The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Buhari: Sweat and tears

    The founder of modern Germany, Otto Von Bismarck, after the failure of the 1848 Liberal revolution to unite the German states, told the Germans that German unification will not come through debate but through blood and iron. Meaning that if Germans wanted unification they would have to fight for it by war and by shedding their blood. Winston Churchill, war time Prime minister of Great Britain in those dark years of 1941 when defeat was starring Britain in the face told the British people that he had nothing to offer them than blood and tears.

    In view of the depressed economy of Nigeria and moral bankruptcy in high places, General Buhari must tell our people that we can pull ourselves out of the quagmire we are in by a policy of sweat and tears. This means in essence that there is work to be done and that in doing this work, we may go through lots of pain involving shedding tears and sweating. He has already said he has no magic wand to solve all our problems at once and that we must not expect any miracle but that he would offer moral compass by which to negotiate the stormy waters ahead of us. If all he offers is the moral leadership, I believe this would be more than sufficient.

    The problems facing Nigeria are both physical and psychological; it is easier to tackle the physical problems of infrastructural decay in form of bad roads, unavailability of electricity and pipe-borne water, poor health and educational facilities, poor environment, non-functioning of our railways, seaports, airports and general urban decay as well as the huge problem of unemployment.

    The psychological problem we have is not knowing when to stop taking from the public till, as well as embezzlement in order to provide for ourselves and families, moral decay and buccaneering attitude to public service and governance and general lack of integrity and prevalence of unrighteousness in our way of life.

    Many years ago, our first civilian President, Right Honourable Dr Nnamdi Azikwe of blessed memory, said the problem with us Nigerians was the problem of politics of poverty. He defined it as the desire of public officials to embezzle public money so that they and their family will not lack anything. We still have the problem with us.

    This attitude to life generally has permeated not only public life but also private commercial dealings to the extent that Nigerians in the corporate world and in public life are too steeped in corruption that they cannot help themselves. The problem of underdevelopment can be attacked if the president has the right kind of people working with him and, a grand plan to implement the other problem of moral deficit that is not something that can be easily solved. It will require the leadership acting as a beacon to those who may go astray when called to serve.

    The president is the head of the executive branch. The executive branch is the council of ministers and the departments working under them composed of civil servants. This is the branch that formulates policies and after approval from the legislative branch, executes policies. It is the executive branch that is in charge of contract awards and supervision. Eighty to ninety percent of the resources of states is handled by the executive branch. Hence, if there is going to be a reduction in corruption, the executive branch is going to lead the way. The executive branch must ensure that contracts are not padded for the purpose of kick- backs. It must ensure that the bureaucracy is not over inflated with un-needed personnel; it must ensure that a lean administration shorn of jobbers and nepotism is in place. The days of special advisers, special assistants, special-this and special-that should be gone, and gone forever. The days of a fleet of aeroplanes and cars for the executives should no longer be tolerated, and as much as possible, promotion should be based on performance and we should bring back the days of Public Works Department (PWD), so as to engage the service of young engineers and technicians in doing public works instead of all minor physical works being given to contractors.

    This will help to fight unemployment and our youth must be told frankly that the task of building this country is in their hands. Whatever is being done at the centre must be replicated at the state and local levels. A regime of accountability must be imposed on all levels of government through beefing up and activating audit departments at all levels. The executive must also ensure that all institutions charged with preventing public corruptions like EFCC and ICPC must be revamped and sufficiently staffed and well-funded to do their work. They must also be separated from he executive and merged with the judiciary so that they can do their work without let or hindrance. The days where prosecution takes a lifetime must be stopped. Cases before anti- corruption courts must be swiftly decided; those guilty must be sanctioned and punished. No regime can completely wipe out corruption and corruption is a global problem but we must be seen to be serious about tackling this hydra headed problem.

    If educational institutions are functioning well, if there are hospitals to take care of the sick, if infrastructure is modernized and efficient, if there is excellent public transportation, if there is welfare plan for the old, the women, the children and the unemployed, then, there will be no reason whatsoever to steal from the public treasury. This was the philosophy of Lee Kwan Yew in Singapore. He decided that he would so highly remunerate his workers that they would not steal and embezzle public funds and that people would work for and uphold the system that takes care of them. Let us try it here in Nigeria. If the executive is serious about cutting down corruption and the cost of governance, the legislative branch will have to follow suit and the same goes for the judiciary.

    The current package of emoluments and allowances for legislators is not sustainable. We are told that our current members of House of Representatives and of the Senate are the most highly paid in this category in the world. This is not an enviable record for a third world country. This has to change. What we are saying of the centre applies to the states and the local governments. We cannot honestly ask for a change of direction without all of us being committed to changes in the system.

    There has to be a change in revenue mobilization, a situation in which Nigeria charges a VAT of seven percent while other African states are charging 18percent must change. We have to increase VAT to 18percent especially at a time when our income for oil has been reduced by 50percent. Increase in VAT will hit the rich more than the poor because it is the rich who buy aeroplanes, cars and drink champagne etc. we should also adopt on a national scale, Lagos state land use tax and each state would decide how much it wants to levy. States had better get used to mobilization of internal revenue than carrying begging bowls to the federal government.

    Finally, we must direct our energy to industrialization, agriculture and exploitation of solid minerals as a way of diversifying our economy from over-dependence on oil and gas and when we have enough resources, we must radically transform our electricity generation and distribution because without this we will not have modern industries, health, transportation, industrial and communication infrastructure.

  • In defence of Oba Rilwan Akiolu of Lagos

    However distorted, Nigeria runs a federal system. The Ibos, like other immigrants from other parts of the country, have lived peacefully with their Yoruba host communities for decades.  The Ibos have always enjoyed better privileges in Yoruba land than among their own people at home. That they won an election in Lagos to represent indigenes whose language they don’t speak without the killings and mayhem we have witnessed in parts of the southeast is enough evidence.

    But even long before now, in the 1940s at a time when non indigenous Onitsha were regarded as settlers and denied the same privileges as the Onitsha indigenes, the Ibos in Lagos and part of Yoruba land were already standing for elections. (G I Jones, Report of the position, status and influence of chiefs and natural rulers in the eastern region of Nigeria (Enugu 1957).

    In 1950 when the indigenous ‘Onitshans’ which constituted only 12.5% of the population controlled majority of the members of the council and the non Onitsha Ibo had to form an association to agitate for equal treatment for non Onitsha in the manner of allocation of stalls and equal democratic representation in the Onitsha local council, (Richard Sklar, Nigerian political Parties: Power in An Emergent African Nation), the Igbo in Lagos controlled the NCNC which was initially a Yoruba party.  Zik, who was the only non-Yoruba at the inaugural meeting of NCNC rose on merit to become the leader of the party.

