The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

  • 2023: what interest groups overlook

    2023: what interest groups overlook

    UNTIL the two leading political parties fully settle the problems besetting their presidential tickets, any analysis on the subject will at best be tentative. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has already nailed their colours to the mast. They have opted for a Muslim-Christian ticket but violated the unwritten agreement to rotate the presidency between the North and South. They leave the South and other interest groups to determine what weight to attach to the mixed ticket and what weight to attach to the violation of the rotation understanding. The weight will, therefore, be assigned by the South, and it will be left to them to decide where to place the requisite emphasis. The South is predominantly Christian, and the choice they face is anything but simple. If they insist the issue of Muslim-Christian ticket is more germane to their existence, they will in effect be winking approvingly at the PDP candidate’s effrontery in securing the ticket for the North and hence giving the region at least a 50 percent chance of retaining power after Muhammadu Buhari’s eight years in office. But if they stress their preference for rotation more than anything else, they will be serving notice to the PDP that on election day, the party’s goose could be cooked.

    As far as 2023 is concerned, the North is unlikely to face any suffocating dilemma as the South. Either way, and discounting the candidacy of Labour Party’s Peter Obi, they have Muslims as the presidential candidates of the two leading parties. So, the dilemma is solely the South’s to manage. Given the cacophony of threats and noises in the South, they may not be doing very well in handling the dilemma at the moment. But they will have to streamline their options and do a brilliant trade-off if they are not to lose both ways in 2023. The PDP is clear which direction it is heading. With a northern presidential candidate, they want power retained in the North, for the vice presidential position is just a little better than sinecure. On the other hand, though the All Progressives Congress (APC) is yet to present its full public face, it has given enough indication that it will go with a Muslim-Muslim ticket. The North has no illusion the APC would come to that pass; but the South had hoped that the awkward reality of a same-faith ticket confronting their predominantly Christian region would turn out to be nothing more than a boondoggle.

    It didn’t seem obvious when the APC concluded its presidential primary last month that the party would contemplate same-faith ticket. The possibility existed; but it was shrouded in mist. Now it has become clear, hence the choice before the South to determine whether it wants power retained in the North, with all the attendant galling implications, or for power to rotate South with the consequent discomfort of having to constantly wince at the reality of a Muslim-Muslim presidency. Having spent seven vexatious years under the Muhammadu Buhari presidency enduring probably the most pernicious form of religious extremism seemingly connived at by a complicit administration, southerners may be appalled to welcome a repeat. Yet, the last seven years have been supervised by a Muslim-Christian ticket. Trying to escape or resolve this dilemma, many southern faith leaders have begun to gesture in the direction of Mr Obi of the Labour Party. He is a southerner, thus satisfying their cry for power shift. He is Christian and looking good on the hustings, thus also satisfying the puritan longings of a disproportionate number of Christian leaders. And above all, he is Nigerian, they chorused, as if there was any doubt.

    Southern faith leaders have a worrisome way of trying to resolve dilemmas. But apart from being incurably romantic about Nigerian politics, they seem naïve about the consequences of the choices they are about to cavalierly make. Whatever support they give Mr Obi and whatever campaigns they run against a Muslim-Muslim APC ticket will neither give victory to the Labour Party nor satisfy their more important desire to ensure power rotation especially in the face of the horrendous existential struggle enacted by rampaging herdsmen and other militant ethnic irredentists sequestering in their forests. If they do not begin to see 2023 presidential poll in the light of securing the lesser of two ‘evils’, chances are that they could make a bad choice and finish worse off, if not expose themselves to far more gloomy scenarios. If power is retained in the North in 2023, there will be no incentive in the near future to rotate it to the South.

    It is shocking that regional and faith leaders miss the golden opportunity of having on the APC ticket a most engaging secularist presenting himself for election into the presidency. The APC presidential candidate Bola Ahmed Tinubu is Muslim, but he is not a proselytiser, and is completely inured to the usage of religion as usufruct rights, and opposed to the pervasive exceptionalism of both Islam and Christianity. Mr Obi not only cocks a snook at progressivism, he is also ambivalent about secularism. He is not averse to exploiting Catholicism to the hilt. So far, he also seems untouched and unfazed by any form of ideological trapping, including the tamest form of pragmatism. Alhaji Atiku poses as a liberal and cosmopolitan Nigerian. He is nothing of such, regardless of the connubial ecology he flaunts in the public face. His youth and adolescence were shaped by abject surrender to religion and a deep fear of the militant power of religion. His vacillation in the face of the public lynching in May of Deborah Samuel, a Sokoto College of Education student, reveals a politician engaged in ceaseless appeasement. Like Mr Obi, and all past presidents, he will do little or nothing to gradually shift Nigeria away from the corrosive influence and stranglehold of religion.

    At the moment, there is nothing to show that the highly emotive faith leaders of the South have the capacity to make a realistic choice between the two leading parties. Mercifully, the campaigns are still a few months away, and they give perhaps enough time for passions to cool. Meanwhile, graduating from the hysteria of denouncing same-faith ticket, faith leaders have crept into the field of militant religious politics, introducing voter cards almost as an article of faith in worship centres. They suggest that they can mobilise their faiths against same-faith ticket, and possibly get their members, who are sometimes die-hard members of opposing political parties, to go along. It is hard to see this happening without dire consequences for faith leaders and religious establishments. To introduce permanent voter card possession into religious worship is another form of corruption of religion of the same severity as other forms of politicisation of religion. It will be counterproductive.

    Put simply, the South faces three choices: a Peter Obi candidacy that is certain to perform only a spoiler role (see article below), and is incapable of winning the election no matter the euphoric militancy and celebration of his supporters on social media; an Atiku/Ifeanyi Okowa candidacy that will keep power in the North possibly for another eight years should the PDP win; and a Tinubu presidency that stands a more than average chance of being truly secularist. Many southerners, particularly faith leaders, see these choices as unpalatable. Notwithstanding, they will have to choose one. When the battle is finally joined in the months to come, and the real running mates are revealed, it will become clear whether reality can reconcile with desire or not. The regnant opinion in the North is that for the sake of unity and stability power should rotate South; but it remains to be seen whether the cacophonous view of politics in the South can be juxtaposed with the current agreeable tune from the North. In 1993, that tune sounded sonorous on distant peaks, indicating the possibility of a country where neither religion nor tribe mattered much. Nigeria flunked that opportunity. Now, another chance offers itself to emplace a secularist country where religious dervishes are unwelcome in politics. Sadly, it does not seem, at least today, that the country and its faith leaders recognise this amazing opportunity to reset Nigeria.

     

    Hmm, the Peter Obi movement

    THE brethren who market the Peter Obi candidacy to the rest of Nigeria swear by his frugality, honesty and patriotism. They are free to sell their product with all the saccharine posts they can project on social and traditional media. Unfortunately they are not content simply marketing him with all the doggedness they can muster. No, they insist everyone must buy their product. In the months ahead, Nigerians will, therefore, have to contend with the bullying tactics of the Obi crowd, shocked that the ‘new age’ robe the campaigners dress their candidate violently contradicts the reasons they claim make the old age politics of contemporary politicians repulsive. The Obi campaign, which has prematurely taken off in full blast, will of course implode whether the campaigners like it or not. The reasons are not far-fetched.

    Despite the optimism of the campaigners, and despite their jumping the gun, not to mention their insolence and irreverence, they are building castles in the air, castles without foundation. They seem to give the impression that if their product is not bought, it is either sceptics are idiots or charlatans who must be punished with a revolution, youth-led revolution, that is. Again they assume that their new age fantasies have caught on everywhere, North and South, and that their rolling thunder of clean, honest, fervent and futuristic politics was pealing irresistibly in every nook and cranny of Nigeria.

    But the Obi movement, assuming that is what it is, is nothing but tilting at windmills. The Obi attraction is of course refreshingly different, despite being corrupted by campaigners. However, it is in fact a showy article that is at bottom full of ostentation but empty of substance. As indicated in this place weeks ago, the Obi movement is incomparable with France’s Emmanuel Macron’ En Marche, which upended the old order. France is homogenous; Nigeria is not. In the end, what will matter is what structures have been built by the candidate, regardless of youthful scoffing of the desirability or even indispensability of structures, and what networks, friendships and connections have been erected across the country. No one can become president without extending series of handshakes across regions. The candidate must be trusted by a significant critical mass to stand any chance of winning the presidency.

