The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Trump and his Middle East Policy

    President Trump’s threat to pull out of the agreement with Iran to prevent it acquiring nuclear weapon is not a wise move .The agreement under the Obama administration was negotiated by the p5+1 meaning the United States, Great Britain , France, China , Russia and Germany. The five countries are permanent members of the United Nations Security Council ( UNSC) while Germany is the most important country in Europe but for having lost the Second World War is not a member of the UNSC.when  kofi Annan was  Secretary General Of the United Nations (UNSG) there was a spirited attempt to review and restructure the Security Council which would have possibly brought into it countries like Germany, India, Nigeria, Brazil , Japan and May be Turkey, Egypt or Iran to represent the Muslims and the Middle East geo-political region.It seems the whole idea remains for the time being dead.

    In a nutshell the deal tries to deny Iran the  possibility of access to the material it would need to make nuclear bombs by stating that Iran’s uranium stockpile will be reduced by 98% to 300kg for 15 years. It also stipulates that the level of enrichment must also remain at 3.67%. Iran will retain no more than 6104 out of the 20,000 centrifuges it possesses . Iran was also to be subjected to intrusive  International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitoring . This Agency Of The UN  based in Vienna is an International organization that seeks to promote the peaceful use of nuclear energy and to inhibit its use for any military purpose including nuclear weapons. Since the agreement with Iran was signed in 2015 the country has been in compliance with the terms of the agreement. The agreement in some areas is to be in force for 25 years and in some areas for 10 years . But the Iranians are saying that Iran clearly stated that it will never become a nuclear weapons state because possession of weapons of mass destruction is against the dictates of Islam . Opponents of the deal particularly the Israeli prime minister  Benjamin Netanyahu  accuses Iran of lying when it said it never planned to have nuclear weapons in the first instance. Netanyahu in secretly acquired Iranian  nuclear research  documents  exposed what he suggested was Iranian advanced plans to build atomic bombs up to 2013 .Because of this and implied hiding of the program from the  p5+1 during the negotiations Iran should not be trusted and compensated by lifting of UN sanctions on the country. Of course Israel itself a nuclear power is an interested party and it can be expected to exaggerate alleged Iranian perfidy up to 2015 when the agreement came into being. Those who negotiated the deal say there is nothing new in what Netanyahu is saying because they were aware of Iran’s advanced knowledge of nuclear research and that  ,that was why they signed the deal with Iran.

    But right now Europe as represented by Britain , France , Germany and Russia as well  as China and the IAEA are saying Iran is in compliance with its  international obligations. Both  President Macron of France and  chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany have made trips to  Washington DC to persuade Trump that he should stay in the Iranian deal. Nobody knows what the mercurial President Of America would do on May 12 when he has to certify the agreement or pull out the United States out of it . This particular American President seems to be bent  on undoing whatever Barack Obama his predecessor did in office in order to wipe out the latter’ s legacies. Trump appears to have a point when he said Iran has not been a force for good in the Middle East in recent times . He points to Iran’s military adventures in Yemen , Syria, Lebanon ,and Iraq where Iran is actively involved in either supporting the Hisbollah in Lebanon , the Hoothies in Yemen , the Shi’a militia in Iraq and the Shi’a Alawite in Syria and those rebelling against the regime of Abdel Fattah el – Sisi  in Egypt. Trump argues that lifting of sanctions against Iran and America’s  return of Iranian funds confiscated following the Iranian revolution against the shah in 1979 has financially empowered Iran to such an extent that it can support all kinds of incendiary movements all over the Middle East including giving the Houthis rockets to fire at Saudi Arabia. Trump also complains that the agreement should have captured Iranian missile program  which poses potential threat not only to Israel but even some European countries since some Iranian missiles have a range of 1000 miles. The response to Trump was that there was an urgency to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapons and that including other issues would have deadlocked the negotiations and that short of war what was agreed was the best option in that period and circumstance .

    What therefore is the way forward.?  If America pulls out of the Iran deal the other signatories May continue with it but because America would sanction any country that trades with Iran this may constrain countries like China and the European Union countries like Germany, France and Great Britain from flouting American laws prohibiting trade with its enemy .in other words American withdrawal may have devastating effect on the deal if it does not kill it outright.And if the USA kills it Iran would withdraw from it and we would be back to status quo ante . Iran would then go back to its nuclear weapons program.  How would this then be in favor of Israel and the rest of the world ? Trump says Iran would not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons . But how will he stop Iran from doing this apart from going to war or preemptive strike perhaps in collaboration with Israel, to destroy whatever is known about Iranian nuclear weapons infrastructure.This will be dangerous for every country in the Middle East because Iran is a powerful country with the ability to set the whole of the Middle East on fire exploiting the Sunni/ Shi’a schism within Islam . Abrogating the Iranian deal may also have unintended effect on the planned deal with North Korea. This is because North Korea may feel whatever agreement it reaches with the Trump administration may be cancelled by its successor and may therefore not be as forthcoming as it would have been .

    The option suggested by  President Macron and  chancellor Merkel that the deal should be maintained while  an addendum on missile development should be separately negotiated with Iran  makes sense . The question to ask is if Iran will agree to do this . Iran may not agree to do this and if it agrees it may say a comprehensive nuclear weapons agreement including with the state of Israel would have to be put on the table. This will then become a complex negotiation and the more complex  it is the less the likelihood of agreement and in the meantime the  Iranian nuclear bomb  program will be progressing without internationally binding constraint as it is now.

    The irony of all these is that Trump says he wants to withdraw from the Middle East cauldron yet by threatening to abrogate the Iranian deal he will get sucked more into the Middle East . America  is dangerously goading Saudi Arabia to resist Iranian influence  and if shove comes to push Sunni  Egypt would line up on the side of Saudi Arabia and the whole of the Middle East will be sucked into a Sunni / Shi’a problem bringing in at the periphery  Sunni states of Turkey and Pakistan . The world does not want this and the earlier we realize this the better but the onus on Iran is to moderate its desire to spread its influence in the Middle East .The people of the Middle East have suffered too much  in the last decade beginning with the  so called “Arab spring “ which has now morphed into “Arab winter” with wars in Syria , Yemen , Iraq, the Sinai part of Egypt , Libya , Lebanon  , Algeria  and Palestine  and even small Qatar is not left out the problems. What the Arabs want is to be left  alone to develop their lands and not to spend trillions of dollars acquiring deadly weapons from America, China, Russia and the European Union  to fight one another.

  • In the throes of a drug epidemic

    HE drives into the bank premises rather scrappily. The two security guards are immediately jolted into action. They rush to direct him on where to park as he struggles to squeeze his Camry, the model Nigerians love calling Big Daddy, into a space that is obviously small for the car.

    His hair is twisted into little mounds. A thick gold chain is dangling from his neck. He disembarks from the car and turns his back to ensure that the doors are locked after pressing the remote key. His jeans trousers are down, fastened to the lower part of his buttocks with a thick leather belt, revealing a brownish boxer shorts His unbuttoned shirt reveals the wild hair on his chest. It is a hot, scorching day, but our man is decked out in a pair of long, loosely-laced boots, the type infantry men wear.

    He goes into the banking hall, a half-filled water bottle in his hand.  On the queue, he sips from the bottle occasionally. All eyes are on this patron, whom the guards describe as “an important guest”.

    This is the portrait of many of our youths. The feeding-bottle generation. They are hooked on drugs and various stimulants that make them get high – in a bid to fly far above the reality of life they are too scared to confront.

