The Nation Newspaper

Category: Saturday

  • Caging NPFL’s monsters

    Caging NPFL’s monsters

    I was very impressed when the NPFL disciplinary committee swiftly slammed very stringent measures on Kano Pillars over their captain Ahmed Musa’s post- match comments, scolding the match referee in a game which they lost. My joy stemmed from the fact that NPFL chieftains their  maintained their stands to show that there isn’t any room for sacred cows in the domestic league. Not anymore.

    “I’ve been praising the officiating and the progress in the league up until now, but the performance of the officials in this match Day- 9 game made me wonder if coming back to play in the NPFL was the right choice,” the Nigeria international said.

    “For the league to improve, we need to address the quality of officiating. Officials must not be allowed to diminish the players’ morale and effort. If I keep witnessing such officiating, I cannot encourage anyone to return to the NPFL, It would be a waste of our efforts if this continues,” Musa said further.

    What got me thinking was that the information which resulted in NPFL’s sanctions came from a press release by the club’s media department. They have learned a lesson on how to distil messages sent out to the media for public consumption, going forward. What hit the Pyramid side as an own goal. It also sent a message to big stars in the league not to disparage the game by pouring odium on it.

    The NPFL Disciplinary Board fined Kano Pillars N2 million – N1 million for misconduct capable of bringing the game to disrepute and another N1 million for improper conduct of their players and officials. Pillars’ Ugochukwu Gabriel exhibited unruly behaviour during the match. Gabriel, who was sent off against Nasarawa United, was given a nine-game suspension, which began from match day 10. The club, however, reserves the right to appeal the sanctions within 48 hours from the date of notice. This again is another kettle of fish when the chips are down in the closing weeks of the domestic league. We wait.

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    It is good to note that erring players, officials and coaches are being punished for uncouth comments with their clubs made to pay heavy fines. We haven’t reached the critical stages where every game brings to the fore teams as title contenders and those enmeshed in the murky relegation waters. This stage, sadly, starts in the second round with the fans taking the laws into their hands to cause mayhem. I’m looking forward to seeing how the NPFL body would punish irate fans, the clubs and such clubs’ chairmen who most times look the other way when the thugs who are their fans wreak havoc on match referees and spectators who are focused to flee the stadium.

    The disciplinary markers laid in wait for defaulting players, coaches and team officials, underline the seriousness the organisers have attached to discipline. But, it is pertinent to remind the organisers that club officials would soon use their home fans to forcibly get things done their way. It raises the poser of the relationship between NPFL chieftains and the Nigeria Police.

    Adequate policing of the premises where games are being played gives the match referees the confidence to do their jobs judiciously, knowing that their lives and indeed all those inside the stadium are safe. One only hopes that the organisers have time tested security architecture to arrest monsters who most times do the biddings of the home teams, especially when the results on the field of play end in defeats.

    Mayhem at match venues before, during and after games are mostly engineered by the home fans. No winning away side can sustain any crisis on the field of play knowing that the results are in their favour. There are also instances where some illiterate player, coaches and officials incite the home fans to take the laws into their hands when they deliberately refuse to continue the games on flimsy grounds which are the sole prerogative of the centre referee and his two assistants, not forgetting the match commissioners.

    The physical presence of 50 policemen armed with batons and canisters of teargas is grossly inadequate to checkmate irate fans in a capacity filled stadium with a sitting arrangement of 20,000 people. The NPFL officials need to sit with the different State Commissioners of Police to fashion means of policing the premises by ensuring that known troublemakers of home teams are appealed to conduct themselves peacefully. Otherwise, they would be made to face the full wrath of the law, no matter their stature in society.

    Those who disturb public peace at match venues are no spirits but people known to everyone in such locations. So, how is it possible for match officials to be maimed and no arrests and prosecutions are made on urchins who caused such bodily harm without wearing masks to hide their identities? Indeed, when such a thing happens, such a club’s chairmen and the chairman of the State’s FA should be told to produce the culprits within specific days otherwise, they would be held culpable.

    It would amount to a failure of leadership, if in the coming weeks; we started reading about the atrocities of criminals masquerading as soccer fans in stadiums. No Nigerian blood should be shed on the altar of watching soccer matches live simply because some people aren’t satisfied with decisions taken during matches.

    The Nigeria police are our friend but the NPFL chieftains should help them to do their job very well by insisting that all the domestic league clubs at the elite class must play their games with excellent and functional CCTV cameras to capture questionable scenes during games, especially during mayhem.

    It wouldn’t be a bad idea to have vans inside the stadium where anyone caught constituting themselves into nuisance are hauled into the waiting Black Maria vans and driven away to the police station for further investigation. The era where some charlatans move majestically from their seats towards the playing pitches brandishing cudgels and all manner of dangerous weapons to unleash bodily harm on vulnerable match officials is over.  It is about time the Nigeria referees’ body take their destinies in their hands by prosecuting club chairmen who fail to arrest thugs who inflict needless bodily harm on match officials.

    The referees’ parent body must insist on prosecuting beasts in human clothing at the law courts. Miscreants won’t cease to take the laws into their hands until they know those who are languishing in jail across the country. Need I state the immense pains the battered referees go through in hospital for committing no offence? Only the NFF through its organs can punish erring referees not illiterate fans or ill prepared clubs.

    I don’t like to disparage the domestic league because sports, albeit football, is one of the few platforms where Nigeria can be ranked with world-beaters.

  • Missing links in the’T-Pain’ narrative

    Missing links in the’T-Pain’ narrative

    Last month, on October 10 specifically, former Vice President and serial losing contender for Nigeria’s presidency, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, referred to President Bola Tinubu as ‘T-Pain’ in a statement on his ‘X’ handle criticizing the handling of the removal of fuel subsidy and the undeniably painful consequences of the major economic reform policy for the majority of the population. Atiku borrows from current fashionable social media labeling of President Tinubu as ‘T-Pain’ on account of the harsh impact on living conditions of the far-reaching economic reform policies of the latter’s administration without demonstrating a capacity to rise above the shallow superficiality, careless over generalization and sheer lack of rigour that characterizes much of what passes as discourse on social media.

    The ‘T-Pain’ labeling of President Tinubu insinuates that the current economic crisis began and was instigated by the Tinubu administration particularly through its attempts at key structural reforms that have had excruciating implications for living standards for millions of Nigerians. But was the former subsidy on fuel resulting in humongous amounts of illicit funds accumulating in a few private pockets and the attendant ever increasing indebtedness of the Nigerian state sustainable?

    Could this administration have continued with a parallel foreign exchange management system that enabled a microscopic number of well-connected persons buy foreign exchange at relatively low official rates only to sell and make obscene profits at the unofficial market without any productive exertions whatsoever? Is it not true that the pains associated with the current administration’s reforms are fundamentally rooted in a dysfunctional structural crisis of the Nigerian economy that has prevailed over the last four and a half decades with successive administrations incapable of or unwilling to take the necessary ameliorative policy measures to tackle the source of the problems?

    Over three and a half decades ago, a Nigerian economist, banker and administrator from Kano State, Dr Ibrahim Ayagi, wrote a book on Nigeria’s protracted economic conundrum titled ‘The Trapped Economy’. He clinically dissected why at that time in 1990, the country’s economy remained seemingly irretrievably trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty, indebtedness and underdevelopment.

    The situation has worsened ever since Dr Ayagi penned these words nearly four decades before Tinubu’s emergence as President thus demonstrating that the key causes of Nigeria’s economic disarticulation predated the current administration. If restless, impatient and angry Gen Z contributors on social media are unable to situate economic policy issues in their proper historical context, should we not expect much more in terms of nuanced and informed public policy analysis from a politician and supposed statesman of Atiku’s stature?

    Read Also: Onu: Death has robbed Nigeria of committed patriot, statesman – Tinubu

    This week, Atiku in another statement on his ‘X’ handle offered his alternative economic policies to that of the Tinubu administration saying he was spurred by many people asking him what he would have done differently had he been elected. Regurgitating what would appeal to populist emotionalism, Atiku with dishonest subtlety sought to create the impression that as President he would have made omelets without breaking eggs by engaging in structural reforms without pain. He said his administration would have adopted a gradualist approach to fuel subsidy removal, repositioned the NNPCL and revived the nation’s refineries, ensured frugality by those in government, sequenced reforms to achieve fiscal and monetary congruence and introduced a robust social welfare programme to make life meaningful for the vulnerable.

