The Nation Newspaper

Category: Barometer

  • Between el-Rufai and free speech

    LEFT to the Kaduna State governor, Nasir el-Rufai, he would not mind being regarded as the most tyrannical governor and politician in Nigeria. He simply doesn’t care how he is perceived, nor what anyone thinks about him as an elected person who has done his utmost to destroy the foundations of the democracy that has given him so much publicity and probably undeserved relevance. Speaking during the presentation of a book, Digital Wealth, by blogger Japheth Omojuwa in Abuja last Tuesday, Mallam el-Rufai insisted he would force those who tweet or re-tweet fake news about Kaduna State to be brought to the state for prosecution, if the tweets lead to loss of life or pandemonium. Hear, hear.

    The haughtiness with which he phrased his threats is both damning of his disputed credential as a democrat and frightening about what fate awaits democracy in the hands of politicians like him. Hear him in full and unedited: “We should not confuse freedom of expression with freedom to kill. If you tweet something that is fake or you tweet something that is reckless without checking and it leads to the death of people, then you deserve to be tried at least as an accessory before or after the fact of murder. In Kaduna State we have done that very aggressively because there are things that have been put on social media that have led to the death of people. So, we take it very seriously. You cannot sit in Port Harcourt or Lagos and start posting stuff that leads to societal instability in Kaduna and we let you go. We will file charges, we will go and collect you from Port Harcourt or Lagos and bring you before a judge in Kaduna and the judge will decide whether you are guilty. We’ve done that two or three times. The people we have done this to are still being prosecuted. If you want to tweet something about Kaduna, be very careful because I am watching.”

    Despite the ruling of the governorship election petition tribunal, there is still no incontrovertible evidence that Mallam el-Rufai won the last Kaduna governorship poll. He is not liked, he is irascible, has shown no sentiment for democracy or the rule of law, promotes Fulani exceptionalism, and talks nineteen to the dozen, declaiming upon subjects far beyond his ken, indeed on subjects like religious practices which he has no business meddling in. Now, in addition to this burdensome cargo, he is seeking to regulate free speech and, being an exponent of unitary system of government, plans to cross state borders to effect arrests and violate the rights and freedoms of Nigerians in the same atrocious way he has hobbled Kaduna State. Hopefully, his fellow governors will make him realise that simply because the police are the public and ignoble face of Nigeria’s unitary system does not entitle him to ride roughshod over other states. One state is enough for his tyranny.

    Indeed, in his remarks during the Abuja book launch he used Lagos and Port Harcourt as examples of states where he believes the fake news practice predominates and where freedom of expression is abused. It is clear what chicanery he has afoot, especially as he has boasted that, using the state’s cowed judicial system, he is already dealing with a few people who had crossed his path. If in their political battles with him Senators Shehu Sani and Suleiman Hunkuyi could not get the protection the constitution vouchsafed them and the justice they deserved and demanded, and the people of Southern Kaduna are short-changed and alienated, how can those he has dragged before his state’s judicial system ever hope to get justice under the nose of a man who gloats at his opponents misfortune? Not only is federalism misinterpreted and misconceived in Nigeria generally, it is also being misused in Kaduna in particular.

    Note very well the terrible assault on free speech being masterminded by Mallam el-Rufai. For a governor who indiscreetly announced that some Kajuru natives massacred 66 Fulani people in Southern Kaduna early this year contrary to the evidence presented by the alleged suspects, what does it take him to present fake evidence of a pandemonium or even of death to justify the arrest of so-called fake news tweeters? The problem is not that fake news does not exist, or that tweeters do not sometimes exceed themselves by deliberately concocting falsehood. The problem is that Mallam el-Rufai himself ought to be put on trial for, for instance, paying off murderers by his own admission, demolishing opponents’ houses on trumped-up charges, and lying against a whole people as he did against Southern Kaduna, among other things. The same governor who cannot discipline himself on anything, and who has shown no proper understanding of the rule of law or of democracy, is purporting to stand up for the law. Posting fake news is deplorable, but ruling a state oppressively and undermining its peace and stability is even more deplorable. Who will check the checker, especially someone who has benefited so much from democracy and given nothing in return? Had the Kaduna governor given a presentation on the menace of fake news and suggested ways of dealing with the problem without undermining or curtailing freedom of expression, he would have been applauded and regarded as a sound politician worthy of support. And to think he has interest in the presidency!

