UnderTow

After six years in office, President Muhammadu Buhari has admitted that one unclear thing led to another and his presidency fell asleep.  Nevertheless, he is awake now, and he is ready to get things going, starting with changing the circumstances of the hoi polloi wallowing in misery. Although the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) in May 2019 noted that some 89.2 million Nigerians (40.1%) are living in poverty, the world poverty clock suggests that about 105 million Nigerians (51%) live in poverty. The presidency seems to agree with the latter, as it has at sundry times expressed its commitment to lifting 100 million of such Nigerians out of poverty. The president’s admission of somnolence occurred last Tuesday at a meeting with the Presidential Economic Advisory Council (PEAC). It had all the ingredients of the Muhammadu Buhari-led presidency’s controversial public outings. First, the president was not there and was represented by a media aide, this time his Senior Special Assistant (SSA) on Media and Publicity. Next, the statement shot the president in the foot. Third, the statement was vague, contained no clear-cut policies, but was replete with philosophising and recycled promises. It did not need the SSA to identify it as a Buhari administration classic.

The statement gushed: “I was shocked hearing from you that of the vast agricultural land resources available to the nation, only two percent of it is under irrigation. We will make the best use of the land. Thank you for shaking us up. We are now awake; we will not doze off again. We didn’t just bump into this; we believe it is something we can deliver on.” Meanwhile, somewhere in the statement, the government promised that the scheme to lift that century of millions of Nigerians from poverty was not an accident but a deliberate policy that would be pursued with grit and determination, agreeing that the country required a poverty reduction strategy that would usher in a rapid, sustained, sustainable and inclusive economic growth. No one doubts that the presidency, to the best of its ability, tried to come up with what it believes is the best strategy.

It is, however, shocking that after all these years in office the presidency still talks futuristically about its policies. A government that has less than three of eight years left in office should be talking in the present continuous. Is this a sign that public analysts were on to something when they warned Nigerians of the vacuousness of promises constantly doled out by the government? Worse is that the government’s sloganeering and social investment schemes have received one major criticism – they do not treat the disease but the symptoms. Those schemes, sceptical Nigerians say, can barely lift anyone out of poverty, let alone furnish them with the means to enjoy a decent standard of living. Nigerians struggle to understand why they are being programmed to live off government’s cash injections, but have to spend expensively in an inflation-riddled economy. Why does the government have to serially borrow money to pump into the economy for alleviating poverty through various schemes? Are those schemes, rapid as they sound, as sustainable as the government promises? Is it sustainable that the government shares N5000 to Nigerians every month in a bid to lift them out of poverty when the conditions that pushed them into poverty remain in place, including excessive and sometimes double taxation, for those who do pay, and arbitrary shutting of Nigerians’ sources of livelihood without alternatives? It remains a mystery of the current government’s glib commitment to treating poverty.

Despite barely passable regulations to facilitate the ease of doing business in Nigeria, ranking the country at a pitiful 131 of 190 economies, the country has become a terribly hostile place to do business in. As usual, expectations do not always meet reality. Regulations are in place, but a deep-rooted malaise of corruption and insecurity, carelessly nurtured over years of avarice unchecked by a succession of lethargic, biased and soporific governments, has taken its toll on the country’s socio-economic fabric. At almost every level of government and private practice, analysts and commentators say corruption and a base absence of ethics reign supreme. Both the government and the populace, they say, are neck deep in corrupt practices. If the presidency were altruistic about combating corruption, it would have realised that the anti-graft war is only one small part of a larger equation. It is illusory to think that making scapegoats of certain individuals will do the trick. The National Orientation Agency (NOA) has an understated but important role to play in stemming ingrained, nationwide corruption. The anti-graft war, after being initially labelled a witch-hunt, has been described as directionless and lacking steam. With the right people in the agency, adequate funding and excellent policy formulation, the agency can slowly but surely reorient the collective mindset of the country to eschew corruption. But how can a government that has been accused of selectiveness in its war against corruption combat that same corruption? This is a paradox; but corruption remains a leading factor contributing systematically to the impoverishment of Nigerians. If the government retains its perceived glacial approach to national issues, corruption will plunge more people into poverty than ambitious social investment schemes can extricate them.

Nothing, however, that the NOA can do will cheat Nigerians into misunderstanding their reality. To lift people out of poverty, there must be enabling environment for business. The government has identified, among others, technology as a crucial component of economic diversification; but technology, as with every other business avenue in the modern world, requires uninterrupted power supply. This is another illusion. Federal Minister of Power, Saleh Mamman, displayed uncommonly low understanding of the power situation in Nigeria when he appeared on the Nigeria Television Authority (NTA) last June to state that: “We have improved our services. Before this government, they gave light for less than 10 hours a day, but today I can tell you that we give light from 18 to 24 hours in a day.” He will never be able to explain that statement, as several parts of the country experience no power supply for days and sometimes even weeks. Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, one year into his first term in office, promised 24-hr power supply in Edo State. Ekpoma residents will disagree strongly with him on that point if he so much as repeats it to their hearing. In Lagos, the economic hub of the country, power generating sets continue to drone all day and night. Even 18-hr power supply daily remains a myth in many areas.

