The Nation Newspaper

Category: Ropo Sekoni

  • A political class for enlightened self-interest 101

    Look at the orators in our republics; as long as they are poor, both state and people can only praise their uprightness; but once they are fattened on the public funds, they conceive a hatred for justice, plan intrigues against the people and attack the democracy—Aristophanes, Plutus
    Oh, tell me, who first declared, who first proclaimed that man only does nasty things because he does not know his own real interests; and that if he were enlightened, if his eyes were opened to his real normal interests, man would at once cease to do nasty things, would at once become good and noble because, being enlightened and understanding his real advantage, he would see his own advantage in the good and nothing else—Fyodor Dostoyevsky

    The ongoing migration from one party to the other between APC and PDP is troubling, not because it is unusual in Nigeria, but because it demonstrates that the country’s politics tilts more in the direction of selfishness and moves further away from enlightened self-interest expected from leaders. The absence of qualms for the leading political parties to accept members from the other party may not bother the characters moving between parties, but it cannot but bother ordinary citizens whose human fulfilment is left hanging. Especially, citizens who hold to their chests religiously our constitution’s Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy as evidence of a national ideology or aspiration that drives voting behaviour in many parts of the country. Lack of enlightened self-interest on the part of many politicians explains why many of them roam from one party to the other during election season.

    The first quote overleaf is from Poverty a stock character in a comedy written in 388 BCE by Ancient Greece’s master of comedy, Aristophanes. In this play, Plutus (god of wealth similar to Olokun A Soro Dayo in Yoruba) Chremylus, a poor Athenian and his slave Cario went to consult the Oracle at Delphi (equivalent of Babalowo in Yoruba) concerning the old man’s son. Chremylus wanted to know how to socialise his son: about injustice or the rightness of primitive acquisition.  Apollo tells Chremylus to persuade the first man he meets to follow him home. The first person the protagonist meets is a blind beggar. He finally talks the blind beggar into going home with him. Chremylus realizes that his guest is blind and has been made so by Zeus (similar to Olodumare). Lack of sight represents not being able to distinguish between justice and injustice or not being able to tell a just person from an unjust one.

    Chremylus decides to cure Plutus of his blindness, believing that with his sight fully restored, he will be in a better position to distribute wealth in a just way, giving more to the poor and virtuous rather than to the rich and vicious. Plutus’ sight is restored after which he continues to stay as a member of Chremylus’ household. After his cure, Plutus recognises the presence of Poverty (a goddess) who also lives with Chremylus. Poverty’s motto is that deprivation is the source of production and productivity and that without poverty there would be no slaves and luxury. Chremylus disagreed with the goddess. The new distribution system by Plutus changes the dynamics so much that Hermes (similar to Esu in Yoruba religion) came to Chremylus to join his world, which has destabilized the world under the directorship of Zeus. Sacrifices formerly due to the gods have been stopped as all attention in Chremylus’s micro-world has gone to Plutus. The play ends with a procession that takes Plutus to the temple to replace Zeus.

    Without turning our page into a literary analysis classroom, many things happen in this play that should bring Nigeria to mind. An unjust system of wealth distribution by a god without the ability to act fairly in the play is changed into one in which many people who otherwise would remain poor and hopeless become respectable members of their community. So impactful is the transformation brought by Plutus with eyes that can see to the world of Chremylus that Chremylus provides leadership for creating a new cosmos attempts to create a new cosmos not constrained by fear, unfairness, inequality, and inequity, that a god that is logical in his distribution of wealth is replaced by a capricious one.

    In relation to our politicians, our military politicians and their civilian successors pretended to act like Chremylus, by having an ideology of empowerment of citizens in its Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy. This section of the constitution seeks to redistribute the wealth of the nation, just as Chremylus changes the god of unfair distribution to one of fairness. The irony is that the constitution’s citizen-centred section is frozen at the level of rhetoric. It has remained non-justiciable since it entered the country’s constitutional history in 1979.

    The practitioners of the constitution in the major political parties habitually look away from the most ideological section of the constitution and looks forward each election season to what to do to remain in power, regardless of what citizens desire. The chances of politicians remaining in power after each election overshadows the cries of citizens for justice and equity, a situation that can be achievable if this section of the constitution is given a chance by making it justiciable and accepting the challenges that may emerge from such decision for both politicians and citizens.

    Unlike political elites in the developed countries that Nigeria’s political leaders rush to for vacation and education of their children: USA, UK, UAE, Europe, and now China, ours in Nigeria refuse to include citizens in the political landscape except keeping and viewing them as voters. Many, if not most, politicians relish acting like what Poverty in Aristophanes’ Play calls upright orators who become fattened enough to feel at ease in conceiving a hatred for justice, planning intrigues against the people and attacking democracy. By running from APC to PDP and vice versa, politicians demonstrate that they are not interested in the fundamental objectives of government but principally in the lucre of office under any party that shows promise of winning election.

    Even pundits on both sides of the divide continue to shout about the rightness of what is now called Buharism and Sarakism or Tambuwalism, the surface of the problem facing Nigeria’s future, depending on whose sides such pundits are.  Is the country’s condition likely to be improved by deification of individuals: Buhari, Saraki, Tambuwal (by Buharists, Sarakists, Tmabuwalists? Undoubtedly, such deification strengthens those whose names have become synonymous with ideology and followers who expect some comfort from such association. But each such Isms further degrade the discourse on governance, as it closes citizens’ eyes and minds to government’s effort to freeze Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State Policy into mere rhetoric, rather than turning them into engine for development.

    Chremylus formed the habit of thinking not only about himself but also about other people. In our country’s past, we have had people who made a habit of thinking of other people as politicians, to the extent that anyone competing with them or coming after them felt that it was compulsory to insert Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principles of State even in a constitution that did not consult the people. Many, if not most, politicians since 1999 have formed the habit of looking away from this important part of the social contract between citizens and rulers. Such politicians have chosen an ideology that promotes just their own interests in the way they think about politics. That politicians of both major parties keep changing party affiliations is not a sign of honesty and political maturity. Our politicians in all parties need to learn from an Ondo proverb: people should not feel bad to name their children Akinduntire, but they should feel ashamed to name them Akinduntirenikan (self-promotion and promotion of self alone respectively). This is a folksy manner of drawing a line between self-interest and enlightened self-interest, the need to act to further the interests of others as a decent way of serving one’s own interest. The culture of joining, staying in, or decamping from a party can only add to the nation’s distractions, without allowing for consideration of its myriad problems.

  • Politics in search of ideology, or character?

    We try to build politics of ideology in this country and that is why I commend the members that have remained committed….If ideology was entrenched, we will not see the way people are cross-carpeting as we see in Nigeria today. In advance democracies, hardly do you hear of such a thing—Gbajabiamila, Majority Leader
    It is not in anybody’s interest, certainly not in the national interest that we continue to patch this democracy in a way that birds that are incompatible congregate. The point I have been trying to make is that we need to build a political structure that goes beyond the platform for election. It will not be worth my while to preside over a national party that is simply an electoral platform….I had said and I want to repeat it, this business of governance must be driven by men and women of honour. If the only motivation is personal interest, what is in it for me, what have I gained, how many people have I done xyz for, if that is the basis, the earlier those in this business of personal gains, the earlier they return to where they belong, the better—Adams Oshiomohle, APC Chairman

    In the last five days, our politicians from both ruling party and the main opposition party have, to use the local parlance, been heating the polity, for no reason other than the nearness of the next elections. Many senators and members of the lower had relocated from APC to PDP, the way many PDP senators and representatives defected to APC about four years ago. As expected, pundits and even folk theorists have taken positions as supporters or opponents of the defectors, some praising them to high heavens while others paint them as enemies of the nation’s young democracy. As it happened four years ago, newspaper proprietors are likely to gain from increasing sensationalism that the theatrics of decamping and defecting may bring, until the 2019 presidential election is over.

