The Nation Newspaper

Category: Saturday

  • Agitated presidency, discontented populace

    Agitated presidency, discontented populace

    UnderTow

    It took quite some time and several displays of vacillating leadership for Nigerians to come round to the fact that they were hasty in voting the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration to get rid of what they believed to be the Goodluck Jonathan laissez-faire presidency. The ripple effect of that unspoken meeting of minds among Nigerians is that the presidency has become defensive and now claims that there is a plot to upstage the administration in a treasonable and undemocratic manner, to wit any other manner than by elections. This fixation has, in turn, left the populace in the remarkable position of being unable to communicate its discontent with the state of the nation to the presidency without constituting, in the presidency’s opinion, a party to the treasonable plot. What the presidency seems unable to appreciate is that there is a fine distinction between citizens who are discontented with the presidency on the one hand and anarchical malcontents at whom the presidency’s suspicion should ideally be directed on the other hand.

    Primarily, a congress of factors, including controversial policies, economic imprudence, social tension and friction, insecurity, stultification of the judiciary, and disregard for human lives, have made Nigerians to be dissatisfied with the administration. This discontent is what generally grieves the presidency, whose spokesmen have tried futilely to portray it as the best thing since independence, more so against the backdrop of the secessionist ambitions of agitators for tribal republics. For the citizenry, their primary woe is the activities of malcontents, lawless anarchists who mock the government at every step of the way, and who have no other design than the actualisation of some fundamentalist ideology based on either religion or ethnicity. Nigerians feel that although the government is aware of the activities of these malcontents and the dangers that they pose to the populace, it does not think them a big enough threat, hence the national dysphoria.

    It is difficult to blame them: the distressing news that have emanated from Kaduna for instance, where Governor Nasir el-Rufai sentinels an obstinate policy not to negotiate with bandits and kidnappers despite initially holding contrary views on the matter, are enough to have caused a fatal stir in other less accommodating countries. To jog the memory, on March 11, 39 students were ferreted without their consent from their hostels within the premises of the Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation, Afaka, to an unknown location. Being thus kidnapped, their abductors released a sickening video in which the helpless students were being indiscriminately flogged and harangued with whips and guns. This was to expedite the payment of the N500m ransom demanded for their release. On April 18, however, things took an uglier turn when some kidnappers, under the stewardship of one Sani Idris Jalingo, kidnapped about 22 students from Greenfield University, Kaduna. The criminal outfit asked for a ransom of N800m, and when things were not moving at a satisfactory pace, they killed first three then two students. It was only three days ago that the students from the Federal College of Forestry Mechanisation were released, after 56 days in captivity. It took the facilitation of former president Olusegun Obasanjo and Sheikh Ahmad Gumi to get them out.

    Distressed, the parents of the students from Greenfield University established a forum, the like of which should not happen in a sane country, but which has been the trend since perhaps the Chibok girls kidnap. One of the parents, a widow, appeared on Roots TV and reported that they had in fact gone to prominent Islamic cleric, Sheikh Gumi, to see what he could do about the matter. The thing about Sheikh Gumi is that everyone wonders how he has portrayed himself as a bandit medium and always seems to be in the picture whenever issues with killer herdsmen, bandits or insurgents arise. He is an expert on the matter, it would seem, and he has been known to advocate for them severally. That he advocates for the bandits, suspicious as that is, is not the problem – every Nigerian is entitled to their political opinions, regardless of how subnormal they are, and the venting of such offensive opinions. Sheikh Gumi’s actions are also guileful. He walks in and out of bandits’ dens and is not questioned by anyone, he speaks fatherly of them, claiming to know who they are, and claiming to understand their griefs. It is unclear how anyone can identify with murderers; but he does it anyway, and the government does not raise eyebrows.

    The parents’ entreaties have not moved the abductors, neither will the president’s detached appeal through his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, on May 5 that the bandits should release the abducted Greenfield University students. Although, the other parents have come out to publicly disavow the statement of that distressed widow and apologise to Sheikh Gumi, no one is falling for the smoke and mirrors game. The presidency’s stoic refusal to investigate the Sheikh who clearly has access to some of the bandits is unnerving and has further fuelled suspicion that the administration is simply apathetic. A government that wants to adopt a no-negotiation stance on terrorists must have a plan for rescuing students. Many Nigerians are appalled to see the presidency and the el-Rufai government remain adamant about not negotiating, yet not having a cogent plan to save the kidnapped students.

    More than apathy, however, is the worry that the administration is simply mischievous. Reacting to opposition from the People’s Democratic Party that the president should bring kidnappers and bandits to justice, the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, stated that it was not the job of the federal government to prosecute kidnappers. His words: “The PDP alleged that kidnappers and bandits are not being brought to justice. This is apparently aimed at the Federal Government. It is shocking that a party that ruled this nation for all of 16 years does not know that kidnapping and banditry are not federal offences. The PDP should therefore call out the states, including those being controlled by it, to ensure a rigorous prosecution of arrested kidnappers and bandits.”

    This legal manoeuvre explains why there has been general lethargy on the issue of kidnapping in Nigeria. Section 364 of the Criminal Code makes kidnapping a crime and offence against liberty under federal law and stipulates that it is punishable with 10 years imprisonment. Section 365 of the Criminal Code allots a punishment of two years’ imprisonment to anyone guilty of depriving another person of liberty in Nigeria. Many states, however, have domesticated the Criminal Code as laws within their jurisdictions. Accordingly, several states have instituted the death penalty for kidnapping. So when the crime of kidnapping occurs within the boundaries of states, it is the attorney general of that state that commences actions in that regard. This does not, however, exculpate the federal government as the minister would like to believe. The governors of states may be the chief security officers of their states, but security apparatus are controlled by the federal government. There are no state police forces, neither are there state armies. The presidency’s belief that it is making headway in the fight against terrorism is also not satisfactory. Prosecuting terrorists and reintroducing them into the society only for them to continue a life of unhinged crime does not sound like success in the fight against terrorism contrary to the minister’s opinion.

    Indeed, by pushing the responsibility of bringing kidnappers to justice to the state governments but retaining control of security forces, the presidency cannot recognise that the biggest threats to its administration are the malcontents they are trying to avoid and its own self which is stripped of every vestige of nobility by warring power factions, not dissatisfied Nigerians who seek better governance. Without the foregoing context, the following agitated statement by the president’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, released on May 4 would have dropped Nigerians’ jaws: “Championed by some disgruntled religious and past political leaders, the intention is to eventually throw the country into a tailspin, which would compel a forceful and undemocratic change of leadership. Further unimpeachable evidence shows that these disruptive elements are now recruiting the leadership of some ethnic groups and politicians round the country, with the intention of convening some sort of conference, where a vote of no confidence would be passed on the president, thus throwing the land into further turmoil. The agent provocateurs hope to achieve through artifice and sleight of hands, what they failed to do through the ballot box in the 2019 elections. Nigerians have opted for democratic rule, and the only accepted way to change a democratically elected government is through elections, which hold at prescribed times in the country. Any other way is patently illegal, and even treasonable. Of course, such would attract the necessary consequences.”

