The Nation Newspaper

Category: Segun Ayobolu

  • The Lagos question

    By Segun Ayobolu

    Was the Lagos State governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, being prescient when his very first act after being sworn into office was to issue two Executive Orders to decisively and speedily address the issues of indiscriminate refuse dumping, incessant traffic congestion and pot holes and crater-ridden roads across the state? The three problems are interconnected and mutually reinforcing. While giving marching orders to the Lagos State Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) to deal expeditiously with the refuse menace, the Lagos State Public Works Corporation (PWC) was also mandated and mobilized by the governor to immediately commence identification and repair of bad roads throughout the state.

    On traffic management, the governor directed the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA) to begin to operate in two shifts, extended the working time of LASTMA operatives till 11pm while also increasing their duty allowances for higher motivation. As the rains ceaselessly flogged the state over the last few months with the attendant heavy flooding impeding traffic flow across the state, the valiant men and women of the agency could be seen in their yellow overalls and rain boots trying hard to carry out their arduous ask in impossible conditions late into the night. The rains and bad roads were formidable obstacles to smooth traffic flow.

    For most administrations, the temptation would be strong to put the blame on the challenges and problems they inherited from their predecessor. The Sanwo-Olu administration has not, happily, taken that beaten line. The commissioner for Information and Strategy, Mr. Gbenga Omotosho, and other spokesmen of the government have been excellent. They have not engaged in needless buck passing but focused on what the government is doing to address and transcend the problems, which is what it was elected to do.

    The past few weeks have indeed been a baptism of fire of sorts for Sanwo-Olu and his team. Lagosians are impatient with stories. All they want is action from their government, even if it requires performing miracles. You cannot blame them. To whom much is given, in this case the elected government, much is expected. Thank God, Sanwo-Olu and his team have not been sleeping after all. His commissioner for the Environment, Mr. Tunji Bello, and Special Adviser, Works and Infrastructure, Engineer Aramide Adeyoye, have been continuously on the road taking charge personally to ensure the effective delivery of the mandates of their respective ministries in these tough times.

    Read Also: Razak backs Sanwo-Olu’s N250b loan request

    Apparently frustrated by the sheer hell that moving in Lagos traffic had become, someone wondered on Facebook if the governor was missing. Sanwo-Olu’s response has been resounding, through action. The governor has declared a state of emergency on Lagos roads. Eight reputable construction firms have been mandated to immediately commence work on major roads repairs and construction across the state. Lagosians will surely soon enjoy a respite from the twin evils of crazy roads and crazier traffic but I don’t see much being done before the rains are over. The kitchen has surely been very hot for Sanwo-Olu these past few months but it was even hotter for the Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu administration during the first one year of his tenure 20 years ago.

    Like I said earlier, Lagosians do not enjoy ‘stories’ from their governments. They would not listen to the argument that Tinubu came to office after years of neglect and ineptitude by the military; that the inherited problems would take time to overcome. Story. Lagosians were unimpressed. It was understandable. Most residents were still mesmerized by the much adulated performance of the preceding military administration of then Colonel Mohammed Buba Marwa, which had aggressively carried out sustained road patching and repairs across the state. This was in contrast to Marwa’s predecessor, whose administration had whined continuously that it could do nothing about the roads because of the non-availability of bitumen.

    Even then, Tinubu stubbornly insisted that the patching of roads, inevitable as this was, would not be the defining essence of his legacy on roads. When the Tinubu administration awarded the construction of the then absolutely collapsed Kudirat Abiola road, Oregun, Ikeja, for a little less than N1 billion in Y2000, for instance, the PDP opposition was up in arms. They alleged that the contract sum was outrageous even though the road came complete with pedestrian walkways, drainage channels, street lights and the contract included payment for displacement and re-location of PHCN, Lagos Water corporation and telecommunications facilities among other costs.

    But the important thing is that nearly 20 years after, the road stands as solid as ever with no single pot hole along its stretch. The same goes for scores of other durable and sturdy roads constructed by the Tinubu administration across Lagos State.

    The Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) and Akinwumi Ambode administrations also left admirable legacies of high quality roads, bridges and flyovers and their enduring projects dot the landscape of the state. If so, why does Lagos still grapple with the menace of so many bad roads and the attendant traffic complications, it is quite reasonable to ask? The answer is that the situation could most likely have been far worse but for the interventions by the successive administrations since 1999.

    Lagos State is located below sea level. It is so easy to forget now, for instance, that the Atlantic Ocean routinely used to overflow the Bar Beach, on Victoria Island, resulting in loss of lives and eroding the commercial viability of the entire stretch of the Ahmadu Bello Way. But for the Tinubu administration’s deployment of technology to contain incessant flooding and considerable erosion of the bar beach, Victoria Island would have been faced with the serious danger of being submerged by the ocean particularly with the recent extreme twists in global weather conditions due to climate change. Before this, the Federal Government spent at least N2 billion annually simply pouring sand into the Atlantic Ocean to stem the erosion of the bar beach. It was neither an intelligent nor a sustainable response.

    Even more, adversity in Lagos has been turned to advantage. Out of the reclaimed land of the Atlantic Ocean is springing up the breathtaking Eko Atlantic City, conceived by the Tinubu administration as possibly one of the most ambitious Public-Private-Partnership infrastructure projects in Africa and continuously nurtured by the Fashola and Ambode administrations with the support of the Federal Government. On completion, the new peninsula will accommodate 250,000 residents with an anticipated daily flow of 150,000 commuters while at the same time definitively halting the erosion of the state’s coastline.

    I have no doubt whatsoever that the Sanwo-Olu administration will improve significantly on and even far surpass the performance of its predecessors. Both the governor and his Deputy, Dr Obafemi Hamzat, are men of high intellect as well as vast administrative and managerial experience. They know the state like the back of their hands and are focused and habitually committed to excellence. Yet, even after eight years in office, the Sanwo-Olu administration will most likely have left only a small dent in the problems of Lagos State despite its best efforts unless the Lagos question is decisively and urgently addressed.

    As the governor and his deputy have stated on several occasions, the entire annual budget of Lagos State is far smaller than the budget of the New York City Fire Service for instance. Yet, this is the most populous state in Nigeria with residents from virtually every ethnic group in the country. This has serious financial implications for refuse generation and management, maintenance of security as well as provision of basic social services particularly in public healthcare and education to cite a few. Senator Oluremi Tinubu’s bill for the granting of special status recognition to Lagos was obviously shot down in the 8th Senate for political and untenable reasons. It is a matter that must be urgently revisited.

    The larger percentage of revenues from Value Added Tax (VAT), Petroleum Tax Fund (PTF) and Education Tax Fund (ETF), among others, that go into the Federation Account is generated in Lagos.  The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) and Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) generate from Lagos yearly revenues that exceed the annual budget of Lagos for which the state gets nothing in return. Yet, the activities of thousands of heavy duty trucks going to and from the ports in Lagos wreak such terrible havoc on many of the state’s roads and bridges.

    Indeed, one of the state’s most viable economic zones, the Apapa Central Business District, has been rendered prostrate and totally paralyzed over the years as a result of activities at the ports and the utter neglect by the federal government of its collapsed infrastructure in the axis until the advent of the Buhari administration.

    A former Speaker of the Lagos State House of Assembly, Honourable Jokotola Pelumi, has launched an advocacy campaign for a more just and equitable treatment of Lagos in the Nigerian federation through adequate funding of the state commensurate with its substantial contributions to the national treasury. It is an effort that deserves support. Luckily, a former governor of the state, Tinubu, is National Leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and another former governor, Fashola, is Minister of Works and Housing. Surely, there cannot be a more propitious time to ensure that the Lagos question in the Nigerian federation is concretely addressed.

    And it is time too for the Lagos State Chairman of the APC, Alhaji Tunde Balogun, to begin to address his mind to ensuring that the large number of registered voters in Lagos, the highest in the country, begins to count in elections through percentage turnout of voters that can no longer be taken for granted by those seeking to control power at the centre.

  • PMB as unlikely economist

    By Segun Ayobolu

    In one of his not infrequent, characteristically expansive moments, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, in assessing the President Muhammadu Buhari administration during the first term, gave Buhari a pass mark in the war against corruption and insecurity but concluded patronizingly that PMB lacked a firm grasp either of economics or foreign policy.  That was, of course, before the Ota farmer’s letter-writing knives were fully drawn and he could find nothing worthy of commendation in the lanky General from Daura.  The inference could only be that OBJ believes he is a virtuoso of sorts in those areas in which he rated PMB low particularly economics. Not many will agree.

    In his first coming as military Head of State, OBJ simply adopted the massive state-led interventionist development policies that were the dominant paradigm of the time. And during his second incarnation as elected civilian President, OBJ went in a diametrically opposite direction. This time, he wholeheartedly embraced the free market, neo-liberal economic policies that had become the reigning conventional wisdom.  OBJ seemed to lack any deeply held developmental philosophies of his own.

