The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

  • Governors’ vigil for bailout

    Governors’ vigil for bailout

    Time to  face reality 

    Nigeria’s governors are at it again! They want more money. But for how long will they be going cap-in-hand to Abuja to look for money or ‘bailout’, as the fine bara (begging) has now become famously known? Bailout gained currency in the country when the Federal Government, perhaps in some cases for want of what to do with public funds, started giving money to some sectors of the economy, ostensibly to get them out of the woods. Thus, the textile sector, the agriculture sector and even airlines benefited from this free money that no one is sure the government can ever recover. Anyway, was the money ever meant to be recovered?

    In fairness to the governors, their financial fortune has dwindled over the last 12 months or so; with the continued fall in crude oil prices. It would appear reasonable too, as the governors argued, that they agreed to a minimum wage of N18,000 per month when crude oil was selling for $126 per barrel; it is now $41. Now that crude prices have fallen, they added, it is difficult for them to sustain the minimum wage. Zamfara State governor Abdulaziz Yari, who read the communiqué issued by the governors at the end of their meeting held at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, under the auspices of their umbrella body, the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) on Thursday, said: “The situation is no longer the same when we were asked to pay N18,000 minimum wage when oil price was $126 (per barrel) and continued paying N18,000 minimum wage when the oil is $41 and the source of government expenditure is from oil and we have not seen prospects in the oil industry in the near future”.

    This is the extent to which I sympathise with the governors. Even then, the sympathy should be qualified because this is not the first time that crude prices would fall. And, as a major crude oil producer, we have always known that the international oil market is volatile and that this volatility is beyond our control. Yet, we did not as a country take any practical step towards providing any cushion such that we would not catch cold whenever crude prices slump or sneeze. Year in, year out, our schools have been turning out graduates (including governors) at all levels that were taught in the various schools some lesson about diversification of the economy. We have heard so many economic experts who wrote papers upon papers delivered at seminars and symposiums about this topic, and many of these papers only gather dust in government establishments; that is when the documents have not been handed to the groundnut seller across the road in the government offices in exchange for groundnut due to lack of space to keep them.

    In other words, successive governments that should have seen the developments that eventually culminated in the slump in oil prices, including the discovery of shale oil, which have put everyone in Nigeria in a mess, merely paid lip service to diversification or, characteristically Nigerian, simply wished that no evil would befall oil prices in Jesus’ name!. Even when we lost the United States, our major crude customer, a thing that should have warned us further of the impending crisis, we celebrated the replacement of the U.S. by Russia and some Asian countries.

    It is sad that I have to return to the Goodluck Jonathan administration so early after my leave, but it is inevitable because it was under his watch that oil prices plummeted last year and the only thing that occupied the then president’s mind was reelection; a thing he did not deserve considering the result he posted after running the country for about five years.   At a time President Jonathan should be strategising on how to address the challenges facing the country’s jugular, he was busy polarising virtually everything that seemed a hindrance to his second term ambition; everything including the NGF some of whose members suddenly became exposed for the dullards that they were as they claimed that 16 was greater than 19 in an election involving just 35 persons!.

    One point the governors must realise now is that the era of sharing is gradually coming to an end in the country. It’s now time to bake. Few persons, if any, have been talking about baking, the emphasis has been on sharing; we have dissipated so much energy on revenue sharing formula when we should be talking about revenue baking formula. This is a reality that our governors have to start accepting. And I want to believe we are getting there because the governors too tasted what a vigil is like. I hear their meeting lasted from Wednesday to the early hours of Thursday last week. So, when the poor too talk about vigil, the governors would have a feel of what they (the poor) mean. I hope the governors would permanently wake up to this reality on baking before it is too late. They gave that impression on Thursday.

    And, when the time for baking comes, no one would need to tell state creation agitators that their time is up. Even as we speak, they seem to have gone into hiding since the cash crunch set in. The truth is; many of them will get silenced for life the moment states begin to fend for themselves. Even as things are, creation of some of the existing states was a mistake. because most of those who created them did so more for political expediency.

    Without doubt, the Federal Government has to shed weight even under the lopsided federalism that we are practicing. But then, the governors have to resolve this time around that if the NGF must be relevant, they would use it more for functional rather than the dysfunctional purposes that many of them used it for under the Jonathan presidency.

    It is not just a question of meeting President Buhari again as the governors resolved at the meeting; it is about being ready to take hard, even if painful decisions about unlocking the potentials buried in the bowels of many of the states and checking corruption. After all, they (governors) met with the president on the same issue in June; yet, not all of them paid their workers with the money as directed by the Federal Government which bailed them out then. The truth is; unless things improve, I foresee a situation where one of these days, all that the governors would bring back from Abuja would be the admonition given by one of the military commanders during the civil war when his subordinates told him that their food supplies at the battle front had been exhausted. The commander simply told the soldiers to “go and manage”. When he was reminded that there was nothing left to ‘manage’, he merely repeated himself; ‘I say go and manage’!

    The solution to the economic crisis is not in reduction of minimum wage as some of the governors are thinking because the N18,000 minimum wage is ridiculously low. How many of the governors with girlfriends would ‘dash’ their mistress N18,000 for transportation even for a single trip (or a single shot) and expect to see her again?

    My point is that, before the situation gets this bad, the governors should start thinking about alternatives to the Abuja ‘fine bara’. President Buhari may not be in a position to bail them out all the time if things do not improve, because he too will be under pressure from Nigerians to deliver the democratic dividend he promised them during the electioneering. Let our governors put on their thinking caps so that they won’t have to go and ‘manage’ when it is visible, even to the blind, that there is nothing to ‘manage’. In the same vein retrenchment does not seem a likely option so that we do not compound the present security situation. Rather, what is required is a pragmatic and holistic approach to getting our economy out of the woods and this involves all, the president, governors and other stakeholders.

  • Baba Lekki propounds a Neo-Biafran theory

    As the entire length and breadth of the Eastern part of the country is convulsed by agitations for a new state of Biafra, tongues are beginning to wag about the real motives( and motivation) of the protesters. Not a few people are worried that should things get out of hand, there may soon be a bloody confrontation between the agitators and a determined military authority that has vowed to crush all threats to national security with maximum force.

    Originally thought to be a fringe group looking for attention and led by a metropolitan smart aleck and out of work con-man called Nnamdi Kanu, it has gathered tremendous strength and momentum in the past few weeks as the nation sinks deeper into an economic quagmire. The dire economic straits that the nation has found itself has proved a fertile recruiting ground for unemployed urchins and many disaffected nationals who see a forcible dissolution of the Nigerian union as the only route to self-determination.  IPOB has supplanted MASSOB for now.

    It was a worried Okon that went in search of Baba Lekki who had relocated to Papa Ajao. The old man was in fine fettle and gamey mischief.

    “Kukuruku boy. You can see that I am moving in the right direction, towards the airport in case yanponyanrin come burst for obodo”, the old man crowed with savage delight.

    “Ha baba, dis one no be laughing matter. Dem useless Kanu boy don come again. The last time for one-million march I supply am with container full of dem Ibo people and him no pay”, Okon opened.

    “Okon, you are a fool, no be dat Kanu and dis one no be one million march na twenty three million. Katakata don dey come small small.”

    “Baba, wetin dem want dis time abi na so so fight?”