    Disturbingly, this amounts to an exhibition of the presidency’s difficulty with appreciating public law, as well as the overarching paranoia that is the result of its ignorance. Section 143 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) dictates the procedure for removing the president or vice-president from office. Mr Adesina’s claim that any other way but presidential elections and tenure expiration for entering and removing people from the office of the president is patently illegal is faux pas. Some Nigerians state that the presidency’s statement does not only reek of ignorance, but is also a reflection of the administration’s disregard of and contempt for the oversight functions of the legislature. Whichever it is, ignorance or disdain for legislative powers, the presidency’s paranoia comes across as the whining of a minor.

    The presidency should know that the frustrated citizenry, who send their children to universities in the country with the mind-set of a herd of gazelle crossing crocodile infested waters, who endure woeful living standards in an ailing giant economy, are discontented with the administration and simply want better. They are neither interested in a violent overthrow of government, neither are they anarchists, for they know the failure of the state is equally injurious to their wellbeing. The government should not fix a myopic gaze on them while the malcontents, who compromise the lives and territorial integrity of Nigerians and Nigeria, appear to operate unchecked. Foresight and depth will bring home to those in authority that Nigerians want them to complete their tenures peacefully, but not with the same weakness manifested over six years, which has brought the country to a sorry pass.

  • Awo’s unheeded voice (1)

    Awo’s unheeded voice (1)

    By Segun Ayobolu

     

    It is an incontestable fact that Chief Obafemi Awolowo was one leader who, more than any of his contemporaries and even up till now, has thought most articulately, rigorously, comprehensively and exhaustively about the problems of Nigeria and their most effective solutions. He was clearly not being immodest when he declared that, when many of his opponents and adversaries were wasting their time in unproductive activities, he was busy burning the midnight oil engaging in intellectual toil on the most appropriate path to Nigeria’s future stability, unity, development and greatness. There is a veritable library of speeches, articles, lectures and books in which Awolowo expressed his methodical, deeply researched views and ideas on practically every sphere of Nigeria’s polity, economy and society. His leadership as Premier of Western Region in the First Republic, when that territory was, perhaps, the fastest growing area of Africa is still a reference point in excellent and unimpeachable governance anywhere in the world.

    After the 1959 general elections that ushered in the country’s first post-independence government in 1960, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe’s National Council of Nigerian Citizens (NCNC) and Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s Action Group (AG) had more seats combined in the federal legislature than Alhaji Ahmadu Bello’s Northern People’s Congress (NPC) even though the latter with its majority of seats in the North had the single largest number of elected legislators. To enable a coalition of the NCNC and the AG to form the government at the centre in accordance with the practice under the parliamentary system, Awolowo offered Dr Azikiwe the position of Prime Minister while he would serve as Finance Minister in the first post-colonial Nigerian administration. While the NCNC in coalition with the Northern Elements Progressive Union (NEPU) won 89 seats, the AG had 73 seats while the NPC won 142 seats out of the total of 312 seats in the federal parliament. This means that a coalition government of the AG and NCNC, as proposed by Awo, would have a combined total of 162 seats and would have formed the government.

    Unable to transcend petty rivalries and Igbo-Yoruba conflicts during the nationalist struggles that led to independence, Zik inexplicably led the NCNC into an alliance with the NPC accepting to be the powerless and constitutionally impotent ‘ceremonial president’ of Nigeria while Alhaji Tafawa Balewa became Prime Minister with the powerful leader of the NPC, Alhaji Ahmadu Bello, opting to remain in Kaduna as Premier of Northern Nigeria. But for the fateful decision of Azikiwe, it is possible that Nigeria’s post-independence trajectory would be radically different from the tragedy we are witnessing today with the country’s immense potentials trapped by successive governments striving to outdo each other in sheer venality, indolence, incompetence, nepotism and irresponsibility.

    When Awolowo passed on in 1987, members of Nigeria’s political class from across the country fell over themselves to shower encomiums on him even though they had done everything to obstruct and frustrate his attempt to put his enormous mental, spiritual and moral energies at the disposal of Nigeria’s development during his lifetime. The South-East, where today some of the most vehement and virulent voices for secession can be heard, were the first to acquiesce to northern leadership of the country when, as noted above, Azikwe rejected Awolowo’s offer to be Prime Minister under whom the latter would serve as Finance Minister in 1959. In 1979, when Awolowo aspired to lead the country as President on the platform of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), he sought in vain to find a candidate from the North to be his running mate.

    In fact, I remember that when Awolowo formed the UPN in 1978 in preparation for the return to civilian rule, the late Alhaji Abubakar Rimi launched a largely baseless, vitriolic tirade against his aspiration. He thus picked Chief Phillip Umeadi, a lawyer of Igbo extraction, to be his Vice-Presidential candidate. Understandably, because the civil war was still fresh in their minds and the Igbo elite perceived him as the prime architect of the failure of the Biafran secession attempt, the South-East again decided to reject Awo at the polls and opted to split their votes between the Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP) led by Zik and the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) with Alhaji Shehu Shagari as President and the cerebral Dr Alex Ekwueme as his Vice –President. Again, Awolowo’s attempt to forge a handshake across the Niger between the East and the West was rebuffed by the Igbo as Dr Azikiwe led the NPP into an alliance with the NPN and nominated leading members of his party into the Shagari administration.

    Read Also: Nigeria’ll escape over-dependence on oil in 10 years – Awolowo

     

    More than any part of the country, it is however the northern elite who, deep within them, must have the deepest regrets that they frustrated Awo’s attempts to lead Nigeria and replicate for the entire country, particularly the North, the spectacular feats of leadership genius he exhibited as Premier of Western Nigeria. For, today the Northern leadership are reaping the bitter fruits of years of the most corrupt, undisciplined, visionless and irresponsible leadership that has made the region of otherwise hardworking people and abundant resources the sprawling, lawless terrain of rampant banditry, kidnapping, religious extremism, insurgency, abject poverty and mass illiteracy.  Yet, this was what Awo incessantly warned against for the better part of his political career.

