The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Nigeria’s destructive steps

    Most of the fundamental mistakes that are about to destroy Nigeria have been made by Nigerian rulers as a result of their wrong perceptions of Nigeria. If we can get rid of these wrong perceptions, wrong conceptions, wrong expectations, and wrong steps, we can save Nigeria – and we can make Nigeria a stable, harmonious and prosperous country.

    The most serious mistake is the belief that power (in particular, the power of the Federal Government), if used deftly, vigorously, or violently, enough, can subdue the various peoples of Nigeria and turn Nigeria into a malleable and easily directed country. It is a lie. But it is a lie that the rulers of Nigeria have generally held dear to their hearts and tried relentlessly to use since independence in 1960.

    The record of the use of that lie in the ruling of Nigeria is horrible. From day one after independence, it was obvious to all observers that the Balewa federal administration (formed by an alliance of Northern NPC leaders and Eastern-controlled NCNC leaders) was seriously incensed against the Western Region’s leadership and eager to destroy it. Why? Because the Western Region’s people and their leaders were so independent-minded, so confident of their capabilities, and so achieving on their own. The federal assault, when it came in 1962, devastated the Western Region. But when the Yoruba majority of the Region arose and resisted, they quickly taught Nigeria a powerful lesson – namely, that it is foolish to underrate the toughness of any of the many nationalities of Nigeria. The Federal Government lost control, and some elements of the Nigerian army stepped in and destroyed what remained of the government.

    Meanwhile, in the homeland of the Ijaw people of the Delta, petroleum exploration and mining activities were destroying the people’s livelihood and wrecking their quality of life, all with no measurable concern from the rulers of Nigeria. The Ijaw were a minority nationality, and the Federal Government was therefore not inclined to countenance their experiences or their groans. But then, suddenly, to Nigeria’s surprise, a group of Ijaw youths, led by a youth who was essentially a school boy, arose to make the Ijaw voice heard in shattering terms. The war they started has continued for over five decades. In the face of the enormous powers of Nigeria, and countless military expeditions against their homeland, the Ijaw people are still there and still fighting.

    Major General Aguiyi Ironsi emerged from the first military coup as Nigeria’s first military dictator. He was sure that federal military power could solve all of Nigeria’s problems, no matter what the various peoples of Nigeria thought or desired. For a lot of Nigerians, the existing federalism was not pervasive enough. The minority peoples in the North and East wanted Regions of their own. Ironsi and his advisers, certain that the Federal Government was wiser,and that it had irresistible power to enforce its brand of wisdom, abrogated the Regions and imposed a direction towards a unitary government. His folly soon brought upon us the reward it deserved – unfortunately, taking the lives of millions of innocent citizens among us.The military dictators that followed after him, until 1999, and the so-called “elected” civilian dictators that took over from them since 1999, have taken the use of unrestrained and irresponsible power to hideous extremes. Their heritage is a general Nigerian leadership whose members appropriate all the fruits of our economic life to themselves alone, pushing the millions of the masses of Nigerians into the depths of barbaric poverty and deprivation, as well as into utter hopelessness, insecurity, and intractable conflicts. As things stand today, we do not really have a country left; all we have is a battered and incoherent entity hobbling painfully towards its demise.

    And yet, even as we watch our country dying and our people perishing, the few privileged politicians and their cronies who hold all the power and wealth that belong to us all in their hands, have continued to proclaim by their actions that the government (all governments, but particularly the Federal Government) commands all knowledge and all wisdom. The apical representative of them all, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan (the President or dictator of Nigeria) exudes the know-all confidence of the position that he occupies, the position that encapsulates all the evils that Nigeria’s leaders and rulers have gradually concocted since independence.

    President Jonathan is from the Delta where brave young men have sacrificed their lives for decades in the fight against excessive federal presumptuousness and insensitivity. But, surrounded by all the limitless federal money and unrestrained federal power, he does not, obviously, feel the urgency for change. He has initiated a National Conference, but there is, manifestly, no sign that he seriously intends that the conference will produce serious outcomes. His dominant preoccupation is to win re-election next year, so as to be able to continue for four more years to swim in the status quo with its limitless money and its unrestrained power. Almost certainly, he will make sure that the National Conference does not create changes that can prevent his winning, orthat can rob him of his ruling in the status quo that he has enjoyed so much for over four years. Meanwhile, it does not matter what is happening to 170 million Nigerians out there.

    It is almost trite to say that Nigeria must learn to listen to its many peoples and its millions of citizens. But we who keep saying it must keep saying it. Nigeria can survive and thrive, but only if serious changes occur in the way Nigerian leaders and rulers perceive and conceive their country, as well as in their personal expectations, and if the horrendous mistakes of the past were eliminated.

    Nigerian leaders must listen to their people, must be less arrogant of power, and must be less resentful of the voices of their people. It is not true that the political leaders know all and the people know nothing. Most Nigerians are screaming now for changes that will reduce the power and resources at the disposal of their Federal Government, and that will strengthen the agencies (the state governments and local governments) that are close to the lives of Nigeria’s common people. They are right in insisting that such changes as these will bring development closer to the people and revive their capability to bring some prosperity back into their lives. But, everywhere across Nigeria, the leaders who are preparing to go to the National Conference share the attitudes of the Federal Government. They do not want changes that can rob them of their leaders’ benefits – the benefits that they enjoy today. What they want is that the National Conference will mess around for some months and ultimately come away with nothing important.

    In short, though Nigerian leaders know the consequences of their wrong perceptions of their country, of their peoples, and of their common citizens, and though they know the consequences of their warped expectations and terrible distortions of their country’s life, they are resolved to keep those wrong perceptions, expectations and mistakes going. What all this portends for the future of Nigeria, Nigeria’s leaders and Nigerian citizens, is anybody’s guess.

  • Our gods are not to blame

    Think continuously of those who are truly great, men and women who by their deeds fight for fairness and the good of all; think of those who wear on their hearts’ sleeve and domicile in the inner recesses of their souls, irrepressible zeal to make our lives better and worthy of our dreams …there are no such men and women alive, are there? For if there are, Nigeria would be 21st century version of Eden or Al Jannah; and men and women on whose watch our country so evolves and appreciate would be everything and even gods.

    Our people are quite inane, they wouldn’t know how to create a heaven or sustain the like of it but they create gods by the dozen. I do not speak of divinity that manifests only in far-fetched miracles and dreams; I speak of men and women, boys and girls that we quite desperately and misguidedly deify as our vanities dictate.

    Being rich is the closest you get to being god in Nigeria. Add an impressive root and very intimidating academic record to the mix and you have yourself a 21st century hero or god. Of what calibre are our idols? Who really is the Nigerian god? Who is an example of a quintessential idol? Allison-Maduekwe? President Goodluck Jonathan? Sanusi Lamido Sanusi? Reuben Abati? Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala? Do their deeds make them worthy of hero-worship or blind deification?

    To what would these individuals owe our reverence of them? Some would say it is their brilliance and extraordinary achievements in their chosen callings. Anyone could be brilliant from time to time but intelligence is what we have to affect all of the time. How intelligent are our ruling class? How intelligent is President Goodluck Jonathan? How intelligent is Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala? How intelligent is Sanusi Lamido Sanusi? How intelligent are they and every other character we continue to endure in the Nigerian ruling class?

    The answer lies as much in their utterances as their deeds. Alas! Transcendent moments and heroic acts are rather deeds of an exalted intelligence, something which Nigeria’s incumbent ruling class pitifully lacks. But despite its protests and dissatisfaction with the status quo, the Nigerian citizenry equally lacks that towering immensity of intellect and strength of character that remains prime requirements in the constitution of a progressive race.