To combat poverty decisively, the government needs to successfully defeat the Cerberus of insecurity, abysmal low quality of education and unequal distribution of wealth. No government can crusade against poverty when businesses and food production are not safe; when bandits can kidnap wantonly in their search for money while flat-footed government and their security agencies fail to pay necessary attention, and even pamper them; when governors finger one another as terrorists; and when the sanctity of human life means less than that of cattle. A government that struggles to implement N30,000 minimum wage for the populace, where some in power earn N30,000,000 monthly, lies without compulsion when it says it will lift 100m Nigerians out of poverty in two years. The truth is not in a government that promises to combat poverty but cannot stem the trend of students getting kidnapped by the hundreds. In short, Nigerians will not be too wrong to feel that the Buhari-led administration’s symptomatic policies and empty, placebo vocalisations either toy with the national intelligence, or wage an illusory crusade against poverty. Pragmatic economic policies, such as the government’s economic teams have outlined often, will not automatically translate to reality if the right environment is not created for it. Numbers, figures and policies are good ways to formulate a plan for the economic growth and development of the country. But Nigerians are not too illiterate to understand their reality. No one, perhaps not even the government itself, expects 100m people to miraculously exit poverty in two years, especially when impoverishing factors remain in place. Fertilisers are good for growing crops, but if weeds and pests are not removed, if the weather remains harsh, and if parasites attack the plantation, the harvest will not be bountiful. It is not rocket science.

By UnderTow

To many Nigerians, President Muhammadu Buhari is a phantom, taciturn Jubril from Sudan; to the president himself, and his traducers from the outlawed Republic of Biafra will agree, he has been hibernating but has only just woken up sometime last week; to Boko Haram insurgents and insurrectionists, he is a Muhammed Yusuf from Niger Republic; and to bandits and kidnappers, he is an unserious perjurer. Dynamism of this sort either makes a leader enigmatic or miasmic. This is a choice which the now awakened president must make over the next two years to counterbalance the past six somnolent years of painful governance.

But, bandits not only think him unserious, they appear keen to emasculate him for reneging on certain nebulous promises they claim he made to them. Represented by his Chief of Staff, Ibrahim Gambari, the president has in the past week noted that criminals should be dealt with as criminals, that they will not be granted amnesty (cleverly evading the Gumi complex), and that criminals should be dealt with without ethnic profiling. These are excellent standpoints, except that the bandits have called his bluff and advised him to appear before them in person for a dialogue or they would continue apace to wreak havoc. Making judicious use of surprising media coverage, the bandits said last week: “The president should personally come and preside over the talks. When he was campaigning, he travelled all over, why would he not do it now? He does not take these peace talks seriously and everyday people are being killed. There is no day that someone is not killed between Zamfara, Niger, Kaduna, Sokoto and Katsina. There is no tribe that is spared, gunmen kill, soldiers kill, and vigilantes kill. Whoever you see with a gun today in Nigeria, he uses it to kill people. You may not know but if I were to tell you the situation of things in this country, you will cry. Even the president will cry.”

Criminal or otherwise, the bandits make a strong case; they just may not know they are making it. They clearly do not regard the president seriously. Bandits are not usually this bold, despite their daring and callousness. But with the Buhari-led presidency, and going by the comments of several misfiring governors and hyperbolic clerics, they are emboldened enough to think that they can get away with anything. Indeed, they kidnapped students in Kaduna, right under the president’s nose and virtually in his own backyard. They carried on about their usual damning enterprise Thursday night by invading a school in Zamfara and spiriting away 300 female students. Despite the Chibok and Dapchi episodes, Nigerians are still not used to these things and the scar does not tingle like a déjà vu. No, the wound opens afresh as the country sorrows with the affected parents while the emasculated presidency continues to be all bark.

UnderTow

On the issue of herdsmen and what is to be done with them, many public commentators have talked themselves to ruin, while others have said just about the right things to smear themselves with a healthy coating of public approval. Even those who have operated outside the law have been celebrated as heroes, who have taken the bull by the horns; and anyone who has dared to oppose the outlaws has not been spared public opprobrium – governor and peasant alike. Examples are not hard to come by. Governor Bala Mohammed of Bauchi State and Sheikh Mahmoud Gumi, Islamic cleric and now bandit whisperer, can tell. No one needed to be put wise that except necessary, it was generally safe to skirt the polarising issues of herdsmen and banditry, which have divided sentiments among even top Nigerians, than air any controversial opinions. Not Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, who never shies away from controversy, perhaps even glorying in it.

