The Nation Newspaper

Category: Lawal Ogienagbon

  • A soldier’s soldier

    It is rare in this part of the world to praise military and police men because of how we perceive them. Frankly speaking, they are the architect of this problem. Our soldiers and policemen see themselves as superior to others. They believe that they are above those of us the soldiers like to call “bloody civilians”. They call us “bloody civilians” because they carry the guns bought for them with tax payers’ money. This is why there is no love lost between them and the people.

    This is, however, not to say that all uniformed men are bad. There are men of honour and integrity among them; men who will lay down their lives for their fellow men;  not only for their country which territorial integrity they swore to defend. But the few bad eggs in service are rubbishing the good done by their conscientious colleagues.

    A lot of privileges come with being a military personnel and one of these is that soldiers live on the state. They are catered for by their country because they have signed off to defend it with their sweat and blood. Many of our soldiers and even officers have come to see these privileges as given. This is why they will board commercial buses and claim to be “staff” to avoid paying the fare. Often times, this has led to squabbles.

    We look at our soldiers and officers from the prism of the shameful conduct of some of them that fight in public or beat up women in traffic. That, of course, is not the face of the Nigerian soldier. The face of the Nigerian soldier is the one who does exploits on peace missions; who fights without yielding ground to the enemy in the theatre of war; who stands by and with his colleagues in the trenches; who looks out for others before himself no matter how difficult the terrain may be. To be an officer and a gentleman, you must first be a good soldier.

    Leadership is a trust and you can only earn your subordinates’ trust if you lead them well. There are many leaders whose subordinates can even abuse to their faces. Only a few can earn respectable remarks from their subordinates. In the military, which runs a command structure, leadership can be a burden, at times, because the lives of the rank and file are in the hands of the commander. This is why in some cases we have heard of subordinates revolting against their commanders, especially on welfare matters. A commander may be good in leading troops and may not do well in taking care of his men’s welfare.

    But blessed is the commander who can marry the two. He will be the pride of his troops, who will do anything for him. A commander who will live and die for his men will always be their beloved. But the love of money and the good things of life have made many of our officers to derail. They cut their men’s allowances and still expect them to be loyal. If they were in their men’s shoes will they be loyal? I have followed keenly reports of the exploits of the late  Lt Col Muhammad Abu-Ali, who was the Commanding Officer, 272 Special Forces Tanks Battalion in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital. His men have been eulogising the Sarki Yakin (chief warrior) just as the army too has been singing his praise. The slain officer was a soldier’s soldier, going by their accounts. He was an officer who risked everything for his men. To him, his life did not matter, but that of his men.

    This is why the late Lt Col Abu-Ali was always found in the thick of battle. He was in the hottest spot and never sent his men to where he could not go. There was no front too tough to scare him; even when his men pleaded with him not to go, he ignored them. His refrain in such circumstances, which may well become his epitaph, is : “Gentlemen, stay alert and be alive, and be prayerful. I don’t want any of my soldiers to be injured or lose his life in this operation, and if at all someone may go down, let me be the one”. Why won’t such an officer be the darling of his men? The late Lt Col Abu-Ali showed leadership in the face of death. He did not hide behind his troops, he was in their front.

    As young as he was, he was not scared of death; rather, he scared death. Did he really fall in battle or was he sold out by those envious of his reputation? Men like him will surely have enemies within the service because of the way he related with his troops who he took as members of his family. He knew the secret of fighting which many of his colleagues probably did not know and that is – to fight well you must put your troops at ease. His men were at home with him. He was not an oga that you could not walk up to, to discuss your problems with. He was so open because he had no skeleton in his cupboard. He earned his spurs fighting Boko Haram, chasing members of the sect from one corner of the Northeast to the other.

    He was spotted by his bosses. ‘’Seest thou a man diligent in his work? He shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men’’, says the scripture. The late Abu-Ali stood before kings when he earned rapid promotion from major to lieutenant colonel for his bravery. At his nocturnal decoration by the Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Tukur Buratai, on September 9, 2015 at Gamboru Ngala, the border town with Cameroon , his men went wild with joy. They lifted him off the ground dancing and singing his praise. They were happy for their oga. But in the crowd may have been people who were envious of this gallant soldier’s meteoric rise. They may have been the ones who plotted his killing in battle last Friday. His death is the nation’s loss. Whoever thinks he has gained from Lt Col Abu-Ali’s death is only deceiving himself. That person does not love our country. For his information, soldiers like Abu-Ali do not die because their legacies will live forever.

    Officers like him are rare to come by and when they come, we must do everything to preserve them. The army saw his potential early and encouraged him by giving him rapid promotion, but death struck when he was yet to be in full bloom. It is understandable if the army is pained by his death. No institution worth its name will want to lose a good officer. No; never. If a probe will unravel the circumstances of his death, so be it in order to prevent the untimely death of other equally good officers. There is more to Abu-Ali’s death than meets the eye. To buttress my point, we do not have to look further than Gen Buratai’s statement that  Abu-Ali’s death ”will be an eye opener” if the utterances of some individuals and organisations are scrutinised. We owe it a duty to his memory and to his family to ensure that he does not die in vain.

    My heart goes out to Abu-Ali’s widow and his children. May God give them the fortitude to bear this loss. Adieu, Sarki Yakin, the people’s commander.

  • The Jonathan theory

    Poor Dr Goodluck Jonathan. I pity our former president; he is ill at ease because of what is happening to some of his aides, especially Colonel Sambo DasukI, who has been answering questions from detectives over the $2.2 billion arms cash. As National Security Adviser (NSA) under Jonathan, Dasuki was the be-all and end-all on security matters. Whatever he said was final. Everybody in government kowtowed to him. The ministers, the special advisers and military chiefs et al were at his beck and call.

    Dasuki was larger than life. Who wouldn’t if he had the sort of money the former NSA had to play with. The Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), which he headed was an exchequer of sorts; it was the war chest of the Jonathan administration. The office funded everything – from the buying of stationery, rams, rice, campaign tools to payment of school fees, hospital bills, salaries and furnishing of offices.

    His office was a clearing-house. Top government officials walked in there, picked their own share of the cash and left. This was the practice for the three years he held office. Trust public officials, they swarmed his office like bees because of the free money. Was he generous? Because it was not his, he dished out money as if it was going out of fashion. Dasuki became a tin god overnight. Those who wanted favour from him deified him. But nothing lasts forever.

