The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Cry, the beloved country

    Until last Thursday, it was believed in certain quarters that nothing shocks Nigerians. No matter how serious an issue is, it was said, Nigerians won’t be bothered. It was argued that we have developed a thick skin to everything and that no matter how gargantuan an issue may be we will turn a blind eye to it and move on. I used to believe so too. If we are looking for a society where the people do not care about what is happening around them, Nigeria is it.

    Our leaders know us inside out; they know how to manipulate us and get us eating out of their hands. It does not cost them anything to sway us to their side. All they need do is to throw a few wads into the air and we will go rushing for the cash like kids scrambling for candy. Even kids will join in the mad rush for these crumbs from the so-called leaders’ pockets. Yes, these are crumbs compared to the billions now being recovered from them.  Are they really leaders or looters?

    They are more of looters than leaders from what we have seen in the last 21 months. In less than two years in office, President Muhammadu Buhari has exposed some of our past leaders for who they really are. These leaders  were chosen to be the custodians of our patrimony, but  they opted to be destroyers of the economy they were expected to protect. The immediate past administration, especially,  failed the country in every area of human development despite having high calibre professionals to run the economy.

    But I daresay, the ruination of the economy did not start with the Jonathan administration. The question is what did it do about the mess, if any, that it inherited? Did it just keep quiet in order not to ruffle feathers? Did it help the country by sticking to the age-long practice of business as usual? Has it not shot itself in the foot by upholding that asinine policy under which a past  administration covered up its predecessor to enable it commit greater evil against the country during its own time? It takes a determined administration; an administration with the love of the people at heart to break from the past to expose the evil deeds that have kept us underdeveloped for ages.

    The Buhari administraton has chosen to tread this path and from revelation so far, it is a step in the right direction. Our country has been stripped bare by those who should manage it. Former President Olusegun Obasanjo left $45billion as external reserve for the late President Umoru Yar’ Adua in 2007. The late Yar’ Adua grew the reserve to $64billion before he died in 2010. But when former President Goodluck Jonathan was leaving in 2015, the reserve had been depleted to $32billion, despite having some so-called World Bank experts working with him. It was not only the reserve that was depleted, many in the administration helped themselves to public funds. They turned the whole thing to a bazaar of sorts. It was as if they were in a competition over who will steal the most from the public till.

    The military too joined in the looting. Some Service chiefs diverted billions of naira and dollars meant for the purchase of arms and ammunition to their personal use. They built exquisite houses in Lagos, Abuja, Kaduna and their hometowns, while they sent their men to fight Boko Haram insurgents with bare hands. It was the height of  sheer wickedness. Their ongoing trial is quite revealing. It shows how they used our money to acquire properties all over the world. Many of them stole money which their generations yet unborn will never finish spending.

    We have heard of the Abacha loot stashed in different parts of the world, thinking that we will never travel that road again. But here we are today confronted by another set of perverts probably worse than the late Gen Sani Abacha, who held power between 1993 and 1998.  What has so far been recovered from former Petroleum Resources Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke alone is mind-boggling. Then there are others like former First Lady Dame Patience Jonathan, former Chief of Defence Staff Alex Badeh, former Air chiefs Dikko Umar and Sola Amosu, former National Security Adviser (NSA) Sambo Dasuki, some former governors and ministers and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftains. And what about the $151million in a fictitious bank account?

    The latest recovery is from the former Group Managing Director (GMD) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Andrew Yakubu, in whose house in the slum of Sabon Tasha in Kaduna State, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) found $9.7million and  £74,000 cash. We should not be surprised that such a huge sum was found in Yakubu’s house. Those who should know once told us that the ‘’GMD’’ as the NNPC boss is called in government circles is the supplier of cash for all the needs of government. The NNPC, which should be bothered about ensuring all-year supply of fuel nationwide is saddled with other responsibilities, such as meeting the cash needs of the ruling party and top government officials.

    In such a situation, why won’t the GMD help himself? The GMD cannot be watching, while others are looting, abi. On a more serious note, what this shows is that our leaders and public officers are more interested in feathering their nest than looking after the interest of the people. For all they care, the people can die of hunger and illnesses for lack of money and good hospitals as long as they have the means to take care of themselves and their families in some of the best hospitals in the world. Yakubu sought refuge in a slum because he thought nobody will ever think of looking for such cash in such a place.

    The dour looking Yakubu may have seen himself as wise by taking the money to that out of place community, but his wisdom did him in. The same people he relied upon to cover his track may have betrayed him because he never took care of them. He did not take care of them because he did not want them to know that he is keeping what the EFCC describes as ‘’proceeds of crime’’ in their community. This shows how greedy and inhuman our public officers are. They are only interested in themselves and are not concerned whether people are dying beside them or not.

    How do we stop this mindless stealing? It is by holding all public officers to account at the end of their tenure. We, the people, should also open our eyes. When we see evil, we should talk evil. We should not help looters to cover their tracks. By helping them, we re killing our country slowly. The result of all these years of looting culminated in the recession we are in today. In a recession when the country is looking for $30billion to borrow, someone has $9.7million stashed away in a slum, and others have $151 million hidden in a bank, not to talk of the various sums hidden in other places here and abroad. And they say Buhari should not fight corruption. Haba!

  • Money money everywhere…

    Money money everywhere…

    (A guide to cash keeping in recession)

    First, they said there was no change. It was all slogan; no action, they cried. Then, they said the recession was taking  too  long to go away with all its pains. Shut factories, poverty, hunger, anger and poor infrastructure.

    By now, those who see nothing good in the recession must be having a rethink, the objective ones that is. Not those who are so deep in the come-and-chop politics that has been with us for a long time.

    Consider the earth-shaking revelations that confront us everyday about recovered loot, the sheer audacity of the looters and their grab-all mentality. A South-south governor is said to have deposited $10m in the wrong bank, the large bosom of a wily mistress who shut it all up and fled.

    He reminds me of the manager of a microfinance bank in which a friend of mine deposited his life savings. Poor fellow, he cries like a baby who has lost his lollipop to a greedy old man.

    Not so His Excellency. A man who has never run away from a street fight, he has taken it all on the chin. He has been unusually calm, like a Yoga expert in deep meditation so that he does not become a laughing stock for this little indiscretion.

    The Police Headquarters was like a typical Nigerian banking hall the other day. Bundles heaped on bundles of cash were on display. Television cameras trained their lens on them. I wonder why no station warned that “viewers’ discretion” was required.

    I was told of a pensioner who fainted upon seeing so much cash displayed on television. His shocked children rushed him to a hospital where he was revived. “Give papa some water,” the doctor directed a nurse. The old man opened his eyes and said angrily: “Water? For who? Please, keep your water and leave me alone. I know what I saw before I passed out. Give me money.”

    As I was saying, the police exhibited the cash, N111.3m. They said it was recovered from some Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) officials who allegedly collected it from Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike.  His Excellency was said to have bribed them to rig the last legislative rerun for his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidates. He denied it all and accused the police of blackmail.

    Anyway, as if the police show was not dramatic enough, we were confronted with images of detectives hauling out cabinets of cash from the home of a former Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation’s (NNPC’s) Group Managing Director Andrew Yakubu in a remote part of Kaduna. The value? Some $9,772,800 and 74,000 pounds sterling.

    Some other cash has been found sitting pretty in some fictitious bank accounts. The huge sums – $151m and N8b – were deposited by some yet unnamed civil servants, aided by bankers.

    Apparently scared that it is becoming more difficult to hide cash, some compatriots who crave for anonymity for obvious reasons have flooded “Editorial Notebook” with requests for advice on how to hide their cash.

    Who will blame them? The government is desperate for money to battle the recession that has held the system down. The banks, hobbled and humbled by the TSA, are hungry for cash. Everybody is looking for money.