    For instance, in his book, ‘The Strategy and Tactics of the Peoples Republic of Nigeria’, first published in 1970, the sage had warned that “It is now generally accepted that if we want to keep Nigeria united, and harmoniously so, the yawning gap in education between the north and the south must be closed with the least possible delay, and immediate steps must be taken to this end”. In a speech he delivered in Kano on 23rd April, 1970, Awolowo once again admonished that if the nation, latest by 1974, embarked on aggressive implementation of free education and free health services at all levels, “I am convinced that in  a matter of fifteen years from now illiteracy and mass ignorance, as well as preventable diseases, would have become a thing of the past; and in twenty years from now, the present yawning, dangerous and explosive gap between one part of the country and another would have been totally closed, putting all ethnic groups in Nigeria on equal footing with another in educational and intellectual attainments”.

    At the launching of ‘The Strategy and Tactics of the People’s Republic’ in Lagos on Friday, 31st July, 1970, Awo spoke further on his vision to close the educational gap between the North and the South. Let me quickly state that this book contains 7 extensive tables abstracted from 158 tables with 1,587 columns, which set out in his words “the estimated school population at all levels for the Northern and Southern states, from 1970 to 1980, taking into account a compound growth rate of two and a half percent per annum in our population”. What were Awolowo’s startling conclusions from this immense research work?

    According to him, “Granting then that God bestows on us the wisdom, vision and grace to embark on free and compulsory education by January 1974, it is clear from tables 1 and 2 that we would end this decade in 1979 with a primary school population of seven and a half million people in the northern states as compared and contrasted with 6 million primary school pupils in the Southern states. By 1980, the Northern states would have 1.17 million general secondary school pupils as compared with 1.2 million in the Southern states. Also, by 1980, 270,000 students of Northern states origin would be pursuing post-secondary education as contrasted with 262,000 students from the Southern states. By 1985, the process, which would have begun much earlier, of each constituent state having at least one university, would be completed”. Mark you, Awo was writing these words in 1970!

    Again, in a broadcast to the nation as Nigeria’s Commissioner for Finance and Vice-Chairman of the Federal Executive Council on 1st October, 1967, Awolowo again addressed the question of educational imbalance between the North and the South in vivid detail. According to him, “It may not be generally known that, in the current year, there are only approximately 18,000 pupils in secondary grammar schools in the six Northern states, as against 170,000 in the six Southern states, and roughly 12,000 teachers in training in the Northern states, as against 24,000 teachers in training in the Southern states. If we are to keep Nigeria one – and harmoniously so, and if all sections of the national groups in Nigeria are to have equal opportunity for contributing to our high-level manpower needs, this yawning gap must be closed without further delay. It is for this reason that the Federal Military Government has decided to stimulate, vigorously, the rapid expansion of secondary education and teacher training in the Northern states, by the award of scholarships in large numbers, and the grant of free financial assistance – not loans, to qualified pupils in the Northern States”.

    Had Awo’s voice of wisdom and foresight been heeded, would the North today harbor the largest number of out of school children in the country? Would the educational imbalance between the North and South not have been eradicated? It is unlikely that we would have the Boko Haram insurgency, banditry, herdsmen violence, kidnapping and other crimes crippling most parts of the North today especially, as we will see in the second part of this piece, Awolowo had well researched, detailed proposals for tackling unemployment, modernizing agriculture and cattle rearing and promoting rapid industrialization across the country.

  • Nigeria league without end

    Nigeria league without end

    By  Ade Ojeikere

     

    Those fable tellers mouthing the many gains of the domestic league are looking for where to cover their faces in shame. All the illusory permutations about money which would come into the coffers of the league have melted away like ice-cream under the sun. It has suddenly dawned on those advocates that they may have been scammed. Other facets of the league which have dared to raise their voices haven’t been able to do anything that would jolt the organisers.

    Suddenly, the tiny thread holding the rickety league together is about to snap with the practitioners threatening to sit at home to expose the folly and tales of the organisers. The match referees have vowed not to step onto any pitch to handle games except their indemnities running into millions of naira in the last two seasons were paid in full. Previous attempts to paper the cracks in the league have fallen belly up.

    The folly of getting Nigerian players in Europe to show off videos of them watching the domestic games wherever they were stares the organisers like a sore thumb. The videos have gone blank. No sound, no images and no side comments from our gullible players who ought to have told their mentors that it isn’t the way live games are shown on television in Europe.

    The organisers in their characteristic style of playing god announced at the end of easily the worst league competition held in this country that the second stanza would begin at a date they later changed. And like the local clubs noted when the new movement of the resumption date to May 9, was publicised again, moving dates of matches is normal with the league organisers. What a shame.

    Would the second stanza begin on May 9? It is looking like a mirage except the referees go back on their promise to down tools. A few clubs won’t be surprised if the referees swallow their vomits with relish and return to the field with all its abnormalities, debts, and threats to referees’ lives by fans who ought to be locked out, no thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. A prominent club chairman laughed his hearts out when told that referees were planning a showdown with the league organisers. He hinged his foolery of the referees on the fact that they make more money from their unhealthy relationships with some rich clubs than what they would receive per game as indemnities. No prize for guessing that the referees handled Wednesday evening’s Oriental derby between Enyimba FC and IfeanyiUbah FC in Aba.

    IfeanyiUbah shot into a 2-0 advantage but watched in disbelieve how the People’s Elephant rallied very hard to end the tie at dusk 2-2.

    Read Also: Nigeria League: 30 years in diapers 

     

    Expectedly, feelers available to this writer showed that Pinnick met with the club chairmen on Thursday night to do an appraisal of the league’s events and stories around the league since it began last year to arrest some of the inherent problems associated with the game in the last five years. Thursday meeting with the club chairmen in Abuja provided the platform for Pinnick to sit with Davidson Owumi and the organisers’ boss over the delay in implementing the federation’s Annual General Assembly (AGA) in Abeokuta last year where it was announced that Owumi had been given the job as the CEO of the league competition.

    Can these organisers work with Owumi? We wait. Owumi’s presence in the running of the league would take all the pressure from the players union on the NFF.

    Feelers from the meeting which ended on Friday morning confirmed the fact that Owumi is the league’s CEO, as revealed to club chairmen during the meeting. The missing link is that Owumi cannot assume the position because of a paucity of funds. Myopic thought because an enterprising body ought to have used this problem to test Owumi’s abilities to make the league solvent. Not so for those who only know how to spend government subventions. Is it not strange that the clubs were told of a paucity of funds yet they didn’t know what to do to the leadership or is it management? A more progressive group ought to have called for the organisers’ resignation since they have been hearing this reason in the last four years.

