The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Criminality in Niger Delta and absence of governance

    Illegal oil bunkering seems to have become institutionalized in the oil producing states of Delta, Rivers and Bayelsa. Large volume of oil is siphoned from pipelines damaged by criminals and ferried into waiting ships on the high seas en-route Europe and North America. This is done with impunity. Periodic lamentation is all we get from the federal government even with its control of the army, navy, air force and the police. President Jonathan whimsical award of multi-billion dollar contract to Tompolo, General Boyloaf and other Niger Delta armed militants to secure our oil pipelines only led to the booming of illegal bunkering.

    Reporting in the Financial Times issue of June 26, 2012,   William Wallis  claims ‘The Nigerian state and oil companies are losing a billion dollars or more a month to oil theft by criminal networks whose activities have expanded rapidly under the government of President  Jonathan’. In 2013 during Spring meeting of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in Washington, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala the then Finance Minister and coordinating minister stated: “We estimate total loss at over 300,000 barrel per day,’’ valued at $1billion. The trade in stolen oil involves a sophisticated criminal network and international traders who provide oil at discounted prices to refineries in West Africa and in China and India”.

    Nuhu Ribadu-led Petroleum Task Force report  on the oil and gas sector put daily crude oil theft at 250,000 barrels daily at a cost of $6.3bn (N1.2trn) a year. This according to the report puts the total amount lost through oil theft in the two years of Jonathan’s government at over $12.6bn (N2trn).  Charles Soludo, one time CBN governor in his 2015 letter to Okonjo Iweala put the average loss figure at 400,000 barrels per day coming “to about $60 billion (12.6 trillion) ‘stolen’ in just four years” at a time of cessation of crisis in the Niger Delta, amnesty programme and huge amount paid for ‘protecting’ the pipelines and security of oil wells, asking if the ‘thieves’ were spirits”.

    Sadly, nothing has changed under President Buhari’s government of change. Earlier this year, Rotimi Amaechi, the minister for transport alleged as much as $25 billion is lost to oil bunkerers annually. Edo State’s Godwin Obaseki, who doubles as chairman of the ad hoc committee of the National Economic Council on Crude Oil Theft recently revealed that about 22 million barrels of crude oil have been shipped away out of our shores by the vandals in the past six months. And only last Monday, September 9, SPDC’s General Manager, External Relations, Igo Weli, during a media workshop on pipelines vandalisation in Port Harcourt was lamenting that “SPDC JV is currently losing about 10,000 barrels per day (bpd) of oil valued at N202 million and appealed to   government, communities and other stakeholders to stem the incessant attack on our oil assets in the Niger Delta.”

    The Nation newspaper editorial of September 8 titled “Flamboyant Vampires” however seems to have hit the nail on its head.  The reason the business of illegal bunkering continues to boom according to the editorial   is that “some of the security operatives assigned to protect the oil infrastructure have become the criminals-in- chief, not only aiding and abetting but also enabling, the army protects them on land and the navy at sea. Even members of the police force are also in on it. It is a massive mess”.

    And involved in the massive mess are the governors of the crime infected Niger Delta states who many believe arm the rampaging Niger Delta militant groups the elite use as foot soldiers, the traditional rulers who the late Saro wiwa described as ‘vultures’ for sacrificing the well-being of their people by receiving blood money from multinationals that pollute their environment and the federal government that treat the oil rich Niger Delta as a conquered territory.

    The nightmare of people in the Delta region started with the promulgation of the petroleum decree which wrested ownership of all land and any resource found in, under and upon the land, in the federal military government shortly before the outbreak of the civil war. Just like the foreign companies prospecting for oil in the region, the motive was greed. If consideration for the people and their environment came later, it was as an after-thought or as a result of pressure from the political elite from the area. And as it has sadly turned out, the leading light from the region including the governors ( Ibori, Igbinedion, Alamieyeseigha,  already convicted for stealing their states blind and Odilli, shielded by the courts,) who took the federal government to court over on-shore and off-shore oil revenue, the vultures who live on the blood and sweat of their people and the creeks armed gangs who after securing multi-billion dollar contracts from Presidents Jonathan and Obasanjo and today live like kings serve none but themselves. The poor whose names were used in vain are left alone to cope with consequences of devastated farmlands and polluted streams.

    Although it was the agitation by leading lights of the devastated Niger Delta area that  led to the establishment of The Oil Mineral Producing Areas Development Commission (OMPADEC) with Decree 23 of 1992, primarily to rehabilitate, develop and tackle the ecological problems through provision of infrastructures such as good  roads, electricity, potable water, land reclamation, agriculture, fish business and transportation, but OMPADEC also collapsed under the weight of corruption perpetrated by the same Niger Delta political elite.

    OMPADEC was succeeded by Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) empowered with 13 per cent derivation revenue. It was established to develop Niger Delta and end the restiveness among the youths in the affected oil producing communities. Again, NDDC failed to achieve its objectives. Many of the youths who received technical trainings abroad returned into the service of big time bunkerers who needed their newly acquired technical knowledge to damage pipelines in the creeks.

    Criminality in the Niger Delta region, like the Middle Belt, Southern Kaduna, Zamfara, Southwest and elsewhere in the country as many have argued, is evidence of absence of governance in the country.  Most of those regarded as leaders at all levels since the beginning of the fourth republic have turned out to be dealers. Both Obasanjo’s and the Niger Delta governors, that took him to court over resource control were neither sincere to Nigerians nor to the oil producing areas. One had eyes on a third term agenda while the other set out to further impoverish their people.  President Jonathan as commander in chief handed over the protection of our oil pipelines to armed gangs who were in the employ of dealers as leaders. That served only the interest of the terror groups he and other Niger Delta dealers put in place for political survival.

