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Category: Tunji Adegboyega

  • Gbanjo crude oil

    Gbanjo crude oil

    Tunji Adegboyega

    It is a matter for regret that the reduction of petrol pump price from N145 to N125 per litre that should ordinarily pass for good news is something that is capable of making anyone who understands the basis of this reduction and what that means for our national economy, sad and weep. We must have anticipated that the very moment crude prices began to tumble as a result of the usual vagaries in the international oil market. Indeed, many of us who did Economics at the school certificate level were taught this several decades ago, but successive governments have hardly taken it seriously. It would appear therefore that many of us, particularly those who have had the privilege of doing something about our monocultural economy at various leadership positions, have only been hearers of the point but not doers of it. Otherwise, we should not be in this quandary.

    Gbanjo, for non-Yoruba readers, is just a way of saying something is at rock-bottom.

    President Muhammadu Buhari approved the reduction in fuel price last week. The Minister of State for Petroleum, Timipre Sylva, said this was to enable Nigerians benefit from the fall in crude prices. Should we then clap for the president? Yes and no. I mean if we must clap, we must do so with only one hand!

    But, despite the reduction, many filling stations still sold fuel at N145 or N143 per litre as at Friday. This is what happens whenever fuel price is reduced; it doesn’t take immediate effect as the fuel station owners claim they are awaiting directives or official confirmation from wherever before implementing the policy. I bought fuel at one of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) outlets on Thursday at the old price of N143 per litre. But every price increase always takes immediate effect. Why? We may not get answer to that for obvious reasons, though. At any rate, that is not my concern today.

    Crude oil producers that have done well for themselves do not have much cause to fear about the sharp drop in price. Yes, they may be sad that prices have plummeted, and indeed they should because that means drop in their countries’ revenues. But then it is not going to be the end of the world for them as it is for us because they have something to fall back upon. Nigeria is probably the only exception where the people would not know whether to be happy or sad over this development. This is because the current reality has led to a reduction in pump price but it also signifies a sharp drop in income for the country. Meaning what? Meaning that Nigerians would still have to pay for the so-called reduction in pump price by some other means. Already, the exchange rate of the country’s currency, the naira, is worsening and no one can tell when the free fall would abate.

    Although I would use Senator Ike Ekweremadu, as an example of public officials who have had the opportunity of weaning the economy off its monocultural trajectory but did little or nothing in that direction, it is not necessarily an indictment of the former Deputy Senate President because he is not alone in this; it only happens that he is the one whose comment about what we know is most recent on the issue. Ekweremadu said the dwindling oil price has hit Nigeria most hard because the country operates a monocultural economy. He spoke at the maiden Annual Lecture of the Faculty of Law, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, delivered by the President of the National Industrial Court, Justice B.B Kanyip, in Enugu, on Thursday.

    According to him, the country would have been able to better absorb the shock of the current downturn if it was economically restructured since the 36 states would have been operating 36 different economies, based on their comparative advantages. In other words, the way forward is restructuring. But the former deputy senate president’s political party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was in power for 16 years, it never occurred to them to restructure then. This is the problem with many of our ex-this, ex-that. However, PDP has been out of power since 2015, the ball is now in the court of the Buhari administration. By Ekweremadu’s projection, many state governments would find it difficult to pay salaries if the situation continues into the next four months.

    What to do? Ekweremadu restated the obvious: “If there is one lesson we will have to learn the hard way, it is that ‘feeding bottle federalism’ does not pay. Ordinarily, we should have been talking about 36 economies based on the federating units. But we can only talk about a mono-economy driven by oil.” He is not done yet: “It is my hope that when the impending economic tsunami settles, we will see the need to diversify the economy, and we will see that there is no better way to do so than to entrench real fiscal federalism to unleash the economic potentials and comparative advantages of the various federating units.”

    My fear however is that something always happens at a time when we should be forced to take the hard way to federalism (some of us have perfected the art of rebuffing the noble idea, which is the only way out). We can only be forced to go this way if oil price crash lingers for longer than we could cope with. Unfortunately, a miracle has almost always happened when we are nearing that juncture and oil price would always rebound at that very crossroads.

    Ordinarily, fuel price should be dynamic, that is it should be a function of how much crude is going for at the international market, among several factors. But that is in a fully deregulated economy. However, because our fuel consumption is still heavily subsidised, we have had the pump price relatively stable at N145 per litre since 2016. If the market had been deregulated, it is possible fuel price may not even be as high as N125 at about $24 per barrel of crude oil. Forget whatever template the Petroleum Products Pricing Regulatory Agency (PPPRA) is using because allowance may have been made to accommodate all manner of ‘Nigerian factor’. As a matter of fact, it was because the government had been absorbing the shock that should have translated into higher petrol price if the market had been fully deregulated that Nigerians could not immediately clamour for fuel price reduction at the outset of the  crude oil price crash.

    So, when finally the news broke that the government, in its magnanimity, had decided to reduce pump price from N145 to N125 per litre, some of us initially felt like clapping for the president. But when we remember that although his government has been doing much to revive agriculture, the government does not seem to understand that it needs more than 24 hours in a day to take us anywhere near our destination. He should imagine how much time was lost to his picking his cabinet in 2015. That is something we have not recovered from.

    Nigeria is the sixth largest producer of crude oil. None of those who were around when the gold was struck in Oloibiri in Ogbia Local Government Area of Bayelsa State in 1956 could ever have imagined that what we are going through is what would be our portion at any point in the country’s history, because crude oil is a money spinner. Their optimism was not misplaced. Many other oil-producing countries have done so well with their oil wealth, leaving us to bemoan why our own oil blessing has become more or less a curse before our very eyes.

    If the President Buhari administration had realised the urgency of the tasks ahead, we should be getting close to solving the problem of perennial importation of petrol instead of waiting on Dangote Refinery which seems what the government is banking on to take us out of the petrol quandary.

    Painful I didn’t think of the topic early; I would have ensured it came out with a befitting cartoon.

     

    Dancing ‘Palongo’ at rail crossings

    Nigerians are happy that the government is constructing railway lines to facilitate their travels. But they are not happy that railway crossings, especially in Lagos, are in bad shape due to ongoing laying of tracks in the state. Perhaps worst hit are the railway crossings at Ikeja and Ilupeju where motorists dance ‘Palongo’ while climbing or descending the hills that pass for rail crossings in those places. I have seen several vehicles, including buses and even cars rolling back in their attempts to cross the rail lines in the two places. If this is happening to small vehicles, then your guess is as good as mine as to the fate of bigger vehicles. Many times too, some vehicles have had to splash mud on other vehicles and passers-by while undertaking the same process. I have my doubt if some people’s windscreens would not have been broken by pebbles thrown from screeching tyres as a result of vehicles having problem climbing the uneven road surfaces at these rail crossings.

    Granted that work is ongoing in these places, it is not expected that they would be tarred now or fixed permanently. But then, motorists do not have to bear additional cost of repairing their vehicles each time they have the misfortune of passing through these places. I am not an engineer; but I do not even know why the rail crossings should be that high. But if they must, passing through them should not be a nightmare for motorists. These rail crossings should be fixed as many times as necessary since contractors are still on site, at least pending when they can be permanently fixed.

    I guess the honourable minister himself was aware, as a ‘Lagos boy,’ of what the musician that sang ‘Palongo’ in those days said about the dance. He said it makes them mad.

    We will not be mad while trying to cross rail lines in Jesus’ mighty Name! Amen.

     

     

  • Joy in service

    Joy in service

    Tunji Adegboyega

     

    ALTHOUGH a 200-page book could not have told everything about the personality of Alhaji Aliyu Ibrahim Atta, former Inspector-General of Police (IGP), his autobiography, The Joy of Service, certainly gives some insight into who this amiable and perhaps taciturn man is. Yet, because of his accomplishments, especially in the Nigeria Police Force (NPF), such a man must have something in his well of wisdom that today’s generation of upwardly mobile policemen in particular, and the nation at large, can sip from.

    The book opens with Chapter One that chronicles the author’s childhood, particularly his early days in his native Ebirra Land. Born on May 12, 1937 in Okene, Kogi State, into royalty, he never allowed this to get into his head. His father used his position as ‘Atta of Ebirra’ to attract development to the town. Yet, he had to voluntarily renounce the throne in curious circumstances. The author pays tribute to his “sweet mother, irreplaceable and forever adorable”; his wife whom he describes as his alter ego and his six children that he and his wife are proud of in the chapter which ends with the mentoring and child-in-ward programme that happens to be an age-long practice in northern Nigeria.