    For a country wracked by mistrust, guilt and alienation, it would be a pipe dream to think social media can catapult anyone into office. The suspicion is that Mr Obi, unlike his converts and followers, does not really think he can win the presidency now or even anytime soon. But his followers, inundated with the gleeful optimism of youth and the dreamy expectations that temper the frustrations of decades, actually expect a win. The obstacles that render such conjurations unrealistic do not dissuade the campaigners. Good for them. When the real campaigns begin finally, and backdoor alliances and trade-offs have been completed and signed and sealed and waiting to be delivered, it will become obvious how tough, if not impracticable, it is to overthrow the conservative and regional machines that locked politics in a vice-like grip and delivered votes in their millions in years past.

    Unfortunately, Mr Obi’s campaigners and followers have managed by their lack of coordination and dexterity to foster segregation in the polity. They sneer at conservatives, mock advanced age, and scoff at cultural differences. The candidate himself has kept his message simple, voicing nothing complicated about modern economy beyond buying and selling, and he has refrained from provoking the high and mighty, the panjandrums of Nigerian politics whose blood his followers bay for. But it is a matter of time before the impressionable candidate catches up with the message(s) of his followers, notwithstanding his purest intuitions telling him he is being led willy-nilly to Golgotha. He may soon begin suspecting that the scarecrows he has let loose on social media have got the country petrified. He may even begin to trust his intuitions which have led him to see merit in constructing an edifice from the roof. However, his followers may be iconoclastic; he is not, as his years in politics and trading show.

    He and his crowd see merit in skewering everyone who disagrees with their offensive manners. But their intimidation will not deter the opposition he is bound to encounter soon once the battle for 2023 is fully joined. Some analysts fear he may galvanise a momentum such as this country has never seen, a movement that could catapult him into office. Nonsense. He will make waves, but those waves will be smothered by the countervailing tide of generations of Nigerians whose deliberate approach to politics leads them into the pawky caution that has served them well over the decades and helped them avoid the suicidal plunge reckless and regicidal youths seem enamoured of.

     

    Presidency needs change of gear

    AS the flurry of statements recently issued by presidential spokesmen Femi Adesina and Garba Shehu indicates, President Muhammadu Buhari appears determined to evade being prematurely tagged a lame-duck president. Strictly speaking, he won’t become lame duck until well into early next year. But given just how easily he had become unresponsive to the terrifying crises dogging the nation and his presidency, not to mention the unduly early election of presidential candidates who deflect attention to themselves by their activities and pronouncements, Nigerians feel they lose nothing by shifting their gaze from the president.

    But just as the lame-duck phenomenon was about to develop premature roots and entangle the president, Mr Shehu issued a  revisionist statement to the press controversially proclaiming the president’s democratic credentials as evidenced by his ‘salutary’ role in the APC presidential primary. In addition, with exquisite sophistry that stretches dubiety to its elastic limit, he whitewashes the idea of a cabal suffocating the presidency. Nigerians were of course incredulous. But that was because they failed to see the statement as a philosophical sleight of hand. The furore was yet to die down when Mr Adesina also assailed Nigerians with the Bloomberg News interview with the president. In the interview, the president waxed coherent against naysayers and painted glorious pictures of Nigeria as economic and social El Dorado.

    Delirious with joy over the wide reception that greeted his earlier statement, Mr Shehu talked up another storm from the president. President Buhari, he moaned, had set his face against religious fanatics baiting Nigeria into disaster. Yes, you heard him right, the same religious excesses the administration spent years unsure how to respond to. So, what next from the considerably fecund Mr Adesina? Let the spokesmen get to it. Nigerians, now bewitched by the religion of presidential and governorship running mates, won’t be tired of the presidential red herrings. But while they are engaged in their presidential bombasts, could they please prevail on the president to do something, other than junketing around the globe, about the killings laying the country waste, the roguery of the power generation and distribution companies, and the prehensile and unconscionable vermin who swarm the cabinet, ministries and other public agencies?

  • SNAPSONG 162

    SNAPSONG 162

    I come from the country
    Of the Happiest People on earth,
    Where death sells at ten for one kobo
    And the Living envy the peace

    Of the hastily dispatched.
    Living every day on the edge of the knife
    Suffering all night at the mercy of the bullet
    Taunted and tossed from wall to wall

    Foodless, drinkless, and faint from fright
    Lean like a line from the book of anguish
    Hunger has a seat in my little hovel
    My growling stomach is the devil’s drum

    I count the stars from my lowly bed
    The lightest shower unravels my roof
    When geckoes snore in my bedroom wall
    The cockroaches tremble in their shining coats

    I do not know when last a smile
    Stumbled between my lips
    A shark can shuffle through the ocean of my tears.
    Sadness lives in the furrows on my forehead

    Yes, I come from the country
    Of the happiest people on earth
    The thunder of our laughter
    Rips through the ears of the world

  • Life well spent

    Life well spent

    Imagine attending a commemoration Service ahead of the burial of a colleague on Monday morning. That was what I did last Monday when I attended the service for the late Director of Publication of the Nigeria Baptist Convention, Dr. Adelokoji Okejimi Ijaola who died recently in Ibadan.

    It’s been a while I heard from him, but while scrolling through my Facebook timeline days before the service, I saw the announcement of his death by someone who had worked closely with him on how he had transformed the publishing work of the church.

    On Wednesday, I was at another Wake-Keep service for another close associate, the Provost of the West African Theological Seminary (WATS), Pastor Oluwafemi Martins who also recently died after a successful operation on the day he was to be discharged. What a week!

    Like Dr Ijaola, I have not been able to meet Pastor Martins for a while, though we exchanged text messages and I have been hoping to visit him only to get a message that he passed on.

    Dr Ijaola and Pastor Martins are two of some of the people I know very well who have died this year.  Others are Dr Olunike Ashaolu of the department of Mass Communication,  Yaba College of Technology, a popular columnist wth The Telegraph Newspapers who was my former colleague at The Punch and The Nation, Michael Awe ( Michael West), another colleague at The Punch who later worked with THISDAY, Afolabi  Lawal and former Chairperson of the National Association of Women Journalists ( NAWOJ) in Lagos, Hajia Raheemat Momodu.

    While trying to get over the death of one, I get to hear of the other and sometimes I get so confused that I don’t know what to say. I was on a webinar when another colleague asked in a Whatsapp chat if I heard of Awe’s death.

    Read Also: Beware of Twitter

    I remember asking him recently to contribute a write up to a book I was coordinating on memories of former staff of The Punch where we were once both Assistant News Editors at a time. We bounded well even when his appointment could have generated some animosity between us. I was so short of words on his passage, and couldn’t bring myself to write a tribute detailing our relationship that all I wrote on Facebook with his picture was Awe: Ko ye mi rara ( I don’t understand).

    I first met Dr Ijaola in Singapore at an international Christian print media conference and really appreciated the good work he has been doing regarding various publications by his church.

    He invited me for a training and created a Whatsapp group that has been a networking channel for Christian Writers and publishers in Nigeria.

    Monday morning is not a day many will want to attend a commemoration Service but the New Jerusalem City Baptist Church in Ikotun Egbe, Lagos where he was a Pastor for about ten years before his appointment as Director of Publication was filled beyond capacity.

    The solemn occasion was a celebration of the unforgettable impact Dr Ijaola made in the Church and other places he has served.

    Pastor Martins got the kind of wake keep he deserved for what I know  him for as a member of Journalists for Christ and outstanding service in many capacities at WATS. Even as a student his commitment to the development of the institution was such that he was appointed into the governing board, later served as Director of Communication and Fund Raising and eventually the Provost.

    Such is the acknowledgement of his outstanding performance as Provost that founder of the institution, Gary Maxey hoped it will be possible to find someone like him.

    Afolabi died in United States where he has been based after working with THISDAY as the Bureau Chief. I remember our meeting in Washington during a visit and have been looking for the picture we took. I remember my Afolabi, my friend and gentleman former Aso Rock correspondent who shared with me some off the things that goes on in the seat of power reporters can’t write about. I remember Afolabi my boss when for some months we managed The Punch newsroom as Deputy News Editor and Assistant News Editor.

  • Samuel Abidoye at 100

    Samuel Abidoye at 100

    If indeed, His Grace, the Baba Aladura of the Cherubim and Seraphim Movement Church (CSMC), The Most Revd (Dr) Prophet Samuel Adefila Abidoye has a thousand tongues, they are not enough to praise the Lord. If all the hairs on his head are tongues, they are still not enough to sing His praise. For a man who was told he would not live beyond 26 years, Baba Abidoye has every reason to be thankful to God. He is now 100 years plus. Although this was common with ‘Aladura’ church members of old, these days, it is a feat.  “God is the one that gives long life. I am still alive through His grace”, the spiritual head had said in an interview.

