The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Parliament of privilege

    Recently there was news that the Senate is planning that 20 percent of the national budget be allocated to the House of Representatives and the Senate for what they called constituency projects. By this year’s budget, that would be close to two trillion naira. This will be on top of the humongous salaries and allowances being illegally and clandestinely paid to members without full disclosure to the public leaving many wild guesses about exactly how much the legislative branch is costing the national exchequer. In recent times too, members were also toying with the idea of making members to retire on pension whenever they are defeated at elections or whenever they retire. They also want to enjoy immunity in and outside the parliament. Apart from taking huge amount as basic car allowances, they also go ahead to buy foreign SUVS costing millions of Naira each as official vehicles. Millions are paid as housing, dress, newspapers, health and personal aides’ allowances. When they go on so-called oversight functions, they demand gratifications from Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs). One wonders if these people are Nigerians. They seem to be totally disconnected with the electorate and the reality of the Nigerian condition. If not how can they be talking about how to maximize their financial benefits and increasing their exploitative salaries and allowances when millions of young and old Nigerians are jobless and when those who are employed particularly in the public sector are not being paid their salaries and those who used the productive years of their lives serving the country in their different jobs are not being paid their pensions? The irresponsible behaviour of these people made President Obasanjo to describe them as armed robbers without guns. When Nigerians get to know what is going on in their parliament, President  Obasanjo will not only become the people’s tribune, there may come a time of storming the parliament in blind fury by a people who have suffered silently for a long time in the hands of their so-called representatives. While this is going on, most Nigerians live in permanent and perpetual darkness. The roads are almost impassable and millions are dying in accidents on the roads in their rickety vehicles since they cannot afford new ones. To make matters worse, their so-called representatives are usually speeding past them with siren blowing at maximum noise while occupants of the SUVS sit in tinted vehicles hiding themselves from the electorate and their constituents.  So who is fooling who? These wretched of the earth is what our representatives want to take trillions of Naira to serve with so called constituency projects. Morning shows the day as childhood shows manhood. If we go by current wretched constituency offices scattered all over the place, we can guess that the huge budget for constituency projects will develop wings and fly into Dubai, Lebanon or China or to any country that does not ask questions where depositors get the loot they bring into their country’s banks. The allocation to constituency projects must be stopped immediately since it is unconstitutional. The legislatures cannot usurp executive functions. Their role is to pass budgets and not to pad them or to hive a percentage of it for their own use. If they persist in serving themselves, they will lose their legitimacy as representatives of the people. What is happening at the federal level is unfortunately happening at the state level as well. The situation at the state level is so pitiful because the so-called houses do nothing but rubber stamp the actions of the executive. Governor Fayose was absolutely but sadly right when he recently said with candour that he was the Speaker of the Ekiti State House of Assembly and that the Speaker was merely representing him!

    I do not know where we got the paradigm we are following in Nigeria. Our people will glibly say whatever they are doing they are copying it from the United States. This is absolutely wrong. The legislature and the executive and the judiciary are not above the law and the constitution of the United States. Many of our people in the three branches of government would be in jail if they were in America. Those who say we should go back to the regime of part time legislature are right. Imagine how much we can save for development if we cut out the huge amount being used to service the full time legislatures if they were reduced to part time legislatures. Defenders of the legislatures would argue that the executive branches are not run by saints. I agree. Let us deal with what is realistic and move from that to the next step of pruning the bureaucracy. There is evidence that this is being done from the announced saving of billions of Naira from ghost workers’ salaries. More can still be done if service in government is seen as a ministry rather than as an opportunity for self-enrichment and self-aggrandizement. The present government’s searchlight and focus on the judiciary is a step in the right direction. A colleague of mine said publicly about 20 years ago that if he had a case in court, rather than hire lawyers he would take the money straight to the presiding judge. We thought he was exaggerating but we are now wiser with the exposure of the Augean stables in the judiciary. One judge in the USA boasted that he used to take brides from litigants and when he was told he was a disgrace to the judiciary he said wait a minute “ I take money from both parties and I decide the case according to law “ I wish this was the case in Nigeria.

    Finally back to our parliament of privilege. Yorubas have a saying that “ Ti osanyin ba fe te  ani ki nwon gbe  ohun si ni ojo lati se oro ile baba ohun” translated simply that when the earthen sculpture wants to be told of the material of which  it is made, it will demand to be put in the rain to have rain showers. In Rivers State among the Ijaws, we have a saying that when a god does not perform well it will be told from what tree it is hewn. This I believe is what is happening to our so-called parliament if it continues to behave as if it exists in a bubble. This bubble will soon burst!

  • Magu, victim of government of Non politicians

    The echo of Buhari’s if ‘we don’t kill corruption, corruption will kill us’ has continued to resonate. He has however devoted the last 16 months of his administration to a crusade against only those who have explicitly stated ‘stealing government funds is not corruption’, leaving those who are directly responsible for the current depression through their mismanagement of the privatization policy that scuttled the IMF projected seven million jobs, and turned our country to importers of labour of other nations with millions of our own youths thrown into the unemployment market.

    And because the nation has been frightened into frenzy by the level of debauchery exposed on daily basis by government, we have failed to acknowledge that part of our current problem is the preponderance of men of faith rather than politicians in government. The result is a regime that seems to daily find excuses for failure by blaming its predecessors whose forces including those used by Ibori and Saraki to run Ribadu out of town and Magu out of EFCC into detention are still visible in government. Unlike advanced democracies driven by Orwell’s fictional Nineteen Eighty Four, where everyone is a slave to the state, we are piloted by a physically exhausted 74 years old Buhari, a national icon who would rather run the state by prayers than politics. He is ably supported by an equally apolitical but praying Vice President, Pastor Osinbajo. There is also Pastor Babachir, the SGF.  A few others who hold critical position in government are said to fuel intra party crisis in order to present themselves as alternative to physically fatigued Buhari in 2019 in case he chooses not to run. Conspicuously missing in Buhari’s team are the real politicians.

    Raged against President Buhari on the other side are his well known adversaries hooded in APC cloak. They live and thrive through intrigue, serial betrayals and opportunism. They blame Buhari for all the woes of the country including the continued sabotage of the economy by ravaging Niger Delta Avengers they secretly sponsored and equipped. Their open antagonism to Buhari’s war on corruption finally found expression in their refusal to confirm Magu as chairman of EFCC last week.

    The script was modelled after the one used to take over the Senate. Giving themselves enough time to perfect the script, they had held on to President Buhari’s request for five months. Then as if the Senate was doing Nigeria a favour after the long delay, the deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, announced at plenary on Wednesday that the confirmation hearing would hold on Thursday – the following morning.  Senate Committee on Anti-Corruption chairman, Chukwuka Utazi, PDP-Enugu, went on to confirm to Premium Times the hearing would hold as scheduled.  But curiously on Thursday morning, the Senate failed to list the Magu’s confirmation in the Order Paper. Those who understand how the Senate Mafia operates will agree the chamber did not receive the DSS report that was deployed to scuttle Magu’s confirmation only that morning.