    It is not yet Uhuru. Beyond instutionalisation of criminality in the oil rich Niger Delta by successive Nigerian dealers, evidence of absence of governance today abounds everywhere. While soldiers, naval officers, air force men and the police are said to be aiding and abetting criminality in the Niger Delta and elsewhere in the country, one encounters on the roads and at functions obscene scenes of two dozens of DSS men and as many policemen wielding guns and intimidating people because a minister’s convoys of several SUVs is passing by. (Ministers during the administration of President Shehu Shagari in the second republic only moved around with a police man while minister of states had none).

    The country remains dysfunctional in the way those in Abuja today carry out the normal business of government.

  • Nigeria: Cry my beloved country!

    These are the worst of times for Nigeria.  Nigerians are being arrested in Los Angeles and New Jersey, United States for advanced fees fraud, impersonation and credit card fraud and for what is now generally called “Nigerian scams”.  When other people commit these crimes, they are charged for committing “Nigerian scam”. We have now gone into legal history as giving name to a particular kind of crime. Tens of our people are being beheaded in Saudi Arabia for drugs peddling.  The American FBI is looking for almost a hundred Nigerians for fraud. One of our country men even appeared on an ABC television network confessing his crimes and tearfully telling Americans how to identify “Nigerian scams”. Tens of our nationals are awaiting executions in Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and Vietnam. Some are in Laos and Cambodia for one crime or the other deserving capital punishment. What the hell for goodness sake are Nigerians doing in Laos and Cambodia? I mean it’s a long way to Tipperary! Other Nigerians are being killed in South Africa for drugs peddling. Chinese and Russian jails are also full of them for one infraction or the other of their laws. Some years ago, they were brawling on the streets of a Chinese town until they were beaten to surrender by some burley Chinese constabulary.

    It seems wherever they go, they are followed by their criminal reputation. Genuine business people cannot transact business without being suspected of fraud. When our people particularly the young people have successfully conned an unsuspecting victim, they spend the money on frivolities like huge marriage celebrations, cars, hotels and on hedonistic life styles and prostitution.  They even not only spray our national currency which they march under their feet, they also spray dollars, euros and pounds sterling. And for these they are prepared to ruin themselves and ruin the image of our country and even to commit hara kiri because anybody caught with hard drugs in most parts of Asia and the Middle East is likely to be sentenced to death. Yet with wide opened eyes our people go to these places hoping they will not be caught. Our greed is what is killing our young people. There is of course unemployment at home but the fact is that many of our young people are not ready to do the work that is available.  They go to universities to avoid hard work or not to work at all. Even those who have jobs want to make it big by illegal and criminal ways. Why will a bank manager for example, resign his job to emigrate abroad where there is no certainty of a job but to join criminal gangs to defraud the system of the country he or she is going to? There is no Eldorado anywhere. There is no crown without thorns! This is the truth. A man who is a bank manager resigns and goes abroad only to wash dead bodies in the mortuary! Our young people must be realistic. I once participated in an interview panel for young recruits into an industry. When a young girl was asked what her goal in life was, she retorted that she wanted to “live large”. I had never heard the expression before. She was thanked for coming and asked to go and live large. I hope she has learned a lesson and would moderate her life expectations.

    Young people tend to blame us the older generation for having spoiled the country for them by our criminal indulgence in corruption, squander mania, mismanagement, lack of focus  general insecurity and planlessness. I plead guilty to all these charges of generational crimes. But I must say that this country has produced in the past world class scholars, international civil servants and administrators, jurists and distinguished medical scientists. Where we have failed is getting the right kind of political leadership and right helmsman at the critical juncture of national development. We were never able to find a leader who could cut through the miasma of tribal divisions and antagonism and chart a brilliant course of national integration for all round development. Poverty knows no tribe and prosperity also knows no tribe. Americans always say their favourite colour is green that’s the colour of the dollar. If Nigeria was prosperous, who will care what tribe the man at the top of government belongs to? I feel really ashamed that I am a citizen of a country that earned almost a trillion dollars from oil and gas over the years and we have nothing to show for it. No light. No potable water.  No motor-able roads. Hospitals are “mere consulting clinics “No schools and 30 percent of school aged children are roaming about the streets as almajiris and hawkers of all kinds of goods. We do not have comfortable means of transportation or communication. All the appurtenances of modern civilization are missing. Some of our leaders troop to England, Dubai and Abu Dhabi to invest stolen money .We build mansions that become useless even while we are alive and in any case our children will not be able to maintain them when we are gone and if they want to sell them there will be no buyers because they will be old fashioned by then. What we have built will become useless at the end and all we have accumulated primitively will become a manifestation of vanity.

    Vanity upon vanity is all vanity, said king Solomon in his Ecclesiastical discourses.

    If my generation has failed the country and our greedy youth has ruined the image of the country that the older generation built, shouldn’t we all start all over again and make hay while the sun still shines? Or are we going to throw up our hands and wait for Armageddon or the inevitable revolution?

    The signs of revolution are all over the place, we can no longer move from one city to another without the fear of being kidnapped. We can’t sleep with our two eyes closed. I arrived last week from London and my luggage was instantly stolen. Foreign investors except for intrepid Chinese and Indians, who are ripping us off, have stopped coming to our country. We must do something to rescue this land of our forefathers. It seems to me that we must prepare the next generation by teaching them how to behave right from home to primary and secondary schools. Cheating at entrance examinations must be severely punished.  Parents indulging in it must be publicly disgraced. We also must try and begin a campaign of moral rearmament and ethical revolution in our regular civic and religious lives. The church and the mosque must be engaged and charlatans masquerading as men of God must be forced out of their disguise. The government must mobilize the country for development.  All young people roaming about the cities must be taken away to state farms and agricultural settlements to be built by all state governments. Annual budgets without any appreciable change in our lives must give way to physical changes. This country needs to be transformed like China was after 1949 and even Vietnam in recent times. Within living memory, we have seen the transformation of Malaysia and Singapore with which we shared common colonial history. There is presumably nothing wrong with us as a race. We just must get out of this rot. We cannot continue like this.