    Here are some of the tips on safeguarding cash in this recession:

    Unlike the army of critics who have seen no redeeming feature in this recession, a group of youths have incorporated a company – of chartered engineers, diggers and dredgers. They specialise in dredge in burrowing deep down into the earth to build bunkers  in which you can safely keep your money. Hire them.

    They will build a safe house, somewhere in your village or hometown, away from the prying eyes of envious city neighbours who often take delight in dredging up salacious stories about successful people, like your good self. The house will, needless to say, be air conditioned; dollar bills abhor heat. That is why they always remain crisp and smooth with a seductive smell.

    You will be supplied huge boxes with digital locks and alarm systems, which can tip off a guard should any intruder ever get near the bunker. Not the ordinary soft steel cabinets that are common in many offices. Those are only good for files. It is in these boxes that the cash will be stuffed and loaded into the bunker.

    An uncle of yours can live in a nearby chalet so as to give the compound some form of communal identity so that it cannot be mistaken for a lonely house tucked away in some remote corner of the village. Remember that your uncle or whoever you have chosen to live there  must not even suspect that you have a fortune in the house. Never.

    In these days of whistle blowing, the risk of banking huge sums of money is high. The law says such cash must be reported to the EFCC, which more often than not believes that such money is a proceed of crime, even when it can’t put its finger on a particular crime.

    If a fictitious account is opened for you, this is no guarantee that you will not someday lose your hard-earned cash. A crazy cashier or a frustrated customer relations manager, one of those who pound the street in search of deposits,  may work his calculator and begin to dream of grabbing five per cent of your money by squealing on you to the EFCC.

    It is not enough to have a reinforced steel safe buried in the bosom of a building. What if a bitter uncle who is never satisfied with what you give him you decides to join the Whistleblowers Vanguard and make a fortune off you? What if your wife makes a slip of tongue at the hair dresser’s? It could even be your ever-dutiful driver boasting about his boss’s weight in cash.

    There are juju men and spiritualists who will claim that they can make the cash invisible to all eyes, except yours. They have been advertising their skills on the web. “The more you loot, the more  they look, the less they see,” one of such advertisements said. Never patronise them. They are scammers.

    Building a house with all the appurtenances of good security is the sure way to go. If the authorities somehow find out that you have kept some cash in the house and they storm the place, never panic.

    Be bold like a lion. Step forward to own up. Insist that it was given to you by your friends and admirers, who have the right to deck whoever they like with gifts.

    The government may go to court to seek its permission to confiscate the cash. Never mind. Hire a good lawyer, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), a loquacious one whose fee will be so hefty that even a part-payment will draw the EFCC’s attention. He will sue to enforce your fundamental right to own, keep, use, spend, deploy, disburse and amass money and enjoy all the rights and privileges of  having, owning, acquiring, possessing and holding such money and such other property that may be purchased, acquired or bought with the said money, either in cash or kind without let or hindrance from whatsoever quarters and by whatever means. He will also urge the court to give any other order or orders it deems fit in the circumstance.

    To your surprise, the court may rule that the EFCC has no right to block your account. When this happens, remember to acknowledge it all as a victory for the rule of law. Then, rush to the bank to make some withdrawals – far above the recommended limit – and tell the media how pleased you have been.

    The EFCC may take you in for some days after getting a warrant from a magistrate. Remain firm. It cannot keep you there for long without charges. Remember, no prima facie case has been established against you.

    Your neighbours will scorn you and regale the world with false tales of your stinginess. That’s fine. Remember it is not your business that they do not have friends or that they befriended people who could not shower good gifts on them. Where were they when you chose friends worth their weight in dollars and pounds?

    Do not be surprised if you are the subject of gossip by idle academics who have for years been unable to differentiate between stealing and corruption. A gift can never be proof of stealing. Corruption? That is neither here nor there.

    If everything fails – this is not likely – and you are sent to prison, be courageous. It is a temporary setback, which your comeback will soon obliterate. Upon your return, there will be a great revelry. A thanksgiving service will mark the great occasion. The priest, a revered senior cleric, I can bet, will preach on how Christ our Lord was persecuted and all that to encourage you and smooth your reintegration into the society which, as you will discover, has not changed.

    Later at a reception, you will deliver a moving speech in which you will insist on your innocence. Your enemies hounded you into prison, not because you stole a dime; they just wanted you off the stage, you will say. Some in the audience will shed tears. Others will merely shake their heads.

    The message has sunk in. Go out there and reclaim your status.

    One last word. All rights reserved. No part of this guide may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without the permission of the author.

  • Nigeria: Agonising reminiscences!

    Wait a minute! So, yet again, for some days in the past two weeks, we Nigerians did not know the exact health conditions, and the exact whereabouts, of the president of our country?  This is so uncannily similar to another experience some eight years ago when we Nigerians did not know the true health status and the exact whereabouts of our elected president for weeks. For any Nigerian of my advanced age, these experiences cannot but open the gate to an agonizing walk down memory lane, and to uncomfortable questions.

    Let us face it, we as one country called Nigeria have waded in great agony through what, arguably, qualifies as the worst half-century in the history of any country in the world.  Virtually everything of importance that our country has touched in the past 56 years has been done in the dark, and has yielded rancor, hostility, poverty, conflicts and bloodletting.

    We entered into independence preparations through a federal pre-independence election whose outcome was manipulated and viciously contentious. It was the election that was supposed to produce the government that would lead us into independence, but it led us, first and foremost, even in the months before independence, into dark plots by some sections of our country against another, and into a future picture of conflict and doom.

    That 1959 pre-independence federal election also laid the foundations for the kind of elections we have had since then in this country – elections marked by utmost desperation and crookedness, elections whose results are pre-determined in dark corners by those who would rather see Nigeria crack and perish than let any true voting outcomes rob them of power.  The very first post-independence federal election of 1964 followed in the same mode, and was so blatantly corrupted and violent that Nigeria could not put a new federal government together for days. And yet, when the Western Regional election came some months later in 1965, the federal desperadoes were so bent on controlling the Western Region that they went on and rigged the election in the most insulting manner imaginable. That banditry provoked the youths of the Western Region into exploding – in a revolt that went on stubbornly for months, until all governance over Nigeria literally collapsed, and until some young officers in the army finally stepped in and shut down everything.

    In spite of over one decade of military dictatorship, mass pogroms that took tens of thousands of lives, and a horrendously bloody civil war that took millions of lives, nothing about our elections changed. When an election came again in 1979, the desperation, manipulation and crookedness returned too. Stunned beyond measure, the country could muster not much of a response. And the result was that when elections came in 1983 again, the confidence to rig and manipulate was much more shattering and much more infuriating. Violence followed in many parts of the country. In the then Ondo State, the youths declared outright war and, in only one single morning of carnage and death, almost totally wiped out a whole generation of local politicians who had helped the federal agencies to rig the Ondo State gubernatorial election.

    Another military coup soon shut down the civilian regime. And many years of military rule followed, dragging Nigeria down into the most corrupt and most murderous dictatorships in all its history. Even so, when elective politics returned in 1999, the crookedness and election manipulations returned with it. At the elections of 2003 and 2007, Nigeria’s rulers, declaring the elections to be “do-or-die” wars, broke all bounds with official violence and manipulation of election processes and results. International observers, many of whom had come at the invitation of the Nigerian government, were so shocked that they issued a worldwide report that essentially wrote off Nigeria as a country below the level of human civilization.

    But that was not enough to change anything as far as Nigeria was concerned. Only a few weeks ago, Nigeria recorded one of its most violent elections in the Rivers State as federal agencies and state forces faced off in a sickening blood fest. And so it goes on and on.

