The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Before Maina is sacrificed

    Before Maina is sacrificed

    Until he became the chairman of the Pension Reform Task Team (PRTT), Abdulrasheed Maina, was an unknown quantity in the Federal Civil Service. A level 14 officer, he took his queue behind many other top officers. This is the Maina, who has today become the issue in pension matters in the country. How and what informed the decision to give him the PRTT job, which seems to have entered his head, we may never know. This is, however, not to take away from him, his capability to do the job. His bosses would have seen certain qualities in him which informed their decision to put him on the task team. He is not only on the team, he is the boss.

    As the team leader, Maina is expected to set example to members in his conduct and behaviour. As the task team’s face, he must comport himself in public and in private and ensure that he does not draw attention to himself. Maina is handling a delicate assignment – probing the administration of pension in order to reform the system. The truth be told, our pension system needs reform if workers must not continue to hold the short end of the stick after retirement. We see what many pensioners go through today in the pursuit of their pension. They stay in queue for long hours; at times they bring their beds and toiletries to the pay points because they don’t when they will be paid.

    When I see aged men and women, who toiled for their country, being treated like this in their twilight, my heart bleeds. As pensioners, these people should not be begging before we pay their entitlements, but that is what the system has reduced them to. In some cases, these pensioners collapse and die on the queue or on their way to the pay centres. These are some of the ills of the pension system which should have since been corrected. Those who brought in Maina saw in him a man that can bring the desired change to our much abused pension fund towards which workers save but get nothing from after retirement.

    Maina may be the man to do the job, but the controversy now surrounding him appear not to make it healthy for him to remain on the task team. Those who hate his gut have got him where they want him. Maina played into their hands because he was not tactful in the discharge of his assignment. He didn’t realise that the pension cabal will fight back with all they have. These are people who have been feeding fat on easy money for years and all of a sudden, a small boy comes from nowhere to put san san for their gari. The mistake he made was that he didn’t know when to talk and when to keep quiet. Yes, the PRTT has uncovered what it calls a huge pension fraud and also recovered some money from the fraudsters.

    It is good that the team has done all this, but can Nigerians know those behind the scam? Are they top government officials? Have they been arrested? If not, what is delaying their arrest? Or has the matter not been reported to the police? In a task like this, Maina and his team have to work with the police for their own safety and to avoid blackmail. We know our society too well. Those who have something to hide and feel that the team may indict them will not hesitate to cry wolf where there is none. Maina may not have borne this in mind when he went blabbing about those involved in pension frauds.

    Perhaps, if  Maina had stopped at that point, he would not have run into trouble, but he didn’t. He added members of the National Assembly to boot and got himself into trouble with the lawmakers. The distinguished and honourable fellows are now asking for his head for opening his mouth too wide. What did Maina say that irked the lawmakers. He was quoted as saying that some of them demanded bribe from him. The allegation prompted the lawmakers to invite him, but rather than honour the invitation, he chose to hold court right inside the National Assembly Complex and repeated the statement which got him into trouble in the first place. Maina, it seems, has some facts about how billions of naira of pension cash were stolen in the past. It looks as if he has the names of those involved and the huge amount involved. But he seems to have a challenge and that is who will he tell his story.

    Should he tell it to the Na

    tional Assembly members

    who are doing an assignment similar to his? Or should he wait until he submits his report before he comes out with the earthshaking tale about how our leaders killed the pension scheme? There lies Maina’s dilemma, which he didn’t know how to handle. He thought that by accusing the lawmakers publicly he would get them off his neck. He didn’t know that he was further compounding his problem. He is now a man on the run because he has bitten more than he can chew.  With the Senate and House of Representatives baying for his blood, Maina will not find it easy wriggling out of the problem he has brought upon himself.

    With the lawmakers employing blackmail, over this matter, Maina is as good as gone from the task team, if not the civil service. The National Assembly may have its grouse with Maina, but it does not have to malign others in order to make its point. I don’t really like the way Maina treated the National Assembly’s invitation. No person, no matter how big should be allowed to treat a revered institution like the National Assembly the way and get away with it in order not to set a bad precedent. If Maina goes scot-free, others will toe the line and before you know it we will have a legislature which people will treat with scorn. We must not allow that.

    But with due respect, Senate President David Mark carried his anger too far when he took Maina to the cleaners on February 13 for treating the National Assembly with disdain. In tongue-lashing Maina, Mark descended on the press which he believes has been given undue publicity to the PRTT boss. The fact of the matter is that by virtue of the job he is doing today, Maina has become a news maker. Whatever he does in the course of his assignment is news and he does not need to give the press sacks of money as Mark insinuated before he is covered. As Senate President does Mark give the press that kind of money before his activities are reported?  Hear him: ‘’First, for those of you who have been following Maina; he bought over the entire press…’’ Haba, Mr Senate President, were you there when he bought the press? How much did he pay the press?

