The Nation Newspaper

Category: Femi Orebe

  • The new PDP – APC merger in perspective

    The new PDP – APC merger in perspective

    Nigerians have not seen the last of PDP’s troubles

    Not even the most audacious hater of the banal PDP could have , this time a year ago, conjectured that the political behemoth could  come crashing so ignominiously under the sheer weight of its sins against Nigeria and Nigerians. The sins of biblical Sodom from which only Lot’s family escaped eternal judgment, would pale into literal insignificance compared to PDP’s banality which, in  its  mere fourteen years stranglehold over Nigeria  reduced a resource –rich country, which should ordinarily have been the pride of black peoples all over the world, to an absolutely beggarly country wallowing in the lowest rungs of the world’s development index. In those fourteen years, the only time, as of recent, when a Nigerian can truly feel proud of this country is when our yet to be adulterated youth, win some sporting laurels far away  from our shores; more from their own individual efforts than any deliberate policy of the PDP-controlled federal government.

    Only recently, a Ghanaian minister lost her high office simply because she expressed a mere intent to have some huge amount of money at her disposal to politically control the people but  here in an amoral PDP- controlled Nigeria, a minister continues to sit pretty in President Jonathan’s cabinet despite copious evidence of  her moral, financial and constitutional  derelictions  and weeks after the president’s panel of inquiry set  up, more to obfuscate than to adjudicate, had submitted its report. In like manner, the government has washed its hands clean of any responsibility to ensure that those who creamed off billions of naira through the oil subsidy scandal are promptly brought to book, merely by handing them over to the courts which is equally under its baleful control, sure the accused ones will, at best, be given a slap on the wrist. After all, children of PDP Chairmen, past and serving, are among. But presidential spokespersons will waste no time in telling you how the president does not control the judiciary. Nigerians, however, know better than the courts which unashamedly declare that there is no split in the PDP, in your face as it is, straight from the party’s Abuja mini convention.

    Those who stole billions from the pension fund are not any different. Indeed, so horrible was the pension scam, and the government’s effort at cover up, that in spite of a court order to arrest him, the police claimed it could not locate an accused top gun in the pension’s department, who was, incidentally being guided round the clock by dozens from the same Nigeria Police until he was allegedly helped to escape from the country.

    Given the above scenario many Nigerians have refused to be excited at the historic merger of a huge chunk of that same political party with the All Progressives Congress, claiming, indeed, that Nigerian politicians are all the same: what with ownership mentality, imposition of candidates and the fact that corruption is basically party- blind, though much more at home in the PDP.

    My response to all these has been that although one individual Nigerian is hardly different from  the other, PDP  in its corporeal sense and dealings,  is completely irredeemable, no matter how good its individual members may be. It was for this reason that Moremi Funmi Olayinka, the late Ekiti State Deputy Governor, used to liken it to a virus. The reader is certain to know a decent PDP member who is, however, party to the large scale treasury looting and perverse election rigging over which the government has superintended these many years. They are getting worse by the day.

    Many have, therefore, wondered as to how these big guns ‘porting’ into the APC from PDP will not spoil the broth and my answer is  two-fold;  one,  that the milieu is by far different. Whereas all those murky practices are more the directive policies of the PDP, a party from which you could hardly identify a lone biblical Lot for redemption, you will find among the  APC leaders, individuals like its Chairman, Chief Bisi Akande,  General Buhari and many others,  who are, indeed, Nigerian poster boys of the incorruptible. These two leaders have held high public offices and have been adjudged completely above board, leaving office in flying colours and with serial testaments to their patriotism and honesty. It is equally true that while accusations of imposition and the lot could hold true in smaller, regional parties, it is totally unthinkable that individuals, qua individuals, could exercise the same level of influence in a much bigger, national party, like the APC.

    However,  much more important is the fact that APC’s hope of rescuing Nigeria from the evil stranglehold of the PDP, rests mostly on comprehensively galvanising the people to make it a mass movement  by aggressively pushing to the public space, PDP’s record of  unprecedented corruption and non-performance since 1999; one that has no single redeeming feature, not even the GSM phenomenon wrongly attributed to Obasanjo but  which  the thoroughly disreputable Abacha regime had, in fact, initiated.  APC should let the world know that PDP luxuriates in illegalities such as abrogating the electorate and robbing the treasury blind. These negativities should be comprehensively enumerated and their evil consequences brought home vividly to Nigerians. The APC must show, very clearly, how and why, these are the very reasons an otherwise blessed country like Nigeria is wallowing in the abyss of ignominy with the poverty level of its citizens in the high 70s.  The recent resignation of the chairman of SURE-P, though allegedly for health-related reasons, should best be seen in the fact that the programme was fast becoming a cesspool of patronage and corruption with which the decent man will never ever be connected. These inglorious facts about the PDP, therefore, impose a moral obligation of probity on all levels of the APC membership: leaders, officials and ordinary members alike, if it must lay claim to any higher moral ground which is a sine qua non for victory.

    Ever a master of self deceit and unprecedented rigging in whatever level of election, local, state or federal, the PDP had been loudest in  proclaiming on roof tops, how the exit of no less than five state governors and sundry legislators at all levels  would not affect  it. I imagine, therefore, that even if, as a result of its many problems, President Jonathan decides to dump the party today, some jokers like Gulak would claim that nothing has happened as long as Chairman Tukur remains his rambunctious and all-conquering self. It can only be a shame that President Jonathan could not see the disaster Chairman Tukur had become to the PDP.  A well-heeled and aristocratic former governor, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, unfortunately, sees the party only as an extension of his vast holdings where he is the undisputed authority. He could, therefore, not tolerate the elected party secretary, nor did it matter to him whether or not meetings of the national executive of the party, which he saw as no more than the nominal boards of his many companies, met as statutorily expected. Rather, it was game for him to summarily dissolve state executive committees which he replaced with some fringe, unpopular members as long as his word would be law. The result was that when concerned members, state governors inclusive, raised these troubling issues with the president who is the party leader, it mattered nothing. Indeed, to ensure he had his way, Alhaji Tukur went back many decades to drag the one and only Umaru Dikko, to head his self-appointed Disciplinary Committee; all these while the soporific PDP leadership slept. Today, they can only gnash their teeth as it matters nothing to them either if their party could no longer field a governorship candidate from within its own ranks but must go shopping for one in other political parties. Nigerians have certainly not seen the last of PDP’s troubles as the party’s winter is already here.

  • Anambra: President Jonathan’s ‘Ondo Model’ fatal flaw

    Anambra: President Jonathan’s ‘Ondo Model’ fatal flaw

    Did the Anambra shambolic election look, by any means, like a one-man, one-day job?

    Somebody once called him a snake. The more you look at President Jonathan the more you are amazed at his ability to distant himself from activities he inspired; the Anambra fiasco being only the latest of so many. What is playing out, before our very eyes, whether in the Delta Senatorial bye election, the Edo Local Government election or now in Anambra, is nothing but a test run for the 2015 presidential election. It started with the re-election of Governor Segun Mimiko of Ondo State. I have written about this in the past, but let me recap the basic ingredients of the ‘Ondo Model’. It starts with a massive sexing up of the voters’ register into which hundreds of thousands of fictitious names are imported. If in the Ondo case the other candidates didn’t get to know this early, in Anambra it was a complicit INEC Chairman, who ‘promised to clean up the voters’ register, but which he deliberately never did. When then he said a single INEC official sabotaged the election, I merely laughed. Did the Anambra shambolic election look, by any means, like a one-man, one-day job?

    Jega should please show Nigerians some respect.

    The compromised register secured, the next is ensuring that security agencies are primed for rigging the president’s preferred candidate to victory. This, of course, as we also saw in Ondo State, is never the official PDP candidate which I described elsewhere as caricature, but that of either the Labour Party, especially, or of whichever other marginal party is equally programmed to do some dirty electoral job, come 2015. This, then, is their authority for police men thumb printing ballot papers, and providing cover for ballot box snatchers, multiple voting and sundry other illegalities. This has, in fact, worsened since the new Chairman of the Police Service Commission came on board and the Nigeria Police transmogrified into a gun-bearing wing of the PDP.

    This should not surprise us since the Nigeria Police, long before the present Inspector- General, have become more than attuned to slave-like labours. You only have to remember Obasanjo’s use, and misuse, of that outfit which saw one of its leading lights end up in jail.

    But the army?