    Jonathan lost the April 28, 2015 presidential election and the cookie crumbled. Then came the day of reckoning. Dasuki was pulled in to give an account of the money allocated to his office. $2.2 billion was earmarked for the purchase of arms, ammunition, vehicles, aircraft, vessels and other weapons of war in the fight against Boko Haram. Up till today, he has not given his interrogators an accurate account of what he did with the money. He has since said that whatever he might have done he did with Jonathan’s authority. In effect, he is saying that he gave out the cash to all the ministers, advisers, defence and service chiefs who came to his office with Jonathan’s approval.

    Did the former president okay those disbursements? This is the question Jonathan must answer sincerely. In the past, he dodged answering the question probably because he knew that there is no way he could do so truthfully. But, last week in London, he finally stopped hiding behind a finger. Delivering a lecture on Youth Entrepreneurship at the Oxford Union, Jonathan absolved Dasuki of stealing the $2.2 billion. Then what did he do with the money? Hear Jonathan : “They said the National Security Adviser (Sambo Dasuki) stole $2.2 billion. I don’t believe somebody can just steal $2.2 billion. We bought warships, we bought aircraft, we bought lots of weapons for the army and so on and so forth and you are still saying 2.2 billion; so where did we get the money to buy all those things?”

    That is precisely the issue – “all those things that were bought” – where are they? By now, Dasuki, who has been in detention for months should have shown his interrogators where the equipment are. He cannot do so because nothing was bought. There is proof to that effect. Many officers and soldiers refused to go and fight Boko Haram because they were not given arms and ammunition. Their superiors wanted them to confront the insurgents with bare hands, but they declined and were court martialled by those who are today being interrogated for mismanaging the $2.2 billion. Since Jonathan knows more about this matter as he was then the president, he should be invited to shed more light on it.

    He has joined the fray with his comment, which shows that he was aware of what was going on. His intervention is, therefore, critical in the resolution of this matter so that the innocent are not punished. Who knows, those we thought might have stolen the money may not have done nothing after all by the time we hear from Jonathan. Dasuki might have been carrying out instructions for all we know. Let us hear from Jonathan again : “Yes, there were some issues. Yes, there are still corruption issues but some of them were overblown. I’d say exaggerated and they give a very bad impression about our nation. You cannot say the national security adviser stole $2.2 billion. It is not just possible”.

    Where then is the money that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) is looking for? Or what did the Jonathan administration do with the money since the former president’s claim that it bought warships, aircraft and lots of weapons with the cash has been debunked by military sources? According to the sources, the weapons bought by the Jonathan administration were “unserviceable” and “useless”. They stated that the administration bought three fairly used (Tokunbo) Alpha Jets and two helicopters  for the Nigerian Air Force (NAF), adding that the jets were “not worth anything because they were not weaponised and the helicopters were cannibalised”.

    It will be interesting to see Jonathan testify in court for Dasuki. But will his evidence stand in the face of the rebuttal of his claims by military sources?

     

    Pound of flesh

    At last, the National Assembly had its way. It has amended the Code of Conduct Bureau/Tribunal Act,  investing itself with powers hitherto belonging to the President. Many believe that it took the action because of its Chairman, Dr Bukola Saraki’s case before the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT). Saraki is being tried for alleged assets falsification at the tribunal. Since the case began, he has put up an attitude, which watchers see as unbecoming. They say the Senate President portrays himself as if he is above the law. Saraki’s trial has been dragging because of his numerous applications before the tribunal. The matter has gone to the Supreme Court and back, yet the substantive case is yet to be settled. The lawmakers are not happy with the CCB/CCT Act because they believe it gives too much powers to the President. What powers are we talking about? These are powers which they believe make the President use the law to oppress them. But is that possible? Having had its way, can the Senate stop the trial of any of its members caught under the law? The truth is it cannot. The best thing for any public officer is to avoid acts which can bring him in collision with the law. Anything short of that will be begging the issue. As Senator Yahaya Abdullahi said : “To remove a whole President, who has equally been elected by the country is wrong. You cannot approbate and reprobate; this substitution of the President with the National Assembly is wrong…” Need we say more?

  • Letter to CJN

    Whatever happens or goes wrong in the judicial system, lawyers (particularly some senior lawyers) are involved. There are some who have the capacity to influence and intimidate the courts and they do it with relish…sometimes (and when it matters) some members of the Bar representing NBA on the NJC hardly stand up for the truth, not to talk of speaking the truth.
    – Justice Ayo Isa Salami, ex-President of the Court of Appeal.

    My Lord, the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Mahmoud Mohammed, it is with heavy heart that I start with the above quote from the parting shot of Justice Ayo Salami to the judiciary three years ago after a two-year battle to retain his seat as President of the Court of Appeal (PCA). As you are aware, Justice Salami was suspended from office by the National Judicial Council (NJC) on August 18, 2011 not for professional misconduct or corruption but for refusing to apologise to then CJN and NJC chairman Aloysius Katsina-Alu.  Though you were not then a member of NJC, which you now head, you were privy to all that happened as a Justice of the Supreme Court (JSC). My Lord, I will not bore you with details of that matter, but recent happenings in the judiciary make it imperative for me to refer to it. And I will be drawing heavily from some of Justice Salami’s remarks at the valedictory session held for him on October 31, 2013 in Abuja because he spoke a lot about NJC.

    By virtue of his position, PCA, as he then was, Justice Salami was an automatic member of NJC, but his membership amounted to nothing when he had issues with his chairman, former CJN Katsina-Alu. His fellow members disowned him in the face of glaring evidence that he did no wrong because they did not want to incur the wrath of Justice Katsina-Alu.

    Justice Salami exposed the inner workings of the NJC at his valedictory session. From what he said, it is not the august body that we all think it is. It seems that rather than stand up for what is right and just, the NJC will do anything to protect its own, especially those in the good books of its chairman. The NJC was not set up to be the tool of the CJN and his acolytes. It was established to ensure that the justice system works smoothly, with judges seen to be alive to their sacred responsibilities. Should such people become objects of scorn and ridicule? The answer is no.