    That grace of God has not only seen him through to old age, it has always been manifesting in major trajectories in his life. About 1922, when he was born, there was nothing like Christianity in his town, Omu-Aran, in Kwara State, where he started his primary education at the Native Administration Primary School. Indeed, it was not until 1929 that Christian Missionary Society (CMS) got there and he joined. In 1936, he was baptised. That same year, Prophet Ayo Babalola, founder of the Christ Apostolic Church, visited Omu-Aran in the rainy season and it was raining heavily. Babalola reportedly prayed and the rain stopped. This confounded the teachers who there and then decided to allow the pupils to choose whatever denomination they wanted to belong to. That was how Abidoye opted to become a member of the Cherubim and Seraphim Church, at that time apparently unaware of the consequence of that singular decision.

    Today, that young man who became a Christian by default is the fifth spiritual father/chairman, Cherubim and Seraphim Movement Church Worldwide. It was, apparently the fulfillment of a dream he had in 1937, when he had told someone in the dream that he wanted to become the head of a church, in response to that person’s question of what he wanted to be in life. His response was amazing because, coming from the Odetulu Abegunle Royal Family of Omu-Aran, he should have wished to mount the throne in the town, someday.

    Becoming Baba Aladura came as a surprise to him because of what he called his radicalism. As he noted, “Well, I was worried at the beginning. First of all, I never imagined that I could become the spiritual father (Baba Aladura) because I was a bit radical. I have written five books on the church. In one of them, After Moses Orimolade—What next?, I criticised some of the church’s doctrines like the problem of not wearing shoes in cold countries like Europe where I stayed for so long; among others.”

    That he has been able to lead the church successfully in the last 16 years further testifies to his divine mandate. It is not easy to run an organisation. Not in the least one as complex as a church, with all the centrifugal and centripetal tendencies.

    I first came in contact with the Baba Aladura in June, 2013, during the inauguration and enthronement of CSMC, 84, Old Otta Road as Emmanuel District. As chairman, publicity secretary of the ceremony, my main responsibility was to take him to three major newspapers — The Nation, The Punch and The Guardian. We were able to make it to only two. We could not make it to The Guardian because of time constraints, and also the stress, especially for Baba Abidoye.

    That was some nine years before.

    Read Also; Exemplary Pastor Adeboye

    What struck me during the visits to the two newspapers were his alertness and the relative ease with which he responded to questions during the press briefings, despite his advanced age.

    The success of this assignment apparently informed my second close contact with him. That was in December 2017 or so, when he requested to see me. Venue was the Lagos Airport Hotel on Obafemi Awolowo Way in Ikeja, Lagos, where our links person, Most Senior Apostle Abiodun Akinbusuyi, then of Lagos Television, and about two other very senior members of the church, including Special Apostle S. A. Dansu, led me into his chalet. The day’s experience was instructive. It laid bare one of the main challenges the CSMC is facing today.

    I am here talking about the liberalisation of spiritual titles.

    I met a multitude waiting to see the Baba Aladura, including some of them with the very high titles in the church. I could read their minds: “who is this small man that they are clearing the way for to see Baba when we have been here for so long without seeing him”? But, the truth is that Baba Abidoye could not have seen many not to talk of all of them, not out of contempt but because it was not humanly possible.

    It immediately dawned on me that this was one of the fallouts of the liberalisation of spiritual titles in the church. This would not have been so in the days of yore, when the top-ranking titles in the Movement were few and far between. Then, a Most Senior Apostle was so seen and respected anywhere in the church, whether in Nigeria or overseas. These days, I hear some churches discriminate regarding which title holders to accept as ‘bonafide’ holders of whatever titles they parade, and which not to honour.

    It is unfortunate that a thing that the Baba Aladura devised as a means of raising money for the church has turned out to produce these apparently unintended consequences. The good news is that the church itself appears sufficiently worried about this phenomenon, and I hear it is looking in the direction of solutions to it.

    The point must be made though that what is lacking, that is driving this attitude is that the people are yet to be ‘hit’ by The Word, as Bishop David Oyedepo always says. They will always do the right thing without expecting titles when they are so ‘hit’ and the CSMC will never know lack. This is one of the secrets of the prosperity in the Pentecostal churches that are about the richest in the country today.

    Be that as it may, only about six of us entered the bedroom with Baba Abidoye — Akinbusuyi, Dansu, and may be one or two other persons. I must confess that, despite the fact that I was not taken unawares, declining the offer to become Baba Aladura’s Media Adviser was not particularly easy. I immediately prostrated, appreciated him for the confidence reposed in me but regrettably, told him I could not take the job. There was no point taking an assignment I would not be able to cope with.

    After explaining to him the reason, Baba Abidoye asked me to sit down on the bed with him. He then told me aspects of his life story; his days at Nigeria Railways, sojourn abroad and how he became Baba Aladura (a thing he least expected), and all that, apparently to convince me that some things happen, even if one does not like them. I however told him to always count on me if he had any assignment that he would want me to carry out for him relating to my job.

    It was the lawyer in Baba Abidoye that was talking. I could feel his warmth; his liberal-mindedness was equally palpable. He was not annoyed with my refusal to accept his offer. Some people would feel offended.

    So, if the church has witnessed the kind of phenomenal progress it has since his assumption of office in 2006, this liberal approach to issues must be one of the reasons. When he came on board, he conceived the idea of ‘Project Hephzibah’, which has remained like a blueprint of his programme for the development of the church. He brought in a group of young and vibrant men to help bring this into fruition. To the glory of God, the project has achieved significant successes, visible in several aspects of the church.

    Baba Abidoye’s tenure has changed the face of the prophetic ministry in the church. Without doubt, the activities of prophets dominated every other thing at Kaduna. His tenure has also seen to the ordination of pastors in CSMC. Until now, only prophets were in charge. This is with a view to giving the congregation a deeper knowledge of the scripture. It is expected that the ensuing division of labour between pastors and prophets would yield good dividend for the church and members at large. People not only need to rely on prophecies and predictions alone, they should also know enough about The Word. It is also significant that when the Baba Aladura was installed in 2006, there were 47 districts. But as at last year, the church had expanded; it had 96 districts and 31 model parishes.

    His exploits at Orile-Igbon which has since 2018 become the International Headquarters of the church has not only given the sleepy town some spiritual significance, they have also transformed the socio-economic lives of the people as a result of the many of the church’s activities that are held there from time to time.

    All said, this is not necessarily about celebrating the Baba Aladura’s achievements in the church but essentially to congratulate and wish him more successes for as long as it pleases God to keep him in that enviable position.

  • Zamfara self-defence force

    Zamfara self-defence force

    Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State is not as comparatively spunky and fiercely rhetorical as Kaduna State governor Nasir-el-Rufai, nor as quietly enigmatic as Katsina State governor Aminu Masari; but after endless killings have drenched his state in blood, he has finally come to his own, both as a rhetorician and radical. He has asked Zamfarans to prepare to arm themselves against bandits, to resolve to do so courageously, and to put in the paperwork needed to bear arms legally. He will be the third or fourth governor in the Northwest to okay self-defence in the classical American sense of cops and robbers, sheriffs and outlaws. Katsina and Kaduna have since sunk into stupor in the face of federal opposition and intransigent and pampered bandits, while bluffing but beleaguered states in the Northeast have reached some controversial accommodation with the so-called repentant insurgents. It remains to be seen how long Zamfara will hold out in their newfound resolve to fight on the hills and in the valleys, and in the forests and trenches until the enemy is vanquished.

    What is important now is that frustrated Zamfarans and their nervous government are eager to do battle with unrelenting bandits. In a statement the governor caused to be issued last week, and which made newspaper headlines, indigenes were called upon to apply for gun licences to protect themselves since the police and the military had proved spectacularly unable to do so. That the security agencies have become flatfooted is not in doubt. They are also haemorrhaging, losing men and material, and are short-staffed and unable to muster substantial force to deter rampaging bandits. But they want their sacrifices to be acknowledged and their losses to be recognised and appreciated. However, they and the federal authorities that deployed them in battle have become unresponsive to the changing dynamics of the country’s worsening security crisis. A country of more than 200 million people runs, along very archaic lines and simplistic philosophy, one centralised and poorly funded and poorly equipped police force. To worsen the crisis, the government sees the police and the security agencies more as a protective force for the administration than a law enforcement agency to safeguard the populace.

    Unlike the ambiguities that truncate the government’s perception of what the roles of the police force are, the Zamfara government’s statement is direct and energetic. According to the state’s Information commissioner, Ibrahim Dosara, “…Government is ready to facilitate people, especially our farmers, to secure basic weapons for defending themselves. The government has already concluded an arrangement to distribute 500 forms to each of the 19 emirates in the state for those willing to obtain guns to defend themselves. People must apply to the Commissioner of Police to own guns and such other basic weapons to be used in defending themselves. A secretariat or centre will be established for the collection of intelligence on the activities of informants.” This is perfectly legitimate and constitutional.

