities for breaking more and more marriages”.

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    He argued that the beautiful lucidity of his mind and the wonderful clarity of Paschal’ s thought puts a lie to the widespread notion today that believers are credulous, sentimental people and that it is materialists and scientists and humanists who have a sceptical mind. Rather, he contends that “I believe myself that the age we are living in now will go down in history as one of the most credulous ever. How could anyone look at television advertisements without reaching that conclusion? All those extraordinary potions that are offered to make your face beautiful, those things you can swallow to make your breath fragrant, are all apparently believed in to the extent that people buy the products…here, in the Western world, the most highly educated, the most progressive, the most advanced part of the earth, there is a reservoir of credulity beyond the wildest dreams of a wizened witch doctor from Africa”.

    Muggeridge avers that Paschal was the first to warn about the deleterios consequences of the exaggeration of the importance of the human ego “in contradistinction to the cross , symbolizing the ego’s immolation” and the romantic, arrogance -derived expectation at the time of the Enlightenment “that man, triumphant, would bring to pass that earthly paradise whose groves of academe would ensure the realization forever of peace, plenty and beautitude in practice. But what a nightmare of wars, famine, and folly was to result therefrom”. He deplores the scholastic and philosophical arrogance responsible for the celebrated presumed ‘death of God’ at the Enlightenment noting significantly that it was Nietzsche who first announced the death of God and that “Then, growing bolder, he went on to insist that God had been murdered by his creature, man, this being, according to Nietzsche, the most glorious and promising event in human history”.

    He then continues ruefully that “Not surprisingly, Nietzsche ended in an insane asylum in Venice and continued his observations about the death of God from a padded cell. But in a world that has itself gone mad like him, in excess of arrogance and self-conceit ,his ravings continue to be seriously regarded, as for that matter do those of other lunatics down to and including the Marquis de Sade”. It is thus appropriate that Muggeridge quotes from the American critic, Leslie Fiedler, in portraying the pathetic dilemma of contemporary man, particularly Western man, thus, “God has been abolished by the media pundits and other promoters of our new demythologized divinity. We continue to insist that change is progress, self-indulgence is freedom and novelty is originality. In these circumstances it’s difficult to avoid the conclusion that Western man has decided to abolish himself, creating his own boredom out of his own affluence, his own vulnerability out of his own strength, his own impotence out of his own erotomania, himself blowing the trumpet that brings the walls of his own city tumbling down”.

  • ADC swimming against the tide

    ADC swimming against the tide

    Of all the things driving the unstable African Democratic Congress (ADC), the most potent is the desire to dethrone President Bola Tinubu. Established in 2005, the fringe party has no state or local government under its control. It has only two members in the House of Representatives. In each of the presidential elections it participated in since 2007, including in 2019 when ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo adopted it for his Coalition for Nigeria Movement, it never got up to 100,000 votes. It consistently underperformed, lacked ideological clarity, and has had a perverse fondness for being prostituted. It is to this party that the Atiku Abubakar-led coalition has turned for refuge and succour. In preparation for the 2027 elections, particularly the presidential poll, the ADC’s new leaders hope to change their party’s permissiveness and trajectory. To provoke that change, however, they will have to do a character surgery on the party’s new helmsmen and purge the party itself of the lethargy that had debilitated it for about two decades.

    The party lacks ambition. So, those who have taken it over are desperate and eager to inject it with a horse dose of ambition. They see the party as the last straw they must clutch at, and the next presidential poll as the very last they stand any chance of participating in and winning. Apart from Alhaji Atiku, other new ADC leaders are former senate president David Mark, former Osun State governor and Internal Affairs minister Rauf Aregbesola, former Kaduna State governor Nasir el-Rufai, and former Rivers State governor Rotimi Amaechi, among many others. Former Anambra State governor and Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate in the 2023 poll continues his curious straddle, unsure whether to fully commit himself to a party he strongly doubts their bona fides. He is naïve to think they would be sincere enough to give him the presidential ticket. Former Ekiti State governor Kayode Fayemi continues to snap at the heels of the APC and the president in particular, but he has been reluctant to openly and hastily commit himself to the ADC. He wants to see which way the cat jumps before he commits political suicide.

    These leaders, whether they are still in the closet or have openly committed themselves to the ADC cause, will do their utmost to ply the party with huge funds to make it competitive. They are scared of founding a new party and labouring to prime it for 2027. They are unsure they have the competence to run a hijacked party, and so they will do everything to prevent the adopted party from imploding. What might undo the party and probably cause it to unravel is, however, intrinsic to the personalities and character of the new leaders, not money. Most Nigerians already view the party as coalescing around the worldview and ambition of the former vice president. They are not wrong. Alhaji Atiku might have been unable to dominate the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for more than three election cycles, and whimsically for as long as he wished, but in the ADC, he is primus inter pares. The PDP is finding it hard to secure a southern candidate for the coming poll, for the ADC, it is much harder. But should the coalition defy Alhaji Atiku and secure the nomination for a southern candidate in alignment with conventional wisdom, they would find him a harder sell, for the party is unlikely to generate the momentum needed to drive the candidate to victory or aggregate a consortium of altruistic financiers and thinkers which that candidate would need to stand any chance of success.

    The ADC’s dilemma is not helped by the person and character of Alhaji Atiku. He has shown over the decades that he looks after number one with unbridled fanaticism. He left the PDP because of his presidential ambition which he thought was being jeopardised by finicky and irresolute party leaders. He would be mystified to be asked to help build the ADC only to cede the nomination to a southern candidate. It is not in his character to surrender anything priceless for the common good. More importantly, for someone so fanatical about winning the presidency some day, it is strange that he has never really given a thought to the stabilising dynamics of preserving national unity through rotation or zoning of the presidency. Machiavellian through and through, he is in sum unconcerned about others, unconcerned about the stability of the country, and is inured to the feelings and patriotic actions of others, not to talk of having the capacity to adopt or promote lofty principles.

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    But he is not the only exponent of realpolitik in the new party. Mallam el-Rufai and Mr Aregbesola are cut from the same cloth, and are the archetypal politicians: opinionated, conceited, and verbally violent. Both owe no loyalty to anyone or idea. The ADC acting chairman, Sen. Mark, has sometimes been cast as a hero of democracy on account of his involvement in finding a solution to the succession impasse that crippled the country in the closing days of the late President Musa Yar’Adua’s life. If he didn’t see any advantage for himself and those who surrounded him, he would have abandoned any pretext to patriotism as eagerly as he colluded to undermine the final moments of the former military head of state Ibrahim Babangida’s transition programme. He undermined the consummation of the said transition and helped in no small measure to derail MKO Abiola’s crowning after the 1993 presidential poll. The 77-year-old senator is no democrat; in fact, despite presiding over the Nigerian Senate for eight years from 2007, there was no time he said anything profound, or took inspiring step to fortify democracy.