    Unfortunately, this is what is happening today. Two Justices of the Supreme Court – Inyang Okoro and Sylvester Ngwuta –  the suspended Presiding Justice of the Court of Appeal, Ilorin Division, Mohammed Ladan Tsamiya, Justice Adeniyi Ademola of the Federal High Court, Abuja, Enugu State Chief Judge Justice I.A. Umezulike, Justice Kabiru Auta of the Kano State High Court, Justice Muazu Pindiga, Gombe State High Court, Justice Bashir Sukola and Justice Ladan Manir, both of the Kaduna State High Court are today fighting a battle of their lives following allegations that they desecrated their offices. They are being investigated by the Department of State Service (DSS). Six others – all of the Federal High Court – Justices Mohammed Nasir Yunusa, Hyeladzira Ajiya Nganjiwa, Musa Haruna Kurya, Agbadu James Fishim, Uwani Abba Aji and Rita Ofili-Ajumogobia are being probed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).  These are men and women who sit in judgement over others being accused of some of the offences they try people for.

    My Lord, Justices Okoro, Ngwuta and Ademola have written to you, stating their innocence. Without their stating so, our law presumes them innocent until otherwise proven. Their letters have become subjects of public debate, with many wondering if they were actually written by those judges. Indeed if such letters should come to these judges in the course of a case what weight will they attach to them in evidence? Can they convict any felon on the strength of such letters? My Lord, their lordships, in their own words and in their own hands, admitted that there were attempts to induce  them to pervert justice and they kept quiet until they ran into trouble!

    The issue now is : should they continue to sit while allegations of corruption are hanging over their heads like the sword of Damocles? My Lord, to you, this is a dilemma, but to the public, it is not. The judges put themselves in the position they are in today. A smart and incorruptible judge, if it is true, would have reported to the police immediately he was approached to subvert justice. His complaint would have stood him in good stead in the day of trouble. Without a police report, I am sorry to say, Justices Okoro’s and Ngwuta’s claims that some ministers sought their help in some election petition cases sound like fairy tales. But, My Lord, they claimed to have reported the matter to you. Is that so? What did you do? Did you refer the matter to the police? The world is waiting to know the steps your lordship took.

    To keep silent in the face of at tempts to bribe a judge is to encourage corruption. If a Justice of the Supreme Court does not know this, then who will? The man on the street? My Lord, you have about two weeks left counting from today to bow out of service. With November 10, your retirement date fast approaching, you have but a little time to decide how you wish to be remembered after your exit. One major decision you have to take between now and then is what to do with the embattled judges. The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), which always side the NJC, has called for their suspension. Whatever anybody, especially some so-called senior lawyers, may say, the Bar cannot be faulted on this score. It cannot be proper for the judges to continue to sit not even while being investigated, not to talk of when their trial eventually starts.

    My Lord, you have kicked against the Bar’s demand, saying it is against the law establishing the NJC. That law, until amended, only gives NJC the power to discipline judges and recommend appropriate actions against them. It does not confer NJC with the power to conduct the sort of investigation being carried out against the judges by DSS and EFCC. My Lord, I am at a loss over your objection to the suspension of these judges. To me, suspending them will not be breaching the NJC law.

    It is misplaced fear to say that their lordships’ suspension will negate the law and also affect their integrity. To restore hope in the judiciary, their lordships must step aside to face trial. If they do not, you will be shirking your responsibility as NJC chairman. This is no time for esprit de corps. To save your own name, you must let the law take its course.

    Justice Salami may be right after all when he said : ‘’The problem with the Nigerian judiciary is that some dishonourable people not fit to be judges get into the stream and then make it to the highest level of the judicial career…’’ Will the outcome of the judges’ trial prove Justice Salami wrong? Time will tell.

  • Back from hell

    Unlike their abduction over two years ago, their release last Thursday was without a bang. There was no noise, nothing whatsoever in the air to suggest that something of that magnitude was about to happen. It was done quietly and the operation was clinically executed. The lesser the noise about the operation the better those behind it might have thought. They guessed right. You do not announce the execution of such high profile operation to the world until it is over.

    They may have learnt from the killing of Osama bin Ladin by the United States (US) Seal on May 1, 2011 in a nocturnal operation which left the Pakistani authorities wondering how it happened right under their noses without them knowing.  The girls were in captivity for over two years before they regained their freedom. Over 200 of them were kidnapped in the early hours of April 14, 2014 by Boko Haram from the Chibok Girls Grammar School (CGGS) in Borno State. The incident generated uproar worldwide.

    In no time, the Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) movement was born.  The BBOG spearheaded the campaign for the girls’ rescue. What it had going for it was not arms and ammunition with which to go after the kidnappers but the force of moral suasion.  Campaigning under #BBOG, the movement became a force to reckon with globally. United Nations (UN) Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, US First Lady Michelle Obama and other renowned figures identified with the movement to fight for the girls’ release.  The Nigerian wing led by Aisha Yusuf and Oby Ezekwesili became a thorn in the flesh of government.

    Through its daily sit-out at the Eagle Square, from where it was pushed out when the government thought it was becoming a pest,  the movement ensured that the Chibok girls never left our consciousness.  Through thick and thin, the movement stayed together despite all the Jonathan administration did to frustrate its efforts.  Can we talk about the Chibok girls without saying one or two things about former President Goodluck Jonathan? I do not think so. His administration’s handling of the case is nothing to write home about.  It felt unconcerned about the girls’ fate when news of their abduction broke.

    It sounded odd to the administration that over 200 people could be abducted at a go. “Are they goats?” Some top security officials of the administration were said to have asked while dismissing reports of the girls’ abduction.  At secret briefings with the former president, these security chiefs insisted that no girls were kidnapped in Chibok that fateful night of April 14, 2014. So,the government went on as if everything was normal whereas they were not.  It read political meaning to the whole thing. But why will a rational person play politics with such matter? Why will anyone claim that his daughter had been kidnapped when she was not? The government did not take time to think through the matter after wasting a precious two weeks before waking up from its slumber.

    For a whole two weeks after the girls’ abduction,  the government did nothing to find them. Rather than move swiftly to rescue the girls, Jonathan went to campaign for his party’s candidate in the then coming Ekiti State governorship election.  On the rostrum,  he and others danced to azonto music as they prepared to rig the election in favour of Ayo Fayose.  Elsewhere, the government would have dropped everything until the girls were found because governance is all about the people. A government that does not value the people is no government and until our government appreciates this fact it will continue to have problems with the governed. The people are not there to be wooed during elections alone, they are there for all seasons – in good and in not so good times.