    In the midst of all these betrayal and degradation, a major blessing that God had programmed into the soil of Nigeria for millions of years was reached by human ingenuity. Nigeria became a big producer of mineral oil, and a wide door became open to wealth and prosperity for Nigerians. But Nigeria’s rulers had their own Nigerian kind of response to the blessing. They set upon the blessing with subhuman greed. Worse still, they abandoned the sources of wealth that Nigerians had developed before the coming of the oil bonanza – sources of wealth like cocoa, groundnuts and palm produce. In these ways, they gradually spread poverty into the lives of most Nigerians. In short, the Almighty God gave wealth and prosperity to Nigerians, but the rulers and leaders of Nigeria turned it all into hopeless poverty for their countrymen.

    The ordinary Nigerian ceased being part of the equation of national politics and governance. The purpose of all politics became simply the jostling for positions from which one can share in the oil money.  The brightest and best in our land abandoned truly productive enterprises and embarked on wheeling and dealing for some shares in the stolen oil money.  Nigeria has made much more money than most countries of the world, but almost all of it has gone for sharing among the powerful and influential – from the heights of the federal government to the most remote local governments.  Abject poverty gripped the lives of ordinary Nigerians. Public facilities and services disintegrated and perished, so that even our most important highways became death traps. The young person who sincerely desires to embark on some honest business can no longer do so, because he cannot find the loads of money that he would need to bribe public officials for the official documents and licenses that he needs, and because he cannot be sure of the electricity, the water, the roads, and the reliable public services that businesses need. Support was withdrawn from our schools. Our school teachers, denied proper teaching needs and often going for months without salary, lost heart as well as professional dedication.  Our children ceased to learn anything at school, and their performances in the vital public examinations plummeted disastrously. The same fate befell our universities, as the professors were deprived and battered into academic incompetence; and the little academic work that remains is frequently interrupted by professors’ strikes and students’ riots. Crowds of our educated men and women roam the streets without employment. Crowds of others haunt the embassies of foreign countries, in desperate efforts to flee from the hopelessness of their own country.  Many even attempt to reach the African Mediterranean coast and southern Europe by walking the hundreds of miles across the Sahara Desert – with many of them dying in the effort. Large numbers of Nigeria’s educated young women regularly get trapped into sex slavery in different parts of the world. We have produced, and are producing, some billionaires, most of whom are robber billionaires; but we have produced, and are producing, a country of mostly hopeless paupers.

    Naturally, in the midst of all these, inter-group hostilities and conflicts have grown in most parts of our country – nationality versus nationality, religion versus religion, immigrants versus indigenous hosts, cattle herders versus peasant farmers, etc.  On a regular basis, we are slaughtering one another with a ferocity beyond description.  A deep darkness has descended upon our country, and the soul of our country has shriveled and more or less died.  By the year 2004, informed observers in the world were predicting that our country would break up in a few years.  From all indications, we are very close today to the fulfillment of those dolorous prophecies.

    We Nigerians need to pray for our president. We need to pray, and pray fervently, about our country. And, may be, we also need to ask the question: Are we doing the wrong thing by stubbornly keeping this country together as one country? Is this a venture that God does not approve of?

  • Beyond lip service

    Someday, death will become something more than an unexplainable mystery to the incumbent ruling class. Every public officer will die; their family members too. Despite their inhumanity, they are human after all. They breathe and bleed just like we do. At their demise, they shall discover what manner of life they deserve in the afterlife. They shall find that money and rank they covet are useless after the last howl had fallen silent, at their funeral. They shall learn that currency-activated prayers their clerics hoist above them will serve like raincoats under a blitz of cannon balls, at the end.

    In the wake of their demise, how shall they be remembered? How do we remember men who summon our joys to harness it with a sable bind? Shall we remember them with rage and rant? Shall we wish they burn in the earth, like splinters of wood fed into the hearth to spite the fire? Shall we wish that they lie in plagued repose low down with the worm and ant?

    How shall we be remembered? How shall posterity remember the ones who have perfected the art of letting their voices trail off in confusion at decision time? What will our children think of our desperation to keep the worst of our kind in power? What pantheons or dungeons shall we inhabit in the annals of Nigerian citizenship?

    The troubles of Nigeria are unwieldy like a storm. By our perversions, we impregnate and corrupt a history and civilization 56-years old. Great evil lies in you and me, and by our perpetuation of it, we make history the way of the diabolic, that decapitated his newborn to satisfy his hunger pangs. Too many threads of heedlessness, woven of gluttony and lust, of racism and fear, inequality and blind hate of the stranger, form in our souls, a thick network.

    Yesterday, we suffered violence and bloodshed by militants in our creeks, down in the Delta. Today, we suffer violence and bloodshed by Boko Haram and Niger Delta Avengers.

    Every day, we suffer greater violence and bloodbath by murderous and incompetent ruling class. The most remarkable characteristic of the Nigerian ruling class, according to Prof. Itse Sagay, “is its complete and total insensitivity to the public outcry and outrage over the percentage of our resources that the members appropriate to themselves for their own consumption.”

    Sagay, in his lecture on ‘Good Governance and Enforcement of Law and Order’ at the Nigerian Institute of Management’s 2013 Management Day, lamented that while Nigerian Senators and House of Representative members earn $1.7m and $1.4m respectively per annum, American Senators and British parliamentarians earn 174, 000 and £65,738 respectively per annum.

    Yet income per capita for the US and UK is $46,350 and $35,468, respectively, while that of Nigeria is $2,248. The figure have grown more outrageous over time. Simply put, Nigerian legislators pay themselves the highest salaries of all legislators in the world, even though their country is amongst the least developed in the whole world.

    More worrisome is the government’s inequitable distribution of benefits and punishments meted out to people from different classes and professions, along with the asymmetrical distribution of respect and dignity. Eventually, you get the feeling that some people don’t count and never expected to count in the Nigerian State.

    In the wake of violence and bloodshed by successive terrorist groups, mostly constituted by youths, in the country, Mr. President, legislators and governors simmer in frustration and moral outrage. Jumping on to the bandwagon of these elected representatives’ deceitfulness and officialese, monarchs, clerics, newspaper columnists and other bastions of society pay lip service to the degeneration of the Nigerian youth and State.

    It is hardly astonishing that the government and cohorts resort to explanations of criminality, a feral underclass, and dysfunctional parenting. These are easier explanations for which the government does not need to accept responsibility. However, a careful assessment of the situation reveals that a greater percentage of the culprits are motivated by poverty, illiteracy, dysfunctional parenting, unemployment and inequality induced by unfair government policies, insensitivity and oppression by the ruling class.

    But such cruelties foisted on us by the most insidious ruling class, do not justify the descent of the Nigerian youth into barbarism or bloodthirstiness of any kind – but we choose to be savages anyway. Insensitivity and bloodlust enjoy sweet repose in the psyche of the Nigerian youth thus habituating them to all manners of savagery and triviality.

    Hence it wasn’t surprising to see the youth, the media and the general public descend on Shema Obafaye, former Lagos State Commandant of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC) as violently as a mugger, as frighteningly as an armed robber, and as deadly as a hit man, over his gaffe when he featured as a guest on a breakfast show on Lagos-based private television, Channels Television.

    For Obafaye’s “My oga at the top” slip-up and his inability to accurately state his organization’s internet address, he became an object of nationwide ridicule. Footage of his blunder went viral on the social media making him an object of malicious jokes and caricature on Facebook, Twitter, Blackberry Messenger, T-shirts, and rascally musical medley by local disc jockeys (DJs).

    It was one gaffe that Nigerian youths particularly, couldn’t forgive; consequently, branded mugs, face-caps and T-shirts with the inscription: “My oga at the top!” were produced and sold at a profit in merriment over Obafaye’s gaffe.

