The Nation Newspaper

Category: Gbenga Omotoso

  • Just before Buhari’s ‘tough decisions’

    PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari could be blunt at times. He also has a wry wit. In fact, some of those who know him very well would swear that his sense of humour is remarkable. He deploys it in unusual ways.

    Consider that German trip on which he was asked about his wife’s comments on his administration. He did not simply tell his audience that his wife is no politician; he said “she belongs to the other room”. I am sure His Excellency must have let loose a loud guffaw anytime he got comments of women rights activists who suddenly woke up to launch a campaign that he wasn’t right to say that a (his) woman’s place is in the kitchen or in “the other room”. And comedians seized upon the phrase to fuel their trade, ascribing all manner of innuendoes to “the other room”.

    The President could also decline to join issues with his critics, taking it all on the chin. Even then, his silence is as loud as thunder. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s epistolary (mis) adventures failed to attract a wink from Buhari, who perhaps in the best traditions of military orientation, would not join issues with a senior officer. Now, who needs to be told how silence has been golden, trumping the din of the marketplace?  But Obasanjo, being Obasanjo, would not hold his fire. He keeps screaming that Atiku Abubakar is better than Buhari. Is anybody listening?

    Buhari has been asking some hard questions. Sound replies have been hard in coming. He once asked governors: “How do you sleep soundly when workers are not paid?” Of course, there was no reply. A cheeky fellow who claims to be close to some governors sneered at the question. He wondered how the President could understand it all as he does not know how Champagne tastes. “Who won’t sleep soundly after a glass of chilled champagne?” he said derisively.

    The President remarked that $16billion was spent on power. He asked: “Where is the power?”  Obasanjo, wily and crafty, actually admitted that $6.5b was spent. He advised those searching for answers to visit the ports where the equipment for power projects he initiated were rotting away.

    Buhari has also said Nigerians would like to have answers to the “irresponsible expenditures of 1999 to 2004 when oil earnings peaked at about N140  a barrel”.

    Now a foreshadow of his last four-year tenure which begins on May 29. I will take tough decisions, he warned when members of the Federal Executive Council visited to congratulate him on his victory at the February 23 election. Ever since he announced   this, questions have been flying all over the place. What are  the “tough” decisions our President is likely to take? There have been speculations, postulations and permutations on the “tough” decisions.

    Will Buhari grab the evil hands behind the herdsmen-farmers killings that have debased our claim to decency? Will he expose their sponsors, seize them and bring them to justice for their horrendous crimes? The military have been battling Boko Haram, the fiendish group that has killed many innocent Nigerians. At a point, we all felt helpless. Now the herdsmen-farmers wars are as worse as Boko Haram’s madness. How sweet it would be if Buhari decides to go all the way against the killers and their sponsors, who the security agents should know.

    Will private individuals who own oil blocks be made to shed some of their holdings for states to get a piece of the action? There is the thinking that many rich individuals have lost focus on how to spend the cash they harvest from their oil blocks; they funnel some to oiling the destructive machines we have all over the place. Will Buhari tackle them?

    The Malabu oil block (OPL245) scandal remains unresolved, a bad sore that won’t just heal. About $523m of the $1.092b paid for the block was shared out as bribes to some former ministers and by politicians. A former president was named in the dirty deal. Will Buhari hauled them all before the courts?

    The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) may wish to lengthen the list of banned items to save the naira from pressure and boost our foreign reserves? Local manufacturers will be happy, if we actually stop importing biscuits, cotton wool, eyelashes, eye shadows, eye shades, Brazilian hair, lip stick, lip balm and such frivolous items in the name of beauty care. Will the President approve that more items should join the list?

    Will the government carry out its threat to go after the billionaires who don’t pay taxes and won’t even come forward to negotiate how to pay? This also shall pass seems to be their thinking.

    Will petrol price go up for the embarrassing high subsidy to end? Will Buhari, being a friend of the poor, embrace the age-long official line that stopping subsidary will free some huge cash for infrastructural development?

    A special court for corruption cases has been advocated? Now injunctions are jamming injunctions as lawyers and judges argue over jurisdiction. Corruption cases take years to complete as defence lawyers take advantage of the loopholes in the system. With a special court, so goes the popular thinking, those who deserve to go to jail will go fast and return home early after learning a lesson or two in how to handle public trust. Those who don’t will know their fate as fast as possible. Will Buhari pursue this idea?

    Will the President listen to the mercantile advocates of restructuring if they agree that they know what they are talking about? Beyond being a vote harvesting and money minting gimmick in the hands of its insincere advocates, how good  is this phenomenon?

    A friend of mine could hardly name six ministers and their portfolios the other day. Many are believed to be bench warmers in the cabinet, enjoying all the appurtenances of office without the commensurate hard work that these times demand. Will Buhari throw away the dead woods or kowtow to political considerations in his choice of a cabinet? How long will it take to raise a cabinet?

    Many have pointed at the detention of former National Security Adviser (NSA) Sambo Dasuki as a stain on the human rights banner of this administration. Dasuki is being held for alleged diversion of about $2.1b cash meant for arms to fight Boko Haram. His case is in court. He has been given bail, but the authorities won’t let him go home. Will Buhari say why Dasuki must remain incarcerated or let him go?

    The Shi’ites keep protesting the detention of their leader El- Zaky Zaky and his wife. Like Dasuki, he is also being held under a thick security veneer that the public finds hard to understand. Will Buhari let El-Zaky Zaky go?

    A word of advice: If Buhari wants to have an opportunity to take some tough decisions that will form the legacy of his administration, which will be tabled when the verdict of history comes, he must pay attention to the shenanigans of some opposition figures in the battle for the leadership of the National  Assembly.

     

    The UAE robbery suspects

    FIVE Nigerians are being held in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for alleged robbery. They were said to have smashed their way into a bureau de change, grabbing its cash and injuring the staff. The camera on the premises gave them out.

    When the President’s Special Assistant on Foreign Affairs and the Diaspora, Mrs Abike Dabiri-Erewa, broke the news and named the suspects as some of those disgracing Nigeria overseas, there was anger – apparently because the youngsters (gangsters?) belong to the same ethnic group. Why won’t others be named? Are they the only people disgracing Nigeria overseas? Is it fair? Outrage.

    Abike Dabiri- Erewa

    It is all disgusting. We should be ashamed of what these youths have done instead of playing the ethnic card, as we often do. Some of the critics of the name-and-shame went ahead to release on the social media their own lists of Nigerians who are facing one allegation or the other overseas. Okay. But what is bad is bad.

    We all have a duty to educate our youths that crime doesn’t pay. It used to be drugs, 419 and prostitution. Now, it is armed robbery. The path of hard work, integrity and honesty can sometimes be strewn with thorns, but in the end it leads to success and peace of mind, which no hot cash can buy.

    In scolding our wayward compatriots, ethnicity shouldn’t feature.  Crime wears no ethnic badge; it is a universal phenomenon that should be condemned by all – always.

  • A peep into our leaders’ future

    NOW that the elections are over -somehow – it is fit and proper to ponder the future of some of the major actors. Court summons are flying all over the place as some launch desperate battles to reclaim what they call their stolen mandates. Others have surrendered to fate, that unseen hand in human affairs, to face life without the rough and tumble of politics. Just for a while, I bet.

    What will they do? Will they stay here or hop onto a plane and wave a long bye to this land of exciting contradictions? Will they join the struggle to rebuild and rework Nigeria? Will they defect to the winning party as politicians often do without scruples? Or will they just sidon look (apologies to the late Chief Bola Ige).

    Consider Senate President Dr Bukola Saraki. Since  populism flew high on the wings of the “O to gee” phenomenon to trump what the people described as a long-time hegemony, he has been a subject of relentless vitriol from all-comers. He took it all on the chin. Now there are postulations, permutations and speculations on his future.

    Some have suggested that Dr Saraki should stay put in Kwara and rebuild his political empire. Others said he should simply return to his first love – medicine. They went further to suggest his early clients, who are also VIPs in their own right – Senator Dino Melaye (of whom many have wondered, ‘what ails him; is he well?’) and former Ekiti State Governor Ayo Fayose (is he still in sifia pains?) who may soon ask the court trying him for alleged fraud for leave to attend to his health.

    Saraki, I learnt, won’t give up on politics. With hindsight, you count him out at your own peril.

    Many pundits have sworn that this is Atiku Abubakar’s last political battle, which he has vowed to fight with his all. They said on account of age, he may not be strong enough for the rigours of running in 2023, even if he has the financial wherewithal for the unpredictable venture.

    I suspect that when the court battle is over, the Waziri Adamawa, who is contesting President Muhammadu Buhari’s victory, will find the time to write his memoirs and debunk all those pesky speculations about his wealth, his women and his friends. Such rumours include what his opponents have gleefully described as the “Dubai Agenda” with which they claimed he wanted to clinch the presidency. Is it a myth or reality? What does it mean? Could it have handed Atiku power if it had not been checked as his opponents aver? Did Atiku actually have access to INEC’s server?

    Former Senate President David Alechenu Bonaventure Mark is not returning to the Red Chamber. What is crystal clear is that the retired soldier is not tired. He will surely be involved in the local politics, sponsoring his cronies for offices. More importantly, perhaps, Mark will now have time for golf, the elitist game for which he has a remarkable passion and in which he is said to have invested a fortune home and abroad. Now he can tend his courses better and savour the sheer lush greenery of the fairway and improve on his handicap.

    Besides, he can now splash more cash on the game, with the fairway so far away from the prying eyes of those curtain-twitching busybodies posing as whistle-blowers.