Speaking at a lecture through the agency of a media aide on Tuesday, the senior advocate joined the ongoing battle of ideas on what should become of herdsmen and their business. Ideas that have preceded his include the expulsion of all herdsmen from the southwest, dialogue and amnesty, the Rural and Grazing Act (RUGA), speculatively the Water Resources Bill, banning of open grazing, ranching, and even boycotting of herdsmen and the products of their cattle. Everyone seems to have something to say about them and so it was understandable that despite the imminent danger and risk, Mr Malami was afflicted by a compulsion to throw in his legal sentiment. Many who have heard his opinion are convinced he did not think the matter through as well as he could and should have. A minority believes he knows the right thing, but has a special interest job to perform.

He suggested: “…It is not out of place for me to say that simply addressing farmer-herder crisis from purely theoretical perspectives often devoid of reality and without synchronization with the needs and aspirations of the involved stakeholders is not only counter-productive but inimical to the emergence and sustenance of a peaceful and prosperous Nigeria. It is against this backdrop that I proffer the following recommendations for the consideration of the symposium: The setting up of regulated grazing reserves to replace the ‘Burtali’ or ‘Hurumi’ pastoral system… Intensive enlightenment to livestock breeders on the need for sedentary farming and transhumance agriculture as complementary economic process to nomadic farming. Provision of water holes in remote grazing locations, subsidized veterinary care and mobile ambulatory services for surgeries and other medical interventions for livestock. Provision of infrastructure – social amenities, educational facilities and cattle markets at central locations to accelerate nomadic settlements… It is perhaps time to consider setting up of a commission for pastoralism regulated by law. This might provide recipes for resolving protracted farmer-herder conflicts. The commission may even engage in or facilitate in-depth analytical studies with a view to providing lasting solutions for the benefit of people and the country. Revamping of the activities of the Nomadic Education Commission with a view to complementing the efforts of government in resolving the farmer-herder clashes.”

Until he began to talk about a pastoralism commission, it was easy to think that he was speaking altruistically. It is clear, however, that what he meant was that the government should take up the responsibility of setting them up. The Attorney-General may be idealising something that will not work, given the perennial failures of several federal governments since independence more than 60 years ago to administer resources for the greater good. That will not work, so Mr Malami needs to get his head out of the clouds.

The leniency and support the herders, whether criminal or honest, enjoy from the presidency make it appear as though these are excellent times to join their ranks. There are those among them who go about their business in all honesty, grazing their cattle nomadically and causing only environmental damage, but there are the infamous bandits and criminals among them who have diffused their trade with the criminal industry of kidnapping and murder. When a crime becomes organised and profitable enough for its perpetrators to procure enough arms to fight a national army, it has morphed into an industry. Sheikh Gumi, the government’s self-appointed eyes and ears among the bandits, can testify to the strength of bandits’ arsenal.

Although livestock has been identified as being responsible for a third of all agricultural GDP, there are reports that show that as at 2018, livestock was responsible for 18 percent more greenhouse gas emissions than transport. It does not get better, for livestock production is also responsible for conflicts, land degradation, loss of biodiversity, overgrazing and even deforestation. In a word, livestock has been putting in a spirited but unnoticed shift in global warming, and this is simply because the activities of herders have gone largely unregulated for decades and would have remained that way had things not come to a head in the Southwest.

Previous attempts at regulating grazing did not meet with as much success as they should have. There was the Grazing Reserve Law of 1975, The National Environmental (Watershed, Mountainous, Hilly and Catchment Areas) Regulations of 2009. Some states have also worked hard to regulate grazing by simply outlawing nomadic or open grazing. Benue State, in 2017, passed the Open Grazing Prohibition and Ranches Establishment Law (2017), which restricted the free movement of cattle in the state and sought to vest the control of ranches for breeding cattle in the Department of Livestock, which is under the Benue State Ministry of Agriculture and Natural Resources. Ekiti, Taraba and now Ondo State also have legislations in place to regulate herders’ activities. Livestock farming cannot, therefore, be banned outright, hence the calls for regulation of grazing. The government is not averse to the idea.

This circumspect opening was, however, exploited to excess by Mr Malami, who clearly believes that the departments of livestock in the various states and federal governments cannot do the job. He was expected to have been aware that one of the major political weaknesses of the Nigerian government is duplication of offices. As things stand, many offices and institutions in the federal structure are surplus to requirement and would have fared better if they had been merged with other structures. The cost of governance is already too high, and this is why politics has become a get-rich-quick green pasture for all sorts of people. With the establishment of the senior advocate’s favoured pastoralism commission, expenses would be incurred. What then is the use of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development?