    Our lust for heroes and gods illustrates a fable; it is not of latent strength but disintegration rather it reveals the weakness and shallowness of the Nigerian adult’s awfully preadolescent mind. It reiterates a very shrill cry for help that’s at once selfish, infantile and retrogressive. Put precisely, we are incapable of creating such super humans or elements worthy of being called gods of unconditional love and compassion. All we are capable of are gods of impoverishment and gods of war.

    If we are to be judged by what Greek philosopher, Pythagoras, deems the human measure of all things, shall we fare excellently or not? Things have gone on decadently for too long; that is why idiots as fragile as clay toys have evolved into outsized heroes and gods, on our watch.

    The Nigerian hero is a human sound bite. He is essentially a half-formed mammal, animal to be precise. Take for instance gods and goddesses we have created as our ruling class; they are no longer exclusively Nigerian or humane. Rather they have been turned upside-down and inside-out; they have been scrambled, corrupted and fertilized by ghastly manifestations of self love, tribalism, wantonness, perverted education and sense of worth.

    This abnormality is accentuated by the citizenry’s lack of courage and inclination to dither when the situation calls for decisiveness and fearlessness in determining the course of our affairs. “All gods are homemade, and it is we who pull their strings, and so, give them the power to pull ours,” says Aldous Huxley, English writer.

    Truly; the manner in which the Nigerian electorate worships its ruling class and celebrates its mediocrity makes it impossible for the latter to affect the necessary humaneness, tact and humility that are prime requirements of occupants of exalted public offices. Having made super humans of them, they begin to delude that they are untouchable and unquestionable. They begin to parade themselves as gods and see the electorate on whose strength they ascended to their exalted positions as lesser creatures.

    They seek the exaggerated safety and coziness of fortresses they build around themselves to protect their ill-gotten wealth and ostentatious lifestyles. Suddenly it becomes taboo for them to hobnob with the working class. It becomes abominable for their wives, daughters and cooks to visit the same grocer or shop in the same market as the masses.

    Shamelessly, they clear our public coffers of our collective fund without any inhibition and in response; we celebrate them and grovel at their feet for crumbs of what is rightfully ours. Whenever they intrude our world, they leave behind pungent memories and pains. Whenever they come to town, we must be kept in traffic for them to move freely; whenever they are ‘guests of honour’ at our functions, we are treated with little or no honour. Apology to Kayode Oteniya.

    The chief quality of a true leader is the apparent sincerity in his manners. The speeches he makes are never mere platitudinous enterprise and his developmental programmes are never extraordinary elephant projects; his politics and humanity are not only heard but concretely seen and felt.

    Really there is prime merit in everything about him, and his life generally, radiates truth. His life is what we may call a great sober sincerity. A sort of temperate authenticity that is not only blunt but uncompromising. His fervor is undomesticated, bordering on the wild and forever wrestling naked with the elements that be for the love of the good and the truth of things. In that sense, there is something of the savage yet humane in him like all great men.

    He is one in whom one still finds human substance. He relishes no opportunity to tell any colourful story of himself anywhere; usually, he stands bare and grapples like a giant, face to face, heart to heart, with the naked truth of things. ‘That, after all,” according to Thomas Carlyle “is the sort of man for one.”

    And such is the type of man we should value above all others. He is the man who as Norman Mailer, an American writer, puts it, would argue with gods and awaken devils to contest his vision. When he dies, his death would be felt nationwide as something more than a historic calamity; women would weep and men would fight back tears as if they had heard of the death of a very dear friend or Saint.

    The creation of such honorable man and god would be our noblest work. But we seem incapable yet of such honorable task. We could start by stripping ourselves of the greater vanities and portentous contradictions. Unhappy the land that has no heroes, says Andrea; No, unhappy the land that needs heroes, responds Galileo in Bertolt Brecht, late German playwright and poet’s “The Life of Galileo.” Regrettably, the meaning is lost on us all.

  • Interesting times

    Interesting times

    MANY were caught unawares by the President’s whistle-stop tour of palaces in the Southwest last weekend. I wasn’t. The only problem was the oversight – I don’t want to believe it is a deliberate slight – of leaving my beautiful town out of the presidential itinerary. Serene and seductive, Ada in the state of Osun offers a refreshing balm against the chaos of the city.

    Dr Goodluck Jonathan said the visits were private. Not quite, many said. Some swore they were a prelude to his soon – to –be – announced plan to run in the 2015 election. The traditional rulers too have kept their discussions with the President as secret as possible. But, dear reader, today’s column is not about the presidential sorties to palaces. No. There are more urgent matters that are in no way secret but in all ways critical. Grave.

    As Dr Jonathan sought royal endorsements in the politically savvy Southwest – its leading lights could sometimes be naive – the deadly Boko Haram sect was busy in Konduga, a hitherto unknown Borno State village that is now a testimony to the devastating blow that Boko Haram has dealt our military muscle, killing residents and razing homes. No fewer than 106 died. I don’t remember a presidential condemnation of the dastardly act. I guess the President is tired of issuing those statements of consolation- that our hearts are with those who lost their loved ones – and defiance – that we won’t surrender to the Boko Haram terror machine. The sect struck again yesterday in Bama, Borno State. Needless to say, it was bloody. Whichever way we look at it, it is sad that blood, human blood keeps flowing and we all are helpless. So sad.

    Who are Boko Haram’s sponsors? Where are their weapons coming from? What are Nigeria’s neighbours doing to help? Are they collaborators in this long festival of horror? How effective has been the Air Force in this war? Can we in all sincerity claim that our soldiers are well equipped and well motivated? How did it happen that Boko Haram trampled on Konduga for five hours and no help came to the beleaguered village? The insurgents use unconventional tactics, but is that enough to justify the horrific harvest of deaths and broken limbs? We may never find answers to these questions.

    But, it has not all been a bloody affair. Those pushing for the sack of Ms Stella Oduah as Aviation minister carried the day. She got the boot. Now, the woman of exquisite taste has the chance to lash her traducers, those censorious champions of morality who felt N255m was too much to spend on bulletproof cars for the protection of a woman who is not just a minister but a princess. Ms Oduah will now, a source who admires her monstrous but highly maligned airports transformation project said, ride in more expensive cars – to the shame of all those who called her a spendthrift.

    Besides, our amiable lady will have time to think about her memoirs. The work, those who know her closely have said, will be an invaluable companion of first class managers, including those who must learn how to survive in a hopelessly stifling corporate environment that is immersed in both national and domestic politics. A likely title? Well, The odyssey of a Princess.

    Now that President Jonathan has named Brig.-Gen Jones Oladehinde Arogbofa as his Chief of Staff, Chief E. K. Clark and Raypower proprietor Raymond Alegho Dokpesi can catch their breath. Just because some newspapers speculated that Dokpesi was among those being considered for the job, Clark launched into a rage, vowing to ensure that Dokpesi did not get it. Dokpesi fought back, pouring invectives on the old man. It was messy. But then, what else do you get when a high chief is battling to become a chief of staff and a chief is dying to stop him. So much for cheap chiefs.

