The Nation Newspaper

Category: Femi Orebe

  • PDP: big money, propaganda and utter debauchery

    PDP: big money, propaganda and utter debauchery

    Since Dr Reuben Abati disputes the N2 trillion allegedly spent, he should help convert all the money spent by TAN on its pro-Jonathan propaganda which began a full year ahead of the elections focused on labelling self-evident lies as evidences of transformation

    PDP is dead, okay almost. No thanks to PVCs and the Smart Card Readers and, of course, an INEC Chairman whose integrity you can take to the bank. Prior to the elections, various organs of the party had coyly obtained about 20 million voters’ card numbers from their unsuspecting owners.  Claiming to be looking for endorsers, TAN, by its own admission, grossed 17.8 million signatories with their voters’ card numbers. Omo-Ilu Foundation must have distributed, and received back, close to 2 million application forms, also with voters’ card numbers in the Southwest, making close to 20 million voters numbers available to be cloned but for the Smart Card Reader.

    Nigerians should, therefore, congratulate themselves for their historic escape from a 16-year virtual enslavement. Even President Jonathan, by his own confession, has been entrapped for his own six of those years. Nigerians also know that in the last four, although we voted for one, we got two. While one sat placidly, watching our problems multiply, with hundreds of children stolen under his nose, the other ran roughshod over the entire country, especially in her south south zone, causing problems everywhere she went.

    Again, because he that is down needs fear no fall, let us spare the PDP but take a cursory look at some of its most outlandish legacies. First, the humongous, absolutely unimaginable amount of money they spent on the presidential election. Since Dr Reuben Abati disputes the N2 trillion allegedly spent, he should help convert all the money spent by TAN on its pro-Jonathan propaganda which began a full year ahead of the elections focused on labelling self-evident lies as evidences of transformation. Or how can any serious organisation claim that President Jonathan fought corruption to a standstill, even as corruption related cases were being serially withdrawn from the courts?  And why do they think a wily Femi Fani-Kayode moved over to the PDP?  Dr Abati should also convert to naira and kobo, all the amount spent on those dizzying television adverts which were, allegedly, funded by federal government agencies. Then to the campaign proper, he should tell Nigerians how much was spent on logistics, adverts –radio, television and outdoors, as well as the staggering ‘mobilisation’ fees paid, mostly in hard currency, to all Lagos -based tribal associations then being assiduously recruited to work against the Yoruba; to Obas, Obis and Emirs; to the ever available CAN and other faith-based organisations, not leaving out hotel expenses at the most expensive hotels in the country. Others are fuelling the thousands of vehicles deployed, rendering operable the entire presidential fleet of 10 air craft and others that were chartered, all put in the service of that most expensive campaign ever in the history of Nigeria. I have deliberately left off security and INEC officials, many of who must have been handsomely ‘settled’ to turn the other eye as we saw copiously in Akwa Ibom and Rivers states. Before he can successfully dispute the allegation that PDP spent N2 trillion of public money on the election, Reuben must tell Nigerians how much the PDP spent.

    Apart from literally emptying the national treasury and instituting corruption and crass debauchery in the country these past 16 years, the Peoples Democratic Party has completely disembowelled Nigeria; it  has turned it to a mere shadow and we are only fortunate that a man like General Muhammadu Buhari will be taking over in days. While President Barrack Obama took over an America that was economically humbled as a result of a general economic downturn, General Buhari will be taking over a country economically, as well as morally, in ruins. Nobody has captured our current circumstances better than Bámidélé Adémólá-Olátéjú, a Premium Times Editorial Board member, who we shall be quoting here at some length.  Her article: ‘Thieving Nigerian Elite and Their Brats’, apart from very accurately capturing the Nigerian condition at the tail-end of the Jonathan era, situating as it does, some of the reasons our politicians, public servants, oil subsidy and pension scammers –all friends of the government – steal much more than they would ever need in nine lives, it also points us in the way of the much desired relaunch of the War Against Indiscipline.

    Wrote Ademola-Olateju: “The rich Nigerian makes a compelling case that unearned money is unfulfilling. That explains their enslavement to primitive acquisition, ostentatious consumption and transparent displays. The Nigerian wants to be rich just to show and to oppress those around him. They steal more and covet more, long after the money has become a burden rather than a comfort. They are raising brats and self-absorbed children who are accustomed to living large from infancy. They have no idea they are ruining this country much more than what they stole but by contaminating the environment with children who have no respect for hard work and know nothing about integrity. They see expensive vacations and high brow shopping as commonplace. What the truly wealthy in other nations consider as luxury is commonplace in Nigeria. Luxury loses meaning when it is a constant. Constant luxury is no luxury at all; luxury is not commonplace! There is no need for sweeping generalisations as some people earned their wealth in this country but how many are they? How many are genuinely rich and not fronting for people in government or enabled by insiders? Richard Branson who owns Virgin Atlantic has children and they fly economy. How many Nigerians are as rich as Richard Branson? Unfortunately for these thieving parents, their children know them as thieves and they themselves are trying to be bigger thieves when they grow up. They are all over the Lekki-Ikoyi corridor and the streets of Maitama and Asokoro, displaying the stereotypical arrogance of privilege. They are everywhere, driving fast cars and lacking the motivation to accomplish anything in life. Our rulers who stole us blind send their children abroad to study with the aim of coming back to take over the reins of power; have they? No! It doesn’t work that way. Privileged children have no motivation to take better control of their education. They have the money to stay in posh apartments, ride expensive cars and party away because the money is there for the taking. There is no need to learn for a future career. While their children struggle through school, partying and doing drugs, the parents are still delusional, hoping it is just a phase. It is not a phase! Life without work, however financially secure, is an aimless life. A life without purpose. That is why monied children are swinging in oceans of anxiety, indecision and despair. In essence, money robs children of their ambition. When children are in full knowledge of their parents vast fortunes, they are more likely to develop a twisted view of the world. Money prevents them from developing a strong sense of empathy and compassion. The result? The aim of sending them abroad eventually falls flat. The best among them come back as DJ’s and the children of their drivers and nannies become doctors!”

    Continuing, she writes: “we owe it a duty to tell it loud and clear that stealing billions of Naira will not bring them all they had hoped for nor will it guarantee happiness. We must educate people on the concept of service and aspiring to something greater than the self. Parents, teachers and the clergy must go back to preaching our lost values as people are truly happy when they concentrate on things that make the world a better place. How many Nigerians alive today can have the cult following Buhari has? Money did not fetch him that, something far greater did.

    “If nothing is learned from the profligate times of Goodluck Jonathan, we, at least, know that stealing is far more complicated than it seems. Money is never enough! The rich worry more about money than the poor. They worry about losing it, so they steal more and more. As the zeroes increase, the dilemmas get bigger. If anything, the rich faces more melancholy than the rest of us. We generally believe a little more money would make our lives happier and in many instances it is true. But the hard truth is; human appetites for material indulgence are rarely satisfied. Money is overrated!”

    As we march into the new Buhari era, therefore, we all must learn to abandon those negative actions and traits that combine to put us smugly amongst the wretched of the earth. We must graduate out of PDP-ism, forever.

  • Ayo Fayose: Before it is too late

    Ayo Fayose: Before it is too late

    Of  all those I spoke to, not a single one  was convinced Governor Fayose would honour his word…

    Let me state from the outset that this is a dangerous undertaking I am getting into; not from the point of view of safety of life – that is in God’s hands – but rather from the multiple interpretations that could be given to what you will be reading in this article.  The Yoruba, in their millennial wisdom have this saying: oun to wa lehin ofa, o ju oje lo – which can literally be translated as there is so much that is unknown.  I expect that Governor Ayo Fayose, as a free born Yoruba, should understand that perfectly.

    Left to those watching the  running, macabre drama playing out in Ekiti from a distance, the governor is not only well loved by Ekiti people,  he has, in fact, become a demi god. After all, didn’t he win the June 21, 2014 governorship election 16:0, followed it up with two successive wins in the  2015 general elections and capped it up with the victory at the Supreme Court; serving as  an icing on the cake? And by the way, didn’t the whole city of Ado-Ekiti poured out on his victory parade through the state capital? At a stage in his life, Charles Taylor could have had the entire Liberian population line up the streets, in scorching sun, to sing panegyrics in his honour. But on Thursday 26, September 2013, Charles Taylor lost his appeal against a war-crimes conviction as judges confirmed a 50-year jail term against the Liberian ex-president for encouraging rebels in Sierra Leone to mutilate, rape and murder victims in its civil war, holding that “the  primary purpose was to spread terror, and that brutal violence was purposefully unleashed against civilians with the purpose of making them afraid, afraid that there would be more violence if they continued to resist.”

    On that day, not  a single one of  his  crooning Freetown crowd was anywhere in sight as Presiding Judge George Gelaga King pronounced those words. Lesson: Governor Ayo Fayose should desist from encouraging acts of brigandage in Ekiti state.