    I am completely flabbergasted by the reported involvement of men of the Nigerian Army in anti-democratic incidents for three main reasons. The Nigerian Army is a truly distinguished service which lost men and limbs but fought gallantly to keep this country together. Here is an army that continues to demonstrate incredible discipline and expertise in the many international peace-keeping exercises it has participated in since the ’60s, beginning in the Congo. Thirdly, the Nigerian army today parades, amongst its retired top echelon, some of the most patriotic Nigerians and here, I have in mind, the T.Y Danjumas, the Alani Akinrinades, the Y.Y Kures, to name a few. But I have a troubling fear. If current leaders of the service will not be able to resist the anti-democratic uses to which it is currently, egregiously being pushed into, the time will come, much sooner than later, when soldiers from civilised countries will refuse to participate alongside Nigerian soldiers in any peace-keeping exercise.

    While Governor Adam Oshiomhole decried the ignominious police role in a mere LG election, the army was accused both in the Delta Senatorial Bye Election and the Anambra, of being used for illegal electoral duties.

    There is a myriad other ways the ‘Ondo Model’ is consummated; from non delivery of election materials at all or ensuing they come very late, to opposition strongholds. Of course, as APGA Chairman Umeh confirmed, writing election results far away from voting centres has always been the trend in the South-East. This too must have been put to work in the Anambra election.

    All these would have been tolerable if limited to a money-driven state like Anambra, with its thousands of competing billionaires, but from what is fast becoming the norm, PDP is furiously spreading bile, anguish, even insecurity, all over the country. In Ekiti State which, in the past three years of the Fayemi administration, had been widely regarded as one of the safest and most peaceful states in the country, we have seen the results of their crookedness. Having forsaken its 23 aspirants for a consensus candidate from outside the PDP, it has now become the style that aDid the Anambra shambolic election look, by any means, like a one-man, one-day job?nytime Opeyemi Bamidele comes to town, or his Bibire micro group is having any event, there must be a massive breach of peace most probably to confirm that he is such a big fish .

    The fact that PDP routinely abandons its own candidate to line behind another, on a different party, has outrageously played out in the same Anambra conundrum when, like a programmed robot, Olisa Metuh, its Publicity Secretary, peremptorily started praising not only INEC, but the president, for doing a great job at a time his own party’s now abandoned candidate, Tony Nwoye, was boycotting the rescheduled election and joining two other candidates to denounce the shambolic election. I hope the presidency knows by now that it no longer matters a thing whether the APGA candidate is declared winner a thousand times.

    The Anambra fiasco has also demonstrated the awesomeness of God. It has shown that God cannot be deceived by puny man. He has made mincemeat of any ‘erusalem Accord’, just as He did Ahitophel’s counsel.

    Somebody should please inform them of the Yoruba saying that you can deceive a woman to have intimacy only once. We have seen their hands nearer home in Akure and we wait patiently to see what shenanigans they intend to unfold in both Ekiti and Osun, the REAL targets of all these serpentine schemes. Ekiti is a state of eggheads, not money bags, and we wait to see how they intend to manufacture supporters for their consensus, non PDP candidate.

    In the meantime, all the 23 aspirants from the party have been whipped into line and you no longer hear a single one of them breathe a word of his gubernatorial ambition about which they almost shattered our eardrums a few months ago. The enforcer, Chairman Tukur, must have seen to that. Of course, the party is nowhere on ground in the state as recently confirmed by none other than Olatunde, its State Vice-Chairman, when he said candidly, that ‘there was no way the PDP can dislodge Governor Kayode Fayemi in 2014’.

    And it is a certainty that once PDP makes its choice of a candidate in Ekiti public, a deluge of unprecedented proportion will hit the PDP. In the meantime, former governor Segun Oni has pitched tents with the New PDP and it sounds quite logical to suggest that APC will be the party of choice for aggrieved PDP members rather than team up with an imposed, outsider.

    Without a scintilla of doubt, the ‘Ondo Model’ will be DOA -dead on arrival- in both Ekiti and Osun.

  • Erelu Bisi Fayemi: Senior Advocate of the women fold

    Erelu Bisi Fayemi: Senior Advocate of the women fold

    Mrs Fayemi has done a lot to change the life of women and children in Ekiti State

    In my article: BUY ONE, GET ONE FREE,  of 19 June 2011, I wrote:  ‘I make bold to say that with respect to passion for Ekiti’s socio-economic development, the only difference between Dr Kayode Fayemi and his wife, the Ekiti First Lady, Erelu Bisi Fayemi, is that the latter was not elected by the  popular votes of the good people of Ekiti.’ Her most recent initiative resulted in the passing into law by the Ekiti State House of Assembly of the Equal Opportunities Bill to protect the economic and social rights of the physically-challenged, as well as those with learning disabilities in the state concerning which,  V.A Adewusi, a Diasporan member of Ekiti Panupo not only  gave her kudos, but  added that  the bill cold also technically  be regarded as a bill sponsored by the executive branch,  because, in his words,  omi eko, eko ni (they ‘re both the same) giving the example  of  when  in 1996,  U.S President,  William Jefferson Clinton,  had Hillary Rodham Clinton lead  his attempted Healthcare Reform.

    Today, I yield the column to Ado-Ekiti-based Akeem Bello, who has observed Erelu’s multi-faceted peregrinations on behalf of  the needy in  Ekiti for  quite some time. Happy reading.

    Wife: “Help me ooo! Help me ooo!!”

    Husband: “I will kill you today, you this useless woman.”

    Wife: “Please Baba Kehinde, don’t kill me.”

    Husband: “I will kill you, ‘sebi’ you said you will not hear.”

    Wife: “My eyes! My head!!”

    That was the violent interaction between Baba and Mama Kehinde in the early 80s in Bauchi. Mr and Mrs Afolabi Akinwumi, (aka) Baba and Mama Kehinde were members of a happy family. I was about twelve years old then. Our families came in contact  in 1982 when  we both rented apartments in the same compound along  the Kofar Gombe, Unguwar Dawaki area of the town. Theirs was a family of six. Kehinde was the first child and there were Taiye, Tunrayo, followed by Tunde and Sunkanmi who was the last child.  Kehinde and I were in the same class. Suddenly, the happiness in this family turned sour as a result of regular beatings of the wife by Mr Akinwumi. Initially, neighbours intervened to stop these incessant beatings but, after some time, it became so constant that no one cared again.

    That was the story till my own family moved  to  somewhere on Wunti Road  in 1983 though Kehinde and I remained in the same school. Kehinde  would tell me a year later that his father had sent his mother packing for no obvious  reasons, forcing her to leave  the  young children behind

    In 1985,  my family left Bauchi for Ado-Ekiti in Ekiti State and  I did not go back to Bauchi until in 2008 when, Sani, a mutual friend of Kehinde and I was my host.  And, quite naturally,  I asked Sani about our friend and his siblings.  His response was heartbreaking. Sani told me Kehinde was shot dead by the police while robbing a bank; Tunrayo, his sister, he said,  died of  some mysterious  ailment, Tunde became a drug addict and  he knew practically nothing of their youngest sibling. Baba and Mama Kehinde’s whereabouts, too,  were   unknown.

    This is the sad story of  a promising Akinwumi family and the extent to which domestic violence  could destroy a family and ruin the lives of innocent children. Today, I am a  graduate  teacher; my younger brother, who was very close to the late Tunrayo, is a Correction Officer in the USA state of  Texas. My other siblings are graduates from reputable universities. We were all friends to the Akinwumi’s except my youngest brother who was not part of our Bauchi history. The most painful thing, for me personally, is remembering that Kehinde was such a brilliant student.  Without a doubt, had there been an Erelu Fayemi type  there in Bauchi  at that point in time, not only  would the Akinwumi family be intact today, the children would have fulfilled their God -ordained destinies.

    Erelu Bisi Fayemi, like Betty Ford, 1918- 2011, wife of the 38th President of the United States of America, Gerald R. Ford, had a passion for  womens’ rights and that  became her calling. She never hid her feelings about this even if it was against the spirit of the Republican Party, her party.

    Erelu Bisi Fayemi is not by any means a sterile women’s rights advocate. She pursues her exertions to the very end, seeing them become law. For instance, the bill she inspired on prohibition of violence against women was passed into law by the Ekiti State House of Assembly on 25 November, 2011 just as the one on Equal Opportunities, that is, against discrimination of any kind, was passed this November.

    Hers too, is not a one -sided advocacy. Therefore, as an educated woman versed in our culture, Erelu, where ever she goes, advises women to respect their husbands. She tells them that the laws are made to protect them, but that they too, must not abuse the laws.