    “Na dem Yoruba fit explain dat one. Dem say name be destiny. As dem boy dey bear Kanu the problem be say Ko kanu. In Yoruba, he mean say food dey but he no dey enough. Appetite don whet pass saliva”, the old man sneered.

    “Baba, wetin go happen if dem Buhari general come hammer dem people?” Okon demanded.

    “Okon na dem name go explain dat one again. Na dat one dem Yoruba people dey call Kanuko, or shut your mouth. Na mechonu for Ibo “.  With that, the old man dismissed the poor boy.

  • Between corruption and the judiciary, which is Nigeria’s worse enemy?

    Without a shred of doubt, the Nigerian judiciary has been more of a foe than a friend; it is too consumed with financial consideration which is the reason we have cases going on for decades in our courts.

      “I sincerely believe that the president as the Head of State and Chief Executive of the Federation, by virtue of Section 130 of the constitution, has the power to express concern and call on the CJN to explain what happened. “He can do this through the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation as the chief law officer of the state. In his capacity, the president as the chief executive can, through the AGF, direct the Federal Judicial Service Commission or the National Judicial Council, both as federal executive bodies under the Third Schedule to the Constitution, to query all the justices of the Supreme Court involved in this scandalous illegality.” – Lagos-based lawyer Johnson Esezoobo

    Much as I do not subscribe to  Lawyer Esezoobo’s anger-induced  views which form  the epigram to this piece, I haven’t  the slightest doubt that  some elements within the Nigerian judiciary must silently be thanking their stars that President Muhammadu Buhari did not come,  this time around, as a military head of state. When last Sunday I quoted Femi  Falana, SAN, ad nauseam, detailing how some members of the bar and the bench are doing everything to  undermine the president’s anti-corruption war, little did I know that worse was to come. For in the space of a few days, the Supreme Court showed very clearly that the Nigerian judiciary is not ‘ad idem’ with the president when he says corruption is capable of killing Nigeria. Nigerian courts have no qualms, whatever, giving succour to anybody standing trial on corruption charges as in the Ibori case, easily demonstrating how hollow the Nigerian judiciary really is.  But with sections 306 and 309 of the New Administration of Criminal Justice Act still live in our books, the Supreme Court decision staying proceedings in the Saraki case before the Code of Conduct Tribunal must take the cake in judicial infamy. It became worse, when Mike Ozekhome, an otherwise respected Senior Advocate, flew into unpardonable sophistry, claiming that though applicable at the lower courts, the administration of criminal justice act does not apply at the Supreme Court as if Nigerian courts operate different laws.  It doesn’t get more worrisome.  When I remember how fetchingly Professor Biodun Jeyifo celebrated the Act in his column in The Nation on Sunday of  23 August, 2015, even  bringing Falana in to validate his position,  I could not help conclude that  newspaper columnists , in our clime, most probably labour in vain.  All the same, could he have also had the Supreme Court  judges in mind when he wrote as follows in that article: “. . . this concluding essay in our series on effective prosecutions versus probes as weapons in the war against corruption in our country will focus on the Administration of Justice Act of 2015. Most Nigerians, including lawyers, seem either to be totally unaware of the existence of this Act or if they are aware of its existence, do not seem to have a grasp of what it would take to make it work”.  Did our Lord Justices become seized of it only when the likes of highly regarded  Chief Folake Solanke,SAN, Professor Itse Sagay, SAN, Chief Adegboyega Awomolo, SAN,  Mr Femi Falana, SN, Jiti Ogunye and Malachy began to vent their spleen on the Apex Court?   For space constraint, I quote only Professor  Sagay: “The new Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015 has completely eliminated any application or grant of stay of actions or proceedings in criminal trials; it prohibits it. So, what the Supreme Court has done is illegal and it is shocking that the Supreme Court would indulge in illegalities. “It is a complete affront to the law that is binding on them (S’Court) and it is a bad example to the rest of the judiciary and the country. There is no question about that.”Now, we have to call on them to revoke their own illegality and that is a more difficult thing because pride will make it difficult for them to accept that what they have done is an affront to the law. But that is the only thing that has to be done’.

    Nigerians were certainly not surprised when the Punch reported in its Thursday, 19 November, 2015 edition that the Chief Justice of Nigeria may be disbanding that panel of Supreme Court Judges. It got so bad even Esozoobor thinks the president should play the role of an overseer over the judiciary – a complete anathema. But who can blame him?

    I think it is apposite, for a thorough understanding of how the judiciary continues to undermine  the president’s  anti-corruption war, that I conclude this piece  with Femi Falana’s views, again,  as I captured  them  on these pages last Sunday. Said Falana: “The menace of corruption is compounded by the impunity of the ruling class. It is, therefore, pertinent to join issues with the lawyers who are being used to frustrate the anti-corruption war. Although the NBA condemns corruption in both the bar and the bench, it is public knowledge that some senior lawyers have since been recruited to frustrate the prosecution of corrupt elements in the society. The president’s appeal to lawyers to help in the fight has since fallen on deaf ears as these senior lawyers are determined to frustrate the trial of corruption cases. In the past three months, several interim and interlocutory orders have been issued by the federal and state high courts which have prevented the anti-graft agencies from prosecuting certain highly placed individuals accused of involvement in corrupt practices and other economic and financial crimes. In fact, a judge in the Federal High Court has granted not less than 10 of such orders. I also know of a State High Court judge who has ordered the police not to charge some indicted murder suspects to court. From the information at my disposal, these illegal orders were procured by some senior lawyers contrary to the settled position of the law. Granting of interlocutory injunctions to restrain the police or anti-graft agencies from investigating allegations of corruption and other criminal offences is illegal, and unconstitutional, as no court has the power to turn any person into an outlaw in a country which operates under the rule of law. In Fajemirokun v. CCB Nig. Ltd. (2009) 21 WRN 10 the

    Supreme Court held: “In view of section 35(1)(c)(2)(3)(4)(5) and (6) and Section 36(1)- (12) of the 1999 Constitution which provide adequate safeguard for  the arrest of any person suspected of having committed an  offence, investigation of the allegation, and the prosecution of the  offender, no person has the constitutional right to be shielded  against criminal investigation by a judicial fiat or order.”

    In the same vein in the case of Dododo v. Economic and Financial Crimes Commission & Ors. (2013) 1 NWLR ( PT 1336) 468 at 510 the Court of Appeal held: “The EFCC and the ICPC enjoy the status of the powers vested in  the police that encompasses the duty to examine a complaint or petition, investigate and prosecute, if necessary, and that when a petition or complaint is made the statutory body, their duty to look  at the complaint cannot be suppressed.”  In spite of the clear pronouncements of the appellate courts to the effect no court can confer immunity on criminal suspects, high court judges have continued to frustrate the anti-graft agencies from arresting, investigating and prosecuting influential persons accused of involvement in serious cases of corruption, fraud and other economic crimes. No doubt, the lawyers involved in the charade are promoting corruption and subverting the rule of law under the guise of protecting the fundamental rights of their clients”.

    It is a shame that it is the same group of lawyers you find going the rounds, shopping for courts in all parts of the country, eagerly looking for unprincipled members of their fraternity who would do their bidding. I cannot forget in a hurry, both the late Mr. Justice Kayose Esho, and Aare Afe Babalola once saying, at the end of a meeting of the Institute of Arbitrators, a few years ago that many lawyers have become billionaires through bribes related to election matters. PMB’s anti-corruption war would go nowhere unless the Nigerian judiciary puts Nigeria first. Without a shred of doubt, the Nigerian judiciary has been more of a foe than a friend; it is too consumed with financial consideration which is the reason we have cases going on for decades in our courts. Nigerians must call their bluff.