    I am aware that Governor Fayose has reacted, soberly, to his Supreme Court victory and among other things he said, and I quote: “to my opponents, I plead with you to sheath your sword and join me in the development of Ekiti State. If truly our struggle is about service to our dear State, it is time to come together and channel all our resources towards the development of the State. I am irrevocably committed to the protection of all, including the opposition in the State. Nobody is infallible, and I am not a perfect being. The only one that is perfect is God…”

    Before I set  out to write this piece at all, knowing my views could be given a million interpretations, especially at a time PDP  could not  have completely expended all its dollars, I consulted a variety of Ekiti stakeholders, deliberately avoiding speaking with any of  our politicians. Of  all those I spoke to, not a single one  was convinced Governor Fayose would honour his word, going by what they claim to have come to know about  him. When I posited that a wise one like him should understand, and appreciate, the  probable consequences of  May 29,  one of the individuals, a Consultant Orthopaedic and Trauma Surgeon who told me he had  studied Fayose closely since his first coming,  told me: Oga, with all due respect, you would believe anything  if  you took the governor’s words for it.

    I consider these testimonies a major character flaw and a possible hindrance to how much my suggestions  would go in resolving the logjam since they would require trust and  fidelity on both sides of the divide. Trust is of the essence as,  without it, Ekiti as well as its poor people would literally rot in this unfortunate conundrum.

    On  the Ekitipanupo web portal, an indigenous intellectual forum , Wednesday, 14 April 2015,  a forumite, Port Harcourt-based Tope Ojo, directly asked from me: ‘What is the way forward,’ in this long running, profit-less battle between PDP and the APC, each  of which has ruled Ekiti for 8 years? I replied, with some editing, as follows:

    ‘Thanks Tope. Let me react to the most important part of your  mail: the way forward. Honestly, effective from today, given the Supreme Court decision, I will candidly advise as follows: Let everybody, party, organisation and individuals reach a consensus that governor Fayose should run his term. Let him in turn climb down from his high horse, apologise  to Ekiti  people, via a television broadcast,  for all the obvious illegalities he has committed and promise that henceforth, he will conduct Ekiti affairs  decently like any other governor in the country. I am sure that  those who neither like nor trust him will be willing to forgive while those who love him will do so the more. Let him try everything, together with all stakeholders, to return peace to Ekiti.  On the other hand, let the G.19 drop the impeachment process all together in the full knowledge that four years, even ten, is not a life time. We cannot fight one another forever as we have done for the last 10 years at the expense of the state’s overall development. It is time to sheath our swords’.

    ‘There is a lot more to do for genuine peace. For starters, Governor Fayose should pay all outstanding emoluments due to the G.19 as well as pay the outstanding salaries, and severance packages, of the political appointees of the last administration. Whoever was relieved of his/her job for political reasons should be promptly recalled.  The governor must genuinely set out to restore peace to Ekiti. It has been shown abundantly in the bible that God can use anybody for His purpose. Governor Fayose should not see the Supreme Court judgment as an opportunity for gloating. Rather, he should use it to usher in peace and cordiality in Ekiti. We have lost a lot. We have become the butt of jokes worldwide. Let him initiate a rapprochement, first with all the former governors, and then, with Ekiti leading lights across board. Let the interest of Ekiti take centre stage. He must make the first move for others, our Obas and leading lights in commerce, church and community as well as the people, in general, to join him in starting a new era of peace and understanding in Ekiti. He is not a sole administrator and must never see himself as such. I have been a constant Fayose critic but I think we must now put a closure to all that for the sake of Ekiti. May the good Lord help us. Amen’.

    Nobody needs be told that there has been nothing like governance in Ekiti in the past six months. Enough should be enough. The era of brigandage should be over. Governor Fayose must provide an enabling environment for every arm of government  to operate and Olugbemi and his  gang  of  7- man rogue parliament must be put exactly  where they belong.  I regret being a member of the state ACN screening committee that cleared that man for elections in 2011. The G.19, as w all saw in the recent elections, must have realised that in politics, as in life generally, you cannot win all the time. They too must embrace peace. Ekiti has suffered enough and  one of the topmost Ekiti lawyers I spoke with does not think the impeachment attempt stands a chance in a million of being concluded before the end of their term. That is even, if all approaches to their hallowed chambers were not to be barricaded as we have once seen. It should be time for governance which many of those I spoke with said Fayose is incapable of. He must now prove  such people wrong. He must realise he is the face of Ekiti and come May 29, he would look for, but not see any of those roughnecks currently at his beck and call if they do not want to spend time in jail.  Governor Fayose, in case he does not know, is himself under some close watch by the Human Rights community, whatever the braggadocio of his spokespersons.

    Finally, I plead with all well meaning Ekiti, across board, to buy into this peace process and let us see Ekiti take its rightful place in the progressive and totally development-oriented government General Muhammadu Buhari is set to usher in effective 29, May 2015.

    Ure Ekiti a soju kete ra o. Amin.

  • Nigerians talking about the change we need

    Nigerians talking about the change we need

    Nigerians are already out, indicating their readiness, to partner with the incoming government in re-inventing a Nigeria already thoroughly hobbled by a succession of some unthinking PDP governments

    Nigerians must surely have gone through hell in the 16 years of PDP  rule – call it ruination – going by the reactions I have so far received  since last week’s publication of  ‘The Change Nigeria Needs’. They have come in torrents but space constraint will not allow us publish all.  Concerned with what Nigerians now know the PDP is capable of, a highly regarded, retired public servant, eager to see that Nigeria remains financially healthy, was kind enough to draw my attention to something he believes Nigerians must watch out for. This, according to him, is financial transactions between now and May 29. Not a few Nigerians have likened President Goodluck Jonathan to the Second Republic President Shehu Shagari who is highly regarded across board as a very decent statesman, but who, unfortunately, surrounded himself with all manner of characters, among them, those who should not be found in the public service of even Myanmar. Like Shagari, like Jonathan, they say, except that the former did not have the bad luck of being further weighed down by a totally misbegotten spouse who threw all caution to the wind and, with her verbal diarrhea, caused all manner of problems for the husband. Or what manner of a First Lady could have listlessly denigrated an integral part of northern culture for which the president built some special schools thereby costing him what may have run into hundreds of thousands of votes. The president is, of course, well aware of the kind of persons at his table having many times shielded some from appearing before the legislature to answer to allegations of corruption.

    That, therefore, must have informed what the retired public servant, in bullet form, itemised as follows under what he titled: NEED TO STOP UNLAWFUL MOVEMENT OF CASH AND ACCOUNTS WITHIN AND OUTSIDE THE COUNTRY.

    1. The period between now and the end of May is critical and vulnerable. There is therefore, the need to put in place a machinery to monitor all financial transactions;

    2. Movement and transfer of funds, especially of unusual value, will have to be carefully watched;

    3. All financial transactions beyond Nigerian borders must equally be watched;

    4. Payments for existing contracts and the original terms of the contract agreements must be closely monitored;

    5. Banks’ Chief Executives must be warned not to be involved in unlawful transactions like emergency transfer of funds;

    6. Last minute contracts, involving advance payments, must be stopped and passed over to the incoming administration;

    7. All MDAs with ongoing financial liabilities must bring such to the notice of the Joint Transition Committee;

    8. The Central  Bank must be at its best in monitoring both internal or out offshore financial transactions;

    9. Necessary measures aimed at averting any untoward distortion of the monetary and financial situation of the country should quickly be put in place by the Joint Transition Committee.

    In anticipation of  a re-introduction of the War Against Indiscipline (WAI) first introduced by the president-elect at his first coming some three decades ago, Nigerians are already out, indicating their readiness, to partner with the incoming government in re-inventing a Nigeria already thoroughly hobbled by a succession of some unthinking PDP governments. Our next example, shared by the African Youth International Development Foundation, exemplifies this. It was sent to me shortly after Fikayo Tunde-Ojo had posted it on the Ekitipanupo web portal.

    Under the caption: IT’s TIME TO SAY, SHOUT OR SCREAM: CHANGE!

    It reads like a rhyme and I would enjoin Nigerians to internalise them and from henceforth, put it into everyday use even long before 29 May.

    CHANGE STARTS WITH US:

    When somebody in the car ahead of you throws wastes on the road, drive next to him, roll down your window and shout, “change!” ,#ChangeNigeria.

    When you are on a queue and someone tries to force his/her way in front of you, scream “change!!”. #ChangeNigeria.

    At the point of entry, either at an air or sea port, or at a border with our neighbours, a custom or immigration official shows up asking for bribe, shout Change. # Change Nigeria.

    To a landlord who habitually increases house rent, shout Change. # Change Nigeria.

    If you see any irregularities in the measurement of food items in the market or display of fake products in a supermarket or drug store or spare parts shop: shout Change. #Change Nigeria.

    To any lecturer that is hell bent on collecting bribe, in cash or in kind:  harass him with Change. # Change Nigeria.

    To any public / private servant stealing from our national heritage. Shout Change. # Change Nigeria#

    When a police officer stops your car and says “Oga, anything for the boys?”, tell him, “change!”. #ChangeNigeria

    When you walk past any Nigerian who throws paper or banana peel on the floor, stop him and tell him, “change!”. #ChangeNigeria.