    Several celebrities cashed in on the madness and donned the branded T-shirts to major public events in pitiful desperation to replenish their dwindling acclaim. A smart movie producer attempted to cash in too on the national ridicule of a man and public servant while it lasted by hastily putting together and releasing a film titled, “My oga at the top.”

    Nobody cared what sorrow or misery burdened Obafaye’s heart nor did anyone pause to imagine what shame and disillusionment his wife and kids are forced to relive and suffer daily long after the mockery had quieted to a murmur.

    If the Nigerian citizenry, the youth particularly, could be so coordinated and methodical in their perpetration of such “good-natured” ridicule and hate, would it not do Nigeria immense good to have us unite in more coordinated and disciplined revolt against the oppression and cruelties of the incumbent ruling class?

    We are past the novelty of coordinated mockery and moral outrage. The most powerful indignation we could express exceeds the pages of acerbic columns and social media; it subsists in latent courage and will we haven’t yet summoned the courage to express.

    Until we mature in grace and learn to apply ourselves to passionate pursuits for the love of the good, our pains shall run amok where we seek ease and bliss, always. It’s a matter of choice; to which system of thought should we commit our lives to? Is there anything in our norms worth saving? Shall we define the Nigerian dream in the language of humanity? Shall we begin to officiate for posterity’s sake? Shall we begin to affect the honesty and decency to which we pay lip service? Shall we choose the right candidates and vote them in at election time come 2019?

    It’s about time we refined the subtleties that make the Nigerian dream the fantasy of thieves, looters and blinkered murderers.

  • Ambode’s traffic enforcers

    Ambode , ‘Nigeria’s alpha governor’ (apology to Sam Omatseye,) as worthy successor to his trail-blazing predecessors has in the last one and half years continued to validate the over 2000 years old Plato’s thesis that those best equipped to manage society are the philosopher kings.  His preparation through acquisition of relevant training from the best schools across the world has shown in the quality of leadership he has so far offered the good people of Lagos. When many of us shortly after his assumption office urged him to cage danfo drivers and Okada riders who wanted to take his government hostage following false hopes they received from defeated PDP, he in what has become the style of his administration, took time to study the problem before arriving at his own unassailable position which was that even animals with appropriate approach could be tamed. He shortly afterwards inaugurated his Lagos traffic law aimed at taming those who “engage in flagrant disregard or violation of traffic rules with impunity; break traffic rules at will and cause needless traffic snag, drive against traffic and beat the traffic lights, destroy traffic furniture and infrastructure, drive across the road median and through their lawlessness and irresponsible actions, daily inflict pains, grieve and sorrow on fellow citizens.”

    The reservation of some, including yours truly  as expressed on these pages on September 1, 2016 was that“ some of the penalties for some of the 11 new laws which range from  “three years imprisonment without option of fine for ‘One-Way’ driving;  a fine of N50,000 or three years imprisonment, or both; for abandoning vehicle on highway; a fine of N20,000 for riding Motorcycle against traffic, or without crash helmet and smoking while driving ,etc can neither achieved the intended objectives – whether deterrence or to raise revenues for the state – because such stiff penalties provided enough incentives for exploitation of victims by those saddled with implementation of the laws.

    My encounter with some touts pretending as traffic law enforcers about a 100 yards after the Mile 12 bridge and my over one hour observation at their Ikorodu yard for ‘haggling and bargaining’ convinced me beyond any doubt that some of the touts are on the road for other reasons other than the  Governor Ambode’s above stated objectives

    I had overtaken a wobbling truck in front of me as I descended the Mile 12 bridge towards Ikorodu, at about 8.30 a.m last Thursday. There emerged within seconds, two stick-wielding touts and two policemen menacingly pointing their guns at my car. As I rolled down the window of the passenger’s seat to find out what was happening, one of the two boys forced himself into the back seat while one of the policemen still with his gun cocked eased himself into the front seat. I was accused of taking the BRT lane. Shocked, I asked why any sane person at that hour of the morning when an Ikorodu inward motorist driving against the traffic can see as far as 500 yards ahead opt to take a BRT lane. I called their attention to over 10 vehicles that did exactly what I did-(overtake a vehicle) while we were arguing inside my car. They however insisted I must follow them to their Ikorodu office.

    At the Ikorodu office located behind TOS Benson Estate, I was taking before the head of the traffic task force, a young man of about 28. I told him his boys were up to some mischief as I did not commit any offence. After collecting my key, he then took time to explain to me that the portion of the road after the Mile 12 bridge spanning a distance of about 100 yards was marked with two solid lines and that once a motorist tyres pass over that portion, an offence has been committed. His verdict was that I was guilty as charged and would have to go and pay fine in Oshodi before returning to retrieve my impounded car. As he left me standing in the scorching sun along with scores of other victims I met there, he announced openly to no one in particular but for the benefit of all that the fine was N50,000 and those who are not satisfied have the option of going to court.

    After about 30 minutes in the hot sun, the policeman who had earlier forced his way into my car came to advice I introduce myself to the young man. Defeated and deflated, I did, appealing to him to educate unsuspecting motorists like us who obtained our driving license some 50 years back on the relevance of two solid lines on a portion of a road shared by BRT buses and other motorists. Besides I told the chief traffic law enforcer that I was slated to deliver a lecture at 10am in a nearby university. He asked me to go and wait by my car while he consulted with his key men and some policemen under a shed. Shortly afterwards, he came as promised, returned my car key and asked me to go. And when I told the touts manning the gate who insisted on collecting a gate fees of N500 that I had no money left on me except I looked for an ATM around, he graciously came down to open the gate to let me out .

    As I drove out of the place, what was on mind was not the lecture that was already one hour behind schedule. I was overwhelmed with a sense of shame and guilt. Many of those I left inside the burning sun trying to haggle and bargain their way out  trouble because they could not ‘introduce themselves’ as I did are probably victims like me with their day and plan ruined. I felt a further sense of shame that I could not suddenly transform myself into a Femi Falana and fight for the rights and dignity of those with  forlorn long look on their faces who by looking at me as I drove out Ikorodu yard of ‘haggling and bargaining’, I subconsciously believe were indeed accusing of betrayal.

    The pangs of pain increased with the realization that some traffic offence enforcers and their police accomplices who hide at obscure portions of the road to arrest unsuspecting road users who had no incentive whatsoever for BRT lane violation will return to their families with bountiful returns at the end of the day in good conscience. Stiff penalties from which only few thinking animals will not try to haggle and bargain himself from only serve as additional incentive for the sadistic enforcers who set up innocent people for a contrived offence in Mile 12, dragging them to Ikorodu where their vehicles are impounded while they find their way by public transport to Oshodi to pay fine before returning for their vehicles.

    Here is an enlightened Governor Ambode working hard to tame some products of social dislocations in the urban centres while those saddled with executing his noble objective exhibit even worse base instincts than those Ambode set out to reform.

    Ikorodu ‘haggling and bargaining’ yard is only symptomatic of what is going on all over Lagos State where danfo drivers routinely take BRT lane on even  the ever busy Ikorodu Road as in many other places and okada riders ride against traffic unmolested.

  • Sound and fury

    By now, Justice Walter Onnoghen should be sitting pretty as the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), but what happened to the Judiciary towards the end of last year seems to have stalled his confirmation for the exalted seat. It is given that the most senior Justice of the Supreme Court (JSC) takes the CJN seat on the retirement of the incumbent. This has been the practice for ages, but in 1972, the military deviated from the tradition to appoint the late Dr Taslim Elias, the commissioner of justice and attorney-general of the federation, as CJN. Perhaps, in order to avert a recurrence in future, the framers of the 1999 Constitution stipulated the criteria for appointing the CJN in the social contract.