    Move over cannabis, heroin and cocaine; you belong in the old school. Now is the age of Science Students. Never mind that many schools have lost their laboratories to sheer neglect and the carelessness that rules our lives. Science nevertheless remains popular among the youth.  Ask Olamide, the singer whose new song, “Kosewe Kosegbo” is the toast of the hip hop world. It has become the signature tune of youths who are excited to get high.

    Codeine, tramadol and various substances are the new kings of the world of ecstasy in which many Nigerians are basking. They are inhaling lizard faeces and putting their noses in pit toilets. They smoke also match sticks- all to get high

    There are, also, all manner of drinks. Kerewa, Ogidiga, Bajinatu, Jigijigi and others. For Olamide, this is a lifestyle to be celebrated in a hit song, Kosewe kosegbo. The lyrics are exotic; only the initiated can understand them.

    Kosewe kosegbo, kosewe kosegbo.

    Won ti pomi gutter po; oju ti dirty 

    Won ti po chemical po; awon omo science students

    Eemo wolu; eni ire lo

    Ore mi ti high. O my gosh!

    What do we make of this? Do we begin to praise the singer’s creativity? Should it all be art for art’s sake? And check out the dance steps; the harmony between the sound and the movements is not decipherable.

    A drug epidemic is loosed on the land. Long before the BBC shot its moving (but not shocking) documentary that seems to have given us all a wake-up call, the Nigerian media had done so much about the drug problem. Nobody listened.

    The comedian, Akpororo, once told an interviewer that he got the materials for his jokes by watching mad people closely. That was in 2017. The number of victims of hard drug who have gone nuts in the street or are being restrained at various rehab centres has since risen. Is there a correlation  with  Akpororo’s rising profile?

    The problem is not only with our youths; it permeates all strata of the society. Men are involved. Women are involved. Professionals are involved. Gone are the days when it used to be the lot of motor park touts and thugs to be labelled drug addicts. Students now revel in it.

    Of Nigeria’s rising psychiatrist cases, the youth account for 85 per cent due to drug and substance abuse, according to the President of the Association of Psychiatrists in Nigeria, Taiwo Sheikh.  Their ages range between 18 and 38.

    It is wrong to think that this is a problem of the poor only. It is not. The children of the rich are involved. Our pharmacists and their marketers are involved. What do we make of the vendor who sold some 60 bottles of codeine to the BBC reporter? He even boasted that he could sell one million cartons of the syrup in one week. Is there a cough epidemic in Nigeria?

    Customs announced last Tuesday that a consignment of tramadol packaged as electrical materials had been seized at the Tin Can Island Port in Lagos. The cargo of death is worth N124million. In February, 3,623 cartons were seized. Greedy businessmen have found another route to blood money.

    Why is nobody talking about the danger the unregulated consumption of codeine and other drugs pose to health – organ failure, schizophrenia and others?

    A school proprietor once showed me a room in which students were tested for drugs. Some of those who failed the test are children of the rich and powerful, who fainted upon being told of their children’s situation. Some of such kids had cult signs on their bodies.

    The government has clamped a ban on codeine. That is not the way to go as the drug has its uses; it is the abuse we need to fight. One fellow found in the codeine ban an avenue for a joke. “If they ban codeine, let them take APC,” he said.

    This is beyond jokes. The other day in Lagos, a group of friends of another celebrated musician went out clubbing. One accepted a challenge to prove his absorptive capacity. He hit the battle so hard that he could barely walk. In the car, he collapsed into a deep sleep. By the time the team reached another club, he could not get off the car. He was left in there with the windows firmly shut. He died.

    The Kano rehab the BBC reporter visited is a scene of horror. Men screaming like animals. A man jumping up and down, yelling. He is chained to a tree, like many of the inmates, to restrain him. He is said to be undergoing withdrawal symptoms. A repentant 16-year-old girl battling addiction sends an urgent message to the youth:   stay away from codeine.

    Pharmaceutical giant Emzor’s cocaine line has been shut. The company says it is investigating its distribution chain to find out what went wrong.  Why did it not check if we had a cough epidemic as the bottom line was getting fat? And why did it take the airing of the BBC documentary for the anti-narcotics agents to move?

    Nowhere is free of this epidemic. The thugs who stormed the Senate to seize the mace were no doubt hooked on some strange substances. The fingers that pulled the trigger of the guns that shot more than 20 people, including women and children, in Offa, Kwara State, were surely no ordinary fingers. The robbers attacked five banks, carted away a fortune and celebrated their haul with a wild Champagne party. And they made a video of it. Wives are killing husbands. Husbands are killing their wives. Lawmakers talk like and act like gangsters.

    Some experts have recommended psychiatric tests for would-be public office holders. I back such a decision. There seems to be no rational explanation for the kind of stealing that went on as if it was a state policy in the 16 years the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ran Nigeria. How many of the leaders of that time will pass such tests?

     

    And Evans cries in court

    Chukwudumemem Onwuamadike (alias Evans) is finding the reality of life in detention too much to handle. This is understandable. He used to live like a king, the head of an underworld gang that specialised in grabbing rich people and keeping them away until their families paid – in hard currency. He had beautiful houses, exotic cars, girlfriends and boys at his beck and call.

    All that collapsed on June 10 2017 when he was arrested in Lagos by the police who had described him as “the most brilliant, richest and craftiest kidnapper in the country’s history”.

    Evans refused to disembark from the prison van that brought him to court last Monday. He was protesting the condition of the Kirikiri Maximum Security Prison  in which he has been detained.

    Said Evans when he was eventually persuaded to come into the court: “Since I have been in the maximum prison, they have been maltreating me; no visit; they don’t feed me well. I have eye problems and I cannot see far.”

    Chukwudubem Onwuamadike, also known as Evans
    Chukwudubem Onwuamadike, also known as Evans

    He complained also of being beaten and kept in a solitary cell. At a point, Evans burst into tears. He actually cried. It is surprising to discover that a man who is believed to have a steely heart is also human–prone to emotions. It reminds one of the notorious armed robbery kingpin of the 80s, Anini, who, when asked how he felt about the fate awaiting him, following his arrest, said: “I am afraiding.”

    One of Evans’ victims, the pharmacist  Innocent Duru, was chained for five months before he escaped to tell the police his story. Evans has a right to his full rights as an accused is deemed innocent until the court pronounces him guilty. Even then, nobody seems interested in Evans’ theatrics. He will do well to stop grumbling and face his medicine with a straight face.

  • Between Buhari, Saraki and Tambuwal

    Last week, Uche Secondus, National Chairman of PDP currently defending his honour in court following the listing of his name as one of Federal Government identified alleged looters, inaugurated a committee to woo back and groom former PDP stalwarts such as Saraki, Dogara and Tambuwa, for 2019 as “a part of a strategy to ensure “the party does everything within the confines of the law to regain power in 2019”.  “The last three years of Buhari”, he says, “has convinced Nigerians of the need for a credible alternative in 2019”.

    It is difficult to fault the thesis of Secundus who without doubt has correctly read the mood of frustrated Nigerians.  For his party, his jibe at Buhari could not have come at any other auspicious time. The daily mindless killings have continued. Pastor Adeboye has hardly finished saying there may be no election in 2019 if the killings continued while government appears helpless, when grisly murder of 71 women and children in southern Kaduna by suspected herdsmen followed. In the midst of this, the president buffeted by ill- health jetted out to London for medical attention leaving in charge of his security apparatus, a defence minister, the Director General of DSS and an Inspector General of police who by their body language and pronouncements have lost the confidence of besieged people of the Middle Belt region. Whether out of indolence or incompetence of his administration, there was no government policy thrust to address new realities following his admission in faraway US that the killers are remnants of Gadaffi armed gang let loose on West Africa. Similarly, little has been heard of state policing as recommended by his Party. Wailings by Middle Belt opinion leaders such as Jerimiah Useni and Theophilus Danjuma who now openly accuse the Fulani hegemonic power of discrimination and ethnic cleansing seemed to have been ignored.

