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Category: Sunday

The rise of pidgin punditry

And whilst we are still on the subject of the soccer extravaganza now waltzing its way to its glorious finale at the iconic Lusail Stadium in Doha, it is meet to report on one of the impressive bye-products of the tournament. It is the rise of pidgin soccer punditry. Yours sincerely had been socially and intellectually conditioned to view pidgin language as an inferior mode of communication favoured by the lower classes and the animated hoi polloi. But this tournament shattered that elitist delusion.

One could understand the social leveler and recalcitrant rebel in Prince Charles, now Kings Charles, lapsing into pidgin language on a royal visit to Nigeria. “God don butter my bread”, the old contrarian famously crowed to wild applause. But when one discovered that pidgin commentary had become semi-official among some of the listed channels, one felt it was a joke taken too far.

But it has turned out that the joke was actually on the aging columnist. On a second attempt and having taken time to listen to the actual commentary, one felt completely bowled over. It was a moveable feast of rich and illuminating soccer punditry laced with social, political and historical bon mots and delivered in the racy almost breathless tempo of pidgin conversation. The commentariat demonstrated a deep grasp of the dynamics of the game and a remarkable awareness of positional play.

It is with a deep sense of historic responsibility that one must now call on African nations to examine the possibility of elevating Pidgin English to the status of the official language of commerce, sports and politics on the continent. Something new always comes out of Africa indeed.

December 18, 2022
The World Cup according to Cervantes

It is just as well that the highly imaginative world of soccer segues into literary symbolism. There are times when a living spectacle is just too good to be true; when reality strains the borders of the magical and when both chronicle and the chronicler are part of the entertainment. This week, your columnist takes leave of the political affray on ground to entertain readers of this column with the improbable soccer extravaganza now winging its way to an explosive finale in Qatar.

For about a month, the entire world, particularly the soccer-loving buffs and aficionados of the game, sat glued to their television or phones as national teams dueled in the hot and sultry Qatari desert now made lush and sumptuously livable. The atmosphere on the field was even more electrifying. It was an explosion of soccer talents and feats of mesmerizing artistry on a scale hardly seen before.

The jury is out. This is about the most remarkable world cup in the history of the game. It had everything: drama, suspense, excitement, class and what the Americans call pizzazz. There was also the odd sense of satisfaction one gets as an underdog when a great footballing nation is upended by one of the minnows.

It makes the misery to go round. All in all, the Qataris have done themselves and the developing world proud. They have shown that nothing is impossible when big bucks meet high passion and higher patriotism.

But let us not race too far ahead of the narrative. Who on earth is Cervantes? Miguel de Cervantes was an aristocratic Spanish writer of the late sixteenth century who is still regarded as Spain’s greatest writer ever and the father of the modern novel. Although of high born Spanish nobility, he was also convinced that the feudal order with its tradition of chivalry and civility was on its way to extinction.

Accordingly, Cervantes’ greatest novel, Don Quixote, chronicles the quixotic adventures of a Spanish knight of the expiring feudal order as he tries to stop the unstoppable, tilting and fencing at the windmill. It was a doomed quest marked by much hilarity and frenzied hyperactivity. But it allows Cervantes a brilliant opportunity to showcase to the reader how history and societies evolve. No force or power on earth can stop a people, nation, society or class whose time has come.

Like Cervantes’ brilliant expose of the inevitability of change and the evolution of human society, the 2022 World Cup is also suffused with the telling symbolism of inevitable change in the global soccer suzerainty and pecking order. The old order changeth indeed. Like human classes on the make, the ascendant nations are grabbing and grasping, dynamic and full of energy; whereas the old soccer powers, except one or two who still have something to prove, appeared lethargic and utterly laidback.

The soccer world took early notice of this changing order and evolving dynamics in the opening rounds of play when Saudi Arabia beat Argentina and Cameroons beat Brazil. Having been severely mauled by less fancied opponents, Germany crashed out of the tournament without as much as a whimper while both Portugal and Spain survived by the skin of their teeth but not for much longer.

Meanwhile, the emerging soccer powerhouses of the East and Central Europe, the new samurais of soccer such as Japan, South Korea, Croatia and Serbia were behaving very much like terrorist squads unleashed upon the world. They were merciless and implacable.

Once Brazil succumbed to the hereditary lassitude of allowing Croatia to equalize thus forcing the game into penalty kicks, many astute watchers who knew the Eastern Europeans were master craftsmen of penalty dead-balls could sense another Brazilian soccer tragedy in the air. And the samba maestros were bundled out.

The sight of Neymar and Cristiano Ronaldo crying their heart out as they slouched out of the stadium after their countries had been defeated was particularly heartrending. They tell the story of how more than any other contemporary sports, football has emerged as the new leitmotif of modern nationalism.

During the 1982 World Cup tournament, Brian Clough, the eccentric but gifted manager of Nottingham Forest club, was asked on prime television what he thought were England’s chances against the highly regarded German team which played with Teutonic thoroughness and Robot-like precision. The rogue contrarian retorted that he saw no problem since England had already beaten the Germans twice. He was not referring to football but the two world wars.

And who can forget the infamous chortle of Diego Amanda Maradona who insisted that he enjoyed his first goal against England better because it was akin to picking the pocket of the English? His country having been humiliated by England in war over the Falkland Islands, the former pick pocket from the slums of Buenos Aeries, thought the best way to get even was on the other front. And boy, did he not.

In its extreme manifestation, men have been killed in the name of soccer and for committing what was deemed as treason against their nation. Two Latin American countries have gone to war over soccer disputes. In Africa, it was said that Emperor Bokassa, the madman of Ubangi-Shari, once ordered the entire football team of his country to be stripped and publicly caned for daring to lose a match against the national team of his arch-enemy across the Ubangi-Shari River.

In the seventies, the losing Italian finalists had to be hurriedly ferried across to a military airbase for safe disembark after it was discovered that a hostile crowd wielding cudgels and sticks was waiting to receive them at the main airport. Surely, if they knew how to lose effortlessly, they must also learn how to endure punishment without much ado. It reminds one of the film, Divorce: Italian Style.

Despite Neymar’s torrid tears, history and experience have taught one never to be unduly sentimental about the fate and fortunes of the brilliant but eternally disappointing Brazilians, the world’s favourite soccer nation. Its 1982 World Cup soccer squad was arguably the most outrageously talented Brazilian team ever.

The team of Zico, Socrates, Falcao, Junior and Eder—he of the magical looping and dipping shot which left goalkeepers stranded and bemused— needed only a draw against Italy to proceed. But thinking that they could always overcome any opposition and outscore any team, they allowed Paulo Rossi to roam freely in the box. By the time the rogue goal poacher finished with them, it was a bridge too far for Falcao’s heroic interventions. They went home with nothing.

Now the same fate has overtaken their descendants four decades on. But with France and Argentina, two ancient soccer power-houses, squaring up to each other in what promises to be a memorable climax to the 2022 soccer fiesta in Qatar , one might be tempted to agree with cynics that nothing much has changed in the world of soccer, or that the more things change, the more they remain the same.

But that will amount to a superficial scratching of surface realities without disturbing the sizzling and heaving realities below the surface or the profound dynamics of accelerating globalization and momentous changes in the world of soccer. Players, coaches and national teams now wear multiple identities and complicated super-hyphenate nationalities. It is a chiaroscuro of motley colours or the soccer equivalent of a rainbow coalition.

Some national teams, particularly France, England, Germany, Belgium and now Switzerland and even Austria, remind one of a garment of many hues. Many players come with dual or even multiple nationalities. Kylian Mbappe, a French hero, is of Cameroonian and Algerian parentage. Walid Redragui, the coach of the outstanding Morocco team which was the revelation of the tournament, was born in France and could claim French citizenship.

