The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

The road now taken

Aganga charts path towards improving industry, trade and investment

With 17 parastatals, it would appear the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment (MITI) has the largest number of government agencies in the country. By the way, I have always searched in vain for the meaning of the word ‘parastatal’ in any good dictionary, to no avail. I guess I must have missed the golden opportunity of knowing what it means or how we came about it in our civil service lexicon at the fourth edition of the media workshop for industry, trade and investment correspondents and senior editors of the local and international media held at the Transcorp Hilton Hotel in Abuja, from November 7 to November 8. The workshop, with the theme: “Building a Greater Nation Through Sustained Transformation” was attended by the minister, Dr Olusegun Aganga, the permanent secretary, Ambassador Abdulkadir Musa, as well as directors in the ministry and the heads of its parastatals. Since the event was well attended by the heads of the parastatals, it should have been a good opportunity for me to ask them what the word means and how come it is only in Nigeria’s public service that it has gained currency. Anyway, there will always be another chance.

And, talking about parastatals under MITI, one is not talking about some of those idle or irrelevant agencies of government but very crucial ones, especially in the area of developing the economy and weaning it away from its perilous dependence on oil and the vagaries of the international oil market. Here, one is talking about agencies such as the Bank of Industry (BoI), Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Consumer Protection Council (CPC), Industrial Training Fund, Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC) and Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRCN), among others. The credentials of the heads of most of these agencies and parastatals are equally intimidating. Indeed, this was the impression I got on the very first day of the workshop when some of them delivered their papers and answered questions from the participants.

In this respect, Dr Aganga took the heat off my zone when he reeled out the academic and professional attainments of three of them, including that of the CPC boss, Mrs Dupe Atoki, on the second day of the workshop. Mrs Atoki, apart from the many national appointments she has had, had also served the African Union in diverse capacities including: legal consultant in the drafting of legal instruments; member of election monitoring/observer team to several African countries; commissioner of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights, as well as the chairperson of the Committee for the Prevention of Torture in Africa. I singled her out deliberately because when she started her presentation and kept talking about challenges that are not making the consumer king in our (kind of) environment, I already gave her presentation the title “Lamentations of the CPC boss”. She however redeemed herself by the time she touched on the achievements of her council, particularly the celebrated case of the 39 air passengers allegedly abandoned by one of the airlines in the country without compensation or apology, which the CPC took up and over which it was challenged by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA). I am waiting to see if by the time the matter is resolved by government, the passengers would still retain their crowns as the kings that they should be.

One thing that cannot be taken from the minister is his business-like approach to issues. Another is the open-mindedness with which he took questions at the workshop. For instance, when I took him up on his automotive policy, his response was not totally satisfactory to me but he had his own point. My issue is with the state of infrastructure, particularly power, which is crucial to the success of the dream of a cheap Nigerian car and all its accompaniments. While I thought we should have sorted out the power problem first, at least; he felt otherwise. My concern is exacerbated by the fact that some of these things crisscross one another; it is not something for a single ministry to determine. In the specific case of the automotive policy, loans and interest rate (CBN) will be involved; the power ministry will be involved, etc. The danger is that all the ministries and agencies involved might not have the same passion and commitment to the project, which will invariably tell on the end-result. However, the bone of contention over our respective positions is which comes or should come first. It was not a fundamental question of the desirability of the dream car.

There have been some firsts in the line of Aganga’s achievements. But I take personal interest in one. For the first time in about 100 years, the ministry has switched over from manual to automated registration of industrial property through the Industrial Property Automated System (IPAS) to improve the integrity of registration of trademark patent and design in the country. As the registrar, commercial law department in the ministry, Salman Mann said, “The automation is modern technology that would make it easier and faster for our staff and applicants in line with the international best practice as well as put the registry on the same footing with other registries in the world. It’s going to enhance our revenue and block all leakages and no process can be skipped in the course of the registration”, he said.

In essence, a ministry like MITI is not one to be left in the hands of just anybody. It is a strategic ministry that should be handled by a pragmatic helmsman who knows his onions, especially in the country’s diversification efforts, given the recent developments in the oil sector. Without sounding unduly alarmist, we must begin to think creatively and vigorously too of viable alternatives to oil revenue before we start drinking the commodity or before we start hawking it like we do pepper and groundnuts, seeking buyers at rock bottom prices.

However, there are a few things that I noted at the workshop which I cannot but touch on since two days were not enough to tackle all the relevant issues that arose from there. One of these is my observation that the ministry too believes this impression that the country’s huge population remains one key factor attracting investors into the country. This may be working for us now but there is need to caution that things must keep improving economically for this to continue to be, because what is important in the final analysis is not the absolute figures but the vital segment of the population; that is those with the ability to buy or make effective demand, as the economists would say.

The point may be made that if the ministry is this efficient, how come we are not beginning to see or feel the impact? Perhaps the answer can be explained by the fact that things are so bad that the impact of little drops of water here and there from a single ministry cannot be felt immediately. The important thing though is that the minister appears to know what his job entails and has charted a course that he believes would take the country to the Promised Land, at least from the point of his own portfolio.

Another important point that should be stressed is that whatever the major decisions reached at the yearly workshop should be summarised and implemented. In addition, the implementation must be well monitored, say quarterly, to see the progress made on them. Otherwise, the workshop would be like any other talk shop that the country is notorious for. I do not think there is any other country where seminars and workshops are held the way we do in Nigeria. The sad thing about it all is that we allow the papers and resolutions to gather dust in government shelves.

All said, one can only hope that the minister’s case would not be like that of the cockroach that wants to dance, wriggling its waist, but which the prowling fowl looking for cockroaches to devour would not allow. Succinctly put, my fear is that much as the minister seems passionate about the government’s transformation agenda; his passion to transform industry, transform trade, and transform investment won’t end up making him a victim of political transformation. We once had a power minister that many of us thought was leading us out of darkness only to wake up one morning to be told that he had to go. Yet, many people who do not know their left from their right are still sitting pretty in office where they are consuming unproductively at the taxpayers’ expense.

November 16, 2014
Political War-games in Nigeria

The Helium Balloon from Hargeisa

Last Tuesday, one of the worst kept secrets in the history of Nigerian politics became public property. After months of intense preparations marked by guile and dissembling , as well as the saturation bombing of public consciousness by his storm troopers, Dr Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan finally made it known to the Nigerian public his intention to vie for the highest office in the land once more.

Many discerning observers of Nigeria’s colourfully chaotic political opera have hinted that right from his early days in office, Jonathan, either through one elongation scheme or the other, or through some more brazen self-perpetuating scams, has never hidden his obsession with ruling Nigeria for as long as it is possible. For him, longevity in office seems to be all that matters and not actual achievement. But this needs not delay us.

A man cannot be hanged on the basis of ambition however overweening and ignoble. In any case , there may be compelling ethnic, religious and regional justifications for turning the Nigerian president, an otherwise meek and amiable fellow to his admirers, to such a polarizing and divisive figure at this particular conjuncture of Nigeria’s history. Jonathan will not be the first person to rule Nigeria in extremity.