    General Jeremiah Timbut Useni, former military governor, former minister, former Quarter-Master General of the Army, distinguished senator and governorship candidate of the PDP in Plateau State, has vowed to reclaim his mandate. He says he was rigged out. Solomon Lalong, the incumbent governor, has since been handed the trophy.

    What will Useni do now? Get set to have another shot at the office? Retire from politics and go into humanitarian ventures, if indeed service is the engine that drives his ambition? I really don’t know. All I am sure of is that the senator will neither be bored nor be idle. No.

    There has been this clamour for his memoirs in which he is expected to shed light on what actually happened on June 8, 1998 when former Head of State Gen. Sani Abacha – of dreadful memory – died. Useni is said to be the only one who holds the key to unravelling how the man who ruled Nigeria with an iron fist passed on peacefully in his bedroom in what is believed to be either an orgy of concupiscence or a miracle.

    Now the amiable senator will have time to debunk all the rumours. Was there a bevy of Indian girls at the Villa when Abacha died? Where was his Chief Security Officer (CSO), Col. Hamza Al-Mustapha (retd.), the one singing like a canary and blabbing all over the place, when his boss succumbed to death? Was it a murder or a natural incident? Will Useni agree to write?

    Former Kano State Governor Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso believes his candidate was robbed of victory in the governorship election. Like many others, he is screaming and swearing and crying and sobbing and whining and singing and wailing that Umar Ganduje’s victory will be reversed. Interesting.

    Those who think the leader of the Kwakwasiyya Movement will be idle got it all wrong, I dare say. His Excellency will be available for politicians seeking Hausa votes in any part of the country. Articulate, calm and charming. Kwankwaso can always deploy his skills to woo his kinsmen living outside the North to vote whoever has sought his service. That, no doubt, is a hell of a job that will keep anybody busy. But, will His Excellency receive a just and commensurate reward for such physical and mental exertions?

    Oyo State Governor Abiola Isiaka Ajimobi is at peace with himself after losing the battle for Senate. He carries on with the business of state with the nobility and dignity of a self-respected leader, unlike some of his colleagues who are fighting for their integrity after being accused of betraying the party that gave them power. One was even hit with a criminal allegation of putting a gun to an electoral officer’s head to force his declaration as winner of a senatorial election – he denies it ever happened.

    Since Ajimobi mounted the saddle about eight years ago, Ibadan has ceased to be the haven for thugs and motor park warlords whose cutlass brandishing henchmen ruled and ruined the exciting city. Ibadan is now peaceful, no more home to gangsters, mobsters and tricksters. His Excellency will have his hands full, seeking peace where there is trouble – there are many such places in our beleaguered country. The Oyo formula will surely be handy.

    It is stale news that Senator Godswill Akpabio lost his seat in an uncommon election that was prosecuted in an uncommon manner by an uncommon electorate and some uncommon supervisors, who are defending it all in an uncommon way. Many have been wondering what the charismatic politician will do now.

    Akpabio, it has been suggested, should set up a first-class law chamber – many don’t remember he is a lawyer who strayed (or strolled) into politics. The uncommon senator, I am damn sure, has his eyes on a bigger stage, considering his closeness to the men of might and means in Abuja whose social functions he now finds time to attend. In other words, Akpabio is likely to get a national platform from where he will relaunch his uncommon political career and reclaim his lost crown. Will he not be betrayed again?

    The Uba brothers – Chris and Andy – lost the battle for Senate to another Uba, Ifeanyi, the controversial businessman. Chris Uba, you may wish to recall, had spoken of his plan to propose a law to protect godfathers. All that has become a mere dream, some conjectural fantasy of a wannabe senator. But the chief need not worry;  godfathers, fortunately, will remain with us for as long as we have willing godsons and goddaughters. He should return to that role in which he is so experienced.

     

    The Rivers conundrum

    RIVERS State residents are faced with a difficult question. Who won the March 9 governorship election? The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is laying claim to the prize. So is the African Action Congress (AAC), a relatively unknown party eager to become a giant killer. There are speculations that it is backed by the All Progressives Congress (APC), which fielded no candidate in the election.

    Results were being collated. Suddenly it all stopped, stuck in the murky mud of violence. INEC is set to resume the collation, but there are many results that are being pushed as the authentic representation of the wishes of the people.

    inec Elections
    INEC Chairman Mahmood Yakubu

    Amid the chaos, the AAC candidate’s running mate, Akpo Yeeh, jumped ship (o yeah, he did), defecting to the PDP. Suddenly. He got a warm reception at the Government House where Governor Nyesom Wike, PDP National Chair Uche Secondus and others were waiting excitedly to receive him. Before AAC could deal with the reality of a running mate dumping its camp to join its opponent’s (at whatever price), its vice chairman also threw in the towel to join – no prize for guessing which party – the PDP. Suddenly.

    There have been protests and protests. Who has the people’s mandate? Will INEC be seen as an unbiased umpire when it all ends somehow? Why has it all been so bloody? With soldiers in hospital, is it valid to say the army was the aggressor or aided the violence that attended the election?

    Until our politicians decide to bury their greed and allow the people to decide who gets their mandate, there will always be violence as personal interests and people’s interests clash. INEC will continue to get the bashing – wrongly.

    Since democracy remains the best way of choosing leaders, it must be saved in Rivers. But will our desperate politicians agree?

  • A long running show

    I HAD thought the elections and the accompanying melodrama would be all over by now. The vote bazaars, the fumbling and rumbling key actors, the hassling and haggling. How wrong I was; damn wrong. The show, which began on February 23 after a shift from February 16, goes on.

    Supplementary elections are coming in Bauchi, Kano, Sokoto, Plateau, Adamawa and Benue states. Legal battles are raging as politicians get more enraged over their fate. Rivers State politicians have turned their (beloved?) state into a ping pong, smashing it up and down and defending it at the same time. The young people who run the show have gone gaga. Elders are crying for help. Who will save Rivers?

    Where the elections have been concluded, the drama remains inconclusive. Gbenga Daniel (I bet you know him  very well), the former Ogun State Governor who was the face of the Atiku Campaign before the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) convention where his principal got the party’s prized ticket, suddenly announced the other day that he was waving a final bye to politics. Incredible. The news was shocking – to fans and foes alike.

    Why? Why now? Age? Health? Cash? Is he broke or broken by the peculiar vicissitudes of our peculiar politics? Heartbroken by Atiku’s costly loss? Or is it all a stunt – the type our politicians pull off with shameless dexterity? What ails Daniel?

    As many were struggling to unravel these puzzles, Daniel’s fans rushed down in droves to his palatial home. Their mission: to beg their hero not to quit politics. It was a moving scene. Women were crying. Men held their heads in their hands. Unable to hold their emotions, some went down on all fours, held Daniel by the leg and cried, begging him not to leave them in the wilderness. They grovelled and snivelled all day. “Please, don’t go; take us to APC,” they cried.

    Daniel, obviously a compassionate man, rescinded his decision. “My people have spoken. What else can I say?” he told reporters. End of the show? No. Not at all. Those curtain-twitching busybodies, whose number among us is unfortunately growing by the day, went after him. They claimed – as usual, without any proof whatsoever – that Daniel was broke, as if being broke is a criminal matter. Besides, they said he was eager to shake off the damning effects of a probe of his administration by Governor Ibikunle Amosun. He had thought an Atiku victory would be a sure ticket to those good old days of naira –sorry, a slip there – dollar rain. They called him names, saying he should have waited for Atiku’s legal battle to end before throwing in the towel.

    But the question remains inconclusive: is Daniel heading for the APC?

    Also inconclusive is His Excellency Rochas ‘Owelle’ Okorocha’s bid for a senatorial seat. INEC carried out its threat not to give him a certificate of return because, the electoral umpire claimed, his victory was obtained through the bullet and not the ballot. The electoral officer reported that he announced Okorocha winner under duress as a gun was put to his head. Wonderful..

    The Imo State governor is defending his mandate. He appeared on television the other day to say that he was unjustly shut out of that rowdy certificate presentation in Abuja. But he gave INEC the benefit of the doubt. “Maybe INEC wants to organise a special session for me,” he said, smiling. Yes; it is possible.

    As His Excellency was fighting for his certificate in Abuja, another war had broken out back home in Owerri. He was accused of withdrawing N7b cash in three days. Besides, he was pointedly told to get set for a probe. Poor fellow. It does not just rain it pours, as they say. Trust Okorocha, a man of outstanding courage and an exciting sense of humour. He dared the incoming Emeka Ihedioha administration to probe everything, including his meals.

    Those fellows whose business is minding other people’s business even as theirs remain unattended; those who know nothing about the workings of a government, began to gossip. Why such huge withdrawals? What for? Does he want to erect more statues or repair and erect again those that have been pulled down?

    Apparently not done, they hit the social media with a picture of His Excellency in a complete khaki uniform of one of the state’s paramilitary outfits. He is at attention – never mind the protruding tummy – with his two arms tightly placed beside his big frame, fists clenched and eyes looking straight.A brown beret sits gently on his gubernatorial head. The caption: “My governor on the way to INEC to collect his certificate.”

    His Excellency need not fret. He should remain hopeful and prayerful. These matters could take some time to resolve.