Incurable racists who are sold on the notion of the inviolable purity of races often pooh-pooh this development as akin to the mongrelization of soccer. This is why some players are still subject of racist attacks particularly when their team loses. But we dare say that that they have seen nothing yet. The world renews and rejuvenates itself true such arcane and daring recombination and re-permutation.

It was said that after Switzerland overpowered their country in the opening round series, some irate Cameroonian fans went over to the Embolo homestead to demand from the mother why her son should be such a source of national misery. The outraged woman was reported to have ticked them off for disturbing her peace of mind.

The end of a trend cannot be predicted from its beginning. Soccer is not native to Africa or South America. African soccer has benefited tremendously from the current wave of globalization and the forcible incorporation of the continent into the global orbit. In soccer, this demographic volatility and its compulsory dispersals has engendered a cross pollination of techniques, vision and players in a way that was not thought possible in an earlier epoch.

It has allowed economically backward nations of Africa to play first violin in soccer as Engels famously noted of philosophy and literature. It has allowed Africa to catch up and to bridge the gap between Africa and the leading soccer nations of the world. It looks like a long time ago when bootless and scantily clad teams from African first played exhibition soccer in the stadia of England.

In 1974, the Congolese team, Africa’s lone representatives, were snootily reported by the global press to have arrived with their private supply of monkey meat and witchdoctor. But this did not prevent them from receiving a resounding nine goals to zero walloping by the merciless Poles.

Sixteen years after in 1990, a beguiling Cameroonian witchdoctor known as Baba Bamenda spread his grisly ware with much pomp and pomposity and was still mumbling his mumbo-jumbo even after it became more than obvious that Gary Lineker’s goal was sending England to the Quarter Final. It was all in a day’s work for Baba Bamenda.

The brilliant and compelling performance of African teams in the about to be concluded Qatar fiesta has erased the history and record of shame and idiotic superstitions for Africa. Africa has finally come of age in soccer, with an African team reaching the semi-final of the World cup. It has been long in coming, with Nigeria in 1994, Senegal in 2002 and Ghana in 2010.

After Morocco saw off both Spain and Portugal, the historically minded must recall that there once was a sub-group of Berbers and Moors from the present day Morocco which invaded the Iberian Peninsula and occupied most of what is currently known as Spain and Portugal for almost five hundred years before they were driven out and sent back to Africa by the Castilians in 1492. Eusebio, Portugal’s greatest footballer ever, came from originally from Mozambique.

Miguel de Cervantes would be chuckling in his grave.

December 18, 2022
Could Obi, Kwankwaso step down?

Should Labour Party’s Peter Obi or New Nigeria Peoples Party’s Rabiu Kwankwaso win the presidency in 2023, the former Kano governor, with a far saner crowd around him and a secular habit that enables him to avoid cultivating and politicising religion, would govern far better than the former Anambra governor. But neither Mr Obi nor Mr Kwankwaso can win, whether they publicly acknowledge it or not, and regardless of the endorsements they have received from influential members of the Nigerian power elite. It is, therefore, not surprising that rumours of their stepping down in favour of the big parties persist, especially because both seem at their wit’s end in raising the requisite funds needed to structure and run their previously orphaned but adopted political parties. With paucity of funds and dearth of experienced politicians to help manage their ambitions, both men may begin thinking the unthinkable as weeks chase weeks in January, probably the last month in which votes can be safely locked down.

Last week in Abeokuta, Mr Kwankwaso was asked whether he was considering stepping down for any of the big parties. He dismissed the idea, suggesting quizzically that the time to concede the race and step down for anybody was gone. The NNPP, he said, was presenting candidates for the various races, and it would be inappropriate to abandon them. He was not confident they could win, but he was assertive about the morality of not negotiating away the ambitions of his protégés. He said little about himself; and since his mind was not legible, it was difficult to estimate what pains he was enduring running a race he must know at the bottom of his heart he stands no chance of winning. He is a more realistic man, a sound administrator, a passable secularist, and a believer in Nigeria. If anyone between him and Mr Obi was likely to step down, it would have to be him. He could step down, but it is not clear whether he would.

Unlike Mr Kwankwaso, Mr Obi is tethered to his followers by an implacable bond of social, political and religious fanaticism never before experienced in these parts. He was running mate to Atiku Abubakar, ex-vice president and two-time PDP presidential candidate, in the last presidential poll, and is also dogged by rumours that he could step down for his former boss. So far in the race, he has not attacked Alhaji Atiku, not even in whispers, not even in his bedroom, and perhaps not even in his dreams. He is proud to announce that he would not say a word against the PDP candidate. In theory he could step down, obviously for Alhaji Atiku, but he has become a hostage to his followers, and by his excursions to churches to curry admiration and support, he has also become a hostage to himself. Every trip to a church has been met by vibrant approbation and such robustious din no church of Jesus Christ was ever thought to have the leeway to render to any politician. Yes, he could step down, especially because his party is presenting fewer candidates than the NNPP for the next set of polls, but he will be more loth than Mr Kwankwaso to abandon the race without consequence to himself or his political future.

But the rumours will persist and will reach a crescendo in January, weeks before the fateful presidential election. If it became clear to the candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the PDP that the election would be too close to call, they would intensify the jostle and put inordinate pressures on the two fringe and disruptive candidates of the LP and NNPP. However, if one of the two fringe candidates should step down, the other may follow suit. They are not political Siamese twins, it is obvious, and in methods and ideology, both are absolutely dissimilar. Mr Kwankwaso is ideological, a progressive even, and he considers stretching stories or events beneath him. Mr Obi is a free spirit flattered by the hosannas he has been receiving from churches. He will do anything for votes and approbation. In sum, both fringe players are bound together by a common fate, condemned as they are to bring up the rear in the February race.

Despite the cheap political antics of the former House of Representatives Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, and the former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Babachir David Lawal, who both deployed sectarian tactics to drive hard bargains into political whoredom, the February presidential poll may not be as entangled as it appears at first view. There are suggestions that more than Mr Kwankwaso, the LP candidate may complicate the race, hacking significant votes from the geographical portion originally ceded to Alhaji Atiku in the Southeast and perhaps a part of the South-South. But with the politics of rotational presidency, it is not clear that this supposition is irrefutable. All that is known, however, is that Mr Obi, sometimes dubbed Saint Obi for assiduously, indecently and desperately currying the Christian votes for his presidential bid, will self-destruct should he step down for Alhaji Atiku. After all, he seems the more likely of the two fringe candidates to concede the race before the ballots are cast. He is the least ideological, does in fact not believe in ideologies, nor does he think anything of manifestos. Though he has finally produced a manifesto, it is a largely platitudinous document he will never speak to or engage even in his nighttime cogitations. Like the PDP manifesto which Alhaji Atiku has orphaned and will not speak to, the LP manifesto is simply produced to silence those who scorned Mr Obi for his speciousness.

The LP candidate has rekindled hope among the Igbo that they could produce a man whose politics would resonate nationally, notwithstanding the fact that the impression he creates may be superficial, deriving oxygen to play his brand of politics by dint of the APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket. It has enabled Mr Obi to cast himself in the mould of a Christian candidate, the darling of the politicised Pentecostal bishops and Christian faction of the power elite. Years ago, Labour and Employment minister Chris Ngige, a medical practitioner, was thought to possess the charisma which, encouraged and sculpted appropriately, could help sell his presidential aspiration as a south-easterner to the rest of the country. But his tenure as a minister has exposed his delusional side. Indeed, last April he imagined himself as having done what Napoleon Bonaparte could not do in fostering conciliation between the federal government and university teachers’ union, ASUU. Yet, he is also curiously capable of self-abnegation, when he described President Muhammadu Buhari as having done with education what Napoleon (yes, the same Napoleon) could not do. It finally dawned on his interlocutors in the ASUU-FG imbroglio that apart from his fixation with Napoleon, Dr Ngige suffered from delusion of grandeur. Had they known this side of him, instead of staring him down, ASUU would have massaged his ego to get what they wanted.