Ruling a nation in extremity and utter adversity often has its historical justification and logic. According to Lenin who claimed to have learnt the argumentative dimension of the tactic from Machiavelli, if somebody bends a stick utterly in the wrong direction, you do not achieve equity by straightening it but by bending it utterly in the other direction. Equity can then be arrived at after arduous negotiations and intricate deal making. This is the dangerous and intriguing conjuncture that has come upon us in Nigeria.

It has been a colourful pageant of political intrigues at the Eagles Square in Abuja; a moveable feast of state intimidation; a bazaar of Byzantine plots and furtive blackmail. The political pantomime might have come straight out of Dr Caligari’s cinematography. All the usual suspects who have laid Nigeria low were either lurking in the background or cavorting in the foreground. They are what the French call pompier pyromanes, those who set off fires in order to show their skills at putting them off. This time, the fire may well consume them.

The Jonathan declaration was a carefully coordinated and clinically choreographed affair. Before then, and despite a subsisting ban on political campaigning, his voluble assault troops had subjected the whole country to carpet bombardment with subliminal messages extolling the superhuman virtues of their avatar. No weapon was considered too crude and nothing was sacred and inviolable, not even the execrable and egregious comparison of their master to world-historical leaders who have been of great benefit to their society and humanity at large. In their wanton crudity, they conflated epochs and rammed together societies with dissimilar synchronic manifestations.

But even they in their heart of heart know that this is going to be a very hard sell; a lie that flies in the face of the ugly and damning facts. Unfortunately when they finish with Jonathan, they will move on to the next game as if nothing has happened, leaving the poor man and his core supporters in the lurch. It is the seller who must beware in this instance. The doctrine of mercantile necessity is an equal opportunity employer. In Yoruba feudal parlance, whether a brand sells or not, the branded serf must receive his full wages.

In the event, and despite the glitzy razzmatazz , the Jonathan declaration was a damp squib. There was something surreally obscene about it all. It was all eerily disturbing. You had to pinch yourself to ascertain that this was actually happening. It was an absolute disaster. The last rampart of reason has deserted the ascendant faction of the Nigerian ruling.

It was not just the callous insensitivity of it all, it was the brutal disregard for the sanctity of human life. A day before this event, almost fifty students from the Government Science Secondary School in Potiskum were blasted to eternity by a suicide bomber. It was a scene of carnage and apocalyptic horror. Brave newspapers splashed the pictures of the mayhem along the pictures of the Nigerian ruling class wining and dining in nearby Abuja at Jonathan’s declaration.

There was not even a minute’s silence for the peaceful repose of the slain. That would have detracted from the boisterous chest beating and the orgy of self-congratulations. What will the international community think about us? Something must be driving the Jonathan crowd to this merciless and senseless disdain for the cultural and political sensitivities of a significant section of the country.

Even before the Potiskum massacre, we were still looking for the Chibok girls. The post-abduction drama has been as horrid as the actual abduction. Hundreds of pupils have been slaughtered. Thousands of citizens have been killed by the Boko Haram insurgents. Ranking military officers have been seen in videos as they were about to be summarily beheaded. What was known initially as a rag-tag militia has now transformed into a full blown army that has become a terror to the Nigerian military, outwitting and outgunning them at will. As we speak, and with a huge swathe of the nation held by the insurgents, Nigeria is effectively partitioned. Whatever remains is facing slow economic strangulation.

Unless there is some mass neurosis abroad, there is something strangely incompatible and in fact deeply incongruous about a presidential declaration of democratic ambition in a country that is at the losing end of a war with a non-state army. A state of emergency and/or a Government of National Emergency are more rational probabilities. In more civilized climes, a president who has led his country into a losing war and with such dismal incompetence will not dare show his face in public not to talk of capering and cantering at the instance of a hollow orchestra.

It is very unlikely that President Jonathan will dare campaign in the areas he has treated with such devilry and insensitive disdain, and that is if they are still part of the nation by the time of the election and have not been steamrolled by the Boko Haram blitzkrieg. Yet it is also obvious that no amount of mathematical and legal legerdemain can make him president of Nigeria based on his obvious popularity and acceptance in both the South South and South East.

It would be politically foolish and obtuse to the bargain to ever imagine that Jonathan and his strategists are unwise enough not to realize his electoral limitations at this crucial moment. If that is so, it brings us to the central thesis of this piece. Jonathan and his handlers may very well not be preparing for an electoral competition but for a physical conquest in the guise of a democratic quest.

This is war-gaming at its most perilous and devastating in the post-colonial polity. It is not about democracy at all. Recent acts of commission and omission by the Jonathan administration suggest that it may be the least interested in deepening the democratic process. Rather, this is a project of brutal domination and decimation barely disguised in electoral garb. If the northerners like, let them continue to kill themselves.

Electorally speaking, the less the merrier. If the north likes, let it disintegrate and scatter to the winds. They are more useful voting with their feet. They are no polling booths in refugee camps. If the Boko Haram religious thugs like, let them conquer the whole territory and give the people a new nationality as long as they leave the rest intact.

As we have said, Jonathan is not the first person to rule Nigeria in extremity. In a sense, Jonathan represents the final nemesis of the old northern Nigeria feudal power masters. Watching their historic rump these days, disheveled and disoriented, with their tail between their legs and in involuntary obeisance to the merciless logic of modernity, one cannot prevent a wry grin. After this conjuncture, it is historically impossible for anyone to go back to ruling Nigeria along the old lines. Those elements in the South West scare-mongering about the old north are merely flogging a dead horse.

All those who have tried to rule Nigeria in extremity and in stark disregard of its cultural sensitivities have always met their legendary comeuppance. This may be due to the great mythical spirit of the largest congregation of black souls. Or it may be due to the great irrational dynamics of the post-colonial polity itself in which redoubtable contradictions tend to cancel themselves out on the way to a grand new synthesis.

The sociological explanation may well be that in war-gaming, you can only focus on your own game. But other games are simultaneously going on. There are other gamers who may appear in paradoxical complicity but whose interests are not coterminous to or contiguous with yours. For example, if General Mohammadu Buhari were to win the presidential election next year, a swift reconquest of the Boko Haram territory may well be beyond his military ken. Having naturalized and entrenched themselves with the help of rogue Islamic brotherhoods, the Boko Haram by then may well be seeking a definition of borders and other protocols of effective partition.

This past week, the Nigerian Ambassador to the US cried out to the world about the uncooperative attitude of the US authorities in assisting Nigeria in procuring arms to defend the territorial integrity of the nation. Adefuye is a tame and temperate fellow not given to speaking out of turn. But the seemingly lax, laggard and lackadaisical attitude of the US authorities tells its own story, and the joke is on us. Could it be that the western authorities have given up on Nigeria as a viable nation? Are they trying to save us from ourselves and from needless and heedless bloodletting? It is very curious that the Americans would appear to turn their gaze away from a fast expanding Islamic enclave of prehistoric brutality deep in the Sahel.