    But beyond sheer verbosity, what do these assertions mean in concrete policy detail? As Presidential spokesman, Mr Bayo Onanuga, aptly noted “First, Alhaji Atiku’s ideas, which lacked details, were rejected by Nigerians in the 2023 poll…Abubakar lost the election partly because he vowed to sell the NNPC and other assets to his friends. Nigerians have not forgotten this, nor would they be comforted by Atiku’s antecedents when he ran the economy in the first term of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s government between 1999 and 2003”.

    Mr Onanuga rightly noted that “Despite the futile attempt to hoodwink Nigerians again in his statement, it is gratifying that the former Vice President could not repudiate the economic reforms pursued by the Tinubu administration because they are the right thing to do. His advocacy for a gradualist approach only showed that he was not in tune with the enormity of problems inherited by President Tinubu…While advocating for gradual reforms may sound appealing, Tinubu took measures that should have been taken decades ago by Alhaji Abubakar and his boss when they had the opportunity”.

    Atiku makes a number of assertions that seem right but coming from him they sound hollow because he had a free hand to run the economy during Obasanjo’s first term but never demonstrated the ethical and moral standards he now advocates to the incumbent administration. The fraudulent privatization programme under his superintendency that saw several multi-billion Naira public corporations sold to his friends and cronies at giveaway prices is partly at the root of Nigeria’s contemporary protracted economic crisis. It was also under a PDP administration that the former Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) was unbundled and sold to Generating and Distribution Company owners who obviously lack either the technical or financial capacity to effectively and efficiently discharge their obligations. This is apart from the $16 billion squandered on the power sector under the Obasanjo administration with negligible impact on electricity supply.

    If the over $12 billion lump sum paid to our creditors by the administration in return for debt forgiveness had been invested on improving electricity transmission infrastructure, for instance, the frequent national grid collapses that continue to hobble economic growth would most likely have been overcome by now.

    When asked during the campaign for the 2019 presidential election about allegations that he had sold public assets to his friends at giveaway prices under the Obasanjo administration’s privatization programme, Atiku wondered cavalierly on national television if he should have influenced their sale to his enemies showing no remorse whatsoever for what was a national calamity he was responsible for.

    When Atiku avers that “I would not run a ‘palliative economy’ yet, we would have a robust social protection programme”, what is this but a mere play on words? As Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Mr Wale Edun, told reporters at the end of the 145th meeting of the National Economic Council (NEC) recently, under the Tinubu administration, the reach of the social investment programme has been expanded to encompass 25 million vulnerable Nigerians from five million households who have received N25,000 conditional cash transfers in two tranches so far with plans to sustain and continuously expand the exercise.

    To address the challenge of food inflation, Mr Edun said the government has introduced a programme allowing millers to import duty-free and levy-free brown rice to bridge the 2.5 million metric tons supply gap. Other poverty alleviation initiatives of the administration include the Consumer Credit Scheme, which has benefited 11,000 individuals with N3.5 billion within a week and the Student Loan Scheme that has reached over half a million students with N90 billion in interest-free loans for fees and student upkeep. There is also of course the doubling of the national minimum wage to take into account current cost of living realities. All these among others show that Atiku is incorrect or just mischievous when he accuses Tinubu of being “undisturbed by the economic hardship in the country”.

    Again, Atiku asserts that had he been elected, “We would have launched an Economic Stimulus Fund (ESF) with an initial investment capacity of approximately $10 billion to support MSMEs across all economic sectors”. But just last week, the Tinubu administration commenced the distribution of N75 billion single digit loans to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises through the Bank of Industry (BOI). Micro, Small and Medium enterprises can access at least N1 million at nine percent interest rate repayable within three years while enjoying a moratorium of three months.

    Speaking during a briefing on the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the BOI and the Nigerian Association of Small Scale Industrialists (NASSI), the National President of NASSI, Dr Solomon Vongfa, said “The N75 billion MSME Intervention Fund is more than just a financial injection; it is a beacon of hope for countless MSMEs that have been struggling to access affordable credit. This initiative will undoubtedly catalyze economic growth, create jobs and foster innovation”. The MSMEs Intervention Fund is part of the N200 billion Presidential Intervention Fund to boost businesses which comprises N50 billion Nano grant, N75 billion loan scheme for big businesses and N75 billion loan scheme for MSMEs.

    Of course, no one can downplay the extent of hardship being borne by Nigerians as the Tinubu administration strives to restructure the economy towards greater productivity and prosperity and there is no indication the current government is doing so as Atiku so misleadingly insinuates. But is there any hope of light at the end of the tunnel even as Nigerians bear temporary pains of structural economic surgery? No less a person than Reno Omokri, an ardent Atiku supporter in the last election offers an informed, fact-premised response. His words, “Nigeria under Tinubu has experienced two quarters of unprecedented trade surpluses. At the end of August 2024, it had a record-breaking N14.6 trillion trade surplus and a GDP growth of more than 3%, as Nigeria now exports more than it imports. Inflation is being tamed, and the minimum wage has been increased…Our foreign reserves hit a record $40.2 billion because we no longer indulge in the politically popular but economically unreasonable act of defending the Naira with $1.5 billion each month”.

    Seasoned economist, former Central Bank governor and current governor of Anambra State, Professor Chukuma Soludo, speaking on Thursday at the convocation of the Abuja-based Veritas University, does not appear to disagree. According to him, “Nigeria is undergoing a fundamental and disruptive reset. Hopefully, we have ended the debilitating scam called fuel subsidy as well as the Forex and electricity subsidies. We have entered a ‘muddling-through’ phase which we must navigate carefully. Soon we must migrate from the destructive subsidies that benefitted largely the urban elite to a productive social contract that creates opportunity for all”. But then, Nigeria’s envisaged economic resurgence lies not just in the realm of economic technicalities but also in that of mass political mobilization and ideological enlightenment. We have addressed this issue before in this space and will do so again.

  • November 5th: All eyes on American democracy

    November 5th: All eyes on American democracy

    American presidential and congressional/senatorial elections happen on the first Tuesday of November on every election year. This 2024, the 5th of November, just three days away will determine one of the most consequential Presidential elections in United States‘ history. Great as the United States is as seemingly the lone super power, no woman has been elected president. The very first major political party nomination by the Democratic Party was that of Secretary Hilary Clinton in 2016.

    A Hilary Clinton, former first lady, two-time Senator and former American Secretary of State won the popular votes during the 2016 election by more than three million votes but lost through the electoral  college to the Republican nominee and 45th president, Donald. J Trump. Kamala Harris, broke a record in 2020 by being elected the Vice President to President Joe Biden becoming the first woman of South Asian and African heritage to become Vice President in America.

    For the 2024 election, President Joe Biden patriotically handed over the baton to Mdam Vice President, Kamala Harris. A very remarkable historical first that is seen as not just a very selfless act but also a stamp of trust and patriotism for his Vice president and America. A woman of many firsts in her career as a public servant who became the first Asian/African  American to be elected the Attorney General of California and later a Senator of the United States. 

    With the nomination and endorsements from almost all Democrats and some Republicans,  Vice President  Harris came into the Presidential race just a few months to the D-day and is squaring up with former President Trump. The two candidates have kept the global media buzzing as pundits battle with realities and permutations. In 2016, they were wrong after the ballots were counted. A Hilary Clinton, a seasoned lawyer and former Secretary of State lost to the new kid in politics, the businessman, Donald Trump.

    As the world holds its breath as the first female Vice President of America goes against former President Trump, the stakes are too high. This election is like no other in the history of America. America in its global policeman of democracy has never elected a woman despite women getting the right to vote about a hundred years ago.