    As a top public officer, Mark should weigh his words before he speaks. He is condemning Maina for making wild allegations against the Senate, yet he is doing the‘same against the press. The issue is, however, not the way he spoke but the problem Maina has got himself into. It has been over a week now since Mark drew the battle-line with the Presidency over Maina. Where is Maina? The police that declared him wanted don’t seem to know. Maina is swimming in trouble: the Senate is after him; so are the police and his employers. He risks being sacked for alleged abscondment.

    Whether Maina is sacked or not will not remove any hair off the people’s skin. We are, however, interested in the outcome of the work of his task team. He should be given an opportunity to submit the team’s report if it is ready before he is punished for the offence(s) he has committed. We should not throw away the baby with the bathwater. Let Maina finish his job before paying the price for his excesses.

     

    CORRECTION

    Joseph Stalin was Soviet leader and not a German general as reported here last week.

     

  • Thoughts on a new cabinet

    Thoughts on a new cabinet

    IT has been about six months since the President signed a performance bond with his ministers, and almost midway into the administration’s lifespan.

    Is it safe to assume that all the members of the team have been faithfully driving the transformation agenda – the Goodluck Jonathan administration’s mantra for good governance? If the team has not done well, is it capable of springing a surprise and, like the Super Eagles, prove bookmakers wrong? Will the coach bring in new players to present a more formidable first eleven? Will those players who are obviously injured be allowed to carry on in the name of Federal Character or will they be dropped? What shape of cabinet are we expecting towards the magical year 2015? Will there be a bigger team to accommodate those grumbling of being marginalised?

    Here are some suggestions for the President on a more efficient team, one that will accommodate all and, as they say here, give everybody a sense of belonging: Only a few months ago we had a shameful outing at the Olympics, but the fans are now revelling over our victory at the Africa Cup of Nations. A grateful nation has been showering gifts on the soccer heroes. The party was almost marred even before it began by Coach Stephen Keshi’s sudden resignation, which was announced while the team was still in South Africa. The President and Senate President David Mark, apparently seeing the hand of saboteurs and disgruntled elements in the whole thing, stepped in to stop Keshi.

    These busy officials, the busiest in the land, obviously, would not have had to dump other urgent matters of state to settle the soccer family’s quarrel, if we had done the right thing. How about a Minister of Soccer? The advantages: more room for genuine patriots and more time to cater for other sports so that we can prevent another sham of an Olympic outing. Besides, there will be so much to celebrate. Recall how we almost lost our culture of wild celebration and the country became a vast canvass of blood and tears – until the Super Eagles’ victory.

    When National Security Adviser Sambo Dasuki came on board, he embarked on a massive peace drive, waving the olive branch at the dreaded Boko Haram sect and preaching dialogue. For a while, the guns went silent and the bombs stopped going off. Then, he stopped the much publicised tours and went back to Abuja, apparently to take care of other matters of his delicate office. Then, as if to say dialogue has lost it all to violence, the guns began to boom again. Now from faceless(?) Boko Haram, which claimed to have announced a ceasefire, to Ansaru, which snatched seven foreigners off their duty posts in Bauchi, the security situation seems to have degenerated. On the side are kidnappers and their uncles, the armed robbers who have made life a war for other Nigerians. Why don’t we have another NSA, NSA II, an expert in Conflict Resolution, who will be saddled with the responsibility of discussing with those agents of violence?

    Now that cassava bread has become a regular on many breakfast tables in every village, town and city, shouldn’t Agriculture Minister Akinwunmi Adesina stop the road show and have more time to pursue yet another challenging task, that of telephone for farmers?

    When Dr Doyin Okupe was appointed Senior Special Adviser on Public Affairs, many condemned the wise move. They said Okupe was coming in to play the Rottweiler, tearing at the President’s recalcitrant critics – a role they felt Dr Reuben Abati was not playing. But some actually thought there would be some relief for Abati. How wrong they are! Abati issues statements on behalf of the President, commiserating with one family or the other on the loss of their loved ones to Boko Haram bombs, kidnappers and all other agents of the devil. Shouldn’t there be a minister (of tragedy?) to free Abati of the grim, but compulsory job of penning those elegies?