    If the church opposite your house is using a loud speaker to disturb the neighbourhood, visit the pastor & say, “change sir!” #ChangeNigeria

    If you are in a bus and the driver is driving like mad, shout “change!” #ChangeNigeria.

    If the mosque opposite your house is using a loud speaker to disturb the neighbourhood, visit the Imam & say, “change sir!” #ChangeNigeria.

    When somebody is trying to jump a queue either at the bank, fuel station or at an  ATM stand: shout Change. #change Nigeria #

    When an electricity official cuts your light unjustly, trying to extract a bribe: shout Change. # Change Nigeria#.

    If you discover someone on phone lying about his location: shout change #

    If you discover a man or a woman cheating on the spouse: whisper CHANGE!

    When a fuel attendant wants to under dispense fuel into your vehicle remind him about “Change” #Change Nigeria#

    Finally, although I am not hereby authenticating the figures, Nigerians want President Buhari, working with the huge APC majority in the legislature, to maximally cut the cost of governance which is accentuated by the allowances being paid to federal legislators; which are indicated as follows:

    EMOLUMENT OF NIGERIAN SENATORS.

    * Basic Salary (B.S) – N2,484,245.50  * Hardship Allowance (50% of B.S) – N1,242,122.70

    * Constituency Allowance (200% of B.S) – N4,968,509.00  * Newspapers Allowance (50% of B.S) – N1,242,122.70  * Wardrobe Allowance (25% of B.S) – N621,061.37  * Recess Allowance (10% of B.S) – N248,424.55  * Accommodation (200% of B.S) – N4,968,509.00  * Utilities (30% of B.S) – N828,081.83  * Domestic Staff (70% of B.S) – N1,863,184.1  * Entertainment (30% of B.S) – N828,081.83  * Personal Assistants (25% of B.S) – N621,061.12  * Vehicle Maintenance Allowance (75% of B.S) – N1,863,184.12   * Leave Allowance (10% of B.S) – N248,424.55  * Severance Gratuity (300% of B.S) – N7,452,736.50   * Car Allowance (400% of B.S) – N9,936,982.00

    * Total Monthly Salary = N29,479,749.00 ($181,974.00)

    * Total Yearly Salary = N29,479,749.00 x 12 = N353,756,988.00 ($2,183,685.00)

    COMPARABLE LEGISLATORS PAY WORLDWIDE, PER ANNUM

    * Britain – $105,400.00   * United States – $174,000.00    * France – $85,900.00

    * South Africa – $104,000.00   * Kenya – $74,500.00    * Saudi Arabia – $64,000.00

    * Brazil – $157,600.00    * Ghana – $46,500.00    * Indonesia – $65,800.00

    * Thailand – $43,800.00   * India – $11,200.00     * Italy – $182,000.00

    * Bangladesh – $4,000.00    * Israel – $114,800.00  * Hong Kong – $130,700.00  * Japan – $149,700.00     * Singapore – $154,000.00   * Canada – $154 000.00    * New Zealand – $112,500.00     * Germany – $119,500.00     * Ireland – $120,400.00    * Pakistan – $3,500.00

    * Sweden – $99 300.00     * Spain – $43,900.00     * Norway – $138,000.00

    Source: The Economist –but if the figures happen to be wrong, Senate President David Mark should please, immediately, furnish Nigerians with the correct figures.

    From the foregoing, it is easy to see that  while at a minimum N18, 000 per month (N216,000) the Nigerian earning the minimum wage  takes home an annual $1,333.00, his senator, who he never sees beyond the campaigns grosses $2,183,685 and the Nigerian university professor, even of medicine, earns no more than N6 million. It also means that it will take an average Nigerian worker 1,638 years to earn the annual salary of his Senator.

    What a country!

    Unfortunately with an eye on the 2015 elections, now gone with the wins, and the need to be in the good books of the politicians within the legislature, President Jonathan never one day talked about  reducing the ballooning cost of governance in the country. This was obviously one of the many ways he completely alienated Nigerians who roundly voted him out.

  • The change Nigerians want

    All proceeds of corruption must be retrieved; all scammers –oil subsidy, pension etc must be listed, publicly displayed and made to return every penny stolen

    In a 3-part article: Periscoping  The ideal APC presidential candidate, which graced these pages between Sunday, 21 September and  12 October, 2014, and  in which I concluded that Nigeria needs General Muhammadu Buhari, the president-elect, more  than he needs Nigeria. I also quoted The Nation’s columnist, Gbogun gboro, as observing that Nigeria is now one of the foremost contributors to poverty in the world and that according to a World Bank Report, it will by 2030 be one of the main contributors to global poverty.  I followed that observation up as follows: ‘No thanks to a kleptomaniac PDP government which, rather than deal decisively with corruption prefers to romance it, serially dropping corruption charges against its members. Although the government has been touting its annual growth average of over seven percent, I think it needs be told that with the country’s dilapidated infrastructure and over dependence on oil, massive youth unemployment and, with between 60-70 percent of the population living below the poverty line, there is absolutely nothing for the Jonathan government to gloat about despite those voodoo statistics by the likes of TAN’.  Concluding, I wrote: ‘fifteen years after the PDP  took over the reins of government, Nigeria  now generates far less than the 4000 MW of electricity it generated in 1999 after having most of the 20 billion dollars it allegedly  spent on the sector stolen. It will be interesting to see which sane people would vote more of the same at the 2015 elections, and thereby consign Nigeria to purgatory’.

    Please come with me briefly to see the comments of some well connected Nigerians who did not agree with my views, going by their publicly stated positions:

    Buhari will die before the election –Fayose

    Buhari is brain dead –Mrs Patience Jonathan

    If APC survives till October 2014, call me a bastard –Doyin Okupe

    Mark my words, it will not happen for Buhari to rule Nigeria –Doyin Okupe

    If APC wins, I will go on exile – Bode George

    Buhari can never win in Yoruba land – Gani Adams

    Jonathan will shock APC with defeat –Femi Fani Kayode

    If Jonathan loses, we would set Nigeria on fire –Asari Dokubo

    We instigated the 6 weeks’ postponement so that Jonathan can win –Faseun

    I will deliver one million votes to Jonathan in Ondo State –Mimiko

    We shall deliver the South West vote to Jonathan –Afenifere

    Tinubu is no longer a force in the South West –Odumakin.

    Now all these would have been hilarious if they were not uttered in moments of excessive arrogance of power by persons you will reasonably call advisers to President Jonathan and those he, unfortunately, depended upon for victory.

    And while at this, even as President Jonathan may have saved lives, limbs and property by his telephone call to the president-elect, it would need some effort to convince many Nigerians that the call was not induced by the likes of Washington and London on the grounds that Nigeria might descend into an orgy of bloodletting if the election was called.  I suspect this was what led to the proactive telephone call. I say this because the president has shown severally that he is only a skin-deep democrat.  Here is a president who did not utter a single word when a rogue parliament took over in Ogun State under Gbenga Daniel just as he has not deemed it right to caution Fayose under who the same has now subsisted for four months in Ekiti. Worse is the many references both Fayose and Obanikoro made  to him as the master mind of the army-led  rigging of the Ekiti governorship election of 21 June, 2014 as a bewildered world has come to know from the Captain Sagir Koli’s secretly recorded  Ekitigate tapes.  For the sake of posterity, it is important that these things be put in proper perspective

    Given that the president-elect had  once opined that the PDP has, since 1999, presided over our country’s decline, leaving  Nigeria divided and  polarised  as never before; this by an unthinking government hell bent on ruling and stealing everything, it is obvious that the change he and the party  envisage must be  a total rescue mission of a country already  humbled by insecurity, corruption, an economy  worse than he inherited  in ’84,  massive unemployment, a  shambolic  electricity, a ballooning cost of governance; a  decrepit  road infrastructure especially in the Southern parts of the country,  a declining  standard of education and a people whose circumstances is worse than that of Europeans coming out of World War 11. The task is therefore daunting but Nigerians are trusting General Buhari to hit the ground running.

    Security concerns should immediately concentrate his mind because, without peace, we cannot claim to have a country and given that Boko Haram, which has accounted for over 15,000 deaths, is only the worst of the demons of insecurity tormenting our country, urgent steps must be taken to tackle insecurity. The administration must, therefore, aggressively continue the current push against Boko Haram in conjunction with our neighbours.  Multilateral strategic assistance should also be sought from friendly overseas countries with hands-on experience in the fight against terror just as our men under arms must be adequately kitted and properly looked after. If the outgoing president could not deliver our Chibok girls before he exits on May 29, President Buhari must consider it a top priority of his government. With the help of hindsight, it is gratifying to know that the era of graft in our armed forces will be a thing of the past the minute General Buhari takes over as Commander-In-Chief.

    That corruption has become a way of life in Nigeria is beyond doubt and government must approach it from two ends: a long term, fundamental re-orientation of the citizenry to the ends that corruption diminishes us all, and a short run that must be punitive. All proceeds of corruption must be retrieved; all scammers –oil subsidy, pension etc must be listed, publicly displayed and made to return every penny stolen. Impunity must stop and everybody held accountable for his/her actions.