    And curiously the president has ignored the opinion of Nigerian patriots such as elder statesmen Wole Soyinka, the Nobel laureate and Emeka Anyaoku, the respected former secretary General of the common wealth and many others on restructuring which they had proffered as panacea to massive corruption at our dysfunctional centre, herdsmen killing, uncontrolled entry of illegal immigrants, insurgency in the north and militancy in the Niger Delta.

    With the President once again away on medical trip to London while various causes of social dislocations remain unaddressed,  not many will disagree with our young hot blooded but highly resourceful Professor Pius Aladesanmi’s verdict that it is not difficult “to  delegitimize Buahri because of his irredeemable clannishness, failure to fly, and failure to deliver.”

    Unfortunately since a people deserve the government they get, we are saddled with Buhari’s government no matter how imperfect. However, since tomorrow is a product of yesterday and today, Secondus and his committee of Babangida, Abacha and Obasanjo groomed new breed politicians like Babangida/Olu Falae’s SDP and Obasnajo/Oyinlola coalition cannot in my view be the messiahs the country needs.

    The Committee is headed by former Cross river state governor, Liyel Imoke  supported by former Jigawa State Governor, Sule Lamido; his Niger State counterpart, Babangida Aliyu; and former Benue State Governor, Gabriel Suswam. Others are former Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Dr. Paul Orhii; former Aviation Minister, Kema Chikwe; and a former National Chairman of the PDP, Bello Haliru Mohammed. Besides Dr. Kema Chikwe and Dr. Paul Orhii, all other members of the committee are either on judicial or media trial by EFCC

    First,Uche Secundus, the man trying to chart a new beginning for us was   himself in February 2016 arrested by EFCC for allegedly receiving 23 vehicles including Mercedes G63 and a Range Rover Autobiography, all valued at N310 million from controversial businessman and Deziani associates who was said to be in the habit of distributing money and gifts to politicians in order to evade payment of $14m crude oil royalty his company, Atlantic Energy Drilling Concepts Nigeria Limited, failed to remit to the federal treasury.

    Liyel Imoke the chairman of the committee, was a senator at thirty under Babangida fraudulent “transaction without end”, became a member of one of Abacha’s “five fingers of a leprous hand” (apology to late Bola Ige, and later Obasanjo’s Special Adviser on Public Utilities; Chairman of Technical Board of the National Electric Power Authority and his Federal Minister of Power and Steel, where he supervised the unbundling of the National Electric Power Authority (NEPA). He and Olusegun Agagu, who had also served as Minister of Power and Steel were questioned on the disbursement of $16 billion for the National Integrated Power Project (NIPP).  Committee on Power of the House of Representatives during a public hearing later concluded that  all the contracts awarded to companies to execute power plants projects in the country were not executed just as it also queried the scandalous concessionairing  of the Ajakouta Steel Plant.

    Sule Lamido was Obasanjo’s Foreign minister from 1999 to 2003 and elected governor of Jigawa State April 2007-2014. He was Obasanjo’s favourite for the 2015 presidential election. Mr. Lamido alongside two of his sons, Aminu and Mustapha, and two others have been arraigned by the EFCC on a 27-count charge for alleged abuse of office and money laundering. He did not consider that as an impediment to his 2019 ambition. While declaring at a rally in Birnin Kudu Local Government Area of Jigawa recently, he had bragged “They called me a thief and jailed me. All the molestation and intimidation can’t change my destiny in becoming the next president come 2019″ His joker: unlike Buhari, he says he is an authentic Fulani.

    Bello Haliu Mohammed was the former Chairman of PDP. He and his son, Bello Abba Mohammed, were arraigned before Justice A.R Mohammed of the Federal High Court, Abuja on a 4-count charge bordering on criminal breach of trust and money laundering by Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, that want them to return the N300, 000,000 (Three Hundred Million Naira) paid into the account of Bam Projects and Properties Limited in March 2015.

    As for Gabriel Suswan, Benue state Governor (2007-2015), he was indicted by  the Justice Elizabeth Kpojime’s Panel of Inquiry  set up by Governor Samuel Ortom along with 52 others for alleged misappropriation of N107 billion.  The Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has since sealed off three properties: the Metropolitan hotel along FMC road, a residential building still under construction by the river side and Suswan; s family home in HUDCO quarters all in Makurdi

    Like the committee members, those they seek to groom also have a past. Saraki fresh from medical school in London was with his father’s Societe Generale Bank where the loss of N19b led to the collapse of the bank. His illustrious father thereafter donated him to Obasanjo where he served as special adviser on budget. From there he made him governor of Kwara state, a state he had run as a personal fiefdom for over fifty years. Then Saraki moved to the senate where in 2015, he traded off the victory of his party to snatch the plum job of senate President. Today he has all the 8th senate senators who illegally collect N13, 5m in addition to their N700, 000 monthly salaries in his pocket. Melaye is Saraki’s man Friday. He is currently in police detention for alleged gun-running. Of course, Nigerians are conversant with the story of budget padding at the lower house under the leadership of Dogara.The problem with Tambuwal is that even as a former speaker of the lower house and now as a governor, he has been unable to properly articulate  our crisis of nation building. He continues to insist our problem is not restructuring but more money from the federal to the states to implement their programmes.

    Dear compatriots, with the facts before you, pick your choice among all the devils you now know and those you don’t know.

  • Evans’ crocodile tears

    MANY strong men are only as strong as they look. Some of them are cowards, who will take to their heels at the shout of eh! But they put up a tough mien when they are armed. With guns in their hands, they are as dangerous as a rattlesnake. They will not think twice before snuffing life out of anyone who confronts them. Take the gun away from them and they become  jellies.

    A gun in itself is frightening enough; that cold metal sends a chill down the spine by merely looking at it, not to talk of when it is pointed at one. It becomes a wicked combination when a guy with bloodshot eyes is wielding the cold metal. Before he says freeze, you are already frozen and at the same time pleading for your life. Some of them listen to such plea and spare their victims; others do not. They kill and steal from their victims.

    Strong men are strong only when they have the upper hand. When the table turns, they are like any other man, who will give way to the other on the street. Whether as an armed robber, a kidnapper, a militant or an insurgent, strong men have something in common and that is to scare the daylight out of their victims before dealing with them.

    Who is the man that will see a gun pointed at him and will not do as ordered him? As the late Zik said only a mad person will argue with a man with a gun. With a gun, a hoodlum can do and undo. You are at his mercy. He barks orders at you and you comply for the fear of your life. Snatch the gun away from him and he becomes another Anini (remember him? The robber, who shook Benin to its foundation between 1985 and 1986, but urinated on himself when he was caught). We have seen other hoodlums turn sissy when the law caught up with them. They will never cease to amaze us with their acts of cowardice when they are before the law.

    Suspected kidnap kingpin Chukwudumeme Onwuamadike aka Evans is not a stranger to us all. We have heard about his escapades. Long before he was captured last year, he had written himself into the book of infamy as a dreaded person in the world of kidnapping. He was said to have gone after the affluent. His victims were the rich and mighty from whom he collected dollars, euros and pounds. He did not deal in chicken feeds. He went for the big bucks and it is either you pay up or you were killed. He employed fear as a tactic to unlock the wallets of the rich. His victims were kept in captivity until they paid to the last kobo. How they got the money never bothered him. All he was after was the money.