The Igbo also have an alternative in the current Anambra governor, Charles Soludo. But it will take time to gauge his mettle and determine whether he can establish and build the kind of network and bridges needed for a south-easterner to successfully aspire to be president. Mr Obi wishes to use the Christian ladder to pole vault into the presidency. The problem is that the pole he is using is not made of fiberglass; it is made of dry wood. It will not only break when he leans on it during his sprint to February, it is also brittle to the touch. Whether he goes ahead to contest or not, Mr Obi is unlikely to meet with success. Should he contest, he will fail, and by the next election cycle will be supplanted by more solid Igbo aspirants. Should he step down, he will have signed his political death warrant, for the yokels who egg him on with fanatical glee are not the kind of fellows to take no for an answer, and will not take lightly being taken for a foolish and useless ride.

On the other hand, Mr Kwankwaso, 66, can safely step down and still keep his relevance. He occupies a safe zone in northern politics that is hard to fill, a zone dedicated to political pragmatism and, in some ways, ideological progressivism, a zone famished for someone like him, a man of steel and character. And if he declines to step down, he will still retain his relevance far beyond 2023, even if he never contests again. He is obviously not as flighty as the LP candidate, and has not deployed his defection proclivity in the same casual and sentimental fashion Mr Obi throws caviar to the general in traipsing from party to party and from church to church. In theory, both the LP and NNPP candidates could step down, but it will not be until sometime in late January before Nigeria finds out whether any of them would. And of course that would also depend on how bitter the taste of anticipated defeat feels in their mouths.

Ex-president Jonathan continues to amaze

It is sometimes difficult to decipher ex-president Goodluck Jonathan’s very fluid politics, as a new book by Nathaniel Bivan appears to indicate. Dedicated to showcasing the chaplaincy of Obioma Onwuzurumba under the Jonathan presidency, the book presented in Abuja last week reveals another curious side of the former president, a side completely at variance with his private expectations of himself as a politician and leader. Dr Jonathan’s views are of course not as sanctimonious as those of another former president Olusegun Obasanjo, no, not at all, for that would defame the character he had carefully woven for himself for years; nor as evasive as those of former military head of state Ibrahim Babangida. But overall, his views are infinitely more difficult to place. As president, Chief Obasanjo had a direct line to heaven, he said; perhaps he still does, and his interpretation of faith at the time was that he only needed to wish a thing, and heaven was at his beck and call. Frail and less meddlesome now, he is probably not as cocksure today. Gen. Babangida on the other hand did not boast of any celestial connections, nor the gifts of a proselyte; but his seeming self-doubt masked an assertive determination to play God or subvert Him in the affairs of men. Dr Jonathan is entirely different. Diffident but more ruminative, he ruled as though he dared not, and courted heaven’s endorsement as if, even as a Christian, he was an outsider.

Mr Bivan, the author of the book on Mr Onwuzurumba, ‘My Time As Chaplain In Aso Rock,” contains a brilliant and revelatory interview with Dr Jonathan. The media feasted on two areas of the interview last week: the former president’s opinion on insinuations that he attempted to contest the presidential primary for the 2023 poll; and his take on APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket. Both perspectives, as the interview revealed, took equivocations to new limits. On his attempt to contest the 2023 APC presidential primary, he said: “I was enjoying the drama. At least they were not insulting me. After all, I was pursued out of the office, that I was not good enough. So, if now, Nigerians are saying, ‘Oh, this man should come,’ that means they are cleaning me up. So, let me enjoy the drama…I was not disturbed. I know I cannot go and start struggling to be President again. It wasn’t only Nigerians who were asking me such questions, even most of the top ambassadors – the American ambassador, the UK High Commissioner, France, and all of them. They came to ask me whether I would contest. I don’t think I would contest any election…If you wake up tomorrow and see that I’m President again, that means there may have been circumstances beyond my control. But not to go and pick one form and go and start lobbying people and running for campaigns, be it PDP power or APC broom and moving across Nigeria. I can’t do that again; if I do that, I will diminish myself.”

There is nothing in his response to indicate he did not try to contest the presidency – not his enjoyment of the drama from which he feigned aloofness, nor did he reveal the answers he gave the ambassadors who sought clarifications. He seemed to bask in the illusion that his drafters were cleaning up his image. How he came to this conclusion is hard to say, for he went on to suggest in another breath that attempting to contest again would diminish him. But the back and forth did not end there. In the interview, and probably remembering how inexpertly he disguised his true feelings at the tantalising prospect of being returned to an office he was loth to vacate, he did not quite discount the possibility of becoming president due to ‘circumstances beyond his control’. All he detested was the flagrant and messy aspects of the processes of vying for the presidency. In the end, no one obliged him, despite the atrocious sum paid by herders to buy the N100m APC presidential nomination form on his behalf. He probably forgot that when he was waffling and pussyfooting over the race months ago, the country was entertained to a daily blow-by-blow account of his conspiratorial manoeuvers, moves so replete with breathtaking suspense that the best playwright would have had difficulties in conjuring.

His views on the Muslim-Muslim ticket do considerable damage to the reputation he had tried so valiantly as a former president to cultivate and safeguard. Here is what he was quoted in the book as saying: “When I took over as the vice president, the tradition then was that if the president was a Christian, the vice would be a Muslim, and vice versa. We have religious festivals in Nigeria and, of course, National Day, where there will be Jumu’ah prayers and Christian prayers. Nigerians are religious people; this is why I get worried about the issues of Muslim-Muslim or Christian-Christian ticket. Yes, Muslim-Muslim or Christian-Christian can run the state. But I always ask, ‘who will represent this other bloc whenever we come to the national days that we celebrate?” Here, in the name of God, is the considered opinion of Nigeria’s former president. He has boiled everything down to which elected official in Aso Villa represents Christians or Muslims during festivities and holidays, since Nigerians are religious. In all his studies of great societies and empires, the only takeaway that seems to strike him is who represents whom on religious days, the same suffocating emptiness and drudgery addling the wits of every Dick and Harry. He forgets he was president, regardless of whether he deserved it or not, and that a perspective more elevating, inspiring and noble is expected of him.

Dr Jonathan’s vote next year would probably be cast not for vision or competence or the drive of the candidate but on whether the presidential ticket accords with the arithmetic and ecclesiastical balance of his acquired fancies. He bemoans the dismissal of his presidency; but years out of office, he has still not learnt any lessons. He will continue to reinforce his primordial understanding of politics in casting his ballot for a candidate that accords to his faith. After all, his loyalty to his party has been so tenuous and tentative that it is not even clear to himself that he was ever a PDP president. He was ‘pursued out of the office, that I was not good enough’, he whined. Why then would he care anything about loyalties beyond his boyish fancies? Dr Jonathan illustrates why Nigeria is teetering on the brink despite its enormous endowments. The country has never truly produced a deep, reflective and competent national leader. Worse, the country now boasts of power influencers shamefully ignorant of the terrible consequences of using religion and tribe to pick Nigeria’s president.

December 11, 2022
Governors grandstanding governance? (Part 1)
“I have always believed that the road to prosperity is productivity. If the people are productive, the economy will change. One day money will stop coming from Abuja. This is the truth and every discerning state must start to prepare for it. As a government, we will create enabling environment for Agribusiness investments. We will put our weight behind it because it is in our interest as a state and as a people to get this done.” – Mr. Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji, Governor, Ekiti State, 5th December 2022.

