The Nation Newspaper

Category: Tunji Adegboyega

  • Potable water for all

    Potable water for all

    Adamu’s audacious moves at water resources ministry

    Water is indispensable to all living things.  Human beings use it for nearly everything: drinking, washing of clothes and plates, bathing, cooking, brushing our teeth, watering the garden, washing the pets, scrubbing the floor, watering the yard, farming, industrial uses, etc.

    Although we need both food and water to survive, it is possible for human beings to go for more than three weeks without food.But not so for water. At least 60% of the adult body is made of it and every living cell in the body needs it to function.

    Paradoxically, successive governments hardly pay much attention to it the way they do power, roads, education, health and other sectors of the economy. Little is heard of our ministry of water resources. May be that explained the paltry N6billion capital vote the ministry had in 2015. This is peanut considering that the ministry has 17 agencies/institutions under it, including 12 River Basin Development Authorities (RBDAs).

    Mercifully, the capital vote was increased to N37billion and N7.2billion for recurrent expenditure in last year’s budget. However, to underscore the importance attached to the ministry by the present administration, the proposed vote for it has been increased from the N44billion in 2016 to N85 billion in the current year’s proposal, in spite of the downturn in the government revenue. One can only hope the National Assembly would realise the centrality of potable water to human existence and be generous in approving its budget.

    With a silent worker like Suleiman H. Adamu as minister in charge of the ministry, we should be hopefulthat the money would be spent judiciously. Like other ministers in the President Muhammadu Buhari cabinet, Adamu was appointed in November, 2015. He immediately swung into action after receiving briefs from the departments, units and agencies in the ministry. Less than a month after his swearing in, he organised a ministerial retreat from December 11-13, 2015, to acquaint him with the ministry’s opportunities and challenges. Consequently, five major issues of focus were identified viz: repositioning the ministry for efficient service delivery; executing the ministry’s mandate more efficiently; identifying alternative sources of funding projects; strengthening river basins operations and enhancing monitoring and evaluation.

    Many people think the Federal Ministry of Water Resources is all about providing potable water for Nigerians alone. No. Its mandate extends somewhat to the power and agriculture sectors, among others. And so much is going on towards delivering on most of the ministry’s core responsibilities. So far, it has concluded the immediate and long-term plans for the water sector (2016-2030). Its roadmap includes: conclusion of the Draft National Water Resources Policy and National Water Resources Bill. And, in order to reposition the ministry for better service delivery, Adamu has embarked on manpower review as well as prioritised the execution of the ministry’s projects, based on established criteria. The ministry is also working assiduously towards assisting in the Federal Government’s efforts to boost power supply as well as improve food supply through its implementation of a national Irrigation Development Programme and identification of dams with hydro electrical power potential, for development.

    Indeed, a committee has been constituted on the revitalisation of RBDAs while the dams with hydro electrical power potential will help in further diversifying the source of power supply in the country. Lest we forget, the RBDAs played a major role in the agriculture sector a few decades back. So, it is cheering that the ministry is looking into how they can be revitalised to make them efficient again.

    It has become clear that government alone cannot cater to the needs of all ministries and parastatals; so, the Federal Ministry of Water Resources is working towards partnerships for alternative funding. Moreover, the ministry is developing and implementing a National Water Supply and Sanitation Programme to enable it achieve the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It has also inaugurated the National Council on Privatisation Sub-Committee on RBDAs, through which the ministry is collaborating with the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) and ICRC to put the RBDAs on the path of full commercialisation. The same applies to the hydropower and irrigation projects for which the ministry has developed guidelines for investment opportunities. Bringing in private investment into these areas will help the government to save money for other pressing demands while at the same time ensuring the elimination of the bureaucratic tendencies and corruption that have hobbled many government parastatals. In other words, efficiency will be better guaranteed when this happens.

    Of course, the ministry alone cannot achieve all these objectives. Therefore, it has gone into active collaboration with other ministries and parastatals, including the federal ministries of agriculture and rural development; power; finance; budget and national planning; environment; health and the ICRC, Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority, BPE, state governments and other stakeholders to achieve the plans. Such collaboration is necessary for synchronisation of ideas so they would not be working at cross-purposes. So far, implementation plan for each of these items has been concluded.

    The other good news from the ministry is the launching of Graduate/Youth Farmers Employment Programmes in seven locations nationwide. These include Kampe Irrigation Project, Kogi State; Integrated Farming Project, Abeokuta, Ogun State; Talata Mafara Scheme, Zamfara State; Kadawa Inegrated Centre, Kano State; Ogoja Irrigation Scheme, Cross River State; Agbala Integrated Farm Project, Imo State and Doma Dam Irrigation Project, Nasarawa State.

    This is a continuous programme that mirrors the Songhai Integrated Farm model and engaging carefully selected participants in batches of 50 to be trained in various agricultural activities. It would ultimately be extended to the 109 senatorial districts in the country. The ministry has also  completed and commissioned the Central Ogbia Central Water Supply Project in Bayelsa State to provide potable water to Otuoke and 12 other communities of Central Ogbia Local Government Area.

    Under Adamu, the ministry has executed a number of memoranda of understanding to facilitate the actualisation of the ministry’s goals. These include: memorandum of understanding between the Federal Ministry of Water Resources and Hungarian Ministry of Interior for Strategic Cooperation in core mandate areas; memorandum of understanding between the ministry and National University of Public Service, Hungary, on collaboration on areas of capacity building and sustainable development. Others include the memorandum of understanding with M/S Powerchina International Group Limited for the overall planning and study of Nigeria’s irrigation and hydropower resources as well as that between Lake Chad Basin Commission (LCBC) and M/S Powerchina International Group Limited, to conclude studies for the actualisation of transfer of water from the Congo Basin to Lake Chad Basin.

    The ministry has also secured the approval of the Federal Executive Council for the National Water Policy, Irrigation and Drainage Policy and Water Resources Bill for subsequent presentation to the National Assembly (Executive Bill) for passage into law.

    As if these are not enough, the ministry has proposed for completion and commissioning, several water supply, dams and irrigation projects. These include: Northern Ishan Regional Water Supply Projects; rehabilitation of Ojirami Dam Water Supply Scheme and Reticulation in Edo State; Inyishi Water Supply Projects; rehabilitation/upgrading of Vom Water Supply Projects; Otamin Water Supply Projects; Ekeremor Water Supply Projects; completion of Sabke Water Supply Projects; rehabilitation/upgrading of Takum Water Supply Projects and Mangu Water Supply Projects.

    Dam projects in the pipeline are: Ogwashi-Uku Dam; Mangu Dam, Plateau State; Kashimbila Dam, Taraba State; Aloshi Small Earth Dam, Nasarawa State; Inyishi Dam, Imo State; Ekuku Dam, Kogi State; Amauzari Earth Dam, Imo State; Ile-Ife Dam, Osun State; Barkin-Ladi Dam, Plateau State; Otukpo Multipurpose Dam, Benue State; Galma Multipurpose Earth Dam, Kaduna State; Gimi Earth Dam, Water Supply and Irrigation, Kaduna State.

    We also have Jibia Irrigation Project; Gurara Water Transfer + Gurara Irrigation Project, Kaduna State as well as the Gurara Water Transfer Conveyance Pipeline, Kaduna State; Middle Rima Valley Irrigation Project; Mangu Regional Water Supply Scheme (intake and distribution), Plateau State; Shagari Irrigation Project, Sokoto State; Bagwai Irrigation Project, Kano State; Adani Rice Irrigation Project; Lower Anambra Irrigation Project;  Zauro Polder Irrigation Project and Mamu Awka Drainage Projects.

    For record purposes and easy tracking, the ministry is also preparing a compendium on dams and irrigation facilities nationwide.

    Without doubt, this is a loaded assignment but the challenges will be greatly reduced if the government is able to hand over some of the areas it has slated for commercialisation to the private sector.

    But then, only someone who understands his brief and is ready to work can confront such daunting challenges. Adamu’s antecedents show that he is made of the sterner stuff needed to accomplish the tasks. Born on the 19th of April 1963, Adamu, a 1984 graduate of Civil Engineering of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, and a Master’s degree in (Construction) Project Management from University of Reading, United Kingdom, has garnered enough experience from the beginning of his career at the Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA), Abuja, in 1985, to the Water Resources and Engineering Construction Agency (WRECA), Kano State, where he designed, supervised and managed water and dam projects.