    The Jonathan administration failed woefully as regards the rescue of the Chibok girls. The release of the 21 girls has shown that if it had put in some commitment, it would have achieved the same result as the Buhari administration, which in two years has given the nation something to cheer about this matter. These girls have gone through hell and back. They have seen a lot in their few years on earth. Only God knows what they went through in the hands of their captors. We are happy that some of them have returned because we had lost hope of ever seeing them again. The possibility of not finding them again was a reality too difficult to swallow but what could we have done in the face of then available facts. Our acceptance of that reality does not mean that we do not wish either the girls or their families well, it was borne out of what we know about Boko Haram, especially after its leader, Shekau, boasted that the sect would marry the girls off or kill them.

    The condition in which the 21 girls and the one earlier rescued returned shows that they are not being well kept. For all we know, Boko Haram may be using these girls as slaves. They will be slaving for the group’s leaders, who will be feeding fat on their sweat. Besides, Boko Haram may be sexually abusing and torturing the girls. Of the 219 confirmed to be with Boko Haram, we have now got back 22, leaving 197 still with the sect. 197 is a huge figure; we cannot afford to leave one, not to talk of such a large number of girls with the sect. President Muhammadu Buhari has done well in bringing back some of the girls, but his administration should not rest until it brings back all of them.

    No matter the number of sheep a shepherd has he will not rest until he gets back any that is missing. So, our president too should not sleep until he brings back the remaining girls.  Let us all hearken to the plaintive cry of Gloria Dame, one of the 21 freed girls, : “I did not know that a day like this will come that we will be dancing and giving thanks to God among people… we are praying to God to touch the heart of Boko Haram to repent and we are calling on Nigerians to pray and fast for the release of our remaining ones in captivity”. Captivity is hell, it is not a place to wish for even one’s enemy.

     

    Who killed Dele Giwa?

    His killing that fateful Sunday of October 19, 1986, shook the nation. It was 30 years yesterday that he was blown into smithereens in his Adeniyi Jones, Ikeja, Lagos home. The news spread like wildfire that Dele Giwa, the founding Editor-in-Chief of Newswatch Magazine,  had been killed by parcel bomb. Then, it was novel to kill by parcel bomb unlike these days when bombs explode everywhere.  What could Dele Giwa have done to warrant being killed like that? Nobody was ready to answer the question which agitated the mind of the public. The late Giwa was a damn good journalist who liked to live well. He was from a humble background and he strove to make it in life to free himself from the shackles of poverty. He achieved his dream, but he was not allowed to enjoy the fruits of his labour for long. Newswatch, the magazine he co-founded with Ray Ekpu, Dan Agbese and Yakubu Mohammed was about 21 months old when he was killed. Many theories have been propounded for Giwa’s death. One of these theories is that Newswatch was working on a story about Gloria Okon, who was said to be a drug courier for the wife of a former head of state. Whether true or not the public cannot say. But the magazine has since denied working on any such story as at the  time of Giwa’s death. One thing is certain though – Giwa was killed. But who did it? This is the question we have been asking in the past 30 years.

     

    Arepo calling IE

    For the past two months, Arepo, a burgeoning community in Ogun State off the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway,  has been in pitch darkness. Despite all efforts to know what is happening, the Ikeja Electric (IE), which services the community, has not been forthcoming. According to sources, we have been without light because of a fault which is yet to be traced. If it takes weeks or months to trace a fault, how long will it take to repair it? Years? This is what happens when public utilities are sold to those without the technical know-how to run them.

     

  • Judiciary’s worst hour

    Unless we work in synergy to ensure that only fit and proper persons remain in our midst, it will be impossibe to expect a different Bench when its origin remains the same. I hereby call on NBA leadership to expunge from its ranks such persons whose conduct may be unfit, improper, dishonest or unethical —CJN Mohammed Mahmud

    Like a bolt out of the blue, security operatives stormed the homes of some superior court judges last weekend and arrested seven of them. Among the arrested were two Supreme Court Justices – Sylvester Ngwuta and Inyang Okoro. Also arrested were Justice Mohammed Ladan Tsamiya, who presides over the Ilorin branch of the Court of Appeal,  Justice Adeniyi Ademola of the Federal High Court,  Abuja, Enugu State Chief Judge, Justice I.A. Umezulike, Justice Kabiru Auta of the Kano State High Court and Justice Muazu Pindiga of Gombe State High Court.  Their lordships’ arrest has opened a new front in the anti-corruption campaign and also opened a debate on the propriety or otherwise of their arrest.

    Outgoing Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Mohammed Mahmud is livid over the matter. According to him, the arrest is ‘’saddening and unfortunate’’. The CJN believes the security operatives over reached themselves in raiding the homes of the judges and arresting them. The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is raising hell too  over the matter, threatening fire and brimstone if the government does not apply the brakes in its clampdown on the judiciary. As every right thinking Nigerian knows, the judiciary is rotten and the rot did not just start today.  Sometime in the past, all eyes were on magistrates, but little did we know that  judges were a worse case.

    Many judges were dispensing justice without the fear of God. Only a few did their job conscientiously and without affection or ill will. Today, we are facing the consequences of keeping quiet in the face of large scale corruption by judges who did not mean well for the country.  It is a taboo worldwide for judges to receive gratification for job done. This is why judges are shielded from the public so that they are not tainted. But because of their love for money, some of them go out of their way to demand bribe from litigants. It will be dishonest of NJC and NBA to say they are not aware of the mess in the judiciary because it did not start today.

    To reform the judiciary in the wake of the June 12, 1993 crisis, the late Gen Sani Abacha, who seized power from the Ernest Shonekan-led Interim National Government (ING) in  November of that year, constituted the Justice Kayode Eso-led panel. The panel’s terms of reference were wide and at the end of its sitting,  it recommended the sacking of 47 judges. For eight years, the report did not see the light of day. Following a review in 2002 by the Justice Bolarinwa Babalakin-led panel, six judges were sacked. We are in this mess today because NJC and NBA have always turned a blind eye to the issue of corruption. They have always allowed those accused of corruption to go free and sin no more.

    But often, these judges return to their vomit because they do not act alone. They have allies in the lawyers, who appear before them and in the top echelon of NJC. NJC and NBA  should blame themselves for what happened to the suspected corrupt judges. If they have acted the way they should, the Department of State Service (DSS) would not have taken over their job. Since they decided not to see evil or talk evil where corruption in the judiciary is concerned they should learn to live with their choice. We were all in this country when the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) accused some lawyers of encouraging corruption in the judiciary. Rather than work with EFCC to fish out the bad eggs within its circle,  NBA resorted to a campaign of calumny against the commission.