    Zik became a household name in major towns of Yoruba country. But for the overbearing activities of Igbo hawks and Zik’s 1949 gaffe when as the president of Ibo Federation Union he declared; ‘the martial prowess of the Igbo nation at all stages of human history has enabled them not only to conquer others but also to adapt themselves to the role of preserver,” yet, he was on his way to becoming the premier of the Yoruba country. That unrestrained statement was all the Action Group led by young Yoruba professionals and intellectuals needed to mobilise and convince Yoruba voters and traditional rulers that a Yoruba country should be led by a Yoruba and not an Igbo irredentist.

    Oba Akinolu’s anguish, I’m sure was not that Igbo won elections to represent his people but the body language and the indiscretion of a segment of Igbo elite. After the first round of elections, the Ibos, who gave block votes to President Jonathan not out of principle, (for four years he did not fulfill any of the promises to the south east), wanted the Oba to appreciate their newly acquired power to decide who governs Lagos.  If they embark on irrational block vote for the President, it becomes even more irrational to do the same to derail a government that everyone adjudged better than any PDP- run state in the country and which has allowed the Igbo to thrive.

    We must not forget these are the luxuries they don’t have in Abia, Ebonyin, Enugu, and Rivers Akwa Ibom where the Ohanezes, the Obis and Amayanabos decreed who to vote for and their anointed candidates won a landslide with statically impossible electoral returns of about 95% of registered voters.

    Leaders and Obas in Yoruba country cannot go against the will of their people. This perhaps explains why the Oba told the Igbo that those who work against the interest of Lagos will die in the lagoon. The Oba couldn’t have put it differently. Unfortunately, his Igbo visitors singing ‘winners o winner’, saw the Obas reaction as a threat because they don’t understand our culture that teaches us not to bite the fingers that fed us, a culture defines our behaviours and worldview.

    While it is part of the Igbo culture to ‘run away when calamity befalls the owners of the land who know how to appease their own gods, we as Yoruba have been forewarned that “eiyele ki ba onile je, ba onile mu, ki o salo ni ojo isoro” literarily saying you are not allowed to abandon your benefactor when he is in difficulty. Our respected leaders say:  ‘eniti o ba dale , a bale lo’(those who betray the cause of the Yoruba race will die a miserable death).

    This is not a curse but a call to maintain certain standard of behavior expected of ‘Omoluabi’. The only people who have anything to fear are those who are planning evil. Unfortunately, a segment of the Igbo elite, in the last few days have engaged in futile exercise of trying to teach the Oba democracy ignoring what was described by observers as vote allocation in the south south and southeast followed by screaming newspaper headlines such as “Bloody polls in Rivers, Ebonyi and Akwa Ibom”; “Police, thugs kill 18”; houses, cars burnt”; “policeman, youth, leader shot dead”; “INEC office, vehicles bombed”; “AIG Ogunsakin ordered out of Rivers”; “10 NYSC member, soldiers caught voting in General’s house”.

    They forget the dominant party ran neck to neck in Lagos and other parts of Yoruba country. And that was not by accident. If democracy is about participation, freedom of choice, checks and balances and accountability, the Yoruba country had practiced democracy for a thousand years before the advent of the Europeans. The pre -colonial history of Nigeria clearly shows a system of government existed in Oyo that was as good if not superior to the modern democracy, the world new god.

    The embattled Oba’s warning against an irrational use of block votes in the name of democracy to derail 16 years of development recorded in spite of efforts of clueless PDP-led federal government that did everything, including seizing Lagos state local government allocations, instigation of non indigenes against indigenes and bribing outlawed militant groups to cause mayhem during elections, came against the back drop of mischievous claims such as “we came from the east to turn jungle into a city” and “Lagos is no man’s land”.

    With such statements from a former governor of a state where elected governor was kidnapped and locked up like a criminal in broad day light by gangsters or from barely literate street traders who became stupendously wealthy; or still some parasites who emerged from detention over fuel subsidy scam to become chief fund raiser and campaign manager to a president, one can understand the righteous indignation of the Oba of Lagos.

    It cannot be any less exasperating when immigrants lay claim to a kingdom and territories his illustrious forbears fought the British to protect until they were forced to sign a treaty with the British in 1861.

    And for those on civilization mission, P C Lloyd has shown that the Yoruba country was more culturally developed not only than any part of Nigeria but more than Europe as at the time the Europeans came if we use urbanisation as index of measurement. For instance, while in 1921 the population of Ibadan was put at 287,133, Lagos 99,890, Ogbomosho, 84,880; Oshogbo 51, 413 Iwo 51,183, Ede 48,300, Enugu, a mining village had a population of only 3,170, Aba 2,327 and Onitsha 10,309.

    Of all the capitals of The Fulani caliphates, Sokoto had 19,335; Zaria -25,000); Katsina-17, 489 and Kano with a figure of 49,938 was the only town in the north with a population of close to fifty thousand. Ilorin that was closest to Kano with a population of 38,388 was for all intent and purposes a Yoruba town. As a matter of fact by 1931 when Ibadan had a population of about 400,000 and Lagos about 130,000, the most densely populated town in the old eastern region was Onitsha with population of about 18,000; ( P. Amaury Talbot “The People of Southern Nigeria(London 1935)vol.iv.)

    Oba Akinolu is greatly misunderstood. He has not threatened the Ibos. He was merely carrying out his responsibilities to his people.  As Thomas Hodgin has explained, ‘Yoruba Obas are constitutional monarchs who ratify decisions made by council of hereditary lineage chiefs who had consulted the wishes of their people’. Not much has changed in Yoruba land since that study. Except that we live in denial, even the United Nations recognized the right of indigenous people and has since December 23, 1994, dedicated 9th of August every year to the celebration of The International Day of Indigenous People.

  • Chibok girls and Orekoya boys

    WHAT is in April that makes the month tick nationally? It is a month like no other month in the annals of the country. Things have happened in the month that reverberated around the world. Check :  the Orka coup of 1990. Check :  the abduction of the Chibok girls last year and now the abduction of the Orekoya boys. All these happen at various times in April. These were earthshaking events, which threw the country into a spin.

    The country was shaken to its foundation when these events occurred. The Orka coup hit the Babangida regime where it least expected. The regime did not know what hit it until the plotters struck. It was through sheer luck that the regime  survived the onslaught. Being one not to push his luck too far, former military president Gen Ibrahim Babangida promptly moved the federal capital from Lagos to Abuja, where he believed he would be safer.

