The Nation Newspaper

Category: Dayo Sobowale

  • Information, security and corruption

    Wiki  Leaks  and American Security  Operative  Edward   Snowden  stunned the civilized  world  some time  ago  when they  revealed confidential, state  and governmental information,   discussions and minutes leading to important state  and diplomatic  decisions of the US  government. It  was  also  revealed  that world leaders had  their  phones  bugged  by  the US security  agencies  and the notable example  was  that  of  German  Chancellor Angela  Merkel  who  around the time of the exposure  was  on  a trip  to the US and  the occasion  proved quite  embarrassing  for the normally  engaging  and amiable  President  Barak  Obama. Ironically,  some news  magazine  provoked  outrage   then,   when  they  recommended  both  Wiki  Leaks  founder   Julian Paul  Assange  and  Snowden  for  Man of the Year   Award   in Transparency  as  a result  of their     anti – secrecy   revelations.  That  to  me was  a  very  bad  joke  given  the  gravity  of the offence of both men  which  to me was  treasonable  as they  leaked  confidential  state secret  and information and have betrayed  their  nation and  jeorpadised its  security  and  stability  and  should  face the wrath  of the law . In fact  both  men knew the damage and offence they  had  committed and  both fled. The  Wiki Leaks founder  has  been  holed  up in Ecuador’s Embassy   in  London  ever  since while Snowden  fled  via Hong  Kong  to  Russia where  he was  given  political  asylum.

    This  background  information   is necessary  to  follow  the discussion  of today’s  topic on  Information, Security and  Corruption. I  think  it is necessary  to highlight  that state and  government information should  be treated  with a certain  measure of confidentiality  and secrecy  not only to protect decision  makers but to  enable government  decision   to  be respected  as in the best  interest  of the larger society  and motivated  by    overall    public    interest  and  the  common  good  of  society. It  is not as if this  is always  the case,  as history  has shown  and as the lid   when   open  on  statute  barred  disclosures  have sometimes  revealed, there  may  be    many other  less  than  salutary   ulterior   motives  of leaders    and decision  makers. Yet  that is no  excuse  for publicity  seeking individuals  in  whatever  guise to throw into  public  domain, without  authorization, the secrets of  government  decision making and processes  while political  actors  and public  functionaries  are  still in office and  carrying  out  their  officially   designated  duties.

    It  is in this light that we  look  at the allegations  by  US President Donald  Trump  that  his predecessor President  Barak  Obama  ordered a check  on the phones  at  Trump  Towers which  was his campaign  headquarters while  he was  contesting for the presidency  of the US, a  competition  which  he won  to become the 45th president of the USA. Former  President  Barak  Obama through  an aide has denied the charge.  But President  Trump went  on to compare  the bugging with  the historical   one   of the Democratic Party’s   Watergate  Complex in  Washington DC  during  the reelection of President Richard Nixon which  led to the resignation  of  Nixon   in  1974  in  what  is now  widely  known  as the Watergate  Scandal . Donald  Trumps’s categorization  may seem  like  an  exaggeration but  when  you look at the pressure he has faced from the media  literally   claiming that the Russians  won the elections for him by  hacking,  it  can  be assumed safely   then  that his accusation against  Obama  is  a calculated  and measured  tit  for   tat  against  the US  media  which   has always  had  a soft spot    for   his predecessor.  Again, when  you  recall  that Obama pardoned  and   commuted    a 35  year   long  jail term  given    to  Chester  Manning  who  released  700000  files   on security  to   Wiki  Leaks  and the offender  will  be out in May  2017  and  Obama  also  granted pardon to a Marine General, James  Cartwright who  admitted    lying  to the  FBI on  the Stuxnet  computer   virus,   on Obama’s departure  from   office,     then  you  really  cannot  easily   dismiss   Trump’s   charge  with a  wave  of the hand.  When  you  add  the fact on record  that on his  departure  from  office Obama  pardoned  and commuted  more  prison  terms  and sentences  more  than the  overall  done  by the 12 previous  US  presidents then  you  see that the US now and in the future  has serious  security  challenges that  are bound to affect  its political stability, diplomacy  and foreign  policy  for  a  long time  to come.

    In  South  Korea this week  the Constitutional  Court ruled  by a margin of 8-0 that  the country’s  president  should  be tried  for  corruption thereby  waiving the immunity  she had  enjoyed from prosecution  as president. The  ruling followed  the vote  at the nation’s  National  Assembly  that the President  should  be impeached. To  the letter of the law,  South Korea’s legislative and judicial  institutions have  lived up to their lawful  duties  and that was summed up in the verdict  of the Constitutional  Court  which ruled  that President Park Geun –hye   had  breached the values  of  democracy  and the rule  of law  and should  be  dismissed   as  president .According  to reports, the S Korean  Acting  Chief  Justice said  the president’s  ‘acts of violating the constitution and law are a betrayal of  the public  trust.  The  benefits  of protecting the constitution that can  be earned by dismissing the defendant are  overwhelmingly big ‘

    The  court  verdict  was a tragedy  for  the ousted president  but  a victory  for  democracy  and  transparency.  Yet  the  ousted  president was well prepared  for public office and service  as she was the daughter of former S Korean military  dictator  Park  Chung  Hee  who ruled  at the same time like powerful  military leaders like Suharto in Indonesia, and Ferdinand  Marcos in the Phillipines.  She  is said  to be married  to her nation as she has  no  husband  or  family.  Yet  she failed  the anti  corruption test  as  she  colluded  with  a friend  to betray  public trust  and she has left  office  in  disgrace. That  is a good  lesson  for  world  leaders  and  politicians,  especially  those in  Africa  to  learn  from.  The   lesson    is  that nobody, not even  a sitting  president  is  above  the law,  no   matter  the leader’s  origins and manner of ascent  to power.

    Let  us  now look  at  the  situation  in our  nation where luckily and happily  our  President   Muhammadu  Buhari   returned  home this  week  after a two month  medical  vacation.  In  his  absence  the Vice  President  Professor Yemi  Osinbajo  who also  turned  60  this  week  held  fort dutifully  and  brilliantly  too,  in my estimation. I  wish  him many  happy  returns  of  the day.  But  no tribute to him on the occasion can  be greater  than that of his  boss  who congratulated  him  for being  Vice  President  who  turned to a friend  and  partner in office. That is  a tribute  to  loyalty  and  diligence  and  nothing  can  be better, coming from someone  in a position  to make such  appraisal.‘

    In  the president’s  absence  his Vice  performed  numerous state  functions  on his  behalf  quite commendably  and  gave several  speeches  and admonitions  to  keep  the anti  corruption crusade  on course  in the absence  of its  Commander In  Chief  and  Champion, President  Muhammadu  Buhari.  But  it is one  of them  that arrests  my  attention  and  tickles  my imagination on the rule  of law, the fight against  corruption  and the administration of justice  now  and in the future in  Nigeria. Fortutous   circumstances made  it  possible   this week  for  Professor of  Law  to stand in as the President of Nigeria to swear  in the Chief  Justice  of  Nigeria.  At  the occasion the Acting  President  asked  for probity  and uprightness  in the administration of justice  in the temple  of  justice in Nigeria.  As  a former  Attorney –  General  and law  professor nobody  could  have said it better and more  painfully  too as a member  of the  ‘learned    profession‘  In  response  the new  CJ,   Hon Justice  N S Nkanu  Onnoghen  GCON  called  for the cooperation  of all  arms  of  government , namely the executive, the judiciary  and the legislature   and  present  at  the occasion were the  leaders of the  National  Assembly  who  are  also  involved  in their own unique  way  in the fight against  corruption.

    What  tickles  my fancy  however was that the last  time a professor of law  had  anything to do with the installation of Nigeria’s CJ  was when the legal scholar  and luminary, Professor  Taslim  Elias was  made  the  CJ himself   and  served  from 1972  to 1975.  Professor  Elias  was  later,   President, International  Court  of  Justice from  1982 to  1985. Now  another law  professor has sworn in Nigeria’s  new   CJ. What  I am  wondering at  is not  a case  of history  repeating itself  but    of what  is in the offing    this    time  or   the future,  in the highest  office in the temple  of justice  in Nigeria. Especially    for someone  who  has delivered so  eloquently and faithfully his  mandate of  Acting President  of  Nigeria,  to the  obvious   delight  and  admiration of  the leader  for whom he  sat in  for two  months. Once  again, long live the Federal  Republic  of  Nigeria.