    Mr Amaechi does not necessarily bring up the rear in the ADC leaders’ display of lack of character. He nevertheless ranks fairly well for entirely the wrong reasons except in one area where he is incomparable. Some Nigerians think Mallam el-Rufai arrogant in part because he views politics through the prism of Fulani exceptionalism. Yes, he is irredeemably conceited, but he is no match for Mr Amaechi. The former Rivers governor has no unique gifts, whether rhetorical or intellectual, and he demonstrates no fidelity to truth; but he is proud, dismissive of others, and projects messianic propensity. Eight years as speaker of the state legislature, eight years as governor, and another eight years as Transportation minister have dulled his senses for comparison and proportion, and inculcated in him the delusion of grandeur. But like other ADC leaders, he does not know he is plagued by character deficit.

    Overall, none of the ADC leaders can be pinned down to any philosophy or ideology, or any unique idea of Nigeria for that matter. Character in politics or leadership goes beyond the dictionary definition that equates it with “the mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual.” It instead and more poignantly involves the possession of the “internal resources of strong moral compass, resilience and self-awareness”, and the “demonstration of integrity, responsibility, and commitment to ethical behavior” that ultimately manifest in great and lasting impact on the society. Two weeks ago, this column argued that the ADC had a long way to go to transform into a serious political party of any kind. If it managed to transcend its legal troubles, the piece said, a feat that might yet prove herculean, it would need political impresarios to turn the party into a full-fledged political organisation anchored on discernible and coherent ideological platform. It must, therefore, find a way to prove that it can build itself into a party inspired by the noble virtues of justice and equity, concluded the column.

    A little more has become known of the party since that piece was published. A few political juggernauts previously sitting on the fence have thrown in their lot with the party; but so far, there has been no indication whatsoever of any of the new helmsmen being associated with noble or extraordinary ideas. Mallam el-Rufai is still embroiled in controversy in the SDP, which he threw into turmoil once he got into their midst; the surreptitious Kayode Fayemi, who is still expected to join the party, is still throwing darts at the president and the ruling party on the sidelines; and Mr Aregbesola has thrown himself into the thick of the street fighting he is used to in order to sow confusion and distrust in the Southwest.

    If by some miracle the party acquires a measure of stability, and manages to attract an influx of stranded political souls, it will nevertheless still have to struggle to hold its centre together during electioneering as well as labour even more tediously to hold on to its converts as it tries to proselytise around the country selling political sure cures against hunger and northern and south-eastern marginalisation. The auguries are not good at all for the ADC. In the end, if the coalition leaders are not forced to take poison by going for a new party altogether, it will need tons of money to canonise the ADC and beguile the electorate. When the APC was on the back foot in 2015, it had the good fortune of crystallising its messages around the freshly varnished former president Buhari. The ADC does not boast of any such centralising figure, flawed or not, and may be unable to find one in the near term. But it has many makeshift magicians in its ranks who can perhaps conjure a few genetically modified rabbits from their worn hats.

  • Benjamin Kalu’s failed ‘Indigeneship’ Bill

    Benjamin Kalu’s failed ‘Indigeneship’ Bill

    Last Tuesday, House of Representatives deputy speaker, Benjamin Kalu, withdrew the Indigene Status by Birth Bill (HB.2057) sponsored by him and some six other lawmakers. He anchored the withdrawal on concerns raised by the public and intervention by the National Institute for Legislative and Democratic Studies (NILDS) which identified contradictions in the bill. It is unlikely the bill, popularly referred to as Indigeneship Bill, will ever be presented again. Not only was it not well thought out, in a country still contending with the vestiges of unitary system bequeathed Nigeria after the 1966 coup d’etat, it also attempted to take the bitterly controversial unitary system a notch higher. The controversy the bill stirred was so intense that some sceptics described it as a bill primarily designed for a hostile takeover of Lagos. Hon. Kalu did the sensible thing by withdrawing a thoroughly bad bill flexing notoriety.

    The Bill had hoped to create a pathway for any Nigerian to claim indigene status of a state as long as he had resided in that state for 10 years and paid tax, or was born in that state, or had been married for five years to an indigene of that state. Had the bill sailed through, it would have amended Section 31 of the 1999 Constitution. The sponsors initially defended their action by suggesting that the bill hoped “to promote national unity, equity, and inclusiveness among all Nigerians, regardless of where they reside.” Even though it was not indicated, and no one voiced it, the bill probably drew inspiration from the political sociology of the United States. The sponsors were, however, guilty of tunnel vision. Nigeria’s turbulent history, including its long-lasting resistance to every effort to legislate and coerce unity, should have restrained the sponsors from their exuberance. The US is not a good example at all, and in any case, that country is now mired in ‘birther’ controversies and jousting with birth tourism. Indeed, rather than get more multicultural, the world appears to be relapsing into far-right nationalism.

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    The Bill was irredeemable from the outset. From the First Republic to the Fourth, most Nigerians know that Nigeria’s founding paradigm was untenable. Everything ancestral and cultural about Nigeria violently wars against the bill. In addition, even if the bill had passed, it would not have created the utopia the sponsors dreamt. The problem assailing Nigerian unity is too deeply structural and cultural to yield to simplistic palliatives. Decades of military rule have merely worsened the crisis, and all panaceas, including the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, have not made any dent on it. Indeed, whether intended or not, the bill would only have rewarded ethnic groups with proclivity for migration. Nigeria is already deeply embroiled in a contest of wills between indigenes and settlers in many cities and states, especially over economic and political rights, and so far there has been no lasting solution. To design a bill that legitimises and encourages those migrations is to ignore the tragic lessons of other countries.

    Rather than derive inspiration from the US where longtime residence opens political doors – not even indigene status – Hon. Kalu should have studied why the social and political engineering of Yugoslavia failed, why Canada, Switzerland, and Belgium have struck a delicate ‘ethnic’ balance in their constitutions, why Russia and Ukraine are at war, and why Nigeria’s former colonial master, Britain, bequeathed a constitution that did not seek to obliterate Nigeria’s cultural dividing lines or create pathways for ambitious ethnic irredentists to the appropriation of other people’s ancestral lands. And since unfortunately the 1966 coup imposed a unitary system upon Nigeria through a half-baked political engineering supposedly designed to promote unity, the country has reeled from one existential and structural crisis to another. During the decolonisation process, Britain recognised that it was attempting to do the impossible by welding together vastly differing nations that were at different stages of civilisation. Most of them shared little in common. To defuse tension and address concerns, the colonisers built a number of safeguards into the Independence constitution. Since those safeguards were obliterated following presumptions that what Nigeria needed was more ‘unity’, the country has not known peace.

    Hon. Kalu and his co-sponsors did not do their homework well. Like the 1966 coupists, they assumed that what Nigeria needed was more unity rather than structural equilibrium based on ethnic nationalities. They thought less about the fears of communities burdened by heavy migrations from obtruding cultures attempting to superimpose their ways of living on host communities, and aggressive groups not averse to supplanting or dominating their hosts. It was those fears Hon. Kalu overlooked that triggered the controversies around the ‘Indigeneship’ Bill. If the deputy speaker had done his homework well, he would have abandoned the fool’s errand he sent himself and applied his skills to more rewarding lawmaking. In the end, the bill had no redeeming virtue at all. He might have meant well, as his supporters said, and might have genuinely wanted to find a solution to the ethnic distrust and animosity seething below the surface. But he almost naively exacerbated the problem by adopting a one-dimensional approach probably influenced by his background to tackle a fundamental problem affecting the country’s superstructure.