In Edo State, after media reports initially announced that the state government planned to create reserves for the herdsmen, the governor went on a security tour round the state and in a short while, Secretary to Edo State Government, Osarodion Ogie, debunked those reports, noting instead that the government would not cede any land for grazing, as it was a private economic activity, a private business. The federal government does not own the cattle, and it remains suspect if the herdsmen even pay taxes. They carry weapons that they are not licensed to own and some of them revel in crime and criminality as a second stream of income. Mr Malami does not, however, appear to appreciate these nuances on justice, fairness and equal distribution of resources. His position is that the federal government should spoonfeed the herders by creating a special commission for them backed by law, naturally to the redundancy of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.

He was not altogether wrong though. Mutual tolerance between host communities and herdsmen remains a viable option, but only after criminal herdsmen and bandits have been brought to book. The wheat must be separated from the tares, while the tares are strictly regulated for continued coexistence with host communities. Mr Malami needs to appreciate the place of justice as he plots the expenditure from federal resources. He must ask himself how fair it is for national funds to be spent at the drop of a hat, especially for causes of dubious benefit to the federation. What is so special about livestock grazing or pastoralism that the federal government should spend so much nurturing the trade, as Mr Malami has suggested above, especially in an era of huge loans and the unending refrain of the shortage of funds for infrastructure in the country? Can the government even be trusted to develop a sustainable blueprint or legal framework for regulating herders’ activities?

The federal government, despite its often inscrutable stance on herdsmen, will most likely regard the Attorney General’s idea with as much attention as it accorded Sheikh Gumi and Governor Bala Mohammed – very little – though there are suspicions in certain quarters that he speaks, cabalistic style, as the mouthpiece of the presidency. But the country simply lacks the funds to bend to his prejudiced and incongruous suggestions. Although, Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, was quick to hop on the amnesty suggestion for bandits, he will remain quiet for now. He has other fish to fry, especially as youths in his state want to impale his political career on a pike of frustration and disappointment. They feel he has not represented them well, and he is unsure how many people probably agree with them and scorn his person and politics.

The tension surrounding pastoralism runs beyond the economy and has ramifications in ethnicity and politics. For all its impetuous policy-making and open grazing benevolence, the presidency may still be shamed to disavow Mr Malami’s elegant and idealistic plans. So far, governors have been shuttling all over the country and making a show of taking control of the threat to internal peace that herdsmen tensions have triggered. However, there is no indication that the federal government could summon the depth necessary to address the issue with the decisiveness and equity needed, what with Mr Malami’s, among others’ idealising.  But who knows, the presidency may yet welcome the innovative suggestions on grazing and insecurity by the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), if it can find common purpose and attention to heed their advice.

UnderTow

In a week that saw him say almost all the right things and make certain useful observations on every subject he exposited on, Bauchi State Governor, Bala Mohammed, succumbed on Thursday to a moment of beguiling controversy. It is not clear what exactly the temptation was, but the issues involved touched upon the rationality or agreeability of herdsmen wielding weapons, as well as Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State’s recent outburst. The Bauchi governor appears to believe that other tribes in Nigeria, as well as south-western and south-eastern governors, are making a broil over the herdsmen-indigenes conflicts in their states. His argument was that the herdsmen, as a matter of necessity and self-defence, had to carry weapons, and seeing as the constitution guarantees the right of every Nigerian to live freely in any part of the country and move freely within, then why the fuss about the illegality of expelling them? In that summarisation of the issue, the governor betrayed a fine but faux appraisal of the conflicts. Indeed, the governor reduced the issue to being nothing more than a transgression against the herdsmen’s rights to free movement and life.

His account: “The west does not want to accommodate other tribes but we are accommodating your tribe in Bauchi. We have Yoruba, who have stayed in Bauchi for over 150 years, some of them have being made permanent secretaries in Gombe, Bauchi and Borno. But because the Fulani man is practicing the tradition of transhuman pastoralism, he has been exposed to cattle rustlers who carry a gun, kill him and take away his cows, and he has no option but to carry AK-47 because the government and the society are not protecting him. It’s the fault of the government. Nobody owns any forests in Nigeria; it’s owned by Nigeria. Under section 23, 24 and 25 of the Constitution, every Nigerian is free to stay anywhere. Anybody can speak anyhow but we are only exercising restraint. If cybercrime is being practised mostly by one tribe, you don’t criminalise the whole tribe because of this. That’s why you journalists need to be sensitive and exercise restraint. Avoid writing reports that will threaten the unity of this country… My brother and my colleague Ortom started all this as regards herders clashes with other tribes. That’s why I must commend the Chairman of the Northern Governors Forum, Solomon Lalong, he is a hero in the promotion of peace despite his diverse and minority background, he put an end to the Incessant fighting between herdsmen and other tribes in Plateau.”