  • Leadership, corruption and migration

    I start today on the premise that leadership matters in governance and is indeed the ideal catalyst for political stability and economic progress. I also aver that while the world is distracted by the anti establishment emergence of the populist leadership of Donald Trump in America’s 2016 presidential elections, other nations of the world are experiencing worse issues than the controversial migration ban by the US leader on seven majority Muslim nations on Trump’s list. Anyway, the US judiciary has shown the new US president that he cannot run America solo as its presidential system has an in built system of checks and balances that works literally like an automatic stop watch. Events and news from Nigeria, S Africa, Pakistan and France, provide food for thought today in terms of today’s topic.

    Issues arising from these events show that corporate and political leadership can make or mar an institution and much more a whole nation. Leadership is about integrity and trust and once these twin virtues are betrayed, institutional decay and social malaise set in and corruption, an incurable cancer in any such perverse system, rears its ugly head. This is what I shall illustrate, candidly and vividly, today . Firstly the news from Nigeria is, as usual, shocking and unbelievable.

    At an on going trial of the Senate President it was alleged that 77m naira was lodged in in one day in an account whose owner’s salary was just a bit above a quarter of a million. In another news item the boss of the Nigerian Customs Service who was in office for just six years was alleged to have embezzled 40 bn naira and about 17 exotic cars were found in a compound owned by him. In an era of fake news one can be forgiven for doubting the authenticity of these news. But these are published stories from Nigeria’s leading newspapers and not mischievous social media which values speed of viral information at the expense of truth.

    This is verifiable truth being revealed in our courts and in effect show a betrayal of leadership at the level at which the leaders involved have operated to the detriment of the goals and objectives of the public institutions over which they presided as leaders. Also from S Africa came the news that the nation’s President Jacob Zuma has ordered S Africans not to attack foreign nationals living in that nation. The president’s order came on the heels of the news of persistent attacks on Nigerians by S Africans accusing Nigerians of drug trafficking and taking their jobs. This really is like giving dog a bad name in order to hang it.

    This is because while one can sadly agree that the 419 saga and drug trafficking have given Nigeria a bad name, Nigerians are largely hard working people who strive hard to make their mark in the commercial life of any nation, wherever on earth that they work in, including S Africa. Anyway we hope that the S Africans listen to their president and stop attacking Nigerians as historically the free S Africa they now enjoy would have been impossible but for the contribution of Nigeria and its people to the Anti- Apartheid Struggle that led to the freedom of Nelson Mandela from prison after 27 years of incarceration on Robben Island .

    Indeed Nigeria’s civil servants contributed part of their hard earned salary to the Anti Apartheid fund set up by the Federal government to pursue the fight against Apartheid until it collapsed and held a free and fair election from which Nelson Mandela emerged from prison to be president. Such a huge sacrifice and contribution on the part of Nigerians to the political and economic emancipation of S Africa should not now be rewarded by attacks on Nigerians living in S Africa as this will be nothing less than a shameful act of ingratitude to Nigerians and Nigeria by the people of S Africa. It is necessary to mention here that the S African president has problems on his plate just as challenging as his loose control of xenophobia by his people.

    A S African court recently ruled that his withdrawal of his nation’s membership from the International Court of Justice – ICC – was illegal as it was not an act of Parliament which is the judicial requirement. To me that shows that the rule of law is still prevalent in S Africa in spite of the massive odor of corruption that pervades the presidency of President Jacob Zuma. In fact the fear of future prosecution for corruption by the ICC once he leaves office was the rationale for President Zuma’s sudden withdrawal of S Africa’s membership from the ICC, an act which the judiciary in the country has now dismissed as unilateral and unconstitutional. Which means that this court ruling has compounded President Zuma’s poor image on integrity and has fuelled the charge of the opposition which heckles and abuses him annually in Parliament whenever he comes to Parliament to present his state budget. Anyway, Nigerians expect him to still have enough authority and credibility to stop his country men from killing Nigerians working peacefully in S Africa as has been the case from reports in the last few weeks.

    Let us now look at how xenophobia and migration have affected real and potential leadership in other parts of the world namely Pakistan, and France. In Pakistan the Army is waging a huge war against Islamic militancy and terrorism after innocent Muslims were killed in a shrine by terrorists recently. Hundreds of terrorists have been killed in recent weeks and the Army is virtually closing the border between Afghanistan, the base of the terrorists and Pakistan.

    The rise in spate of terror has been attributed to a change of leadership of the Pakistani army and the time needed by that change to come to understand the game on hand. But Pakistan is a fiercely democratic society just as it is very Islamic. Some have mooted the idea that only a military government in Pakistan can confront and defeat the Islamic terrorists once and for all but the politicians will not give such talk any consideration what so ever.

    Yet it is becoming increasingly clear that democratic mandate and arrangements are ineffective against terrorism by Islamic extremists in a very Islamic nation. How far the military and political leadership can accommodate each other in this leadership tenterhook will determine the fate of the security and political stability of Pakistan in the foreseeable future. In France a serious potential political leadership is facing threats based on its positions on migration and xenophobia. Marine Le Pen who is the leader of the Far Right National Front Party in France and who has boasted that the next French presidential elections this year will go the way of Brexit in the UK and the emergence of Donal Trump in the US is now facing trumped up charges. She is facing a charge that some of her aides were being paid from illegal funds from the EU which is a form of abuse of office or misuse of funds.

    But she has denied the charges as politically motivated and she has refused to attend a police interview and technically she can not be arrested because she is a Member of the European Parliament. She has alleged that she cannot get justice given that this is an election time and I believe her. In addition the fact that she has promised to do a Brexit if she is elected president could very well have aroused the hostility of the bureaucrats in Brussels who have brought up the charges. To me this looks like the tax returns issue of Donald Trump in the last US presidential elections.

    Yet Trump won in spite of this. I expect the French electorate to treat Le Pen similarly on this trumped up EU charges. This is a politician well respected for her commitment to principles part of which led to her expulsion of her father from the Party he founded.

    That sort of steely principle and guts also made her to refuse to attend a meeting with an Islamic Mufti in Lebanon where she was asked to cover her head. She refused and left although she had gone there to woo the votes of Lebanese French in this year’s presidential elections. Le Pen’s leadership style is indeed made of sterner stuff and I expect the French to show that her time has in this coming French presidential elections. Just as the US electorate showed the American political elite and haughty party establishment that no one can stop an idea whose time has come when they created an unexpected upset by electing Donald Trump as the 45th US president in the 2016 presidential elections. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Ideological feuds, credibility and corruption

    PLAY me foul and I play you tricky‘ a quotation from R L Stevenson’s book ‘ Kidnap ‘ that I read in the secondary school, drives my thoughts on today’s topic and the reason will soon be clear. For now in the global media. the resignation of the new US National Security Adviser retired Lt Gen Michael Flint and the banning of the CNN by the Venezuelan government are the arrow heads of the emerging ideological and credibility feud that has polarized America’s post- election politics.

    This sadly has directly or inadvertently affected not only the global drive against corruption but the more deadly one against terrorism. I will illustrate with some clear developments that arose during the week to highlight today’s topic and my view points on them for the day’s analysis.

    The sacked US NSA Michael Flint who was appointed recently by US President Donald Trump was the general who told the Obama Administration that ISIS was a ‘political ideology of Islam’ and is a‘ weaponised faith ‘out to settle ancient animosity with the rest of the world. Flint observed loudly then that the Obama Adminstration was fighting ISIS with kid gloves as Flint advised then that the US should fight ISIS with an Ideological strategy similar to that used to fight communism and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. For that observation and advice Michael Flint was sacked by the Obama Administration and recruited by the Trump Presidential Campaign team which made him the new NSA after winning the 2016 US presidential election.

    To President Trump therefore losing Michael Flint this week was a great personal blow and he lamented publicly and blamed the media for the mishap. So in effect, the media especially the CNN and New York Times have drawn the first blood in getting rid of Trump’s right hand man on security. But that really is the beginning of the ideological fight between the liberals who lost the presidential elections when Hillary Clinton was defeated by Donald Trump in the last US presidential elections Donald Trump the outsider who secured the nomination of the US conservatives without the approbation of the Republican party leadership .

    But this is just the tip of the iceberg in this juggernut of bitterness that has pitted the new US president against the powerful US media which never gave the new US president a chance of winning the presidential election and is now casting aspersion on that victory with the claimed Russian state connivance and contact during the campaign and through the transition to White House of the new Trump Administration. This has created a mountain of bitterness in the US political system that will affect its stability in the very near future and that is no exaggeration. Just look at the cross charges between the new president and for example CNN.

