The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

  • Erelu Bisi Fayemi: Senior Advocate of the women fold

    Erelu Bisi Fayemi: Senior Advocate of the women fold

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

    Wife: “My eyes! My head!!”

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

    Akeem Bello writes from Ado Ekiti.

  • Bad news from Ghana

    Bad news from Ghana

    President Mahama’s hammer on  Minister Hammah for merely contemplating corruption is bad judgement.

    It would appear the Ghanaian president, John Mahama, took anti-corruption war to a ridiculous level when he hammered the country’s deputy minister of communications, Victoria Hammah, not for committing any crime, but for merely contemplating one. I am sure our own President Goodluck Jonathan and many other African leaders must be wondering what is going on in Ghana because that is something novel in this part of the world. A public official being dismissed for allegedly making a statement suggesting she could be corrupt? And what is the source of the information? A taped conversation that the minister had with someone which quoted her as saying she would not quit politics until she had made $1million, that leaked on November 7, and the next day, the minister got the boot. Just like that! Even baby lawyers know that intention is not a crime. Shouldn’t President Mahama have waited for his minister to commit the crime before moving against her?

    The most disgusting thing is that some people have been commending him for this inhuman action. This runs against the grain of what obtains in this part of the world; which is that even when it is crystal clear that crimes have been committed and the public till tampered with, we still need to set up committees to look into the issue. In Nigeria, for instance, our president is so fastidious he would not want someone punished for sins they haven’t committed. Look at the recent case of the aviation minister, Ms Stella Oduah, the matter is still being looked into by several committees. The House of Representatives had looked into it and said the poor woman had a case to answer. But thank God for our President who understands that such a beautiful woman doesn’t come easy; so he is not one to be goaded to act by such conclusion from a House that seems to have a phobia for beautiful women. We shouldn’t forget this same House passed a similar ‘vote of no confidence’ on Ms Arunma Oteh, the Securities and Exchange Commission boss, and asked President Jonathan to starve her of oxygen (money). If the President had answered their prayer, the woman, a paragon of beauty that God created her, would have been ‘recreated’in the image of the House of Representatives.

    We should wonder what kind of unsustainable template the Ghanaian president is trying to set for Africa? How can you render a minister jobless for merely dreaming of setting a goal for herself while in public service? Don’t ministers have performance bonds or targets? If the government demands that of them, why would a minister not set his or her personal target of how fat his or her bank account should be by the time he or she is quitting the public service? What is the big deal in that?

    Obviously President Mahama’s action has given him away as a nincompoop in matters of corruption. When the issue is corruption, we are champions; and this is acknowledged worldwide. How many awards has Ghana won on corruption? If thus we have such comparative advantage over Ghana in the matter, it follows that Ghana must turn to us for solutions to corruption-related matters. As far as Ghana is concerned, the cankerworm fled their shores when Jerry Rawlings killed three former heads of state, among others, as sacrificial lambs. Corruption, it seemed, then relocated its castle to Nigeria.

    Imagine also the ridiculous amount for which a honourable minister was fired! A mere $1million that she had not even made! Imagine, this is one other thing that annoyed me in this matter. If the minister had wanted to eat a toad, shouldn’t she have gone for a fat and juicy one? That a minister was contemplating quitting government after hitting the $1million mark shows that Ghana’s public officials don’t have taste. What would a Nigerian public official do with such peanuts that could only buy one bullet-proof car? That apart, didn’t the honourable minister grease some palms to get the job? President Mahama should have asked his Nigerian counterpart who would have lectured him that the poor woman needed to recoup money she spent greasing those palms before being approved minister. In Nigeria, such things have become a part and parcel of us. A lawmaker once told us why people must steal after winning elections. He said they must recoup their investments. Yes, here politics is investment, and, like all investments, the investors must make profit. We might not have clapped for him then, but we hailed him for saying the truth. Was Minister Hammah not entitled to such return on investment?

    Honestly, it is the Ghanaians that I blame for giving their president this kind of sweeping powers. Are there no traditional rulers from the minister’s place who can protest on her behalf? Has she not got some ardent youth supporters? Where are they? By now, they should have protested that the minister’s sack was the handiwork of her political detractors who are unhappy with the good works she is doing? Or, don’t they have political detractors in Ghana? And the senior advocates? Where are they? Should they not educate their ‘unlearned’ president that you don’t punish people for merely contemplating to empty government treasury into private pockets?

    What I am saying is that the Ghanaian president should have caused his government to set up a committee to find out whether the voice in the alleged tape was that of the minister. Even as that is busy doing its work, he should pretend to be angry with the minister by setting up his own committee tagged presidential fact-finding task-force on the matter. At the end of the day, committee reports will jam committee reports such that he will have no option than to set up another committee to harmonise the reports of all the committees. Then, another committee of eminent bureaucrats would be set up to prepare what we know as Government White Paper (that is if the matter is so serious as to ever get to that stage). Before the White Paper is ready, the people would have become weary and put the matter behind them, until another scandal breaks. That is what Fela called ‘government magic’. Why then would President Mahama want to demystify government the way he has done?

    The Ghanaian President should not infest us with his kind of anti-corruption war. We don’t fight corruption that way. I wonder what African presidents review at their so-called peer review sessions, when Ghana’s president would take decisions on a matter that he is least competent to act on when he simply should have referred the matter to his Nigerian counterpart. He is lucky Chief Olusegun Obasanjo is no longer our president; otherwise, he would have taken offence at such insult. Nigeria is not only big, we are also rich. Our ruling party, the Peoples Democratic Party is the ‘largest in Africa’; so, what the hell is wrong with President Mahama?

    Not to forget that the woman in question reportedly contributed significantly to President Mahama’s electoral success. How can such a neighbour in need become a bloody nuisance for merely dreaming to make $1million off the government? Obviously, President Mahama has not heard of such things as Neighbour to Neighbour. We need to tell him, in fact, educate him on how to handle such sensitive matters. Obviously too, the Ghanaian leader has not heard of ‘soft landing’. These Ghanaians actually need to be tutored about a lot of things. Apparently what they do not know is by far more than what they know, or think that they know. If a president can single-handedly dismiss a minister, then, who says our own president is about the most powerful in the world? Haven’t we a lot to teach the Ghanaians about zero tolerance for corruption?