    The Constitution made the CJN’s appointment a matter of seniority among JSCs. In one word, it became a turn by turn thing depending on who is next in the hierarchy. As the most senior JSC when CJN Mahmoud Mohammed retired last November 10, Justice Onnoghen should have automatically stepped in as CJN, in accordance with constitutional provisions. But there was a snag, which is not of his own making. Justice Mohammed was leaving at a time the Judiciary was virtually on trial for certain indiscretions, with two JSCs caught in the web. The homes of Justices Sylvester Ngwuta and Inyang Okoro were among the houses of some judicial officers searched by the Department of State Service (DSS) following allegations of corruption.

    Ngwuta has been arraigned, but Okoro is yet to be brought to court. Some Federal High Court judges have also been arraigned, while arrangements are on to bring some other judicial officers to court. This was the setting when Mohammed was leaving. Faced with a judiciary already tainted with allegations of corruption, President Muhammadu Buhari was probably in a  dilemma in keeping with the tradition on the appointment of the CJN. What do I know about this most senior JSC? Is he corrupt? Can he be trusted not to stain the exalted seat of CJN? What are his antecedents? These and many more posers would have weighed on the president’s mind. To avoid making hasty decision, he named Onnoghen acting CJN in line with Section 231 (4) of the 1999 Constitution as amended.

    Appointment into the Supreme Court is not a small matter, not to talk of who becomes the CJN. Elsewhere, appointment into the Supreme Court is treated with all the seriousness it deserves. Some countries do not follow the book as we do on the matter. They go for those who have what it takes to do the job. Such people may not even share political affiliation with the appointing authority. The most important criterion is : can the person do the job? Being the highest court in the land, the Supreme Court must be peopled by men and women of honour who will not compromise their stand because of filthy lucre. What we have heard about our judiciary in recent times is distressing, too too distressing. If the last hope of the common man is really like that, what hope is there then for the hoi polloi?

    Should the president be blamed if he decides to bide his time before appointing the CJN because of these distressing stories about the Judiciary? All we want is a judiciary that will serve the people and uphold the scale of justice without looking at the faces or the standing in life of the parties before it. The CJN plays a key role in the judicial set up because he is the numero uno, the leader of the Bench and the father of other judges. As a father, he must give direction to others. Can a CJN with a soiled hand play such a role and redeem the Judiciary? The answer is no. Onnoghen’s turn to become CJN came at a critical juncture in the life of the Judiciary. But, who knows, fate may have thrown him up as CJN at a time like this in order to sanitise the Judiciary.

    This is why I am not taken in by the noise being made by those trying to stampede the president to confirm him. The president, I am sure, will eventually send Onnoghen’s name to the Senate for confirmation, but that will be after he is satisfied with the investigation on the acting CJN. Let us face the truth, if we are in the president’s shoes, will we just send Onnoghen’s name to the Senate just like that because he has been recommended by the National Judicial Council (NJC) without probing his background in the light of the mess in the Judiciary? The president has not said he would not appoint him and he did not breach the Constitution by naming Onnoghen acting CJN. And Onnoghen’s three-month acting tenure will not end until tomorrow. As I write this on Tuesday evening, I am sure that the president will act on the matter between now and today.

    Those who feel that the president is delaying unnecessarily should sheathe their swords. The president will send Onnoghen’s name to the Senate before Friday for confirmation and he will only be doing so because he is satisfied with the outcome of the investigation on the acting CJN. Onnoghen has a Herculean task ahead of him. He has to cleanse the Augean stable once he becomes the CJN and automatically, NJC chairman. He has a lot of work to do as CJN to change the people’s perception about our judges. Long before the DSS’ raid on some judicial officers, many Nigerians had nothing good to say about many judges. Many senior lawyers will dismiss this claim, saying there is no proof of such allegations. They will talk like that because they are in it with those judges. But we all know that there is no smoke without fire.

    If a poor man goes to the market square or a bar and paints a picture of what he went through before a judge, then he must know what he is talking about. There is no poor man who will just wake up and accuse a judge of misconduct if he did not experience such in court. We should not be sentimental about Onnoghen’s appointment. It is not an ethnic, religious or political thing. All the president wants is the best for the country. His administration is fighting corruption and he needs a strong and an incorruptible judiciary to wage the war. If the Judiciary is corrupt, it will make nonsense of the anti-corruption war.

    This process will strengthen Onnoghen and make him a better CJN. I wish other CJN went through the same process. May be that would have helped them in leaving behind a worthy legacy.

  • Will the Trump US presidency hurt Nigeria-US relations?

    Will the Trump US presidency hurt Nigeria-US relations?

    Very few in Nigeria expected Donald Trump to win the presidential elections in the US. His election was received in Nigeria, as in most foreign countries, with some concern and consternation. Public opinion in Nigeria favoured Hillary Clinton, his democratic opponent and former US Secretary of State. Her husband, Bill Clinton, was quite popular in Nigeria when he was US president. He had a street named after him in Abuja. As a political figure Donald Trump was largely unknown, and his disturbing campaign rhetoric with a tinge of xenophobia was the source of much global concern. Some of the things he said he would do if elected are quite disturbing. He said he would restrict immigration, particularly of Moslems, Africans and Mexicans, into the US; that he would build a wall on the Mexican border with the US, and that he would, if elected, repudiate some of the bilateral and multilateral trade agreements concluded by the US with other foreign countries. Very few thought this possible, Many thought  that if elected he would be compelled by global realities and strong domestic opposition to drop some of these wild ideas. Like Hitler before him the world underestimated his resolve to make America ‘great’ again, even if it means destroying long standing friendly diplomatic and political relations with America’s allies.

    Within two weeks of being sworn as President of the US, Donald Trump has, through Executive Orders, begun implementing some of the weird policies many thought were impossible. He is brave, brash, unconventional, hugely controversial and unpredictable. It is early days yet, and no one knows how far he will go in seeking to make America ‘great’ again by breaking the existing international system and order. His narrow, limited and illiberal world view has serious global consequences. He says it is ‘America First’. This is a negation of the principles and liberal philosophy that have made the US such a great and admirable nation. Under him the US will become increasingly isolationist as it turns its back on the rest of the world including its allies. It is a misguided approach, and one that will not make America a great nation again.

    In the case of Nigeria and Africa, it is safe to say that Donald Trump is not really interested in Africa. He does not know Africa, has no direct business investments there, and has probably never visited the continent, at least sub-Saharan Africa, before. Africa is really low in his world view and agenda. During his election campaign he hardly ever mentioned Africa. On the few occasions he did it was to denigrate and condemn her, particularly Nigeria and Kenya, for corruption. From that perspective, he is not likely to show much interest in African affairs. That will be good for Africa as he is unlikely to pursue any interventionist policy or strategy there. A blundering American president will not do Africa any good. China’s growing influence and economic relations with African countries may spur him to seek to engage Africa to counter Chinese influence there. But US trade and economic ties with Africa are insignificant when compared to its dominant share of world trade. Africa accounts for less than 5 per cent of world trade and most of the meagre US investments in Africa are in oil and gas and the extractive industries. America has little or no investment in the development of infrastructure in Africa. In fact, China and India now trade more with Africa than the US. So, Africa will not lose much by a possible Trump policy of benign neglect towards it. It has strategic interests in Africa (in Nigeria, Egypt and South Africa) that it will seek to maintain and protect. But the period of the cold war and competition for political influence in Africa by the great powers is over. That accounts for the relative political stability in Africa in recent years. Foreign meddling in African affairs has diminished. For now, China is in Africa largely to seek new markets for its bludgeoning exports.