    Trump calls CNN – fake news – which shatters immediately the reason for CNN’s existence and its main asset, which is its credibility. In one moment he has destroyed the reputation of a major news company and he is the president of the US. CNN however is not taking the matter lightly. It has started a debate on the sanity of the new US president and has gone on to make the Michael Flint resignation look like Watergate in which US President Richard Nixon was involved in bugging of the Democratic Party’s head quarters.

    No one knows how all these will end and for the first time I see the losing party siding with the media to prevent a new government from carrying out its campaign promises. I will illustrate with two examples involving NATO and the banning of CNN in Venezuela this week. At a NATO meeting in Europe during the week , the US new Defence Secretary retired General James Mattis asked NATO nations to fulfill their financial obligation to the military alliance which is 2 percent of their GNP. As at now only 5 out of the member nations have fulfilled the requirement out of 27 members.

    The new US Defence Secretary told the defaulting nations that no one can defend the future of their children more than themselves. Yet when Donald Trump raised the issue of NATO members not fulfilling their obligations during the presidential campaign, he was called a liar by the US media. On Venezuela, the CNN recently did a brilliant piece of investigative journalism in which it published the report of an investigation on how Venezuelan embassy officials in Baghdad Iraq sold Venezuelan passports to Iraqis who wanted to leave Iraq. Such Iraqis could enter the US and Europe and carry out terrorist acts without any data linking them to any terrorist operational centre or group.

    This fraudulent scheme was detected by a Venezuelan diplomat and lawyer who blew the whistle and contacted CNN which investigated the matter up to the Venezuelan capital and interviewed the Venezuelan UN ambassador who refused to answer any question. At the end Venezuela denied the charges and fired the whistleblower who fled for his life to live in exile. What is important is that this Venezuelan passport scam was being aired at a time that the Trump Administration issued its travel ban on migrants from 7 Muslim majority nations and Iraq was one of them.

    This certainly showed that the ban was well thought out more so as Syria’s President Bashar whose nation was among the seven confirmed that terrorists abound in his nation and could be anywhere. Yet CNN played up demonstrations against the ban and the suspension of it by the Appeals Court, more than anything else.

    Similarly this CNN Venezuelan passport scam report on Iraqis using bought Venezuelan passports to enter the US and Europe was a masterpiece of rationale to support the ban on the migrants from the 7 nations involved in the Trump Administration migrants ban to fight global terrorism . Definitely the anti Trump posture of CNN and Trump’s bitter branding of the global network as fake news have made even CNN to downplay the huge contribution of its investigative journalism to the global fight against terrorism, inherent in the timing of the airing of the Venezuelan passport scam which earned CNN a ban in Venezuela. Definitely CNN has cut its nose to spite its face and did not get value for money on the Venezuelan passport fraud because it was more interested in putting the new US president down than fighting terrorism as a global news network and that is just bad. Whilst the US media and establishment make life difficult for the new US president because he is an outsider the same can not be said of the Nigerian president who is ill and is away from the country.

    It is an open secret that the president is the arrow head of the fight against corruption in Nigeria . Just as Donald Trump is the arrow head of the fight against political correctness which he won , when he won the US presidential election last year and is now paying a bitter price for a victory that the politicians and the US political establishment never expected. Our president too won a famous and unexpected victory in 2015 and embarked on a war against corruption which obviously his absence and health have stalled.

    I saw a picture of him when he received the President of the Senate, the Speaker and the Senate Majority Leader. Definitely these are strange bedfellows for the president in the fight against corruption on which the executive and the legislsture have been at daggers drawn in Nigeria. But even that is not my worry for now. What bothers me is the extravagant interest in Nigeria of a UN organization, the UNDP whose spokesman reportedly asked our government not to allow Internally Displaced Persons to return to their towns, villages and residence until government has put in place facilities to make the environment conducive. Whose interest is UNDP protecting , that of IDPs, the government or the UN? Definitely it is protecting its mandate and self interest to the detriment of Nigeria and the IDPs .

    If displaced people want to return to their abode because they feel safe enough why should anybody including the UN stop them?. Is the UN happy with their displacement or with the insurgency that has dislocated them ? This is clear example of foreign organisations making money out of the Boko Haram insurgency by casting aspersions on government efforts to rehabilitate people displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency. If refugees fleeing war anywhere feel obliged to return home they should be encouraged to do so and further help taken to them in their locations. It is not helpful at all to set them up in camps and make money out of them for both local officials and foreign institutions which will be jobless when IDPs return home. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Global justice, politics and security

    It is apparent now that it is not an exaggeration to say that when the US sneezes, the rest of the world catches cold. This is very obvious in the way the people and nations of our world have reacted to the shocking election of tough talking new US President Donald Trump, and its aftermath. More ominously though, the cold has suddenly turned to a high fever in the way and manner the US president has introduced a new mode of policy announcement and formulation, via tweets, executive orders, dismissive hand gestures, and the new emphatic way of saying No, inherent in his famous statement – it won’t happen.

    From France, to the UK, to Japan and Nigeria, the world is dancing to the music or reeling from the pains of Donald Trump’s bold effort to live to his campaign promise of making America ‘great and safe again‘. This is a costly effort in terms human concern on migration, religion and terrorism which the new US president has roundly condemned as not the rationale for his migration orders to stop refugees from seven majority Muslim nations. Instead, Donald Trump asserts boldly as his lawyers will argue in US Courts right to the Supreme Court if necessary, that his motive for the migrants ban are security of the US and the protection of American lives from the rampage and bloodthirstiness of global terrorism. And let us face it there is no denying that terrorism specially Islamic militant terrorism has gone global and has fanned fear, mistrust and xenophobia in most communities of the world where, hitherto, people have lived in peace and quiet until the bloody advent of ISIS in the world at large and the Boko Haram in Nigeria.

    Whilst Donald Trump battles with the judiciary in the US in what I relish as a vintage test of the much vaunted sanctity of separation of powers and checks and balances, which are hallmarks of the American presidential system, it is obvious that the temple of justice is in for some pretty rough time from the abrasive and derogatory challenge and language of the new US president. Clearly Trump has the support of his party in the US Congress but the judges of the Courts of Appeal have liberal leanings and have justified that from their recent ruling not to lift the ban they have imposed on Trump’s migrant ban. Their argument in the ruling was that executive orders are not immune to judicial review.

    They also held that the US government has not produced evidence that aliens from the banned nations have committed terrorism on US soil. The three judges then agreed with the arguments of the states that brought the case that the freedoms of travel, separation of families and discrimination have been assailed by the ban and that is unconstitutional. Of course Trump has dismissed the ruling as political and has said he will win easily on appeal . This certainly showed that Trump is not the normal run of the mill US president. This is a litigious billionaire and businessman who is used to fighting for his rights in US courts and his new office can only sharpen and expand his proclivity for having his way in the courts of the US. Especially now that he is president and he has the unique and important opportunity of having his new US Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch confirmed into office.

    This will certainly tilt the balance of that court in favor of conservative values over the prevailing liberal judicial pronouncements of the last eight years. Let us now look at how the Trump style of leadership and formulation of policies have impacted some parts of the world. Starting with France there is happiness on the part of right wing leader of the National Front, Marie Le Pen, that Trump’s election will boost her chances of becoming France’s next president in presidential elections due this year.

    She has stated clearly that Brexit and Trump’s victory were a reflection of their electorate ‘s disenchantment with the establishment parties over their handling of migration issues in allowing in migrants fleeing wars in the Middle East, who because of their religion of Islam, are potential terrorists who cannot integrate easily into European societies. Le Pen’s party under her father was like an outcast party in France for most of the time. Now, however, the Party is the front runner against the Socialist Party of current President Francois Holland who was so unpopular that he did not seek his party’s nomination for re- election. In the UK the Speaker of the British Parliament went out of his way to announce in Parliament that he will not allow Donald Trump to speak in the British Parliament on his next visit to the UK, as the US president. Which is quite interesting given the mode of operation of the British Parliamentary system.

    The first reason given by the Speaker was that he is one of the key holders to the doors of Parliament, the prime law making institution of the UK. The other two reasons for denying the opportunity are racism and sexism on which grounds he found Trump unqualified to address the British Parliament . The Speaker went on to say that the right for any visitor to address the British Parliament is not automatic but earned. Which really to me is so much balderdash from this Speaker who should know better. This is because British Parliamentary democracy is driven by the cabinet system in which the party that wins the election runs the government on a day to day basis and the PM leads that same party in Parliament in making laws.

    The Speaker’s role is to moderate debates and discussion of issues brought by parties and MPs. I wonder what role a Speaker, in this case a self – confessed housekeeper, has to play in how the PM, a first amongst equal leader of the cabinet, has to play in the choice of who will address and not address the British Parliament. And what is the duty of the PM who has invited the US president on this occasion when the Speaker has usurped the role of the PM by closing the door on her invited guest?.