    It is no longer rocket science tracing the proceeds of corruption. It has become one of the major ways the world is now confronting terror. Once they pay up, cases against them should be withdrawn as we profit nothing by their going to jail. We need the billions, even trillions, to upgrade infrastructure in all facets of the Nigerian economy.

    Concerning the economy, a friend, Biodun Adu, a London-based consultant gynaecologist, has suggested that the starting point should be the sale of at least nine of the eleven planes in the presidential fleet. Nigerians expect to see the back of the coordinating minister and, ipso facto,  what Dele Sobowale  of  Vanguard  describes  as  Mrs Okonjo-Iweala’s “ abandonment  of  planning and forecasting for mere allocation of revenue and (mis)management of the Excess Crude Account”.

    From my layman’s point of view, the incoming government should do everything to increase the quantum of electricity available in order to stimulate economic activity at all levels. To begin to chip off from the huge unemployment numbers, government must immediately discontinue statutory allocations to revenue generating agencies and use savings there from to almost double the staff strength in the police and immigration. Skill acquisition centres should immediately be established to retrain the hundreds of thousands of our graduates of higher institutions and enterprising ones amongst them should be given seed money to start off their own small scale businesses.

    Working harmoniously with the APC majority in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, the government must ensure that it cuts to a reasonable level, the embarrassing allowances our legislators are paid. This must be reduced by about 60 percent while retaining the salary which was fixed by the RMAFC. It is mandatory on the Buhari government to reduce the cost of governance in the country. At the beginning of its second year, the government should begin serious work on restructuring the federation. It should set up a committee of not more than 33 experts – 5 from each geo-political zone and 3 from the FCT – and task it with the responsibility of coming up with recommendations that should be approved, after appropriate constitutional amendment, only through a national referendum. The committee, in my view, should have at least 12 months to do its work, with the recommendations of the 2014 National Conference serving as its primary working paper. The committee should, however, expand the recommendations to arrive at a true federal system, anchored on the principles of fiscal federalism. Space constraint does not permit discussions on how to revive our education, make suggestions on a welfare programme for the elderly as Dr Kayode Fayemi did in Ekiti but now, unfortunately, cancelled; as well as proffer ideas on a robust youth policy. Without a shred of doubt, Nigerians can rest in the sure belief that the Buhari government shall work for them as the president-elect has promised. It is a new day in Nigeria. The change is here.

  • The day after: Wither Nigeria?

    The day after: Wither Nigeria?

    It is the day after and I ask:  where exactly did President Jonathan and the PDP leave the entity called Nigeria?

    The problem that we have is Mr Goodluck Jonathan himself – a president who prides himself on his own weakness and incompetence and whose love of false prophets and strange women knows no bounds and has no end. “A president who is as confused and as clueless as the comic character called Chancey Gardner in the celebrated 1970’s Peter Seller’s Hollywood blockbuster titled “Being There”  -Femi Fani-Kayode (President Jonathan’s Campaign Spokesperson)

    It is the day after and I ask:  where exactly did President Jonathan and the PDP leave the entity called Nigeria?  What is left of it? Is it standing, dead, ruptured, wounded or warring?  Is it in the midst of, Kenya-like, a horrendous post-election conflagration, more like a civil war? Did this weakest ever   president succeed in taking the country down with himself, win or lose? I am writing this article a whole 48 hours ahead of the election and so haven’t the slightest idea who of Jonathan or Buhari has won.  But that changes nothing, since either he wins or not, Goodluck Jonathan has damaged Nigeria beyond immediate repair. The country is, without question, in worse straits than Europe at the end of World War 11. Exploiting every conceivable fissure in a huge, multi-ethnic country – ethnicity, religion, anything;   and manipulating everything in completely unimaginable ways as survival tactics, President Jonathan has left Nigeria more divided than ever. He split everything on his way and, in particular, shredded the Yoruba nation worse than did the long Yoruba inter-tribal wars of the 19th century.  With an eye on his re-election, he vacillated so needlessly he ended up sending between 15-20,000 Nigerians to their early deaths in the hands of a Boko Haram by deliberately permitting it to fester and luxuriate.   Add to this the thousands of widows and orphans and an estimated 1.5 Nigerians that have been turned to internally displaced persons. Through a mindless  divide and rule tactics  he  gave undue advantage to a small fraction of his  Niger Delta  compatriots,  gave them unmerited access to huge, sometimes,  illicit funds  and turned them to instant billionaires even as Nigeria  became  the world headquarters of stolen oil.

    The best way to appreciate how low he has taken Nigeria is to take a critical look at some institutions of state, namely: the police, army, and the economy whose national currency he shredded so nastily. An advertorial which appeared in The Nation of Wednesday, 25 March 2015 and yet unrebutted, showed how a total of 600 million dollars was taken from the Central Bank vaults under spurious national security reasons – reminding one of Abacha – and it has since become common knowledge that all manner of characters and organisations are being bribed in dollars all over the country ahead of the presidential elections.  If any institution has been thoroughly worsted, it is the Nigeria Police now turned PDP -Police. That institution has so completely lost its soul it is now being used by President Jonathan for the most heinous of assignments. Under the lead of  a totally  uncaring  Inspector-General , with its  men and women  training and living under the most wretched  of conditions, the police has become so disoriented it is now seen protecting  the likes of OPC thugs, armed to the death, behaving like rabid dogs  as we recently  saw in Lagos. It is, indeed, worse in Ekiti where it is now  nothing more than the  attack dogs  of the rigged-in governor who has put the entire state to rout.  When not being used to protect an illegal 7-man rogue legislature, the police is, zombie-like, enthusiastically running opposition politicians to ground and assisting his group of thugs.  With its men paying for everything needed for official duties despite the humongous annual budgetary allocations to it, the Nigeria Police is today nowhere near any national police. It has become so unkempt and uncared for that, as they have threatened, some elements within it should about now be going on strike. In its present circumstances, the Nigeria Police has been turned into a completely anti-democratic institution.

    The least said about an otherwise well trained Nigerian Army, respected world-wide for its discipline and abilities demonstrated  at several peace keeping, even enforcement, operations,  the better,  as  President Jonathan has  listlessly turned  it into a tool of political manipulation so horrible the rag tag Boko Haram accounted, unfortunately, for too many of  its members  thus  turning  their wives  to widows and the  children to orphans simply because, rather than fight Boko Haram, he  decided to use them  to serve his own personal desires. It got so bad its one time Chief of Staff was alleged to be a sponsor of Boko Haram by an expatriate peace negotiator who should know.

    It got worse.

    As has now been evidentially proven through the Captain Sagir Koli  Ekitigate tapes, President Jonathan so thoroughly undermined the integrity the Nigerian Army when he allegedly  – Obanikoro  and Fayose’s words –  ordered it, through its Chief of Staff,  to rig the Ekiti governorship election of 2014  for Ayo Fayose. So ruinous was that directive that the Nigerian Army will never ever completely erase its unwholesome consequences. By the time everything is known about the current election, it is almost certain President Jonathan would also have used the army to rig again for both himself and his party. It will be most unlike an eminently pliable President Jonathan not to have acquiesced to the illicit demands of the likes of Wike, Fayose, Obanikoro and Akpabio to have soldiers rig for them in their respective states.  If, therefore, there are post-election crises, the entire world should know who to hold responsible.

    Nor is that all he has done to tarnish the image of the Nigerian Army

    Some two weeks ago, the army leadership, apparently acting on orders from above, told Nigerians that elections will not take place in newly freed areas. Incidentally, this is by a government and party whose silly, unpatriotic fight over PVC was premised on no Nigerian being disenfranchised. So what did this president tell the army? Thanks to Chadian army authorities, we now know that Nigerian soldiers were ordered not to take over control of the freed territories in order to make them unsafe. The consequence was fast in coming: not only were several  Nigerians killed, about 500 were reported seized and carried away by Boko Haram from one of such towns already freed by the Chadian soldiers. Big surprise is it, that an army that put the dreaded Boko Haram to rout in six weeks could now be running away from taking over control and responsibility in the captured areas. That is how ineffective the president has rendered a once formidable Nigerian Army which, some thirty years earlier, under General Muhammadu Buhari , yes, the same  Buhari, ran Chadian soldiers  beyond their own borders  as a reprisal for an attack on Nigerian territory – a tale of two heads of state. The army has, however, proved itself by putting Boko Haram to the rout in six weeks even though the president has restrained it for a whole of six years claiming, without a shred of evidence, that his government had been infiltrated by the same Boko Haram.