    What we are seeing now is an indictment of NJC, especially, because it is responsible for the disciplining of judges. Unfortunately, it cannot act without a formal complaint against a judge. Even where there is a complaint,  NJC can destroy the case through its biased handling. It is because NJC cannot be trusted to handle the cases against its own that the security operatives moved in. If NJC had done what it should do,  we would not have seen the dirty linen of our judges being washed in public. Nevertheless, what is happening is for the good of the judiciary and our country. A corruption free judiciary will aid national development.

    We are at that stage of life where our judges should be able to look the bad guys in the face and tell them without mincing words that they are bad. We do not want judges that will look the corrupt in the face and wink at them with a slap on the wrist. What such a judgement suggests is that the judge must have been compromised. Many of such cases abound, but the one that easily comes to mind is that of Lucky Igbinedion, who after being found guilty of corruptly enriching himself with the money of Edo State was slapped with a N3.5 million fine based on a suspicious plea bargain. Why plea bargain with corrupt public officials when mere pepper and phone thieves are sentenced to long terms of imprisonment? EFCC is as guilty for that as the judiciary.

    Nobody should tell me that our laws are to blame. It is only in our country that we have two sets of laws – one for the rich and the other for the poor. Laws that punish the poor and allow the rich, who steal the country blind to go unpunished,  are no laws. Judges hide under the guise of interpreting these laws to extort money from the rich working through their lawyers. NJC will only be pretending if it claims not to know that these  are some of the tricks adopted by corrupt judges. Over the years, the council has been receiving petitions accusing judges of using their positions to enrich themselves.  What did it do beyond recommending such judges for sack so that they can go and enjoy their loot?

    Now the blood of the poor who have been cheated all these years through misapplied justice is crying for justice. If an armed robber could be executed for stealing N5000, why then should a pen robber be allowed to live after stealing N192 billion out of which he will give the judge N5 billion to buy his freedom? Man may be at home with injustice,  but God is not a God of injustice. Today has come because He wants to right the wrongs of the past. NJC and NBA cannot be happy because the security operatives have hit close to home. Justice Mahmud hit the nail on the head when he blamed the NBA for the rot in the judiciary at the association’s seminar on June 24, last year. Indeed, as he noted,  it is impossible to expect a different Bench when its origin (Bar) remains the same.  The NBA should heal itself instead of blowing hot air over the arrest of the suspected corrupt judges.

    If it had removed from its membership those described as unfit, improper and dishonest as advised by Justice Mahmud, it may have saved the judiciary of this shame. No amount of threat can change the fact that NBA ‘s failure to put its house in order over the years contributed heavily to the corruption in the judiciary. It is sad, terribly sad that judges are today being picked up from their homes like common criminals. NBA and NJC should also be troubled by this and not the propriety or otherwise of their lordships’ arrest. Being a judge does not confer immunity on you from arrest if you are  suspected of committing a crime.

  • Justice for sale

    FROM time immemorial, corruption has been a soul mate of our judiciary. The lower bench, especially, is replete with tales of corruption. Lawyers and litigants relive stories of how magistrates demand bribe from them to decide cases in their favour. These stories sound incredible but in most cases they are true. From my little experience, I know that the worst thing to happen to the judiciary is the magistracy. In the years that I covered the judiciary, the magistrates’ courts were a cesspit of corruption. Their worship did everything for money and they never hid it. Whether inside the court or inside their chambers they did not think twice before extorting money from people.

    In many cases, they found allies in the lawyers who appeared before them. The lawyers used the magistrates’ names to collect money from their clients. Working as a team, they would strip a litigant of all he has and before the man knows what is happening, he would have lost everything. And the lawyer who he hired to plead his case would be his albatross. Those days, the barely literate litigants could not distinguish between a magistrate and a judge. To them, a magistrate is also a judge. So, it was easy to play on their intelligence to rip them off. The lawyers, who knew what was happening, were ever ready to exploit their clients’ ignorance to make fast bucks.

    This is not to say that the high courts were better off. No, they were not and the story may still be the same today for all I know. That of the magistrates’ courts was pronounced because it was done with impunity. Compared to magistrates,  high court judges were more refined in their approach. Though some of them also acted through lawyers, they knew where to draw the line. You cannot just walk into a judge’s chamber with sacks of money in broad daylight as often happened in the magistrates’ courts. There is something about judges that makes it difficult for people to just approach them anyhow. Even the affluent will think twice before going into a judge’s chamber to mess up.

    Yes, mess up, that is what people do when they go to bribe judges on their turf. This is the bane of the judiciary, the much touted last hope of the common man. The common man cannot obtain justice from our courts today because they do not have money. Painfully, our judges have become what they call in local parlance “cash-and-carry”. They dispense justice to the highest bidder and not on the strength of a party’s case. A litigant is expected to rise or fall on the strength of his case, but this is no longer so. No matter how bad a case may be as long as a party can afford the judge’s price he will win. Judges, like Caesar’s wife, are expected to be above board. They are by virtue of their position expected to be upright, clean and incorruptible.

    A judge is next to God on earth because he has the power of life and death. If he spares a criminal the criminal lives but if he condemns the criminal the criminal dies. This is why judges must be fair, sincere and honest in the discharge of their duties. They must uphold the scale of justice between parties to avoid a miscarriage. What is happening in the judiciary today beggars belief. Some judges have become commodities that are bought by parties, especially the wealthy. Once the price is right, they will not bat an eyelid before ruling in favour of the wrong party. To them, it is a matter of the piper calling the tune.

    These judges have lost their respect before the public, which has come to know them for who and what they are – incorrigible and unworthy of the high office they occupy. But do they care? They do not. Many of them were weeded out in the past for the shameful act of collecting bribe, yet many still in service were not deterred. They have continued to be on the take, having come to see their position as an opportunity to become rich quick. Last week, the National Judicial Council (NJC) axed three judges, which it found wanting in the discharge of their duties. A common thread runs through the case against them – they collected money from litigants.

    This is not the first time that the NJC will be descending on judges for being corrupt but of what effect has its sanctions, over the years, been on those still in service? Their attitude seems to be “well NJC can do whatever it likes but that won’t stop us from collecting bribe as long as we can cover our tracks’’. Out of every one or two caught there are five or so others that escaped, so what are we talking about? NJC’s policy of naming and shaming corrupt judges appears not to be working. If it is, corruption would have since abated in the judiciary, but sadly, it is growing stronger and stronger. But there should be a way out. We must remove the judiciary from the morass of corruption for it to retain its integrity.