    I think and advise that this Speaker should be sent on an indefinite leave till the visit occurs and told in plain terms that a Speaker is like a referee and should not use a yellow card off the field especially when the game has not even started as he has so insolently done. With regard to Japan and Nigeria the news are a bit complicated and a sort of mixed grill. Japan’s PM Shinto Abe is to play golf this weekend with Donald Trump at a private golf club in the US. While in Nigeria, labor leaders seized the opportunity of the president’s absence due to sickness to protest against what they called poor governance, corruption and economic hardship of the Nigerian people.

    Both the Japanese PM round of golf with the American president and the labor union protests against economic hardship and corruption have economic undertones and I will treat them one after the other, starting with Japan. During his campaign, Trump had frightened the Japanese and other US allies in the Pacific by saying that they have the resources to shoulder their defences and the US will review the current policy of footing the bill on that account. Indeed, that made Japan’s PM the first world leader to visit Trump at his Towers before he was sworn in. In addition the Japanese had it rough with the Obama Administration which prosecuted Toyota, one of the corporate jewels of the Japanese motor industry for poor quality brake parts in the brands sold in the US and globally.

    The head of Toyota was summoned to the US and disgraced in a public grilling in the US senate. Toyota was prosecuted successfully on the matter by the US Justice Department, and paid a colossal amount in millions of dollars as fines. In addition the Japanese PM wants to discuss how some Japanese companies will manufacture goods and services in the US in support of the Trump campaign to create more jobs in the US and stop the globalization policy of outsourcing which takes American jobs offshore. So PM Abe of Japan is killing two birds with one stone as he plays golf with the US president.

    He is polishing Japan’s image on product quality and paving the way for smoother relations on US- Japanese defence and security in the Pacific. Which means he may have to soft pedal in taking on Trump on the golf course so that he [Trump] wins clearly which will certainly boost the objectives of the Japanese PM’s golf diplomacy. With Nigeria, the issue has to do with a case of when the cat is not around, mice will play. That is what the unions have done to a sick president who is away and that is not fair .

    Granted the recession is biting. But where were these union leaders when the government increased the price of fuel from 86 naira to the present 140 naira? No sensitive and caring labor leaders in a civilized world would wish that away and kow tow without expecting that workers would bear the brunt of the economic hardship from the multiplier effect of such a fuel increase. And that is precisely what is happening. Nigerian labor leaders therefore are just crying over spilt milk. When it is a fact of life that nothing can put split milk together again.

    To make matters worse for the unions they are condemning the fight against corruption and doing this behind the moving force of the anti corruption brigade who is the president who is away on sick leave. These union leaders have forgotten that there is no power vacuum in Aso Rock and they met more than their match in the Vice President Professor Yemi Osinbajo who told them there is no gain without pain and that corruption is endemic and ubiquitous in Nigeria including religion and the VP himself is a pastor. I think the VP who has become our Socrates or Chief Philosopher on defeating the biting recession was just telling the union leaders to let charity begin at home in the clean up of Nigeria and face reality because they were there when the same VP explained the fuel increase and they acquiesced. So who is fooling who on recession and the fight against corruption now? Once again, long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Trump’s new world, politics and diplomacy

    THERE is no denying that America’s new president Donald Trump is going to change the way the world, as we know it today, conducts its diplomacy, and international relations in many different ways from what we are used to. Undoubtedly his policies so far manifested in the daily issuance of executive orders especially on migration into the US involving the stigmatization of seven Muslim majority nations have provoked protest rallies in in the US and EU nations who are normal and traditional allies of the US. Yet although he has not said it in many words it is apparent that the new US President does not care a hoot whose ox is gored, not only without but similarly within his very divided and now restive nation and population.

    According to British history in the Victorian era, a certain Foreign Secretary called Lord Palmerston became PM at 70 years of age, the same age at which Donald Trump was elected US President in 2016. Lord Palmerston became PM on Februaary5 1855 after serving as Foreign Secretary for several years. He was described in the history books as a ‘swashbuckling high handed promoter of British interests‘ and was Britain’s most popular PM until Winston Churchill upstaged him with his handling of Hitler and Allies victory in the second world war. In taking on Britain’s allies and `enemies alike Lord Palmerston pursued a personal agenda that earned him the hatred of friends and foes alike although none of them doubted his patriotism and love of the nation. He defended the rapid phase of new alliances and territories he brought into the British Empire by saying on record I have brought a new world into existence to redress the balance of the old. It is on record that Lord Palmerston was so controversial that even Queen Victoria was reluctant to call him to be PM even when it was obvious he was the man of the moment. Palmerston while he was Foreign Secretary and later PM rallied Britain against Russian, and French ambitions in the Ottoman Empire, adopted a high handed policy towards China and made the Unification of Italy [1859- 60 ]look like a victory for Britain over France, Austria, Russia and the Pope. To all intents and purposes that old Palmerston excuse for new alliances and territorial expansion in the 19th Century appears to be the battle cry of the 45TH US president, Donald Trump, this 2017, as he rolls out his plan to unravel the legacy of his predecessor and fulfill his electoral promises. Promises which were so wild during the campaigns that many peopl, both within and without the US thought it would not be humanly possible to fulfill them, if and when he was elected. Now Trump has shown that he is as crazy as his promises and is even crazier in his passion and commitment in seeing them implemented. Which really is a lesson for politicians and world leaders who never remember such campaign promises once they are entrenched legally in power.

    When Trump introduced Neil Gorsuch , his new nominee to the SCOTUS – the Supreme Court of the US, Trump started by saying ‘I am a man of my words‘ and he said he has brought the best judge forward for the Supreme Court position as he promised. He did not beat his chest in saying so and he did not need to do that because his actions so far on his election promises have spoken more than his words. And, really in just two weeks in office, no one could deny that Donald Trump has lived up to his billing in terms of credibility on his campaign promises. Indeed no US president could have sounded more believable in terms of performance based on campaign promises than Donald Trump did in so short a time.

    Yet the fulfillment of his campaign promises seem to have earned him more opprobrium , vilifications and hatred than any other new US president in history. Why such a phenomenon has come to be, and how the fulfillment of campaign promises can be a source of vehement protests and denunciations by right thinking people, both within and without the US – the politics involved and how that affects the immediate and future conduct of diplomacy and international law in the global comity of nations, form the kernel of our discussion today.

    Definitely and analogically like Lord Palmerston’s famous quotation, Donald Trump is bringing a new world into existence to redress the balance of the old. Which in the immediate past, in this particular instance, is the Obama Legacy. However, unlike Lord Palmerston who was defending his actions and finding excuses before Parliament, Donald Trump has a fresh mandate for his new policies and therefore owes no one any excuses for a legitimate mandate obtained before our very eyes and in spite of very staggering odds. That to me is vintage democracy at work in which essentially the majority will have its way while the minority must have its say. That is the order of democratic politics and the rule of law. Which means the present liberal democracy sour grapes over electoral loss and tragedy, can never result in the losing party having its way while the victor is to only have its say. That is trying to steal a famous election victory by the back door and that is not only unjust but revoltingly anti democratic and subversive of the rule of law. Let us now look at Donald Trump’s election and campaign promises in the context of the role of the US in world politics and how that affects the prospects for world peace. Undoubtedly the greatest danger to world peace today is terrorism, particularly Islamic militant terrorism typified by ISIS. It has been branded as a religious ideology by Trump’s Advisers and it is to be fought the same way the US and Western Europe fought the Soviet Union during the Cold War, with as they claimed, all American and European resources. The seven nations named in Trump’s Immigration ban order are ipso facto, the front line war zones of the US under this Trump Administration. How that affects Iraq where US troops are still on the ground to prevent a failed state or how that will influence the execution of the Iran Nuclear deal will have to be worked out in deals for which Trump has well known proficiency. Of course oil as a bargaining diplomatic chip is back on the table of international relations and diplomacy as the Trump Administration is one of big business and the cabinet has more billionaires than any other. If you add to this the fact that the new US Secretary of State was the boss of Exxon Mobil who opposed US and EU sanctions against Russia after the invasion of Crimea, then you can see that Russo – American relations are about to enter an era of Rapprochment and Dialogue that characterised the Cold War and had mutual deterrence and balance of terror as the driving vehicles of engagement. That prospective relationship, to be based on hopefully on mutual respect is what Russia’s President Vladmir Putin never allowed the Obama Administration as well as Hillary Clinton in particular when the US supported protests in Russia in 2011 after Putin won the presidential elections there .This prompted the Russian hacking debacle on the US last presidential elections. That also was behind the warning by Sir Michael Fallon, Britain’s Defence Secretary that Russia is using ‘ weaponised misinformation ‘against Western democracies, crucial infrastructures and governments and has created thereby what he called the post truth era in cyber attacks and war fare, which NATO must counter as it does with air, land and seas attack, militarily. The UK ‘s Defence Secretary however bluntly said he agreed with the new US President that NATO nations must contribute the required percentage of their GDP to boost NATO’S defence strategy at least against the current Russian aggression and cyber saber – rattling and hacking.