How Mr Bala came about the idea that no one owns the forests in Nigeria can only be speculated upon. As a governor, he would have been expected to acquaint himself with at least Section 1 of the Land Use Act (1978), which states that, “Subject to the provisions of this Act, all land comprised in the territory of each State in the Federation is hereby vested in the Governor of that State, and such land shall be held in trust and administered for the use and common benefit of all Nigerians in accordance with the provisions of this Act.” This includes forest reserves, from where Governor Rotimi Akeredolu of Ondo State sought to expel unregistered herdsmen. Has Governor Bala perhaps not been exercising his legal rights as a governor with respect to land? Has he thought all along that the lands in his state belong to the federal government and not the state government? The governor has neither displayed a proper understanding of the issues on ground nor proved that he roundly followed up the progression of events until the executive orders by governors and the forceful eviction of Fulani herdsmen allegedly inspired by Yoruba activist, Sunday Igboho. He also may be labouring under the impression that Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State is simply grandstanding and rather myopic in his recent outbursts concerning the federal government’s bias towards one tribe to the fatal detriment of the other tribes. In short, the governor could and should have suffered his disagreeable position on herdsmen-tribal clashes to retain the anonymity it had previously enjoyed. To his ruin, he did not; and although many will not think any pro-herdsmen sentiment worth their while, more people have pointed the accusatory finger at him, questioning his credentials as a leader.

More, Section 41(1) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, not 23 (national ethics), 24 (duties of the citizen) nor 25 (citizenship), guarantees the freedom of any Nigerian to move anywhere within the country. That right is however derogated by Section 41(2), and even his quoted Section 24(d) would have posed a problem to anyone living in an area without making any positive and useful contribution. To acknowledge the rights of criminal herdsmen to freedom of movement, without so much as a mention of the losses and disadvantages that the aggrieved indigenes of those areas have suffered at their hands, would be in short to gratify that meanest of human frailties, closedmindedness, and disqualify oneself from the circumspection that should attend great leaders at all times. This, unfortunately, was the camp Governor Bala chose to pitch his tent with, carrying on as though to argue that the wielding of weapons should become a perfectly natural thing to Nigerians without so much as questioning where they may have obtained these weapons. Reports have revealed that these weapons were owned illegally anyway. If a person has a legitimate fear for his safety, the appropriate thing to do would be to apply for a license to carry whatever weapon he may so require for his safety. Does the governor know this?

To continue in the same breath as if he were not a governor, and by extension a part of the government, would make many of the aggrieved parties, including the governors he so excoriated with his faulty arguments, cringe. Some, reluctant to undervalue his comprehension of the deeper and more nuanced issues relating to the herdsmen’s possessing weaponry of the sophisticated kind, believe that he is simply cozening the facts of the issue to satisfy his tribal or perhaps economic interests. That much may be doubtful and almost unfair to the governor, despite his otherwise excellent pronouncements on issues like rape or the rechannelling of some N500m recovered from ghost workers’ salaries to paying off gratuities. It was unfair of him to dismiss the opinions and efforts of his counterparts, one of whom has taken the welcome but perhaps dramatic step of conducting security tours round his state. Despite how dramatic and unnecessary some may believe such a step is, it means some governors are at least taking the issue of insecurity in their states serious enough to try to get to the root of it, instead of sitting on a high horse and pontificating dismissively on the issue. Is it not presumptuous of him to assume that the governors that have taken steps to regularise the activities of herdsmen in their states have not conducted their due diligence in detecting the source of a heinous criminal syndicate that has not only haunted but harassed and terrorised their communities for almost a decade?

But such is the power of what some have described as inordinate ethnic fidelity, an accusation thrown at not only him but many northern governors in general, and an accusation which some of the governors have made spirited efforts to extricate themselves from. Indeed, Governor Bala appears to have forgotten that Nigerians do need the beef and leather that come from cattle. The fact that Nigerians are willing to forgo it speaks volumes. They reason is that it is more pertinent to preserve their lives than to enjoy whatever nourishments may accrue from the consumption of what they will now view as blood cattle. However, the more important point is that while regular Nigerians appear willing to boycott beef, governors are more circumspect and are calling for a ranching or modern system of raising cattle. They have lost too many people for comfort, mostly to the activities of some of the herdsmen who bear these weapons illegally.

An important point the misfiring governor raised, which needs correction, is that the Fulani in general are being stereotyped as criminal herdsmen. This is not true. Herdsmen have been identified as belonging primarily to the Fulani, Hausa and Ebira tribes. There may be others, but of those three, the Fulani are the most popular. Statistics and history prove this. The validity or otherwise of his claim that ethnic profiling lies at the heart of the claim that other governors have dedicated time and effort to pitching tribes against one another is suspect. Governor Seyi Makinde, his Oyo State counterpart, who has been accused of a glacial and apathetic approach to insecurity in his state, preached peace to the wrath and anger of his people. It is also unfair to accuse Governor Ortom, whose state has suffered more than most from militant herdsmen, of fanning the embers of discord with his statements. To the contrary, his statements are an umpteenth echo of the general sentiments of Nigerians concerning the ethnic fundamentalist accusation they have made against the federal government. It is this same federal government that has failed the people – perhaps the only correct statement Governor Bala made to the press.