    These days many no longer believe in the judiciary because of the rot there. They snigger when you ask them to go to court : ‘’to sue a thief  before a thief, what’s the use?’’ We cannot allow our judiciary to go to the dogs. No matter what it takes, we must save it from the hands of judges who are hell bent on turning it into their public limited company (PLC). Besides naming and shaming corrupt judges, they should be tried, jailed and made to forfeit their ill-gotten wealth, if we are really serious about ending this judicial rascality.

  • Nigeria’s biggest stumble at 56

    THIS WEEK, Nigeria turns 56. By midnight of Saturday, fireworks will go off in celebration of the landmark event. It will be like October 1, 1960 all over again when we got our independence from the British colonial masters. A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then. We went through a bitter civil war between 1967 and 1970. Though the war has since ended, we are still suffering from its hangover. Those agitating for Biafra Republic are still up and doing, threatening fire and brimstone if they are not allowed to have their way.

    Did we fight a war for us to remain divided? Those who sacrificed their lives for the unity of our country will today be turning in their graves over what is happening in the land. Besides the Biafra agitators, many other groups have sprung up seeking a republic of their own. To them, the Nigerian nation is a mere ‘’geographical expression’’. They argue that it is not a state in the true sense of the word and they want out. This should not be a matter of life and death; it is  an issue that can be discussed at a round table. You want out, so be it, that should be the natural course of things.

    The matter is made simple since they have representatives in the National Assembly. As the voices of their people, the lawmakers would take up their people’s cause at that level. But the agitators do not believe in talking things over; they believe more in force. To them, they can only achieve their aim through war. This is why the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) resorted to bombing oil facilities in order to achieve its ultimate aim of declaring Niger Delta Republic last August 1. Wise counsel prevailed and it shelved the plan. As we mark our National Day on Saturday the last thing the country needs is undue agitation that can lead to the dismemberment of the country.

    Our major problem now is economic. We are going through the worst economic crisis ever in the history of the country. Though Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Godwin Emefiele has said the worst is over, his statement may not be entirely true after all. Nigerians who are the worst hit by the recession which has hit the country know that the worst is not yet over. There is still a long way to go for this cup to pass. For now they are praying hard to survive the times. At 56, there is nothing to cheer about the country and the downtrodden are feeling the heat most. Those at the top too are complaining because they do not understand what is happening. The money in their hands is not worth the paper on which it is printed.

    The naira has lost its value, exchanging at over N400 to the dollar. As a sign of the times, our naira, which used to be the leading currency in West Africa, has lost its pride of place. It has become worthless compared to other currencies in the sub region. It used to exchange at a very high rate to other currencies like the Ghanaian cedis and Cote d’ Ivoire’s CFA, but now the wide gap in the exchange rate has been bridged. As an Ivorian friend told me few weeks ago Nigeria’s money has lost its value. If our neighbours can say that of our country’s currency, where lies our claim to being Africa’s leader? How can we lead the continent without a strong currency?

    Leadership is not by mouth. It is by a nation’s ability to mobilise its resources to prove its worth in the comity of nations. For a country to lead others its economy must be strong and viable. Without a working economy a country cannot lead others. America is the world’s leader today because of its strong economy. The American dollar remains the currency for international trade. Despite its robust economy, the United States is not relenting in its efforts to remain a global leader in all ramifications. On our part, we run our economy in fits and starts. Today, it is doing well, the next day, it is going under because of mismanagement and corruption.

    Our leaders put us in this mess. Rather than grow the economy, many of them preferred to feather their own nest. They grew fat, while the country became lean. This is why at 56, we are going backward instead of moving forward. This is not a good story because it is not our story. Our story is that of success and abundance and by the grace of God, so shall it be. Happy anniversary, Nigeria.

     

    The governor-elect is…

    YESTERDAY, the Edo State governorship election finally held. It had been shifted by two weeks for security reasons. There were pockets violence in some of areas. It was gathered that there were shootings in Edo North. In some areas, results have come in and as expected, it was a straight fight between the All Progressives Congress (APC) standard bearer, Godwin Obaseki, and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate Osagie Ize-Iyamu. Early results show them running neck-to-neck, as they say. No matter how close the race may be, one person will emerge winner of the election. The people are waiting with bated breath to know who their next governor is.

    After outgoing Governor Adams Oshiomhole’s eight years tenure they are looking forward to having another governor in his mould who will take the development of the state as priority. Edo is the heartbeat of the nation. To remain true to this appellation, it must have a governor whose sole interest will be to  make it the best state in the country. Edo deserves nothing less than that. And the governor-elect is…

  • Abduction at dawn

    IT has become routine for them to rise at dawn and gather at a nearby makeshift structure for early morning exercise every Saturday. These days, we have all caught the bug of exercising, which we are told is good for our health. It has become a pastime – men, women and children engage in it. It is now common to see people jogging around their neighbourhood or on the road as you drive out early in the morning. To them, jogging is life and they will do anything to go jogging.

    Gone were the days of lazing around for want of something to do. At any given opportunity, the exercise buffs take off to indulge in their pastime. Sometimes you find them in company of twos, threes or more sweating it out together on the street. Last Saturday, some landlords from Oshorun Heritage Estate in Isheri North Local Government Area of Lagos State gathered at their usual spot near the Lekki Gardens Estate for their weekly exercise. Theirs is an organised aerobics class taken by a coach.

    That fateful day they were with their trainer, simply named Coach Oni. Hardly had they settled down at the end of Channels Television Avenue, which leads into Lekki Gardens Estate, that they saw some strange faces. These were people that do not normally attend the class. Could it be that they have heard about the class and came to join? That could not be because this is an exclusive gathering of landlords from the Oshorun Estate. So, no outsider can come in except he or she is invited by members. They did not have to wait long because the men showed their true colours.

    Armed to the teeth and hooded, they wasted no time before they made their intentions known. The landlords immediately sensed danger as the kidnappers said to be in military camouflage shouted that ‘’nobody should move’’. By now many of the landlords had become transfixed to the spot they stood. But, before the gang’s leader finished giving his order, some of them had taken off, running into the wild bush. They did not know where they were running to, but they knew that wherever it is, it will be better than being caught by the kidnappers. So, three of them escaped, but four were not so lucky.