    Chapter Two aptly tagged “Education in my formative years” relives the author’s experiences in his early school days, with all the foibles and nuances. How they went to farm and on hunting expeditions. It tells the story of his life in the Emir of Katsina’s palace, his admission to the famous Barewa College, etc.

    Alhaji Atta’s enlistment into the Nigeria Police Force is the focus of Chapter Three. How fate, his sport acumen and the uniform and appearance of cadet officers at the time influenced his decision to join the force. An interesting aspect of the chapter was the cool mien of the Sardauna of Sokoto whose entourage was stopped by a cadet officer to inspect their vehicle particulars. While this infuriated those on the entourage, the Sardauna said the man was only doing his job (P45). How many of today’s leaders can be so humble? Atta eventually got enlisted into the Police Force as a member of Basic Cadet Course 8 after which he and his colleagues were commissioned as Inspectors.

    Alhaji Atta makes a case for State Police in Chapter Four. This is one issue that has lingered for long in political debates in the country. He also believes that having between 400,000-500,000 police men under one system is inadequate for the country. The chapter also examines some complicated cases like the Gboko riots of the 1950s and 1960s, and the “Apalara killings” in the Western Region, each with its own unique characteristics and demands from the police. Police training, the Police Mobile Force (PMF) and how it has been abused is well dissected in the chapter.

    His coming of age in the NPF is the focus of Chapter Five. He was tested with several responsibilities in Sokoto and Birnin-Kebbi; his service at the Police College in Kaduna where he trained both male and female recruits. His flair for sports also made him to form a female football squad, the ‘Atta Babes’ which, unfortunately, was involved in an auto-crash that affected it.

    Chapters Six and Seven examine the author’s tenures as Commissioner of Police in both Rivers and Kaduna states. Alhaji Atta brought his ingenuity to bear in resolving the several crises that confronted his stations then. He so well handled the Kalabari centenary celebration that he got a letter of commendation from the then Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly. He also did his best in handling the restive students of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria; the perennial clashes between farmers and herdsmen, suggesting that the issue is an age-long one.

    Chapter Eight relives Alhaji Atta’s sojourn at the National Institute for Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPSS), Kuru, Plateau State, as a participant in the Senior Executive Course Number 8 in 1986. The chapter also affords the author an opportunity to correct a mistake on the title of his research essay during the course.

    Chapter Nine deals with events leading to Alhaji Atta’s elevation as Inspector-General of Police on December 29, 1989. He was eventually sworn in on January 2, 1990 as IGP and member of the Armed Forces Ruling Council, the highest decision-making body in the land at the time. The celebrated case of two school girls – Bisola Savage and Tomi Makinde – that were abducted in FESTAC Town in Lagos on May 2, 1991 is prominently told in the chapter. It was commendations galore when on May 16, 1991 the girls were handed over to their parents.

    Policemen are first and foremost human beings; ipso facto, they need to be motivated to enhance their performance. Hence, Chapter 10 looks at welfare projects that Alhaji Atta was instrumental to their setting up as a senior police officer, or actually pioneered when he became Inspector-General. These included Nigeria Police Cooperative Society, the raising of insurance benefits to relations of policemen who died in service from N3,000 inherited from the colonial masters to about N500,000,  the NPF Community Bank which later metamorphosed to Nigeria Police Force Microfinance Bank Plc.

    The chapter also tells the story of three men, among the lot, that Alhaji Atta assisted to achieve their life ambitions. But then, Alhaji Atta’s dream to transform the Police Mess from the colonial relic that it is to a ‘two’ to ‘five-star’ hotels could not materialise.

    Chapter 11 dwells on Alhaji Atta’s experiences during coups. Apparently the police colleges were considered safe havens at coup times, hence the influx of all manner of people, including the very influential to the police colleges on such occasions.  The author was in Benin at the time the failed coup by Col. Buka Suka Dimka took place in 1975. Indeed, he was lucky not to have met one of his relations involved at home. The man had come to Benin at the planning stages of the plot. Alhaji Atta also says he got a prior intelligence of the Gideon Orkar coup in 1990 and passed the information to the then Military President, General Ibrahim Babangida. However, the State Security Service (SSS) disregarded the information.

    The author harps on the need for cooperation between the Nigerian Armed Forces and the police for maximum efficiency, recalling that Nigeria Police was once the toast of the continent’s police forces and even one to reckon with at international engagements. The chapter closes with the sad news that the Retired Inspectors-General of Police Forum which was to act as a ‘think tank’ on issues affecting the police force and policing generally has not been active since July 2012.

    A book of this nature, coming from someone who has seen it all, as it were, in the NPF cannot be complete without some recommendations on how professionalism and efficiency can be enhanced in the force, with the desired integrity to command the respect of the public. Thus, Alhaji Atta in Chapter Twelve of the book suggests a complete overhaul of the police for greater efficiency. He wants a return to the old order where traditional rulers and Local Government Police will form a ‘‘State Police” that can be structured in line with present day realities. Also, the police should be better kitted if the force is to be saved from collapse.

    Alhaji Atta’s Life after Retirement in the police force, after 33 years of meritorious service, captures his experience as Chairman of the Board of Kaduna Textile Limited (initially known as Arewa Textile). He served in this capacity for about five years, during which the company was returned to profitability. A satanic rumour, and the humiliation of having to wait for hours before being ushered in to meet with the Northern Military Administrators Forum that had summoned him over the $30,000 rumour however made him to resign his appointment, with serious consequences for the company’s health.

    ’The Joy of Service is not only about Alhaji Atta. It also highlights the decadence in the country. The author expresses surprise that exam malpractice has become a national malaise: “Not once did I witness an incident of examination malpractice whilst the examinations (Cambridge) were going on”. He adds, to boot: “What more, the messengers collecting the examination papers from the post office were models of integrity and selflessness. Today, they would be waylaid and even at the post office level, the papers would have been tampered with; both postmaster and messenger may have succumbed to the temptation of exploiting the situation to enrich themselves.”

    However, as with all such endeavours, the book is not without some shortcomings. First, its title on the cover appears too small and almost lost. Nothing stops the author from superimposing it boldly on his picture on the cover page if he wants his picture so prominently displayed as well. Moreover, some typos were observed (i.e. is it Kam Salem House or Kam Selem House? pp 144 and 153. Then there is the issue of binding which needs to be paid more attention to. The author may also consider having the title of every chapter on alternate pages for easy referencing.

    But the generous use of memorable pictures which makes for better aesthetics and easier reading is highly commended. Also commendable is the ease with which the author recalls names, even of those some other people might have considered so inconsequential. The three young men that he helped to actualise their dreams and even some of those who worked with him in very junior capacities in the police force readily come to mind here. This reflects the degree of uncommon rapport he has with such persons.

    In all, The Joy of Service, which would be launched on March 19 in Abuja does not only reveal some aspects of the life of Alhaji Aliyu Ibrahim Atta, the Okene prince who rose from a humble royal beginning through a dint of hard work to become Nigeria’s Number One Cop. The book is also a good compendium on the Nigeria Police Force. We need more of such quality works from leaders in all aspects of our lives for record purpose and posterity.

     

  • Sanusi’s home truth

    Sanusi’s home truth

    By Tunji Adegboyega

    All he is saying is … Give the north education and other things shall be added

    Many prominent northerners have spoken of the need to do something about the region’s backwardness. They had spoken eloquently about the need for change, in a way that would bring down the antediluvian cultural practices and put the region on the path of development and modernity. But, much as it would appear many of them have spoken well, it remains to be seen whether they meant what they said.

    But, of all those who have spoken, I found the comment of the Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, most comprehensive and down-to-earth. The emir indeed spoke the minds of many progressive Nigerians on February 17, when he told the north, point blank, that the region was destroying itself and only engaging in self-delusion to think that ‘quota system’ and ‘federal character’ would last forever. It was vintage Sanusi! This piece is coming this late because I had been on a two-week leave. I had made up my mind that it would be the very first thing I would write on as soon as I resume because one must add one’s voice, for the record, to such a statement coming from a distinguished member of the aristocratic (or should I say feudalistic) north.

    The statement was, as usual, audacious even as the occasion was auspicious. Sanusi bared his mind at the 60th birthday of Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, in Kaduna. He highlighted the well-known problems facing the region: poverty, millions of out-of-school children, malnutrition, drug abuse, Almajiri, and the Boko Haram insurgency.