    The Roundtable Conversation feels that beyond all the hullabaloo about the different electoral value of the various demographics and their ability to swing votes, too many lessons stand out for very unstable democracies in developing countries especially Nigeria. The history of the first Tuesday in November as the election day in America is very profound. It was chosen with the people, who are the mandate givers in a democracy in mind. It was chosen as the freest day that allows the most agrarian population in the 19th century to come out and vote with little inconvenience as regards their leaving their jobs or being impacted by some inclement weather.

    As time went on and occupations diversified and people embraced other non-agrarian occupations, the early voting and mail voting was introduced by law. Today, these kinds of voting bring convenience to every voter in America. Geography and distance is never a disadvantage to any voter. This is an inclusivity that is lacking in the electoral system of Nigeria. The political class in Nigeria seems to have no plans for any form of inclusivity in the Nigerian political space.

    People could give the puerile excuse that Nigeria’s independence is just less than a century old but they forget that the fathers of America laid a very solid foundation that gave power to the people. This merely takes patriotism, humanity and a large heart and not a million years. The Nigerian political class seems less patriotic than the founders of American democracy and writers of their constitution.

    The Nigerian democracy is fashioned after the American model but in some weird way, the political class merely picks and chooses what favours individuals, the male gender, groups and regions. This attitude is the albatross of the Nigerian model of democracy. There is exclusion, there is no ideological identity of the political parties unlike the American model. The Nigerian political parties lack ideological convictions in a way that the late political scientist and former Senate President, Chuba Okadigbo had described the political parties as mere gatherings of people.

    With no strong ideological leanings, the political parties lack character in ways that voters can trust or country thrive from. In fact, there is a huge trust deficit on politicians because they see the political class as selfish and very politically fluid as majority of politicians effortlessly defect from one party to the other depending on the political expediencies they expect. The Republican and Democratic parties in America are easily identifiable by the ideals they are formed on.

    Even though America has never elected a woman president, there is a sizeable representation of women in party leaderships, many women have been elected mayors, governors and to various political offices in ways that is progressive. In Nigeria, the existence of the very vacuous, “Women Wing” of political parties is an eloquent testimony of the subtle and overt sexism that exist in the Nigerian political party system. Somehow the political parties in Nigeria are exclusively run by men and women are offered tokens as “Women Leaders” while there are no “Male Leaders” or Male Wings of political parties. Less than 10% of women win party nominations.

    There is no equity in representation as the youths, women and those living with disabilities always clamor for inclusion. There is also no financial order in the Nigerian political space unlike in America where there is a well monitored financial order in ways that fraudulent financial donations to parties either by corporate bodies or individuals is often monitored and defaulters punished.. Conversely, the Nigerian political system seems to be a ‘winner takes it all’ as individuals with enough money and influence often impact the administeration of the political parties negatively.

    The stability of electoral institutions and dates is one aspect of democracy that Nigeria must try to emulate. More often than not, electoral systems are corrupted by leaders and made unstable. As Americans go to the polls everyone sees how near perfect the system works. There is an impersonal institution that is loyal to the system and not individuals no matter how influential they are in the country. This points very much to Barack Obama’s advice to Africans to build strong institutions rather than strong individuals. Strong institutions are more viable for development as they are more productively enduring than seemingly strong individuals given the mortality effect every human is subject to.

    The American electoral system is very compelling when it comes to individual self-presentations. Candidates put themselves on the public space once they declare their intentions. Winning or losing or even dropping out at the early stages is often almost automatic given the demands of the voters through holding individuals accountable. Candidates are expected to face the voters through various media and town hall platforms during campaigns that even though they still use surrogates, the candidates must be leading. In the Nigerian system, sometimes, the candidates feel the voters don’t matter.

    Read Also: This American democracy is alien!

    The American system gives power to the voters even if there are some missteps sometimes. No human system is perfect but Nigeria can do better with its electoral system. Most times the Nigerian electoral system is so flawed that it is a known fact that Nigeria has some of the most litigious elections in the world with a substantial number of elections often determined by the law courts. In some instances, post-election litigations last years into the tenures of some usurpers of power. In these instances, voters are denied their voices and discontent reigns supreme.

    With each successive American election, the world sees the patriotism in the people. This 2024 presidential election is even more profound as many Republicans are for the first time voting for Vice President Harris based on what they term love of country and loyalty to the constitution. This is possibly a sentiment lacking in most Nigerian politicians as power is often about, personal ego, personalities, regional and ethnic loyalties and even, sadly, religion. These are very divisive sentiments and its not surprising why the country is as underdeveloped as it is divided along ethnic and religious lines.

    The 2024 American election again projects the power of voting demographics. Each candidate will win or lose based on how their policies on the economy, immigration, gender rights/justice, abortion, etc. appeal to voters across America. 64 years after Nigerian independence, politicians still campaign based on the provision of basic infrastructural facilities like electricity, roads and schools. These seem to be the permanent clichés at both state and federal elections.

    While infrastructural development is necessary, most times the campaign promises are mere smokescreens. Successive governments at local, state and federal levels seem to be disloyal to their campaign promises. Sadly, more often than not, such failure on campaign promises do not impact on the chances of most Nigerin politicians to access power at future elections. This speaks to the powerlessness of the electorate in a developing country like Nigeria.

    As the world holds its breath as the clock ticks towards one of the most significant elections in US history, the greatest lesson must be learnt by citizens of Nigeria, one of  the most populous and endowed countries in the world. Adopting the American democracy model must not just be on paper or about the convenient. Profound lessons must be taken away from America not as a perfect system but as a functional system where the rule of law works to hold every citizen to account and where loyalty of individuals is to the nation and not to an individual, state or political party. America is great because the citizens love and work sincerely for their nation and people.

    • The dialogue continues…
  • Gowon @ 90: Could history absolve him? (2)

    Gowon @ 90: Could history absolve him? (2)

    Truth remains that both Gowon and Ojukwu made the resolution of the crises leading to the civil war impossible, but while Ojukwu could use the July 29 coup and the pogroms that followed as a pretext for his actions, Gowon had none, save for the fact that he was merely a “Yes” man for our British overlords. Even if Ojukwu wanted a kingdom of his own, as is mooted by certain scholars, Gowon’s haughty like obstinacy gave much fuel to Ojukwu’s decisions, as he, (Ojukwu) sought to give the East cogent reasons for its secessionist attempt.

    In retrospect, Gowon had accused Ironsi of wanting to force the federation into a Unitary system, a major reason for the bloodbath of July 66, but the same Gowon was a member of the Supreme Military Council, SMC which acted as the clearing house for all of the policies and decrees enacted by the Ironsi administration, matter of fact the SMC had more Northerners in its fold than Southerners, how then the likes of Gowon could glibly talk of Ironsi imposing such a policy on him and his accomplices should baffle any right thinking human being. Ironsi, perhaps might have being a bit naive but surely the likes of Gowon cannot wash their hands totally off such a decree.

    Aburi offered the nation, some promise of lasting peace. Accounts of such event as illustrated by the scholars such as John de St Jorre in his book ‘The Nigerian Civil War’, describes General Gowon again as behaving like some cavalier soldier, notwithstanding the loss of innocent lives and properties had sought simply to wish away such gory occurrences. It is believed that Gowon had expected Ojukwu to simply banter away whatever real concerns the Eastern Region had as regards the previous incidents and the security of the Easterners, to him it seemed that the lives lost didn’t really matter for as long as they were all in the saddle of power and had shared some form of camaraderie, Ojukwu, who’s Region had borne the brunt of the killing spree was definitely not on the same boat with Gowon.

    The decisions reached at Aburi were expected to be honoured too but Nigerians know that General Gowon did renege on such agreement. Yes, Ojukwu may have ambushed him at Aburi, yes, Ojukwu may have outsmarted Gowon and his six other counterparts by insisting on regional autonomy and getting ironclad concessions on such and other matters, such as the exclusion of the use of force and the repealing of all decrees which tended to over centralize power at the expense of the agreed regional autonomy, however, was the flat refusal to implement what was actually agreed upon at Aburi in preference for what was never discussed nor agreed upon the way for Gowon to go? If he simply felt that the end result of what was agreed upon at Aburi was detrimental to the health of the federation then he should have initiated another round of negotiations rather than attempt to browbeat Ojukwu and the Eastern Region into submission, forcing the latter to declare the Eastern Region as the sovereign state of Biafra. Had Gowon the moral courage to seek renegotiation, even using the adhoc conference to achieve this, such an example would naturally serve as a salutary lesson for the future. Intoxicated with power he rather unleashed the civil war and the legacy of the cult of violence which has pervaded the nation’s psyche till this very day.