    The kidnappers took away the coach, Kennedy Ucheagwu, Dr Omololu Bello and Fidelis Essang. Criminals will always look for an opportune moment to strike and in most cases that will be when they know the police won’t be nearby. Criminals are humans; they are flesh and blood like us. In that wise, they too are prone to fear, notwithstanding the brave look they put on because of the arms they carry. If they know they will be challenged by the police or even the people they will develop cold feet. But, in this case, the kidnappers had a free rein and went away with their victims. A chase by the police could have led to their arrest. The police did not consider it a matter serious enough to deserve immediate action as they argued over whose jurisdiction the case fell while the criminals escaped.

    Policemen from the Lagos and Ogun Commands passed the buck on who should handle the case. Those from Ogun said the kidnap happened in Lagos, while their Lagos counterparts said it happened in Ogun. Is it in such situation that the police will be fighting over jurisdiction? Their main job in that circumstance should have been how to stop the hoodlums from escaping as they got there early enough to do just that. They were also there in large number. If only they had chased those kidnappers, the story may have been different today.

    Yes, some lives would have been lost, but all the kidnappers would not have escaped. Today, the kidnappers are demanding N300 million ransom on each victim, amounting to N1.2 billion for the quartet. Where do they expect the victims’ families to get such money from? It is not their fault but that of the police which allowed them to slip away. As I write this on Tuesday night, one of the landlords was said to have been freed.  This is good news, even though it is at a price. May the others also regain their freedom soon. As for the police, they should bury their heads in shame for not doing enough to rescue the landlords last Saturday.

    KSA at 70

    CALL him KSA, King Sunny Ade, Sunday Adegeye or simply Sunny, the public will instantly recognise the person you are talking about. KSA is a household name. People like me grew up to know the man and the artiste through his music. It was in the days that Juju musicians were virtually at war with one another – call it imaginary war, you may not be wrong because it was what their fans imagined. Whenever KSA sang, listeners believed that he was taking a jibe at Commander Ebenezer Obey and vice versa. Though it was all in our imagination, the artistes themselves fueled it with the kind of songs they sang. The Yoruba call it orin ote. Whether orin ote or not, we enjoyed it and sang along with them. To disabuse people’s minds, the guitar wizard (anjonu onijita) sang: Bi Sunny Ade ba nkorin wa ni Obey lo banwi, bi Obey ba nko ti e, wa ni Sunny lo banwi… The song did not douse tension. Their fans continued to shout wolf where the musicians claimed there was none.

    Speaking musically, the late 1960s and 1970s belonged to Sunny and Obey on the Juju scene and it is  a credit to them that they are still standing tall today despite the challenge from other stars. Sunny and Obey were not the only stars in the firmament, but they overshadowed others to make their mark. They remain a success till today because first luck smiled on them and second they did not rest on their oars. They did not allow their success to get into their heads. KSA did not start as a musician. He was in the theatre group of the legendary comedian Moses Adejumo aka Baba Sala when fate changed the course of his life for good. Baba Sala encouraged him to take the plunge by telling him: lo try e wo, with a caveat that he could come back to the drama group if things did not work out fine. As the master guitarist said in a recent interview as part of activities to mark his 70th birthday, he is still on that lo try e wo, some 45 years after. As he celebrates the biblical three scores plus 10 today, we wish him many happy returns of the day. May his fount of music never dry.

  • Equity and clean hands

    FOR too long, our leaders and their families have taken us for a ride. They treat the commonwealth as their personal property and do not give a care in the world about the led. As far as they are concerned, the people can go to hell as long as they live well. The welfare of the led is not their priority, yet they were elected to take care of the people. They do not believe that they should aspire to be the people’s leaders; they are satisfied being leaders of their families, feeding and meeting their needs with public funds.

    Our leaders are our greatest enemies. The nation is where it is today because of them. They had all the opportunities in the world to make the nation great, but they did not do what was expected of them. The nation made money – tons of it – from oil under their watch, but the cash was not well spent. The money found its way into their pockets, while the people groaned in poverty. The money meant for millions of Nigerians was pocketed by our leaders, their wives and children.

    Since this administration came on board on May 29, last year, we have been regaled with reports of how these leaders milked the nation. By leaders, we are not referring to the former president, vice president, governors, deputy governors and leaders of the legislature only, but all those who held key positions in their administration as well as the military chiefs. The military brass, especially turned out to be a big disappointment. We have heard of how some service chiefs used their positions to acquire wealth in the immediate past administration.

    Money meant for the acquisition of equipment to combat Boko Haram was diverted. The military brass converted the money into their own use, acquiring houses, cars and other properties as if those things were going out of fashion. They were not bothered about the men they sent to fight Boko Haram in the Northeast; they were more interested in pocketing the billions of dollars meant for the prosecution of the war. They expected the soldiers to fight with their bare hands. When these people rebelled, they were court-martialled. Yes, a soldier signed to die for his country, but not to commit suicide. But his superiors wanted him to commit suicide by not providing him with the equipment to fight.

    The generals were lucky that the soldiers did not turn on them. Elsewhere, soldiers have mauled their generals for cheating them. But in our own case, our generals had the temerity to court-martial soldiers that they did not provide arms and ammunition to do their job. Citing military law, they said it was a cardinal sin  for a soldier to refuse to fight. We all know that. But what do we say of the generals, who embezzled the funds meant for arming the soldiers?

    The cheek of it is that some of them are claiming that they did not do anything wrong despite the overwhelming evidence against them. They are contending that the billions of dollars found in their accounts belong to them. They also claimed that the multi-billion naira properties found in their names were legally acquired. The question is: how much is their salary that they would own such fat bank accounts and plush houses? They have even gone to court to enforce their fundamental rights! Can you beat that?

    In this league is the immediate past First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan, who is battling the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in court for freezing her accounts with Skye Bank. The court is the last hope of the common man, as the saying goes. The courts are there to uphold the scale of justice and ensure that an aggrieved party is fairly and justly treated. Thus, parties who go to equity must do so with clean hands. How clean are the hands of those seeking to enforce their rights against the government? Can a party claim for a wrong, which raises more questions than answers?

    Dame Patience is seeking N200 million damages from EFCC and Skye Bank for the the freezing of her four accounts containing $15,591,700 (about N4,926,977,200). Since the story broke Nigerians have been wondering how she came about the money. $15.5 million is no chicken change. I do not know the work she did besides being the first lady for about six years to have made such money. Oh! I forgot, she was also a permanent secretary in Bayelsa State. We all know the salary of permanent secretaries. Except, she was placed on a special salary, there is no way she could have made $15 million for the four or so years that she served as permanent secretary.