    Those critics of the rapid transformation at the airports, who are grumbling that huge renovation contracts are being awarded and terminals knocked down for arrival and departure halls to look spick and span should take it easy. Who knows, a Minister of Airport Infrastructure may be appointed. And Princess Stella Oduah will spare some time for air safety equipment and personnel, considering the allegation that many have been sacked and replaced by those of her ethnic group.

    With the gargantuan cash that has gone into the subsidy mess – cash that would have been spent on building roads and providing medical facilities, for example – it is unimaginable how the minister copes. To the subsidy palaver, add the new cash machine in town, the one that goes by the fancy name SURE-P and the plans to obtain some foreign loans. How about a minister to handle these to free Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala of such chores so that she can have time for more creative ventures, such as announcing in newspapers how much local governments are collecting and attending all those key economic fora overseas.

    A good accountant should be able to handle the job – the accountants’ parent body, ICAN, can be asked to make a recommendation – of sorting out the muddled subsidy scene. Who is to be paid what? What for? Who has supplied what? At what rate? These are questions that a minister saddled with other responsibilities may find difficult to answer.

    For a long time, it has been said that the oil giant, NNPC, does not know how much of the stuff is pumped and shipped out by the multinationals. There has also been the tortuous search for appropriate pricing for fuel, a venture that has culminated in numerous attempts to remove subsidy. Subsidy removal, the government says, will ensure availability of petrol and free the cash for other areas of need, such as building roads and providing water. Market forces. To many Nigerians, it is merely a euphemism for higher pump prices. This, obviously, is too much for a minister. Besides, isn’t there a difference between petrol and petroleum resources?

    The other day in Abuja, an impudent fellow who saw President Jonathan on the television commented about his dark, glittering shoes. “How wonderful God can be,” said the gentleman, a village teacher holidaying in the expensive city. “Here is a man who once had no shoes. Who knows how many pairs he has now?” “What type does he wear?” “Who are his favourite designers?”

    These are very crucial questions in an ever inquisitive society, such as ours. A minister of Domestic Affairs won’t be a bad idea, after all. Will it?

    Erosion has become a major problem in many states. Homes are being washed away and farms are threatened, especially in the Southeast. Unfortunately, many are talking about bad roads only. The government seems overwhelmed by last year’s destructive floods from which many are yet to recover. People are asking: where is the Minister of the Environment? But, to be honest, how much of those calamities can a minister cope with? Can’t we have a Minister of Erosion?

    And now, dear reader, a little civics test. Match the following names with their portfolios: Ita Okon Bassey Ewa, Zainab Ibrahim Kuchi, Bukar Tijani, Mohammed Musa Sada, Viola Onwuliri, Mohammed Musa Sada and Samuel Ioraer Ortom.

    Obasanjo, Jonathan and the Odi verdict

    WHEN former President Olusegun Obasanjo denounced President Goodluck Jonathan’s handling of Boko Haram as tardy and timid, I knew he was going to get a good reply. Dr Jonathan fought back. He described Odi as a disaster and a crime against humanity. He was short of calling in the International Criminal Court (ICC).

    Now, a court has ordered the Federal Government to pay Odi residents N37.6billion for the atrocity visited on the community by soldiers. This is a lesson for all who wield power. Those who murdered policemen in Odi, many believe, could have been found without levelling the community.

    Will Obasanjo still be proud of how he handled the matter? Have our soldiers learnt any lesson – that there are rules that govern internal security as against when a nation is at war? Shouldn’t Boko Haram have gone to court for the murder of its leader, Mohammed Yusuf, instead of taking up arms against the state?

  • Between Orji and his predecessor

    Between Orji and his predecessor

    It is expected that a drowning man will not like to go down alone; rather he will be desperate to pull others down along with himself, if it is possible. And where it appears impossible, he comes out confused, frustrated and helpless.

    I refer here to an interview by the former governor of Abia State, Orji Uzor Kalu – a man who has been in political limbo, since his successor T. A. Orji liberated the state from his grip. The former governor in the interview with his newspaper, The Sun made a lot of claims – cleverly woven lies to attract undue public sympathy. They range from the reasons for the political differences with his successor, the incumbent Governor Orji; how he met the former and how former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo asked his mother to install his brother as his successor in office and other issues.

    The former governor conveniently failed to tell the world why T.A Orji, his successor went to prison and why he did not quarrel with him until the latter liberated the state following his defection from PPA to PDP. May be the former governor forgot that Nigerians are neither fools nor do they suffer from amnesia.