    The battle of chiefs isn’t the only show in Abuja. Until last week, many thought the national conference was a mere joke. Some, including the sagacious Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, saw it as pure subterfuge in the 2015 battle. To others, it was another chance to get on board the cruise ship for a jamboree. Then, the government announced the financial package for the talk shop –N7billion – and everybody is now struggling to be a delegate. No doubt this will rank among the world’s most expensive talk shows. Long after the delegates must have gone to celebrate their fortune –pot bellies, chubby cheeks and all – Nigerians and their friends will still be talking about the cash that got sunk into this revelry that is expected to resolve this country’s problems once and for all. But then, is talk –any talk – cheap? Ask the mobile telephone firms and their clients.

    Unknown to many, also in Abuja, the centenary anniversary celebration has been on. Not much attention has been paid to this show, perhaps because delegates are not being selected and the per diem not announced as it was clearly proclaimed for national conference attendees. The cash, we have been told, will come from the private sector. Good. Nigerians love shows. A private sector struggling to create jobs and crying like a baby because of the huge cost of doing business – diesel, haulage, duties and others – has suddenly found the cash for Nigeria’s biggest party this year. Secretary to the Government of the Federation Anyim Pius Anyim announced gleefully yesterday that 28 world leaders would join the celebration. What a feat.

    So much for jamborees. Some serious business. Is $20billion oil money missing? Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) says the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) should explain where the cash is gone. Besides, he alleges that NNPC has been hurling cash into kerosene subsidy when there is a presidential directive that it shouldn’t do so. Finance Minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala – many wonder if she is actually ministering onto the economy – says forensic auditors should be called in. NNPC says because the presidential order was not in a gazette, it carried on subsidising kerosene, even as queues for the commodity lengthen at filling stations and prices keep soaring. If at the level of the Finance Ministry we can’t find somebody to do the arithmetic, then we are in real trouble. Besides, the kerosene thing smells like a scam, a highly combustible scam scrounged off the public till. Whichever way the matter goes, Sanusi doesn’t deserve the blows he is getting; he has raised issues of probity. We demand answers. Simple.

    Poor David Mark. The Senate President seems to be confused on the matter of the senators who dumped the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC). The PDP insists that he should declare the senators’ seats vacant. The senators demand that their letter to the Senate be read out, loud and clear, to seal their defection. Mark says the matter is sub judice. Clever guy. There is no way the PDP can force these fellows to stay with it. They are gone – body and soul. A man should be allowed to keep the company he likes. Isn’t this a basic principle of human right? Besides, what is democracy all about if not the right to have a choice and to exercise such a choice anywhere, anytime, so long as the exercise of such a choice does not impugn other people’s rights? A battered wife should get a divorce. More so as there is no demand for alimony.

    It is just about two weeks since Police Commissioner Mbu Joseph Mbu left Rivers State. And the expeditious effect has been so soothing. Not a single shot has been fired at innocent people gathering for peaceful purposes. Projects are being commissioned and governance is back in full swing. Mbu, a garrulous officer who brooks no criticism, became part of the crises of power and suspicion in Rivers. The more he proclaimed his professionalism, the deeper he got immersed in the murky waters of politics.

    Now that those who wanted him out have their prize, Mbu should spare a thought for his future. I assure him Abuja is easier to police. There is little politics. The Federal Capital Development Authority (FCDA) will find Mbu useful in enforcing the much abused Abuja master plan. He will also be busy chasing vendors off the street in the day and laying ambush for women of easy virtue in the night.

    From the Boko Haram madness, unnecessary revelries and hazardous economics to political complexities, one fact is clear: we are in interesting times.

  • Sanusi vs nnpc: governance through delegation by abdication

    In A Multi ethnic nation where the dominant ethnic groups and their political leaders try to outwit each other using the minority as pawns to guarantee their hold on to power and where the leadership of the minority group often behave like a woman with three husbands to the detriment of their impoverished people on whose behalf they pretend to flirt, I really don’t see anything wrong in president Jonathan motor of ‘if you don’t trust others, how do you expect others to trust you?’ I think the problem is not this politics of subterfuge, but the president penchant to delegate and abdicate responsibilities to those who we now know are not driven by altruism.

    For President Jonathan, his trusted friends can hardly err. They are beyond reproach. If perchance they, either as governors or ministers are involved in what , Augustus Aihkomu, Babangida.s vice, termed ‘misapplication of funds’ as against misappropriation, and got indicted by the judiciary or house committee probe, they will be given a presidential amnesty to enable them, in the words of Doyin Okupe, ‘continue to contribute to the development of their nation’. The president is therefore slow to action no matter the degree of malfeasance of his trusted friends such as Petroleum minister Alison Maduakwe, and NNPC Andrew Yakubu the Nigeria new oil wizards and the minister of Finance who often talks and acts as if she is doing Nigeria a favour by climbing down from World Bank to be our minister of Finance.

    The president shields his friends .That the petroleum ministry, PPPRA presided over the theft of about N1.7 trillion, that Okonjo Iweala paid those who in the words of Audu Ogbe, a former PDP chairman, never imported a bottle of fuel’, even after arrogantly telling Nigerians she needed to pay those who imported fuel on behalf of government, that Otedola was culpable for inducing Lawan Farouk with bribe, count for little because they are the president trusted friends.

    Sanusi Lamido, the outgoing CBN governor is not one of the president trusted friends. This is why I think his current crusade against the president men which started with a private memo to the president blowing the whistle about unremitted 49.8 billion dollars to the federation account was initially ignored. When the letter was finally leaked to the press after three months, an irritated president was alleged to have tried to force Sanusi to resign.

    A reconciliation meeting of CBN, NNPC and ministry of petroleum later confirmed #10.8 billion was ‘unreconciled’ according to Ngozi Iweala, the finance minister. The Minister of Petroleum, Mrs. Deizani Alison-Madueke, and the NNPC Group Managing Director, Mr. Andrew Yakubu claimed the original 10. 8 billion dollars which was the shortfall they admitted existed as at July 2013 was spent as follows: NNPC withheld 8. 76 billion dollars for subsidy, 0. 4599 billion as holding cost of strategic reserve and 0.761 billion as pipeline crude oil and product losses.

    But Sanusi insists such expenditure without appropriation by the national assembly was illegal. Besides, the Yar Adua administration having discovered the whole kerosene claim was a scam had by a memo signed by his Principal Secretary, Mr. David Edevbie on June 15, 2009 given a directive to stop the so called subsidy on kerosene. Sanusi presented evidence of the directive. The petroleum minister however has no counter directive even from president Jonathan .Trying to pass the buck; she said she wasn’t a minister in 2009 as if government is not continuity. She then hazards a guess. Those who flouted the directive probably did so because according to her kerosene is for the use of the poor.

    Her argument ignores the fact that the subsidy was stopped by Yar Adua because it was discovered if anyone was benefitting from the scam call kerosene subsidy, it was the marketers and government officials and not the poor. And to further demonstrate the arbitrariness of that president has delegated power to, the minister said Yar Adua’s directive was never gazeted. It will appear under Jonathan presidency, trusted ministers can unilaterally decide initiate and implement policies, and flout presidential directives because they are not ‘gazeted’ and move on to spend 8 million dollars a day on phantom subsidy.

    But The CBN was not done. He has further claimed that 20 billion dollars was yet to be accounted for. The Coordinating Minister for the Economy Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, has at the Senate Committee on Finance hearing on the alleged missing 20 billion dollars also admitted there ‘is ‘a puzzle over unremitted funds to the CBN’ which she would like an independent forensic audit to resolve. “Our judgment is that a proper examination of these documents requires technical expertise beyond the capacity of the reconciliation team.”Therefore, we believe we should have an independent forensic audit to manage these submissions,”

    But not too long ago NNPC and the supervising ministry of petroleum said Sanusi as a banker lacked the capacity to understand accounting processes. Suddenly we are been told there is a need for a forensic expert to trace humongous 20billion dollars.