    Hear Sanusi: “When we talk about birthday, we talk about happiness. Just last week, someone asked me, ‘are you happy?’ And I said, ‘I am not’. And the person was surprised. The truth is nobody who is a leader in Northern Nigeria today can afford to be happy.

    “You cannot be happy with about 87 percent of poverty in Nigeria being in the North. You can’t be happy with millions of northern children out of school.

    “You can’t be happy with nine states in the North contributing almost 50 percent of the entire malnutrition burden in the country.

    “You can’t be happy with the drug problem, you can’t be happy with the Boko Haram problem. You can’t be happy with political thuggery. You can’t be happy with all the issues; the Almajiri problem that we have.”

    The bombshell which came barely one week after a damning World Bank report on the region, was more or less a parody of the report. In essence, northern Nigeria is largely responsible for Nigeria being the poverty capital of the world. Why this is so, I have been trying to comprehend for so long, without success. After all, the north, like other regions, has been getting its fair share (perhaps more than it because of its population) of national budgetary provisions. What has happened to the monies accruing to the region over the years?

    When we talk about the north being in crisis because of cultural inhibitions, it does not appear to me like we are being fair in assessing the issues. If successive northern leaders had invested hugely in education, some of these cultural beliefs would have since died. The situation would have been different if they had invested in education because the wool in the eyes of the downtrodden in the region would have been pulled off a long time ago, to enable them see clearly.

    It beats me that any rational human being will think a fellow human being will forever continue to accept that he was created to beg and feed only from the crumbs of the food that are falling from the dining tables of some rich persons. I said it in a piece on this page sometime ago, and it bears repeating: many of us had said in those days at The Punch in the 80s and early 90s that the north would implode someday because of these so-called cultural beliefs. I also referred recently to one of my seniors in the university (when I wrote on the need for Amotekun) who said his parents “gladly embraced poverty” to see him through western education. This is weighty. Such a person should not be killed by some ragtag, misguided elements who just delight in blood-letting and who cannot appreciate the value of education.

    The truth  of the matter is that while it may be desirable that allowance might sometimes be made for certain situations like the one that brought about the ‘educationally disadvantaged’ status of the north, or ‘quota system’, or ‘federal character’, it should not be in perpetuity. To perpetuate such policies is not only to encourage indolence on the part of the political leaders; it also does not give room for creativity even as it kills initiatives on the part of other constituent regions.  As a matter of fact, if there had been a terminal date for such policies, the north would have been the better for it because leaders in the region and even the led would have had to face the realities of such terminal date and thus be gingered to think out of the box to solve the region’s problems. The way things are, the north cannot change and will only continue to log the kind of unimpressive record it is logging in almost all spheres of life, as attested to not only by reality that stares us in the face, but also by global bodies like the World Bank, UNESCO, the World Health Organisation (WHO), etc.

    As Emir Sanusi rightly noted, a time will come when the other parts of the country that get the short end of the stick for these policies will begin to question why they have to be the beasts of burden of such policies. I do not have at my disposal what this country has spent to rebuild the northeast devastated by Boko Haram. This is money that ought to have been spent to bring about development across Nigeria: provide hospitals, build and equip schools, provide security, good road networks, reduce poverty, etc. Now, as we are busy pumping money into the northeast and other parts devastated by the insurgents, the fundamentalists are still pounding those places, wreaking more havoc which someday we would still have to fix at the expense of the entire country. Yet, Boko Haram would have been averted if political leaders in the north had given the youths the desired education which would have freed them from the shackles of retrogressive cultural beliefs, assuming that is really the problem. I mean if the political leaders are not merely pretending to be sad about the development while satisfied with the situation internally because it gives them access to cannon fodder that they can fall back on to further their political interests.

    Some governors in the north had threatened that the region can do without the money from the south-south (we are only deceiving ourselves if we say from the centre because the centre does not produce anything). It is high time these governors actualised their threats. This is what would be in everybody’s interest. If the other parts of the country must subsidise any other part, that must be for people whose leaders are prepared to alleviate the situation, not in a situation where a governor was happy and thanking God that he had nothing to fear about newspapers criticising him because his people could not read.

    Let no one castigate Emir Sanusi for speaking the truth. No one kills a dog for barking; the same way we don’t kill a ram for ram-fighting; no one kills the he-goat for misbehaving. So, you don’t chastise Sanusi for his radical stance on this matter. Never mind too if he is a major beneficiary of these contradictions that are now haunting the north. It is better for reform to come from above. As we have seen in the northeast and elsewhere, the consequences are dire when it comes from below.

    It would be a ‘Miracle of Damman’ for Emir Sanusi to reign long, given his candour and the no holds barred manner he always pushes his point against the ills plaguing the northern region. Truth is bitter; but it must be told and it had to be swallowed if the region’s wellness is truly desired.

    There is nothing basically wrong with the north. As a matter of fact, the region would appear to be doing fairly well in agriculture. It should keep this up. However, beyond farming at the subsistence level, there is need to add value to the farm produce. A state like Benue, for example, needs factories to process the soybeans, citrus fruits, mangoes, roots, and tubers , etc. which it produces in abundance. Other states in the north have one thing or the other to also depend on; they can work on these.

    My candid advice to the northern leaders who might be feeling uncomfortable with Sanusi’s radicalism is that they should, for once, pay attention to his message and ignore the messenger. It is in their own interest because one day, the other parts of the country will reject some of these contradictions in federal laws that are holding them down for the north whose leaders enjoy the best that modernity and civilisation offer but are hiding behind one finger (culture) to deny their followers the pleasures of both.

    Someone whose parents “gladly embraced poverty” to see him through school cannot  understand what is meant by a certain part of the country being perpetually ‘educationally disadvantaged’; just as ‘quota system’ or ‘federal character’ would mean injustice to him. We are inching toward that trajectory.

  • Buhari, do something

    Tunji Adegboyega

     

    I SAW it coming. I am referring to the claim by the Presidency on the Hausa Service of BBC on Thursday that those who booed President Muhammadu Buhari in Maiduguri on Wednesday might have been hired by the opposition to do so. As a matter of fact, I was about advising the government not to toe that path as soon as I began contemplating writing on the topic on Friday because I could bet my life on it that that would be the natural reaction of the government.

    Unfortunately, virtually everything that presidential spokesman Garba Shehu said in response to the incident could be debunked. Hear him: “I was part of the delegation that entered Maiduguri right from the airport to the palace of the Shehu of Borno. The people came out to say thank you and welcome us.

    “But there was a group which came out shouting ‘we don’t want’.” He said, maybe “some politicians gathered some miscreants and paid them money to boo Buhari”. He added that whoever shared such a post on the social media was unfair to the people of Borno State who are well known for their hospitality.  He noted that President Buhari’s government had demonstrated the capacity to fight Boko Haram and he had promised to change strategy in dealing with the issue.

    Lest we forget, Borno State is the epicenter of the Boko Haram war. It has been recording casualties from terrorist attacks, even in recent times, on a scale that leaves one wondering if we are in a war situation. Just last week Sunday, 30 people were dispatched to untimely graves when suspected Boko Haram terrorists descended on majorly late travellers in Auno village in the state. The Federal Government said about 10 persons were killed. More than 18 vehicles and other properties were destroyed. According to reports, the victims arrived at the military checkpoint leading into Maiduguri after closure of the gate by soldiers at 5pm, and had no choice than to stay overnight in the village which is on the Maiduguri-Damaturu Highway.

    Many others had died in the state in recent times, with the governor, Prof. Babagana  Zulum, crying about the fate that has befallen his state as a result of the terrorist attacks. The state has recently lost many people such that we can begin to wonder if people are dying like this in peace time, how many body bags would we be seeing if we are in a war situation?

    How then can people who are undergoing this kind of trauma troop out to thank the president that they see as incapable of or reluctant to solve their problem? How can they wholeheartedly welcome the man they see as being responsible for their plight, as Shehu wanted us to believe? How did Shehu or even the government want the Borno State people to believe that the government has the capacity to defeat Boko Haram or that the president would keep to his promise of changing strategy this time around, when he had made similar promises in the past with the changing never changing?