We may as well be witnessing the endgame of the Lugardian state which itself is a trope for colonial nation-building. The American prediction about the unraveling of Nigeria as we know it may well be upon us and with chilling precision. While they are helping to re-impose state formations in Somali almost twenty five years later, there is an enclave known as Somaliland with capital in Hargeisa which declared itself independent of the parent nation in the turmoil of war. It is not recognized by anybody yet, but it has all the trappings of a stable, orderly and well-run country. The puffed up pomposities in Abuja last Tuesday may well herald the helium balloon from Hargeisa.

November 16, 2014
The chicken of rentier states coming home to roost? (2)

The country now needs, more than ever before, governments that are sincerely committed at all levels to fighting corruption.

The conclusion to the piece last week pointed at the two suggestions from the federal government about the fast-falling oil price: devaluation of the naira and the imperative for states to look for new sources of revenue. Some of the readers of this column called me last Sunday to advise me to desist from being pessimistic about the future of petroleum and Nigeria. I was urged to accept that there was nothing in the facts I had listed regarding advances in energy research that can be taken as providing a sufficient condition for my conclusion that the value of fossil fuel may be waning from now on rather than waxing.

The intention of last week’s piece and of the piece for today is not to propagate pessimism, as some of my commentators have alleged, but to heed pragmatism. Moreover, there is no effort to use the piece to criticise the Jonathan presidency. The problem of our political leaders’ irresponsible attitude to petroleum revenue is much older than Jonathan’s presidency. It goes back to the years following the civil war and under the watch of several leaders: military and civilian, but the Jonathan regime has not done much to right the wrongs of the past on this matter. It was not Jonathan that started the policy that transformed the existence of petroleum into a curse for the country. It is also hard to argue that his presidency has done anything to end the curse that petroleum would not bring progress but hardship to citizens. Readers should resist the temptation to read partisan politics into a matter that is likely to affect the life of every Nigerian, regardless of his or her political party affiliation.

Getting back to the two suggestions by agents of the federal government, devaluation may not be a very bad option if the country eventually has something other than petroleum to export, to attract foreign exchange. No doubt, devaluation will be painful. It will drive inflation up and further impoverish those already at the bottom of the economic ladder. But with an economy that uses oil to acquire over 90% of its foreign exchange; to determine the size of its budget; and to pay for about 85% of import bills, a Nigeria with drastic reduction in revenue from oil cannot but devalue. Not having a huge reserve and not having saved a lot in the excess crude account, devaluation has to be high on the list of responses to the country’s latest challenge. Devaluation then becomes a bad consequence for poor judgment of the past.

One way to delay devaluation is to look for ways of increasing the country’s reserve. This will require adoption of a more aggressive attitude to corruption. Probing as many of past political leaders and bureaucrats as possible, with the hope of liberating much of foreign exchange stolen and stashed in foreign banks by them and repatriating this to the country can boost the country’s reserve and increase the chances of the country to pay for its high import bills in the event that the flow of foreign exchange from petroleum refuses to get better. But even such additional revenue may not be able to stave off devaluation for long. It may delay it a little only if new outflow of funds from petroleum revenue is stemmed or stopped through draconian steps to discourage further stealing of public funds. In other words, the country now needs, more than ever before, governments that are sincerely committed at all levels to fighting corruption.

The other piece of advice by the federal government last week that states should look for sources of new revenue may sound creative. But this advice is not any better than the rhetoric of diversification that citizens have been fed decades to no avail. The imperative of diversification of the economy has been around since the era of Structural Adjustment Programme. If it has not happened in close to thirty years, there is a need to look into why it has not happened.

Guaranteed revenue from oil has fuelled corruption. This has been so, largely because over 50% of the revenue that flows into the country has gone and still goes to the federal government. This level of government has no direct population that it serves. But like other levels of government, it has a huge bureaucracy that consumes a lot of revenue while producing very little. Now that the chicken seems to be coming home to roost with respect to the country’s use or misuse of oil revenue over the years, it is more important for the federal government with a huge chunk of national revenue and very little direct interaction with citizens to review the revenue allocation formula than it is for minders of the federal government to call on states to look for sources of additional revenue.

This should be no time for blame game or for scapegoating the states. Most of the states were created at the instance of mangers of the federal government between 1967 and now. When citizens and even governors cried out since the exit of military dictatorship that many of the existing states are not sustainable, owners of federal power who out of misconception of what national unity means in a multiethnic state have ignored such calls. For example, the recent amendments to the constitution by the national assembly and the recommendations from the recent national conference convened by Jonathan failed to come to terms with the danger inherent in structuring the polity on the expectation that revenue from petroleum is more or less infinite and will always be sufficient to foot the ever-increasing recurrent bills of the three levels of government that live off the manna from the bowels of the earth.

It is ironical that the federal government which has dispossessed states of their traditional sources of revenue is now quick to call on the states to find new ways of attracting revenue. All the services that used to bring revenue to states and local governments have virtually been taken over by the central government or passed to federal agencies. A federal agency is in charge of issuing driver’s license, vehicle registration, collecting and distributing consumption taxes, etc. For decades, the central government has turned states into agencies to spend money allocated to them from the federation account, made possible largely by petroleum.

As this column had observed in three articles in the past titled “Petroleum and the future of Nigeria,”dwindling revenue from petroleum provides an opportunity for the country to re-examine its methods and re-invent itself. The new economic challenge that may ensue from reduced revenue from the country’s only crop may make obsolete the view that all that is needed for Nigeria to survive is that the country is pampered and made to be seen to be united. After throwing whatever is not stolen from the revenue that has accrued to the country since 1967 at sustaining 774 local governments and 36 states put perpetually on life support by huge flow of oil revenue, Nigeria does not appear to be any more united than it was when the country had just four regions and each region functioned as a centre for production and development by using the model of optimising comparative advantage.

To continue to think that the present structure of the polity can be sustained if the era of oil boom comes to an end is for our leaders to knowingly bury their heads in the sand in order to avoid coming to terms with an unpleasant reality. There appears to be plenty of time to do a lot of re-thinking before the few amendments of the 1999 Constitution reach the state legislatures. Endowing 774 local governments with autonomy to spend funds allocated from a petroleum-driven federation account may no longer in the next three months be as realistic as it was to federal lawmakers a few months back. Correspondingly, President Jonathan needs to review his pledge to delegates at the recent national conference on implementing their recommendations, particularly creation of additional 18 states. The game may not have changed completely but it is changing fast. Let us start to get realistic and embark on removing traces of military inscriptions on our polity and economy.

November 16, 2014
Is Jonathan Nigeria’s Jimmy Carter?

As I watched the colourful Eagle Square, Abuja carnival where President Goodluck Jonathan formally declared his intention to seek a second term in office, I kept thinking that sometimes one problem or episode can make or mar a presidency.

Despite the determination of the president and his party men to project an optimistic and cheery front, nothing could mask the fact that the declaration was being made against the backdrop of one of the administration’s major burdens – the failure to rein in the virulent insurgency in the North East.