    The chairman of the committee, Ahmed Makarafi, has even added another dimension. Apart from the forensic audit by the reconciliation group, he said that the committee would reconvene on Feb. 20 to enable the Attorney General of Federation to give a legal advice on the issue.

    But what has become apparent so far is that the president trusted friends spent over N500 billion within four years purportedly on kerosene which was hardly available at filling stations and if when available sold for about N150 as against government N50 controlled price. For over four years the government appeared impotent unable to meet the demand of consumers or sanction those who sell above the advertised subsidised rate.

    The president burden is immense. But I am not sure if delegation by abdication and seeking refuge in church can lighten the president burden. Last Sunday following the massacre of about 109 of our compatriots by those who are probably not Nigerians in the besieged Bornu state after the initial killing of 52 innocent Nigerians and an ambush of eight soldiers all within one week, the commander in chief was in RCC church in Banana Island Lagos, to thank Christians for their prayers, claiming it would have been worse but for their prayers and that of other Nigerians. Our revered pastor Adeboye prophesied that Nigeria would be great. Of course there is perhaps no other time our nation needs more prayers and prayers warriors than now, but I think it will be more symbolic if we try to identify more with our suffering brothers by carrying the crusade to their besieged cities and villages.

  • International relations in historical perspective – 5

    It was in the anti-colonial environment of a cold war and bipolarity in world affairs that the process of decolonisation gathered momentum. America traditionally had been opposed to colonialism, with the exception of the aberrant behaviour of the conquest of Spanish territories in Cuba and the Philippines in the 1890’s. America’s anti-colonialism has been demonstrated since their intervention on the world stage from the time of James Monroe in the 1820’s through the time of Woodrow Wilson to the time of F.D. Roosevelt. Their opposition to Franco-British intervention in the Suez Canal in 1956, during the presidency of the 34th president of United States, Dwight David Eisenhower (1890-1969) was in tune with their opposition to propping up the old Empires of Britain and France. Throughout the Second World War American policy makers had left the British in no doubt that they would strenuously work for the dismantling of the old Empires. The existence of colonial empires, the Americans reasoned, contributed to the outbreak of wars. America also wanted to occupy the high moral ground in their titanic struggle with the Soviet Union. Both the United States and, ironically their foe, the Soviet Union were committed to a policy of decolonisation for different reasons. America was driven by anti-colonial idealism fundamental to the origin and evolution of the United States itself but for Soviet Russia, right from its foundation by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870-1924) anti-imperialism was an article of faith because Lenin believed that all wars were imperialistic wars fought for carving out the world into markets as a result of not knowing what to do with surplus production and primitive accumulation of capital in the highly industrialized countries. Whatever may be the reasons for support of the liquidation of the European Empires in Asia and Africa, the nationalist leaders of these areas exploited the situation to their countries’ advantage in the traditional European fashion of power politics and national interest.

    By 1947, beginning in India and ending in the 1970s the Europeans lost their colonial empires in Africa and Asia and by 1990 the remnant of colonial empires in Africa notably Namibia was freed. The biggest prize, South Africa, has been freed from institutionalized policy of racial discrimination and apartheid. She has since joined the civilized world under a non-racial majoritarian democratic regime. This happy ending could never have been achieved but for the determined effort and struggle of independent African countries joined by other progressive forces in the world notably in the Socialist countries and the Scandinavia. The United States policy oscillated between support for justice, benign neglect and what in the Reagan years was called constructive engagement which was a euphemism for support of racist oppression in South Africa.

    One can look at events during this period from reactive and active perspectives. the African saying that when two elephants fight it is the grass that suffers guided the actions of many Afro-Asian and Latin American countries at this time. The point was that no developing country wanted to be caught in the middle of the struggle for hegemony between the Capitalist West and the Communist East. This was why many countries in this group embraced the policy of non-alignment. This was a policy based on self-interest. It was, of course, not a policy of neutrality in the traditional sense of steering clear at all times of political engagement.

    Non-alignment meant that decision of which side to take would be based ideally on sovereign assessment and high moral principles and not on political expediency or ideological preference. This was the Theory. But in practice many of the non-aligned countries took pro-soviet positions in international politics. There were reasons for this. The stridently anti-colonial propaganda of the socialist countries was very alluring and attractive. In practical terms, the socialist countries demonstrated their support by supplying weapons and instructors for the various liberation movements particularly in Southern Africa. The socialist countries were also more prepared to offer financial and technical aid to independent African countries. The apparently great industrial strides made by the socialist countries, particularly the Soviet Union through the five-year development plans easily recommended itself to the African countries. Capitalist mode of development with emphasis on individual capital was regarded as inappropriate since indigenous individual capitalists were few and far between and the foreign capitalists were only interested in extractive industries rather than investing in consumer oriented labour intensive industries. Because the problem of youth unemployment was one of the greatest problems that the newly independent countries had to face, they found the ‘full employment’, characteristic of the commandist and centrally planned economies attractive. The example of India’s embrace of centralized planning based on five year programmes was copied by most African countries during their first decades of independence.

    Furthermore, the will to be different from the brutal collectivisation of agriculture in the Soviet Union and the free-for-all land alienation by a few in western countries underpinned the economic basis of non-alignment. Non-alignment was a policy based on high moral ground. Its founders Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964) of India, Ahmed Sukarno (1901-1970) of Indonesia, Marshall Josip bros Tito (1892-1980) of Yugoslavia, General Abdel Nasser (1918-1970) of Egypt, Kwame Nkrumah (1909-1972) of Ghana, cleverly assessed the international situation and decided that it would be unwise of them to allow their countries to get sucked into the life and death struggle for mastery of the world. Non-alignment gave these leaders the feeling of some relevance. Their friendship and support were courted and sought by the leaders of the West and the East.

    In reality, all the great events of the 20th century have been resolved without the input of the non-aligned nations. We can recall, for example, the Berlin blockade of 1948, the Hungarian rebellion of 1956, the Berlin air lift of 1961 and, most importantly, the Cuban crisis of 1962. For the first time, since the advent of nuclear weapons, the United States and Soviet Russia faced each other over the America’s blockade of Cuba over Soviet Russia’s missiles in Cuba. The world stood at standstill until Soviet Russia’s premier Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (1894-1971) blinked, when he realised his policy of adventurism and brinkmanship, left the young president John Fitzgerald Kennedy (1917-1963) no alternative than to risk nuclear war. Other events in which the non-aligned nations were marginal include the spring revolution of Czchekoslovakia of 1968, the resolution of the Vietnam war, the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, the coming down of the Berlin wall, the collapse of communism in Russia itself, the disintegration of Yugoslavia, and the collapse of the apartheid regime in South Africa. In terms of Realpolitik the non-aligned movement has been rather tangential in the politics of the modern world.

    •Concluded

  • Nigeria: Learn this lesson and survive

    Nigeria could soon break up. As things stand today, if anybody thinks that Nigeria is not about to break up, he is deceiving himself. I don’t mean secession by this or that nationality. I mean actual dispersal of Nigeria’s many nationalities. Anybody who takes time to observe all the quiet goings-on in the political life of our country now can easily see it. It is self-evident; it is not rocket science.

    But I believe that Nigeria can be saved – that Nigeria can survive, and go on from there to prosper in the world. The country called India offers us a very useful lesson. If we learn that lesson and use it, we can save our country.