    Erelu Bisi Fayemi has given philanthropy a new perspective in Ekiti State.  At the launch of  her  Ekiti Development Foundation, all the Dangotes, the Elemelu’s, well known names in philanthropy in the country, were present to lend their support to a worthy cause. Since then, there had been no looking back for her. She has in place, a provision of N200,000 for any family that gives birth to twins or other multiple births just as she recently facilitated the construction of Adunni Olayinka Wellness and Cancer Diagnostic Centre at the Ekiti State University Teaching Hospital, Ado-Ekiti, to facilitate early detection of  breast cancer. There is also her Feeding Project  for the elderly and the hungry who are given both cooked meals or raw ration. A few weeks ago, she visited all the markets in the state to assist market women in their various trades. The programme was called ‘Erelu be oja wo- Erelu Visiting the Markets -’ during which women traders were given buses and millions of naira to upgrade their trade;a  completely unprecedented happening in the history of the state.

    Erelu’s efforts are not borne out of gender sentiment or political exhibitionism. Rather, they are deeply held passions borne out of the words of God. For instance,  in the Quran chapter 65 V 6, Allah says;

    “Lodge them where you dwell, according to your means, and do not treat them in such a harmful way that they be obliged to leave. And if they are pregnant, then spend on them till they deliver. Then if they suck to the children for you, give them their due payment, and let each of you accept the advice of the other in a just way…..”

    This is similar in the Bible to Ephesians 5 vs 28 which says:

    “So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loveth his wife loveth himself”

    Some ‘Ifa’ verses in Yoruba cosmogony also attest to this. These verses are why Erelu will insist on respect for women dignity by their husbands. Women are the navel  of any home.

    Erelu, just like Hillary Rodham Clinton, is a formidable pillar behind her husband. She is giving Dr. Kayode Fayemi the necessary support he needs to  continue to move Ekiti forward. Her school of politics is with a difference; carrying out her activities, as she does,  with civility and an unrivalled panache.

    Mrs Fayemi has done a lot to change the life of women and children in Ekiti that all we can do is commend, and thank her, for the many ways in which  she has, and continues to  touch  lives, especially of our women, children, the hungry, the sick and the needy, in general.

    I therefore urge the entire Ekiti citizenry to support her husband, our dear governor, Dr John Kayode Fayemi,  who has, in three years, taken Ekiti to  socio-economic heights never seen in the entire history of the state.

    Akeem Bello writes from Ado Ekiti.

  • A poem and Awo’s words on marble

    A poem and Awo’s words on marble

    A smoke must show up announcing fire and so it is now with MOB

    Under the lead of the inimitable Dr Segun Osoba, I first came across the book, WHAT IS HISTORY, which literally became my bible for the Philosophy of History class at the University of Ife during my final year in ’71. Originating from a series of G.M Trevelyan lectures given by the English historian, E.H Carr, it is a deep study in historiography; discussing facts, science, morality, individuals and society but, most importantly, moral judgments in history. It is a book I would like to recommend to all, especially, aspiring politicians who, unfortunately, find themselves vacillating between honour, integrity and crass opportunism. But rather than wade through pages I last read 42 years ago, it will suffice to teach the same lessons I intend to impart by this recall, simply by quoting a very apt poem from the ekitipanupo web portal and gloriously cap it with the immortal words of the Avatar, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, in circumstances not totally dissimilar from what we have in Ekiti today.

    Contributing to this same subject on the web portal, Tunji Orisalade, on Thursday, 7 November, 2013, wrote :

    How low can Mortals fall

    When it’s time for real test

    A test to detect their real personality

    Hitherto boxed under borrowed clothing

    Deliberately designed to deceive all

    But that can only be ephemeral

    It can never stand the test of time

    A smoke must show up announcing fire

    And so it is now with MOB

    All that dining and wining with Progressives

    Are all, but mere smokescreen?

    Bibire must necessarily involve Omoluabi

    An Omoluabi knows when right to dance

    Not dancing without music

    Or dancing in the Market Place

    EKITI is too much for that

    Hope Somebody regains consciousness

    And retraces several, several steps

    Before the political lights are out

    A word should be enough for the Wise.

    Interestingly, however, 30 years ago in 1983, when Opeyemi was but a child, Awo had, perspicaciously, mirrored today’s events when, in the heat of the Ondo State political crises of that year, in which this writer was more than a mere onlooker, declared poignantly as follows:

    ‘People who always want to have their ways at all cost and never provide better arguments but rather want to force their petty ideas on others are anarchists and pocket despots who will ULTIMATELY FAIL’.

    Awo did not stop there.

    Hon Opeyemi Bamidele must be to Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the equivalent of what highly regarded Chief Akin Omoboriowo, of blessed memory, was to Awo. He loved Awo just as Papa loved him, even writing a book, Awoism: Select themes on the Complex Ideology of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, which we all trooped from Akure to Lagos to launch at an impressive ceremony at the Hotel Le Meridien, Victoria Island. How history repeats itself as tragedy simply because human beings refuse to learn from its lessons. Chief Omoboriowo’s decision to join the opposition NPN, led Awo to reflect as follows, as I suspect Tinubu must be doing under his breath about Bamidele at this moment:

    ‘My affection for Akin is undiminished. That is why I am anxious that he should be helped to redeem himself before he makes the final plunge. My concern for Akin is that he has worked himself up into an illusion (some prefer delusion) of grandeur: he now suffers from a kind of psychosis. He thinks and claims that he has majority following in Ondo State. He has nothing of the sort. It pains me much that Akin could be involved in this kind of mess’.

    Substitute Tinubu for Awo and Ekiti for Ondo in the above quote and you would be talking of Bamidele.

    What surprises really is exactly on what basis he reckons that he has a following at all, in Ekiti at this point in time. We do not only have a performing governor in Dr Kayode Fayemi, Opeyemi contested a senatorial primary election which, as a member of the Election Screening Committee in the state for the 2011 elections, appointed by the National Headquarters of the party, I knew only too well he did not win as he continues to claim. The first election was cancelled mid-way through a public announcement by the A C N State Chairman, Chief Jide Awe, on both the Ekiti Radio and Television stations when series of reports of fracas came from all over the state. The rerun, for which governor Adams Oshiomhole sent us five senior party men in Edo state to assist us, never saw the light of day as all we did the whole day was to join former state governors Dele Olumilua and Otunba Niyi Adebayo, Dr Fayemi and some state party elders to resolve the issues which arose from that first day in a marathon meeting that lasted for over three hours. Bamidele approached the matter like he would vaporize if he was not named the candidate.

    He would subsequently be gifted the House of Representatives ticket which somebody else had contested and won; a wholly undeserved ‘bending over backwards’ by the party, which I believe is the cause of all we are seeing today as it got him completely swollen headed. It is a part of that giddiness, that soul-less pride, that he believes, apparently without any reflection, that his town of birth could produce three governors in a state where a whole senatorial district has not produced one in decades and why his ‘popularity’ must be erected on a skirmish, any skirmish, each time he visits the state or anything is being done by his Bibire fraternity.

    Actually, unlike other would-be Labour Party governorship candidates in the Southwest, Opeyemi Bamidele is probably the only one who had to seek out governor Mimiko who nobody can blame for wanting a larger share of influence for his party in the geo-political zone except that he chose to do so working , unmistakably, for the PDP as a member of that party recentlyconfirmed.

    Ope had permitted himself to labour under the impression that the man who carried him on his shoulders throughout his senate odyssey, former governor Niyi Adebayo, was going to contest the senate seat in the Ekiti Central senatorial district. Fearful he might lose out completely since he comes from the same town as the former governor, and rather than seek Otunba Adebayo’s confidences, he had gone shopping for succour from wherever one can be found. From what we now know, PDP, even PDP, could very well have been his platform to become governor. Today, he does not even as much as greet Adebayo, all because he just must occupy an elective post, conveniently forgetting whatever relationship ever existed between them. That precisely is the nature of a vaulting ambition which, surprisingly, a columnist of The Nation’s Olakunle Abimbola’s prodigiousness , most probably for the sake of good old times as Asiwaju’s aides, sees as nothing more than an adjective. For him too, if a man cannot actualise his dreams in a union, he must be at liberty to rupture and cripple that union but , for me, what is bad is bad, and had Bamidele reflected deeply on his young life, especially his political trajectory, he should effortlessly have come to the conclusion that a shot at the Ekiti gubernatorial seat, in an election he can never win, whatever scientific rigging/ force PDP and Labour may be planning, was not worth his alienating Asiwaju Ahmed Tinubu who took him from nowhere politically, and ensured he was in top posts for 12 straight years in Lagos state which, by the way, happens not to be his state of origin.