    Unfortunately, while the president and his agents failed to completely shame the army as an institution, they are still relentlessly at work rubbishing its leading lights –the generals who gave everything to make the Nigerian Army worth its name in gold before its current ruination.  Following the lead of a president who called General Obasanjo, a former head of state, a motor park tout, all manner of rehabilitated drug addicts have since described General Buhari as an illiterate while the president’s own unrestrainedly loquacious wife, Patience, has declared the APC candidate, General Buhari, another former head of state, brain dead. Nor was General T.Y Danjuma, a former Chief of Army Staff, spared by some irritable, totally insufferable and ordinary, Niger-Delta militants turned billionaires. So miffed at all these shenanigans was General  Babangida,  also a former head of State, and victim of these reckless president-led attacks , that he had to issue a press statement decrying the descent into outright depravity. Wrote General Babangida: ‘ Nobody is stopping  anyone from campaigning for their preferred candidates but to do so at the expense of the reputation, contributions, patriotism, loyalty and sacrifice  of former presidents to the Nigerian state is, to say the least, immature. It is therefore callous, wicked, out of sync, cynical and a show of crass ignorance for anyone to undermine the military institution by embarking on mudslinging campaigns against former presidents and leaders with military background.’  And the clincher, which should resonate with these foul mouths: ‘it is this form of demonisation and stigmatisation that often compels us to exhibit espirit de corps amongst ourselves in support of our military institution, and colleagues, when the stakes are high.’

    One can only hope that those who have ears have heard.

  • For the love of country

    For the love of country

    During the oil subsidy crisis, he thoroughly bad- mouthed Yorubas and canvassed that non-Yoruba elements in Lagos, who he claimed are more than Yorubas, should gang up against their hosts

    While some of us continue to relish the past and insist that our leadership position is not threatened, the more discerning among us realise that failure to correctly appraise the situation could only be calamitous to the destiny of the Yoruba people. The truth of the matter is that the lives and destiny of over 30 million souls cannot and should not be trampled upon by reprobates, renegades, revisionists, and impostors. The contemporary self-proclaimed spokesmen and supposed protectors of our people just have to cease and desist from their sanctimonious and opportunistic crusade and become true subscribers to the common cause’.

    The Jurisprudential Professor of Professors, Akin Oyebode, in his lead paper at the authentic  Pan -Yoruba Summit in Ibadan,  Thursday, 19 March 2015.

    ‘For the love of country’, ‘for the love of country’ etc. So goes one of the multibillion naira television adverts of President Goodluck Jonathan urging Nigerians to vote him for another term of four years with his duplicitous government that keeps assuring foreign envoys of peaceful elections while for two whole months it has continued to deny visas to over twenty foreign journalists from such stables as the influential The Telegraph, The Times and Channel 4 News; something that should take no more than two weeks. Candidate Jonathan showed the extent of his love for Nigeria and Nigerians this past week when he inspired the country’s wretched of the earth, to lay Lagos prostrate.  Earlier, another  phalange of these  miscreants, operating  under the aegis of  the  anti-Nigerian ragtag organisation which  recently publicly launched vehicle and driver’s licences, as well as what it called the  passports  of its still-born Biafra Republic without a whimper from the  security agencies-  by the way,  dollarized Afenifere should try doing the same  for Oduduwa Republic  to gauge  the real depth  of Jonathan’s love for  Yoruba. Unlike them, however,   those under the lead of the carpenter completely shut down  Lagos and laid  it  prostrate for hours,  causing  the citizenry untold hardship. The scallywags, members of the outlawed Oodua People’s Congress (OPC), who had long become thugs -for hire, brandishing assorted guns and live ammunition, broken bottles  etc, with the PDP- police and  DSS, even soldiers, watching in amusement, smashed their way through Ikorodu Road,  laying waste everything on its way, including APC billboards.  With the resultant traffic snarl, Lagos was completely crippled for a whole day.

    In his desperation, President Jonathan showed, through these characters, that he would not mind a version of Boko Haram sprouting in Yoruba land the way they brandished live ammunition without a single security operative raising an eyebrow. Coming so soon after  the  president included  both Fredrick Faseun and Gani Adams  in his reckless pipeline surveillance contracts, both factions of the Oodua People’s Congress have shown  themselves no better  than mercenaries as they were  campaigning for  the president’s re election  which they believe  the INEC chairman’s sack, even if  in total disregard  of laid down procedure, will guarantee. And I ask, what exactly is driving President Jonathan into this paranoia: love of country or an eagerness to cover up the massive looting under his watch?

    And this is what baffles about his Lagos/ Yoruba politics. During the oil subsidy crisis, he thoroughly bad- mouthed Yorubas and canvassed that non-Yoruba elements in Lagos, who he claimed are more than Yorubas, should gang up against their hosts.  During the current campaigns, he has met with literally every ethnic group residing in Lagos, preaching the same serpentine hate message. Yet, both within and outside Lagos, he has spared nothing in presenting as a Yoruba friend; romancing Afenifere and heavily compromising all, but few of Yoruba Obas. Such duplicity!

    Happily, Yorubas know their friends just as they know a Greek gift. The historic desecration of Lagos by the OPC, in a complete reversal of roles by a group founded primarily to defend Yoruba land, will haunt them eternally. This shameless, mammon-induced perfidy will, forever, scare them. How they can so easily shred whatever remains of their tattered integrity since they came under the tutelage of the likes of former Ogun State governor, Gbenga Daniel, simply confounds. It must be mentioned here, for emphasis, that the treaty which ended the Kiriji War in 1886 forbade Yorubas fighting against themselves. Their action is, therefore, an abomination the consequences of which will not escape.

    Nigerians must go out on 28 March, 2015 to show that they are not deceived by this type of ‘love of country; by voting out candidate Jonathan.

    Six weeks was only a decoy for rigging

    Readers of this column must have read me say, severally, that PDP cannot win a mere local government election without rigging. The coming elections will be no different, only the rigging method will change. With Capt Sagir Koli, through the Ekitigate tapes, blowing the cover off the military, at its rigging best, which the likes of Obanikoro had relied upon for victory, and INEC’s PVC and Card Readers now a fait accompli, they are already gunning for new methods.  This is precisely what inspired the postponement even after the Council of State had okayed it. My auditory nerves have been on active mode since the Ekiti photocromic rigging, waiting for these shameless riggers.  The answer came shortly after the president’s visit to one major Yoruba town.  A megalomaniac politician, who, of course, should know the finer details of the plan talked too much to those he believed were his supporters. That was how we got to hear that card readers would be sabotaged and that under no circumstances would President Jonathan hand over to General Buhari. All signals are also to be jammed by agents of the PDP on 28 March, 2015.

    Incidentally, it would appear the APC also picked up this information and it’s Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has since addressed a press conference during which he gave more details which included the name of the Israeli fixer contracted to supply 750, 000 units of fake Card Readers which will be planted on PDP members at the polling centres to jam the INEC Card Readers. Olisa Metuh, PDP’s Publicity Secretary, on a Channels TV appearance with Alhaji Mohammed on Thursday, 19 March 2015, had no answer to this allegation.

    Traditional rulers on wonder errand for President Jonathan

    Nigerians woke up Wednesday, 18, March 2015, to read that the president has sent traditional rulers on some mundane errand across the country; an abomination in the first place. This was, however, not completely surprising having just returned from shaking hands with most of their Southwest colleagues. After all, one good turn, they say, deserves another. Divided into 11 groups, their mission is simple: regardless of the fact that elections have not yet been held, talk less of knowing what the results will be, just go where I send you, seat them down and plead that they accept whatever the outcome, no matter the sanctity of the process. In my opinion, no self regarding person, however hungry, should have accepted this formless assignment.  This is why not a few Nigerians have reasonably read meanings into this misadventure. Granted nobody wants a recrudescence of the 2011 post-electoral conflagration, but how do you explain this graceless job?  What exactly do President Jonathan and the PDP have in stock for Nigerians?

    And what are they agitated about after signing a Memorandum of Undertaking supervised by two of Africa’s greatest international diplomats, Emeka Anyaoku, former Secretary-General of the Commonwealth and Annan, a former United Nations Secretary-General? What is President Jonathan or the PDP afraid of?  Why do they think they have to beg Nigerians to accept the outcome of what everybody expects to be a free, fair and transparent election? Is this a case of the guilty becoming sleepless ahead  of what would surely be the consequences of a compromised election; no matter  what force is arraigned against a cheated  people? I think it is important these royal errands ask why this has become a necessary enterprise.

    Or does it have anything to do with the rumour making the rounds that Nigerians are about to experience June 12, all over again?  Is it true that we could soon have procured, a court judgment at the 11th hour, on Thursday or Friday -26/27 March, 2015 – invalidating the use of card readers?

    I feel certain President Jonathan loves Nigeria much more than to have it incinerated.

  • Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom and liberty

    Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom and liberty

    This is why I am appealing to the APC to instruct all its agents to ascertain that only INDELIBLE, as opposed to VANISHING INK, is supplied for use

    In the case of Afenifere that has so shamelessly and so strangely declared its support for President Jonathan, its support is worth little or nothing to the PDP. Afenifere is no longer the formidable political organisation or movement that it once was. None of its present leaders can win elections in the Southwest. They have become irrelevant in the politics of the Southwest where their political influence has fallen considerably. Equally, the traditional rulers in the Southwest that President Jonathan has been trying desperately to woo have little or no influence on the electorate in the region. Even in Ife, the Ooni, the leader of the pack, has little or no political influence now. So trying to bribe the Obas is a waste of money, time and effort. They cannot deliver the votes Jonathan needs to win the elections, if they are free and fair” -Ambassador Dapo Fafowora, fromer Nigerian Ambassador to the United States and Deputy Nigerian Representative to the United Nations.