    Unfortunately many of us who as columnists try to interpret government action for the benefit of the public have not been of much help to President Buhari. When he postponed quenching of a raging fire in his house until the very morning the election of the Senate leadership was to take place, we attributed his naive ‘I am ready to work with anyone’ as respect for independence of four arms of government. We justified government indolence for spending six months to constitute a cabinet, a task often executed within 24 in other democracies. When reminded that those who did not contribute to his electoral success or understand the policy thrust of APC have hijacked his presidency, we allowed the President to get away with a righteous indignation that he understands politics better than anyone else on account of having contested for the presidency three times. When Pa Bisi Akande first raised alarm about the self-serving group that was set to destabilise the APC they had worked hard to build, we wrongly credited Buhari with Fulani’s famed mastery of power politics.

    Now with an  attempted derailment of Buhari’s war on corruption by the Senate using  Daura’s DSS report and the SGF alleged award of contracts to the company in which he has an interest using the Senate Ad Hoc committee report, the pertinent question is who Daura is working for?  How come Saraki and his ‘Like Mind Senators’ who have demonstrated their opposition to the President’s war on corruption had the DSS report ahead of the executive that controls the awesome apparatus of state power. We can then proceed to ask how come the DSS brief about  Magu’s alleged flight to Maiduguri alongside Mohammed and  Nnamdi Okonkwo of Fidelity Bank who are being investigated by his commission and the alleged award of contract by FCDA to his Africa Energy to lavishly furnish his residence at a cost of N43m was never passed to the President before Magu’s name was forwarded to the Senate for confirmation.

    How come DSS that organized a sting operation at the middle of the night to retrieve alleged proceeds of corruption from residences of some Supreme Court justices was unable to capture an abuse of office by the SGF who has not denied awarding contracts to ‘Rholavision’, a company he claimed to have founded in 1990 but from whose board he claimed to have resigned in 2015. The two tragic events seem to vindicate the claim by many concerned Nigerians including the President’s wife  that some of those currently surrounding  the President are working neither for Buhari nor Nigeria but for themselves.

    And once again, it will appear Buhari and his APC government of men of faith has been outwitted by Saraki and his ‘like mind senators’. The forces that demoted Ribadu, chased him out of the country, and replaced him with a candidate of their own choice; arrested, detained and suspended Magu from the police for several months without salary before he was finally transferred out of EFCC ‘for illegally keeping case files of top politicians being investigated by EFCC in his house’ until he was rehabilitated by President Jonathan are still very influential in Buhari’s government of change.

    The immediate target and victim is Magu, regarded by his peers as ‘an incorruptible and courageous officer’, who as head of the sensitive unit charged with the investigation of senior public officers, investigated the role of  Bukola Saraki in the collapse of  Societe Generale Bank of Nigeria as well as James Ibori, former Governor of Delta  currently serving jail term in London  in addition to recording in one year, more high profile convictions than all his   predecessors put together.  The ultimate target however is Buhari’s war on corruption which they intend to discredit

  • Yoruba in the Nigerian situation

    The general decline of Nigeria, and Nigeria’s growing poverty, has dragged the Yoruba nation steadily down since independence. Typically too, federal administrations hate the Yoruba spirit of enterprise and modernization, as well as the Yoruba frontline position in development, and devise various ways to drag the Yoruba people back.

    In spite of all these, the Yoruba are deservedly proud of their consistent contributions to the progress, stability and survival of Nigeria. They have always served as the pace-setters in educational and most other aspects of modernization in Nigeria. They have faithfully preserved their culture of religious tolerance and accommodation in their homeland, their cultural openness to the acceptance and inclusion of immigrants from other parts of Nigeria, and their political culture that promotes the growth of modern democratic society. They are always the foremost in the promotion of a sane federal structure for Nigeria, and in the defence of the integrity and well-being of Nigeria’s many nationalities. The Yoruba   homeland has therefore regularly been the destination for most Nigerians needing to relocate from the harsh conditions and conflicts of their homelands.

    The Yoruba also have a proud record of stepping forth at critical moments to defend Nigeria’s existence and stability. In 1966-7, as Nigeria slid towards chaos and civil war, the Yoruba were the only major Nigerian people standing up for peaceful resolution of differences in Nigeria. Unfortunately, the very courageous interventions by Yoruba leaders (Leader of the Yorubas, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, and the Western State’s then Military Governor, Gen. Adeyinka Adebayo) did not succeed in achieving an amicable and peaceful resolution of the passionate differences – and civil war followed. In the civil war, the Yoruba nation’s various inputs (on the battle field and in the government’s management of Nigeria’s war effort) proved the most crucial contributions to the preservation of Nigeria as one country.

    In 2009-10, when President Yar’Adua from the Arewa North died in office, the Arewa North political elite demanded that he must be succeeded by another Arewa North    politician – a demand that sought to set aside his Vice-President, Jonathan from the Delta, in negation of the constitutional provision that a president who dies in office shall be succeeded by his vice-president. It was a strong and resolute defence of the constitutional provision by masses of Yoruba elite and people at home and abroad, that stopped the crisis which threatened Nigeria with conflict and disaster.

    In 2014, when the President of Nigeria convoked a National Conference, the overwhelming majority of the Yoruba elite and people arose to give it full support. Many Yoruba civic organizations submitted memoranda. A series of Yoruba leadership meetings was held, and a restated Yoruba Agenda was put forth, spelling out the well-considered proposals of the Yoruba nation for Nigeria’s stability and progress. Furthermore, in the interest of Nigeria, the leaders of the Yoruba South-west reached out to the leaders of the other zones. Their contacts with the South-east and South-south resulted in a meeting of the leaders of the three zones at Asaba just days before the commencement of the National Conference. At the Asaba meeting, the leaders of the three zones agreed to work together. On the whole, the Yoruba delegation discharged its duties creditably at the conference, did a good job of putting the Yoruba position clearly forward, and deserves much of the credit for the success achieved by the conference.

    Even though not much hope for change ever manifests in the Nigerian situation, the Yoruba generally don’t give up on Nigeria. Thus, in the course of 2013-14, the collapse of Nigeria appeared imminent. The Federal Government became more chaotic than ever before. The ruling political party was breaking up. Corruption was at a peak in all aspects of government. The Armed Forces, horribly weakened by corruption, were limping pitifully against Boko Haram in the North-east, and the fear was high that Boko Haram would expand its terrorism all over Nigeria. Faith in the country was at its lowest. Even in the Arewa North, whose political elite had always held a predominance in Nigeria’s governance since they had been installed over Nigeria by the British at independence, people were talking of dissolution of Nigeria. Various prominent Arewa North citizens threatened a resort to war. Reports of illegal arms imports into Nigeria sky-rocketed. An organization of Arewa youths held demonstrations demanding that Southerners resident in the North should return to their homelands within two weeks, that Northerners resident in the South should return to the North, and that the “failed experiment” of Nigeria should be terminated without delay.

    In these dark hours, a Yoruba political leadership group stepped forth to save Nigeria. Their resourcefully and competently managed effort mobilized leading citizens from all over Nigeria and produced a new Nigeria-wide political party which boldly promised change. In order to stem the tide of the prevailing inter-regional hostility, these Yoruba leaders helped to nominate their party’s candidate for Nigeria’s president from a nationality other than their own Yoruba nationality – a candidate from Arewa North, Muhammadu Buhari. Their party won the presidential election as well as majorities in both houses of the Nigerian federal legislature. Change seemed about to begin.

    President Buhari is fighting corruption and the old terrorist organization, Boko Haram, with some success. But he has demonstrated that he is no President of change. He has seriously depressed the influence of the party that got him elected; and he runs what looks more and more like an ethnic-sectionalist administration. He never makes any reference to the need to restructure the federation, to allow some autonomy to the regions, to restore socio-economic development initiative to the regions and states in order to revive the country’s economy and reduce poverty.