There was an episode during the military intrusion and interregnum during which General Yakubu Gowon was the military Head of State of Nigeria. It occurred in 1974. The then Minister of Communication and Transportation, the influential Mr. Joseph Tarka, a political heavyweight from the Tiv tribe of Benue-Plateau State was heard saying the citizens should be outspoken against corruption ravaging the country. A fellow citizen from the same state, Mr. Godwin Daboh, was attentive. It was like a lurking lion ready to latch on a lackadaisical lamb as Daboh already possessed damning and weighty evidence of corruption against Tarka. Daring Daboh was targeting Tarka’s downfall from the high political pedestal in which the latter perched. The seemingly diabolical Daboh went public with the accusation of corruption against Joseph Tarka. Initially, the government of the day looked askance. However, with more daring evidence of corruption especially a secret tape recording of the conversation in which the minister was demanding for a kickback of 6% from a contractor was unbecoming of a statesman of the status of Tarka. Moreover, the last straw that broke the camel’s back was the allegation of allocation of a dedicated telephone line to a mistress of the minister which was a clear and convincing token of breach of trust on the part of a public servant.

The then vibrant National Union of Nigerian Students (NUNS) picked up the gauntlet against the government if Tarka was not probed. At the forefront was the University of Lagos (UNILAG) Students’ Union. In a release by the Secretary General of UNILAG Students’ Union, Mr. Wole Olanipekun (now SAN), there was a demand for the sacking of the minister, failure of which the students of the institution would embark on street protests. Then, Mr. Joseph Tarka could no longer contain the flurry of fiasco as he threw in the towel. He resigned from the government. Why go this route as an introduction to this week’s article? Tribute should be paid to the celebrated columnist, though late, Mr. Gbolabo Ogunsanwo, the erstwhile Editor of the defunct Sunday Times who coined the phrase: “If you Tarka me, I will Daboh you.” This clique is pertinent to the recent brickbat between the Federal Government and the influential Governors’ Forum on who is really responsible for the pervading poverty among the populace within Nigeria’s context. There has been accusation and counter-accusation from one party to the other.

Federal Fisticuffs

The usual Federal Executive Council Meeting held last Wednesday did not go down as usual with reeling out of contracts awards as the norm. Aftermath of the meeting was a press briefing that sparked a raging row between the Federal Government and the State Governors. Throwing the first punch was the Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba, who was delegated to brief the press. He chastised the helmsmen at the state level as squarely responsible for the hapless poverty index recorded for the country. He poignantly posited that the Governors were inexcusable. According to the Daily Post of 30th November 2022:

“UNIDO report shows us in terms of employment, the MSMEs employ 70% of our people. So, you can imagine how much progress we will make when you find that there are roads, there is power in these rural areas.

“In terms of agriculture, you find out that the federal government doesn’t have land that they would plant, the government has pushed for the Anchor Borrowers programme and that is going on very well but the state control lands … They are the ones to provide land for agriculture. They are not investing in that.

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“They would rather build skyscrapers in a city where people will see and clap but the skyscrapers does not put food on the table (sic).”

Before throwing away the baby with the bathwater, it is good to analyze the points raised by the minister objectively. He seemingly accused the Governors of more of grandstanding governance. He came out with statistics which should be addressed by the latter rather than lampooning the Federal Government which the minister spoke on behalf. There are three salient and succinct points raised in his briefing that I will pinpoint here in this column for followers to ponder and reflect upon if Nigeria must witness real development, and not just media hype or ‘paper tiger’ development that is more of a propagandist parochial approach that followers cannot feel, see, touch or embrace! More of such abound in the pages of newspapers and apparently non-visible as one commute the nooks and crannies of Nigeria. However, it may be unfair to lump all the states together in one haphazard perspective. Perhaps, the minister goofed here! However, there is the issue of access to rural areas where 70% of the populace reside and from which 90% of what we feed upon come from. Without gainsaying it, how many states have access roads in good condition to the rural areas to aid farmers and traders to link the semi-urban and urban areas to promote socio-economic activities that would engender growth?

Two, and very significant, how, in concrete and measurable terms, have our Governors demonstrated proactive and practical interests in impacting the numerous Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME). This is the sector that should stem unemployment rate in greater proportion than all the sectors put together. If our Governors do the needful here with proper application of monitoring, evaluation and learning (MEL) tools, it is possible for mass engagement of our teeming youths that will result in enhanced productivity thus shoring up the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) whilst simultaneously increasing income of these youths. Ultimately, it will progressively and positively impact the poverty index as many citizens will exit the poverty net.

Three, the minister complained of low interest and investment in agriculture by the men in the saddle in the states. It is worth mentioning that no state government should blame the federal government for low productivity in farm produce as the state governments have access to land within the states rather than the federal government. It is unfortunate that many of our states still pay lip service to agribusiness whereas this ought to be the fulcrum of our industrial revolution when harnessed with modern technology laced with digital skill acquisition and impartation, especially targeting our restless youths. It is sickening and saddening seeing many of our hapless youths; some of them graduates of our higher institutions, riding motorbikes (‘okada’), operating tricycle (‘maruwa’) transport business, pitifully engaged in debasing cultism or internet fraud operations, etc. Proper governance, at the state level, would have redirected their energies to worthwhile and productive ventures that would have resulted in a win-win for them and the states where these teeming youths reside. Largely, perusing many states of the country, this has not happened!

Will Ekiti Make the Difference?

There is a new sheriff in town in Ekiti. So, it seems. He posited of recent:

“I have always believed that the road to prosperity is productivity. If the people are productive, the economy will change One day money will stop coming from Abuja. This is the truth and every discerning state must start to prepare for it. As a government, we will create enabling environment for Agribusiness investments. We will put our weight behind it because it is in our interest as a state and as a people to get this done.”

Prosperity will always be through productivity, and in Oyebanji’s perspective, vis a vis, the context of an agrarian state such as Ekiti, agribusiness is the way to go. This columnist was a resident of Malaysia for upwards of 3 years. In that country, it was exploitation of oil palm that jump started that country’s economy. Malaysia inculcated technology into it laced with modern research techniques. Presently, there is a species of oil palm that produces fruits within 2 years. In addition, Malaysia had since initiated production of biodiesel from oil palm! Recalling these words of Oyebanji succinctly stated on 5th December 2022, will it be like someone once opined: ‘talk is cheap?’ Two years from now, will the statement of Oyebanji produce tangible outcomes in measurable and discernible terms that Ekitikete can see, feel, touch and embrace? To this columnist, as a development strategist and analyst, this is the hallmark of real governance, any other one is mere grandstanding! In the second part, the other side of the coin will be viewed: are the Governors justified in their counter accusations against the federal government? Looking forward to your perspectives on this issue of governance knowing that both the state and federal governments have distinct roles to play rather than subjecting the citizens to exchange of diatribes from one another as a form of defense. Thank you for keeping the interest in the column.
- Ekundayo, Ph.D. – can be reached via 08155262360 (SMS only) and drjmoekundayo@hotmail.com
December 11, 2022
2023: Of Tinubu’s approach to governance, oppossition’s intellectual lassitude, propaganda and disinformation
But Tinubu is a genius. For only a genius would realise that it would be foolish to not tap the massive human resources surrounding him to form an operational framework for his vision, in his quest to power Nigeria to great heights” – Ademola Adeniran.

But who are the loudmouth quislings of both Atiku and Obi to know that?

I crave the indulgence of my highly esteemed readers to do what I will be doing here today, jettisoning my own article for another person’s article. Not once have I done that on this column which actually predated The Nation by two years, when I was writing for its predecessor, the COMET.