    He had served as project manager on several projects, notably under the PTF Urban/Semi-Urban, Regional and Rural Water Supply Programmes, National Farm Power Machinery Rehabilitation Programme and National Waterways Development Project (Dredging of River Niger). He is a Registered Engineer and member of the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) as well as Fellow, Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE).

    However, setting lofty goals is not enough; what is important is the ability to deliver on those goals. As stakeholders in Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) have noted, full implementation of the 2017 water resources ministry’s budget would impact on other sectors of the nation’s economy. But again, as they observed, the problem is not about the amount allocated but judicious use of the money voted to the sector. These are critical points that Adamu must bear in mind as he goes about executing his tasks.

  • Ode to the Nigerian senator

    Ode to the Nigerian senator

    This was one of the posts I got from whatsApp on Friday. I was really fascinated by it and I felt I should share it.  

    “My dog sleeps about 20 hours a day.

    He has his food prepared for him.

    His meals are provided at no cost to him.

    He visits the doctor once a year for his checkup and again during the year, if any medical needs arise.

    For this, he pays nothing, and nothing is required of him.

    He lives in a nice neighbourhood in a house that is much larger than he needs, but he is not required to do any upkeep.

    If he makes a mess, someone else cleans it up.

    He has his choice of luxurious places to sleep.

    He receives the accommodation absolutely free.

    He is living like a king, and has absolutely no expenses whatsoever.

    All his costs are picked up by others who earn a living.

    I was just thinking about all these, and suddenly it hit me like a ton of bricks –

    My dog is like a distinguished Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria!”

    On that note, I say happy New Year!

  • Guiding Buhari into 2017

    Guiding Buhari into 2017

    Another attempt to help the govt deliver democratic dividend

    I must have written on a similar topic this time last year; that is, my very first piece for 2016. The focus, as today’s, was the President Muhammadu Buhari presidency which was barely six months old then. Many Nigerians had started to complain that the government was slow. The ready example was the delay in constituting the cabinet, which was done at about mid-November last year. Nigerians were disappointed that rather than leverage on the advantage of time the president had (i.e. the time his predecessor conceded defeat to when he was inaugurated, a clear three months), President Buhari could not come up with a ministerial list until six months after his inauguration and about nine months after it was clear his election was not in doubt. In other words, they felt the president’s slow motion was not what was required, going by the extent of damage done in the past, particularly the immediate past.

    I am afraid, and, with due respect to the president, more Nigerians hold that view even today. Indeed, if anything has changed, it is in the growing number of people who believe that the government is too casual in its handling of the country’s challenges.

    Much as one cannot blame the Buhari government for the present mess, one should be able to say whether the government is in control of the situation, more than 18 months after. But I am also beginning to have doubts as to the capability of the government to get things right. I have said it before, and I restate, that I am not one of those who believe that the country would have been better off with former Dr Goodluck Jonathan continuing in power. This time last year, some of my friends and colleagues that we were in the same Buhari boat together before told me that by the end of this year, it would have been clear to us that the government has no answer to the country’s problems.

    Could they be right? I sincerely hope not.

    One thing many of us agree on though (even till today) is that we have no regret going for Buhari if the choices before us were limited to Dr Jonathan and him. There may be a few people who might be teasing that those of us who wanted ‘change’ have got ‘change’ after all, and so should not complain. As the Yoruba say, when a bird causes rain to fall, it should not complain if the rain is accompanied by thunderstorm. Many people so lament out of what I call genuine ignorance while a lot of others say so because they no longer have the free public funds that they used to share.

    Anyway, as was the case this time last year, the perception out there is that the government is still in slow motion. President Buhari must realise that in another six months, he would have been half way into his tenure. Soon after, people would start jostling for 2019. The scorecard is not impressive so far. The economy is as stupid as ever! Millions of Nigerian youths are still roaming the streets in search of non-existent jobs. Power supply is still epileptic; with the generating and distributing companies battling the challenges their predecessors could not conquer.

    The anti-corruption war is however ongoing, even though some people may disagree with the procedure. That the government is able to touch an otherwise sacred cow, the judiciary, is commendable. As some of us have always argued, no one can fight corruption with the kind of judiciary we have. Many lawyers who can’t ask judges where to drop their bribes would readily agree that the judiciary stinks.

    One other thing the administration cannot be denied is the fact that it has done well in the fight against terror. Those of us who are hundreds of kilometres away from the scene of carnage cannot appreciate the full import of the conquest of Sambisa Forest on December 22 by the Nigerian Armed Forces. Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, knew what he was saying when he said that 2016 Christmas was his best ever and that 2016 was his best year as governor. It could not have been otherwise for a governor who had spent five years governing a state where Boko Haram had wreaked its worst havoc. Nor can the parents of the abducted but released Chibok girls who had been forcefully separated from their parents since April 14, 2014, ever forget the year 2016 and the Buhari government.

    Lest we forget, President Buhari had made at least two major proposals to get the country out of the woods. The first is the selling of what the government calls some non-core assets (with the possibility of buyback when the situation improves); and the second, his request for $30billion loan to execute key infrastructural projects between 2016 and 2018. Many Nigerians who are opposed to either have genuine cause to fear. The fact is that once the president is fixated on an idea, it is difficult for any argument to convince him otherwise. And we should not gamble with the country’s very jugular. Should things not work out if the government had its way on either option, the repercussion would be grave, not only for us but for generations unborn. That is the fear of many Nigerians, and it is legitimate.

    But those with the power to approve or reject the proposals have chosen the latter option. That is the kind of thing you get when you want to fight corruption involving big people; corruption fights back. Even though they rejected the ideas for their own selfish reasons, they made it appear as if they were guided by the nation’s interest. Unfortunately, like the proverbial bird that people want to roast that has also made the job easier by dousing itself with petrol, the government left gaps in the loan proposal that were used as excuse to return it to the presidency. What many of the senators have done and are probably still doing is perhaps more damaging than the consequence of the failure of Buhari’s projections on the loan or the selling of assets.  It is for the same selfish reason that they are playing kite with the confirmation of the appointment of Ibrahim Magu as Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

    But the government should refuse to be distracted. If it has programmes it believes in, it should go ahead with them; all it needs to do is expedite action. For example, diversification of the economy. What has happened in the county by way of the rice revolution, with Lagos, Kebbi and Ebonyi rice projects is pointer to the huge potential in the agricultural sector. The LAKE Rice (a joint venture between Lagos and Kebbi states) is huge testimony to the fact that where there is the will, there will always be a way. What was achieved with LAKE Rice within one cropping cycle is amazing. But the Federal Government has to come in by providing the road and other infrastructure needed to get the farm produce across the country to the markets. It must also address the issue of storage so that farmers would not produce only to watch their efforts rot away. Let the government also focus more on job creation, the exchange rate and power supply, among others, more than ever before and within the constraints of resources. Hope is not lost yet.

    All said, President Buhari may be losing some admirers but he can still reverse the trend. However, the earlier the president and his aides accept that all is not as well as before with the government’s perception by Nigerians, the better for them and the country. Indeed, the better for those of us who stuck out our necks for him before and during the elections out of sheer personal conviction.

  • Ambode’s rice revolution

    Ambode’s rice revolution

    After a string of successes, LAKE Rice is a good way to end the year 

    Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State must have confounded many Lagosians with the superlative performance he has so far rendered this year. Not many gave him a chance at about this time last year, when he was barely six months in office. I recollect calling Steve Ayorinde, the state commissioner for information in November last year, to uniform him about an article on the online platform of a national newspaper which many people found offensive in that they considered it generous with praise for an administration that was ‘yet to take off’.

    Mercifully, the story is different today. The Ambode administration has indeed come a long way and made a lot of difference between this time last year and now. Even the governor’s critics in different political parties have little or no negative comments about his administration.