Just the day before, a suicide bomber sent by Boko Haram killed 47 school children in Potiskum. As if anticipating that the terrorists could rain on their parade, some of Jonathan’s 2015 boosters like the so-called Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria (TAN) had placed wrap-around advertising on the front pages of leading papers. The adverts were designed in such a way that not much else would be noticed.

Amusingly, while the TAN advert was labouring to assure us that ‘history’ was about to be made on Eagle Square, the very little space left on the front pages of the papers that had the advertising carried the depressing headline about the murder of 47 innocent children – obliterating the feel-good factor that any spin doctor might have been trying to project.

More than anything, Jonathan’s inability to bring the insurgents to heel, or to, at least, create the impression that momentum is on the side of the government and the armed forces, might just turn out to be his undoing at the general elections. His supporters may choose to believe that he was making history at Eagle Square, but in reality his handling of the insurgency suggests his presidency might soon be history.

This is where the parallel with the 39th president of the United States, Jimmy Carter, leap at you. Carter came to the White House against the backdrop of the Watergate mess that brought down Richard Nixon.

He was a breath of fresh air that blew into Washington to clear the foul smell of scandal. He was a former governor of southern state of Georgia with very little name recognition on the national scene. Despite that handicap he emerged the Democratic Party candidate in 1978 against all odds.

Just like Carter, Jonathan’s route to Aso Villa can only be described as a fairy tale. At the time he was asked to run with late Umaru Yar’Adua he had no ambitions to seek federal office. He was content to be governor of his home state, Bayelsa – and then fate intervened. Not only did he become Vice President, Yar’Adua’s demise ferried him into the highest office in the land on the magic carpet called good luck.

Carter like Jonathan is often described as a good man, amiable, humble and well-meaning. The former US president’s tenure had some noteworthy achievements like the Camp David Accords, the focus of American foreign policy on human right rights and renewed attention to Africa.

Unfortunately, towards the end of his term, the widespread perception of Carter was that of an incompetent and failed president. And it was all down to one incident – the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979 to 1981.

The Americans became pitched against Iran under Ayatollah Khomeini after fifty-two American diplomats and citizens were seized by revolutionary students and held hostage for 444 days. Their ordeal began on November 4, 1979 and ended on January 20, 1981.

The hostage crisis put a lot of strain upon Carter and in the later stages of the crisis he often looked harassed in public appearances. Things came to a head after the US decided on a military rescue after all negotiations came to nought. On April 24, 1980, ‘Operation Eagle Claw’ which attempted to free the hostages ended badly with the deaths of eight American servicemen, one Iranian, and the crash of two aircraft.

The failure of the rescue was a huge blow to American prestige and the preeminent global super power of the age. It came to symbolise the failure of the Carter presidency. It was no surprise that he lost the 1980 election to Ronald Reagan and the Republicans.

Interestingly, Reagan was not regarded by most voters as intellectually superior to Carter. If anything, he was given to gaffes, memory lapses and often dozed off in meetings because of his age (He was almost 70 when assumed office). However, he always projected that confident, can-do spirit of the American cowboy. That seemed to resonate with the electorate who were fed up with the rubbishing of their proud country under Carter.

Just like Carter, Jonathan has his own hostage crisis. Over 200 days ago in the tiny village of Chibok, Boko Haram gunmen swooped on hapless schoolgirls sleeping in their dormitories at night. They carted away hundreds of them. Today, 219 of them remain in captivity with no hope in sight that they would soon be freed.

The government, of its own accord, has severally raised hopes of their release, announced ceasefires that turned out to be flukes. The upshot is that no one places much store these days by whatever the administration says on the matter.

More than anything else the Chibok schoolgirls saga and the seeming helplessness of the government to free them has come to define the Jonathan presidency. Over this matter the pride of the Nigerian military burnished by its prosecution of the civil war and exploits in peacekeeping operations around the world has been badly bruised.

The president appears to have played all his cards. Once upon a time the declaration of a state of emergency seemed to be the mighty stick that would whip the insurgents into line. But it seems like more people have been killed since the so-called emergency measure came into being.

He and his men have tried blaming everybody but themselves. First, it was embittered Northern politicians and lost out in the 2011 presidential contest in the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) and promised to make the country ungovernable. Next it was the opposition All Progessives Congress (APC) which only came into existence late last year. In a moment of contrived excitement at Eagle Square, Akwa Ibom Governor, Godswill Akpabio, denounced its leaders as blackmailers and sponsors of terror.

The accusations have since been shown up to be hot air because if the accused are truly the powers behind the insurgency, and are still walking the streets as free men, then this administration has only confirmed that it is not capable of enforcing law and order in the land. No responsible government would have evidence against terrorists and their sponsors and not move against them.

Again, the Chibok saga, the recourse to the blame game and name calling is also a manifestation of another of the president’s problems. He is out of touch and surrounded by people who tell him what they think he would like to hear.

Nobody expects Jonathan to march into Sambisa Forest – guns blazing to free the girls. There is no superman president anywhere – not even in Hollywood movies. Sometimes all a leader needs do is project empathy and the people would be satisfied. He would be judged to have shown leadership at critical moments.

But what have we seen with the Chibok episode and the wider question of the insurgency are actions that support all who question the president’s suitability for the office he occupies. He swear he’s concerned but his actions tell a different story.

He and his wife began by doubting whether any kidnapping actually took place. Next, he would not even deign to visit the town in question despite the fact that it had become a global cause. Citing security concerns, the president of Nigeria with all the military resources at his disposal pulled out of visiting a locality that CNN journalists ventured into.

The day after the Abuja motor park bombing he was off to Kano to receive a defecting politician. A day after the massacre of the 47 school children he was grinning and dancing on Eagle Square. Where is empathy – even if faked? What? A minute silence and let the show go on? Shame!

President Jonathan stood on the podium and declared that he had fulfilled all electoral promises he made to Nigerians in 2011. I was shocked because I can think of several that are still awaiting fulfilment. But I will just touch on one for this Sunday.

Four years ago gigantic billboards welcomed you into Abuja with the visage of Jonathan promising a ‘breath of fresh air’ in governance. That suggested back then that there would be a new way of doing things.

On the cusp of the 2015 polls the one who promised fresh air is battling to clear the stale air that is practically choking us all. Nigerians have always struggled with our differences over our beliefs and ethnicity. But in the last four years all that has been exacerbated to the extent that people are threatening fire and brimstone because of religion and ethnicity.

We are back to the era of manipulations of the state’s weapons of coercion in pursuit of personal ends. A typical example is the Inspector-General of Police, Suleiman Abba, jumping into a political tug-of-war and assuming the role of judge. Nigeria deserves better.

I am sure that the president must have tarred a couple of roads in the last few years. But it takes more than that to be president of a country. At this point in time it all comes down to the question of whether Nigeria under Jonathan is headed in the right direction. I don’t think so.

