The Nation Newspaper

Category: Lawal Ogienagbon

  • The dream teacher

    In the not too distant past, teachers were revered. To be a teacher then was the wish of many. Parents willingly handed over their children  to teachers to be trained and disciplined. Many of my age mates grew up as teachers’ wards; they only went home once in a while to see their parents. For long, they knew no other home than their teachers.

    Parents harboured no fear about their children being maltreated by the teachers. They had implicit confidence in the teachers to groom those children as theirs. And the teachers trained those children along with theirs without any sign that they were not their biological fathers. Teachers earned their stripes then because they were strict and stern. They brooked no nonsense and it was obvious  that they were men of honour and integrity.

    It does not take long to recognise a principled and straight forward person. Teachers had these attributes and more then. They will not give you marks for money or sex. You have to earn your marks. As small as we were, we knew that our teachers could not be compromised and we worshipped them for that. You could only be your teacher’s boy if you are brilliant. You do not need to curry his favour by bringing him gifts, expensive perfume, ornate wrist watches and fanciful shoes.

    The teacher was the ultimate in self respect and self esteem and everybody wanted to be like him. Teachers were second to none. Only reverend fathers came close to them. Because then, Nigerians did not wear their religion like a badge, the clerics were heard but rarely seen; teachers were heard and seen. They were the eyes, ears and mouths of our parents.

    But these days when things should be better, with the coming of technology and other state-of-art gadgets to ease learning, teachers have turned into monsters, devouring their pupils. I wonder if they did not pass through the teachers of yore, who did not make hell on earth for their pupils. Teachers are supposed to be role models; those that their pupils can look up to and aspire to be like.

    Unfortunately, today’s teachers are different from their counterparts of old. What matters to them is to become rich quick and at the expense of their pupils. We have been crying for years that the standard of education is falling, heaping the blame on pupils and their senior counterparts in higher institutions. What we don’t seem to know is that teachers may be the major cause of the problem. They leave what they should teach to engage in unethical activities. They want to make it big at all costs. We are not advocating that teachers should be poor; no, never.  But any teacher interested in wealth should kiss the classroom goodbye and head for the boardroom, where luck may smile on him.

    In their desperation for wealth, teachers have devised means of ripping off primary, secondary school pupils and students in tertiary institutions. They impose all sorts of levies on them. They do not care if parents cannot afford the levies. They take joy in parents’ inability to pay so that they can harass the pupils, especially the girls. It is a shame that in this age and time, teachers can descend so low as to assault girls old enough to be their daughters all because of what they want to eat. What is in these girls’ bodies that they have not seen before? In the past few days, the media have been awash with reports of sexual assault against a teacher at the 89-year-old Queen’s College in Yaba, Lagos Mainland. This is a school, which many parents, whether rich or poor, will do anything to get their children admitted into.

    Queen’s College is among the best in its class and it is the last place where you will expect such a thing to happen. But it happened, according to Chinenye Okoye, who claimed on social media that her daughter was sexually harassed by her teacher, Mr Olaseni Oshifala. We are waiting for Okoye to come out with her daughter and prove her allegation against Oshifala. The Federal Ministry of Education has raised a five-man panel to probe the allegation, which the Queen’s College Old Girls’ Association (QCOGA), has declared is ‘’not unfounded’’. The old girls claimed that such allegation against Oshifala was not new. It may be so, but what did the association do before now to make him pay for eating the forbidden fruit?

    If the association has been in the know of such a weighty allegation against Oshifala since 2005 and kept quite, does that not make it an accessory to the case? This is a serious matter and the government should not rest until it gets to the bottom of it. Who is Chinenye Okoye? Is that her real name or a pseudonym? Who is her daughter? What is her name? What class is she? How did she come in contact with Oshifala? Does Oshifala take her class? Okoye and her daughter are key to cracking this case. Oshifala, we already know, and hopefully, we will soon know his accusers too when they meet at the panel’s sitting, where the whole truth is expected to be unearthed.

    The QCOGA statement is not cheery at all; it calls for concern. Could this have really  been going on for over 11 years, with everybody, especially the principal, the vice principals and their predecessors, looking the other way, despite allegedly knowing about it? Why did they do such a thing to girls put under their care – to protect and to guide? Can they be said to have discharged their responsibility as in loco parentis to these children? Why did they keep quiet? Why? Would they have kept silent if those girls were their biological children? Why did they breach the trust parents reposed in them?  To protect Oshifala and save their school from public odium? With what is happening now, what will they say is the wisdom in their action?  

  •  Okada : Will Ambode bell the cat?

    It was sometime in 1989 and the defunct Directorate of Food, Roads and Rural Infrastructure (DFRRI) was having a workshop in Bauchi State. Participants were expected from all parts of the country. Those of us coming from Lagos gathered at the Murtala Mohammed Airport in Ikeja, as directed, for our flight to Jos enroute Bauchi. Getting to board our flight was a fight as it was in the days of the almighty Nigeria Airways, the nation’s  sole carrier then. At intervals, following announcements, we rushed to board flights going our way as we used to rush for that contraption calledmolue, the once-upon-a-time popular commercial bus in Lagos

    There was chaos at the airport that day because hundreds of us – university teachers, members of the diplomatic corps, military personnel, captains of commerce and media men, among others – were going to Bauchi, but there were no flights. We eventually left the airport around 5pm. On arrival in Jos, the Plateau State capital, we were conveyed by buses to Bauchi, which is about 40 minutes drive from the Tin City.  In Bauchi, Gbenga Ayeni, then of West Africa Magazine, Kudo Eresia-Eke, then of Sunray, and I struck a bond as we explored the town together. Since Jos, Bauchi and Gombe are coterminous, we moved from one town to the other. And our means of transportation was motorcycle.

    It was in Bauchi that I first saw motorcycle being used as means of transportation. And as young reporters then, Gbenga, Kudo and I had fun riding on achaba, as motorcycle is called in the North, to our destinations. Whether going to Zaranda Hotel, where the workshop was held, or to Awalah Hotel, where we lodged, we enjoyed taking the achaba as the operators were stationed in strategic corners of the town, waiting for passengers. To us, it was strange seeing motorcycles being used as commercial buses, so to say, because in Lagos we were used to danfo and molue.