     

  • Buratai on reorienting the Army

    THE Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, has suggested that soldiers must be reoriented to prevent the kind of killings and rape committed by soldiers at checkpoints in Taraba, Ondo States and elsewhere. His statement, which was made at a military conference in Abuja last week, seemed to imply that the Army’s junior cadre was more in need of this reorientation. That is not true. All cadres do, without exception. If discipline had not broken down, if soldiers were properly trained and the right professional values inculcated in them, if officers did not indulge troops and sometimes lie to protect them, the killings complained about would hardly occur.

    Hear Gen. Buratai: “However, recent occurrences have shown that there is a need for more reorientation on civil-military relations and inter-service cooperation at the junior cadre levels. Unfortunately, incidents such as the recent one at Ibi in Taraba State, which generated intense comments, are not healthy for the smooth cooperation and operation of our security forces. I hereby charge commanders at all levels to continue to educate personnel on the need to adhere to the rules of engagement at all times.” Maybe, for starters, the general should ask himself how he and his troops handled the December 2015 Zaria Shiite killings. Was it professional? Could such horrifying killings be committed by any of the world’s best militaries? So who really needs reorientation now? Senior or junior cadre, or both?

    Gen Buratai then adds that “The army will not condone any form of indiscipline or actions that will tarnish its good image.” He should be honest enough to find out what kind of image the Army he leads already has. He will find that that image is painfully and shamefully sullied by rank indiscipline. If he and his army do not know what to do to arrest the damage, they should ask those who know and stop scratching the rot on the surface.

  • An appalling bandit culture

    APPEASEMENT. That seems to be the name of the game these days, as bandits operate freely in some parts of the North. Some 10 days ago or so, the Katsina State governor, Aminu Masari, engaged bandits in negotiation to end banditry and their destabilising and disruptive activities in some parts of the state. He probably had no choice. He had cried out repeatedly that his state was under siege, inundated with banditry. And since he did not possess the security apparatus to end or even curb the menace, and because his entreaties to Abuja had also met with qualified failure, he simply damned the unethicalness of negotiating with criminals and proceeded to dialogue with the tormentors of his people. Peace at all costs.

    After all, a few years back, the Kaduna State governor, Nasir el-Rufai, also negotiated with Fulani herdsmen whom he claimed were terrorising parts of his state, and paid them off to fend off further attacks and bloodshed. He was roundly condemned at the time, but he was too set in his ways to care what anyone thought about his methods. No one is sure Mallam el-Rufai’s tactics bore fruit, nor that further attacks had still not been executed by herdsmen who were mostly Fulani. What is important, according to his own confessions, is that he had negotiated with the masterminds of the violence against his state.

    For a few years, Zamfara State also became the poster boy for banditry in the North, nay in Nigeria. Weeks ago, however, the state government engaged the bandits in negotiations, gave them amnesty, and negotiated peace on certain pecuniary conditions. Banditry has since ceased considerably in Zamfara, a fact loudly celebrated by the state’s political elite and the governor. Given the rush to negotiate with bandits everywhere in the North, at least for now, appeasement may be the answer that proves durable in the short run. The negotiating state governments have, however, not been as transparent on the issue as the public would love them to be concerning just how much they have paid the bandits to secure and sustain the tentative peace the affected states are enjoying. The governors are unlikely to declare the cost of peace in the short run, believing that the alternative is far costlier and too gory to contemplate.

    It was telling, more than a week ago, that the Katsina State governor allowed the publication of a photograph he took with an armed bandit leader after negotiation. The gun-wielding bandit was even more tellingly sandwiched between the governor and a military officer. Perhaps the governor merely wished to illustrate what he was doing, in particular his commitment to the peace process, and his altruism. The other symbolism of the photograph — state helplessness — either escaped him and his advisers or they felt it was a far smaller price to pay for peace.

    Indeed, significantly, the bandits boldly told the government that soldiers and policemen, by their unprofessionalism, contributed immensely to the breakdown of peace and upsurge in banditry. According to the negotiating bandits, the unbearable extortionist inclination of law enforcement agents and their repressive and arbitrary methods had a triggering and catalysing effect upon banditry. Said one of the bandit leaders, Idris Yayande, who met and dialogued with the governor last Wednesday: “Soldiers, policemen and other security agencies are fuelling banditry, kidnapping and other heinous crimes through large scale extortion in return for their support to us. We have lost confidence in them. We prefer to work with the local vigilante.”