    With regard to Nigeria there is no denying that the Trump administration will be more sympathetic and supportive of Nigeria’s military effort to wipe out Boko Haram and rebuild the war ravaged North East of the nation. Given the credentials of his new Attorney General and Supreme Court nominee the Trump government will not give Nigeria and nations with anti gay laws the cold shoulder that the Obama administration gave to African nations like Uganda, and Senegal, which Obama visited, while literally withholding economic aid to nations with fragile economies to make them follow the gay brigade and abandon their culture and way of life. In addition, this new US government can be expected to help in solving the problem of vandalisation of pipelines in the Niger Delta which has crippled oil production, lowered our oil proceeds and thrown the nation into darkness as electricity from gas took a nose dive thereby creating the present recession while also fuelling it at great cost to the welfare and quality of life of Nigerians generally.

    In addition I expect the Trump administration to give moral and financial support to our military in routing terrorism. Our military should be commended when dealing with terrorists and suicide bombers, not vilified by Amnesty International for doing their duty while small girls are used as suicide bombers to kill innocent Nigerians with impunity and the same Amnesty has nothing to say on that . Such lopsided and uneven attitude informed Trump’s Immigration anger and travel ban policy against seven majority Muslim nations. Nigeria can surely benefit from the new US global show of strength against terrorism in our fight against Boko Haram and in helping to whet with our oil, the new US appetite for oil which we have aplenty. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Democratic values, oligarchies and security

    US President Donald Trump’s retort on the use of torture to get information from terrorists, and the defence of the Nigerian SGF by the Presidency on the ground of fair hearing in the Senate, form the kernel of our discussion today. The two issues are concerns about democratic values, the rule of law, and the promotion of the concerns and interests of the ruling oligarchies in both nations.

    They collectively show how far democracy and its claim in liberal democracies to be the government of the people by the people and for the people can be a mere slogan or rhetoric, that makes a mockery of democracy itself while creating insecurity which in itself in an anathema to the idea and concept of democracy.

    I was impressed by the spirit and candor with which Donald Trump spelt out his policy not to rule out the use of waterboarding, a form of torture introduced by the Bush Administration after 9/11 alongside the building of Guatanamo Bay in Cuba as a high security prison for captured terrorists. Waterboarding makes victims feel they are drowning and they want to talk and give out information they would not give out under normal interrogation.

    The Obama Administration cancelled this and Trump is reinstating it because he said it is productive in terms of actionable information provided from its use. To Trump, it is like returning fire for fire because of ISIS use of the ‘medieval tactic‘ of beheading people for being either Christians or Muslims and showing such macabre scenes on videos on the internet and global TV. Since Trump knew he was being trapped on his utterances he said he would abide by whatever his Defence Secretary and NSA decided on the matter as he would not like to break any international law.

    But left to him, the playing ground is not level when ISIS is allowed to behead people with impunity and people scoff at the use of water boarding against terrorists. To me, Trump was thinking and talking aloud on an issue that has agitated the minds of not only the people who voted for him but a large percentage of peace loving people in the world especially Muslims who have recoiled and denounced such beheading, and ISIS, as un –Islamic. What Trump has articulated amounts to saying that at a point security is more important than an enemies rights, the rules of war and the rules of engagement in any conflict more especially a war.

    Indeed one can say that his argument is that in practicing beheading in modern times ISIS has broken the rules and a deterrence needs to be put in place to redress the balance of terror against ISIS. Which really is an argument that must flow from the failure of the Obama Administration to contain ISIS by promising to withdraw US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan and giving a deadline which US enemies simply waited to pass before resuming hostilities. The same wrong signals were sent on the cancellation of water boarding and the end of Guatanamo Bay although the latter was not accomplished at the end of the Obama Administration. What is necessary to ponder over in Trump’s new approach is the arrogance inherent in both the cancellation of waterboarding as an instrument of war and the gathering of intelligence. There is a saying that everything is fair and fine in a war.

    In cancelling water boarding before, the Obama Administration was arrogant in thinking it could win the war on terrorism without resorting to such tactics, even in the face of beheading. The anti boarding policy was popular then because Americans and Europeans were in an anti war, anti intervention, and isolationist mood at the beginning of the Obama Administration. However the attendant insecurity created at the end of that Administration and the ensuing migration from the Middle East into the US and EU have created the same sense of danger and insecurity leading to the allegation of porous borders and walls, as well as the need to make America Great again which also is arrogant but is a message that the American people have bought.

    That is what has put Trump in a position to say what he has said on waterboarding and it does not matter what the world thinks about it or its legality as terrorists do not know that he who comes to equity must come with clean hands. All the same, I feel it sends a potent a message to all terrorists who kill innocent people any where, anyway including the use of small girls as suicide bombers, that America has awoken from its arrogant slumber of thinking that global terrorism can be contained with only one eye open. Which was a terrible and agonizing illusion that was the hall mark of the Obama Administration and a tragedy of a foreign strategy and policy which fortified ISIS and spawned the immigration to Europe that has created the xenophobia which then created Brexit and now Donald Trump and the return of torture in the war against terrorism.

    In Nigeria’s popular war on corruption a land mark or watershed on its success was reached this week. This happened when the Presidency replied that the SGF was not given fair hearing by the Senate Committee that found him culpable on grounds of conflicting or undeclared interest in the handling of funds meant for the welfare of the Internally Displaced Persons -IDP – in the theater of the war against Boko Haram in North East of Nigeria. Under the rule of law the right of fair hearing is a fundamental human right because an accuse is presumed innocent until otherwise proven in a court of law. This is our law inherited from the Common Law of our Colonial master, Britain.

    It is unlike the French law which assumes an accuse is guilty as charged and can be detained at the pleasure of the state until he proves his innocence in open court. Both colonial masters however respect the right of fair hearing. However the SGF versus the Senate Trial is not a court case but a case of a confrontation between two arms of government in Nigeria’s powerful presidential system. Indeed it is a battle between the Government which is the Executive arm of the presidential system and the Senate which is the legislative arm. In this particular instance the two arms are behaving like an oligarchy that is above the law with each pursuing its diverse goal.

    The goal of the senate is to get the SGF dumped by the Administration even though they know he is a key member of the war against corruption and denting his image without trial or fair hearing is bound to tarnish not to talk of the integrity of the war against corruption. But it is not the duty of the Presidency to defend the SGF on the grounds of fair hearing as that is a duty of a lawyer in a court of law or any duly constituted investigative body on the matter. Neither is it the duty of the senate to be both accuser and judge in accusing the SGF and asking for his removal as that too is against the principle of natural justice.

    It is my considered view that both the Senate and the Presidency have constituted themselves in to oligarchies in the Nigerian political system which have usurped the functions of the judiciary which seem to have into fallen into a slumber following the arrest of some judges, with millions of dollars and naira in their various residences. Although nobody can be said to be above the law in Nigeria there is no denying that the SGF deserves a fair trial or investigation of the allegations against him and that the defence on his behalf is oligarchic and self serving of the presidency.

    Just as the spirited attack on his reputation albeit to tarnish the war on corruption is equally unjust and oligarchic of a Senate that is always at daggers drawn with a presidency that is one heartedly waging a war on corruption. Either way the law in Nigeria presumes that all Nigerians are equal before the law and that even election into public offices to make laws and govern, do not mean that those involved can constitute themselves into an oligarchy above the law in pursuit of their class or functional interest at the expense of the rule of law. That is making an ass of the law and our democracy and those who live in glass houses should learn not to throw stones. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Business acumen, globalisation and politics

    IT is indeed an irony of history that the leader of Communist China was this week at Davos defending globalization and free trade, while the president elect of the US sworn in as President yesterday got elected on an anti trade and anti globalization campaign or platform.

    That really pitches the two leading ideologies of the world namely communism and capitalism at a cross road in terms of their different styles of economic management and their competing and conflicting slogans on democracy and human rights. However an intermediary came into the fray at Davos to mediate and that was Theresa May, the UK PM who made the welcome acknowledgement that while globalization could have created wealth for millions around the world it has left many behind in terms of outsourcing, wages cut and new changes in communities around the world. Which really is the crust of the matter on how far globalization and world trade has affected all of us in a world that has become a tiny global village, no thanks to the internet and information technology.

    Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th US president yesterday after a campaign in which he condemned the EU and NATO as obsolete, ridiculed globalization for stealing US jobs and accused China of cheating on the US in world trade and tariffs. And he promised to deal with China on winning the presidential election, which he has done and now the ball is in his court to do as he pleases.

    Yet one can also recall that China was dragged like an unwilling school boy to the school of international global trade although it is still an open secret that the Chinese are the greatest champions in piracy and violation of intellectual property rights in a wide range of products and services globally. Similarly there is no denying that the three issues that Theresa May raised were lessons learnt from the Brexit Referendum result the UK and this has informed her determination to ask for no quarters from the EU or anyone else in negotiating a respectable Brexit in tune with the will of the British people to leave the EU and chart a new, independent, sovereign future for the UK, no matter how hazardous and solitary that would be, in an increasingly connected and interwoven world. Interestingly, however, the issues that the UK PM called the attention of the world’s banking elite to at Davos, Switzerland, the icy cold venue of the cynical annual, global, financial elite annual chit chat, that has not moved the world forward economically, are the issues on which the US electorate gave the mandate of governance to their new president, who took office yesterday.

    The issues are British in origin, in their PM’s perspective namely outsourcing, wages cuts and migration as they were the protest of the British people against their leaders and politicians in finding so many strangers in their midst so unexpectedly and without notice from their, political representatives and government.

    These issues were the same grudges and resentment that brought Donald Trump into office in the US against all odds; and now certainly at a huge cost of anger, unbelief and disgust of those Americans who had written the victorious American billionaire off because of his brazen and bold anti establishment rhetoric and strindent denunciation of the status quo during the campaign. Unfortunately, even now that he has been sworn in, there is still a floodgate of premonition and apprehension on his capability as a billionaire to deliver as a President of the US or to make the US great again, as was his campaign slogan.

    It is such doubts on his potential to deliver on his campaign promise that I categorically and contemptuously denounce as a fallacy and it is my intention to prove that today on the basis of the topic of the day premised on business acumen, globalization and politics. Already, I have treated the globalization angle of this debate. I proceed now to show that leaders anywhere in the world, including the US, with good or even moderate business acumen and experience, have the potential to become good political leaders as well as successful economic managers and executioners of their campaign promises once elected and Donald Trump can be no exception in this regard.

    Indeed, in the real world, global prosperity and wealth which globalization has put on the table in a way that Theresa May lamented in terms of poverty, iniquity, and lack of equity, is a cumulative product of global corporate and business skills. It follows logically that business men made a success of it even though the enabling environment for the performance was made possible by political leaders controlling the political system. That is the rationale behind the dictum that in making business and economic human progress possible, politics matters.

    This is because the political system functions to ensure security and political stability, which are the sine qua non, or enabling environment for human and economic development. Again business leaders have the skill and acumen to deliver on set corporate and entrepreneurial goals and objectives based on their talents, management skills, innovation and on occasions just plain unfathomable intuition and luck. Success in such endeavours emboldens such people to go into politics in the hope of improving society at large.

    In Nigeria there are two clear examples. The first was that of MKO Abiola and the June 12 electoral success which was truncated by the military and ended in tragedy for the Nigerian millionaire who clung to his mandate till death. The second is the former Treasurer of Mobil in Nigeria who became the Governor of Lagos state and performed for two terms so well that the state has won three consecutive governorship elections thereafter in the state. That honour and achievement belongs to Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu who went on to midwife together with others the great victory of the APC at the 2015 presidential elections.

    Aside from the billionaire Trump in the US there was another Mobil appearance at the ongoing formation and screening of Trump’s cabinet in the selection of the CEO of Exxon Mobil as the Secretary of State for the US . Indeed his screening revealed his business strength and vast knowledge and connections. Leading all the way albeit, controversially, to a national honor from Russia’s President Vladmir Putin, an honor being portrayed now as unpatriotic and suspicious by those who cannot see a world in which there will be no eclipse if there is détente between the US and Russia.

    Yet this is the reality about to befall the world in due course, or even quickly, once Donald Trump gets his cabinet and act together on his new mandate as the US 45TH president. Undoubtedly, the profession, background and orientation of a leader of any nation must rub off on his real and potential capability economically to deliver on the expected goal of moving the nation forward. The military have played their part historically in Nigeria and have failed woefully. The politicians have had their time and at the last call they left a legacy of massive and unrestrained corruption which the present government is battling with.

    While the population is getting restive, restless and very impatient for progress and relief from high prices, lack of electricity and power, hunger and insecurity as the government clears the Augean stables from where the horses had bolted before the gates were locked in the last Administration. Yet there is still hope that the anti – corruption reputation, ascetic, disciplinarian bearing and military legacy of law and order of the incumbent president will still salvage the Nigerian economic and social hiatus and conundrum. But really time is running out and the patience of the populace is wearing thin on the promised change that led to the 2015 election victory.

    Again with regard to the US, it follows therefore that Donald Trump is not a dunce when it comes at least to corporate governance and leadership given his stature and success as a US billionaire. To those who scoff that he did not pay tax, he has retorted that he was smart a but even that did not deter the US electorate from voting for him.

    In addition this is a man who has written books on deals and leadership and yet some have written his coming Administration off as a descent to buffoonery in American government and politics and have even branded him as a ‘President of a Divided United States‘. Which really in my view is a grievous error of judgement and lack of an understanding of the saying that no one can stop an idea whose time has come.

    That idea today is the Trump Presidency now unfolding before our eyes with its confidence and potentials along side the sour grapes and simmering disbelief of doubts and consternation on his election victory. Yet I expect him to live and lead effortlessly to his promise to make his nation great again given his tested and successful business talents and obvious managerial skills that have made a billionaire and now a new president of him. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Global leadership, change and expectations of 2017

    I look today at the statement credited to Nigeria’s former Head of State retired General Olusegun Obasanjo that he and a handful Nigerians picked Nigeria’s current Head of State President Muhammadu Buhari in the context of the nature of elections, democracy and global leadership. I want to compare that with revelations at the screening of nominees of US President Elect Donald Trump for cabinet and other appointments as he prepares to be sworn in as the US ‘45TH president on January 20 this year. The two events are about power, its usage and transfer, and the expectations in 2017 of the electorate, especially of the leaders they have elected in any election that is free and fair.

    It is necessary to point out that we are not taking about elections like the one in Gambia recently where the incumbent president accepted defeat but changed his mind later and refused to concede defeat while claiming that he had discovered some arithmetical inexactitude in the collation of the announced results by the Gambian Electoral Commission. Before proceeding further it is pertinent to mention here that the Gambian President and that of S Africa were the two African leaders that pulled their nations out of the International Criminal Court -ICC – on the grounds that the ICC was biased against African leaders and is racist in its judgment on African leaders.

    I wrote against such views then, noting that law abiding and honest African leaders have nothing to fear with the ICC in the way it dealt with Charles Taylor of Liberia. Now the two presidents have shown their true credentials first in the Gambian president’s sit tight hold on power and the recent call by S Africa’s corruption ridden presidency of Jacob Zuma this week for a woman president in S Africa and prodding his wife, the current President of the African Union to succeed him. If justice and rule of law must prevail in Africa, I pray that one day both the Gambian president and the S African president will have their day in court at the ICC like the former Liberian President Charles Taylor who ruled Liberians with iron hands and scant regard for the rule of law, and is now Languishing in a British jail.

    Let us now return to the topic of the day namely Obasanjo’s claim on President Buhari’s emergence as president and the topsy turvy US presidential elections and power transition process. This we shall treat with the 2016 US presidential elections which have thrown up Donald Trump as president elect. We take a peep at his choice of cabinet ministers whose choice, pedigree and screening have shown clearly that the US has made a huge and dramatic U turn from the legacy and direction of the eight year presidency and tenure of outgoing, lame duck President Barak Obama.

    With regard to Nigeria, OBJ was quoted to have said that he and his colleagues lamented that Nigeria was not living up to its billing as a nation created by God to be a land flowing with milk and honey and they picked the present incumbent president as the leader to rescue the situation. OBJ then went on to say reportedly that the incumbent president is living up to expectations. Which is where I beg to differ both on his claim of picking our leader in the 2015 presidential elections as well as his assertion that he is doing well. Which somehow also means that the government is living up to expectations on which again, I respectfully disagree.