    Years later, the achaba landed in Lagos, but under a different name,  okada. The coming of okada changed the face of transportation in Lagos. From the remote and innermost parts of the metropolis, where commercial motorcyclists started their operation, they found their way into the heart of the city, competing with motorists on the highway. Since okada became means of transportation in Lagos, though illegally, things have not been the same in the megacity. With it came a steep rise in crime, fatal accidents and frequent clashes between okada riders and other road users. Okada riders see themselves as lords of the road. They fight for the right of way with motorists; take one way; jump traffic light and ride without helmet.

    Okada is not recognised as means of transportation in any part of the world because it is not safe to use. Yet, we have people who take okada from Ikotun, one end of the city to Lekki, another end of the metropolis,  because, according to them, ‘’we are in a hurry’’. In a hurry, on a machine without any safety measure with the passenger exposed to the element! Though okada business may be  thriving , that should not be the reason for retaining what has become the major cause of crises in the state? Moreover, it adds no value to the economy. To check the excesses of okada riders, former Lagos State Governor Babatunde Fashola restricted their operation to 492 of the 9200 roads in the state.

    They are complying with the restriction in the breach. Up till today, there is no part of the road where you do not find okada despite the restrictions contained in the Lagos Road Traffic Law 2012.  For how long will we tolerate the crudity and lawlessness of okada riders?  It is high time the traffic law 2012 was reviewed to ban okada operation in the state.

    The buck stops on Governor Akinwunmi Ambode’s desk to decide the fate of okada. It has become urgent for his administration to do something about okada operators before they turn the state upside down with their violent streak. Okada riders operate on short fuse. Whenever there is trouble on the road or in a market, look well, an okada rider will be at the centre of it. No administration will watch and allow a bunch of people to throw its state into anarchy. This is what okada riders are trying to do in Lagos, if they are not stopped now. It is where there is no law that offences are not committed.

    Lagos State has laws; so why should okada riders break them at will and go scot-free? Their operations have been restricted, yet they keep operating as if they have the freedom to run around in every part of the state. If restriction cannot stop them, a ban will surely do the magic so that we do not witness again the kind of incident that happened at Agiliti near Mile 12 about two weeks ago.  What happened in Mile 12 on March 3 was uncalled for and that was not the first time okada men would behave like that.

    An okada man hit a woman and his refusal to take her to hospital led to a riot. The okadaman is Hausa and the woman, a Yoruba. In the twinkling of an eye, the story had changed to Hausa fighting Yoruba. Injustice is injustice anywhere; it has no colour, religion or region. What the okada man will not accept was what he wanted to do to his victim. Some of us would have been witnesses to how they block the road over minor accidents involving their colleagues, harassing the ‘offending’ motorist and other road users. We have also seen how okada is used to rob in traffic, banks and other places.

     

    What good does okada serve? None; whatsoever.  Its patrons may say it eases their movement, but should that be at the expense of the larger society, which is at risk of its operation? There is nothing good about okada.  Many of the riders use their okada to rob, kill and kidnap and they want the government to look the other way. No serious government, which has the public interest at heart, will do that. What is more, many orthopaedic hospitals are full of victims of okada accidents. It is not a business to invest in.

    Thank God, Ambode has created Office of Job and Wealth Creation. Okada operators can approach the agency and see how they can fit into its programmes because whether they like it or not, the days of okada riding are numbered. It may be a hard decision for the governor to take but history will remember him if he takes it because it will be in the overall interest of this megacity. Heavens will not fall if okada is banned and the public will surely find alternative means of movement after its abolition.

    To ban okada is a task that must be done and the House of Assembly must be prepared to play its role in amending the traffic law 2012 to make commercial motorcycling illegal in the state. By so doing, it will be helping Ambode in pushing forth his mantra : itesiwaju ipinle ilu  Eko lo jewa logun. Yes, the progress of Lagos should be the desire of its true residents, no matter where they come from.

  •  The other Ese Orurus

    It took the case of Ese Oruru to open our eyes to the sordid act going on in some parts of the country. It is something that many will never believe can happen in our country. But, it did and from the look of things, it has been going on for years. The affected families could not talk because the system stilled their voices. The best they could do was to blow ‘’muted trumpet’’. Where they lodged complaints, they were denied fair hearing – at police stations, emirs’ palaces and Sharia commissions.

    The families were alone, all alone. Some are still alone today despite the public outcry over Ese’s case. Ese is lucky; she has since been reunited with her family after a seven-month sojourn in another land. She was allegedly abducted from Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital, taken to Kano, converted to Islam and married by his suspected abductor, Yunusa Dahiru popularly known as Yellow. Yellow was a regular face at Ese’s mother’s canteen where he and his friends hanged out.

    It is not impossible that he might have developed interest in the  girl there. But as a much older person, he should have known that Ese, who was then 13, is not ripe for an affair. But he was overwhelmed by what he wanted to eat. Using guile and subtlety, he tricked the girl out of Yenagoa and took her to his Tofa hometown in Kano State. His parents rather than ask him how he came about the girl when they were not married kept quite. They were happy that their son has brought a ‘wife’ home. Just like that; is that how to marry? If Ese were to be their daughter would they have been happy if a man took her away like that?

    Yellow, who appeared in court on Tuesday, is claiming that he and Ese are in love. Well, at 18 since that is the age he is claiming, he may know the meaning of love. Besides, he is street wise since he has been fending for himself out there in Bayelsa far from his Kano home state, where his parents live. Ese cannot be said to be as smart as Yunusa and as such she can easily fall prey to his antics. She may have been attracted to fine boy Yellow without knowing what she was getting herself into. Can that be said to be love? This is why parents, especially mothers, should keep an eye on their daughters. I believe that Ese’s mother should also share in the blame of what happened to her child. Yellow has even indicted her with his claim that she was aware of his affair with Ese

    We cannot run away from the religious, ethnic and cultural dimensions of this abduction saga. The culture of Bayelsa and Kano is different. Bayelsa is predominantly a Christian state; Kano is mostly populated by Muslims. In the former, minors are not given out early in marriage; in the latter it is the norm to get girls married at a tender age.  Former Zamfara Governor Ahmed Sani Yarima, who introduced penal Sharia law in his state in 2000, showed the world that there is nothing wrong in marrying a minor when he took a 13-year-old Egyptian girl for wife over five years ago. His action generated controversy, but he got away with it.