    According to a report by this newspaper, “The leader of Volunteers (Yan-sakai), Lawal Tsoho, also accused soldiers, policemen, other security agencies and some politicians in the state of working against the ongoing dialogue between the bandits and the state government because they are benefiting from banditry, explaining that he had evidence to prove his statement.” Any wonder the governor chose to negotiate? If law enforcement agents are too busy betraying their oath, as indeed everyone fears, a state governor has precious little elbow room to manoeuvre.

    Overwhelmed by insecurity everywhere, and still shorn of the presence of mind to recognise that lack of security both signposts and presages terrible times ahead, the government has desperately sought to involve sundry militias, some of them ethnic, in policing this vast country. Soldiers can hardly be relied on to get the job done neatly, and policemen are not any better; such a horrifying combination transmogrifies the governing paradigm from one of constitutionality and methodicalness in ruling the nation to one of peace secured at its most ignoble and expedient worst. It will be a mistake to focus on the jarring metaphor of armed bandits openly negotiating with governors and thereafter posing for group photographs, or to use such short-sighted showiness to condemn the state chief executives. The problem of insecurity is a very complex one embedded in how the country is structured and run, in this case by irresponsible and unthinking elites. Until the fundamental problems predisposing the country to anarchy are addressed, the nation will continue to witness short-term panaceas and futile solutions. In fact, these objectionable negotiations, not to say the collaborations between law enforcement and security agencies on the one hand and civilian militias on the other hand, indicate what little time the country has left to rejigger itself before apocalypse.

  • CJN on judicial independence

    THE Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Ibrahim Tanko Muhammad, was emphatic during the 2019 Annual General Meeting of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) that judges bowed before no one in deciding cases. However, it is not clear exactly what he meant, considering that almost in the same breath he groaned at the paradox of state governments refusing to respect the financial autonomy of the judiciary in their states. “Let me assure this assembly,” he asserted,  “we don’t look at anybody’s face or feelings before taking our decisions. If there is any deity to be feared, that deity is the Almighty God. We will never be subservient to anybody, no matter how highly placed.” But on the other hand, he complained, “If you say that I am independent, but in a way whether I like it or not, I have to go and bend down, asking (for funds) I have lost my independence.”

    Even if the contradictions in the CJN’s observations were resolved, few Nigerians really believe that the Nigerian judiciary could be described as truly independent. They know by experience, contrary to the CJN’s optimism, that neither the federal nor state governments are as keen to let the judiciary be free as they routinely proclaim. But the assault on the judiciary is not only from the states. Consider for instance the emergence of Justice Muhammad himself, a product of the ingenious psychological and sub-legal war waged against the judiciary by the federal government. Regardless of the culpability of the former CJN, Walter Onnoghen, who was accused of unexplained wealth and other financial malfeasances, none of the constitutional provisions for his removal was followed. Railroaded through a court not envisaged by the constitution for his removal, he was suspended, then tried, and just when the case looked like becoming entangled in a legal logjam and thicket, he was cajoled into resigning.

    A number of states have mistreated the judiciary, castrated judges, and subordinated chief judges to political encumbrances so burdensome that some judicial officers have been frustrated into involuntary resignations. The situation is so bad in some states that it has become a rarity to find a few bold judges who can call their souls their own. Justice Muhammad was, therefore, guilty of generalisation when he declared at the NBA conference that judges did not look at anybody’s face or feelings before taking decisions. The statement is generally untrue, but only true in some particular cases. The CJN was, however, more accurate when he suggested that without financial autonomy the judiciary could not be independent.

    No meaningful progress can be made without Nigeria’s judicial leadership acknowledging the bondage in which political authorities have driven them. There are of course a number of cases where judgement was entered against the federal government and the decision stood. But other cases exist, such as the Fed Gov V. Sambo Dasuki, and Fed Govt V. Ibraheem El-Zakzaky, where the government demonstrated adamantine resolve to openly and unrepentantly defy the courts. That sort of defiance has not only been sustained in recent years, the government often cleverly muddies the waters by initiating fresh trials based on new charges in order to obfuscate or even scuttle old and untenable charges.