Today, I am assuming the concurrence of Dan Osa-Ogbegie, to have published on the column, mutatis mutandis, his article titled as above. I have actually finished my own article which I captioned:’Tinubu: Chatam House and The Ensuing Chatter By Nabobs of Negativism’, before I saw the article which completely bowled me over by its uncanny understanding, and capture, of what I will like to call: ‘THE ESSENTIALL PHENOMENAL TINUBU PERSONA’.

Please come with me as I show you candour and unencumbered truth, from a writer who is not even of the same ethnic Yoruba stock as Tinubu. It should shame the naysayers – a small, but loud circle of envious, animus – driven pranksters, especially among Tinubu’s own Yoruba. I forsee many of them joining Chief Bode George in emigrating from Nigeria once Tinubu is elected President, come February, 2023:

“The presidential candidate of the A P C yesterday addressed a group of intellectuals at Chatham House, London, and it was another big revelation of candidate Bola Ahmed Tinubu on one hand, and the opposition supporting Southern Nigerians, on the other.

I woke up early today to the cries of certain Nigerians on how embarrassed they were at Tinubu’s outing at Chatham House and I was compelled to watch the video. All I saw was a highly presidential delivery by a man who understands what was expected of him as the next President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, perfectly appreciating the relevance of Nigeria to the entire West African sub region.

In his speech, Tinubu emphasised Nigeria’s role in Africa as a big brother and a beacon of hope to the continent, especially the ECOWAS sub-region where there had, of recent, been some military interventions.

He told the audience that if he is elected president, his administration will continue to provide quality leadership to the sub-region, to ensure that democratic ideals reign in the entire sub region. He talked about security, energy, private sector participation, and the building of a virile Nigeria that will provide leadership for the much needed African rennaisance. It was a beautiful speech any sincere Nigerian should be proud of.

During the question and answer session, Tinubu again showed class by the dignified way he handled some insolent questions that would have made a Peter Obi flip, as he did with a certain Dino Melaye, and that other cretin, Reno Omokri. He was asked questions about his identity, age and health; all facts already available in the public space. Tinubu is 70 years now, and will be 71 when he becomes President of Nigeria by the grace of God in 2023.

But why is his age suddenly an issue this year when it wasn’t in 1992 when he contested for the senate and won? Why was it not an issue when he sided with the Nigerian people to fight for the restoration of democracy in Nigeria when the country was under some military dictators who held us all by the scruff of our necks? Why was Tinubu’s age not an issue in 1998/1999 when he won election as Lagos State governor, and started therefrom, what has now put Lagos on the map as a centre of excellence? Why was his age not an issue when he staved off Obasanjo’s dictatorship and came out as the last man standing; rescuing Nigeria from the rudderless PDP government, making a new opposition political party win a presidential election, for the first time, in the whole of Africa? Or when he gave Atiku his party’s presidential ticket during one of that man’s many fruitless attempts at becoming the Nigerian president? Its all because they are scared stiff of the massive support Tinubu is attracting everywhere in the country.

One reason opposition elements have relied upon to questionTinubu’s age is their wrong belief in the silly propaganda that Tinubu’s daughter is 62 years old. Here, in reality, is a young, 46 year old lady, and my friend, Darlington Okpebholo Ray, a PDP member and Obi supporter, knows her very well and can attest to this.

So rather than discuss the Tinubu speech at Chatham House as intelligent people should, the naysayers have, as usual, been busy whining about how Chatham House was imposing “a sick Tinubu on Nigeria” ( Sowore’s Sahara Reporters), and how Tinubu allocated questions to his team members to answer (Dino Melaye and Peter Obi’s social media urchins). Without a scintilla of doubt, Nigeria has about the most mischievous and intellectually lazy opposition in the entire world.

Ten questions were put to Tinubu after his speech and in his characteristic way of showing that the presidency would not be about just him, but about the first class team he would assemble, he personally answered four of them, and shared the others to his ‘A’ team members, who included Nasiru El-Rufai, a first class brain and current governor of Kaduna state, Ben Ayade, a renowned Professor and governor of Cross Rivers State, Dave Umahi, an engineer and governor of Ebonyi State, who has turned the state to a major talking point in Nigeria because of his unparalleled development strides. There was also Dele Alake, a long time Tinubu confidant and associate; a veteran journalist and master strategist.

The traction Tinubu got from delegating questions to members of his team after addressing the August assembly, is enormous. His rivals know this and would soon try to copy the innovation which shows that Tinubu would rely on highly skilled Nigerians to get the job done the way he did in lagos State. Tinubu is not one to pretend about being a messiah like Peter Obi and Atiku.

I say this: the choice in 2023 must not be an emotive one. We must go beyond emotions to assess all the candidates and choose the one that has a track record required to get Nigeria out of the woods and place it on a trajectory of unstoppable progress as we have all seen in Lagos state where he turned a measly N600M IGR to a humongous, multi- billion Naira achievement.

We must look at the records of the front line candidates and examine their record in public service. Nigeria needs a completely detribalised leader who sees every Nigerian as one, not minding their ethnic groupings, religious beliefs, class or creed.

That certainly is not a Peter Obi who showed that he is irredeemably clannish, by driving a wedge between Catholics and Anglicans in his native Anambra state, causing schisms between them. Nor is it an Atiku Abubakar who has shown, in words and deeds, that he is a divisive character, from the manner in which he beat a fast retreat from condemning the crazed mob which killed Deborah Samuel, a student of the Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto.

If Obasanjo’s numerous complaints about Atiku are anything to go by, Atiku was a wrong choice for him then and will be a wrong president now. Please read Obasanjo’s MY WATCH, where he gave us strong insights into the persona of Atiku Abubakar, concluding that he can never recommend him for the Presidency of Nigeria.

Nothing has changed as Atiku remains desperate to become president as foretold by his marabouts. For that reason, he has changed political parties more than a prostitute changes sex partners. He has been contesting, unfailingly, since 1993.

Today, wobbling all the way from Dubai where he lives, he sees nothing wrong in selfishly breaking the principle of power rotation between the South, and the North, showing how much Atiku loves himself but disdains a peaceful Nigeria.

While Bola Tinubu created a first class civil service in Lagos state, employing Nigerians from diverse religions and tribes, Peter Obi was busy repatriating Northerners from Anambra to Delta state, and sacking fellow Igbos from other South east states working in the Anambra civil service.

If Peter Obi can discriminate against Anambra Anglicans in favour of Anambra Catholics, if he can discriminate against Imo indigenes working in Anambra and retrench them, how can he handle a combustive, and heterogeneous entity like Nigeria, as president?

Tinubu’s record of performance in Lagos, is without question, an example to all state governors. He implemented a land administration system reform in Lagos which made housing development and ownership a lot easier, embarked on a holistic judicial system and legal proceeding ( criminal and civil) reforms , went on a tax system reform to make it at par with international best practices.

He didn’t stop at that as he also embarked on a traffic management reform that has incrementally been improved upon by all the successive governments after him.

In addition to the above were his reforms in education. Tinubu, a muslim , was the first governor to return mission schools to their original owners, and started the payment of O’level enrolment fees for all candidates in Lagos schools, irrespective of their states of origin.

In contradistinction, Peter Obi increased school fees in all Anambra schools, and compelled parents to pay three terms’ fees in the first term. When students and parents protested, he infamously retorted that education was not for the poor, and that they could withdraw from schools, and go to learn vulcanizing or carpentry, or any other trade; that they didn’t have to get formal education. He was brutal to Anambra people; the reason they have been rejecting his candidates since the end of his tenure as governor.

All the reforms Tinubu institutionalised in Lagos have greatly impacted on the ease of doing business in Lagos; the reason Lagos state is the 5th largest economy in Africa today.