    But responding to what in effect amounts to a vote of no confidence in the country’s security forces whom many now fear have been compromised, the state’s Police Commissioner, Ayuba Elkana, warned that the ban on firearms licence was still in force. He added that the police were doing their best, and wondering whether anyone expected policemen to accompany farmers to the farms in this planting season. What he did not address, a lacuna the state government has done its best to draw attention to, is what the people should do in the face of bandits’ unremitting attacks. This is not a dilemma the federal police, including policemen deployed in the state, can address. They are under authority. They cannot recruit more men than they are given, and cannot propose and enforce laws not backed by Abuja and the national legislature. They are nearly as helpless as the people they are expected to protect.

    Sadly, having allowed the problem of banditry to fester and metastasize for so long, sustained it seems by years of federal excuses designed to shield herdsmen who have morphed seamlessly into bandits, the country, police force and beleaguered states must now contend with federal paralysis that has prolonged the mayhem and made the crisis intractable, if not entirely irresolvable. But while the federal administration dithers dangerously as the country careens towards the precipice, the bloodletting continues with ferocity that now seems entirely capable of predisposing the country to general conflagration. The economy is prostrate, insecurity is worsening, government agencies as well as insurgents and bandits run parallel extortionist organisations, and inflation is climbing to the stratosphere. If the Muhammadu Buhari administration does not sit down to address these issues head-on, federal incompetence may endanger everybody and imperil the country’s fragile and generally untenable unity.

    Read Also: Matawalle’s curious gospel of self-defense

    The Zamfara police commissioner may be unable to react to the governor’s call to arms other than the way he has responded, and the military, through the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), may also frown at the desperation of embattled states; but rather than shuffle their feet, they should let the states know how else to protect themselves: whether to confront bandits with broomsticks or rely on overwhelmed and thus ineffective security agencies. Rather than cavil at the states’ call for self-defence, the security agencies should prevail on the administration to respond more imaginatively to the crisis threatening to unravel the country. The current paralysis is undesirable, and cosmetic surgeries have proved wasteful and futile. If the administration cannot be made to see why there simply must be radical and revolutionary changes in law enforcement, then they should be less sanctimonious when citizens and states take the law into their own hands.

    Mr Matawalle has rightly insisted on the need for the state to embrace self-defence in the face of the impotence of security agencies and ineffective administration ensconced in a bubble in Abuja. But just as Governors el-Rufai and Masari were unable to find a way around federal indolence, Governor Matawalle will sadly discover that there is little, in the end, that he can do to mobilise his embattled people against pampered bandits against whom the federal government is allegedly pulling punches. The killings will continue. What is not clear is how much the people can take and how long they can be silent in the face of circumstances that try their souls.

    Landlords, EFCC and foolish ‘laws’

    Last week, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) invited the public to a town hall meeting on the controversial subject of punishing landlords who let out their houses to internet fraudsters, aka Yahoo Boys. The meeting was billed to hold on May 29 and was to be anchored by an EFFC legal team. It is presumed that the meeting held as planned, and hopefully they received enough inputs to help them fine-tune what is certain to be a very difficult proposition and law.

    Until the outcome of the meeting is circulated, it is not clear what legal grounds the anti-graft agency hopes to stand on to suggest that landlords should be punished for the crimes of their tenants. Hopefully, they can also convince their legal draftsmen to adduce reasons to punish the internet fraudster and, not satisfied, then go after the property owner. Except on rare occasions, no property owner would want his house turned into a criminal den. Therefore, carrying out due diligence on their tenants becomes advisable, if not obligatory.

    But there is a limit to the due diligence a property owner can carry out. After thoroughly screening the prospective tenant, and he passes muster, but turns rogue somewhere down the line due to inability to respond very well and sanely to pressures, how on earth does that make a landlord culpable? Or are landlords also expected to be soothsayers to foretell a tenant’s future? The EFCC is right to be concerned about conspiracies between house owners and criminals, not just internet fraudsters; but to seek to criminalise landlords over their inability to foretell the future of their tenants may be treading on dangerous constitutional grounds. The EFCC and other law enforcement agencies should limit themselves to prosecuting the criminal, except in cases where collusion is clearly indicated. The Commission does not need the extra thrill of pursuing sensational nonsense.

  • Pawns and powerbrokers

    Pawns and powerbrokers

    Once again the endemic struggle for federal control among Nigeria’s power blocs has been reduced and simplified to a straightforward duel unto death between two ancient enemy camps undergoing simultaneous internal transformation: the hegemonic master ensemble that has held the north in political thraldom since Othman Dan Fodio and the emergent pan-Yoruba power bloc that has coalesced around the former Lagos State governor, Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

    The third leg of the old power triumvirate, the heaving and forever seething Igbo power consortium, has been left once again holding the short end of the stick after a very nasty and brutal power game in Abuja whose outcome has left the best pundits in the land completely wrong footed. The Igbo leadership nurse a smouldering resentment against their Fulani tormentors and hold the dominant Yoruba leadership in bitter contempt for what they consider their insensitivity and political perfidy.

    But truth be told, hegemonic aspirations must be made of sterner stuff. It would appear as if there is something constitutionally defective or inherently myopic about the core Igbo leadership and their inability to appreciate the power configuration in contemporary Nigeria in all its overarching complexities and the inherited prejudices that drive the alliance-making.

    If things had been left to the desultory and derisory antics of the Igbo candidates at the last APC convention, the keen and punitively proactive northern power Mafiosi would have made a mince-meat of all. You cannot rewrite the rules of the game when it is already underway. Having been outspent, outflanked and outsourced by their opponents, the leading Igbo candidates could only resort to public jeremiads about how unfair it had all been. Whoever told them that politics is fair?

    This must however lead us to the other side of the coin. What type of a country are we building and what type of democracy is this in which we are investing these demonic energies? Democracy is not all about the simple arithmetic of majority rule or ramming unexamined policies down the throat of vital segments of the society however unpleasant and unpalatable their politics may appear to us.

    Democracy is about inclusive governance and the capacity to bring on board diverse views and visions of the nation particularly in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country. Any democratic revalidation of the nation which is not embossed by national restitution is an exercise in futility. This is not some idle pontificating.

    Nigeria has never been farther away from an elite consensus about how to lift the nation from the morass of economic backwardness and political underdevelopment than at this moment. This is what makes the whole country to appear like a victim of a coordinated siege on all fronts. Anarchy threatens from many directions.

    Harmonious relationship among the nation’s constituent units has broken down to the extent that there are now well-organized groups demanding for the immediate dissolution of the nation or the urgent reconfiguration of its structure at the very least. After the euphoria accompanying the primaries, the old demons haunting the nation are back and self-determination groups have resumed their clamorous beat.

    Read Also: Atiku, Wike: the burden of leadership

    It has been said that those who refuse to learn from history are condemned to repeat it. It will be recalled that the original quarrel which sent the nation on a tailspin was not between the Igbo hegemonic group and the northern power brokers. At that point in time, the two were locked in an opportunistic alliance whose sole purpose was to keep Awolowo out of circulation and the Yoruba dominant group out of the loop of booty-sharing.

    But mid-ranking officers of Igbo extraction had other ideas. They brought their artillery and military grade weapon to bear on the contention. Two bloody coups, a civil war and protracted military rule ensued.

    The same scenario repeated itself in 1993 with a Yoruba dominated civil alliance spear-headed by MKO Abiola, an erstwhile military crony and enabler, squaring up to the military who were acting as proxy to the feudal oligarchy. Only one Igbo state voted for Abiola. The argument then was that if the military could not cede power to other members of the ruling class on the ground of ethnicity, then ordinary members of the society should simply forget it.

    In the event, the Egba mogul won the election but was prevented by the military from acceding to power. In the ensuing stalemate, Abiola lost his life and the country went through a low voltage political insurgency for five years. Having exhausted its political and historical possibilities, the military was forced to retreat to the barracks and the nation ended up with the Obasanjo Settlement of 1999.

    Almost thirty years to the Abiola debacle the nation has arrived at another conjuncture in which the transfer and distribution of power has become another major source of contention. It is essentially the same historic plot with a major reconfiguration and reconstitution of actors.

    The northern power bloc is facing a stiff challenge to its suzerainty by another Yoruba dominated coalition spearheaded by a Yoruba power master with intimidating range and reach; a man of immense mystery thrust on the stage to achieve what Awolowo and Abiola combined could not. If we discount Obasanjo’s ascendancy as a military coup by retired generals using extant civil structures, this one is going to cause a major rumbling of the tectonic plates.