    Now, this writer knows that these club chairmen are the problems with the league since they forgot to demand their entitlements which are in arrears of over three years. Will you blame them when the real owners of the teams – the governors don’t ask the right questions at the beginning of each new season? As far as they are concerned the league should continue so that the government cash which comes in quarters is paid. The referees are trying to be difficult but with the chairmen backing the management, one won’t be surprised if the games are played from this Sunday.

    What is apparent is that for the third consecutive league season, Nigeria’s representatives as winners of the domestic league may be chosen through boardroom permutations, not on the field of play. Whispers  suggest  that  CAF  may soon call for the countries’ representatives because it is clear that Nigeria won’t finish her league competition early unlike others in the continent. The most disappointing scenario from these disturbing tendencies by the league organisers is that they also have the impudence to fix long mid-term breaks even when the competitions begin very late. A league body that opted to stop the country’s league competition because the body’s chieftains wanted to be at the 2018 World Cup in Russia ought to have been sacked if the clubs knew their onions. It didn’t matter to those self-serving chieftains that only one home-based goalkeeper was in the country’s squad, making their trip to Russia a jamboree.

    Club chairmen and the hierarchy of the country’s football met on Thursday night with words rife before the session started that the organisers were taken aback by the referees’ decision not to step onto any pitch to handle matches. A game was played on Wednesday in Aba, with referees but it appears that the match arbiters have closed shop, necessitating the night session. How come the organisers are broke on a venture they claimed so much expertise in?

    Did they not announce many sponsorship packages which they said would resolve some of the issues of the league? What happened to the television package which they celebrated with glee? Where are those Super Eagles players who acknowledged watching the games in Europe? Shouldn’t they raise the alarm now that they aren’t able to watch the home games on television in Europe?

    How do people announce a package, get it on stream in the country’s biggest network, then like a thief at night it goes off and nobody is asking questions over it sudden extinction? Only in Nigeria can this happen. How do the organisers expect would-be investors to listen to their pitches with this kind of miserable antecedent? How could a deal have been struck without either party heading for the courts to seek redress? Or wasn’t there a package for television? The questions are many but the answers as far and wide apart as the dentition of a 100-year old person.

    One doesn’t know what the organisers show to prospecting firms willing to do business with them. Would it not have been better to show them recorded programmes of the league to appreciate what they stand to gain in a partnership? Will firms be excited to associate their brands with the game when the benefits of such unions are not documented? I’m sure the organisers dare not show games where referees are battered. They also won’t show videos of crowd violence with fans running through teargas.

    For any venture to attract good funding, it should be packaged to look attractive. But with the spate of violence at venues, nobody will do sports business with the league until hoodlums are chased away from the stadia. The carnage at the stadium may dissuade spectators from watching games. Nobody will bring his family to the stadium only to scamper out of the place as violence breaks out.

    I don’t subscribe to the view that we should introduce soldiers at match venues. They are no battlefronts. Stewards and those associated with keeping the stadium peaceful should be made to do their jobs; negligent ones should be axed. Many jobless Nigerians will be happy to land this kind of job.

  • A political economy of Olukorede Yishau’s ‘vault of secrets’

    A political economy of Olukorede Yishau’s ‘vault of secrets’

    By Segun Ayobolu

     

    Those who have read Olukorede Yishau’s first novel, ‘In the Name of Our Father’, will not be surprised at the linguistic felicity, stylistic dexterity and imaginative fecundity exhibited in the ten short stories that comprise his new collection titled ‘Vault of Secrets’. Yishau is a breathtaking storyteller of outstanding craftsmanship. His weaves his plots effortlessly with twists and turns that keeps the reader wondering till the last sentence. And many of his characters make his writing a unique brand of ‘faction’; they are identifiable people or types in society acting out their lives in his spellbinding narratives. Let us take, for instance, Nonso Ejiofor, the key character in the story, ‘This Special Gift’. He is a wealthy and influential publisher who, because of the power conferred by his newspaper, is courted by the high and mighty – governors, businessmen, bankers – more out fear than respect.

    Nonso lives in the exotic Banana Island, where the lives of the opulent contrast sharply with the hardship of the wretched of the earth in the two contrasting cities of class division that define Lagos. But he spends the most part of his time as a denizen of some of the city’s most luxurious hotels. He utilizes the enormous wealth he has amassed exclusively to satisfy his hedonistic adventures rather than pursuing worthwhile ventures that edify and ennoble society. Not under aged girls young enough to be his daughters, married women or even the wives of his employees are immune from the publisher’s amorous escapades. How does Nonso die of a heart attack in a hotel room in the company of a young, single girl and a married woman whose husband believes is out of town on an official conference? You will have to read Yishau’s story to find out?

    What about Williams who discovers that the tale that he is the product of an unknown rapist who had forced carnal knowledge of his mother in her youth is not the true story of his origins? Rather, his grandfather had impregnated his own daughter, William’s mother, and he was the resultant offspring. Williams accidentally discovers this truth, which had been a secret known only to his grandfather, grandmother and mother. How this dark secret shapes his life is the story titled ‘My Mother’s Father is my Father’. In this review, I intend to focus on one of Yishau’s stories in which, beyond in depth psycho-analytic portrait of characters, the author’s fiction paints a vivid picture of the socio-economic contexts within which the lives of the characters are narrated.

    The setting for the first story in the collection, ‘Till we meet to part no more’, is a prison in Nigeria and the tale revolves around a female inmate, Oluwakemi, who has died of tuberculosis but whose heart-rending and tragic experiences is told by her cell-mate, Elizabeth. Oluwakemi has been found guilty of first-degree murder of her husband, Jide, and sentenced to death when the court ruled that the murder was premeditated and not in self-defense as her counsel had pleaded. That the convict had been awaiting the execution of the sentence for 15 years and had no idea when this would be portrays the experience of thousands of condemned inmates in our prisons that have to endure an agonizing and interminable living death after conviction.

    Oluwakemi had married Jide in Queens, New York, at a home for the elderly where they both worked. It was a passionate love at first sight and the couple’s early romance evinced a promise of what would be a life-long, till- death- do- us- part relationship. Unfortunately, this was not to be. On their return to Nigeria, Jide became a changed man. He routinely maltreated and inflicted violence on Oluwakemi on whom he heaped all the blame for the failure of the business he had started with their joint savings from America. As Oluwakemi narrates the story, “One unfortunate day, he came home very drunk and beat me…That day, I did something I rarely did – I fought back. I hit him with the first thing I could grip. He fell, and I stood over him, waiting for him to stand so I could hit him again. When minutes later he had not stirred, I bent down to shake him. That was when I saw the blood flowing from the back of his head”. The man died.