    The reason why our young people have taken to crime both at home and abroad is that they think crimes pay. This is why we must approach punishment after crimes with full speed of the law. Punishment must be sure and swift whether crimes committed by herders, kidnappers, armed robbers, economic criminals and economic saboteurs damaging gas and petroleum pipelines. The spate of crimes committed at home and abroad indicates that our chickens have come home to roost and our cup is full. We must face our responsibility and take whatever measure that is necessary to stamp out all these criminal tendencies of our people. No one is born a criminal it is our degraded society that has made us criminals. We must therefore purify this evil society. Our legal system that allows criminals to exploit legal technicalities to avoid judgement and justice is not a worthy and worthwhile legal system. It must be thrown away. Recently a  British court fined us $9.6 billion to be paid  to so-called Irish investors who never dug the foundation of their so-called gas liquefaction complex in Calabar and then turns up to say because Nigeria failed to deliver gas to a non-existent gas factory, it lost  imaginary profits for 20 years. The deal ab initio was a product of Nigerian corruption and lack of patriotism and coordination.

    But what is most galling is that a Nigerian lawyer sat on the panel of arbitrators. What kind of legal system would condone this kind of fraud? We need whole sale judicial review in this country and Nigerian lawyers need to be more patriotic and less corrupt. Money is not everything. We brought nothing to this world and we shall not take anything with us when we depart it.

    Our cup is indeed full and we must change the course of our journey as a nation so that we don’t hit the rocks of the inevitable cascade into an abyss of no return.

    The recent situation of our much abused and despised people in South Africa, even though the involvement of many of them in drug dealing , prostitution and gang violence in which Nigerians are killing Nigerians in a foreign country, calls for close scrutiny of the kind of Nigerian migrants invading other people’s homelands. We must be frank with ourselves. I don’t like hearing we helped to end apartheid in South Africa. So what? Does that give us the right to invade another country with drugs? Our support for liberation of Southern Africa was based on enlightened self-interest of wanting to wipe out the blemish on and the humiliation of all black people on account of their colour which was what apartheid represented. Helping people in Southern Africa, in which I was personally involved, amounted to a second liberation of Nigeria from racism. There are Nigerian doctors, lawyers, professors, engineers and others making useful contributions in South Africa and they are not being molested. We must bring home our flotsam and jetsam and other deplorables ruining our image in South Africa. Must everybody be a trader? Enough is enough. Our humiliation in South Africa is part of the failure of our governments over the years that earned money and failed to industrialize the country and provide jobs for its teeming population. Enough of this voluntary second slave trade. We need introspection and soul searching to find solutions to what is wrong with Nigeria.

  • Before another attack

    Giving its history, a country like South Africa should be seen promoting tolerance and unity. As a country which rose from the ashes of racism, it should have learnt a big lesson from its dark past. South Africa was virtually a pariah nation when White supremacists cornered every part of it, riding roughshod over Blacks and other people of colour. The world refused to keep silent and that was what saved South Africa from the hands of the Whites.

    Nigeria played a key role in the fight for a democratic South Africa. It committed, man, money and material into the cause. It took up Britain again and again over the issue because of the insincerity of the United Kingdom (UK) in the fight against apartheid. Our leaders and musicians saw the South African cause as  personal. In their individual capacity, they waged war against the evil known as apartheid.

    Musicians waxed albums to condemn the evil practice. Our head of state, the late Gen Murtala Muhammed showed true leadership when at the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, in 1976, he came down hard on world powers, especially the United States (US) for their support for apartheid. ‘’When I contemplate the evils of apartheid’’, he began, ‘’my heart bleeds and I am sure the heart of every true blooded African bleeds…

    “Rather than join hands with the forces fighting for self determination and against racism and apartheid, US policy makers clearly decided that it was in the best interest of their country to maintain White supremacy and minority regimes in Africa…Africa has come of age. It is no longer under the orbit of any extra continental power…’’ It took 18 years after that no holds barred speech for South Africa to become democratic and it was democracy well earned few years after its iconic leader, the late President Nelson Mandela, was released from 27 years imprisonment.

    Since then, South Africa has not looked back, but it seems to have forgotten where it is coming from. These days, some South Africans take delight in attacking foreigners in their land, levelling all sorts of allegations against them. If they do not describe them as drug barons, they will accuse the foreigners of taking their jobs. How are these foreigners depriving them of employment? The thing is they are suffering from inferiority complex. They hate to see foreigners, Nigerians especially because they cannot stand up to them in every facet of life. The next best thing to do in the circumstance, in their thinking, is to make wild allegations against these foreigners and descend on them in large numbers.

    These xenophobic attacks did not start today. They have been on for years and Nigeria has, in the spirit of African brotherhood, been considerate, too, too considerate in handling the matter. I can see reason with our leaders. They do not want to destroy the house they built with their own hands. But what if the occupants of the house keep making the house too hot for you as the South Africans are doing? Our government’s lukewarm attitude over the years may have emboldened the South Africans to continue to treat Nigerians like pests.

    We are no pests nor irritants. Nigerians are a proud people who can hold their own anywhere in the world. South Africans are not a match for us. I am not advocating a tit for tat, but it is high time these South Africans were put in their place. What do they think of themselves? Their people and government are not showing any remorse despite the diplomatic way Nigeria is handling the matter. Does South Africa think it can take on Nigeria if our relationship breaks down?