    The judiciary in Nigeria is not quite free, especially in some cases where the government has interest. Some of the fetters might have been self-inflicted, a consequence of abominable corruption in the temple of justice, but others have been deployed by the government, an indication of their shallow understanding of the role of the judiciary in a democracy. To reverse the situation, the government must promote and defend the financial autonomy granted the judiciary, inspire reforms in the judiciary in accordance with the law, and fight graft and other forms of crookedness in the judiciary sensibly and lawfully. With high political stakes, however, this type of altruism may not be readily found.

  • A deplorable mix of propaganda and legalism

    IT was not enough that the federal government defied the courts in their case against the Shiite leader, Ibraheem El-Zakzaky, nor found the restraint and constitutionality to entwine the Shiite leader in further charges that overtook the initial trials and judgements, they have now also decided on the scaremongering tactics of paint the sheikh as a dangerous nihilist dedicated to fomenting a bloody revolution and Islamising Nigeria. The government’s tactics have largely worked, thus rendering the trial unfair. Indeed, given the emotions the government has whipped up, anyone calling for a fair trial is regarded as impressionable or complicit in the anticipated Iran-sponsored Nigerian Shiite revolution.

    By a combination of propaganda and litigation, the Shiite leader is being demonised far in excess of the scarification the Sheikh’s Zaria, Kaduna State, neighbours felt during the sect’s dominance of the northern city. But it is time to distill legalism from propaganda. By all means put the Sheikh on trial, and if he is found guilty, punish him in line with the law. However, not only has the government promoted enough propaganda to elicit a mistrial, and has done so unconscionably, it has also brazenly defied the law by wilfully spurning court decisions on the case. Sadly, Nigerians have become short-sightedly complicit.

    The government cannot have its cake and eat it. If Nigerian leaders have any regard for the rule of law and democracy, they must recognise that the law exists because of offence, and that no matter how brutal the offence, the law cannot and must not exceed itself or subvert its rubrics to engage cruel tactics and abuse of process in the haste to tackle the problem. The only way to prove that society has not degenerated to the same abominable standard of criminals are the tactics by which the government restrains itself in its delicate and sometimes convoluted interactions with criminals in the face of egregious crimes.

  • CJN on judicial independence

    THE Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Ibrahim Tanko Muhammad, was emphatic during the 2019 Annual General Meeting of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) that judges bowed before no one in deciding cases. However, it is not clear exactly what he meant, considering that almost in the same breath he groaned at the paradox of state governments refusing to respect the financial autonomy of the judiciary in their states. “Let me assure this assembly,” he asserted,  “we don’t look at anybody’s face or feelings before taking our decisions. If there is any deity to be feared, that deity is the Almighty God. We will never be subservient to anybody, no matter how highly placed.” But on the other hand, he complained, “If you say that I am independent, but in a way whether I like it or not, I have to go and bend down, asking (for funds) I have lost my independence.”

    Even if the contradictions in the CJN’s observations were resolved, few Nigerians really believe that the Nigerian judiciary could be described as truly independent. They know by experience, contrary to the CJN’s optimism, that neither the federal nor state governments are as keen to let the judiciary be free as they routinely proclaim. But the assault on the judiciary is not only from the states. Consider for instance the emergence of Justice Muhammad himself, a product of the ingenious psychological and sub-legal war waged against the judiciary by the federal government. Regardless of the culpability of the former CJN, Walter Onnoghen, who was accused of unexplained wealth and other financial malfeasances, none of the constitutional provisions for his removal was followed. Railroaded through a court not envisaged by the constitution for his removal, he was suspended, then tried, and just when the case looked like becoming entangled in a legal logjam and thicket, he was cajoled into resigning.

    A number of states have mistreated the judiciary, castrated judges, and subordinated chief judges to political encumbrances so burdensome that some judicial officers have been frustrated into involuntary resignations. The situation is so bad in some states that it has become a rarity to find a few bold judges who can call their souls their own. Justice Muhammad was, therefore, guilty of generalisation when he declared at the NBA conference that judges did not look at anybody’s face or feelings before taking decisions. The statement is generally untrue, but only true in some particular cases. The CJN was, however, more accurate when he suggested that without financial autonomy the judiciary could not be independent.