    For Governor Ambode, the arrival in the local market, last week, of LAKE Rice, a product of good thinking that came from the collaboration between the Lagos State government and its Kebbi State counterpart is a good way to end a very productive year. The ingenuity of the deal can be found even in the name of the rice – LAKE – which was formed from the first two letters of the names of the two states (Lagos and Kebbi). Yoruba elders say, if one’s daughter is good; one should say so, even though one is not going to marry her (t’omo eni ba dara, ka wi; ka fi s’aya ko). It takes an administrative maestro to dream such dream.

    The decision of the two state governments to partner on the rice deal deserves commendation. Rice, which many old Nigerians would readily admit was eaten, at best on Sundays by the rich, and usually at festive periods by many more Nigerians in those days, has suddenly become a staple in the country. It is the toast of the kids, particularly the female ones. They do not mind eating rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner. This is hardly a problem, except to nutritionists who would tell you it is not balanced diet. Beyond that, the snag is that much as we have developed an insatiable appetite for rice, we did not see the need to cultivate it in sufficient quantities. According to Rice Millers, Importers and Distributors Association of Nigeria (RiMIDAN), about 5.5 million tons of rice is required in the country per annum. But we could only produce about 3.4 million tons in 2015, thereby creating a production gap of at least 2.1 million tons. The result is that we have had to be importing from Thailand and other places to make up for the shortfall, losing about $1billion annually in the process.

    This is crazy in that rice is what we have comparative advantage to produce. As a matter of fact, it is something we should be exporting and earning foreign exchange from. Recent developments in the country have proved this point. In so short a time, we have been harvesting rice from some parts of the country like never before.

    But it is not many administrations that will see the lacuna in rice supply in the country when Ambode and his Kebbi State counterpart, Abubakar Atiku Bagudu, saw it and decided to take advantage of it for the benefit of their respective people in particular, and Nigerians in general.

    If the present momentum of rice production is sustained, it is only a matter of time for the country to get over its craze for imported rice. One major complaint against our local rice is the stones that usually compete with the grains for attention. So, we need to pay attention to the problems that made imported rice the toast of Nigerians by thoroughly de-stoning the local brands of rice. This should not be a problem these days with the appropriate technological tools to do that.

    Then we also have to prepare for the bumper harvests that we would be having if we are able to sustain the present momentum because a time would come when the problem will no longer be about the inadequacy of rice but its glut. Lest we forget, Dangote Rice is also in the offing, it is only a matter of time for Nigerians to get to the Promised Land in rice production. As we know, whatever Dangote intervenes in, it is usually mega-intervention. Yet, one of our musicians said Dangote o lori meji (Dangote does not have two heads)! Says who?

    The situation with rice should not be allowed to be like that of fruits, tomatoes and pepper, etc. most of which get spoilt due to lack of storage facilities.  One major way to ensure that the stream does not break is for government to buy up whatever excess is left from the farmers and keep in silos so as to encourage them to remain in the business.

    The Lagos-Kebbi deal is particularly refreshing in that the two states recognise each other’s strengths and weaknesses and did not allow these to deter them from their lofty dream. Lagos has the market for rice; in real terms, it has an estimated consumption of over 798,000 metric tonnes of milled rice per year which is equivalent to 15.96 million of 50kg bags, with a value of N135 billion per annum, according to Governor Ambode. Moreover, if there is anything like handshake across the Niger, the Lagos-Kebbi initiative is it. It shows that we can find unity even in our diversity. The point is that hunger does not know tribe or religion. A hungry man, whether in Kebbi or Ebonyi, Lagos or Bayelsa, will almost always react hungrily.

    One question that has been agitating my mind is: if rice is this easy to produce, why did it take forex shortage and recession to make us realise that we must return to the rice farms? Anyway, that might be a belated question because, right now, what we should be talking about more is how to get out of the rice trap. Nigeria is held down by many traps; rice trap is only one of them. Given our experience, we should be exiting those traps one after the other, especially now that we are faced with forex crunch.

    However, much as efforts are being made towards heeding President Muhammadu Buhari’s call for diversification of the economy, to wean it of its dependency on oil, the Federal Government must, in addition to our roads, pay attention to water and rail transportation to make such efforts succeed. In the same vein, since it takes two to tango, Governor Bagudu too deserves praise for agreeing to the initiative because if he had not, we might not be talking of LAKE Rice today. We should look forward to more of such beneficial collaborations across the divide in the country. Poverty is diminished when hunger is taken out of the way.

    …Ebonyi Rice, too

    I was on a short vacation early this month when Ebonyi State Commissioner for Information, Senator Emmanuel Onwe, visited our office to market, as it were, Ebonyi Rice. What is baffling is that Ebonyi Rice, unlike LAKE Rice, is not new. I got to know that in the course of my research into today’s topic because I had wanted to group both brands as new. Thus, I would have misled my readers into thinking it is also a new brand of rice. But I got to know it has been around when I was told it is the same ‘Abakaliki rice’ that some of us know but are not sure whether we see it as a better product than the imported parboiled rice. As a matter of fact, as far back as last year, the state government had donated about 1,000 bags of it to the Nigerian Army for onward sending to the troops fighting Boko Haram insurgents. It is against this background of its obscurity that one would appreciate the visit of the commissioner to the media to let more Nigerians know that something like that exists.

    Ebonyi Rice as well as other local rice brands need such exposure now more than ever before. I have eaten it and I must confess it tastes nice, far better than the rubbish we gobble from Thailand and those other places, some of which had been preserved with suspect chemicals five-to-six years before arriving our shores. That is when we are not being giving ‘plastic’ to eat in place of rice.

  • Same old mistake

    Same old mistake

    I insist, what Nigerians need is good governance, not pay rise

    NOTA BENE: This piece was first published on May 8, 2016, (except for a slight adjustment to the headline) when Labour made a proposal of N56,000 minimum wage to the government. It would appear that the statement by labour minister Chris Ngige to the effect that a pay rise was in the offing for workers was government’s response to the demand. I had said in the piece that workers should insist on good governance instead of clamouring for pay rise always because government would always be more than willing to grant pay rise. This position seems to be corroborated by the government’s decision, even at a time many state governments cannot pay the present minimum wage. Who would ever have thought that the Buhari government could be contemplating pay rise in the context of the economic milieu that the country is now? But, as I said in the piece, this is cheaper to grant than good governance. It’s only a matter of time, we’ll find out as usual, that it is not the solution.

    Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) on Tuesday (May 3) formally presented their minimum wage proposal of N56,000 to the Federal Government. “I can say now authoritatively that as of yesterday (Tuesday) we made a formal proposal to the Federal Government of N56, 000 to be the new minimum wage. The demand has been submitted officially to government and we hope that the tripartite system to look at the review will actually be set up to look at it”, NLC president Ayuba Wabba said. Whilst this might have drawn applause from workers in the country, it would seem to me an indication that Labour has not learnt any lesson with regard to minimum wage. The unions seem to be doing the same thing all over and therefore should not expect a different result. When in 2011 the present minimum wage of N18,000 was fixed, the same way they celebrated; now the euphoria is gone and the workers are back to square one.

    Of course Wabba advanced good reasons for labour’s position. One is that the law stipulates that minimum wage must be reviewed every five years. If the last review was done in 2011, then it is time to review it again, so that, to use Wabba’s words, workers would “not be seen as sleeping on their rights”. The logic, according to him, is that no worker should be taking salaries that cannot sustain him for 30 days. In other words, workers’ take-home pay should be able to take them home. Can the present minimum wage do that? I’m afraid, ‘No’. There is also the problem of manufacturers who will not be able to sell their products if workers are too poor to buy. Workers have to be empowered to be able to buy what they need. This is as well impeccable. Wabba crowned it all by alluding to the connection between corruption and good wages. If workers are not well paid, the temptation to steal will be high. Again, one can hardly fault this.Indeed, those who conceived the idea of five-year review of the minimum wage did so for very good reasons, chief of which is to index it with the rate of inflation. True, a lot of waters had passed underneath the proverbial bridge since 2011 when the minimum wage was last reviewed. As at the time they got the N18,000, crude oil was selling at about $111 per barrel and the exchange rate was N110 to the dollar. Today, not only has crude price fallen (around $46 per barrel), the exchange rate too has depreciated, with the Naira now exchanging for about N321 to the dollar at the parallel market. Ironically, it is now that Labour wants N56,000 minimum wage! Wabba noted the bad state of the economy: “Our argument is that, yes, it is true that the economy is not doing well, but the law stated that wages for workers must be reviewed after every five years”.