    Kano State Governor Umar Ganduje is confident of winning Saturday’s makeup election. Apparently unwilling to stand his confidence, his opponents have hit the social media to deride him. An old picture of His Excellency carrying a head pan at a construction site has been dug out and presented as fresh. “See how Ganduje is appeasing one of the communities where the supplementary elections will be held,” the purveyors of the fake news announced. There is yet another —of Ganduje and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu — an old picture taken when the governor visited the APC leader in Lagos last year. They said Tinubu was in Kano to influence the makeup poll. Lies. Bloody lies.

    Besides, what is wrong in a governor carrying a head pan; isn’t there dignity in labour anymore?

    At a thanksgiving service in his Iperu hometown, Ogun State Governor-elect Dapo Abiodun said he would not have won if men were God. He told of how he had run several times but failed and never gave up. That was the lesson. But some of those busybodies, aforementioned, took the matter beyond the church. They started their inquiries. Who was the “Incoming” referring to? Did anybody try to play God? Why did he not go all the way, like some other politicians, to name the small men playing God? Was he afraid?

    Suddenly, videos and photographs of a furious Governor Ibikunle Amosun, seized by a strange anger, leading the destruction of Abiodun’s campaign materials, appeared on the social media. His Excellency, who many would swear to be a man of manners, is seen supervising the mannerless assault on Abiodun’s posters. The APC candidate’s supporters were beaten black and blue and chased away from the stadium in Abeokuta when President Buhari visited.

    Are they insinuating that Abiodun was referring to Amosun?

    Oyo State Governor-elect Seyi Makinde has been on the road, visiting dignitaries and thanking everyone for his victory. He was with former President Olusegun Obasanjo in Abeokuta the other day. Asked by reporters why he was visiting, Makinde told the inquisitive fellows that he came to seek wisdom on how to run his administration. A cheeky fellow among the reporters was later heard telling his colleagues that he was sure that a one-day tutorial in “egocentrism” and “do-or-die” will not be enough for the “Incoming”.

    Atiku also came visiting. Obasanjo, you will recall, was one of his main backers who swore that Buhari must go. Now, Buhari’s supporters are claiming that Obasanjo has been demystified. Are they right?

    The Ninth Senate is yet to open, but one of its potential stars has been all over the place. Dino Melaye, who will again be representing the twice lucky people of Kogi West, a master stuntman and loudmouth, has been unusually quiet – no new tricks, no vulgarity and no abusive videos. It is common knowledge that there is no love lost between Governor Yahaya Bello and the distinguished senator. Now, there is this picture of the governor posing as a boxer – black round neck shirt with a red stripe and a pair of red shorts. His fists are clenched like a pro boxer’s, the left hand up and the right down, bent to deliver an upper cut. Beside the picture is Melaye’s. He is in a blue jeans jacket, his right hand across his chest, fist clenched.

    Are those posting these pictures suggesting that Dino should be careful because His Excellency is not just keeping fit but actually getting into a fighting shape? Is it true that he used to be an amateur boxer? I really don’t know. But, I have it on good authority that Bello used to run a motor park and a fleet of commercial vehicles somewhere in Lagos before fate vaulted him to his exalted seat. I don’t even know if he was a member of the NURTW (Up National!).

    As I was saying, this has been one of our longest running shows. It will begin to wind down as from Saturday, but nobody can predict when its melo drama will end.

     

    Delta girl Success’ video

    The government of Delta State has been battling to fend off attacks since the video of a little girl, Success Adebor, went viral on the Internet. The seven-year-old was sent out of school for unpaid fees. She said she would have preferred being flogged instead of being sent out of school. The government insists that fees are not to be charged in public schools.

    Success

    The headmaster of Okotie-Eboh  Primary School I, Sapele, has been suspended to allow a thorough probe of the matter. We await the government’s findings.

    Success’ case isn’t new. There are many kids who are on the street because of the greed of some teachers, who charge illegal fees. When their poor parents can’t pay, the kids stop schooling. Such teachers should be fished out and sacked.

    Many critics have been asking the state government to account for its huge revenue; it should.

  • Notes on Elections 2019

    I have always been intrigued by the fecundity of an average Nigerian’s mind. Every situation is an opportunity for creativity.

    The elections may not have been the ideal that we all strive to attain, people may have died (unnecessarily because an election is not a war), giants may have been humbled and hobbled, wrong choices may have been made and relationships that took many years to build may have been shredded, yet many will agree that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) put in so much to ensure a smooth exercise. It has been rough in some areas, not because INEC did not play its role, but the Nigerian factor threw in its usual intrigues.

    By March 23, it will all be over – hopefully. And the battle will shift to the tribunals where the disputes will eventually be settled. What will not be in dispute is the hilarity of the situation, courtesy of our compatriots’ ability to see a window of humour in every situation, no matter how dark.

    An NGO was campaigning that the electorate should vote wisely. “Some Nigerians went to their polling units looking for wisely on the ballot boxes,” a fellow said the other day. Another was wondering why the President reportedly lost in the polling units around the Villa. “Yes; that is very simple; corruption is fighting back. Who are the people living in this area? How have they been affected by Buhari’s policies and style of governance? These are the questions to ask,” said yet another fellow.

    As the collation and announcement of results dragged on, somebody suggested that INEC should announce results for only the two leading parties – the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). The others, he said, should buy scratch cards to check their results on the INEC website. INEC, being not that business inclined, did not consider the suggestion, let alone table it before the parties.

    The social media was alive. When it was rumoured that former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s candidate Atiku Abubakar lost in the polling unit where the former president voted, he was said to have smiled and retorted churlishly: “Am I contesting; wetin be my own? If Atiku lose nko? Dat na im toro, naim sabi.”

    It is heartwarming to know that PDP Chairman Uche Secondus has been at the vanguard of the battle to reclaim what he and his candidate believe is their stolen mandate, marching on INEC and threatening to go to court. Some morbid analysts had suggested that Secondus should fulfil his promise to die should Atiku lose the election. They suggested that if Secondus could summon the courage to commit hara-kiri, the PDP secretariat should be named after him as a mark of honour for a man who sacrificed it all for a noble party. But when will the PDP complete the building of the edifice?

    That, to me is unfair. Should Secondus be asked to fall on his sword just because Atiku lost? How about the other godfathers, those who swore – and worked as if it was their final assignment here – that Buhari will go? Obasanjo was speculated to have left Nigeria for good after Buhari won the election. I am happy to report that the former president is back, rambunctious as ever. He has threatened to continue to lash Buhari. He will surely be angry enough to.

    Buhari  has promised to find out what happened to the $16b that allegedly went down the drain in our desperate search for electricity during the Obasanjo Presidency. Just before the probe, may I report that Obasanjo once said whoever was looking for the cash should go to the ports where the equipment imported for the projects were lying abandoned. He was later to admit that about $6.5b went into the project. But will Buhari stop asking: “Where is the power?”

    When the Ibadan spiritualist, the self-styled “perfect living master” advised Atiku not to contest his loss in court, lawyers were up in arms against him. They grumbled that when soothsayers, necromancers and futurists descended on the Atiku Project, no lawyer complained. Now, said the learned men, when it is their turn to do business with the PDP and its candidate, he is being advised to smoke the peace pipe with Buhari. One lawyer, I learnt, was already compiling papers to sue on behalf of his fellow SANs for an express enforcement of their fundamental rights to encourage their client to launch a legal battle. Thankfully, there will be no such dispute anymore. Atiku has assembled a team of lawyers who have been working to ensure that he retrieves his “mandate”.

    Talking about Atiku’s mandate, a cheeky colleague sent me what was obviously a mischievous cartoon the other day. There is an Atiku effigy watching with deep interest a woman’s heavy back side. The woman is wearing a tight pair of jeans trousers, with the buttocks threatening to burst out of the enclosure into which they have been forced. The caption: “Ah! I have found where APC and Buhari have hidden my mandate.” Thankfully, our women’s rights activists did not notice the drawing; we would have been battling to quench the fire and fury of women who will be demanding apologies from all those sharing the offensive drawing on the social media. They would have been asking: “Is a woman’s backside now the vault for a stolen mandate?”

    There is also the picture of Governors Rochas Okorocha (Imo) and Ibikunle Amosun (Ogun), dejected, rejected and depressed. Sober. The caption: “See the demigods of yesterday.”  Amosun’s trade mark long cap is also pictured lying on a table with the caption: “Here lies a monument to self-conceit and the Samson’s Syndrome.” Apparently, the writer was referring to His Excellency’s failed battle to install a successor of his choice. APC’s Dapo Abiodun won the election.

    Okorocha has been through hell in a bid to make his in-law Uche Nwosu succeed him. APC Chairman Adams Oshiomhole accused him of erecting a monarchy. Many of his close allies felt the idea of his in-law mounting the saddle after him was nauseating; they jumped ship. His Excellency joined the senatorial race. The speculation was that the electorate punished him by voting for his opponents.

    Suddenly, the ballot was shoved aside for the bullet – so goes the story – and the Returning Officer announced Okorocha as winner. INEC kicked. It refused to recognise His Excellency’s dramatic victory. The Returning Officer said he announced Okorocha winner under duress. Nwosu is crying like a baby whose new toy has been grabbed by an unconscionable elderly man. He said he was robbed in the governorship race. PDP’s Emeka Ihedioha has been basking in the euphoria of his victory at the polls.

    Okorocha had been quiet since he was stripped of the trophy. He recovered from the hangover of the INEC shocker yesterday to tell the electoral umpire that it has no power to hold on to his certificate of return. Some of his kinsmen, who would not understand the sobriety of the situation, stormed  Owerri, the state capital, and maliciously pulled down one of those statues for which the city has been famous. “No more Okorocha’s erection,” they were screaming.