    One year after the Chibok girls were kidnapped from their school, the question is still : when will they be rescued? It was 12 months last Tuesday that they were abducted from their Government Girls Secondary School (GGSS) in Chibok, Borno State,  by Boko Haram insurgents. The world was stunned that the girls, many of who are in their impressionable years, could be seized from their hostels in the wee hours of the day and taken into captivity.

    Nigerians expected the government to react in equal measure to the insurgents’ audacious challenge, but nothing was done. For two weeks, the government felt unconcerned while the girls languished in Boko Haram den. To the government, it was impossible to kidnap such number of girls in one fell swoop and so it did nothing for those  two weeks. Nigerians were shocked by their government’s stance, provoking questions, such as, will hoodlums notify their victims before they strike? What is government’s job if it cannot protect its people? If the girls were children of the rich would government turn a blind eye to their plight?

    The posers  arose because the government created the impression that it must be informed before crimes, such as the abduction of the Chibok girls, are committed.  Thus, since it  was not so informed, it dismissed the girls’ abduction with a wave of the hand.  By the time, it decided to act, the girls had been taken far deep into Sambisa Forest. This was why its much-vaunted  six-week onslaught against Boko Haram  before the general elections came to nought – it did not lead to the rescue of the girls – because it was too little too late. Will the girls ever be rescued? The government says they will, but Nigerians are not that convinced. But we all live on the hope that one day a miracle will happen and the girls will be back home.

    It is this kind of miracle that the Orekoya family is praying for now. The Orekoyas have been in agony since April 8 when their children – Aderomola (11 months), Ademola (6) and Adedamola (4) – were kidnapped by their housemaid,  Mary Akinloye. The maid  ran away with the boys, barely 24 hours after she was employed. Mary (I am sure this is not her real name) had her plan well laid out before she took the job. From reports so far on this unfortunate incident, the Orekoyas, it seemed,  walked into a set up by Mary and her gang. The kidnap of these boys was well planned and clinically executed by a maid who was supposed to care for them.

    Like all animals in human skin, she first won the confidence of the kids’ mother, Mrs Bisi Orekoya, before moving in for the kill. Within hours of getting to the home of the Orekoyas, she had tidied  up everywhere, giving the place a spick and span look. Of course, the woman of the house was impressed and let down her guard. Who wouldn’t? First impression, they say, matters. With that act, Mary got Mrs Orekoya. a working class mum, who needed her services so as  to relieve her of the stress of working and taking care of the home. Many women indulge in this luxury these days.

    In the past, our mothers did everything themselves, whether or not they were working. I agree that times have changed and that today’s women need extra help to cope with work and family challenges, but they should be wary of the kind of servants they go for. No matter how good a maid may be, she cannot take the place of a mother in the life of a child. This is the mistake some of our mothers make today.  Once they get a maid, they hand over their homes to her. The maid becomes the madam of the home and before you know it she becomes another thing.

    The truth is that  if they can help it, most girls would not want to be maids. They would rather prefer to play madam. This is why women must open their eyes wide while hiring maids. No matter how good and industrious maids appear, madam must not give them an elbow room to operate. Yes, she may need a maid’s services, but she must know where to draw the line. There must be certain things the maid must not do in the house. But under the guise of ‘’working myself to the bones’’, many women have unwittingly handed over their homes to their maids.

    I am not blaming the Orekoyas for hiring a maid since they could afford it, but the question is did they take all the necessary precautionary steps? Did they do diligence check on the girl’s background? Or were they in such a hurry for her services that they allowed her to sell them a dummy? These maids are streetwise; they can get some funny characters to stand for them as aunts, brothers, sisters and uncles before their would-be employers. When trouble comes as we have now seen in the Orekoyas’ case, such ‘relations’ will simply disappear.

    I feel for the Orekoyas and pray that soon they will be reunited with their children. For God’s sake, why will anybody kidnap toddlers? Why? May God touch the kidnappers’ hearts and let these children go.

     

    * The kids were rescued early yesterday after this article had been written.

  • What the southwest wants!

    We, the masses of the southwest are living in poverty – a degree of poverty unknown before in our history. For us, independent Nigeria meant poverty and more poverty. We are not used to living in poverty and we cannot stand it much longer.

    The agency that hampers struggle and success in all parts of Nigeria today is the federal government. It was not so in the 1950s. From the time when our country became a federation in 1952 and until 1962, the federating units of our federation (the then regions), had enough autonomy and enough of control over their own life and resources to make progress in all directions. The federal government was not an obstacle then, as it is today.

    And the federal government was by no means weak. There was a careful and sensible balance between the powers of the federal and regional governments. The regions were empowered as seats of detailed development while the federal government was empowered to stand above all, protect the regions, defend our country and speak for our country in the world. That was the kind of sane and sensible arrangement that our leaders (our Awolowo, Azikiwe and Ahmadu Bello) agreed upon. Each region had its own Coat of Arms, its own flag, even its own representatives in London to see to its affairs abroad. It was not perfect but it was good enough – and it worked very well.

    It was under this sensible arrangement that the genius of our Awolowo could blossom in our western region. He was a thinker, planner and achiever above all others. Our region was free to breathe and live and thrive. Awolowo and his team of capable colleagues were able to make miracles happen. That is how our region became “First in Africa” in a lot of developmental achievements.

    But the other regions were proudly achieving too. Gradually, in the eastern region, a culture of small industrial businesses raised its head. The northern region was starting far behind the western and eastern regions in education. But, under its great leader, Sir Ahmadu Bello, the northern region embarked upon a very admirable development progress in many directions too.

    In the midst of all this excitement, we celebrated independence in 1960. Our Nigeria was growing and prospering and heading for the highest in the world. And we young Nigerians proudly bragged to our friends in the countries where we were studying abroad that our Nigeria would soon become the Blackman’s world power of modern times.  Then came 1962 – yes, 1962.  In that year, the people in power in the centre thought that the western region was just too successful on its own strength, too confident, too proud. Therefore, they decided that the western region needed to be humbled and subdued.

    Our young people of today do not know the story but they need to know it. I was young then. I had just graduated from University College Ibadan. The day I finished my last BA degree examination, the car sent by my employers to bring me to my new job was waiting for me in front of the exam hall. By evening, I was a proud person in my new job. That was the way we citizens of the western region lived in those days.

    After graduating, we were immediately ready and able to start supporting the parents who had supported us through school and university and to start helping our younger brothers and sisters to get higher education too. Our life was orderly and sure. We walked the earth with assurance and pride. Then suddenly, the federal plot struck at our region.

    Everything started to crumble all around us. It was awful!

    Leaders of the eastern region should have advised against the attack on our region but they chose to support it. They calculated that our fall would benefit them somehow. Our pacesetter region was overrun and brutalized. At last, in desperation, we the youths of the western region rose in a mighty revolt which shook Nigeria to its foundations.