    One consoling aspect of the drama of decamping and defecting is that the country’s self-appointed prophets are already in business about Nigeria’s uncanny capacity to avoid falling into the cliff, regardless of destabilising ritual of defecting as elections approach. Even members of the ruling APC have started expressing optimism about the defection being temporary, according to Senator Ahmed Lawan: “We are still expecting some of our colleagues in the original PDP who have expressed willingness to join the APC…. For our colleagues that have left, we are still optimistic that many of them or all of them will have a change of heart.” And such optimism is despite complaints about defectors’ lack of electoral value by other senior members of the ruling party.

    Another consolation is that the new chairman of APC, Adams Oshiomhole, and the Majority Leader in the House of Representatives, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, have referenced two factors that must have made it easy for politicians to defect at the risk of endangering the country’s democracy that brought honour to Nigeria in 2015. Gbajabiamila has blamed defection on r-APC’s failure to adjust to politics of ideology: “We try to build politics of ideology in this country and that is why I commend the members that have remained committed.” And the new APC chairman, Adams Oshiomhole, has linked the current Defection Virus to lack of character: “I had said and I want to repeat it, this business of governance must be driven by men and women of honour.”

    Despite many complaints by pundits that elections bring crisis to the polity because politics in Nigeria is not driven by ideology, the reality is that there has always been politics of ideology in the country. If political ideology is, simply put, a set of ideas and principles that explain how a polity or society should work and offer the blueprint for a certain political, economic, and social order, there has never been a time since attainment of independence that ideology has not been central to political rhetoric and practice. For example, in the First Republic, the Action Group and NEPU pushed variants of social democracy as guiding ideology while the NPC had an ideology that supported feudalism. In the Second Republic, there was ideological opposition between NPN’s adherence to the ideology of NPC while UPN and PRP remained close to social democracy as the preferred ideology to drive governance. Under the ethos of A Little to the Right and A Little to the Left of NRC and SDP, opposition between the status quo and change was evident. Even in 1999, the general understanding was that it was late Bola Ige that wrote the constitution of PDP and the grand-father of APC, Alliance for Democracy (AD). Bola Ige was incapable of writing and saying anything devoid of ideology. In 1999, the party of change faced the party of continuity. We have always had one form of ideology or the other. What has been lacking from republic to republic is the character to make democracy sustainable, on the part of most party members.

    It is a deliberate attempt to befuddle political discussion for pundits and partisans to say that the country’s political crisis or instability is traceable to absence of ideology. It may not be in the long-term interests of citizens to continue believing the argument that lack of ideology is the problem of our politics. The diagnosis seems to me to be lack of character and conviction on the part of too many politicians. Without men and women of honour, democracy cannot be sustained, let alone, nurtured. Rule of law depends on good character on the part of political leaders. Building consensus or compromise that drives democratic debate requires men and women of integrity, just as conducting transparent, free, and fair elections is indispensable to good governance and legitimacy of government. The lack of discipline on the part of many politicians to respect citizens’ right to choose their rulers is one element that has characterised the country’s politics for far too long. It seems that most politicians would prefer selection to election, to speed up their access to the glamour and lucre of political office.

    At the beginning, the military did not trust the country’s politicians; hence the introduction of military rule to the young polity in 1966 and subsequent multiplication of military dictators. Lack of trust within the military spawned frequent change of military dictators on the excuse of fighting corruption on-and-off for about four decades. Departing military dictators also did not trust citizens. They created a constitution to guide politics and governance in the country beyond the exit of military rulers. And the rest is history.

    Blaming adherence to or disregard for ideology does not seem to be our trouble, as much as not having the character—honour or discipline that separate leaders from dealers in government. Lusting for power and money as the means and ends of participating in politics is the issue that decamping threw up in 2015 and now in 2018. When defectors from PDP joined the young APC in 2015, it should have occurred to citizens that another group of defectors could emerge in 2018 to decamp to PDP. Ita Etang’s post-defection analysis that those who left APC did not have any problem with President Buhari but with their governors who seem to scheme many legislators out sounds credible.

    For many of our post-military politicians, the primacy of short-term personal gain seems to lead to adoption of Quick-Fix solutions to the problem of organising for development of the parts and the whole of our multiethnic federation with diverse worldviews. So far, the most visible national consensus since 1999 is belief in periodic elections to confer power on individuals. One of such quick-fixes is the 1999 Constitution itself. Agreement to use this quick-fix document to seek and use power cannot but throw up seasonal defectors, as it happened in 2015, and now in 2018. The long-term solution to Nigeria’s political instability is de-militarisation of its polity, i.e. creating a new constitution that addresses terms of association for the Nigerian Union. Failing to do this important reform urgently may continue to leave the country at the mercy of mercenaries in politics or governance, as seeking political power has been since transfer of power to civilians in 1999.

     

  • Universal Basic Education: the least we should do

    Our progress as a nation can be no swifter than our progress in education. Our requirements for world leadership, our hopes for economic growth, and the demands of citizenship itself in an era such as this all require the maximum development of every young American’s capacity. The human mind is our fundamental resource—John F. Kennedy

    If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich. … If we desire a society that is democratic, then democracy must become a means … Hatred is corrosive of a person’s wisdom and conscience; the mentality of enmity can poison a nation’s spirit, instigate brutal life and death struggles—John F. Kennedy
    When all the talents in society are not fully developed, it is not the individuals that are adversely affected alone who suffer; the society as a whole suffers as well. Now, granting that every Nigerian is given an opportunity to develop his talents, it is imperative that he should also be given an opportunity to employ these developed talents. Full development of man and his full employment are not only social imperatives, but also inseparably inter-connected and complementary—Obafemi Awolowo

    A man whose personality is fully developed never fears anything; he cringes not, and never feels inferior to anyone; His breadth of mind enables him to exercise his freedom in such a manner as not to endanger the interests and freedom of others. He is a citizen of the world – free from narrow prejudices. He is what he is because the three main constituents of his entity – his body, brain, and mind – are fully developed—Obafemi Awolowo

    There are too many outstanding problems about human development in Nigeria, despite claims by all post-military governments about expenditures and achievements on education in the last 25 years. One depressing statistic is that 50 percent of children in northern Nigeria drop out of primary school in order to get married or join the labour market without functional literacy. Another is that Nigeria has the largest number of school-age children that are out of school in the world, about 10.5 million and that most of these children are girls, panhandlers (Almajiri) in local parlance, and children of nomadic groups.  60 % of children out of school live in the northern part of the country, where 45% of the population are under 15, the age to obtain Universal Basic Education.

    Sufficiently related dismal figures include the announcement that many schools lack safe private toilets and hand-washing facilities. About 2.5 million children under age five suffer from Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) every year and 11 million children are stunted, a result of prolonged malnutrition. Further, less than 20% of children in Nigeria are fed diets that meet the minimum adequacy for healthy growth and development—physical and cognitive.

    For the avoidance of doubt, none of these deficits owes its origin to the current government, nevertheless, the government is expected to have solved some of these problems more noticeably in the last three years, particularly in confronting the jinx of illiteracy in the north, where vote seekers believe most of the country’s children currently live.

    With several holders of doctorates in various disciplines in all northern states, including Borno where literacy rate according to UNICEF is 15% and Yobe where it is 7.23, it is logical to assume that northern cultural and political leaders are not averse to Western education. Children of the elite in the north, just like in the south, are in good schools and universities in Nigeria and other countries. What could be the reason for low literacy rate in states with several doctorate holders? Factors that recur in various analyses in respect of low literacy in northern states include poverty, culture, and lack of will on the part of state and federal governments.