    First, here is the background. India was, like Nigeria, created by the British. It was the largest British protectorate in Asia – in the same way that Nigeria was the largest British protectorate in Africa. Both Nigeria and India contain very many nationalities (otherwise known as “linguistic nations” in India) – Nigeria contains nearly 300 nationalities, India about 2000. At the independence of India in 1947, India was a “federation” designed by the British overlords. The British had created the Indian Federation merely for “administrative convenience”; the states or federating units of the federationwere arbitraryblocks territories based on administrative convenience – without any deference to the nationalities. The nationalities were grouped or split irrationally.

    Like the India of 1947, the Nigeria of 1960 (at independence) was also a federation designed by the British for administrative convenience – without deference to the nationalities. The nationalities were grouped arbitrarily into three Regions, and some nationalities were split up along the boundaries of the three Regions. When many nationalities cried out against this irrational treatment, the British rulers answered that they were not willing to change anything – and that Nigerians themselves could tackle the problem after independence. Since independence in 1960, the Nigerians (civilian politicians and military dictators) who have controlled the powers of the Federal Government, have just followed the example of the British – by creating states for administrative and ulterior political considerations, and by irrationally grouping and splitting our nationalities. Therefore, the Nigerian federation of 2014 is, unfortunately,still almost exactly like the Indian federation of 1947.

    Worse still, as Nigerian rulers have created smaller, weaker and poorer states, they have reasoned that these states are too weak to hold much power or responsibility, and they have consequently grabbed all power, all resources, and all resource control in our country, and heaped everything in the hands of the Federal Government. The Federal Government has therefore become a sick and unrestrained monster, mud-swimming insanely in limitless power and money, barging into everything and anything according to its whims and caprices, dragging all efficiency down, generating corruption, distorting electoral and judicial processes all over our country, and breeding hideous poverty. With the poverty grew crimes, insecurity, various species of conflicts, and now, terrorism. Today, most Nigerians have had enough – and Nigeria is about to implode.

    Parts of India (the far northern provinces which became Pakistan and Bangladesh) broke away soon after 1947. After that, the rest of India continued to shake; many nationalities wanted to break away. Today, Nigeria is shaking, and many nationalities want to break away. But Indians took action and saved their country. We Nigerians can save Nigeria too – simply by doing what the Indians did.

    Here is what the Indians did. Many Indians began to advocate that their federation should be restructured in such a way as to show respect to the nationalities, and make the nationalities happyto be members of the Indian federation. Most of the biggest politicians opposed this, claiming that it would only lead to the breaking up of the country. The Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, threatened that if it was adopted he would resign. But the proposal grew more and more popular, more andmore intense. Finally, by 1953, the country accepted it. Nehru did not resign. A National Commission was set up to look into the matter and to advise the country.

    The Commission recommended the following: First, that the nationalities should be respected, and that no nationality should be split by any boundary in the federation. Secondly that the larger nationalities should each form a state. Third, that the small and contiguous nationalities in various parts of the country should negotiate among them and form states (no nationality was to be pushed into any state; the nationalities that agreed to form a state would negotiate the constitution of their state, thereby respecting the integrity and rights of every nationality). Fourth, that a lot of powers should be devolved to the states from the Federal Government to make the states strong, and that, in revenue allocation, the states should receive much more than the Federal Government.

    The process of devolution resulted in the following list of “exclusive” powers for the states: public order; police; education; local government; roads and transport; agriculture; land and land revenue; forests; fisheries; industry and trade; state Public Service Commissions; and Courts (except the Supreme Court of India).It also laid down a”Concurrent List”, on which the states and the center wouldboth have power to make laws. This list includes criminal laws and their administration; economic and social planning; commercial and industrial monopolies; shipping and navigation on the inland waterways; drugs; ports; courts and civil procedures. The Federal (or Union) Government was given powers over such subjects as defence, foreign policy, inter-state commerce, the Supreme Court, etc. In revenue allocation, the states were given a percentage much larger than that of the Federal Government. Today, it is 85% for the states and 15% for the Federal Government.

    An Indian scholar and statesman, S.D. Muni, has described the effects of this careful restructuring as follows: “The elaborate structure of power devolution has combined with the linguistic basis of federal unity to facilitate the management of cultural diversity in India and to help mitigate pulls towards separatism and disintegration”. Muni adds thatboth at the federal and state levels, Indians are dedicated to “a consciously followed approach to preserve and promote the cultural specificities of diverse groups”, and that that “has helped such groups identify with the national mainstream”. Finally, the health of the whole structure has been greatly helped by the fact that Indians have consciously remained loyal to the integrity of their democratic institutions and to democratic politics.

    That is it. Surely we Nigerians are able to take these same steps and save our country. In the coming National Conference, we should restructure our federation along the same lines. We should establish effective measures for upholding democratic politics in our country, the integrity of our elections, and the handling of our public accounts. These steps will surely benefit our country, our states, our nationalities, our institutions, and all of us Nigerians. They cannot conceivably hurt any Nigerian nationality or group. Therefore, hopefully, no Nigerian nationality or group will, at the National Conference, put up a resistance to them. I fear that if any nationality or group resists these measures at the National Conference, Nigeria might quickly evaporate on the spot. I fervently hope not.

  • Stella Oduah’s swan song

    LIKE her predecessors, she came to office with her people, who she planted in key areas of the aviation sector. These moles were are ears and eyes. They were the ones doing the dirty jobs for her whenever the need arose. She came on board as Stella Ogiemwonyi, but in no time, she dropped her marital name for her maiden name. Nothing bad, you would say, since she had become estranged with her husband.

    But that should have told us something about the former aviation minister. It should have told us that with her at the helm, the sector will not grow. Some seem to think that it grew under her watch because of what they call the fanciful changes she made at the terminals. But, I beg to disagree. What are these changes, which some writers have already dubbed as ”cosmetic”. They are the remodelling of 22 airports nationwide. It is good for our airports to look beautiful from outside, but the real beauty of those facilities lies in their working seamlessly.

    By this, I mean getting the airports to function as airports, with little or no delay of passengers. As minister, Princess Oduah was less concerned about that, she was more concerned with using the airports to her own advantage under the guise of serving the national interest. Little wonder that she ran into trouble with experts in the sector. She also got into trouble with the House of Representatives Committee on Aviation because of her pomposity.

    She was full of herself, yet she knew nothing about aviation. Perhaps, since she is into oil and gas, she must know something about Jet A1 , the aviation fuel, which planes use. Besides that, I do not think that she is that conversant with that beat. All she needed do as minister was to look for those with the technical know how to guide her. Rather than do that, she elected for those who worked with her on Neighbour2Neighbour (N2N), one of the groups, which campaigned vigorously for President Goodluck Jonathan’s election in 2011.

    As the face of N2N, Oduah was all over the place, spending money as if it was going out of fashion and many of those in power were ever ready to lend a hand. Some National Assembly members were not left out in the binge. These lawmakers benefited heavily when Oduah became aviation minister on July 2, 2011. Assessing her tenure appears difficult because there is nothing tangible to point to as her achievement, except, if you like, the remodelling of airports, which she solely undertook.

    The money for the project, according to those who should know came from the Bilateral Air Services Agreement (BASA) fund, which had accrued over the years, ever before she became minister. The fund is in the care of any serving aviation minister and the person can do whatever he or she likes with it. If the person decides to plant flowers in all the nation’s airports with the money, so be it since he is the alpha and omega as far as the money is concerned.