    There is, however, one point Labour has not mentioned, which is enough to knock out all the good points it made to justify its call for N56,000 minimum wage. And that is the fact that many of our political leaders have over the years proved that that they cannot be trusted with the noble responsibility placed on their shoulders because they care only about themselves. That is why they always think they must have access to whatever comfort money can buy, even when those who supposedly elected them (and they are representing) do not even know where the next meal will come from. It has been said time and again that our legislators are about the highest paid in the world. Some of those who made the assertion had often cited examples from different parts of the world, including the United States of America and Britain where lawmakers take public transport and live in moderate apartments. Also, they are not paid stupendous allowances in those countries as our own lawmakers, even as they do not have perks that are wrapped under the table. Everything about their worth as lawmakers is open and transparent.

    Let me therefore help Labour by adding the prodigal manner in which our political leaders live as one of the reasons to justify the new minimum wage. With our kind of politicians, it is quite a valid point for Labour and indeed all other Nigerians who do not have access to public funds to insist on having as much as possible of the national cake.

    Perhaps if the political leaders only live big at our expense, without stealing brazenly in a way that we had to notice, as in the immediate past, we would not be this aggrieved. But the way and manner many of these political leaders and their cronies help themselves to our common patrimony cannot but make us angry. I doubt if there is anyone that is angrier than me over this matter. Indeed, that was what made me become a proponent of the idea that Nigerians should always insist on having the best of good life that money can buy from government so that those who intend to steal will have very little left to pilfer.  The political leaders and their cronies have so much to steal because we often leave too much free money in their care, and because we do not ask questions.

    Moreover, you have people who served at best for eight years and after that, they award themselves mouth-watering packages that have no bearing with the country’s economic realities. These are more serious issues that Labour should fight; and not to keep asking for wage increases which the political leaders would almost always grant if that would make the Labour unions happy and keep their eyes from prying into what is happening in the executive, legislative and other chambers (of corruption) that dot the landscape.

    What I am saying is that I am now wiser.

    Indeed, this assumption (by Labour and the rest of us that increase in minimum wage is the solution to workers’ poverty in the country is analogous to the belief that chopping off the head is the cure for headache. We are where we are in the country because of bad governance. Even if crude prices have not crashed, the country would still have been in trouble, given the rapacious and primitive manner the country was stolen blind, particularly in the Goodluck Jonathan years.

    I can bet it, the government would most likely grant some concession, (that is after reminding labour that its members constitute only a fraction of the Nigerian population and can therefore not get all it wants) but whatever concession government grants will still not take most workers home, whether in cosmopolitan Lagos or in rural Ekiti or Osun, going by the prevailing cost of living which is not likely to improve unless we have good governance in the country. And I see the workers gladly embracing it. In a few years time, however, the reality would dawn on them that what they thought they got was not what they actually got. At the rate we are going, a time will come when we would have to buy a loaf of bread which can hardly feed two persons for N250.

    Why Labour has not thought along this line is what I do not understand. Could it be that it is shying away from this line of reasoning because it is also afraid of its own shadow? Whether we like it or not, Labour too is enmeshed in some integrity crisis, particularly concerning its housing scheme which remains as messy as ever. And for it to demand good governance, it must also put its house in order. You can’t go to equity with soiled hands. I have this feeling that Labour often capitulates in crises times due to the fear that government could want to blackmail its leaders with some of these messy deals. So, when the Labour should be in the forefront of struggles, its leaders suddenly develop cold feet and abandon the cause, citing some threats of treason charges from government as reason.

    A man with logs in his own eyes cannot be bold and comfortable to tell another person to remove the speck in his.

  • Testimony time: Day Ikeja Electric ‘shocked’ me

    Testimony time: Day Ikeja Electric ‘shocked’ me

    Uninterrupted supply, estimated billing in focus

    It’s testimony time! Actually, this piece could not have passed for testimony properly so-called but testimony in reverse, except for the fact that the word ‘testimony’ is now loosely used, perhaps bastardised or even prostituted, as seen from some testimonies I have heard or read about. I guess I must have shared one of such on this page. It was told by a lady in one of the Pentecostal churches where a friend is a pastor. According to the lady, her father worked with the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and for years, he was doing strictly administrative work in the office, pushing files. In a place like Customs, the meat is on the field, not the office where all you see are files that have gathered dust over the years. She said they had been praying fervently for a change in their father’s fortune so that he too would be posted to a border post. However, God finally answered their prayer and remembered their father as he was promoted and eventually transferred to one of the lucrative border posts! “Praise God”!

    Now the testimony on what Ikeja Electric has done. I must confess the company really scared me last week Sunday. I guess many other people connected to the same transformer with me would have been equally scared. What happened was that I had gone to the barber early in the morning but by the time I returned at about past nine, I saw our security light on. That told me that electricity supply had been restored to our area.

    I was glad; in Nigeria, that is something really cheery. What made it particularly instructive was the lead story in one of the national dailies the previous day to the effect that we should expect nationwide blackout soon. Reason? Unpaid debts, especially by ministries, agencies and parastatals and other customers running into about N400billion. I had already instructed my household that we should brace up for the worst. Not necessarily because we have been having electricity supply before but because it could last longer than we were used to, now that we are being served notice of the impending doom. Usually, those who hold electricity captive here do not serve notice. They just strike, for weeks or months and return it when they like.

    So, we filled all containers with water before going to church, even though we have borehole, surface tank and even underground tank in the house. In Nigeria, you prepare all-round; leaving nothing to chance. So, when I returned from my barber’s and saw that electricity had been restored (we had been in blackout for about a week during which the light did not blink), I had thought it was something that would last for the usual few hours. To my surprise, supply was not disrupted because I also observed the light in the church did not blink (we are on the same problematic transformer). There is hardly a month when that transformer has been well from morning till night.

    When I got home and still found that we had light; I then started to fret. This is unusual; about six hours of uninterrupted electricity! Something must have gone wrong at the Ikeja Electric office where they have the switch. Or, could it be that the person who was supposed to put off the light had hangover from the previous day’s social engagement and was not in the right frame of mind to do this hallowed duty of switching off the light?

    Fear then turned to panic. Indeed, I was in this state of stupor until it was ‘lights out’ at about 9.00 p.m. I was then relieved because I was too scared all the while that I made up my mind not to go out at all on that day until I was sure there was no cause for alarm. I finally heaved a sigh of relief when the owners of the light took it at about 9 in the night. At least that was evidence that all was well at Ikeja Electric as it was with the other electric distribution companies (DISCOs); I knew then that there was no cause for control since everything was already under alarm! It was not until then that I decided to go look for fuel to power my generator. I must confess the company has been fair to us since then. Indeed, I would have said they have turned a new leaf, but it is too early to conclude, because whenever I said that in the past, their progenitors, the National Electric Power Authority  (NEPA) and Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) ‘seized’ the light almost immediately again.

    It seems Ikeja Electric almost made the same record on Friday. I hope they will sustain the ‘shock’.  Praise the Lord!

    But that is for the testimony.

    Beyond that is the lingering issue of issuing estimated billing, which the Acting Chief Executive Officer, Ikeja Electric, Mr Anthony Youdeowei, said would inevitably continue, at least for now. For me, this was a problem the new owners of the electricity firms should have envisaged even before things went awry with the economy. I said this in the context of the prepaid meters that Youdeowei said has jumped from about N40,000 apiece to about N100,000. Whoever was buying the entities then knew the issue of metering and billing should have been accorded priority if the new owners were not intent on continuing with the ancient billing regime which was most unfair to Nigerians. If they had seen the issue in that context, they should have metered a substantial number of their customers before the recession set in and meters now became gold.