    Ghanaian ministers who might want to resign in protest and solidarity with their sacked colleague should hop into the next plane to Nigeria. They have my assurance: none of them will in no wise be cast out. But they must be prepared to up the ante. In Nigeria, one million dollars will only get them a bullet-proof car or spent on official furniture!

  • On Sovereignty

    On Sovereignty

    Modern sovereignty derives its power and authority from the withdrawal and substitution of the “divine” and absolute right of kings and monarchs to preside over the affairs of humankind for the legal right of the people to choose who will rule them. In effect, although sovereignty belongs to the people, they are deemed not “sovereign” enough to preside over their own affairs. As it has been famously noted, if men were angels, there would be no need for government. Nowhere in the modern history of mankind have the people actually come to power. Power is often held in permanent trusteeship for them: either delegated by them or collected on their behalf by those with the will to power.

    This contradiction between the legal power of the people to determine the sovereignty of their rulers and its political limitations in the face of rulers ready to assert their sovereignty and authority often leads to a democratic conundrum: the pious myth of liberal democracy as peoples’ power in motion, or as government of the people by the people and for the people collides with the harsh reality that this is nothing but a gigantic swindle. It is the government of the organized few by the organized few and for the organized few in most cases.

    The battle for the soul of Nigeria has shifted in focus in the past month since the advent of President Jonathan’s advisory committee for the convocation of a National Conference. Sovereignty itself has become a site of fierce intellectual struggle. There are those who insist that in order to pass muster, and since it is a gathering  the Nigerian people, the sovereignty of the proposed confab is non-negotiable and should be guaranteed ab initio by Jonathan. There are also those who insist that since sovereignty has already been ceded by the Nigerian people, there can be no two sovereign authorities co-existing in the same polity except as an anarchic anomaly. For Jonathan to surrender his authority without a formal seizure of such in organized elections amounts to sovereign suicide.

    If everybody sticks to their guns on this sticky matter, particularly organised labour and the influential South West, it can be assumed that the conference is dead on arrival. The widespread clamour for the sovereignty of the conference is a direct indictment of past efforts and a reflection of grave concerns about the viability of Nigeria in its current incarnation. If Nigeria were to be running well, there would have been no need for such a historic dialogue. In fact never in the history of Nigeria has there been so much contempt among the educated classes for both the sovereign and the notion of sovereignty itself within the backdrop of a politically and economically traumatized citizenry. When then and where then lies the sovereignty of a state that has virtually unraveled?

    It must not be forgotten that no ruler in post-colonial Africa has willingly surrendered his sovereignty.  Not even with imminent death and the dissolution of empire. African rulers can be a hardy and recalcitrant lot. In 1996, and in a cruel twist of ironic fate, snooper  watched Mobutu, his body already ravaged by cancer, being helped to his feet by a frail Nelson Mandela on a frigate moored off the coast of Angola. Kabila’s forces were already closing in on the capital. But Mobutu was too far gone in his delusions to have any truck with reality. A few days later, Mobutu was chased away from his country to die in ignominious exile. Even as he fled, his official griot was singing on the radio that the president reigns but does not rule.

    It must be conceded that that was a situation of war and anarchy. But it was war and anarchy arising from a political stalemate engineered by Mobutu and arising from a deliberately deadlocked National Conference in which a dithering France paid with the life of its ambassador to Zaire. Jonathan still has some residual good luck.  The widespread loss of authority and legitimacy as we are witnessing in Nigeria does not equate to a loss of the power of coercion and forcible compliance. Based on that alone, the Nigerian state still has substantial sovereignty. Whether that balance of force can be maintained or sustained in the coming months particularly if anarchy spreads and anomie deepens will determine how much sovereignty is left for the Jonathan administration.

    This morning, in continuation of our policy of letting a thousand flowers bloom, we publish an article that offers a fresh and interesting  perspective on the issue of confab and leadership.

  • Confab versus Leadership

    The issue of Confab is not new to Nigeria or Nigerians. Over time, we have been inundated with echoes, agitations and clarion calls for the convocation of a national discourse. Such an envisioned discourse has been tagged various names or given different nomenclatures – depending on the side of the aisle you position or find yourself. With the growing clamour, it has dawned on men and women of thought that the agitations have been on the pedestal of selfishness, parochial interest or ethnic egocentrism. Thus, it is becoming increasingly obvious that some people believe the Confab could provide an opportunity to settle some latent scores especially for some sections of the country or those Nigerians who have always felt cheated and therefore aggrieved in the leadership debacle and general distribution of the largesse that has accrued to the country especially, since the advent of the first oil-production at OLOBIRI, decades ago. This is however, without prejudice or discredit to the gains of competitiveness, self-help or independence, growth and regional development, of old. All told, the Confab euphoria is not about nationalism or development per se, rather, it is a rivalry or tussle on who “rules” next or whose turn should it be thereafter – based on some political intricacy or ethnic calculus.

    By extension, the objective of such a Confab is the evolution of a brand new Constitution that would potentially accommodate most of the yearnings of the people since the current 1999 Constitution as amended, is supposedly, a relic of military interventions in the polity. Paradoxically, a good number of the drafters then, have now joined hands in condemning the Constitution and currently in search of a brand new one. Rather than blame the operators of the rule book or barometer for governance, every Confab apologist seems to exploit the omissions or “commissions” in the Constitution, as if there is a perfect Constitution anywhere in the world.

    I am told, Sovereignty has a dual hue or composition – Popular and Legal.  The popular one resides in the people, who however, go to the polls to express themselves by electing their leaders or representatives who there from is given the Legal Sovereignty in trust. Meanwhile, the Constitution expressly states and insists that any act of irreverence by the holders of the Legal Sovereignty in the course of its exercise, is tractable and therefore the Legal Sovereignty is redeemable by the power of recall by the people lest, they have to wait for the next general elections for appropriate redress through the sanctity of the ballot. It is little wonder why there is a yawning divide amongst people regarding a Confab report – those who want the Confab document to be subjected to the whims and caprices of the National Assembly, in contradistinction to those who want a referendum to decide the way forward based on the same Confab document.

    To all intents and purposes, the National Assembly, being a beneficiary of the extant polity, would hardly succumb to the dictates of a Confab document since the legislators are after all, deemed to have been given the Legal Sovereignty by the people, at the instance of the most recent polls. The proponents of referendum, who are apparently averse to the status quo ante, are not pragmatic enough to observe that the two sovereigns are to a large extent mutually exclusive of each other, since they cannot operate concurrently in real time. However, they are collectively exhaustive in the end. Thus, any extant political administration has the constitutional power to initiate, arrange, convoke a Confab and examine the attendant document from which a referendum could be called for, if adjudged expedient or desirous.