    While politicians have been renting crowds to do their biddings for years, it is preposterous to dismiss Wednesday’s booing of the president as the product of such antics. Indeed, it is foolhardy for the government to even insinuate such. As a matter of fact, the surprise should have been in the people rolling out the carpet for the team after all they have gone through insecurity-wise. What happened was a true reflection of the people’s feeling and angst against the government’s handling of the war on terror. A frustrated Gov Zulum’s statement after the Sunday attack on Auno would convince anyone who thinks otherwise: “I am being pushed to the wall to say the truth,” he said. “Since my inauguration as governor of Borno State, Auno town has been attacked about six times. And the reason is that the military has withdrawn from the town. We have made repeated pleas to the military to re-establish a base in Auno since it is one of the flashpoints of the Boko Haram (insurgency), but nothing has been done to that effect,” he added.

    Perhaps the only thing Shehu said that was spot on was the statement that it was impossible for anyone to satisfy everyone since no human being was god, especially in a city like Maiduguri with a population of four to five million people. The fact of the matter is that not even God can satisfy everybody. But what we are talking about is for President Buhari to do something for the greater good of society, not to attempt to please all.

    Unless the Buhari government is able to get over this infantile self-delusion and get down to serious business, I am afraid, it may jolly well continue to wobble and fumble to the 2023 General Elections. Its scorecard then would be abysmally poor not necessarily because it has performed so poorly but because it has failed in its core duty of protecting Nigerians. However, what I do not know is whether the government meant what it said or it merely said it for political purposes, or for lack of something better to say. But, if what Shehu said is the official thinking on the matter, then, Nigeria is in trouble. I say this with all sense of humility and due respect to the government, and without fear or favour, or even fear of contradiction. This is because the implication of the Maiduguri incident, grievous as it was, would seem lost on the president and his government. It tells us that President Buhari is not aware that things have since changed from the ‘Sai Baba’ of 2015. Graver still is that if the president and his government seriously think the opposition is responsible for the near humiliation that the president suffered in Maiduguri on the fateful day, it means they are far from realising that there is fire on the mountain, or there is a serious problem at hand. And, when one does not know there is a problem when there is one, then that person is far from solution. Someone who does not see or believe there is a problem would not seek for people that would proffer solution to the problem. May be that is even the problem with the terror war.

    I cannot remember the number of times that I cautioned the military and the government when about three years ago they said they had defeated Boko Haram. I asked if it was not premature celebration and that we should not dance ourselves lame when the actual dance was yet to come. Many other people gave similar warnings. Now, we have seen ourselves. The Boko Haram that both the military and the government said they had defeated or decapitated is still wreaking havoc. If truly it was defeated, then it means they only beheaded it, they did not bury the head. They should do that immediately. Now, we are hearing all manner of expressions. It is no longer that Boko Haram has been defeated but that the terrorists have been rendered impotent but it would take some time for terrorism to die. All of these are sheer semantics to people who have lost their loved ones to Boko Haram.

    In all of this, President Buhari is the architect of whatever he reaped in Maiduguri on Wednesday. At the very beginning, it was herdsmen killing people and the president looked the other way. These people carry arms, trample on other people’s rights with impunity, kill, rape and maim in the name of rearing cattle. They sacked people from their villages and farms, as if the entire country belongs to herdsmen. Then, the southwest came up with a resolution to deal with insecurity generally and the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, said it was illegal. Whatever that meant! It is good though that sanity is prevailing at the higher level of government on this. Even herdsmen protested the establishment of Amotekun in the southwest. So, people should fold their arms and allow themselves to be slaughtered by people who are impervious to know that nobody rears cattle the way they want to continue doing in the 21st Century?  I have said it before; the president has to change his style, especially with regard to security because he does not seem to have his hand on the handle in this regard. Yet, this is the most basic duty of any government. President Buhari does not have any advantage of time. Three months from now, he would have completed one year of his four-year second term. He cannot continue to give only statement of hope when people are being killed almost on a daily basis without matching words with action. I am not going to join the team of those calling for the removal of the service chiefs because it seems the president has covenanted not to sack them. May be there are things he knows that the rest of us do not know. But, if he has given the military much of what they require to fight insurgency, there is no reason why we should be witnessing what we are witnessing today.

    Until President Buhari and his government learn to accept the reality that the scales have since fallen from the eyes of the romantic pair of lovers and they can now both see clearly, unencumbered by love or even infatuation, he and his government would keep luxuriating in blissful ignorance and his government would continue to feel all is well when in actual fact, all is unwell. The government should stop behaving like the woman who has only one child. Yet, when told that her son was fighting outside, she asked “which of them”? That is the height of self-delusion. Unfortunately, that would seem the journey the Buhari administration has embarked upon. President Buhari should wake up to the reality that 2015 is different from 2020. Things have changed a lot. He should therefore do something. His government should stop talking to itself.

     

  • Okada regrets

    By Tunji Adegboyega

    It would be foolish for anyone not to expect the pockets of protests that trailed the renewed enforcement of the restrictions on commercial motorcycles (okada) and their tricycle counterparts (Keke Marwa) by the Lagos State government on February 1. The government had, through its Lagos State Road Traffic Law 2012 barred the vehicles from plying major roads and bridges in the state due to safety and security concerns. Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu also signed the state’s traffic rules and fines in June, last year, shortly after assuming office. Apparently, the state government postponed the strict implementation of the rules until February 1, to enable it fix the roads that were generally left in bad shape by the Ambode administration. This must have been the opportunity cashed in upon by the numerous people who now decided to join the okada business in Lagos. The renewed enforcement thus put paid to speculations as to what the state government would eventually do with this mode of transportation.

    Ban on okada is not limited to Lagos. As a matter of fact, Lagos did not ban okada; the state merely banned them from plying 15 local government areas. Enugu and Cross River states have banned okada. Akwa Ibom too banned it (and bought the motorcycles from their owners). Even the Nigerian Army last year had cause to ban okada in seven states. Spokesman of the army Sagir Musa said: “The Nigerian Army (NA) over time has observed the use of motorcycles by armed bandits, kidnappers, criminal elements and their collaborators as enablers to perpetrate their heinous crimes especially in the states within the North West geopolitical zone of the country.”  He added: “In this wise, it is hereby reiterated that the use of motorcycles remain banned within the forest areas in Kano, Katsina, Zamfara, Sokoto, Kaduna, Kebbi and Niger States.”

    So, what are we talking about? I am still at a loss as to how people who did not lift a finger in their states when their governments banned, outright, operations of commercial motorcyclists, they simply hop into the next available bus or truck coming to Lagos, with their motorcycles only to land in the ‘Centre of Excellence’ which many people now see as ‘no man’s land’. Indeed, that could be the only reason for the obstinacy of some of the okada riders to ply their trade in Lagos, willy-nilly; or to suddenly realise that it is part of their God-given entitlements to ride the motorcycles anywhere in the state, and on their own terms.

    I have always argued that the influx of people into Lagos would have been somewhat reduced if only people learn to exercise their democratic rights in their states of origin. It does not help people who were merely watching when, for example, their governor made erection of statues a state priority, wasting a lot of public funds that could have been used to do better things on the meaningless projects.

    That Lagos is a cosmopolitan state or city should not make it a dunghill for all manner of refuse, including even the ones rejected as unfit for the villages. We would be under a great illusion if we assume that Lagos has an infinite capacity to absolve the truckloads of people and okada that are brought to the state almost daily, simply on account of its cosmopolitanism. At a point, if the influx is not checked, something would snap.  There is no doubt about that. Even as we speak, infrastructure is overstretched in Lagos. We have got to a point where people should be interrogating their state governments on how they are utilising their resources. It is unfair, unjust and even ungodly for people to fail to ask necessary questions from their home state governments only to get to somewhere else to insist on having those things that were not provided or allowed where they are coming from.

    And, on the specific issue of O-Pay, O-Ride, etc. Some people feel the government should have exempted them from the restriction. But my findings show that these businesses were not registered with the Lagos State government. This seems strange to me; though. I cannot understand how people will establish what has been touted to be billions of Naira projects without getting the government’s nod to operate. It is only proper for anyone who wants to do business in a place to be conversant with the rules and regulations governing that business. Those behind these businesses ought to know that there is the Lagos State Road Traffic Law forbidding okada in certain parts of the state. That law has neither been suspended nor repealed. Even at that, I do not think anything has been spoiled now that the state government has decided to enforce the restriction more rigorously. As I have said earlier, okada business is not banned completely (let me add ‘completely’ for effect) in Lagos. So, those in the ‘organised’ ‘okada’ business can continue to ply their trade on the routes that are not under restriction. The issue apparently now is that the pie is going to be smaller and may not be worth it. But that is a price to pay for ignoring the state traffic law before launching the business. I sympathise with them though, but that should not be a reason to want government to amend or bend a law that had been in existence long before the commencement of that business.