November 16, 2014
2015: INEC’s indefensible management of PVCs

In matters as fairly simple as registering voters, producing voter cards, and issuing them to owners with precision, it was expected that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) would pull the exercise off with only a few hitches. It was also expected that in case of hitches, the electoral body was savvy enough to find adequate ways of remedying the problems. But not only has INEC approached the permanent voter cards (PVCs) matter with as much shoddiness as two or three generations of electoral commissions aggregating their incompetence can manage, it has stubbornly refused to appreciate the magnitude of its lapses, and seems determined to either disenfranchise voters or punish them bitterly. Nigerians are conversant with INEC’s administrative malfeasances, so let me spare readers a rehash. What I cannot understand, however, is that if INEC has no hidden motives as it claims, why is it pretending not to appreciate the weight of the problem it is confronting and is not summoning the urgency needed to tackle it?

I am among the more than one million registered voters in Lagos whose data were lost for whatever reasons — computer problems and other lapses. At least the sms I sent to them and their reply indicate as much. But the real puzzle is why it took INEC almost four years to realize that the commission faced a data loss/mismanagement catastrophe. Beyond announcing that their computers and servers malfunctioned, as a result of which about a million registered voters in Lagos cannot get their permanent voter cards, INEC has not fully explained how the problem came about. They had almost four years since 2011 to make amends; but they have waited some three months before the next general elections to scramble for a solution.

Those whose cards are ready have faced an uphill task in collecting them. And those, like me, who have to register afresh are facing an even more daunting battle. INEC officials do not come to polling units on time, and in some cases don’t even show up at all. In many polling units, they showed up only on Saturday for the fresh registration billed to commence days earlier and discovered that their machines were either not functioning well or not functioning at all. It is shocking that a fairly straightforward task of registering enthusiastic voters has become so hugely complicated, as if this elementary administrative exercise is too burdensome for our public officials, or as if it is a deliberate ploy to disenfranchise potential voters.

INEC claims to have lost computer data. If by a miracle the 2011 manual registers have not also been gobbled up by some goblins, and if it is true they mean well and are not working towards a predetermined end, they should be kind enough to revert to the use of manual register and temporary voter cards for the next polls. But if they are too proud to go back to former mode, they should kindly flood the polling units with functioning machines and prove to everyone they have no programmed agenda to disenfranchise us. The way they have handled the exercise is truly disgraceful. Let them be humble enough to make amends, and stop punishing Nigerians and making a spectacle of themselves before the whole world.

November 16, 2014
Re: Fani Kayode’s some hard questions for Buharists

To get involved in any discourse with Femi Fani Kayode, the ‘most brilliant’ Nigerian polemicist, must be the equivalent of throwing oneself into a conundrum

It is curious how some scions of thoroughly illustrious Yoruba fathers easily lose it once they are close to the power loop and this is usually in spite of being very educated in their own right. Examples are too many to delay us here but writing recently on the phenomenon, Dr Jide Oluwajuyitan of The Nation attributed it to an infernal fear of having to live below the stinking opulence they were used to growing up. But should that be enough reason to lose one’s integrity and overall bearing?

To get involved in any discourse with Femi Fani Kayode, the ‘most brilliant’ Nigerian polemicist, must be the equivalent of throwing oneself into a conundrum of unending self promotion by a man who so loves President Jonathan any criticism of the number one citizen is a dagger in his throat. Femi obviously has more than enough reasons to love a man who has the power to cause the EFCC, or any anti-graft body for that matter, to withdraw court cases, even if there are enough grounds to secure conviction. Add to this the need for the young man to be adequately compensated for dumping the APC. It is small matter if, like he did to former President Obasanjo, he had severally thrashed the president before his Pauline conversion in an archetypical case of crass opportunism.

Let me briefly narrate a not too dissimilar story. I once wrote on these pages an article that was very critical of my aburo, Akin Osuntokun. That was during the Obasanjo era when he, Fani-Kayode and Segun Awolowo were top men in the Villa with Fani Kayode eagerly playing the president’s armour bearer, throwing tantrums at whoever it was who disagreed with President Obasanjo on any issue. Osuntokun, not exactly as acerbic, was not particularly far behind. That was what triggered my article. Being Obasanjo’s blue-eyed boys, Akin could very easily have got me arrested and heavens would not have fallen.

But he chose differently. He telephoned me, remonstrating: Egbon, you were very unkind to me in your column today and he went on to explain why, out of sympathy to an old man, he felt constrained to always defend President Obasanjo who, in truth, was having a real bad press. I then asked him if he knew a certain Segun Awolowo to which he said, of course, yes. I went further to ask if he had ever seen him insult anybody to which he said no, even though they were both in Obasanjo’s service.

I then reminded him that, like Segun, he too is from a lofty pedigree and should therefore be guided in whatever he does. Not once again did I see him roughly address anybody in defence of Obasanjo. Not so a truculent Fani Kayode who forever sees himself in superlatives and as having a divine right to act with impunity. Nobody, not a Wole Soyinka or a Muhammadu Buhari, is immune to his uncultured tongue.

Now, coming to matters of the moment, if anything surprised me in his recent tirade titled: Some Hard Questions For The Buharists, it is the statement credited to Opeyemi Agbaje, an astute professional I had interacted with severally. According to Fani-Kayode, the following are Ope’s questions: ”How come the only debates we have in Nigeria are over a “Muslim-Muslim” ticket? How come the opposition party’s instincts are always in that direction-Nuhu Ribadu/Fola Adeola? How come a discussion of a Christian-Christian presidential ticket is completely inconceivable? How come Buhari, who even in a military regime instituted a Muslim-Muslim/North-North ruling clique along with Idiagbon and eight or nine out of 11 Supreme Military Council members, is now testing the ground again with another possible Muslim-Muslim pairing? Is it that we have a shortage of capable Christians in Nigeria?”

Given Agbaje’s assiduity, these questions should rather be directed to a president for whom, going to Jerusalem, when not kneeling before pastors, has become an annual ritual. The president it is, who not only frequents Jerusalem but ensures that jet-owning pastors are in tow. He, it is, who has completely politicised religion that integrity and efficiency have been pushed far into the background as determining factors for office. Opeyemi should cast his mind back to 2011 and tell Nigerians who and who were more qualified to take Nigeria out of its present morass than the duo of Nuhu Ribadu and Fola Adeola. These are relatively young men you would never see romancing corruption or directing that corruption charges be withdrawn from courts; men who will never protect corrupt ministers or aides. It is essentially to mask these foibles, these predilections in some quarters, that religion has been deliberately imported, as a façade, into our politics.

As to why not a Christian -Christian ticket, the APC as a thinking party, must reasonably walk away from the religious booby traps the president and his minders, especially the CAN leadership, have woven into our politics. A ticket of same religion has since been rendered completely unreasonable for any party that wants to win election. Nor could it be a Muslim/Muslim ticket for the same reasons and the eagerness of the Metuh’s of this world to dub the APC a Moslem party. APC is considering a Moslem Presidential candidate because equity demands that it should be the turn of the mostly Muslim North to have its turn at the presidency, come 2015, or for how long can we keep a part of the country away from power in a democracy?