    History has shown that racial or ethnic nationalism follows cycles. Whenever it rears its head, it engenders chaos or, in extreme cases, war. Suggesting that ethnic animosity fully explains the resistance to migration, political miscegenation, or cultural dilution is counterfactual. Nationalism reared its head in World War II, and is again suffusing the politics of Eastern Europe and the United States. Nationalism undergirded and shaped Brexit, and at different times and different places had led to horrific genocides and pogroms. Rwanda, Argentina, Yugoslavia, and Belgian Congo (DRC) are typical examples. Nationalism is a volcano. If it is dormant today, there is no proof it cannot erupt on a hypothetical tomorrow. As many historians know, the story of humanity is one of migrations, supplantation, domination, and wars and genocides, sometimes interspersed with extraordinary but brief eras of development and discoveries. Few regions or continents have enjoyed centuries of unbroken peace and development.

    In the 1950s and 1960s, Nigeria’s political titans engaged in recriminations over ethnic domination until a civil war broke out. Decades later, neither the anxieties that triggered war nor the political recriminations that fouled ethnic trust have abated. It was, therefore, bad timing, especially in the context of the tension generated by the 2023 polls, that Hon. Kalu sponsored a bill interpreted as a deliberate machination for ethnic domination. He should have been more sensitive. And in the light of stirrings in some parts of Southern and West Africa, where nationalism is on a gentle but steady and invidious rise, it is urgent to develop systems, structures and solutions that address the country’s national question rather than resort to knee-jerk legislative or political responses that deepen the country’s contradictions.

  • APC: The task before Yilwatda

    APC: The task before Yilwatda

    Unlike Ambassador Umar Damagum, acting National Chairman of the highly decimated Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Barrister Julius Abure of fragmented Labour Party (LP), and retired Brig.-Gen. David Mark of the crisis-ridden African Democratic Congress (ADC), Prof. Nentawe Yilwatda, the new National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), is presiding over a largely united and cohesive party.

    Up to now, there is no obvious faction in the ruling party, despite the frantic attempts by propagandists and social media miscreants to allude to imaginary cleavages arising from the memory of rested legacy parties that fused into a formidable platform.

    The major test for the former university teacher and ex-Humanitarian, Disaster Management and Social Development Minister would come during the state party congresses and nominations for elective positions ahead of 2027 polls.

    Nomination politics always drive the parties in power to the edge in Nigeria. Succession politics at the sub-national level often unleashes tension. In the past, faulty state congresses led to a huge electoral misfortune. The court did not spare the platform.

    The greatest asset of the new chairman is his integrity. Either as a teacher, electoral officer, politician or minister, no baggage has been attributed to him. He narrowly lost the Plateau State governorship election in 2023. One of his assignments now may be to woo the man who defeated him, Caleb Mutfwang, and persuade him to abandon the distressed party on the Plateau for the APC.

    Yilwatda’s choice was a product of wide consultation among the leaders of the party: President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Vice President Kashim Shettima, members of the National Caucus, the National Working Committee (NWC), the National Executive Committee (NEC), and the Progressives Governors’ Forum (PGF), the most influential bloc in the party.

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    To succeed, he would need the active support and cooperation of these party organs and structures.

    In 11 years, APC has produced seven chairmen. The turnover is high, suggesting  leadership instability, a manifestation of internal squabbles, a clash of influence and ego, lack of a shared vision, derailment from a steady mission, lack of trust and confidence-building, as well as diminishing emotional intelligence on the part of party leadership. It is worse in PDP which has produced 18 national chairmen in 27 years.

    Yilwatda’s predecessors are former governors who were also party leaders at the state level. There is no party in Nigeria that jokes with the cult of governors, especially when they are jointly pushing a collective agenda. Over time, the fear of the governors has become the beginning of wisdom. Thus, when just five governors declined support for the PDP in 2023, the party lapsed into a decline. It has not recovered from the resultant fall.

    Perhaps, serving and former governors were selected as national chairmen from that rank to make communications easy, with them as the intermediaries between the party and the governors’ forum. The belief might be that as serving or former governors, they fully understand the language of their colleagues. Experience has, however, shown a glaring gap between expectation and reality.

    Apart from the erstwhile interim chairman and former Osun State Governor Bisi Akande, the tenures of his five successors were marked by controversies. A section of the party was fed up with the John Odigie-Oyegun leadership midway, despite supporting his emergence against the wishes of President Muhammadu Buhari’s camp. Odigie-Oyegun and Buhari appeared to have previously parted ways in the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) before the logic and urgency of mergers/fusion of legacy parties brought them together in 2014.

    His successor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, also ran into turbulence. His albatross came through his former colleagues in the governors’ forum. At first, he was dancing to their cultish tune. But as he could not balance the influence of the powerful governors and the demands for equity and internal democracy, the governors removed the rug from under his feet.

    In those days of the Buhari administration, some APC governors indulged in anti-party activities by sponsoring governorship and parliamentary candidates on the platform of opposition parties. An action man, Oshiomhole slammed suspension on them. But his sanctions caused his downfall. They retaliated by insisting on his ouster. The President and Party Leader, Buhari, was aloof.

    Oshiomhole’s estranged godson, turned adversary at home, Godwin Obaseki, with who he had a running battle, moved against him at the ward level. The national chairman was suspended. As the crises multiplied, Oshiomhole was shoved aside for a caretaker chairman to take over.

    Yobe State Governor Mai Mala Buni’s mandate was to restore sanity, unite the party, and reconcile aggrieved chieftains within six months. Instead of doing his job within the stipulated time and bowing out honourably, he became a sit-tight party manager for two years.

    After the elongated interim period, Buhari brought in Abdullahi Adamu, who had stood by him as a senator when the Bukola Saraki-led Senate was not on good terms with his presidency. He never aspired to be chairman. What the former Nasarawa State governor could now be remembered for was that under his tenure, zoning was nearly jettisoned when Senate President Ahmad Lawan suddenly surfaced as Buhari’s anointed presidential candidate ahead of the 2023 general election. It was disputed by governors who stormed the Aso Villa to confront the former president. But Buhari disowned the plot.

    There might be a nexus between that episode and the hidden circumstances that led to his departure from the national secretariat of the party.

    However, the circumstances that led to Dr. Abdullahi Ganduje’s sudden resignation appear to be in the realm of conjecture, although he said he stepped down on health grounds.

    In contemporary Nigeria, the emergence of party leadership at the national and state levels is being linked with the preferences of presidents and governors to the extent that party conventions and processes are no longer competitive but mere coronation ceremonies.

    Unlike the processes that threw up Chief Adisa Akinloye as chairman of the defunct National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in the Second Republic, Ambassador Babagana Kingibe and Chief Tony Anenih as chairmen of Social Democratic Party (SDP), Chief Tom Ikimi and Dr. Hammed Kusamotu as chairmen of National Republic Convention (NRC) in the Third Republic, and Chief Solomon Lar of the PDP at the beginning of this dispensation, the selection of party chairmen from the Olusegun Obasanjo days has been the sole affair of the President. Also, state chairmen are candidates of the governors.