    Oduah had a field day, spending the money on beautifying airports, which failed to serve the purpose they were built for. What is an aviation minister for when airlines treat passengers shabbily? What is an aviation minister for when the regulatory agencies cannot do their jobs the way they should? What is an aviation minister for when security remains porous at the airports despite their so-called aesthetic beauty, which is making some people swoon over her? Last month, some experts gathered in Lagos to dissect the aviation sector under Oduah’s watch.

    Their verdict was an indictment of the sector. They said the heat generated over the N255million bullet proof cars bought for Oduah by the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) was a tip of the iceberg when looking at the rot in the sector. The sector, they said, was in bad shape and needed a surgical knife. It seems their prayers were answered, with the sacking of Oduah last Wednesday. Before her sack, she was planning, among others, to make Aero Contractor the national carrier, without considering the implications for the economy. She had tidied up things before the hammer fell on her. We pray that her predecessor will not make the mistake of going that way.

    At the Aviation Round Table (ART), the president of Sabre Travel Network, Mr Gbenga Olowo, advocated that three airlines be designated as flag carriers, adding that they should have a combined fleet capacity of at least, 30 aircraft, which should be expanded to 50 in three years. He described as ”fundamentally flawed” Oduah’s plan to designate Aero Contractor, in which the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) has 60 percent equity, as national carrier. ”Such an airline with limited capacity and weak structure cannot compete favourably in the increasingly competitive global industry”, he said.

    Former Managing Director of Nigeria Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) Rowland Iyayi lamented that the NCAA cannot meet its oversight responsibility and sufficiently train its technical personnel. Yet, Oduah spent over two years in office and saw no need to address this critical issue. Iyayi said : ”Airlines are not making profit because the fabric of infrastructure in the industry is not yet what it should be. Even aviation fuel is taxed by the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria (FAAN).

    ”Even the NCAA cannot pay its bills to carry out a thorough oversight of airlines. Imagine airlines paying the travel bills of NCAA aircraft inspectors, who travel abroad to inspect aircraft. It appears to me that the NCAA is completely docile. The NCAA has to fight to get its autonomy because the law provides for that”. But can the NCAA lift a finger when its leadership is at the beck and call of the minister? Isn’t it the same agency that cannot pay its bill that bought two armoured cars for Oduah for N255million? With her exit, it will be interesting to know where these cars are now.

    Oduah could not have done

    more than she did at the

    aviation ministry. She was not equipped for the job; she was put there as compensation for her role in the president’s election in 2011. This is a sad commentary on our nation, which is so blessed, but yet goes for its third eleven in manning key political posts. She should have been sacked long before now having realised that we put the wrong foot forward in posting her to that ministry. Oduah signed her sack warrant during what she called a Stakeholders’ Buy In on her pet aviation master plan.

    She spoke as if the aviation ministry was her private property at the event held in Lagos between January 26 and 29. Thinking that the controversy over the armoured cars had died down, she thundered before a bewildered audience : ”Those who say this minister is going, their nightmares have just begun. This minister is going nowhere. I am your minister today; I am your minister tomorrow…” And her proteges clapped wildly to cheer her on. Perhaps, she meant to say : I was your minister yesterday. By the way, what happened to her claim that she was shot at in her car in the heat of her probe over the armoured cars? Are the police still investigating the case? Yeye dey smell.

  • True meaning of freedom

    True meaning of freedom

    Continued from yesterday

    There is another freedom, only recently recognised-economic freedom, not less valuable than any of those mentioned. It is the freedom of the whole people from the oppression of poverty, of illiteracy, of hunger, of hopelessness, of ignorance, of a degrading environment, destructive of happiness, prolific of misery. As Adam Smith, the great British classical economist once observed, ‘No society can flourish and be happy, of which the far greater part of its members are poor’. In Nigeria today, 70 per cent of its citizens live below the poverty line of two USD per day. It is the love of power, the extension of state power, the abuse of power, the greed and avarice of the ruling class, that is the source of wide spread poverty, misery and social abuse in Nigeria. In general, the strong have a tendency to abuse their power, particularly in a poor country, such as Nigeria. All governments have a tendency to extend their power, a hidden hankering after absolute power, which all political progressives must resist. They must seek to protect the weak against the strong, and the subject against the ruler. In other words, the political progressives, or liberals, have a duty to lead the resistance against any form of absolutism or personal rule. Where there is corruption in public life, the people cannot be truly free as freedom will cease to have any significance for them.

    Now, how has Nigeria faired in maintaining or promoting these freedoms? First, let us consider the idea of freedom from foreign control. We are rid of colonial rule, but this has been replaced by indirect rule by foreign big businesses, the corporate behemoths, and the ubiquitous foreign creditors which, with the active support and connivance of the World Bank and the IMF, now determine the economic fate of the poor countries. In other words, formal colonialism has been replaced by the informal one of globalisation under the direction of the old colonial Western powers. And the global economic objectives of these powers are being actively promoted by local agents tied to the WB and IMF, who also retain in the poor countries so-called ‘country directors’ to ensure that western economic interests are fully protected, and that they override local economic interests. So, our freedom from foreign rule has proved illusory. The foreign powers are still in charge through their foreign economic agents and their local collaborators. Our impressive statistical economic growth has not translated into more jobs or a better quality of life for the poor. It is our rulers and the rich, like the foreign predators, who garner the material reward of any economic growth.

    Then, how have we faired with regard to constitutional freedom? The truth is that since independence in 1960, there has been a massive erosion and decline of personal freedoms in this country. For nearly half of the post-independence era, Nigeria was under military rule during which all personal freedoms were simply abrogated. Under duly elected civilian governments personal freedoms have not faired any better. General elections are blatantly rigged, thus denying the electorate of its freedom of choice. Even the political parties lack internal democracy. Their candidates are usually selected, not elected. State power, through the security forces, particularly the police, has been used to curtail personal freedoms in this country. The police often act outside the constitution to harass, intimidate, demonise, and terrorise citizens even when they have not broken any laws. The security agencies have become the instruments used by the state to deny its citizens of their personal freedoms. The freedom of association is being denied the people by the police for partisan political reasons and objectives. The right of the citizens to full protection and security by the state has been under massive assault by religious extremists, often with the connivance of the local authorities.

    As for economic freedoms, the right to employment, to equal economic opportunities, to a decent environment, to a good infrastructure, to such social services as access to good education and health care, Nigeria has faired very badly, way below its full potential. It is the reason that a large number of skilled Nigerians emigrate abroad, to escape poverty at home. The prevalent massive public corruption has undermined the economic and social rights of the people. Every kobo of public funds stolen by public officials makes the people poorer and deprives them of their inherent right to a decent standard of living, to security, the main purpose of the state. Except the rich, every man, woman, or child in Nigeria suffers from such massive public theft.

    How have we faired with regard to religious freedom? This is a delicate question, as religious freedom is both the most fundamental of all freedoms and the most difficult to defend. It is the most fundamental because all other freedoms depend ultimately on religious freedom. In our religion, whatever it may be, we express out total being, our reaction to the universe. In its essential nature, it defines our world-view, and determines our values. This is why people cling tenaciously to their religion; it is their way of life, the only spiritual succour they have. If asked to choose between dying for their religion or their nation, most people, except those with no religion, will prefer to die for their religion. Abandoned by the state and out of desperation, the poor and needy in Nigeria flock to the mosques and churches where they are again ruthlessly exploited by unscrupulous clerics who control their lives completely in the name of religion. Down the ages, people have fought and died for their religion, whether Islam, Christianity, or Judaism. In Nigeria, there have been some direct and indirect efforts to use state power to promote one religion or the other. But as we have seen in the Arab world, where sectarian conflicts even among the Moslems have erupted, it is a futile effort as no people will accept any attempt by the state to force them to change their religious way of life. Nigeria is a multi religious state in which the freedom of all religions must be guaranteed and respected by the state to avoid future religious conflicts. The state must be even handed when dealing with religious affairs.