    At any rate, we would be deceiving ourselves if we say that because the riders of such motorcycles work for the ‘organised’ okada operators, they are better than their ‘un-organised’ counterparts. I think that innocence was noticeable only at the very beginning of those businesses. As at February 1 when the enforcement began afresh, many of them had started manifesting the characteristics of the okada riders that we used to know. This should be expected. The business, being the daily money spinner that it is, must have necessitated the relaxation of the rules by these companies to accommodate some of the old okada riders who began to look for greener pastures in these establishments. So, it was a matter of time for the ‘organised’ okada riders too to begin to manifest the characteristics of their progenitors.

    This is one of the bitter truths that the owners of the ‘organised’ okada business would not want to admit. The truth of the matter is that okada business can only be profitable in a chaotic situation in a place like Lagos. It would only have been a matter of time for the ‘organised’ operators to close shop if their riders were to observe traffic rules the way they should. The business would not be worth it if the riders cannot drive against traffic or ignore traffic lights as many of them are won’t to do. Many of those who patronise them would readily tell you this is what makes them patronise okada, organised or un-organised. Okada takes them to their destinations faster. There is no way this can be possible if the okada riders, like other road users, obey traffic rules. There is nothing like gentleman in the okada business. When they scratch your vehicle, you are in trouble. When you mistakenly hit them, you are done for. For them, head or tail, other vehicle owners lose. It does not take them time to congregate and mete out jungle justice on the vehicle owner, irrespective of whether they are right or wrong.

    There is no way some people would not feel aggrieved about the enforcement of the restriction. It is the only means of livelihood that many have come to know in the past years. For sure, some of the riders could be law abiding; but they appear to be in the minority. Again, we cannot say the state government should fold its arms and allow the chaos that has come to define road transportation in the state to continue. We can continue to argue till thy kingdom come as to whether the government’s decision is right or wrong; but that is neither here nor there. At the rate at which all manner of people, largely unskilled and uneducated keep bringing truckloads of okada into Lagos to ride, something would still have happened, now or in the future.

    We all must have learnt our lessons: the governments and the governed. Okada business was a product of bad governance at all levels. I recollect that up till the early 1990s, those of us in Lagos were amazed whenever we read stories on okada or watched documentaries on them as taxis in places like Kano and Calabar, to name a few. None of us then could ever have thought that Lagos would one day become the hub of their operations, and in our lifetime. This is sad indeed.

    Let everyone that contributed one way or the other to the okada menace atone for their sins. I said it last week that we might not have ever considered the okada option in Lagos if the then Gen. Muhammadu Buhari as head of state had not killed Lagos Metroline project under the Lateef Jakande forward-looking administration in 1983. We probably would not be talking about okada if power supply had not been epileptic. We probably would not have been talking about okada menace, especially in Lagos, if the roads were not neglected, especially in the recent past. So, let everyone concerned say ‘never again’. It is only then that artisans would be able to return to their trades, industries would be able to employ again and we can then put the okada issue behind us faster than can be imagined.

  • Let Amotekun be

    Tunji Adegboyega

     

     

    Thank you for your piece. This, I believe, if the governors of south west, with the full backing of the people themselves (because this is their interest at stake) do not fight this with all their being, there will be a repeat of what Buhari did in 1983 when he summarily cancelled the Metro Rail project started by the Governor, Alhaji Lateef Jakande. We are living with the consequences 37 years later!” Olufunso O. Famuyiwa (retired Professor of Medicine).

     

    THIS is Prof Famuyiwa’s response to my penultimate week’s piece titled “Amotekun:  A region’s initiative to protect itself caught in the web of high-wire politics”. However, due to unforeseen circumstances this column could not feature last week, hence, the postponement of the continuation of the column on the initiative today.

    There is no way this kind of sad reminder would not stir the anger of south-westerners who were around when the then Head of state, General Muhammadu Buhari aborted the Metro Line project in 1983. Perhaps only Gen Buhari could tell what informed that decision which, for all practical purposes, was unwarranted. But he was able to get away with that because of the unitary system of government that military rule foisted on the nation with their incursion into governance in the 60s. The soldiers seemed to have forgotten that even if a family is blessed with twins, the two are not likely to be doing well at the same pace. One could be a late bloomer and the other a prodigy. It was the same military mindset of wanting to make the different regions develop at the same pace that made the soldiers put all manner of unworkable laws that have been retarding, rather than advancing, the country’s progress.

    Take for example the ridiculous Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) Act of 1955 which grants the central government the exclusive legal right to construct and operate rail service in Nigeria. The implication is that states or regional governments cannot establish their own railways without running afoul of the law. That is why rail transportation has been undulating in the entire country depending on the state of Nigeria Railways.   Wikipedia tells it better: “The rail network reached its maximum extent shortly after Nigerian independence …. Shortly after that, the NRC entered a long period of decline, inept management, and eventually a complete lack of maintenance of rail and locomotive assets. In 1988, NRC declared bankruptcy, and all rail traffic stopped for six months. After that, trains resumed, where the tracks were usable. By 2002, passenger service was again discontinued altogether. Starting in 2006, plans were made to restore the rail lines and add new locomotives with foreign assistance. In December 2012 regular, scheduled passenger service was restored on the Lagos to Kano line.”

    It is only because of what appears to be the special interest of the Buhari administration in rail transportation that we are witnessing an upsurge in rail networks across the country. That is 37 years after the Buhari regime stopped the Lagos State government from starting Metro line! As Prof Famuyiwa observed, we are living with the consequences of that cancellation till today. We can only imagine how far the state would have gone in the area of transportation if only that project had not been aborted. There is no doubt that many other states would have taken a cue from the Lagos example and the country would be the better for it. One may even aver that the ‘Okada’ business which has now become a menace in the state might not have been if that project had been allowed to stay. Not only did Buhari stop Metro Line, he so loathed the idea that he even paid a hefty fine for aborting it.

    We have the she same scenario in the power sector where the entire country is hooked up to one so-called national grid and where only the Federal Government could own and control power supply. This was what President Olusegun Obasanjo used to scuttle the attempt by the same Lagos State to have Independent Power Producers in the early years of this dispensation. If those who conceived the idea of a single grid for the country never heard of the maxim ‘don’t put your eggs in one basket’, by now, we should have realised the futility in doing that. How can a country of 180 million people be on a national grid? That is why we keep having the entire country shut down whenever there is system collapse.

    Back to the security issue. The fact of the matter is that President Buhari seemed to be satisfied with his usual assurances that the last action of violence on the part of the extremists in our midst would be the last, without being ready to do what is required to make this happen. Yes, it is good to condemn such actions; but from the president of a country, that is not enough. The condemnation should be followed by actions that would further reassure the people and not to take the assurance and condemnation with a pinch of salt.

    One other thing that President Buhari does not seem to reckon with  is the fact that parents in the southwest region are ready to do anything, including selling their clothes and other property to get their children educated. On this same page I once recalled what one of my seniors in the university wrote in the ‘Dedication’ column of his first degree project which really fascinated me. I was doing some research on my own final year project when I stumbled on it. I have forgotten his name but his nickname was ‘Perrow’. He wrote, inter alia, this project is dedicated to bla bla bla and “to my parents who gladly embraced poverty” to see me through university education. No one could have gladly embraced poverty. It was such an emotional submission which could not but have brought tears from the eyes of whoever understands the pains gone through by parents in this part of the world in order to see their children through tertiary institution.

    Then, after the parents have gone through such thick and thin to get the children educated, is it proper for some ragtag religious extremists, herdsmen (whether they are of Fulani extraction or whatever), or other criminals to snuff life out of such children of promise, and all the parents would get for their sacrifice are beautiful graveside orations and threats that the government would deal with the murderers? And all because some people who should have done some things to take these ones away from religious extremism or crime generally did not do their bit?  It is someone like Pa Reuben Fasoranti, leader of the Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, whose daughter, Mrs. Olufunke Olakunrin, was shot dead on Ore Expressway in July, last year that can better appreciate what insecurity means. To the rest of us, it is one of those things. Or, at best, we see victims of such crimes as mere statistics. What followed the gruesome murder was argument as to whether Mrs. Olakunrin was killed by Fulani herdsmen or bandits, as if that really mattered. To date, we don’t know who dunnit!

    The point is, Nigerians have lived too much on hopeless and meaningless assurances from governments and they are getting weary of doing that. The governments, at all levels, seem to have understood the psychology of Nigerians of never allowing the sun to set on their anger. They rake and fume when they see something that upsets them and in the next few days, they forget and the country moves on, until another incident that touches the heart occurs.