    Today, the demand for a Biafran Nation is presently in the offing bearing strong links with  its past existence, perhaps had Gowon averted such a declaration, who knows what may have followed? Definitely not a senseless civil war.

    Gowon still deserves some commendation for his Lincolnesque approach after the civil war or should I say his adaptation of such. However his announcement of “No Victor, No Vanquished” remains hollow: the millions who lost their lives, properties and even savings were indeed the vanquished while Gowon and his administration in Lagos were indeed the victors.

    Away from the civil war, the General Gowon administration was also to introduce corruption as an official practice in Nigeria. We first became witnesses to millionaire officers and officials in that administration. Military Governors in the various states merely enriched themselves to the consternation of the public, but then a trend had been set and successive administrations attempted to do ‘better’ than the Gowon administration.

    Read Also: Gowon: Hero with apostolic leadership character

    We remember his refusal to handover power to civilians as he had initially promised the nation by 1975(Gowon naturally reneged on so many things) without even fixing a firm date for the nation’s return to democracy. The cement armada, the gross examples of government inefficiency and the famous quote while in Jamaica stating that “ Money was not our problem but how to spend it”. At that time Nigeria’s out of school children stood at 9 million children, while nearly 69 percent of the nation’s population then which stood at 68.5 million people had little or no access to quality healthcare!

    The confidence in Gowon’s administration had by 1975 become so depleted that his own kinsman in the person of Colonel Joe Garba who also happened to be his Commander Brigade of Guards announced his overthrow while Gowon was attending the OAU summit in Kampala, Uganda.

    The fractious state of the Nigerian nation and its purported challenges faced even in these very days all lie with the Gowon administration, had he sought some lasting solutions to what the Aburi Accord offered, even some amendments, perhaps the Nigerian nation would not be in this permanent state of wanting to self destruct!

  • Nwosu: demise of June 12 umpire

    Nwosu: demise of June 12 umpire

    ON June 12, 1993, Humphery Nwosu, a Professor of Political Science and former chairman of the proscribed National Electoral Commission (NEC) – the forerunner to the current Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) – made history by conducting the most credible and peaceful presidential poll in the history of the country.

    When he took over from his former teacher, Prof. Eme Awa, a renowned political scientist, little did he know that he was drafted into a futile exercise. The subsequent drama showed that the transition programme was designed to fail by the military president, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, who midwifed the process.

    After eight years of tossing Nigerians around, the dubious political experimentation hit the rocks, as planned. The free and fair election was criminally annulled by IBB, the Evil Genius, thereby throwing Nigeria into a monumental crisis.

    From 1959 to date, Nigeria has produced 12 other electoral umpires: Dr. Kofo Abayomi, Chief Eyo Esua, Chief Michael Ani, Justice Victor Ovie-Whiskey, Prof. Awa, Prof. Okon Uya, Chief Dagogo Jack, Justice Ephraim Akpata, Dr. Abel Guobadia, Chief Maurice Iwu, Prof. Attahiru Jega and Prof. Mahmood Yakubu.

    However, Nwosu stood out for obvious reasons. None of them confronted the type of challenge and roadblocks deliberately erected on his way. Bracing the odds, he was strengthened by a staunch determination to make a name and a patriotic resolve to erect a solid foundation for an orderly democratic transfer of power from military rulers to civilian leaders.

    Why the result of the 1993 poll was cancelled was largely unknown. Only two principal actors – the former military president and the former NEC chairman – could give the real reason behind the criminal assault on democracy and the popular will of the people.

    IBB has been rambling for 31 years, struggling with conscience and a sense of guilt, an internal version of punishment that torments the soul. The truth is that there was no convincing justification for leading the people on a long journey to nowhere. However, the military ruler decided to tread the path of social perdition. It is worse that the principal culprit can never correct the mistake.

    Nwosu’s book, titled: ‘Laying the Foundation for Nigeria’s Democracy: My Account of June 12, 1993 Presidential Election and Its Annulment,’ offered no clue. It never met popular expectations. Facts may have been inadvertently concealed. To some observers, it smacked of timidity, particularly the type a scholar of repute that he was should not have displayed.

    If Nwosu had spoken up, other hidden circumstances behind the annulment could have been unravelled.

    There are puzzles: was Nwosu a willing tool? To many people, such a possibility was remote, judging by the efforts he put into the work. It appeared that he was helpless because the hand of the military was heavy on the electoral commission. Was Nwosi harassed, as alleged in some quarters? Was he frightened to chicken out? Was his life under threat? Why was the final result not declared?

    Last week, the man died at 83, carrying to his grave the most vital information about the glaring controversial event that heralded the collapse of the Third Republic.

    Apart from drawing home the point that the annulment was a colossal injustice that created a legitimacy and credibility crisis for the military government, the book is essentially limiting.

    Yet, judging by the inconducive atmosphere under which he operated, Nwosu, to date, could be described as the most outstanding electoral officer: diligent, creative, innovative, courageous, hardworking, bold, and brave. He was not a pliable man for a dirty job.

    His antecedents showed that he was a man of honour and integrity. Nwosu was the Head of the Department of Political Science at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN) when the military government appointed him the NEC chairman. Six years after getting his PhD, he became a professor. He published articles and books to avoid perishing in the Ivory Towers. Nwosu was appointed a member of the 20-man Dasuki Committee on the Review of Local Government System in Nigeria. In his native Anambra State, he also served as Commissioner for Local Government, Rural Development and Chieftaincy Affairs, and later, Agriculture.

    His appointment as an umpire was consistent with IBB’s policy of drafting intellectuals to contribute to the nation’s socio-economic and political development. Thus, the likes of Prof. Wole Soyinka, Bolaji Akinyemi, Tunji Aboyade, Omo Omoruyi, Dr. Tai Solarin, Adele Jinadu, Tunde Adeniran, Tunji Olagunju, Eme Awa, Sam Oyovbaire, Pius Sada, Ikenna Nzimiro, Jerry Gana, Jubril Aminu, Jona Elaigwu, Dr. Kalu Idika Kalu, and Dr. Chu S. P. Okongwu, at one time or the other served in the regime.

    Nwosu’s assignment was the most tedious. As Nigerians, particularly the political class and the civil society, clamoured for military disengagement, eyes were on the electoral agency. Although he had a competent team, the military threw obstacles in his path.

     There was enough evidence to doubt the sincerity of the gap-toothed General. The handover dates were shifted twice and the transition programme became a delicate project, unduly elongated to the nation’s discomfort. Ahead of the transition scheme, Chief Obafemi Awolowo had expressed doubt about the fruitless search for a new social order, warning that when Nigerians imagined the new order was here, the nation would be disappointed. The old man was labelled as a prophet of doom in some quarters, but his foreboding came to pass.

    Nwosu was a student under Awa, who had to leave the commission after a serious disagreement with IBB. The old man might have alerted his former student to the decoy of a deceitful military president who was not ready to midwife a transparent transition programme, which Nwosu, despite the hurdles, managed to implement.

    The experiments took the polity through the Open Ballot System, Modified Open Ballot System, Option A4 for the selection of presidential candidates, formation of political associations that later ended in a fiasco, and imposition of two military-created political parties that were “a little to the left and a little to the right”, and the foggy diarchy that produced more theatrics from the military leadership than genuine interest in a seamless political engagement.

    A mutual suspicion had developed between the military and the political elite. The banning, unbanning, and banning of key actors paved the way for the moneybags called the new breed. But Jerry Gana’s MAMSER (Mass Mobilisation for Self Reliance, Social Justice, and Economic Recovery) intensified the political education and enlightenment which sustained the interest and hope of Nigerians in the process.