Fani Kayode also quoted the views of one Oladeji in support of his quaint views but to treat those views with more than a benign neglect is to waste precious time on nothing. Described by Fani Kayode as a seasoned and experienced journalist on the stable of Mr Nda Isaiah’s Leadership newspaper, it should not be difficult to see where Oladeji is coming from and what motivations drive him.

Fani Kayode’s uneasiness is, however, much simpler, as he personally elected to put himself in a bind by promising what he could not deliver. His defecting to the APC, in the first place, is allegedly, the result of a promise he gave to a well-heeled northerner to influence the emergence of a Christian northerner as APC’s presidential candidate. He bolted the minute he saw the futility of that self-inflicted assignment. We should therefore expect more of his diatribes against APC leaders as we inch towards the elections. Only that this time around, he demonstrated a level of illogicality so unbecoming of one so seemingly brilliant.

Among other things, he had written:

“… in the APC-controlled Lagos State today 80 per cent of State House of Assembly members are Muslims, 80 per cent of Local Government Area Chairmen are Muslims, 80 per cent of National Assembly members are Muslims and 80 per cent of Commissioners and key government functionaries are Muslims. It is also a fact that every single state that is under the control of the APC in the south west today is governed by a Muslim whilst 90 per cent of APC governors throughout the Federation are Muslims’. Then he concludes jubilantly: ‘That is the APC for you. With them you will never see what you will get until it is too late.”

Now if this young man were in full control of himself, shouldn’t he have remembered that this had been the position long before the merger of the parties and the founding of APC? This inexplainable gaffe should be enough to tell Nigerians how desperation has driven Fani-Kayode to his misadventures.

Having also failed miserably to add any value to Senator Omisore’s quest for the governorship seat in Osun State, in respect of which he must have characteristically promised much to his new friends, and given his gift of the garb, I will advise this young man to try his schemes towards emerging a top member of the Jonathan campaign; that is, if his loquaciousness would not turn awry for both party and candidate.

November 16, 2014
The idiot’s approach to the Nigerian economy

The minister is saying that the economic road ahead is going to be rougher for the 99% of the population living on the remaining 1% resources of the nation

Minister of finance, Dr. N. Okonjo-Iweala, dropped a bombshell not long ago that oil prices were dropping in the world but that Nigerians should not fear because we were adequately covered: the budget had been planned on an oil price of seventy-nine dollars ($79). Then followed another bomb shell from a government quarter that said because oil prices were dropping, salaries may soon be affected. I wondered then why anyone would aim straight for people’s salaries out of all governmental spending as the first thing to bear the brunt of such a fall. Why not the colossal and largely unmerited legislative allowances? Why not the president’s lunch? Why should mine be the scapegoat?

Anyway, then came the most recent bombshell from the minister: this month, the country will begin to witness the result of this oil price slide; so we should get ready for tougher times. And I thought, tougher times this month, eh? What about the tougher times the people of this country have been experiencing for decades as a result of little or no governmental intervention in their lives?

Let me present this idiot’s perception of the Nigerian economy as observed in the people’s experiences. For decades now, I have watched in sympathy as my nearest and dearest neighbour in the house has agonised on the phone nearly every morning trying to describe for the repairman the latest sound coming out of the little generating set that supplies electricity to the apartment. I have usually heard the laconic reply of the repairman at the other end as he too often tried to place the fault in the complex machine he could not see but must repair, like a doctor making a phone consultation. You can expect some roughness, but you’ll get some pain remission, even if most times the patient and the doctor are talking at cross-purposes. For the generating set owner and the repairman, this has been a daily routine.

As a matter of fact, it has been the daily routine for most men in Nigeria now. I think they would just wake up in the morning, greet everyone in the house and pick up the phone to call the generating set repairman. Whenever that one has failed to turn up because he is tired of tinkering with old sets, the owner must undertake the repair himself. He must sweat and puff to change the plug. He must puff and sweat to change the oil. He would then find that the plug has been placed in one remote, inaccessible or difficult-to-reach corner of the set as his hand and arm disappear into the machine, all the while crouching uncomfortably and hissing from both ends. The reason has been the absence of electricity supply whenever it has been needed.

Did you read about the most recent (yes, the most recent because there have been many others) unfortunate incident where a couple lost all their children to a fire started by a candle because there was no electricity? Before that, there was another incident in which a young man had gone to kick his generating set and unknowingly answered a call on his phone at the same time. The explosion took his life. There are so many ‘before thats…’ that if I do not cut them, this page will be filled with the stories of many families that have perished from inhaling generator fumes while sleeping at night; factories that have folded up for unbearable overheads, etc. The relatively safer and cheaper public electricity system is not available to anyone for love or money.

Any intercity wayfarer in Nigeria now is lucky to arrive home from his destination, even if all he is covered in is dust and not his blood. Not only are roads insufficient, they are in such disused states that Socrates would not walk on them in his sandals, much as he liked walking. Potholes deep enough to sink cars litter the roads from the weight of trailers, trucks and tankers owned by people in or close to government. Northern youngsters barely out of nappies are consigned to drive trailers longer than their villages and so do not have the experience and patience to prevent their trailers from lying down, coma-like, in the middle of the highways, causing days-old traffic jams. Other road users drive as if they are unaware that lives can be lost because there is no one to check them. How then can we move products cheaply, safely and fast across the states without the rail system?

Those are just two examples, from my perception, that provide insight into this nation’s economy. For decades now, basic amenities (including energy, water, roads, etc.) have been provided by house owners, factory owners, manufacturers, etc. Yet, Nigeria is said to earn anything between twelve (12) to eighteen (18) billion Naira from oil PER DAY. This is in addition to the billions more generated unofficially through oil bunkering. It is not recorded, yet regarded. So, I ask you, who is to provide the enabling environment for the economy to grow: champagne swirling leaders?

Just check the amount of money that has been released by the Ministry of Finance from the time of Gen. Obasanjo to the present for the revamping of the nation’s electricity project, and you’ll see that it did not come anywhere near ‘We the people…’ While you are at it, could you also check who was contracted to handle some of the nation’s highways – Ogbomoso-Oyo highway, Egbe-Kabba highway, and many more. This is so we’ll know who to curse when next we are on those roads. Those are the ones giving us rough roads, not oil price slide. Unfortunately, the government’s blind eye to these things makes the roads rougher for ‘We the people’.

Right now, the country is not only regarded as the most corrupt nation in the world but also the most foolish. It is only a foolish country that awards its low achieving legislative arm of governance such allowances and emoluments that are higher than those of their counterparts in developed nations where people do real work, or light years ahead of the gross or net earnings of the nation. It is the more foolish when you remember that the country parades a poverty-afflicted population that is among the highest in the world. I just love the way some online commentator has succinctly described the situation: the government’s blind eye is putting 99% of the nation’s resources in the hands of 1% of the population. This means that the remaining 99% of the population must exist on the remaining 1% of the resources. Yet, I believe that the minister’s ratified audience is clear: she is saying that the economic road ahead is going to be rougher for the 99% of the population living on the remaining 1% resources of the nation.