    Now, President Buhari is constructing a standard gauge railway from Lagos to Kano. Is he doing this, 37 years after stopping Lagos Metro Line, as demonstration of his remorse for his 1983 mistake or misjudgment? If it is not, then, what is it? And if it is, are we to expect that 37 years from now (if God grants him longevity), he won’t again look back and say ‘had I known, I would have allowed Amotekun in 2020’? But would the consequences be as mild as those of Metro Line? I bet they won’t because victims of the absence of Amotekun would long have been dead and buried, without an opportunity of a second chance since life has no duplicate.

    A central government that cannot secure its citizens has failed in the very basics of the existence of government. It therefore has no moral right to stop people from protecting themselves, citing some obnoxious laws. The declaration of Amotekun as illegal by Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, on January 14, a day to the 50th anniversary of the end of the Nigerian Civil War, was not only insensitive; it was also a sad reminder of the incidents that led to the war in the first instance. It was provocative, to say the least.

    Attempting to create a so-called community police under the control of the same inspector-general of police who has not been able to secure Nigerians for whatever reasons is trivialising the issue. It is an attempt to buy time and kill a laudable idea whose time has come. It is not the answer to Amotekun. And if it is not Amotekun, it cannot be the same thing as Amotekun. So, let Amotekun be.

     

  • Amotekun

    Tunji Adegboyega

     

    How dare you? This naturally should be the question one should ask when on January 14, the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), declared the Western Nigeria Security Network (WNSN) popularly known as ‘Operation Amotekun,’ illegal.  A statement from the minister’s office reads: “The setting up of the paramilitary organisation called Amotekun is illegal and runs contrary to the provisions of the Nigerian law. The Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) has established the Army, Navy and Air Force, the Police and other numerous paramilitary organisations for the purpose of the defence of Nigeria. As a consequence of this, no state government, whether singly or in a group, has the legal right and competence to establish any form of organisation or agency for the defence of Nigeria or any of its constituent parts.” Then, the subtle threat: “This is sanctioned by the provision of Item 45 of the Second Schedule of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) authorising the Police and other Federal Government security services established by law to maintain law and order.

    “The law will take its natural course in relation to excesses associated with organisation, administration and participation in Amotekun or continuous association with it as an association.”

    Although Mr Malami made the decision public, he could not have done that without consulting his principal, President Muhammadu Buhari. This is why I am surprised that many people keep blaming the minister for the declaration. When we see the whirligig dancing on the surface of the river, we should know that something is beating the drums for it. So, we should look in the direction of the president for whatever comments we want to make on the significant matter, be it for or against the decision.

    One undeniable fact, however, is that the Nigeria Police Force cannot guarantee internal security, which is its primary function. The force is handicapped by a lot of factors, from insufficient personnel, to lack of motivation, inadequate and obsolete arms and ammunition, among others.

    That the police are unable to guarantee security is so evident, even to the blind. As a matter of fact, that explains why many state governments assist the force, to augment whatever the Federal Government makes available to it, to make their states secure. Lagos State, for instance, has the Lagos State Security Trust Fund (LSSTF), which the private sector has also bought into, in realisation of the fact that business can only thrive in a secured environment. No matter how tempting an environment is, investors would think twice before doing business there if their investments cannot be guaranteed. Through the trust fund, the state government has been able to provide logistic support to the police and other security agencies running into billions of naira.

    It is also because the Federal Government realised the inadequacies of the police that it brought in the military to complement their efforts. It was so bad that the army were on the streets of at least 30 of the 36 states of the federation at some point in time. Even as we write, soldiers are still in some places under one scary-named operation or the other. Soldiers have had to be deployed to electoral duties in recent years. All of these are aberrations because soldiers’ main duty is to protect the country against external aggression. And how else could a Federal Government have admitted that the police cannot secure the country from the criminals that are becoming increasingly sophisticated by the day?

    There is no doubt that something is not right about not just the announcement, but more importantly, the manner of the announcement, especially when most of the actors are from the same party with the president. Was President Buhari not aware of the elaborate preparations by the south west governments prior to the launch of the outfit? This was something that was highly publicised. Or did the state governments go beyond the permissible, given our lopsided federalism? This question is apt, especially in view of Malami’s claim that the state governments did not consult him before coming out with the outfit. Hear him: “Finally, it is important to put on record that the Office of the Attorney General and Minister of Justice was not consulted on the matter. If it had, proper information and guidance would have been offered to ensure that Nigeria’s defence and corporate entity are preserved at all times.”

    Could this, indeed, be the real reason why the organisation was declared illegal? Could Malami’s response have been his own way of taking his pound of flesh from the pompous southwest governors for their failure to recognise his almightiness by seeking his input before launching the outfit?  I would be playing to the gallery if I tried to answer the question in the affirmative. I would have joined the bandwagon of those lampooning Malami for the government’s decision, a thing I do not want to do because, I insist, Malami could not have acted alone. His action had the imprimatur of President Buhari. Unfortunately, mum has usually been the response from the president in matters like this. It would be a departure from the norm associated with the president if this time around he ventures to comment on the issue. But never make the mistake of thinking this is his style of giving his subordinates the free hands to run their official affairs.

    Our 1999 constitution says governors are the chief security officers of their states. Interestingly, commissioners of police in the states are not responsible to them. Rather, they are answerable to the Inspector-General of Police who in turn is an appointee of the president and who, more often than not, acts based on the president’s directive or his body language. Provision of security is the very basic duty of government. Ab initio, therefore, the governors have been castrated by the same constitution which envisages them to be chief security officers of their states, by not making the police commissioners report to them. In this matter therefore, they are like generals without troops. But the governors do not seem to be complaining; at least they are not castrated from accessing their security vote!

    In all of these, however, it is the governors that I blame. It is not only on this issue of Amotekun, but even on some other matters that they could make things happen and they have, at best been timid about. Take the revenue sharing formula, for instance, there is no reason why the governors cannot bring about the desirable change if they are serious. It is an open secret that many of them control their state houses of assembly. We may say this is reprehensible, but that is what presently or largely obtains. In this case, it should not be difficult to get the needed two-thirds of the state houses of assembly to buy into whatever the governors push forward as what the revenue formula should be. The National Assembly can be taken care of in like manner, too. I do not know what the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) is doing if it cannot push for legislation on such serious matters and get them through.

    So, what next? The southwest governors can approach Malami for his advice; that is if it is not belated because his announcement has sufficiently fouled the air. It does not even portray the Federal Government in good light. If it was designed to humiliate the southwest or their governors, the point is; it speaks volumes about the Federal Government and the contempt in which it holds the entire region. This is especially sad and bad for a government that is always accused of parochialism. A person who makes his friend the butt of expensive jokes over the failed party organised by the friend is indirectly indicting himself. What was his own contribution to help make the event memorable? Let’s even assume the southwest governors did not consult Malami for his advice, could the minister not have demonstrated maturity, and more importantly good faith, by calling their attention to the possible ‘pitfalls’ in the arrangement since the issue had been in the news months before the launch? Why did he have to wait until it was launched before declaring Amotekun illegal? The justice minister can only be exonerated if he did just that, even if behind the scene.

    The truth of the matter is that the present security architecture is not working; it has to be rejigged. This is not necessarily an indictment of the Nigeria Police as I said earlier. Indeed, one would be unfair to lay the entire blame of inefficiency on the police because we all know their peculiar problems.

    It would seem the only option left for the southwest governors is to approach the courts. The courts would have a better understanding of the difference between defence and security. And there would be nothing unusual about this. If the Federal Government can wait till after the last minute before announcing publicly that an outfit that did not just come into being overnight is illegal, nothing stops the southwest states from challenging the decision in court. The point is that, some of these issues that should be settled once and for all are allowed to linger because those who should challenge them in court lack the political courage to do so.

    If Amotekun is illegal, then the Federal Government should look in the direction of some other parts of the country with a view to abolishing similar outfits, some of which are even working in collaboration with the Nigerian Armed Forces.

    Let the governors fight this as if it was their security votes that are at stake.

     

     

  • What is Buhari worth?

    By Tunji Adegboyega

     

    Having come into power on the much publicised change mantra, one would not have thought that knowing what President Muhammadu Buhari is worth would be an issue. One would have thought such declaration would not only be available on demand, it would be on the internet for whoever cares to know what is there. Change presupposes that old things are passed away and all things have become new. So, if President Buhari’s predecessors did not make their assets declaration public, whether in their first term or second, he should, given his antecedent and his promise to revolutionise the ways in which public or elected officials, especially at the level of the presidency, should behave.