It is the pace setter state – thanks to Tinubu.

I challenge Peter Obi’s supporters, home and abroad, to tell Nigerians one reform, policy, programme or project of Peter Obi – just one -that other states have gone to Anambra to copy.

What exactly is now the basis of supporting Peter Obi? He is no orator as one can barely make sense of what he is saying in his feminine tone. He essentially does nothing besides lying with statistics; quick at enumerating Nigeria’s problems but never offering the solution. Not even the intellectuals, of zero political relevance, and without any electoral value, surrounding him, and reportedly keener about running their party’s huge Diasporan bank accounts, are any better.

Nigerians must not be emotive in deciding who governs us. No messiah is coming to take all our problems away. Tinubu does not claim to be the messiah. What he knows, is what Nigerians also know about him: that he is a DOER, and has the capacity to put a team of very competent hands, from all over the country together, for the good of the country. He has done it before and the evidence is all over the place. He can and will do it again, this time around, Pan – Nigeria.
- DAN Osa-Ogbegie writes from Benin City, Nigeria. 6th December, 2022. 8:30 am.
dogbegie@gmail.com
December 11, 2022
She for He: Amazing women who stood in for me
Reflecting on some decisions I took while I was ill for weeks recently that made it impossible for me to honour invitations to speak at some major programmes, I am glad I unconsciously got three women to represent me and they expectedly proved that what a man can do, a woman can do better if given the opportunity.

The first programme was a 60th birthday lecture which I was invited to speak on Digital and Information Technology and Church Growth about two months before I became ill.

Days before the lecture, it became apparent that I couldn’t make it to the programme despite the wide publicity with my picture and I was worried that the celebrant will be disappointed if I just called to inform him of my situation since he was not aware of my state of health.

I quickly thought of someone I could suggest as an able replacement who I assured the celebrant would do justice to the topic. I called Adesewa Greg-Ighodaro , Lead, Communication Coach and Strategist at Corporate Church Consulting who I have not spoken with for long but I follow her work on various platforms.

Despite a few days’ notice, she accepted to stand in for me and she waooed the celebrant and guests with her excellent presentation.

In the words of the celebrant, Adesuwa was “fantastic. She did justice to the topic.”

The second assignment was to be one of the main speakers at a training programme by Labour Writers Association of Nigeria. I told the Vice President of the organization I was ill but should be well by the date of the programme.

It later dawned on me that I was not yet in good shape to make it to the programme. There was someone I assumed I could call at the last minute to stand in but it turned out he had an emergency situation to attend to.

Who can I call two days to the lecture to represent me considering the high calibre of the other speakers and will be able to speak on the specialized topic: The Power of Social Media and the 2023 elections? I remembered my old colleague at The Punch, Adesola Ayo-aderele who resigned from the company early in the year as Editor, Online.

Read Also: Kissing women in movies your only contribution to Igbo, Ulasi slams Okonkwo

I called and asked that she should help me out of my dilemma. She immediately agreed and I didn’t have to bother about having a prepared lecture for her to read. I had none.

She got her power point presentation ready and delivered it to the delight of the organisers and participants who called to thank me for getting a very suitable speaker on the topic for them.

“She is very knowledgeable on the topic and shared lots of insights,” the programme Coordinator told me.

The third assignment I couldn’t attend was my Multimedia & Online Journalism class at Nigeria Institute of Journalism (NIJ). I was almost sure I will be able to show up in the class having missed three earlier once, but it occurred to me that I may not make it back from Lagos where I had gone for check up.

Not wanting to disappoint the students, I called Oladunjoye Blessing , Publisher, bonewssng.com and shared the course outline with her to take the class.

She is a former Best Graduating Student of the institution and I was sure she has enough experience to take the course.

Two of the responses I got from the students are below:

“Ms Blessing covered the topics on multimedia journalism. She inspired me to want to have a blog.Thank you sir.”

” She taught us well.”

My appreciation to Adesewa, Adesola and Blessing for not only standing in for me at the assignments, but generously sharing their knowledge and insights.

My appreciation to many others who did other things for me while I was down.

The reminder and lessons from the above for me include the following:
- You can always find a replacement for yourself if you have to and make a good case for them as a suitable alternative.
- There are enough women professionals to speak on any topic if you look out for them.
- Pay attention to what others are doing and be willing to recommend them to people who may need their expertise and experience.
December 11, 2022
SNAPSONG 172

I Think for a Living

Blame me not
For my critical curiosity
I confess to a major crime:
I think for a living

Forgive my audacity
When I follow your answer
With further questions: I am only
Seeking a path to your hidden brain

I live in a house
Built of if’s, where’s, and how’s
Therefore’s and thereby’s
My why has a very long tale

Read Also: SNAPSONG 171

I am lawyer in the league of forces
All out against the non sequitur
And the hastily mouthed platitude
I thrive on the lore which sustains the logic

With the mind’s eye
Let me see the utterly invisible
Let me live in the house
That is yet un-built

A thinking heart, a feeling mind
Laakaye, baba Ogbon*
The mind which thinks and asks
Is the mind that knows

* Deep discernment, father of Wisdom

December 11, 2022
Germans plan coups too

The world woke up in disbelief last week to learn of a coup attempt in Germany – yes, the same democratic, industrialised and stable country with a thriving economy, the 4th largest GDP in the world. The coup was foiled. Imagine if it was not. Three thousand police officers reportedly searched about 130 sites in 11 out of Germany’s 16 states, arresting some 25 suspects, all of whom are members of the far-right extremist group, Reich Citizens (Reichsburger) movement. The raids were clinically conducted. And beyond the huge number of law enforcement agents involved, the country was not discomfited by the searches, nor did citizens even bother too much about the extremist movement. It is a measure of the stability of Germany that the whole affair did not trigger undue panic among the citizenry.

The coup plotters reportedly planned the overthrow of the state in favour of a monarchy-ruled Reich, the armed takeover of the parliament (Bundestag), and the rejection of Germany’s post-World War II constitution. Clearly, the plotters had retained their fascination with elements of Nazism and European monarchical system. The arrowhead (more appropriately, the figurehead) of the plot, a little-known Prince Heinrich XIII, is a Prince of Reuss in present-day Thuringia in Germany. His family disowns him, describing him as aloof and conspiratorial. He had allegedly contacted Russia to negotiate deals in anticipation of his group seizing control of the Bundestag. There are no indications what his contacts in Russia thought of the plot or who they might be, or indeed what agreements he had hinted in his so-called negotiations.

What baffled the world is not that far-right extremists exist in Germany. (Recall the infamous activities of the Red Army Faction, also known as the Baader–Meinhof Group or Baader–Meinhof Gang, a far-left Marxist-Leninist urban guerrilla group founded in 1970). Indeed, Europe boasts of a number of fascist and far-right groups, with some of them making significant gains in parliaments across the continent as the principle of multiculturalism runs into immigration storms. What set the Reichsburger group apart was their determination to plan the African-type coup d’etat to replace the existing order by force. Europe has become complacent and accommodating of their far-right groups, most of which, while being alienated from the system, still grudgingly prefer to use democratic means to win office. The Reichsburger group held no such pretensions.

Prince Reuss and a few other leaders of the group have been arrested. They may face a long prosecution, but they will eventually be convicted, regardless of how far they had gone in their plot. There may even be efforts to subject the figureheads of the plot to psychiatric evaluations, but these may also end in fiasco. To conduct the kind of massive operations that led to the arrest of the planners of the coup means Germany took the plot seriously, if not because of the fear of its possible success but perhaps because of fear of the massive disruptions it could cause. Germany is embarrassed by the coup plot, but they would have been far more flustered had it been executed, even if it finally ended in failure.