    Moreover, under him, the most murderous terror gang hitherto known in Nigeria has grown and quickly extended its rampages to most parts of Nigeria. This gang consists mostly of Fulani herdsmen who are armed with sophisticated rifles – and are destroying farms, killing farmers and farmers’ families, raping women, and destroying villages in most parts of Southern Nigeria and the Middle Belt. According to President Buhari himself (in an interview with CNN in London in late May) gangs of Libyan militiamen from late President Ghadafi’s militia who fled from Libya with their arms after the fall of Ghadafi, are embedded among these Fulani herdsmen, and have been supplying much of their capacity for killings and destruction.

    What the objective can be for this whole storm of rural killings and destruction is a great mystery to most Nigerians. It looks very much like the Janjaweed kind of terror in the Darfur Province of former Sudan Republic. In the Middle Belt, it looks very much like ethnic cleansing – an attempt to wipe out the small nationalities of this region and seize their homelands. In the South, where the nationalities (like the Yoruba and Igbo) are larger and stronger, the immediate objective seems to be to disrupt the agricultural economy of the various peoples.

    Even as this new storm of terror has grown, President Buhari has chosen to take steps to terminate the debate over the restructuring of the Nigerian Federation. On May 28, he made the alarming statement that he had not “bothered to read”, and did not intend to read or to seek any brief on, the Report of the 2014 National Conference. He stated that he had simply dumped it into the archives. A week later, his spokesmen informed Nigeria that restructuring the federation was not part of their government’s agenda – even though their party had earlier promised Nigeria that restructuring the federation was a cardinal point in their change agenda.

    It is historically significant that, while President Buhari thus shot down all consideration of structural change in Nigeria, some nations in Nigeria stepped up their demands for separation from Nigeria. In the South-east, the Igbo pro-Biafra organizations put huge crowds of demonstrators on the streets, and the clash of some of these with the police resulted in death and injury to many people. In the South-south, Niger Delta militants repeatedly announced demands for a new sovereign Delta country. They then greatly intensified their blowing up of oil mining and pipeline installations, thus inflicting very heavy damage on the Nigerian economy. In the Yoruba South-west, some highly placed Yoruba citizens, gathered at a civic event, reiterated the demand for the restructuring of the Nigerian Federation, adding that continued resistance to restructuring would result in “no Nigeria”. A few days later, in a city in the Igbo South-east, many prominent citizens from most parts of Nigeria (including former Nigerian vice-presidents, ministers, governors, legislators, etc), gathered at a civic event, demanded that the Nigerian federation should be restructured without delay, insisting that the existing conditions of the country were no longer tenable or sustainable.

    In short, stubborn and rigid resistance to demands for restructuring the Nigerian federation and for increased local autonomy, now makes Nigeria steadily more unstable, more violent, more chaotic, and more unworkable day by day. It is difficult to see what more the Yoruba, or any group, can do now to stop the slide. The probability of Nigeria’s dissolution has become very real.

  • Magu and the DSS papers

    Since coming to office about eight months ago as the anti-graft czar, Ibrahim Mustafa Magu has  been discharging his duty with single-minded purpose. All he is interested in is bringing to book those who used public office to enrich themselves. This cannot be a mean task, especially in a society like ours, where public officers, no matter their category, are untouchable. So, Magu is treading where even angels fear to walk by taking on these people. By so doing, he is only doing his job. But many, especially those affected and their friends, do not see it that way. They have taken it personal.

    What they do not know is that if they did not do anything wrong, Magu would not have come after them. As head of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), it is Magu’s duty to investigate pilferers of public funds. These are funds meant for national development and the provision of infrastructure. We complain of dearth of infrastructure today because these funds were not well managed. Rather than being used for the common good, they were siphoned by incorrigible public officers.

    The stealing of public funds did not start today. It is an age-long problem, which is as old as Nigeria itself. Every public officer believes that public office is an opportunity for him or her to become rich. This is why many who get into office without a kobo to their names leave office stinking rich. Where did they get the money from? This is the question Magu is paid to ask and he has been asking that question without looking at faces in the past one year. Unfortunately, this has earned him many enemies. Virtually all the public officers being probed or tried today do not like Magu’s face. They will stop at nothing to do him in, if they have the slightest opportunity.

    Magu has become an endangered specie just for doing his job. What these people want is an ally, who will join them in the looting of the country. Since Magu is not ready to play ball, they believe that the next thing is to ensure that he is not confirmed as EFCC chairman. If he were to be pliable, they would have been clamouring for his confirmation through some faceless groups. Never in the history of this republic has the confirmation of the head of an agency being so  delayed as that of Magu, who was appointed on November 9, last year, by President Muhammadu Buhari.

    Despite holding office in acting capacity, Magu has not allowed that to affect his job, which he has been doing conscientiously and to the discomfort of those who believe that they should have unhindered access to the treasury. He has become their enemy because he denied them such access. Magu, like everyone of us, is not perfect, but there is no denying the fact that he does his job with near perfection. He is diligent and committed – two key attributes – required for the enormous task of cleansing the Augean stable, which our nation has been turned into by unscrupulous public officers.

    Magu’s screening by the Senate is generating heat because of the kind of person he is – a no nonsense and uncompromising anti-graft czar. Were he to be otherwise, we will not hear all this noise about whether or not to confirm him. The Senate would have since asked him to ‘’bow and go’’. But because he is Magu, he is being subjected to all sorts of chicanery so that the president will withdraw his nomination. The Presidency also has its own share of the blame in all this. It is trite that the Presidency does not send a nominee for public office to the Senate for clearance without first knowing his security status. Why was this not done in Magu’s case?

    By not getting a security report on Magu before sending his name for screening and confirmation, the president unwittingly left him in the hands of hawks in the Senate and his administration. The president should not deceive himself that he and all members of his administration are on the same page in the anti-corruption crusade. No sir, there are many in your administration that do not share your sentiments about corruption. These people still believe in the old order of doing things – awarding contracts and collecting 50 percent and abandoning public infrastructure to decay. The Presidency made a huge mistake by not securing Magu’s security clearance before sending him for confirmation. It took a big risk by leaving this important task to the Senate, which could have exploited it to make Magu a turncoat.

    As things are now, the Department of State Service (DSS) may have given the Senate ammunition to deal with Magu, who does not enjoy cordial relations with many of the senators, who are either being probed or tried for one offence or the other. The DSS’ job is to screen some of the president’s appointees once their names are sent to it. After the exercise, it is expected to send its report to the president, who will on the strength of that report, decide whether or not to send the nominee’s name to the Senate. Magu was appointed in acting capacity after Ibrahim Lamorde’s exit. So, there was no need for his security screening before taking up the job. But what happened when the president decided to retain him for the job? Was he screened by DSS? What was the outcome of the screening?

    f he was found wanting by the  screening panel, was the presi    dent  so advised? Is it appropriate for the Senate to ask the DSS to screen a presidential appointee and use the outcome to determine the appointee’s fate without recourse to the appointing authority? And what is all this about the DSS writing two reports on Magu – one clearing him and the other rejecting his nomination? Which of these reports do we believe? The one saying that Magu is not fit for appointment or the other giving him ‘benefit of the doubt’ and asking the president to appoint him if he so wishes? There is confusion over this matter and it is only the DSS that can clear the fog.