    In contrast, PMB would be the last to make claims to possessing any delusional mastery in an arcane field in which he has no rigorous theoretical grounding. Yet, he appears to hold very strong and consistent, instinctual convictions as regards the kind of policies indispensable for the economic emancipation of a poor, dependent, neo-colonial economy like Nigeria. Of PMB’s first coming as military Head of State between 1983 and 1985, noted political economist, Professor Adebayo Olukoshi, writes, “One of the factors that underlay the Buhari regime’s crisis management policies was its conviction that fraud and indiscipline were central to the economic problems of Nigeria and that all steps would have to be taken to eliminate these ills”. The Buhari military government adopted a strongly nationalistic stance in its approach to the management of the national economy.

    According to Olukoshi, “While agreeing, like its predecessors, with the IMF on the need for fundamental reforms in the Nigerian economy, the Buhari regime was unwilling to accept the recommendations of the IMF for the devaluation of the naira, the across-the -board privatization of public enterprises, the liberalization of trade and the withdrawal of petroleum subsidy. In the view of the regime, these measures were inappropriate for tackling Nigeria’s economic problems”.

    With the Buhari/Idiagbon regime insisting that “to abandon the economy to market forces, as the IMF recommended would merely complicate matters”, it was no surprise that the talks between the regime and the IMF soon collapsed.  The western powers tightened the economic squeeze on Nigeria and the Buhari regime was soon history with the General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida coup of August 27, 1985.

    Read Also: Does Buhari want to live in people’s hearts forever? 

    I must confess that I was one of those who jubilantly welcomed the fall of the Buhari government and the ascension to power of the gap-toothed, all smiling, IBB. While the Buhari/Idiagbon military government’s nationalistic and patriotic economic instincts were admirable, the government’s assault on fundamental human rights and the rule of law; the sheer arrogance of its functionaries and their utter insensitivity to public opinion was intolerable. However, with the benefit of hindsight, if we knew what tortuous paths the nation would traverse for the next one and a half decades, would we have celebrated Buhari’s loss of power in 1985 the way we did? It is a difficult question to answer.

    Of course, the IBB regime wasted no time in taking the country into the full embrace of the IMF and its neo-liberal, so-called free market economic policies. Oh yes, there are no doubt many benefits that the country reaped from the comprehensive deregulation and liberalization of diverse sectors of the economy undertaken by the IBB regime under the philosophical guiding hand of the IMF. Yet, it is indisputable that Nigeria emerged from IBB’s Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) poorer, more dependent, more indebted, more unequal, more de-industrialized, her more jobless than before the undiscriminating adoption of the IMF’s neo-liberal pills.

    On the massive devaluation of the Naira by the regime on Friday, 26th September, 1986, as a core component of SAP, for instance, renowned billionaire businessman and statesman, the late Chief Alfred Rewane, had written: “As my friends and I discussed the implications of the government’s announcement, I expressed the view that the devaluation of the Naira was a recipe for disaster and that within five years, the Naira would be worth less than 20 percent of its then existing value, leading to the possible collapse of the Nigerian economy. I reminded them of a standard economic argument that devaluation of the national currency is best contemplated where the nation’s economy depends largely on the export of manufactured products for its foreign exchange earnings, and where the devaluation is considered appropriate to ensure the competitiveness of its manufacturers”.

    Taking issue with the contention of IBB’s ‘Presidential Advisory Committee on Economic Affairs’, headed by the late Professor Ojetunji Aboyade, that overseas investors would be attracted by a cheaper Naira to invest in the country, Chief Rewane had retorted: “Well, that may be impressive stuff for an undergraduate class on the principles of economics, but it certainly is not so in the real world of business. There are factors more critical than cheap currency in rating the congeniality of an investment climate, and the presidential advisers should be presumed to know that”.

    Even after his eventual emergence as elected President of Nigeria, in 2015, Buhari evidently still remained as reluctant to throw the country’s economy at the mercy of rampaging market forces as he was as military Head of State three decades earlier. True, the Buhari  administration today operates within the context of considerably strengthened global neo-liberal market forces and has been forced to accommodate degrees of currency devaluation, fuel subsidy removal and increases in Value Added Tax ( VAT). Yet, there still appears to be reflexively ingrained in PMB’s subconscious, Professor Noam Chomsky’s cutting observation that “Those who expect to win the game can be counted on to laud the rules of “free competition” – which, however, they never fail to bend to their interests. To mention only one obvious lapse, the apostles of economic liberalism have never contemplated permitting the “free circulation of labour…from place to place,” one of the foundations of freedom of trade, as Adam Smith stressed”.

    Thus, rather than abandoning the national currency to market forces as would have been dictated by the tenets of neo-liberalism, for instance, Mr. Godwin Emefiele’s Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), certainly under the influence of PMB’s body language, has not shied away from intervening in the market to ensure sustained exchange rate stability in the interest of the national economy. And the massive injection of funds into the Buhari administration’s Social Intervention Programmes, hitherto under the purview of Vice President Yemi Obasanjo, is another feature that distinguishes economic management of the PMB administration from the preoccupation with conservative austerity measures associated with neo-liberalism or ‘financialism’.

    Without being an economic theoretician, PMB has nevertheless stamped his imprimatur on the economic philosophy of his administration albeit in an understated manner. As the newly inaugurated Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC) settles down to business, we can only hope that the body will add value to the progressive economic policies and poverty alleviation strategies it meets on ground and eschew narrow doctrinal and doctrinaire ideological considerations.

    Despite their undoubted pedigree, members of the PEAC have, in my view, as much to give as they have to receive. Theirs should certainly not be the disposition of that member of IBB’s Presidential Advisory Committee on Economic Affairs, who had wondered in exasperation on national television, why even Awka market women felt qualified to contribute to a national debate on whether or not Nigeria should obtain an IMF loan! The economy has become too important to be left to economists.

  • PMB and PYO

    THE announcement was uncharacteristically terse coming from the Special Adviser, Media, to President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB), Mr. Femi Adesina. In a press statement, which offered no context to allow for proper evaluation by analysts, Adesina simply announced the establishment of a new Economic Advisory Council (EAC) to advise PMB on economic policy and management. The EAC, he said, would replace the former Economic Management Team (EMT) headed by the Vice-President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo and which was responsible for overseeing and coordinating the economy in the administration’s first term. The Economic Advisory Council will report directly to the President.

    Of course, the rumour mill immediately went into frenzy. All kinds of reasons were adduced for the development. The most prevalent, however, was that this signified a loss of favour in the presidency by PYO and that he was being stripped systematically of much of the powers and influence of his office. Others referred to the dissolution in the same week of the Presidential Committee on Asset Recovery, which was also under the supervision of PYO. The functions of the office have been transferred to the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation.

    It has also been reported that a number of other functions, especially as regards the massive Social Intervention Project, domiciled in the   office of PYO, will be transferred to a number of other ministries. Others contend that all we are seeing is the politics of 2023 and that the fabled ASO Rock cabal is doing all in its power to discredit and rubbish Osinbajo’s image before then.  The aim, the argument goes, is to render him too politically weak to be any electoral threat in future. That in my view is to engage in unfruitful speculation about the political future of a man who is passionately doing his job and exhibiting uncommon fidelity to his boss and country.

    Another report is that PYO is paying the price for some of the actions he took as Acting President during the PMB’s indisposition last year. In particular, the cabal is said to have been irked by the dismissal of the former Director-General of the DSS, Mallam Lawal Musa Daura, when officers of the agency invaded the National Assembly causing the country great embarrassment at the time. But that was an action that was applauded both within and beyond Nigeria and brought the country tremendous goodwill.

    In any case, PMB could easily have restored Daura to his post at the DSS on his return to the country.  He could have him appointed to head any other agency were he considered that invaluable and indispensable. Indeed, the president has the power to appoint him to membership of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) if he so desires.    It is not tenable to argue that PYO foisted a fait accompli on PMB at any time.

    Speaking as the controversy raged, PYO deplored the activities of fifth columnists trying hard to undermine and destabilize the government. It is not a thesis that can be lightly dismissed. The truth is that PMB and PYO are a dream tag team in government. At least from a distance, I believe that the President shows tremendous respect to his Deputy who also evinces unblemished loyalty to his boss. We can only imagine what crisis could have occurred when the President travelled abroad for medical attention if he had a different kind of Deputy. But then, if PMB had any doubts about PYO’s intellect, character or integrity, he could just have picked another running mate to contest with him in the 2019 election.