    He knew that he could not have tried that nonsense in Egypt without paying dearly for it. This was why he brought the girl, whose father is his driver, to Nigeria to consummate the marriage. Yellow was only following the footstep of northern leaders like Yarima, but unlike his role model he lacks the resources to satisfy his lust. Only few northerners will see something wrong in what Yellow did because majority of them are involved in the practice. So, why won’t Yellow’s father defend his son and declare that ‘’Ese is in love with my son”. Love? What does a 13-year-old girl know about love?

    Ese epitomises other girls who have suffered similar fate and are being held against their parents wish in Kaduna, Bauchi and Zamfara states. 16-year-old Ifeoma Nichodemus was abducted in Zaria, Kaduna State, in May 2014 by a neighbour, simply named Abdullahi. She has been renamed Aisha. Blessing Gopep, 13,  was abducted in August 2015 by two men, simply named Iliya and Umaru in Bauchi. She now bears Mariam. Linda Christopher, 16, was abducted by a man named Shagari in November 2015 in Bauchi. She is now known as Aisha. 13-year-old Progress Jacob was abducted last January by one Musa in Bauchi. She has been renamed Aishat. Lucy Ejeh was abducted at 15 in October 2009 by one Awaisu in Zamfara. She has been renamed Lewusa. Now 20, Lucy has spent five years in a strange territory without her parents’ consent.

    These are the cases we know of because the families have been emboldened to come out following Ese’s case. Many more may still be out there that we do not know about because their families may be shy to come out and tell their stories. These girls deserve their freedom too, just as Ese and 15-year-old Patience Paul, who has been let go in Sokoto after being held for six months. This thing did not just start today. According to Kano State Chapter of Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) Chairman Bishop Ransome Bello, it has become a ‘’regular occurrence’’ that Christian leaders have resigned to fate.

    It is sad that a thing like this is happening in our country and right under the noses of some of our leaders, who are now feigning ignorance. If the media had not latched on to the Ese case, it is possible that she may still be in Yellow’s home today.

    There is no other name to call this practice than indecent, barbaric and bad. No religion supports the abduction of a minor for marriage because marriage is a union of two consenting people. Northerners may be in support of this indecent practice because it favours the region in the sense that its boys are winning more converts into Islam. But how will they feel if their girls should start to abduct boys of other faith and bring them home for marriage? Will they accept such boys as their in-laws and allow them to stay in the family home? In this wise, I know that what is sauce for the goose will not be sauce for the gander.

    If they cannot bear to see their girls bring those they refer to as kafir home for marriage, why then are they comfortable with their boys doing to others what they would not want done to them?  The  media has not done anything bad in its handling of this matter because there is no way it could have done its job without stepping on powerful toes;  the toes, that is, of those that did not want the story out.  The fact is the North must rise as one to stop this indecent practice of snatching little girls and forcefully converting them to Islam before marriage. Force, the Yoruba say, is not applicable in buying and selling

  • All flay the King

    He’s the only one who knows how he came by that name. He was named Chukwuemeka Ezeugo but he adopted Rev King when he started his ministry. There was a Rev King, who captured the imagination of the world in his lifetime. Even in death, the American Rev Martin Luther-King remains a legend. By adopting his name, Ezeugo was trying to walk in the image of the original Rev King, but he lacks what it entails to do so. This is why he missed his way and misled many, who religiously believed and still believe in him.

    According to Mark Anthony, in Shakespeare’s tragic play, Julius Caesar, ‘’the evil  men do lives after them…’’ Though  Ezeugo  aka Rev King is not dead, the evil that he perpetrated resonates across the country. In his lifetime, the evil that he did is already living after him. Since the Supreme Court upheld the death sentence passed on him by the Court of Appeal and a Lagos High Court for murder, the feeling in town is that he should be executed immediately. Where two or more are gathered the discussion is on when will Rev King be executed? His neighbours, especially, do not pray that he should ever come back. Why is a ‘man of God’ so hated by his neighbours?

    This is the question I have been trying to find answer to since Rev King’s travails began 10 years ago. Rev King is the General Overseer (G.O) of the Christian Praying Ministry (CPM) on Ugo Unabuife Street in Ajao Estate, Lagos. He held sway in the neighbourhood where he turned himself into the lord of the manor. He oversaw everything that went on in that area. He was not only the G,O of CPM, but also of Ugo Unabuife, where he is seen as a terror of a pastor.  Rev King was a different kind of pastor. He was in a class of his own; he was not in the class of the late Rev King whose name he corrupted to perpetrate evil.

    It is ministers like the killer-Rev King that give the real men of God a bad name. Rev King, if he was true to his calling, should be winning souls for God and not taking the lives that he cannot create. I have not ceased wondering how his kind of preacher is able to attract thousands of followers, but then is religion not said to be the opium of the people?  No matter how bad a pastor is, he will always get those that will follow him. Like, they say, attracts likes. This is the case with Rev King. He may have the gifts to preach the word; speak in tongues and prophesy, but he misapplied them. He knew the Word but he was not a doer of the Word. He replaced the Word with his own rules, which he applied  in dealing with those who called him ‘’daddy’’.

    Yes, he is their ‘’father in the Lord’’, their ‘spiritual father’, so to say, but he was not spirit filled.  He was not a father in the true sense of the word to his many disciples. He treated his ‘’children in the Lord’’ as slaves and a master-servant relationship existed between them. He flogged them at will; threw things at them in anger and even set them on fire if he so desired. One day, he overstepped his bounds and he found himself in the trouble, which earned him a death sentence right from the high court to the Supreme Court. What kind of G.O is he that he will set his church members on fire? Is that the way to correct a child? The Good Book says ‘’train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it’’. This G.O did not imbibe this teaching.

    Of course, we should not spare the rod in order not to spoil the child, but that is not to say that we should beat a wayward child to death. We should feed them with words, which they should keep in their hearts. A godly priest will not have acted the way Rev King did when six of his followers – Chizoba Onuorah, Vivian Ezeocha, Jessica Nwene, Kosisochukwu Ezenwankwo, Chiejina Olise, and the late Ann Uzor – allegedly committed fornication. Indeed, the Good Book frowns at fornication, but it does not say that we should kill fornicators and a G.O is expected to know that. A G.O is not expected to fly into a rage over every matter; he should be seen keeping his head where others are losing theirs.