    And from that time, there followed a series of military coups and military dictatorships going on until 1999. Like the people who had held federal power in 1960-62, the military dictators also destroyed our federal arrangement and replaced it with a strongly centralized arrangement. They created more and more states until we reached 36.

    But that was not their real intention. Local demands for states gave them the opportunity to splinter the country into small weak states that the federal government could easily dictate to.  For instance, claiming that the new small states were simply too small and too weak to hold the assets and development products of the former three regions, (highways, universities, control over export products, etc), they seized all for the federal government.

    They even went as far as to listing our local governments in the Nigerian Constitution and provide that they should deal directly with the federal government – so that the federal government may be able to manipulate them. The federal system we had at independence disappeared and Nigeria became essentially a country ruled by an unruly federal government.

    As things stand today, there is hardly anything the federal government does not interfere in. The Federal Government has stopped some states from building or improving roads, claimed to be the sole controller of all natural resources, taken over taxes paid by companies doing business in the states, marched soldiers into states without any consultation with the state governments, insisted on determining the number of local governments in states, rejected decisions of courts and even used its unlimited power to rig elections across our country.

    The federal government presumes to have the right to sack the elected governors of states and to dictate the minimum wages that state governments will pay to their employees. The federal government is the mighty power behind the culture of corruption that has pulverized Nigeria and wrecked Nigeria’s name in the world. The federal government is the enormous agency that promotes and guarantees poverty in Nigeria.

    The federal government stands in the way of states that are ambitious and eager to fight poverty. If we do not urgently curb the excessive powers and presumptions of the federal government and restore considerable development competence to the federating units of our federation, poverty will rise to such heights that Nigeria will not be able to contain the anger it generates.

    That is why we the citizens of the southwest, as one people, want the Nigerian federation to be restructured without delay. In our regions or states, we can beat poverty and return to a life of progress and prosperity. This is not a selfish demand. All Nigerians will benefit. Nigeria will benefit.

    So, we say to all our Southwestern politicians, governors, federal and state legislators: Pool your energies and influences to get the Nigerian federation restructured now. The present so-called federation is an imposture.

  • We shall miss them all

    We shall miss them all

    A NOSTALGIC feeling pervades the land.

    President Goodluck Jonathan has set up a transition committee to ensure a smooth transfer of power to the Muhammadu Buhari administration, which will take office on May 29. His team will be remembered as a damn good one that failed to perform. Even then, we will miss some key actors in the cabinet.

    I disagree with those who claim that Dr Jonathan never delivered a profound speech in all of his six years. Those off-the-cuff remarks – “I am not a Pharaoh; neither am I a Nebuchadnezzar” – reverberated all over. They won’t be forgotten so soon. Definitely not by those who forced His Excellency to define who a statesman is, those who claim to be statesmen but “talk like motor park touts”.

    There have been speculations about his future. Will Dr Jonathan return to the classroom? Can he still prepare lesson notes and get his slushy presidential palms messed up with chalk? What becomes of those bowler hats and long dresses with glittering golden chains and buttons? They surely won’t be fit for the classroom. Will His Excellency stay in Abuja and retire to his 94.04 hectares Abuja farm, the one with a helipad, a hilltop farm house and crocodiles, among other livestock? Will he just go quietly to Otuoke, the small town he put on the map, and set up a presidential library or a fishing company or a canoe–making company (to promote the family’s age-old trade)? Lucky man; the possibilities are limitless.

    Now that Dr Jonathan is free from it all, one thing seems sure – he will have time for his memoirs. I would like to suggest a title for the work,” Caged – for 16 years.”

    My brother Reuben Abati should, naturally, get the job of editing the manuscript. Being a journalist, lawyer and writer of no mean repute, he will ensure that it is as compelling as any other in its class and free of libel so that nobody will need a court to stop the publication, denying us of the lurid details of how our president was captured and caged for all of 16 years. Who are his abductors? Men? Women? Why did they choose to cage him? How did they cage him? A cage in the lap of luxury? A sure best-seller is on the way. I bet.

    We will miss the First Lady. You may disagree with her style, her brusqueness and her couture, but give it to Dame Patience Jonathan – she surely knows how to wow the crowd. To many, there would have been little or nothing to enliven the polity and trigger a laughter in the Jonathan administration, but for Mrs Jonathan.

    As a dazed world struggled to recover from the shock of the Chibok girls’ abduction, she summoned a meeting that turned into an inquisition at the Villa, scolding everybody, including the principal of the school from which the over 200 girls were abducted.

    “Princepa, is there anybody dat can tell us dey coducted dat ezam; do u come with any? Princepa, na only you waka come? First Lady is calling you now… No…u wia not eform too eh? Ohkay. Kotinew! No ploblem. God will see us. Dia ris God. Dia ris God in everything we ah doin!! Dose blood that are shiarin in Boronu will answer! What of two teachers? WAEC.  Now the first lady is kolli you, kwom, ah wan to hep you! Kom to fine ya child, ya missing child… will you keep quiet? Chai..eh …chai-eh…Dia  ris God o!! Dia ris God, Dia ris God, Dia ris God oh! The blors wia sharing. Dia ris God ohhh … Dia ris God ooooooo.”

    But a colleague said last night that we may not miss Mama Peace for long – if the authorities decide to probe why the rivers of blood in the March 28 and April 11 elections in Rivers State. Mrs Jonathan’s incendiary directive to Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members to stone their opponents, in his view, deserves some insight.

    Dr Ngozi Okonjo – Iweala was one of the stars of the Obasanjo administration . She is credited with securing the Paris Club debt relief that raked up so much controversy concerning who got what commission. To date, the matter remains unresolved. In fact, the popular view is that in her sudden movement to the Foreign ministry – Obasanjo eased her out of Finance – lies the answer. We really don’t know.

    Jonathan brought Okonjo-Iweala back and added to her portfolio the nebulous title of Co-ordinating Minister for the Economy. Under her watch, fuel price went up as she insisted on cutting a non-existent subsidy. Prices went up. Cost of doing business rose exponentially just as cost of living headed for the roof. Companies closed shop as diesel turned gold. Job cuts came in thousands. Due process became “dupe” process.

    The government replied with SURE-P – a dubious programme that consumed so much and delivered so little. Nobody really can tell how much went down the drain in this strange venture under which youths were dressed up in black polo shirts and trousers, drilled like soldiers and sent onto the streets to cause traffic chaos in Lagos.