    Ruling parties, from 2002, never had the opportunity of customary, internal healthy rivalry; the wheeling and dealings, the rigorous mobilisation and campaigns by chairmanship aspirants, the debate on issues, the critical media portrayals, the enunciation of their manifestos at the convention, and the attendant shared conviviality.

    The old element of selection that is visible in the current guided process is the wide consultation and strategic scrutiny that heralded the choice of Yilwatda, a candidate without blemish. The approach is built on zoning of the slot to a particular region. Yilwatda’s choice fulfilled the ethnic, zonal and religious balance.

    The onus is on the professor to justify the trust reposed in him and remain loyal to the party. Yilwatda should be a man of progressive intentions and ideas for him to make an impact as chairman of the biggest party in Nigeria. APC should migrate from being a mere vehicle for seeking power to the pedestal of ideology so that it can fulfil the criteria of identity, form, content and predictability.

    He has promised to unite the party. In states where there are crises, he should not delay reconciliation. Concessions should be given, and consensus should be built. Complaints by aggrieved members should not be brought to the court until the internal mechanism for conflict resolution has been fully explore.

    Yilwatda, who is expected to work with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and other party stalwarts, should try to keep the party united and avert defections that may be blown out of proportion by the adversarial media.

    Whenever there was a defection from the APC, no matter how insignificant, it was usually blown out of proportion by a section of the media. It is typically referred to as an implosion.But even the gale of defections from the opposition to the ruling party has never received due attention from such media outlets. Instead, it was condemned by the same biased section of the media, with the defectors to the ruling party being label as polticians without principle.

    As observed by the ‘man of timber and calibre,’ Dr. Ozumba Mbadiwe, in Nigeria, politicians like to gravitate towards winning parties.  Defections can throw up concerns about the harmonisation of party structures. The party’s membership register should be updated.

    The chairman should ensure that newcomers into the fold are accommodated and accorded a sense of belonging. A governor who defects automatically becomes the leader of the state chapter. There is also a need for the old members to adjust to the leadership change. Collaboration should triumph over exclusion or marginalisation.

    The chairman needs to make the zonal chapters very strong so that regional matters within the party can be easily settled at that level. The two deputy chairmen and six vice chairmen should be active as coordinators at the regional levels. It may not be a bad idea for Yilwatda to embark on the tour of the six regions to feel the pulse of the chapters.

    Next year, there will be a major test for the APC leadership during the Ekiti and Osun State governorship polls. While the party should consolidate on its profile in Ekiti, it needs to support the bid of the Osun State chapter to bounce back. The greatest task before the party chairman is the re-election of President Tinubu.

    Under Yilwatda, the party should be supreme, and the leadership should show discipline. Exemplariness must trickle down from the top.

    The scramble for the limited elective slots by many qualified, competent and loyal party chieftains often spark stiff competition, antagonism and protracted conflict. Post-primary crisis should always be addressed with speed.

    Also, accommodation should be found for those who lost elections within the larger, collective interest of the party.

    State chapters should be allowed by the party leadership to choose from the options of consensus, direct and indirect primaries, based on their peculiar circumstances.

    APC governorments at the state level would do the part a lot of service if they consistently perform to expectation. The state chapters should constantly assess the policies and programmes of the state governments to ensure that they reflect their campaign promises, party programmes and public expectation.

  • Like Falcons, like Madugu

    Like Falcons, like Madugu

    President Bola Ahmed Tinubu doesn’t ever fail to excite this writer with his concise approach to issues. The President does things out of strong conviction. He hardly plays to the gallery. No wonder most of his presidential decisions run against the grail. The President gave nothing away with his countenance over what laid in wait for the worthy sports ambassadors. Obviously, the President is a very good listener as epitomised during the Meet the President’s session on Monday, which erupted into a roar when he announced the country’s ‘thank you’ gifts to the girls one has always described here as magicians.

    The President on Monday announced monetary rewards, approving the Naira equivalent of $100,000 (approximately N153 million) for each player and $50,000 (N75.6 million) for each member of the coaching crew, totalling N4,503,600,000. He also conferred the national honour of Officer of the Order of the Niger (OON) on each member of the victorious squad, as well as a three-bedroom apartment each to go with.

    The President’s directive that the girls be paid their outstanding allowances till the semi-final was the elixir which propelled the girls to lift the trophy. One is, therefore, alarmed by the outcry over the President’s gift which would serve as the fillip for the game going forward. France, a renowned soccer nation recognised her World Cup-winning team in 2018, not because teachers or civil servants were unimportant, but because exceptional contributions demand exceptional recognition. For the girls who played and gave out their best, the rewards shouldn’t have been given anything less than what the President announced. I’m glad that the President said the figures should be paid in the equivalent of its value in naira.

    One is particularly thrilled that goalkeeper Ann Chiejene benefited from this largesse because she once manned the goalpost during her heydays with the Super Falcons carrying a two-month pregnancy. The President’s gesture to the girls whose backgrounds have been shrouded in secrecy has now provided impetus where they would now become the subject of discussions globally during this transfer window for the new European season. Need I remind you that these girls are breadwinners for their families – ignoring the societal vices around them to eke a living playing football to international levels for both their clubs and country.

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    One develops goose pimples each time the country’s national anthem is sung at sporting competitions all over the world and a Nigerian or group of Nigerians mounts the podium to celebrate excellence and change the narrative that something good can come out of Nigeria. How much is the N4.5 billion compared to the traction the girls have brought, with the international media celebrating our great nation that is being propelled by the Renewed Hope mantra? Take a bow great Super Falcons!

    GTI Asset Management & Trust Limited in a statement described the Falcons’ victory as a testament to the indomitable Nigerian spirit — a spirit defined by resilience, passion, and the ability to rise to the occasion when it matters most, pointing out that: “This triumph is not just a sporting milestone; it is an inspiration. Let us harness this moment to invest further in the beautiful game because it helps foster national pride and project a positive image for Nigeria on the global stage.”

    What the President has done with the government’s gesture, I dare say, brings back the beauty of the game to the girl child around the 774 Local Government Areas (LGAs), that there are other platforms to change their destinies through sports. Parents in these LGAs would be happy to allow their kids to play the beautiful game, citing the president’s game-changing gifts.

  • 2026, 2027 and the PBAT, BAO model

    2026, 2027 and the PBAT, BAO model

    Given the perceived distance of the federal government from the grassroots where communities are located in the states and local government areas and the yet unrealized efforts to ensure effective financial and administrative autonomy to guarantee the efficacy of local government service delivery, the states still remain the most critical units of governance for the impactful delivery of democratic dividends to the populace. Thus, the performance and developmental strides of State governors are central to the electoral prospects not only of the chief executives at the state level but also of President Tinubu and other contenders for power at the centre in the forthcoming critical 2027 presidential elections. An interesting feature of centre-state relations under the Tinubu presidency over the last two years is the near quadrupling of revenue allocation to the states as a consequence of the courageous removal of fuel subsidy by the President immediately after being sworn into office.