    Nigeria is speaking diplomatically, but they are talking aggressively. What do you make of this statement from Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, South Africa’s Minister of Defence: “we cannot stop the xenophobic attacks. The truth is that we are an angry nation. What is happening cannot be prevented by any government’’. Haha! The minister was only toeing the path of some of her compatriots who perceive the Nigerians in their country as layabouts. This is why they call our people all sorts of names in order to justify the unwarranted attacks on them.

    If as the minister said no government can stop these attacks, then the government must have failed in its duty of enthroning law and order. A government that cannot control its citizens is no government. Perhaps, the simple explanation to all this is that the government is privy to what is happening and it is only pretending to sympathise with the victims. How will the South African government feel if Nigerians were the ones doing this to its citizens?

    It will not be happy just as Nigeria is feeling bad over the killing, maiming of its citizens and the destruction of their properties. When did it become an offence to seek greener pastures in a foreign land?

  • Daily shuttle, daily suffering

    FOR those living on the Lagos – Ibadan Expressway axis, these are not the best of times. Going and coming on that road since work began on the Kara bridge – Berger portion on September 2 has been hell. Be it in the morning, afternoon or night, movement is not smooth. The traffic is always crawling. When you think you have left home early to beat the traffic (was that not what they advised us to do?), you will still run into it one way or the other.

    What is confounding is that you will not know the cause of the problem. On Monday, the traffic was so bad that those who took the untarred road that bursts out at the OPIC intersection were swearing under their breath. Those on the express did not fare better. If Julius Berger had worked on the untarred road as an alternative route, it would have been in good condition whether it rains or not.

    It was in a terrible condition because of the rain which fell at the weekend. It was clogged as motorists tried to beat the traffic on the express. Everywhere was jammed as motorists sought the way out. From the look of things, there may be no way out until Julius Berger completes the job. And that is going to take 120 days. Hmm! We are in for it.

  • Sanwo-Olu and the Greater Lagos vision

    WE all saw it as a simple exercise to shake off that lethargic feeling that often visits after a heavy lunch or a short night rest. Or a physical exercise to keep us awake. It all turned out to be that and more – the power of dreams, sheer imagination, some deep thinking and a test of the fecundity of the human mind.

    “Just close your eyes and imagine the Lagos of your dream, the Lagos you would like to see.” That was the directive from the instructor at one of the sessions during the three-day retreat for members of the Lagos State Executive Council and Permanent Secretaries.

    The results were as exciting as they were imaginary. Some dreamt of a Lagos at peace with nature – beautiful parks and gardens, with exotic flowers and lush green grass, clean air and seductive beaches on which coconut trees sprout freely.

    Others saw a Lagos with smooth and wide roads, free of pestering street hawkers and traffic robbers. A Lagos where nobody goes to bed without food, where no kid misses the education train for lack of money, where the old are catered for, where all have access to good healthcare and where religious harmony thrives. A Lagos driven by technology, where investors will be willing to stake their cash and jobs will be more available.

    Again, the power of dreams. “Are these possible?”  “Can we do it?” “Yes; we can!” we all screamed.

    That has been the team spirit propelling the administration of Governor Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu and his deputy, Dr. Kadiri Obafemi Hamzat, which is 100 days old today, having been inaugurated on May 29 to lead the journey to that “Greater Lagos” we all dreamt of.

    Driving the vision are the Six Pillars of Development, with the lyrical acronym, T.H.E.M.E.S, which stands for Traffic Management & Transportation, Health & Environment, Education & Technology, Making Lagos a 21st Century Economy, Entertainment & Tourism as well as Security & Governance.

    At the centre of it all are the people. That is the song that Mr. Sanwo-Olu sings, believing that a policy is most meaningful when it is immensely beneficial to the people. Has the administration kept to this line of thought, considering its actions? Discerning members of the public, among who the good people of Lagos number, will surely testify to this.

    An 110-bed Maternal and Childcare Centre (MCC), a four-storey edifice that is a piece of architectural delight, was opened on Tuesday at Eti Osa Local Government to boost the battle against infant and maternal mortality, with plans to upgrade the facility to a general hospital. A beautiful school, 12 blocks of classrooms, built in partnership with the state government and the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Tabernacle of David Parish in Alaguntan village, also in Eti Osa, was opened.

    For one month – from August 1 to 31 – there was a festival of surgeries. A team of volunteer doctors, who are specialists in various areas of medical practice, performed thousands of surgeries, especially on children with deformed limbs. Free.

    There were many moving spectacles – of fathers shedding tears of joy after seeing that their crippled children could walk again, of many having their sights saved from glaucoma and others having their troubled health restored – courtesy of BOSKOH Lagos Health Mission International (HMI), a Non-Governmental Organisation. More than 25,000 Lagosians were treated and 1,417 surgeries were carried out.

    It was delightful to find our senior citizens singing and dancing last Friday after being handed their pensions and gratuities – about N5b. Some shed tears. Others were speechless, just staring. Many were just praying for Sanwo-Olu.

    The Alhaji Jakande Gardens Estate – 492 homes with sporting facilities, good roads, car parks, a sewage treatment plant and a mini-water works – was inaugurated  on Wednesday in Igando, in a daring bid to reawaken the housing sector.

    So symbolic was the ceremony that Alhaji Lateef Kayode Jakande,90, the state’s first civilian governor, after whom it was named, and his wife attended. So was Chief Tajudeen Olusi, member of the respected Governor’s Advisory Council (GAC) and many members of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

    The Lagos State Employment Trust Fund (LSETF), also on Wednesday, gave out N4b cheques to women entrepreneurs. So glad was Access Bank Group Managing Director Herbert Wigwe that he announced that the facility would be increased to N10bn to get more Lagosians employed.

    There is also the World Bank agriculture loan scheme;  1,700 people will benefit. Each will get N2m. An integrated rice mill is being built in Imota – a 22-hectare facility, which has the capacity to cater for 25% of our national rice needs.