    It should be recalled that the two dominant power groups in the country are in some sorts of alliance dating back to the historic triumph of General Mohammadu Buhari in 2015. But it has been a tense and fraught alliance, close to collapse on several occasions with irreconcilable and countervailing notions of the nation getting in the way and with some northern hegemonic hawks bent on scuttling the coalition with provocative pronouncements and hostile body language.

    Going to the party’s convention in Abuja last month, it was only residual common sense and goodwill that sustained the historic coming together. But even then the supremacist hardliners almost overturned the applecart except for a divine stroke of inspiration based on agile calculation on the part of some governors.

    At a point the ethnic supremacists went completely for broke brandishing a consensus candidate anointed from the villa which would have put an end to the Fourth Republic. In the end, they threw the contest open to all comers in flagrant desecration of the founding canon of the party. It was only the historic intervention of the governors that saved the day.

    That breach of feudal protocol must reverberate in the months ahead and if it stands, it may cause a major realignment in Nigeria’s post-military politics. This convergence of contrasting visions leading to cross pollination of paradigms of governance may well be the historic tonic that Nigerian politics has been waiting for it and it could not have happened without the original merger despite its flaws and failings.

    All is now quiet on the northern mafia front. It will however be foolish and politically inexpedient to expect the hawks to sheath their swords and go home just like that. This vision “thing” can be a stubborn and overpowering demon indeed. Those who have been born with a vision of dominating and lording it over others in the society are not expected to give up just like that. Despite the happy faces they have been forced to wear over their historic comeuppance, they are far from finished.

    It is this chiaroscuro of multi-segmented forces and the play of unfamiliar signifiers across old binary divisions that will make the 2023 presidential elections the most exciting and exacting in the history of the country. But we can briefly speculate without intending to sound like an infallible oracle by any means.

    In the case of Peter Obi who has decamped from the PDP rather than stay to thwart the hegemonic domination of the two state parties, the “obidient” folks are likely to succumb to their own logic of ethnic obeisance in a multi-ethnic society, the failure to build inter-generational linkages and the sheer technological hubris and overreach that will eventually compromise the mission-speak. They will enjoy their fifteen minutes of fame before antagonistic forces of state democracy move in to overwhelm them and prevent the republic from going under.

    That leaves the stage once again, and barring any unforeseen accident, to the domination of the two state parties and the perpetuation of their hegemonic hold on the nation. But unlike the Second Republic when Chief Awolowo and his Unity Party of Nigeria solitarily squared it up with the phalanx of feudal domination, the forces this time around are more evenly matched.

    It is useful to note that in the Second Republic, the choice of a diffident and dissembling Shehu Shagari was rammed through the throat of the ruling party against the claims of better fancied and better credentialed contenders by a feudal oligarchy acting in concert with military enforcers and civilian accomplices alike. But this time around there was no resolute military dictator or sterling civilian strategists at play. The times and forces are changing indeed.

    That leaves the two big elephants in the room. But there are ironies and contradictions here too. There is a basic similarity between the two men.  Both are self-made, self-reliant and self-propelling individuals who have clawed their way to the top of the society through sheer grit and an iron will. There have been question marks on the sources of their wealth, but that notwithstanding, they ought to be respected and applauded for how far they have come.

    Atiku Abubakar is not the official candidate of the northern feudal power brokers just as Bola Tinubu is not the official candidate of the old Yoruba establishment. But in both cases, both men have been able to build a transnational support base which transcends narrow ethnic origins. Among the Fulani top most caste, Atiku and his genealogy are considered not pukka enough.

    As far as the aristocratic Fulani Brahmin are concerned, Atiku belongs more to the Mumuye brand which is regarded as an inferior sub-ethnic category. The fact that he lost his father to a flooded river while still relatively young has not helped his social ranking. For there to be an upper class, there must be a lower caste.

    Despite his political tutelage under the widely influential and charismatic Shehu Yar’Adua, there seems to be an abiding froideur between Atiku and a wide segment of retired military brass hats of northern origins who believe that as Vice President to Obasanjo, Atiku resorted to baiting his military superiors and was fond of frequently punching above his weight. They have not forgiven him.

    It also bears restating that neither man has been given enough credit for his sterling and heroic contribution to the sustenance and maintenance of civil rule in post-military Nigeria: Atiku for slugging it out toe to toe with a spiteful civilian autocrat who was bent on pounding him to submission.

    Tinubu in his own case will be remembered for his epic constitutional struggle with the same dictator and later his heroic campaign to retrieve the mandate lost to sheer electoral banditry. It must also be said that the former Lagos helmsman incurred the wrath of the old dominant Yoruba establishment for outfoxing them and for not joining them in the rush to political annihilation as designed by the old fox.

    The wheel of fortune has now come full circle for both men, old collaborators and old antagonists, who have found themselves in the ring in an epic slugfest from which one of them must emerge the winner. There is no honourable draw in political prize fighting. One man must emerge winner with his hand raised.

    In all this, there is nothing to suggest in the antecedents of both men and on current form that they have the blueprint and the visionary capacity to set a fresh template and a new beginning for a much abused nation. Human actors are conditioned and determined by the structural contingencies that throw them up. No fiery radical or flame-throwing revolutionary could have emerged from the process that has thrown up either man.

    The truth is that in all human processes, closure is as important as a new beginning. There can be no fresh beginning without a formal closure to old misadventures. It may be the historic duty of one of these men to provide a needed and necessary closure to a miserable and better forgotten chapter in the history of the nation.

    Given the circumstances of institutional chaos and widespread decommissioning of vital organs of the state in which this transition is taking place, it would be foolish and unreasonable to expect a miracle. Nigeria has arrived at one of those important conjunctures where any possible electoral outcome is already suborned by process and procedure. You cannot plant cassava and expect to harvest yam. If we manage to avoid state implosion, that would be quite a feat.

  • Matawalle’s mouthed mutiny?

    Matawalle’s mouthed mutiny?

    “It is analogous to when a lion wants to kill a man in a government forest reserve where hunting or poaching is outlawed. He must choose between obeying the law of not killing the big cat or ending in its belly. The law of nature will make him instinctively choose the former.” – Ademola Adegbamigbe (PM News edition of 29th June 2022).

    These are interesting and intriguing times in Nigeria. Taking into cognizance, insecurity, the Federal Government’s effort seems not ameliorating or alleviating the sordid situation virtually in all regions of Nigeria. Is it that our police and armed forces are overwhelmed or overstretched? Travelling within states and outside one’s state now requires that one prays and calculates his or her time of departure very well as  the individual  is unsure of her safety not sure what may befall you on the road, you have to pray and take precaution before embarking on your trip.. Do we not have, as a country, simple technology that could detect these miscreants where they are in the forests and through intelligence gathering decapitate them before they could strike? Erstwhile Governor of Lagos, Mr. Babatunde Raji Fashola, SAN, now Minister of Works and Housing resorted to this security strategy and incapacitated many arm robbery incidences before they could strike; or even when they struck, as they were about sharing their loot, they were apprehended. This is one power of intelligence gathering that all states’ governors need to resort to at a time like this. In essence, governors need to invest more in special security units of the police to make this happen in every state. There was a time in Lagos, under Fashola, that armed robbers had to relocate to neighbouring states to ply their nefarious trade because adopted security strategy checkmated and crippled their callous activities.

    Kenya’s government forest reserve episode

    There was this related incident that is worth torch lighting regarding the recent outburst of Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State. There was this incident that took place in a Kenya’s government forest reserve involving a man named Moses. Moses and his friend were herding their cattle through a government reserve when out of the blues, a ferocious lion charged at Moses’ friend. Moses could not stand and watch helplessly for his  friend to be hunted and hacked down by the big cat, he tried to defend his friend, The lion would take none of such seeming nonsense and he made for Moses; he however outsmarted the big cat in a smooth and swift manner. He attacked the lion with his sharp and soldierly spear which went through the eye, and in ihe process, penetrated the brain of the animal. The lion fell down at Moses’ feet. By Kenya’s law it is illegal to attack and kill a lion, more so in a forest reserve. The government’s forest guards went for Moses saying he should have reported first and not taken the law into his hands, Pray, was there any safe time span to report when the ferocious lion was about devouring two men? Is the life of an animal worth much more than homo sapiens?

    Ademola Adegbamigbe writing on the Zamfara’s saga, in the PM News edition of 29th June 2022, compared the sore and sordid situation to the episode aforementioned well repotted story that was even reported in the global magazine, the Times of London, stated simply and squarely. in his own words: “It is analogous to when a lion wants to kill a man in a government forest reserve where hunting or poaching is outlawed. He must choose between obeying the law of not killing the big cat or ending in its belly. The law of nature will make him instinctively choose the former.”