    Let the DSS tell the nation if Magu is fit for appointment or not and state its reasons for whatever position it takes. For now, in this Magu case, it has not discharged itself well. It has only helped the Senate to arrive at an answer, which it has long wished for in order to paint Magu as unfit for the EFCC job.

     

    Wike’s faux pas

    By now, Nigerians know Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike for who he is. He is brash and rash and can do anything to get what he wants. The governor seems to enjoy swimming in troubled waters. To him, the end justifies the means.

    Wike is having a ball as governor and his desire is to rubbish his predecessor’s achievements. Whatever politics he likes, he can play with former Governor Rotimi Amaechi. After all, they were bosom friends before things went awry between them. But whatever he does, he should not drag Rivers down the drain. If he truly loves the state, he should be more interested in leaving it better than he met it and not take it down the religious ravine.

    Like every other state, Rivers has its own share of Muslims and Christians. But, last Friday at the Second Christmas Carol of the state, Wike was overwhelmed by the occasion when he was called to speak after the ministration of the Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG) General Overseer, Pastor Enoch Adeboye. After greeting the eminent preacher,

    Wike said when he became governor last year, he thought it appropriate to introduce the yearly Christmas carol celebration because “this is a Christian state and I do not have any apologies for saying so”. But, the last time I checked, the Constitution in Section 10 states: “The government of the federation or of a state shall not adopt any religion as state religion”.

    I don’t think this has changed. When last did His Excellency read his Constitution?

  • Yoruba and burden of history in the politics of Nigeria – 3

    Restructuring of Nigeria. It is this feeling that makes the Tinubu faction of the APC to be favourably disposed to some form of restructuring of the country and designing a new political, administrative and financial architecture, including fiscal federalism to remove the bogey of domination of one group by the others. The modern political history of the Yoruba, starting appropriately with Awolowo, is known for its contribution of the federal idea to political discourse in Nigeria.  Implicit in this is that no one group or state should be big enough to dominate or overwhelm all others put together. This is basic to Professor John Wheare’s ‘Principle of Federalism’. The federal principle has now been bought even by some segments of the northern political leadership. The Igbos who were previously deluded about national unity and unitary government, have now bought into the federal idea and the minorities, especially those in the Niger Delta, seem to be on board for selfish economic reasons.

    The force of our history in Yorubaland compels us to lead the way of restructuring along proper federal lines, because it is good for the Federal Republic of Nigeria and it is good for Yorubaland. Chief Awolowo, while pushing the federal idea during the struggle for independence, said one can be a Yoruba patriot and Nigerian nationalist at the same time. I agree that there should be no conflict between patriotism and nationalism. What shape the restructuring should take, will have to be negotiated. Awolowo wanted all Yorubas including those in Kwara, Kogi and Edo to be in one state. It is a good idea but it is apparently unrealisable. What is possible is not reversion to the old three or four regions but a restructure based on economic viability and not the present states of misery and beggary, where salaries are not paid and all resources are gulped up by administrative excesses and political extravaganza. Perhaps we should go back to Gowon’s 12-state structure with a heavy dose of economic viability, and superimposed on it should be the principle of fiscal federalism where each state would survive on its own economic bootstrap.

    The present situation of the centre, creating states and local governments is not only absurd but an anomaly which contradicts the essence of federalism. In normal federations like Canada, Belgium, Switzerland and the United States, it is the states that create and fund the federal government and not the other way round. When we embraced the federal idea in Nigeria in 1957, the states funded the federal government and this was so until the military took over government and shaped the country in its own military- unitary way of command. Peace has eluded us since then and we must go back to the period of correct relations between the centre and the periphery in terms of viable state structure. This is the challenge facing Yoruba and Nigerian politics now and in the future. All stake holders, including traditional rulers like our Obas must be engaged in finding a path for the Yoruba in the politics of Nigeria.

    Role of obas and traditional institutions.

    I have once described Nigeria as a republic of a thousand kings which sounds contradictory, because monarchies ordinarily should not co-exist with a republic. When faced with this problem, India simply abolished the various kingdoms ruled by powerful Maharajahs, but left them with their considerable wealth. No one can do the same and survive in Nigeria. In the past, politicians have removed powerful rulers like Alaafin Adeyemi 1, by the Awolowo government in western Nigeria in 1954. Sarkin Kano Muhammad Sanusi was in 1962 removed by the Sir Ahmadu Bello government and General Sani Abacha’s government removed the Sultan of Sokoto, Ibrahim Dasuki in 1994. Some of the Obas suffered their salaries being withheld or reduced to pennies during the time of Chief S.L Akintola’s government in western Nigeria. It is however unlikely that any Nigerian ruler at the centre or the state will be strong enough to abolish an institution which the people still support and venerate. In fact, many of the new rulers are eager to bid for the traditional thrones whenever there are vacancies.

    Traditional rulers still provide rallying points for the people’s mobilisation especially in the rural areas. They also provide channels of communication between governments and citizens. They are also in some cases religious leaders of their communities. This is more apparent in the Islamic Emirates of the north. But it is no less obvious in Yorubaland, where in spite of whatever monotheistic religion an Oba may profess, he still has to carry out religious obligations binding him to the land, the people and the ancestors. In Ife in particular, no single day goes without the Ooni or his priests propitiating the local gods for one thing or the other. In times of danger, people are more likely to look towards the palace than to an elected politician. The Oba’s position is so formidable that politicians know that their support is necessary for electoral success. Obas are regarded as vice-regal to the Almighty. They are not to be argued with or questioned, “Kabio kosi” Or Kabiyesi. They are in the case of Oyo, supposed to have power of life and death (Iku Baba Yeye). This awesomeness of power and influence are most noticeable and glaring in modern Bini, where the Oba is virtually worshiped. Even in an apparently republican Ibadan, the influence of the Olubadan is growing incrementally. The considerable power wielded by Obas in Yorubaland must also come with responsibility.

    Power goes with responsibility!

    This is going to be the greatest challenge to the institution of Obaship in these days of modernisation. Some of the young Obas coming to the throne must learn to keep intact the mystic and mystery surrounding the institution. They must avoid being seen at every party and social events behaving like ordinary people. Once this becomes the pattern, they will lose all respect and loyalty of the people. This behoves on them to maintain a reasonable distance from the Hoi polloi of the land and stay away from the corrupting influence of money and republican ethics of trade and commerce. Obas, no matter how young are regarded as fathers of the people in Yorubaland. This is why older people must bow, prostrate and kneel down before rulers young enough to be their children. Respect is not to the person of the ruler but to the institution. I remember visiting my cousin, the Oba of our town and prostrating for someone who was a friend, cousin and school mate of mine but who in return wanted to hug me, I however told him he could no longer do that. He asked me why? I promptly told him he carried all the power of our ancestors the moment he went through the process of coronation. He smiled and understood me.

    In conclusion, I have pointed out how the history of Yorubaland has affected and is affecting Yoruba politics internally among the people, and externally with the rest of Nigeria, especially the North. It is suggested that the excision of Ilorin from the rest of Yorubaland has been a sore point, but that we should let bye gone be bye gone and realistically deal with the issue politically by forging links with the Kwara and Kogi modern political leaders, instead of harking back to the past. We must not allow the burden of history to wear us out and weigh us down and to determine the trajectory of our future politics and political alignment at the centre. We have also suggested that the ideology of progressivism should help in breaking down north/south dichotomy in Nigeria, as is the case in the current APC party imperfect as it may appear. We are also suggesting that no matter the political differences in Yoruba land we must conduct our politics with tact, civility and decorum characteristic of an ‘Omoluabi’. We have also suggested that for a long time to come, traditional political leaders, as constituted by the Obas will continue to have a role to play in Yoruba politics and that for the institution to endure, those occupying the traditional thrones must preserve the mystic and the mystery of their posts, lest familiarity breeds contempt.