    In Cross River, Prof. Ben Ayade has been celebrating his victory. He has promised that by the time he will be leaving office, the state will be competing with Lagos. That is the spirit.

    Talking about celebration, a colleague yesterday sent me a video of some young women cat walking into an expansive sitting room. They all look like beauty pageant participants getting set for a parade – rotund buttocks in bum shorts, short skirts, big eyeglasses, eye shadows, eyelashes and high heels. They are obviously excited   as they wave “hi” to some boys in the room. The caption: “See heavy materials. They have just arrived government house for His Excellency’s victory party.” The scene – somewhere in the Niger Delta. The guests – likely flown in from South Africa, going by those unmistakable hips, according to a colleague who would rather argue about the identities of the governor’s guests. No need to guess.

    Viva democracy.

     

    …And the Word of the Week

    SUPPLEMENTARY elections will be held on March 23 to determine who should get the prize in the governorship elections in six states where the polls have been declared  “inconclusive”. For the exercise are Adamawa, Bauchi, Kano, Plateau, Sokoto and Benue. Interesting.

     Some are blaming it on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). That isn’t fair. INEC did not ask politicians to organise thugs who snatched ballot boxes and disrupted the process. Results were either shredded or mutilated, not by INEC, but by unscrupulous politicians and their agents. Ad hoc staff were abducted — by INEC? Of course, no.

    Now, the most popular word in town is “inconclusive”. It has become a subject of jokes everywhere. Cartoonists are not left out. I saw one on Tuesday in a newspaper. A man relaxing on a chair asks his son about his report sheet. He presents it and the man goes through. He discovers that mathematics is omitted and asks the son why the subject is not listed. The youngster replies: “The teacher has declared the exam inconclusive.”

  • Election 2019: A mock trial

    THE presidential election is over – won and lost. Not quite. The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Atiku Abubakar, has been threatening to challenge the outcome in court.

    Atiku insists that he, in actual fact, was robbed of the prize. Who stole Atiku’s “mandate”? How? Was it an armed robbery or a burglary? When; at night when everybody was asleep? Daylight? Who are the witnesses to this infernal heist? Were PDP leaders and their army of supporters on holiday when the thief struck? What kind of weapon was he carrying? A rifle? A pistol? Dynamite? Bombs?

    The court has its job cut out for it.

    Before the PDP could assemble its team of legal giants to file its case, before its supporters could get over the trauma of the loss, before the electoral umpire could be summoned to defend its decision and before the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and its candidate, President Muhammadu Buhari, could pick up the gauntlet, an army of legal experts with all manner of wonky opinions on the matter had sprouted all over the place. Incredible.

    In other words, the matter had become a subject of postulations, permutations and presuppositions in barbershops and coffee shops. Many Nigerians who have never held in their hands a copy of any law book, let alone see the four walls of a law school have been running mock trials on this landmark case.

    I stumbled on one of such gatherings the other day at the barber shop. Except that the protagonist was not dressed like a judge and the main actors decked no wigs and gowns, it was a typical courtroom setting.

    It is a bit rowdy. Then, one of the youths screams: “C-o-u-r-t!” All is quiet. “The next case is PDP, Atiku Abubakar and others versus APC, Muhammadu Buhari, INEC and others,” a young man says in a low voice portraying the sobriety of the matter at hand.

    One of the youths stands up. “My lord, I am Chief Oreofero Ojulari, SAN. I announce my appearance for the plaintiff. With me are Okwudili Afemefuna Chiachogomnma, SAN, Ahmed Amid and others.” Another rises. “My lord, I am Ogbonlogba Abijawara, SAN. My colleagues and I appear for the defence.”

    It was as if everything had been rehearsed. The gentleman posing as the judge adjusts his glasses. He pores over a copy of an old newspaper he is holding like a case file. “Thank you. Let the plaintiff come forward to present his case,” he says.

    “Milord, as I have said, I represent the plaintiff. I will like to crave your indulgence to cross-examine my client so as to present our case in a logical and conclusive manner that will help this honourable court to arrive at a just decision, which will reverse the injustice that my clients have suffered. Unjustly.”

    Atiku steps into the witness box. He dips his left hand into his pocket and brings out a white handkerchief. He removes his glasses and cleans his face. He is given a copy of the Holy Koran to swear. “I, Atiku Abubakar, do solemnly swear that everything that I will say is the truth and nothing but the truth. So help me Lord.”

    “Are you Atiku Abubakar, the candidate of the PDP in the February 23 election?”

    “Yes; I am – by the grace of the Almighty Allah, the One who gives power to whoever He pleases. May His holy name be glorified.”

    “Thank you. Is it true that you are saying and campaigning that  you won that election but that your mandate, which was given to you freely and fairly by millions of Nigerians to keep and to enjoy as you deem best under the Constitution, was stolen. Why did you allow it to be snatched from you?”

    “Milord. I have witnesses. I did everything to keep my mandate. I hired no fewer than 40million Nigerians to police it from 119,973 polling units to collation centres, yet these people came, like cattle rustlers, in the dead of the night, burgled the place and stole my golden mandate, which I am pleading with this honourable court to retrieve for me.”

    “Okay. Can you identify your mandate if you see it? Do you know its colour, size, texture and other features of the said mandate? How is it different from the one Muhammadu Buhari has?”

    “Yes, Milord. Yes; I can. I got it on February 23 from over 100,000 polling units across the country, in cities, towns and villages where thousands of our supporters came out ‘en masse’ to vote for me, Atiku. And I had warned the world that the APC people planned to come with some gadgets, which look like telephone sets, to slow down the card readers. Our people would then get impatient and storm out of the polling centres. Disenfranchised. That’s how they stole it.

    “The use of the card readers, I insist, was enforced in my strongholds. Southsouth, Northcentral and Southeast. Not so in the Southwest, Northwest and Northeast where the APC says it is strong.

    “Besides, Milord, the results were not electronically collated.”

    “Okay. It is alright. Can you confidently claim that you won the election despite all the anomalies that you have pointed out? Was the APC not affected by the card reader problems? Where were the 40million men you hired to collate the results? Again, who stole your mandate?”

    “I know them. APC, INEC, Buhari and Oshiomhole, who said I was not destined to be president. It was a huge conspiracy. They connived with the security people to snatch it from us. (He wipes his face again, shakes his head slowly and removes his glasses to wipe his face. The lawyer interjects: ‘Milord, we are sorry for that short break; my client is gripped by emotion over the traumatic events of those days. We are sorry. He needs to get himself together. The judge nods his head to show his understanding of the situation).”

    “Okay. How did you know you had won? Where was your confidence coming from?”

    “I was sure of my chance. Obasanjo, my former boss, who was always abusing me, fighting me and calling me names, forgave me. He campaigned for me. The international community was behind me. They said I couldn’t go to America, I went there and returned. No problem. Even the foreign observers who are now applauding the election can’t say that they didn’t know that I won. I had it all wrapped up. Unknown to me, they planned to snatch it at the point of delivery (He wipes his face again).”

    “At what point was it clear to you that your mandate or been stolen, hijacked, grabbed, snatched and pilfered?”

    “Simple. When the INEC people started announcing those figures. I was hearing, one million aight handired and sebunti poor thousand nan handred and pipty two botes and such things. I knew I had been robbed.”

    “Is it true that you lost your polling unit? Is it true that Obasanjo did not win his? Did you win in your village? Did your man Buba Galadima win his polling unit? Did Kwankwaso win his polling unit? So how did you win the away matches if you and your men lost at home?”

    “I didn’t lose my polling unit. No. That’s mere propaganda.The collation was the problem. My agents told them to stop it, but INEC refused to listen. Even when we told them that the Northeast that was under Boko Haram attack could not have voted that much for APC, they dismissed it. You see?”

    “I am okay for now,” the lawyer says. Atiku is asked to leave the witness box.

    “The court will adjourn till May 29 for the defence to open its case. I hope the date is suitable for us all,” says the judge, checking his diary. “No, Milord; that is the day my client will be inaugurated as the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces,” says the defence lawyer.

    The plaintiff’s lawyer springs up to his feet. “Objection, Milord. I will advise that we stop the inauguration, until the determination of the substantive matter.”

    “recally, I advise you file a formal objection. You can’t ambush this court, please. The two parties should agree on a suitable date. I rise.”

    “C-o-u-r-t!”

     

    Rapists on the loose …who will save us

    WHY has rape suddenly become an epidemic?

    A 16-year-old girl was in tears on Tuesday as she told an Ikeja Magistrates’ Court how she was abducted and gang – raped by four evil men at the Army Cantonment in Maryland, Lagos. It was an emotional session.

    The young girl was sent to buy pepper. She said: “They called me but I did not answer. They came and held my hands and put me in tricycle. Immediately my body changed and I started feeling somehow.” That was the beginning of a four-day ordeal for the poor girl.

    Three of the suspects, among them two students, are facing a three-count charge of conspiracy, defilement of a minor and abduction before Magistrate Bola Osunsami, who ordered that they be remanded in prison, pending advice from the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP).

    This and many other cases should interest our activists. Rapists are on the loose. It has never been this bad. Many of our youths are on drugs. Elders have lost their moral values, blinded by mad pursuit of wealth. The line of difference between man and animals is getting thinner by the day as many embrace a life fit for the jungle in towns and cities.

    Who will save our humanity?

  • Atiku calls Obasanjo

    BOOKMAKERS were confused. Some said it was going to be down to the wire. Others saw a rout. Atiku Abubakar, they vowed, was set to retire Muhammadu Buhari and send him back to Daura to tend his cows. Buhari, others claimed, will carry the day.