    Even then, can we say that PMB by creating the EAC to replace Osinbajo’s EMT, is trying to marginalize and diminish Osinbajo? I don’t think so. PYO still heads the National Economic Council (NEC) as expressly stated in the constitution and which also comprises all governors as well as the Central Bank (CBN) governor. The 1999 constitution states clearly that “The National Economic Council “shall have power to advise the President concerning the economic affairs of the Federation, and in particular on measures necessary for the coordination of the various economic planning efforts or economic programmes of the various governments of the federation”.

    It was this provision that gave Alhaji Abubakar Atiku practically almost total charge of Nigeria’s economy as Vice-President in President Olusegun Obasanjo’s term. Unfortunately, his perceived mismanagement of the opportunity was part of what strained his relations with his boss in their crisis –ridden second term in office. With the benefit of hindsight, perhaps as Chairman of the NEC Osinbajo should have constituted a high powered economic team just like Atiku did when he sourced and brought a lot of brilliant young people into Obasanjo’s government.

    It is certainly not a very efficient idea for the same individuals that hold positions in government to also turn around to become the advisers to the president on the economy. This kind of situation breeds dysfunctional insularity. I have a feeling that this situation is what PMB wants to correct with the EAC. Perhaps the communication could have been handled better thus making so much of the wild allegations absolutely nugatory. Indeed, all things being equal, Osinbajo’s hands will now be freer to carry out assignments delegated to him by PMB more efficiently and effectively.

    PMB and PYO must certainly watch it so that they do not play into the hands of detractors plotting to make them go the Obasonjo/Atiku route with damaging implicatons both for their administration and the country.

     

    On the economic advisory council

     

    I am no economist. This is, thus, a layman’s view on the new Economic Advisory Council (ECA) set up by PMB.  Several analysts have heaped fulsome praise on both the President and members of the team for the quality of the assemblage. Many have proved their worth and have acquired immense experience in academia, prestigious international financial and development institutions, consultancy and central banking among others over time. However, I am disturbed that with some of the best economists that have put their expertise and intellect at the disposal of the country over the years, Nigeria’s economy still remains largely comatose with soaring unemployment and increased poverty despite sometimes vigorous growth.

    Some of these distinguished economists that have advised various governments over the years include the late Professor Pius Okigbo, late Professor Ojekunle Aboyade, Dr. Kalu Idika Kalu, Professor Charles Soludo, Dr. Chu Okongwu, Professor Sam Aluko, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala etc. So what will the new Economic Advisory Team do better or differently? Can it be that the problem is with the training of our economists and other scholars and their deep immersion in western economic theories and philosophies? Even though many would have loved to see more development economists on the team, I congratulate the new members and wish them luck in their new and onerous assignment.

  • Judiciary as political umpire?

    It was the National Chairman of the defunct National Party of Nigeria (NPN), Chief Meredith Adisa Akinloye, who famously declared in the run up to the 1983 general elections that there were only two political parties in Nigeria – the NPN and the military. The opposition political parties took umbrage at Akinloye’s explosive assertion. They interpreted it as implying that the ruling NPN would prefer the military coming back to power than losing at the polls. Yet, there was an element of truth in Akinloye’s thesis. The military, which had only recently quit the political stage in 1979 after 13 years of praetorian rule, was still a potent political force waiting in ill-disguised impatience, to hijack power, once again, not just from the NPN as assumed by Akinloye, but from the political class as a whole. And this is exactly what happened with the military coup of December, 1983, that sacked the Second Republic.

    The politicians, seemingly oblivious of the existential danger they faced as a ruling power elite, continued to approach competition for power as a desperate do – or die affair, until the military crept into the political household like the proverbial thief in the night. The country was to remain under the jackboots of military authoritarianism until the onset of this political dispensation in 1999 after the forced exit from the political terrain of the men in uniform.

    Despite the last two decades of unbroken civilian rule since 1999, it is evident that not much has changed as regards the tendency of the political class to pursue the acquisition of political power with such fierceness and utter absence of restraint that perennially threatens not just democracy but the stability and very existence of the polity as a whole. Yes, unceasing quarrels, disagreements and disputes among factions and fractions of the political class are inherent and indispensable features of the democratic process. But these must always be conducted within the boundaries of the ‘constitutive and regulative’ rules of the game if they are not to become dysfunctional to the system.

    In the absence, for instance, of a largely coherent and credible entity like the military able to intervene as in the past when democratic rule experiences systemic breakdown, persistently disruptive behavior on the part of the political class is more likely to result in generalized descent to anarchy with devastating consequences within and beyond Nigeria if such an entity as we know it survives as a cohesive whole.

    This is why it is so sad that the proclivity of Nigeria’s political class towards political self-immolation, which had brought the polity to grief so many times in the past, continued to be evident before, during and after the 2019 elections. The violence that marred the elections at several polling centres in many states was only an indication of the ferociousness of the power struggle. With the conclusion of the elections and the announcement of winners and losers at various levels, the battle only shifted in most cases from the electoral to the judicial front.

    The depth of desperation of political actors in the quest to win or retain power at all costs was again poignantly exhibited in some of the extremist submissions both of the petitioners, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and the PDP on the one hand and the respondents, President Muhammadu Buhari and the APC on the other, in the presidential election dispute resolved in favour of Buhari on Wednesday. For instance, Atiku did not only want the court to pronounce on the integrity and plausibility of the 2019 election results as pronounced by INEC, he sought to convince the court that Buhari was unqualified to contest the election in the first place because he allegedly lacked the constitutionally stipulated educational requirements.

    Of course, the court was, unsurprisingly, not persuaded. Here is a man who had not only risen to the apex of Nigeria’s military as a General; he is a former Head-of-State and Commander-In-Chief of the country’s Armed Forces. Furthermore, he had contested for the country’s presidency on four previous occasions amassing substantial votes on all occasions. Had Atiku’s submission been upheld by the court, Buhari’s election would have been annulled and the PDP candidate declared winner even though he lost the election by a margin of no less than four million votes! That would have been a veritable judicial coup.

    But then, the Buhari camp was also uncharitable and provocative in contesting Atiku’s claims partly on the grounds that the PDP candidate is not a Nigerian by birth. It is laudable that the court did not find the reasons adduced for this submission plausible and thus dismissed it. Again, here is an Atiku who rose to the top hierarchy of the Nigeria Customs Service from where he retired to pursue his career in business and politics for over three decades now. He was a former Vice-President of Nigeria for eight years and after that had contested for the country’s presidency on two occasions.

    These kinds of submissions by both Atiku and Buhari, had they been upheld by the courts would have eposed Nigeria to global ridicule and generated severe tensions and conflicts in the polity. It is important that members of the political elite cultivate the discipline to look beyond their immediate personal interests in the pursuit of their ambitions and also consider the stability, peace and cohesion of the polity. For, a country must first exist before political offices can be meaningfully competed for.

    Does this mean that aggrieved contestants and parties in elections must sacrifice the pursuit of justice in the interest of peace? No. The latter will surely always ultimately be a function of the former. But has Atiku really been denied justice in this instance as claimed by the PDP in its rather provocative reaction to Wednesday’s verdict of the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC)? It is difficult to agree with the PDP. Luckily, the PEPC’s judgement was not delivered in the cloistered closet of the court. The 8-hour marathon judgement was broadcast live on national television for the public to follow. In my view, the jurists were painstaking and rigorous in their submissions even though the Supreme Court will have the last say on the matter.

    Atiku and the PDP claim on the one hand that the elections were marred by large scale violence and intimidation of voters by security agents, over voting, manipulations, alterations and subtraction of valid votes given to Atiku by Nigerians all of which resulted in Buhari’s victory as declared by INEC. But it claims, on the other hand, that this allegedly perverted and grossly manipulated process by electoral and security agencies, working in concert with the APC, also strangely resulted in Atiku’s victory according to results the party claims to have obtained from an INEC server that it failed to convince the courts exists.

    This is an irreconcilable contradiction. How did these alleged gross irregularities not stop the PDP’s victory in the 17 states and the Federal Capital Victory which it won in the 23rd Februray, 2019, presidential election in contrast to the APC’s victory in 19 states. The truth is that it was a closely fought and largely credible election whatever its shortcomings.

    But then, this is not just a problem peculiar to Atiku and the PDP. It is a question of an entrenched political culture in which contestants for political office do not accept the outcome of elections and always resort to litigation no matter how glaring their defeat at the polls. After all, Buhari also resorted to seeking judicial intervention up to the Supreme Court on the three occasions that he lost the presidential election until his victory on the fourth attempt. His 2015 election triumph, however, shows that Buhari’s previous losses could be attributed not just to electoral malpractices but also the limitations of his political platforms and his lack of a pan-Nigerian appeal on those occasions.

    Yes, aggrieved contestants for political office have the right to seek redress exploiting all constitutionally stipulated avenues to do so in the accordance with democratic tenets. In fact, we have had several badly rigged executive and legislative elections upturned especially since 2007 thus strengthening both democracy and the judicial process in Nigeria. But when contesting the outcome of elections in court becomes the norm rather than the exception when elections have been demonstrably rigged, it becomes a distracting, enervating and dysfunctional practice.