    What, then, can we as a people do to re-gain our freedom, our fundamental human rights? The German philosopher, Karl Marx, once stated that man was born free but was everywhere in chains. The fact is that man has always and everywhere had to struggle for and maintain his freedom. In Nigeria, some people have openly called for a revolution. But it is these same people, some of whom have worked for and profited materially from corrupt governments, who, by their action, actually make a populist revolt unlikely. It is they who have made our people poor, docile, servile, and indifferent to the assault on their freedom. At the moment, despite the prompting, there is little or no sign of the willingness of the people to enter into such a struggle. The people are already tired from the strains of social and economic deprivations imposed on them by their rulers and their collaborators. As a result of this weariness and poverty, they are inert and not inclined to go looking for more trouble. Besides, it is the middle class that can trigger off such a rebellion. Historic revolutions in France, Britain, the United States, Russia, China, and Cuba were led by the middle class in all those countries. But where is such a middle class in Nigeria today? If it exists at all, it is part of the problem and not the solution, for it has no soul. It has compromised itself and abandoned its moral responsibility to the people for the good life.

    All the freedoms outlined in this article are vital for the stability and future harmonious progress of the nation. They must not be trampled over. It is the primary duty of the state to protect them. That is not the case now. These are some of the basic issues that the forthcoming National Conference should address itself to. Writing a new constitution for Nigeria will not necessarily make it a better country. What will make it a better country is the respect of the state for the freedoms I have outlined in this article.

  • Who’s your daddy? (2)

    God will not do for the Nigerian “faithful;” salvation lies at the feet of the “daddy.” Thanks to “daddy,” heaven now lies in “spirited” hoopla, the ones they have learnt to tout as soul food; there’s bliss to be had in “miracles” and terrifying hypocrisies.

    “Daddy” knows how dumb his believers are. A simple lust remains their woes; he knows, thus his desperation to milk their gullibility even as he legitimizes their unarticulated sinful lusts. The problem of the Nigerian faithful is a problem of intellect. The virtue of understanding, which connotes the beauty of mankind has given place to that fount of all ugliness, unquestioning humility.

    It doesn’t matter the age, learning, wisdom and status of the Nigerian believer, the spirit of inquiry has died in him under the untiring energy and superior powers of the “daddy.” As you read, the Nigerian faithful sinks, without demur, to his place at the bottom of a new pseudo-religious and economic system that consciously shuts him out to any philosophy of life except that advanced by his “daddy.”

    The values of humaneness, knowledge and experience are calculatingly stifled in him to prepare him emotionally and psychologically for the doctrines of passive submission embodied in the newly evolved faith by the “holy daddy.” This conquest of the Nigerian faithful is evocative of the triumph of racist aristocrats and slave masters of old that realized the usefulness of religious propaganda and joyously aided it controlling their slaves within certain bounds.

    As it was during the period of tribulation, repression and degradation of the African slave in colonial captivity, religious practice tends to emphasize the elements of the believer’s character which lays him bare thus making him a valuable chump and meal ticket of “daddies.”

    Twenty first century faith according to the “daddies,” encourages the faithful to affect unquestioning humility. It seeks to degenerate moral strength into “moral” submission; while it consciously remodels profound human appreciation of simplicity into an infinite capacity for covetousness and materialism.

    The Nigerian faithful, in pursuit of his often elusive joy and right to prosperity, eagerly seizes upon the offered conceptions of the “grace,” “extraordinariness” and “holy spirit” of his “daddy” who excites and enables his lust for materialism. This deep religious perversion, painted so beautifully by the “daddy” according to his gospel of the “living faith” breeds, as all fatalistic faiths do, the pathetically vain and idiotic, side by side with the sensualist. Shock and grief perhaps most clearly depicts the peculiar ethical paradox that faces the Nigerian faithful today.

    With the exception of the purportedly high and mighty aristocrat and upper middle class, the Nigerian faithful dwells in an atmosphere in which his rights and dearest ideals are being trampled upon. He lives in a society in which the public conscience has grown deafer to virtuousness, and that all reactionary forces of prejudice, greed, and revenge are daily gaining new strength and fresh allies.

    Conscious of his impotence, and heartfelt pessimism, he often becomes bitter and vindictive; and his religion, instead of worship becomes a complaint and a curse, a wail rather than a hope, a mockery rather than a faith. Apology to W.E.B Dubois. On the other hand, the self-righteous “daddy” and vendor of faith, shrewder and keener and more twisted too, see in the hopelessness of the faithful, an opportunity to amass wealth and socio-political strength. Hence with prophetic virtuoso and sophistry, he marshals his cunning and vanities to turn the poor and unassuming faithful into his hopeless prey. Thus we have two pitiful and psychologically reconcilable streams of thought and moral strivings; the danger of the one lies in idiocy, and that of the other in duplicity.

    The faithful eagerly deserts God for “daddy” and his prophet, the “daddy” is too often found a traitor to righteousness and a coward to spirituality. The faithful is excited to the pursuit of prosperity, the whimsical and often impossible rewards of spirituality; his “daddy” on the other hand, keeps smiling to the banks, conveniently forgetting that life is more than materialism and humanity more than raiment. Consequently blatant lie triumphs to the detriment of truth and spirituality. The gospel evolves and perpetuates acceptable falsity, irrationality and vanity.

    From the faithful, the most valuable thing taken is his thought, and the most abject tragedy suffered is his loss of humaneness and understanding. By this pitiful loss of his, his “daddy” prospers. Meticulously and quite lovingly, he strips the believer of intellect and thought, conditioning him via dazzling oration, ostentatious realism and “executive” life-coaching programmes. Basically, he silences his ability to think and wonder “why?”

    No degree of “faith” or “grace” can cure the faithful of his pitiful condition and no amount of hope will rid him of his extraordinary capacity to scurry before his high and mighty “daddy” every Sunday as a caricature of humankind in order to please, succeed, or climb the long spiral ladder to approval. Eventually, he needs to face the fraud.

    Asides it’s obvious theological problems, the gospel according to “daddy” poses a psychological problem in the end, a problem of fraudulent living as whitewashed tombs. What Jesus preached was a religion that fostered simplicity, mercy and sacrifice. These humane elements have been perverted by the gospel of the “daddies” to evolve a base and more pocket-friendly version of faith.

    Basically, it enhances the capacity to say the right things without doing them. The “daddies” brand of righteousness and faith propagates life without integrity, devotion without humanity and the darkest possible version of prosperity. The modus operandi (MO) of both faithful and their “daddies” brazenly projects a dynamic adaptation of sorcery or what more discerning theologians have termed “charismatic witchcraft.”

    A pastor or “daddy” who tries to control his flock or group is practicing witchcraft. The Nigerian “daddy” thinks he knows best for his faithful and then tries to force it to happen. Many Nigerian churches are administered and controlled by dictatorial “daddies” for a profit. Thus if you attend a church where the preacher elevates prosperity over everything and anything, it’s time for you to leave. Basically, you are enslaved to your “daddy” who has without doubt formed an unbreakable soul tie with you. Consequently, you have yielded to his control rather than the direction of God in your life. It is time to desert your spiritual “daddy” and his wife, your “mummy,” in order to embrace and honour your God-given parents.