    And the long wait – the election took place on Saturday and the winner was announced at 4.39 a.m. Wednesday when many Nigerians were still snoring in bed – had everyone in a flap.

    Will an Elder Godsday Orubebe – where in the world is he? – show up at the collation centre, screaming and huffing and kicking and cursing and swearing and daring Prof. Mahmood Yakubu to continue the collation and announcement of the results? Can Yakubu play Jega, Prof Attahiru Jega, his predecessor at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), who remained unfazed as Orubebe went gaga? Will a judge issue an injunction stopping the show? The rumour was all over the place that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was shopping for a judge who will grant an “ex parte order” that the exercise should be stopped. Will somebody listen to the PDP’s shrill cry that the collation be cancelled? When exactly will the winner collect his prize? The anxiety was so much you could feel it. Many were wondering what the PDP had up its sleeves as it summoned its war council, the national caucus, to pooh-pooh the election.

    And the denouement. Yakubu announced Buhari as winner. He won with 15,191,847 votes. Atiku scored 11,262,978.

    There were many rumours. Some said Atiku was meeting with some foreign envoys to complain that he had been robbed. They should intervene to save democracy, he was said to have told them. As usual with such speculations, nobody could confirm it as no documentation of such meetings existed. Others said Atiku was under pressure to call Buhari and congratulate him. Yet, others –again without any proof whatsoever – swore that Atiku called former President Olusegun Obasanjo, one of his major backers, to seek advice on his next line of action.

    Could that be true? Is it not logical for Atiku to call Obasanjo, who put his integrity on the line for him in so controversial a manner? What did they discuss? “Editorial Notebook” asked an Atiku aide to clear the air on the rumour. He declined comments. Luckily, this reporter ran into a former school mate who claims to be close to the uncle of a friend of his whose maternal cousin works in the sprawling hilltop facility of the former president in the heart of Abeokuta, the Ogun State capital. He swore that Atiku actually called Obasanjo, but he confessed that he was not privy to the details of their discussion, even as he pleaded not to be named because of what he called the “sensitivity” of the matter.

    Here, nevertheless, is a conjectural account of the discussion between Obasanjo and Atiku since nobody would confirm or deny that they talked, let alone divulge the details:

    Atiku lies on a couch in the living room, surrounded by some friends and aides who are harrumphing about the election and its result. He suddenly rises and asks for his mobile phone. He goes into a room and calls Obasanjo.

    “Good morning, Your Excellency. This is Atiku Abubakar. I hope I didn’t wake you up sir.”

    Obasanjo: Waziri, is that you? Good morning. And how are you?

    Atiku:  I am fine sir. And you, baba?

    Obasanjo: Thank you. I dey kampe.

    Atiku: Your Excellency, I am a bit worried. I am sure you must have heard the result of the election. Is this a true reflection of the wishes of the majority of Nigerians? What is going on? I am worried, walahi, that democracy is being emasculated.

    “Huuuu! Huuuum! (Obasanjo clears his throat).You see, Abubakar, why are you worried? Is this the first time you have lost an election? Why allow your soul to be troubled?”

    “Baba, people have been mounting pressure on me to surrender. These are people, who should be fighting this big injustice against us; this obvious rigging and theft of my mandate, a mandate freely given to me by Nigerians. I will go to court, I swear. I am a fighter and I will fight this injustice.

    “One even said I should call Buhari and congratulate him. And I said, ‘for what?’ Where is that done? You contest an election, you are rigged out and you won’t go to court to fight it out and you will, instead, be calling the so-called winner. I am not a fool; I won’t.”

    “You see, Waziri, if I were you, I will simply call my opponent and say, ‘okay, as things stand now, you won, abi? It was all a game and in the true spirit of  true sportsmanship, I congratulate you’, Chikena! I will move on. But you politicians are hard of hearing.”

    “Sir, you say ‘we politicians’; are you no longer one of us? Are you not our leader?”

    “Me? I am not a politician o. With due respect, I am not. I am a statesman. I said so a long time ago. That is why I have stayed out of it. Nigeria is my politics. Anybody, I repeat, anybody who wants to destroy Nigeria, I don’t care; I am ready to go konko bilo with that person, no matter his position.

    “If they say Buhari has won, so be it. But if you have the courage to fight, as you have claimed, rally the media, get your supporters to organise mass protests in major cities and call on the world to rise and save democracy in Nigeria.”

    “Baba, what will our people say, our supporters across the length and breadth of this country? The masses of our people who we promised jobs, education, security; those who expect us to get Nigeria working again; what do we tell them? I refuse to surrender.”

    “Waziri, if anybody says you have not done well, dat na dem toro. You don’t owe anybody any apology. Let them also try and see how easy it is.”

    “Sir, what is the feeling of our foreign friends? I was surprised to see that some of them saw nothing wrong in the process – the violence, the disenfranchisement of many people who wanted to vote for us – and I said kai! And I… .”

    “Okay. Hold on. Hold it, please. You see, Oyinbo people won’t say what they didn’t see o. I didn’t expect it to go this way. I must confess. We can’t condemn this election on the basis of violence; it was largely peaceful. Is that clear?”

    “But, baba, if you tell them it is not peaceful; won’t they believe you?”

    “Please, my dear Waziri. Again, with due respect, I can’t lie. I have never lied. I don’t know how to lie and it is too late at my age to learn how to lie. God has given me all that I have asked for. So, why should I lie? But if you want me to join this fight, I will. I can talk to our foreign friends and my fellow statesmen, the Generals that they should not allow democracy to suffer.”

    “Some of our people are even saying you destroyed my chances with all you wrote about me in your book. I have told them not to embarrass you and… .”

    “Please, hold it! Don’t annoy me o. Me? Embarrass me? Point of correction. And get me straight and clear; nobody can embarrass Obasanjo. Not me. Never. If I wrote about you nko? Were they deaf when I told the whole world that you had repented? I said, ‘yes, Atiku was bad; he has confessed and repented and I have forgiven him. He promised not to do it again. Not so? If they are now saying all that nonsense and jagbajantics, that I contributed to your loss, that’s their problem, not my headache.”

    “No problem sir. I hear they are so afraid we could cause problems for them. They have asked the security people to start watching us.”

    “Security? Trouble ko treble ni? Let them keep watching. Security my foot. I dey my house, let them come and carry me.”

    “Even Secondus is asking me to call you and say my mind – that I must defend democracy and … .”

    “W-a-z-i-r-i. Thank you. Secondus; who is so called? I dey laugh o! (He chuckles). You see, when you make Secondus your chairman, do you need to search for why you’re second? If you carry second, na Obasanjo do am? A beg I need to go back to bed. I have a squash game to play in a few hours. I wish you all the best.”

    “Bye-bye sir.”

     

    UNILAG Eight and their distraught victim

    A UNIVERSITY of Lagos (UNILAG) student, 17, has told of how eight fellow students  gang-raped her, filmed the act and blackmailed her with it. Five of the suspects have been arraigned before a court. The others are being sought.

    The victim was afraid of telling her story, but her friend helped her to unload her burden. She was hospitalised for days. The parents of some of the suspects offered her parents between N3m and N5m to settle the matter, but they refused to sell their dignity.

    Justice Sururat Soladoye of the Ikeja Domestic Violence and Sexual Offences Court has adjourned the hearing till March 18. Rights activists and all lovers of justice should pay attention to this case, which is a vivid expression of man’s inhumanity to man, pure savagery and bestiality.

    The parents who tried to bribe the victim’s family are shameless and useless – even to their children who took a fiendish pleasure in hurting their fellow student. Where is that common humanity that separates us from animals in the jungle? We need to find it and restore it through the instrumentality of law and justice as well as good parenting..

  • INEC’s ‘force majeure’ and matters arising

    “ELECTION is no war.”

    I’m not the author of that profound statement ; the copyright belongs to the United States Consul General in Lagos, Mr John Gray, who was interviewed by the BBC. Is Mr Gray right? Yes. No.

    Democracy offers us a chance to exhibit our freedom of choice. Just get the ballot paper, thumbprint your choice and drop it in a box. The votes are counted and results announced. The winner and the loser are expected to be patriotic – the country first. That is when an election is no war. Just the ballot; no bullet. That is the ideal.

    Consider the reverse. How dare you go into an election without an army of roughnecks and a huge cash vault to buy votes, hire legal giants and procure justice,  should you have to take the battle to court. You cause some heads to be smashed here and some limbs broken there; it is all in the spirit of the game. Now tell me, isn’t this a war?

    Why is it so here? The Nigerian attitude. Put a round peg in a square hole, tell the world that it is working, refuse to play your part and blame it on others. Do everything surreptitiously to smother the system. Invite experts and charlatans – we are never short of them – to analyse why everything failed and get everybody talking at the same time. This goes on and on, until the next disaster.

    Many had the funny feeling that the February 16 elections would run into a hitch. An obviously troubled INEC trying to get by; desperate politicians talking as if we were headed for a motor park officials’ election and marauders taking advantage of the tension.

    Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai issued his “body bag” warning and international observers restated their altruistic motives. Two vehicles carrying voting materials were burnt in Akwa Ibom; two people were killed in the incident. Hundreds of thugs were seized by the police. INEC offices and materials were burnt in Anambra, Plateau and Abia states. There were stories of compromised INEC officials in some states.

    In Abeokuta, the President and the Vice- President became victims of some wild ego, stoned by some wild people at a wild rally that was to be their party’s. Nobody has been arrested for this treasonable action. Incredible.