    Evans made money through this illicit trade and he lived big. He had wine, women, money and all the other luxury of life. You could not access his home except he allowed you in. To get him, the police employed some tactics in order to beat his state of the art security at the gate. For Evans, the end of the road came last June,  after years of being hunted by the police. A man, who collected ransom in foreign currencies, must surely know how to cover his tracks. He did that quite well.

    His luck ran out after the kidnapping of a pharmaceutical chief, who was kept in a bungalow in Igando. The businessman escaped and that opened the way for the busting of Evans’ gang. Evans kept his victims incommunicado, without food and water. His victims were only fed to enable them pay the ransom. He was ruthless in dealing with his victims through his foot soldiers. He had no pity for them. If they paid, they lived, if they did not, they were killed. That was his philosophy. He shunned those who begged for food, water and life. His stock reply to their request, we were told, was : ‘’go and pay up”.

    His love for money and the good life made him feel larger than life. Now in police net, he is crying like a baby whose lollypop was taken by an elder. In court on Monday, Evans wept! Why did he cry? He claimed that he was being maltreated in prison. But, how did he treat his own victims? If we may ask. Clad in shorts and  a green T – shirt , said to be torn on the right shoulder, Evans told the court after being allowed to speak : “I have an explanation to make. Since I have been in maximum prison, they have been maltreating me; no visit; they don’t feed me well; I have eye problems and I cannot see far”. In tears, he added : “What have I done to you people, they have been beating me? No good food. I have been locked up in one place since August 30. Why are they taken my case personal? Let me face my trial alive. Why do you people want to kill me?”

    Many will say serves him right. Evans is reaping what he sowed. He who sows the wind will reap the whirlwind, so we are told. This is a lesson to other Evans still out there. Mend your ways now before it is too late.

     

    What a primary!

    THE Ekiti State All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship primary was a disaster foretold. Before the shadow election, analysts warned that the exercise would end in chaos if nothing was done to manage the crowd of contenders. To avoid disenfranchising any of the aspirants, the race was thrown open. Thirty-three contestants were fighting for one ticket and none was ready to step down for the other. The beauty of democracy is to allow a thousand thoughts contend; so the 33 were allowed to slug it out. But some of the aspirants and their supporters had their plans. They came to disrupt the exercise because they knew they cannot win. Election, whether at the party or national level, should be seen as a game and the contestants, sportsmen. Last Saturday, these spoilers virtually turned the congress venue to a battleground as they snatched ballot boxes and papers.

    It was a show of shame not befitting of the ruling APC. The party should show example with the way it conducts its affairs. It must show that it encourages internal democracy because that is the only way it can promote national democracy as the ruling party. What happened last Saturday in Ado Ekiti should not  repeat itself at the rescheduled primary coming up tomorrow. Otherwise, the party will turn itself to the laughing stock of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), which conducted a hitch free primary on Tuesday.

  • Our pitiful class narrative

    Money changes everything. It ravages the soul of the youth, in particular. The need of it makes all human; loving it could be practical but an obsession with it drives us to the brink. It flips the afflicted upside-down and inside-out, revealing their hide as men of vulpine souls and intellect, built to despise honour for the love of mammon and associated luxury.

    Several youths argue that they can never sell out by playing muscle to the ruling class. “We are only enjoying our share of our collective wealth that they steal from us,” they claim.

    Whatever justification we give to it, a bribe is a bribe. And it changes relations. Once accepted, it vitiates a large chunk of the essence of the recipient, making him inferior, like a man who receives money to lie with a skunk, the same way the impotent pays to be sodomized by a horse, thinking it would cure him of his impotence and aid him to sire by a woman, a blessed child.

    The folly of our ways has dawned on us. The meek and humble leadership we thought we had installed in our legislative and executive chambers constitute yet another dangerous tyranny Nigeria should be done with. The culprits surround themselves with aides likable to a murder of crows – whose shrill cackles deafen them to the citizenry’s cries.

    A brilliant tyrant could be trusted to a certain degree of depth and capacity to lead but a manipulable tyrant is infinitely more dangerous, as he cannot be trusted beyond his blandness, intellectual handicaps and devious plots of his crows – cronies, advisers and kitchen cabinet.

    Sadly, in the corrupted currents of the world that they have foisted upon us, we can only devise more alluring ways to play dumb and project our generation as easy marks for the ruling class to exploit. The current liaisons between the ruling class and the so-called representatives of the Nigerian youth portend an ominous development.

    It presages the continued enslavement of the youth and our incapacitation by obscene inducements and gifts of grandeur; the perpetuation of a system in which the youth are psychologically confined and broken by financial inducements, dubious segregation and manipulative politics.

    A situation in which the sentimental fops among us are programmed by rumors, innuendo and outright falsehood to shun the path to progress and tow the fast lane to destruction.

    Many argue that the major problem afflicting Nigeria is the dearth of inspired leadership drawn from the nation’s youth. A converse view advances the presence of eminently capable persons out there, many of whom have failed to altruistically and responsibly apply themselves because like every other Nigerian, they are too busy looking out for themselves.

    Potential heroes we could rely still embrace the wisdom of keeping silent. They scoff at our romanticized wish to abolish the status quo, knowing that, as usual, we would settle for an opportunistic contract between our exploiters (the government) and a part of the exploited (labour and youth leadership), at the expense of the rest of the exploited (you, me and everyone) – something Noel Ignatin aptly identifies as “the original sweetheart agreement.”

    I recommend as usual, peaceful revolt guided by probity and a conscious quest to achieve the collective good within the ambit of fairness, equity and unflinching morality. Without such humane attributes, every measure we adopt will fail. Policies and practicable solutions are mere words on paper; they can only be activated by our conscious efforts to actualise them.

    Mr. President, the National Assembly, the judiciary, our 36 State governors and political parties are indisputably worthless and impotent without the support of the Nigerian youth. These societal creatures depend on our goodwill to survive. It’s about time we stopped playing disposable muscles and junkyard dogs to them.

    Money and other inducements they dangle before us shall be exhausted sooner than we can ever imagine. If we are indeed serious about installing visionary leadership capable of steering us from the threshold of ruin to the portal of hope and social renaissance, we have to start now.

    The Nigerian youth needs a platform.

    We need a more concrete forum than Facebook and Twitter. We need to create a rallying point by which we could sit to determine a bloodless path to a promising future. Yes, the current leadership won’t relinquish power easily hence our need to act. Let us identify and vote into power that particular breed whose idealism and pragmatism capably understands our painful silences and heartfelt dreams in order to speak and actualize them.

    Let us begin to ignore those who would desert us no sooner than they regain their hold on power. I speak of men and women that would recoil into their exclusive homes in Banana Island, Lagos, their palatial estates in Abuja, and fashionable neighbourhoods in Europe at the barest sign of chaos. There, they isolate themselves from the tragedies that mar our world by indulging in unrestrained hedonism and extravagant consumption of their ill-acquired wealth. We, the suffering masses are however, repressed with greater ferocity every time we protest.

    Our resources are being depleted; soon they will be exhausted. And then our hollowed-out edifice will collapse. Impoverished and severely robbed of optimism, we, the hopeless masses will rise against the ruling class in a premeditated and very savage strike – of which we shall suffer the worst consequence.

    Like in all such uprisings, Nigeria will plunge into a canyon of blood and maniacal murders, in the name of the “revolution.”  The Roman and Sumerian empires fell this way. The Mayan elite became, at the end, as the anthropologist Ronald Wright notes in A Short History of Progress, “…extremists, or ultraconservatives, squeezing the last drops of profit from nature and humanity.” This is how all civilizations ossify and collapse.