    When I first saw the headline about estimated billing to continue, I was annoyed because I was an experienced victim of it under both the defunct NEPA and its equally incompetent successor, the PHCN. Indeed, the matter got to a head when my estimated bill hit about N200,000 around 2002/2003. Knowing what electricity tariff was like in the country then, it should have been clear, even to the uninitiated, that one could be paying such an outrageous electricity bill of about N10,000 monthly if one had a bakery run on electricity. However, because I did not want to be seen as someone who loved enjoying light without paying, I kept paying (I think about N5,000 monthly even though I was usually slammed about N10,000 to N11,000 monthly) which was far above what my friends in the same area having more powerful electrical appliances and even more regular electricity supply than myself paid monthly. The matter became unbearable when in December of that year (or was it the next?), NEPA wrote those of us they claimed to owe them that they were offering us 50 per cent rebate and threatened to disconnect our supply if we did not take advantage of the bonanza.

    I then wrote to their offices at Akowonjo and Alausa both in Lagos that they should pocket their rebate or direct it at genuine debtors. As you know, it is not only the person who stole the fowl of the wretched of the earth that has stolen the property of the talkative. If you steal a journalist’s property, you also have to prepare for the loud noise. Eventually, the then NEPA sent some of its officials to my apartment to verify my claims without notice, and at different times. Guess what? They later discovered that they were the ones owing me after doing reconciliation and I was given a credit balance of an amount I cannot remember. I therefore continued to enjoy electricity supply for some time without paying.

    I thought I have had my fair share of estimated billing. But I was wrong. It was like somebody was determined to take back from me the credit that I enjoyed earlier. So, again, sometime in 2012, PHCN decided to jerk up my bill from N4,389.30 in March 2012 which dropped to N1,206.50 by June of the same year. Three months later, this again jumped to N11,311.50. Interestingly, it has been around the N11,000 mark until about four months ago when an enumerator from Ikeja Electric came to our house. Fortunately, I was at home and I reopened the matter with him. He did some inspection and left. Because I had done that severally with the PHCN which started the unfair billing severally without any result, I did not have any confidence that something positive would come out of it this time. Surprisingly, since then, my bill has not exceeded N3,500 per month. At a time we had a serious problem which was clear as there was no light for about two weeks; it dropped to about N2,000.

    So, you can see that I am eminently qualified to comment on estimated billing. As a matter of fact, I have a protest letter ready for the company because, despite paying N5,000 every month all through the years since the problem started in 2012, (even when we did not have light for about two weeks before the enumerator came), they are still putting a threat of disconnection notice on my bill. They should stop harassing me with this.

    However, my anger on the continuation of estimated billing subsided when I saw the full text of Youdeowei’s statement. First, he said the charges have reduced considerably on consumers placed on estimation as more are connected to the company’s data base. This is unlike the past when NEPA and PHCN based their billing on only the people they metered instead of ensuring that everyone using electricity was metered and billed appropriately. What they did then was look at a house and apportion charges that they liked. They failed to reckon with the fact that there are some people in ‘face-me-I-face-you’ apartments that have more powerful electrical gadgets than even those living in flats.

    All said, I sympathise with Ikeja Electric and other DISCOs if truly their tariffs are still low to make them break even. The thing though is that they caused the problem for themselves. I do not mind paying a higher tariff; and I believe many Nigerians are ready and willing to do same. That is not to say we would not have defaulters even if tariffs hit a rock-bottom low. But let me pay for what I consume. The companies should go after their debtors instead of trying to spread the defaulters’ charges on those they adjudge have the ability to pay, just because they want to meet their cost. There is no business that can ever succeed on such paradigm. The electricity firms will begin to earn Nigerians’ sympathy and respect when they learn to bill their consumers as they go.

  • Again, the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway

    Again, the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway

    Way out of the avoidable nightmares

    For three consecutive days last week, motorists and commuters who travelled on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway literally saw hell, when a multiple-vehicle collision occurred on the Kara Bridge, at the Ogun State end of the expressway around 2.30 a.m. on Wednesday.

    At least five lives were reportedly lost to the accidents. This was in terms of direct deaths. It is doubtful if the loss in terms of property will ever be known, given that several vehicles, some with valuable contents, were said to have been burnt in the process. Add these to the many man-hours lost by the thousands of people that were stranded on the road for hours on each of those days. Just as the lives that were lost, none of these other collateral damages can be quantified in monetary terms.

    I had cause to dedicate my column of October 3, last year, to the same expressway due to an experience I had, alongside my wife and daughter when we travelled to Oyo from Lagos, a distance of about 170 kilometres and could not return home until about 21 hours later. It was such a harrowing experience. Many people attributed this ‘vigil’ on the road to the clash of two public holidays, the Independence celebrations and sallah. To compound matters, it also fell on a weekend that the monthly Holy Ghost Service was being held at the Redeemed Camp on the axis. But last week’s experiences of people on the corridor did not clash with any public holiday. First, it had to do with the reconstruction work going on on the Long Bridge axis of the road as well as the multiple-vehicle collision.

    The Lagos–Ibadan Expressway is a 127.6-kilometre-long (79.3 miles) expressway connecting Ibadan, the capital of Oyo State and Lagos State, the commercial centre of Nigeria. It is the busiest inter-state route in Nigeria and also the major route to the northern, southern and eastern parts of the country. The expressway, which is the oldest in Nigeria, was commissioned in August 1978 by Major-General Olusegun Obasanjo. It handles more than 250,000 passenger car units (PCUs) daily and constitutes one of the largest road networks in Africa.

    Given its strategic importance, one would have expected that the Federal Government would pay attention to the road as well as ensure the construction and or maintenance of other roads that could serve as alternatives to it whenever there is a problem on the ever-busy expressway. For sure, accidents, much as we do not like them to happen will always happen, sometimes due to human error, carelessness or even dereliction of duty on the part of the government (gullies or potholes on the roads, lack of adequate traffic signs, etc). When the accidents happen, or when for whatever reason motorists cannot travel as fast as they should on the expressway, alternative routes should come handy.

    But what we have is a situation where we cannot say there is any such alternative properly so-called. Although travellers going to Ibadan from Lagos and vice versa could take the Lagos-Abeokuta Road; or Shagamu road or even go through Ikorodu, the point is; these roads are largely bad. We have craters on the roads and motorists who ply them must be ready to do comprehensive servicing and repairs after each trip; that is if they are lucky to escape their vehicles breaking down during their trip. How can we leave all our eggs in one basket, which is what the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway is at present?

    Even in normal times when there are no accidents, Lagos Traffic Radio usually gives terrifying reports of the traffic situation on the expressway, which makes one feel for people living in that corridor. Last week Tuesday, a colleague who left office at the Matori area of Lagos at about 9.00 p.m. did not get to his house at Arepo, Ogun State ( a distance of about 36 kilometres), until about 2.30 a.m. the following day because of the traffic necessitated by the incidents. His wife who left home for her office at about 6.00 a.m. on Wednesday was still on the Long Bridge as at 10 a.m. I have been wondering how people would say they slept on the expressway and had thought they were exaggerating until I experienced it in October last year. It is possible to be on the road of about 130 kilometres for a whole day!

    Concerning the activities of churches (and even mosques now) on the expressway that contribute to the traffic chaos in normal times, many people have said (and I think it is necessary to restate it) that the government is not duty bound to give them permits to establish their mega churches or mosques on the same axis. But, since the religious organisations have been allowed to build their centres there, probably because that is one of the few places they think they can have their crowd, then it is the duty of government to also ensure that their activities are done with minimal discomfort to other road users. Detailing traffic wardens to the venues of the religious organisations during their programmes is only a leg of the issue. Is it not possible to have overhead bridges in some of these places (i.e. the Redeemed Camp) so that those not connected with the activities of the religious organisations can bypass such places en route their destinations? Why must people suffer expectedly every month in the name of religious activity?

    It was as if successive governments just went to sleep after the expressway was opened in 1978, at least until 2013 when the Goodluck Jonathan administration saw the need to expand it because it was no longer able to cope with the daily traffic. Although the road is generally better now compared to its 2013 state, it is still a far cry from what an expressway of its status should be, with its many potholes; the reconstruction around the Long Bridge area of Lagos (which the contractor says poses a serious challenge because of the nature of the place) appears to be taking too long to complete. It is those who have the misfortune of passing through the place daily that can better relive their ordeal.