    Read Also; Matawalle’s curious gospel of self-defense

    Security: Zamfara’s context

    The whole country was jolted when the man in the saddle of government in Zamfara State, Governor Bello Matawalle directed able men in the state to rise up and carry arms to defend themselves in the face of escalating attacks by bandits and terrorists rampaging his people. He was not the first to do this as the governor of the homestate of President Muhammadu Buhari, Governor Aminu Bello Maisamari had earlier made this cold and clarion call. The government went further to advise its citizens who wish to have arms to apply for the permit. However, in a swift reaction, both the Chief of Defense Staff, General Lucky Irabor, and the Zamfara’s Commissioner of Police, Elkanah Ayuba, rebuffed this directive. This outburst is nothing short of seeming mutiny coming from the man in the saddle in Zamfara. Even though the governor of any state in Nigeria is referred to as the chief security officer, he has no control over the police or the armed forces. The General was plain on this stating that such a directive could only come from the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, Mr. President.

    In the same vein, Zamfara State Commissioner of Police wasted no time in responding to the apparently illegal directive of Matawalle, by stating that he has no power to grant license to anyone. In any case, there is an existing ban on acquisition of arms making the directive dead on arrival! Afenifere, the Yoruba socio-cultural group, condemned Matawalle’s directive for able men in the state to carry arms, referring to it as a sign of a failing and floundering government. It is easy for someone or group to castigate the steps taken by Governor Bello Matawalle, if you are not wearing his shoes. He, definitely, knows where the shoe pinches. Having lost several people to banditry and terrorism, there are others recent killings and kidnapping in Tsafe, the hometown of the state Commissioner of Security and Home Affairs, retired DIG Mamman Ibrahim Tsafe. In the attack targeted at Tsafe, the son of the commissioner and two others were killed when the security forces engaged the terrorists in gun battle. It is on record that many have been killed or abducted on their farms in recent times. It is instructive to pinpoint the slogan of Zamfara in this essay: ‘Farming is our pride.’ Life has been miserable for farmers in the state, even in this planting season! However, the people of Zamfara must survive!

    Laudable Steps of Matawalle

    Apart from the call to carry arms, there are some laudable steps that Matawalle’s government took. Recently, the state’s House of Assembly passed a bill for the prohibition and punishment for banditry, cattle rustling, cultism, kidnapping, terrorism and other incidental offences. Once, the bill reached the table of Matawalle, it was instantly accented to, thereby making it a law in the state. In a dynamic response to the menace of these callous men, other sagacious strategic steps were taken by the Matawalle led government of Zamfara. There was the inauguration of four committees on security matters. He went further by providing 20 brand new Hilux vehicles and 1,500 motorbikes for the commencement of this laudable operation. The committees are: Special Committee on Intelligence Gathering on Banditry; Management Committee on Operations of the Community Protection Guards (CPG); Committee on Prosecution of Banditry Related Offences; and State Security Standing Committee.

    Is there not a dire need for a State Police?

    One may ask rhetorically: is the state governor really the chief security officer of his state? No governor, within Nigeria’s context, can issue any directive to the police or the armed forces. Our constitution is definitely defective. Are we really running true federalism in Nigeria? Earlier, the Chairman of Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF). Dr. John Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State, in an interview on Arise TV clamoured for a state police. In addition, the Southern Governors’ Forum under the leadership of Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, repeated the same call in a communique released last year at Asaba. One may ask: What is the National Assembly doing to bring up something on this in concrete terms? Even though Afenifere, the Yoruba social cultural group, initially castigated Matawalle’s call to bear arms, the group made it saliently and succinctly clear that state police will solve this incessant and nagging insecurity in the states.

    In concluding, it was as if Matawalle was ready for any counter move from the centre as he insisted there is no going back on his directive. According to the helmsman in Zamfara: “self-defence is a natural instinct and has always been part of human survival strategy.” He based his insistence on the Fire Arms Act saying everything that his government would do will be within the ambit of the law. Matawalle’s stand and stake is that many have not taken into consideration the precarious plight “of the innocent people who are maimed, killed, and kidnapped every day in various parts of the state,” In any case, in his own perspective, there is no difference between the Civilian Joint Task Force (JTF) in Borno State and the Amotekun in the Southwest of Nigeria. Does this provide a veritable time for our legal luminaries to interrogate the Fire Arms Act and under what conditions citizens cannot be denied access to bearing arms even when they applied formally? In this columnist’s perspective, it is worth the inquisitive eyes of patriotic legal luminaries backed up by Civil Society Organizations (CSOs).

    • Ekundayo, Ph.D. – can be reached via 08155262360 (SMS only) and drjmoekundayo@hotmail.com

  • President Buhari can have state police as lasting legacy

    President Buhari can have state police as lasting legacy

    According to Statistics, 838 Nigerians were kidnapped in 2018 out of which 176 kidnappers were charged to court. Fast forward to 2021, over 2,500 Nigerians were abducted across the federation, including prominent individuals such as emirs, obas, clergymen, and academics. In addition, over N7 billion was paid by families, associates, and friends of the kidnapped victims as ransom to secure the release of their beloved ones. (a report actually has it that N20B was paid as ransom in 500 kidnapping incidents).

    Therefore, over time, a cottage industry has evolved into full stature before our very eyes, and its name is-kidnapping” – a newspaper editorial.

    As another evidence that this house has truly fallen (see “This House Has Fallen: Nigeria in crisis”, by Karl Meir – a vivid, chilling and absolutely down to earth account of Nigeria – Africa’s most populous, potentially richest, and most dangerously dysfunctional nation;  being, each year, with depressing consistency, declared the most corrupt, and now the most unsafe nation on the African continent” – Nigerians woke up this past week to the chilling directive by Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara state, Nigeria’s Somalia, that every citizen should own a rifle for personal protection. This, the governor said, was sequel to the previous Saturday’s attack on Mada community in the Gusau Local Council Area,  where bandits killed many people, wounded many and forced thousands to flee their homes.

    Expatiating further on the Governor’s directive, the Commissioner for Information, Ibrahim Dosara, explained that the decision was taken to ensure adequate security in the state.  He went on: “Government has resolved to take further measures to deal with the recent escalating attacks, kidnapping and criminal levies being enforced on our innocent communities. This act of terrorism has been a source of worry to both the people and the state government and to deal decisively with the situation, the  government directed individuals to obtain guns to defend themselves and that the government has directed the Commissioner of Police to issue licence to all those who qualify for it. The

    “government, he further emphasised, is ready to facilitate people, especially farmers, to secure basic weapons for defending themselves.

    Most surprising was the immediate reaction of the Chief of Defence staff who opposed the directive  claiming that the military had answers to the security challenges in the state. While there can  be no denying  the military’s yeoman’s efforts,  one expects that the CDS would see the peoples’ daily  existential, security problems to which the state government cannot be expected to close its eyes. A more positive approach should be a synergy like that between the military and the JTF which has achieved so much in the Northeast. Rather than oppose the  directive,  the  Chief of Defence staff should arrange appropriate training for the citizenry as, properly handled, it can actually do a lot to assist in confronting banditry.

    After all, Alhaji Zubairu Idris Abdulra’uf, a former Managing Director of the Kaduna State Media Corporation(KSMC), disclosed on national television this past week, that the people of Randegi, in the Birnin-Gwari emirate of Kaduna State, a farming community where bandits have collected over N400M in forced taxes to be able to go to their farms successfully dislodged bandits from the area.

    Why should a whole country be held captive by bandits in this time and age. Why would you not try something new if all you have been doing havent substantially solved the problem. The determined people of Randegi have proved that the Governor’s directive is doable.

    Afterall, it is not as if Zamfara state has been under- policed. On the contrary, it has witnessed a heavy police presence, yet with hardly any significant success. Wrote a columnist recently:”First was the stationing a full battalion of Special Forces in Zamfara. This was followed by “Operation Maximum Safety” with 510 police personnel and 40 patrol vehicles; Joint Intervention Team of about 1000 police personnel. There was the Nigerian Air Force Operation ‘Diran Mikiya’ and IGP Mohammed Adamu’s “Operation Puff Adder,” aimed not only “at taking the battle to the doorsteps of the criminals”, but to “rout-out, arrest and prosecute armed bandits, vicious kidnappers for ransom and cattle rustling gangs operating in some parts of the state.”

    What has become of all these that news strategies cannot be adopted?

    A civil rights activist, and former National President, Committee for Defence of Human Rights, Malachy Ugwumadu, recently observed that: “To a large extent, this directive signposts a critical stage in the deteriorating security situation in our country”. “What qualifies a country as a state, he said, is that the cohesive forces of that country is in the hands of recognised institutions of state and not in the hands of individuals”. “Where a government throws up its  hands, and directs the people to bear arms to resist terrorists and insurgents, then there can be no better definition of a failed state”.