    Since 1999, it is an axiomatic that governors do not choose their successors and members of their kitchen cabinet from people they did not know very well or who have not made any impact in their lives before they became governors. It is public knowledge that the governor of Abia State Chief Theodore Ahamefula Orji is a 1978 English graduate of University of Ibadan. After completing his youth service in Sokoto, he was employed as a civil servant by old Imo State Civil Service Commission. From then he was in public service rising to the position of Administrative Secretary in the then National Electoral Commission (NECON) now INEC.

    His predecessor, with limited education, on the other hand rode on the back of his mother to fame, having served as an errand boy for the military hawks that ruled the country for years. That is why he had to enrol for a degree programme at Abia State University Uturu in 2002 as sitting governor of the state.

    The story of the relationship between the due went back to the time of Kalu’s bid to emerge as the governorship candidate of PDP in the 1999 elections. Faced with stiff opposition, he ran to Orji, then with NECON, for help. The latter, in his good nature obliged.

    After the elections, Kalu in the attempt to reciprocate the gesture approached him to join his government as Chief of Staff, a very strategic, sensitive and powerful position in government.

    For the eight years he served as Chief of Staff, he displayed high level of professionalism and diligence, borne of the immeasurable experience garnered in the civil service over several decades.

    That position prepared him for the Herculean task of governance and challenges of holding public office. After Kalu’s second term, the search for his successor began. The factors that determined the choice of the successor included the personality, the senatorial zone and the choice of majority of the party stakeholders in the state. The then Chief of Staff came in handy as he fitted the bill.

    Before then, President Olusegun Obasanjo who had been at loggerhead with then Governor Kalu had already thrown his weight behind one of his aides, Chief Onyema Ugochukwu from Abia Central zone to emerge as PDP governorship candidate and possibly as the next governor of the state. This made the stakeholders in PPA to zero the search for Kalu’s successor to Abia Central zone.

    That was how the choice of Orji was made by the party. Kalu being from Abia North senatorial zone couldn’t have chosen his successor from the zone again in the interest of fairness and equity. Besides his numerous deputies which he changed at will during his tenure were all from Abia South senatorial zone, the likely zone that might produce Orji’s successor in 2015.

    At the time Orji emerged as the PPA governorship candidate in the state, his predecessor had been on the wanted list of Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for corruption. But because of the constitutional immunity that he enjoyed then, the anti-graft agency could not arrest or prosecute him. That was how Orji was arrested and incarcerated for offence allegedly committed by his boss.

    While Orji was in EFCC custody, his wife, Mercy Odochi Orji whom he married while both of them were in secondary school being an only child of his parents traversed the nooks and crannies of the state with other party members campaigning for her husband. The people who knew that Orji was being politically persecuted over a criminal offence he knew nothing about voted for him en masse and he won the election against his kinsman and major rival in the election, Chief Ugochukwu of PDP.

    His release from prison before his swearing-in was made possible following the inability of the EFCC to arraign him to prefer any charges.

    On Orji’s assumption of office as governor, Kalu hijacked the government and installed his younger brother as Chief of Staff. He made other sensitive appointments which included the commissioner of Finance, Works, and Accountant-General of the State and others. Council chairmen in the state were accountable and answerable to Mother Excellency –mother of the former governor.

    The situation remained like that for almost four years. Throughout this period of manna, Kalu never complained or criticised Orji for anything, not even on non-performance as being bandied now by the same man that was responsible for Orji’s non-performance during his first term.

    But immediately Orji liberated the state from his control and started promoting good governance driven by people-oriented and legacy projects that are rapidly on-going across the state, his predecessor started crying foul by calling Orji and his government names. But how can somebody who failed in the provision of good governance teach or preach such to somebody that has done far better than him? Is it not the issue of teacher teaching nonsense to his students? Enough of the deceit by the former governor; the state government is no longer his family estate.

    • Elder Umah (KSJ), a community leader wrote from Aba, Abia State.

     

  • Fair weather patriots

    Suddenly everybody is proudly Nigerian. And the maniacal hooting of the Nigerian citizenry and State attains the eerie melodiousness of owls. It is tragic to see everyone celebrate the Super Eagles’ victory at the recently concluded

    African Cup of Nations (AFCON) 2013 tournament. It is even more frightening to see what record lows Nigerians would descend in pursuit of unearned sentimentality and delight.

    Nobody gave the Super Eagles a chance. Nobody wished that they did well and emerge Champions of African soccer. Every soccer enthusiast, sports writer, analyst and even the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) predicted and wished upon the Super Eagles, doom, and a disgraceful outing at AFCON 2013.

    NFF chieftains reportedly sought to force a foreign technical adviser on Coach Stephen Keshi even while the tournament was on, in a desperate plot to embezzle state funds. They never cared or wished that the national team do well at the tourney. And like the NFF, everyone else wished that the Super Eagles crash out in the early stages of the tournament.