    But what we have seen with the debate now trailing an innocuous request by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project, (SERAP) for the president to make his asset declaration public would seem to suggest that there is little or no difference between six and half a dozen. If President Buhari decides to keep his assets close to his chest and only dumped same in the shelves of the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), how then is he different from the rest?

    Rather than simply obliging SERAP with the request, and probably thanking it for reminding it to do the rightful, Femi Adesina, President Buhari’s spokesperson said no law compelled his principal to make public his assets in his second term. And that to do this “is voluntary and not a compulsion. The president will do what the law requires of him and I can say for a fact that the president has declared his assets. Declaring that publicly is not in our law but voluntary. Therefore, he cannot be compelled to do so,” he said.

    I find this sad, regrettable as well as unfortunate. It is unbecoming coming from a man like President Buhari that should be eager to make such document public. Secret declaration of assets is useful to no one, especially as the CCB had always refused to make such available to those who request for it. Those who made asset declaration a part and parcel of our democratic experiment did not do so for the fun of it. The aim is to make whatever is declared there get to the ultimate user –  the public. Even if this is not expressly stated in the statute books, it should be implied, especially for someone who became president promising change.

    Ours is a country where public and elected officials make anticipatory declarations so that what they had declared in advance would now be their target as at the time they are leaving the stage. I do not think President Buhari would do such a thing, given his anti-corruption antecedent.

    A document released by the Presidency in 2015 said Buhari had less than N30million in his bank account; that he had no foreign accounts, etc. “The documents also revealed that President Buhari had a total of five homes, and two mud houses in Daura. He had two homes in Kaduna, one each in Kano, Daura and in Abuja. One of the mud houses in Daura was inherited from his late older sister, another from his late father. He borrowed money from the old Barclays Bank to build two of his homes.

    “President Buhari also has two undeveloped plots of land, one in Kano and the other in Port Harcourt. He is still trying to trace the location of the Port Harcourt land.

    “In addition to the homes in Daura, he has farms, an orchard and a ranch. The total number of his holdings in the farm include 270 heads of cattle, 25 sheep, five horses, a variety of birds and a number of economic trees.

    “The documents also showed that the retired General uses a number of cars, two of which he bought from his savings and the others supplied to him by the Federal Government in his capacity as former Head of State. The rest were donated to him by well-wishers after his jeep was damaged in a Boko Haram bomb attack on his convoy in July 2014.”

    What has the president added to these assets which, one must agree, were quite modest for someone who had been head of state, governor, Minister of Petroleum and the head of the Petroleum Development Trust Fund (PTDF) in our kind of country? That is all we want to know. President Buhari should please tell us.

     

  • Mr President

    THERE never has been a time when our leaders lacked speech writers with sugar-coated pens. They write so fantastically for their principals, with some of them ending up delivering the speeches so fancifully. But it is at the level of implementation that we have problem. So, I do not think we should bother about whether President Muhammadu Buhari’s New Year message resonated well with us or not. I think we should even pray that he should be able to do about 80 per cent of what he has told us he would do before quitting the stage in 2023. Mercifully, he has assured us that he is not interested in tenure extension. As President, he is more or less an oracle; therefore we should take him for his words. So, the current version of the ‘Association for Better Nigeria’ (ABN) people championing this rumour should look for something else to do.

    With regard to the state of the nation it is clear that birds are no longer crying like birds and rats like rats. I mean things are not going as they should. This is not to open debate about whether the Buhari government has done well so far or not. It is also not about whether it has been able to improve on the mess left behind by the Goodluck Jonathan administration. It is just about the national reality. And this is one main reason why I find it difficult to agree that the Federal Government should be allowed to borrow the $29.9bn loan that it wants to borrow. I know we have infrastructural deficit to tend to and we need a lot of money which we do not have to do this. The other argument advanced by those in support of the loan is that our debt-to-GDP ratio is still okay.

    But they have not successfully answered the question of what happens if, as usual, the Buhari government too misappropriates the loan. Then, we give the same alibi that we need loan to fix infrastructure and so on. And suppose (at least for the purpose of argument) another government comes with the same excuse of fixing infrastructure, and the foreign lenders refuse to give us the loan because (by then) we have exceeded the debt-to-GDP ratio, what happens? Will the world collapse simply because of that? Lest we forget, according to Inclusive Press, in 1999 when the military handed over power to President Olusegun Obasanjo, the average crude oil price was $16.56 per barrel. In 2003 when he was re-elected for a second term, average crude oil price rose to $28.05 per barrel and $69.08 per barrel in 2007 when he left. The world did not come to an end on account of that. We did not borrow. As a matter of fact, he paid off a chunk of Nigeria’s foreign debt despite the limited resources. So, what is happening?

    It is true the Buhari government has been fighting corruption, the point is, it does not seem we have got to the point when we can say the cankerworm has been defeated. In fact, it has not even been degraded (to quote our military authorities on Boko Haram).  I think we should have gone farther than where we are concerning corruption before contemplating taking such loan.

    One major area the government has to redouble its efforts is the economy. There is need to fix power supply to enable the country enjoy stable power supply without which there cannot be any meaningful economic development. The government has mapped out its strategies towards this. I can only hope it would live up to its promise within the 12 months deadline it has given itself.

    The government also has to do more in the area of security. Nigeria is still not as safe as it should be. There is need to reinvigorate the security agencies for better performance.

    But, in spite of whatever anyone may have against the Buhari government, it cannot be denied that it is at least trying in some areas. For instance, the agricultural sector. Some achievements have been recorded in this regard although this is yet to tell on food prices, particularly rice.

    Then railways. There is much progress in this regard, too. But the road networks too have to be fixed so that there would be less pressure on any single aspect of the transportation system.

    President Buhari’s promise to bequeath a credible electoral legacy however has k-legs, especially in view of the last governorship election in Kogi State. We saw how over 35,000 policemen could not effectively cover the state during the election, such that guns boomed ‘ta-ta-ta-ta’ as threatened by some of the politicians and political thugs before the exercise. The Inspector-General of Police said this was the handiwork of fake policemen. So, where were his original policemen? If 35,000 policemen could not police election in a state effectively, how many policemen would we need during the 2023 General Election? However, to fulfill this promise, the president must be ready to be the father of the nation that the constitution envisages for him. It is true he would no longer be eligible for another term again; the fact is if he anoints any candidate, he would want such candidate to win.

    Also, President Buhari does not have to be angry when people say his government has no regard for rule of law. He demonstrated this over and again, especially on the issue of Col. Sambo Dasuki, former National Security Adviser (NSA) who spent four years in detention despite several court orders that he be released on bail. Nigerians are not necessarily in love with Dasuki because they knew the consequences of the crime he was accused of committing, but they realise that if a man is given the opportunity to ride rough shod over rule of law, then none of us is safe.

    The same applies to Omoyele Sowore, the convener of the #RevolutionNow campaign that his government needlessly lionised. This was a man who could not muster any appreciable number of votes in the last presidential election that he contested. Yet, by keeping him behind bars against court orders, the government succeeded in making him popular. The Punch that said it would henceforth be referring to the president by his military title got infuriated like millions of other Nigerians, over these flagrant flouting of court orders. Whether it went overboard or not is a matter of who is making the judgment. The lesson is that President Buhari has to realise that those things he did and got away with as military head of state he can no longer get away with in a democratic dispensation.

    But I am afraid it does not appear the government is willing to learn any lesson, from the way it has shut out the paper from the president’s New Year Letter advert. The government should realise that what the paper did has become its tradition; it probably has nothing to do with the president as a person. Indeed, it rode on the wings of such victimisation to where it is today. Long after the Buhari government would have gone, the paper would continue to be. Those in government today should ask self-acclaimed military president, General Ibrahim Babangida and other military dictators of the past..

    The government must realise that when it keeps offending sensibilities the way it has been on human rights, rule of law, etc, whatever little achievements it has got will be wiped off by such little sins.