    How will Donald Trump’s foreign policy affect Nigeria? On November 27, 2016, the Vanguard published excerpts of an interview with the new permanent secretary in the Foreign Ministry in which he assured the nation that the election of Donald Trump as the US president will not disrupt, or have any negative effect on Nigeria’s long standing cordial relations with the US, under successive US presidents, Republican and Democrat. That view is broadly correct. Though there have occasionally been strains in our relations with the US (Angola and Africom), particularly during the process of decolonization in Southern Africa in the1980s, our bilateral relations at all levels with the US have remained mature and cordial. Both sides recognize the strategic need to maintain the amity between them carefully developed over five decades, since Nigeria’s independence in 1960. In fact, the US was one of the countries that sponsored Nigeria’s admission into the UN soon after its independence in 1960

    However, the new permanent secretary in the Foreign Ministry was careful enough to add that, though there was really little or nothing to worry about in Nigeria over a Donald Trump presidency, the Foreign Ministry was holding a retreat for its top diplomats in Abuja on Monday, November 28, 2016, to brainstorm and deliberate on what Donald Trump’s presidency of the US could mean for Nigeria’s relations with the US. Although such retreats are not unusual and  are held when occasion demands, the retreat on the possible repercussions for Nigeria of a Trump presidency indicate some uneasiness in the Foreign Ministry about the possible effects of a Trump presidency on our bilateral relations. He said this retreat was being held to consider all the possible scenarios, options and eventualities that could have some effect on Nigeria’s relations with the US.

    Broadly, there are three issues, immigration, security cooperation, and economic co-operation that underpin Nigeria-US bilateral relations. These have to be handled by Nigeria deftly and professionally. The first is immigration which could lead to tensions with the US.. Until recently the emigration of a large number of Nigerians to the US in search of new economic opportunities to escape poverty at home was not a major issue in bilateral relations between the two countries. Now it could become one. It is estimated that there are over 1 million Nigerians now living and working in the US. Most of them are there legally and have made an immense contribution to the US in the health, education, transportation, housing, IT, and cultural sectors. Some of them are making waves in medicine, computer, engineering and computer science. There are hundreds of Nigerians teaching in American Universities as well as a preponderant number of Nigerian doctors and nurses making an outstanding contribution to the US health delivery system. Donald Trump has been reported as complaining that Nigerians were taking away jobs from white Americans. He was reported as even threatening to build a transatlantic wall to stop Nigerians going to the US. But this is totally unjustified and reprehensible.  We are very proud of the immense contribution some of our people are making to the US. Nigeria’s loss in this regard is America’s gain. It is the duty and responsibility of our government and diplomats to ensure that these Nigerians are treated fairly all across the US; that their rights are protected by the US government as legal US residents. Some of them have dual nationalities. As I write this there is as yet no Nigerian Ambassador in Washington who can begin to engage the new Trump US administration expeditiously. This is regrettable as early contacts with the new administration are vital to Nigeria’s interests in the US. It is important for Nigeria to let the new US administration understand at the highest levels how we feel about President Trump’s hostility to African-Americans in the US. For many would-be immigrants the American dream is now a nightmare.

    There are some Nigerians, possibly in their thousands, who are in the US illegally in breach of US immigration laws.  But Nigeria is not one of the seven Moslem dominated countries on which the Trump government has imposed a ban or restriction on entry into the US. This is in recognition of the fact that Nigeria does not sponsor Islamic jihadist terrorism in the US. It is a multi religious secular country. It is itself a victim of the Boko Haram terrorists that claim association with ISIS, Trump’s bogey. We have a common interest in this regard. Nevertheless, these illegal Nigerian immigrants will face a hard time under these new restrictions or travel bans introduced by the Trump administration. The travel ban order is being challenged in federal circuit courts in the US and could go as far as the US Supreme Court for final determination. Until this matter is judicially resolved Nigerians living illegally in the US may lose their jobs and possible deportation. A few, including those who have valid US entry visas, are already being denied entry into the US. The US is a nation of immigrants of diverse race and culture. But it is largely white and racist. Its loss of global power and influence will make it increasingly racist and isolationist. It will be less tolerant of new non-white immigrants. As under Trump America turns inwards one should expect that it will seek to shut its doors on Africans, including Nigerians, which constitute the largest number of African immigrant communities in the US.

    At the economic level, Nigeria cannot expect new US investments from the US. Trump has made it clear he wants American companies to invest more in the US and bring back jobs allegedly lost to foreign companies. US oil companies are doing good business in Nigeria but there are little or no US investments in other sectors of the Nigerian economy. Total US trade with Africa in 2015 was only $35 billion; its investment was a paltry $6billion, in both cases far lower than Chinese trade and investments in Africa. The African Growth Opportunities Act (AGOA) under which America seeks to promote trade with Africa by lowering American tariffs for African exports has not worked out because of poor African response and trans shipment by Asian countries of their manufactured exports for African exports. In addition African economies face an uphill task developing local industries that can compete effectively with Asian economies in the US market. Globalization of world trade has not worked very well for African economies. It has led to loss of industrial production and capacity, worsened by the global recession that has hit African economies very badly. The Joint US-Nigeria Commissions intended to promote economic cooperation between the two countries have remained largely moribund. The US is not seriously interested in these commissions. Under Trump the US may abandon them completely.

    It is in the area of security that both countries have been cooperating in recent years. ISIS threatens US security while Boko Haram presents a serious threat to Nigeria’s internal security. The US has been assisting Nigeria with non-lethal American military supplies. It has also been sharing military and security intelligence with Nigeria. The US takes the stability and security of Nigeria very seriously. Nigeria’s peace keeping role in Africa is recognized as vital to American security interests in Africa. Nigeria is still a fragile country threatened from within by ethnic, tribal, and religious divisions. America’s continued support for the stability and viability of Nigeria as a strong, democratic, peaceful and stable country is vital to Nigeria. But ultimately, it is up to Nigeria and its leadership to move Nigeria in a more positive direction that will create new jobs, reduce mass poverty and make Nigeria an economic success story. The US or any other foreign country cannot do that for us. And if Nigeria implodes you can be sure that under Trump the US will feel obliged to intervene massively to stop further emigration of Nigerians to the US.

  • Youth like papercups (1)

    An Ivy League education without ethics makes a trust fund ‘baby’ an expensive toy without batteries. Substandard education makes the middling youth even worse; it moulds him into a broken toy without appeal. They are both disposable but they enjoy patronage anyway – by the ones Wole Soyinka eloquently described as the wasted generation.

    Does the Nigerian youth possess the personality of a paper cup? This is because like paper cups, we are used to being used and disposed by the predatory ruling class. Yet whatever callousness we are forced to endure, our elders are not to blame. They shall not be blamed, for we made ourselves unbidden offering on the altar of vultures.

    It is the malady of this age that the youth are too busy preaching that they have no time left to learn. In Nigeria, we are too busy dumbing down that we barely have time left to grow. It is a sad manifestation of stunted growth that we evolve into foetal adults and spend the rest of our lives seeking the comfort of debilitating “life boats.”

    It is even more disheartening to see us adopt as a favourite past time, the pillorying of our elders and the rapacious ruling class. Many a Nigerian youth love to prophesy the worst about our fatherland thus it is never surprising to hear the average Nigerian youth pronounce with emphatic pessimism and relish that “This country is doomed,” and “Nigeria is finished.”

    The Igbo youth laments his persistent marginalization from the scheme of things/bounties. He believes Nigeria is skewed to work against him and fellow Igbo because his peers from other ethnic groups are wary of his towering acumen, industry, courage and political savvy. The Hausa youth believes he has inalienable right to statutorily and heavenly accorded rights to reign supreme and lord it over his peers irrespective of merit. And the Yoruba youth, goaded by sentiments of his higher wisdom, towering depth in diplomacy, culture and politics believes that he is entitled to the best the country has to offer, on a platter of gold.

    Every youth desperately perpetuates his sense of victimhood and entitlement. The idea is to keep whining until he gets lucky and corners an immense portion of the proverbial national cake – with minimal exertion and at no cost.