    The pains became unbearable. But trust the ever inventive minister; she dug into her bag of tricks and whipped out a new formula. Rebasing. Just overnight, the Nigerian economy became Africa’s number one. The criteria were as esoteric as its purveyors, but Nigerians were told to jump for joy. The giant of Africa has risen at last, Abuja said.

    Okonjo wahala will soon leave. She told CNN yesterday that she would like to go on holiday; “no telephone”. I’m happy to report that Nigerians have given her a long, long holiday. We shall miss her modest fashion sense – the conservative headgear, the Ankara fabric and beads – a trait that many have sworn is a camouflage of sort.

    Where is Oil Minister Diezani Alison-Madueke? She has not been seen in town since the PDP lost the election. A little bird told me she is somewhere in the Bahamas where she is gradually recovering from the hangover of the dizzying loss.

    The more she tried to cut the fuel subsidy, the more the scheme became a huge canvass of fraud that attracted all manner of fraudsters, tricksters and gangsters who got paid billions for fuel they never delivered.

    When former Central Bank Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi raised the alarm that some $20b oil money was missing, he was dismissed as an incorrigible alarmist. In fact, he was surreptitiously given the push and derided as a busybody. But fate – that unseen hand in human affairs – supervened. Sanusi is now Emir of Kano.

    A committee set up by Okonjo-Iweala said $10b was actually missing. Accountants who were drafted in to untie the knot claimed that only $1b was missing. The other day we learnt that Mrs Alison-Madueke asked the behemoth, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) to pay the $1b into the treasury, perhaps to close the matter. Just like that?

    Mrs Alison-Madueke will be remembered as our most powerful Oil minister ever. The more her critics cried out that she should be fired, the more entrenched in the system she got, confounding those who doubt the power of women.

    Urbane, suave and ever dandy, Dr Akinwunmi Adesina is  not your run- of- the- mill Agric Minister. Who will forget his sartorial taste, his tokunbo accent and his retentive power. We always wonder whether he is talking about Nigeria whenever he rolls out those figures – the 750,000 metric tons of home grown rice, as of last year, that has not just made us sufficient but has actually become a revolution. So successful was the rice revolution that some companies got waivers to import several tons of the stuff, perhaps to augment the shortfall occasioned by the “stomach infrastructure” policy in many PDP states.

    Adesina will be remembered also for giving us the cassava bread. Will the stuff now be accessed by ordinary Nigerians, many months after it made its debut at the Federal Executive Council and became the favourite on the presidential breakfast table?

    The duo of Doyin Okupe and Femi Fani – Kayode seem to be out of job now.       Does anybody need a character assassin? Nigerians will find it difficult to forget the way they did their jobs as spokesmen for the President and the PDP, jobs that were created ad hominem for them.

    They manufactured a fake medical report for Gen. Buhari. When that failed to stick, they threw up the matter of his education, vowing that the man never went to school. The army- oh, our dearest army – was drafted in to strengthen the doomed scheme.

    Now that Fani-Kayode has enough time on his hands, he will surely drown his sorrows and return to the court where he is fighting the battle of his life against money laundering charges. Now, Okupe will have time to execute that juicy contract in Benue for which he reportedly collected a fortune as mobilisation fee. Fani-Kayode and Okupe will no doubt be missed for being so dramatic, eccentric and shameless while on the beat.

    Only a thin line was left between Musiliu Obanikoro’s ministerial arrogance and gangsterism. If some will forget the disruption of work at Ilubinrin, Lagos, many will surely remember that voice ordering an army general around in the Ekiti poll rigging plot tape.

    Now that Jelili Adesiyan will soon leave office as Police Affairs minister, Senator Isiaka Adeleke should watch it. The honourable minister, you will recall, once promised to beat him up upon leaving office.

    There are so many others who will be sorely missed.

    Who will complete the Centenary City, the one conceived by the committee headed by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Anyim Pius Anyim?  He and the others will surely be remembered for such grandiosity.

    So much for a good team.

  • Difficult task ahead of President-elect Buhari

    Difficult task ahead of President-elect Buhari

    After three failed and agonising attempts, retired Army General Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC) won the recent presidential election with a resounding victory over the incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    It was a well-deserved victory and we should all offer him our congratulations. He waited patiently for 30 years, for the right moment, to regain the power he lost as a military ruler in 1985 when he was ousted by his military colleagues.  Buhari, previously considered locally by many as unelectable, beat President Jonathan by a margin of over 2 million votes of the 28 million votes cast. He won in 16 of the 19 states in the North and five of the six states in the Southwest. As expected, he did poorly in the polls in the Southsouth and Southeast regions both of which were easily swept by Jonathan.

    Buhari won because he ran a strong, determined, courageous and focused campaign, skillfully and brilliantly exploiting the weaknesses and failures of the Jonathan PDP Federal Government. It was a bitter and hateful campaign. The stakes were high. But it was relatively peaceful with only a few regrettable fatalities. And the elections were considered free and fair by both local and international observers. The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) team, particularly Professor Attahiru Jega, its chairman, must be fully commended for their political neutrality in the conduct of the elections. After 16 years of drift under the PDP Federal Government, it was definitely time for change. The electorate decided to vote for change instead of the continuity offered by the PDP that led the nation to nowhere.

    President Jonathan must be commended for his gracious and magnanimous statement, promptly conceding defeat to Buhari. It was a rare display of statesmanship in the annals of Nigeria’s political history for which he will always be remembered. It was the first time in our country that a ruling party had been defeated at the centre. Had President Jonathan disputed the results of the election, political agitators and roughnecks in the PDP would have taken advantage of that to inflict mayhem and violence on the country. By that singular act of conceding defeat to Buhari, Jonathan averted needless violence in our country. We must be grateful to him for his sense of decency and fair play. In victory Buhari too has been gracious. That is the way it should be in a mature democracy.

    Now that Buhari has reached the top of the greasy pole, he must know that our country is gripped by high and rising expectations after a decade of drift. A few days after the election, one could see that business activities have resumed almost fully in the country. There is an air of cautious optimism in the nation about the future. The value of stocks has increased by nearly 25 per cent after the election. There will be renewed confidence in the business community here and abroad about Nigeria’s political and economic future. Investments in the economy that are currently on hold due to economic and political uncertainties will be reviewed favourably. The fact is that despite our current economic difficulties, Nigeria is still the largest economy in Africa with far greater economic potential than any other African country. It should be the first destination in Africa for foreign direct investments. Its middle class is growing faster than that of any other African country as is its population, the largest in Africa. Its work force is one of the best in Africa and the entrepreneurial spirit of its people is unmatched in Africa.