    As first lady, I do not think that she was on salary because the office is not recognised in the Constitution. But being a powerful position with a lot of patronage, she could have used it to make money. Which may have been the case in this instance. If that is the case, is her action defensible? There must be something that Dame Patience knows that we do not know to have come out boldly to fight for this money. As things are, she should be ready to tell the world how she came about the money in order to get it back.  Is the money from her salary as a civil servant? Is it from a contract? What kind of contract is it? Was the contract bid for? Under what name did she bid for the contract? As our former first lady, we are entitled to know the source of the money. It is when she is able to explain how she got the money that she can legally make a claim for it.

    We do not expect our former first lady to be poor, but we do not also expect her to be stupendously rich without telling us the source of her wealth. Since she is laying claim to the money, the onus is on her to tell us how she made it. If she cannot do that then she should forfeit it to the state. As the legal maxim goes : ‘’He who comes to equity must come with clean hands”.

  • A dogfight and other stories

    These are not the best of times in our country. Anywhere you turn to it is always the same thing people are talking about. Times are hard and they are terribly so. In the midst of it all there is some comic relief, but many of us still go about wearing long faces. It seems we have lost our sense of humour because of the prevailing economic hardship. We take what we should laugh over as something serious and we are ready to break bones over it. The other day in Sango,  Ogun State, two neighbours nearly tore themselves apart over the name of a dog.

    The dog owner, Joe Chinakwe, named his pet Buhari. Now, do not ask me why he did that? It is just like asking me why some one named his dog Clinton or Obama. Owners are free to give whatever names they like to their pets. And in most cases, they prefer names that are popular, which people can easily relate with. What is the use of naming your dog Lawal? That name will not turn heads when you walk your dog on the street and shout out its name to the hearing of all. But say Buhari and you will attract attention.

    Perhaps, this was why Chinakwe named his dog Buhari. Coincidentally, our president bears Muhammadu Buhari. Some mischievous guys may want to say that Chinakwe is up to some mischief by giving his dog the president’s name. They should not be that fast in arriving at such conclusion because the president is not the only one bearing that name though he may be the most popular Buhari in the land. A case study is Chinakwe’s neighbour who felt offended that a dog was named after his father, Alhaji Buhari. The neighbour reported to the police that Chinakwe not only named his dog Buhari but also inscribed the name on both sides of the dog’s body.

    You know our police. They are easily excited by such things. Before you could say IG, they had already taken up the case and invited Chinakwe for questioning. The matter went to court and Chinakwe was granted N50,000 bail. For days, he could not meet his bail condition. He eventually did and was allowed home few days ago. Since then, the police have come under attack for the way they handled the matter. People feel that if the dog had been named after a Lawal, a Mojeed or an Isaac, the police would have turned a blind eye to the case no matter the number of complaints lodged. ‘’Because it is the name of Buhari that is involved what do you expect from them than to be seen acting to protect the name”, they say, suggesting that the police are acting because the president’s name is at the heart of the matter.

    The police too heard the insinuations. On Monday, the Zone 2 Command comprising Lagos and Ogun states explained why Chinakwe was arraigned in court. According to the zone’s spokesman, Muyiwa Adejobi, a Superintendent of Police, his arraignment has no connection with the fact that the president bears Buhari. For all the public cares, he may say that to the marines. Chinakwe, he said, was not arraigned for naming his dog Buhari, but for inscribing the name on both sides of the dog’s body and parading it around Ketere area in Sango Ota. Chinakwe’s action, he said, was capable of causing a breach of peace. What if he had inscribed Lawal or Sule on both sides of the dog’s body and paraded it in public would the police have raised an eyebrow?

    Well, the police may have been doing their duty. Why do little things set us on edge these days? Is it because of the hard times? Emeritus Archbishop of Lagos Cardinal Anthony Okogie may have captured why we find it difficult to laugh at ourselves anymore in an open letter to the president. The serious issues he raised showed that the hard times have overwhelmed many. ‘’Today, cries of hunger can be heard across the length and breadth of our vast country…this letter is to appeal to you to do something fast, and, if you are already doing something, to redouble your effort. May it not be written on the pages of history that Nigerians die of starvation under your watch’’, he said.

    Cardinal Okogie might have been in the spirit when he wrote the letter. Few days after his open letter, an unidentified man jumped into the river under the Mile 2 Bridge in Amuwo Odofin, Lagos,  in an apparent bid to commit suicide. The man was said to have stood on the bridge for minutes brooding over his suffering and how things had gone bad for him. There and then, he decided to end it all. A passenger boat was said to have stopped and rescued him. The rescuers left him on the bank of the river where officials of Lagos State Ambulance Service (LASAMBUS) met him and gave him first aid. A witness said the man said he was tired of life and wanted to kill himself.

    Many Nigerians are dying in silence because they cannot make ends meet. They have become walking corpse. This is why it is advisable that you go on your way these days and avoid altercation with anybody on the road because many out there are just looking for somebody to kill them. Yet in the midst of this distress, criminals are still on the loose. They struck again in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, on Monday, killing an activist lawyer, Ken Atsuete. He was killed when he went to pick his tenant who had been mistakenly kidnapped for him. The police have ruled out assassination, saying he was killed by kidnappers. I will not say the police are jumping into conclusion, but they should investigate first before arriving at their conclusion. What gives them the impression that it is a case of kidnapping and not assassination when they have yet to conclude investigation? They are the experts, so they know best.

    Some men of God will not always act godly and be role model to the rest of us. In Enugu, a pastor was reported to have married a mother and her daughter. The woman, Mrs Calista Omeye, told an Enugu North Magistrates’ Court that she and her daughter married Pastor Timothy Ngwu with her husband’s consent. Her husband, Fidelis, she said persuaded her to meet the pastor because he wanted her to do the will of God through the cleric. So, the pastor ended up doing the will of God through her and her daughter! Reminds one of the kind of things that went on in Jesu Oyingbo’s enclave in the 70s and 80s in Lagos. Who knows, if the pastor’s wife, Veronica, had not shouted out in time her husband too might have ended up creating his own harem in Enugu just as the late Jesu Oyingbo did in Lagos those days.

    Want a tip on how to survive these times? Try laughter – it is a good tonic to relieve tension and a sure way to live long.