    We used to be regarded as the promising youth, the gifted generation that would rescue Nigeria from the brink of irredeemable ruin. But that spell of hopefulness has dissipated now. Our “wasted” elders have seen through the swollen belly of our pride. They know we are increasingly handicapped by greed and lack of creed. By creed, I mean a coherent and specific set of goals, a consistent series of norms according to which society is to be remade.

    Since we have learnt to blame the ruling class for everything, what is it that we want from the ruling class? We don’t need their permission to make something of the world where they have failed but we still live our lives seeking their permission to evolve positively and maturely.

    It takes courage and an enormous reserve of decency to evolve a humane ideology and establish it. We haven’t the courage and will, and this interferes with our ability to accomplish progressive change. More worrisome are our violent attempts to be radical; eventually they resonate too feebly as a kind of rudderless activism.

    We identify all that is wrong with our society but we are never specific about what must be done to correct them. It is relatively easy to join a picket line and tirelessly castigate our elders and ruling class for everything that is wrong with our lives but these actions, while they demonstrate frustration, in some instances even heroism, deal generally with symptoms of· our problems and not the solutions. All the picket lines in the world will not resolve ills of fraudulent and impatient youth, perverted values, greed, racism, disillusionment with study and substandard education.

    A broad wave of disillusionment and darkness persists above the silver linings we desperately wish to succeed our darksome clouds. Yet with precision and unfaltering devotion, we work ourselves up into such a state that we can only see the volcanic flare of our destructive acts as glitters of grandeur. We have perfected the art of standing on barrel-heads to spout and be seen, while we engage in pursuit and acquisition of mostly unearned wealth and greatness. Eventually, we luxuriate and spread out like a green forest with sour fruits and severed roots.

    Apparently, we suffer a throwback to the 70s – the era that launched a trend in which Nigerians became preoccupied with themselves more than the survival of the nation. Self preservation has become an inexorable obsession of many youths seeking to escape the slow, steady path with its craters of mishap and socio-economic vagaries. What Joshua Lubin identifies as the “Me” decade has indeed, recoiled inward rather than concern itself with crucial national issues, like national progress and ethical rebirth. Therefore, popular culture attracts dubious labels such as “narcissistic” and “decadent” from critics and the “wasted” older generation.

    The Nigerian youth has become so self-involved that almost every action and train of thought perpetuated by him serves as an instrumental resource to situate this generation in historical context, as perfect illustration of the much-hackneyed and over-exploited “Lost Generation.”

    Our inordinate quest for self-fulfillment further establishes us as the worst that could possibly happen to a heavily endowed nation like Nigeria.

    But we aren’t actually so bad. If we could look inwards to summon latent will and channel it towards the rejuvenation of outdated mores of morality and simple decencies, our lot may change, for better.

    It shouldn’t hurt to evolve faith and be steadfast in it. If we could discard our sentiments about the lifestyle of Tuface Idibia, we would find in the musician some worthy anecdote about the quality of faith. Tuface Idibia believed in his dream of stardom. And he relentlessly pursued it through the stark streets of Festac, the wilderness of hunger spasms and institutional adversities to become whoever he is and whatever he is today. If I had used Soyinka, or Late Babatunde Jose, many would claim they grew up when Nigeria neither smothered dreams nor murdered hope. Hence my choice of Idibia, the minion who managed to become a poster icon for generations of Nigeria’s music hopeful, despite the odds.

    Yet many would read this and consider it “Pollyannaish.” To this lot, any hearty lunge at hope or belief in a brighter tomorrow manifest as blind optimism and a pathetic attempt to be patriotic even while it’s absolutely idiotic to do so. They would love to see the nation ruin in order to justify their inordinate cynicism and yearnings about the pointlessness of the Nigerian dream. They continually affirm their ill will and prayers of doom for the nation by tirelessly projecting separation and insurmountable bleakness on the Nigerian state.

    Individually, their contribution towards nation building is virtually non-existent or abysmally low, they are amazingly adept at sowing seeds of doubt and disillusionment amongst their peer and younger generation. But they love to be seen as heroes of truth and the new world.

     

    • To be continued…

  • A pastor and the law

    From time immemorial, the state and the church have always been in a contest for power. The church has the power of the word and the state has the force of coercion. The church appeals to the minds of the people, the state coerce them to do its will. In this contest for power and supremacy, the people have always been at the receiving end. Yet, they claim to be working for the people. The church has an edge because it is closer to the people. This closeness is as a result of the relationship between the pastor and his flock.

    A pastor, who is a good shepherd in the biblical sense of the word, looks out for his sheep. He does not make too much demands on them, rather he ministers to their needs, whether spiritually or materially. A shepherd who sees his sheep as cows to be milked misses his calling. The scripture puts it succinctly : ‘’Woe be to the shepherds…that do feed themselves! should not the shepherds feed the flock? Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed : but ye feed not the flock…neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost, but with force and cruelty have ye ruled them’’.

    The job of a pastor is not only to feed his congregation with words, he is also to cater to their needs to enable them stand firm and not to backslide. Unfortunately, the reverse is the case today. Pastors ride exotic cars, live in mansions, while their flock live in abject penury. Their God, they are quick to say, is not a God of poverty. Is it the God of their sheep that is poor then? Beyond their flock, pastors owe society a duty to speak truth to power and also pray for those in authority. ‘’Exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; for kings, and for all that are in authority; that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty’’, says the scripture.

    This divine mandate is to ensure that the society progresses as it should for the betterment of all. A society where the fear of God reigns will surely be peaceful. This is why pastors are to act as checks on leaders so that they do not derail. In discharging this obligation, the men of God are not expected to overreach themselves. Though they are ministers in the temple of God, they are not above the law. A pastor who oversteps his bounds is courting trouble and when the consequences come, his flock may not be able to save him. In correcting the leadership of their countries, pastors are not expected to be quarrelsome. They must discharge this god-given responsibility with decency and not play to the gallery.

    A pastor must not criticise the government of the day in order to score cheap political point. By his calling, he must be apolitical in order not to incur the wrath of government. Reason : if he supports the Pharaoh that is in power today, what will happen if there comes a Pharaoh that does not know Joseph. He would have exposed himself for what he truly is. Pastors must tread gingerly because anything they do or say are usually monitored by the public that can easily discern where they stand from the positions they take. The church and the state appear to be on a collision since the failed attempt by the Federal Reporting Council of Nigeria (FRC) to regulate not-for-profit organisations, such as churches, mosques and civil society organisations. The FRC set a tenure limit for general overseers, which forced the respected G.O of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) to step down for Pastor Joseph Obayemi. Obayemi is now the national overseer for Nigeria.

    The churches did not find this funny and they rose stoutly to condemn the code of corporate governance fashioned by the former Executive Secretary of FRC, Jim Obazee, who was fired in the aftermath of Pastor Adeboye’s  decision to quit as RCCG’s leader in Nigeria. Living Faith Church Worldwide aka Winners Chapel founder Pastor David Oyedepo did not hide his anger over the issue. In a message that went viral, he said unequivocally that the country could not remain under the shackles of one region. Nigeria, he said, belongs to all Nigerians, noting that nobody should be treated as a second class citizen in his fatherland because of his faith.

    Apparently taking a cue from his fellow pastor, Apostle Johnson Suleiman of the Omega Fire Ministries (OFM), at a crusade in Ado Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital, last week, touched on the vexed issue of herdsmen’s killings in some parts of the country. He condemned the dastardly act, calling on Christians across the country to defend themselves, if the need arises. He was quoted as saying that if any herdsman comes near Christians, they should kill him. His statement ruffled the feathers of the Department of State Security (DSS), which went for him in his hotel room. The pastor quickly called Governor Ayo Fayose, who rushed to his aid before the security men could pick him up.