    It is thus not surprising that most governors, including those belonging to opposition parties, have hardly expressed any negative disposition to the re-election of the President for a second term while we have had the wholesale transplantation of the governance and party structures of previously solidly Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) states in Delta and Akwa-Ibom to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). In taking such a radical step of drastically reshaping the partisan colouration of their states, governors Sheriff Oborevwori and Umo Eno, respectively, and the political leadership of their states have cited the favourable inclination of the Tinubu administration to their states and the resultant developmental outcomes.

    Ekiti State, one of the most politically sophisticated and educationally advanced sub-national jurisdictions in the country, offers an example of the electorally significant impact of centre-state amity for the re-election prospects both of President Tinubu at the presidency and Governor Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji (BAO) in the critical South-West state. Although both Tinubu and Oyebanji belong to the APC, the truth of the matter is that the struggle for electoral dominance in the state has always been a grim and tight battle between the progressives in their various mutations from the defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD), the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to the current APC and the PDP. Under Governor Oyebanji ‘s leadership astuteness, however, we are witnessing a rare coalescence of disparate political forces across party lines in support of continuity in office of Tinubu and BAO.

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    Next year, Oyebanji heads to the polls to seek the electorate’s mandate for a second term, while aggrieved political elements within and beyond the ruling APC are already experimenting with possible coalitions to oust Tinubu from power two years before elections are due at the centre in 2027. It is obvious from unfolding events that Ekiti is one state where the politics of coalition to oust the incumbents at the centre and in the state, especially through the emerging mechanism of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), is not flying. An indication to this effect was the mass rally held in Ado-Ekiti on Monday, at which ex-governors of Ekiti State in this dispensation and diverse political leaders across partisan divides, in an unprecedented manner, emphatically and unanimously endorsed Tinubu and BAO for a second term in office.

    At the event, ex-governors Niyi Adebayo of the APC, as well as Ayo Fayose and Segun Oni, both of the PDP, cast their lot in support of the re-election of the President and the governor, with the governor of neighbouring Ondo State, Mr Lucky Aiyedatiwa, on hand to lend his contributory voice. The three ex-governors are no pushovers in the politics of Ekiti State. Although BAO’s immediate predecessor, Dr Kayode Fayemi, was not at the event, he was present at an earlier meeting where key stakeholders in Ekiti State had voiced their support for the re-election of President Tinubu and BAO. A former Deputy governor of the State and federal law maker, Senator Biodun Olujimi, of the PDP, a senior lawyer, Mr Obafemi Adewale (SAN) and a state lawmaker of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Babatunde Omotola, also defected to the APC and declared their support for the re-election of the President and the governor.

    Federal and state legislators, as well as Federal Executive Council members and heads of federal agencies from the state, members of the executive committees both of the government and the party, local government functionaries, among others, all voted in support of the motion for the re-election of Tinubu and BAO. A critical factor in this rare near-unanimity behind the re-election of the duo in a state with highly enlightened and critical minds like Ekiti is the consensus of opinion as regards the exemplary performance of the governor as he heads into his third year in office in October. A non-performing governor would have been a political liability both to the President and to himself. But in diverse sectors from agriculture, education, health, security, road infrastructure and rural development, among others, the indelible and verifiable imprints of the BAO administration are obvious for all to see.

    In the face of biting food inflation, for instance, the aggressive promotion of higher agricultural productivity has been the preoccupation of many state governments, with Ekiti State being one of those at the vanguard in this regard. The BAO administration has resuscitated moribund farm settlements established in the state by the Obafemi Awolowo administration in the first Republic, resulting in the renovation of agricultural buildings and furnishing of upgraded accommodation for youths mobilised into farming at Erifun farming settlement. While about 200 participants have been empowered to go into horticultural production, about 1000 youths have been engaged in the Bring-Back-the-Youth into Agric Program, cultivating various crops in land clusters across the state.

    Diverse quantities of assorted agricultural inputs, including small-scale processing equipment, day-old chicks, poultry feed, bags of maize, fish seeds, goats, and pigs, have continually been distributed to hundreds of farmers in the state, while seven wet markets have been upgraded and several kilometres of farm roads upgraded. Following the payment of its counterpart funding of about N1 billion, the Rural Access and Agricultural Marketing Project (RAAMP) commenced the intensive construction/rehabilitation of rural roads across the state. The administration created at least 32 farm clusters in different parts of the state for communities and cooperatives, with the state government bearing the cost of land clearing in addition to other support gestures to activate and sustain the clusters.

    In recognition of the people’s fervent love for education, the BAO administration has recruited about 2000 teachers for primary and secondary schools while expending N14 billion in the renovation and construction of 203 public schools, payment of about N700 million as Running Grants to all public schools in the state and paying over N1.2 billion in examination fees for about 150,000 students who wrote junior and secondary school exams since 2023. The administration also paid over N2.5 billion as counterpart funding for the 2022 and 2023 Universal Basic Education Commission, procured instructional materials for primary schools worth about N174.1 million while paying car and housing loans, upgrading graduate teachers in primary schools to level 16 and provided diverse training and capacity building interventions for about 1,700 teachers.

    Within its first two years in office, the BAO administration had disbursed about N400 million as grants to about 922 micro, small and medium enterprises in addition to sponsoring certificates issued by the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) of 5, 400 micro, small and medium enterprises. The BAO administration secured an $80million facility from the African Development Bank (AfDB) for the Ekiti Knowledge Zone, which is projected to generate no less than 12,000 jobs in the state in the first instance. It also provided $100,000 each to 10 Cooperatives in partnership with USADF, secured N1 billion funding for the Ekiti Cooperative Industry and partnered with Access Bank to facilitate credit facilities worth N1 billion to boost small-scale businesses for women.

    Apart from investing massively in the provision and upgrading of rural and urban health facilities, the BAO administration is also executing expansive road rehabilitation/construction projects such as the Ikere-Igbara Odo; Igbara-Odo to Ikogosi; Ikere to Ilawe; Ikogosi Township roads;   Ikere-Ise-Emure to Eporo road; Ado Ekiti to Iworoko to Ifaki Dual Carriageway (federal road); Ifaki-Efon Alaaye; Omu-Ijelu, Ijurin-Ipoti, Ikole–Ara-Isinbode road and construction of Ekiti ring road among several others. The administration’s expenditure on security, including the re-equipping and re-arming of the Amotekun Corp has made the state safer than BAO met it while it has also invested substantially in upgrading the power supply infrastructure, including the supply of transformers to scores of communities across the state. At its last State Executive Council meeting this week, the BAO administration approved over N18.5 billion for various projects encompassing road construction, electricity supply, water, sanitation and hygiene, agriculture and security, among others.

    But then, the demonstrated performance in diverse sectors is not in itself sufficient to harness the wide scope of support that BAO has won for himself and President Tinubu. After all, it is all too easy for opposition politicians to deny and denounce accomplishments that even the blind can see and the deaf can hear. What is particularly outstanding about the governance style of BAO is the wisdom and maturity with which he has steered the affairs of a state that had been all too often associated in the past with political bitterness, acrimony and violence. Even his political adversaries testify to his disarming humility, patience, simplicity and modesty. This has no doubt ensured the harmonious relationship he has had with his predecessor and benefactor, Dr Fayemi.