    I cannot agree less.

    Why are we then in this state of utter helplessness in Nigeria? What makes us so very different from our neighbouring countries, especially those in the West African sub region? Why is Nigeria showing such a grotesque lack of leadership?

    Corruption has been a major cause, just as ethnicity has not lagged behind as it has underpinned Nigeria’s increasing unitarism.

    Read Also: State police: To be or not to be?

    Succinctly putting his fingers on corruption as the bane of our beleaguered country, candidate Muhammadu Buhari in 2015, put it very aptly when he said that “if we don’t kill corruption, corruption  will kill Nigeria”.

    As he was saying that, the sum of $2.1B earmarked for security, in a country fighting an enervating insurgency war, was being  systematically looted by the high and mighty in the government of the day.  So bad was it, the country’s National Security Adviser had to be hauled before the courts. As you read this, the country’s Accountant – General, Ahmed Idris,

    is presently on suspension on allegations of looting N80B, just as a military contractor’s house was raided by an anti graft agency this past week with billions of naira allegedly found.

    Not a few Nigerians believe that we have not seen anything yet.

    To the all pervading corruption in security circles must be attributed the reason why the police in Owo, Ondo state, hadn’t a single vehicle with which to pursue those animals that mowed down 40 worshippers and wounded more in that  bestial, and gruesome, attack on the St Francis Catholic church  on 5 June, 2022.

    That beggarly situation is the lot of most police formations in the country, even as the federal government, inexplainably, continues to put it under its suffocating stranglehold.

    But if a major asset on which  the bandits leverage, is the many, and  humongous ungoverned spaces, aka forests, scattered all over the North, why has the Federal government made itself a stumbling block to the establishment of a state police system which, staffed by those who know the terrain much more than total strangers being posted to locations from far and wide, many with no knowledge of the local language, would have helped tremendously in reducing banditry and assorted criminalities?

    If as far back as 2016 Governor Ganduje of Kano state has supported the establishment of state police, and the APC committee on restructuring, chaired by Governor El Rufai of Kaduna recommended same,  just as North East governors have “joined their counterparts in the South to

    recommend state and community policing as well as sub-regional outfits to compliment the efforts of the military and other federal security agencies in addressing insecurity”, it can then be surmised, with considerable justification, that President Buhari is the chief opponent of state police.

    With this assumption in mind, and to be able to do a robust and objective article on the subject, I contacted two good friends of mine from the North. I wrote:

    “Hi –

    Please can you educate me on why the North, no President Buhari, hates state police, even with the horrendous killings in the North and the fact that the NGF, or at lesst, most Northern governors approve of it? I am also talking to some other people as I intend to write an article on the subject

    Thank you”.

    One of them, whose name I shall be at liberty to mention, only because he has not replied – unlike him – he hasn’t even read the chat dated 28th June – and here’s hoping he is quite well – is Tony Sani, a highly regarded elder statesman who has served, at different times, as Publicity Secretary, and Secretary, of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF). We have related for well over a decade and I hold him in great respect, even though I never cease from taunting him with his  being ever more solicitous of the Fulani than other Northern ethnics, including his own – he is from Nasarawa state – and I always background this charge with the way he bludgeoned then Plateau state governor, Jonah David Jang,  in his support for the settler Fulanis in the ferocious inter- ethnic conflict of that era. I wasn’t saying he shouldn’t support the settlers, but to just try be objective)..

    The other friend, a very brilliant gentleman I once described as a true Nigerian on account of his Pan- Nigerian views, and network, was rather too brief, making his  comment not particularly fit for purpose as I truly wanted to  be educated as to  what must have influenced President Buhari’s position that he could ignore the Northern governors. His position, as one can see, is analogous to his iron cast rejection of restructuring which I think derives from his belief that the North would lose many of it’s unfair advantages, were Nigeria to be restructured.

    Here is his comment: “Buhari and North West Muslim majority states are opposed because it would whittle down their domination considerably. All other northerners are in favour.

    We are doing fine but the provocations from the Muslim Hegemons in the North are getting to a point where push will come to shove or worse”.

    “May God intervene before things deteriorate further”.”Oratre fratres,  Oratre sine intermissiones”, meaning: Pray, brethren, pray without ceasing for, indeed,  we have reasons to be prayerful”.

    As I indicated to my two friends earlier, because I am always keen to learn, I have, for quite some time, been involved in discussions on the subject with somebody who should know: a very  honest, direct and straight talking, retired commissioner of police who  does not mince his words,  no matter the subject, no matter who and who is involved.

    I present below his views on the issue of state police and what he believes has held back its establishment.:

    “Re: Owo Church Tragedy.

    The only solution to these incessant attacks and killings is state owned Police. Let every State recruit, train and arm its own Police. Ondo State Police, fully equipped in every sense of it (not Federal Police stationed in Ondo state) would have easily faced, confronted and repelled those rag tag cowards. In fact they would not have come, if they knew what would have confronted them.

    It is a pity that we all prevaricate while innocent lives are being  lost and valuable properties destroyed. A lorry load of Amotekun without requisite arms, and other necessary equipment, cannot confront 5 or 10 bandits, who are fully armed”.

    “Let’s do the needful. Let’s stop lamenting. I don’t want to say let’s stop praying, rather I will say let’s compliment prayers with action. That’s what all the Good Books say”. “Since security comes first, let us ammend the constitution today, and bring Police under the concurrent list so that willing, and ready, states can start setting up their own Police”.

    “The results will be remarkable in one year.. Anything short of this is a waste of time and we will just be perambulating as Fela would say; waiting for the next disaster to happen..

    On receipt of this, I asked further questions whereupon he wrote:

    “I have been on this state police matter for the past 20 years; right from while I was in service. Ask my colleagues in the Police and even in my Universities. In fact, my doctoral thesis is on Law and Community Police; a large part of which focused on state police. So this is not a question of getting those in authority to know. I dare say they all know. Don’t they enjoy same state police setting when they travel out ? They don’t want it for selfish, and hypocritical, reasons.. They want to eat their cake and have It. It is the same way they do not want to empower Local governments.

    I am repeating these, not because they will hear, but because I just cannot keep quiet. What will you do to wake someone who is not really asleep?  Yoruba will say: a ki i  ji apiroro. Eni sun ni won n ji.

    What exactly will knock sense into this country?

    I just don’t know”.

    “They” will not be able to appoint one IGP whose “powers” will cover the whole Country. Thus they will not be able to post their “Boys” to politicaly “strategic”, and economically “juicy” states like Lagos ,Ogun, Rivers “Anambra, Bayelsa” , Akwa Ibom etc.They wil not be able to have their “Boys” as Mobile  Commanders ,Area Commanders and DPOs in Shagamu, Onitsha, Warri, Aba, Port Harcourt, and other numerous commercial points in the South west and South South.

    The reasons are Legion”.

    I decided to write all these, even when I know it could rub some nerves, simply because of my concern for President Buhari for whose election, both in 2015,  and 2019,  I must have written over a million words, canvassing support.

    I am eager that he ends well, as well as  leaves a decent legacy.

    What the retired police commissioner wrote here is like hearing from the horse’s mouth and they point,  unequivocally, to the charge that the President terribly mismanaged the Nigerian diversity.

    He still has more than enough time to use his humongous stature within the appropriate organs of government, legislative and through the Nigerian Governors Forum, to ensure that state police will be one of the enduring legacies he will leave behind for Nigeria and Nigerians.

    By doing this, he would have killed two birds with one stone because he would, thereby, have solved the country’s security problems by more than half.

    I wish him well.

  • Baba Lekki sings ARIWO lenu Vendor

    Baba Lekki sings ARIWO lenu Vendor

    After a late meal of fried breadfruit and a prehistoric variant of mountain legumes still very popular in the hilly intersections of Oke Osun and Ekiti terrain, your columnist was rudely awaken by the din of early morning merriment and festivity going on in the neighbourhood.  Rather than rush out of bed to engage the revellers, yours sincerely decided to let discretion be the better part of valour. These days, one is never sure whether the coming revolution will be musicalized or televised.

    But as the melodious noise grew louder, yours sincerely could pick Oke Ogun music and the mellifluous infusions of Ade Gator, the ancient native crooner from Oke Ogun and the dandified ululations of Ahuja Bello, the old Oke Ogun master juju musician whose brilliant career was cruelly terminated by a motor accident.

    As soon as one roused to open the shutter, the reason for the din became clearer. It was Baba Lekki with a pile of newspapers on his head and screaming at the top of his voice: “Ariwo lenu Vendor!!!” Okon, the crazy one, was helping out with crowd control. Snooper could pick the scent of caustic burlesque. It was the old man’s eccentric way of welcoming the new Chief Justice Ariwodola whose appointment had been met with sly querulousness in certain quarters. Then trouble stirred as yanga woke it from slumber.