The shameful truth about Nigeria’s economy is that it has been left to run wild with little or no governmental intervention. Have you noticed that all the gains of the Gen. Obj. era in terms of forcing the country to look inwards and build her economy through self-reliance have been jettisoned out the window? Now, just about anything can be imported into the country; and that greatly discourages local participation in the economy. So, what economics are we really talking about?

This is my idiot’s approach to Nigeria’s economy. There are many countries in the world without the resources that Nigeria has been blessed with. Yet, they are making do by exporting the products of their brains and what they can gather from social services such as provision of public utilities and infrastructures. Nigeria can do the same. Let us use the pittances we have left to prepare for this rainy day.

November 16, 2014
An evening with Macmillan

To the magnificent Agip Recital Hall, Muson Centre Onikan penultimate Thursday for the annual literary event of the Macmillan Publishers with the long-missing Okon Anthony Okon in riotous tow. As the Christmas season finally unfolds, snooper was in fine fettle and preppy spirit. Despite advancing years and the ravages of the soul by the post-colonial pandemic, there is still nothing as exhilarating as the Christmas season. In the event, it turned out to be a celebration of everything that is noble and ennobling about the Nigerian project.

It was Harold Macmillan, the famed scion of the great publishing house, who once famously told his British compatriots that they had never had it so good. With a rising tide of prosperity, with many households owning a car, a fridge and a television set for the first time, it was too good to be true. Coming in the second decade after the most destructive war in human history, it was a remarkable feat of social engineering pioneered by the leftwing government of Clement Atlee and consolidated by the conservative interlude of Churchill, the ill-stared Anthony Eden later Lord Curzon and Macmillan.

It was a moveable literary feast. Snooper has not had it so good in a long time. It was the night when old literary gurus and the aficionados of high culture interfaced with the younger avatars. The chairman of the Macmillan Literary Event Committee, Mrs Francesca Yetunde Emanuel, was at her energetic and indefatigable best. As painstaking and meticulous as ever, Mama FYE sat behind a desk meant for ushers personally ticking off the attendance register.

Known behind her back in her Civil Service days as General Franco, mama does not take hostages when roused from her upper class splendour and serendipity. At eighty one, the iconic first female permanent secretary in the Federal Civil Service and gifted actress continues to defy the odds of gravity and age with her dazzling appearance. Little wonder then that the evening was a marvel of artistic delight and tightly controlled timing.

As soon as we reached the premises, Okon began his rabid commentaries. He had been complaining that he had not been paid for supplying a container of “human and woman being” for Jonathan’s presidential declaration. Very soon and to Snooper’s chagrin, the mad boy began introducing himself to everybody in sight as Mr Ebola whereupon they all recoiled in fright and horror. A punitive eye-whip could no longer do the trick. The rogue was brimming with malice and malign humour. Very soon, Okon collared one of the female ushers and demanded from her where he could get good snuff. Snooper quickly disappeared into the crowd of distinguished Nigerians.

It was an excellent outing for the Macmillan people. The Ben Tomoloju troupe did not disappoint with its searing critique of the Nigerian political condition. The chairman of the Company, Bode Emanuel Esq, gave a rousing speech which showcased the triumph of human will over adversities. The guest of honour, Akachi Adimora-Ezeigbo ,delivered an inspirational address which warmed the heart and spirit. The evening concluded with dinner at the adjoining La Scala restaurant. Once again, “General Franco” was on patrol to make sure that nobody sat in the wrong place.

November 16, 2014
Munroe: Maximising potentials

The President of Bahamas Faith Ministries International, Dr Myles Munroe, who died last Monday in a plane crash along with his wife and seven others, will be remembered for his teachings on many practical issues of life.

In this tribute to him, I wish to share one of his very inspiring messages on maximising potential.

Everything in life has potential

It is a tragedy to know that with over five billion people on this planet today, only a minute percentage will experience a significant fraction of their true potential. Perhaps you are a candidate for contributing to the wealth of the cemetery. Your potential was not given for you to deposit in the grave. You must understand the tremendous potential you possess and commit yourself to maximising it in your short lifetime. What is potential, anyway?

Potential is dormant ability, reserved power, untapped strength, unused success, hidden talents, capped capability.

All you can be but have not yet become. All you can do but have not yet done. How far you can reach but have not yet reached. What you can accomplish but have not yet accomplished. Potential is unexposed ability and latent power. It is also important that you never let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do. The greatest tragedy in life is not death, but a life that never realised its full potential. You must decide today not to rob the world of the rich, valuable, potent, untapped resources locked away within you. Potential never has a retirement plan.

To simplify this concept, let us look at one of the most powerful elements in nature, the seed. If I held a seed in my hand and asked you, “What do I have in my hand?” what would you say? Perhaps you would answer what seems to be the obvious, a seed. However, if you understand the nature of a seed, your answer would be fact but not truth.

The truth is I hold a forest in my hand. Why? Because in every seed there is a tree, and in every tree there is fruit or flowers with seeds in them. And these seeds also have trees that have fruit that have seeds, that have trees that have fruit that have seeds, etc. In essence, what you see is not all there is. That is potential. Not what is, but what could be. God created everything with potential, including you. He placed the seed of each thing within itself (Genesis 1:12), and planted within each person or thing He created the ability to be much more than it is at any one moment. Thus, everything in life has potential.

November 16, 2014
American midterm elections, 2014: two-thirds standing beside one-third in the shadow of big capital

Where one thing stands, another thing will stand beside it.
Chinua Achebe, “The Truth of Fiction”

Come and see, American wonder, come and see American wonder!/Come and see American wonder, come and see American wonder!
The single, repeated line of a magicians’ song from my childhood

A big tidal wave, a tsunami, a landslide, a complete and unmitigated rout: these are some of the metaphors or terms that have been applied to the defeat of the Democratic Party by the Republicans in the just concluded American midterm elections of 2014. The defeat is so thorough, so crushing that you have to go back to almost a half century to see something close to it in modern American political and electoral history. The Republicans not only expanded their control of the House of Representatives and regained control of the Senate, they did so by taking seven senatorial seats away from the Democrats, four of those in so-called “purple or swing states” that had voted for Barrack Obama in the presidential elections of 2012. Moreover, in local and state elections around the country, the Republicans wrested control of governorships from states like Maryland and Massachusetts that are some of the “bluest” states in America where “blue” means heavily Democrat, red means heavily Republican and “purple” means a swing state that could vote Democratic or Republican depending on how successful the party which wins such state is in winning voters away from the other party.

As a matter of fact, the thorough defeat of the Democrats was compounded by the fact that many legislatures throughout the length and breadth of the American hinterland are now controlled by the Republicans. This means that with their expanded control of the machinery of local politics and administration across the country, the Republicans can, and will almost certainly, tinker with existing state and local laws so as to redraw the electoral map of the country to tilt things in their favor in future local, state, federal and presidential elections. There is not the slightest doubt about it: this week the Democrats, with their far more progressive positions on internal American and global affairs than the Republicans, suffered an electoral rout greater than any defeat they had experienced in recent memory.