  • Aliko Dangote at Harvard: the question I wanted to, but did not ask him (3)

    Aliko Dangote at Harvard: the question I wanted to, but did not ask him (3)

    When PDP came to power in 1999 Nigeria was generating about 4,000 MW of electricity. After 15 years and $20 billion spent we are generating between 3,000 and 4,000 MW.
    Presidential Candidate Muhammadu Buhari, November 2014

    As published in ThisDay, February 22, 2015 on the eve of the presidential elections that swept Goodluck Jonathan out of office, the following statement was made by Jonathan’s Minister of Power, Professor Chinedu Nebo, during the re-commissioning ceremony of the privatized Egbin Power Plant in Lagos State:

    “Your Excellency, since privatisation, the power sector has received as it were a new baton to move Nigeria to the next level of moving in the direction of uninterrupted power supply. Your Excellency, since privatisation and handing over to the private sector, distribution and generation value chains of the electricity sector, we have seen an employment of over 2,000 engineers hired in the sector. Your Excellency, please remember that for 16 years before you became President, the entire power sector in the country under both NEPA and PHCN did not hire a single engineer.  The level of dilapidation of the power sector that you inherited was so huge that it was not only with regards to material components but also with regards to human resources. It was also with regards to funding that was allowed to go so low that it appeared the power sector had become an orphan”

    Please note Professor Nebo’s observation that in the 16 years prior to Jonathan’s ascendancy to the presidency, the entire power sector in Nigeria had been in such a state of “dilapidation” that it seemed to have “become an orphan” grossly lacking in vital human and material inputs that could have made it capable of resolving the nation’s perennial crises of inadequate and irregular power generation and distribution. Note that for most of those 16 years before Jonathan came to power, his party, the PDP, was in power. Note also that the PDP presidents before Jonathan, Obasanjo and Yar’ Adua, had in fact disbursed billions of petrodollars for the resuscitation of this sector, all to no avail. Finally and finally, please note that Professor Nebo’s boast about the unique “achievement” of the Jonathan administration within the 16-year reign of the PDP pertains to the fact that energy production in Nigeria rose to its highest level ever in the country, this being 5,500 Megawatts. But as soon as you compare this “achievement” with energy production around the planet, it is actually one of the lowest per capita, not only in the world at large, but within the African continent itself. I pass silently over the fact that among all the nations of the world, we have an unusually high and even superabundant supply of the raw materials needed to generate and supply power to our peoples – fuel oil; natural gas; coal; water; sun and wind. But this question I will not pass over: at the dawn of the reign of the new ruling party, will things be different in the energy sector?

    In the context of this series based on Aliko Dangote’s lecture at Harvard University on October 29, 2015, this question is directed as much to our business elites as to our political rulers. As a matter of fact, I am directing the question more to our business moguls that to the government. In doing this, I ask the reader to please remember that I started this series with the following question that was prompted by Dangote’s lecture at Harvard on October 29: why is it that our business elites have never considered that they could be part of the solution to our perennial crisis of power generation and distribution? Let me now proceed directly to a discussion of this all-important question.

    Given the depth of the crisis of power production and distribution in Nigeria, the reader of this series will be surprised to learn that there is actually in existence a considerable number of quite excellent studies, reports and commentaries on the things that are wrong with the power sector in our country. But to my knowledge, not a single one of these excellent studies and reports was sponsored by any of our business moguls. If I am wrong in making this assertion, I ask anyone who has the evidence to refute my assertion to please step forward and correct me and I will take back my assertion. For now at least, this much I can further assert with absolute certainty that nobody can step forward to disprove what I now declare: there has never been a lobby, a self-organized front among our business elites to promote ideas and actions that could make our energy problems and crises things of the past. To put this assertion in concrete terms, let me point out to the reader that there is in existence a so-called Presidential Task Force on Power (PTFP); however, there is not now in existence and never has been a task force set up by our business elites on power generation and distribution in Nigeria. If the matter really interested them, all Aliko Dangote or any of our billionaires or business moguls would have to spend on sponsoring and vigorously promoting studies on solutions to the problems of the energy sector would be very small fractions of their immense fortunes; they haven’t. More precisely, they have never thought of doing such a thing.

    It is perhaps useful to place these astounding observations of mine against the historical background of electrification as a vital part of economic, technological and cultural modernity throughout the planet. Historically, there are essentially only two paradigms or patterns available to us as models. The first and by far the more familiar paradigm is that of effective electrification by modernizing capitalist elites who were real industrial, commercial and financial haute bourgeoisie and on that basis used their influence with politicians and the state to construct power generation and distribution monopolies that were later broken up into smaller enterprises. Western Europe, North America and Japan are of course the big exemplars of this paradigm. Parenthetically, let me add here that history provides no single instance of bands of “emergency” contractors and business moguls that successfully led their nations to complete and adequate electrification of the nation and its economy.

    The second and far more limited but no less effective paradigm pertains to socialist or communist states that used the mechanisms of a centralized, command economy to rapidly construct successful national power grids as a vital sector in the drive towards economic, social and cultural development. One of the most memorable examples of this particular paradigm is that revealed in the slogan of the Bolsheviks when they came to power in Russia: “socialism = collectivization + electrification”. Within one decade the Bolsheviks transformed Tsarist Russia, one of the most backward countries in Europe into one of the economic and political powerhouses of the world; effective electrification of the country and the economy was one of the engines of that spectacular achievement. Maoist and Post-Maoist China and Cuba are also shining exemplars of this paradigm.

    It is of course indisputable that Nigeria under the new ruling party, the APC, is most definitely not about to take the path of the Bolsheviks and other socialist or state-capitalist nations of the world in installing full, adequate and reliable electrification in Nigeria. In ideological temper, the new ruling party is at best Centre-Right; the handful of Centre-Left thinkers and politicians in its ranks wield no real influence in both the party and the federal and state governments that the party controls. Moreover, at the current historical moment, very few countries in the world seem poised to follow the socialist path of the command economy and its model of technological modernity with particular relevance to rapid, complete or adequate electrification. In these contexts that are both national and global, the question that arises with regard to prospects of full and adequate electrification in APC-ruled Nigeria is this: Can or will the ruling party successfully apply the paradigm of true capitalist modernization in the energy sector and if so, what will be the contribution of our business elites to that process?

    Any regular reader of this column knows that if I had a say in the matter, we would choose the socialist path of rapid, complete and reliable electrification. Beyond ideology, there is a profoundly humane aspect to this preference: socialism places human beings, their needs and aspirations above economic production either an end in itself or as a means of surplus accumulation by the wealthy and the powerful. But since, as I have said earlier, it would be extremely unrealistic or delusional of me or anyone to expect that the APC governments at the centre and in the states are likely to choose this socialist path, the burden that lies squarely on the shoulders of the Buhari administration is to successfully apply the well known paradigm of the capitalist path. But since in this series I have been more interested in the contribution of our business elites, I must save the last words here for that group.