    With respect to poverty in the North, like elsewhere, there is a correlation between abject poverty and literacy. Parents with no primary education in most countries are more likely to be poor than their counterparts who are literate. It is abject poverty that makes primary school children to drop out of school to get married or look for job. But such choices are elements of the vicious circle that perpetuates poverty. It is the government—federal, state, and local—that can end such vicious circle of poverty. Many people would say that one of the goals of UBE is long-term poverty alleviation. But UBE without commitment on the part of states and local governments to encourage enrolment and retention of children in school is bound to aggravate inequality and poverty in the north and elsewhere in the country. With UBE already in existence, the reason for children dropping out of school may not be just because of poverty of parents and guardians; it must be connected with the worldview of cultural and political leaders in the North.

    The cultural bias that Western education is not what the generality of people in the North need is a mask for perpetuating inequality and poverty of children from the average family in the region. If Western education is good for children of Emirs, Ministers, and Permanent Secretaries in the North, it cannot be bad for children of the hoi polloi. There is danger in cultural leaders holding on to the fallacy that what the masses of the North need is non-Western education, particularly in a country held together by English language. Many Islamic countries acquire and provide Western education along with Islamic education. UAE, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Pakistan are good examples. In a federation like Nigeria, Islamic education is undoubtedly useful for Nigerian Muslims. What is useful for all Nigerians is Western education which is part of the culture that keeps Nigeria together as one country. In a way, Western education is crucial to sustaining the unity of Nigeria as one territory with an integrated economy. It is, therefore, important for political leaders in the northern region to think more liberally than their cultural counterparts.

    Even though UBE is inadequate for moving the population to a fully modern ethos, as it is, UBE has laid a good foundation for extending basic and functional literacy to the masses in the North. What is expected of the federal and state governments is to accept the inevitability of UBE for all citizens that can still benefit from it. And to make citizens take the advantage offered by UBE, federal and state governments need to legislate that UBE is free and compulsory for all citizens of school age. Kaduna has set the pattern for other states in the North to follow. With reference to the history of mass literacy in Western Nigeria, many Yoruba cultural leaders were opposed to Chief Awolowo and the Action Group on establishment of Free Primary Education Scheme. It took the adoption of a forward-looking worldview on the part of Awolowo, Ajasin, Enahoro, Awokoya, Awosika, Akintola, and many others in the Action Group for the region to move beyond cultural leaders who preferred to be stuck in the past for whatever extra benefits looking backward brought to them, and the rest is history.

    Many societies had faced the problem that northern Nigeria now faces: choosing between the past or the future. No society had become modern and developed without facing the future, that is, accepting the imperative of change as part of the human condition. Many leaders across the globe, especially those who had benefited from feudalism believe that is easier to live according to tradition-theological or methodological. Feudalism is the best illustration of the desire to get stuck to an existing system, not necessarily because it is the best form of producing the common good, but solely because it brings the most comfort to those at the apex of the society’s political and social ladder.

    It is a common knowledge that most societies that have become developed have given education to their citizens through a combination of caring and compulsion or carrot and stick. Such governments provide tuition, facilities, and opportunities of easy access to public schools for all citizens. In addition, governments that sincerely want to improve the quality of life of their young ones also make at least the first 12 years of schooling free and compulsory. Such policy makes parents and guardians liable if their children or wards are on the street while they should be in the classroom, to be groomed to function as citizens and reap the benefits of citizenship. President Buhari should have no problem to send an executive bill to the National Assembly to make UBE free and compulsory all over the country. If the country’s cultural or religious rightwing is uncomfortable with which type of education to make free and compulsory—Islamic or Western, the bill can include that Muslim children be made to study English and Arabic as part of the curriculum.

    There are already too many fault lines in our federation: religion, ethnicity, culture, geography. It is very dangerous to add another fault line: literacy and illiteracy.

  • Democracy, security and politics: how far have things changed?

    First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak out-
    Because I was not a Communist.
    Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out-
    Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
    Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out-
    Because I was not a Jew.
    Then they came for me-and there was no one left to speak for me.-Martin Niemoller

    Whatever took place in Ado-Ekiti last Wednesday, a day after the display of positive power by  movers and shakers of All Progressives Congress and current governance of the country, it will be important for the growth of democracy for citizens to know what exactly took place: why and to what effect. So far, the conflicting claims include that Fayose did not get police permission to lead a rally on that day and Fayose’s supporters claimed that permission was secured to use the pavilion.  The police said that its men tried to prevent a clash between Fayose’s party and Fayemi’s party. But Fayose’s supporters claimed that the police dispersed his men and women with teargas, making Fayose to sustain an injury that took him to the hospital. It is never an easy task to get to the root of most things about partisan politics in our society, but this is what a commission of inquiry can do.

    Citizens who were excited in 2015 when transition from one civilian government to another went without violations of human rights must be alarmed by the regression now in vogue in Ado-Ekiti.  In 2015, this column joined many others in celebrating the advent of electoral democracy that the country had not experienced for a very long time since June 12, 1993 presidential elections. For the event of last Wednesday in Ekiti not to bring back sad memories about the practice of partisan politics in the country, there is need for the federal government to investigate police officers who used teargas when the deputy inspector did not “tell them to do so.” Such intervention from security can give the impression of partiality on the part of the police.

    Not many citizens between the age of 15 and 45 may know that repression of opposition parties has been part of the culture of electioneering in the country from the beginning of its electoral history. In 1959, it was hard and impossible in many parts of Northern Region for members of the Action Group to campaign freely.  In 1964 and 65 in Western Region, forces of Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP) harassed members of the Action group before, during, and after regional and federal elections. Candidates were incriminated by government agents. Some candidates were charged for stealing goats and put in prison to prevent them from taking part in campaigns. Similarly, in 1979 and 1983, many journalists from Western Region were intimidated and harassed out of many parts of the North before election days by security forces in support of National Party of Nigeria. It was overcoming such moments of darkness that inspired democrats to resist annulment of Abiola’s election. It was also the free atmosphere for citizens to choose their rulers that made many Nigerians to celebrat in 2015 when the election that brought President Buhari into power was without intimidation and repression of members of opposition parties. Overzealous security agents must be prevented from taking the country back to the dark age of our electoral politics.

    What could have been the reason to turn Ekiti which enjoyed the peace and excitement of a festival on Tuesday during the campaign of APC into a space of weeping by PDP members barely 24 hours later?  It is only the security forces deployed to Ekiti that can tell the nation why the sudden descent into such primitive and barbaric acts at a time that citizens believe that politicians have accepted to work in compliance with the rule of law. Fayose may not be the most civil politician, but he is not in the wrong to want to campaign for his candidate on Wednesday for an election that is to hold on Saturday. If he had tried to campaign on Friday, he would have been at fault, but certainly not on Wednesday. Why would he be denied the right to hold a rally in support of his own candidate 24 hours after the opposing party had its own dance toward power in the same state?  So civil was APC’s campaign on Tuesday that some of the leaders of the party even tried to campaign for Fayose. Why would the police get so enthusiastic about preventing a breakdown of law and order that it would destroy the gains of several years in the country’s political culture? Why would people deployed to keep peace be the source of crisis?

    The space given to our police for errors seems to be too large. Fayose could have been killed by a stampede and that could throw Ekiti into chaos or anarchy. Does our country need such a problem at a time that the country is virtually at war with itself – Boko Haram, herdsmen’s killings, killing by cattle rustlers, etc?  Security agents ought to be reminded of the proverb, ‘Discretion is a greater part of valour.’ It is noteworthy that a relatively senior police officer has finally acknowledged that something was wrong in the handling of PDP’s proposed rally by the police. But it is premature for the Deputy Inspector to promise to avoid a repeat of a violation that has not been fully acknowledged. Thus, the latest response from Deputy Inspector Habilal Joshak: “What I said was that those massing for the rally should be asked to leave because it is not good going by the mood of the state now to hold rally or street procession. I didn’t say they should use force. This is an election and electioneering is a civil matter anywhere across the globe, so police as security agents can’t use force on the people. But I want to assure the good people of Ekiti State that such mistake will never repeat itself,” is certainly more civil than what is usual with the Nigeria Police Force. However, this statement is not enough to put this unprovoked attack on democracy behind us. The attack on Fayose and his supporters, and by extension, on tolerance of opposition that democracy requires deserves a more robust acknowledgement that the police had been out of order in its overreaction in Ekiti last Wednesday.