    Some 120 patrol vehicles and 35 motorbikes have been given to security agents to enhance their operations, aiding their patrol system and boosting their response time in case of an emergency.

    The battle for a cleaner and healthier environment is on. The heaps of refuse that turned the highways into a vast eyesore have largely disappeared. Millions of bags that will help residents in sorting their wastes have been distributed, even as there are plans to expand the Olusosun dumpsite to 42 acres for more waste and a faster trucks turnaround time.

    Many roads have been rehabilitated. Workers are back on the Lagos-Badagry Expressway, the Pen Cinema Bridge and Isawo Road in Ikorodu.

    What lies ahead of the Sanwo-Olu administration? Exciting times are on the way. There are efforts to improve transportation by harmonising all the areas of the sector for better performance. Water transportation will be enhanced with ferry services getting a facelift. The rail lines under construction are, once again, receiving attention.

    More teachers are to be recruited to boost primary and secondary education, even as technical education will be strengthened to equip our youths for the fast-evolving technological age that has caught up with us all. Tourism, with its huge potentialities, will come alive to boost internal revenue and showcase our essence to the world.

    Security will go beyond the routine as technology will be deployed in the fight against crime. Laws will be enforced for a total reorientation of the people.

    How will the Greater Lagos dream be achieved? Leadership, in Sanwo-Olu’s view, remains a key factor. Besides, team work is also important. To drive home his point, the governor at the retreat aforementioned, used a sports imagery. He is reputed to be a soccer enthusiast; an Arsenal fan.

    Sanwo-Olu spoke of being relevant, drawing his example from Jamaican sprinter Merlene Ottey, who remains so relevant even at 59. There must also be resilience, an attribute that has seen tennis star Djokovis staying on top for so long. For appropriate resourcing, the governor chose Man City, the Premier League team, which would not take on a player unless there is need for him. Besides, the team enjoys good funding and would not tolerate a bad manager. Many were fired until the team stabilized. Barca, the Spanish League frontliners, Sanwo-Olu believes, symbolises value for money, with good returns for investors.

    A team living in the past? That is Arsenal – in the governor’s view. Its fans see Arsenal as prudent; it would not shell out cash on new players like the others and it is a good example of how to be solvent. Trophies, it seems, are not the team’s priority but stability. Today’s achievement is good, but not enough to make room for complacency as there are always more hurdles to scale.

    ‘Many have spoken about Team Sanwo-Olu – a mixture of professionals and politicians, including women who are knowledgeable about their areas. For the governor, the 100 days ceremonies are no mere revelries on what has been done. No. They are like a springboard to propel the administration into the future – a future in which the Greater Lagos dream will become a reality.

    The challenges are huge, no doubt, but Sanwo-Olu sees it all as a marathon and not a 100 metres dash for which he and his Deputy Dr. Kadiri Obafemi Hamzat are prepared.

     

    • Omotoso is the Commissioner for Information & Strategy, Lagos State

  • The first 100 days illusion

    THIS minute, the “First 100 Days in Office” panegyric attains crescendo in the caverns of Nigeria’s State Houses and the Ninth National Assembly.

    Government institutions, routinely, churn out statistics and claims celebrating public officers’ “excellent” exploits over the first three months widely considered a probationary period.

    The media is seduced to preach the gospel even as the public unfurls and pliantly accepts the Kool-Aid of this engineered temperament. It doesn’t matter if the highlighted achievements are exaggerated or unreal, everybody buys into the farce. Those that couldn’t are too spiritless to protest.

    Amid the pageantry, however, a spirit of gloom and depression haunts the 36 states of the federation; the spectre mocks the hyperbolic chants in praise of public officers, on the corridors of power, the pulpit and across multimedia platforms.

    This haunting spirit is manifold: a post-recession and wartime gloom afflicts the citizenry; a rising tide of poverty and bigotries aggravate the situation increasing distrust among the citizenry, public office and political institutions.

    Nigeria shrivels like a sick rose but the public officer inhales its sick molds, basking in its scent, cradling its diseased stamens as his bower of bliss.

    The country’s death wriggle is mistaken for an act of concealment hence the public officer’s approach takes the form of a rape. To this end, he deploys political power as his shaft of conquest, his manic death agent. Nigeria may be a sick rose, but her shrivelled petals become his bed of crimson joy; little wonder he plunders state coffers amid a gloomy economy.

    There is no gainsaying elected representatives fleece the country’s meagre reserves; the Ninth National Assembly, for instance, faces litigation for perceived excesses as you read.

    The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), BudgIT, Enough is Enough (EiE) and 6,721 concerned Nigerians recently filed a lawsuit asking the Federal High Court to “restrain, prevent and stop the National Assembly Service Commission from paying or releasing the sum of N5.550 billion budgeted for purchase of luxury cars for principal members of the ninth Senate, and to restrain and stop the Senate from collecting the money until the downward review of the amount proposed by the Senate.”

    In suit number FHC/L/CS/1511/2019 filed at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi Lagos, the plaintiffs argued: “Spending a huge sum of N5.550 billion to buy luxury cars for principal members of the ninth Senate is unjust and unfair. It negates the constitutional oath of office made by members to perform their functions in the interest of the well-being and prosperity of Nigeria and its citizens, as contained in the Seventh Schedule of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution (as amended).”

    The plaintiffs also queried the proposed spending by the National Assembly via the following posers: What is the economic value and contribution of the vehicles sought to be purchased to the grand scheme of Nigeria’s economy? What are the parameters used to arrive at cost efficiency and value for money in the decision to purchase the vehicles? Where are the vehicles purchased by the eighth Senate?

    That the National Assembly deems itself worthy of a N5.550 billion vehicle largesse (valued at N50 million per Toyota Land Cruiser SUV) at a time the government finds it difficult to pay the N30, 000 minimum wage further establishes the legislature as a sinister drain on the nation’s dwindling resources.