    • Concluded.

  • Death in the cathedral

    The thousands of worshippers who gathered in the auditorium of the Reigners Bible Church International in Uyo, the Akwa Ibom State capital, last Saturday came there for the consecration of their pastor, Akan Weeks, as a bishop. Everything went into the planning for the bishopric consecration in order to make it a success. Governor Udom Emmanuel was among the congregants. It was a day of joy for the pastor, his family, his spiritual children and well-wishers.

    An atmosphere of conviviality pervaded the church. The celebrator was at hand to receive guests as they came in.  There were pumping of hands and backslapping here and there as longtime friends reconnected. Laughter rang out loud from all corners of the expansive auditorium. The service started as soon as  Emmanuel came in and the national anthem was sung. For over 30 minutes everything went well, but suddenly, the unexpected happened – the auditorium crashed. There was bedlam as people scampered for safety. One’s survival did not depend on how nimble footed one is; it all depended on luck and where you sat.

    Up till now, we have yet to know the number of those in the hall. So, getting the true casualty figure is difficult. Do not believe the figures being bandied by the security people; it is in their nature to hide such things in situations like this. The truth is that many people died and we may not know their exact number no matter how hard we try because some people will not want it revealed so as to avoid public outrage. We do not pray for things like this but when they happen, we should have the courage to say the truth in order to avoid a recurrence. Buildings do not just collapse for the fun of it, something must have triggered the crash. No matter what we say or do, what has happened has happened. We can only take stock now in order to know whether the church brought this upon itself.

    What do I mean? What was the state of the building before the ceremony? Was it still under construction as reported in the media? How safe was it for human occupation in the state it was then? These are some of the issues we should look into if we want to get to the root of this matter. We should not allow religious sentiment to becloud our reasoning in determining what led to the crash. Scores of people cannot die while attending a church ceremony only for the government to keep quiet as if all is well. The dead like those who survived went to serve God and to witness the consecration of their bishop. As their spiritual father, Pastor Akan, like a good shepherd, should have been concerned about the well-being of his sheep.

    He should have done this by ensuring that he gathered them in a safe and secure environment. As ministers, we are charged to feed our sheep, not to allow them to die through acts of omission and commission. The news that we are hearing now that the church was asked to stop work on the building is not palatable at all, if it is true. Was the church served a stop work order? A building is not served a stop work order for nothing. The action must have been informed by what experts saw. What did they see to warrant the issuance of the order? And why did the church not comply with it? It is only in our country that a thing like this will happen and we will start looking for excuses to explain it away instead of taking action against the offenders. Are we saying that the lives of those who died do not matter? Over two years ago, a similar incident happened at the Synagogue Church of All Nations in Lagos and till today the culprits have not been brought to book. Instead the church is dodging facing the law.

    This must not happen in the Uyo case. If something untoward had happened to the governor would we be handling this matter lightly? The answer is no. By now, all the church trustees and its other leaders would have been arrested. Even the injured pastor would be placed under arrest in the hospital. If that is good for the governor why is it not good for those who died in the crash? I feel sorry for the church and its pastor over what happened, but we cannot close our eyes to the fact that people lost their lives because of the negligence of some people. This is why those people are now on the run. They can only run; they cannot hide. Sooner than later the law will catch up with them. May the souls of the departed rest in peace.

     

    Mission to Gambia

    On Tuesday, some West African  leaders were in Banjul, The Gambia capital, to prevail on outgoing President Yahya Jammeh to accept the results of the December 1 election, which he lost to opposition candidate Adama Barrow. Jammeh is among the fast diminishing tribe of  African leaders still in office famously referred to by the west as the ”Africa Big Man”. By the west’s definition, the ”Africa Big Man” is a sit-tight leader who does not believe that there is life after office. So, he must die in office. Jammeh first came into office in 1994 through a military coup at the age of 29. In 1996, he transmuted into civilian president and has held office since then after being reelected in 2001, 2006 and 2011. After his reelection five years ago, he boasted that if he wanted he could be in office for one billion years. Pride, they say, goes before a fall. His pride led to his defeat in the December 1 election, which results he graciously accepted before making a volte face last Friday. What could have informed his sudden U’turn? Yahya Jammeh has become used to the presidential villa that he cannot imagine himself ever staying elsewhere. But he cannot impose himself on the people who have become tired of him.

    The time for him to go has come and the people have spoken that they no longer want him. If he decides to stay in office against their wish there will be bloodshed. He should not deceive himself that because he is president he would have the upper hand if crisis bursts out in The Gambia today. Jammeh has ridden the tiger long enough. It is time for him to dismount in order not to end up in its belly. It is to save him from himself that Presidents Muhammadu Buhari, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf (Liberia),  Ernest Bai Koroma (Sierra Leone) and John Mahama (Ghana) went to talk with him. The good thing is for him to stick to his acceptance of the outcome of the election and not allow some people to mislead him.  It is heartening to hear that he was receptive to the four leaders’ advice to go. The consequences of his not leaving will be too grave for his tiny country, which he has ruled with iron fist in the past 22 years. Jammeh was still living in the past by recanting after accepting the election results. There is nothing for him to fear if he knows he has done well. For the sake of his impoverished country, he should go and allow a breath of fresh air in The Gambia. If he looked well he would have seen in the four leaders’ delegation another president, who just lost election – John Mahama of Ghana – and accepted the result without attempting to bring his country down. Jammeh should take a cue from Mahama and just go.

  • Bakare and CAN as Buhari critics

    Pastor Tunde Bakare, the overseer of Latter Rain Assembly Church while delivering his State of the Nation address, titled ‘Roadmap to successful change,’ back in January launched a sweeping attack on some of President Buhari’s policies. First, he said “The CBN was contributing negatively to the Nigerian state by becoming a conduit for politicians to drain the nation.”  He  thereafter ‘demanded for the prosecution of those indicted in the damning report of the Farouk Lawan committee, a phenomenon he refers to as ‘Kleptoric kleptocracy unlimited’, where for instance, N999m was reportedly paid 129 times totaling N128,871,000,000 to some companies by the office of the Accountant General of the Federation.” He went on to remind the President that ‘with the non- prosecution of those indicted four years after; we didn’t need to wonder why corruption is so endemic and very pervasive in our nation today’.

    Bakare’s criticism is in pursuit of a better society. This is a crusade he started back in 1982 when he first launched his ministry. Bakare has intimidating credentials as a ‘prophet, lawyer, politician, a successful international businessman, an activist and servant of the people’.  His commitment to Nigeria as a social crusader with Nigeria will work in my time mantra has been attested to by no less a personality than Pius Adesanmi, a professor of Literature and winner of the Peguine prize for Africa writings.  According to him “Bakare  is Nigeria first and only liberation theologist who provides not just spiritual food and guidance for Nigeria but been in the trenches’ deploying and interpreting the gospel as a manifesto of liberation of the Nigerian people  from poverty injustice and all assorted  consequences of corruption and bad leadership”.