    The herdsmen matter has become something else because of the seeming silence of the government on how they have been wreaking havoc in some parts of the country. Are they Fulani herdsmen or where are they from? The DSS will do well to ascertain who these herdsmen are if it is really interested in getting to the root of how they have been killing, maiming and raping women in some states. Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai in whose domain the herdsmen struck last December, leaving death and destruction in their trail, said they were from outside the country. The governor must have had certain information at his disposal to have spoken like that. But has he availed the security agencies of that information?

    Apostle Suleiman’s message got the DSS worried. And since the agency could not get him in Ado Ekiti, it invited him to Abuja last Monday. We do not know yet what actually transpired at that meeting, but it is certain the apostle would have been grilled on the message he preached in Ado Ekiti. Was it a call to arms by Christians, he would have been asked. The apostle has since clarified what he said in Ado Ekiti. Shortly before going to keep his appointment with DSS, he told reporters that his statement was based on information from a reliable source that herdsmen were coming to attack him. ‘’I was talking in my personal capacity on information from a reliable source that certain people in the capacity of herdsmen were coming to attack me and I told the people around me that if it happens they should defend themselves’’.

    Everybody, not only pastors, should be concerned about the atrocities of these herdsmen. If it takes the message of a pastor to wake us up to their menace, so be it. The pastor may have made what the DSS perceives as inciting statement, but did the agency leave him with any option? Indeed, has it left Nigerians, especially those attacked, any option over this issue? The herdsmen have been allowed to be on the loose for too long. It is high time the DSS and other security agencies upped their game and fished out the culprits. The pastor may have spoken as one pained by what is happening to those he considers his shepherd, but that does not mean that he should take liberty for licence.

    Our governors too should be mindful of how they interfere in security matters. They do not have the power to stop the security agencies from doing their jobs.  No matter how strong  they feel about an issue, obstructing security agencies in the line of duty is not the way to go. If care is not taken, this may create more trouble than it is meant to solve.

  • The Agatu/Fulani herdsmen deal

    Last week the peace deal between  the warring Agatu people of Benue and the Fulani herdsmen  midwifed by Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue and his Nasarawa  State counterpart, Umaru Tanko Al-Makura to rebuild confidence after  what the former described as  “ the massive and unprecedented destruction of Agatu and killings by herdsmen”, and the latter as “the culture of impunity where a group of individuals entered other people’s land and began to kill them or attack others and their cattle” crumbled no sooner it was publicly proclaimed by the peace makers. The highlights of the collapsed peace deal designed to end five decades of reprisal massacre of cows and human beings  include  the call for “forgiveness by  the  victims while keeping silent on the need for genuine contrition;  a creation  of  dedicated grazing route along Oguto Adanyi – Ogumagbo- Bagana  communities for the movement of cattle by indigenous Fulani herdsmen’; a proposal by the peace makers  to make representation  to the Federal Government, donor  agencies, development partners, voluntary organizations and philanthropists to assist victims of the crisis in the affected communities of Benue and Nassarawa states and contribution of the sum of N30m by the two peacemakers  which would be used to provide building materials for the ravaged Agatu Communities”.

    I sympathise with both governors. It was obvious from their body language they were trying to walk the tight rope instead of striking the nail on the head (apology to Alhaji Ishmael Jose). These are governors who under a freely negotiated   federal arrangement   are expected to be independent and equal with the centre but who in reality exist at the behest of a dysfunctional centre that runs a multi-ethnic society without residual powers for the federating units. The result is that the federating units that depend on the centre for payment of salaries of local council workers, primary school teachers, and protection of life and properties which is the major reason they exist as states, cannot publicly admit the problem of our nation is the tyranny of the government at the centre.

    Thus, instead of Al Makura talking truth to the Fulani hegemonic power whose members arm herdsmen with sophisticated weapons, he spoke from both sides of the mouth without making a distinction between the victims and aggressors.  Of course, Ortorn like his fellow  new generation of Middle Belt politicians like Gabriel  Suswam, Joshua Dariye and Jonah Jang  appealed to his compatriots to allow God fight their battle while reminding them that  the only safeguard for peace and  development is forgiveness as if there can be peace without justice. The Middle Belt military politicians are not different. Their genius only find expression in planning coups (military and civilian) or threatening to shoot MKO Abiola if his mandate was allowed to stand. None of the grovelling military Generals-turned-politicians have been able to tell truth to the Fulani hegemonic power, in the manner of  the inimitable Joseph Tarka  who suffered deprivations  from the dominant northern establishment  over his demand for self-actualization  for his people within the context of Nigerian politics in the pre- and post-independence  years.

    Of course, vengeance as Governor Ortorn has said, belongs to God. Of course, the indigenous Fulani born in the land who have no other place to call home and identify with the aspirations of their host communities should be supported by the community to make a living like the rest of the people. But peace as end of justice can only be achieved by listening and coming to the aid of those whose source of subsistence living has been destroyed.  Compensating those whose cattle were massacred and above all, bringing those who engaged in mindless killing of innocent men, women and children to justice.

    Our crisis of nationhood as this column has consistently maintained, is the resistance to restructuring to make our federal arrangement work by the groups that seem to derive temporary benefit from the current unwieldy and unviable 36 states and 774 LGAs. This is why some federal lawmakers with false sense of self-worth will declare during a grazing bill debate that herdsmen have the right to graze their cattle anywhere in the country by virtue of the constitution. The question that follows is which constitution? The current constitution as many informed Nigerians have concluded  is a military document designed to keep the military that has directly or indirectly been in power since 1966  relevant in our national affairs? The document gave an edge to the North because the military leadership was dominated within this period (1967 and 1999) by military officers of northern extraction. Obasanjo, the only influential exception owes allegiance to the North that tolerated him as Head of State following the assassination of Murtala Mohammed in 1976.  (Brigadier Babafemi Ogundipe who as the most senior surviving military officer, was rejected as Head of State by the North in 1966). The result of this is the emergence of a new generation of northern politicians who despite lacking the vision and mission of the late revered Ahmadu Bello who once referred the restive Middle Belt region shortly after independence as extension of his great grandfather’s fiefdom, have with this false sense of entitlement   continued to resist restructuring of the country to free federating units from the tyranny of a dysfunctional federal centre.

    It is but a dysfunctional centre that will choose to waste resources it does not generate on grazing  zones over state lands it does not control when it has the options  of either establishing or empowering private  concerns to establish  commercial ranches as obtains elsewhere in the world. And  precisely because the centre has been busy playing politics with resources it does not generate instead of providing leadership, few of the unwieldy 36 states have exhibited the type of resourcefulness  associated with pre and post-independence regional leaders,

    Why for instance can’t the government of Benue, Nasarawa and some other states in the north jointly set up or empower the wealthy Fulani farmers to set up commercial ranches that can provide employment for thousands of unemployed northern youths? Why can’t a Governor Ayo Fayose, currently obsessed with building bridges over land and an airport take a break from chasing errant cows around farms to rehabilitate the dairy farm established by Adekunle Ajasin during the Second Republic in order to take advantage of South-west’s huge market where 10,000 cows are consumed daily?

    And finally for the patrons of Fulani herdsmen in the National Assembly  who want to live in the 19th century  with their thesis of fear about  desertification  forcing  Fulani herdsmen to overrun  the southern states in desperate search for grazing field if the passage of the grazing bill failed, let me call their attention to the miracle of Botswana. Here is a country of two million people, the size of France with 70% of the land covered by Kalahari desert but exports more meat to the world than the combined efforts of other African countries. Cattle are the mainstay of Botswana economy which depends on deep-bore-hole water for 95% of her human and animal water need. Botswana was one of the poorest nations in the world with per capita income of about $70 at independence in 1964 but today one of the fastest growing economies in Africa with per capita of about $18,825.