    Nothing proves more decisively that oil wealth has effectively wiped out the small, bourgeoning group of real capitalist industrialists and entrepreneurs that we had when the national economy was based on cash crops and light consumer goods industrialization than the ridiculously miniscule quantity of power generated in our country at great expense. At all times since the coming of oil doom, actual production of power has trailed far behind installed capacity for production; and both installed capacity and actual production have been one of the lowest per capita in Africa and in the world. Significantly, neither state-controlled energy production and distribution nor massive privatization has made the slightest dent in the abysmal quantity and erratic nature of power production in the sector. For this reason, we may conclude that there are no true capitalists in government or business in our country.

    In Dangote’s lecture at Harvard on October 29, 2015, I heard distinct intimations that he represents an emerging group of real capitalist industrialists and entrepreneurs. If this is true, will Dangote and these small groups among our business moguls please step forward, separate themselves from the majority of “emergency” or “barawo” capitalists in our country and lead the way to complete, regular and reliable electrification in Nigeria and our region of the continent? This will enormously make life much better for all our peoples. Moreover, the reduction that this would create in the cost of doing business in our country and our West African region is literally incalculable. In turn, this will create a vast internal market of actual and potential consumers in the region that will be numbered in scores of millions, most definitely one of the biggest regional markets in the world. And indeed, it boggles the mind that our business moguls that regard themselves as more than mere “agbero”, “barawo” or “emergency” contractors and businessmen have never set their sights, their prospects of surplus accumulation this high. It makes one wonder whether indeed there are true capitalists in our country beyond the philistine, lumpen-bourgeois hordes that emerged in the wake of the oil doom. I happen to think that there are; indeed, I personally know a few among them. What I have never observed among their ranks is a sense of critical self-awareness of themselves as a group on whom the fate of capitalism in our part of the world depends. Dr, Yemi Ogunbiyi, CEO and Chairman TANUS Books Limited, I swear I am not thinking of you as I write these words!

     

     

    Biodun Jeyifo

    bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu

  • Petroleum mode and pork barrel governance (2)

    Just as the new minister of power has set out to look for the root cause of decades of epileptic power supply in the country, so do the president and his team need to look for the root cause of the country’s under-development, in spite of half a century of over $500 billion revenue to the country from petroleum.

    • Initiate action to amend our Constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties and responsibilities to states and local governments in order to entrench true Federalism and the Federal spirit;
    • Prevent abuse of executive, legislative and public offices through greater accountability, transparency and strict enforcement of anti-corruption laws whilst strengthening the EFCC and ICPC;
    • Amend the Constitution to remove immunity from prosecution for elected officers in criminal cases;
    • Restructure government for a leaner, more efficient and adequately compensated public service;
    • Balance across regions by the creation of 6 new Regional Economic Development Agencies (REDAs) to act as champions of sub-regional competitiveness;
    • Put in place a N300 billion regional growth fund (average of N50bn in each geo-political region) to be managed by the REDAs, encourage private sector enterprise and support to help places currently reliant on the public sector;
    • Initiate policies to ensure that Nigerians are free to live and work in any part of the country by removing state of origin, tribe, ethnic and religious affiliations and replace those with state of residence. –FROM Buhari/APC MANIFESTO

    By way of summary, last week’s piece emphasised the negative impact of a false feeling of affluence from steady flow of revenue from petroleum on the structure, content, and style of governance in the country in the last 50 years. More specifically, we argued that the belief of military rulers that “money is not Nigeria’s problem but how to spend it” influenced military dictators between the civil war and the exit of military dictatorship in 1999 to create 36 mini-states and 774 local governments that turned the country into multiple sites of compulsive consumption and very little production. It also spawned a culture of profligacy in compensation of political office holders in a country where over 70% of the population live below poverty line, while also giving birth to innumerable agencies to do what other layers of government are constitutionally designed to do. We also added that citizens were alienated from government by being largely released from paying taxes, just as they were excluded by military dictators and their civilian successors from the process of creating the current constitution that is to drive governance under President Buhari, also  a one-time military dictator.

    Today’s focus is to elaborate on the thesis of last week: the need to take advantage of huge decline in revenue from petroleum to redesign the structure, content, and style of governance, including response by the government and citizens to the need to finally use the spirit and ideology of change promised by President Buhari and the All Progressives Congress to re-invent the country with the goal of enlarging the space of freedom;  strengthening the architecture of security; enforcing transparency in governance; re-designing the architecture of governance; and transforming states into centers of productivity rather of parasitism on revenue from petroleum or other non-renewable mineral resources-solid or liquid.

    In contrast to the regional model inherited from the British colonial master at independence, military dictators became too unrealistic about the abundance of petroleum, to the extent that they felt emboldened to re-conceptualise Nigeria. Instead of continuing the tradition of a system of three or four regions that compete in terms of economic activities and cooperate by ensuring the survival of the country as a political or territorial unit, military dictators misread the significance of petroleum by viewing it as the sole driver and sustainer of unity. Abundance of petroleum spawned a culture of profligacy; killed economic production in the states under military rule and after; encouraged military rulers to create mini-states as administrative units to guzzle the revenue from oil; and also created a political class addicted to exorbitant personal emoluments, despite having immense opportunities to rob the state. Sixteen years after the exit of military rulers, retired General Buhari and the APC realised that the country needed to be mended through changing the modus operandi of running the country.

    Despite the existence of 36 states with sizable bureaucracy, oversize pay packets for political office holders, and easy access to unwholesome hands of political leaders in the country’s treasury, the social statistics remain depressing. 62 million Nigerians are illiterate; 70% of Nigerians live below poverty line; Nigeria has between 3,000 and 4,000 megawatts of electricity for 170 million citizens; Nigerian manufacturers have to run to Ghana and even Benin Republic to do light manufacturing; more women die at childbirth in the country than any other country in the sub-region; infant mortality in the country remains one of the highest in the world; over 160 million Nigerians are transported daily by mini buses and motor cycles; etc.

    It was therefore not surprising that General Buhari and his party chose the path of change when they crafted the manifesto for the 2015 presidential and state elections. It is still not surprising that after winning the presidency, President Buhari and his party are singing, as enthusiastically as ever, about the imperative of change. Since the election, many pundits have blamed the failure of the country in the last five decades on poor quality of leadership or on the existence of ethnic and religious diversity. Others pontificate on the web about the reluctance of Nigerians to evolve into new post-colonial personas that choose cultural amnesia by demonising their cultural past. Such pundits blame the inability of citizens to undo the diversity that served them well in the years before independence and that has the potential of making them create one of the world’s most developed countries with cultural diversity.

    Many public commentators have complained about lack of a grand vision conveyed in a grand narrative of Buhari presidency’s pre-figuring of the Nigeria he wants to leave behind at the end of his tenure. However, the manifesto with which he negotiated for votes is full of episodic narratives that can add up to a grand vision, if the objectives of such episodic stories are met sincerely and realistically. It is reassuring to note in the manifesto (part of which the bullets overleaf represent) that the president and his party did not just choose the path of escaping from the country’s cultural diversity into cultural homogeneity through individuals’ efforts to re-invent themselves culturally. In a list of what to do that include food self-sufficiency through agriculture and revenue generation through solid minerals, passing N5,000 from the national purse to 25 million poor citizens; free education, free meal in school, improvement of power and other infrastructure; fighting Boko Haram terrorism and political and bureaucratic corruption; the president clearly promised in the first line of his manifesto the need for a new design of the polity bequeathed by military dictators. He has pledged to use his presidency to: initiate action to amend our Constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties and responsibilities to states and local governments in order to entrench true Federalism and the Federal spirit. He and his party also seem to have recognised the need to return to regional economic planning and development: Balance across regions by the creation of 6 new Regional Economic Development Agencies (REDAs) to act as champions of sub-regional competitiveness.