The governor is no stranger to controversy: until his election as governor, he was hounded by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). After his election, the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) harried him and tried to square account with him. He has emerged from these controversies, only two of many, stronger, grizzled and immovable. He, however, should be alive to even his own limits before stoking the flames of controversy with his polemic stance on ethnic controversies. Seeing as he does not have the philosophical or ideological sense of fairness required to judge correctly the nature and extent of ethnic issues, he may find obscurity a truer companion than the harsh scrutiny that comes with airing narrowly construed, illiberal and borderline positions.

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When President Muhammadu Buhari “accepted the resignation” of his faithful service chiefs, who were long overdue for exit from office, two weeks ago the public was more than a little joyful. The vindictive and the aggrieved among them, who had scores to settle with the service chiefs, raised the cry to hang the men. They begged the International Criminal Court (ICC), the United Nations (UN) and even the United States (US) to have their way with all four of them. Some, however, knew that was all wishful thinking. They did not know why, after months of tarrying, the president sprang into action and semantically put the men out of circulation. They suspected it was only a mild anaesthetic and he would soon pull the hare out of the hat. They were not disappointed. Last week, the president forwarded five names to the senate for confirmation as non-career ambassadors. They were Abayomi Olonisakin, Tukur Buratai, Ibok-Ete Ibas, Sadique Abubakar, and Mohammed Usman. Until their recent retirements, all five of them were security chiefs. It remains unclear why the president is so loyal to the security chiefs that he has nominated them as non-career ambassadors. The air is still thick with the smoke left by 52 ambassadors whose appointments were finalised after months of gruelling delay.

While career ambassadors go through trainings in diplomacy and usually carry a high level of requisite education, non-career ambassadors are usually nominated at the prerogative of the president, but they must be capable and meriting individuals. The presidency, maintaining its trademark taciturnity, did not disclose its exact reasons for nominating the recently retired security chiefs as ambassadors. Were they meriting individuals? What skills did they possess in that regard that made them more deserving than other Nigerians of the ambassadorial nominations? Most importantly, should Caesar’s wife not be above suspicion? Already there are those who have theorised that the presidency only nominated them to grant them diplomatic immunity. These are the sorts of controversies that the president should have avoided at all costs. His nomination of the former service chiefs, who were hated by many Nigerians to the extent that the effecting of their overdue retirement caused celebration, to represent the same Nigerians portrays President Buhari as being deaf and insensitive to the people’s pulse. Indeed, the only thing standing between the service chiefs and their ambassadorial deployments will be the National Assembly. Will the legislative arm of government recognise the presidency’s sleight of hand for what it really is? The same sleight of hand was executed by the government in the disbandment of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) and the creation of the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) to the dismay of Nigerians.

If it is not already so, it is fast become a habit of the presidency to mock the intelligence of Nigerians in that illusionary manner. After months of outcry characterised by marked federal aloofness, the presidency suddenly acts, only nominally altering the status quo but fundamentally changing nothing. It is the type of inscrutable and apathetic governance that satisfies only those in power and goes against the very grain of democracy. There is no evidence to prove that the presidency will ever repent of its unwelcome politics. It will continue to fly in the face of Nigerians whenever they air their displeasure or make demands concerning how they want the country to be run. The senate, for its part, cannot be trusted to appreciate its oversight functions on the presidency well enough to execute them. They cannot even be trusted to unite in ideology on the rightness or otherwise of grating policies. So for as long as too many chefs brew and spoil the federal broth, the presidency will only get better at its trickeries and Nigerians will continue to spectate in this macabre theatre of illusions.

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Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mohammed Adamu, should have hung up his uniform, complete with boots and beret, on February 1 this year in line with the Police Act (2020). But as has become the custom with the Muhammadu Buhari presidency, controversy has reared its all too familiar and unwelcome head. The IGP commenced service on February 1, 1986 and has now spent 35 years and five days in the police force. In that period, he spent about three days illegally in office, working under a cloud of uncertainty, donning the police uniform to the frothing chagrin of Nigerians and generally receiving opprobrious media attention. Section 18(8) of the Police Act compels the IGP to retire after 35 years in service or attaining the age of 60, whichever comes first. The public believes that the man to blame for the IGP’s predicament is the president who appointed him and recently extended his tenure in office by another three months. There are some others who are convinced that the IGP actively sought the tenure extension he was eventually granted, but these are nebulous police matters, and except top-level drama occurs at the presidency, the travesty will remain unclear for quite a while. Already, Mr Adamu was operating under harsh but seemingly deserved public scrutiny. The public has since postured to double its scrutiny of every breath he continually draws in office.