    Whilst the National Assembly cannot make or write a Constitution, she could alter or amend a subsisting one to a large extent beyond which she is empowered to call for a referendum that could lead to the making of a new Constitution – presumably agreeable to a good majority of the populace. However, our antecedent regarding Confab issues as in many other development areas is “res ipsa loquitur” – the matter speaks for itself. Our various governments understandably, have been flagrantly insincere to the bidding of a Confab – including other existential areas and this lacuna has elicited an epoch of incredulity – leaving a cumulus of suspicion, distrust, skepticism, unreliability and deception at the doorsteps of Aso Rock. And since government is a continuum, the current administration is therefore not exempted from the morass of insensitivity and impunity, over time. Indeed, the current administration, through all manner of unrepentant raisons d’état, has had and still having her fair share of the revolving and unremitting irreverence to the sensibilities of those who willingly obliged or surrendered Legal Sovereignty in trust.

    A glimpse or cursory look at existing records – regarding committee approach to national issues, indicates flagrant disrespect to the honorable and revered committee appointees whose erstwhile reports and honest recommendations have been resigned to the heap of dysfunctional statistics. Swept under the “impregnable carpet” at ASO Rock are reports of UWAIS, DANJUMA, RIBADU and ORASANYE – depicting a tiny few in the pile. Thus, those crying foul of deception or distraction in respect of this current attempt at resuming the Confab recurrent decimal, are not without their justification.

    Truly, it is virtually sacrosanct save a revolution, to do away with or underrate the powers of an existing National Assembly or government based on a convoked Confab or its attendant document. Meanwhile, evidence abound that the casualty of any revolution (presumably bloody) goes beyond the instant immeasurable carnage and egregious destruction or deprivation of the very resources the revolution was meant to protect, in the first place. Each revolution invariably mortgages the life and times of a nation including those of unborn generations, as a revolution culminates in utter confusion and instability, whilst growth and sustainable development become a mirage, if the country survives.

    Any in-depth search for the main cause of a clamour for a Confab or new Constitution or the most authentic resource and catalyst for ethnic disturbances or even religious upheavals, would throw up “FAILURE of LEADERSHIP” as the root, trunk and branch for such agitations. Whilst it is true that human beings are invariably forward looking with the view to expanding their horizon and bringing about self-progress using all forms of methods, it is equally incontrovertible that they also relish the opportunity of easy paths or reassuring roadmaps to fortune, comfort and freedom. Thus, the Nigerian citizenry would prefer the path of least resistance towards achieving their goals as opposed to confrontational or revolutionary means or ways that could be tortuous, devious, antisocial, irreverent and sometimes illegal. Incidentally, the popular and well-acknowledged sanctuary that is most available to provide such paths of least resistance is the government of the people by the people for the people – the government of the day.

    Political pundits relish and extol democracy as the best form of government currently known to man, the world over – regardless of the concomitant gerrymandering or filibustering, it obliges. It is therefore no gainsaying the fact that good governance as epitomized by benevolent, visionary, insightful and purposeful leadership is the sine qua non of growth and sustainable development in a developing nation as Nigeria. After all, the 1999 Constitution as amended, unambiguously states and insists that the primary purpose of government is to provide security and welfare for her teeming population – enshrined in Chapter 2, Section 14, subsection 2(b): Fundamentals Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy. Thus, if government provides and also seen or adjudged as providing the enabling environment through the provisioning and enhancement of infrastructure (power, water, transportation), health and education, it would be easier for the citizenry to benefit wholesomely and irretrievably from learning, commerce, business and general welfare.

    The sprawling effects of such a sincere and committed disposition of government to her nationals would improve the general wellbeing, stimulate wealth creation, sensitize economic emancipation and enhance growth and sustainable development. As the workforce would continually and numerically soar based on general growth – while keeping all major economic indices in check, idleness, truancy, crime and criminology would be at controllable low ebbs – with the cooperation of a disciplined and savvy judiciary. Thus, poverty, misemployment, underemployment and unemployment – adjudged as the raison d’etre for breaches of law and order, civil disobedience and all manner of unremitting but avoidable agitations would subside, as more people would be happy, gainfully employed, committed, and focused on self-development at the very least. At that point, issues of ethnic demagoguery or religious bigotry would be reduced, as a growing number of people would be genuinely engaged in creating wealth for themselves and summarily for the country. A resounding byproduct of such a commitment by the government is a gradual increase in patriotism with obeisance to rule of law by the people – invariably guided by the much or less each individual or group derives or benefits from government’s benevolence.

    So, the case for the convocation of any Confab albeit, not irrelevant, is definitely not a front-burner issue that would quickly transform or launch Nigeria into limelight or levitate to her rightful place in the comity of nations. Rather, the quest for diligent, forthright, dogged, committed, knowledgeable and visionary leadership is primus-inter-pares and it is crucial to our survival now and forever. And the leadership odyssey is NOW as time is running out.

    Dr Bello, a former MD of NITEL, lives in Abuja.

  • Why I endorse Ngige for Anambra governorship

    Why I endorse Ngige for Anambra governorship

    If all the politicians in the Southeast, including the very interesting and amusing but often hyperbolic Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, Chris Ngige seems to me to be the most colourful. On Saturday, he hopes to defeat 29 other candidates in the Anambra State governorship election. Analysts think the election will be a four-way race between Dr Ngige of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Willie Obiano of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA), Tony Nwoye of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and Ifeanyi Ubah of the Labour Party (LP). I had hoped the race would be a titanic two-way race between Dr Ngige and former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, Charles Soludo. With the manipulation of Professor Soludo out of the race in APGA and the official sanction of Mr Obiano as candidate by the state governor, the only credible, independent person of substance remaining in the race is Dr Ngige, irrespective of what his chances are.