    But then, how did Oluwakemi get to America in the first place? It is not an unfamiliar story in Nigeria’s political economy of poverty, exploitation and underdevelopment. At 14, Oluwakemi had been sold into slavery by her own parents to a certain Madam Koikoi who processed the necessary papers and took her to America. The excited young girl was promised a bright, promising and successful future in God’s own country; a life which contrasted sharply with the poor, bleak and gloomy existence she led back home. Does a sex slave market not thrive in Nigeria where parents prompted by poverty or greed or both sell off their children to predatory sex slave entrepreneurs who make a fortune from this satanic trade?

    Alas in Maryland, America, Oluwakemi was turned into a sex slave by Madam Koikoi when she turned 18. “Different men would come and have sex with me, unprotected and Madam Koikoi was being paid for the service I was providing”. When Madam Koikoi died in a fight with her husband, a fight instigated by his raping Oluwakemi, the police took custody of the girl, put her on a welfare programme that enabled her to get an education and eventually a job in the home for elders where she had met her husband.

    Back home in Nigeria, Oluwakemi’s father had become rich and famous, not through productive efforts but through fraud and roguery. His daughter naturally kept a distance from him. With the acquisition of his wealth, Oluwakemi’s father promptly abandoned her mother and lavished money and attention on a variety of younger girls. Oluwakemi had no sympathy for a mother who had acquiesced in her being sold into slavery. One of his criminal enterprises soon caught with him, however, and Oluwakemi’s father ends up in Ikoyi prison, Lagos, for duping an American businessman of about $10 million.

    Elizabeth, the cell mate who narrates Oluwakemi’s story, got into prison for poisoning and killing her husband, Jacob, “who had four other women on whom he was lavishing my money”. She contracts cancer while in the cell and knows that the terminal ailment would soon rescue her from the endless wait for the hangman. In her soliloquy, Elizabeth gives a vivid depiction of the deplorable socio-economic conditions of Nigerian prisons. In her words, “Oluwakemi, like you well know, this prison is a house of horror…Many things were going on that we did not know. We did not know that the male warders were raping female inmates. We did not know that sex was used as barter for food, to access the medication your family brought you; to get better living conditions. We did not know that they were selling them in the open market. I did not know until recently when an inquiry revealed it, and most of the officials in our prison were changed and the people from the Ministry came to visit”.

    Praying that her cancer kills her quickly, Elizabeth quips “I know I deserve to die, but not for killing Jacob. I deserve to die for causing many deaths with the counterfeit drugs I was manufacturing. When my fate comes, I will embrace it”. This, like many other stories in this fascinating book, is a graphic fictional narrative of the political economy of greed and criminal pursuit of wealth acquisition at practically all spheres of life in contemporary Nigeria.

     

     

  • A governor and his prophecies

    A governor and his prophecies

    Sentry 

    Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun, is indeed a man with many caps. The successful businessman with interests in oil and gas as well as real estate, has established himself as a force to reckon with in politics; what with his elections, first as a senator and now governor.

    But if you think the Iperu-Remo born politician is all about the board room and government, then you are wrong. At the weekend, he revealed another of the many feathers in his cap to the audience at a religious programme, when he took the podium and dished out two strong prophecies.

    Abiodun, while speaking at the 108th Nigeria Baptist Convention held at the Baptist International Conference Centre, Lufuwape Town, along Lagos-Ibadan highway said: “I may end up on the pulpit after I have served as governor for eight years.”

    Read Also: Abiodun and the culture of cash gifts

    Packed into that single sentence are answers to two crucial questions many people within and outside Ogun State are seeking answers to.

    First, the governor predicted flawlessly that he will win re-election in 2023 and go ahead to govern the state for another term of four years. This will interest all the aspirants currently running around ahead the next election. It will also interest those opposed to his administration.

    Secondly, he has foretold what he is most likely to do after leaving office. Contrary to permutations within and outside his camp, Abiodun may not be heading to the senate after all. This is a piece of ‘prophecy’ that will also help some APC chieftains in planning their own political moves.

  • Gov Ortom no longer cares

    Gov Ortom no longer cares

    UnderTow

    With Benue a favourite hunting ground for kidnappers and murderers, Governor Samuel Ortom has had just about enough. He cannot be blamed; he was pushed to this point. Only two months ago, he raked Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State over the coals for unguarded and insensitive comments made by the latter in league with the now subdued Sheikh Gumi. On Tuesday, he gave the presidency a mouthful. His words: “What is happening now, to me, is very clear; Mr President is just working for these Fulanis to take over the whole country… The body language, the action and inaction of Mr President shows that he is only the President of Fulani people; I have known this… We are becoming a banana republic, if we have a president who gave the security agencies order to shoot on sight anyone wielding AK-47, and the Minister of Defence came out to say that they cannot shoot on sight… so who is the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces?”

    On Wednesday, he explained further: “It is an unfortunate development that what is happening, if the federal government had taken a proactive step, we will not be where we are… It means we don’t have a government… They no longer come here with their cattle because they want to suck blood… They are not bandits. They are Fulanis. We saw them and heard them speak the language.”

    Read Also: Killings: Buhari sad, disappointed over Ortom’s attacks

    Responding to his accusations, the presidency limply and unconvincingly stated that the president was deeply disappointed with the governor and that no responsible government would be happy with the loss of lives of its citizens. In a word, said the presidency, the government swore an oath and it was going to fulfil it so Mr Ortom should cooperate. Big words, small actions. Following this, the presidency went on the offensive to misfire — but fire nonetheless– political missiles at the hapless governor, accusing him of divide-and-rule tactics.

    Unfortunately for the Buhari administration, Mr Ortom’s statements were a polite representation of the true sentiments of Nigerians. The enemy is not Governor Ortom, neither is it any of those who have lost their lives needlessly. The enemy is not the university students who are being picked off like lilies in the field, nor is it soldiers whose lives are being offered up as sacrifices to bloodthirsty marauders and insurgents from neighbouring countries. The presidency is its own worst enemy with its consistent armoury of silence, denial and inaction. The battle is not within; it is without. Until the presidency’s spokesmen have tangible messages of substantive hope, no one wants to hear what they have to say. Mr Ortom is too injured to care anyway; but, alas, Nigerians somehow care even less.