    The proposed expenditure is amoral, despicable and redolent/reflective of all that’s wrong with the country’s ruling class.

    It would be recalled that similar exotic cars including Toyota Land Cruiser SUVs and office equipment such as computers, photocopiers, and refrigerators. were reportedly pawned off to senators in previous assemblies.

    Some of the lawmakers who are in the current Assembly allegedly profited from the misconduct. Some of the items were reportedly sold to members of the Eighth Senate and House of Representatives at scandalous prices; for instance, a Toyota Land Cruiser SUV acquired at N36 million each was reportedly sold to the departing lawmakers at a paltry N1 million.

    All the items handed almost freely to the legislators would apparently be purchased afresh and supplied to members of the Ninth Assembly inaugurated on June 11, 2019; just as the new computers, scanners, photocopying machines, television sets, and refrigerators would be purchased at ridiculous prices, according to a media report.

    In the wake of the outrage generated by the lawmakers’ excesses, prominent figures in the National Assembly have argued that no one can deny them their ‘inalienable’ right to the largesse.

    Nigeria is no doubt superabundant with politicians who assert legitimacy for their belligerently exploitative actions and redundancies on the grounds that they are acceptable privileges of their high offices.

    Still, there’s something unnerving about how brazen and savage this spiel has grown in a time of acute economic depression, social inequality and ideological vacuum. Any public officer or their lackey rationalising the controversial N5.550 billion vehicle largesse is nothing but a glorified political grifter.

    Similar fraud subsists in state governments’ frenzied celebration of incumbent governors’ achievements in their first 100 days. Nothing justifies the curious appeal and endurance of the underlying grift here; government agents manipulate statistics and data to foster illusions of growth and prosperity where they are non-existent.

    Sadly, the citizenry who should know better, trade invective across multimedia platforms, defending the excesses and redundancies of their favourite public officers goaded by bigotries. Call it political illiteracy.

    The cost of their ignorance is not being paid by the government and its agents of illusion. It is being paid on our inner city streets, in barren manufacturing towns and dystopic host communities to multinationals.

    The cost is borne by the desolate townships of Ewekoro, living and dying in a thick haze of effluents, cement dust and flying rock fragments billowing from multinational, LafargeWAPCO’s exhaust pipes and limestone quarry.

    The cost is borne by the helpless people of Bodo, who are continually tormented and traumatised by Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC)’s lethargic approach to ridding the community of its major oil spills.

    Although SPDC agreed in 2015, to a clean-up the Niger Delta community, the clean up is expected to cost around $500 million and will take up to 10 years to complete. In a rare victory for such communities, Shell also agreed to pay £55 million ($84 million) in settlements to Bodo community for the devastating effects of the spill. That’s a way forward.

    This isn’t the time for Nigeria’s National Assembly, the presidency and state governments to roll out the drums and splurge on ill-conceived jamborees; they haven’t done enough work to merit such.

    It is foolhardy for a federal minister or state governor to celebrate giving the approval for rehabilitation of a road project, a derelict school or public health facility in his first 100 days. The performance of such roles, among others, was the reason he or she was elected into public office. He has done no one no favour.

    It is about time public officers stopped misappropriating state fund and the historical language of ennoblement to ornament dew as crystal. Its about time we stopped humouring them.

    Nigeria is at war on several fronts: from Boko Haram, herdsmen terrorism, kidnap for ransom, to xenophobic attacks against Nigerians in South Africa, our elected representatives have got their work clearly cut out for them.

  • Sign of things to come

    It was the first day of the partial closure of the Kara bridge – Berger Junction section of the Lagos – Ibadan Expressway and it was a bitter experience for thousands of motorists. A trip that takes less than 10 minutes took hours. It was early Tuesday morning and for many residents of that axis the short trip from their homes to Berger became a long and tortuous one. I knew there was trouble as soon as I drove out of the gate leading into the Arepo community at about 7.13 am.

    My heart sank as I saw the huge number of vehicles running away  from the main road. I instinctively knew that the Long Bridge was congested. That was the only reason motorists would leave the road to take the undulating and highly dangerous path which residents of Arepo and Wawa call ‘’alternative route’’. It is no alternative route, but so called for want of a better name.

    If it were really an alternative route, construction giant Julius Berger, which is handling the rehabilitation of the road from Sagamu Interchange to Berger, would have made it motorable long before now. You take this path at night at your own risk. The path connects Wawa to OPIC at the intersection of the road leading into Sparklight Estate. In other climes, the path would have been made motorable and lit up for use during any emergency work on the expressway. Policemen and road safety personnel would also have been deployed there.

    But as it is now, motorists are left to their fate on that unsafe path. Since they do not have a choice, they take it whenever the express is choked up. This was the case on Tuesday as they struggled to beat the traffic on the express caused by the ongoing work at the Kara bridge – Berger axis. The work, which began on Monday, would last 120 days. It was to start on August 3, but was shifted because of the conventions of the Redeemed Christian Church of God and the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries as well as the Eid-El-Kabir festival.

    Traffic was not too bad on Monday because the road had not been partially closed then. The real test for this 120-day exercise came on Tuesday following the closure of the road on Monday evening. There was chaos on the road the day after the closure. What could have caused this chaos barely 12 hours after the closure? It is easy to blame it on the impatience of motorists and what some people call ‘’road indiscipline’’.

    I beg to disagree. That is not really the case even though, you cannot rule out that fact in some cases. What really caused the problem was bad planning by Julius Berger, the Federal Ministry of Works and Housing and the road safety agencies. Were they prepared for what happened on Tuesday? They were not. They had assumed that they could appeal to the sentiments of people and all will be well. They should have envisaged what happened on Tuesday. The episode should serve as a lesson to them because whether they like it or not, it will still happen again and again as long as the work is on.