    But the President-elect, Buhari, has to contend with a legacy of grave economic and social problems, such as the prevailing massive public corruption, the mass unemployment, particularly of university graduates, the fall in the price of oil and the consequences of this for the national revenue that has declined by nearly 50 per cent, the Boko Haram insurgency, the continuing threat to public safety and law and order, the rising cost of public administration and the decaying infrastructure, all of which constitute major impediments to our overall economic growth. All these will have to be vigorously tackled by the new Buhari APC Federal Government. It is a tall and formidable order.

    It is unlikely that Buhari will be able to solve all of these formidable economic and social problems in the short period of his four years in office as president in the first instance. And considering his advanced age, he may not be disposed to run for a second term in office by which time he will already be 76. Time is therefore of the essence. He must hit the ground running immediately. There is no time to be wasted. But he will need to prioritise his reconstruction agenda and concentrate on those problems that he can best solve in the time frame of four years. Of these, public order and safety is the most critical for political stability. Next to this is a massive review of our current economic strategy that has grown the economy but has failed to create jobs. Since 1986, we have religiously followed the prescriptions of the World Bank and the IMF in the restructuring and management of our economy. Some success in economic stabilisation has been achieved in this regard, but this was made possible more by the favourable international economic and financial climate, particularly the staggering rise in oil revenue, still the mainstay of the economy. But our economy is still not yet mature. Our efforts to diversify the structure of the economy away from its dependence on oil exports have not quite succeeded, leaving us still utterly dependent on the vagaries of an economy based largely on oil exports and revenue.

    As President, Buhari will need to consider other viable and sustainable alternatives to the existing World Bank/IMF economic and financial strategies that have failed to create the jobs the country needs for its social, economic and political stability. He will need to change the nation’s entire economic management team that, after six years, has simply run out of ideas, and replace it with more imaginative and innovative economic planners and managers. The aim of economic planning in the new dispensation must be strong economic fundamentals in an economy driven largely by the private sector, with the government creating a fair playing ground for all investors. I am thinking here of the Chinese, Indian and possibly Brazilian models. In these three countries, billions of people hitherto stricken by poverty have been pulled out of their misery by an economic strategy that has as its focus the creation of jobs on a massive scale. In less than a generation, the Chinese leaders lifted over one billion of their people (about the entire population of Africa) from poverty into the middle class. They have created the largest middle class ever known in the world’s economic history. This accounts for China’s social and economic stability in recent years. It is not a question of ideology. Rather, it is one of visionary leadership that has been lacking in our post-colonial history. Of course, to achieve this economic revival and growth, public corruption must be stamped out ruthlessly. Without doing so, no economic strategy will work in our country.

    Nigeria needs a strong, effective and competent Federal Government to accomplish all these. But it also needs a compassionate government; one  that will place the welfare and economic well-being of the poorest in our nation above all other considerations, or narrow selfish interests. A nation’s real wealth is not measured by the size of its economy, or its GDP growth rate, or the opulence of a tiny minority of its people, but by the welfare and living conditions of the vast majority of its people. This is no time for political recriminations and rancour. The incoming APC Federal Government and the new PDP federal opposition must work together harmoniously to move our country forward. Failure to do so will be very costly. Unless great care is taken, the large and growing army of the unemployed will constitute a far greater danger to our national security than the Boko Haram insurgency that also has its root in mass poverty.

  • ‘Boy’ George’s empty threat

    Before the March 28 presidential and National Assembly elections, some Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chieftains were so sure of  victory that they ran their mouths. There was nothing they did not say about President-elect Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and his party. Femi Fani-Kayode, the rabble-rouser, was in his element, dishing out lies about Buhari. Fani-Kayode came up with the story  that Buhari does not have a  school certificate. He said his party was putting Buhari to the ‘’strictest proof’’ to show that the president-elect has that certificate.

    ‘’Strictest proof’’ or not, Buhari did not have to break a sweat to prove anything. His school came to his aid by releasing his West African School Certificate (WASC). According to the result, he made Grade 2, but the Fani-Kayodes of this world refused to believe the documentary evidence tendered by the school. Fani-Kayode, Director of Media and Publicity of the Jonathan Presidential Campaign Organisation, claimed that the document was forged, but he could not prove his assertion, thereby rendering it valueless.

    Step in Doyin Okupe, the loquacious doctor-politician, who swore heaven and earth that Buhari will not become president.  ‘’If Buhari wins’’, he said, ‘’call me a bas….’’ Okupe, who is always on the side where his bread is buttered, was not done yet. ‘’The choice before Nigerians in this election is either good luck (making a pun of his principal’s name) or bad luck’’. Going by Okupe’s submission, it is our ‘’good luck’’  as a nation that Buhari defeated President Goodluck Jonathan of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the historic March 28 poll. Buhari won because men are not God; they can only play god but they do not have the power of the omniscient and omnipresent One, who anoints leaders.

    He anointed Buhari and that is why the former Head of State won the March 28 election. APC and PDP went into the contest determined to win and as both parties know only one of them could emerge winner. Since the return to democracy in 1999, PDP has been in the saddle. For 16 years, it has held sway at the national level. Its founding fathers had a dream for the party to be in power for 60 years. It is a good intention but it seems it was  not backed with a plan of action. If there was a plan for the country, the party did not execute it for the 16 years it held power. Can it then benefit from its mistake? Why did it not impress it upon its members, who led the country between 1999 and now,  on the need to execute programmes that would make the party the people’s choice?

    PDP lost the March 28 presidential contest because the people were fed up with it. The party had run out of ideas. It is good to have a concept to be in power for 60 years; but a concept will remain a concept if not backed with plans and programmes for the country’s  growth. Ideas, they say, rule the world. If PDP had bold ideas for moving the nation forward, it would not have suffered defeat in last month’s elections. It had a golden opportunity to turn things round, but it flunked it. Things got to a head under outgoing President Jonathan, who did not help matters because, as it were, he lacked what it takes to reinvent the wheel.

    But we must credit Jonathan for running a good race and for conceding defeat in a sportsmanlike manner. By his action, he nipped in the bud the plan of some people to create crisis. He should remain true to himself to the end by not allowing the hawks in government to use him to foment trouble. The president has acted like a true statesman. He pulled us back from the brink despite the huge cost to his own ambition. If he had played Laurent Gbagbo,  the former Ivorian president who refused to leave office after losing election, only God knows where we will be as a nation today.

    After the 16-year disaster that PDP was, Buhari will be a breath of fresh air on assuming office on May 29. The president-elect knows that he carries a huge burden because the people are looking forward to a magical performance from him. He knows too well that the mission to rescue Nigeria from the 16-year rot of PDP is one that must be won, come what may. His party, APC,  also knows that PDP and its members will not wish it well. The Fani-Kayodes and the Okupes will always be waiting in the wings to run it down no matter the good it does. But no matter what they say, the good the party does will always speak for it. The only way to keep their mouths shut is for the party to concentrate on the job at hand.