    To strengthen public confidence in the electoral process and thus reduce the justification for reflexive resort to the courts by losers in elections, the National Assembly should improve on the Electoral Act passed by the 8th Assembly but which was rejected by the President and ensure that this time around it is passed into law.

  • Zoning and 2023

    WHY should there be so much preoccupation with Nigeria’s 2023 presidential elections when the newly elected administration of President Muhammadu Buhari’s All Progressives Congress (APC) is just over three months in office and the freshly inaugurated ministers are just settling down? It is not an inappropriate concern. Electioneering cannot be a continuous unbroken affair if meaningful governance is to take place in between electoral cycles. But this is a predicament even in mature democracies.

    President Barak Obama had barely settled down in office in 2009 when some top white Republican Party hierarchs reportedly met to strategize on obstructing his administration at every turn and ensuring its defeat at the next polls. Incumbent President Donald Trump made clear from the onset in 2017 that his tenure would be an eight-year and two-term affair and his fierce Democratic Party adversaries have been fighting him inch by inch all the way. It has thus been non-stop, cut and thrust, politicking in the USA ever since although that country has the institutional and economic resilience to withstand any negative developmental impacts.

    Ironically, it is a member of President Buhari’s inner caucus, Governor Nasir el-Rufai of Kaduna State who has helped to bring to the forefront of national consciousness the fact that 2023 is so far yet so near. His widely publicized views on the current informal zoning arrangement for choosing the occupant of Nigeria’s presidency has re-ignited intense debate on which part of the country the next president of Nigeria should come from after Buhari. Had such a controversy at this time been instigated by someone not perceived as being very close to the president, he would have been accused of deliberately trying to distract the administration.

    In his contribution to a recently published book on politics and power in Nigeria, el-Rufai had argued that the zoning or rotating of the presidency between the two major zones of the country as has been the practice at least among the dominant political parties since 1999 should be discarded. Describing zoning as a barrier to political equality, el-Rufai stressed that the emphasis should shift from the region of origin of the president to considerations of qualification, competence and character.

    True, el-Rufai had expressed his views generally with regard to the zoning of political offices particularly those of the president and state governors. But informal zoning arrangements exist down the line encompassing even local government and legislative elections. Yet, el-Rufai’s critics contend that it is the presidency he has in mind since he reportedly habours a little-disguised presidential ambition himself.

    Others accused the Kaduna State governor of flying a kite aimed at ultimately ensuring the continuity of another northerner as President after Buhari. But then, to question the motives of the proponent of an argument is not necessarily to credibly debunk the validity of his reasoning or the plausibility of his logic. Let us forget whatever misgivings we have about el-Rufai the messenger. Let us consider the merits or demerits of the message.

    The central question is: Considering the prostrate state of Nigeria in virtually every sector of the country today, her inexorable continuous decline and slide to anarchy and near disintegration, the deepening misery and impoverishment of the vast majority of her people and the disproportionate gap between her potentials and attainments, can Nigeria afford to sustain her current leadership recruitment culture particularly at the apex of the political system – the presidency? I do not think so and I think that is el-Rufai’s point.

    As from 2023, the qualities of competence, character, qualification; emotional intelligence, sense of compassion, personal national network, cosmopolitan outlook, stable temperament, and capacity for hard work must trump the consideration of place of origin in choosing the helmsman of Nigeria’s ship of state.

    One of the most interesting reactions to el-Rufai was from the radical human rights and pro-democracy activist, Senator Shehu Sani. He argued that the APC ‘s dumping of its zoning policy with the possibility of a northerner emerging as President on the platform of the party after Buhari would amount to an act of ingratitude to the Southwest in particular, which played a critical supportive role in Buhari’s electoral victories both in 2015 and 2019.

    Sani contended that “…what we need to put into perspective is the fact that it will be a serious threat to unity and peace of our country if one part of the country will continue to dominate the political space of the country due to its demographic majority and land size. I’m a socialist and I believe that the one who should preside over the affairs of the country should be competent, but is it competence that brought the ruling party to power in 2015?”

    But if it was not competence that brought the APC to power in 2015 and its victory was more of a function of the manifest incompetence and incomparable venality of the PDP, should that stop us from striving ceaselessly to bring competence to the forefront in our choice of leaders for the country from henceforth? I am not sure that the Southwest is looking for gratitude for the support it lent to Buhari’s emergence as President in 2015 and his re-election in 2019. Neither is the region, at least as represented by its political class within the APC, fearful of competing for the presidency with any other region on the basis of merit to the best of my knowledge.

    In the run up to the 2019 elections, I was surprised that a number of political office holders of Southwest extraction at the federal level urged the electorate in the Southwest to vote for Buhari to enhance the possibility of the presidency returning to the region in 2023.  The great Chief Obafemi Awolowo would have found such an assertion coming from Yoruba politicians most embarrassing and unacceptable. The great sage never sought Nigeria’s presidency on the basis of the fact that he was a Yoruba man.

    Rather, he studied the country’s problems rigorously and proffered well thought out solutions to them, which he then vigorously canvassed to the country on the platform of his political parties in the first and second republics. He would have considered it an insult for the presidency to be conceded to him simply on the basis of where he came from.

    In the same vein, Chief MKO Abiola never canvassed for the presidency in 1993 selling his ethnic credentials as a Yoruba man. Rather, he sold his ‘Farewell to Poverty’ manifesto to the public and leveraged on his business success, stupendous wealth, record of pan-Nigerian philanthropy and strategic relations with key power groups, especially the military, to coast home to a nationwide victory that was later annulled.

    Indeed, when a cunning IBB named Chief Earnest Shonekan, an Egba man like Abiola, as Head of the Interim National Government (ING) to permanently nail the coffin of MKO’s June 12 victory, the Yoruba roundly rejected the arrangement. They were desirous not just of a Yoruba President for the sake of it. They were more concerned with the principles of democracy as exemplified by the June 12 election as well as justice as embodied in the struggle against its unjust annulment.

    The truth is that it is impossible to contest for the office of Nigeria’s presidency on a purely ethno-regional platform and realistically expect to win. Indeed, Shehu Sani, in self-contradiction, notes this point when he avers that “We have not forgotten that President Buhari had contested three times without becoming President and on the fourth time, with the support of people from the South, he emerged the President…” The dynamics of Nigeria’s politics is too complex for any ethnic group to brazenly impose a President on the rest of the country no matter its population. This is why Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, an ethnic minority, defeated Buhari in the 2011 election.

    Given the number of political parties that contest elections and which are free to choose candidates from any part of the country, the question of zoning is largely theoretical and of any effect only within political parties. But given the country’s current political configuration, the APC and PDP are the only parties that can realistically contest meaningfully for the presidency come 2023 unless something dramatic happens. It is the responsibility of the two parties with the requisite organization, structure and resources to win nationwide elections, to accord merit greater priority in choosing their presidential candidates.

    If this is not done, the country’s current hydra-headed crises will deepen and the mass uprising that currently seems unfeasible will most likely become an unplanned and spontaneous future reality, with diverse ethno-regional, religious and other sectional implications, that will grievously endanger the country’s stability, cohesion, and very existence.  It is an avoidable fate.

  • Revolutionary pressures in Nigeria (3)

    With the reckless and relentless squandering of the country’s bounteous oil revenues at various times between the mid-1970s and the tail end of the Dr. Goodluck Jonathan administration, various elected governments in Nigeria have conveniently hidden behind the non-justiciability of Section 2 of the 1979 and 1999 constitutions to refuse to make any meaningful effort to actualize the extensive welfare provisions that make up the ‘Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy’ that constitute the chapter.

    They claim that that the country simply does not have the resources to pursue such ambitious welfare schemes stipulated but not made mandatory by the constitution. This is as a result of the ever increasing marginalization of oil in the international political economy and the failure over the years of an irresponsible and complacent political class to utilize successive periods of intense but short-lived bursts of oil boom to diversify the economy and create alternative viable and sustainable revenue sources.

    Yet, the reality of shrinking oil revenues has not in any way diminished the capacity of the various factions of the Nigerian ruling class to engage in the most venal forms of primitive accumulation through both the direct, massive looting of the national treasury and the extraction of humongous amounts of resources as ‘legitimate’ salaries, allowances and emoluments of elected and appointed public officers. It is thus not surprising that Nigeria is routinely described today as the poverty capital of the world and a wide gulf exists between a few Nigerians who feature among the club of the richest individuals in the world and the vast majority of the citizenry who merely exist but do not live in any meaningful sense of the word.