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    Nwosu worked hard and succeeded in moderating the tense processes, particularly intra-party nominations of candidates for the various layers of elections by the government-imposed Social Democratic Party (SDP) and the National Republican Convention (NRC). The House of Assembly and governorship elections were successfully conducted. Later, elections into the House of Representatives and the Senate were held.

    The governors and elected state and federal lawmakers had started functioning under the inexplicable diarchic system. While the military was democratically displaced by legitimate authorities, its top echelon developed cold feet, fearing the liquidation of self-acquired8 powers.

    To the people, Babangida’s days in Aso Villa, Abuja were numbered. The initial success of the last phase of the transition programme was underscored by the successful presidential primaries won by Moshood Abiola of SDP in Jos and Othman Bashir of NRC in Port Harcourt. The primaries validated the country’s historical antecedents and the national disposition to a two-party system.

    On June 12, 1993, Nigerians were determined to end military rule. The election was a huge festival of choice and change. Voters from across the six zones, irrespective of their ethnic and religious backgrounds, trooped out to elect candidates of their choice. There was no disruption, particularly the manipulation, irregularities, stealing and vandalisation of ballot boxes and thuggery that characterised the first and second republics’ elections. An atmosphere of peace and tranquillity pervaded Nigeria on poll day.

    As the results were transparently announced, the beat stopped abruptly, based on the “order from above”. Nwosu was summoned. The announcement was promptly discontinued. The poll results were cancelled.

     Tension engulfed the country. The military suddenly remembered that a compromised judge it instigated had given an order at midnight forbidding the poll, as demanded by Arthur Nzeribe’s Association for Better Nigeria (ABN). But they forgot that their decree stated that no court order could stop the exercise.

    On June 23, 1993, IBB annulled the poll, thereby writing his name on the wrong side of history. The annulment tarnished the image of the electoral agency. It remains a huge burden on IBB, 31 years after.

    Nigeria will always remember Nwosu for conducting the freest and fairest election in the nation’s history. Despite all the gimmicks of military leaders, who were determined to stay in power perpetually, the eminent scholar did his national assignment with candour and competence. He will not be listed among the goons who sacrificed the Third Republic for selfish gains.

  • Between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris

    Between Donald Trump and Kamala Harris

    There is no doubt that the fervent deniers, particularly in Nigeria’s February 25, 2023 presidential poll, borrowed substantially from the playbook of former President Donald Trump and his rabid supporters in their response to the latter’s failure to win re-election for a second term in 2020. Trump, who had hinted darkly in his 2016 contest with Hillary Clinton that he would only accept the outcome of an election in which he was victorious, had adamantly maintained that the 2020 election was massively rigged against him even without the slightest iota of evidence and scores of election petition cases filed against the outcome were dismissed by the courts. In the run-up to next Tuesday’s presidential election in which Trump is running against Vice President Kamala Harris, there is no indication that the former President will graciously accept defeat if he loses particularly as the opinion polls suggest a tight race in which the two contenders are running neck to neck and victory could go either way.

    To those who have long respected the United States as one of the best models of liberal democracy and one worth emulating by less advanced democracies, it is astonishing that the former President who unabashedly instigated the January 6, 2021, riotous attack on the Capitol Hill with large scale destruction of property and loss of lives, is free to participate in another election and has bright chances of being re-elected to the White House. This is in addition to his conviction by a law court for a felony and his long-standing entanglement with the law over tax evasion and manipulation charges as well as allegations of sundry sexual indiscretions by numerous women. That in spite of these seeming albatrosses, Trump retains the fanatical support of at least half of the electorate illustrates just how divided American society is and how divorced politics has become from morality in ‘God’s own country’.

    From its once-upon-a-time dizzying heights of fidelity to the values and principles of liberal democracy which made her the proverbial ‘shining city on a bill’, millions of Americans now share with an emergent democracy like Nigeria, a deep and destructive distrust of democratic values, principles, and institutions. More than any other political actor in contemporary America, Trump has substantially shredded the fabric of mutual trust and fidelity that is critical to democratic sustainability. In his current campaign to return to the White House, he and his Republican fellow travelers, a party he has virtually completely taken over, have not desisted from questioning the integrity of electoral and state institutions as well as the credibility of public officials.

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    Even more alarmingly, he has stated a readiness to utilize state power to intimidate his political adversaries while expressing admiration for the almost unlimited powers wielded by some of the world’s totalitarian leaders. Thus, some of those who served in his administration in the first term have described him as a fascist while others fear the gross retardation of the country’s constitutional democracy should Trump be re-elected.

    Of course, the delinking of American politics from its ethical moorings did not begin with Donald Trump. Its seeds were sown over time among others by Presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson’s war in Vietnam in the 1950s to early 1970s, President Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal that resulted in his impeachment, President Ronald Reagan’s Irangate scandal, President Bill Clinton’s salacious’Monica Lewinsky’ affair and President George Bush’s war against Iraq under the false pretext that Saddam Hussein harbored weapons of mass destruction.

    Large numbers of Americans had over time begun increasingly to distrust members of the political class across party divides. Matters were not helped by the periodic worsening of the capitalist economic crisis despite its demonstrated capacity to bounce back from periods of recession and record momentary expansionary booms. Donald Trump did not just accidentally happen on the American political terrain to undertake a hostile takeover of the Republican Party as well as seize the country’s politics by storm. The grounds for the emergence of such a figure to fill a vacuum in American politics had been laid for quite some time.

    In his book, ‘Capitalism’s World Disorder’, published in 1999 by Jack Barnes, long-serving national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party in the United States, he traced the roots of political demagoguery in the country long before the political ascendancy of Donald Trump. Focusing particularly on the 1992 presidential election between Bill Clinton and George Bush, Barnes points out how Ross Perot, an independent candidate, and Patrick Buchanan, an outflier Republican candidate, both men from outside the political mainstream, had garnered relatively significant votes in that election.

    Commenting on the appeal of Perot’s candidacy, Jack Barnes writes, “Perot taps into a conviction growing among millions of people that the established bourgeois politicians are incapable of addressing the social crisis. More and more people are open to the suggestion that these figures are at worst plotting conspiracies; at best they are immoral, not fit to be in office. Millions are convinced that the government is rotten; Washington and all it represents is morally degenerate; the parliamentary and democratic institutions under capitalism are cesspools where thieves and bureaucrats and maneuverers hide. And more and more believe that something radical must be done to break through this spreading corruption”.

    Continuing, Barnes writes, “But Ross Perot got nearly 20 percent of the vote – 4 to 5 percent more than predicted on the basis of those who said beforehand they would vote for him. The Perot vote registers the growing view that no established Democratic or Republican Party candidate will ever be any different”. As for Patrick Buchanan who contested on the platform of the Republican Party, he stressed the imperative of using the U.S Army and National Guard units to win the war “for the soul of America”. He told the Republican Party convention in 1992 that “And as those boys took back the streets of Los Angeles block by block, my friends, we must take back our cities and take back our culture and take back our country”. Was this not a foretaste of Trump’s ‘Make America Great Again’ and anti-immigration rhetoric that has formed the fulcrum of his campaign?

    But then, this is the trend in major democracies and advanced economies across the world where anti-immigration sentiments are having a major influence on the direction of politics. It does not matter to those who harbour such sentiments that, as Teresa Hayter put it, “People need to migrate for two main reasons: first to improve their economic situation, and second to escape from wars and persecution. Imperialism bears much responsibility for both needs. It has created extreme polarization of wealth internationally. When European expansion began in the 16th century, the levels of prosperity and technical development they encountered in what is now the Third World were often more advanced than what then existed in Europe. The Europeans plundered the Third World, destroyed industries, and reduced much of it to levels of poverty and malnutrition which had not previously existed”.

    Unfortunately for Kamala Harris, she was the immigration Czar under the Joe Biden administration during which large numbers of immigrants are believed to have entered the country and a fact that Trump is harping on. Although some experts contend that the American economy is holding on well within the context of global inflation and war-induced disruptions in international trade, not a few voters will agree with Trump that massive immigration is partly responsible for their economic woes.