    It is also why even erstwhile bitter political opponents are willing to bury their differences and join BAO in putting the best interests of the state above partisan considerations. The ex-governors who have endorsed the governor and the President for a second term have their fair share of disagreements and contrasting views and perceptions, but he has succeeded in getting them to transcend these through uncommon tact, diplomacy and dexterity. As ex-Governor Fayose declared at the rally, “I must commend Governor Oyebanji ‘s humility and his rare leadership style. He deserves another term. I hereby endorse, without reservation, President Bola Tinubu for a second term”. Echoing similar sentiments, Engineer Oni declared, “I’m here to say the Nigeria of our dreams is coming gradually. And since the Nigeria of our dreams is coming, the Ekiti of our dreams is near. One thing Governor Oyebanji has done better than us is his ability to bring people together…By working together, we can make Ekiti great and a state of our dreams”.

    A number of BAO’s associates are said to have deserted the APC for opposition parties but the impact of such has been as visible as pebbles in a vast ocean of positive approbation of his efforts. It is interesting that the endorsement of BAO and PBAT for a second term transcends the political class and includes the public and private sector workforce, artisan groups, trade associations, civil society organisations and transport unions. Some leaders in the state aver that the people are unhappy with the PBAT federal government because of the dilapidated state of many federal roads across the state. But the sophisticated people of Ekiti State realize that an administration that is just two years in office cannot justly be blamed for a situation that has steadily deteriorated over the last two decades.

  • Thoughts on Nigeria Prize for Literature’s list

    Thoughts on Nigeria Prize for Literature’s list

    This year’s the Nigeria Prize for Literature longlist showcases a diverse range of narratives. In some of them, ghosts and otherworldly figures are characters. 

     Two of the eleven authors on the list are past winners. Chika Unigwe won the prize in 2012 and Abubakar Adam Ibrahim won it in 2016.

    Of the eleven books, I have read nine and had a taste of the other two, Ayo Oyeku’s ‘Petrichor’ and Nikki May’s ‘This Motherless Land’.

    Ungwe is nominated for ‘The Middle Daughter’, which follows Nani, Ugo, Ephraim, the ancestor, Udodi, and others in this modern retelling of the Greek mythology of Hades and Persephone. Fresh off two tragedies, Ephraim becomes the shoulder Nani leans on. She tells him things she can’t tell Mother or Ugo. She looks forward to seeing him, talking to him and receiving the small, small gifts he has cultivated the habit of bringing. Ugo notices their closeness and starts calling him her boyfriend.

    Ugo and Mother eventually leave for America and Ephraim becomes Nani’s husband and father of her children, and she is estranged from Ugo and Mother. Ephraim becomes a disappointment but Nani is stuck with him and her centre is unable to hold.

    The author shows that humans are complex and dwell in moral ambiguity, and principle is the first casualty when our interests are at risk.

    Ibrahim is on the list for his sophomore novel, ‘When We Were Fireflies’. Like his first novel, this new one, has an opening that can compete as one of the best ever written: “The first time Yarima Lalo saw a train trundling into the Idu Station on a hot June day in Abuja was also the first time it occurred to him that once, many years before, he had been murdered in the carriage of an old locomotive with well-worn, seaweed-green seats.”

    The author brilliantly reimagines the fantastical beliefs that shape the thinking of millions of us. And his use of real events, such as the Kafanchan riots, the capture and killing of Boko Haram founder and several others, roots his magical rendition in realism and teases believability and will set you thinking, make you ask questions, question what you know and imagine new possibilities.

    Another major force on the list is two-time Booker Prize finalist Chigozie Obioma with his war-time novel, ‘The Road To The Country’.

    The novel tells the story of two men battling guilt which leads them to take decisions with far-reaching consequences.

    Obioma adds a second layer that takes away the ordinariness with his clever choice of letting the story of one character unfold through the other’s ‘mirror’ (opon Ifa), which at first appears blurry but eventually becomes clear and meaningful.

    Aside the divination touch, there is also something extraordinary about how the vision is presented. There is a sub-layer about the city of the dead, which gives the author a cosmic take on the war and the afterlife.

    In a precise and elegant voice, Obioma makes his characters sing and we dance along with them in this tale of brotherhood, grief, guilt, love, friendship and redemption.

    I have also read Yewande Omotoso’s entry on the list. It is her third novel, ‘An Unusual Grief’, which follows Mojisola, a mother who arrives Johannesburg from Cape Town, in search of a better understanding of her dead daughter Yinka who left home after catching her professor father pants down with his young assistant.

    On the surface, ‘An Unusual Grief’ is about a mother and her dead daughter, but it is much more. Omotoso’s prose is simple but certainly not simplistic. She appears to deploy words with empathy, perhaps because of the subject matter of grief.

    With his sixth novel, ‘Leave My Bones in Saskatoon’, Michael Afenfia grabs a slot on the list. The novel starts on Owoicho Adakole’s happiest day, which also turns out to be his saddest. Earlier, he got the green light to move with his family to Saskatoon city in Saskatchewan Province in Canada after two years of tedious paperwork, but then his wife and three of their children were killed by armed bandits in Benue State. The only survivor is their 15-year-old daughter, Ochanya, who was in Abuja for a school event.

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    ‘Leave My Bones in Saskatoon’ also hints at the downside of migrating as an adult, the loneliness most immigrants wrestle with, the cultural and culinary differences, the extreme temperatures, and the absence of familiar community. Even with steady jobs and a working system, they are constantly nostalgic about home. Owoicho misses home but the uncertainty about the state of things in Nigeria convinces him that his decision to ‘japa’ was one of the best things he ever did.

    One of the debut novels on the list is ‘Fine Dreams’ by US-based Linda N. Masi. The novel is narrated in parts by the ghost of a girl named Kubra  whose restless spirit lingers in her town. In her own voice, she recounts the haunting story of how she died. We watch her silently observe her grieving mother, who struggles to accept the cruel finality of her daughter’s fate.

    The book lays bare the manifold evils of terrorism, exposing its brutal disregard for humanity. We see terrorists masquerading as soldiers, perverting the honour of military service into a mask for brutality. We witness suicide bombers, mostly young women turned into weapons, their lives reduced to political statements. We see the abduction and impregnation of underage girls, their bodies seen not as sacred but as spoils of war, used to breed the next generation of fighters or to humiliate entire communities.

    I have also had the honour of reading Oyin Olugbile’s debut novel, Sanya, which took a well-deserved slot on the list.

    It is about a woman named Sanya, the one who defies death and serves as the protector of her elder brother, Dada.

    In this tale steeped in myth, culture, tradition, fantasy and more, Olugbile takes us on an adventure, a roller-coaster on the lives of the couple’s children, but with a special slot for Sanya, the special one, the warrior. 

    Sanya is just different. Almost everything that interests a girl makes her uncomfortable. She hates menstrual cycles. She despises the idea of marriage. And she hates the wrapper. She likes almost everything the world claims belongs to men.

    This gem of a book will take you on a path only few mortals have trod and you will see, hear and feel things beyond this world and your soul will hum tunes of joy for being led to such a path. 