    An overseer, the Good Book says, ‘’must be above reproach, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money…he must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and the devil’s trap’’. Rev King did not take heed and he fell into disgrace and the devil’s trap. See where it has landed him – the death row. The Supreme Court has affirmed that he should be executed for the murder of Uzor, the only one who died among the six persons he set on fire on July 22, 2006. It is just a matter of time before the execution of this verdict, which has become a subject of discussion worldwide. Many of his brainwashed followers believe that he will not be executed, but many who have tasted of his so-called terror are praying for a speedy execution of the verdict.

    He can only be saved if Governor Akinwunmi Ambode decides to temper justice with mercy. But Rev King’s reputation in his neighbourhood does not show that he deserves such mercy. Besides his gullible followers, and perhaps, family members, none of who has, of now, spoken on his fate, no other person is  praying that he should be spared. Rev King has reached the end of the road. His fate should be a lesson to other pastors, who believe that they are larger than life. No matter how big they think they are, they should bear  in mind that they are not God. If he had been a good pastor, his fate may have been different. But as he made his bed, so he will lay on it.

     

    Free the girls now!

    ON Monday night, three schoolgirls were abducted from the Anglican Church-owned Babington Macaulay Junior Seminary (BMJS) in Ikorodu, Lagos. Their abduction brings back the sad memory of the Chibok girls, who were kidnapped in similar circumstance from their school in the wee hours of April 14, 2014. The Chibok girls are yet to be found. This should not be the case with these BMJS girls. We should all rally round their families, the school, the government and the security agencies to get them back. We should not allow the abductors to have the last laugh. No, never. If they know what is good for them, they should let the girls go now.

  • When tomorrow comes

    In other societies where lives matter, Abba Moro, former Minister of Interior, would have been fired immediately after the 2014 Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) recruitment tragedy in which 19 people died. As the minister under whose watch the tragedy occurred, Moro should have carried the can, but he passed the buck. He sought to use former NIS Comptroller-General (CG) David Parradang as scape goat.

    There was nothing Moro did not do to ensure that Parradang became the fall guy. He accused Parradang of abandoning his job for a party in Jos, the Plateau State capital, on that fateful March 15, 2014 when the recruitment took place nationwide. Where was Moro himself that day? What was he doing where he was – monitoring the exercise? I doubt if he was anywhere near any of the centres for the exercise. Is it not expected that for such a huge exercise, the minister and the head of the agency should be in constant touch?

    Was there such interaction between them to ensure that things went smoothly? There was not and this was why the tragedy happened. Both of them are guilty of failing in the discharge of their duties to the nation. But Moro should take the larger share of the blame as the supervisory minister of NIS. It does not speak well of his office that he would descend so low as to start blaming his CG for the tragedy when he too failed in the discharge of his statutory obligation. Moro, it seemed, was more interested in the multi-million naira contract for the recruitment than in ensuring that preparations for the exercise were hitchfree.

    When the Board of Immigration Service, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence, Prisons and Fire Service appeared before the House of Representatives Committee on Public Accounts on March 19, 2014 over the matter,  it blamed Moro for the tragedy. A Commissioner on the board, S.D Tapgun, said  only Moro and the consultant he engaged for the exercise could tell Nigerians exactly what happened. He said Moro ignored their letter not to hire the consultant, adding that the CG was not “part of the recruitment at all”.

    The consultant collected N1000 each from the over 520,000 applicants, who also bought tee shirts for N500 at their centres. The problem with our public officers has always been that of money. When money is involved in any deal, they will show more than a passing interest in it. Once they get the money, they will turn their backs on the project. Could it be that Moro became disinterested in the NIS recruitment after his consultants reported back to him on the money collected? In all good conscience why will he expect Parradang to monitor the exercise when the former CG was not aware of the preparations for it? Where is the money collected from the applicants – in the treasury or private pockets?

    Another leader would not have wasted time in dealing with the matter.  But former President Goodluck Jonathan pussyfooted. In his characteristic manner, he did nothing, waiting for the storm to blow over. That is the kind of leader we had; a see nothing and do nothing leader. Even when his country is burning, he will pretend as if all is well. Little wonder that Moro got away with the death of those poor guys. If we had a decisive leader then,  Moro would not have stayed a minute longer in office after the tragedy. But what did we have? He served out his tenure until Jonathan lost the April 28, 2015 election to President Muhammadu Buhari. Moreover, those who should have pushed for Moro’s sack in the National Assembly were criminally silent over the matter. Moro was a protege of former Senate President David Mark, who pushed through his clearance at the Senate. With people in high places to watch his back, Moro was not brought to justice for the death of these young, promising Nigerians who only applied for jobs with NIS. Did they commit any offence by so doing to warrant their death in such a callous manner?

    All calls for Moro’s sack were ignored by Jonathan. Instead, he left leprosy to treat ringworm. Since he knew his compatriots to be gullible, he promised members of the bereaved families jobs and N5 million compensation. To him, that was the end of the matter. The lost lives did not matter to him. The money and the jobs will settle everything, so he thought. He forgot that everything is not money. His action emboldened Moro, who rejected calls for his resignation and also had the temerity to blame the victims for the stampede that led to their death. ‘’They failed to obey instructions’’, he said, alleging that some unauthorised persons came to the centres to cause problems. Adding insult upon injury, he declared: ‘’I will set up a probe panel’’.

    See who wanted to probe who!  The person that should be tried, saying he would probe those, who out of desperation for work, subjected themselves to harsh conditions in order to be employed. Is that an offence? The offender suddenly became the complainant in order to save his own neck. His ploy worked with Jonathan, who instead of punishing him allowed him to be. All we heard was that the former president told him in private that ‘’I am highly disappointed with your performance. I cannot tolerate this’’. And the matter ended there.

    In 19 days, it will be two years since they died. It is painful that the Jonathan administration carried on as if nothing tragic happened on March 15, 2014.  If Jonathan had returned to power, by now, everything about the case may have been forgotten. What is more, Moro too may have returned with him, if no longer as interior minister, but still as a member of the cabinet. His retention would have been Jonathan’s way of paying him back for a job well done as if the death of those job seekers is a good thing!