Extending the embattled IGP’s tenure in office on Thursday, the presidency, through the Minister of Police Affairs, Mohammad Dingyadi, had said: “Mr President has decided that the present IGP, Mohammed Adamu, will continue to serve as the IG for the next three months, to allow for a robust and efficient process of appointing a new IG…This is not unconnected to the desire of Mr President to not only have a smooth handover, but to also ensure that the right officer is appointed into that position. Mr President is extending by three months to allow him get into the process of allowing a new one.”

Read Also; Lawyers fault Buhari’s extension of Police IG Adamu’s tenure

The process that the president is now about to get into, according to the minister, is outlined in the Police Act, Section 7(3) of which is clear that the Inspector general of Police shall be appointed by the President on the advice of the Police Council from among serving members of the Nigeria Police Force. Many issues remain unclear, however, in the president’s conduct. When, if he did, did the IGP hand in his retirement letter? What were the presidency and the Police Council so busy with that they could not prevent this extension, another of several controversies, from occurring? Was it slothfulness or pure irresponsible indecision? Or was it a general scornful disregard of the law and due process?

Nigerians noted the prompt and decisive manner President Joe Biden of the United States nominated and appointed his top officials and aides shortly after winning the election. Analysing his efficiency and promptitude, experts diagnosed his rapid appointments as being a zeal to perform admirably. They are not wrong. Any president who has a handle on his presidency and possesses a clear ideology will not dally on matters such as the appointment of the IGP. Retired police chiefs and experts agree that former IGP, Ibrahim Idris, was not half as efficient as his predecessor, Solomon Arase, and was serially disrespectful to the National Assembly, and could not properly control the rogue Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). They say he ran the force aground and that Mr Adamu simply inherited the problem but was not ideological and visionary astute enough to turn things around. Indeed, they argue that the IGP’s impuissance was exposed nakedly first in his repeatedly disobeyed disbandment of the hated SARS and eventually during the abysmal and impolitic handling of the #EndSARS protests.

The presidency and the IGP will not agree with that point of view. The former because it is as culpable as the latter for the structural decay, and moral as well as morale impoverishment of the Police Force, and the latter because he believes he has done his best and that should count for something. The Police Council, meanwhile, has been silent, unwilling to attract attention to itself in the fiasco that has created an anorexic relationship between the police and the rule of law. Paragraph 27 of the Third Schedule to the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria explains that the Nigeria Police Council shall comprise the following members: the President who shall be the Chairman; the Governor of each State of the Federation; the Chairman of the Police Service Commission; and the Inspector-General of Police. Accused of possessing only a kindergarten understanding of human rights and the law, the police force has continually operated seemingly unchecked for years. Although empowered by Paragraph 28(b) of the Third Schedule of the Constitution to perform supervisory functions on the Nigeria Police Force, what has the Police Council done or said? Yes, Governor Seyi Makinde of Oyo State, like many other governors before him, recently piped up on the necessity of state police forces. No, the public does not expect the Police Council to say a word concerning the legality or otherwise of the tenure extension of the IGP. No one wants to fry that kettle of fish for now, so they will let sleeping dogs lie.

The excuse for elongating the tenure of the IGP is only as valid as the argument that the Police Council and the president slacked most woefully and disrespectfully. They knew the IGP’s tenure was coming to an end and should have taken the appropriate steps to ensure that smooth handover the president is so desirous of. At the very least, they could have appointed the next most senior police officer to function as the IGP in an acting capacity. But to walkover the law in the manner brazenly adopted by the president, with not so much as a blush or a stammer, is the unimaginable reality that Nigerians are forced to cope with. The Police Force is desperately in need of some visionary leadership, one that can display the necessary fidelity to champion the cause of the policemen employed in the force that they may function better and more effectively. The IGP could not provide that leadership, and preparations should have been made for his impending retirement months ago. But again, indecision has haunted the Buhari-led administration. It remains to be seen how quickly the irreversible disaster can be mitigated.

UnderTow

After stirring the hornet’s nest by accusing religious centres, among other public places, of contributing to the uncontrolled increase of the second wave of COVID-19 infections in Nigeria, Chairman of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, Boss Mustapha, retreated to take a ringside seat and watch the blame game begin. The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), which has long felt that the policy of shutting religious centres was needless and only a little better than upsetting their liturgical applecart, made no bones about just what they thought of the PTF chairman’s statement. CAN General Secretary, Joseph Daramola, was not having any of that.