    I have also read Chioma Okereke’s ‘Water Baby’, which uses Makoko, a Lagos slum to tell a very important story and in a beautiful way. Like ‘Fine Dreams’, there is also a ghost in ‘Water Baby’, but not as a narrator, but as the sibling of the narrator who goes on to conquer the world despite her humble beginning.

    My final take: The judges of the Nigeria Prize for Literature must have gone through hell coming up with a list of 11 from over 250 entries received. As an avid reader and reviewer of Nigerian literature, I know that scores of fantastic books have been written in the last four years. At the end of the day, a winner will emerge, but all on the list are winners in a way and they deserve to rejoice no matter what eventually happens when one of them is chosen in October.

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    The judges of the Nigeria Prize for Literature must have gone through hell coming up with a list of 11 from over 250 entries received. At the end of the day, a winner will emerge, but all on the list are winners in a way and they deserve to rejoice no matter what eventually happens when one of them is chosen in October

  • Former President Buhari’s 12 million votes gone with him

    Former President Buhari’s 12 million votes gone with him

    From my experience as a political apparatchik, as a strategist, and as a Nigerian who has witnessed and been part of different phases of the political evolution of Nigeria and other Countries, the truth is that the 12 million votes of the late former President Muhammadu Buhari (May His Soul Rest in Peace) died with him. There are no more Buhari’s block votes to share. All the politicians who were hanging around late President Buhari were actually leeching on his political capital to win elections at the state and federal levels, and Buhari knew that. That is why President Buhari was not loyal to any of them.

     To contextualise this reality, in northern Nigeria, where the chunk of Buhari’s “12million votes” came from in 2003, 2007, 2011, and 2015, there was a political phenomenon called “SAK”. SAK is a colloquial Hausa word that means “uniformity”. The SAK concept started in the north, especially in Kano State. So, if Buhari was in a political party, politicians leaned on Buhari’s so-called “integrity” political capital to join him as “underdogs” to win the elections. For instance, Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau became governor of Kano State in 2003 riding on the SAK phenomenon, when General Muhammadu Buhari entered into Nigeria’s politics as a Presidential candidate on the platform of the then All Nigeria People’s Party (ANPP), state and national assembly members also emerged. Subsequently, politicians like Senator Umar Tanko Al-Makura became governor of Nasarawa State under the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) in 2011, Mallam Nasiru El-Rufai became the Governor of Kaduna in 2015 under the All Progressives Congress (APC), including Senators and members of the House of federal and state representatives. Prior to their emergence, most of those politicians did not have valuable/significant political capital. And most of them never made serious efforts to build political structures, and now former President Muhammadu Buhari is dead with his votes!

     Former President Buhari knew that those politicians were all leaning on him to achieve political relevance and prominence. That is why Buhari stated the mantra, “I am for everybody, I am for nobody”, during his inauguration as the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in 2015. Therefore, all those people that we are posturing about claiming political relevance will now have to earn their political relevance, going forward.

     Some Strategic Considerations

    Buhari’s demise has technically reset the voting pattern, which will only manifest during the 2027 elections. It is instructive to note that the Buhari factor was crucial to the APC winning the Presidential and Gubernatorial elections in 2015. In 2023, the Buhari factor, although highly eroded by 2023, still played a significant role in the APC’s victory. But his demise has now opened a new vista for the APC. The hatred of the APC by some citizens is not only due to the perception of poor governance, but also of the perception of a lack of “enough” dividend of democracy given that the core north (North West and North East) who gave President Tinubu and he APC enough numbers to win the Presidency and State governments in the region.

     However, the key performance deliverables of Governors at the States in the northern states are seen by most citizens as the job of Mr. President. Therefore, the non-performance of Governors (where applicable), if not properly communicated, will continue to rub negatively on the image of President Tinubu’s administration, as we approach the 2027 elections. Consequently, the handlers and political leaders holding key positions in the administration of President Bola Tinubu have the responsibility not just to deliver their mandates, but also to communicate clearly and effectively to their fellow citizens at the federal, state levels as well as at their constituencies. Moreover, the sense of entitlement and disdain with which some of the APC leaders behave at the local levels could backfire on the APC. Indeed, Mr. President is doing the best he can at his level, but a “tree does not make a forest”. The APC team should not allow complacency to creep into their psyche or seep into their ranks, because the opposition parties are in disarray. My caution is that it is early days yet to rest on your laurels and allow Mr. President to do all the work! To whom much is given, much is expected!

     Complacency and Simmering Internal Party Concerns

    In my view, the current biggest challenge for APC now is not the opposition political parties;  the biggest challenge that APC will have is the APC itself. That is the issue of managing success, and that is “complacency.” APC is simmering underneath because there is disenchantment and frustration among some of its members.

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     Therefore, If the power of incumbency intoxicates the APC to the extent that they don’t take care of their own within the party structure, whether it is the CPC block, the ACN block, the ANPP block and others that feel that they have been abandoned, as we have seen them moving away or they grumble to us behind the scenes, they will play the game of opposition politics or sabotage under the radar; and the North are masters of playing that game. And that is what we call in places like Kano and other parts of the north in Hausa, “Wake da Shinkafa” (Rice and Beans) method, whereby we will vote for a Governor to emerge in a political party, but we are against the President during the Presidential election or vice-versa. Nothing should be left to chance.

    Situational Awareness and Delivery of Good Governance

    Essentially, situational awareness and the delivery of good governance in reality are critical success factors for the APC, i.e., dealing with insecurity, cost of governance, and dealing with the mandate as it were, beyond the political narratives. Because, like I said, the Buhari factor is gone, and most of the self-acclaimed or so-called political godsons of late Muhammadu Buhari, be them the ones that are with President Bola Tinubu today, or those that are currently gallivanting across political parties, do not have the political capital they are claiming to have. While some are selling dummies to President Tinubu so that they remain relevant, others who are malingering in other political parties are also selling dummies and living in a virtual reality, except for a few authentic political leaders. I am sure that President Bola Tinubu is aware of these dynamics, albeit not to the full extent, down to the grassroots in the north. I reckon that is why President Tinubu is making some political moves to reposition the APC. One of such moves is the removal of Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje as the National Chairman of the APC and zoning the national chairmanship to North Central. This is a good development for the APC, because in my opinion, Dr. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje has since outlived his relevance as the national chairman of the APC.

     Hence, basically, the death of former President Muhammad Buhari has reset or will reset the voting pattern in the North in 2027.  It takes time and a lot of work, credibility, and other political assets to muster 12 million votes in 2027, given the level of voter apathy we have witnessed in 2015 in 2019, and 2023. However, I reckon that there would be more voters who would turn out in 2027 because Nigerians will see the reason why they really need to come out to vote and decide who leads them at the national and state levels.

     Focus on State Governors

    What I will say here is that the focus on the state level should be key for citizens to ensure the delivery of good governance in Nigeria going forward. 60% of our lack of performance or the progress of Nigeria can be directly aligned to the non-performance of our state governors.