    But the day of reckoning is here for Moro. He will soon get his just deserts long after he thought he had gone scot-free.  Thank God, we now have a Pharaoh who knows no Joseph in power. This is why Moro is being called upon to account for what happened in 2014. Though it is rather late in the day, but I do not think it is too late to do justice to the memories of the dead. Their families have suffered for long in silence. What is happening now is heartwarming and reassuring to Nigerians that though the wheels of justice grind slowly, they grind finely. Let Moro take his stand in the dock and tell Nigerians all he knows about the Immigration recruitment tragedy. This is also a lesson to all of us that no matter the office we occupy today there is always a tomorrow when we will give account of our stewardship.

    There is nothing we do today that we will not account for tomorrow. Moro’s tomorrow has come and it is left for him to give a good account of himself or face the consequences of his actions.

  • A budget of errors

    The drama over the 2016 budget seems unending. As one act ends, another opens, making Nigerians wonder whether the government really worked on the appropriation bill before sending it to the National Assembly. It was with fanfare that President Muhammadu Buhari presented the budget to the National Assembly last December 22. Tagged ‘’Budget of Change’’, it is, according to the president, meant to restore Nigerians’  hope in their country after so many years in the wilderness.

    Sadly, the enthusiasm about the budget is waning. Nigerians cannot understand what is happening to the budget over one month after it was presented to the lawmakers. Rather than see their representatives progress with work on the budget, it has been one complaint after the other since the document got to them about two months ago. From the Senate, first came the allegation that the budget had ‘’disappeared’’. Disappear? Nigerians could not believe their ears. How could the budget disappear when it is not a piece of paper on which something was hurriedly scribbled?

    As the din over its whereabouts grew, the Presidency wrote to the National Assembly leadership, seeking to recall the budget for some corrections. Last January 19, it sent the corrected budget back to the lawmakers, with the figures, it said, ‘’remaining the same’’. Since the revised appropriation bill got to the lawmakers, our ears have been tingling from what we have been hearing from those coming to defend their budget. The impression they are creating is that they do not know anything about the document’s preparation. It sounds unbelievable that a minister will not know about his ministry’s budget until  he is confronted with the figures by the lawmakers.

    It all looks so comical, but it is not a laughing matter; no, not at all. Is it possible for a minister not to be in the know of his ministry’s budget until he and his team appear for its defence at the National Assembly? If this is so, who then prepared the budget? Was it prepared before the minister assumed office? If that is the case, was he not briefed about what was done before it was sent to the Budget Office for collation along with others? If we did not see the respective ministries working on their budgets, at least we saw the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, and his team working on the N6.08 trillion budget on national television.

    Udoma even invited Vice President Yemi Osinbajo ‘’to see what we are  doing’’. The vice president praised the team for what it was doing and Udoma said then that what remained was to dot the i’s and cross the t’s. Unfortunately, the budget defence has put a lie to the so-called enormous efforts said to have been put into the document’s preparation. Is this happening because the administration is in a hurry to meet the people’s expectation? It is good that the administration desires to fulfil its obligation to the people, but it will be better if it is thorough and painstaking in doing so because a country’s budget should be prepared by the finest minds around.

    No matter the hurry in drawing up the budget, every figure must be correct so that when the document comes under scrutiny, as it is now at the National Assembly, there will be no room for doubts. Doubts have been created with the disowning of the budget by some ministers and the discrepancies discovered by the lawmakers. The firing of Director-General of the Budget Office Yahaya Gusau on Monday shows that there is more to the matter than meets the eye. Last February 8, Health Minister Prof Isaac Adewole caused a stir when he told the Senate Committee on Health that his ministry’s original budget had been ‘’largely distorted’’. A bigger drama occurred at the House of Representatives Committee on Capital Market last Thursday when the Investment and Securities Tribunal (IST) represented its 2015 budget for 2016.

    ‘’The budget for IST in the 2016 budget proposal is just an exact copy of its 2015 appropriation. It is word for word; figure for figure. And items dealt with and completed in 2015 were repeated’’, the panel said. Are those who prepared the budget blind? Or was it done deliberately to perpetrate fraud? The seriousness of the matter should not be lost on us all. This is why I disagree with Udoma that the errors were ‘’overplayed’’. They were not overplayed. Rather, it is Udoma, with all due respect,  that wants to downplay a serious matter for which those responsible should be punished. A budget is not a document that should be treated in a slipshod manner the way some civil servants have attempted to do with the 2016 appropriation bill. I expect the minister to be angry that some people want to rubbish the first budget that will be prepared under his watch instead of him talking as if there is nothing to what has happened. There is a lot to it and in some countries it could have led to the resignation of the man in charge.

    To many Nigerians, the president’s probe of the ‘’budget padding’’ is welcome so that our people will know that it is no longer business as usual. We expect more heads to roll over this matter besides that of Gusau. That will be the only way for Buhari to live up to his promise that ‘’the 2016 budget will address the problems. We are here to serve Nigeria and indeed Nigerians will get the service they have longed for’’.

     

    See who’s PDP chair

    On Tuesday night, Senator Ali Modu Sheriff popularly known as SAS became Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chairman after a lot of wheeling and dealing. Many never expected PDP to go for SAS, but the party has made its choice; so it should live with it. But what has SAS, a former Borno State governor, got to offer the party? We wait to see.

     

    The seven ‘wise men’

    The jury is still out on the Supreme Court verdict upholding the election of Nyesom Wike as Rivers State governor. Did the Supreme Court err? Was the full court of seven justices induced? I keep my gun powder dry for now. For the benefit of readers, who have been asking, the seven-man panel comprised Chief Justice Mahmud Mohammed, Justice Ibrahim Muhammad, Justice Nwali Ngwuta, Justice Kumai Aka’ahs, Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, who delivered the lead judgement, Justice John Okoro and Justice Aminu Sanusi.

  • Beauty, the beholder and the beast

    Beauty, the saying goes, is in the eye of the beholder. How true this aphorism is can be seen from the different ways we react when we see a thing of beauty, particularly a woman. Most men drool over a beautiful woman. Those specially crafted by God earn our compliments because whether we like it or not they  are irresistible, be they men or women.