    Motorists did not do anything wrong by taking the route that bursts out at the OPIC intersection; they were only following the instructions of the ministry, Julius Berger and the road safety workers to take alternative routes. The problem is they did not prepare this particular ‘alternative route’ (is it even in their plan?) well for this four-month exercise. The route despite being dangerous has its uses for those living around that area. This is why Julius Berger should have worked on it before now because it is unmotorable whenever there is a downpour.

    The firm just like the government  assumed that the people would find their way. They sure did and the consequence was what we saw on Tuesday. What happened on Tuesday is not good for anybody’s health. It is unthinkable to imagine that this is what motorists will go through for four months on that road. The Tuesday experience has shown that motorists are on their own during the road repair. There will be no help, whatsoever, from Julius Berger despite the postponement of the exercise for one month to ensure that everything, especially, the alternative routes, are in place.

    Why was the exercise postponed when they knew that nothing would be done to minimise the people’s suffering when it starts? If they had started on August 2, we would have by now gone through the first month of suffering, while waiting and praying for the remaining three months to fly past. But now, we have four months stretched out before us to endure this unnecessary suffering all because a road is being repaired. No government in the world treats its citizens like this, except of course, Nigeria’s. How sad.

     

  • Donald J. Trump and the decline of the United States

    I have been a close observer of American politics since my secondary school days when General Dwight David Eisenhower (1953-1961) was president succeeding the immediate post Second World War President  Harry S. Truman (1945-1953) who himself towards the end of the war took over from Franklin Delano Roosevelt ( 1933-1945), the longest serving president of the USA. I was in the University of Ibadan when President John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1961-1963) was assassinated on November 22 1963. The assassination of President Kennedy nearly destroyed the image and reputation of the United States in the world. For us in Nigeria it was a tragedy. Kennedy had so much interest in Africa and the developing world that he invited Nigeria’s prime minister, Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa not only to pay a state visit, but also to address the joint sitting of the USA Congress, perhaps the only African that has ever been granted that honour up till today. I still remember how our President, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe made a broadcast to the nation ordering our national flag to be flown at half-mast for three days in memory of a great man and a global citizen. Many of us in the University of Ibadan wept openly for a man who was regarded as an icon by young people. The way he spoke, the words that came out of his mouth, his mid-Atlantic accent and diction, his lanky stature, his haircut and his beautiful wife and young children were objects of admiration by all of us. I personally made a painful visit to the spot where he was shot when I visited Dallas sometimes ago. When the tears had dried up and the then Vice President Lyndon Blaines Johnson (1963-1969) took over the American presidency, most of my contemporaries lost interest in the USA. Ironically President Johnson did many revolutionary things like getting the Civil Act of 1965 through the Congress and passing a few other socially relevant acts of what he dubbed the beginning of a “great society” into law thus bringing millions of black Americans into the mainstream of American political life through having the right to vote and be voted for. These were rights that were latent and had been inactive because of deliberate acts by the white deep state to deny the right to black people by violence and subterfuge. The bitterness the murder of Kennedy introduced into American politics and the whole conspiracy surrounding the assassination in Dallas Texas, the home state of Vice President Lyndon Johnson, made it difficult for many to view President Johnson’s achievement dispassionately. The war in Vietnam also complicated matters to the extent that many within the Democratic Party of the president rose against him and the younger brother of President John Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Senator Eugene McCarthy challenged Lyndon Johnson in the Democratic primaries for the party’s nomination which was an unusual scenario that forced a sitting president to refuse to contest for a second term in office. The challenge was to end in tragedy for the Kennedy family when Robert Kennedy was gunned down on June 5, 1968 by a Palestinian refugee Sirhan Sirhan in Los Angeles while Kennedy was celebrating his victory in the Californian primary. The disarray in the Democratic Party paved the way for the coming into power of a shady and calculating character like Richard Milhous Nixon who ended in disgrace when he resigned in 1974 for his anti-democratic and illegal shenanigans of bugging the office of the rival party in the Watergate office complex in Washington DC and for refusing to release his secret taping of discussions in the White House including his attempt to cover up the burglary of the Democratic Party’s office. Since this low point in the history of the American presidency, there have been people like Jimmy Carter, William Clinton and Barack Obama on the Democratic side and  Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan, George H. Bush, his son George W. Bush from the Republican Party. Some of them distinguished themselves in office and some out of office but all maintained their positions as models and examples for the American people to follow. Some of them were closet racists like Nixon and Reagan and at least presented a facade of upholding the American myth of equality of equality of all races.

    Now we have an unusual and incredible president like the current occupant of the White House, President Donald J. Trump. Trump virtually exploited the anger of the white American working class and rural folks who felt left behind by the globalized economy of the world which transferred manufacturing to China and countries in Asia while many manufacturing jobs in America were lost thus creating boarding of factories in the so-called rust belt of Pennsylvania, Michigan, Illinois and to some extent Wisconsin. Trump bullied his way into the presidency calling his Republican and Democratic contenders unflattering nicknames and being totally uncivil and rude while his opponents who did not want to get into the gutter with him not knowing what to do bore his insults with equanimity. In the bitterly contested election of 2016 against Hillary Clinton, Trump got more electoral college votes than Clinton who beat him by close to three million plurality votes. Trump was able to paint Hillary as a corrupt person who exploited her position for financial gain in what he called “pay for play”. He was also able to tar Clinton with the brush of the so-called liberals who want to flood the country with immigrants from Mexico and other countries from Latin America and Africa. In other words, he told white Americans that they were being marginalized and were doomed to become a minority in their country if they did not vote for him. This racist language worked and fired up about 40percent of Americans who no matter what Trump did were ready to support him. Trump himself boasted that if he shot a person in the heart of New York City his supporters will continue to support him. When he got elected people thought the awesome weight of the office will sober him up and he will be the president of all Americans and the so called leader of the “free world”. In office President Trump has not only contributed to the bitter division of his country and mostly along racial lines with White supremacists on his side and those white and black opposed to them that call themselves anti-fascists or “ANTIFA” for short, President Trump sees both as evil in his warped morality. Not only is he dividing the USA, he is also angering the western allies of the USA and undermining the western institutions that had secured world peace since 1945. Nothing is sacrosanct, not NATO, IMF, World Bank, the UN and its specialized agencies. The president says he is not interested in multi-lateral institutions and that he would rather deal on bi-lateral basis with countries that America would want to relate to. His credo is “Make America Great Again “which is a policy in which America’s interest is paramount. But America is not an island sufficient unto itself because if the USA is in good shape and the rest of the world goes to the dogs, the USA would not benefit from such a self-defeating selfish policy.