    And then the banal remark about the weather. A plane carrying the materials for the Southeast could not land in Enugu due to poor weather. Where was the weatherman? Did he play his part? A minister actually ruled out weather as the culprit here.

    Trust Nigerians. They consoled themselves by turning it all into jokes. Such jokes flooded the ubiquitous social media. One wondered why event planners were not hired to organise the election since it was, after all, an event. Another started sending his greetings (Happy postponement o). And many replied (Same to you o).

    My plan was to suggest that a 200-man “high powered” probe panel  be set up to find out what went wrong. Were the reasons given for the postponement tenable? Was anybody negligent by his or her act or acts of omission or commission? At what point did INEC decide it should postpone the election? What led to the postponement of the announcement of the postponement until about five hours before the voting? Who and who were informed before the announcement was made? Who was not informed? What are the remote and immediate circumstances of the postponement? Is the postponement real or part of an invisible game by some key elements of the system? Is somebody a puppet here? If so, who is the puppeteer?  The panel should examine also all other factors that may help us make some sense of all this.

    To chair this all-important panel is Maurice Iwu (remember him?), a professor of pharmacognosy and a former chairman of INEC, who hopefully will want to deploy his vast experience to save the nation at this difficult time. Just then, I stumbled on a social media post that I may have been a bit late – the amiable professor was already consulting for a party in this electoral battle. I couldn’t immediately confirm this.

    Tempers are rising. Allegations – that money has changed hands, Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs) are wrecking their residences and card readers are being compromised in collusion with some unscrupulous foreign powers – are flying around. The puzzles are getting more puzzling. What is to be done?

    To the barber shop I headed yesterday.  As usual, it was packed full of all manner of people– experts and expats, youngsters and gangsters, workers and wreckers. Some were watching soccer on television; others were engrossed in a game of draught as two fellows slugged it out on the board.

    Suddenly, all heads turn to the wide door as an old man stomps in, screaming: “What a hell! Damn it!” He is sweating. A young man offers his seat and the bearded man sits on it, the old furniture creaking as if it is set to break.

    “Long time, Papi D,” says the distracted barber, a rotund fellow in a white coat like a doctor’s and a blue apron that shields his dress from the strands of hair that stray off after succumbing to the sharp blade of the clippers.

    “It’s all nonsense. It’s all nonsense what we are facing in this country,” the old man replies. “I have been going up and down to tell our people to be prepared for the elections because after chasing away the military, we don’t have any other means of choosing our leaders. And now, here we are.”

    Some  young men harrumphing about the postponed elections descend on Papi D, an old lawyer who claims to have studied in England “when cocoa money was the king”, firing questions.

    “Easy, easy, young men. I am also agitated, but I have refused to be confused. No. Never. Ask your questions one after the other. I have time today.”

    “Sir, why did INEC Chairman Mahmood Yakubu announce  the postponement in the dead of the night?”

    “You see, I don’t know how many of you are Yoruba. What is the difference between ‘Yakubu’ and ‘abuku’? When it all seems hazy and there are questions of sincerity and character, elders will start warning that you should beware of ‘abuku’ and ‘ete’. They both mean ‘disgrace’. If your name is Yakubu, you will easily be told to be careful not to become ‘Yakubu alabuku’(the disgraced Yakubu) so that the world will not be saying ‘abuku Yakubu ni o’ (It is Yakubu’s disgrace). That is my positon; I won’t blame anybody, not even Yakubu – for now.

    “We are all Nigerians – those appointed to run the show, those who have gone round the world to seek how to compromise the system and those carrying cash around to simply buy or purchase or procure or obtain everything, believing that money can do all things.”

    Just before Papi D calls for the next question, the heavy clouds that have darkened the sky give way to a downpour. It begins to rain and more people rush into the shop. Everybody is talking at the same time. Confusion. The barber keeps shouting: “Order, order; I say order, gentlemen.” Nobody is listening.

    Papi D deeps his hand into his bag, whips out a small bottle, opens it and turns the content into his month. He frowns his face as he battles to cope with the biting effect of the drink, smiles like a baby and bites his lips. “You see, Mr barber, you should also be in the spirit; these are unusual times. I can see that the noise you are trying to stop will continue. That is what some people want. When it reaches a crescendo, they will now move in with an interim plan for peace. But I can assure you, we won’t let it pass; we have been there before.”

    The rain subsides. Papi D carries his bag on his shoulder and shouts: “See you later, everybody. And don’t forget to vote on Saturday.”

     

    That Keyamo and Dino encounter

    DINO Melaye is back – in his rambunctious best. The senator has been off the scene for a while – no thanks to a brush with the law. He was hospitalised after a botched attempt to resist arrest.  He released a video recently, thanking Nigerians for standing by him.

    There he was on Tuesday, sparring with Buhari Campaign spokesman Festus Keyamo (SAN). At issue was the presidential order that ballot box snatchers will pay dearly for their action. The Kogi West senator was as abusive and reckless as ever as he made his point that President Buhari was wrong to have spoken the way he did. Keyamo insisted Buhari was simply following the law – ballot snatching is treasonable.

    keyamo

    The force with which Dino spoke has forced some to ask: “Is Dino planning to snatch a ballot box?” Others have been asking why the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has been so vociferous in criticising the presidential order. Are its members planning to snatch ballot boxes?

    It was revealed during the encounter that Dino has been studying law. Keyamo advised him to spend more time in class than “clowning in hospitals”. Some viewers chipped in: “Has Dino gone to the right hospital?”

  • See you at the polls on Saturday

    FEBRUARY 16 is here. It is just a few hours to Nigeria’s date with history. The general election begins on Saturday.

    It has been a long, tortuous journey full of drama, venom and malice. The battles have been fought on many fronts – newsrooms, boardrooms, restrooms and staffrooms. Internet “hyenas” and “jackals” have been at their most venomous, splashing hatred and lashing everybody.

    The tension has been so thick one could slice it with a kitchen knife. Elders and leaders have become mere dealers, with some claiming they have the key to a race’s brain box. Others have dumped the garb and dignity of statesmen to jump into the arena of politics, spewing out lies and concocting weird scenarios.

    It is an old ambush-and- hit war strategy: whip up sentiments against the opponent with a big heap of lies, play the victim by urging the world to keep an eye on him, rally people of like minds and dreams behind you and  get set to strike. Raise as much hell as you can and then go for the kill; hammer him.

    Obasanjo, a combatant of some repute, has been a master of this “shock and awe” strategy, which he used against Dr Goodluck Jonathan just before the 2015 elections. He accused the former president of breeding snipers who would be unleashed on the populace if he lost the election. Dr Jonathan lost and returned peacefully to his Otuoke redoubt, holding Mama Peace by the hand. The strategy has been deployed against President Muhammadu Buhari, a soldier, who seems to be unperturbed. Naturally. Has it worked? We shall see on Saturday.

    So prominent is Obasanjo’s role – he rallied some parties to form a stillborn coalition and delivered a lengthy diatribe of a press statement excoriating Buhari –  that the respected former president became the object of derisive jokes on the social media. There is this picture of Obasanjo in which he is dressed in a big “agbada”, cap and dark shoes. His neck is turned to the right as his head falls in total submission to the awesome power of nature. He is asleep at a public function. The caption: “Nobody should wake him up until the election is over; im wahala too much.”

    The religion card has been played in a desperate bid to heighten the tension. Buhari was accused of planning to Islamise Nigeria and Nigerians. As I write, the Church is getting stronger and nobody has claimed to have been Islamised.

    Besides, ethnic jingoists stepped up their campaign that Buhari was planning to enthrone a Hausa/Fulani hegemony – an age-old song. Will religion and ethnicism play a role? We shall see on Saturday.

    Guns were booming in many communities. Farmers and herders who had been together for ages suddenly became bitter enemies, killing one another and destroying structures that represented many years of toiling and sweating. Homes were burnt. Cows were stolen. Human life became a ping pong ball smashed across a table until it got broken, replaced by another, which is also smashed and broken for the morbid cycle to go on.

    Now, the guns are silent. Some peace. A governor made a huge show of the funeral of the victims of such killings. Obasanjo and his co-travellers turned the state into a tourist attraction. Tragedy-for-sympathy became a political tool and state policy. Take a bow Benue Governor Samuel Ortom. He dumped the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and shortly after, the killings stopped. That was magical.

    Will all this count in this election? Let’s wait till Saturday.

    Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Walter Onnoghen was accused of failing to declare some choice assets of his. He was told to face the Code of Conduct Tribunal after an investigation by the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB). His Lordship, a honest man, simply told the truth – he forgot to declare the said assets, among them an account through which some $3m had passed.

    Indiscretion? So thought many patriots. Not so the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA). It rose like the Eiffel Tower in defence of the symbol of its trade and insisted that Justice Onnoghen should face the National Judicial Council (NJC) and not the CCT. A wise man, Justice Onnoghen would rather not sit at judgment in his own matter; he sent the NJC on an indefinite suspension and then launched a series of legal battles to stop his trial. The CCT, unbowed, yesterday ordered his arrest.

    As I said, eminent lawyers lined up behind Justice Onnoghen. They were falling on top of one another to enlist in his army. But there were some renegades, who felt the procedure should not trump the substance. Did he do it or not? That should be the question, they roared for their lonely voice to be heard amid the popular din. Step forward for recognition, the indomitable Prof Sagay Itsejuwa Esanjumi, SAN.