  • Tribalism, racism and integrity

    Tribalism, racism and integrity

    By Dayo Sobowale

    A spokesman for Myetti Allah  the  umbrella organization    of   cattle    sellers and rearers  recently asked government to stop the killing of Fulani herdsmen in  the South East by terrorists .  A     sitting    governor in the zone   also  asked   security  forces to distinguish  between agitation and criminality and arrest members of the secessionist IPOB  who  are known to be attacking  police stations and fomenting   trouble in the same South East . But  it  is well  known that  armed Fulani   herdsmen have been having  a field  day in the entire South West  of the nation destroying  farms and terrorizing  the area with impunity   while  government has wittingly or not turned a blind  eye to their atrocities  .  Indeed  Myetti Allah gloats  regularly   with  cheeky   impudence   if not   impunity as if it knows that it is a sacred cow that  government  cannot  touch  or punish in any way  whatsoever . Tribalism  has played a   large  part in government’s  aloofness  or inability to call both  the Myetti Allah and Fulani  herdsmen to order   because the President is  Fulani and has  once intoned   or reminisced publicly  that if he had not gone to school he would have been a Fulani herdsman . That  is the core of the matter we shall  discuss  today   taking into consideration events in Nigeria as we highlighted on the Fulani issue  and government ,   while  roping that to Election integrity in the US where  racism has become the whip to  cancel  dissent by the Biden Administration and  Britain where  the PM is  being accused of using campaign   donations illegally to fund the renovation of his apartment  in 10  Downing Street which is the official residence of the British Prime Minister .

    I  will  start with some quotations from two  black  Americans who  are holding their  positions as the first  black  to do so. One is a black senator   Tim  Scott  who responded to President Joe Biden’s first State of the Nation’s address to the US Congress  .  The  other is  Mark   Robinson , the first  Black Lt Governor  of North  Carolina . According to reports,  Senator Scott went after race relations, corporate  cancel culture and what  he called the politics  of division in the US .  In    response   to Joe   Biden’s    address   Senator   Scot    roared    ’Hear  me clearly America is not a racist  country . Its  backward to fight discrimination  with another type  of discrimination  and its wrong to try to use our painful past to dishonestly shut  down  debates  in the present .’  What  this black senator is telling the Biden administration is that the Democrats  should  not get more catholic than  the Pope  and do as if they can identify racism against  the blackman  better  than  the blacks  who bear the pain and stigma of racial  discrimination   all  the time .

    In similar  vein North  Carolina’s first  black  Lt Governor Mark  Robinson told  a House Judicial  Committee that  the  Democrats  should  not shed  crocodile tears over Georgia’s new election laws that asked for  identity requirement  for  voters involved in in mail and absentee  voting which the Democrats say  is meant   to prevent  blacks  from voting . According to the black  Lt Gov   the notion  that  black  people  must be protected from a free ID   to  secure the vote is  ‘ not just  insane  , it  is  insulting ‘  . He  went  on to   recall  that blacks went through slavery , the civil  rights movement    and  are at the highest  echelon of US government with an Obama Adminisration  haveng come and gone and yet the  Democrats are using  the slogan that there is systemic racism in the US  when  indeed they  are using  racism  to get more power and silence the opposition .’Really  if  black  leaders now see through  the ploy  to use racism  to  beat the opposition  to order and acquire  more  power then the issue  of election integrity of the US 2020  presidential  election  which  the US courts  swept  aside as lacking evidence  all the way  to the US Supreme  Court is still  very  much  alive . It  certainly  will  play  a large role  in the US mid term elections of 2022 and  the Republicans  who  question  the integrity  of the 2020  presidential elections will  be hoping that the Democrats will  meet  their waterloo and the Republicans will  gain control  of the senate   and House of Reps which  they lost in an election of questionable integrity in 2020 .

    In   Britain too accountability and integrity were at  play  in the way  the opposition Labour Party  is asking the PM Boris Johnson to  account for where he got  money to furnish  his  official  apartment  . The  news was leaked  by a  former  aide he fired  recently  who  said he told him then that the idea was stupid  if not illegal . He  was called a liar in Parliament  and asked to explain himself . When  he sought protection from the Speaker to determine  if the question was in order , he found  himself  naked and had  to  answer the question and  an  inquiry  on the matter  has been set  up   .It  remains to be seen how Boris  Johnson will  survive this renovation misadventure  like  he and his fiancée survived the pandemic  narrowly  earlier on.  The  way  campaign funds are raised  and  utilized  is very  important  issue   more respected as a matter of election integrity and  accountability  in Britain .It  is   not that much  of an issue in the US  or  Nigeria . In  the US aside  the Georgia ID matter it is an open secret  that big Tech  companies funded the Biden Campaign  massively while big  media outfits simply blacked out news on any  financial accusation  of the Biden family  until after the   2020   presidential   elections  .

    In  Nigeria election integrity is observed more in rigging than in observance  and voter  participation .While  the US  is planning for the 2022 US  mid  term elections Nigeria  too is getting set  for the 2023 presidential  elections .While charges of White  Supremacy  and Racism  dominate politics in  the US tribalism  or  ethnicity is  the Achilles   heel  of Nigeria’s  democracy . Insecurity  is  also  an issue  that  will  determine  the fate of Nigeria in the 2023  elections . If  the present trend of pervasive  insecurity  persists ,  one will  fear  for the conduct of a peaceful   election . Government should  therefore  move   in the direction of   making  the political  terrain ready  for a peaceful  election and a new transition of power since the president cannot  contest for a third term . Government  should show that a government is any government that successfully upholds a monopoly  to the exclusive  use of physical  force in maintaining  its rule within a given  territorial  area ,  which in this case is Nigeria .Government  should show its hands transparently  and bare its fangs powerfully  ,  to  call  to order  those challenging its    legitimate  authority    with   impunity  and  insolence ,   all over the place . That  really  is the meaning of government  in any democracy and we are  one ,the largest indeed in Africa ,  if not the world . Once  again From  the fury  of this pandemic Good Lord Deliver Nigeria

     

  • Ecclesiastical predictions and partisan predilections

    Ecclesiastical predictions and partisan predilections

    UnderTow

    Through the past week, polar ecclesiastic positions on the fate of Nigeria came to the fore, making the ruling party, All Progressives Congress (APC), temporarily defensive, and arousing the poet in presidential spokesman Femi Adesina. Spiritual Director of Adoration Ministry in Enugu, Ejike Mbaka, a reverend father, had last week asked President Muhammadu Buhari to resign if he had lost the ability to turn Nigeria’s fortunes around and provide adequate living standard and security for the people. In the event of the president failing to resign, the cleric urged the National Assembly to commence the process of impeaching him.