    This is because even the President at an event this week reportedly said that when he got elected he met an empty treasury and inherited a tripod of problems namely insecurity, corruption and a poor economy. He gave himself pass mark on corruption and insecurity but lamented publicly about the poor economy as work in progress literally. My first point of disagreement is on the management of the economy whose growth is stalled by falling oil prices and was bedeviled by a drastic and unexpected rise in fuel prices whose multiplier effect on household spending and depletion of revenues of the manufacturing industry have crippled the economy and adversely affected negatively, the quality of life of millions of Nigerians. This means that the nation has to go borrowing and this too has created unexpected legislative bottlenecks and diplomatic somersaults for us as a nation .

    The government has asked for a loan of 30bn dollars from China and the loan was questioned bitterly by the Senate whose president later said the legislative body acted in the best interest of the nation. Also this week it was reported that the government has asked Taiwan to remove its diplomatic office from Abuja, the nation’s capital which is another way of saying that Nigeria does not recognize Taiwan anymore. The presidency later refuted this saying that Nigeria never had diplomatic but only trade office representation with Taiwan in Taipei and Taiwan ‘s office in Abuja. It is obvious that that is a very diplomatic way of giving in to China to improve Sino –Nigerian relations in consonance with the One China policy and at the expense of Taiwan.

    This has been called cheque book diplomacy by some analysts and I cannot agree more as he who pays the piper dictates the tune. Yet, it is difficult to forget the contribution of Taiwan to the development of our economy even though we are in dire economic straits and are now abandoning Taiwan. Surely Nigerian mechanics, motorists and transport owners cannot forget easily the time when Taiwan motor fake parts moved our transport commuting and motor industry at a time Taiwan was a synonym for fake motor parts .

    Nowadays however our mechanics in the face of very scarce availability of car parts often tell their clients that Taiwan car parts are the ‘original’ which perform even better than new motor parts. Now with Taiwan booted out of Abuja and diplomatic and trade reckoning, I presume we should prepare ourselves for an influx of Chinese motor parts which are largely untested as at now in our part of the world. One prays that we have not cut our nose to spite our face in the way we have kow towed to China’s One China policy so very awkwardly and with such undue haste.

    We should have learnt from the Taiwanese, who are leaders in global IT industry as well, how they were able to make progress from being manufacturers of fake parts to makers of genuine motor parts in so short a time and right before our eyes. Now we have to borrow from the Chinese with One China strings attached and we have missed an opportunity to learn how to fish by Taiwa because we have been given fish, a la carte by the ubiquitous and rich Chinese dragon. A pity indeed but we hope we make the best of the Chinese loan in 2017 to improve our problematic economy. Let us now round up with the screening of Donald Trump’s cabinet nominees in the US and revelations from that on the direction of US foreign policy in 2017 and the import of that for the rest of us, globally.

    My first observation was that the Senatorial screeners saw Russian President Vladmir Putin as an outright scoundrel and America’s No 1 enemy and tried to extract any trace of connection or sympathy for the Russian president, from the nominees in order to make them un -confirmable by the US senate. This brazen attempts happened especially with the nominees for Attorney General Senator Jeff Sessions, Defence Secretary, retired General James Mattis s and Rex Tillerson nominee for Secretary of State respectively But the Defence and Secretary of State nominees held their ground and accepted Putin as America’s No 1 enemy in international relations and lately in the arena of global election cyber hacking which even Trump has admitted Russia had a hand in the hacking of the Democratic Party Secretariat in the 2016 presidential elections in the US. All the same the nominees left their screeners in no doubt that things would be done better under Trump and that America’s battle and combat readiness have taken a plunge under the present out going Obama Administration.

    To me the screening was biased against the nominees and tried to make them disagree with the controversial utterances of their selector, the US president elect awaiting inauguration or is it coronation on January 20 2017. Or else why did the screeners not ask the Secretary of State nominee on his views on the deployment of troops to Germany to defend the EU against Russia by an outgoing US Administration whose days are numbered? Or why did the screeners not ask the Defence nominee for his views on the deployment of the US most lethal and expensive F35 fighter jets to Japan by an outgoing Administration which should while it had time, have done this to deter China from seizing Islands from US allies in the South Seas of the Pacific? Surely such belated efforts were meant to tie the hand of the incoming Trump Administration and are disruptive of the transition of power in a leading democracy like the US. But then the focus in the US media and of course in this screening exercise has always been on the US president elect and open consternation and bitterness on his unexpected victory in the US 2016 presidential elections.

    That fact and hostile media attitude will surely affect the Trump presidency one way or the other. What is clear however is that, ceteris paribus, all things being equal, Trump will become President in 2017, on January 20 and America will move in opposite direction of the Obama legacy and foreign policy. How that will affect or shape the world in 2017 will be there for us to see as virtual and digital ring siders in a global village, watching the biggest ‘ rumble in the jungle’ of the ‘ greatest democracy on earth‘ as Americans love to call their nation. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria .

  • 2016: The year of Donald Trump, xenophobia and corruption

    It is difficult not to see Donald Trump as the man who has dominated world affairs for good or bad in the year 2016. Put simply , it was his year whether you like it or not; or worse still if you can not stick the man, his guts, utterances and now tweets which he uses infamously to announce his coming policies, likes and dislikes.

    Grudgingly Time Magazine picked him as the Man of the Year but of a Divided United States. Which really does not matter since the same magazine established the main criterion that the man of the year must have influenced world affairs for good or bad and had picked Ayatollah Khomeini, and Adolf Hitler before, for its cover magazine just as it picked Donald Trump for 2016. In addition and most unbelievably Donald Trump turned American politics on its head by making global and American security an election issue and whipped up hysteria on Islamic militancy and terrorism by promising to make America safe and great again.

    The convincing way in which he won the presidential election has shown that the US electorate believed him and my initial view here is that a nation deserves any leadership it gets and that is the problem of Americans and indeed the rest of the world for at least the next four years of a Donald Trump presidency.

    Also Donald Trump branded Hillary Clinton ‘Crooked Hillary ‘over her handling of the Clinton Foundation affairs, her destruction of her e mails under investigation, and the Benghazi killing of the US ambassador during her tenure as Secretary of State. But really on the issue of corruption I intend to tackle the matter from a Nigerian perspective while leaving the Americans to their own designs and perspectives as reflected already in the results of their 2016 presidential elections. Again I say it is difficult to pick the Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari as the Man of the Year in Nigeria just as it was not difficult to pick Donald Trump as the global Man of the Year and the reason is clear, as well as the difference. Donald Trump triumphed against all odds and was elected president of the USA.

    President Buhari on the other hand tried his best in the fight against corruption but left the battle ground in the fight against corruption in 2016 gasping for breath or literally out of breath. This is because corruption and its anti corruption war brigade waxed stronger against the rule of law in both in the legislature, which has taken on the government brazenly and contemptuously on the matter, and even amongst the security agencies that were expected to be both the foot soldiers and vanguard of the war against corruption.

    As at the end of 2016, the DSS had written against the integrity of the boss of the EFCC the official anti-corruption institution of the land in the process of the confirmation of the appointment of the EFCC boss, who made his mark in the fight against corruption by taking on key members of the institution with the power to confirm or refuse his confirmation.

    Worse still the Secretary to the Government of the Federation was implicated in a case of conflict of interest in the handling of contracts for the welfare of millions of Nigerians displaced by the Boko Haram war in the North East. Coming on the heels of the 2.1 bn dollars diversion of funds meant for war by the last Administration, but used as campaign funds instead and exposed as such by the Buhari Administration which however is yet to prosecute or punish any alleged culprit on that account, one can see why the war on corruption has not achieved much other than its strident and well known battle cry in the year 2016.

    The only hope now is for the Buhari administration to revamp its strategy in 2017 and re engage the slippery and fortified forces of corruption swiftly and decisively as justice delayed is justice denied. More so in the fight against corruption on which the credibility of the Buhari administration hangs like the famous Sword of Damocles.

    In addition to Donald Trump’s victory won as his detractors said on the platform of xenophobia, sexism and racism, 2016 was also the year of Brexit another result based on insecurity and fear of migrants into Europe and the attendant fear of Islamic militancy and terrorism. No one can seriously say such fears were unfounded but the Americans believed anyway they were real and voted for Trump who vowed to stop migration and destroy ISIS which he said President Obama was so afraid of or so compliant with that at first, he was scared to call the Islamic terror group by its name.

    Again the American electorate believed Donald Trump and voted for him because they saw rightly or wrongly that he has the stomach for a fight that his predecessor spent eight years dodging. More pointedly, Trump has appointed as his National Security Adviser a general fired by Obama for suggesting that the war against Islamic terrorism should be an ideological war similar to the Cold War between Communism and Capitalism and should be fought with all American resources and vigor as was done during the Cold War .