    As much as we appreciate beauty, we are not always in one accord in picking a thing of beauty.  What is beautiful to one may not be beautiful to the other. Some will see an ugly woman and scream ”what a beauty” to the amazement of onlookers. Others may see an acclaimed beauty like Miss World and not take a second look at her. What do you make of that? Can we then say that a woman chosen as the most beautiful woman in the world is not pretty?

    She is,  at least to those who chose her, but to other beholders, she may not get a second look.  This is why beauty pageants are always dogged by controversies, with the panellists and members of the audience disagreeing, in most cases, on whoever is eventually picked as winner. But no matter how a woman looks, her head will swell to hear a man say to her ”you are beautiful”.

    Though those three words look simple and ordinary, they have a magnetic effect on women. Many women are known to have taken offence because they do not get such compliments from their men even after taking all the time in the world to look nice for them. Some men do not know how to sweet talk their women to get them, speaking figuratively,  eating out of their hands. And women, no matter how hard hearted they may be, want to hear words that will make their heads spin. It is an age-long practice to appreciate a thing of beauty. There is nothing bad in telling a woman that she is beautiful even if you know she is not. Such compliment is the first step to opening up conversation with her in order to know her better.

    Many men have hit the bull’s eye with that opening line as they have gone to build a lifelong relationship with those complimented women. For trying to use that line on a female cadet officer, a man almost paid with his life, according to a video now trending on social media. He was beaten black and blue sometime in 2014 in Kaduna by the woman and his four male colleagues. They recorded the show of shame on their phone from where it found its way to social media.

    This beauty was not impressed by the compliment of her beholder. And her colleagues, who in this instant can be referred to as beasts because of the way they behaved, descended on the man. The Beast in the fairy tale titled Beauty and the Beast did not behave like that. The Beast appreciated the beauty of Beauty, the last daughter of the widowed wealthy merchant, that it fell ill when Beauty was away from their home in the forest for long. In that tale, we saw the power of love and care, which turned the Beast into a charming, handsome prince.

    But in this true life story, the female cadet officer did not appreciate the language of love. She seems to understand only the power of force, which could be linked to her military training. Does military training preclude a woman from accepting such compliment as ”you are beautiful”? Is there any harm in telling a female cadet officer that she is beautiful? Was that the first time the officer is being told she is beautiful? Was that why the compliment sounded strange to her? Does it not show that something is wrong with her if she can flare up over such innocuous compliment? Does she have the temperament for the military job she is being trained for?

    Who knows the kind of training our cadets are receiving these days. Last December, two Air Force cadets also displayed the beast in them when they locked a porter in the trunk of their car for breaking the windscreen. It was not an intentional act by the porter, but the cadets did not see it as such. They decided to teach the “bloody civilian” a lesson by first dragging him on the ground after which they dumped him in their car trunk. Their plan was to take him to the Air Force Base at Ikeja, Lagos, where he would have seen hell.

    He was saved from these power-drunk cadets by Governor Akinwunmi Ambode, who was passing by Mile 12 market, where the incident occurred. The governor directed the police to take over the case. It will be interesting to know what has become of the matter. Have the cadets undergone orderly room trial for public misconduct? When will the police charge them to court for conspiracy, assault occasioning body harm and disturbing public peace? It is when these cadets are tried for their disgraceful public conduct that they will know that their uniform does not confer on them the power to misbehave and terrorise civilians at will.

    The military is an hallowed institution and those who wish to join it must be levelheaded people that will not abuse its might. What is bad in telling a female cadet officer ”you are beautiful”? Even if she is not beautiful, that should not lead to a quarrel. By her training she should have acknowledged the compliment by simply saying ”thank you” and go her way;  or better still she should have kept quiet and moved on. But to now descend on the man with her colleagues, cursing and swearing, is barbaric. It is unbecoming for military cadets to use foul words like “Am I beautiful? Idiot. Describe me, how beautiful am I? This bastard is not responding. See this idiot. Squat down…”

    It is a shame that these cadets are the future of our military. What will they turn to when they become officers? Brutes? The military will be failing in its duty if it does not re-orientate these cadets before they become terrors. The military, whether of now or of the future, must be people-oriented and should not be constituted by officers who run on short fuse.

  • A second act for judiciary

    It goes without saying that the judiciary is central to the success of the anti-corruption war. To win the war, the judiciary must ensure that corruption cases are speedily disposed and justice dispensed without fear or favour, affection or ill-will. But many believe that the judiciary does not appreciate the enormity of the problem at hand. The judiciary, they claim, does not see the war as one that it should join the larger society in waging.

    Those who talk like this may have a point because of certain developments in the not too distant past. Then the judiciary seemed to have subtly backed those accused of corruption with the way some judges handled the cases before them. They gave judgement which many never believed could emanate from the Bench. The public wondered if it was not the same judiciary that did not bat an eyelid before sentencing small time criminals, such as,  pickpockets and pepper thieves to long term imprisonment that was treating those who stole the nation blind with kid gloves.

    For instance, former Delta State Governor James Ibori was cleared of the charge against him on technical ground by a judge, who held that he should have been tried in Asaba, the capital, and not in Kaduna, where he was docked. His Lordship forgot that corruption, unlike courts, cares less about jurisdiction. Corruption does not also have any shade of colour. What is corruption in Asaba is also corruption in Lagos or any other part of the country for that matter. To throw out a corruption case on the ground of jurisdiction is unfair to Nigerians whose commonwealth many of our leaders have pillaged over the years.

    If our judges are ready to close their eyes to corruption on the ground of jurisdiction, their British counterparts are not ready to do so. They  taught us a big lesson   by sending the same Ibori to jail for the same offence, thereby turning us into a laughing stock in the comity of nations. From also the judiciary, former Governor Lucky Igbinedion walked away with a slap on the wrist for running Edo State like his family empire. He was fined N3 million after being found guilty of corrupt enrichment. The money involved ran into billions of naira. And without breaking a sweat, he dipped his hand into his back pocket and whipped out the fine. Just like that!