    Bakare, who has in his own words ‘moved from the pulpit to the street and to the podium” to make ‘propositional alternatives’ to government was the Convener of the Save Nigeria Group, (SNG) that fought on behalf of Jonathan on the streets of Abuja. Following the astronomical increases in fuel subsidy from N256.3b in July 2008 to N673b in 2010 under Yar Adua,  moving to N1.3 trillion in 2011 under Jonathan and N2.19t in an election year, Bakare was at the ‘Freedom Park’ in Lagos calling for the investigation of those ‘behind the colossal looting of our money’. His crusade paid off when a House of Representatives probe indicted some PDP leading lights and their siblings for the theft of about N1.7 trillion.

    We can therefore easily understand  Bakare’s righteous indignation that those who should be in prison to serve as a deterrent to others today under Buhari government of change enjoy the same immunity  as they did as Jonathan fund- raisers and campaign managers.

    The difference between Bakare and Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) as critics of government is very clear. Unlike Bakare  who has since 1982  had “the courage to say and do what he considered the right thing”  for our nation, his other CAN members  who kept their peace, sometimes not as innocent onlookers, while the looting of our resources  went on, have in the wake of economic recession ravaging the land found their voices. They have told Buhari to find solution to the nation’s economic woes instead of moaning over spill milk. I agree with our religious fathers. Wasn’t that the reason Buhari stood a chance against Jonathan after three failed attempts?

    The views are the same. From Tunde Adeoye the Bishop of Calabar Diocese, Anglican Communion, to Jacob Adetunmobi, Bishop of Ibadan South Diocese, Adeyemo, Bishop of Omu- Aran, Prelate of Methodist Church of Nigeria Dr. Samuel Uche, to the Bishops of the 19 northern states and Abuja whose spokesman, Revd. John Hayab ‘wants the government to embark on policies that show they love the citizen’, to the chairman and spiritual father of Cherubim and Seraphim Movement Worldwide (Ayo Ni o), Most Revd. Samuel Abidoye whose concern was that this year Christmas ‘will be the poorest Christmas celebrations in recent time” to Emeritus Archbishop Olubunmi Okogie, who saw ‘youth revolution because the people are hungry.’

    Although it is on record that some jet-flying prosperity prophets contributed to the current hunger in the land, the verdict of both Christian and Muslim clerics is that Buhari alone must carry the can. Dr. Saheed Ashafa, the president of Muslim students society of Nigeria,  blames the current economic predicament on Buhari while  the Chief Imam, Ansar-Ud-Deen Society of Nigeria, Sheikh Abdurrahman Ahmad says to  Buhari “ the hunger is real, you cannot continue to ask Nigerians to be patient , you cannot continue to preach to hungry people.”

    While they are all absolutely right, I however think we cannot afford a divided home through finger-pointing in view of the imminent danger hunger poses to our people. I therefore believe all hands must be on deck instead of blame game.

    Let us start with our Muslim clerics. In Lagos, Musliu Obanikoro, former minister of defence who has only been able to pay N140m of about N1billion he admitted he illegally took, is known in the Muslim community as generous giver to mosques and Muslim associations. This is the time he needs the help of his Muslim spiritual leaders most. They could make contributions or prevail on him to sell off some of his properties. A billion naira if stashed together according to our inimitable Olatunji Dare will be as high as the empire building in New York. If Buhari has that humongous stolen fund, it will surely go a long way in reducing hunger.

    The President of the Muslim Congress Dr. Luqman Abdul Raheem who claim ‘division within the President’s APC had increased hunger in the country’  can join hands with his fellow Christian clerics to appeal to Saraki who caused the division by trading off the victory of his party to retrace his steps. Senator Alasoadura (he whose armour is prayers); his able supporter, Dino Melaye who claimed to have made his fortunes through prosperity prophets, both Abdulmumin Jibrin, and Yakubu Dogara the Speaker, put asunder by ‘budget padding, are Muslim and Christian respectively. If division is the cause of hunger according the cleric, who are better placed to bring reconciliation than those who claim to hear the voice of God?

    And finally  an appeal to my own Cardinal Olubunmi Okogie who ‘saw a revolution going on underground because there is hunger in the land and some people are still crying for their salaries and not getting them” . He is right to blame Buhari for our economic woes. But since we are looking for solution to the hunger ravaging our land, Okogie who commands a lot of respect among his Niger Delta compatriots can appeal to the Niger Delta militants who are currently sabotaging the economy.

  • The MMM fairy tale

    The MMM fairy tale

    There are various ways of reacting to a major calamity in the Yoruba-speaking Southwest. Elders simply shake their heads, recalling how they tried without success to talk the young ones out of trouble. They could also shed some tears and then recede into the cocoon of their homes to mourn their fate.

    The young ones scream to alert the world that an evil occurrence had hit a target. In expressing their pains and agony, they cry out, exclaiming in such a moving manner that neighbours will rush out to offer some comfort and consolation.

    Exclamations, such as moku, mogbe, modaran (I’m dead, I’m lost and I’ve commited a crime) are common. Did you grab the alliteration and the acronym MMM? Some poetic coloration of a mournful situation, if you wish.

    What is “Editorial Notebook” up to this morning? Poetry? Language? Neither, I assure you.

    It is all about the major calamity that befell some of our compatriots on Tuesday when the promoters of the foggy Mavrodi Mondial Movement (MMM) ponzi scheme that has seized the land like harmattan suddenly suspended payment till January. Christmas was just some 12 days away. Now, the cries of  mogbe, mote (I’m disgraced) and molo (I’m gone) have been ringing out from many corners. From other parts of Nigeria have been tears as the greedy and the gullible count their losses.

    At least a suicide attempt has been reported in Benue State. A would-be groom who invested N300,000 in the scheme, on learning about the payment suspension, grabbed a can of an insecticide and gorged himself on the acidic stuff. Doctors are battling to save his life.

    Is this new? No.

    The picture remains as gripping as its first appearance on prime time national television. Ace comedian Sunday Omobolanle, who is also known as Aluwe or Papi Luwe, unusually decked out in a big ceremonial dress, an agbada, a cap made of damask, the type the Yoruba call abetiaja because of its two sides standing firm, erect like a dog’s ear. His face is wreathed in smiles. Behind him is a small crowd of incredulous well-wishers, who also turn out in beautiful dresses. All beaming.

    Aluwe throws open the front door of a beautiful house and looks back at the crowd, raises his hand like a traffic warden’s and says in a loud arresting voice: “Everybody, come inside. Na work of Forum.”

    Forum was the Lagos mortgage firm that promised everyone a home in the 1980s. Many, including the middle class and the wealthy, rushed in there to seek some fortune. Forum became the toast of the town among those who wished to own their own homes. From all over the country, they stormed the company’s elegant headquarters in Lagos to deposit cash.

    Forum crashed. With it were the hopes and aspirations of thousands of unwary depositors. There was no news about the company’s chief promoter, a certain Chief Owolabi, who an American returnee said was seen in New York behind the wheels of a yellow cab.

    There were also other “wonder banks” that promised depositors huge returns on their investments. Umana Umana held sway in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital. Plan Well got Benin City residents excited.

    By the time the depositors realised that they had been conned, it was too late to go back.