    In the words, once again, of Mr. Femi Falana (SAN) in his book, ‘Nigerian Law on Socioeconomic Rights’, “Despite the abundant resources of the nation, the federal government has admitted that over 100 million Nigerians live below the poverty line. The commitment of the Buhari administration to fight the menace of corruption is not in doubt. But it should be pointed out that that corruption is not the root cause of poverty, but a fall out of the country’s peripheral capitalist economy, which is anchored on privatization, maximum profiteering, capital flight, tax avoidance and capital waivers”.

    Rather, Falana contends that “The State has engaged in the systematic promotion of poverty through the implementation of the neo-liberal economic policies instead of striving by means of appropriate regulations for the minimization of exploitation and the concentration of wealth in a few hands, the securing of adequate means of livelihood and employment opportunities, suitable shelter, reasonable minimum living wage, old age care and pensions, unemployment and sick benefits etc”.

    But how on earth, can the resources be found to implement this kind of extensive welfare programme the question will be asked in many quarters particularly with ever shrinking oil revenues? It would appear as Mr. Falana himself acknowledges that the welfare provisions of chapter 2 of the constitution are predicated on the continued availability of abundant oil resources to make these social services available to the majority of deprived Nigerians rather than the transformation of the Nigerian ‘rentier’ state from almost exclusive dependency on oil rents to one with a solid foundation based on actual production and not merely distribution of oil revenue.

    But without making Section 2 of the constitution legally binding and fully justiciable, Nigeria’s ruling class will not be motivated and forced to put on its thinking cap and ensure the imperative that, in the words of Professor Okwudiba Nnoli, “The demands of production must define the character of Nigerian politics. This means that the state must formulate and implement concrete incentives to increase creatively the productivity of the vast majority of the people…The State must ensure that economic enterprises, public or private, maintain a viable Research and Development activity with a view to creating new products related to the needs and traditional consumption habits of the people, using local resources…Without increased and increasing production, distribution soon reaches a dead end”.

    Chief Obafemi Awolowo and his Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) faced this same skepticism as regards resource availability when they enunciated their four cardinal programmes of free education at all levels, free medical care for all, integrated rural development and full and gainful employment for all in the Second Republic (1979 – 1983). These promises evoked cynicism and scorn from Awo’s opponents who dismissed them as mere election gimmicks that could not be realistically implemented. Awo demonstrated repeatedly, however, that he and his political think tank had done the hard work of estimating the cost, crunching the figures and working out the implementation details of these programmes.

    On the occasion of the launching of his book, ‘The Strategy and Tactics of the Peoples Republic of Nigeria’ on Friday, 31st July, 1970, for instance, Awolowo gave an insight into the kind of comprehensive research and meticulous planning he and his inner circle had done towards the actualization of free education on the country’s return to democratic governance, which he assumed at that time would be in 1974 as earlier promised by General Yakubu Gowon.

    Let us have a glimpse of the incomparable industry I am referring to here by quoting Awolowo at some length on that occasion: “As I have stated in the preface to the book, Tables 1-7 are only abstracts from 158 Tables with altogether 1,587 columns. Tables 1 and 2 set out 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 2 and a half percent per annum in our population. Tables 3-7 set out the projected recurrent and capital costs of this great scheme for the next 20 years. Appendix 1 is a summary of the methodology and procedure adopted in computing the 158 Tables from which Tables 1-7 have been abstracted. Table 8, on the other hand, contains Nigeria’s projected GDP from 1970/71 to 1990/91 at current factor cost, and the estimated Government Revenue for this period. Appendix two is an outline of the rationale for this Table”.

    Giving details of carefully calculated capital and recurrent expenditure from 1970/71 to 1990/91, Awolowo stressed that free and compulsory primary education “must not wait till later than 1974…if we truly appreciate the unifying and harmony-promoting influence of such a scheme”. He continued: “Granting then that God bestows on us the wisdom, vision and grace to embark on free and compulsory primary education in 1974, it is clear from Tables 1 and 2 that we would end this decade in 1979 with a primary school population of 7 and a half million pupils in the Northern States 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 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 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”.

    Where would Nigeria be today if this kind of meticulous, serious-minded thinking and planning had been applied to Nigeria’s developmental aspirations in diverse sectors since 1970 when Awolowo penned these words? These are exactly the qualities needed by the leadership for the successful actualization of Section 2 of the 1999 constitution in order to respond effectively to the revolutionary pressures occasioned by the crisis of poverty, inequality and underdevelopment in post-colonial Nigeria. Of course, Awolowo was aware that achieving the ambitious developmental goals his party set for Nigeria would require the highest levels of discipline and sacrifice from all and sundry. Thus, in a speech on 6th October, 1978, he lamented the high level of indiscipline and self-indulgence at all strata of our society, asking “What else on earth, for instance, could have made our public servants at the Federal level alone feel at ease with the expenditure in 1977/78 of over N97 million on Local Transport and Travelling, over N28 million on Vehicles, Maintenance and Running Costs and over N7 million on Overseas Travel?”. The levels of waste and fiscal recklessness in our public life have grown even more atrocious and reprehensible over time.

    Interestingly, Awolowo does not disagree with Sowore on the imperative of revolutionary changes as a necessary condition for national transformation in Nigeria. But the sage’s notion of revolution is not the spontaneous, reflexive and superficial #RevolutionNow spearheaded by Sowore. Rather, Awo avers that “In order that she may attain her natural birthright and destiny, Nigeria must be remade and re-created. Every aspect of her existence must be revolutionized: her agriculture, her industry, her trade and other tertiary services, the attitude of her sons and daughters to life as well as their education and upbringing – all must be revolutionized”. Which party can achieve this feat within the context of a democratic, federal and united Nigeria? That is the big question. But the answer certainly does not lie in populist showmanship masquerading as revolutionary fervor.

  • Revolutionary pressures in Nigeria(2)

    There are schools of thought that believe that the extant 1999 constitution, which provides the legal pedestal on which this democratic dispensation stands, is incurably defective, utterly irredeemable and thus deserving of being wholly cast aside and another constitution crafted de novo. Those who are of this persuasion advocate a thorough going root and branch restructuring of the Nigerian polity even though there are as many conceptions of what a restructured Nigeria should like as there are believers in the idea. In a way, they are like Mr. Omoyele Sowore and his #RevolutionNow fellow travelers who seek to arouse Nigerians to revolutionary action without giving any clear idea of their vision of a post-revolutionary Nigeria.

    Sowore seeks to utilize the constitution’s guarantee of the individual’s human rights, including the rights to free speech, movement and association to mobilize Nigerians to overthrow the same constitution. For, that in essence is what a revolution means. On their part, the proponents of restructuring want the state organs, parties and individuals that are the products and beneficiaries of the extant constitutional structure to, as it were, pull the rug from under their own feet by effecting radical constitutional changes that transcend the purview of the periodic incremental and perfunctory amendments that the constitution provides for. This can, of course, only be achieved through a referendum, which the constitution makes no provision for!

    The realistic thing to do, therefore, is to work within the framework of the constitution to continuously nudge Nigeria slowly but steadily in the direction of increasingly deepening the practice of democracy and adherence to the rule of law , strengthening the federal elements of the constitution and actualizing its immense potentials to help enhance the socio-economic wellbeing of the Nigerian people. In this regard, for instance, Chapter II of the 1999 constitution, which states what are the ‘Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy’ makes extensive provisions for promoting and protecting the socio-economic rights of Nigerians. The provisions of this chapter as well as its near revolutionary socio-economic, political and legal potentials have been exhaustively examined by radical human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), in his book titled ‘Nigerian Law on Socioeconomic Rights’published in 2017.

    According to Mr. Falana in his prefatory comments to the book, “The provisions of the Fundamental Objectives cover socio-economic rights such as the right to security and welfare, right to political participation, right to education, right to health, right to environment, right to secure adequate means of livelihhod including suitable and adequate shelter, suitable and adequate food, reasonable minimum living wages, old age care and pensions, unemployment or sick benefits and welfare of the disabled and other vulnerable people”. In over 300 pages and across twelve chapters, Mr. Falana explicates and critiques the various laws, agencies and programmes that have been enacted, established and initiated towards the realization of these objectives in the last two decades.

    Is it that members of the Nigerian ruling class love Nigerians so much that such lofty and ennobling welfare provisions were enshrined in the constitution? Not necessarily. True, Falana writes that this section clearly states that “In order to guarantee national prosperity the state is obligated to promote a planned and balanced economic development and harness the resources of the nation”. He, however, points out, and this is the crux of the matter, that “…the ruling class has ensured that while civil and political rights guaranteed in chapter 4 of the constitution, are justiciable, the jurisdiction of the courts is completely ousted with respect to the enforcement of socio-economic rights. This idea of non-justiciability has limited the access of victims of socio economic rights abuse to effective remedies”.