    There are many matters arising from the sudden use of police power in Ekiti.  One such matter is the claim that it is only a central police force that can be depended on not to abuse police power. With a state police in Ekiti State, the chances are high that many of the police in such a homogenous state may be relations or neighbours. Would such people have acted with such venom as was displayed last Wednesday? Given the readiness of Fayemi’s opponents before the primary to solidarise with him immediately after the primary, there is no doubt that Ekiti people are politically mature people. Why would the police ignite an unnecessary crisis a few days to the election? Couldn’t the police have imagined that such intolerance of Fayose and his party supporters could have tarnished the candidacy of Fayemi? They ought to have given this scenario a thought if they were prepared to use discretion. Police attack on Fayose and PDP members when they acted within their rights can lead to post-election hostility among such a closely-knit state as Ekiti. Many of us from other states were thrilled when Fayose came out to support the nomination of Fayemi for ministerial appointment in 2016, calling him a worthy son of Ekiti.

    What kind of federalism leaves state governors without a security system loyal to him or her as the symbol of the state, as the federal police is expected to be loyal to the president? The deficit in the country’s federal democracy has been underlined by the poor political literacy of the police in Ekiti.  Could any state governor in the United States, Canada, or Belgium have been disrespected the way Fayose was, regardless of Fayose’s love of histrionics or theatrics?

    The civilised international community which praised Nigeria in 2015 for peaceful conduct before and during the elections is being made by the excesses of the police on Wednesday to see the experience of 2015 as a fluke. A way out of this embarrassing situation is for the police to apologise for what Deputy Inspector Joshak has acknowledged as a mistake or be probed to determine why such mistake was made.

  • Towards police reform by lawmakers

    There is no way we can continue with the way we are going with policing now. . . For us to continue this old way of policing our country, I don’t think it can work and it is not working. We have to look at other parts of the world, how they are doing it-Vice President Yemi Osinbajo
    Community policing which demands effective police-public partnership and trust in crime prevention is the best form of policing…. Even among police personnel themselves, a research carried out in 14 states discovered that if community police strategy is adopted, it could assist to eradicate most of the challenges attributed to the traditional reactive police culture…. There is no debate about the efficacy of community policing model of internal security management-Solomon Arase, former IGP.
    You are all aware of the challenges we are currently facing in this country, particularly that of insecurity. There is no doubt that the security architecture of this country presently cannot meet the demands and challenges before it….One of the decisions we took today is to address the issue of state and community policing. In doing that, we gave our Constitution Amendment Committee two weeks to bring to the floor a Bill on State and Community Policing. The House of Representatives is also working along similar lines.—Senator Bukola Saraki

    The police force in Nigeria is again under the radar. The National Assembly has vowed to create state and community police through amendment of the 1999 Constitution. The tendency to say “Déjà vu” must be high among the country’s federalists, but nobody can readily know what good outcome can come out of such promise at a time that election is virtually at the nation’s door. In furtherance of this column’s interest in re-federalisation of the country, it chooses today to err on the part of optimism by sharing with lawmakers its views on police reform.

    One central police force to secure the entire country was decreed into existence in 1970 after the civil war. The thinking then and later by other military dictators and their folk theorists is that there is an umbilical cord between policing a multiethnic and multicultural federation and national unity. The decree promoted ever since the notion that the more Nigeria is centralised, the more united it can be. Not even the colonial master, the creator of Nigeria, discouraged multilevel policing. Other members of the school of thought that only central agencies can guarantee national unity and that is devoid of abuse of subnational police system have continued to support expansion of federal powers at the expense of states and local governments which provide homes for citizens and property. Many federal lawmakers have expressed support for over centralisation since the beginning of the fourth republic in 1999. It is, therefore, a pleasant surprise that the federal legislative body has come to the realisation that it is not wise to leave law enforcement in the hands of a central government that has no space of its own, apart from the FCT, federal roads, and land transferred to the central government for specific use.

    For too long, the National Assembly has acted in favour of those who think that national unity is the main reason for establishing police systems, instead of the need to guarantee public order. When in 2012, the 36 members of Nigeria’s Governors’ Forum called for subnational police systems, the NASS looked away, when it could or should have supported such call with constitutional amendments. The legislative body has been looking away from such demands until now that herdsmen from within and outside the country have exposed the weakness in concentrating state security in the central government.

    Realization by the National Assembly that one centralised police force is incapable of sustaining public order in 36 states in a federal system may be seen by many citizens as belated.  But acquiring such awareness is better late than never. What is concerning is the degree of guarantee that the same legislature may not sing another tune before the process of amendment commences. Since history is created daily, the National Assembly should be given its due; it appears today to be on the right side of history. Legislators who are pro-multilevel policing need all the suggestions fellow citizens can offer them as federal and state legislators embark on what can change the history of federalism in a country in which the federal government has monopolised (unsuccessfully) provision of security for 180 million people with over 250 languages and cultures spreading over 923,768 square kilometres.

    It shouldn’t matter how long it had taken the Federal Legislature to realise that the military template for securing the country is now stale and outdated. What matters is that significant segments of the population have come to terms with the fact that the military template for governing Nigeria, if continued as it was passed to post-military politicians, is likely to endanger the unity the military designed the template to achieve. One irrefutable part of human behaviour is that many individuals get used to an existing practice and often become beholden to it, even when such practice hobbles them. Another abiding aspect of humanity is the capacity of every society to throw up leaders that can see better than those inured to an existing method. Such personalities also pluck the courage to throw away what in the existing system causes problems and pain for those that are needed for the system to survive.

    The reasons for subnational policing are more than responding to the recent tragedy in many North-central states, as important as such response is. The recent killings are effects of age-old neglect of proper way of securing persons and property in a multiethnic state. Central policing has presented itself more like intimidators than protectors of citizens and property. The federal police have shown inadequate respect for diversity of the country it has been designed to secure. Under the central police system, security operatives are deployed to states whose language and culture they hardly understand. It is obvious that law enforcement officers who do not understand the simplest and most horizontal register of the language of the community of their beat are likely to be shut out of vertical and connotative language of such community: metaphors, idioms, and idiolects in which criminals communicate with each other. A central police force mocks federalism by running a security system in which governors and state lawmakers make laws they do not have the power to enforce.

    Ideally, decentralising policing should be a part of a larger process: restructuring.  While speed may be essential for the National Assembly on this matter, the amendment ought to involve citizens as much as possible. This is an exercise that should not involve re-inventing the wheel. Best global methods and practices abound in countries with longer history of federalism: United States, Switzerland, Australia, India, Canada, Belgium, Brazil, Argentina, Pakistan, to name a few. Even the United Kingdom, until recently a unitary state, and New Zealand, another unitary state, have multiple police systems to consider.

    The obsession of military dictators with unity instead of with security and safety of citizens had produced a federal police force that is alienated from citizens. Continuing with one police force is likely to water down security of life and property, as it has done most graphically in the case of killings in Plateau, Benue, and other states. No federal system in the world puts the country’s security in one basket as Nigeria’s military dictators had done for decades. It is, therefore, uplifting that lawmakers who have for long seen one central police force in a multiethnic democracy as a norm rather than an anomaly have promised to provide leadership for a new security architecture.  This new vision is better late than never, but it should be more far-reaching than creation of state police. Lawmakers—federal and state—should think about full-scale de-militarisation of the polity, particularly the 1999 Constitution.