    He said: “We are crying because we don’t have a shepherd. All those that will fight what I am saying now will eventually suffer. If you (Buhari) can’t do it, either you resign or you are changed. A good coach cannot watch his team defeated when he has players sitting and watching from the bench. Either Buhari resigns by himself or he will be impeached. This statement is too mysterious and supernatural. I know that people will begin to fight it. The chief security officer of a country will not just be sitting down and not making any comment. Gunmen are attacking everybody. Why are you crying Nigerian youths? As I said, foreign nations have become a dumping ground for our ingenious youths. Young doctors and lawyers are running away from Nigeria to countries we used to be better than. What is the matter? Nigerians are crying, why? Because there is no security in this country.” After Rev. Fr. Mbaka made his angry declarations, Deputy Spokesperson of APC, Yekini Nabena, in turn flew off the handle and threatened to expose the cleric to the Vatican. True, Fr. Mbaka has been the source of some controversial statements, but it is not clear if the APC has any credible evidence to indict him. They would have delighted in exposing him to not just the Vatican, but also to the entire country a long time ago. In politics, no one suffers a sword of Damocles to just hover over their enemy; they instantly deliver a killing blow.

    Couching a related but substantially different message in a more subtle way was Pastor W.F Kumuyi, Founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry, who noted that Nigerians would need to unite for the country to rise again. He was rather silent on the roles that the presidency and leaders had to play in the quest for unity, but was unequivocal on the role citizens had to play. Without bothering to read between the lines of his statements or meditate on what role the presidency had to play in uniting Nigeria and Nigerians so that the country could “fly” again, Mr Adesina, the presidential poet, tickled pink by Pastor Kumuyi’s prophecy that did not directly indict the country’s leadership, described him as a fine man who knew how to say fine things and who was a model of what the church should be in Nigeria. It was unimportant to him that the church used to be less incendiary than it has been in recent times. It did not occur to him that perhaps the spate of religious intolerance and insecurity in Nigeria could have something to do with the church’s rebuke of his principal’s administration.

    Mr Adesina was even more concerned with the positive promises that were attached to the pastor’s statements without paying too much attention to the caveats attached or the provisos that needed to be met before the prophetic declarations would be fulfilled. By his summation, the pastor’s prophecies were as follows: “What did the simple, self-effacing man say? A lot, which can be distilled into the following points: Nigeria is down today, faced by many challenges, but it can still fly again, if only the people can stop hate, killing and divisive utterances; God is still interested in Nigeria, but we must eschew utterances that could damage the expected change; Don’t give up on Nigeria, but believe things will get better with focus on God; Love one another and use resources God has blessed the nation with, for the good of the people.”

    Excited by these promises, Mr Adesina struggled not to mention names as he took other ministers to the cleaners for what he perceived was their negative and divisive prophecies concerning Nigeria. It is not clear whether his problem is with the ministers, their messages, or how they delivered their messages. That he is unhappy with the personage and identities of certain ministers is hardly likely. Evidence to support that claim, if it exists, is hidden. That his problem is with their message seems more likely. While he eulogised Pastor Kumuyi, he said: “What deep, penetrating words from the former Mathematics teacher, who heads one of the largest Pentecostal churches in the country. And how perspicacious, encouraging, comforting, unlike the things we hear from some pulpits, organizations, and preachers today. Those ones have become veritable parts of the problems of the country.” But, it could be argued that he has not examined the former Mathematics teacher’s words with the depth it deserved.

    Conversely, the words may also be read as follows through Mr Adesina’s lenses: “Nigeria is down today and would never fly again except certain conditions, especially eschewal of hate, killing and hate speech are fulfilled. God is fast losing interest in Nigeria because Nigeria has refused to eschew certain utterances…” The final point speaks for itself – “start to satisfy private interests with the people’s collective patrimony and Nigeria will underwhelm.” This is the same message that many preachers have delivered and suffered presidential excoriation for. Bishop Matthew Kukah delivered something along those lines and was roundly rebuked for it earlier this year. It is, in fact, a message that common sense and knowledge of political science and public policy should dictate to anyone who is not in denial. Against most of the vices mentioned above, laws have been enacted. No, the presidency’s problem cannot be with the messages of other clerics despite the spokesman’s statements suggesting so.

    It would appear his grouse is more with the manner in which other clerics deliver their message. Pastor Kumuyi has delivered his message without pointing accusatory fingers at anyone hence the approval that accompanied his message. Many other ministers have not minced words in identifying the presidency as being culpable in the social and economic decline which the country has suffered. This would mean that the presidency is satisfied with enjoying the benefits of leadership but will not take responsibility for the failure of such a leadership. But for how long will it continue to avoid this reality? Is it Greek to the country’s leadership that they were elected to fix any broken parts of the polity, and that failure to fix it after six years of ceaseless tinkering means a general failure of leadership? Why the blame game then?

    Several accusations of nepotism against the presidency have been replied with venom. The argument has always been that nepotism is not about the number of administrative appointments but the calibre of such appointments. Has the presidency done much to uphold the federal character principle? For a government that campaigned heavily on corruption, Nigeria ranks 149 out of 180 countries – an unenviable position. For a government that promised to quell inflation, salaries have not increased but prices of commodities have. For a government that condemned its predecessor for high rate of insecurity, it has done damage that would take donkey’s years to remedy. Yet, the presidential and ruling party’s spokesmen think that their problem is with clergymen who have done nothing more than tell it as it is.

    It is needless to direct vitriol at men who have only echoed the sentiments of Nigerians and reflected the reality on ground. Contrary to the presidency’s understanding of the Bible, prophets of God were fond of commenting viciously on the leadership styles of errant kings and prophesying doom if they would not repent. King Ahab once referred to Prophet Elijah as a troubler of Israel. Jesus Christ himself spoke against injustice although he paid his taxes. What then is wrong if contemporary preachers speak against injustice?

  • Anambra 2021: Did attack slow Soludo down?

    Anambra 2021: Did attack slow Soludo down?

    Sentry 

    Last February, former Central Bank of Nigeria Governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, declared his intention to service Anambra State, after serving Nigeria and the world in different capacities for decades. He announced the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) as his platform of choice.

    Exactly a month after his entrance into the race for the November guber election, gunmen attacked him in his hometown, Isuofia in Aguata Local Government Area of the state. They killed three policemen attached to him and abducted the state’s Commissioner for Public Utilities, Mr. Emeka Ezenwanne. The attack took place during an interactive session between Soludo and Isuofia youths.

    Read Also; Nine suspected attackers of Soludo arrested

    The police made some arrests and the former CBN governor recounted his near death experience for days unending. His camp later reassured his supporters that the attack will not dampen his morale ahead of the election. But some observers of the state’s politics say it appears Soludo has slowed down after the incident.

    But a source close to the former CBN governor told Sentry that not only is he still in the race, he remains the candidate to beat. “What do you mean by slowing down? We have done so much without making noise. Yes, the attack jolted us as humans but it is not enough to make us lose focus,” he claimed.