    It would also appear that in championing abortion (reproductive rights) and sexually deviant behavior such as gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender rights including taking prayer out of public schools, the democrats have moved far from the Jeudo-Christian foundations of American politics and values thus alienating a not insignificant section of the populace. As a leading Christian conservative thinker, Charles Colson, notes on abortion, for instance, “Abortion has always been about more than abortion. It is the wedge used to split open the historic Western commitment to the dignity of human life. In 1973, when pro-life proponents warned that Roe was taking us down a slippery slope to all manner of horrors, they were mocked as alarmists. Later events proved them prescient”. Given his first term record, it seems that Trump will be less militarily adventurous in his second coming than a democratic administration and it would appear to me that American institutions are too firmly rooted for fascism or tyranny to thrive in that country no matter who emerges as the next President.

  • VAR: Nigeria still snoring

    VAR: Nigeria still snoring

    When Ademola Lookman’s goal against Libya inside the Stadium of Champions in Uyo was chalked off, not a few fans looked towards the stadium’s big screen for the replay of the scenario leading to when and how the disallowed goal. Their primary objective was to watch the replays to find out what the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) would say. To their dismay, play resumed as soon as the referee identified with his assistant referee’s offside decision. Really! Just like that? were some the words from the fans signifying their disgust that one of the biggest stadia in Nigeria had no VAR machine,

    It didn’t matter if the goal was disallowed by the custodians of the game for FIFA here -the chieftains of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF). After all, Nigeria won the game with a last-ditch effort. For the fans inside the stadium and those at home around the globe, the disallowed goal was the subject of discussion with many wondering why no stadium in Nigeria has a VAR machine. How much would it cost the owners of such stadia to install the VAR machine, reminiscent of what is obtained in big stadia in serious-minded football nations?

    Had Nigeria needed more than one goal to qualify for the next round, for instance, such a wrongly disallowed goal would have stolen Nigeria’s thunder. Perhaps, that would be a call to quickly install a VAR machine in Uyo Stadium. The fans could also take the laws into their own hands, and wreak havoc after the game, especially if the game is against any of rival African nations. Shouldn’t we task our soccer administrators to do everything within their power to make the installation of VAR machines on all grounds where domestic games are being played weekly?

    I posed this question to a top technocrat, Chuks Sokari and he revealed that: ”The installation cost of a Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system can vary depending on specific needs and the scale of implementation. A basic (entry-level) VAR system which includes cameras, monitors, and necessary equipment, is estimated at around $50,000 to $100,000. On the other hand, a Full VAR System which comes with more advanced features and additional cameras costs significantly more, potentially ranging from $200,000 to $500,000. For competitions with smaller broadcast setups, a VAR Light system can be a more cost-effective option, with costs ranging from $100,000 to $150,000. There may be additional costs for installation, typically ongoing maintenance, software updates, and technical support, as well as training of personnel.

    ”Based on the above, the cost of installation of VAR nationwide would involve determining the number of stadia to be covered,” Sokari stated.

    Would the Nigerian sports ecosystem embrace the need to have all the stadiums, where the domestic league matches are played, fitted with VAR machines? Not likely going by the NFF President’s utterances which seem to suggest otherwise. Our sports administrators always give the excuse of high purchase of the VAR machines rather than thinking of how to engage the private sector to invest in it stating what they would gain from such a business arrangement.

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    Going by the statement attributed to the President of the NFF as stated above, a minimum of six stadia might be involved in the pilot phase of implementation, and the cost of acquisition could be extrapolated from the above estimates based on the option(s) considered. While this would help to improve officiating, a better option would be to go full blast and implement VAR use in all football matches. Selective implementation does have some drawbacks, including a lack of confidence in and controversies over the results of matches played in non-VAR stadia.

    Again, Sokari, prefers a pragmatic approach towards the enforcement of VAR pointing out that: ”Nigeria has approximately 2,000 registered referees and this forms the pool of personnel to be recruited to handle the VAR. Though the referees are trained, operating VAR requires specialised skills. Fortunately, recent efforts by the NFF and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) have seen Nigerian referees undergo training in VAR operations. Only last month, some referees from the country recently returned from a CAF-organised course in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, equipped with enhanced knowledge of VAR operations. Having promised earlier to introduce VAR in Nigeria, the President of the NFF, Alhaji Ibrahim Gusau would appear to be keeping to his promise.

    According to Sokari: ”Notwithstanding the above, not all the referees may meet the skills necessary for operating VAR; however, it is expected that approximately 10-15% of these referees might be trainable for VAR functions based on technical aptitude. Consequently, given that VAR operations require technical expertise in video technology and decision-making, Nigeria may need to recruit additional personnel with backgrounds in sports technology, video analysis, or related fields.”

    As interesting as the submissions of Sokari are,  a trade that has been perceived as a hobby, shouldn’t we toy with the idea of professionalising refereeing in a bid to raise the standard which would rub off on the quality of the referees and the approaches to the trade?

    ”Training VAR operators involves both theoretical and practical components. This includes classroom-based training on the VAR protocol, on-pitch simulated practice sessions, and live match testing. The cost of training can vary based on the duration, location, and depth of the programme. On average, the cost of training a single VAR operator ranges from $1,000 to $3,000,” Sokari insisted when asked to estimate how much it would cost intending stadium owners to train and expose personnel to operate the VAR machines in their premises.

    ”The introduction of VAR technology in Nigerian football refereeing would be a significant investment that holds the promise of improving the quality of officiating and the overall integrity of the game. Amongst other benefits, VAR significantly reduces mistakes in crucial match moments, such as goals, penalties, direct red cards, and mistaken identity in bookings. It also provides referees with immediate access to video replays; VAR supports better outcomes and thus promotes fairness in the game.”

    What stands out clearly is that it would be easier for the proverbial Carmel to pass through the eye of the needle than for any meaningful attempt made to have the VAR machine installed in key venues where games are played. It would take a stadium riot arising from the absence of VAR to decide an obvious goal in Nigeria’s favour that those who run our sport would start the process of acquiring one or two.  Those who administer sports in this country aren’t proactive on this kind of tricky issue until a calamity occurs.

    Pray, that the football world has left us behind with the introduction of the VAR. In Nigeria, we are pretending that it doesn’t matter now until it becomes a prerequisite for hosting international matches. It would be too late because of the cost of installation, and training of the personnel to operate the VAR machine. Pity!

  • Dr Tunde Olusunle’s new twin literary offerings

    Dr Tunde Olusunle’s new twin literary offerings

    Poet, reporter, columnist, editor, communications scholar, literary critic and engaging polemicist among others, Dr Tunde Olusunle has been an enduring and value adding presence on Nigeria’s intellectual and imaginative landscape over the last three decades. The energetic and unflagging public intellectual has engaged in vigorous public discourse and sought to contribute his quota to shaping the direction of the national course through prolific commentary in diverse newspapers, magazines, online publications, social media idea contestations and less popularly visible contributions to peer-reviewed scholarly journals.

    He has recently added to new muscular essay collections to his previous publications which include three acclaimed volumes of poetry and two collections of essays on the international peregrinations and diplomatic forays of former President Olusegun Obasanjo in office as well as on the life and times of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar who has been a relentless but so far unsuccessful contender for the presidency of Nigeria, respectively.

    The first offering titled ‘Toasts, Tributes and Wreaths’ comprises his tributes and commentaries on no less than 50 distinguished Nigerians across disciplinary boundaries – academia, politics, governance, diplomacy, the military, business, media, the civil service etc – on diverse occasions including milestone birthdays, notable professional attainments, honours conferment and, of course, transitions from our earthly realm of existence. Running into 308 pages, the volume is subdivided into three sections: ‘Birthdays and Champagne poppings’, ‘Recognitions, Honours and Landmarks’ and ‘Requiems and Epitaphs’.

    I conceptualize these essays as snapshot mini-biographies of the various personalities focused on which portray and illustrate why their lives and accomplishments are indispensable to any credible rendering of the sociopolitical and intellectual history of contemporary Nigeria. The collection reminds me of a memorable lecture to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the defunct Daily Times delivered years ago by the late Dr Stanley Macebuh and titled ‘A few good men and women’. The celebrated scholar and consummate columnist vividly sketched the trajectories of distinguished journalists and administrators who had traversed the terrain of the then veritable octopus of Nigeria’s media industry and left indelible imprints not just on the newspaper but also the nation’s social consciousness and collective memory.