  • Toward Disarmageddon in Nigeria

    When The Economist used the word Disarmageddon a few weeks ago, it was in respect of failure on the part of world leaders to curb nuclearization. The emphasis of the article is that “a complacent world may be playing with Armageddon.” The use of disarmageddon today is to warn Nigeria’s political leaders against wittingly or unwittingly turning Nigeria into a theatre of war between forces of good and evil, instead of doing everything possible to put the country on the path of cultural democracy and order capable of holding a country of several nations together in peace and for progress for all.

    The ongoing tragedy of blood, otherwise known in literature as Revenge Tragedy, can create an apocalypse in a country with several other fault lines capable of turning a joke into a crisis. If about 100 lives were snuffed out in Plateau State by guns in the hands of citizens who may not even have license to carry such weapons and without being detected by any law enforcer makes invoking the image of Armageddon conceivable. The claim that the murder of about 100 citizens from Plateau State was a revenge for rustling of 300 cows signifies the fast evaporation of  values in a country that is after peace and progress, especially a multiethnic one like Nigeria, where respect and tolerance of difference are prerequisites for stable state structure of governance.

    It is proper that the presidency has promised to put more energy into providing efficient security for all citizens and their property. The President’s decision to provide funds for taking care of victims of the murderous gang in Plateau is also a good gesture, just as the call on security forces to track down the suspects for prosecution is a rational option in the circumstance. All efforts must point in the direction of assuring citizens that no citizens are special to the extent that they can get away with murdering other citizens, for whatever reason. The country’s prosecutors and judges should have been called upon by aggrieved cattle owners to intervene, as the laws of the land prescribe.

    Further, security forces are more efficient when they act in a timely manner to prevent crime, particularly a heinous one involving pre-meditated murder of many people.  Perhaps, if there had been a judicial enquiry into the killings in Benue, Taraba, Zamfara, and other places, the most recent killings in Plateau might not have happened. The President or the legislature should call for a commission of inquiry on Plateau and other killings. It is not too late to apply the principle of crime and punishment to these tragedies. Citizens, wherever they find themselves in the country, deserve to feel that the country’s security forces are equipped materially and emotionally to protect them. Citizens need to be assured that the goal of the Nigerian State is to secure all citizens and prevent them from being murdered by any ethnic or occupational group, be they from other countries or within the country.

    Life in Nigeria in the last few years has been stressful for the average citizen, not only in respect of decades of poor quality of life but, more importantly, in respect of psychological stability. Since the beginning of Boko Haram terrorism, most citizens including those living in states physically far from Northeastern states must have been living under psychological stress, regardless of whether they have ways of expressing this. With the addition of terrorism from herdsmen, it should be expected that citizens must be more stressed than before. The federal government needs to be visibly worried that citizens are generally living under fear of one form of terror or the other. Making efforts to address effects of intermittent group killing of other groups is a positive step, but high incidence of such killings in the last two years suggests that there is need to pay attention to cause(s) of such hostility between ethnic communities in different parts of the country.

    A cause-and-effect approach is crucial at this point. At no time since independence, apart from the killings before and during the civil war, have citizens been so afraid of being killed while asleep or on the road as we have experienced in the last two years, and this development should worry the president and the ruling party. The soothing balm of kind words after calamities does not endure as much as efforts to identify causes of calamities. It is not an exaggeration that the country is believed by many citizens that Armageddon must be around the corner. The government ought to invest in identifying why Benue, Taraba, Plateau farmers get killed and apparently with relish. No such thing happened even in the years that all the states now involved in endless inter-ethnic vendetta belonged to one region in a proper federation.

    Could the dismantling of federalism be a source of such conflict? And can the renewal of the political structure of the country be of any significance in the regulation of inter-ethnic relations?  In view of demands by federal officials that legislatures of various states rescind laws they had duly enacted to prevent tension from the country’s nations of farmers and nations of pastoralists, these questions are bound to arise. It is, therefore, instructive that many communities have been calling on the federal government, especially the President to listen to citizens about the deleterious effects of over centralization of governance on inter-state or inter-ethnic relations. During the 2015 campaign under the ideology of change, many citizens voted for the ruling party because they wanted change from a constitution that puts all powers in the hands of the federal government, to the extent that state governors and lawmakers are relegated to the role of  subordinates to those who control the federal government. Otherwise, how could a Federal Minister have ordered state legislatures to annul laws that subnational legislatures had created to prevent land from becoming a source of inter-ethnic conflicts in such states? Similarly, how could occupational groups have the temerity to announce that existence of certain state laws had make them to kill and terrorize innocent citizens?

    It seems to me that many political leaders have played the ostrich game of self-deception long enough. The two presidents who had the chance to serve as military dictators have been visibly averse to restructuring. This is understandable if their purpose of serving as elected presidents is to perpetuate military dictators’ denaturing of the country’s federalism during the era of military rule. But it is worrisome that the country’s post-military governance is still operating on the template of governance handed over to civilians in 1999. It must be a hard job for President Buhari, one of the military dictators responsible for the current architecture of governance, to enthusiastically dismantle what military rulers in their wisdom or lack of it believed was the best way to keep the country united. But this is an appropriate time for a new imagination or vision about Nigeria. The governance system bequeathed by military rulers appears to have outlived its time. Leadership is not necessarily about sticking to the past; in many cases it is about making new changes that can improve the life of citizens—politically, socially, and emotionally. Leadership is not necessarily about keeping a multiethnic polity together by force, as all the military rulers had attempted to do. Leadership is about having the courage to find out how to make diverse cultures live together without tension and suspicion. This has been the reason for creating and sustaining federal system of governments in societies with noticeable cultural diversity: Canada, USA, Switzerland, Belgium, Brazil, UAE, Germany, etc.

    Apart from the negative effect of corruption on material poverty of citizens in the country, lack of a proper structure for managing multiethnic complexity seems to be a major source of political and social tension. The Plateau mass murder, like the others before it, may not bring Nigeria immediately to Armageddon. But ignoring the source of instability, such as has spawned Boko Haram, herdsmen/farmers conflicts, in the name of sustaining a user-unfriendly governance system can lead to apocalypse in the long run.  A complacent multiethnic polity like Nigeria, where communities can be decimated for failing to account for 300 cows and acquiring Western-style education can make a person lose his life and property, may be playing with Armageddon.

  • Cattle and citizens

    This article had appeared on this page before. It is being republished as an acknowledgement of change in policy response to what has become a national crisis spawned by conflicts between nomadic pastoralists and farmers. The recent decision of the federal government to establish ranches in 10 states of the federation marks a major change from obsession with grazing zones  to ranching, a model that represents global best practice in meat and milk production.

    Tim Marshall in a recent book, Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Tell You Everything You Need To Know About Global Politics has a conclusion that could have been written specifically in relation to politics of cattle production in today’s Nigeria: “As the twenty-first century progresses, the geographical factors that have helped determine our history will mostly continue to determine our future…. Of course, geography does not dictate the course of all events. Great ideas and great leaders are part of the push and pull of history. But they must all operate within the confines of geography.” This quote, like the rest of the book, has lessons for the whole world and more immediately for Nigeria that is under serious stress of coming to terms with nature in a century more empowered by science and technology to cope with the constraints of geography.

    Desertification may be a remote cause of the problem between herdsmen and farmers in states below the Sahel belt in the northern part of Nigeria, but desertification is not peculiar to Nigeria. About 900 million people in the five continents live in zones that are threatened by desertification. But most countries adopt new techniques to cope with such challenges of geography. Nigeria must find ways to acquire such knowledge to save itself from creating easy solutions that may create similar or worse problems in the future for its citizens and its cattle.