    Such bewildering ingratitude!

    Fundamental human/constitutional rights must be exhibited within limits of decency.

  • This is no scare mongering

    This is no scare mongering

    Nigerians know from history that PDP has no two means of winning elections other than by rigging.

    In his electoral Beatitude in Jerusalem, President Jonathan promised a better electoral system saying, with glee, that ‘though we have challenges in our electoral system, at least, it is better than what it was yesterday.’  With due respect, Mr. President, I beg to disagree. A pattern of election rigging ahead of 2015 is emerging as any keen observer of recent elections in the country would readily affirm. And it is certainly not by happenstance; rather, it is a well choreographed test run of what will be put into play in the 2014 elections in both Ekiti and Osun, as well as, at least, the presidential election, come 2015. Of course, they will attempt to deploy the ‘Ondo template’ in Anambra where they will do everything to assist the president’s friend, Governor Peter Obi, to engineer the APGA candidate’s ‘victory’. Other candidates in that election, especially APC’s Senator Ngige, should, therefore, learn from Ondo and properly scutinise the voter’s register into which may have been imported hundreds of thousands of spurious names. They must insist on a public verification of the voters’ list which INEC tries its utmost to avoid whenever it is up to some dubious game. Examples of these recently compromised elections will further elucidate the point being made.

    Commenting on the Delta Central Senatorial bye election which held recently as a result of the unfortunate death of Senator Pius Ewherido, Ede Dafinone , the  DPP candidate in the election, has the following  to say of the electoral  process : ‘there was no election, as defined by our laws. The scale of impunity, assault, molestations and violence by the PDP, thugs/cultists and the supposed security agents was just unimaginable. The lopsided and partisan involvement of state security apparatuses in supporting the PDP and the brazen use of thugs to unleash violence and mayhem on our party members and the electorate is unprecedented. Thus there is now very serious concern for the progress of our nascent democracy and a diminishing hope for peace, unity and good governance in Nigeria, both now and in the immediate future’. The APC interim Publicity Secretary, Lai Mohammed, corroborated this and named specific areas where  all these were most pronounced, citing reports from APC agents on the field, who he said indicated that armed soldiers and policemen were deployed strategically to intimidate voters, while trailers and tankers were used to block the roads leading to opposition strongholds. A particularly dangerous dimension to PDP’s rigging methods was to suborn Youth Corps members to refrain from doing their legitimate electoral duties on the day, a fact which, in future, could expose these young persons to extreme danger or why would they take that particular day to protest non-payment of their allowances if they were not being instigated by those who have the most to lose?

    On the heels of that and within two weeks of each other, a whole state governor, Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State, also known to be the President’s friend , at least up until the last gubernatorial election in the state, had this to say of a local government election that was being held, unsuccessfully,  for the third time simply because the PDP’s ‘Ogas at the top’ thought they could, as of old, rail road victory, in spite of the huge development the local government has enjoyed under the incumbent governor unlike when they were in charge: ‘As a Nigerian, I am embarrassed that the police are involved in carrying electoral materials, arresting EDSIEC returning officers and coercing them into a police station and converting it into a collation centre supervised by policemen imported from Abuja and Lagos in order to subvert the will of the people of Esan North East. As a civilised man, I felt ashamed that men in uniform at rather very senior levels supervised this criminal act of the police in yesterday’s (Tuesday) election. A federal minister and other federal functionaries, including Assembly men used their exalted positions, taking unfair advantage of the police assigned to protect them and deployed them for election purposes, detaining returning officers and treating them as if they were prisoners of war and, under duress, compelling them to sign fake results and police becoming Returning Officers writing result sheets.’

    A comparison of the above quotes copiously corroborates the latest devilish devices of the PDP. But the question Nigerians must ask is this: if all these are happening in a state or local government election, what will they not do at the presidential? And that is not to forget the icing of the cake, the ‘Offa abracadabra’, where, in broad day light, the APC was robbed of its chairmanship victory even where everybody knows that the PDP could never have won.

    Nothing worries me more than the fact that even if INEC, the electoral umpire, was not complicit, ab initio; it is completely acquiescent of the illegalities. The Delta Resident Electoral Commissioner, a woman who nearly reminds one of the Ekiti experience, could therefore say, without a hint of shame, that “there can never be 100 per cent perfection in any election conducted anywhere in the world’. Does that remind you of plane crashes as an act of God? Wonders, they say, will never cease.  This was followed in the well-rehearsed choreography by the state Commissioner of Police, Ikechukwu Aduba, who said the bye-election was peaceful because his men were at all the voting centres to maintain law and order; the same policemen that stories abound were guarding ballot box snatchers.

    Nigerians know from history that PDP has no two means of winning elections other than by rigging. They rig even those elections they should ordinarily have won.  It is also well known that the much celebrated 2011 presidential election was massively rigged in the North as well as in the South-East where jumbo figures tumbled in.

    In Ekiti where the first of the 2014 elections will hold, not a whimper has been heard from the colony of about 16 wannabe PDP candidates since they, minus former Governor Ayo Fayose, met on or about 30 July, 2013, to jointly sign a communiqué supporting a consensus candidate. It would appear the party has now located its consensus candidate and what remains to be done is find the ‘official’ PDP candidate, the caricature candidate, that is, who will be utterly dumped by the party as happened to Sola Oke in Ondo State. As in the Ondo case, Abuja would spare nothing; not money, tonnes of it, not the entire Nigerian security apparati, for the Labour candidate while, like Oke, their own caricature candidate, will be left hard and dry. The poor gentleman, Sola Oke, in case you had forgotten, even had to carry his own can at the tribunal as PDP treated him like a wet rag. That is what they are perfecting for Ekiti, and it will not matter whoever that candidate is, even if it is Oga’s former boss. But somebody should tell them they are mistaken. In the first place, they will have more than 70 percent of Ekiti people to contend with whatever their nearby South-West Coordinator-General may be telling them in Abuja. They should be told too, in case they cannot see, the tremendous developmental achievements the incumbent governor will, on campaign carnivals, take to the Ekiti people who are already very appreciative of his accomplishments, even in just three years. They should know that while the PDP has no record of achievement in the state, except you reckon that six governors in seven years is one, their real candidate on the Labour Party platform would have a hell of a time explaining off moral turpitude; at least, that of biting the fingers that fed him so generously and the very party that gave him an unmerited political leverage, even gifting him a House of Representatives’ ticket he never contested for, not to talk of winning, as well as explain why he thinks Iyin-Ekiti, the beautiful town of decent people,  rich history and culture  where he comes from, deserves to produce three governors for Ekiti State, having produced our revered father and the Omoluabi first Executive  Governor of the state, Otunba Niyi Adebayo, even when an entire senatorial district in the state is yet to produce a single one and is crying marginalisation to high heavens. He will now officially be invited by us, his constituents, to personally identify those phantom constituency projects he has so elegantly claimed in publications but which the most due diligent search has not succeeded in locating; not bore holes, nor internet cafes, nothing. We, in Ekiti Central are certainly waiting for that 8th wonder of the world.

  • Better a national conference on corruption

    Better a national conference on corruption

    Nigerians, no, the  entire world, had known that corruption, not  even structure, is Nigeria’s greatest undoing

    It will be pretty difficult for any accusation of not wanting a national conference, called by whatever name, to be sustained against me. In articles upon articles on this page, I tried to call the rulers’ attention  to the need for a national conference at which Nigerians can take hold of their destinies by vigorously interrogating what manner of an ideal federal structure they should put in place to right the wrongs of amalgamation to which Nigerians made no contribution. I will rely on only two of such articles to properly situate my objection to the National Conference which the President recently pronounced and about which I will advise Nigerians not to invest much hope. The articles are: Why President  Jonathan  Should Convoke A National Conference Now,  19 May, 2013 and North’s Unnecessary Fears May Create A Federal Monster, 4 August, 2013.

    I began that of 19 May, 2013 by quoting from a forthcoming book by Professor Banji Akintoye, where he wrote: ‘If the Arewa North’s resistance to the restructuring of the federation continues to remain immovable, and the rest of Nigeria continues to be impotent to overcome that resistance, then indeed the much-to-be-feared mass uprisings will be more likely to come, and Nigeria will be more likely to break up’.