  • Picking Rohr’s brain

    Picking Rohr’s brain

    By Ade Ojeikere

    Gernot Rohr comes across as one football coach who thinks he knows his onions even if it is going to take forever for him to deliver a trophy. Will you blame him? No. His coaching pedigree suggests that he is not one used to podium celebrations. He doesn’t understand the hurry in delivering trophies to the teeming fans. Again, would anyone blame Rohr? No. He hasn’t been lucky to handle teams or countries with the kind of talents available to our national teams’ tacticians. And his employers Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) didn’t set very high standards for Rohr when he joined because Super Eagles was a sinking ship that needed an undertaker to rescue it. Rohr dragged the Eagles from being ‘Super Chicken’ or a big-for-nothing squad.

    Credit should go to Rohr for reducing the average age of the team to between 22 and 24, giving it a very competitive edge if they play to their strength and potentials. The German also used his influence to sway a lot of Nigeria-born kids whose ages we can vouch for, unlike our locals whose ages are measured by sworn affidavits not birth certificates. This bunch of players has close to ten years to give their best to the nation with proper coaching.

    Penultimate week, the news from the international media suggested that Rohr would be working with a 50-man squad. Many screamed blue murder considering the time the manager had spent rebuilding the squad. The 50-member squad sounded like a failed project given the exploits of our players in Europe which clearly showed us who our best players are. For others, it was in Rohr’s character to list 23 players with five standby players, most of who sneak into the squad when invited players sustain injuries playing for their European clubs.

    Rohr may have heard the cries of his critics in the media since the world is a global village. On Tuesday, Rohr spoke with French newspaper Ouest France stating that he had drawn a 30-man squad which he hoped to submit to the NFF in the next three weeks. This provisional 30-man team would be pruned to 23, which he would announce as those to prosecute the June 6 tie against the Lone Stars of Liberia inside the late Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos from 5 pm. No prize for guessing that the remaining seven players would form Rohr’s characteristic standby team.

    Read Also: Millions of Lagos residents to lose TV signals

    One would have glossed over the stories but considered it expedient to pick Rohr’s brain knowing that this is how he releases his squad list to gauge Nigerians’ comments on his intentions. The thirty-man squad looks more like it unlike the initial flyer of 50 players. But this 30-man squad shouldn’t include goalkeepers Daniel Akpeyi and Ikechukwu Ezenwa. The list shouldn’t have Kenneth Omeruo, Tyronne Ebuehi, a good player but doesn’t have the strength to play the African game, Jamiu Collins, Ahmed Musa, Henry Onyekuru, Samuel Kalu, Chidozie Awaziem and Shehu Abdullahi.

    I want to shock Rohr here. If he insists on the central pair of Balogun and Ekong, Nigeria will not win the Africa Cup of Nations. They are poor headers of the ball, they can’t anticipate crosses, and are tentative to their approach to most games. Over time, this writer has seen the duo beaten by good passes which either of them ought to have anticipated, making them look like amateurs that they really are. It seems to me, that Balogun and Ekong play in the same position to necessitate this flaw. They are both right-legged players, raising the poser how any one of them could function as a no.6 player. It is the reason the Eagles concede early goals.

    If Rohr can’t find a left legged or a defender who uses his left foot very well, he might as well look at the local league for such a player.

    The performance of Enyimba’s Anayo Iwuala in the last two AFCON qualifiers against the Squirrels of Benin Republic and the Crocodiles of Lesotho proved that Rohr was all along underrating the capacity of the NPFL stars to compete for shirts with their foreign-based compatriots.

    Providence had a hand in Iwuala’s journey into the national team because he was never in Rohr’s plans for the AFCON qualifiers until some Europe based players pulled out due to coronavirus restrictions.

    One would have suggested Semi Ajayi but he is prone to mistakes and doesn’t know how to neatly wrest the ball from the opposition. Ajayi’s major flaw is tackling from behind. He has good height, knows how to head the ball but he is a slow runner. I will suggest that Rohr finds somewhere in the defence Ola Aina because of his versatility. He has a good height, uses both legs, plays regularly for Fulham and that should help get him into the Eagles’ first team. Players such as Balogun and Ekong will struggle against top-class oppositions like Mohamed Salah and Sadio Mane.

     

    The best player in the Eagles’ current defence is Zaidu Sanusi. He can be a truly world-class player with the right guidance. It is no surprise that Wolves FC of England’s scouts want to sign him for next season. I foresee a bigger future for him.

    In previous Eagles teams, we know who is no.5 and who is no.6. Uche Okechukwu and Chidi Nwanu never stood on the same line while defending. Players like Taribo West instilled fear into the minds of opposition’s attackers. West understood how to partner Okechukwu at the Atlanta’96 Olympic Games largely because Okechukwu knew what to do.  What we have now are players who fall to the ground when strikers run at them. Recall, how we couldn’t defend against minnows Sierra Leone and conceded four cheap goals at home to draw the match 4-4. Are we sure, Balogun and Ekong are the best choices for the centre-back position under Rohr?

    We already have two tested goalkeepers in the national team, Maduka Okoye and Francis Uzoho. Both goalkeepers have age on their side. They have enough years to grow into being world-class goalkeepers. They are young and have shown a high propensity to learn. In fact, they have learned from their past mistakes. It has been easy for them to recover very fast because they are young. Kudos to Rohr for sticking with them. However, the third choice goalkeeper must come from the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL).

    Rohr should again invite John Noble who mans the goalpost for Enyimba FC of Aba, Nigeria’s surviving club in CAF’s inter-club competition to find out if he is still in form. Rohr has no business playing our armada of foreign-based stars against the Lone Stars of Liberia in Lagos. He should at best invite 13 foreign-based players and fill the remaining 1o spots with good home-based players. The argument that he wouldn’t want to take risk which could jeopardise Nigeria’s chances of qualifying for the Qatar 2022 World Cup is weak if the opposition is the Lone Stars of Liberia, with due respect.

    Allowing the three home-based players in the last two games against the Squirrels of the Benin Republic and the Crocodiles of Lesotho back to the squad such as Adekunle Adeleke, goalkeeper John Noble, and  Anayo Iwuala would boost their confidence. It would further reassure the others in the domestic league that they could surpass what the trio would have achieved with a second invitation. Home-based players in the local leagues would know that they are no longer training materials for every new session before Nigeria’s international matches. This is the fillip the domestic leagues need for growth.

    Nigeria has always been blessed with great forwards and the current Coach Gernot Rohr has been blessed with three goal-scorers that are totally different but can complement each other when used properly. Now, the German needs to earn his pay and make these guys fire the Super Eagles back to its glory days.