    Details of what to do “to entrench true Federalism and the Federal spirit,” are missing in the episodic narrative of change in the nation. But what to do to promote “regional economic planning and development” shows the impishness (birthed by the philosophy and sociology of spending petrodollars) of throwing money at problems by creating bureaucracies to administer, rather than solve problems. The pledge of Buhari and the APC to re-craft the 1999 Constitution with the aim of re-federalising the country needs be addressed with as much speed and enthusiasm as doing everything else on the manifesto.

    Just as the new minister of power has set out to look for the root cause of decades of epileptic power supply in the country, so do the president and his team need to look for the root cause of the country’s under-development, in spite of half a century of over $500 billion revenue to the country from petroleum.

    – To be continued

     

  • Now, the hard part

    Now, the hard part

    It is not for nothing that Nigerians’ have been in excitable mode since Muhammadu Buhari swore in dream team last week. Nigerians, no doubt, are an interesting lot. A week after, not only have they said everything that could be said under the sun about their new ministers, it seems there’s no ending to their inventiveness in their description of President Buhari’s amalgam Presidential and Westminster systems. One interesting one that I actually heard said was that we have moved from the era of a ‘super’ or a superintending minister to having a Prime Minister! The fellow would of course add – that if that says anything about the texture of change, it does not even appear as yet that we are done with innovations going by the team leader’s penchant to surprise! Nigerians we hail thee!

    This obviously takes me back to the question I raised on this page few weeks back and which I considered pertinent. Here is what I wrote: “…For an administration that has been accused of lacking direction, the cabinet list did very little to assuage such concerns. At the individual level, there is no question that some of the nominees, having proven their mettles in different theatres of our national life can be counted among the very best perhaps anywhere in the world. I could even go as far as to describe the team as star-studded as far as pooling a team goes… At this time, the question must be – what does the team represent? In other words, where is the country headed?”

    That piece was written before the portfolios were assigned. A week after, I must confess that the allocation of portfolios have actually deepened my puzzle – rather than resolve them. A Babatunde Raji Fashola in the Works and Housing ministry obviously makes eminent sense; why put him in a triple-barrelled ministry of Works, Housing and Power?  To prove what? That the man is a superman or what? Agreed, the President, as the appointing authority, is obviously entitled to his assessment of his appointee, given that the individual in this instance actually delivered sterling performance as governor of the most complex state of Lagos. Capacity or not; if you ask me, I will simply say that President has merely pandered to instincts that could be a drag on team spirit. I hope I am proven wrong.

    The real challenge will however come in the coming days. The challenges, I dare say, will call for new fresh new thinking. That’s not all. The wind of change must come with small, well-intended gestures that speak to the compassion of their change government. At this point, I don’t think anyone – least of all the so-called Dream Team – can afford to luxuriate in the illusions of the past. It simply will not work. With oil prices showing no signs of picking up, and the infrastructure in such terrible states of disrepair, the choices ahead can only be hard – and that is to put things mildly. Trust Nigerians to be on the watch in the coming days for positive gestures from the leaders and their appointees.

    I have argued the point elsewhere that it is not as if Nigerians do not know or even appreciate the problems. They do. The point must be made that Nigerians are in fact wiser – and more fair-minded – than their government are willing to give them credit for. What they detest is the bad faith and insincerity of successive governments particularly when they slap a regime of austerity which demands sacrifice from them while living in luxury.

    By the way, what is the Presidency still doing with a fleet of 11 Presidential planes? I thought we are in the era of change? Is also true that the nation has spent a whopping N6 billion on the expensive toys in the last six months? Think Nigerians aren’t watching? Someone’s gotta be kidding!

    Permit me to strip the current reality of any further pretence. We are simply broke! It is bad enough that oil prices are still headed south; worse is that our sweet crude is no longer the darling of buyers! For a treasury hung on oil, that can only mean trouble! So I say, stop the bleeding! Now, let’s wrestle corruption to the ground.

    What about the avenues for wastes? I cite a most recent one – the N413 billion paid out for oil subsidies! Is anyone still pretending that the current subsidy regime can be sustained? Let the person step out to show us the numbers! Like corruption, it’s either we kill this subsidy, or it would kill us!

    Already, the monetary authorities are doing a yeoman job keeping undesirable imports at bay. But what about the customs that looks the other way when our markets are flooded with illicit imports? That is however only one half of the equation. The other half is how to get our factories revving back to life to fix the gap caused by restriction in imports. That again, demands a new paradigm – one that rewards work as against rent!

    Really, what do our factories need? Pretty little, if you ask me. Credit is of course their lifeblood; cheap, long-term credit that is. Power is critical and so is transportation. None of these are rocket science, nor do they require angels to fix. It is as simple as saying that they need heavy government muscle to lift them; that way, they help conserve foreign exchange and to put young Nigerians to work!

    As some say, we need fresh, or rather, thinking outside of the box. I say, the earlier better!

    Let me talk about the state of our roads. Seems to me one area where government can make quick impact. I understand we have some 97,000 kilometres of federal roads – all of them traversing the 774 officially recognised local governments in the country. What would it cost the federal government to raise road gangs in all of the local governments – using the old Public Works Department (PWD) templates to fix the pot-holes – all under the supervision of ministry of works officials?

    Think of how many jobs this would create! Seems to me a better way to utilise public funds than the proposed N5,000 handouts for the unemployed!

    I conclude. Year 2016 is going to be a challenging one with the national treasury under intense strain. We can debate the shape and the direction, it seems to me that a new thinking has become imperative in the way public projects are funded. Over to you our Dream Team!

  • Guerrilla democracy in Africa

    Guerrilla democracy in Africa

    The Putin Paradigm  revisited

    Events unfolding in Burundi and in neighbouring Rwanda must concentrate the mind about the democratic prospects of post-colonial Africa. In Burundi, the determined efforts of the Hutu president, Pierre Nkurunziza, to hang on to power after exhausting the constitutionally stipulated two terms has led to epic bloodletting on a scale that is beginning to rival the 1972 genocidal mayhem which convulsed the land-locked nation and set it on the path of endemic instability.

    Nkurunziza is no stranger to the killing fields of Bujumbura. His own father, a notable and influential Hutu politician, was killed in the 1972 pogrom when the Burundian president was a mere boy. He has never looked back. When Melchior Ndadaye, the first democratically elected president of Burundi, was assassinated by rogue Tutsi officers in 1993, the nation unraveled in a spiral of violence. After his Hutu successor was killed with the Rwandan Hutu president in 1994 in a mysterious air crash, Nkurunziza took up arms against the Burundian state and its Tutsi supremacist hardliners.

    It should be recalled that this was also the genesis of the Rwandan genocide. The ensuing Burundi Civil War lasted  ten years. In 2005, Nkurunziza was elected president by the parliament after some arduous and tricky negotiations which tested the political ingenuity of Julius Nyerere and later Nelson Mandela. Nkurunziza’s argument for a third term is that since he was not originally elected president by a popular suffragette, his first term could only be regarded as an interim tenure. This has cut no ice with the irate opposition, and the entire country has erupted in chaos.