    Nigerians need more than assurance on this road. They have lived by assurances for too long; what they need now is action to take their nightmares away on the expressway. The problem there is compounded by the fact that motorists have no choice once they are trapped in the traffic. There are no short cuts; they must stay put until providence clears the way for them. This is not good enough; and I do not think this is the best we can get. Our leaders travel outside a lot; they should replicate on the expressway and other roads in the country some of the things they see that so fascinate them abroad. After all, as they say, “what is sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander”. It is in areas like this that Nigerians can feel the impact of their frequent travels abroad, thus justifying the huge resources they cough up to sustain our leaders’ foreign trips.

    As I observed in my piece last year, what is happening to and on the expressway is exactly the way we are; the way we are governed. A first time visitor to the country does not need to do much research to realise this fact. Moreover, security has been a key missing factor on the road. On the night I did ‘vigil’ there last year, we hardly saw any security beyond a few security men who broke traffic rules in their bid to clear the way for themselves, leaving the others to their own devices. Also, at night, the road is so dark, save for vehicles beaming their lights to illuminate their path. One can only hope provision has been made for security lights this time around to make the road compare with roads anywhere in the world.

    Definitely, seeing the huge number of vehicles on the expressway, the question of what happens to other modes of transportation would naturally come into mind. Specifically, what is happening to rail transportation in the country? It is true some progress is being made in this regard because the Nigeria Railway Corporation is trying to find its feet after years of dormancy. Definitely, many people will prefer to escape the nightmare on the expressway if they could travel by rail to most parts of the country. So, we expect more progress in the efforts to rejuvenate the rail sector to give Nigerians more travel options.

    It is only that we are not in a country where  research is taken seriously. Otherwise, we would have known that those who travel on the expressway frequently, indeed, those who are always on the move in the country, passing through some of our roads must have been losing their ‘joints’ and ‘bolts’ gradually due to the bad state of most of these roads. Unfortunately, we would be attributing some of the deaths and sicknesses arising from travelling on these roads to witches in the village. More unfortunately, the witches cannot defend themselves for reasons best known to them.

  • An appeal to Donald Trump

    An appeal to Donald Trump

    He should erect his promised wall to shut out Nigerian elite from America

    Just like our credulous parents – Adam and Eve – whose ‘understanding’ opened only after eating the forbidden fruit, and just like the British who realised the depth of their mistake after voting to exit the European Union (Brexit), the Americans too have suddenly woken up to the reality of the import of the election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States of America on November 8. Less than 24 hours after the result was announced, Americans trooped out in their thousands to denounce it, with not a few wondering about the wisdom in a situation where a candidate with the majority vote could still be subjected to the decision of an Electoral College before knowing whether he/she could be declared winner of the election. Indeed, how do you explain it that Hillary Clinton who had 60,467,245 votes (47.72%) lost the presidency to Trump’s 60,071,650 votes (47.41%)? The puzzle is in the country’s Electoral College in which Clinton had 228 as against Trump’s 290. Interestingly, Trump himself has had cause to criticise the Electoral College which he described as phoney: “The phoney electoral college made a laughing stock out of our nation. The loser one!” He also tweeted, “He lost the popular vote by a lot and won the election. We should have a revolution in this country!” he had said. But he has since deleted the comments from his 2012 posts.

    Many Americans reportedly smashed their television sets when Trump was making one broadcast or the other, in a manner reminiscent of the way people destroyed their Rediffusion sets in the Western Region here in Nigeria in the 1960s, because they saw them as purveyors of the fraud that the then election represented.

    Perhaps the worst violence was in the northwestern city of Portland, where protesters hurled projectiles at officers, vandalised businesses, smashed car windows and attacked drivers. It is so serious one would have to start wondering if this is happening in America, God’s own country. But this should be expected in an election that was preceded by campaign of  calumny, racism, sexism and xenophobia, especially on the part of Trump, who simply threw all caution associated with America’s elections to the winds, threatening fire and brimstone if he lost at the polls.

    Almost everything that he did not get right appears to have some Nigerian flavour. That is why I am suspecting that Trump had received some tutorials from some Nigerian politicians on how to do electoral campaigns because we have a surfeit of politicians who see politics as a do-or-die battle.  Unexpectedly, just as it is often the case in Nigeria, Trump too is accusing the media of being behind the protests. No one should be surprised at this because most of the major newspapers in the U.S. have seen as highly repugnant, a Trump presidency. They cannot imagine how a ‘bush man’ like Trump can successfully lead today’s America. But Trump has no one to blame for this than himself. His mannerism does not show he has the temperament required of the exalted office of the world’s Number One Citizen.

    The way things are, it seems perhaps only a matter of time for the Electoral College to be dismantled. It was the same Electoral College that led to the failure of Al Gore to make it to the White House in 2000. Although there had been several failed attempts to do this in the past which failed because of the cumbersome nature of the amendment of the American constitution, this will pale into insignificance when America continues to suffer the kind of fate it is now going through when the majority voted in favour of the country’s first female president only for the votes to count for nothing because of the Electoral College.

    Well, how the Americans begot the Trump presidency is now a belated issue.  The fact is, for good or for ill, they and the entire world that is still recuperating from Trump’s shocking electoral victory will have to live with Trump as president in the next four years; and, if care is not taken, eight years, ceteris paribus. Only Mother Nature can supervene to avert either of these.

    However, like most Nigerians, nay Africans, I also would have wished Clinton got the mandate. But while man proposes, God disposes. But a question many Nigerians have been asking is what specifically did we as a country benefit from the Barack Obama presidency that has made us to want to die for Clinton? It is an understatement to say that we routed for Obama. In fact, Nigerians carried the Obama campaign on their heads like most other Africans during the 2008 presidential election campaign. It is even doubtful if we were as ecstatic and passionate as we were during the Obama swearing in as when our own presidents are sworn in. The reason is simple: America is, loosely speaking, the world. But, despite this support, what specific gains did Nigeria benefit from the eight years of the Obama presidency?  The Obama presidency it was that terminated oil imports from Nigeria in July 2014. For a country that used to be Nigeria’s major crude importer, this meant substantial revenue loss for the country. Well, the U.S. said then that it had to stop fuel importation from Nigeria because America was able to produce more oil than it imported.

    We can therefore concede this to Obama on the basis of national interest.

    But President Obama has been to Africa at least five times but did not deem it fit to touch down on Nigerian soil. Well, some claim it is due to security concerns; but others say it was because of the corruption that signposted the immediate past Jonathan presidency.

    None of the two can stand as the gospel reason why the outgoing American president has not visited Nigeria. Take security, Obama was in Nairobi, where al Shabaab has carried out high profile attacks in the city centre. Second, if he did not visit Nigeria during the Jonathan era because he did not want to be tainted with the corruption tar, that regime was swept away about 18 months ago! Moreover, it goes without saying that Nigeria is Africa’s economic, political, communications and petroleum giant. It is the continent’s largest economy – almost twice the size of South Africa’s and a third larger than that of Egypt.

    All said, much as the world waits expectantly for what kind of baby the Trump presidency would deliver, Nigeria’s elite must be the jitteriest of his victory, given the red alert he gave during his campaign, to tinker with some of the country’s policies concerning immigrants and allied matters. They have every cause to. It is doubtful if there are other countries whose elite are as crazy for America as the Nigerian elite. They are the ones who jet out to that country to treat common mosquito bites or a minor cut by a razor blade instead of developing our hospitals to the standards that obtain outside. They prefer sending their own children to schools in the U.S. while urging the rest of us to make do with the ramshackle institutions at home in the name of sacrifice and patriotism, thereby helping to grow the economies of the United States and other countries and killing ours. So, Trump will be doing Nigeria a lot of favour for which we would be eternally grateful if he can ‘erect the wall’ he has promisedto shut out the Nigerian elite and even encourage other countries to do same so that our elite can stay back at home to develop their own country instead of jetting out at the slightest opportunity.

    IN THE LIGHTER MOOD

    THERE is no point crying over spilt milk; the worst has happened (I can hear you say the worst for who?) and the best way we can mitigate the impact is to put the event behind us. One way to do that is to turn what has happened into a wall-clock joke and laugh over it.