    Mr Obiano is clearly Governor Peter Obi’s favourite, and the governor has undisguisedly tried to advance his candidature. But if the APGA candidate has any fine attributes, and it is likely he has many, not least his banking background and his District Officer looks, they are, however, buried beneath the controversies that accompanied his enthronement as the ruling party’s candidate. He speaks well, and has a fair understanding of financial issues. But he is a dour and incomparably unexciting politician, and he lacks the charisma, rigour, excitement and independence that make both Dr Ngige and Professor Soludo tower head and shoulders above virtually all politicians in the Southeast. Mr Obi himself is not a colourful politician, nor is he anything more than merely pragmatic and somewhat businesslike. He probably sees much of Mr Obiano in himself, much more than the fact that the candidate who comes from Anambra North satisfies the party’s zoning ambition.

    Comrade Nwoye is a latecomer to the race, having only last week secured the Supreme Court nod to be fielded as the PDP candidate. He has a union background and is a dyed-in-the-wool PDP politician. But in a race as tight as Anambra’s, and with a surfeit of eminently qualified candidates, anchoring a divided house on him and entering the race barely 10 days to the election are hardly the kind of credentials that dispose to victory. And like Obiano, he will rely on his party to create an artificial whirlwind to procure victory for him. Should he win, he will bring no experience and no special talent to the office. Mr Ubah is a businessman who is willing to put his enormous money where his mouth is. But beyond that, and his zestful face and longing eyes, the state will be as undeserving of him as it is undeserving of both Mr Nwoye and Mr Obiano.

    That leaves the irrepressible Dr Ngige. I have been a longstanding fan of this witty, colourful and politically passionate senator form Anambra Central. He was governor between 2003 and 2006, after the scheming Chris Uba, an unscrupulous businessman, procured a misbegotten governorship victory for him. But two months after being sworn in, Dr Ngige simply dismantled his godfather, denigrated him openly, and created such a din as no governor had ever done before him, nor is ever likely to do after him. The manner of his fight with Mr Uba, not to say the panache with which he secured victory in that deathly struggle, was as entertaining as the manner his enemies, led by the avaricious Mr Uba, tried in 2003 to unhorse him using a maudlin policeman, Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) Raphael Ige. I of course do not crave entertainment from an Ngige governorship. The plain fact, however, is that though there is no dull moment with Dr Ngige, he is always careful not to subordinate brilliant governance to entertainment.

    While Dr Ngige can be foresighted and diligent, as indeed he seems configured to be all his life, his years in office showed he is also a very practical politician, where practicality can sometimes be defined as not being averse to heroics that borders on outright mendacity. (Imagine if he had not led Uba on before the 2003 poll, and then undid him so spectacularly and dramatically to the relief of all Anambrarians and the mirth of every Nigerian!). I have no trouble whatsoever in endorsing Dr Ngige as governor of Anambra, notwithstanding his anonymity in the Senate where he sat in lugubrious and painless solemnity. He will come to the office of governor with plenty of useful experience and exuberance, uncommon vision, a great deal of joie de vivre far surpassing those of his three main rivals, and certain to put the state in salutary spotlight. Should Dr Ngige lose…no, no, perish the thought.

  • Abysmal statistics, facts and realities that define and yet do not define us (1)

    Abysmal statistics, facts and realities that define and yet do not define us (1)

    Statistics should be used the way a drunk uses a lamppost, not for illumination but for support.

    Anonymous, credited to British humorists

    When a dead fish starts to rot, the process begins at the head from which it spreads to the rest of the body.

    A Greek adage

    With some embarrassment, perhaps with even a little bit of shame, let me admit it: a few days ago when I went to check where our country’s stand in the Human Development Report (HDR) of 2013, I was greatly relieved, indeed almost joyous, to discover that at 153 out of 187 countries, Nigeria was not at rock bottom level among the countries of the world. The HDR is an annual report issued by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) that gives details of each country’s Human Development Index (HDI) for the preceding year. The HDI itself is a term that was devised to give a far more expansive and accurate measurement than the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the total well-being of the populations of the countries of the world. Being ranked at HDI 153 out of 187 is of course a pretty bad, perhaps even scandalously poor ranking for an oil-rich country, but when your country is nearly always at the bottom of the global totem pole of meritocracy, you may be excused for feeling gratified when your country shows up 34 places above the lowest of the low.

    For those who read the piece on the Nigerian Premier League and professional soccer in our country that was published in this column last week, it will come as no surprise why this week I went searching for Nigeria’s location in the HDR of 2013. For in the light of that piece, our NPL has the great but dubious distinction of being the world’s worst national soccer league, not in terms of the quality of the players but with regard to the absurdity of data and statistics displayed in the league table for the 2012-2013 season. Individually and collectively, we have some of the best players on the African continent; and we export players to virtually all the other regions of the world where they generally tend to give good accounts of themselves as gifted, talented players. By contrast, the league table reflects a completely different profile; it reflects matches regularly won and lost due to factors that have barely anything to do with merit, talent, skill and effort; it reflects a moral universe in which referees, fans and players themselves seem totally resigned to winning and losing through corruption, violence, intimidation and fear.

    This gap between, on the one hand, what might well be the real quality of players in the Nigerian soccer league and, on the other hand, the data and figures displayed in the league table for the whole world to see and mock provides the point of departure for the series that begins in this column with this essay. Can we generalise from this case of the NPL and its absurd league table? As a people are we defined, are we constituted by the myriad of other statistics and realities that indicate that for the great majority of its citizens Nigeria is one of the worst countries in the world in which to live? Or as with the players of the NPL, are Nigerians not really defined or constituted by these super-negative statistics and figures? As we shall see, these are not easy questions or issues to resolve; all the same, they are urgent and pressing matters that require our undivided and unceasing attention.

    Now, besides the organisation of professional soccer, there are of course other major areas of our collective national existence like politics, economy, society and education in which Nigeria is a low achiever, a two-bit player in the theatre of the most meritocratic societies of the planet. As a matter of fact, some of the statistics and figures in these particular aspects of Nigeria’s identity at home and abroad are nothing short of the continent’s or the world’s very worst. At one time or another, some of these have been discussed in this column. In the interest of a cogent and focused discourse, I will cite only a few that I consider the most salient and portentous.