    They claimed they were only being objective. They claimed they were simply making informed analysis and extrapolation based on the team’s lackluster and disgraceful approach to the game. Many of my colleagues in the media even went as far as forecasting that the national team will not win a single match at the tournament; they also hinged their analyses on towering objectivity and dispassionate love for the beautiful game of soccer.

    And so do I, by similar standards of unimpeachable objectivity, dispassionately analyze and infer that many Nigerian soccer enthusiasts; sports writers, analysts, et al are intellectually challenged and handicapped by their base inclinations to be failures. Little wonder they denounce anything and everything Nigerian.

    Today, we see a perversion of brotherhood and faith. Today we see the sickly manifestations of blundering fanaticism and the Nigerian spirit, for the love of football. It’s ridiculous to see everybody show love to the Super Eagles. Suddenly, the ones on whom many invoked doomsday prophesies and disgrace have become compatriots with whom they are well pleased.

    Shame. Shame that it took the victory of the Super Eagles at AFCON 2013 to reveal the average Nigerian for what he truly is; a bumbling coward and a fraud. It is even more shameful that the media which should serve as the last bastion of hope for the incurably disillusioned and cynical cheerfully championed the forecasts of doom and irreparable disgrace of the country’s national team at the soccer fiesta.

    More worrisome was the attitude of columnists who ought to desensitize the citizenry of arrant cynicism but derived a perverse pleasure from riling the national team and predicting its failure. Many a columnist and TV soccer analyst likened the team to every other failed project in Nigeria. They predicted the team’s failure and inexorably relished the prospect of saying to every believer in the chances of the team, “I told you so!”

    Now that the joke is on them and every other disparager of the Nigerian team, they have suddenly learnt to cheer in support of the Nigerian team. But a paltry few of this disgraceful band of Nigerians have remained resolute in their antagonism of the Nigerian team. They say: “Let’s see how they will fare against the Spaniards at the Confederation Cup in Brazil.”

    As if they are doomed to stereotype the dying moans of human guinea pigs; their continued disparagement of the national team resonates like the whining of relics of mortality who discountenance hope to howl like an owl at the break of a new dawn. Their cynicism is reflective of a mind which has reached the gooey stage in the mortification of all hopeful and courageous thought.

    Although Thoreau would claim that they remind him of ghouls and idiots and insane wailings, I would say that they are merely symptomatic of a vast and undeveloped nature best suited for the base and cretinous amongst mankind.

    Yes, this is very personal. But lest I am attacked for being too acerbic, let me reiterate that I am only being ‘very objective and dispassionate’ as every Super Eagles’ critic was and still is perhaps.

    The Nigerian youth had no business wishing that much ill on their peers in the national team. By their shameful attitude, they managed to affirm that the biggest challenge facing the Nigerian youth is the Nigerian youth.

    The quality of support given the national team by the Nigerian citizenry and State is reflective of our persistent struggle against the ruling class’ tyranny. It is always quite sufficient to keep us busy and enthusiastic even as our fervor for the struggle is always half-hearted and uncoordinated.

    Having experienced more hardship than necessary in the formation of our character, we imagine a dark pall after every dark cloud and thus react with unforgivable cynicism to anything and everything.

    There is no special reason for this circumstance; the ones that were, have been rendered unjustifiable by our immoderate lust to circumvent the universe’s carefully ordered path to the good life. Not only is the Nigerian youth unable to believe the benefits in honest labour and patriotism, we are unable to believe in anything else. This reveals a worrisome state of affairs that emphasizes the loss and irredeemable corruption of old loyalties. Today, every lofty ideal of nationhood, honesty, justice and truth are ultimately far-fetched in our eyes.

    That is why we are reduced to a cesspool of nonstop tragedies. That is why we have Nigerian terrorists playing with bombs and snuffing our lives like unstable candlelight in a storm. That is why we have very lazy and jobless youth threatening war if anything should happen to “their son,” Mr. President.

    That is why we suffer incessant cases of armed robbery, advance fee fraud and hooliganism. That is why we have more youths picking up charms, bullets and machine guns than a stethoscope, complete works of Wole Soyinka, Christopher Okigbo and chalk.

    It is the Nigerian youth that is blowing up Churches, Mosques and killing people in the north. It is the Nigerian youth that is passionately serving as assassins and political thugs. It is the Nigerian youth that is tirelessly totting guns and machete to rob and decapitate poor, helpless citizenry on our highways. It is the Nigerian youth blaming his lot on the ruling class even as he unquestioningly agrees to serve as canon-fodder in the ruling class’ inhuman designs.