    In a similar vein, Olusunle’s’Toasts, Tributes and Wreaths’ reminds us that, despite the many ills plaguing our country which we lament on a daily basis, there are still a good number of men and women who by their character and demonstrable virtues constitute the salt of the Nigerian earth and whose examples can help facilitate the redemptive quest for a new Nigeria.

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    As Olusunle writes in his preface , “This potpourri of subjects by way of champagne-popping on birthdays, merited honours and recognitions, as well as inevitable requiems and epitaphs, have informed this body of essays. I imagine I met about 70 percent of the subjects featured here on a one-on-one basis, at various times, across time and space. There were instances where I never previously interfaced with the people I wrote about but whose stories and histories nonetheless struck a chord in me. I therefore decided on available research capital about them to ensure empirical validity as much as possible”.

    And as Omotayo Oloruntoba-Ojo, Professor of Literature, notes in the foreword “Toasts, Tributes and Wreaths is not just a book, it is a celebration of life, an acknowledgment of achievement, a poignant reminder of the transient nature of our existence and the need to leave memorable imprints during its sometimes very short course. I am confident that, like myself, you will find inspiration and multiple reasons for introspection within these pages”.

    From the work scrutinized above, Dr Olusunle moves to more contentious, partisan terrain in his second offering titled ‘Orisirisi: Vistas on Contemporary Politics in Nigeria’. Spanning 466 pages, the book is compartmentalized into ten sections focusing among others on state politics, governance and the governed, rulers and impunity as well as issues of crime and punishment in Nigeria with regard to sacred cows and selective justice. Other sections feature essays on the travails of tertiary education in Nigeria, the challenges of insecurity in ‘The unsecured state’, the depraved politics and deterioration of infrastructure in his native Okunland in Kogi State and matters concerning literature and the literary.

    Of course, having served as a political appointee at various levels first in Kogi State and later as Senior Special Assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo from 1999 to 2007, Olusunle offers more than a detached, armchair analysis of politics. He is also a keen participant observer with useful insights into the actions and motivations of political actors and the intricacies of public administration. Yet, it is indisputable that the author writes from an essentially partisan standpoint as a member and sympathizer of the PDP and an unrepentant loyalist of Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. Consequently, he hardly sees anything wrong with the politics of the former Vice President while he is unsparingly scathing in his criticism of the Waziri Adamawa’s adversaries within and outside the PDP.

    But whether you agree with him or not, it is difficult to dispute Professor Omotayo Oloruntoba-Oju’s submission that Olusunle’s writings encapsulate ‘narrative eloquence’ and combine a ‘unique blend of research, journalism and prosaic communication skills’ which are ‘a testament to versatility and depth’. The positive values which the author celebrates copiously in his ‘Toasts, Tributes and Wreaths’ are largely absent in the actors that feature in his political rumination which is why he laments the corruption, impunity, lack of vision, ineptness and mediocrity characteristic of our politics across party lines even if his biting barbs are directed mostly at opponents of the PDP.

  • The PBAT administration and the national question

    The PBAT administration and the national question

    This is one of the most critical periods in the history of Nigeria particularly since the commencement of this dispensation in 1999. The old Nigeria, sustained largely on fuel subsidies that had become hardly sustainable and parallel exchange rate markets that bred criminal and humongous accumulation by a privileged elite, is dying. A new Nigeria is struggling to be born under the midwifery of the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration which has introduced far-reaching reforms to correct fuel subsidy and exchange rate distortions, with painful birth pang consequences for the populace.

    Sections of the citizenry have severely criticized international financial institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank, which have endorsed the economic policies of the administration as being essentially on the right course and admonished that current hardships manifesting in inflationary spirals in food, healthcare, fuel, transportation, and electricity costs among others, be borne as a necessary condition for the economy transitioning to a more productive and prosperous phase. Beyond reflexive ideological opposition to the reforms, perceived in some quarters as IMF and World Bank inspired, there have been little of alternative pragmatic and realistic policy offerings to transform the nation’s economic course and unleash her latent potentials, by vehement anti-reform voices.

    Meanwhile, the administration continues to intensify its efforts to make palliatives available to cushion the sufferings of the most vulnerable sections of the populace while an increasing number of state governments are channeling their significantly enhanced revenues as a result of the fuel subsidy removal to ameliorate the plight of substantial numbers of their people. It is important that the federal government periodically briefs the public on the impact the various amounts it has channeled to micro, small, and medium enterprises are making towards boosting their operational and job-generating capacities.

    It is only natural and understandable that at a time of harsh economic hardships such as the country is currently experiencing, challenges around the national question will become more accentuated with some anguished voices questioning the rationality, desirability, and utility of our continued national coexistence. This is particularly so against the background of the intensively competitive and contentious nature of the last presidential elections, the outcome of which some are yet to come to terms.

    The national question refers essentially to the conditions for and dilemmas arising from the exigencies of diverse ethnocultural groups cohabiting in a complex, plural polity like Nigeria. Only recently, the Yoruba ultranationalist gadfly, Sunday Igboho, led a seemingly theatrical procession to No 10 Downing Street in London in a quixotic quest to seek support for what was described as the desire of the Yoruba to exit Nigeria. The group has not responded to queries on what confers legitimacy on it to speak for the Yoruba and at which forum such a mandate was given.

    On its part, the most clamorous and insistent voice for the secession of a part from Nigeria, the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), has apparently modified its strategies, for now, to secure the release of its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, from detention from where he is currently facing trial for treason. There is no guarantee that should it succeed in this endeavor, IPOB will not return to its erstwhile uncompromising and sometimes violent campaign for the secession of eastern Nigeria even though the degree of its support base among the Igbo people is difficult to ascertain.

    Given his antecedents not only as a pro-democracy activist but even more a fierce advocate for true federalism and the affirmation of state rights as governor of Lagos State between 1999 and 2007, there are those who expected a radical disposition to the resolution of the national question by President Bola Tinubu. The President has however been quite cautious and tentative on the issue since his assumption of office and the reasons are understandable. For one, he is the custodian of a national electoral mandate comprising disparate political constituencies with divergent attitudes, understandings, and orientations to the national question. His must consequently be a balancing act, particularly in a democratic context in which his party needs broad pan-Nigerian support to retain power at the centre.

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    If there was any doubt about the unwavering commitment of the President and his administration to Nigeria’s continued cohesion, the Minister of Defense, who was a former governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Mohammed Badaru Abubakar, dispelled any such notion at a recent peace meeting among feuding communities in Plateau State. Reaffirming the indivisibility of the country and the unwillingness of the federal government to permit any form of balkanization, the Minister said, “The federal government will not entertain such demand capable of causing division and disaffection among Nigerians. Therefore, living together is not an option but an obligation. This is evident in Mr. President’s resolve to fight any secessionist agenda in any part of the country. My presence here is to fulfill my mandate as the Minister charged with the responsibility for the protection of our national territory both from external and internal aggression. Therefore, I will not relent until the Federal Government and the Ministry of Defence deploy all assets to ensure our people sleep with their eyes closed”.

    There is nothing new or strange about Badaru’s submission. An elected government does not have the mandate to endorse the balkanization of the country. Referring to his oath of office to defend the territorial integrity of the United States, President Abraham Lincoln, in his first inaugural speech on March 4,1861, bluntly told those seeking to secede that “In your hands my dissatisfied fellow countrymen, and not mine, is the momentous issue of civil war…You have no oath registered in heaven to destroy the government, while I shall have the most solemn one to ‘preserve, protect and defend it’”. Continuing, he argued that “Plainly, the central idea of secession is the essence of anarchy. A majority held in restraint by constitutional checks and limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free people. Whoever rejects it does of necessity fly to anarchy or to despotism”.