    Indeed the fired general, Michael Flynn, now Trump’s NSA, said Islamism is a political ideology of the Islamic faith and is a weaponised faith out to settle historico – cultural grouse with the rest of the world. For this view this general was fired by Obama and is now employed as NSA by Donald Trump whose views the US electorate believed in making him their next president. One therefore does not need a soothsayer to see the direction of Donal Trump’s foreign policy on ISIS or the fight against terrorism now to be fought on an ideological battle field with all American resources and guts which Trump thinks the US and its people have aplenty to take on not only ISIS but even the entire world as we know it today.

    Again it is difficult to discuss 2016 without mentioning the outgoing US President Barak Obama, now a lame duck president who seems to be relishing that role albeit like the famed stable keeper who closed the stable doors after all the horses have bolted. A few examples after the 2016 US presidential elections where he congratulated the winner and promised a smooth transition of power, will suffice.

    The Obama White House announced that the Russians hacked the elections and is planning sanctions against Russian hackers and officials yet to be identified. The Obama Administration rightly refused to veto a UN Security Council Resolution condemning Israel for building on occupied territories captured in the 1967 Six Days War won by Israel, against UN resolutions on the issue. On this PLO veteran and eloquent spokeswoman and states woman Hanan Ashrawi wondered why the US had been supporting Israel for the last eight years on a matter that all previous US presidents, whether Republican or Democratic have always given the Israelis friendly diplomatic and international cover to the detriment of Palestinians.

    Again, Secretary of State John Kerry, a few days ago outlined US foreign policy in the Middle East and stressed that not using the Security Council veto to protect Israel reflects US values and that sounded so pathetic, forlorn and confusing. This is a policy that will surely be booted out of the window when Donald Trump is sworn in as President by January 20, 2017. Anyway it reminded me of the same American values that Kerry invoked on the use of chemical weapons by President Bashar Assad on his people at the beginning of the present Syria debacle.

    American values and morals were articulated brilliantly but never followed through by the Obama Administration and that bred ISIS and the migration to Europe that fanned Brexit and trumped up a Donald Trump victory. Indeed the Obama Administration’s strangely belated actions on the global diplomatic scene make the recall of two home truths inevitable. One is that procrastination is the thief of time. The other is that an actor quits when the ovation is loudest. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

  • Elections, mandates and business

    It is a tautology to say that elections give politicians or competing contestants power when they win and such victories are the source of political mandates. Indeed such mandates are the precursor of management styles and the challenge of governance.

    This is because the business of politics begins once a leader is given electoral mandate and that may even well be before he is sworn in as both the de facto and de jure winner of such elections and mandates. However the execution of electoral mandates reveal leadership styles as well as the personality and priorities of elected leaders in any environment which we shall assume will be a peaceful one as elections cannot be conducted in an atmosphere of war and violence.

    An aberration occurred in this regard in Syria when the Syrian President Bashar Assad was elected or returned as President but that is not the type of election we are talking about as the carnage in Aleppo and the bombings and failed evacuations of civilians still show that Syria is a nation needing serious humanitarian aid and help rather than elections or mandates for its leader.

    Even as far back as in Ancient Athens the mother of democracy, Herodotus, the father of History was credited with saying that it is in the interest of nations and leaders to seek peace because during peace sons bury their fathers but during wars fathers bury their sons.

    The world has since survived several historical wars including two World Wars and the scourge of 9/11 in 2001 culminating in the present war on terrorism and the bloody emergence of ISIS, Islamic militancy leading to the biggest migration in history of migrants fleeing wars desperately in Syria, Afghanistan on the Mediterranean Sea, en route to safety in Europe.

    The existence of the Gold Star Families in the US, the sight of the Turkish boy thrown dead ashore, and the little stunned bloodied boy in Aleppo shown world wide illustrate vividly demonstrate the old Athenian wisdom that during wars fathers bury their sons.

    This was rampant during the Obama tenure now starkly replaced by a Trump victory that was won because it roundly condemned the apathy and inaction of the Obama Administration on global security and peace. Indeed world trade and globalization as we know it today was predicated on the sound premise that when nations trade with each other then they are not likely to go to war.

    That also is the logic of our discussions of today’s topic as we look at events and happenings in the US, Russsia, Japan and our own Nigeria as well as the leadership styles and mandates of the leaders of these nations. In the US, President elect Donald Trump has nominated the CEO of Exxon Mobil Rex Tillerson as the next US Secretary of State in his administration once he is sworn in on January 20, 2017.

    The leaders of Russia and Japan also met this week to sign trade and business deals between their two nations. In Nigeria President Muhammadu Buhari reportedly lamented that army officers in his time had no time for improving their education but were more interested in coups and their careers. Just as the Nigerian Senate called on his Secretary to the Government of the Federation to resign over conflict of interest in managing the funds for the rehabilitation of the North East, recently destroyed by Boko Haram insurgency.

    Indeed the appointment of an oil boss as the next chief diplomat of the US fits the bill in connection with our earlier proposition that trade promotes peace and not war. This is because the Exxon Mobil boss is said to be chummy with the Russian strongman and president, Vladmir Putin. In fact he was shown on global TV this week at the time he received a Russian National Award from the Russian president.

    Again it was revealed that the Exxon Mobil boss was against the sanctions against Russia by the UN led by the US over Russia’s invasion of the Crimea in Ukraine recently.

    If you recall that Putin accused the US government of Barak Obama of trying to overthrow his government with the sanctions and the Russian government had become totally anti US in the Obama tenure of office, thereby threatening world peace with super power hostility, you can really see the prospect for global amity and diplomatic tranquility when the Russian president receives his friend and well known acquaintance Rex Tillerson as the next US Secretary of State .

    Certainly that would be a far cry from the frosty relations and repulsive receptions that Hillary Clinton and her boss received from Moscow during Hillary’s tenure as American Secretary of State. Again American oil business will be in big business as Russia is the largest exporter of oil and recently built the longest oil pipeline in the world to China at the height of its mistrust of the Obama Administration foreign policy. Certainly the US and Russia are about to show the world that peace thrives when leaders have respect and admiration for each other and this is surely good for global peace, trade and development.

    The Russian President was also in Nagato, the home town of Japan’s leader Shinzo Abe in Japan to find a way of putting the hostile effects of the last two world wars behind the two nations . Russia and Japan have a running bitter dispute over the ownership of four Islands called the Akril Islands in the Pacific and President Putin has recently promised to put the dispute he called an anachronism behind them. It is envisaged that this will cede some control of the Islands to Japan in the interest of peace while Putin will also attend trade confabs with the Japanese and other Asian nations to cement and promote business deals between the nations attending.

    A great day also for peace and trade between these world leaders as they consummate their election mandates for the progress of their nations. Let us round up with Nigeria where the political terrain is not only different but uniquely difficult. While there are known mafia groups in Russia and Japan they are famed for crime in the pursuit of business and profits and they are known as criminal political networks but they know their limits and do not subvert the state.

    In Nigeria the situation is different. Elected and appointed politicians and public servants have looted the state and the Nigerian nation to a state of economic stupor such that our popularly elected president confessed he wanted to bolt from office once he saw first hand the level of corruption facing his office and nation. Luckily he realized that nature abhors a political vacuum and that in a presidential system we have created for ourselves, the buck stops on his table .Unfortunately however, it would seem the hangover of that first scare to bolt has not entirely disappeared.

    This is because the government has been focusing mainly on the war on corruption such that the Senate is taking the initiative in challenging the government on non performance as the Senate President did when the Senate President told the President who came to present his budget that there is hardship in the land. According to reports the Senate President told the President – ‘the feedback we get from our visits to our constituencies is that there is hardship in the land. We can see it. We can feel it ‘.

    Coming from a senate whose members earn several millions to service their constituencies which they hardly see or visit, this is a vintage example of shedding crocodile tears on behalf of Nigerian suffering masses. Yet it is still a welcome antidote or stimulant if it can and should make Mr President to recover from that initial impulse to flee from power and go into real action to take this famed and notorious recession that has brought our nation’s democracy and government to a stand still.

    The Nigerian president can do this by acting first on the accusation against the SGF on being involved with one of the companies handling war relief supplies in the North East of the nation. While one must admit that there is no love lost between the Senate and the Executive arm of government there must be an investigation of the allegations against the SGF in the interest of fair play and accountability, if only to show that there is no sacred cow in the war against corruption the arrowhead of governmental achievement of this Administration so far. Once again long live the Federal Republic of Nigeria.