    It is also Nigerian youth like the Super Eagles, that passionately attempts to propagate the Nigerian dream against all odds but the efforts of such human elements are wholly inconsequential amidst the psychosis of the unbelieving and rampaging hordes. Goaded by such abject reality, the Nigerian youth, submits to the decadent and tirelessly projects it, arguing as he does that since he can neither beat nor correct the system, it is better he serves it. He conveniently forgets that it is by the honest fervor and citizenship of human elements like him that the foundations of the most powerful nations are built.

    Thus is the tragedy of the Nigerian youth; he excitedly perfects the parable of a man who looks around for a coffin, every time he smells flowers.

  • Olanipekun’s rebranding of judiciary

    Olanipekun’s rebranding of judiciary

    Chief Wole Olanipekun, (SAN) is a veteran of many wars. As student leader, he fought against Gowon who at the end prayed for him. As NBA president he confronted Chief Obasanjo and came out unscathed. As a resourceful lawyer, he has secured victory after victory for his clients usually the high heeled in our society. For him water has no enemy. He approaches all cases with passion because according to him “We as lawyers must appreciate our calling as a covenant with God.”

    In this regard, On November 21, 2011, he defended Bola Tinubu, the ACN national leader before the Code of Conduct Tribunal. “I led his very formidable team to ask the Tribunal to discharge and acquit him. By 2.30 pm same day, I was in the courtroom of the Court of Appeal in the same Abuja to as part of defence team of the Jonathan election petition”. This did not stop him for also defending Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) governor in Nasarawa against the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    It is therefore not surprising that Chief Wole Olanipekun has brought his usual passion to bear on his current defence of Ifeanyi Ubah against Access Bank. He is capitalising on Access Bank’s decision to file “documents before a London High Court, wherein the bank alleged that part of the reasons it avoided instituting an action against Capital Oil and its Managing Director, Ifeanyi Ubah in Nigeria was because the Nigerian judiciary was corrupt.”

    Such action, the chief insisted, amount to the denigration of Nigerian judiciary and dragging its image in the mud in the United Kingdom. Contrary to Access Bank’s deposition before the London court, no one person according to the chief can have “the judiciary in his pocket” in Nigeria.

    The judge, Justice Abang in a bid to uphold the integrity of the judiciary and the judicial process, agreed with him and ruled that “by supplying information which scandalised the Nigerian judiciary, the bank’s Corporate Counsel, Fatai Oladipo and Deji Awodein one of the bank’s Deputy General Managers were guilty of criminal contempt”. This may win a case but will unfortunately not win the battle over the minds of Nigerians who have come to see the judiciary as our major problem.

    Chief Olanipekun who has indicated he is uncomfortable with the situation of things in the country, whereby “we are running people’s affairs like a game of chess” however did not see anything wrong with the judiciary. If the third tier of government has any problem at all, it is because it has been overwhelmed by those created by the executive and the legislature.

    First, I am sure the outside world is amused by the chief’s attempt to exonerate the judiciary from the current problems bedevilling the nation, chief of which is corruption. In a globalised world and with the ascent of the new social media, everyone is a witness to history as it unfolds. The macabre dance between the senior members of our judiciary (SANs), some corrupt judges, thieving members of the political class, criminals as bank owners and oil fraudsters are daily documented for the world.

    Besides, UK of all places is a wrong choice for a rebranding effort of our judiciary. This is a nation that has just jailed James Ibori proclaiming him ‘a thief in the state house’ along with his counsel, long after the Nigerian judiciary had found him not culpable of the same set of charges. Besides, Britain is one place where some of our judges and SANs, would have been disrobed and banned from practice for life.

    A few sickening events that are currently playing out in the judiciary which make Nigeria feel like throwing up and unfortunately shared with the rest of the outside world will suffice.

    Recently, after a long deafening silence in spite of calls by Nigerians that erstwhile chairman and secretary of the House of Representatives Ad-hoc Committee on fuel subsidy probe, Farouk Lawal and Boniface Emenalo, be taken to court, their very resourceful SANs, to satisfy all righteousness brought them to court where they were detained. A week later, trial Justice Mudashiru Oniyangi okayed their release.

    This followed a ‘profound’ argument of the SANs that the’ ‘court should take cognizance of the fact that prior to his (Farouk) arraignment, he had ample opportunities to run away, having travelled outside the country four times since investigation into his alleged complicity in the bribery scandal began.’ Thus a man caught by video camera receiving bribe from Otedola in a sting operation master-minded by government will now attend trial from home and have the rights to attend to health issues abroad.