    In one year (2009), only 1.8% of students taking the NECO high school leaving examination passed; in the last decade, the passing rate in this particular examination has never risen above 35%. Similarly, our universities and other tertiary institutions are very poorly ranked in Africa; in the world, the ranking dips so far below the ground level that it is enveloped by invisibility. This pattern also applies to what I personally regard as unquestionably the most unconscionable of these relentless statistics and data of gloom and doom: an absolute poverty rate which stands at seven out of 10 or 70%, again one of the worst in Africa and the world. Closely related to this are the staggering figures, data and anecdotes on corruption in Nigeria that are bandied around the world. Almost a decade ago, Paul Wolfowitz, former President of the World Bank, estimated that since crude oil began to be exported from Nigeria, about $300 billion dollars had been looted by the country’s military and civilian rulers and their cronies. This brazen official brigandage continues to this day, just as it continues to be one of the worst and the most talked about in the world. For instance, as I have observed again and again in this column, in the oil subsidy mega-scam of the year 2011, the sum of N2.58 trillion naira that is the equivalent of $16 billion U.S. dollars was looted from our nation’s savings account, the Excess Crude Account (ECA), more or less in broad daylight.

    Most of these data, figures and realities are well known and much talked about, in Nigeria itself and in many other parts of the world. I think it is safe, if also extremely disturbing, to say that most Nigerians think that we are defined by these data and figures, that we are what the figures and data say we are. On the surface, most Nigerians feel or think that the politicians, the rulers bear full responsibility for this troubled and troubling convergence between what these statistics say and what we are as a people. But I think that deep down; most Nigerians also think that the people themselves, in their scores of millions and in virtually every part of the country, bear some responsibility for the corruption, the rot, the abysmal state of things. Now, this is bad enough when we are thinking of things like corruption and dishonesty, but what of the abysmally low figures for education? What of the infinitely low ranking of our universities and other tertiary institutions? Are Nigerians some of the world’s dumbest people as the statistics seem to imply?

    In case any reader of this piece is inclined to think that these are mere abstract or speculative questions, please think of the following realities. For close to two decades now, employers of labour in our country have been complaining that the majority of students graduating from our universities, often with excellent results, are so bad, so inferior in quality that they are “unemployable”. Think also of the fact that our newspapers are often filled with badly written, sometimes blatantly ungrammatical writing, the likes of which you could never have seen two or three decades ago. Think also of the fact that whether it is corruption or the failure rates of students at the public school leaving examination, Nigerians seem remarkably resigned, seem unperturbed and carry on as if, well, that is how things are and what can one do about? Indeed, this particular factor of resignation, complacency or perhaps even widespread opportunistic collusion in the rot that seems to define us as a people requires careful consideration.

    When I first came across the 1.8% passing rate in the NECO exams of November-December 2009, as shocked as I was about that statistic, I was even more shocked that the Minister of Education showed little or no outrage. In any country in the world that is not benighted with rot and mediocrity in high places, that Minister of Education would have lost his or her job on the basis of that distressing result alone. It was therefore doubly astounding that our Minister of Education did not on that occasion get fired and did not even get queried when he showed no outrage, no concern at all. And in the course of the last one decade when the passing rate has not exceeded 35%, if any Federal Minister of Education has shown any alarm at this calamitous state of things, I have not seen it as I have been on a year after year lookout for it. What this means, what this can only mean, is that as far as the powers that be are concerned, Nigeria is a low achiever in education, period. If this seems a thoughtless or gratuitous remark to make, please think of the notorious “4% annunciation” of the Minster of Finance, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, when she infamously declared that because the scope of corruption, waste and squandermania in Nigeria was so vast and so endemic, she could only hope to have reduced the scale by not more than 4% by the time she leaves office in 2015.

    But what of teachers, parents, guardians, and local communities themselves? What outrage have they shown about 35% as the highest passing rate that their children and wards can reach, as revealed in published NECO results year after year? Again, in many countries in the world, with 35% as the upper passing rate, parents and guardians would be up in arms against teachers, against educators, against the government. But this has not happened in our country. Indeed, if widespread anecdotes are to be believed, instead of outrage, something that is almost exactly its opposite has been observed in many communities across the length and breadth of the country. In one anecdote that was narrated recently by a former member of the National Assembly at a public lecture at Harvard University, his offer in his home constituency to pay for extra hours of lessons and more dedicated teaching for secondary school students so that their NECO results could be improved was rebuffed by the chosen leaders of the community. No, they told the shocked Ex-Honourable Member, our children do not need extra hours of teaching, they do not need better paid and more dedicated teachers, what they need is failsafe access to examination papers since, as they have been told by neighbouring communities that that is the only real passport to good NECO results!

    This, of course, is not the end of the story. As a people, we are not defined, we are not constituted only by these sorts of anecdotes, together with the range of statistics and data of negation that I have discussed in this essay. We must use statistics and data carefully, astutely. And when everything is said and done, it all boils down to how the lives of the people are organised by the political leadership. As the second epigraph to this essay puts it, “when a dead fish starts to rot, the process begins from the head”. This will be our starting point in next week’s continuation of the series.

  • Federalism and taxation 2

    Federalism and taxation 2

    Payment of tax by citizens has over the centuries cemented the social contract between government and the citizenry.

    There are options for the reform of the tax system which could both finance increases in benefits and leave the tax system itself more progressive and more logical in structure. Furthermore, the transition to such a system could be one from which the overwhelming majority of the population would gain-John Halls in Changing Tax: how the system works and how to change it.

    Just as we observed last week, the idea of the federal minister of finance on reforming the system of multiple taxation in the country is still more atmospheric than specific. But as we move closer to a position paper from her, it is necessary for the states to prepare themselves philosophically and strategically to address the issue of taxation in a federation, more so that taxation all over the world is a central political issue for citizens and their governments.

    Among political conservatives who believe that the government should have little or no role in solving the problems of individual citizens, taxation is looked at with disdain. Similarly, in polities like Nigeria that thrive on the mentality of manna from nature as the source of public finance, tax may be considered a burden that the government should not be saddled with while it spends its energy to allocate funds from non-renewable resources that appear infinite to myopic individuals in charge of government. Correspondingly, many citizens in such societies with access to funds from non-renewable resource are generally opposed to tax, more so to progressive tax that they consider to diminish their savings. But among social democrats who think that the role of government is to facilitate the transformation of the government into a caring agency with concern for the welfare of citizens, taxation is crucial to the creation of a welfare state.

    If there is any human creation that has helped to fuel development of democratic states in the last three centuries, it is the fact that citizens pay tax to fund government projects that improve the life of citizens: road, education, healthcare, and even social security for the needy. Payment of tax by citizens has over the centuries cemented the social contract between government and the citizenry. More than vote, tax makes it possible for citizens to own their governments, assist them to create socially beneficial benefits, and even provide funds to fight enemies, if and when they exist.