     I went further to say that “Under successive Northern Heads of state, civilian and military, scant if any , attention was paid to sustained  development policies in education or Agriculture, entrepreneurship, integrated rural development, large infrastructure procurement  in  roads, rails and transportation generally,  heavy industries, venture capital and micro-credit systems for small businesses development etc; failure to do which the Nigerian nation is reaping now in multiples, not only in crass under development but even in home grown terrorism. I then concluded as follows: ‘In order to build a peaceful, prosperous and powerful country that will take its rightful place in the comity of nations, there must be a deliberate move on the part of Mr President to structurally rejig Nigeria in a manner that will empower each part to  have autonomy  over much of its own affairs, so  that  each can develop at its own pace, practice whatever religion and adopt whatever economic models  that will  best suit its citizenry’.

    Unfortunately, that was at a time when the President believed, and was, indeed, confident, that his party, the PDP, was strong enough to again ride roughshod and make a mince meat of the small parties masquerading as opposition.  But two totally unexpected things happened. Like a bolt from the blues, and for the first time ever in Nigeria, three opposition political parties, the ACN, CPC and the ANPP with a vibrant wing of APGA, merged and were accordingly  registered by INEC as the All Progressives Congress, but worse was to come when the seemingly impregnable PDP crumbled; with a group of seven governors, a former Vice President and sundry other leading lights of the party dramatically walked out of its mini conference in  Abuja to form a splinter group.

    And the president panicked

    This so-called National conference is therefore the result of a Presidential think tank that went into over drive to get the President a breathing space. And he sure needed one with Boko Haram not going anywhere, in fact wreaking  more havoc and literally attacking at will,  the economy, on its belly as  result of massive oil thefts and a consuming 2015 presidential election ambition. The opposition, both internal and external, the think tank must have surmised, must  not only be checkmated  but must be maximally distracted while a distraught  President and his handlers ups the ante towards the 2015 elections which has since assumed a do or die status and for which he can give an eye. This obviously was why a President, who had raved and spurned the very idea of a national conference, could  suddenly turn a full 360 degrees to declare  a national conference with gusto and with the spectacle of  a national conference’s enemy-in-chief, the Senate President, David Mark, tagging along jauntily. They must both be congratulated for successfully believing that majority of Nigerians can be successfully fooled and going ahead to give it a try. This conference is the very equivalent of bones to the dogs and Nigerians are eagerly going to be at it for a while before they know what hit them. Or how many reports of this President’s many committees have seen the light of day critical though, we were told they all are? While the late President Yar Adua killed off issues  by remitting them to his National Security Adviser Mukhtar, example being the celebrated  Ekiti PDP bribes to INEC officials in 2009, President Jonathan achieves the same purpose by referring them to up committees.  I hope this latest one will not last, anyway, since the President has  himself given the game away by, I guess, mistakenly divulging that the National Assembly will have the  final say on what all Nigerians would have wasted precious time discussing with all manner of tempers. Again, happily for those who can see beyond their noses, that is a National Assembly which, in a mere constitution amendment exercise that has taken like forever, is dubiously planning to  completely undermine the states whilst creating a centre with limitless powers. So all-encompassing is the autocracy it is currently constructing that one cannot be accused of exaggeration if he says that Abuja would be turned into a monster should they succeed in getting those totally anti-state laws passed. It’s funny members were not shame-faced the other day when, in a federation where the citizenry is clamouring for autonomy, they announced ,with glee, that ‘the House has voted overwhelmingly to give full financial, administrative, executive and legislative autonomy to local government councils in Nigeria; making them a tier of government with a uniform four years tenure, regimenting their mode of exercising legislative power and abolishing Joint State Local Government Account which they replaced with the “Local Government Council Allocation Account.’  So, the least these fellows would do will be to shred any conference recommendation that  goes against their fascist tendencies by conferring any modicum of autonomy on states.

    Before Mr Walter Carrington, former U.S Ambassador came the other day to lay it bare in Ilorin, Nigerians, no, the  entire world knew that corruption, not structure, however warped,  is Nigeria’s greatest undoing. Declared the former envoy as he was being awarded a honorary degree at the University of Ilorin: “corruption is the most terrible monster that confronts Nigeria, and, I am certain that virtually all the problems associated with governance would be removed if we can summon the courage to tackle corruption and banish it from our activities adding that development does not have a bigger enemy than corruption and also that the development of Nigeria is hinged on ridding politics from corruption and corrupt practices’.

    Should we need a home grown ‘Carrington’ on corruption, Opeyemi Agbaje should please step forward. Wrote Agbaje on the consequences of corruption not too long ago: ‘‘Corruption means that at least 100 million Nigerians live on less than a dollar per day; it means that thousands of infants die before their first birthday due to poverty. It means that life expectancy for the average adult Nigerian is less than 50 years; that millions of destinies are ruined as lack of educational facilities ensures that individuals who have the intellectual potential to be university professors end up only as primary school teachers! I am convinced that corruption has reached a stage at which, if not drastically curtailed, it will destroy Nigeria’. The reality is, indeed, far worse since it means high and  intolerable maternal deaths, pensioners dying on queues, court decisions going to the highest bidder, two different auditor’s reports for same company, police ex torsions and armed gangs claiming they too want their own share of the largesse, to mention but a few. Not surprisingly, a recent study has shown that not jut te Nigerian police, but its ant-corruption agencies, namely, EFCC and  ICPC themselves,  rank highest in corruption.

    Can somebody, in view of al these and  the deleterious consequences of corruption on our country, please tell Mr President to convert this national conference to one on CORRUPTION?

    That way he would serve Nigeria better than by this stampede to nowhere

  • A peep into Fayemi’s second term

    A peep into Fayemi’s second term

    Kayode Fayemi’s second term, built solely on  the grace of God, and  excellent performance is already assured 

    When I indicated last week that this Sunday’s article will be a peep into Fayemi’s 2nd term, some people must have wondered whether I am a Nostradamus or simply playing god. I answer no, to both charges as all I am going to do, like the typical student of society, is to critically interrogate events and trends and from them, draw justifiably valid conclusions. Writing in The Nation of Monday, October 14, 2013, Sam Omatseye, the paper’s Editorial Board Chairman, observed as follows : ‘When on 16, October 2010, governor Fayemi was sworn in, I wrote in this column about the high road ahead of him, and wondered how he was going to tackle a state so idealistic, yet so forlorn. Within a year and half, I drove through the streets of Ado-Ekiti, and witnessed a transformation at variance with what obtained while I left the city on the day of his swearing in: the streets narrow, unlit and dust-laden, the houses discoloured, the brow of its inhabitants shorn of optimism, Ekiti did not seem, even with its new chaperon’s good intentions, capable of the lift you see in its streets today’.

    Also writing on the same subject, 23 December, 2012, my brother, Tunde Fagbenle, said: ‘over the years, even those little graces -earlier itemised – had wilted and become virtually the stuff of distant memories. Ekiti land, with all its vaunted brains, had proved not immune to the malaise of a country gone to the dogs; the fate that befell her had befallen virtually the entire old West. Successive (PDP) governments had been preoccupied with the glamour and self-opportunities of office. Lacking in depth, vision and commitment, governance was essentially cosmetic and nothing beyond how to share the monthly dole from Abuja between individual pockets and token gestures of attention to desolate infrastructure within the governor’s very limited horizon’. What they failed to mention with every justified specificity is that from whichever direction you are entering Ekiti today, the minute you hit a smoothly paved road, and could sleep seamlessly if you are chauffeur-driven, you can be sure you are in Ekiti. Such is the amazing network of roads the administration has delivered in three years that you would not but marvel.

    To the chagrin of not a few, I have myself written so copiously about these achievements that many are beside themselves with rage but what do I care since these are self-evident things. I have written, ad nauseam too, that a scintilla of apology, I have not, on that score since the Holy Writ admonishes us to adore and seek the good of our little Jerusalem. Indeed, anyone in doubt about my adulation of an administration wholly in the service of Ekiti people should do what the journalist in Tunde Fagbenle did – visit: to see that of a truth: FAYEMI IS TESTED AND TRUSTED, as was boldly captured on one of the signposts at the mammoth 3rd Anniversary Rally in Ado-Ekiti on Wednesday, 16, October, 2013 which, not even the very busy, highly regarded Ekiti icon, Aare Afe Babalola, a lover of good things, could afford to miss.