    The far-reaching welfarist provisions of chapter II of the Nigerian Constitution is a very deft and calculating but deceptive response of the Nigerian ruling class to the revolutionary pressures generated by the country’s persistently deepening crises of poverty, inequality and underdevelopment despite her enormous but grossly inequitably distributed wealth. It is a form of what Claude Ake describes as ‘defensive radicalism’. In their important book, ‘The Rise and Fall of Nigeria’s Second Republic- 1979-1984’, Professors Julius Ihnovbere and Toyin Falola, referring to this same welfarist provision in the 1979 Constitution, write that “The welfarist provisions in the constitution are fake and illusory; they are more like promises which political parties are not obliged to keep. None of the provisions is justiciable, no citizen can challenge the state in any court of law for its refusal to implement any of the provisions”.

    Yet, through the relentless efforts of progressive lawyers and the pronouncements of courageous jurists, Mr. Falana demonstrates, through several cited cases that more sections of Chapter II of the constitution are increasingly being made justiciable even though there is still a long road of struggle ahead to traverse in this regard. For example, he cites the case of Olafisoye v. Federal Republic of Nigeria (2005) in which Justice Niki Tobi of the Supreme Court ruled that “…the non-justiciability of Section 6(6)c of the Constitution is neither total nor sacrosanct as the subsection provides a leeway by the use of the words ‘except as otherwise provided by this Constitution. This means that if the constitution otherwise provides in another section which makes a section of Chapter II justiciable, it will be so interpreted by the court”.

    Again, Falana points out that Nigerian courts have gradually but substantially changed their stance over time on locus standi, a stance which had previously obstructed the promotion of the fundamental rights of the Nigerian people through public interest litigation. For instance, in his ruling in the case of Femi Falana v. Attorney-General of the Federation (2014), in which the plaintiff challenged the scrapping of the Peoples’ Bank by the Federal Government, Justice J. Idris of the Federal High Court held that “…a tax payer such as the applicant herein has the locus standi to approach the court to enforce the law and ensure that his tax money is utilized by the government frugally or prudently…This action in my view falls under those actions in which the Applicant is vested with locus standi to institute this action to compel the government to discharge its duty conferred by the laws of the Federation of Nigeria”.

    Another factor that has broadened the horizon of the enforcement of socio-economic rights in Nigeria is the country’s being a signatory to several international treaties and agreements one of which, for instance, is the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights. Thus, Falana quotes the Supreme Court in Ogugua v. The State (1994) as holding that “Since the Charter has become part of our domestic laws, the enforcement of its provisions like all our laws fall within the judicial powers of the court as provided by the constitution and all other laws relating thereto. It is apparent from the foregoing that the human and peoples’ rights of the African Charter are enforceable by the several High Courts depending on the circumstances of each case and in accordance with the rules, practice and procedure of each court”.

    Of course, while continuing to explore every opportunity to expand the socio-economic rights of the people through the legal process, Mr. Falana is under no illusion that the struggle for the socio-economic emancipation of the Nigerian people can be achieved on the legal terrain alone since, in his words, “It should, however, be pointed out that judicial pronouncements in favour of social justice can be conveniently ignored by a government that is administered by an army of neo-liberal ideologues who are committed to the defence of market fundamentalism” and that “To reclaim the welfare state from its obstinate opponents in government, the Nigerian people have to be mobilized to ensure compliance with the various welfare laws and intensify the campaign for the full justiciability of the provisions of the socioeconomic rights set out in Chapter 2 of the Constitution”.

    Sowore’s not unimpressive outing in the last election in which he contested for the country’s presidency, despite his fragile political structure and lean resources, shows that radical and progressive young political actors can make an impact on the political scene if they summon the requisite will, focus and discipline towards the attainment of their objectives. It should, however, not be about personal ambition and bloated egos but about settling down to the hard work of joining others to build viable, grassroots based political organizations that can effectively enlighten and mobilize the vast majority of Nigeria’s suffering masses to become a potent electoral force. 2023 is just around the corner. Every minute that Sowore spends in an utterly avoidable detention, he is recklessly squandering valuable revolutionary time in which he should be busy on the field working with like minds to enlighten, mobilize and organize the Nigerian people for self-emancipation in the next electoral cycle.

  • Revolutionary pressures in Nigeria (2)

    THERE are schools of thought that believe that the extant 1999 constitution, which provides the legal pedestal on which this democratic dispensation stands, is incurably defective, utterly irredeemable and thus deserving of being wholly cast aside and another constitution crafted de novo. Those who are of this persuasion advocate a thorough going root and branch restructuring of the Nigerian polity even though there are as many conceptions of what a restructured Nigeria should like as there are believers in the idea. In a way, they are like Mr. Omoyele Sowore and his #RevolutionNow fellow travelers who seek to arouse Nigerians to revolutionary action without giving any clear idea of their vision of a post-revolutionary Nigeria.

    Sowore seeks to utilize the constitution’s guarantee of the individual’s human rights, including the rights to free speech, movement and association to mobilize Nigerians to overthrow the same constitution. For, that in essence is what a revolution means. On their part, the proponents of restructuring want the state organs, parties and individuals that are the products and beneficiaries of the extant constitutional structure to, as it were, pull the rug from under their own feet by effecting radical constitutional changes that transcend the purview of the periodic incremental and perfunctory amendments that the constitution provides for. This can, of course, only be achieved through a referendum, which the constitution makes no provision for!

    The realistic thing to do, therefore, is to work within the framework of the constitution to continuously nudge Nigeria slowly but steadily in the direction of increasingly deepening the practice of democracy and adherence to the rule of law , strengthening the federal elements of the constitution and actualizing its immense potentials to help enhance the socio-economic wellbeing of the Nigerian people. In this regard, for instance, Chapter II of the 1999 constitution, which states what are the ‘Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy’ makes extensive provisions for promoting and protecting the socio-economic rights of Nigerians. The provisions of this chapter as well as its near revolutionary socio-economic, political and legal potentials have been exhaustively examined by radical human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), in his book titled ‘Nigerian Law on Socioeconomic Rights’published in 2017.

    According to Mr. Falana in his prefatory comments to the book, “The provisions of the Fundamental Objectives cover socio-economic rights such as the right to security and welfare, right to political participation, right to education, right to health, right to environment, right to secure adequate means of livelihhod including suitable and adequate shelter, suitable and adequate food, reasonable minimum living wages, old age care and pensions, unemployment or sick benefits and welfare of the disabled and other vulnerable people”. In over 300 pages and across twelve chapters, Mr. Falana explicates and critiques the various laws, agencies and programmes that have been enacted, established and initiated towards the realization of these objectives in the last two decades.

    Is it that members of the Nigerian ruling class love Nigerians so much that such lofty and ennobling welfare provisions were enshrined in the constitution? Not necessarily. True, Falana writes that this section clearly states that “In order to guarantee national prosperity the state is obligated to promote a planned and balanced economic development and harness the resources of the nation”. He, however, points out, and this is the crux of the matter, that “…the ruling class has ensured that while civil and political rights guaranteed in chapter 4 of the constitution, are justiciable, the jurisdiction of the courts is completely ousted with respect to the enforcement of socio-economic rights. This idea of non-justiciability has limited the access of victims of socio economic rights abuse to effective remedies”.

    The far-reaching welfarist provisions of chapter II of the Nigerian Constitution is a very deft and calculating but deceptive response of the Nigerian ruling class to the revolutionary pressures generated by the country’s persistently deepening crises of poverty, inequality and underdevelopment despite her enormous but grossly inequitably distributed wealth. It is a form of what Claude Ake describes as ‘defensive radicalism’. In their important book, ‘The Rise and Fall of Nigeria’s Second Republic- 1979-1984’, Professors Julius Ihnovbere and Toyin Falola, referring to this same welfarist provision in the 1979 Constitution, write that “The welfarist provisions in the constitution are fake and illusory; they are more like promises which political parties are not obliged to keep. None of the provisions is justiciable, no citizen can challenge the state in any court of law for its refusal to implement any of the provisions”.

    Yet, through the relentless efforts of progressive lawyers and the pronouncements of courageous jurists, Mr. Falana demonstrates, through several cited cases that more sections of Chapter II of the constitution are increasingly being made justiciable even though there is still a long road of struggle ahead to traverse in this regard. For example, he cites the case of Olafisoye v. Federal Republic of Nigeria (2005) in which Justice Niki Tobi of the Supreme Court ruled that “…the non-justiciability of Section 6(6)c of the Constitution is neither total nor sacrosanct as the subsection provides a leeway by the use of the words ‘except as otherwise provided by this Constitution. This means that if the constitution otherwise provides in another section which makes a section of Chapter II justiciable, it will be so interpreted by the court”.