    There was this conversation about the outcome of the American presidential election between a mother and her six-year-old daughter who is reputed for being highly inquisitive. The daughter asked the mother: “so, now that the election is over, which party won; APC or PDP?” The mother answered: “PDP”.

    Since the little girl knows that her mother is APC, she got the message that her candidate in the U.S. election lost.

  • Not ready yet

    Not ready yet

    Made-in-Nigeria campaign still a mirage

    Nigerians have been told by successive administrations in the past four decades to embrace made-in-Nigeria goods. Yet, here we are, still battling to extricate ourselves from our lust for imported items. There is nothing under the sun that we do not import. We import toothpicks, needles, pins, lanterns, shoes, groundnut oil, rice, wheat, sugar, fish, furniture, wines, champagne, exotic cars, frozen turkey and chicken, name it!

    But it is clear that most of our politicians and government officials who pontificate on the need for us to curb our insatiable appetite for imported goods themselves are only being hypocritical. For them, we should take a cue from what they say and not necessarily what they do. From their hair cream to their underwear, to the shoes, everything is imported. Yet, they keep telling the rest of us to buy made-in-Nigeria products. Even those of them who say Nehru, Lee Kuan Yew, Julius Nyerere, Kwame Nkrumah, etc. are their role models hardly live by the examples of these models.

    Well, the Muhammadu Buhari government has started singing the same tune. In its own case, it seems to have no choice because we do not have enough foreign exchange to settle our import bills due to the fall in the price of crude oil, the country’s mainstay.

    But just how hypocritical our leaders can be with regards to home-made goods can be found in two examples. One was that of a former Nigerian president who was said to be eating Kellogs Corn Flakes at a time he told Nigerians to buy Nigerian. What happened to Dangote Corn Flakes and other local brands? That is good only for the other Nigerians? Perhaps the more shocking is that of the few car manufacturing plants in the country that our leaders spurn their brands. Imagine this: Senate President Bukola Saraki had, while receiving a delegation from the Innoson Motor Manufacturing Company, Nnewi, led by Chief Innocent Chukwuma, the chairman and founder of the company, in his office in February, said all arms of government have a duty to ensure the success of indigenous manufacturers as a way of rebuilding the economy and putting Nigerian youth to work. Saraki added that government should use legislative actions and policy initiatives to protect the local industries as a deliberate way of reviving the economy.

    “That is why this eighth Senate is determined to amend the Procurement Law to ensure that government agencies patronise Made-in-Nigeria products. I am sure the House of Representatives is in support of this. It is our joint responsibility to ensure that you succeed. If you are successful, a lot more small and medium scale enterprises will draw inspiration from you and they will become successful,” Saraki said. It was as if Mr Alfred Nwosu of Innoson Group read the senate president’s mind. He thanked Dr Saraki for granting the team audience within 48 hours that they contacted him and praised his views on made-in-Nigeria products, but added: “What we need is the support, encouragement and inspiration from decision makers like you.” This is the crux of the matter, for, when Dr Saraki was later to get vehicles for himself, his deputy and other senators, they did not get those vehicles from the local manufacturers. They imported them. So, who’s fooling whom?

    May be the local vehicle manufacturers have to return to the drawing board and work towards adding bullet-proof cars and jeeps to whatever they are doing because most of our political leaders are now afraid of their shadows such that they cannot feel safe in conventional cars. They buy bullet-proof cars for themselves, their spouses, their first to the last child, their favourite pets and what have you! They all deserve tight security that only bullet-proof cars can provide. And this is understandable. Leaders who are expanding while the led are shrinking have every cause to be afraid, even when no one is pursuing them yet. Dr Saraki might have driven one of the Innoson cars during the firm’s team’s visit to his office, but if the cars are not bullet-proof, they can’t fly with the high and mighty. The conventional cars should be marketed to the other Nigerians who just need functional cars to move from one place to another, not to our distinguished senators!

    But Dr Saraki is not alone; that is, by and large, the way most of our government officials and policy makers run the buy made-in-Nigeria campaign.

    This time around, the Federal Government might have re-launched the made-in-Nigeria campaign; the military appears one institution that has imbibed the message, even more than the government itself. The Nigerian Army has placed orders for 50,000 shoes from local shoe makers in Aba, Abia State. It is a matter for regret that until now, and despite the pious statements by successive leaders that we should be patronising made-in-Nigeria products, our soldiers still depend on imported shoes. From what Abia State Governor Victor Ikpeazu disclosed, however, all that might be about to change. Other arms of the military, the police, even the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) and other paramilitary agencies of government are soon to join the military in sourcing their boots locally. We can only imagine how much the country would be saving if all these institutions begin to get their boots and other accoutrements here at home. A few months back, the Nigerian Air Force signed a pact with the same Innoson for the supply of spare parts for its jets.

    Clearly then, the problem is not necessarily with us but in our leadership. The problem is so obvious for even Dino Melaye, Kogi-born senator of the Federal Republic, to see. Melaye told his audience at Nasarawa State University while speaking on ‘The Way Forward Nigeria’ that the country’s leaders, including himself, have failed. Or, how else do we explain the case of a country that spends about a trillion naira annually on importation of food, especially, rice, wheat, sugar and fish. Prof. Baba Abubakar, Executive Secretary, Agricultural Research Council of Nigeria, ARCN, disclosed this at a sensitisation seminar on Genetically Modified Organisms, GMOs, and Agricultural Biotechnology, organised for staff of Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development by Biotechnology Development Agency, in collaboration with other OFAB and National Bio-safety Management Agency, in Abuja in August.

    Without doubt, we have always known long before now that there is little that is wrong with the Nigerian character; many of them who have found their way out of the country have excelled in their fields of endeavour. Even when the average Nigerian is not doing well, it is usually because of failure of leadership.  Look at the case of Dr Oluyinka Olutoye who has a date with President Barack Obama for the feat he recorded in medicine by delivering a baby born twice. Reports say Olutoye and Dr. Darrell Cass, his surgeon partner made the headlines after carrying out an operation on a 23-week-old baby suffering from a tumour known as sacrococcygeal teratoma. “The operation was successfully carried out and the baby was returned to his mother’s womb. Surprisingly, the baby healed and continued to grow until she was born again at 36 weeks.”

    If Olutoye were to be in Nigeria, some government officials who are not known to have added any value to our lives despite being in government since thy kingdom come would have messed him up if he dared ask for tools to perform. Because Olutoye did the feat in a place where such efforts are recognised, even our own President Buhari has also expressed his readiness to host him. But, beyond this symbolic gesture, the president should be interested in how we can bring back these great Nigerians home to replicate some of the feats they are doing abroad at home. Indeed, this should be another chapter in the made-in-Nigeria campaign. The way we treat their contemporaries at home, and governments’ attitude to the development of our healthcare and other infrastructure will go a long way in whether we will succeed or fail in this mission.

    But we must have learnt our lessons by now; that, beyond making speeches about buying made-in-Nigeria items, we must take practical steps to achieve the objective. It is tragic enough that we got this far with imported products, the greater tragedy would come if we fail to retrace our steps, especially if oil prices suddenly bounce back and, we return to our old habits. Nigeria is not the first country to experience what we are experiencing; the difference whether we will get out of it soon and permanently will be in our seriousness and resoluteness never to find ourselves in this mess again. We must return to the era when a particular brand of vehicle was prescribed for public officials if the made-in-Nigeria campaign is to succeed. For us too, it should be what we cannot produce, we do not need. Anyone who is too big to use Nigerian products has a choice to stay out of government.

  • Nigeria’s economy and other matters

    Nigeria’s economy and other matters

    First Annual Conference of The Point Newspaper

    Penultimate Friday, I broke a vow not to attend any forum where the problem with Nigeria’s economy is the issue for discussion. And my reason for the vow is simple: everybody knows the problem with the Nigerian economy but we all pretend not to know until one seminar or workshop is organised to dissect it. I do not think there is any other country where they have conducted as many forums on their economy as the Nigerian economy; yet I do not know if there is any other country that has failed abysmally in harnessing its economic potential as Nigeria.