    Is that how to fight corruption? Many Nigerians strongly believe that is not how to prosecute the war. They are calling for a proactive judiciary that will treat such cases with the diligence and promptness they deserve. Judges believe they are not to blame for the tardiness in handling corruption cases, claiming that they are only interpreting the law as it is in the statute. But do we have two sets of law – one for the low and another for the mighty? Or a uniform law, which does not recognise status like the scale of justice, which is a blindfolded damsel, wielding a sword? The scale of justice portrays that justice is blind; that it does not know class, but will only do what is just and right, no matter whose ox is gored.

    Many of our judges have not upheld the scale of justice, hence the public clamour for a more vibrant and activist judiciary, which will not compromise under any circumstance. A judiciary that will look corruption in the face and call it by its name and not dress it up in fanciful words or accuse the police and the prosecution of not doing their jobs well before coming to court. In many instances, it was found that some judges hide under such false accusations to throw out cases which otherwise should have gone into trial and convictions secured by the prosecution.

    Corruption will never keep quiet. It will, as Nobel laureate Prof Wole Soyinka said, fight back. And the corrupt will fight with all they have in order to keep all they have stolen. It is for the judiciary to ensure that the corrupt do not enjoy their ill-gotten wealth after leaving office. The place of the court in the anti-graft crusade cannot be wished away as the Nigerian Head of Information Centre of the Inter-Governmental Action Group against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), Mr Timothy Melaye, observed in an interview in this paper on Monday: ‘’If you asked me to return one naira and I returned one naira, there is no court that has said I committed a crime; so it is probable discussion between private or public people. What I would say would be of interest is effective prosecution and securing conviction based on court judgements, then we can now say fine this is a case established by a court’’.

    As we all know, it is only the courts that can convict for any offence. If it were otherwise, there would be less noise today over the judiciary’s handling of corruption cases. President Muhammadu Buhari is so worried that the judiciary is not giving his administration the needed support in fighting corruption that he took his case to the global arena last Sunday during his visit to Addis Ababa for the African Union (AU) Summit. At a town hall meeting with Nigerians living in Ethiopia, the president said: ‘’On the fight against corruption vis-a-vis the judiciary, Nigerians will be right to say that is my main headache for now’’.

    The president was only expressing the popular feeling about the judiciary’s role in the anti-corruption campaign.  But the judiciary may not agree with this popular sentiment, which may be why Chief Justice Mahmud Mohammed on Tuesday in Abuja posited that the three arms of government must come together to fight corruption and related crimes. ‘’Stakeholders in the justice sector’’, he said, ‘’must work in tandem towards a common objective as a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. I believe that if we work in harmony and in sincerity of purpose towards concrete outcomes, then, the efforts that we make will doubtless create a butterfly effect of positive change that is sorely required in the justice sector’’.

    That may be true, but the judiciary remains central to the anti-graft campaign’s success. And it can only discharge this duty honorably if it remains above board in the handling of corruption cases. So far, the people believe it has not lived up to expectation. It is not too late for the judiciary to redeem its image in the next phase of the anti-graft war.

  • A tale of two countries

    Rats and mosquitoes. These are the vectors of the two diseases shaking the two heavily populated countries of Nigeria and Brazil to their foundations. These diseases have killed scores of people in both countries and there are no signs of a let-up, if something is not done fast to address the problem. While Nigeria is battling Lassa fever, Brazil is contending with Zika virus.

    Lassa fever is an haemorrhagic infection, which kills within a few days, if the sick does not seek medical attention fast enough. The first six days are said to be critical in the treatment of the disease. There is a drug to be taken within the first six days which will give the sick relief, but if that treatment window closes, the chances of survival are said to be slim. Zika affects new born babies, especially their heads. Since the outbreak, the heads of newly born babies have been unusually small. Doctors are confused about what to do.

    The world is confronted with two diseases in two countries on two continents. Both countries have large populations. Nigeria with a population of 187 million is the most populated country in Africa. So, if there is any serious health challenge in the country, it will threaten other countries on the continent. Likewise in South America, Brazil with a population of 206.1 million is the largest on that continent. Between them, Nigeria’s and Brazil’s population is over 390 million. Rats and mosquitoes are common in both countries because of their high poverty level caused by poor standard of living.

    Their huge populations have not translated into economic prosperity. They are still somehow backward and perhaps, this is why they are being ravaged by diseases which by now they should have contained because they occur seasonally. For instance, Lassa fever first broke out in Lassa village in Borno State in 1969 and since then it has been recurring every year during the dry season. Even though it first occurred in Borno State, its subsequent outbreaks have been in other parts of the country. No state is immune to Lassa fever and we have seen that so far. Speaking on the seasonal nature of the fever during his visit to the Northeast, Health Minister Prof Isaac Adewole said : ‘’It is a seasonal wind that blows across the country. What this administration will do is to ensure that this will be the last wind’’. Nigerians will be happy if that comes to pass.

    The outbreak this year seems to be the worst in the history of the country. As I write this on Tuesday night, Ebonyi became the 18th state to record a death from the disease. It has been like this since this round of Lassa fever hit the country last August, with Niger as the index state. Among the other affected states are Bauchi, Nasarawa, Taraba, Kano, Rivers, Edo, Plateau, Gombe, Oyo and Akwa Ibom and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). With over 212 cases in 64 local government areas across 18 states so far, Lassa fever has wreaked havoc on the country, the kind not seen in its 47-year history. If the fever continues to ravage the land the way it is going the chances of it spreading to neighbouring countries are high.

    The Federal Government keeps saying that it has the capacity to fight the disease, yet we keep on recording deaths from it. What is happening? Is it that the infected are not going to hospital or that they are  reporting to hospitals late? To prevent fresh cases, some states have embarked on what they call Operation-Kill-All-Rats. In Lagos, the Environmental Health Officers Association of Nigeria (EHOAN) has since got cracking, killing over 7000 rats in some markets in the first round of its de-rat the markets campaign. By the time it is done with the exercise, all rats may have been wiped out in the state.

    This matter goes beyond wiping out rats, mosquitoes and cockroaches. Whether we like it or not, neither Nigeria nor Brazil has the wherewithal, at least for now, to wipe out these rodent and insects. Our lifestyle in both countries create room for them to thrive. Many families live with rats, cockroaches and mosquitoes. For us to overcome the Lassa fever challenge, the government must do something to improve the  standard of living. Many families do not know where the next meal will come from, that is if they ever have any in a day. They struggle to send their children to school only for these kids to graduate without a job to do. We are talking of self employment.