    Omatseye and Fagbenle’s words above vividly capture the Ekiti experience until the inauguration of the Fayemi administration and, as the immortal Awo says, since the raison d’etre of government is to work for the good and happiness of the greater majority of its citizenry, there is not the faintest hope, that the good people of Ekiti will ever again elect to go back to those days of rudderlessness and outright profanity, of six governors in seven years – indeed, one was for a day. And because the Ekiti people have twice demonstrated, at elections, that they would see those Egyptians no more, it follows syllogically and realistically, that Fayemi’s second term is, by the grace of God, already assured.

    But didn’t I recently write on this page that power is not served ala carte, especially in Nigeria with the PDP’s ever inventive rigging machine permanently at work? Without a doubt, that party, with its many lackeys and quislings, its Labour Party shadowy ally, and all, it will stop at nothing in its attempt to hang on to its induced minor irritation within the APC in the state , to attempt to rig the 2014 election in the manner of the Offa broad day robbery and the more recent macabre dance in the Edo Bye election where it was alleged security men fragrantly protected ballot box snatchers. Add to this, the story going the rounds in the entire Southwest today, that President Jonathan intends to make the Ekiti and Osun elections a staging post for his 2015 ambition and you know there can be no putting anything beyond a party that has been so thoroughly savaged in the Southwest. But they will need to think again. We have asked those of them who still bother to read to go read, or re-read, Dare Babarinsa’s ‘House of War’ and to remember that Ekiti was an integral part of those historic days in Ondo state. Happily, they can boast of some key dramatis personae of that era among their leaders. It was also in circumstances such as this, that I told, then President Yar’ Adua, when our own Yoruba men of power advised him to inundate Ekiti with soldiers ahead the rerun election that, to ever successfully rig again in Ekiti, he would have to come accompanied with coffins since he would have to literally kill Ekitis to the last man.

    And that, incidentally, was at a time Ekiti people did not know Fayemi beyond his democracy activism and, therefore, a time when good governance, security of life and property, multi-sectoral development and care for the needy and the elderly among us, were mere dreams. That was also a time when, to savour a good road, you would have to take a trip to Fashola’s Lagos state. But Fayemi we now know, in words and work, in commitment and focus, very much beyond description.

    We are well aware that the PDP is no lover of good things. To dispute this, they should point us to their worthwhile legacies, over an 8-year period, across the Southwest whose education they ran aground and left with a depleted and decaying infrastructure. Even with President Obasanjo in office, the Ibadan-Benin Road, which traverses major Southwest cities, was broken into two at Igbara-Oke and you were lucky if your car survived a journey. Week in, week out, at the end of his every Federal Executive Committee meeting, multi-billion naira contracts were announced for various irrigation projects in the North with none ever coming to the Southwest. So appalling was it that at AGBAJO YORUBA, a nascent Pan-Yoruba Socio-Cultural organisation under the interim leadership of Lt. General Akinrinade, a rapid response team, headed by respected Professor Jide Osuntokun, was set up to decry the complete marginalisation of the Southwest. I laughed the other day when I saw them now head to Abuja, their tails behind their backs, to confront the president with allegations of Southwest marginalisation. It is funny, a people who know nothing beyond self, as exemplified by their poster boys, Chief Bode George and Kashamu permanently being at each other’s throat, think they can deceive Yoruba people again.

    Like their compatriots in Lagos, Ogun, Oyo, Osun, Ekiti people have seen the light and can no longer be deceived. Visit any of these states today and try to mentally picture what it was like a mere five years ago (minus Lagos). In Oyo all you remember is a skin-toning governor superintending over the dirtiest city in Africa. Visit today and see the Ajimobi wonder; the very reason some lazy bones are wimping over a bridge all, but a few, commend. Think of Ogun and what readily comes to mind is the Wale Adedayo’s alleged experience. Osun was under a soldier who is today having his comeuppance, while in Ekiti it was one day one trouble.

    Every PDP wannabe governorship candidate in Ekiti or Osun should come back home and point to what he/she did for his community after so many years of Abuja derived opulence. Happily too, Baba has gone, and there can be no more ‘fehingbepon’ – impunity – or a rehash of any mama losing her Christian conscience. Ekiti will be too vigilant for them this time around as we, historically, do not fight unless you went out of your way to want to play us. It is then you see the lion in these genial people of honour. Those among them who would be tempted to play lackeys for the sake of ‘oyele’ (oil) money or appointments, should therefore think twice; as by the special grace of God, Kayode Fayemi’s second term, built solely on the grace of God, and excellent performance, is already assured.

  • Fayemi: I have never been enlisted in a worthier cause

    Fayemi: I have never been enlisted in a worthier cause

    when he  says  his government  will do so and so  for a community, that community can literally go to sleep in complete  trust that  he will not fail them.

    I seek the indulgence  of  readers, following upon my last week article, to  briefly touch on the matter  of the National Conference and  ask a few questions  from those  who still  see  the conference as  the  ‘deus ex machina’  to Nigeria’s multitude of problems. Let me first and foremost; concede that of a truth, President Jonathan, for the love of country, had a change of mind. Are we to ‘ipso facto’,  assume that Mr David Mark, the Senate President was, by some telepathy or an angelic visitation, suddenly divinely  instructed to equally change his own mind or has the Nigerian sovereignty, to which he had hung his opposition like forever,  unknown to us lesser Nigerians,  suddenly taken leave of his National Assembly?

    This could still jolly well be a happy coincidence. But what then are we to   make of the Pauline conversion of Chairman Tukur, the relentlessly sabre-rattling boss of the ruling party who, only some days before the Independence Day Presidential declaration, wanted  Baraje and company  behind bars, to  suddenly  go soft,  go  on bended knees,  begging the same Baraje to bury the hatchet and join him  in presenting  a united front at the conference?   Are we to assume that all these three persons, and more, are united by love of country?  Can’t Nigerians see this Greek gift and well calibrated diversion, thrown like meat to the dog for the simple aim of keeping it busy on a useless piece of bone?

     Let me equally hazard a guess: in some very coy ways, Nigerians will soon come to see very senior academics, well known for their brilliance, recruited to interrogate the scheme as we saw in the IBB SAP debates. It is a beaten path of unscrupulous politicians cleverly leveraging on these individuals’ integrity.  After all, a night or two at the NICON NOGA will not be a bad idea. Fortunately, there is nothing we cynics can do as it has become a ‘fait accompli. But I will be mightily surprised if the cynics do not laugh last.

     As we wind down to the 3rd anniversary of the inauguration of the  Fayemi administration in Ekiti state, it is apposite for me to take a critical look at a man, and a period, in my home state, which have been  truly phenomenal. I am currently writing a book; not an autobiography, nor one to give earth-shaking behind-the-news  stories  of  epochal political decisions,  having really never been a  politician  in the Nigerian sense;  but one in which I have solemnly declared that, and I quote: ‘ I have never been enlisted in a worthier cause than that of Dr Kayode Fayemi’. And that is neither talking glibly nor intended to patronise.  I have been privileged to be part of building a University from scratch just as I have worked very closely for upwards of three years  with eminent Yoruba citizens, among them the likes of  Lt. General  Alani Akinrinade, Dr Amos Akingba, Professors  Bolaji Akinyemi, Jide Osuntokun, Wale Omole,  Rear Admiral Akin Aduwo, Taiwo Alimi,  Mrs Tola Adenle, Mrs Dupe Ajayi- Gbadebo and Dr Dele Sobowale, to mention but a few, in mid-wifing  a Pan-Yoruba  Socio-Cultural organisation,  but seeing how Fayemi has fundamentally impacted  on Ekiti, my primary community;  his focus,  determination , commitment and self denial,  I have nothing but thanks to God that I am found lining behind a man of such  integrity  in his unstinting service to Motherland.  A man  to  whom, in his back,   Ekiti people have  recently  added  another  appellation  to his ‘ILUFEMILOYE 1’ , as they now call him O WI BE SE BE – ( certainly not deifying him), but  saying that this is a man who, when he  says  his government  will do so and so  for a community, that community can literally go to sleep in complete  trust that  he will not fail them. Such has been his believability that every city, town, village, hamlet and every human settlement in the state has, at least,  one project, completed or on-going. This is, of course, not surprising since his government’s annual budget is structured bottom up as  he and his  team  visit all nooks and cranny of the state to identify the peoples’ needs which then form the locus of the year’s budget. Whatever could not be accommodated that year is an automatic item in the next budget.