    Any lesson learnt? None, I dare say. Enter the pure tricksters, pranksters and fraudsters popularly referred to as 419 – in fearful reference to the aspect of the Criminal Code that makes such acts offences. They would write some barely literate letters, claiming to have some fortune somewhere, which has been allocated to you. Unsolicited. There will always be a condition; you must pay some fee to access this huge cash. That is the sting in the operation. As soon as the fool (mugu) is drawn in by a “catcher”, more demands are made. He may even get to see some fake dollars that will need a certain chemical to be cleaned and ready to spend. Wash wash, they call it.

    The gullible continue to fall. In fact, at a point, the Nigerian scam letter was competing with oil – the mainstay of our economy – as our major export. The world was alarmed at the ingenuity of our compatriots, who called it all “reparation” as greedy foreigners would not listen to several warnings from the INTERPOL and local police. Thankfully, with the coming of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), 419 cases have reduced.

    Who would have thought that with their rich experience Nigerians would some day become victims of any major Internet scam. First it was forex trading. Many pumped in their life savings in a bid to earn dollars in a scheme that is as complex as its obscure players. The jury is still out on how many got injured in this strange game.

    Just as the forex trading noise was subsiding, MMM made its amazing debut. Like all other such schemes, it came with jumbo offers wrapped in some sentimental nonsense – that it is a kind of wealth redistribution in which the poor will have priority. You invest money, which will be transferred to somebody who requires help and 30 per cent is yours at the end of the month. What is more, should you require help, it will be yours for the asking. But there is a warning, which many failed to heed – invest only what you won’t need, the smart, shadowy fellows said.

    According to Wikipedia, MMM was a Russian company that perpetrated one of the world’s largest Ponzi schemes of all time in the 1990s. “By different estimates, from five to 40 million people lost up to $10billion. The exact figures are not known even to the founders.”

    In Nigeria, the promoters defined MMM as a “community where people help each other”. “MMM gives you a technical platform which helps millions of participants worldwide to connect those who need help to those who are ready to provide help for free”.

    The scheme won a multitude of people, many of them middle class who feel the biting effects of the recession. There are also greedy folks who believe in a short cut to wealth and – you won’t believe this – bankers.

    How was MMM getting the cash to pay 30%? Is it a legitimate venture? Who are the promoters? Who decides who needs help and how? Is this a charity? From where do the organisers draw their remunerations?  Who are their bankers? Do they have auditors? Any insurance cover in case of losses? They do not invest the cash they collect; so how do they make money? Is there any free lunch anywhere?”

    These are legitimate questions that many recession – dazed investors failed to ask .

    The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) warned that it had no hand in the whole show, but the participants sneered at it. The EFCC advised against investing in the bazaar, but its adherents were too far gone in their dream of a life of abundance and jollification promised by the promoters.

    MMM founder Sergey Mavrodi wrote to the Federal Government to explain the workings of the ponzi scheme. He lambasted the government for not providing for Nigerians and attacking those who are trying to help. He lashed out at the government for its ignorance, adding that the about three million participants were aware of the risks.

    In a cocky and scurrilous letter, written in jerky and childish  language, Mavrodi said: “Honourable authorities, so far MMM has come under a constant attack from you. In this regard, I would like to ask you a few simple questions. Since you are concerned with the interests of millions of your fellow citizens, I hope you will be so kind to answer them.

    “What are you trying to get? Do you want the MMM System to collapse and millions of people to suffer? Who will support them if now MMM is their only means of livelihood? Will you? You don’t pay wages to people. Or might you not care about them? Might you be using a trendy topic to make a good name for yourselves? What will you say to a mother who will have no money to buy food for her child? Will you let her child die for the sake of the higher interests of the economy?”

    He rambled on and on, turning logic on its head. The participants were warned about the risks, he said, so the scheme is no scam.

    Now the fairy tale seems to have ended

    In this tragedy, Nigerians have found an opening for laughter. In the social media, there have been videos of some victims lamenting their indiscretion.  A man collapses, his mobile phone in his hand, after getting a call that MMM had crashed. The man on the other side keeps screaming his name.

    Besides, there is an advisory on the MMM disaster:

    “Ensure that you are close to your friends and relations who are into MMM.

    Observe their movements and monitor where they go to.

    If you see any of them going close to a river, an ocean or stream, raise the alarm and invite the police or RRS.

    If you see any of them talking to himself or herself, alert Aro or Yaba.

    If he or she gets aggressive and smashes things, please seek help of neighbours  to tie the man or woman with a thick, cow rope.”

    Another wondered what newspaper headlines will be. His suggestions:

    “MMM stings Nigerians”; “Man commits suicide as MMM closes shop”; “Wife stabs husband, claiming he introduced me to MMM”; “MMM victims protest at National Assembly”;  and “Atiku condoles with MMM victims”.

    The promoters say the payment freeze is temporary. MMM is threatening to return in January. How many of its investors will wait?

     

     

  • The other class narrative

    The democracy we declared has recoiled into a spent shadow. Sixteen 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 and treacherous human rights activists, women’s rights activists, journalists and columnists parading our streets.

    Very few men are indeed capable of that 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 by the impoverishment of their fellow citizens regardless of any risk or discomfort it might attract to them personally.

    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 even in the throes of rising demand for more radical intervention and reconstruction of the social order.

    It is no surprise however 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. That explains our choice of the incumbent leadership.

    Apparently, we possess an overwhelming and oft-convincing inclination to self-destruct thus our lack of a coherent and defensible political ideology essential to the evolution of a progressive leadership and state.

    The average Nigerian is no more electable than the leadership he endures yet he loves to speak truth to power even as he functions simultaneously to smother his own voice in the riotous gabble of his exultation of the same ruling class, whose dominance he seeks to terminate. No matter who is 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.

    No man, be he a distinguished columnist, lawyer, soldier, or public officer in any office can command the tides of history. The few that appear to have done so–the Napoleon’s, Caesar’s, Hitler’s–were really nothing more than the most capable at making it appear that they command the tides, when in fact they were simply skimming along with them.

    Thus the need for the Nigerian working class to consciously evolve in thought and will in pursuit of a more balanced social order. Such conscious evolution could only be achieved by a re-orientation in scholarship and purification of thought and action.

    The foundations of scholarship and knowledge must be tirelessly 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 – and all these and other inevitable problems of civilization must be resolvable largely by an average member of the working class by reason of his exposure and constitution.

    This informs a greater need for study and thought and an appeal to the rich experience of past and current mistakes in the journey towards the reduction to the barest minimum, the possibility of future mistakes. 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 and youth divides 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. That proverbial 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 incumbent and predatory ruling class.

    Hence they would be able to understand that the much clamoured social enterprise and gesture towards change must be mooted and achieved by the Nigerian youth and working class in further substantiation of their capacities to assimilate the culture and refinement of humane civilization. A veritable step towards such reality is to vote the incumbent administration out of office and elect a younger, less ethnic, less directionless, visionary and humane leadership. But to achieve this, the Nigerian youth would have to establish a more youthful, brilliant, truly progressive and detribalized political platform.

  • Again, season of goodwill

    Again, season of goodwill

    I begin with an apology. The last instalment of this column was not meant to slight anybody, not the least those worthy compatriots of ours who deserve to enjoy the warmth and felicitations that this season offers. No.

    Some readers protested that some names of prominent Nigerians were missing from my mailing list. They may have felt neglected, they reasoned. Others were kind enough to suggest who should get what. Again, I apologise.