    Like Fani-Kayode and Okupe, Commodore Bode George has also been running his mouth. George is still finding it difficult to accept that Buhari has emerged president-elect – about two weeks after the election. George is threatening to go on exile because his party will no longer be in power from May 29. Why does he want to go on exile? Is it because his party has destroyed the economy? Our economy is in doldrums today because of the wrong policies enunciated by the so-called eggheads of the Jonathan administration. So, he should have since gone on exile to protest the bad policies of PDP, which has led the nation thus far. Threatening to go on exile because Buhari won the election is just to draw attention to himself.

    ‘’What will I be doing here? I can decide to go and live anywhere. So, I am not joking about it; what will I be doing here? At 70, what will I be doing here? All we have been doing to restructure the country has been lost. We have been trying to ensure balance in the polity, but all that has gone. What will I be doing here?’’ Is he still around? By the time he returns from exile, he would be shocked to see that things have changed for good in the country.

  • Villains and heroes of 2015 electoral duel

    For conceding defeat after being thoroughly trounced in four of the six geo-political zones by Buhari during the March 28 election, President Jonathan has been acclaimed a statesman. Nothing except his famed goodluck prepared him for an honour reserved exclusively for “politicians and diplomats with long and respected career at the national or international level”.

    His six years in government has been marked by exploitation of our ethnic and religion differences, massive corruption and reign of impunity. But for being shepherded out of office like an elephant in a china shop as a result of tension created by his surreptitious sponsorship of campaign of calumny, hate messages and documentaries, bare faced lies, character assassination, blackmail, PDP stalwarts have been falling over each other to celebrate President Jonathan.

    Tony Anenih PDP (BOT) chairman has asked aggrieved Nigerian politician to emulate President Jonathan who he said “has made an indelible mark on the sands of time’. … Reuben Abati has enthusiastically listed world leaders including   US President Barrack Obama, South African President Jacob Zuma President Alassane Ouattara and Archbishop of Canterbury, Archbishop Justin Webby as some of the world leaders that had called to congratulate Jonathan for his unique achievement.

    But beyond honor so cheaply bestowed on a president who had been cajoled to do what was right and honourable, the real heroes of our 2015 were those who prevented our nations from predicted descent into chaos and turmoil. Leading this group of patriotic Nigerians is Olusegun Obasanjo. He had in what was described ‘a satanic letter’ to his god son asked Jonathan to stop taking “Nigeria and Nigerians for granted, move away from culture of denials, cover-ups and proxies and deal honesty, sincerely, transparently with Nigerians”.

    He then went on to itemise some of the president’s actions, which he believed were injurious to the health of our nation. He cited his reliance on ‘sycophants who he said are ‘wreckers’ and more dangerous than identified adversaries.’ In this regard, he called attention of Nigerians to ‘serious and strong allegation of non-remittance of about $7 billion from NNPC to Central Bank occurring from export of some 300,000 barrels per day, amounting to $900 million a month, to be refined and with refined products of only $400 million returned and Atlantic Oil loading about 130,000 barrels sold by Shell and managed on behalf of NPDC with no sale proceeds paid into NPDC’.

    Nearly everything Obasanjo said came to pass and when the president took refuge under the military to shift the election date, Obasanjo was quick to point out Jonathan’s secret plan to play Gbagbo by refusing to concede defeat. Godsday Orubebe’s tantrums and wild allegations in a futile attempt to disrupt further announcement of the result when it became clear president Jonathan had lost the election was probably part of the script.

    Also deserving of honours are professor Bolaji Akinyemi, who first mooted the idea of the gladiators signing a peace accord; Members of National Peace Committee under the chairmanship of General Abdulsalam Abubakar. Others are Kofi Annah, former UN Secretary General; Emeka Anyaoku, former secretary general of the Common wealth amongst others.

  • Lagosians must reject pdp and its ethnic card

    President Jonathan remains the most divisive president in our nation’s history. In 2011, President Jonathan openly asked non- Yoruba residents in Lagos to join forces to outvote the Yorubas. In 2015, besides the president’s nocturnal meetings with town associations where huge amount of monies allegedly exchanged hands, he appointed ex governor Obi to mobilise Igbos in Lagos. Now the Igbos in Lagos have hearkened to his call. Two weeks ago, they gave block vote to some of their kinsmen to represent some parts of Lagos whose language they can’t speak in Abuja.

    Jimi Agbaje, who has nothing to offer Lagosians beyond his ‘feeling of self worth’, has tried to capitalise on that promising to create a fiefdom for Igbo in Lagos where they will have their own King, a privilege they don’t even enjoy in their own ancestral homes because of their republican nature.

    Now they have dragged the Oba of Lagos into their game of deceit. The Oba, who is the custodian of the culture of his people, has threatened to rain causes on those who work against the interest of Lagos. PDP national body has joined Bode George, Obanikoro, Ogunlewe and Jimi Agbaje who the king claims is his cousin against the king.  There is also a Femi Fani- Kayode, who only two years ago before joining PDP volunteered to lead a battle against any group including the Igbos who dared to lay claim to an inch of Yoruba land.

    The common affliction of Lagos PDP men is opportunism. Ogunlewe and Obanikoro became senators under the dominant party in Lagos and used their ticket to cut deals with the federal government. They don’t even seem to understand that the federal and the state, by our constitution, are coordinates with neither being superior to the other since they both derived their powers from the constitution.  If you think PDP thugs who with the support of police pulled down bill boards, posters and chased motorists off the roads while brandishing broken bottles and knives were ignorant, wait for Jimi Agbaje and some PDP leading lights defend the shameful act on a national television.

    One of them, more out of mischief, in an answer to a question by a Channels Television crew retorted angrily, did Lagos state governor aspirant pay for his posters? The crooked logic is that if Lagos state enjoys a special relationship with one of its parastatal, such concession must be extended to the federal government. If we extend the argument further, then Lagos state should be able to have access to the use of one the air craft’s in the presidential fleet out of which the president sometimes deploys as many as three for political campaigns.

    Or put differently, since The Ports Authority located in Lagos is known to have always made huge contribution towards reelection of all sitting presidents since 1999, Lagos should ask for its own share or resort to self help using thugs like PDP.

    Driven by opportunism and bereft of vision, PDP has nothing to offer Lagos… Besides one or two kilometers of Lagos -Ibadan expressway constructed by Ogunlewe as Minister of Works under Obasanjo at a period it was alleged about N300 billion budgeted for road construction went in to fighting the 2003 presidential election, all we can remember him for was converting party thugs to traffic controllers, which led to clashes and chaos on Lagos road. He was also on record as supporting and encouraging Obasanjo who illegally sat on federal allocations despite court pronouncements.