    The path to heaven lies at the feet of your parents; whether heroes or villains, the beaming brightness of their heartfelt prayers and goodwill illumines even the darkest pall hovering above the most sinful adherent.

    It’s about time you renounced your “daddy” and his infinite capacities to bind and cast demons into your life. It’s only in the context of knowing that you have been blessed with astounding gifts of intellect or talent that you can intimately surmount your weaknesses by marshalling your strength. And what are your strengths? Your God-given intellect, initiative and humaneness; basic attributes that your “daddy” seeks to pervert.

    Forget the gospel according to your “daddy,” it is essentially the crusade of the erudite neurotic; much like medieval anti-witchcraft campaign: grounded in myth, perverted by whim and a most pronounced tendency to play god.

  • True meaning of freedom

    True meaning of freedom

    Freedom, freedom, everywhere there must be freedom: Freedom for you, freedom for me, everywhere there must be freedom’.

    The short poem above on freedom is not foreign in origin. It was the catchy song and slogan of the NCNC, the leading political party in the heady days of Nigeria’s nationalist movement. The freedom refrain became popular in the mid 1940s when colonial Nigeria was stirred into demanding independence from British colonial rule. The Action Group, the other leading Nigerian Party, also joined the fray with its own slogan of ‘Life more abundant’, or ‘Afenifere,’ that inspired and caught the imagination and nationalist impulse of the Yoruba. Not to be left out, the Trade Union Congress, under the uncompromising and courageous leadership of the indomitable Michael Imoudu, waded into the fray in 1946, or thereabouts, with a hugely successful labour strike for pay increases for the workers. The strike was total and effective. It paralysed the activities of the colonial government and exposed its weakness. It was forced to give way to the demand of the workers for wage increases. This event marked the beginning of the struggle for Nigeria’s independence. But the vision of Nigeria’s early leaders of an independent country in which freedom would flourish has since been abandoned, as has the general welfare of Nigerian workers who now wallow in abject poverty and misery.

    I was a boy growing up in Lagos at the time and saw some of those popular demonstrations, mainly at Tom Jones Hall, Evans Square and Oyingbo in Lagos. The colonial government allowed public demonstrations as long as they were peaceful. That is no longer the case today in Nigeria where peaceful demonstrations are often broken up by the police. My late father, who was then in the colonial civil service, often took me along to watch those political demonstrations against British colonial rule in Nigeria. He tried to explain to me that we were fighting for our freedom. That did not mean much to me at the time as I was too young to understand what freedom meant. The struggle for freedom and against foreign rule gathered momentum everywhere. The British had ruled India for over 300 years. But in 1947, after a bloody colonial war led by Mahatma Gandhi, India was granted its independence. The event was epochal as it presaged the fall of the British Empire and foreign rule in Asia and Africa.

    In Nigeria, the activities of the independence movements were confined largely to Lagos where, over a century, some educated elite of professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, and engineers had emerged. It was this educated African elite that led the struggle for independence in Nigeria. Initially, all that this small educated African elite wanted from the British colonial authorities was representative government, and equality of treatment with white British officials; not outright independence. They had all been educated in England and loved and admired the British way of life. Colonial rule in Nigeria was benign and more visible in Lagos, the seat of the colonial government. It was at the old Bristol Hotel in Lagos that a black West Indian was first offered accommodation when it was thought he was white, but refused later, when he was discovered to be black. The vibrant Lagos press took up the matter, and strongly supported the agitation for freedom from foreign rule. To the credit of British colonial rule in Nigeria only one journalist, Anthony (later Chief) Enahoro, was arrested and convicted for sedition, after he had made a speech at the Tom Jones Hall calling for a revolution in Nigeria against foreign rule.

    Outside Lagos, the pro-independence movements made very little impact as colonial rule and some of its atrocities were not so visible, or rampant. Unlike in India, there were no bloody massacres of the people in colonial Nigeria. But there were a few incidents outside Lagos, such as the tragic Aba women’s riot and the violent demonstration led by Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome Kuti, over the introduction of local taxation in Abeokuta that led to the Alake being deposed by the colonial authorities. In Northern Nigeria where the British colonial authorities worked closely with the powerful emirates, there was very little agitation for independence. Raji Abdallah in the North was like a lone voice. British rule did not change much there. There was very little sense of the loss of independence or freedom in much of rural Nigeria where British colonial officials ruled through the Obas. Only the black educated elite in the South felt the humiliating impact of colonial rule. In 1960, Nigeria was granted independence with profound goodwill and amity on both sides. Its independence struggle was short and the transition peaceful. After World War II, Britain was hardly in a position to retain its African colonies and decided to let them go. Starting with the old Gold Coast (now Ghana) in 1957, the African colonies all became free from foreign rule. By 1962, British colonial rule in Africa had ended.

    In October 1960, I was a student at the then University College, Ibadan, and was proud to see the British Union Jack unfurled and replaced by Nigeria’s national flag at the Lagos Race Course (now Tafawa Balewa Square). Like many other Nigerians, I believed that the end of colonial rule would usher in freedom and a better future for the people of Nigeria. But in later years, I began to realise that though Nigeria was now free, this did not mean that its people were also free and could really take their destiny into their own hands. This new freedom was, soon after independence in 1960, undermined by new challenges that were not anticipated at independence. Foreign domination had ended, but it was soon replaced by tribal domination and tyranny that was more extensive and vicious than colonial rule. The ‘federal might’ was used to crush the democratically elected AG government of the Western Region, and its leader, Chief Awolowo, jailed for treason in suspicious circumstances. This presaged the 1966 military coup and the ensuing civil war in Nigeria. Tribal colonialism had replaced foreign rule. The freedom from colonial rule in 1960 and respect for fundamental human rights in Nigeria has since proved to be illusory and elusive. Alien rule is evil, repugnant and unacceptable. And we were right in resisting it. But there is less personal freedom today in post-colonial Nigeria than under British colonial rule. Our new rulers care far less about any freedom or liberties for their subjects.

    Now, the true nature of Freedom is often not understood. It is usually regarded as a single and simple idea: let people be free to lead their lives as they will; provided always that they do not interfere with the equal liberties of others. But Freedom is not such a simple idea. If it were, it would be triumphant everywhere. It is not even a single idea; it includes many other ideas, which sometimes may conflict with one another. There is, first, national freedom-the right of a people to determine its own destiny, free from alien domination. There is, secondly, Constitutional freedom-the right of the citizens to manage their political affairs, not subject to a despot or an oligarchy, or tribal domination, but ruled by representatives duly and freely elected by them. There is also personal freedom- the freedom of thought, of speech, of association, of religion; freedom from arbitrary arrest and punishment, and from any form of control, other than that of impartial courts of Law.

    These personal freedoms are the bedrock of a stable society. A truly free man will not stoop to certain despicable ways of behaviour, such as docility, cowardice, servitude, sycophancy, lying, meanness and plain stupidity, all of which abound in Nigeria today. Only enslaved people exhibit those characteristics. And a nation is not made great if its people are enslaved. Great nations can only be built by free men, not enslaved men. Ancient Rome was great because its citizens were free. A free man will defend his freedom and his nation tenaciously, even unto death. He may, like Nelson Mandela, be jailed for his hankering after freedom, but he will still feel a sense of personal freedom, an inner feeling that transcends all physical shackles. And the true attitude of the free man is not to ask more from the state but to see that it is governed justly. A true liberal, or progressive, goes into public life thinking of what he can contribute rather than what he can get from the state.