    Today, we tow a similar path.

     

     

  • Self-proclaiming messiahs

    But for its tragic consequences, images of Babangida /Falae and Obasanjo/Oyinlola adorning front pages of newspapers as they proclaimed themselves as new messiahs would have been dismissed as expressions of sardonic humour.  Babangida had during Olu Falae’s pilgrimage to Minna called on women and youths to support the Social Democratic Party (SDP), because with of Olu Falae, his former secretary to government, Professors Jerry Gana and Adeniran at different times heads of his MAMSA , Falae’s new SDP he says, approximates the “vision of the security and wellbeing of Nigerians” just like his old SDP – the party whose historical victory he had annulled.

    Last week Friday, 28 April, Obasanjo, the chief promoter of Coalition for Nigeria Movement (CNM), supported by Olagunsoye Oyinlola the National Coordinator of the movement; asked Nigerian youths to “be prepared. (Because)It will not be easy to wrest powers from Buhari” Born-again Obasanjo who supervised the massive rigging of 2007 presidential and gubernatorial elections in Edo, Ondo, Ekiti and Osun, according to Appeal Court rulings,  did not forget to add  “with God, all things are possible”.

    The target of both former leaders are youths below forty years of age many of whom cannot articulate our current crisis of nationhood as a result of education policy thrust of both leaders which did not only eradicate the teaching of history in our schools but resulted in thousands of school drop-outs and areas boys that have today become easy tools in the hands of politicians and prosperity prophets. These youths must be told where we were coming from.

    Buhari was recruited as Head of State in 1984 by veteran coup plotters Babangida, Abacha and Gusau following massive corruption, chaos and indiscipline of National Party of Nigeria (NPN) stalwarts (1979-83). He insisted we must eat what we produce or go hungry. Within a year, our problem was how to store the quantity of our locally produced wheat. But Buhari was afflicted with serious character flaws such as rigidity, making virtue of self-righteousness and serious human right abuses. That was all those opposed to his economic policies needed to chase him out of power.

    In 2015 however, following three previous failed attempts (2003, 2007 and 2011} his story became that of the rejected cornerstone. Ignoring his disabilities and inadequacies, Nigerians at a period of national despair wanted anybody but clueless Jonathan who was imposed by Obasanjo to preside over ‘thieving newbreed’ politicians, he and Babangida groomed.

    In 2018 as it was in 1985, his modest achievements in war against corruption, stabilizing the economy and self-sufficiency in food production seem to have been overshadowed by his character flaws. And just as he came under vicious attack of  wheat importers and IMF foot soldiers while the Western powers using MKO Abiola and Babangida  removed him from office in order to protect their economic interest in 1985, today victims of his current anti-corruption war have teamed up for the final show down in 2019. The strategy is the same- exploit his apparent lack of understanding of how a multi ethnic society works, his substitution of sense of righteousness for compromise, and lack of political will to resort to mischief to counter the evil machinations of his political enemies who want freedom for themselves while scheming to preside over an empire of slaves.

    Part of the fallout of this is the ongoing mindless killing of Innocent Nigerians in the Middle Belt Region which many Nigerians and non-Nigerians including President Donald Trump have come to equate with ethnic cleansing or war against Christians. If the purpose of government primarily is security of life and properties of the governed, it is understandable why many well informed Nigerians are joining our tormentors to call for Buhari’s head.

    But I think we must not allow ourselves to once again be distracted. In 1985, we allowed those who wanted to enslave us by all means to sponsor Babangda and their World Bank/IMF Nigeria foot soldiers including MKO Abiola, Kalu Idika Kalu and Olu Falae who claimed there was no alternative to SAP to turn our country into importers of labour of other societies. While Babangida’s fraudulent transition programme paved the way for Abacha dictatorship and Obasnajo presidency, his blurred economic vision led to the current economic woes.

    If Babangida and Olu Falae assaulted our sensibilities, Obasanjo and Oyinlola believe we are a people with short memories. Obasanjo, the main beneficiary of Babangida and Abacha’s conspiracy against Nigeria in 1999 embarked on selective anti-corruption war against common thieves who pocketed infrastructural funds while he at the same time presided over the sharing of our blue chips companies that escaped confiscation during Babangida’s dubious commercialization programme.  If our highly educated youths are fleeing the country in droves today, it is due to Obasanjo’s ill-implementation of privatization programme which the World Bank that packaged it claimed would create 7m jobs.

    Just as Nigerians also expect apologies from Obasanjo for his role in grooming ‘newbreed’ politicians that breed only corruption, Nigerians also expect apologies from Oyinlola as a representative of Banbangida and Obasanjo boys. Oyinlola as part of south west military admnistrators that constituted the vanguard of what they termed ‘Abacha historic mission’ left Lagos at the mercy of Abacha state sponsored violence, un-cleared Lagos refuse dumps and collapsed and broken roads. His administration of Osun is a lesson in PDP governors at work. His government took a loan of N18.35b out of which a big chunk of N10b was used to make advance payments to those who won contracts for the construction of six stadia even before the sites were cleared, all in the name of Osun youths. And above all, he was indicted for the theft of Aregbesola’s mandated by a tribunal.

    To Babangida and Obasanjo, the two new self-proclaiming messiahs, we can add the main opposition PDP, rumoured to be packaging Atiku, Saraki and Ekweremadu to take over from Buhari. The problem is that like the first two groups, all they have to sell is Buhari’s character flaws.

    Last week, Atiku who has not told the nation what he will do differently from how he and Obasanjo fought themselves over the sharing of our national patrimony among their party members said he was going to probe Buhari over the use of excess crude funds for procurement of military fighter jets. Saraki who also dressed in APC borrowed robes is quietly mobilizing his 8th senate for Buhari’s impeachment over the same issue.

    Amidst the ocean of mental chaos in Saraki’s 8th Senate,  efforts by Senator Abu Ibrahim to introduce some sanity by reminding his colleagues that heavens did not fall when ex-President Obasanjo withdrew $17.7b from the same account to offset Paris club debt or  when Jonathan depleted the same account from over $20b he inherited in 2008 to less than $4b  or even in 2014, when senator Akpabio as governor moved the motion for the withdrawal of $2b  at the National Economic Council, for the purpose of fighting Boko Haram insurgency, all without reference or with belated reference to the National Assembly.

    Dear compatriots, let us first identify our real enemies and to the Nigerian youths, ‘shine your eyes’ before picking between our self-proclaiming messiahs.

     

  • Peace on the Korean Peninsula?

    In the last plenary session of the UN General Assembly ( UNGA) in  October 2017 , President Donald J Trump of the United States threatened “fire and fury” on the “ little rocket man”  Of North Korea and his regime if he dared to attack either South Korea, Japan or Guam as Kim Jong un the young and apparently unpredictable chairman of the Communist Party and head of state of North Korea  had threatened to do . This was after several missile launches some across Japan frightening the proud people of that country  into running to hide in nuclear shelters. The climax of what appeared to be a policy of brinkmanship was when North Korea tested intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capable of reaching continental United States and not just Guam,  that people in the USA began to panic.