    However, the PBAT administration must not create the impression that the component parts of the country are being kept together by compulsion and the force of arms. It is a far more costly and ultimately unsustainable approach to nation building. Rather, the idea of Nigeria must be made such an attractive and mutually beneficial proposition that its components will not only willingly and proudly identify with it but will also be at the forefront of voluntarily defending its continuity.

    Current disaffections with Nigeria by diverse groups stem essentially from the steadily worsening economic crisis of the last two and a half decades and the deepening impoverishment of the vast majority of the people. This is why PBAT struck the right note when he recently told a delegation of the eminent group, The Patriots, which visited him that his priority was seeing his economic reforms through before dealing with their demand for a new constitution.

    Of course, the administration must pay attention to the need to amend or reform those aspects of the extant constitution that hamper optimal economic productivity and efficiency, particularly of the sub-national units just as it has done with seeking greater financial autonomy for local government councils. But its central focus must be strengthening and fine-tuning its economic policies until the economy turns the tide and begins to deliver prosperity and dignified living standards for the vast majority of Nigerians.

    At the root of dilemmas posed by the national question are the economic problems of pervasive poverty, debilitating inequality, widespread ignorance and illiteracy, mass youth unemployment, desperate hunger, corrosive disease, chronic infrastructure deficit, inadequate and inaccessible power supply among others. As Chief Obafemi Awolowo asserted with characteristic perspicacity over five decades ago, “My case then is that, in order to keep Nigeria harmoniously united, and, at the same time, fulfill the natural, ultimate, supreme, and inalienable purpose of that unity, the present and future rulers of this country must place the most crucial emphasis on, and attach the utmost importance to, the advancement of the economic prosperity and social well-being of the individual Nigerian citizens”.

    Apart from staying the course in the implementation of its core economic reforms, the PBAT administration must also urgently address ancillary issues that have implications for the economy. For instance, if the cultural, psychological, bureaucratic and structural impediments to the speedy implementation of state police are proving difficult to surmount, the administration should fast-track its promised establishment of well-equipped, trained, and motivated forest rangers to protect farmlands and farmers across the country and help boost agricultural productivity to stem current food costs spirals.

    Again, the anti-graft agencies should be further motivated and spurred not only to proactively prevent corruption but also to trace and retrieve humongous amounts of stolen funds in private hands. The President has shown a commendable sensitivity to public opinion in his recent cost-cutting reforms to the machinery of government and reshuffling of his administration’s personnel. It is a path that should be maintained and intensified.

  • Libya FA’s myopia

    Libya FA’s myopia

    The cardinal rule on which international sporting bodies allow countries to host their competitions is the willingness of the government of such hosts to provide security guarantees for everyone associated with the event before, during, and after. Yet, the Libya Football Association‘s chieftains informed the CAF’s panel investigating the show of shame at the Al Abraq Airport in writing that the Libyan government ordered the midair redirection of the Value Jet Aircraft from Benghazi Airport to a disused airport. Isn’t this an own goal in Nigeria’s favour?

    What the investigating panel needs to find out from the Libya FA chiefs and their government is whether any aircraft operator or operators used the Benghazi Airport on the day the Value Jet aircraft conveying the Nigerian contingent was diverted to the rustic Al Abraq Airport.

    Article 16.14 of the Regulations provides that ‘if there is an international airport in the city where the match will be held or near that city by less than 200kms; and if the visiting team wishes to land directly at this airport; the host association must facilitate all formalities for entry.’

    In light of the regulations stipulating that the host association, Libya Football Federation must facilitate all formalities for the entry of the visiting team, the Super Eagles of Nigeria, the inability of the Libyan authorities to ensure a smooth entry process for the Nigerian team represents a significant breach of these obligations.

    Indeed, international sporting bodies frown at overbearing governments largely because of their arbitrariness in handling burning sporting issues. In fact, where irritant governments behave in unsportsmanlike- manner, the international sports federation doesn’t waste time in slamming sanctions, no matter whose ox is gored. In fact the CAF President,  Patrice Motsepe during the body’s General Assembly Tuesday in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia inferred that: “Too many stories have been told of national teams or football clubs going to a country, and they spend hours at the airport, being asked about documents that don’t exist.”

    The CAF President stressed the importance of fair play, calling for visiting teams to be treated with respect and dignity.

    “We should have zero tolerance.

    “Appropriate action will be taken.

    “But it’s this lack of sportsmanship that has existed and we haven’t taken effective action, but I just want to repeat, we are proud of those nations that treat visiting national teams and football clubs with the respect and dignity they deserve.

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    “If there are violations of those regulations and those rules, we will take action,” Motsepe concluded.

    Besides, such countries wishing to host international competitions must relax their immigration rules including the issuance of entry visas among other criteria for easy passage of the participants, foreigners who would love to be at such events,  plan their vacation and that of their wives and kids for that period.

    Interestingly, the Libyans’ short-sightedness in this matter looms large not with their threats to drag the impasse to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) in Lausanne as if the body would grant their requests for the game’s three points and other charges levied against Nigeria over their uncouth reception to the Nigerian contingent.

    What the Libyans have forgotten is that the world is a global village in terms of the dissemination of information. Members of CAS don’t live on the moon. They must have been reading what transpired in the show of shame at the Al Abraq Airport, knowing that the losers in the matter would run to them to seek redress by challenging CAF’s decision if it didn’t favour the Libyans.

    Expectedly, FIFA council member and former Nigeria Football Federation president, Amaju Pinnick also highlighted the gravity of the situation, emphasising, “This is very serious because anything could have happened to the Super Eagles. CAF is not leaving any stone unturned.”

    In an interview with Arise Television, Pinnick confirmed that the issue was given serious attention during CAF’s executive committee meeting. “CAF is taking this issue very seriously,” he said.

    “Today, tomorrow, we will have the final result.

    “CAF President, Patrice Motsepe, personifies integrity, and Pan-Africanism. We deliberated on it in our executive committee meeting. It was a subject of intense discussion.”

    Pinnick, who represented Nigeria at the probe panel’s sitting, accused the Libyans of unsportsmanship attitudes toward the Nigerians and the Super Eagles. His position was supported by a number of delegates among who are Senegalese Augustin Senghor; Cameroonian Seidou Mbombo Njoya; and Sierra Leonean Isha Johansen. Libya on the other hand was represented by Abdul Hakim Al-Shalmani, a CAF Executive member and former president of the Libya Football Federation.

    Back to the show of shame in Libya at the Al Abraq Airport, the Tunisian air officer who piloted the Value Jet aircraft from Kano described what happened whilst he was airborne as hostage-taking adding that: “The flight plan was to land in Benghazi as our destination and we got the approval from the Libyan authorities to land there, but unfortunately when we were at a close distance, we were told to divert to another airport which was about 300km away from our destination.

    ”It was far and towards the east and not a part of our coordinates. It is something that’s not good because, in aviation, we have our flight plan and calculate the amount of fuel that’ll take us through so we have to avoid issues like this because it could hamper our safety.

    ”When we were about to land in Benghazi, they told us no, citing it was an order from the highest authority in aviation, we cannot hide anything. I asked them at least eight times but they repeated the same thing, saying we cannot land there. Thank God we made it safely and we landed safely. We have all the evidence and they’re well documented,” the Tunisian aeronaut explained.

    The Tunisian aeronaut’s account of what transpired while he was airborne puts the Libyans’ requests into the trash bin considering what could have transpired had the Value Jet Airline’s aircraft been piloted by a pilot unfamiliar with the setting at the Al Abraq Airport, being a pilot who had worked in Libya for two years.

    One is excited with the fact that CAF is taking a holistic look at the antics of the hosts towards their visitors. In fact, CAF’s President Motsepe listed a few of them which he said the body has taken note of.

    “I have heard too many stories of a football club or national team going to a country. You spend hours at the airport, and they ask you about documents,” Motsepe said.

    “Apparently, during COVID, they would look at who the best players are from your team and say those 10 players have COVID-19.

    “You tell them that you have just been tested, and they say no, you have COVID. But it’s this lack of sportsmanship that has existed, and we haven’t taken effective action. If there are violations of those regulations and rules, we will take action,” Motsepe concluded.