    This article is therefore not solely about enumerating brick and mortar, important though they are as it will also dwell on the Fayemi persona. He has remained truthful, not only to the state but, fundamentally, to himself. He has therefore spared nothing towards achieving his promise of making poverty history in the state – a pivotal part of his 8-Point Agenda. This obviously is not a 100 metre dash but rather, a long distance, multi-faceted project which he has followed with every sinew of his being. I once described him as a product of his upbringing and this has helped him greatly. Not one to carry position on his head, his calmness and simplicity – You need to have seen his equanimity fighting those men playing  god for his mandate – have all  made him extremely  easy to work with. Not for him the airs and garrulity so common with public office holders  in our country. Everything he does attests to these and as all, except the thoroughly politically jaundiced would see, he has become a man  after everybody’s heart:  serving as the pivot  of not only his Regional Governors’ Forum but a distinct leader of both the Progressive Governors Forum  and  the much-feared Nigerian Governors Forum, just as he is  a leading light of the All Progressives Congress Party, where those who should know, attest to his sterling contributions. One thing that particularly gratifies me is that when in those uncertain days I, at great risk,  elected to line behind him, people in power were eagerly seeking my support.

    At his inauguration on October 16, 2010, Dr Kayode Fayemi declared: ‘As am ushered into the governor’s office in Ado-Ekiti, make no mistake about it, I will ensure that you the good people of Ekiti state, own this government. I will do this by redesigning my agenda through the village square and town hall meetings. I promise to ‘democratise  governance, modernise agriculture, improve infrastructure, promote free and qualitative education towards the development of functional human capital, provide free health and social security to the disadvantaged sectors of our state; ensure industrial development, tourism and sustainable development as well as promote gender equality and women empowerment’.

    Dr Fayemi has never looked back.

    Today, education which had  reached its nadir in the state has since turned the corner. In addition to free education up to secondary school level and improvements in infrastructure and teacher quality, a total of 183 secondary schools and 836 primary schools have been renovated. Equally 48,000 laptops were distributed to secondary school students as additional 25,000 are already on order. The result was a quantum leap in the last WAEC results in the state which went from about 20 percent last year to about 70 per cent this year. Agriculture has been socialized and today over 20,000 youth have enrolled in the YCAD –the Youth Commercial Agricultural programme – in which they are not only trained in agricultural practice, given implements and additives but  also  given seed money. The programme is now being aggressively aided by a massive irrigation programme funded from the combined constituency projects of majority of the state’s National Assembly members.

    Health has received such a massive boost that only this past week, the Adunni Olayinka Diagnostic and Wellness Centre in honour of our unforgettable late Deputy Governor, for an array of cancer screening for early detection, was commissioned by the governor. This year, all hospitals in the state are being renovated and are to be more equipped.

    The mother of all the Fayemi quiet revolution is the unprecedented N5000, monthly  social security stipend to the elderly which now goes to no less than 25000 over 70 year-old citizens of the state.

    These wonderful efforts are replicated in every sector of governance.

    The governor is ably assisted in all these by two main persons and his entire team, namely,  his wife, Erelu Bisi Fayemi. Those interested in knowing more about this Amazon should please read my article: ELECT ONE, GET TWO, 19 June, 2011 which, in fact must now read like ancient history given her new exploits in empowering our people. The other is Professor Dupe Adelabu, who has fitted seamlessly into the Deputy Governor’s position. She was before her new appointment, the Chairman of the State SUBEB and remains a strong force in the trajectory of education in the state. As things stand today, Ekiti people could not have asked for more. Yet, there are lots more from where all  these came. To God be the glory.

     Next week – A peep into  Fayemi’s 2nd term

  • APC: Power is never served a la carte

    APC: Power is never served a la carte

    President Jonathan looks to me a much more desperate politician than erstwhile President Obasanjo

    Power is never served a la carte’, is a regular refrain of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, former Lagos State governor, and now one of the leading lights of the opposition party, the All Progressives Congress. He should know. He has bruises to show for his many battles against power, i.e entrenched impunity in our country which, like corruption, fights back very ferociously in aid of the status quo of power without responsibility, except to self.  This once led former President Olusegun Obasanjo to make one of his most important statements ever when, at a PDP congress, he said the party existed, or was at best, cohered only by patronage or the expectation of it.  Both the PDP and the incumbent president have shown beyond any doubt that they will brook no opposition nor concede any quarters to the opposition in the titanic 2015 battle. As far as they are concerned, going by what they do and what we hear their militant supporters say, nothing is sacrosanct; not individuals, not the very existence of Nigeria as a united country. Therefore, as you read this, a sitting governor has no Aide de camp, no chief security officer and the Nigeria Police can look askance, like the governor’s security is no longer a concern of theirs even as certified militants bay for his blood. All this because of an alleged ambition they won’t even let him declare. Nor are their members of only a few months back, but now of the New PDP, fairing any better.

    Consisting of seven governors and a number of leading members of the PDP –they have not defected – they must now, like governor Amaechi, no longer sleep. Indeed, if the PDP has its way, not only Baraje and Oyinlola, but also Obasanjo and Atiku will be behind bars while plans are hatched as to how to truly, and manifestly, humble those seven governors who have the temerity to call attention to the Tukur-led crippling political repression in their party.

    I have gone all this length to properly situate what humongous battle lies ahead of those wanting this county to take its rightful place in the comity of nations and not be seen simply as the domicile of corruption and ineptitude because, even with all the make-belief, President Jonathan looks to me a much more desperate politician than erstwhile President Obasanjo. It must be said, in mitigation though, that while he does not look personally desperate he is simply incapable of reining in those who want him to literally commit murder for the sake of 2015.

    Without a doubt, the most at risk are leaders of the APC and, ipso facto, the party itself. A little history will help but space will not allow details.

    For just being considered stubborn and vociferous, a PDP president decreed  that the licence of Orji Uzor Kalu’s Slot Airline be  withdrawn and hundreds of his employers thrown into the unemployment market just as Tinubu, for the same alleged offence, had billions of naira due Lagos State local governments withheld. The minute Buba Marwa was touted as the ANPP presidential candidate, and becoming rather threatening to the Third Term project, it was  time for the EFCC to move against him and get him detained him for weeks in December 2005, on allegations of laundering money for General Abacha.

    On Thursday, 7 September 2006, the Senate heard that an Administrative Panel set up by President Obasanjo had found Atiku guilty of utilising funds in the account of the Petroleum Development Trust Fund for personal use while it said nothing of same funds being used to buy a car for a female acquaintance of the president. All that for opposing the Third Term agenda even if some spurious reasons of an American report were to be given later. In similar circumstances, Freedom Radio was shut down, Africa Independent Television (AIT) was serially embarrassed and intimidated and its transmission equipment near the National Assembly was destroyed because it ran the Senate hearings.

    All these again to forewarn leaders of the APC that they must remain focused amidst intimidation of all types. Lies and all manners of concoctions will be levelled against them individually but they must, for the sake of Nigeria, brace up and be men of principles. It will not only be scare-mongering but bribes will be offered too, in a carrot and stick, double-pronged attack. A good example is what happened to Hon Nairu Dantiye of the ANPP during the Third Term campaigns.  On rejecting his own N50m, he was freshly offered one million dollars in cash, at night on Thursday, 11 May, 2006 , at a hotel in Abuja.  As he told Punch in an interview published on Monday, 15 May, 2006: ‘My price shot up like crude oil about three days ago. It increased from N50m naira to one million dollars’.  But the failure of the offerer to guarantee that he would live long enough to enjoy the loot, which was his counter offer, vitiated the deal. Even oil blocks were offered. This presidency may not be averse to any of these ploys to ensure Jonathan returns in 2015. APC leaders must, therefore, have honourable Alhaji Dantiye at the back of their minds when their own temptations come.

    And one has already come in the latter-day readiness of President Jonathan to approve the convocation of a National Conference. As usual, this is already trending on the wide web and I have had my say too. Below are some of the comments I have already offered.

    My first was a poser to some mails: Must you really put any stock by this Greek gift? Don’t you by any means remember the SAP debates? Didn’t IBB get his required time to plan the never, never transition programme? What about Yar Adua’s Uwais Committee on Electoral Reforms? Where did it lead to? Were this a year ago, when President Jonathan still had PDP intact, I just might have given this a thought. But today, in my view, it is nothing more than a well calculated diversion and one must give it to the Jonathan ‘2015 Think Tank’. The choice of Senator Okunrounmu as Chairman was, for me, the clincher’.