    Indiscriminate cattle grazing has not always been a problem in the country. Those who were born before independence would know that up to the 1970s when the Sahel had not moved down as radically as it has in the last twenty years, it was unheard of that herdsmen harassed farmers in the South and largely in the middle-belt. One immediate cause of herdsmen/farmers clash is the fear of Fulani herdsmen to accept the unworkability of the old system of roaming with cattle across states as well as the fear of adopting new modes of cattle raising. Just as many Nigerians are mourning with Benue State over recent killing of men, women, and even children allegedly by herdsmen, the officers of Fulani socio-cultural organisation, Gan Allah Fulani Development Association of Nigeria (GAFDAN) are insisting that it is only annulment of Benue State’s Anti-Open Grazing Law that can prevent violence. The Organisation’s Secretary General, Alhaji Saleh Bayeri, indirectly holds the government responsible for the recent tragedy in Benue: “Naturally, the government should know that the Fulani that keep multiplying in human population and their animals should know that they need a space to occupy and carry out their legitimate business.”

    Bayeri’s call for a space for herdsmen to occupy and carry out legitimate business raises two issues that the federal government must address fast. One is demand for a space for herdsmen and the second is what type of space and why. The interest of GAFDAN seems to be in favour of the pre-colonial mode of cattle farming: nomadism and roaming. The second problem concerns government’s readiness to intervene intelligently and equitably in the clash of interests between animal and plant farmers in different parts of the country.

    So far, it appears that the federal government’s latest intervention is to create “cattle colonies.” The Agriculture Minister, Audu Ogbeh, has attempted to distinguish between cattle ranch and colony: “Ranching is more of an individual venture for those who want to invest, but cattle colony is bigger in scope and size. … Cattle colony is not using Fulani herdsmen to colonize any state. It is going to be done in partnerships with state governments that would like to volunteer land for it. Federal government will fund the project and those wishing to benefit from it will pay some fees.”

    The distinction between cattle ranch and colony befuddles the federal government’s policy on this urgent matter of economic restructuring. How big must a ranch become to qualify for a colony? Is the federal government planning late in the ethos of market economy to run cattle farms or colonies in partnership with states or individuals? Why would the federal government feel comfortable with privatising telecommunication, electricity, banking, fertilizer, and even education while calling for restoration of government/private partnership in cattle business? Is the federal government now ready to return to a mixed economy mode it had stopped since establishment of Bureau of Public Enterprise? FG’s decision to pay for space to serve as colonies and charge cattle farmers “some fees” smacks of special subsidy to cattle farming? Is this policy going to be extended to other forms of farming, especially farmers in non-cattle producing states of the federation? What is the extent of involvement of the National Assembly in formulation of this policy so far?

    With or without climate change, the world is changing in geographical terms and is likely to continue to change. Undoubtedly, science and technology are now deployed to assist humanity to cope with constraints of geography. The federal government needs to get more scientific techniques from global best practices in cattle farming. Given the recent tragedy in Benue, policy wonks cannot afford to go to sleep. But while they are doing necessary comparative studies on raising cattle in states vulnerable to desert encroachment, the government should pay immediate attention to investigation that can lead to prosecution and punishment of those who had given Nigeria the worst name possible in international relations: a country practicing genocide.  Policymakers need to benefit from two Nigerian proverbs. The Igbo proverb says roughly in English “life is like a dance, you need to follow the dance in order to enjoy it.” The Yoruba version says, “it is the contemporary dog that is used to chase the contemporary rabbit.” Both proverbs promote adaptability to new modes and methods. The challenge for the ministries of agriculture and the environment is how to fight desertification frontally and how to adopt new ways to produce cattle.

    If herdsmen were children of upper or middle-class men and women in our country, they would have cried foul for being hired to nurse cattle for the rich at great risk to their being. If the country had created an educational system akin to what exists in Kaduna today—free and compulsory basic education for all—it would have been impossible for current owners of cattle to find herdsmen to follow cows across the country.  Such difficulty must come to cattle owners if part of the goals of national development and integration include ensuring equality and equity. Having herdsmen in the 21st century should be discouraged; potential herdsmen should be in school like the children of owners of the cattle they are hired to herd. Young herdsmen who after receiving Basic Education choose to become cattle farmers should be given opportunities to own ranch, even if they need to take loan guaranteed by government to buy land for ranching.

    The media is already celebrating creation of ranches in 10 states as symptomatic of radical change from government’s earlier preoccupation with establishment of Grazing Zones to adoption of ranching as the hallmark of modern animal farming. Undoubtedly, this is a noticeable change. However, citizens require further explanations on there are further explanations on philosophy and method behind selecting the states to be provided with ranches. How does selecting each state to house some of the 94 ranches fit into the agricultural and land management of the ‘lucky’ states to benefit from about N180 billion? Has the federal government acquired sites for ranches for government use and later for transfer to private cattle farmers? What steps are taken to ensure that federal government’s acquisition or purchase of land that is constitutionally under the jurisdiction of states does not derogate from the power of the state to manage state resources on behalf of citizens in a federation? While the nation justifiably celebrates the priority of ranch over grazing, citizens are likely to get a clearer picture of the new  policy, as more details of the policy emerge. (Not in the original essay)

  • Proposed review of power privatisation and citizens’ desires

    Like most citizens across the globe, most Nigerians including this writer do not understand the complexity of power generation, transmission, distribution, and delivery to the point of use. In effect, most citizens complain about unavailability of electricity when they need it, arbitrary tariff increase without connection to service improvement, and fair or estimated billing. Citizens trust a governance system that empowers their rulers to ensure that technical experts and policy wonks are up to the task of constructing policies capable of assuring citizens that their interests, among others, are duly covered by laws and regulations that guide supply of electricity, the locomotive of modernity.

    Just as it was in the days of PHCN, majority of citizens are still complaining about gross inefficiency in the delivery of power to them, since the average citizen does not have the peace of mind to worry about the number of megawatts being turned out from day to day, percentage of which is deliverable by existing infrastructure, and financial capacity of those approved to distribute power to end users.

    The privatisation of the country’s power sector, generally referenced as the Electric Power Sector Reform Act of 2013, though hailed at the beginning, has since been the source of doubt for the average consumer of electricity in the country, despite obvious efforts by Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC) and the Ministry of Power to end what has looked for decades as an impish jinxing of a nation. Signals have been going back and forth since 2015 that the power sector privatisation would be reviewed. In this respect, citizens must have been excited by a recent announcement by the Director-General of the Bureau for Public Enterprises (BPE), Alex Okoh, on a decision by the BPE to re-energise two sectors vital to the country’s economy: petroleum refinery and provision of uninterrupted electricity. On refinery, he has said, “Over the years, we have budgeted tons of money for Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) that did not turn anything around…. If a private sector investor is coming into that sector and he is bringing his money for the rehabilitation, you better be sure that he will get that rehabilitation done because if he does not he will lose his money.”

    It is the Director-General’s proposal to review “the power sector privatisation process” that is the focus of today’s column: “We want to help address the challenges in the downstream sector of the electricity industry. We do not take an antagonistic position against them because we believe that there are key business challenges that they are facing.” More specifically, the proposed review promises to respond to some of the problems that citizens have with the new power sector. BPE is particularly interested in a review aimed at addressing the fundamental flaws, which include enumeration of customers, provision of meters, pricing and revenues that flow from customers to suppliers under the current model of privatization. Incidentally, the Director-General’s optimism about the refinery was also expressed in relation to privatisation of power in 2013 until the devil in the details of the privatisation process revealed the weakness (or incapacitation?) of companies that came out of de-regulation of power. But it will be uplifting if the optimism about private owners of the four government refineries is made to apply to power sector privatisation process.