    Given the claim that Nigeria is a federal republic and the recent announcement by President Jonathan that there is a need to have a national conference at which citizens dialogue on how to improve their federal system, it is important for those leading the debate on reforming the country’s system of multiple taxation to recognize that multiple tax systems is a sine qua non of federalism, be it territorial as in the case of the United States and the United Arab Emirates, or ethnic as in the case of Belgium and Ethiopia.

    The first area to mark down for reform is Nigeria’s Indirect tax system. This area includes all forms of consumption tax: Sales Tax, Value Added Tax, Rates, Excise Duties, Car Tax, Stamp Duties, Driver’s License Tax, etc. At present, the federal government collects most of these taxes. The result of federalization of what should be a subnational tax is that states and local governments in which citizens consume such services and in the process add to the responsibility of the government of such states is that such states induce and collect consumption tax for other states to benefit from.

    For example, when I was growing up in colonial Nigeria and even up to pre-military era, it was the subnational government that collected tax on car registration, issuance of driver’s license, and all rates. Even up till the time of General Sani Abacha, collection of sales tax in Lagos was a state responsibility. Replacing sales tax with VAT, the proceeds of which states send to the federal government for allocation to states in the fashion of revenue from petroleum should be the first area to reform in favour of states and local governments. There is no federal system in the world in which sales tax is collected by central governments, the way federal agencies now collect funds for driver’s license and vehicle registration.

    It is fiscal federalist thinking that encourages true federations around the world to leave indirect taxes to subnational governments. It is subnational governments that provide infrastructure, education, and healthcare to most citizens in federal systems of government. Such governments need funds to provide such services to citizens making such contributions to governance. By paying tax, such citizens are also empowered, thus strengthening their voice in the way they are governed. At present, there are a few states that provide some form of social security for senior citizens while most of the country’s states do not consider such a policy important for their citizens. For example, Osun and Ekiti States provide monthly social security allowances for citizens over 65 years of age. Such states have services they need to fund from indirect taxes. If Lagos State had been allowed to exercise its rights in a federal system to collect Port charges, there would have been no basis for the state to be looking longingly for a special status for the state from the federal government.

    By having a tax system that requires states to send revenue collected from indirect tax to the central government, the federal government carries to a ridiculous extent the weird philosophy of government imposed on the country by military autocracies in the name of national unity and even development. In order to mask the exploitation of petroleum producing states under military rule after changing the principle of derivation from 50% of revenue to zero and later to 13%, military dictators created the policy and decrees to centralize all forms of revenue, which they also created agencies to mobilize and allocate or distribute to states.

    With respect to Direct Taxes, there is nothing in the books that prevents a system in which states collect all forms of direct taxes and send to the federal government whatever percentage is agreed upon for funding projects of central governments. Just as John Halls once said: “The argument that a local income tax would be ‘administratively impossible’ is hard to sustain when Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden and the United States of America already have one,” the central government will not lose anything but its unnecessary power to subordinate states that should have been coordinate with it, should all forms of income tax be collected by states with the option of sending some percentage of collected revenue to fund central government’s programmes. Taking this option will remove what the minister of finance refers to as multiple taxation. Until a few years ago, I worked at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania and lived in the State of Maryland. I paid federal income tax, income tax to Oxford, the city that houses Lincoln University, and to the State of Maryland where I lived. This is a good illustration of diversity in a federal system. If this is what is called multiple taxation, it is the only way for different states to offer different levels of social services to its citizens in a federal system.

    The issue that matters most to citizens is not the number of states to which a citizen pays taxes but the use to which such tax revenue is put by those in power, for as long as such tax is progressive. If Lagos State, for example, had not been able to tax individuals and citizens within the state in the last sixteen years, the state would have been uninhabitable by now, given the meagre funds allocated to it by the central government and the exodus of citizens that move to Lagos State from other parts of the country on a daily basis. What must not be missed in the debate about reform of our tax system is the need to insist on progressive taxation, to ensure equity and fair distribution of income. What must be avoided is any reform that takes the power to tax away from states that provide services to their citizens.

    Concluded

  • Waiting for ASUU

    I would have been surprised if leaders of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) at the end of last Monday’s meeting in Aso Rock with federal government officials had announced an immediate call off of their over four-month old strike.

    Considering the previous reactions of the government, the indications were that notwithstanding the desperation to end the embarrassing strike, not all the requests of the union would be granted. My fear was that the negotiations that dragged into the early hours of Tuesday could be deadlocked and the hope of a quick resolution of the crisis would be dashed again.

    Thankfully the leaders did not emerge from the meeting angry and as expected they have agreed to consult their members on the government’s offer which even if they were comfortable with still need the approval of members of the union.

    With the strike having lasted for this long, it is understandable why many are eager to have it called off if possible immediately after the meeting. However not been the first time government is giving the union it’s words and failing to honour it as it is the case in the non implementation of the controversial 2009 agreement the union have to take its time to digest whatever the government is promising this time and get a firm commitment.

    It’s rather unfortunate that the crisis had to degenerate to this level and one can only hope that the government is really committed to not only in meeting ASUU’s demands but taking necessary steps to enhance the standard of education in the country at all levels.

    Apart from the Universities, other education institutions have also suffered years of neglect and unfulfilled promises. There are still many unresolved disputes with teachers in Polytechnics, Colleges of Education and others that should not be given less attention as it has been done with the ASUU strike.

    Whatever offer the federal government made last Monday could have been made before now and it didn’t need to have given the impression that it has to be fought to a standstill before doing the right thing. I would not be surprised if some other workers in future insist on presidential intervention to resolve labour issues.

    As ASUU members meet to deliberate over the government’s offer, I join other Nigerians in pleading for the call off of the strike. Once again, they have to give the government the benefit of the doubt if not for any other reason but for the sake of the students who are the ones bearing the brunt of this crisis.

    We are all witnesses to this new agreement and this time around the government cannot deny making a commitment to pay what is due to university lecturers. For lecturers to be at their best, they have to be well remunerated and be given all allowances due to them.

    A Professor in a text response to my last column said in his 25 years of being a researcher he has not got N1 as research grant. This is how bad the bad the situation is and the time to redress it is now or never.

    The lecturers have indeed fought a good fight for quality education in the country for which posterity will remember them.