The Reichsburger movement coup plot is a reminder to Europe that nothing should ever be taken for granted, not even their democracy which they thought could never be threatened. With the kind of intolerant and divisive politics sweeping over Europe and the Americas, especially as exemplified by the Donald Trump phenomenon and other conspiracy and extremist groups attacking, denigrating and weakening democratic institutions, democracy can indeed be toppled. The storming of the US Capitol in early January 2021 has been likened to an attempted coup and a reincarnation of the Storming of the Bastille in France in July 1789. The US Capitol symbolised American democracy in the contradistinctive sense in which the Bastille symbolised the French monarchy’s dictatorial rule during the French Revolution.

Germany has yet to live down the legacies of Nazism, despite the country’s enviable economic recovery, growth and stability. Its leaders will view with apprehension the misguided attempt by a cranky monarchist to turn the hands of the clock back. But the US and other European countries like Italy contending with far-right politics will be weary of the implications of the failed Reichsburger putsch. They know by experience that nothing can be taken for granted. And as multiculturalism enters a tricky and troubling phase, especially in the midst of immigration controversies and economic distress, politics in Europe and elsewhere might veer inexorably towards the extreme. Moreover, historians know by learning and experience that nothing lasts forever, not the systems of government that dominate the continent and the US and Canada, and certainly not the prosperity that has delivered stupendous living standards.

Read Also: FG condemns attempted coup in Sao Tome and Principe

To its eternal shame, West Africa is today inundated with coups d’etat. Some analysts and opposition figures even encourage some sort of coups in China and Russia. West Africa will, therefore, take consolation in the fact that such cancer does not seem limited to its part of the world – if not coups, then perhaps some other forms of violent overthrow of the systems, such as outright and probably spontaneous revolutions. The coup plot in Germany is coming less than a century after the Nazis manipulatively took control of Germany’s politics and government, while the far-right Brothers of Italy party led by Giorgia Meloni took office in Italy last September. Who knows whether France will not be next? And if outright coup d’etat would not do it, perhaps, far-right extremism might produce the desired outcome. As historians always fear, who knows whether the next major cycle of revolutions and displacements is not around the corner? For if gold could rust in Germany, what would iron do in backwater countries?

2023 politics already crystallising

With the parting of ways between former House of Representatives Speaker Yakubu Dogara and former Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF) Babachir David Lawal, Nigeria may already be witnessing the gradual coalescence of politics and power groups before the 2023 presidential election. Messrs Dogara and Lawal had formed and led an amorphous coalition to peevishly respond to the ruling party’s Muslim-Muslim presidential ticket. That coalition was supposedly Christian in spirit and inspired by the tenets of the Christian faith. In its early days, the coalition tried to cajole the APC to change its ticket, but failing that, its leaders gave subtle hints they might not be averse to the candidacy of the Labour Party’s Peter Obi who is being valorised in many churches across the country.

A few months down the line, however, the coalition is split in two, with Mr Lawal throwing his lot with Mr Obi, and Mr Dogara embracing the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate Alhaji Atiku. Given what both PDP and LP candidates stand for, not to say their controversial antecedents, it is clear that Messrs Dogara and Lawal are motivated by purely political interests instead of Christian or spiritual principles. Even the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), which at first implacably fused under one banner, has now given free rein to its members to do as the spirit leads them. Invariably, they too will be split into confused parts, especially consequent upon the split by Messrs Dogara and Lawal in the North.

The next group whose coalescence is awaited is the so-called G-5 (the antipodal Group of five governors in the PDP led by Rivers governor Nyesom Wike) which is intent on having its pound of flesh from the dissembling Alhaji Atiku. The Southeast has virtually signaled its preference for Mr Obi, as the Anambra governor Charles Soludo discovered to his dismay recently. The South-South and the core North will also soon clearly arraign themselves in battle. By the end of January, the shape of the coalitions may have fully crystallised and pollsters and analysts can begin to safely foretell the winner of the 2023 presidential poll.

December 11, 2022
1983, 1993 and 2023 revisited

The Nigerian political class is not asking itself the correct questions about the unimaginable level of mutual distrust, hatred and ethnic baiting that pervades the land at this moment. Like many of our compatriots who find all this particularly unsettling and disorienting, one can also seek refuge in the promiscuous optimism of all those who believe that it will soon pass, that all the venom will dissipate once a new political order is in place and happy days have returned to this unhappy land.

One does not have to be a political astrologer to know that this is unlikely to be. Only the savant can determine the nature of the pregnancy a snail is carrying by mere looking at the shell. Never in the history of federal elections in contemporary Nigeria has there been so much rancor, mutual hostility and hate-mongering in the land. The universal acrimony cannot be reduced to the current dispensation. All the past sins of omission and commission appear to be coming to a head in a perfect storm.

It is sad to note that the dystopia has reached the Nigeria diaspora. All the virtues of human warmth, generosity and compassion for which Nigerians abroad are known are dissolving in a bonfire of political acrimonies. You cannot blame many of these people. Some of them have invested in the Nigerian dream and in the exceptionality of the greatest concierge of the Black universe. But it has turned out a roiling nightmare.

Yours sincerely experienced a glimmer of the apocalypse to come last week in a beautiful suburb of Philadelphia. My host and friend, a great Nigerian patriot with whom one had marched side by side during the glorious days of NADECO and the struggle against military despotism in Nigeria, has lost total faith in Nigeria’s viability as a nation and was now part of a group adamantly committed to the exit of the Yoruba people from the ruinous conglomeration of traumatised nationalities.

A notable medical practitioner who had invested his time, energy, hopes and immense resources in Nigeria, our man was no longer ready for any special pleas or alibis for the nation. According to him, he has written off his vast investments in the nation as collateral damage. And should in case my numbskull was not absorbing the disturbing information fast enough, he had asked one the rhetorical question whether it had not occurred to one that he had kept away from these shores in the last six years.

In the afternoon of the second day, my host informed me that he was heading to his study for a zoom meeting of like-minded Yoruba nationalists which could last about five hours. And it did. At some point, news filtered to the august gathering that yours sincerely was lurking somewhere around. In personal recognizance one was ushered to the study to say a brief hello to the gathering of Yoruba luminaries from all over North America and Europe and then summarily banished like a naughty child.

Wearing a benign scowl, my friend later told me that it was important and necessary to preclude me from the deliberations since I was returning to Nigeria. At that rate, it was beginning to look likely that our next meeting may take place in his garage or the nearest Walmart. Our people are taking fixed positions in the trenches of ethnic hostilities. Such has been the degree of the mismanagement of the ethnic diversity in the nation which has reached its apogee in the last seven years.

In the light of the foregoing and before going forward, we can summarize the crisis bedeviling the country into three major aspects. First is the deepening economic immiseration of the Nigerian people in the last forty years and the advent of a generation that has known nothing but poverty and biblical squalor. A poor and deprived people are the ultimate nightmare of the social and political engineer.

Second, is the intensification and deepening of the National Question, particularly since the Orkar coup of April, 22nd, 1990 and the annulment of the freest and fairest presidential election in the annals of the nation and the martyrdom of its winner. This simmering cocktail of ethnic resentments has now been further compounded by the wanton ethnic gaming of the last seven years which has made genuine elite consensus a virtual impossibility.

Finally, the demographic shift in favour of the youth of the nation has rendered precarious the possibility of electoral engineering along the old lines of the electorate voting and the selectorate selecting. It has also rendered electorally impotent the grim premonitory hectoring and occultic grandstanding of a particular brand of sub-national politics. The result is a vast youthful population that is unable to make hay in terms of electoral ascendancy but which is capable of great disruptive possibilities.