    It is, however, reassuring that the BPE says it will review Nigeria’s power sector privatisation process to remove fundamental laws hindering operations in the sector. But the review will have to go beyond elimination of billing challenges, improvement of metering infrastructure, and enthronement of cost-reflective pricing and tariff structure. Many citizens have expressed doubt about the philosophy that drove privatisation in the first place and the model of privatisation adopted. Such people have argued that privatisation was unduly political or politicised, and that many of the individuals favoured to inherit components of PHCN are practicing and retired politicians and their friends, rather than investors ready to commit the high level of capital and knowledge required for transition from decades of little or no electricity to one of energy security and stability. Such citizens may be wrong in their assessment of post-regulation power firms but they are yet to be proved wrong, given the situation of electricity supply in the country.

    A predominant belief among DISCOS is that citizens are too sensitive to higher tariff for electricity. Such sensitivity arises from the fact that many customers in different parts of the country experience little or no change in electricity supply and thus suspect that they are being ripped off by those calling for a tariff that reflects cost or value of service. It is the erratic nature of electricity supply that explains citizens’ seeming over sensitivity to estimated billing. And the solution to such resistance by citizens to higher tariff and even to estimated billing resides in identifying low-hanging fruits already identified by the government but unsighted by DISCOS: the magical wand hiding in provision of pre-paid metres for every customer.

    Citizens are not likely to be interested in counting of megawatts the way government does. It makes no difference to consumers that GENCOS generate 8,000 megawatts when what is distributed or distributable is 6,000 megawatts. It is megawatts that can be distributed that have meaning to customers, and this observation is not meant as a criticism of GENCOS. It is to recognise the staleness of announcing number of increase in megawatts. So is the excuse by DISCOS that estimated billing is necessitated by difficulty to get to many places not tenable.  How do DISCOS acquire the data that makes estimated billing possible for consumers living in inaccessible parts of the country? The proposed review should pay attention to another post-de-regulation billing system not mentioned in public discussion of problems in the power sector.  There are DISCOS in many parts of the country that enter into deals with estates without pre-paid meters to pay N5,000 for 10 hours of electricity supply per day for one month. Hardly do such estates receive up to 10 hours in most days, yet they are made to honour the deal, largely to avoid being denied electricity supply by the only company approved to distribute electricity in the state in which there is no competition or alternative for customers.

    One of the highpoints of marketing before the unbundling of PHCN was (and still is) that privatisation will increase competition while competition will improve efficiency, and the private power companies will, unlike the PHCN, bring electricity to customers as and when needed. This situation remains a myth even five years after the legendary de-regulation of the power sector. Finally, the division of the country into protected zones for each DISCO has not and cannot promote competitiveness on the part of DISCOS.  All DISCOS are designed as captains of seller’s market in the territory allocated to them. For example, if there is a better service being provided by the DISCO in Ifetedo in Osun State, the consumer living in Oke-Igbo across the Oni Bridge in Ondo State cannot opt to use such company. And this is because such consumers have been sentenced to economic prisons in their respective zones. Nothing kills innovation faster than monopolies.

    As the DISCOS are at present, they look more like illustrations of crony capitalism than as operators in a free market. None of them has any other company to compete with within the area of its franchise. GENCOS have more chance of learning competitiveness than the DISCOS, each of which operates as a monopoly in the state(s) allocated to it. As we had suggested in this column in the past, there is need for another utility company to provide (off-grid or new grid) electricity in each state, perhaps under the scheme of alternative or renewable energy. The kind of competition among telecommunication companies needs to exist between DISCOS. It is not healthy for customers to be captured customers in an energy economy segmented as territorial fiefdoms for favoured business owners.

     

  • Enriching the ritual of June 12?

    Two unrelated developments in actual and symbolic engineering of our polity in the last two weeks have encouraged republishing of this article which first came out two years ago under the title of “June 12 Plus.” The first development is presentation two weeks ago of an executive bill that seeks to put management of surface and underground water solely in the hands of the federal government. The second development is President Buhari’s decision last week to enrich the ritual of June 12 by promising to move celebration of Democracy Day from May 29 to June 12 as from 2019 and the award of posthumous national honour to MKO Abiola.

    A well-deserved ritualisation of June 12 took place last Sunday. As usual, this year’s ritual of remembrance of the period of loss as a device to engineer reform went well in most of the Southwest states, leading to public holidays in some states, street marches in others, and calls for substantive and symbolic compensation in others, as well as reinforcement of twenty-three-year old call for true federalism in others. Today’s article is to remind readers of what the June 12 struggle has not been able to accomplish and the new thorns thrown on the road opened by June 12 to re-federalisation and full democratisation of Nigeria.

    Historically, the June 12 struggle had three goals: restoration of MKO Abiola’s presidential mandate given to him by the fairest and freest election in the country’s history; de-militarisation of the country’s polity; and return of federal system of governance to the country. After the death of Abacha and later of Abiola in circumstances that continue to raise questions till today, the struggle lost its first goal. The second goal was partially won at the time General Olusegun Obasanjo became president at the end of General Abdusalaam’s transition to democracy in 1999. But Obasanjo’s presidential election was not guided by any visible constitution to let citizens and candidates know what they were bargaining for. And the third goal, re-federalisation of the polity, had been hanging in the air ever since. Even after four post-military presidential elections, Nigeria is still saddled with a constitution crafted behind closed doors by military rulers and with concentration of power in the federal government and at the expense of subnational governments in a federal republic.

    Surprisingly, seventeen years of elected governments have not alleviated the problems that arose from June 12. On the contrary, the period of post-military rule has aggravated the unsolved problems left behind after Abiola’s death and the transition to civil rule that followed it. However, the narrative of re-federalisation remains alive even 23 years after annulment of Abiola’s election, but its retelling has been hobbled by confusion arising from several quarters. NADECO at home and abroad suffered some gradual haemorrhaging since some of its members came to political power in the Yoruba region. Only a few of the governors/lawmakers elected since 1999 and a few NADECO leaders remained vocal in calling for return to functioning federalism.

    The frustration of efforts to restore federalism has taken many forms. NADECO became war weary after the death of Abiola and became excited by the promise of return to democratic rule by the Abdulsalami Abubakar government. The excitement of periodic elections in a country that had been denied such opportunities on-and-off for many decades of military dictatorship created complacency for uncritical voters. Some found creation of mushroom organisations as vehicles for demanding federalism and as a means of staying politically and socially relevant in their communities. Many others see June 12 as a fitting time to repeat the demand for restructuring while others would rather not be bothered for calling for the kind of change that restructuring entails.

    Ironically, a former chieftain of NADECO-abroad, now leader of the All Progressives Congress, opened a hydrant on the fire of re-federalisation a few days before this year’s June 12 anniversary when he announced that federalism is not a priority of the new administration. Many who voted for a New Nigeria in 2015 are already feeling confused by the pronouncement of the chairman of APC and President Buhari’s media assistant who characterised the call for federalism as a distraction from the ruling party’s priorities. But the following statement in the highlights of APC manifesto: Initiate action to amend our Constitution with a view to devolving powers, duties and responsibilities to states and local governments in order to entrench true Federalism and the Federal spirit, does not suggest that an item in the highlights of the party’s manifesto is not a priority item. From information available to the electorate, the manifesto of APC emphasises re-federalisation or reforming the existing largely unitary system through amendment of the 1999 Constitution. If the spirit to do what was promised is no longer there, it is important for the party to say so. And I believe doing so should go beyond an ex-tempore assessment of Buhari administration’s priorities by the ruling party’s chairman.