    It is strange that in his politics, he seems to love autocrats like Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Rodrigo   Duterte of Philippines and nationalists and populists in Britain, Hungary, Poland and recently Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil while he regularly insulted Justin Trudeau of Canada, Immanuel Macron of France, Theresa May, former prime minister of Great Britain and Angela Merkel, the chancellor of Germany. His regular tantrums and unorthodox way of doing things and his going against all norms of diplomatic behaviour have now come to be accepted as the new American normal.

    Recently on the eve of the G7 meeting in Biarritz France and during and after the post conference press conference, the president said so many things that made people feel he is not fit for the post he is holding. Before leaving for the G7 he peremptorily cancelled a state visit to Denmark because the prime minister of the country, Mette Frederiksen said it was absurd that Trump would offer to buy an island constituting 98 percent of her country. In return Trump called her a “nasty woman”.  At another time he accused Jews in a rather patronizing racist view, that American Jews who vote Democratic in USA elections are either ignorant or disloyal. This is rather a strange thing to say in a country where support for Israel is bi- partisan. He then added the same week that he was the “chosen one “to solve American problems especially his tariff war with China which seems to be about to plunge the whole world into recession. Then he says someone from the highest level of the Chinese government phoned the USA to plead for negotiations on the tariffs war only for the phone call to be denied. While at the G7, he left America’s chair vacant while leaders from the rest of the world deliberated on global climate change obviously because he does not believe in the evidence of climate change. This was explained away by his staff who said he was having meetings with India and Egypt which was a lie because the presidents of those two countries attended the meeting on the invitation of the G7.

    Then it was alleged that he considered nuking the eye of any hurricane approaching the USA. It was allegedly explained to him that he will turn a hurricane into radioactive holocaust if he nuked them! Then he claimed his wife Melania had met Kim Jon Un; this was quickly explained away by saying he meant to say he had spoken so much about the North Korean dictator that his wife seem to know him.  He also offered his money-losing golf club and resorts in Miami Florida as venue for the G7 meeting next year which will go against the Emolument clause in the American constitution preventing a president from benefiting financially by holding the post of president. He has so much embarrassed many people in the USA that two people within the Republican Party including Joe Walsh one of the right wing radio journalists that facilitated his election in 2016 to decide to challenge him in the Republican primaries. It is of course unlikely yet that the Republican Party will abandon him next year. The onus is on the Democratic Party to present an alternative to Donald Trump out of the huge company of 21 candidates running for president. Some of them are simply too extreme in their policies that Americans will not pay attention to them except for entertainment. Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden, two of the three leading contenders are just too old in their late seventies that not many Americans will waste their votes on them. Elizabeth Warren, the articulate and sincere senator from Massachusetts is in her 70s also. Kamilla Harris who is 54 is not likely to be successful in election shortly after another African American. The same goes for Senator Cory Booker another African American and Julian Castro a Cuban-American. Pete Buttigieg, a mayor of a small city looks impressive but he is gay and I doubt if America is ready for gay president. Beto O’Rourke from El Passo, Texas ought to gain more traction than he is gaining right now. Perhaps at the nick of time a shining redeemer would seize the leadership of the Democratic Party to save America and the world from the re-election of Donald J Trump. In other words, the election is for the Democratic Party to lose and not Trump to win.

  • A judge and her millions

    There are many who believe that women are not corrupt. They see them as angels who can be trusted with anything, especially money. These people will tell you that it is safer to keep money with a woman than a man. This myth has been exploded with what is happening in the society these days.

    The public has seen how some women in top positions are being accused of embezzling billions of naira. They dip their hands into public till at will and when they are caught, they beg for soft landing. Are women that virtuous or is it just a matter of imagination? Some of them are so cunning in their ways. They use the names of minions to perfect their scheme.  This is what former Benue State Customary Court of Appeal President Justice Margaret Igbeta allegedly did.

    She was said to have hidden N840 million in her maid’s name. Unknown to the maid, she was a wealthy woman living as a pauper in her madam’s home. With a cool N840 million in the bank, her ladyship retired into a life of bliss until the bubble burst.

    The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has brought an application for interim forfeiture of the money before the Federal High Court in Abuja until the judge gives an account of how she came about the cash. How did she make the money? Was it as a judge or as a lawyer while in practice? Nigerians will like to know as her case comes up in court.

  •  Their pound of flesh

    IT was a tough call for President Muhammadu Buhari, the anti-graft czar of our time. The Supreme Court on Monday raised an ethical issue during hearing in a case in which he was a party. Though the case was struck out, the panel of justices wondered whether his lawyer, who works in the Federal Ministry of Justice, was representing him in his official or personal capacity.

    The lawyer said he was representing the President in his personal capacity. The justices frowned at his response, wondering why the President should use tax payers money to fund a private case. His action, they said, offended the Code of Conduct for public officers.

    In a way, they are accusing the President of wrong doing. Coming from a bench where some members are facing corruption charges, the insinuation is not lost on the public.