    Even if Korea were to be destroyed in retaliatory strike , because of long standing  American strategy of Second strike capability , meaning in a surprise attack America would still have enough nuclear arsenal to destroy its enemy, North Korea would have done a lot of damage to America. It was because of this realization that the Pentagon began to plan for preemptive strike to destroy North Korea. This was also deemed prudent on the grounds that North Korea may not yet have mastered the reentry mechanisms to make its ICBMS work perfectly. The auguries were not favorable for peace. In the case of war, whether conventional or nuclear, everybody will suffer. North Korea had artillery guns in place targeting Seoul the capital of South Korea with millions of people there and 35000 American troops stationed there. North Korea could also possibly hit Japan its former colonial master  and an American ally and hundreds of thousands  of American troops on the island of Okinawa. If Kim Jong un was not challenged the possibility of Japan developing its own nuclear weapons was clear  as even President Trump once suggested and some nationalist forces within Japan were toying with . Something has to give and President Trump’s saber rattling came in useful . On top of this the United Nations  imposed the stiffest sanctions ever , amounting to almost partial economic blockade on North Korea.

    In the UN sanctions China was key to its effectiveness. Once China bought into it, it was only a matter of time before the effect was felt in already impoverished North Korea which was spending up to 80 % of its resources on Defence and the nuclear weapons program. To perceptive onlookers what the North Koreans were doing was designed for the preservation of their regime. In other words they learnt from American invasion of Iraq, Afghanistan and NATO overthrow of Muamar Ghadafi in Libya and constant threat to Iran that the same treatment will be meted to North Korea  unless it had nuclear deterrence. It now seems they have perfected this and it’s delivery mechanism. This perhaps is why they are confident to talk from position of strength as a nuclear weapons state. The unpredictability Of President Trump of America also was a factor compelling North Korea to come to the negotiating table.

    What does North Korea hope to get from talks with the United States? It apparently wants an end to the state of belligerency which still exists between north Korea and the USA and South Korea since there was no formal peace treaty after the Korean War in 1953 .

    On June 25 1950 the Korean War began when some 75000 soldiers of the Korean people’s army poured across the 38th parallel, the boundary between the Soviet backed Democratic People’s Republic of Korea to the north and the pro-Western Republic of South Korea to the south. The war ended inconclusively on July 27 1953 with an armistice signed by the warring parties without much change in the territories previously held by both sides. The war witnessed China intervening militarily by throwing in 300,000 troops while the Soviet Union supplied North Korea with weapons. On the side of South Korea the USA provided 90% of the troops  and at a time the officer commanding the  so called UN forces in the south the famous General Douglas MacArthur mooted the idea of striking China with nuclear weapons but was overruled by president  Harry Truman. The devastation on both sides was immense but due to American generosity and hard working South Koreans , South Korea has become an industrial giant and  a rich  country while the north remains poor and its former  industries have become moribund . This is the war Kim Jong Un wants to formally end.

    If he succeeds in his talks with President Trump he would expect the UN sanctions to be lifted. Foreign investment will pour in as has been the case with China and Vietnam which were former communist enemies of the United States. kim also expects eventual removal of American troops from the peninsula and eventual unification obviously under the Northern regime’s leadership. In return he will be expected to completely disarm ,dismantle and destroy its nuclear arsenal , embrace the principle of freedom and fundamental human rights and peaceful relations with her neighbors and the international community . It will be expected to behave as a normal country and obey international norms of interstate relations .

    . The first inclination that Kim Jong un was about to come out of his self- imposed cocoon was when he publicly stated in January 2018 that he would seek for peace on the Korean Peninsula. His southern counterpart that was hosting the Winter Olympics then extended invitation to the North Korean regime. This was against President Trump’s advice that the South Koreans should not be seen to be following a policy of appeasement. The North Korean government not only accepted but sent a large delegation including Kim’s sister, cheer leaders  as well as the ceremonial head of state of North Korea and quickly assembled athletes. Even though the latter did not do well, but just like the ping pong diplomacy between the USA and China in the Nixon years in the 1970s , the winter games provided a much needed opening to break the ice in north and South Koreas relations . Since then the two Koreas have met in the demilitarized Zone between the two countries with both leaders symbolically stepping on each other’s country across the DMZ.  This is the prelude to a much more important Kim Jong un-Donald J Trump talks .

    The talks holding in three or four weeks’ time in yet unannounced city with Singapore being in contention for this historic meeting of Trump and Kim Jong un cannot possibly deal with all the issues . But the American president sitting with the  North Korean President amounts to formal recognition . This can be followed with signing  of a formal end to the Korean War . Ending the UN economic sanctions would follow good behavior such as ending nuclear and missile tests and beginning of nuclear disarmament perhaps at the same time of gradual withdrawal of American troops. The remaining issues will take time to negotiate but once there is a commitment to peaceful resolution of all issues the world will be able to breathe a sigh of relieve. But nothing can be taken for granted because this same commitment was reached with President Bill Clinton only for the untrustworthy regime to renege and back out . The auguries for peace are good . The regime has unilaterally changed its clock to the same time zone with Japan and South Korea. This may be a little gesture but it could be a sign of what to come. There may be no immediate breakthrough on all fronts but certainly we are further away from the belligerent and bellicose environment we were in just a year ago and as Winston Churchill once said, it is better to “jaw- jaw than to war-war”

    It is now clear that the North Korean leader is not a mad man as previously thought. All he seems to want is survival of his extreme Stalinist regime in a world in which Russia has embraced some kind of capitalism and guided democracy and China though still a communist country, but only in name, but in actual fact  it is practicing some kind of capitalist gerontocracy . Kim Jong un wants economic development for his country but in a secure sovereign environment. He seems to feel secure enough to open up to the world since the country has become a nuclear weapons state feared and respected and  hopefully responsible like China and Russia in which orbit it would like to rotate . As long as the West is not expecting Kim Jong un to give  up everything his country has laboured to achieve under the totalitarian leadership of the three Kim’s including his  grand father , his father and himself a reasonable modus vivendi can be reached with him to guarantee international peace and security.

  • Making sense of these times

    When it rains, it pours. Indeed. So many things are happening in Nigeria at the same time and at such a breathtaking speed that leaves a commentator little or no room to gather his thoughts. We once thought that we had lost our ability to get shocked; how wrong we were.

    Hoodlums stormed the Senate and snatched away the mace. But for the gallantry of our policemen, the fleeing thugs would not have dropped the prized totem under a bridge in Abuja. A senator, in a desperate attempt to resist being taken away to his home-state, jumped off a moving car, got injured and was hospitalised. The President took cash from the Excess Crude Account to buy some fighter jets from the United States. Some senators are raising hell, calling for President Muhammadu Buhari’s impeachment.

    Gunmen stormed a church at dawn and killed two priests and many parishioners. Terrorism is on the loose, holding the land by the throat – in the guise of herdsmen-farmers clashes. There is tension everywhere as horror stalks the land.

    How do we make sense out of so much nonsense? What does the man in the street think of all this? Is he at peace or restless? I really do not know. As usual, the barber shop is the place to go on occasions, such as this. Where else do you have an army of experts on virtually every topic the brain could conceive, all rendering their expertise at no cost and with remarkable gusto?

    It is a very warm day, one of those days you wish the setting of the sun would be followed by a downpour to cool the earth. Some youths are kicking around a ball and screaming. From a lone speaker in front of the shop the music of Afrobeat legend “Confusion Break Bone (CBB)” is blaring.

    Two men are engaged in a game of draught. Others are watching with deep attention. The barber,wearing a pair of shorts and a T-shirt covered by a khaki apron that seems to be long overdue for the laundryman, is busy on a client’s hair.

    “Go down; more, oga,” the client says as the barber takes some steps back to survey his work. He shakes his head in confidence that the job is done, but the client orders him back.

    Suddenly, the soccer- crazy youths break into a song. “Baba oyoyo; baba oyoyo.”  All eyes turn to the door as a bearded old man saunters in, a big, old bag slung on his right shoulder.