    Yes, that is good. But who will provide the seed money for them to take off? Lassa fever will continue to torment us yearly if we do not do something about our lifestyle. It is not like Ebola, which is not indigenous to us. Lassa fever is part of us and it may remain with us for long except we tackle it from the root by improving the lifestyle of our people in the rural areas for them to appreciate the harm of  living on the border line. The government must move fast to check the spread of the disease nationwide before it is exported across the border, which may earn us sanction from the World Health Organisation (WHO).

    Zika is spreading fear not only in Brazil, but in the Americas. WHO has warned that the Zika disease may spread to South, Central and North America. In Brazil, the government is running from pillar to post trying to find a solution to this health challenge, which may scuttle its hosting of the Olympics from August 5 to 21. From Recife to Rio de Janeiro, everybody is gripped by fear. The carnivals planned for some cities have been cancelled. Expectant mothers are afraid for their unborn babies. The situation is so bad because the vaccine for the cure is not available. Without the vaccine, there is no cure.

    And those planning to get pregnant have been advised not to do so, at least for the next two years. Aaaaah!   As it is in Nigeria, so it is in Brazil. These, indeed, are not the best of times for Nigera and Brazil. What a sour tale of two countries. May God deliver both countries from these terrible diseases.

  • Not the people’s Generals

    Nations do not joke with the funding of their armed forces. This is why in most cases, Defence gets a huge chunk of the budget. By setting aside a large sum for Defence, a country is preparing its military for any eventuality. A nation’s military is not built in a day, it is developed over time and it takes successive administrations to work at it. A nation that waits until it has to fight a war before it builds its military is only courting disaster.

    The military plays a crucial role in the life of a nation. It is the bulwark against external aggression. So, for the military to defend the territorial integrity of a nation, it must be well equipped and its personnel well catered for. When soldiers are well kitted they too will give of their best. To whom much is given, the saying goes, much is expected. But where soldiers are not motivated, they cannot be expected to perform wonders. They will flee from the enemy as we have been seeing some of our soldiers do in the fight against Boko Haram.

    A soldier is expected to go to war with arms and ammunition and in these days of technological advancement, he must also be schooled in the use of high-tech weapons and other state-of-the-art war toys. No nation sends its soldiers to war with biscuits in their hands because the battlefield is not for wining and dining; it is for fighting. During the Civil War, our soldiers discharged themselves well, fighting to keep Nigeria one, but in the last three years, these same soldiers were until recently finding it difficult to get their bearings right in the encounter with Boko Haram.

    Why will a well trained army like ours run away from a ragtag bunch of  Boko Haram elements? Why? We now know why. The funds for the acquisition of arms and ammunition and other war equipment were spent on frivolities by those charged with securing us. The Dasukigate has opened our eyes to what happened to the $2.1 billion meant for the purchase of war planes and other weapons to fight Boko Haram. Instead of spending the money on what it was meant for, the former National Security Adviser (NSA), Col Sambo Dasuki, resorted to sharing it out among politicians and friends of the immediate past administration.

    The poor soldiers sent to fight Boko Haram were not given anything to defend themselves. When they retreated from battle, they were tagged cowards and court martialled. Some were sentenced to death; some were jailed and some were dismissed. The generals who sent them to battle without weapons derided them. Immediate past Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) Air Chief Marshal Alex Badeh, who along with 19 others, are to be probed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for their alleged roles in arm purchases for the Air Force between 2007 and last year, once said that the soldier’s oath to defend his country is sacrosanct. A soldier did not take oath to run away from battle, he said. Yes, that is true to a certain extent because there is a condition precedent to be fulfilled for a soldier to lay down his life for his country. Unfortunately, Badeh did not address this condition, which is  the authority must provide the soldier the instruments of war to be able to defend himself and country

    Did Badeh as CDS ensure that these soldiers were well armed before sending them to battle? If he did, he would have been justified in setting up the court martial, which sent some soldiers to death for alleged mutiny. But if he did not, he should be made to face the consequences of his action – the killing of innocent souls by sending them to battle without equipping them. A general is expected to look out for his men and not to hasten their death by ill-preparing them for battle. As President Muhammadu Buhari said on the Hausa Service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) last December 28, the soldiers were provoked to mutiny by the actions of their bosses, who were only interested in catering for themselves.

    ‘’The government at that time sent the soldiers to the battlefield without arms and ammunition to prosecute the war. That was what led some of them to mutiny. They were arrested and detained because of this’’, the president said. Who is guilty between the soldiers and the generals? It is criminal to send a soldier to war without giving him weapons. It is heinous for a general to now turn around to punish the soldier for the  failure to do his own job. It is the generals’ job to provide their soldiers with guns. Why didn’t they do so? What is their defence to this criminal conspiracy to deliberately waste the lives of these young men?

    This is why the probe of Badeh, Air Marshal M.D. Umar, Air Marshal A.N. Amosu, Maj Gen E.R. Chioba, Air Vice Marshal (AVM) I.A. Balogun, AVM A.G. Tsakr, AVM A.G. Idowu, AVM A.M. Mamu, AVM O.T. Oguntoyinbo, AVM T. Omenyi, AVM J.B. Adigun, AVM R.A. Ojuawo, AVM J.A. Kayode-Beckley, Air Commodore S.A. Yushau, Air Commodore A.O. Ogunjobi, Air Commodore G.M.D. Gwani, Air Commodore S.O. Makinde, Air Commodore A.Y. Lassa, Col N. Ashinze and Lt Col M.S. Dasuki, is welcomed. Let them face the EFCC panel and tell the world what they did with the billions of naira that passed through their hands for the purchase of military aircraft. Did they spend the money judiciously?

    We want to know what happened because that is the only way to prevent a recurrence and ensure that in future the military lacks nothing to confront internal and external aggression. If Boko Haram had been an external aggressor, where will we be today as a country? In his valedictory speech last July 30, Badeh, among other remarks, said : ‘’Over the years, the military was neglected and under-equipped to ensure the survival of certain regimes…’’ But when he had the opportunity to change things as CDS, what did he do?  Nigerians are wiser than that. He cannot pull the wool over our eyes.