This multi-dimensional crisis is bound to impact on the elections in a way that has not been thought possible in earlier generations. We are already beginning to see some of the manifestations in the hate-filled discourses in the social media, the irrational threats, the wanton vandalization of INEC property and the grotesque scare-mongering among the political elite.

It is now appropriate to broach the main thesis of this intervention. All political struggles take place under an ideological occlusion. An ideological occlusion is the political equivalent of a complete eclipse. Such usually is the intensity of the besetting fog that true goals are hidden from true intentions; the real trophy is hidden in a dandelion of thorns; enemies embrace bitter foes and long-term allies could no longer recognize each other.

By the time the smoke clears and after the walking wounded have been separated from the quick and dead, it will be obvious that what has been won is not what has been fought for and lost. It will then be left to others to resume the struggle in a fresh format which in reality is a mere reframing of the old order of battle. This is how history proceeds with much cunning and in a manner that seems to pass all human understanding.

Within the theoretical thrust of the thesis adumbrated above and the political sketch that follows, it is possible to make a few intelligent guesses and deductions in order to make a rational choice between heroic pragmatism and visionary idealism within the limited and constricted choices imposed on Nigerians by structural contingencies and the post-military polity.

In 1983 having been adjudged the loser in a presidential poll widely believed to have been heavily compromised and generally flawed, Chief Obafemi Awolowo held a press conference in which he bade both democracy and politics in Nigeria a mournful goodbye. He added the clincher that if Nigeria needed his services, they knew where to find him. For those who can read between the lines, it was a vote of no confidence in democracy as practiced in Nigeria.

It will be recalled that in 1978, a few hours after the military government announced the lifting of the ban on political activities in the country, Chief Awolowo also announced the formation of a new political party and commenced open, country-wide consultations. Now five years after, the Ikenne titan appeared to have had enough, having been subjected to the most unimaginable political torture and psychological ordeal all in a bid to salvage the country.

The military overlords of Nigeria were lurking in the background and watching political developments with more than a keen interest. If they were truly interested in democracy, they knew how the elections were rigged and how the system was badly compromised. Military intelligence was dutifully compiling the record of electoral shenanigans. And they knew what to do.

But unknown to Nigerians at that point in time and even more widely unknown to the political actors and gladiators dueling unto death on the field, the Nigerian military hierarchs had virtually concluded plans to impose a military dominion on the nation to last an epoch. General Mohammadu Buhari, the founding Fuhrer of this new military Reich, viewed the political class with such contempt and hostility that he did not deem it necessary to table a new political order throughout his tenure.

Read Also: TOWARD 2023: DEMOCRACY AND HUMAN RIGHTS IN NIGERIA

But ten years after in 1993 against a background of accelerating economic misfortune, escalating political disorder, institutionalized corruption and a widespread climate of insecurity, the entire country appeared to be up in arms against military rule. Military messianism has turned out a pious fraud on all fronts. The bursting and burgeoning Nigeria youth populace was becoming increasingly restive. An inevitable confrontation was shaping up inside and outside the barracks.

Acutely aware of the prevailing balance of force and a military establishment that had become the proverbial bull in a china store, the overwhelming majority of Nigerians, particularly his Yoruba compatriots, queued behind MKO Abiola, the business mogul and philanthropist. He was not the best candidate and neither was he the most qualified. Like a perennially off-message prodigal son, he had been caught several times infringing against the common weal and the political fortune of his people.

Ten years earlier in 1983, his first wife had contested a senatorial seat against the far more popular UPN candidate and was resoundingly trounced. But at that point in time, the Yoruba people and majority of Nigerians saw him as their best choice to get the military off their back. Just as he was a product of military culture, he was also a product of Yoruba culture. He had cut many deals with the military before. One more political deal to get his friends back to base should not be too hard.

In the event, it was to prove a bridge too far. Abiola not only lost his mandate, he was to lose his life in the ensuing political conflagration. As it turned out, the military might have lost its messianic posturing but not its appetite for power. General Abacha insisted that it was his turn at the till even if the country were to be reduced to smithereens. Once again, it was not what was fought for that was to become the extant reality.

After five years of low intensity warfare, a humbled, disorganized and demoralized military establishment was forced to eat the humble pie but not before mustering enough might to impose one of its own on the nation. It was a facsimile of the original copy. Once again, the Yoruba political establishment demurred but was briskly overwhelmed by sheer military and economic muscle. Again, the hard political reality was different from the rosy dreams of political idealism.

Almost thirty years after the June 12 debacle, a similar political conjuncture is unfolding before Nigerians with another Yoruba son as leading protagonist. Unlike thirty years ago, the current atmosphere is soiled and sullied by widespread economic indignation, unresolved aspects of the National Question, worsening ethnic polarization and the arrogant manipulation of national fault-lines.

But let us get our political bearing right. The main issue before the nation is how to bring back inter-ethnic harmony and intra-elite conciliation which is a sine qua non for political stability and economic development. The second is how to restore the nation to the path of economic modernity which must involve economic prudence and zero tolerance for corruption. The third is how to restore religious equilibrium to the polity.

As the preferred candidate of the actually ruling group, Tinubu , warts and all, is the candidate to beat. Like Abiola before him, he has used his economic might to build pan-Nigerian bridges and to foster intricate elite alliances. It is a tad short of a pan-Nigerian elite consensus but it will stand him in good stead if he manages to avoid the lure of hubris and premature triumphalism in the coming weeks.

Unlike Abiola who was regarded as an economic mammoth but a political mouse, Tinubu is a political pachyderm, a formidable poker player who has acquired equally formidable foes both within and outside his ethnic redoubt. But in the statutory political jungle that Nigeria has become, there is no room left for political idealism.

In the sullied and muddied environ, the wager is that Tinubu’s people are likely to file behind him as the game progresses. That is the way of his people. It is the way of nationalities perpetually under siege. Those who cited Abiola’s earlier political infractions and dubieties as justification for working against him in the June 12 imbroglio are still subject of excommunication and political exclusion in the land.

December 11, 2022
And now the Bavarian barbarians

Just as this column was being put to bed, the report came of an attempted coup by some rogue far right elements in the strongly democratic and very progressive Federal Republic of Germany. The apparently well-heeled plot which was already at an advanced stage before security forces pounced on the plotters involved the arrest and summary execution of the German Chancellor, Olaf Scholz. There were eleven others on the hit list. Scholz would have been supplanted by a seventy one year old provincial prince.

In the Germany of the twenty first century? Anybody can be forgiven for thinking that this is the stuff outlandish drama or some outstandingly imaginative fiction. But it is the truth. Not since Adolf Hitler’s infamous Beer Hall Putsch in November 1923 has there been such a witless and cack-handed attempt at unseating a highly regarded government.

It will be recalled that in the aforesaid coup attempt, while Hitler took to his heels at the approach of security forces, General Erich Ludendorff walked through the hail of bullets as if he was taking an early morning stroll. Almost a century after, Germany is embroiled in another farcical coup attempt.

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Readers of this column will recall that only last week, we broached the issue of why certain Northern European countries, particularly Britain, France and Holland, were able to withstand the fatal attraction of fascism as a result of strong institutional mooring while Italy, Germany and Spain were unable to. Germany was in fact the last of the big European states to evolve into a coherent nation-state.

There will always be a return of the repressed. It can be seen in Germany’s history of brutal colonization in Africa and two ferocious world wars of the last century. As the great psychoanalysts have taught us, in every human society there is always a steep political unconscious which is the murky realm of childlike fantasies and murderous daydreaming. This is where superior reality has banished its recalcitrant alter ego. But it pops out occasionally. Welcome to the Bavarian barbarians once again.

December 11, 2022