    The main problem with our economy is our failure to diversify our economic base and this is a thing many of us learnt in our ‘Ordinary Level’ Economics. Many of those who have led us and are still in positions of authority read some of those Economic books which alerted us to the dangers of our monocultural economy. Yet, all they had done mostly was pay lip service to diversification. Perhaps the Muhammadu Buhari administration would have followed the same old path to where we are if crude prices had remained steady at the international market, when it assumed office. Perhaps not. But that is in the realm of conjecture. The reality is that Buhari took over the country’s leadership at a time oil prices had plummeted and Nigeria was caught unawares once again due to lack of planning.

    The situation was worsened by the rapacious stealing by successive government officials, which got to a head during the Goodluck Jonathan administration. So, we all know what the problem is; but we keep dancing round it and pretending that we cannot know until some egg-heads are assembled to tell us where we got it all wrong.

    It was against this background that the invitation I received to attend the Public Presentation and First Annual Conference of The Point newspaper held at the Eko Hotel and Suites on Victoria Island, to mark the paper’s first anniversary penultimate Friday, would have been declined.  Of course, there is also my mortal fear for going to Lagos Island. One, I almost always miss my way on the Third Mainland Bridge whenever I go there, so, whenever I do, I take my old reliable Eko Bridge. This was the same Island I was used to in the good old days when I worked briefly at the Children’s Wear Merchandise Department of Kingsway Stores on Marina Street. (Now that I am better informed, I don’t know whether to say Kingsway Stores’ gentle soul should rest in peace).

     That the event was fixed for a Friday exacerbated my ‘punishment’. Perhaps the most convenient excuse for me not to go was the fact that I had to see my column for the next Sunday as well as the newspaper’s editorial to bed that same day.

    But somehow, I found my way to Lagos because of the respect I have for Mrs Yemi Kolapo, the managing director/editor-in-chief of The Point. And I might have made it to the event to time but for one truck pusher who used his ‘excess luggage’ to ‘pluck’ the side mirror on the passenger side of my car, which somewhat slowed down my speed on the way. I wasted no time arguing with him because I saw him as much a victim of what we were going to discuss at the event that I was rushing to, as myself. The difference is probably in the degree of victimhood. Indeed, I pitied him because he had to overload his truck to make more money since he is not a legislator and therefore does not have any source of bogus pay.

    I met Kolapo for the first time (I guess) in November 2014 at a seminar organised by the then Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment under Mr Olusegun Aganga. She was Senior Special Assistant (Corporate Communications) to the minister then. We had cause to interact a few occasions after that until the Jonathan government was voted out of power. I have had cause to comment on her articles in The Point (online) on a few occasions.

    So, when I received her invitation to the event, and especially when this was followed by a reminder and yet another reminder, I knew my going to Lagos was inevitable. So, I went. And I must confess I did not regret it even if speaker after speaker regaled us with what we already knew.

    Eminent Nigerians, including Governors Kashim Shettima (Borno), Rauf Aregbesola (Osun)  and Ibikunle Amosun (Ogun) were lead presenters while Governor Akinwunmi Ambode of Lagos State was chief host. But Aregbesola was the only governor present as the three other governors were ably represented. Other dignitaries at the occasion were Oba Michael Aremu Gbadebo, the Alake of Egbaland who was royal father of the day; the Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi Lamido II, the special guest of honour. Pastor Tunde Bakare chaired the occasion attended also by the Minister of Niger Delta, Uguru Usani, chairman, Punch Nigeria Ltd, Mr Wale Aboderin, Mr Debo Adesina, Editor-in-Chief, The Guardian as well as many directors and directors-general in federal parastatals. Most of the speakers had between three to five minutes and they did justice to the issues raised, even if, as I said earlier, there was nothing new under the sun.

    Then came Governor Aregbesola’s turn. The governor kicked immediately the moderator said he had five minutes. Really, it is impossible to blame him on this score because it is not easy to come down to Lagos all the way from Osogbo only to speak for five minutes. As a matter of fact, his protest and preamble took more than the five minutes. He ended up speaking for about 40 minutes. Without doubt, you could hardly fault his prognosis of the Nigerian economy as well as his submissions to turn things around. Two areas of his submissions caught my attention. One, he calculated that we would be producing about 28 million tyres locally every three years, given that an average car has four wheels. I immediately remembered Dunlop and Michelin that we carelessly allowed to close shop and relocate elsewhere.

    Aregbesola also brought the point vividly home about the harm we do to ourselves by  failing to add value to our exports. According to him, we sell cocoa at about a fifth of the price we import chocolate (which is made from cocoa!) There were some other things said at the occasion, but, as I mentioned earlier, most of it we already know. What we have not done is walk the talk. And that is what we should do.

    However, much as the governor also advocated that we patronise made-in-Nigeria products to save our scarce foreign exchange, I looked at His Excellency’s shoes (he does not like that title though) and discovered they did not look like the ones made by our brothers in Aba. We would need to conduct ‘forensic audit’ on the shoes if the governor insists these are not imported products!

    However, that is just by the way. If Governor Aregbesola had concerned himself with the theme of the conference, which is: “What is the economics of change”, he would have been spot on. Unfortunately, he launched into an area he apparently does not have a full grasp of when he attributed the dwindling newspaper sales to dwindling professionalism, poor grammar, etc. The way he spoke, you would think he had a particular paper or some newspapers in mind. Without doubt, these have their negative impact on newspaper sales; but regrettable as they are, they do not sufficiently explain the drop in circulation. The fact is, in the days of Daily Times of yore that the governor spoke nostalgically about (when the paper sold one million copies daily, again, according to the governor as it is doubtful if Daily Times sold beyond 500,000 copies daily), things were by far better and different in the country than today – the economy, professionalism, and all.

    But I will use at least three examples to correct Governor Aregbesola’s assertion. The point is; newspaper sales are falling due largely to the country’s declining economic fortunes as well as some other factors. If the governor’s position on the matter was right, a newspaper that built its ultra-modern edifice as well as commissioned an ultra-modern press at a cost of over three billion Naira without a kobo loan from any bank would not have achieved that feat only about six years ago. Second, this very newspaper (The Nation) too made profit even in its very first year of operation about 10 years ago. That it is still doing fairly well in spite of our topsy-turvy economy, is proof of its acceptability by readers.

    Again, Governor Aregbesola may have to drive round Osogbo, the state capital, and see the huge number of free readers milling around newspaper vendors. They are hungry for news but lack effective demand, which is the demand backed up with the ability to pay, due to the failure of leadership we have had at all levels in the country. When workers nationwide begin to receive their salaries regularly again, Governor Aregbesola would better understand the point I am making.

    At any rate, how can we get professionalism as in the past in a situation where governments join the long list of debtors owing newspapers huge revenue? Again, going by the governor’s logic, is lack of professionalism the cause of dwindling sales of community newspapers too, because in those days, some of those papers did well for themselves?

    Perhaps the most devastating of the factors responsible for dwindling newspaper sales is the ubiquitous social media. It would interest the governor to note that even in the United States and United Kingdom where the newspapers publish impeccable Queens English, newspaper sales are also going down due to the effects of the social media, which in spite of their imperfections are working towards elbowing out the traditional newspapers that must wait till the next day to report events.

    All said, I seize this opportunity to congratulate the management of The Point on its first anniversary. I also apologise to Alhaji Nojeem Jimoh, a director of the company and former editor of The Punch (which I proudly refer to as ‘my source’ having started my journalism career there, rising to edit the daily title) for my inability to play the role he told me I was assigned at the occasion because I was only aware of that role on my way out of the venue. To dub the occasion a Punch affair would not be far from it as Mr Azubuike Ishiekwene, a former executive director (Publications) of The Punch was also there. Mrs Kolapo herself was once Business Editor of The Punch before joining the trade and industry ministry. Without doubt, The Point debuted at a time things are tough, not only for the media but for the economy at large. Yet, my advice to its management is that the sky is wide enough to accommodate all birds. If not, I would have said so. Indeed, the more, the merrier. The paper’s team should be guided by the aphorism that “when the going gets tough, only the tough get going”.

    Congratulations and welcome on board.