    Again, Falana points out that Nigerian courts have gradually but substantially changed their stance over time on locus standi, a stance which had previously obstructed the promotion of the fundamental rights of the Nigerian people through public interest litigation. For instance, in his ruling in the case of Femi Falana v. Attorney-General of the Federation (2014), in which the plaintiff challenged the scrapping of the Peoples’ Bank by the Federal Government, Justice J. Idris of the Federal High Court held that “…a tax payer such as the applicant herein has the locus standi to approach the court to enforce the law and ensure that his tax money is utilized by the government frugally or prudently…This action in my view falls under those actions in which the Applicant is vested with locus standi to institute this action to compel the government to discharge its duty conferred by the laws of the Federation of Nigeria”.

    Another factor that has broadened the horizon of the enforcement of socio-economic rights in Nigeria is the country’s being a signatory to several international treaties and agreements one of which, for instance, is the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights. Thus, Falana quotes the Supreme Court in Ogugua v. The State (1994) as holding that “Since the Charter has become part of our domestic laws, the enforcement of its provisions like all our laws fall within the judicial powers of the court as provided by the constitution and all other laws relating thereto. It is apparent from the foregoing that the human and peoples’ rights of the African Charter are enforceable by the several High Courts depending on the circumstances of each case and in accordance with the rules, practice and procedure of each court”.

    Of course, while continuing to explore every opportunity to expand the socio-economic rights of the people through the legal process, Mr. Falana is under no illusion that the struggle for the socio-economic emancipation of the Nigerian people can be achieved on the legal terrain alone since, in his words, “It should, however, be pointed out that judicial pronouncements in favour of social justice can be conveniently ignored by a government that is administered by an army of neo-liberal ideologues who are committed to the defence of market fundamentalism” and that “To reclaim the welfare state from its obstinate opponents in government, the Nigerian people have to be mobilized to ensure compliance with the various welfare laws and intensify the campaign for the full justiciability of the provisions of the socioeconomic rights set out in Chapter 2 of the Constitution”.

    Sowore’s not unimpressive outing in the last election in which he contested for the country’s presidency, despite his fragile political structure and lean resources, shows that radical and progressive young political actors can make an impact on the political scene if they summon the requisite will, focus and discipline towards the attainment of their objectives. It should, however, not be about personal ambition and bloated egos but about settling down to the hard work of joining others to build viable, grassroots based political organizations that can effectively enlighten and mobilize the vast majority of Nigeria’s suffering masses to become a potent electoral force. 2023 is just around the corner. Every minute that Sowore spends in an utterly avoidable detention, he is recklessly squandering valuable revolutionary time in which he should be busy on the field working with like minds to enlighten, mobilize and organize the Nigerian people for self-emancipation in the next electoral cycle.

     

     

  • Revolutionary pressures in Nigeria (1)

    The title of this piece is evidently not original. It is an adaptation of the title the characteristically profound yet highly controversial book, ‘Revolutionary Pressures in Africa’ published in 1978 by the immortal preeminent political economist, Professor Claude Ake. The reason for my referring to this book in this column today is pretty obvious. Former radical students’ union leader, media entrepreneur turned politician and now convener of the #RevolutionNow protests, Omoyele Sowore, has made revolution, a popular buzzword in Nigeria once again.

    Of course, the state has responded in a predictably high handed manner to what may have most likely ended up as nothing but a futile exercise in unproductive political masturbation. For, as respected columnist, Professor Ayo Olukotun put it in his column of Friday, August 9, in The Punch, “You cannot have a revolution without a revolutionary agenda, revolutionary personality, a vanguard, a rearguard and minimal capacity to enforce the revolutionary script”. By obtaining a court order to detain him for 45 days, in the first instance, the Nigerian state has simply lionized Sowore needlessly.  It has demonstrated a nervousness that only a fragile and insecure state should exhibit when confronted with a political pygmy like Sowore.

    What Ake refers to as ‘revolutionary pressures’ have existed in Nigeria ever since I became politically conscious as a youth. Yet, we have never succeeded in creating a cadre of revolutionaries to take effective and maximum advantage of such situations to successfully mobilize the masses to overthrow an indisputably unjust, exploitative and inequitable socio-economic and political system. At best we have had ultimately ineffectual mass protests, military coups that produced largely reactionary, repressive and regressive regimes or elections in which people mostly vote without choosing (apologies once again to Claude Ake) and elected governments come to power promising fundamental change that forever remain elusive.

    Explicating on Ake’s theorization of ‘revolutionary pressures’, a reviewer, Lawal Abdulmutha, posits that “In accounting for the instability of present-day African political systems, Professor Claude Ake argues that there are revolutionary pressures against the existing exploitative class relations, and thus against the very survival of the ruling elite and the state. He attributes these pressures to, first, the desperate poverty of African workers; second, the huge economic and social discrepancy between rich and poor; third, rising expectations due to modernization; fourth, the enticing models provided by the developed countries made even more piquant by their portrayals in the media and by the limited penetration of consumer goods and retail firms into African markets; and fifth, the politicization of the African peoples through their frustrating colonial and post-colonial experiences”.

    The late renowned development economist, Dudley Seers, famously noted in the 60s that the three most critical questions to ask in order to ascertain whether or not a country was developing are: ‘What is happening to poverty? What is happening to inequality? What is happening to unemployment?’ These three indices have undeniably worsened over the last two decades indicating that we are yet to begin to perceive and utilize democracy as a handmaiden of development. Despite President Muhammadu Buhari’s best efforts and personal example of modesty and rectitude, the country remains trapped in a huge corruption cesspit that continues to inhibit the possibility of extricating the vast majority of our people from dehumanizing poverty.

    Another economist, Edgar Owens, contends that development takes place when there is development of people and liberation of the human potential rather than the development of things. What have we seen in most cases over the last two decades of unbroken democracy? There is an overconcentration on huge infrastructural projects in urban centers mostly for their exhibitionist value as well aspresumably a source of fantastic kickbacks from overinflated contract awards by a larcenous political class. Again, the democratic process itself – the humongous cost of organizing and managing elections or the no less outrageous cost of maintaining elected and appointive public officers – diverts resources from meeting the pressing existential needs of the vast majority of the people including providing potable water, solving the power supply conundrum, undertaking meaningful rural development, eliminating avoidable diseases, providing effective, affordable and qualitative healthcare and educational services among others.

    In calling for his #RevolutionNow campaign, Sowore is, therefore, right that the inexcusable level of poverty in Nigeria today is unacceptable against the background of the country’s abundant resources and the obscene profligacy of a minuscule proportion of the population. But then, does Sowore not contradict himself logically and philosophically? In contesting the last presidential election, was he not expressing his faith and confidence in the extant system? Was not that an election in which the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) lost no less than five states to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)? Is an election credible only when you or your party wins? If Sowore had been declared winner of the election, would his government have magically solved all the country’s problems instantaneously? Would he then have initiated a #RevolutionNow campaign against his own government or tolerated others launching such a campaign?

    Beyond this, Sowore and his collaborators seems oblivious of the fact that Nigeria is already caught in the midst of an ever deepening revolution of the country’s teeming and suffering masses of the underclass even if the latter have never heard of nor have any idea what the word revolution means? How else can you describe the mindless descent into ever worsening anarchy across the country on a daily basis? I have seen with my own eyes youths with blood shot eyes banging with dangerous weapons on the windows of cars caught in traffic and forcibly dispossessing occupants of such vehicles of their money and possessions. Is that not a revolt of the underclass even when they lack any class consciousness in any meaningful sense of the word?

    What do you make of the senseless banditry, terrorism, religious extremism, rape, kidnapping, cultism, communal clashes or even mindless drug use by an alarmingly increasing number of youths? These are forms of revolt and rejection, even if self-destructive, against an exploitative, casino capitalist system that has totally alienated the vast majority of the citizenry and ripped them of their basic humanity and dignity. And here lies the signal failing of the likes of ideologically conscious individuals like Sowore and radical groups like the trade unions, progressive academics and change-oriented civil society groups that have abandoned the more important but back-breaking task of political education, enlightenment and mobilization of the masses of the people to effect radical political change.

    A vacuum has thus been created that has been filled by ethnic entrepreneurs, religious buccaneers and anarchic separatists who consciously divide the people in order to continue to exploit them. Sowore and other young and vibrant presidential candidates in the last election contested on the platforms of parties that had no firm pan-Nigerian foundations or even easily comprehensible and widely disseminated programs capable of appealing to the electorate. Party formation, consolidation and mass mobilization are no tea party.

    What then is to be done? Old style bloody revolutions that sought wholesale overthrow of extant state structures and the emergence of an ultimately elusive radically new order is not the way to go. History teaches us that such revolutions not only eventually consume their own children, they easily degenerate into even worse monsters than the systems they overthrew. Unlike countries like Libya, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia or Algeria which had to undergo the so-called Spring Revolutions to break the bonds of dictatorship but only fell into greater political crisis, Nigeria has a democratic system that, despite its flaws, has lasted 20 years without any interregnum.