    God bless the Awujale of Ijebu land. You feel proud as a Yoruba man listening to Kabiyesi respond to President Jonathan during his visit to the paramount ruler, Thursday, 12 March, 2015. Kabiyesi is not one to lie, promising what he knows no Oba in Yoruba land can deliver.

    Do you lecture the converted? Received knowledge would say, no. But that exactly was what I saw Governor Olusegun Mimiko do to his colleague PDP governors this past week in Lagos as he lectured them on the advantages of restructuring while everybody else looked like the governor was speaking Greek. The few acclamations that interspersed his long lecture were extremely tepid and unenthusiastic. Even Governor David Jang, Chairman of the Forum, was so listless he had to be helped out with his contribution. I could not stop wondering whether he knew that TVCs were being withdrawn as people obtained their PVCs, yet he was canvassing its use. Nobody joining the programme midway would ever have thought he was watching a meeting of state governors. It is, however, interesting that it has now become the burden of the Southwest PDP, and of course its acolyte, Afenifere, to carry restructuring literally on their heads for a president who, outside of the Southwest, has never made it a campaign issue. Not surprisingly, no governor at the event, besides governor Mimiko, did either.

    It is equally interesting to now see PDP top guns, David Jang, their 16-is-greater-than-19 governor’s forum chairman inclusive, with their subalterns, running all over the place, ranting as to why Card Readers should not be used. By doing this, a few things have become clearer to me personally. In the first place, it says very loudly that the Ekiti  rigging template, already eloquently attested  to by the Captain Koli tapes, and on the basis of which President Jonathan must have once told some ambassadors that the elections would be the easiest ever, has been abandoned.  I must say, however, that the six weeks’ postponement could very well be their way of getting their election-fixing rogue scientists to invent other versions. PDP is that desperate. This is why I am appealing to the APC to instruct all its agents to ascertain that only INDELIBLE, as opposed to VANISHING INK, is supplied for use. Secondly, and this explains their strident opposition to the use of card readers, is the fact that by its use, PDP will not be able to profit from a total of  about 20 million voters cards which they most probably have cloned from the VIN card numbers fraudulently extracted from  the 17.8 million youths TAN claimed endorsed President Jonathan as well as the about two million forms distributed all over the Southwest by a chieftain of the party on the spurious grounds that he was going to give them jobs and loans. If they contest this, they should tell Nigerians why they required VIN card numbers on those documents. Indeed, thinking that INEC was complicit in this fraud and would feed the 20 million into its system ahead of the elections, I once, on these pages, advised APC to go to court over the use of card readers. But now seeing how troubled they all are, wanting Jega out by just about any means, it is obvious the professor remains his decent self. However, we cannot go to sleep as that does not, in any way, remove the danger still lurking within INEC with many PDP card carrying members like a former Ebonyi State PDP chairman still on duty. There is, too, that one who we heard in the Ekitigate tape gave Fayose some sensitive INEC materials which he reportedly printed and used in rigging the election. Even if it is the last thing Professor Jega would do before exiting, he must fish out that rotten pig who so egregiously compromised the agency.

    It is to rig the elections that they are doing everything to discredit a card reader which cannot discriminate between parties but would apply equally to all voters. PDP cannot win a single local government election without rigging as Nigerians have seen time and again. From the grave vine, we have now heard they would ensure there is no network, nationwide, on March 28 so they could blame INEC for using card readers. If this fails to stalemate the election, as it sure would, because it is not internet-based, we are told, they could orchestrate June 12 all over again, and when trouble erupts, Afenifere and their other endorsers  in the Southwest would not only  rise in their  support but would start leading delegations to Abuja to express that support. It has, in fact, been suggested they already knew there is no way a people completely sidelined from democratic dividends for a whole six years, as we saw in the case of a highly qualified Yoruba CBN Deputy Governor, a 1976 graduate and long time staff of the apex bank, who, indeed, acted as its governor, had to give way for a 1984 graduate and total stranger to the bank, but who is from the favoured geo-political zone, when it came to appointing a substantive Central Bank governor. Nor did it matter that the Finance Minister and not less than 60 percent of heads of regulatory agencies come from those parts.

    For obvious reasons, the Jonathan government had to shift the 28 February election. They just had to go for broke as the auguries were too bad, seeing defeat staring them in the face should the elections hold. But there could never have been a better time for the Sahara Reporters’ airing of Captain Koli tapes. It caught the PDP in their very jugular; whatever the braggadocio of the falcons and their falconer. For the PDP, it was road closed. Otherwise, that Igbo serial election rigger would still have been hawking about his photocromic ballot papers and the PDP would have won the election long before it took place. That route having been closed, it is not unreasonable to suggest that the six additional weeks is to enable the PDP, as indicated earlier, devise new rigging techniques. As at the time the National Security Adviser suggested postponement at the Chatham House on the grounds that sufficient number of PVCs had not been distributed, INEC had distributed about 65 percent which was much higher than the 35 percent it did in Ekiti as at the time of the governorship election and nobody heard all these jeremiads about number of PVCs distributed. Sensing then that it would not gel, they had to quickly manufacture insecurity as if a seven-year-old insurgency had just dropped from Mars. An insurgency they had romanced all these years, deliberately ill-equipping our patriotic, well trained and disciplined soldiers, suddenly shot into limelight becoming the linchpin for election postponement. Forget, in the meantime, that collaboration with our neighbours had long been suggested by the French President and Abuja did absolutely nothing. It now suddenly hit the president that he had to cooperate with them. I am sure that the full story of these days would be told one day in future and Nigerians will get to know how they were fooled. We can only imagine now, how many lives could have been saved and disruptions to the lives of our hundreds of thousands of Internally Displaced Persons avoided.

    So here we are, with whatever remains of their magical 6 weeks, and I am pleading with all Nigerians to vote right as four more years of the same, or worse, is certainly not what we deserve as a nation.

  • Between authentic Yoruba demands and what these elders are hawking around

    Between authentic Yoruba demands and what these elders are hawking around

    How can these elders expect Yorubas to vote a man who treated them with unequalled disdain for all of his six years in office?

    The name PDP Afenifere cropped up some two years ago when the Yoruba nation began to see the likes of  Iyiola Omisore, the forever wannabe-be governor  of Osun State –  attending  Afenifere meetings. But it has since got worse, with even  Igbos now routinely attending, probably  bearing President Jonathan’s  election-related  gifts  or there to  attest  to  the  loyalty of  our elders to their new leader.  It doesn’t get more horrible for a proud Yoruba people.  And, for a certainty, the Ikemba  must be smiling in his grave; he who had wanted, but failed,  to make Col Banjo an Igbo viceroy in Yoruba land  when, during the Biafran war, he armed him to go conquer Lagos, now seeing  his Igbo brothers, Peter Obi and Udenta, resplendently seated, like conquistadors, at a once  revered Yoruba conclave. A single one of our Yoruba elders is yet to attend an Ohaneze meeting.

    Could these elders have forgotten the Ore war?

    A defining election is here with us, one in which the Yoruba nation must not permit itself to be obfuscated, especially by self-lovers who should ordinarily be our guarding lights. Unfortunately, a Pauline conversion, on an industrial scale, has since happened, and today, those who used to lead us are themselves now being led by a ‘youth’. Yet, however odious the situation, we still must be careful how we approach this delicate matter that fouls the mouth, but instantly adds salt; lest we be confused with that insufferable  PDP Goebbels, who  manufactures a lie, a day.

    I am a student of  history and learnt at the feet of the very best –  Akinjogbin, Fajana, Anjorin, Afolayan, Igbafe, Omosini, not to mention the incredible duo of  Segun Osoba and Banji  Akintoye, about  both of  whom I have written copiously on this column, these past ten years, beginning with the rested Comet. That was at the Great University of Ife, close on fifty years ago, and it is on that legacy I will leverage to shred this unprecedented attempt by so tiny a few – you can now count them on your finger tips – to mislead the entire Yoruba nation; a people with a history dating back thousands of years and a people you would never describe as foolish. Worse is it, that this is in a subterfuge aimed at corralling them to queue behind, unarguably, the most corrupt government in Nigerian history. After all, the essence of history is using the past to illuminate the present, and the future, so that mistakes are rendered negligible. How can these elders expect Yorubas to vote a man who treated them with unequalled disdain for all of his six years in office?

    And how do I do this in a manner that will so resoundingly blow off the shibboleths they are ceaselessly hawking about, running from Akure to Ibadan, and herding thousands of our youth to Akure for no other reason than to socialise bribery, in the forlorn hope that these young people Jonathan’s government could not give jobs, will now give him victory in Yoruba land.  All I have to do is present to the sons and daughters of  Oduduwa, their long standing  demands  for proper restructuring as contained in the YORUBA AGENDA  which I urge them  to  compare with the dead on arrival recommendations of the Jonathan Confab they now equate to a silver bullet for the myriad problems currently hobbling Nigeria. This will convince our people that these elders’ merchandise is nothing but a pig in a poke. Happily, we are too smart to be sold on the cheap, especially since we are well aware that, deep down, all this showboating is targeted at oil pipeline contracts and political rehab.