     Professor Nentawe Yilwatda as the new APC National Chairman

    The emergence of Professor Nentawe Yilwatda as the National Chairman of the APC was the right strategic move by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. The agitation of the North Central geopolitical zone with regard to the position of the National Chairmanship of the APC has been finally addressed by Mr. President. I commend Mr. President for this selection that brought about a “dark horse” at a time when there are a lot of contending powerful and relevant forces that Mr. President cannot ignore, e.g. Senator Umar Tanko Al-Makura, Senator Sani Musa, and others that are highly qualified aspirants, but whose selection could rock the already rocking boat of the Middle Belt APC. Thus, the emergence of Professor Yilwatda, not just as a “dark horse”, but also a Christian, is a deft move, and also partly addresses the Muslim-Muslim Presidential ticket issue that has remained a burning political issue. 

     Furthermore, selecting a national chairman from Plateau State, where the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) is reigning at the gubernatorial level, is another suave move to ensure that either before or during the 2027 election, Plateau State becomes an APC state. What remains to be seen is how Yulwata is going to apply strategy, political dexterity, and emotional intelligence to uniting the party and addressing the foundational issues of the power blocks that formed the APC in 2015, which I believe should not be treated with levity.

  • Queens of Africa soccer

    Queens of Africa soccer

    On Saturday, the Super Falcons came from behind to beat the Atlas Lionesses of Morocco to lift the Women Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) trophy for the 10th time. Our girls were already two goals down in the first 27 minutes of the game. Many watching would have lost hope and assumed that it is all over. The final of any competition is not easy to play. Be it soccer, as in this instant case, table tennis, volleyball, hockey or badminton, the players are cautious and calculating as they do all they can to avoid mistakes.

    They hate to concede early goals or lose cheap points. But when they do, they fall back on their  reserve energy to redeem themselves. Our girls did just that when they refused to give up. To equalise two goals and score a third to win is the stuff of which soccer legends are made. Nigeria is good at coming back to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat. Remember, Damman Miracle in Saudi Arabia when Nigeria’s Under 20 team came from four nil down to beat USSR in the FIFA World Youth Champioship? As the saying goes, when the going gets tough, the tough get going. The girls got going, and their resilience paid off. They were awarded a penalty in the run of play and Esther Okoronkwo converted her chance, with a superb spot kick.

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    The goal paved the way for the two goals that followed. Esther assisted the scorers of both goals. She deservedly got the Player of the Match award. Once again, it was Nigeria’s finest hour on the continental soccer stage. Ahead of the competition, the team had tagged its campaign: Mission X (to win the 10th trophy). They accomplished the mission in style, leaving the Moroccans and their home fans stunned at the end of the game in  regulation time.

  • 2027: North as ‘beautiful bride’!

    2027: North as ‘beautiful bride’!

    When In the build up to the 1982 presidential election in the aborted Second Republic the flamboyant Chief Nnamdi Azikiwe described himself as the “beautiful bride” of Nigerian politics, it was for a reason and just for that season. The late President Shehu Shagari was seeking reelection, and he required all the votes that he can muster to return to office.

    As it were, votes from the Southeast and Southwest where Zik and the legendary Chief Obafemi Awolowo, Shagari’s formidable opponents came from, were locked down for the duo. Shagari needed votes from both regions to win, just as the duo required those votes and more from the north to oust him. It became a game of political romance among the trio in order to get the winning votes. Election is a game of numbers; it is not only about popularity. Zik and Awo found out the hard way in the 1978 elections which ushered in the Second Republic on October 1, 1979.

    They were popular than Shagari by the fact of their political antecedents. Mind you, Shagari too was no push over, but he was not in the class of Awo and Zik, who once held sway in the western and eastern regions before they left their bases in Ibadan and Enugu to play national politics in Lagos. As it was then, so it is today. There must be some sort of political marriage between the north and south before any candidate can become president. No region can go it alone. It would be impolitic for any candidate to go on a solo mission, no matter the millions of votes he can garner from his region.

    The late President Muhammadu Buhari is a clear case in point. He finally made it to the Presidency in 2015, after three failed attempts in 2003, 2007 and 2011, following his strategic alignment with the Southwest. It has now dawned on all pragmatic politicians that this alignment must be sustained for power to continue to rotate between both regions seamlessly until we get to the stage where such things no longer matter, except competence. The north takes delight in the fact that it has the numbers to make a president, but the reality is things are not as simple as that.

    The ‘huge’ numbers are there, no doubt, but those figures alone cannot do the magic. They must be supported by the ‘marginal’ or what many top northerners, in the wake of Buhari’s victory in the 2015 and 2019 elections, now consider the “inconsequential” votes from the south. No matter how meagre the south’s votes are, they are as important as the north’s large votes in an electoral contest. Many contestants have lost elections, which they could have easily won, just by one vote because of their hubris. The search for these magical numbers which can turn the tide in an election has become intense..

    The aim  is to wrest power from President Bola Tinubu in 2027, the way he led the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) to oust President Goodluck Jonathan in 2015. Since then, the APC has been in power, with Tinubu succeeding Buhari in 2023. Many who were with Tinubu then have joined forces with others to work against him now. Their coalition led to the takeover of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), which is more of a vehicle for electoral contest than a political platform. ADC is now in disarray, with some old members rejecting the new comers.

    Despite the uncertainty surrounding their platform, they have been playing the northern card ahead of 2027. They are heaping all the problems of the north on the present administration. Some of their leading lights claim that the north is backward; the north is neglected; the north is marginalised and without infrastructure, and blame it all on the President who came into office only two years ago. They conveniently forget that  some of them were in office at the highest level not too long ago and never did anything for the region.

    Their cry has political undertone. It is to whip up northern sentiments against the government and hinder its return to power in 2027. Do they have the power to sway the people of the region to their side? They do not. Many of them do not command any following. They rode on Buhari’s back to power as governors and lawmakers. Following Buhari’s death about three weeks ago, they are orphaned. They craved Buhari’s blessings for their gang up against Tinubu and APC so that they could present that to the people as his endorsement of their new found group.

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    Buhari was wary of them. But at every opportunity, they dropped his name, as they angled for ways to use it to worm their way into the hearts of the poor people of the region who consistently gave Buhari millions of votes in all the elections he contested in 2003, 2007, 2011, 2015 and 2019. Are those votes said to be 12 million still intact? If Buhari were alive today, could he have influenced the talakawa to vote for any of these people who when they had the opportunity to lead the country did nothing for them?

    Looking at the federal level alone, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, who is desperate to have the ADC coalition as a special purpose vehicle for running for president again in 2027, and erstwhile Senate president David Mark, ADC interim chairman, were at a time the numbers two and three citizens of this country and they are from the north. What did they do for the region whose condition they are deploring today? The north has the votes to make a candidate president, but it is not beholden to Atiku, Mark and their ADC crowd to give them those votes.

    Those votes are not transferable from Buhari to them. If they want those votes, they must earn them like Buhari did by living a spartan and frugal life. They should stop throwing the north in people’s faces. The region and its people are important, but they are not at the beck and call of  these self conceited politicians. The talakawa know the way to go in 2027. They do not need Atiku, Mark, Nasir El-Rufai, and co, to tell them what to do.