  • G-7 governors, the police and Jonathan presidency

    G-7 governors, the police and Jonathan presidency

    Last Sunday, the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of Asokoro Police Station, Abuja, CSP Nnanna Amah, disrupted a meeting of the G-7 governors holding at the Kano State Governor’s Lodge in Abuja. He claimed to be acting under instruction. The incensed governors, one of whom was so enraged he could have tackled the impudent police officer had he not been gently restrained by a fellow governor, resisted the attempt and dared the invading policemen to arrest them. The policemen backed down. The embarrassed governors described the police invasion as impunity. I do not think so; we passed the stage of impunity months ago when the public and the National Assembly failed to take firm and clear action to leash the insubordinate and rampaging policemen of Rivers State led by the obstreperous Mbu Joseph Mbu.

    Though the House of Representatives will be inviting the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mohammed Abubakar, to explain who instructed Mr Amah to disrupt the governors’ meeting, I doubt whether any serious effort will be made to arrest Nigeria’s slow but sure drift towards fascism. However, it will be interesting to find out who sent Mr Amah and why. Until the IGP explains himself, it is at least evident that the DPO invaded the meeting of the G-7 governors last Sunday, behaved most unpleasantly and irresponsibly, tarried at the venue for much longer than propriety demanded, and gave the impression, as Mr Mbu still does in Rivers State, that Nigeria is not under constitutional rule but is a police state.

    The Abuja invasion is a logical progression from the anomy being engendered in Rivers State by the police. If the Amah-led invasion is not made the last of its type, it will continue and even become worse. For all his insolence, Mr Mbu has either deliberately or inadvertently avoided direct contact with the Rivers State governor, Rotimi Amaechi, not to talk of giving him unlawful orders, as Mr Amah tried to give the five governors in Abuja when he ordered them to disperse. Whether the National Assembly has enough understanding and courage to put effective restraints on the police, and by implication the presidency, is hard to say. But if they don’t, the blame for whatever happens to Nigerian democracy will fall squarely at their feet. The executive couldn’t be blamed, for Nigerians are accustomed to their malfeasances and constitutional infractions, not to talk of their limited perspectives on democracy, rule of law and very poor vision of what kind of country Nigeria should be.

    The judiciary could also not be blamed, for in their limited way, and notwithstanding their sometimes curious judgements on political disagreements, sober and courageous judges now and again rise up to the challenge of dispensing justice without fear or favour. On the other hand, the legislature has indescribably tremendous powers, both at the state and national levels, that it is unimaginable they have failed to use them. Instead, and perhaps for business or other reasons, legislators at all levels prefer to ingratiate themselves with the executive. If the police have not apologised for their open indiscretion in Rivers, it is unlikely they will apologise in the case of the Abuja invasion. But, if against all expectations they do, it will be insincere and offer no guarantees that future violations of the constitution would not occur. The reasons are twofold.

    First is that, increasingly, the police are displaying less and less character than their predecessors who enforced the law in the early decades after independence, and the bond and trust that existed between the people and their police have all but been denuded by years of enthusiastic subversion of both the dignity of the people they are paid to protect and the constitution they swore to defend. Mr Mbu, for instance, could not claim to misunderstand the provisions of the constitution or the demands and application of common sense. His problem is more likely to be a damning want of character than anything else. Were he inclined to disobey unlawful orders, for which at any rate he holds no private or public affection, he knew exactly what the punishment would be. It is of course impossible that the want of character, which did not tempt him to stand up against unlawful orders, could by some miracle become strength of character enabling him to withstand the vagaries of unemployment to which he was certain to be sentenced by his superiors whose orders he had questioned.

    However, what compounds Mr Mbu’s eager insubordination and want of mental and moral fortitude is not simply the humiliation of executing unlawful orders, at least for someone who claims to be a graduate of political science from a prestigious university. His dilemma, if indeed it can be so described, is the men by whom the distasteful orders come to him. For it is abundantly clear that even though his superiors in the police force also suffer a despairing lack of character, and could not stand up to the machinations of presidency forces, Mr Mbu appears compelled to carry out orders emanating from lesser men hovering around the corridors of power anxious to please President Goodluck Jonathan. Neither the top hierarchy of the police nor minions like Mr Mbu and Mr Amah would attempt to question what direction the unlawful orders were coming from nor for what purpose they were meant.

    The second reason is the president himself, a man who has proved infinitely less circumspect about the law or the constitution than his predecessors, whether the boisterously ineffective but still somewhat sensible Olusegun Obasanjo, or the sedate but obviously more sensible and sober Umaru Yar’Adua. Dr Jonathan is a man given to much pontification on the rule of law, democracy, constitutionalism and peaceful co-existence. But no one is as adept as he is at knocking tribal heads against one another, subverting the rule of law, and propounding constitutional rule only when it glorifies and glamorises presidential office.

    To a more circumspect president, the defiance of Mr Mbu in Rivers will be viewed with the considerable alarm any sensible democrat and convinced federalist would feel at so open and shocking a display of disobedience never before seen in these parts, not under the military, and not even under the iconoclast, Chief Obasanjo, who loved to humiliate his opponents. A reflective president would be worried that instigating Mr Mbu against a governor, or Mr Amah against five governors at a time, could lead to a bitter exchange between those saddled with protecting the governors and the invading policemen. Does the president not foresee this danger? And in future, could security aides of governors not be fooled by assassins dressed in police or military uniforms purporting to carry out orders from above, as indeed is already happening at checkpoints and highways?

    My suspicion is that Dr Jonathan has pretended not to appreciate the dangers involved in these matters because of two reasons. One, the wholesale subversion of his enemies favours him, and he might have been advised to use strong-arm tactics if he hoped to retain his seat in 2015; and two, simply because he sadly has no role model either in the Nigerian presidency or elsewhere in the world to look up to. Had the Nigerian presidency been occupied at one time or the other by great statesmen like say, No 10 Downing Street and the American White House were, the photographs of such illustrious predecessors adorning the walls of the exalted office would peer down on an offending president with the withering censoriousness their great acts in times of trouble would tantamount to.