    No meaningful progress can be made without Nigeria’s judicial leadership acknowledging the bondage in which political authorities have driven them. There are of course a number of cases where judgement was entered against the federal government and the decision stood. But other cases exist, such as the Fed Gov V. Sambo Dasuki, and Fed Govt V. Ibraheem El-Zakzaky, where the government demonstrated adamantine resolve to openly and unrepentantly defy the courts. That sort of defiance has not only been sustained in recent years, the government often cleverly muddies the waters by initiating fresh trials based on new charges in order to obfuscate or even scuttle old and untenable charges.

    The judiciary in Nigeria is not quite free, especially in some cases where the government has interest. Some of the fetters might have been self-inflicted, a consequence of abominable corruption in the temple of justice, but others have been deployed by the government, an indication of their shallow understanding of the role of the judiciary in a democracy. To reverse the situation, the government must promote and defend the financial autonomy granted the judiciary, inspire reforms in the judiciary in accordance with the law, and fight graft and other forms of crookedness in the judiciary sensibly and lawfully. With high political stakes, however, this type of altruism may not be readily found.

  • Fayose as thorn in Obasanjo’s flesh

    FORMER president Olusegun Obasanjo must by now be keenly aware of the irony of attacking others while opening himself to equally vile attacks. Responding to President Muhammadu Buhari’s many moves to canonise the annulled June 12, 1993 presidential election in the face of relentless criticism from the former president, ex-Ekiti State governor Ayo Fayose joined the fray and declared his support for President Buhari. “Honouring MKO Abiola by Buhari,” said Mr Fayose mockingly, “is to Obasanjo’s shame. It remains a sore point of his political history that because of his ego, Obasanjo, who is the greatest beneficiary of the June 12 struggle failed to honour his kinsman, Abiola. So I commend Buhari.”

    Given his inexhaustible talent for histrionics, no one can be certain that Mr Fayose, who is groaning under EFCC prosecution for corruption, is not trying to worm his way into the heart of the president. He may be trying to figure a way to ameliorate the severity of the prosecution he is facing or even its total cessation, but on the other hand, he may in fact have surmised that his hostility towards Chief Obasanjo must be nurtured more than his love for President Buhari. During electioneering, Mr Fayose said unprintable things against the president, including making statements about his mental condition. However, for now at least, his loathing for Chief Obasanjo takes precedence.

    In his first term as governor, Mr Fayose was extra-judicially deposed as governor through a hasty and trumped-up impeachment proceedings. He never forgave Chief Obasanjo for denting the image he claimed to possess. The former governor can, therefore, be expected to remain a lifelong enemy of Chief Obasanjo, far, it seems, more than he will be the enemy of President Buhari. He will draw his ethical and censorious lines somewhat unequivocally. But whether he lampoons Chief Obasanjo more than President Buhari or not, Mr Fayose knows quite well that no one will ever trust him again, especially given his record as governor. He has done enough damage to politics and ethics for anyone in Ekiti or outside the state to trust him or even acknowledge him as a sound and diligent person. His record out of office may not be colourful, but it is unlikely to be less unethical, regardless of whoever is the butt of his cruel mockery and jokes.

  • Onnoghen and NJC’s complex habits

    THE National Judicial Council (NJC) may be living on old glory. But they are unlikely to know that they are no longer viewed with the reverence of years past, when they were doted on by nearly everyone, and their every word was regarded with a solemnity that was at once noble and distant. Before the NJC became immersed in avoidable controversies, Nigerians had embraced the culture of tiptoeing around the eminent jurists, scared of rousing their anger. Today, the situation is different, and the jurists themselves may not even know it.

    To cap what may amount to many months of difficult judicial diminution, the NJC on Monday issued a statement signed by its spokesman, Soji Oye, indicating that the council took note of the president’s acceptance of the resignation of the former Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Walter Onnoghen, after many months of uncertainty, and thanked him for doing so. Said the NJC: “The NJC held an emergency meeting today (Monday) to take formal note of the acceptance of the voluntary retirement of Hon. Mr. Justice W. S. N. Onnoghen as Chief Justice of Nigeria by President Muhammadu Buhari. The President’s acceptance of the retirement is in line with Council’s recommendation to the President on 3rd April, 2019. Council at the end of its deliberations thanked the President for the acceptance which was in the best interest of Nigeria.”