    Critics of my position wrote back and I replied: Please let’s do a reality check, beginning from the basics; the president can only be doing this if he believes it will help him electorally in 2015. Then the following. 1. The Southwest has been most vociferous about a Sovereign National conference and one of its prime demands is fiscal federalism. Let us assume Okunrounmu is dexterous enough to get this. Will it make the Southwest – now with APC governments and most likely to field a strong presidential candidate – prefer Jonathan, as happened in 2011?   2. I believe also, that we can safely assume that the majority of northerners will detest fiscal federalism. Will that decision therefore hurt or help the president in 2015?  In my view, this will serve no more than good photo ops and beautiful newspaper headlines

    An avalanche of views, even a possible agenda for the conference, then came in and I wrote back as follows:  Even on this podium we already have suggestions as to people wanting representatives on the basis of the 774 Local Government Areas, who, of course, must, in their words, not be politicians. Very fine by me. Now you allude to the Southwest Integration effort. Assuming that this were acceptable to everybody in that zone, marshalling it will then bog down the All Progressives Congress and thereby achieve what I personally consider one of the main targets of this ploy – diversion. Of course, the president has already succeeded by diverting attention to the talk show as you are no longer going to hear of such things as the president’s  ‘cluelessness’,  as was previously the case. And how do you approve decisions of a conference which is not sovereign and where the north already has much more than half the numbers in the National Assembly? Why is the president allowing it now with all the raging challenges he faces?  Also, has he decreed the National Assembly out of existence, since he once said it can’t happen as long as that body was in place?

    I concluded my contribution as follows and tried to respond to views that this should, indeed, be an opportunity for ‘pastors’, not politicians, to straighten the cause  of our country:

    I can’t remember how nice it is to be led by the nose.

    Fortunately, even if out of self interest, those politicians we want exempted this time around, are at their best when the government is out to send them on a frolic. I guess they would rather err on the side of caution. They are most unlikely to fall for this presidential trick.

    Enough history, then, for APC leaders.

  • Energy policy: Comparing the UK with Nigeria

    Energy policy: Comparing the UK with Nigeria

    If only for the ferocity of Al Shabaab’s man’s inhumanity  to man, as witnessed by the 21, September  horrendous  attack at the  Westgate Shopping Mall in  Kenya – that  heart-rending event,  which should be a wake-up call for mall owners in Nigeria, deserves a pride of place as our topic of interrogation this Sunday.  However, given that life has become generally short and brutish in Nigeria, no thanks to Boko Haram and the unceasing group assassinations in Plateau and Kaduna South, we can very well pay our respects to the victims of the Kenya attack, empathise with their relations and move on with our numbing insecurity, praying that our own number is not yet up.

    My current vacation in the UK coincides with the conferences of the various political parties – both the Liberal Democrats and Labour have had theirs, and that of the Conservative Party is slated for September 29 – 0ctober 2,  and  apart from seeing a bit of the Labour Dem’s, I have watched a live coverage of Labour’s  literally all week and together with what I have seen and read of the  Conservative Carty, I have come to observe a major difference in the politics of developed and so-called developing economies, namely: the fact that  governments  in the former put the people at the centre of their policies, while those in the latter are mostly concerned with selves. I am, in this article, taking Nigeria as archetypical of developing countries and I shall zero in strictly on energy policy in both the U.K and Nigeria. Incidentally, and fortunately, the federal government has complete monopoly over energy in Nigeria. This, I must say, however, has a lot to do with the level of enlightenment in each society and the increased activism of civil societies. For instance, at the party conferences, I saw NGO contributions, especially from women and equality groups, I have never witnessed in Nigeria.

    Ed Milliband’s bombshell on energy at the Labour Conference has clearly shown the fact that in their various ways, the political parties always hoist their policies on what they consider best for the people. Only this way can they win elections.

    According to the party leader, a Labour government, come 2015, ”will freeze gas and electricity prices until the start of 2017. Your bills will not rise. It will benefit millions of families and millions of businesses. It’s time to reset the market. So we will pass legislation in our first year in office to do that and have a regulator that will genuinely be on the customers’ side but also enable the investment we need. The price freeze would save a typical household £120 and an average business £1,800 over the 20-month period and would cost the energy firms an estimated £4.5bn.”

    The Nigerian reader of this article may wish to mentally imagine President  Jonathan  or any of his policy wonks say that of our oil companies and off  goes the billions of campaign funds expected from that sector, come 2015. Of course, you will never see them make that mistake.

    Blindsided by Miliband’s radical stance, Ed Davey, the Energy and Climate Change Secretary quickly replied, PDP-speak, and I quote; ‘everyone wants to help with the cost of rising bills but we need to be sensible. The best way to keep everyone’s bills down is to help people to save energy, ensure fair tariffs and encourage competition’. He would go on, like your typical Diezani Allison-Madueke, to line behind the operators and say: ‘they do not seem to be making excess profits,’ while they now make an average of 105 pounds profit per customer where it was zero per average customer this time last year.

    It is obvious, though, that the Conservative Party is working for the high and mighty in society.

    Given the Lib’s far less possibility of ever forming the government – indeed, Mr Clegg says he is ready to work with either party come 2015, it has a more nuanced energy policy. According to him, ‘Climate change is getting worse and could destroy the British way of life. Our children will suffer most if we don’t act now. He says further: ‘I believe that there is a huge opportunity to get out of this recession by going green, strengthening the economy, creating new jobs and improving the quality of people’s lives and that companies should simplify the complicated tangle of different tariffs, requiring them to charge families less for a basic amount of energy used, to encourage responsible use. We believe there should also be a fair social tariff system for disadvantaged families, smart meters should be rolled out to all households within five years and all of Britain’s homes should be insulated to a decent standard within 10 years.’ Although each of these policy positions has been subjected to withering criticisms, what is obvious is that each party considers the place of the people in its policy formulations unlike what obtains in our country where those in government not only share money meant for increased energy, but also work hand in gloves with those responsible for privatisation to enable them buy our common patrimony for almost nothing.

    And what is the situation in Nigeria?

    Thinking only of those in their class, officials of the Nigerian Energy Commission have increased energy bills from year to year but nothing can be more nauseating than Sam Amadi’s claim that what they have is not an increase but a ‘Multi-Year-Tariff Order’ which provided a 15-year tariff path for the Nigerian electricity industry. He further claimed, irritatingly, that they are only charging for services they provide. But where is the electricity? Has he noticed that in cases where cables are cut from poor homes and carried to their ramshackle offices for weeks, monthly bills still come unerringly, even higher? What type of operators are these?

    In a well-researched article in the journal of International Association for Energy Economics, Akin Iwayemi recently showed that Nigerian energy industry is ‘probably one of the most inefficient globally’. This, he says, is most evident in the persistent disequilibrium in the markets for electricity and petroleum products, especially kerosene and diesel.  According to him ‘the dismal energy service provision has adversely affected living standards of the population and exacerbated income and energy poverty in an economy where the majority of the people live on less than $2 a day’. Continuing, he wrote: ‘Yet, though energy and income poor, Nigeria is energy resource rich, ranked, as it is, the sixth largest exporter of crude oil in the world.’  In his view, ‘Nigeria’s persistent energy crisis has weakened the industrialisation  process,  and significantly  undermined the effort to achieve sustained economic growth, increased competitiveness of domestic industries in domestic, regional and  global markets and employment generation’.

    And to imagine that it is for this same resource a harebrained, reconstructed militant now wants to dismember Nigeria, urging President Jonathan to imprison everybody in sight, as if he were the courts.

    The above questions may be out of place now that they say they have privatised the PHCN. So what happens to the fixed bill and the 15-year tariff order? Or was that put in place so they and their friends who they knew would buy the power discos can maximise profit? What should the average Nigerian electricity consumer expect now with regard to the fixed rates?

    Unfortunately, unlike in Britain where campaign funding is regulated and listed companies cannot be found on the list of such donors, the Neighbour to Neighbour of Nigeria have been found to be nothing more than veritable sources of attracting campaign funds from individuals as well as corporate bodies that have benefited maximally from the federal government.

    As long as this immoral practice continues unabated, our institutions and agencies will remain weak and corruption will remain the order of the day. INEC must therefore come up with an Electoral Law that will provide rules which can only be breached at the expense of very serious repercussions to political parties and the conniving individuals.

    This impunity must stop. It weakens government and will continue to see Nigeria sink lower in the comity of nations.

    There just has to be a limit to impunity.