    What great and noble deeds, it may be asked, was Chief Obasanjo noted for, or any of his predecessors? What inspiring vision of country or even leadership could be attributed to any of the gentlemen who ruled Nigeria? And as a country, against what standard do we judge our rulers? Is it against Gowon’s dishonoured promise to hand over the reins of power; or against Babangida’s interminable political and economic experimentations; or against Abacha’s larcenous and hedonistic rule; or against Ironsi’s indefensible naivety, among others? Dr Jonathan has no role model and no example to look up to. Unwilling to create a legacy worthy of emulation, he has both enacted and permitted series of subversive activities against democracy and the Nigerian constitution he swore to protect and defend. He has created a police state in which no one is sure who is governor anymore. And he has surreptitiously begun laying the foundations for fascism from which it would be difficult to extricate the country if a halt is not put to it now, if the stupefied National Assembly would not eschew sentiments to build a solid rampart in defence of our hard-won freedoms.

  • Mr. President, be bothered

    Mr. President, be bothered

    Not to be bothered today is to be when it is too late to make amends

    But for President Goodluck Jonathan’s antecedents, one could easily have accepted his statement to the effect that he is not bothered about criticisms as a Freudian slip. Speaking at the funeral of his mother-in-law, Late Mrs. Charity Oba, in Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State, on November 1, the President said, “To me as a political leader and most of my friends here who are politicians, politics or holding political offices is almost like death. While you are there, you are on the stage. The day you leave, what would people remember you for? That has always been my guiding principle”. He added: “No matter the comments; whether the comments are to the left or the comments are to the right or at the centre, what challenges me everyday is what the present and future generations of Nigerians will remember me for the day I step out of the State House”.

    Ordinarily, one would have taken this to mean that all President Jonathan was saying is that he would not be deterred by negative comments people make about him, but would rather forge ahead with whatever he considers the good works he is doing. Even on this score, the President cannot be entirely right. To juxtapose this against his antecedents makes matters worse; it gives, straightaway, the impression that the President does not “give a damn”, to use his own words when justifying why he is not declaring his asset publicly. The President’s handling of the Rivers State crisis too does not portray him as one who is bothered.

    President Jonathan needs to take tutorials from former President Shehu Shagari of our Second Republic. During the Shagari era, Chief Obafemi Awolowo was leader of the opposition Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN). His newspaper, Nigerian Tribune, was therefore more or less the opposition’s voice. I remember Alhaji Shagari saying his day was never complete until he had read Tribune, a far more credible paper then than it is today. The essence of my reference to the Tribune and Alhaji Shagari’s ‘love’ for it is to make the point that sometimes, it is from the criticisms that leadership is able to learn one or two things. Before you ask what happened to that government in spite of the fact that Shagari said he read Tribune daily, let me answer that the issue is not in knowing what the criticisms are alone but to what use they are put.

    After all, what is criticism? According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, “it is the practice of judging the merits and faults of something or someone in an intelligible (or articulate) way”. Unless President Jonathan is saying he is God, then, he cannot be right not to be bothered by criticisms because no man can ever be perfect. Only God is infallible. Even then, people criticise God, sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously. King Sunny Ade sang some years ago that when a poor man gets to the house of the rich, he would be cursing God even as he becomes so disrespectful to Him; indeed, he won’t even know when he would start asking God rhetorical questions. He would ask how come some people are stinking rich and others are strikingly poor; how come some are pigmies and others are giants, etc. Sunny Ade’s friend and contemporary, Chief Commander Ebenezer Obey gave an equivalent expression in Ketekete. In it, he said no matter how hard you try; no matter what you do, you can never please the world.

    Therefore, what I would have expected the President to say was that he would take constructive criticisms in good faith and even thank critics who see nothing good in what he is doing, because people must say one thing or the other about other people, especially those in leadership positions. People complain even about mad men. Sir Shina Peters prayed against what would make people stop talking about him. No matter what, there must be some message in some of the criticisms coming from even some of your worst enemies. This is why the President should not ignore criticisms; this is why he should be bothered about them now that it matters because a time would come when even if he is bothered, he won’t be in a position to do anything about them. President Jonathan should ask his predecessors; he should read the biographies and autobiographies of great men. General Ibrahim Babangida might have ignored some criticisms to his eternal peril. Maybe it was in an attempt to right some of the wrongs he did while in power that he so desperately wanted to return to the seat of power to make amends; but there is no such second chance for him.

    This is however not to say that leadership must always be led by criticisms. No, because there are some decisions leaders take today that would seem to be poor judgement but which in future will be far more appreciated. There are numerous examples of such all over the world. But this is not an excuse for the leadership to be deaf to criticism because shutting one’s ears to criticisms is like someone who says he would close his eyes because he does not want to see a bad person; such a person will not know when a good person would pass by.

    If criticisms are not useful, the two dominant types of democratic government that we have in the world today would not make room for the opposition. Opposition parties are there to keep the ruling parties on their toes by criticising them. It would seem to me that only the President and those benefiting from his government believe, like the President does, that he would live worthy legacies by the time he is leaving office at the rate he is going. Nigerians see the President and the ruling party that he belongs to as incapable of making a dent on our national challenges. And they have a point; the party has been in government at the centre for over 14 years, yet, it has not been able to tackle any of our challenges appreciably. We live more on promises than the party delivering solutions to our problems.

    All said, it is not enough for President Jonathan to be conscious of the fact that he would not be in the State House forever; it is even not enough that he is concerned about what the present and future generations of Nigerians would remember him for. What is paramount is what sense he makes of some of the senseless criticisms of today because what he does with them is part of the ingredients that would shape people’s perception of him and his government, not only today, but tomorrow. Criticisms allow for cross-fertilisation of ideas, a concept President Jonathan must have been familiar with, at least as an academic. There cannot be cross-fertilisation of ideas when all the President listens to are sycophants milling around him looking for something or even someone to devour.

    From my mailbox

    Dear Tunji, I just read your article on Page 13 of The Nation for Nov. 3, 2013 and all I can say is God bless you. I have never done this before because I always feel all you guys are doing is your job. But this article was not just that of a man doing his job, it came from a soul crying out loud for how the youths of this country have sold their conscience right from birth.

    Yet, some noble personalities in this country will condemn you just at the mention of an idea that the country may divide, all I can say is that they are blind and they need to pray for your kind of perspective. These days, youths only show displeasure to things that are not working in favour of their tribe or religion. I will stop now because I don’t want to give you another article in appreciation of another. Please you have a medium due to the nature of your job, kindly make Nigerian youth a priority.

    osagiejatto@yahoo.com