    More than two decades after NADECO’s struggles for democracy for electoral and cultural democracy, Nigeria is still largely at the same point that it was after the election of the first post-military government of Obasanjo. The partial de-militarisation achieved through election of Obasanjo as a civilian and of subsequent civilian presidents and lawmakers remains as limited as it was in 1999. The constitution that presents a unitary system as a federal one is still intact. And the largest chunk of the nation’s revenue is still going to the central government that has no direct constituents to service while states and local governments that house and provide direct service to citizens receive much less than the central government. The imbalance between subnational and national governance is even getting worse as petroleum fortunes become more unpredictable by the day. States are now leaving on bailouts and loans. Instead of constitutionally returning power and freedom to states to be more productive, they are now at the risk of losing power over actual and virtual water supply in their communities.

    ‘June-twelvers’ who have remained committed to the ideals and goals of June 12 deserve to be congratulated for not becoming despondent after two decades of a constitution that is afraid to come to terms with the demands of managing a culturally diverse country. Since 1966, Nigeria has been trying to find its way to the map of modern development. Rather, it has been moving from one crisis to the other, a situation that had made nonsense of the lives of millions of people who had died while waiting for justice and progress and of the chances of many others still alive to have a good life in a country whose progress is believed to be undermined politically and economically by its flawed structure. There is, however, danger in allowing the government spawned by a party popularly known as A New Party for a New Nigeria which citizens voted for massively in 2015to be derailed by what looks like rightwing interpretation of the platform presented to the electorate in 2015.

    In addition, ‘June-twelvers’ and others genuinely committed to bringing federalism back to the country should not be contented with gathering every year to remember the injustice of the past. Remembering Abiola and June 12 must include working towards realisation of the missed goals of the NADECO struggle, not just through gathering of motley associations, but through a return to a cohesive organisation to resist further erosion of power of subnational governments and to work toward restoration of true federalism to our multi-religious and multiethnic federation.

  • Water: first source of life and now of power and conflict in Nigeria?

    Whisky is for drinking; water is for fighting over.—Mark Twain
    Some hypothesise that increased water shortages around the world will lead to wars. The current Syrian civil war has been cited by many, including Dr Peter Engelke, senior Fellow at Washington-based think tank Atlantic Council, as a recent example. “Between 2007 and 2010, Syria experienced one of the worst droughts in recorded history…. Anders Berntell, executive director of 2030 Water Resources Group, a multi-sector water resources body, also suggests a link to Boko Haram and Al-Shabaab, whereby young people “realise that, as a result of the lack of natural resources, degraded land and lack of water there are no livelihood opportunities… There is no future for them. They become easily targeted.” They are more easily radicalised…. All of which would predict a bleak future – but some nations have worked out solutions. And they’re impressive ones that the rest of the world can learn from.—Tim Smedley
    Almost half of humanity will face water scarcity by 2030 and strategists from Israel to Central Asia prepare for strife.—Chris Arsenault
    Unequal power relations within states and conflicts between ethnic groups and social classes will be the greatest source of social tensions rising from deprivation,” said Ignacio Saiz from the social justice group. “Water too often is treated as a commodity, as an instrument with which one population group can suppress another…. Water scarcity is an issue exacerbated by demographic pressures, climate change and pollution.—Ignacio Saiz

    I have deliberately overloaded the epigraph today, to demonstrate that water stress affects many parts of the world and that what is striking about the attitude to it in Nigeria is the difference between the way Nigeria’s federal government thinks about growing water stress and the way countries like  Australia, Israel, and UAE, think about it. As we will argue later, other advanced countries think about applying technology to their water problem while Nigeria prefers to apply politics to its own.

    Nigeria as a corporate body and as individuals have already started to act as victims of water stress, by attempting to cure headache with decapitation. The 152-clause Executive Bill on federal take-over of management of all forms of water: surface and underground suggests an effort to remake Nigeria into a unitary state: “As the public trustee of the nation’s water resources the Federal Government, acting through the Minister and the institutions created in this Act or pursuant to this Act, shall ensure that the water resources of the nation are protected, used, developed, conserved, managed and controlled in a sustainable and equitable manner, for the benefit of all persons and in accordance with its Constitutional mandate.”

    Clause (5) reads: “States may make provisions for the management, use and control of water sources occurring solely within the boundaries of the State but shall be guided by the policy and principles of the Federal Government in relation to Integrated Water Resources Management, and this Act.” These two clauses have emptied sub-national units of the country of any significance by threatening the fundamental character of the country. Rather than a law for passing by the national assembly, the intent of the law to own all forms of water—actual and virtual—degrades the federating units and reduces them too appendages to the central government. State representatives in the national assembly do not have the power to surrender water that subtends and sustains the land in their constituencies to the central government. This bill should be withdrawn and brought back as constitutional amendment. It is too fundamental to the essence of Nigeria as a federal republic.

    Why would the central government want to treat water the way it has treated petroleum and gas and solid materials? It is to turn water into a commodity that it can also control exclusively and share like petroleum and gas.  Undoubtedly, water is acquiring by the day the force to threaten political stability in many countries. As Anders Berntell has once acknowledged, the Boko Haram and Al-Shabaab terrorist groups owe significant part of their radicalization to growing lack of natural resources including water that has reduced chances to make a respectable living for young people in the countries affected by Boko Haram and Al Shabaab.

    Other experts have also traced the anger and anxiety of herdsmen to threats to their pre-modern occupation and livelihood. Almost three decades ahead of projections on water-driven conflict between nations or sections of the same country, like Nigeria, the President’s bill before the Senate on making control and regulation of all surface and underground waters an exclusive function of the central government seems to be an avoidable heating of the Nigerian polity and society. What is needed is a blueprint to make water available to all sections of the country through use of innovative methods already being employed in other countries. It is not surprising that the bill is already stoking political and regional tension.

    Just within hours of the Senate’s preliminary debate of the Waterways Bill, the nation seems to be divided, because the bill, if passed into law, has the potential to threaten national unity. The recent meeting of South-south governors and the communique that ensues from it: “We also agreed that the bill currently making round in the national assembly which we understand is an executive bill on management of water resources. We are of the view that the provisions of the bill are offensive and obnoxious; we disagree with the centralized control of water resources as we are already dealing with the problem associated with over centralization of our country and we have agreed that the bill should be immediately withdrawn by the federal government and further consultations be made on that” have, as expected, sharpened what is fast-becoming Nigeria’s entry into what is already seeming like high-voltage hydro politics.

    Without mincing words, this bill is anti-federalism. Introducing a federal take-over of management of water resources at a time that the ruling party had established committees to make recommendations on restructuring and devolution of powers is one bill too many. Federating units are land-owning units and water—surface or underground—sustains land. Any bill that seeks to cut management of land from management of water wittingly or unwittingly seeks to de-nature the federation.

    A bill that is likely to overheat the polity, stoke the flames of ethnic and political tension, and threaten national stability is not the way to solve a global problem: water stress. Instead of a bill to politicize the growing water stress in Nigeria, the thing to do is for Nigeria to ‘technologize’ this challenge, i.e. apply benefits of new knowledge and technology to solving water scarcity in all parts of the country. Making management of water resources an exclusive federal function does not guarantee an end to water stress in the context of rising population that is projected to make Nigeria the third most populous country by 2050.

    What is needed is thinking out of the box and ahead, like Israel, UAE, Brazil, Australia, to name a few. These countries are increasing their water supply by capturing rain water and using an ‘Osmotic System’ of de-salination that makes sea water good for human consumption. A new method of de-salination made possible by scientific innovation is the way to end water stress without stoking the flames of regional tension and political instability. We left provision of power in the hands of the federal government half a century ago while we should have given such powers to sub-national governments. We are today bound to provide power at a much higher cost than we would have done decades ago. Transferring management of water resources, to the federal government, apart from such trans-country rivers like Niger and Benue, is to offer a solution to a problem that is not properly identified. Nothing seems to have broken that this bill is to fix. Water stress is now a global problem that can be solved with technology, not politics or law.