    “Papi D!” the barber calls out.

    “Thank you for the warm reception – always. I’m thrilled,” he says as he dumps his bag on the floor and plunks himself down on a seat with a dirty, exposed foam.

    “Water, sir?” the barber asks Papi D.

    “No, thanks. I would rather take some holy water. We are in spiritual times and a sensitive man must always be in the spirit.” He opens the bag, which is full of an assortment of indescribable materials. Junk. He pulls out a small bottle of whisky, opens it and takes a little with which he rinses his mouth. He squeezes his face and coughs sharply before smiling as if to reassure everyone that all is well.”

    “I greet you all. It’s been a long time. I salute your courage and patience in the face of this incredible provocation and irritation. Stay firm,” Papi D says to no one in particular.

    One of those playing draught, wearing a May Day hat with the inscription,  “Worker is king; respect him”, breaks the short silence.

    “Papi, what is going on in the Senate? Is it true that Omo-Agege ushered in the thugs who snatched away the mace?”

    The old fellow lets out a long laughter, begins to cough “gbau, gbauu, gbauuu!” He wipes his mouth with a brownish handkerchief that surely used to be white. “I’m sorry for that short break. You see, the mace matter is simple. A man talks in the chamber. He is seen as a rebel because he would not flow with the tide. He is suspended, but he insists the punishment is harsh and illegal. He vows to seek justice. That is the difference between an Omo-Agege, the original Agege pickin, Omo-Warri and Omo- V.I., Victoria Island, Omo-Ikoyi and Omo-Maitama.”

    “Don’t get me wrong,” he continued.   “It is wrong to invite thugs into the chamber, but how did we get to that level?”

    “Sir, how about the aircraft purchase palaver; is the President right to have spent such a huge amount of money, $496million, without appropriation? Are senators not right to have moved against him?”

    “Senators are right. But the President has been made to look as if he just dipped his hand in the till for pecuniary interest. Another arms purchase scandal.  No. The cash was paid directly to the United States treasury. No middle men, no contractors and no consultants. It was an emergency, a response to the exigencies of a war and there was a deadline to be met.”

    “So why the move to impeach Buhari?”

    “You see, it’s all about due process. The other time when the CBN man was summoned, it was over a simple matter. ‘Everyday we hear the CBN has intervened in the forex market, $250million, $200million, $300million; who are the contractors? Was there competitive bidding?

    “Was there any tender? We must ensure due process in these transactions, you know,’ the lawmakers said. I salute their sense of duty.”

    “Papi D, how about the Dino Melaye matter; he has been having a running battle with the police and Governor Yahaya Bello, who is rumoured to be angry because he invested a fortune in the failed project to recall Melaye?”

    “The Melaye matter has some spiritual connotation. Papi D reaches for the bottle again. And the etymology of the words ‘me’ (I never) and ‘laye’ (dreamt it). If a man who never dreamt of riding a bicycle suddenly finds himself cruising in the air, he may start losing his balance. Simple.” Melaye (I never dreamt I could be this big). The trouble is with the name.

    “As for Bello, if he loses a fortune in the Melaye matter, it is a case of a fortunate man, who does not know how fortunate he has been, investing a fortune in a misfortune. No case.”

    “Former President Olusegun Obasanjo is reported to have been praying that God who removed Abacha will help to remove Baba Buhari.”

    “You see. I have said that these are spiritual times. When Obasanjo announces that he has been praying, we should be at the alert.

    Remember when the man was said to be gunning for a third term and he had to leave office, he said, ‘Me, third term; how many presidents do you want to make of me? I have never failed to get anything that I want. If I wanted a third term I would have prayed for it and God would have answered my prayer’.

    “If Buhari’s supporters allow Obasanjo to get God’s attention before them, that may be dangerous; let them move fast. If a man claims to have God’s direct line and assurance that whatever he asks Him he must get, you need to watch him closely. ”

    “You are right, Papi D. Obasanjo has set up a third force, a coalition with which he hopes will lead Buhari’s defeat in 2019.”

    “Listen, young man. A coalition founded on intrigues and emotions will thrive in confusion and crash in commotion. Chikena!”

    A commercial motorcycle pulls up just by the door, its exhaust belching out thick, white smoke. “Short break,” says Papi D as he springs up from his seat, heaves his bag onto his right shoulder, rushes out and mounts the motorcycle, which hums its way into the cloudy evening.

    Fall of a Senior Advocate

    THE glowing career of a Senior Advocate of Nigerian (SAN) has collapsed at the gates of a Lagos prison, Joseph Nwobike must be ruing the day he offered two Justices some money to pervert the course of justice in matters before  their Lordships. He also lied to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

    He is to spend 30 days in prison for sending text messages to a judicial officer to influence the assignment of several cases to a particular judge.  Justice R.A. Adebiyi of the Lagos High Court, sentencing Nwobike, said his fate would send a strong signal that the Federal Government’s anti-corruption war is no fluke.

    His lawyer, Wale Akoni (SAN), pleaded for leniency. Justice Adebiyi said Nwobike had brought the legal trade to shame. She considered his unblemished record, his comportment in court and other factors in reducing the two years prescribed jail term to 30 days.

    Six of the several cases Nwobike wanted assigned went to  his preferred judge. There are many players in the game in which Nwobike has burnt his fingers badly. We should not scorn him; he is only one of many who are involved in such shameful enterprises. The drive for success could be so overwhelming that many can cross the red line of decency to attain the goal through fraud–just to earn some accolades from a dangerously permissive society.

    Justice Akanbi deserves praise for exhibiting courage and not sentiment. The silk’s fall is indeed a warning to all those involved in the manipulation of the judiciary that it s time to change.

     

  • Our pitiful class narrative

    The democracy we declared has recoiled into a spent shadow. Eighteen years on in the grip of blood-drenched mascots, it steals from our sweetest fantasies, like the proverbial slut making a surreptitious exit with her drunken lover’s wallet.

    Consequently, we suffer poverty of character and this manifests as mean-spiritedness. It’s akin to that patience of the wild that holds motionless for endless hours, the motorist at the police checkpoint, the kidnapper in his lair, the assassin in his ambuscade and the public officer on his perch – this patience belongs primarily to the predator while it hunts its prey.

    Oftentimes, it manifests in uncontrollable spasms that have seen us bury our best and elevate our worst in abject negation of the cycle of the universe and morality. But who needs morals in a nation where fair is foul and foul remains fair?

    As you read, many a Nigerian of commonplace roots live through each day without ever contemplating or criticizing their living conditions. They find themselves born into dehumanising squalor or somewhat indecent circumstances and they accept such sordidness as their fate thus exhibiting no conscious effort to better their lot beyond what their immediate circumstances dictate.

    Almost as impulsively as the beasts of the wild, they seek the satisfaction of the needs of the moment, without much forethought and consideration that by sufficient endeavor, they just might improve their living conditions.

    However, a certain percentage – comprising men and women of privilege – guided by personal ambition, consciously strive in thought and will to attain higher status but very few among these are concerned enough to secure for all, the advantages which they seek for themselves. This explains the number of self-centred, treacherous human rights activists, women’s rights activists, journalists and columnists parading our streets.

    Very few men are indeed capable of the humaneness that drives martyrs to persistently rebel against glaring social evils, in the interest of less fortunate members of the society. But there exists a few however, that are truly bothered.

    These few, driven by compassion tirelessly seek, first in thought and then in action, for some way of escape; some new system of society by which life may become richer, more joyful and devoid of avertable evils that mars the present. But surprisingly, such men oftentimes, fail to curry the support of the very victims of the injustices they wish to remedy.