    “Ah, the jurisprudence of the living oracle himself”, one man hailed from the crowd.

    “Ah, it is the oracle of living jurisprudence. You see, I warned that yeye man when he was removing the Calabar boy that to probe the innards of a rodent in its burrow, you must put up your own innards for stringent examination”, the great contrarian crooned.

    “But you cannot approbate and reprobate at the same time. Your man has been accused of starting primary school at the age of one, abi no be so?” the man cut in.

    “Ah you see. Let them bring it on. We know of a former chief justice who never went to school at all. But, Ogbologbo, why are you not in court?” the old man demanded from his interlocutor.

    “You see when the entire society is criminalized everywhere becomes a law court”, the fellow shot back and began walking away in solemn sorrow.

    “Ah o ri yen so o, Baba Lekki crowed.

    “But baba, why dem no remove dem Tanko man before? Dem say him head no correct again.” Okon exploded.

    “Okon dem no fit. Dem no want dem mad Ibo woman called Mary come dabaru things for dem”, Baba sniggered.

    At this point a squat unruly fellow muscled his way through the crowd. “Ibo man no fit be president. Ibo woman no fit be CJ and Ibo man no fit be nothing, abi? We go show you for this country”, he thundered as he shot into the crowd. Everybody dispersed.

  • Nigeria’s ‘baby’ criminals

    Nigeria’s ‘baby’ criminals

    But for the urgency demanded by the Owo massacre of June 5, and the June 8 All Progressives Congress’s (APC) presidential primary which held the nation spell-bound because of the preceding intrigues; this piece ought to have been published two Sundays ago. The headline tells it all: ”Teenager brutally murders mother and child in Adamawa”.  Some newspapers added the rider that the teenager killed the two after a failed attempt to rape the woman!

    According to the Adamawa State Police Public Relations Officer, Sulaiman Nguroje, the suspect attacked the victim by the riverside, where she went to take her bath alongside her child. ”The Adamawa State Police Command on June 6, 2022, apprehended an 18-year-old suspect for the brutal murder of one Talatu Usman, 36, and her one-year-old child, in Lamurde Local Government Area”, Nguroje said.

    He added that the suspect (Volamu Kalbes), overpowered the suspect and pressed her down into the water when she resisted being raped. The woman eventually died. This, ordinarily, should have scared the suspect out of his blind ambition. But no. Like someone possessed, he also went for the victim’s one-year-old baby who was now crying uncontrollably on the river bank, and pressed him into the water until he too died.

    Newspaper reports did not give further details. For instance, we were not told how the failed rape attempt leaked, leading to the suspect’s arrest. Did the suspect report himself after committing the crimes? Did he leave clues that eventually gave him up? It would have been interesting to know how the husband and father, respectively, of the victims, got wind of what happened.  Nguroje simply said that “… the suspect was arrested by the command operatives attached to Lamurde divisional police headquarters, following a report received by the victim’s husband, Alh. Usman Abdul, who is distraught over the loss of his wife and child.”

    We must be sufficiently alarmed that an 18-year-old who ordinarily should be in school is already obsessed with sex such that he would not even mind becoming a serial killer in the course of meeting his sexual desire. Apparently the suspect killed his victims to conceal his crimes. Apparently, too, as in such rape cases, he must be well known to them, particularly the mother. But why would he also kill a year-old baby? The same guilty conscience that that one too could spill the beans?

    But this incident is not only about the real savage story of some of our youths today; it is not only about the influence of all manner of drugs, including aphrodisiacs that they have cheap access to; or wrong peer influence alone, it is also about the primitive living conditions prevalent in several parts of the country, particularly the rural areas. The victims would not have had cause to go to the river to have their bath if they had access to water, even if well water, at home. But in many of our rural areas, the rivers that people get water from are usually lonely, making those who go there, particularly women and children vulnerable to all kinds of dangers, especially these days when the nation has lost its innocence. This was the fate suffered by Talatu and her baby: they must have been shouting when the man was pressing them down the river but due to the loneliness of the place, no one came to their rescue. The young man must have been monitoring the movements around the river to know when best to carry out his lustful desire. Whether he specifically had the victim in mind or she just happened to have come handy at the time is a thing the police should also be interested in. But governments must work on provision of water in all the nooks and crannies of the country, or at least ensure that there is enough security, to reduce, if not eradicate the kind of fate that befell these hapless victims.

    Read Also: We’re in final phase of campaign against insurgents, other criminals – Buhari

    Perhaps there would not have been much cause for alarm if this was an isolated incident. But it is not. Nigerians are daily inundated with reports of teenagers getting involved in all manner of crimes as if such crimes are going to get out of fashion anytime soon.

    On January 29, this year, two teenage boys – Wariz Oladehinde (17), Abdulgafar (19) and Lukman Mustakeem (20) — were caught in the Oke Aregba area of Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital, burning the head of the girlfriend of one of them, Rofiat, in a pot. The suspects reportedly confessed that the ritual crime was for the purpose of making money.

    Then, on March 5, the Kano State Police Command arrested an 18-year old boy, Abdullahi Suleiman, along with a 17-year-old accomplice, Muazzam Lawan, for the alleged murder of a housewife, Rukayya Jamily, aged 21 years. The suspect had entered the deceased’s house at about 4pm on February 12, 2022, met her on her bed and took possession of three mobile phones she had with her. As is usual about such crimes, Suleiman was said to have repeatedly hit her on the head with a wooden pestle to prevent her telling the story, apparently because she knew him. Suleiman also killed the woman’s two children before fleeing the scene. If the woman was 21, we can imagine the ages of the two children that were also killed to conceal the crime.

    Again, on April 14, Amotekun personnel in Ondo State apprehended three juveniles, Timilehin Femi (12), Ojo Sunday (16) and Odeyemi Ayodele (20) who allegedly specialised in armed robbery, at Ijare in Ifedore Local Government Area of the state. Guess who their models were? Three of the most notorious armed robbers known in Nigerian history: Anini, Oyenusi and Osumbor, whose names they had adopted as nicknames! Some heroes!

    As if these were not enough, three boys between the ages of 14 and 15 who were caught some time ago roaming the  streets in Benin, the Edo State capital, said they were from Delta State and that they were in Benin to scout for opportunities to engage in Yahoo-Yahoo in order to make money. Of course still fresh in our minds is the story of the Chrisland school children caught for immoral sexual acts in faraway Dubai, where they had gone to participate in a sports event. We have numerous other obscene scenes in the social media, of various school children engaging in all manner of seductive dances and other salacious activities.

    If we say the urge for quick money is the reason why some of our youths today engage in ritual killing, Yahoo-Yahoo, kidnapping and other social vices, what would we adduce as reason for teenagers engaging in rape? What kind of sexual urge would make an 18-year-old to kill mother and baby? If we say the boy killed the mother apparently because she could identify him and eventually spill the beans, why kill her one-year-old baby? Talk of the guilty being afraid? It is simply crazy and incredible.

    But, what exactly is the world turning into? This is the question that comes into mind reading these obviously bizarre stories. Imagine an adolescent who is so sex-starved that he did not mind taking two lives, even when it was obvious he was on an impossible mission. Now, not only has his mission failed, he is likely to be arraigned for attempted rape and alleged murder of two persons. The consequence is huge, considering especially the murder angle. The question now is whether the urge for sexual satisfaction is worth such a weighty consequence even if he had had his way. The same way we can ask whether the lust for money that made others engage in ritual killings is worth the trouble. Ditto those who were caught for engaging in Yahoo-Yahoo, etc.

    What these stories tell us is that the value system in the country has collapsed. There is nothing that is held sacrosanct anymore. Gone were those days when people valued good names more than riches. Gone were those days when people remembered the homes from where they came. Gone were those days when Nigerians were their brother’s keeper. All of these have gone to the dogs. All of these explain why the country itself is perpetually on tenterhooks.

    The irony is that we are all to blame; from the parents to the religious leaders and traditional rulers, and ultimately the political leaders. Yet, we are all likely to point accusing fingers at the government. But ”charity”, as they say, ”begins at home”. That being so, a child begins its first lessons right from the home, before going to school where peer and other influences take over. This is where the religious leaders and traditional rulers and ultimately the larger society take over. Everybody needs to wake up if we are to reverse the trend, and if Nigeria is to make any headway among the comity of nations.

    Although nothing can bring back the lives already snuffed out by these heartless fellows, the least the society owes the dead and their relations is for the police to do diligent investigation of the cases and others with a view to getting the suspects prosecuted and those found guilty jailed for their atrocities.