    It makes no sense to seek to discard the system wholesale at this stage.   With all its faults, democracy has built into it a self-correcting mechanism. The cure for the lapses of democracy is continuous practice of more democracy. It is not the perhaps well-meaning but ill-conceived, poorly thought out and immaturely organized #RevolutionNow sought to be convened by Sowore in a complex and plural polity like Nigeria, which he does not appear to have studied seriously.

    In his review of Ake’s ‘Revolutionary Pressures’, Lawal Abdulmuttah, writes: “Ake notes that the African people are essentially demanding two things. The first is equality, which, in effect, means the abolition of post-colonial capitalism and its privileged classes. The second is “social well-being, easing the agony of extreme want”. Ake, however, postulates that neither of these demands will be granted by African ruling elites because the very condition of underdevelopment very drastically limits the expansion of the economic surplus. Thus, the capitalists cannot react favourably to revolutionary pressures without committing class suicide, which, of course, they will not do”.

    Here, I do not entirely agree with Ake. Unable to resist the persistent and vehement demands of Nigeria’s middle and underprivileged classes for a welfare state in order to democratize the benefits of Nigeria’s oil wealth, the Nigerian ruling class had no choice but to include a chapter on the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy in the 1979 constitution and this has been retained in the 1999 constitution. Although this section that provides for far-reaching welfare services to succor the poor and vulnerable was defanged by being made non-justiciable, human rights lawyer and activist, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN), has demonstrated how this section can indeed be a basis for a revolutionary redistribution of wealth in Nigeria in his seminal book, ‘Nigerian Law on Socio-Economic Rights’, which we will re-examine in the final part of this piece next week.

    But let us give the final word, once again, to Professor Ayo Olukotun who warns that, “What the Sowore outburst has to teach us, in case we are a nation that learns, is that time may be running out for the ruling class, to make desirable changes, and to walk the talk by rescuing Nigerians out of the bind in which they find themselves”.

  • PMB, statesmanship and national security

    One of the most thorny security challenges that has confronted Nigeria in this democratic dispensation has been the incessant clashes between Fulani herdsmen moving their cattle southward in search of grazing land and water and sedentary farming communities particularly in the middle belt states of Benue, Plateau, Nassarawa and Taraba as well as parts of the Southeast and South-south. The violent confrontations have resulted in large scale destruction of farms and crops, wholesale razing and displacement of entire communities and the loss of thousands of innocent lives.
    While the menace of herdsmen-farmers clashes appears to have abated significantly in the North-central zone, there has been a sharp rise in cases of kidnapping, rape, armed robbery and other crimes perpetrated in the Southwest allegedly by Fulani herdsmen or bandits who have reportedly invaded and occupied many of the forests in the region. Indeed, the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi and the Alaafin of Oyo, Oba Lamidi Adeyemi, have publicly drawn the Federal Government’s attention to the prevailing combustible situation in Yoruba land.
    While the Ooni personally visited President Muhammadu Buhari at the presidential Villa, Abuja, to formally complain about the invasion of forests in Yoruba land by ‘strangers’ as well as request the Federal Government’s support in enabling affected communities in the region defend themselves, the Alaafin wrote an open letter to the President urging him to arrest the country’s slide to anarchy as well as warning of the readiness of the Yoruba to protect their lives and property if the present situation is allowed to continue.

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    The Ooni again led a formidable 12- man delegation of prominent traditional rulers from Yorubaland to deliberate with the President on the precarious situation in the South West and proffer solutions. A positive fallout of these initiatives was the promise by President Mhuhammadu Buhari that drones and Closed Circuit television (CCTV) will be deployed in the Southwest to monitor and guarantee the safety of lives on the highways as well as in the region’s numerous forests. Suffice it to say that this commendable move should not be limited to the Southwest but rather must be part of a wholistic plan encompassing the entire country, where citizens are daily victims of assorted acts of criminality.
    The murder on the Ondo-Benin-Ore highway of Mrs. Funke Olakunri, daughter of the leader of Afenifere, Pa Reuben Fasoranti, brought to the forefront of national consciousness, once again, the gravity of the security challenge in the Southwest. Yet, it also drew attention to the danger of reflexively ascribing every crime of kidnapping or armed robbery on highways in the region to Fulani herdsmen without thorough investigation. Some sources, for instance, quoted eyewitnesses as saying that the murder of Mrs Olakunrin was perpetrated by Fulani herdsmen even before the police authorities had made any statement on the matter.
    On his part, the Ondo state police commissioner, Mr. Udie Adie, blamed bandits for the murder with armed robbery as the probable motive. Pa Fasoranti’s son and the deceased’s junior brother, Mr. Kehinde Fasoranti, sharply disagreed with the police commissioner insisting that officers at the Ore police station had told him the act was the handiwork of Fulani herdsmen. In any case, if it was a case of armed robbery, how come that none of the deceased’s valuables were touched by the assailants he asked?
    Neither party, in my view, should jump to a premature conclusion. Only a thorough and unbiased investigation can unravel the truth. It is immaterial whether Mrs Olakunrin died at the hands of herdsmen or bandits. What matters is that a crime has been committed and those responsible must be brought to book and urgently too. There have been too many cases of unresolved murders since the commencement of this political dispensation in 1999. A not insignificant number of Nigerians believe that only half-hearted efforts were made by the relevant security agencies to get to the root of these homicidal acts as well as apprehend and bring their perpetrators to justice.
    However, a serious danger of instinctively blaming Fulani herdsmen for kidnapping and armed robbery on many of the highways in the Southwest without prior investigation by security agencies is that it gives ample room for other individuals and groups to violate the law with impunity with the very high possibility of getting away with such lawlessness. This is because once there is the mindset that it is only one group responsible for crimes, there will be the tendency for investigations to be flawed from the onset as the real criminals will not even be on the radar of the security agencies at all. It certainly cannot be the case that the violent crimes of armed robbery, kidnapping and rape in vulnerable areas of the South West are the brainchild only of Fulani herdsmen.
    In any case, is it not possible that forces bent on destabilizing the country and sabotaging her unity can perpetrate heinous crimes in the Southwest and attribute it to the Fulani herdsmen? That would instigate bad blood, bitterness and hostility between the two parts of the country and give those with a separatist and secessionist agenda more ammunition for their divisive weapons. There is also the danger of unfairly profiling one ethnic group as criminal and making them the target of vindictiveness and possibly misdirected retaliatory, even genocidal, violence by other ethnic groups.
    These are delicate times in Nigeria that requires wise, restrained and mature leadership. In the highly inflammable situation in which we find ourselves, a careless or unthinking word by irrational leaders or opinion moulders can set the whole country ablaze. And the sad thing is that, it is only possible to know how a bloody crisis that can consume millions of lives starts, it is always difficult to say how or when it will end and at what cost to human lives and property as well as a national cohesion that has taken a great deal of sacrifice to forge even as it remains a work in progress.
    Of course, none of this is to peremptorily absolve herdsmen of blame for this or any other alleged crime in the Southwest or any part of the country. This would be as criminal and unjust as instinctively blaming the group for acts of kidnapping, rape or arson without proof. I think the standard requirement should be: Focus on the crime and not on the ethnic origin of the criminal. Don’t stigmatize any ethno-regional group. Stigmatize, apprehend, prosecute and punish the individual criminal.
    It is the seeming inexplicable paralysis of the will on the part of the security agencies to do this with a sense of purpose, professionalism and decisiveness that have spawned assorted and damaging conspiracy theories. A situation in which the President is Fulani and virtually all his security chiefs are from the north and are also Muslims does not help matters in terms of trust and confidence between the government and governed in a complex country like ours.
    It is, of course, easier for partisans on different sides of the political divide to make emotive statements in the kind of situation in which Nigeria finds herself today in order to play to the gallery and win cheap popularity. The path of statesmanship is a far harder one to chart. It is that of pursuing the middle course and appealing to reason and restraint in the interest of peace, stability and unity without which the pursuit of justice such as bringing to book the killers of Mrs. Olakunri cannot be meaningfully undertaken. It is this narrow path that I see Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu striving delicately to tread. Pa Fasoranti himself has struck a remarkably restrained note in the face of this grave tragedy that has befallen his family. He has said that what he desires most is the restoration of peace and security to all parts of the country.
    The greatest challenge of statesmanship, however, rests today on the shoulders of President Muhammadu Buhari who has been given an emphatic renewed mandate for a second term in the February, 23, 2019, presidential election. A necessary but admittedly not sufficient imperative for enhancing national security and halting what is widely perceived as a gradual slide to anarchy, is for the President to urgently reconstitute his military/security high command both to more accurately reflect the country’s ethno-regional balance as well as bring on board no less qualified officers with fresh ideas and strategies to build as well as improve on what the current team of service chiefs have achieved in the last four years.