    The NJC is of course at liberty to endorse anyone’s resignation, no matter how controversial or, as in the case of Justice Onnoghen, unwholesome. And as the NJC statement said, a fact also reiterated by the presidency, it is true that the NJC had advocated the compulsory retirement of the former chief justice. But because the presidency was breathing threats and imprecate on Justice Onnoghen in those intransigent days, there were indications that the presidency was ready to meet the former CJN’s stubbornness with a vicious corruption trial of their own. They simply disregarded due process and rode roughshod over the beleaguered jurist.

    Even then, the former CJN, who seemed curiously confident that he could best the government on points of law, was still willing to face up to the presidency’s threats, and was in addition willing to meet them and joust with them in the courts, whether the courts were rigged or not, or whether or not the presiding judges could call their souls their own. It was at that point, when things seemed to drag on interminably, and the regularisation of the appointment of the Acting Chief Justice of Nigeria, Ibrahim Muhammad, seemed threatened, that the NJC cut the Gordian knot and asked the government to compulsorily retire Justice Onnoghen. Sensing that all was lost, and with the Court of Appeal developing cold feet over the myriad of cases brought before them by the former CJN hoping to secure some exculpatory reliefs, and knowing for sure that he could not hope to get justice anywhere and anymore, Justice Onnoghen threw in the towel. He knew that at that point things could only get nastier.

    The politics behind the presidency relenting over the Onnoghen retirement has not been revealed. Perhaps it is complicated. Perhaps a lot of begging went into the affair to bring it to that ignoble end. Perhaps Justice Onnoghen’s hand was not as strengthened as he and his sympathisers made everyone to believe. Whatever the case, the former CJN retired, the presidency took about two months to make up its mind whether to accept the resignation — a speed unlikely to be connected with the customary gridlock afflicting the government — and the NJC has curiously appreciated the government for burying the hatchet. If this outcome had been etched on an artist’s canvas or portrayed in a novel, it would have been condemned as surreal. But it is real. The NJC is grateful that the presidency took its counsel. Not since the Ayo Salami affair, when the same NJC let its imagination get entangled in boyish fantasies, has the judiciary postured so outlandishly.

    The presidency finally relented, just as it is true that the NJC charted a curious way out of the Onnoghen ordeal. But it would have been far better if the NJC had not felt prompted by unknown motives to claim the questionable glory for resolving that judicial and ethical labyrinth and in the same breath extending their gratitude to the presidency. There was nothing to thank the president for. If the retirement of Justice Onnoghen had not been accepted, and the case had dragged on in the courts, it is difficult to see even a conniving Senate ignore the brutal judicial and administrative realities of the day to endorse the appointment of Justice Ibrahim Muhammad. The presidency simply bowed to reality, convinced it could go no further without drawing more flak and fouling the judiciary. The NJC should have kept a dignified silence in a case that unfolded bizarrely before the whole world.

  • Broadcasting commission versus AIT

    ON Thursday, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) suspended the operating licence of DAAR Communications, owners of African Independent Television (AIT) and Raypower radio station. Announcing the suspension, which amounted invariably to a shutdown of the two broadcasting stations, the NBC director-general, Modibbo Kawu, accused them of serial infractions lasting for some two years. The Commission had had enough, he told a press conference last Thursday, a day before the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja nullified the suspension.

    Said the NBC boss: “In their relationship with the NBC, Daar communications carry on as if it is beyond the regulatory direction of the commission. They don’t pay their licence fees as and when due and its broadcast is patently partisan and one-sided and deliberately inciting and heating up the polity. The management of the Company has created the habit of using the channel to fight its personal battles contrary to the statutory requirements of the law…Recently, NBC monitoring reports on AIT and Raypower indicate the use of divisive comments credited to the segment of Kakaaki, tagged, ‘Kakaaki Social’ where inciting comments like, ‘Nigeria is cursed,’ ‘we declare independent state of Niger Delta’, ‘Nigeria irritates me’, ‘this country is gradually Islamising’ and other similar slogans are used without editorial control in breach of the broadcast Code.”