    Stalemate. Not quite. Armed with an order of the CCT, Buhari suspended the CJN and swore in an Acting CJN, Justice Ibrahim Tanko Muhammad . The crisis, rather than recede, boiled over. The NBA ordered a two-day court boycott, which many shunned even as the association’s officials launched an enforcement that sent the public wondering: “Are these lawyers or NURTW (Up National!) members?”

    The NJC has somehow found the courage to sit. It has given the CJN seven days to defend himself against the allegations hurled at him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

    The opposition PDP joined the fray. It accused Buhari of planning to emasculate the Judiciary ahead of the elections. The Senate rushed to the Supreme Court to find out if the President was right in suspending Justice Onnoghen. Curtain-twitching busybodies launched pro- Onnoghen protests, calling for his reinstatement because “he has committed no offence”. Incidentally, CJN Onnoghen was later to reveal graciously the secret of his remarkable wealth – farming. Now, where art thou ye doubting Thomas who see no redeeming feature in the government’s diversification efforts!

    Will the Onnoghen matter affect the election? We shall see on Saturday.

    After the CJN Onnoghen matter and the Obasanjo tantrums, the international community stepped in. The EU, the U.K. and the U.S. cautioned that credible elections should be guaranteed. The Federal Government was angry. It warned that it was all Nigeria’s internal affairs and that our sovereignty should be respected. APC Chair Adams Oshiomhole was furious. He said Nigeria had long ceased being a colony.

    The United States has since assured Nigerians that it has no preferred candidate, but interested only in free and fair elections. Will all the parties agree on what constitutes a free and fair election? What are the parameters? Is an election free when the winner gets his prize and becomes magnanimous in victory and  the loser imbibes the spirit of sportsmanship, believing that Olympics is not for winning, as they say?

    Saturday is here. We shall see.

    When Nasir Hell (a slip there; I take that again) El-Rufai, the tempestuous governor of Kaduna State, jumped into the fray, it became a full-blown street fight. He warned foreigners to behave so that there will be no need for body bags. That was highly inflammatory; combustible. The governor was pilloried to no end. But the Presidency lent him a hand, stressing that His Excellency spoke in the national interest.

    The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has told the international observers that they are just to observe and not monitor the elections. What is the difference between an observer and a monitor? We shall find out on Saturday.

    The Chinese, apparently, won’t be left out of this momentous moment – thanks to the social media. A friend sent me this yesterday: “Breaking News. The Chinese President has spoken on the February 16 election. He says, “chai choi ting. Young tei won feng. Nigeria chun fun chom 2019 feng chaing kin koo kung.

    “After looking at the whole thing, I agreed with the Chinese president. After all, it is in our national interest.”

    See you on Saturday at the polls.

    The Benin City torture victim

    THE police in Benin City, the Edo State capital, are holding five suspects who allegedly stripped naked a young girl, beat her up and poured hot pepper into her private parts – all in a savage bid to make her confess to stealing a phone. The video of the obscenity went viral on the Internet.

    The girl denied stealing the phone. She confessed under duress, she said. “They took me to a jujuman who said I was the one that stole the phone, but I maintained my innocence, until he brought a live snake to frighten me. It was then I said I took the phone, but I don’t know where it is. As soon as he left, the boys pounced on me, stripped me naked and started beating me.”

    Otoghile Joel, Lucky Igbinoba (aka One Man Squad), Edobor Osemwengie, Kingsley Iyamu and Ekponmwen  Friday are facing 14-count charge bordering on unlawful attempt to kill, kidnapping, attempted murder, unlawful administering of noxious substance into private parts and unlawful trial by ordeal. There are other charges.

    Prosecuting counsel Peter Ugwumba told the court that no phone was missing and it was all conceived to extort money from the victim.

    The poor girl’s account of her ordeal is moving. It is a vivid illustration of the bestiality that has displaced our humanity. Rights activists and all lovers of decency should pay attention to this case. I trust the court will determine who is right or wrong in this matter and dispense justice without favour.

  • Manual for a crucial election

    POLITICS is in the air again.

    Big rallies and debates; speeches, facts, farce and figures. But many are praying that February 16 should just come quietly and go quietly. There is so much tension in the land. So thick is the tension that you could slice it with a kitchen knife. Some are excited by it all. Others are indifferent. Many are angry – that by this time in 2015, the green back was the currency of preference. It was raining dollars as politicians prepared for the elections. Alas, as it turned out, money couldn’t buy victory.

    As usual, “Editorial Notebook” remains apolitical, even as it holds a ringside ticket for this historic show. This taciturn stance, it is to be noted, has done little to stop the flood of inquiries from far and near by politicians and their supporters desirous of grabbing the prize.

    One would have ignored such inquiries but for the public service and scholarship orientation of this column as well as the need to enrich public debate. Here then, dear reader, is an update of the old manual on how to win elections with which you are familiar – free:

    After securing your party’s ticket, do not waste time to raise a big campaign team, which will be led by one of those who contested the ticket with you. In other words, be magnanimous in victory and show that you will run an “inclusive” campaign. Some busybodies may be deriding your victory by saying you bought the ticket at $5,000 per delegate and all that. Never mind; they are mere interlopers who are not even members of your party.

    As soon as you have the ticket in your pocket, sit down and spare a thought for your past. Is there any person or group or interest or section that you need to appease? Is there any testimonial that can jeopardise your ambition? Should there be the impression that you are a shifty politician who cut deals to feather his own nest – as most good politicians like you are often labelled – launch a desperate battle to correct it.

    Make peace with your former boss. Raise a team of credible people who will join you on a visit to him. Confess your sins – no need denying them at this stage – and ask for forgiveness. Cry like a baby. Go down on your knees. Promise never to misbehave again. You will be shocked that he, your former boss, will simply say: “Go in peace; thy sins are forgiven thee.”

    The effect, needless to say, will be magical. Your former boss, who had scorned you as if you were the head of the 40 thieves Ali Baba trained, will lead your campaign. He will tell the world that you have changed and that you are, in fact, the best man for the job.

    Your opponents will be all over the place campaigning. Never fret; you will have enough time to do that. Hop onto a jet and fly overseas for some key meetings which cannot be held anywhere in Nigeria. You can go to Kuala Lumpur or Chattanooga or Ouagadougou or Bandar Seri Begawan or Yamoussoukro.

    Should your opponents taunt you that there is a country you cannot visit just because you have not been there in more than a decade for some minor allegations,  stay calm. Do not panic. No comments. The way out? Simple. Hire some fellows whose business is to mind and mend other people’s businesses. They are called lobbyists. They will surely impress it on their home governments that you just cannot be ignored as you may eventually get the prize. Who will want to make an enemy of the future leader of the world’s biggest black nation? In no time, your visa will be ready. Don’t announce to anybody, including your ardent supporters, that you will be travelling. Get the best of photo opportunities for a few days and return home in triumph.

    Campaigns? Not yet time. Relax. Get on the propaganda train. Tell the world that your opponents are planning to rig the poll. Discredit the umpire by saying it is peopled by your main opponents’ relations. Tell the world that the police and other security agencies must be persuaded to be neutral. Urge the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union and, indeed, the international community to prevail on the government of the day to allow a free, fair and credible election. Create a bold impression that the election is yours to lose.

    The result, you will be shocked, will be electrical. U.S., U.K. and E.U. will issue statements, cautioning that all sides should respect the rules and do everything not to jeopardise the credibility of the election. Your opponents will be on the defensive.

    You can now launch your campaign. Some lazy observers, who will never care to attend your rallies let alone get involved in it, will say either the crowd is scanty or rented. Others will say the campaign lacks bite – whatever that means. Ignore them. Keep your eyes on the ball.

    Your former boss should be encouraged to play the statesman’s role. He should come out with an earth shaking statement delivered at a “world press conference”, alleging that your opponents had concluded their plan to ruin the poll by rigging it. He need not tender any evidence; his stature should be enough proof that no lie is intended. Okay?

    Your opponents and their anxious supporters will hurl invectives at you. They will say your “statesman” is a frustrated politician who gathered a few sympathetic newspapers and radio/television stations, lying that the show was a “world press conference”. Do not join issues with them; they have a right to their opinions. Is that not the hallmark of democracy?

    There will be a rash of debates all over the place. Choose discreetly the one to attend. If they ask you how you will strengthen the economy, tell them that you will sell the state’s oil company, the goose that lays the golden egg, and enrich your friends, who will in turn empower their friends and their friends will also empower their friends and on and on like that. There will be an outcry – that you are planning a government of friends, by friends and for friends.They will say you plan to sell NNPC on Jumia, Konga, Dealdey and VConnect. Laugh it off. It is not your fault that your opponents have no friends or lack the deep affection you have for your friends.

    If the audience seems to be unconvinced about your economic plan, tell them you will grant looters amnesty. You will be derided for planning a “lootocracy”, a government of looters, by looters and for looters. Never mind; that is the way of politics. How do we bring back the loot if we don’t pamper the looters?

    After a while, you should renew your allegation that your opponents are planning to rig the polls. Your proof? Oh; the Chief Justice or some top government official has just been removed. Your opponents will again be on the defensive, asking: Is the Chief Justice a member of your party? Is it true you planned to ambush the ruling party in court? Why are you crying more than the bereaved? Is “suspension” the same as “removal”?

    They will mock you, saying your party “is threatening to boycott elections because Buhari has removed their goalkeeper”. Never mind. What do you expect from a soccer-crazy country?