    The globalised world is also watching with keen interest how our resourceful SANs have effortlessly secured relief and shield their high profile clients such as Mahmud Tukur, son of the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Bamanga Tukur; Mamman Ali, son of the former national chairman of PDP, Ahmadu Ali; and Abdullahi Arisekola-Alao, the son of Ibadan based businessman, Abdulazeez Arisekola-Alao facing a ‘nine-count charge of conspiracy, fraud and forgery,’ of N1.8 billion from the Petroleum Support Fund.

    The suit first fixed by judge Onigbanjo for November 13 and 14, 2012, for trial has again been ‘fixed for the 6th and 7th of May 2013. The defense SAN, has already persuaded judge Onigbanjo to grant his clients bail while Abdulazeez Arisekola-Alao also got his impounded international passport back to enable him travel and take care of his sick son in the United States.

    The prosecution of Erastus Akingbola, the former owner and Managing Director of Intercontinental Bank for an alleged stealing of N47.1 billion has dragged on for three years. This is despite his indictment by a London court which directed him to refund about N164b back to the new owners of his former bank. The case against Akingbola who had earlier been discharged in another case at the Federal High Court for what the trial judge, Justice Clement Archibong, blamed on “lack of diligent prosecution.” has according to Human Rights lawyer, Femi Falana(SAN) now been ‘technically resolved in his favour’ because of the new appointment given Justice Abiru, the presiding judge.

    In 2010, Cecilia Ibru accused of a 25 count charge of money laundering and mismanagement of depositors funds totaling over N160 billion, was aided by her celebrated SANs to sign a plea bargain deal. Two years after she was sentenced on 25 counts of fraud and ordered to reimburse $1.29 billion in assets and cash, Anti-Corruption Network executive secretary Otunba Dino Melaye has alleged that many properties in the United States and United Kingdom claimed to have been forfeited are still in Ibru’s custody directly or indirectly.

    The SANs that negotiated on her behalf probably know where “these properties, monies and aircraft are since there was no evidence they were “deposited with the Nigerian Deposit Insurance Company (NDIC) and AMCON for onward transfer to the shareholders of Oceanic Bank”.

    Corruption may be another name for the executive and the legislature. The press might have been greatly compromised according to Sonala Olumhense whose views count for much in the media, but a failed state beckons when the judiciary is turned into the last bastion of the privileged scoundrels by its SANs and some corrupt judges while lonely petty thieves or vagrants arrested for wandering spend years in prison awaiting trials. These are facts not lost on Nigerians.

  • Obama’s second administration

    Obama’s second administration

    I have just returned from the United States precisely from New York and Atlanta Georgia. During my stay, I noticed the deep division among the people of the United States and particularly between Democrats and the Republicans. It will not be an exaggeration to say that the Republicans do not wish President Obama well. The divide between the Republicans and Democrats is partly ideological but unfortunately partly racial. Somebody as eminent as President Jimmy Carter has said that Republican opposition to President Obama is sometimes rooted in racism.

    The Democratic Party has no equivalent in Europe but it is probably close to the old Liberal or Social Democratic Party in England. It is a party that believes that the state has a role in the welfare of the poor and those that cannot make it in a highly competitive society. The party is also committed to making health affordable to as many people as possible. It also believes in the upward mobility provided by education. It is therefore committed to providing subsidy for students to acquire higher education. It is committed also to gun control because violence by gun-crazy Americans has become the bane of the society. In recent times, the party has been seen as the party of the young people, women, visible minorities i.e. Blacks and Latinos, labour and also of the gay community i.e. homosexuals and lesbians.

    In foreign policy, it is a party of environmentalism and international cooperation and peaceful co-existence. The party heroes are F. Delano Roosevelt, John. F. Kennedy, Lyndon .B. Johnson and Bill Clinton. In recent times, the party has become associated with big government and consequently huge government deficits.

    On the other hand, the Republican Party is increasingly identified as a party of professional associations such as those of lawyers, medical professionals, the big churches, elderly people, white male and the military industrial complex. It is the party of big business and Wall Street. It likes to see itself as the real American party that believes in individual success and enterprise. A party of survival of the fittest. In its foreign policy, it is the party of intervention in other country’s affairs in order to preserve America’s hegemony. Its heroes are Theodore Roosevelt the 26th President of the United States of America (1901-1909), Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. The closest party in Europe to the Republican Party would be the Conservative Party in England. Incidentally, President Abraham Lincoln the abolitionist President was a Republican but he is more likely to be seen today by democrats as one of their heroes. The Republican Party is also opposed to non-white immigration into the United States because of wanting to preserve the United States as a White man’s country. The party’s support for small government and balanced budget is also because of its opposition to the welfare of the poor who are invariably non-white. The Republican Party is fighting for its very life because of the increasing number of non-white immigrants into the United States and it seems the Democratic Party of Obama wants the 11million illegal aliens in America to be given the chance of becoming legal immigrants and possibly citizens in the foreseeable future. This is the kernel of the ideological rift between Obama and the Republican Party.