    All said, and as I used to warn when the president took over in May 2015, it is not enough for him to know that Nigerians refer to him as ‘Baba go slow’; what is important is that he takes the lesson from the name-calling. He should realise that time is no one’s friend. The way the president was behaving when he took over in 2015, it was as if he had more than 24 hours in a day and more than seven days in a week, and so forth. I am sure he too must have been shocked when his first term ended. This should not happen again. The rot he met on ground does not require a ‘Baba go slow’. Action was needed as early as yesterday, literally speaking. Before we know what is happening, the referee would blow the whistle to signal the end of his second term. It is when one has not delivered on his promises that he gives ‘ABN’ people the opportunity to be campaigning for third term. Anyone who has the opportunity of leading a country twice for an eight-year tenure should go home to rest and play with his grandchildren. He cannot say he has anything to offer again. Neither can he say he forgot anything in Aso Rock that he wants to go back to retrieve.

    What I am saying is that President Buhari still has 42 months to go. I remember I wrote on the need for speed at about the time he was six months in power in 2015 when I saw the slow pace at which he was moving, but I still gave him the benefit of the doubt that his administration would gather steam. It is only by the president delivering substantially on his campaign promises that he can make it easy for his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) to continue in 2023. His achievements must be so visible even to the blind. It is by so doing that he can keep the opposition silent. President Buhari should learn from some of the states, especially in the south west that were lost to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in some of the governorship elections. Some of them eventually had to struggle and argue with the opposition in elections they ought to have won fair and square at the first ballot if they did well in government.

    For birds to cry like birds and rats like rats, President Buhari has to review his programmes and projects with a view to fine-tuning those requiring fine-tuning. Definitely, he cannot get a different result if he continues on the same ‘go slow’ trajectory.

     

     

  • New, improved DisCos?

    By Tunji Adegboyega

    Joe Ajaero, President-General of the National Union of Electricity Employees (NUEE), the junior workers in the power sector, and his senior staff counterpart, Chris Okonkwo of the Senior Staff Association of Electricity and Allied Companies (SSAEAC) spoke the minds of millions of Nigerians on the need for a total overhaul of the sector. Although they spoke on the same day, but at different fora, the conclusion is the same: the power sector is not working; it needs to be rejigged. While Ajaero spoke at the 6th quadrennial/11th national delegates’ conference of the union in Lagos, Okonkwo bared his mind to journalists later at a press conference,  also in Lagos.

    That the two labour leaders are on the same page concerning the poor performance in the power sector is good news because, as active participants in the sector, they are in a position to know that there is still a long way to go to achieve stable power supply. Ajaero urged the Federal Government to declare an emergency in the sector because Nigerians are totally dissatisfied with the situation as it is. The icing on the cake is his statement that those in charge of the sector have no blueprint on how to move it forward. This is clear to us after six years of its privatisation.

    “We cannot continue to lament. Let the ministers of power and others tell Nigerians the situation in the power sector. Let them tell us that in the next six months, this is what we should expect and in the next one year, this is what will happen. Let them tell us the short, medium and long term plans for the power sector and how they want to achieve them. If they do not have, we think there is need to declare an emergency in the power sector. There is need for us to sit down to discuss the way forward. All stakeholders should join hands to rescue the sector from collapse. Nobody is happy with what is happening in the sector. Nigerians are not happy,” Ajaero said. To this, Okonkwo added the need for a review of the privatisation of the power sector, as some of the companies which came into existence through it  have failed to live up to expectation. This, really, is my area of concern.

    I must confess that the views of these two labour leaders resonate more with me, and I guess with millions of Nigerians, even though the Chairman of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), Prof. James Momoh, believes that once a reasonable measure of success is achieved on prepaid metering, there would be improved power supply. “The target is that by the time we have improved meter within two years, that will improve the quality of service all over the country”, Prof Momoh told Channels Television in September.

    But the truth is that the DisCos never wanted prepaid meters and they did everything to frustrate its easy acquisition. Indeed, contrary to Prof Momoh’s optimism, we would never have stable power supply in our lifetime unless there is attitudinal change on the part of the major players in the industry, particularly the electricity distribution companies (DisCos). Most of the DisCos’ workers need to be purged of the NEPA and PHCN gene in them. And this can only come about if they are whipped into line by the regulatory authority, in this instance, NERC itself.

    I will elucidate, using my experience and the experience of my community that has been disconnected from the transformer by Ikeja Electric since June 30, for no just cause, as case study. I must confess though that NERC is trying, at least through NERC Forum, but the time it takes, for instance, for petitions to be heard is too long, sometimes four months or more. I am talking from experience. Four months is too long for people to be denied electricity over flimsy excuses, not to talk of one year, or even more in some cases. Four months is too long in a country with the kind of I-don’t-care Discos that we have.

    Is Ikeja Electric saying everyone in Solabomi Williams Crescent, parts of Ajiboye Street, Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway and other affected areas in Agege on that transformer is a debtor? If no, why not sift the wheat from the chaff and serve light and darkness accordingly? Instead, at least two of the company’s workers told aggrieved protesters of the communities who took their grievance to their Agege office that their company could afford to do without the revenue from that transformer and they have faithfully kept to that promise since June 30. This was despite the fact that they conscripted the customers in the communities as debt collectors, gave them targets to meet to have the transformer energised again. Twice these people met the targets and twice did Ikeja Electric officials who gave them the assignment keep increasing the target after the people had struggled to persuade some debtors to pay.  The point is, when a struggling DisCo says it does not need revenue from some customers, it tells you the corporate mindset of such organisation. And how does having prepaid meters solve that corporate cancer? How many other areas is that DisCo treating the same way?  Or how many other DisCos engage in similar practice? As I said earlier, not even the stinking rich multinationals despise small beginnings.

    With this type of business model, it is not difficult to explain why some of these DisCos are struggling and gasping for breath in a sector that naturally should be a money spinner. Unfortunately, many of them had banked on recovering the huge ‘debts’ (some doubtful and dubious) that they inherited. Unfortunately, too, many Nigerians have become more aware of their rights under the new regime and are questioning the basis for some of these debts. Without doubt, there are people who do not like to pay for goods or services they enjoy. But, the DisCos ought to have separate such persons from those who are not debtors and sew befitting caps for all, according to their categories. One cap for all is a misnomer.

    These injustices are part of the reasons some aggrieved electricity consumers beat up some DisCo officials. For the same reason, some of their officials had been forced to jump down from the electricity poles after the ladders they used to climb were removed by aggrieved electricity consumers. A few had died in the process. I do not subscribe to such jungle justice, though. At any rate, it would be most unfair to vent one’s anger on hapless junior electricity workers who are only carrying out orders while the bosses who give the inhuman orders from the cocoon of their air conditioned offices do not suffer any harm. Ajaero said that much at the delegates’ conference: “The level at which our members are being assaulted, harassed and beaten up are increasing. Nigerians are venting their frustration on the power situation on our members.”

    It is instructive that, in spite of the extreme provocation of being cut off the grid for months, the issue has been well managed by the communities’ representatives so far. So, there has not been any major incident of Ikeja Electric officials being assaulted.  This is why it would be interesting to hear what Ikeja Electric would say these communities have done to deserve being cut off the national grid for over six months when we both appear, our hands in our back, before the requisite panel to tell it all; a thing which brings my own plight with the DisCo to over a year since I used power supply from them. They would have to tell thepanel whether they expected people who never had light for over six months, and someone who never used power supply from the public power supply system for over a year to come to their office to hug them and give them a long, passionate kiss for a job well done.

    Indeed, when we see people behaving the way some of these DisCo officials behave, we would not need to look too far to see why God decided to be in charge of the air that we breathe. You can imagine what such little-minded people would do when they have the opportunity to produce air! With regard to the DisCos, even as things stand, all they do is just to distribute the power that some other organisations have generated. Yet, they do not have the capacity to absorb all that is generated. Yet, some of their officials say they do not need money from some transformers I doubt if the company even knows the number of its transformers because if it does, someone should be asking questions as to why transformer X, Y, Z is not bringing revenue for six months. Who knows how many other Ikeja Electric and other DisCos’ customers are suffering in silence? It would seem to me that all the company is doing now is to wear out the patience of the communities that want to prove they know their rights under the extant laws, and make them come to the company penitent, like the biblical prodigal son. That is the only reason Ikeja Electric could have been ignoring all those who had attempted to intervene in the matter.

    These included the police at Agege who, out of security concerns invited the company’s officials for a parley. The local government chairman of the affected communities also tried to have an audience with them; they ignored him, even as they snubbed another Lagos State agency which tried to intervene, after reading of the plight of the people in the paper a few months ago.

    Yet, they are assuming the power of life and death over people who should be their customers. I said it earlier, and I dare repeat it; that Ikeja Electric and any other DisCo or business that cares less about its public image, or operates this kind of business model can only continue to struggle, wobble and fumble to its extinction. Quote me.