    The Yoruba Agenda, 2005, represents the culmination of efforts and ideas which have been canvassed in Yoruba land since the agitation for a return to true federalism energised those seeking a solution to the perennial crisis of governance in Nigeria. After its adoption at a Yoruba Assembly, it was submitted to a meeting of the Southwest Governor’s Technical Committee and it formed the kernel of the report submitted to the 2006 National Conference which was aborted. Unlike any other document, it enjoys the singular attribute of having every stratum of the Yoruba nation making a contribution.

    It contains some specific, and, immutable demands which you would think these elders ensured were incorporated in the recommendations, but for where? Among these are the following: a self-governing and autonomous region to mobilise the energy of the Yoruba for progress and development and to ignite their collective resolve for cultural renaissance, educational resurgence and social stability; a right for the Yoruba to live under a regional government within the Nigerian Federation with its own constitution and which will be the master of its own internal affairs.  One which will function as one out of six regional governments  which  will form the federating units in a federation operating federal and regional constitutions.

    Naturally, the new federation will undergo structural changes which will touch on, among others, the scope and limits of the powers of the federating units; the form of government, revenue allocation and fiscal federalism which will ensure that each region can develop at its own pace; resource control, police and policing and a judiciary which will have a federal Supreme Court for strictly constitutional cases and at the regional level, the apex court will be the court of Appeal. Indeed, under these Yoruba demands, membership of the National Judicial Council shall be so representative that excessive power would no longer be concentrated in the hands of the Chief Justice of the Federation. The present archaic, unproductive, centralised, single and unified police system would be jettisoned for a system of federal and regional police.

    The above are only some of the original Yoruba demands as contained in the Yoruba Agenda. Were PDP Afenifere to have based its endorsement of President Jonathan on their inclusion, or even only a majority of them, I could very well have elected to be their orchestra’s drummer boy.

    But what is the testimony of Mr Femi Falana, SAN, who, like them, was a conference delegate but one you would never find running between Akure, Owerri, Delta, Ibadan or Abuja?  In an interview he granted The Nation newspaper and published on Thursday, 5 March 5, 2015, Falana said as follows in answer to the question: Can you be more specific  on the Yoruba Agenda at the national conference?: ”Frankly speaking, answered him, the Yoruba agenda was anchored on regional autonomy, restructuring, parliamentary system or Westminster model, fiscal federalism or resource control, unicameral legislature, a ceremonial president and a prime minister with full executive powers, a special status for Lagos State, state police and deletion of the Land Use Act from the Constitution. Those were the items which constituted the core Yoruba Agenda. The items were defeated in to-to at the confab. Of course, the establishment of State Police scaled through on the basis of the role of the civilian joint task force in the fight against insurgency in the Northeast region. I challenge the authors of the Yoruba Agenda to point to other items that were adopted by the Confab.  Indeed, the approval of State Police, we learnt, was not based on the initiators’ advocacy.  Falana went further to explain that the Confab made three types of recommendations on policy direction, statutory amendments and constitutional review which require the promulgation of over 50 new laws and amendment of about 80 existing legislations and that although some of the bills were prepared and submitted to the government, the President did absolutely nothing in the past six months except set up the Adoke committee to study the report. Or could our elders have forgotten that the legislature has a role to play in its implementation in which case they must have to endorse all the federal legislators too?”

    Given the above, one can only conclude, like this column did last week, that this is all a  poorly calibrated ploy to mask their support for a government which Chief Obafemi Awolowo, by whose name they swear, would never have touched with the longest pole.

    I wish, therefore, to plead  with my Yoruba compatriots that while we continue to accord these elders all the respect they so richly deserve, a single one of us must not make the mistake of voting  a man who has so ill-served the Yoruba race and Nigeria.

  • Whose reputation will this PDP not shred?

    Whose reputation will this PDP not shred?

    If Odikanlu knows this much, and still proceeded to advise as he did, it should be quite reasonable to conclude that he deliberately wants the forthcoming elections rigged in favour of both the PDP and President Jonathan who gave him his present job

    The minute ‘Goebbels’ started the campaign for troops deployment I knew that desperation had set in. PDP, at the best of times, is like an asylum of desperadoes even when not facing a make or mar election capable of finally terminating its corruptive tendencies.  Recently, two court judges,  one at the High Court and the other of  the Appellate,  both  well aware of the prevailing security situation in the country, have done justice to their oath of office and the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria by declaring  that ‘”even the President of Nigeria has no powers to call on the Nigerian armed forces and to unleash them on peaceful citizens, who are exercising their franchise to elect their leaders, further stressing that “whoever unleashed soldiers on Ekiti State disturbed the peace of the election on June 21, 2014; acted in flagrant breach of the Constitution and flouted the provisions of the Electoral Act, which required an enabling environment by civil authorities in the conduct of elections.” A more courageous Appeal Court should, however, have made the logical consequential order of invalidating the election. But no matter, the judges upheld the dignity of the courts.

    And I salute them.

    Therefore, for anybody, however seemingly well placed, to advise the president to continue in that flagrant illegality is to demonstrate the greatest level of irresponsibility which is why the Nigerian Bar Association must move rapidly to discipline Chidi Odikanlu, Chairman, National Human Rights Commission, and a professor of Law to boot. Or how ludicrous can a professor of Law get advising, not that a decision of court be appealed but that the transgressor should continue in that damnable illegality? I verily believe he had been compromised or hugely compromised himself to vomit that baloney unashamedly on national television. And some questions naturally arise:  Is it possible that Professor Odikanlu has not heard of Ekitigate? Does he, like President Jonathan, consider a tape secretly recorded by a Military Intelligence Officer, a captain – present at the scene – who felt thoroughly humiliated seeing the manner in which bloody civilians were humiliating his Commanding Officer – a Brigadier-General- a fabrication too?  Could it be that those who recruited distinguished international diplomats to underwrite a suspected Memorandum of Understanding have also got him? Can Odikanlu tell the world what proportion of Nigeria is in a civil war?  Where exactly does intellectualism stop and banal ethnic preferences take over?

    And just in case he honestly has not heard about Ekitigate, it is that deployment of soldiers, allegedly on presidential orders, in cahoots with a notorious Igbo election rigger, who came to Ekiti with a huge stash of money withdrawn from the Umuahia branch of the Central Bank of Nigeria, thereby indicating government as the financiers of the electoral heist, as well as photocromic ballot papers. It did not end there, as also present was a group of Yoruba politicians; some currently serving on President Jonathan’s cabinet, and a Brigadier General all for the sole aim of rigging the Ekiti State governorship election for the president’s party.

    If  Odikanlu  knows this much, and still proceeded to advise as he did, it should be quite reasonable to conclude that he deliberately wants the forthcoming elections rigged in favour of both the  PDP and President Jonathan who gave him his present job. I am still at a loss as to why he had to tell Nigerians on national television that he is not a politician, even without being asked.

    ON THESE MERRY-GO-ROUND OVER THE LAST NATIONAL TALKSHOP

     First it was Akure but this past week, the Jonathan Southwest Campaign train, aka PDP’s Afenifere, which it became when the likes of Senator Omisore started attending its meetings, crawled to Ibadan. The way they are going about it, you would think only Yorubas attended the National Conference. In what has become a rare moment of candour, a respected member recently declared the Akure meeting a PDP affair which, of course, Nigerians know too well. Otherwise, can they tell us who is picking the bills? Or can these people, in the name of Oduduwa, swear by the god of iron that they have not been compromised? Already, the Anambra APC has asked Ohaneze to return its own N6.2B bribe delivered in two tranches of N1.2B and N5B. The Yoruba nation is waiting for their response. But by the way, isn’t the promised oil pipeline security contract getting too late in coming? Is this tardiness not a confirmation of how President Jonathan actually holds us in these parts? And by the way, why are these respected elders being herded all over Yoruba land on an issue that is pan-Nigerian, acting like only they attended the conference? Is the Yoruba nation in any way ennobled by this obsequiousness?

    No, I am well aware it took them a whole lot of effort to persuade the number one hater of a National Conference to become its ultimate convener. Of course, only the uninitiated would not have heard that they allegedly wrote the conference’s original memo, got one of its members appointed to jump start it and had the highest number of any group delegation. Didn’t they even attempt to also donate the chairman?

    At their urging, weren’t honest Yoruba leaders like Chief Deji Fasuan and Senator Biyi Durojaiye substituted with pliable characters? All these, and more, we know and you would almost think they are a re-incarnate of the immortal Alao Aka Bashorun whose seminal idea a national conference in Nigeria is. But no matter, a people in need of political shelter will sure lap on to something!  But, again, why has implementing the recommendations of a Pan-Nigerian conference suddenly become their business alone? The answer is simple: it is the only seemingly passable justification for their in-explainable support for an irredeemably corrupt government Awo would never have touched with the longest pole.