    In neighbouring Rwanda, Paul Kagame is also toying with a constitutional amendment which will allow him to run for a third term and perhaps perpetual rule. It will be recalled that the austere no-nonsense former guerilla leader has been the de facto ruler of Rwanda since 1994 when his rebel forces swept into Kigali amidst the carnage and cannibalism that accompanied genocide. Kagame himself is a  veteran of the Homeric battlefield of the volcanic region, having fled into exile in Uganda as a toddler with his parents after an earlier Tutsi massacre.

    With Yoweri Museveni who has been in power in Uganda since 1986 and Robert Mugabe who has ruled Zimbabwe with an iron fist since 1979, we can now come to the tentative conclusion that the iron rule of strongmen is the rule rather than the exception in that part of post-colonial Africa. This is not discounting the Democratic Republic of Congo where Kabila the son has been in power since the assassination of his father in 2001, or the other Congo where Nguesso is up to the old tricks having ruled his country in one guise or the other for almost thirty years.

    One thing that unites all the six rulers mentioned , Nkurunziza, Kagame, Museveni ,  the old wizard of Harare, Kabila and Nguesso ,is the fact that they are all former guerilla leaders who deposed the existing status quo of their respective countries by sheer force of arms. They are not about to be dismissed by moral suasion or teary remonstration by the international community. Welcome to guerrilla democracy in Africa.

    Often touted as the most ideal form of governance ever devised by humanity, there is as yet no perfect democracy on earth. Great Britain, the founding father of modern liberal democracy, still has a constitutional monarchy and the American president is not elected by popular votes but by an electoral college. The American senate, patrician and authoritarian, is a deliberate hedge against a descent into mob rule and the more plebian House of Representatives.

    But turning elections to a farce and hollow ritual presents democracy with great difficulties. This is where the Putin paradigm comes to mind. The Putin paradigm is an extremely potent concoction brimming with a petulant defiance of western institutions powered by Russian nationalism, pan-Slavic gusto and an authoritarian democracy which guarantees safety, security and reasonable accountability without caring a hoot about freedom of association, freedom of expression and ultimately freedom of election itself.

    For the past twenty years or so, Vladimir Putin has been cocking a snook at the west without his national support base shrinking. When he exhausted his constitutionally delimited terms, Putin simply put his trusted ally and served as Prime Minister while ruling from the background. After his loyal collaborator finished his term, Putin swept back to office without batting an eyelid.

    Why does the Putin paradigm resonate so profoundly with the Russian people? This is where nationalism often trumps the finer ideals of democracy.  After the collapse of the Soviet empire, its Russian rump quickly unraveled into a reign of political and economic gangsters. A crack security operative, Putin halted the slide into democratic anarchy by putting the oligarchs to sword thereby restoring order and Russian pride. The entire country united behind the new avenging tsar.

    The Putin paradigm finds a fertile soil in a Russian populace long accustomed to treating patriarchal and harshly paternalistic but benevolent authority with indulgence and awe-struck reverence. Having exchanged their old Tsars with a long line of socialist Czars, they are not hooked on the anarchic individualism of liberal democracy.

    In the botched 1905 revolutionary uprising, many of the protesters were found clutching the portrait of the Tsar they called “father” in their bosom even as they succumbed to bullets from OGPU, the Russian secret police. An accidental politician, Putin is the latest Tsar of modern Russian.

    So why don’t the African strongmen try the Putin formula by installing their favourite allies to fulfill all democratic  righteousness? This is where national complexion matters, and where the post-colonial state has tripped very badly in Africa.  Unlike Russia which is a fairly organic and homogenous country in terms of culture and ethnic composition, most African nations are rumbling cauldrons of ethnic, regional and cultural contraries.

    It is obvious that despite his outstanding performance in governance and heroic efforts in imposing unity and harmony on his fractured country from above, Paul Kagame fears another Hutu apocalyptic meltdown once he vacates office or loosens his grips on the levers of the power that he has wielded with such authoritarian sternness and severity. With Hutu nationalism very much at play despite genocide and Kagame’s undeniably sterling performance, it is an excruciating democratic conundrum.

    In Burundi, a curious reverse logic is at play. With Tutsi supremacists such as Pierre Buyoya and Jean-Baptiste Bagaza  still very much on the prowl, Nkurunziza fears that evacuating state control and the levers on military institution would eventuate in a steamrolling by the old Hima Tutsi lions and former ethnic overlords of the nation. It was very much the same group in 1993 that assassinated the hugely popular former Hutu president and his supporters under the pretext of taking them to safety from military mutineers.

    Thus we can see how in a post-colonial Africa riven by ethnic, regional and religious divisions fighting old tyrants often consecrate new tyrannies.  It will be recalled that the only time Robert Mugabe allowed free and fair elections, he was defeated hands down before the old warrior-caste stepped in to disband both the elected and the electorate. It is this fear of the unknown that has turned Yoweri Museveni into a delinquent despot and tired tyrant in the same land where he was dubbed a liberator as his troops swept through Kampala in 1986. Ditto for Joseph Kabila.

    Much as the western democracies clamour for democratic rule in Africa, it can be seen that the situation depends very much on the actual forces on ground and varies from country to country and subcontinent to subcontinent depending on the logic of the cultural and political dominant.

    In West Africa, despite atrophied family tyrannies in Togo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon and untrammeled military and civilian despotism in Gambia, Congo Brazzaville and Cameroons, the subcontinent as a whole has taken giant strides towards the consolidation of democratic rule in the last two and a half decades. There is no single case of guerrilla democracy in the subcontinent.

    In the Benin Republic, Ghana and Nigeria entrenched military autocracies and regnant forces of the status quo have been defeated in landmark elections with the last election in Nigeria completing the glorious triad. In Senegal, the political status quo has been defeated twice by nationalist forces. In Ivory Coast, Liberia, Sierra Leone the old political hegemony has been disbanded after civil wars. The same thing has happened in Mali, Guinea and lately Burkina Faso after unwarranted military interventions which led to the self-destruction of the old order.

    It is useful to note that what happens in West Africa is a clash of the residual formations of liquidated pre-colonial empires whereas in Rwanda and Burundi you have the unique situation of pre-colonial feudal formations and kingship systems surviving colonization unscathed while casually reclaiming authority and dominance after colonization. The ensuing collision between this old feudal order and the new forces and relations of economic and political production unleashed by modernity provoked such stress and social convulsions  that it eventually led to genocide in the two countries.

    What is important in all this is for each country to bolster its strengths and banish its fears.  In vibrant western democracies with entrenched citizenship, democracy is sustained when individuals, groups and guilds subsume their competing and countervailing egos and self-pride under the rubric of higher national interests. By so doing, individual rights do not disappear but are tailored to national needs and necessity.

    In a post-colonial nation like Nigeria fissured by ethnic, religious and cultural polarities what often drives the system is a negative equilibrium powered by competing and countervailing centres of power. Often, and with enough prayers and luck, this equivalent of tribal nuclear deterrence is enough to prevent the nation from sliding into an apocalyptic meltdown.

    But this neither guarantees national stability nor enhances democratic development in the long run. It merely calcifies the categories leading to a fractured public of competing proto-republics.  From the mixed reaction to the announcement of his cabinet, it is obvious that despite President  Buhari’s most heroic efforts to reform the delinquent Nigerian post-colonial state and make it amenable to a rational order, the ethnic caterwauling and sponsored calumny  will not just disappear .