    Predictably, Raymond Dokpesi, DAAR Communications chairman, has attributed the shutdown to politics. He is not only a leading member of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), his television and radio stations are widely perceived as opposition media. In addition, Chief Dokpesi is being tried for allegedly corruptly enriching himself, which has seemed to set him at odds with the government. Whatever the merits of the allegations against AIT/Raypower, the shutdown will invariably be framed as a demonstration of the government’s illiberal approach to governance and politics. The public will recall that the current government (or its agencies) has had a difficult relationship with the media and the opposition. Both the PDP and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, were some weeks ago accused of planning insurrection, attempting to stall the May 29 inauguration, and forming an alliance with unnamed foreign forces to destabilise the federal government. The government did not bother to give proof.

    Furthermore, in view of its awkward and heavy-handed approach to expressing its reservations about some controversial news items published at different times by both Daily Trust newspaper and Premium Times online newspaper, it will be hard indeed for the government to flaunt any democratic credentials before Nigerians, let alone the world. The public may also read the government’s difficult relationship with the 8th National Assembly, culminating in a siege on the legislature, and the judiciary which it has treated with heavy-handedness, as an indication of the current government’s lack of a deep and fundamental understanding of democracy and the sometimes complex environment in which it is supposed to work. The government got away with its brief assaults on both Daily Trust and Premium Times; there is no proof it will also not get away with its shutdown of AIT/Raypower, despite the quick and salutary intervention of the courts.

    The public will nevertheless be torn between wondering whether the government is showing its repressive hands or assuming that regulatory institutions, like the NBC, are simply engaging in their routine work. Indeed, the public may also be unable to find a consensus in interpreting the infractions attributed to the DAAR Communications outfits. Did they exceed themselves, as the government has alleged? Or is the problem really and substantially one of an intolerant government? There is little doubt that a few AIT programmes have been trenchant, but do these amount to a threat to national security, especially in view of a government that seems incapable of drawing a line between private interest and regime survival on the one hand, and the classical definition of free speech on the other hand. Going by both government’s intolerance and media overreach, it appears difficult finding the right balance needed to enable democracy survive and flourish without the society descending into chaos.

    The NBC action has overall prompted many analysts to begin comparing the Buhari presidency with the Goodluck Jonathan presidency, concluding that the latter was by far more tolerant of democratic norms and practices. What is more, some commentators have also begun to muse about how difficult it is for this government to create jobs and how infinitely easier it is for them to lose jobs by going overboard in intimidating organisations that have created jobs. AIT/Raypower may of course not be the most ideal example of a job creator, especially because of its difficult labour relations, but there is no doubt that a threat to the two broadcast outfits menaces workers and their families far beyond the intention of the government and the NBC. It would have been far nobler if the NBC and the government had found a more lawful justification for the draconian steps it took against AIT/Raypower, or a more sensitive and less intimidating tactics to rein in recalcitrant broadcast stations and other regulated bodies.

  • Gory report on killings

    DURING his last ‘media chat’ in late May, President Muhammadu Buhari told his interviewer that those who described him as slow in his first term would be shocked in his second term. It is safe to assume that this time around, he would be fast, extremely fast. It is, therefore, ironic that he also told his interviewer that he had neither thought about nor discussed the composition of his new cabinet with anyone, musing in the same breath that he was not about to discuss it with the reporter. There is nothing unusual to expect that if he would be fast, it really should start with his cabinet.

    Or, if not the cabinet, perhaps he would gather speed in dealing with the problem of insecurity. But a United States think tank, the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations, released a report last week indicating that in President Buhari’s first term, nearly 26,000 people were killed either by bandits, Boko Haram insurgents or even through extrajudicial murder. That problem of killings could do with some hair-raising speed. In fact, the dire situation of the country could do with some extraordinary and urgent remedies. Hopefully, the president can find the will and wisdom to rev up the engine of his government to tackle the crises inundating the country.

    No Nigerian, and no government, can be flattered by a report as gory as the one produced by the Council on Foreign Relations. But more importantly, where are the government’s own figures? How many were murdered by criminals and by state agencies? Where are the government’s figures? Is anyone compiling them, so that the public would not have to depend on outsiders to get a sense of how dire the situation is or how faithful and diligent the government has been in managing the affairs of the country?