    But how come their traditional collaborators are not in on this?

    Are they telling Nigerians that six months is too short for President Jonathan to do anything on the recommendations beyond setting up the Adoke committee to review it but which, in truth, was a deliberate delay tactics? What Nigerians now know is that once the conference failed to produce the expected two extra years for the president, the convener most probably lost all interest.  It is the failure of that promise that made the president distrustful of their promise on Yoruba votes. This also led to last week’s campaign shuttle during which the president re-commissioned a project Obasanjo had commissioned way back 2007 at which Gbenga Daniel was present and smiling broadly. The president, whatever PDP Afenifere may be telling him, knows that he has done nothing to deserve Yoruba votes. He knew he treated the Southwest with utter disdain while simultaneously enabling another geo-political zone to take complete control of Nigeria’s regulatory agencies thereby further pauperising the Yoruba and turning erstwhile controllers of the commanding heights of the economy into hapless, marginal players whose banks were indiscriminately confiscated and their PPP projects illegally and summarily terminated. Shouldn’t President Jonathan have remembered that besides our massive votes for him in 2011, it was the Soyinka’s, the Falana’s and co, who rescued him from the mafia then out to eclipse his political life? Yoruba-friendly, indeed!

    Let me conclude this piece with the wise and timely words of an OduaPathfinder Editorial: ‘When PDP’s Afenifere says it wants the Yoruba to support Jonathan because he will implement the conference recommendations, it is obvious, from the recommendations of the Conference, that Goodluck Jonathan is not in pursuit of “True Federalism” but the strengthening of his presidency contrary to established concepts of Federalism. Hence he must be rejected at the polls. This is the historical imperative for the Yoruba Nation.”

     CONFIRMING PRESIDENT JONATHAN’S ‘IMPRESSIVE’ ANTI-CORRUPTION WAR

     The heavy security attached to Femi Fani-Kayode as he continued defence in his money laundering case at the Federal High court, Lagos, this past week, made up of “five fully armed RIOT policemen and more than four plain clothes security policemen” – all protecting a man on trial for allegedly laundering N100M, must reckon as the most brazen demonstration of President Jonathan’s selective and effete anti-corruption war.

    It is, of course, one more reason CHANGE has become a must, if Nigeria is to survive.

  • It’s time for President Jonathan to decelerate tension nationally

    It’s time for President Jonathan to decelerate tension nationally

    If  the president,  in particular,  is concerned with what history will say about him, his considerable energies should now be  directed  at how to leave a lasting legacy

    It appeared to me  strange  then, if not  sinister,  that  in propounding his theory of a mutually  assured  post-election crisis, whoever  of  President Jonathan or General Buhari,  wins  the presidential election, Professor Bolaji Akinyemi did not canvass a free, fair and transparent election, but  rather suggested a  somewhat uncritical acceptance of the result by not just the candidates, but also  their millions of supporters, obviously with diverse tolerance levels,  knowing only too  well ,  that in Nigeria,  a group of  these  supporters  would most probably have been rigged out. I instantly  remonstrated  by pointing  out on these pages that it was curious  he could so suggest when it was  obvious that the PDP, being the party in power, unlike the APC, can very  easily use its position  to  compromise the integrity  of the election as it has done severally  in the past  to the extent that  a sitting president Yar’ Adua  could  not help confessing  that he was  rigged into  office  by the party. I then wondered  as to why  Professor  Akinyemi, rather than  wanting  the  election’s integrity be assured by both parties, he preferred  to commit them to accepting it, willy nilly, no matter  the process that threw up the result.

    My fears would be confirmed soon after when some reputable international diplomats suddenly materialised, claiming to underwrite a Memorandum of Understanding amongst the presidential candidates but also, with nary a mention of the integrity of the process. After all, post election conflagrations do not just happen on their own but because a foul play is suspected.

    All these thoughts came poignantly back to me on the exposure of the secretly recorded audio tape of the Ekiti gubernatorial election of 21 June, 2014. The tape is believed to have been recorded by a Captain Sagir Koli, who served as the intelligence Officer to a Brigadier-General of the Nigerian Army who allegedly collaborated with some chieftains – also named in the tape –  of the PDP to rig the election. Listening to the tape, one hears several references to not just the Army Chief of Staff but also to the highest echelon of government, namely, the presidency.

     It therefore occurred to me that, being past masters at rigging  elections, the PDP must have lashed  onto Prof Akinyemi’s patriotic concerns and hurriedly got the respected diplomats on board to oversee a MOU  they  could  hide  under as it should naturally have moderated a likely violent response to their ‘victory’.  This conjecture is absolutely reasonable  given the  fact  that  the involvement of the military in rigging the Ekiti gubernatorial election  produced  such a roaring success that it  might have been concluded that it becomes the party’s template for all future elections, especially the presidential which they believe would result in a band wagon effect. This  conclusion  has been  further confirmed by  the fact that  two of those who were captured on the  tape – Governor Ayo Fayose  and Musliu Obanikoro – are known to have boasted  at different times later, that  PDP would win all the elections in their respective states hands down.  Declared Obanikoro, boastfully, in an interview with the Punch, published on Sunday, 28 December, 2015: “Ogunlewe said in his interview with Sunday Punch that he doesn’t know whether the PDP will win in the Southwest. He said it is not yet time for him to talk about that. But it is time for me to talk about it. I can tell you that we are going to win. The president is going to win BIG; WE ARE GOING TO CLEAR THE SOUTHWEST. YOU CAN MARK TODAY’S DATE AND QUOTE ME’.

     I am sure Nigerians now know where Obanikoro was coming from. No thanks to a patriotic Captain Koli.

    So incensed, therefore, has the PDP been about the Court of Appeal, Abuja circuit’s confirmation of an earlier Sokoto High Court decision that the president has no constitutional right, whatever, to involve the military in the conduct of elections. In the decision affirmed by the Appeal Court, Justice Abdul Aboki , in his lead judgment in the Ekiti State Governorship Election appeal on February 16, had held that “even the President of Nigeria has no powers to call on the Nigerian armed forces and to unleash them on peaceful citizens, who are exercising their franchise to elect their leaders.

    “Whoever unleashed soldiers on Ekiti State, disturbed the peace of the election on June 21, 2014; acted in flagrant breach of the Constitution and flouted the provisions of the Electoral Act, which required an enabling environment by civil authorities in the conduct of elections.”

    Knowing what we now know, it should not surprise Nigerians that elements within the PDP are still urging the president to disregard these weighty judicial pronouncements and go ahead to deploy soldiers during the coming elections. Fortunately, Nigerians can go to sleep because we do not have an outlaw for a president. We can rest assured that without the president appealing to the Supreme Court to vacate that ruling, and getting the apex court to so pronounce,  he could not as much as deploy a single member of the Nigerian armed forces to election duties. President Jonathan would never be caught so cavalierly disrespecting the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria which he swore to uphold; especially given that he should ordinarily have been embarrassed by the mere allegation of  the military’s involvement, on his orders,  in the  rigging of the Ekiti election.

    But I digress.

    Ahead of that conjecturable plan to again rig the 2015 elections in line with the Ekiti template, it seems to me obvious that Messrs Kofi Annan and Emeka Anyaoku were most probably used by the PDP to pull its chestnuts out of the fire.  I am persuaded  by my good  knowledge of Professor Akinyemi , dating back  a half a century, that PDP, in its sheer desperation , merely quickly lapped on to his suggestion and  invited the gentlemen to assist in ensuring there was no post election crises in Nigeria, as happened in 2011, after they would have viciously rigged it. The statesmen must have believed themselves lending their weighty reputations to a worthy cause.

    Having thus  been caught  smack , both in the  Ekiti electoral heist, which the ‘son of his father’ thinks he can bury under some outlandish grammar,  and its  forward  plan to again use the military  to  rig  the 2015  elections, clearly indicating the hands of God in our affairs, I think the time has come for the PDP and its agencies to sober up, repent and commit itself to  Nigeria. Rather than foisting tension all over the country as we see daily in Ekiti, but was much more bestially demonstrated at Okrika  this past week, I think enough should now be enough for that party which serially misuses both the military and the police. Rather than spreading fear,  killing, detonating bombs  and  spreading mayhem, I think  PDP and its  agencies, known  and shadowy, should now  concentrate  their energies  and  limitless  resources on making the elections free and fair, campaigning  on President Jonathan’s record, these past six years.  If  the president,  in particular,  is concerned with what history will say about him, his considerable energies should now be  directed  at how to leave a lasting legacy. If he does this and wins the election, his stock amongst the citizenry, and internationally, will rise but, even where he loses, he would have left his name in gold.

    Like former President Obasanjo, God has shown him abundant, even unmerited favours and Nigeria, in turn, has been more than good to him. It, therefore, behoves him to think less of  the self,  be grateful to  God, and jettison as many as he can, of all these fair-weather  political  ‘friends’ and  hangers-on, who  are here today, gone tomorrow. The president must think, and reflect, on how far the Almighty God has taken him, far away, from those Otueke days of shoe-less-ness.