    There two options available to the president in handling this elite-driven disaffection and sponsored hysteria. He can ignore it as mere blackmail and treat it with the icy contempt he thinks it deserves hoping that when his reforms and outstanding corrective measures finally kick in, even his most craven critics will be shamed into silence. On the other hand, he can see it as a symptom of a state that is overburdened by self-imposed unitarist and statist responsibility.

    There is no harm in erring on the side of caution. This is the time to be creative and think out of the box. In order to enhance the prospects of democracy and accelerated development, Nigeria must achieve what we now propose as an equilibrium of ethnic hubris, that is a situation in which  ethnic narcissism is subsumed under national interest no matter the  military prowess, economic vibrancy, political sagacity or diplomatic perspicuity of competing ethnic formations.

    Although a Herculean task, it is not as impossible as it seems.  A way out is to take another look at the political architecture of the nation and realign it in such a way that it liberates and harmonizes the competing and countervailing energies and geniuses of our different people. In a multi-ethnic nation, what holds true for genuine federalism also holds true for genuine democracy.

    No constituting bloc or cultural unit must be in a position to exercise a veto power on the democratic destiny of the nation. This is the abiding tragedy of guerilla democracy in many African countries.  Nigeria must avoid the road to Bujumbura and a passage to Kigali.

     

  • Petroleum mode and pork barrel governance (1)

    It should be for President Buhari and the ruling party to recognise the need to empower states to be centres of production, rather than remain as sites for consumption of petroleum revenue that they have been for decades.

    You are coming on board the ship of governance at an interesting time. So much has been said about the state of our economy. It is expected that we make the running of government at all levels as lean as possible, avoid waste and conserve resources. As ministers, you must be the vehicle that will administer the change.–President Mohammed Buhari at a special retreat for new ministers.

    In the statement above, President Buhari was preaching the message of change to his new ministers. If the country is not to be seen as an example of the saying that “the more things change, the more they seem the same,” dispassionate deconstruction of the culture of governance in the last 50 years has to take place as soon as possible, especially within Buhari’s cabinet. Petroleum and the complacency that rises from a manna mentality about revenue from sale of petroleum have driven the design and working of government in our country for too long. There can be no better time to move away from the petroleum mode than one in which a major goal of the party in power is change, for the better.

    While it is proper to punish cases of corruption under past governments, doing this may not be enough to right the wrongs of decades of governance philosophy and style in the country since the age when Nigeria was quoted across the globe as a country “where money was not a problem but how to spend it.” If we get fixated on corruption under Jonathan, we may miss the negative impact of how Nigeria was governed since the 1970s on what Nigeria is today. There is no doubt that corruption could have reached its apogee under the PDP and Jonathan, but Jonathan did not create a mode of governance that made corruption easy for men and women of small or low character who find their way to government. In addition, corruption under Jonathan does not narrate the whole story of Nigeria’s gyration without movement in several decades, nor of what appears to be a lack of stamina in the way the country has been governed in the last half century and how citizens have responded to failure of governance, despite its deleterious effect on society.

    One place to look at for fuller explanation of the country’s problems, apart from corruption, is the response of leaders since the Biafra war to the role of petroleum in the governance of the country. It is salutary that President Buhari has called for a new way of governing the country “as if we have no oil.” But this new way may not be achieved if we are not critical of the culture of indulgence of political officer holders that has been a part of the politicalculture in our country since the coming of military dictatorship and the various constitutions authored at the instance of military dictators, including the 1999 Abacha-Abubakar Constitution.

    Governing Nigeria has been for the ruling class having the ability to design how to share the funds flowing almost limitlessly from petroleum in a way that makes every state and local government dependent on monthly or quarterly allocation of funds from the federation. Under this philosophy of government, 37 states and 774 local governments were created to serve as units to spend the easy and growing funds from petroleum. Each military dictator apart from Buhari made sure he created states and local governments to increase the number of sites for consumption of the revenue from petroleum. Even under President Jonathan, the national conference of 2014 concluded that 19 states be added to the 36 or 37 already in existence, all in the name of enhancing national unity by bringing government close to the grassroots.  Sharing, rather than baking the national bake, was the driving vision of rulers. Even now that slump in the price of petroleum has shown that money is a problem for the country, many Nigerians are still urging President Buhari to increase the number of states to 55, thus showing that the country is still in the petroleum or manna mode, even after it has become clear that salaries are not paid on time in all of the three tiers of government.

    The military created all constitutions that have turned holding public office into a commercial venture and winning elections to the legislature or being appointed ministers into qualifications for special social welfare checks for legislators and ministers. Under the military, convoys for ministers and even local government chairmen became a part of the political culture. Convoys became a form of ‘festivalisation’ of power by those who find their way to the corridor of power. Buhari’s ministers should not need convoys at all, so the call for reduction of the size of convoys is anti-change. Convoys create spectacle of power more than they enhance security of those in them. Worse still, the Buhari government is acting, despite its rhetoric, as if the mountain of dollars that killed agriculture and even manufacturing in the country was still growing. How else is one to explain the insistence on having 36 ministers and 15 special advisers? If it is the number of ministers and advisers that make a government successful and a country grow economically, Nigeria should have been one of the richest and best governed countries in the last sixteen years. It is hard to find any other country with a higher number of ministers and advisers than Nigeria from 1999 till 2015, the beginning of the Change Era.

    Old habits appear to be dying hard in the country. We still seem to be holding on to the view that government is a pork dispensing agency, ‘one that distributes funds, jobs, and other favours mostly to gain political advantage.’ Just before the end of Jonathan’s regime, Stephen Oronsaye was commissioned to rationalise or right-size the country’s governing units: ministries and agencies. The recommendations of Oronsaye, then considered the doyen of the civil service, were largely ignored after congratulating him for a job well done. Given the recent appointment of 36 ministers, there is no evidence that hundreds of agencies that had been recommended for rationalisation will not be packed with political appointees, not to talk of announcement of 15 special advisers already approved for the president. Consequently, Nigeria, despite the noticeable effect of huge loss of revenue on the economy, will still have more ministers, special advisers, and board chairs than any other country of its size. Its legislators still remain the highest paid lawmakers in Africa (if not in the world). For example, apart from emphasising a pork mentality, what value can a special adviser on education or any other subject add to governance that the minister cannot add? Why would ministers need to look for special assistants when their ministries have tens of underutilised experts?

    The mentality in vogue in the days of oil boom is now outdated in an era of dwindling revenue from Nigeria’s economic mainstay, crude petroleum. Migrating from petroleum to agriculture and mining of solid minerals is not likely to happen overnight. It will take more than the four years of Buhari’s tenure for this to impact on the life of citizens. It, therefore, does not make economic or political sense to continue the culture of pork barrel governance at a time that our government should cut its coat according to its cloth. Even states that are receiving bailouts to pay workers’ salaries are still appointing as many commissioners and special advisers as they used to do in the days of high prices of petroleum. Lawmakers are still resisting any cut in their allowances at a time that some lawmakers are opposing payment of 5,000 naira to unemployed youths. Under the system of example of power, our country was pushed into poverty by policies of profligacy in terms of creation of subnational units of governance and extravagant incentivisation of political office holders. This is the right moment for Buhari to deploy the principle of the power of example to bring sense back to compensation of political office holders.