    Corral as many groups as possible – League of Wizards and Witches, Association of Genital Mutilators and Face Markers, Union of  Port Rats and Allied Professionals and Wuruwuru Bar Association and more – to back you. Throw in some group of elders (never mind those who will deride them as dealers)

    As the election draws near, get some foreign and local media houses to endorse you. There may be so much noise that the predictions are off the mark. So what? Again, ignore them and keep your eyes on the ball. The end, remember, justifies the means.

    Now that you are set for this popularity battle, tell your party’s leading lights to be in high spirits as they announce that you have won. Those armchair critics, aforementioned, will demand proof. Laugh it off. Were they out of town when all those groups endorsed you?

    All rights reserved under International Copyright  Conventions. No part of this manual may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of this copyright owner.

     

    Herdsmen and reprobate youths’ bloody end

    THEY were young, agile and bright, the pride of their parents and the hope of many. They had a promising future. They were the stars of their community. All that collapsed one bloody night in a bush where they had gone to be initiated into a cult.

    Some dangerous herdsmen thought they were the target of the strange night gathering deep in the heart of a bush. They opened fire at the young university students. Two fell, never to rise again. Three escaped, badly injured. The bodies were found by farmers.

    Residents of Abraka, Delta State are still struggling to understand why these  young, energetic men lost their heads. They ought to have been studying, but they chose to gather in a bush, wearing a cult group’s uniform, for an initiation that never was. Why did they join a cult? Money? Power? Sheer exuberance? We do not know, but what is clear as day is that these youths’ vacuous move has plunged many into mourning.

    Will our young ones learn from this foolish act?

  • The Onnoghen conundrum

    EXCITING times are here.

    The Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) accused of false assets declaration won’t quit. He suspends a meeting of the National Judicial Council (NJC); he is suspended and an Acting CJN is sworn in. Lawyers kick. Roll back the actions or face a court boycott, the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) roars.

    Stalemate? Not quite. Injunctions are jamming motions; sanctions are flying against actions. Railing and rulings all over the place. Confusion. Enter NJC. It suddenly jerks back to life after the CJN had suspended its meeting “sine die”. CJN Onnoghen and Acting CJN Tanko Muhammad get seven days to defend their integrity. Some lawyers make good their threat to boycott courts; others won’t, questioning the moral platform on which the NBA is standing.

    All is tense. So thick is the tension that it could be sliced with a kitchen knife. When politics jams rule of law, the result is ruin of law; a legalistic conundrum. But law is capable of resolving its complexities.

    In restrooms, staffrooms, guestrooms and newsrooms, arguments are raging. Who is right? Who is wrong? What is right and what is wrong? It is so exciting- and worrisome.

    Long live the bard. Sweet, indeed, are the uses of adversity. In all this, there is a redeeming feature. I have been told of the great potential of our jurisprudence being enriched. Besides, language has played a major role in this matter. It has been the fuel on which the engine of the legal battles runs. In other words, we need to review the semantics of this exciting time.

    Until President Muhammadu Buhari suspended the CJN following an order of the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT for short, nobody knew that “suspension” could have another meaning. The main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) cried out that Buhari had “removed” the CJN in a bid to “annex” the Judiciary ahead of the February 16 election. The fireworks began. When does “suspension” become “removal”? Is Onnoghen a PDP member? Why is the party crying like a baby whose lollipop has been grabbed by an inconsiderate elder?

    All manner of postulations and permutations and indications began to “emerge” in the social media where many were saying that they “learnt on good authority” that Justice Onnoghen and the PDP “knew’ each other. Any proof? None, of course, was tendered – as usual.

    Justice Onnoghen, a lawful man, went to the Court of Appeal to obtain an “injunction” against the CCT trial. The Federal Government got an “ex-parte” order from the CCT. Injunctions. Motions. Counter motions and more motions. The water got really muddled up. Those knowledgeable about these intricacies said the CJN himself had warned judges against issuing “ex-parte” orders.

    When a party gets an order against an opponent in his absence, such an order is “ex-parte”, which, I am told, is issued only in emergencies.  In such cases, the opponents will be crying that they were not heard, that the orders had been purchased, procured, bought or obtained. And lawyers will be warning them to guard against “contemptu curie” or “contempt of court”.  Is the CJN matter not an emergency the Constitution never thought could occur? I really don’t know.

    I am glad to report authoritatively, dear reader, that nobody has been charged with “in facie atrium contemptui” or “contempt in the face of the court” – a grave offence that can earn instant sentence to jail. Not even lawyers who have been storming courtrooms to stop judges from hearing cases, all in the name of enforcing the boycott.

    Right or wrong, courts are courts even if they issue conflicting orders in a strange battle to assert superiority or right to sit over some matters. This is called “jurisdiction”. In other words, does the Court of Appeal question the CCT’s jurisdiction in the Justice Onnoghen’s matter?

    But why should anybody cry over a mere “ex-parte” order when there are people who have in their kitty a “perpetual order”? They cannot be investigated or arrested or molested or detained or questioned or harassed by “the government or any of its agencies, either by themselves or their servants, privies , agents and any other in whatsoever way or by whatsoever means until this order is vacated”.  If I were the CJN, this is the order I would have sought to obtain. A cheeky fellow told me in the newsroom the other day that this order “is for the big boys only”. Who is bigger than the biggest boy of the Judiciary?

    As I was saying, the PDP cried foul and said the “procedure” for the “removal” of the CJN was not followed. An army of lawyers rose in defence of this line of argument. The CJN, they maintained, should have been brought before the NJC. But a meeting of the NJC had been postponed “sine die” by no less a personality than its chair, the CJN. Curious. “Sine die”, I learnt, means “indefinitely”. Yet, the PDP and the lawyers insisted that the NJC must be the arbiter in this matter.

    But the government insisted that the allegation of false asset declaration is within the purview of the CCT because it did not occur in the line of duty. It arose in the conduct of the CJN as a public officer. In other words, the “procedure” became the subject of the huge row; the substance – that the CJN by “mistake” “forgot” to declare that he had some hefty cash in some accounts – did not matter.

    Ah, some lawyers screamed. They said considering the man involved, the CJN, “who should be above board, like Caesar’s wife”, “procedure” should not trump “substance”. Others, led by the NBA, insisted on “due process”. What is “due process” and when is a process due and is seen to be truly due if everybody concerned wants to be dutiful?

    Some illustration. When a woman has been in labour for too long, with all the pains and pangs, should doctors insist on “due process”– that she must have her baby naturally–or opt for–the knife to save mother and baby? When should “due process” give way to “necessary process”? And when should the CJN be seen as a “law officer” as different from a “public officer”?

    The CJN, some lawyers said, should have allowed the NJC to sit; he should have simply “recued” himself from the matter by giving the “excuse” that he could not sit over his own case.

    As I have said, the NBA leadership plunged the respected group into a controversial boycott of courts, which many lawyers shunned. They said they could not obstruct the course of justice for their clients because the CJN was in trouble. Besides, said some bold ones among the lot, NBA’s integrity is being tested in court as its chief Paul Usoro SAN is facing money laundering charges. They asked:  why is Usoro being tried in court and not by the NBA since the allegations border on his practice? Does it mean that if a member of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) drives recklessly and kills a pedestrian, he should be taken to the motor park to face trial and not the court? A game of logic is on.

    In the social media, the boycott became a subject of contemptuous jokes. There  is a photograph of some young men sitting around a table filled with assorted alcoholic drinks. The men are laughing and talking. The caption:” Nigeria Bar Association dissociates themselves from call to boycott courts from tomorrow.”

    The United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union joined the fray. They threatened to sanction  perpetrators of violence and riggers. Later, they expressed “deep concerns” over Justice Onnoghen’s suspension, adding that it “undercuts the stated determination of government, candidates and political party leaders to ensure that the elections proceed in a way that is free, fair, transparent and peaceful –leading to a credible result.”

    All Progressives Congress (APC) Chair Adams Oshiomhole reminded the E.U. and the others that “Nigeria is no longer a colony”. The Presidency said Nigeria had “noted with interest” the statement linking Justice Onnoghen’s fate with the elections, which “seem more driven by unfounded assumptions”. Now all is calm. But will some people stop linking Onnoghen’s fate to the elections? Is he a member of any party? Diplomats at work.

    Whichever way this Justice Onnoghen matter goes, at the end of it all, many of us will have learnt something about law and its deployment to resolve a crisis or create more crises out of a crisis.

    And the court shall rise.

     

    Can it happen here?

    NIGERIAN – BORN British lawmaker Fiona Onasanya has been sentenced to three months in prison for lying to avoid a speeding ticket.  She will serve half of the sentence , according to “The Guardian” of the U.K., which reported that the Peterborough MP was found guilty of perverting the course of justice.

    At the Old Bailey in London, the lawmaker was in the dock with her brother Festus Onasanya, who pleaded guilty to three similar charges and was sentenced to 10 months imprisonment.

    Onasanya

    Could this have happened in Nigeria? No. Not now. Imagine a senator being booked for over speeding – a routine for public officials here. Many have died in accidents caused by the convoys of public officials. Sirens are blaring as they drive recklessly. No officer dares to stop them. If one tries to, he is knocked down. When the police summon the courage to ask the lawmaker why their man was hit, the “honourable” or “distinguised” shuns them. When they attempt to arrest him, he shuts his door and the police lay siege to his home. His lawyers will storm a court to enforce his fundamental human rights even as his lawmaker-colleagues are hailing him and accusing the police of persecution.

    Some day, the law will be no respecter of persons in our dear Nigeria. Imagine how many public officials, including our hardworking lawmakers, will be on their way to jail when that day eventually comes. Just imagine.