With regard to my own emotions as I sat watching television coverage of the elections on Tuesday night, two things stood out above all others in mind. One: I recalled the famous, tongue-in-cheek observation of the contemporary German philosopher, Jürgen Habermas, that because of America’s significance for the rest of the world, all other countries on the planet ought to be able to vote in one way or another in American elections. Two: because as I watched and listened to the tidal wave of the rout of the Democrats I did so as a person from the Third World, a person who divides his time between Cambridge, Massachusetts and Ibadan, Nigeria, I was able to see a silver lining of progressive, liberal trends in the dark and ominous clouds of the Republicans’ conservative electoral victory that I imagine most Americans are probably not predisposed to perceive. These two observations lie at the root of my reflections in this piece.

First of all, let me highlight a few of indications of progressive undercurrents in what otherwise looks like a massive endorsement of the Republicans’ conservative politics and policies in the 2014 midterms. Some of these are in fact very pertinent to the state of affairs in the rest of the world, especially in our country and our continent. In this respect, perhaps the single most remarkable feature of these recent American midterm elections is the fact that everywhere in the country in which it was contested as a ballot initiative, an increase in mandatory minimum wage won by huge majorities. This victory for instituting a mandatory minimum wage was all the more remarkable in that it took place in even the “reddest” and most conservative states in the country. This rousing electoral victory for poor and average American working families should be seen against the background of the fact that – again in every part of the country – exit polls of voters indicated that most Americans believe that the American economy is massively rigged to favor the super-rich that constitute less than 2% of the population.

To readers who might think that I am placing so much emphasis on these “hidden” aspects of the 2014 midterm American elections only because I tend to see “talakawas” in every part of the world, my response is that if Americans, since the economic crash of 2008, have been speaking of an ever-widening gap between the few super-rich and the rest of the populace, I can only concur with them, based in part on the evidence of what I see with my own eyes and what I read in mainstream American news media. In this respect, one particularly pertinent thing that I read in virtually all the major news outlets in America is the fact that while these recent elections are by far the costliest in American electoral history, it so happens that these elections also recorded the lowest voter turnout in recent memory. Here are the specifics: the total amount spent was around $3.7 billion and it was financed by 0.2% of America’s population of 316 million; the percentage of registered voters that participated in the elections was about 34%. This is a staggering feature of American democracy at the present moment: electoral victories are being “bought” by lesser and lesser percentages of the population; but this is happening because voter apathy is getting higher and higher. This is why, in his first post-election press conference, Barrack Obama stated that he clearly hears both the verdict of the one-third who did vote in the elections and the verdict of the two-thirds of the electorate who did not vote.

It is instructive to compare the voter turnout figure of 34% in these recent American midterm elections with the figure of close to 85% of registered voters that participated in the referendum on Scotland’s continued membership of the United Kingdom in September. In our own part of the world, the Ekiti State governorship election recorded voter apathy of immense proportions last April. Thus, voter apathy is not a constant and invariant aspect of 21st century democracy in our world. In the first epigraph to this essay, I make an allusion to one of my favorite aphorisms from Chinua Achebe’s writings: where one thing stands, another thing will stand beside it. I must add here that I have never thought that Achebe intended in that adage for us to think that the thing that stands beside another thing does so complacently, lost in confusion or perplexity. Rather, in nature and society, one thing stands beside another as a corrective, an alternative, an indication other choices and directions. The tidal wave of Republican victory in the 2014 midterm elections will be repeated only if the two-thirds continue to stand lamely and ineffectually beside the one-third that is bought and tied up by big capital. American domestic affairs are remarkably similar to the domestic affairs of most of the nations of the planet precisely because in most of the regions and nations of the planet, nearly everyone is in the shadow of big capital. What sets America apart from most of the rest of the world is the fact that its foreign interests and affairs are unlike the foreign affairs and interests of most of the other nations of the world. The Republicans know this and know it well; and they exploit this knowledge to the fullest extent possible. One of the most notable aspects of Obama’s presidency has been the attempt to align and bring closer together American domestic and foreign affairs and interests. He and the Democrats will never succeed in this attempt unless and until they make the idle and complacent two-thirds struggle powerfully against the bought and delivered one-third of the American electorate.

An atheist obsessed with preaching the gospel of the non-existence of God

When, about four and half decades ago I stopped being a Christian and a religionist, one of the things I decided was that I would never seriously concern myself with questions concerning the existence and non-existence of God. This decision was at first rather subconscious; when people tried to draw me into discussion of the issue, I would simply avoid it without any comment. But by the time that I entered into my forties, the decision became something of a guiding ethical principle of my mental and psychic life. As a consequence, I made a solemn promise to myself that as far as religious beliefs and practices were concerned, I would never strive to change any person’s belief in the existence of God and neither would I make it my business to shore up any person’s unbelief in God’s existence. The issues involved in this resolution are very complex and perhaps in future essays in this column, I may take them up.

I make this observation against the background of a response to the recent series in this column on “religion and science, faith and rationality” from one Gilbert Alabi Diche that was titled “Jeyifo, religion and science” and was published last Sunday in this paper on page 15. Before sending this response to the Editor of The Nation on Sunday for publication, Mr. Diche had sent me two long emails in which he argued passionately that I was being too soft, too accommodating to religion in my series. In particular, Mr. Diche argued in his emails to me that I should have kept belief in God completely out of and separate from science and the scientific ethos. In my one response to his two emails, I told Mr. Diche that I had no interest whatsoever in being drawn into the controversy over the existence or non-existence of God. I went further to inform him that the essential difference for me between human beings was not whether one believed or did not believe in God; the essential difference was between those who used either their belief or unbelief in the service of the human community or against the public good.

Apparently, Mr. Diche was not satisfied with my response to his private emails to me and for this reason, he went public and had his rejoinder published last week. Fair enough; that is his right. But he has no right to completely and willfully distort the things I had stated in my series. As a matter of fact, it is extremely damaging to his arguments to resort to deliberate distortions and fabrications of the things I had stated in my series, things that can be very easily shown to be deliberate inventions or fabrications. In most of these fabrications, parts of sentences from diverse parts of the series are brought together through ellipsis to make new sentences or assertions that were not there in my series. The most egregious of these can be found where Mr. Diche writes in his rejoinder last Sunday: “Jeyifo also claims that ‘All Nobel laureates in the sciences … also believe in God’. This is a blatant lie”. This is simply beyond belief because there is no such sentence in any of the three articles in my series on religion and science. As I ponder the reason why Mr. Diche HAD to invent this and other fabrications in his rejoinder, I wonder whether or not he has not metamorphosed into the thing about religion that he so passionately opposes: the human transmitter of the gospel of an avatar that has taken complete control of his rationality, this being the deity of unbelief in the existence of God.

Biodun Jeyifo

bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu

November 9, 2014