    Obanikoro’s short stint as Minister of State for Defence was a disaster for Lagos in particular and other Yoruba states in general. Intoxicated by federal power under a Jonathan presidency whose other name is impunity, Obanikoro according to Governor Fashola, used soldiers to stop ongoing public work in Lagos claiming the land belongs to the federal government. He has also been accused of deploying soldiers including some hooded security personnel to intimidate opposition leaders during the Ekiti and Osun governorship elections last year.

     

    Agbaje, who has never managed anything beyond his drug shop, is ill equipped to manage a state as complex as Lagos. Lagosians should troop out in two days time to vote for a party with vision, a party with record of achievements to end the dreams of opportunists bent on playing the ethnic card to cause disharmony in Lagos.

  • Buhari, you do not come to us by chance

    Muhammadu Buhari, you do not come to us by chance. You who have drunk fresh water from an unnamed stream should make history.  I bet you curse providence now or thank it. I bet you wonder why it is that it must carve you so wickedly inwards the way the eclipse comes before that twist in the scenery we all love to talk about and dream about.

    Now you must find a path we both must travel; you must find that proverbial destination we all must arrive, henceforth. You must start a new vision to guarantee the attainment of the old ones laying spent in the doldrums of ineptness and all that conceit, and deceitfulness ever gave.

    Now that you know better, let every smile become the sneer you have learnt to loathe, let every sneer become such incense that would teach your heart to obsess at the crossroads where courage banters with success and progress.

    Today, our dreams are of discord and our talk is of chaos. The cowards that we are have chosen to prevaricate where remedy jostles with perversion for head-space, in the interest of our dying State. But we choose perversion. Would you too?

    Perhaps you have no inkling what turbulence you have been chosen to curtail; do you have any idea what tempests you must ride and conquer?  Perhaps you know not what madness your lot is to contend…the storm is astir Buhari, what can you do?

    Will you become the leader and messiah of our dreams? Will you become the spitting image of predators we have learnt to endure in power? Will you become the proverbial neophyte forever walking in the shadows of enfant terrible tin gods?

    Perhaps you understand not the heart of the matter Mr. Buhari; you do not come to us by chance. You come in the year when old promises stay broken and new promises founder with the breath that utters them.

    You come when the young expect nothing and the old endure forced recall and invocation of pleasures past. You come when we can charm neither logic nor wit to justify what had been taken, stolen and forsaken.

    You come when daylight jostles with our heart’s pulsed reassurance of twilight. You have become Number One citizen at scarcely our finest hour. You come when we perfect the art of decapitation of defenceless mothers, sons and daughters. You come when we master the ‘fine art’ of execution and ethnic genocide.

    You come when fear’s moon flower spreads within the clan. You come when debauchery and bloodlust colours our dawns into devious dusks of gruesomeness and slaughter. It’s a grievous weight you bear, General Buhari, I do not envy you. Given time perhaps I would wish I were you.

    But I do not now, for this brief that you accept confounds me and yet it behoves me to suggest that you remember our official histories of rancour, administrative plunder and death. Remember the histories that afflict our peace and burden our hearts; let them be your guide in your onerous task to hack memorable paths to your own narrative in the pursuit of fresh traceries and histories in the interest of our common good.

    If you can manage to achieve that, your records speak from the shelf a thousand and one years after destiny foisted your leadership upon us. And if you are a disaster like every other before you, your record shall speak from the shelf.

    Tell me, are you the disaster they say you would become. Show us; are you the effeminate struggling to pass as ‘man,’ as circumstances command? It was a brave thing that you did keeping faith in your dream even in the face of random acts of ridicule and violence hauled at you by subhuman elements like Fayose, Fani-Kayode, Faka and company.

    It was about time Buhari that you became our dream. It was about time you actualised our heartfelt wishes; Nigeria deserves more than the impotent wimps and court jesters at the helms of affairs. Now that you have become Mr. President-elect…now, what?

    I wonder if you will get carried away in the euphoria of the moment and so doing, substantiate the fears of wanton alarmists peddling calumny against your Excellency; please do not go the way of outgoing President Goodluck Jonathan and company.

    Please do not turn governance into a bazaar; Nigeria does not need more than 18 ministries to be precise. You know such grey slots I abhor, and our people detest, don’t you?

    Having committed yourself to such gallantry that excited our hearts to sing your praise, do not renounce plaudits we summon from the depths of our hearts.

    Mr. President-elect, you will have to desert the old ways…our corrupt ways. You must deviate from the path of those who played “puppet.”

    You are adjudged to be a man of better breed and character, please do not cross over to the dark side like Jonathan. You must learn from the sad fate of Jonathan; now that you have beaten him silly to the position of Head of State, his cunningness and desperate exploits amounts to nothing; the fortune-hunters that misled him have begun to desert him even after they gobbled the feed with the cart and the left-over. Its four years since 2011 when he took over and our people are passionately retracting heart-felt paternosters they made for his sake; it is only Jonathan out there, I assure you. Please do not go the way of outgoing President Jonathan.

    You have no one Buhari; it’s just you, your actions, inactions, and posterity.

    Mr President-elect Buhari, in a nation of 170 million or more, will you do better? Your first test will be in the appointments that you make; so doing, you will announce to the world what manner of leadership you have to offer. Do not go the way of the outgoing bunch of clueless toddlers who desperately sought to play ‘adult’ to our detriment.

    I hope you are man enough to take charge. I wish you would undo the unforgivable gaffe Jonathan committed foisting damaged policies and men unto our battered state. Shall expired drugs divest the heart of terminal cancer?

    Shall you now rise in high character to act unfettered? Shall you now act enabled by superior manhood to bridge the void that swallows and dampens our lives? Shall you now with calm heart and level head summon and excite the dawning perspective of human good in the interest of Nigeria’s poor, helpless citizenry?

    You see, there is some poetry to your emergence. It is your lot to re-enact the compulsive story of patriotism undiminished, bliss-stung. Shall you now summon and regurgitate that old anguishing virtuosity in the interest of State and those whose destinies listless men you defeated frustrate even as they leave?

    I wish you strength and formidable grace as you divest our fatherland of random vile and madness that became our lot in the wake of President Jonathan’s leadership. It’s never too late to divest our destiny of men and women forever maddened by lust for power and the spoils of phantom projects. I hope you find persons of private virtue, the old-fashioned…post-modern folk who would bow their heads to no blast, and stand unbending to every brute force in the world. And we know that such men and women are yet with us.

    Find them Buhari, if truly you intend to make history.