    This is because more unfortunate sections of the Nigerian populace are hopelessly ignorant, apathetic from excess of toil and disillusionment, apprehensive through the imminent danger of instantaneous chastisement by the holders of power, and morally defective, owing to the loss of self-respect resulting from their degradation.

    To excite among such classes any conscious, deliberate effort in pursuit of general improvement of the status quo, proves basically a hopeless task, as antecedents of such efforts have proven.

    Thus despite our claims to modernity, higher education, sophistication and relative rise in the standard of comfort among wage-earners in the country, the Nigerian society have failed woefully, to achieve better living conditions and a better society.

    It is no surprise therefore, that the Nigerian working class has persistently proved a dismal failure. And the reasons are hardly far-fetched: Nigerians have a problem with differentiating between appropriate and inappropriate political behavior.

    That is why the nation’s democratic experiment like any other system of governance practicable by us was doomed from the start.  What exactly has democracy offered? A 4-1-9 progressive plan that booms circumspectly like it had been doctored as part of a cold-war era propagandist scheme?

    But despite our self-righteousness and persistent cynicism with the current order, we really cannot explore a more worthy alternative than what we have now. The average Nigerian can’t bear to be led by a truly honest, visionary and accountable leadership.

    The average Nigerian is no more electable than the leadership he endure, yet he loves to speak truth to power even as he functions simultaneously to smother his own voice, by extolling his tormentors and keeping them in office.

    No matter who gets elected, the demographic and economic realities of Nigeria will persist, and there is a very limited range of politically-viable solutions for dealing with them.

    Thus the need to evolve in thought and will, in pursuit of a more balanced social order; such conscious evolution can only be achieved by a re-orientation in scholarship and purification of thought and action.

    The foundations of scholarship and knowledge must be reconstructed to guarantee more progressive responses to internal problems of social advance — problems of work and wages, of families and homes, of morals and the true value of life.

    These and other inevitable problems of the Nigerian civilization must be resolvable largely by the electorate by reason of education, exposure and devotion to the constitution.

    The answer to Nigeria’s widening income and social gap – which has so far manifested in preventable crises and persistent state of insecurity – is to found an educational process geared to steer successfully, the commonplace trains of thought away from the dilettante and the fool stereotype.

    It’s about time poor, struggling members of the nation’s working class learned to scorn the maxim that holds that if their stomachs be full, it matters little about their brains. The paths to stable peace and security winds between honest toil and dignified manhood.

    The better society that we seek, calls for the guidance of skilled thinkers, the loving, reverent comradeship between the low income earners and ambitious middle class emancipated by training and culture.

    Such human elements would no doubt be conscious of the fact that not even the sustenance of oil subsidy, higher wages and a fairer economic system could protect its members from the usual handicaps and monstrosity constituted by the predatory ruling class.

    They would understand that the much clamoured social enterprise and gesture towards change, must be mooted and achieved by the working class electorate via peaceful polls, and the electoral revolt of humane civilization.

    To achieve progress, Nigeria needs to vote underachievers out of public office.

  • The broken trough

    SINCE the beginning of the year, Benue State, the nation’s food basket, has been in the news for the wrong reasons. It has been killings upon killings right from the first day of the year. When the world was ushering in the new year on January 1, with shouts of joy and merry making, the people of Benue were in tears. They were mourning their dead on new year’s day. What a way to start a new year. Since then, there has been no let up in the killings.

    The people are not fighting themselves in Benue. No, brothers are not at war there, as the Inspector-General of Police (IG) Ibrahim Idris wants us to believe. Following the new year’s killings in which over 70 persons died, President Muhammadu Buhari ordered the IG to move to the state to restore law and order. The IG went there, held a town hall meeting where the people of the state told him pointblank that his police have failed them.

    They told the IG that they no longer have faith in him, adding that they were ready to defend themselves, henceforth. They protested his earlier statement that the killings were as a result of communal clashes. The police chief apologised for the statement, but despite that apology, he has consistently reduced what is happening in Benue to communal clashes. If that is so, which are the communities fighting? As the nation’s number one law enforcement officer, he should have that information at his disposal.

    Wherever there are clashes in the country, the police, which he oversees should be able to tell us those fighting, the immediate and remote causes and why they are fighting. Anything short of this, the police chief will not be helping his case that what the country has on its hands in Benue is a communal clash. The Benue people have been speaking with one voice on what is happening in their domain. They have said it times without number that herdsmen are behind the killings.

    The herdsmen have not denied this. All they said was that the killings were in retaliation for the killing and rustling of their cows. What is at the root of the matter is the anti-grazing law, which is in operation in the state. The herdsmen are not happy with the law, which forbids them from the open grazing of their cattle. As a way out, the Federal Government proposed to set up cattle colonies across the country, with states expected to give out land for the project.

    Many states are not in support of the proposal, compelling the government to reconsider ranching, which is favoured by many states. Ever before what has today come to be known as herdsmen killings, farmers and herders have always clashed across the country over this issue of grazing. The farmers whether in the north, south, east or west have always accused herdsmen of destroying their farms during cattle grazing. Truly, the cattle destroy crops, especially cassava, maize and yam when grazing, leaving the farmers wringing their hands.

    But the matter has always been settled by the councils of chiefs which call the farmers and herders to a meeting. It seems the problem can no longer be settled at that level. Why? That is the trillion naira question. If the issue could be handled at that level in the past, why is it no longer possible to do so now? There can be only one answer to this question and that is that those now going about as herdsmen may not really be herdsmen. They are killers in herdsmen skin. The President, in London a few days ago, shed light on who the killer-herdsmen are.

    According to him, the herdsmen are gunmen trained by the late Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi. The gunmen, he said, escaped into Nigeria and other West African countries after Gaddafi’s death. “Herdsmen that we used to know carried only sticks and may be a cutlass to clear the way, but these ones now carry sophisticated weapons…’’ Indeed, the herdsmen that we used to know were not ruthless and vicious. As they moved about with their cattle, they waved to, and joked with, little children, who ran after them, singing , malu kongo, lababa kongo… With their staff held with both hands across their necks and a straw hat on their heads, the like of which some of us wore when the sun is hot, the herdsmen looked harmless as they moved from one point to the other.

    Today, those herdsmen with whom most of us related in the past, have become the enemy that we dread. Yes, I believe the President that these are no herdsmen, but killers. No true herdsman will storm a church early in the morning and kill two priests and 11 worshippers. No herdsman will ever do that. The invasion of the St Ignatius Quasi Parish in Ukpor Mbalon in Gwer Local Government Area of Benue State on Tuesday during which Rev Fathers Joseph Gor and Felix Tyolaha and the others were killed was a premeditated case of murder.

    The herdsmen or whoever they are went there to kill harmless people who woke up early in the morning to seek the face of God. What will they say is the offence of their victims? If they have any grouse against the anti-grazing law, is it by these killings that they will make their grievance known? The government and the security agencies have for long treated this matter with kid gloves. Now that the government has identified who the killer-herdsmen are, it should waste no time in moving against them.

    The killer-herdsmen, no mat
    ter how powerful they may
    be, cannot be stronger than the government. Since they have declared war against some sections of the country, the government should pay them back in kind. The only language these killers understand is force and as long as the government keeps talking without any concrete action, they will continue to kill people, disappear and return to do more havoc. This is the time to draw a line in the sand for them, which they should not cross. And if they cross it, they do so at their peril.

    Will the government take them head on or keep on watching while they continue to kill and maim in Benue, Nasarawa, Plateau and Taraba, among other states?