He said: “It is not true that the reopening of churches caused the second wave of COVID-19. Is it the opening of churches that caused the second wave of COVID-19 in other developed countries? All the places they locked have been opened. Nobody should try and make issues out of this. They may have their statistics, but if you go to churches in Abuja, they are still wearing masks. They have been keeping to the social distance protocol. In my church, we are still abiding by the COVID-19 protocols. I do not agree so. Since the government is there and it has all its apparatus, they can set up a committee. The statement is too wide. I do not want to go into conflict with government officials. What is happening is all over the world.”

Although his arguments were not accommodating in scope, his panic is understandable. He had seen the Federal Government backtrack on its earlier decision to open schools on January 18. The same fate loomed before churches and he clearly had had enough of churches being the sacrificial lambs for the government’s attempts to look busy. But he was not being permissive in his reaction. In fact, he was not willing to understand Mr. Mustapha’s position. The PTF had not fingered only churches; they had also fingered schools, business centres and religious centres as being included in the propagation of the virus. Indeed, there is no evidence that the PTF, which has for quite a while now been threatening everyone and every sector of the country with a second lockdown, was targeting religious centres.

The taskforce has had its work cut out for it. It may even have been correct in its allegations concerning religious centres contributing to the spread of the virus. Churches and Mosques, as well as schools, businesses and indeed all other gatherings including the markets, transportation services and so on have contributed to the spread of the virus. The PTF had not singled out only religious bodies, so while it had deflected the real issue on ground, to wit the small question of what is to be done to arrest the spread of the virus, it was not wrong in its assessment of the situation on ground nor was it exaggerating about the factors influencing the spread of the virus. The National Supreme Council for Islamic affairs (NSCIA), for its part, simply deferred to the assessment of the PTF and expressed its willingness to close up shop should the eminent PTF require it to do so. This was another move which the PTF would not have missed. It will now probably stroke its beard and fancy its chances of throwing religious centres under the bus to keep up appearances of being business-like in its war against COVID-19.

Both parties are barking up the wrong tree by disagreeing with the PTF or even by focusing on responding to the chairman’s statements, which are diversionary rather than visionary. They should have focused more on what the PTF did not say than what it indeed said, for it said nothing new. The PTS’s exposition on the cause of the increase in infection rate of the new wave of COVID-19 was not novel at the time; it was simply stating the obvious. Everyone in the country knew that the reopening of public places contributed in its own way to the increase of the infections in the country. The religious associations should have instead focused on pressuring the government to develop a local vaccine or even a cure instead of throwing ludicrous sums of money at the procurement of an international but still controversial vaccine. A cure for the virus will be as welcome as a vaccine, if not more welcome. Word on the street suggest that the true number of infections in Nigeria is grossly underreported, as Nigerians have wasted no time in stigmatising anyone with even the remotest symptoms of the virus. As such, those that have manifested the COVID-19 symptoms have resorted to herbal remedies, which have traditionally lived up to the task of fortifying their immunities against the debilitating disease. People are afraid to get tested. Those who have been there and done that have told harrowing tales of their experience that many Nigerians want to operate in denial and self-medicate instead of getting tested.

Decades of neglecting pharmaceutical advancements have caught up with the government and, although there have been enough needles pricked into the federal ego by the small but deadly virus, the government has developed a thick skin to the problem. It would rather wait to be spoonfed with the vaccines from abroad than scrape the barrel and get something done locally by way of a medical remedy. Lack of innovativeness in anti-coronavirus policy formulation was quickly followed by a shocking allocation of 400 billion naira for the procurement of an unstable vaccine that has reportedly killed one and lamed another, which was in turn followed by reports of a more controversial sharing formula for the virus. No, both the CAN and NSCIA were dancing to the PTF’s diversionary tune by flogging the wrong horse. They would have fared far better pointing out to the government that the time for announcing causes of the increase in the spread of the virus was long gone, as everyone in the country was not inured to the facts. They should have humbly requested the PTF to focus on finding a cure or devising a means and a strategy that did not include locking down the country to arrest the virus.

Needless to say, Nigeria is poorly equipped with infrastructure to handle the virus, and the economy is already in a recession. If the Federal government locks down churches and mosques but does not lock down markets, which are clearly more effective in spreading the virus, it would look ridiculous and make a laughing stock of itself — more than it already has. If the federal government locks down schools, for just how long will that strategy hold? There is hardly infrastructure for online schooling. The virus will not go anywhere if it is not expelled by either a cure or a vaccine. The borders of the country remain open and flights come in from sundry continents on a daily basis.

Some fresh ideas, which the government and the PTF appear bereft of are needed in the tackling of COVID-19. The time for blindly copying foreign countries is passed. Medical doctors are perishing or alarmingly coming down with the virus, and foreign countries keen on brain drain are cherry-picking the fit and the able left in the country. Really, the religious associations should not have bothered to bandy words with the PTF, they should instead have pointed out these realities to the government.