    President Muhammadu Buhari was listed – to the delight of many. But, to some distinguished readers, if the President deserves to be on the list, why not the First Lady –sorry, I take that back- the wife of the President? Aren’t they right? No gift will be too much for Hajia Aisha Buhari, vivacious, affable and radiant.

    A friend has suggested a compilation of my former boss’ series, “Anxiety in the other room”. But the problem is that Mr Femi Kusa, the frontline journalist-turned-herbalist, is yet to conclude the series even after five instalments in this newspaper.

    I have a less complex idea. Madam will get a copy of a poem a potential  literary champion is working on. It will be framed in fine, well polished and glossy mahogany. The fellow, who wishes to remain anonymous until the work is completed, offered me a rare glimpse into the first few lines, which he has permitted me to share with you.

                 Take me to the other room

                 Where there is no sorrow

                 The other room where all pains dissolve                                                

                  into joyous cries

                 The other room where men become babies

                 The other room where all proposals are                                 

                 signed and sealed

                 Oh no room like the other room  

    Another reader made a case for former First Lady Patience Jonathan, who he said had gone through a lot since her husband left office. The other day in Enugu, some youths carried placards, protesting against the seizure of Mrs Jonathan’s $15m in some bank accounts opened in the names of some companies. Others joined the protest yesterday in Lagos and Abuja. To be fair to the former First Lady, she complained to her husband’s ex-aide who facilitated the opening of the accounts that the documents were not in her name. He promised to change that. Apparently, he never did, even as Her Excellency continued to run the accounts.

    Many, including the youthful protesters, have praised “Mama Peace” for coming up to claim the cash, which the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) described as “proceeds of crime”, even after she had let everyone into what was otherwise a family secret – that the fortune belongs to her mother. But, some idle fellows parading themselves as social critics and analysts have been asking  exasperating questions, obviously in their dubious plan to enrage her: “How did she get the money? Was it from her ice cream shop? Kickback? “

    It is fitting and proper to remark that despite the provocation, Mrs Jonathan remains firm. From me, Her Excellency will get a lorry-load of T-shirts with the inscription: MY MONEY GROWS LIKE GRASS. Those youths protesting for her will at least have a uniform for better identification so that their gathering will not be penetrated by touts and other criminal elements.

    Going by the readers’ protest, Rivers State Governor Nyesom Wike, a chief, deserves to be listed even ahead of his Kaduna counterpart, the impulsive Nasir El-Rufai, the one who claims to have  been fighting for peace even as his political opponents cry out that he is a clear and present danger to peace.

    Wike’s opponents have accused him of uncountable allegations, some of them  criminal. Deriding his hard-won electoral victory, they alleged that he rode into office on a road awash with blood and strewn with smashed heads and limbs. They said the governor was borrowing money recklessly, but it is to His Excellency’s credit that nobody has claimed that he is inconsistent.

    On his inauguration, he vowed to protect the rights of Rivers people. Needless to say, the governor has done this with remarkable agility. He once rushed out of bed, braved the night and all its dangerous oddities to save a judge whose home was being  invaded by Department of State Services (DSS) operatives. His critics, obviously those who may have forgotten that he is a lawyer, said he was obstructing justice. Do they know the law more than the governor?

    Wike has vowed that his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) will win Saturday’s by-election. He once advised that the officials coming to conduct the last Assembly polls should write their Wills. Thankfully, no official died in the elections, which the PDP won.

    Now the governor says security agents plan to help him make history by making him the first governor to get killed in office. The opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) says His Excellency is merely raising hell to cover up a massive plan to rig the ballot. Before the dust raised by the allegation could settle, the governor launched another, saying his security aides had been withdrawn. The police denied it.

    I have ordered a big family-size piano, which will be mounted in His Excellency’s living room. A young man well grounded in classical music can always sit down to work the keyboard for the governor’s favourite hymns whenever he seems to be in a foul mood. The Bible (David playing for Saul) days again? Why not? Doesn’t the world know that His Excellency is a believer? A cheeky fellow once remarked that Wike holds the enviable record of a governor whose head has been touched by all the Pentecostal giants in the land. I won’t confirm that because I don’t have the figures.

    A reader suggested a gift for Ekiti State strongman Ayo Fayose. This being a family paper, I will not go into the details, which are full of seditious propositions. You may call him a stunts man of the Ballotelian class and a hell raiser of the Wikerian school, but you can’t accuse Fayose of docility. No.

    When His Excellency stormed the Assembly last year to table the budget, he came with his own gavel. After a short speech, in which his opponents said he was rambling, Fayose turned to the gallery, which was jammed by visitors, and asked: “Those who want this budget passed speedily say ‘yeah’”. The lawmakers kept quiet, but the gallery erupted in a shout of ‘yeah!’. “Those who doesn’t (sic) want this budget passed speedily, say ‘yeah’”. All was quiet.  “The ayes have it,” the governor said, turning to an aide who gave him the gavel. He then banged the table and said: “Mr Speaker, I hereby present the budget.” Applause. Applause.

    On Tuesday, Fayose returned to the House to submit next year’s budget. He was decked out in a black vest, a pair of military fatigue (camouflage) trousers and a fez cap of the same material. Tall and trim, His Excellency was, of course, the cynosure of all eyes. His appearance brought back memories of the great Fidel Castro, the Cuban legend who has just passed on. Only the thick, dark cigar was missing.

    He explained his dressing to his bewildered audience, who apparently thought Fayose had emptied his bag of stunts, saying: “We are in serious wartime in Nigeria. We are at war in Nigeria.”

    Perhaps for modesty, His Excellency did not bring a gavel, but he stressed that the Speaker is his representative. “I’m the Speaker. He is the Acting Speaker. Therefore, if I say this budget will be passed by me, it will be passed,” Fayose said.

    I have ordered for His Excellency some cartons of the best Cuban cigar – to complete this new dressing. He need not smoke it – I understand he doesn’t smoke. He can just chew the stuff.

    Also missing on the maiden mailing list is the indefatigable defender of party discipline, rule of law and loyalty, Ali Modu Sheriff, the former Borno State Governor, who is in the thick of the crisis that has hobbled the PDP.

    Some party chiefs are now ruing the day they drafted Sheriff in as acting chairman. When they asked him to step aside for a Caretaker Committee headed by Senator Ahmed Makarfi, the former Kaduna Governor, Sheriff went to court.  Thus began an internecine war that has cost the opposition party so much.

    His opponents accuse him of being an accessory to the rise of Boko Haram, the terrorist sect troubling the Northeast, urging security agents to take him in. Sheriff denies it all and vows to pursue justice for his faction of the party. I planned to send His Excellency a book on leadership, but a colleague of mine doubted if he would appreciate that. He asked me: “Does he read? Have you forgotten how he boasted while in government that only a negligible percentage of his people was reading?”

    I wasn’t really persuaded, but to be cautious, I changed my mind. Now His Excellency will get 100 cartons of the best brand of spray starch for his big babariga  to remain crisp and smooth as he shuttles from one court to the other in search of justice.

    Now a little family secret. “Editorial Notebook”, you must have noted, never talks about this reporter so as not to be accused of abuse of privilege. My wife has also demanded, as a matter of conjugal right and privilege, to be on the mailing list. She even suggested some “romantic” gifts, which a poor reporter can hardly handle in these days of recession.

    After a long rumination over this sensitive issue, I have decided to give her my Automated Teller Machine (ATM) card for just 24 hours.

    Again, the mailing list remains open. After all, we are still in the season of goodwill. Compliments!