    While it was easy for rulers to run governments as favour-dispensing agencies to friends, associates, colleagues, and constituencies when the main source of revenue was the manna from petroleum, it may not be that easy, once citizens (as workers or owners of companies) are made to pay for the cost of governance through taxation. Taxation increases citizens’ sovereignty and citizens’ power to call government to order. It is not realistic to expect that the design of government in the country since 1975, particularly the view of rulers that government is a source of pork for various constituencies and individuals can be sustained. The challenge is not just for ministers.  It should be for President Buhari and the ruling party to recognise the need to empower states to be centres of production, rather than remain as sites for consumption of petroleum revenue that they have been for decades.

     

    – To be continued

     

     

  • Buhari’s round pegs

    Buhari’s round pegs

    Nearly six months after assuming office, President Muhammadu Buhari has finally assigned portfolios to his ministers. The universal impression is that the cabinet is star-studded and capable of delivering on the programmes and policies of the All Progressives Congress (APC). With a hint of immodesty, the president also enthusiastically indicated how he avoided the mistakes of his predecessors, consulted widely, and deftly put round pegs in round holes. Polemically, experts may question the integrity of his ‘wide consultations’ and the substance of who and what constitute round pegs and round holes. But given public perception of his assignation of portfolios, not to talk of the technocratic zeal of the ministers, Nigerians appear inspired, if not relieved, to give him the benefit of the doubt.

    President Buhari is obviously a late bloomer. From the early months of his presidency when he described federal ministers as noisemakers, and permanent secretaries as the real engine of government, he has quietly given way to disillusionment with the private but outlandish trust he reposed in top civil servants, some of whom have just been sacked and are awaiting prosecution. He seems to have now embraced an epiphanic belief in the role and attributes of federal ministers. More, given the manner he has assigned portfolios and the way he romanticises his cabinet, he even seems to believe rather immoderately that ministers are the lodestar of his government, upon whose shoulders the success or failure of his administration is expected to rest. His conversion is rapid and convincing. He will hope his trust in the men he has appointed is not misplaced or betrayed.

    Nigerians will have to become accustomed to their president’s speed. He has taken all of six months to get so far. He will take many more months to accomplish other yet weightier things, the most crucial of which is the articulation of a vision, not programmes, for the country. This vision is expected to be synthesised from his party’s manifesto or road map, and will serve as the main anchor to hold together the multifarious visions his ministers will articulate in their ministries. The body of ministers functioning as one can, however, neither conceptualise nor articulate this vision, though they may provide its building blocks and give a concrete feel to it. Only the president can. Until that vision is articulated and the country buys into it, whatever success the president achieves may not transcend the commonplaceness evident in many stable and even developed countries. That commonplaceness may be good enough for Nigerians, given their antecedents and sufferings, and even lower expectations. But for any achievement to rise to the grand and soaring level of legacy, a great vision must help to carve a niche for the country and embody the collective sacrifices and yearnings of the people.

    Six months of methodicalness have brought Nigeria to the point where President Buhari has constituted a cabinet. He has done well, and he has carried out his task admirably, albeit slowly. But the time lag may evince something much deeper than just pawky caution. It may be indicative of the disparateness of the president’s thoughts, his hesitations, his undecipherable priorities, and his lack of definable and transcendental vision. While it is good and desirable to run a country where corruption is low, where infrastructure is great, where security is sound and the country stable and peaceful, it is nothing exactly remarkable. If care is not taken, Nigeria under President Buhari may follow this trajectory. But if he appreciates that these achievements are nothing but stepping stones to a greater destination, and that the time is now to chart that almost intangible and ethereal destination, only then can it be said the president has an intuitive grasp of nationhood, that he has been to the mountaintop, and that he possesses a metaphysical connection to that great destination.

    However, on the surface, the cabinet and portfolios will be criticised for their structure and suppositions, whether intended or not. Neither the North nor the Southwest can complain. Both have been empowered and compensated. By bestowing bureaucratic power on the Southwest, the president seems to have completely disemboweled the other faction of the Yoruba elite which embraced mainstreaming during the Goodluck Jonathan presidency. But either by design or accident, the president also seems to be preparing to invoke a new power elite in the zone more amenable to him, distinctly and even exclusively pro-Buhari, an organised army to be deployed for reelection and other purposes in 2019 or any other time. The history and political culture of the Southwest, however, make that latter proposition very troubling, unstable and often unworkable.

    At another general level, deliberately or inadvertently, President Buhari also seems by his cabinet and their portfolios to have bifurcated the country into two dominant power equations: the North to man the real but unseen power base of the nation, and the Southwest to man the bureaucracy; the former to inspire the levers of power, and the other to inspire the execution of programmes and policies. The perceptive southeasterner and critical South-South analyst are likely to feel shortchanged by the whole arrangement. Whether this arrangement will work remains to be seen. But surely, had the Jonathan government embraced even a little of the purposefulness being demonstrated by President Buhari, his government would have had much to show for his efforts and to still keep the PDP in office.

    As enthusiastic as this column and many Nigerians are about the Buhari cabinet and portfolio distribution and management, it is impossible not to ask why the president’s retention of the Petroleum ministry makes sense to him. It is needless, unwise, distracting and fated to create more problems for him and the country than it will solve. Retaining that portfolio may also reflect his incomplete appreciation of the magnitude of the problems he faces as he pilots Nigeria, the onerousness of the transformation the country requires, and his sanctimoniousness which he pushes in the face of the country, as if he could trust no one else to honestly direct that sensitive and graft-infested ministry.

    It is also difficult to understand what logic propelled the president to merge the three demanding ministries of power, works and housing in the hands of one minister, Babatunde Fashola, former Lagos State governor. The competence of  Mr Fashola is of course not in doubt, but it is unlikely that given the collapse already engendered in at least the power and works ministries, one minister can give the undivided attention sorely needed. It is unrealistic and unsustainable.

  • While I was away …

    While I was away …

    I hardly thought I could go on leave for about five weeks without the temptation to resume my column within the period. Of course, as with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, temptations there always will be, but the most important thing is for one to successfully overcome them. So many things had happened since I went on leave on October 1. But the one that almost made me break my vow not to feature on this page until the leave is over was the defeat suffered by Rivers State governor, Nyesom Wike, at the election petition tribunal which ruled, on October 24, that his election did not comply with electoral guidelines. Wike’s attempt to challenge the constitution of the election petition tribunal as well as the powers of the tribunal to sit in Abuja instead of Rivers State was equally dismissed by the Supreme Court to which the Rivers State governor had turned for protection.

    Wike for now remains governor; but for how long will depend on subsequent judgments by the appellate courts that he has approached or will approach (depending on where the pendulum of appeal swings at the Court of Appeal), to upturn the tribunal’s judgment.

    And this … Just last Wednesday President Muhammadu Buhari finally constituted his cabinet, about six months into the inauguration of his government. Of all the appointments, apart from the disappointments in many of the postings which proved book makers wrong, that of former Lagos State governor, Mr Babatunde Raji Fashola who bagged both the power and works and housing ministries, has attracted the most comments. Hopefully, we would have the opportunity to comment more on this and other developments as they unfold now that I am back.

    I thank all those who were not aware I was on leave and therefore voiced concerns over the ‘disappearance’ of my column. Like the ram that keeps moving back, I have only gone to get reinvigorated. Continue to ‘stay tuned’.