    Unfortunately the debate between them is very acrimonious and bitter and the extreme wing of the Republican Party, the so called Tea Party is not averse to using racial epithet for Obama. Some of the party’s supporters while demonstrating against Obama’s policies carry placards with the caricature of Obama as a monkey and asking him to go back to Africa to feast on bananas. Some members of the Republican Party in Congress in a knee jack reaction to Obama’s policy always oppose him no matter how sensible his policies may be.

    As an outsider, one can see the point of the Republican Party in wanting balanced budget and small government and that no country can provide maximally for all its citizens. Since the rich in America do not want to pay high taxes, government will therefore have to cut back on expenditure. But taking care of the poor provides a safety valve for the American society. This simple logic does not seem to appeal to the Republicans because they think that poor people’s rebellion will be shot down by the Police and if necessary by the National Guard and perhaps individually armed Americans since the second amendment to their constitution allows individuals to carry weapons either openly or in concealed forms. This is why the National Rifle Association (NRA) is a staunch member of the Republican Party. The division in America is deep and sometimes troubling. But at the same time, one must praise America for being the only western country that would throw up a black man and a Mormon as presidential candidates of the two major parties.

    The immediate problems that would face Obama in his second term would be how to get confirmation for new members of his cabinet, how to raise the debt ceiling beyond the current 16.4trillion dollars and how to get his budget through congress and how to avoid automatic cut of defense spending and in other areas critical to the United States. If previous debates are something to go by, he is going to have a Herculean task in persuading the Republican dominated House of Representatives to go along with him. I had expected that his inauguration speech would be a unifying speech rather than a partisan speech. Unfortunately, this was not so and I think the President missed an opportunity to be conciliatory to the Republican Party. He probably felt that offence was the best strategy of defence. But I think this is wrong unless he bends over backwards to accommodate the Republican Party, he will not achieve much in his second administration. Yet he has plans to invest in education, infrastructure, environment and to make the United States self-sufficient in energy through support for appropriate technology and the development of Shale gas in continental North America. In his foreign policy agenda, he wants to wind down the war in Afghanistan and avoid getting into any war in the Middle East and elsewhere but the signs are not so good because of Iran and its nuclear programme and the determination of Israel to stop it as well as Korea and its missile programme and then the problem between Japan and China over disputed Islands in the South China Sea. All these problems may make nonsense of Obama’s pacific intentions. This is why he cannot afford to follow a policy of antagonism to the Republican Party. Because if there were to be a crisis outside the U.S in which vital American interests are at stake, he will need unity at home. Of course if history teaches us a lesson, nationalist fervour always manifest in times of crisis, particularly if it is not a long drawn out military entanglement.

  • My Valentine my university

    You came to life in 1948 eleven years after I was born, the whole country your bridegroom, and only the brightest and the best would have the singular privilege to see your face. What chance did I have of ever meeting you, this truculent urchin, from Obetiti, Nguru, Mbaise, who had never crossed the Niger and only knew Aba, Calabar, and Owerri, all in Eastern Nigeria, Lagos a far-off dream. You welcomed all chasing after you, as long as knowledge was their dream and learning the only enterprise of their soul. Oh, yes, you welcomed them and sent them off after four years or so, with their various degrees to a world you had craftily created for them, in union with all that is good to know and live by, their hearts agog in a romance of intellectual affinities.

    Triumphantly selective, you were University College, Ibadan; liberal and warm, you spread your arms to all who sought after you and had a lot to offer you with brilliance, acuity and astuteness. You were accommodating, perspicacious in an uncannily sagacious fashion. Majestic Flame of the Forest trees stood tall in guard of honour at Oduduwa Road, the imperial entrance into the depths and caverns of your intricate dwelling places. To the few who had come unscathed from the roasting discernment of your qualifying examinations, you matched their talent with red bougainvilleas of excellence pried from arduous labour. Only the best would deserve you and they would give their eye teeth to knit garments of learning with your golden threads of diligence and brilliant study.

    University College, Ibadan, the moon at dawn lit your brow; and, at sun-ripe day, your words rolled out in the tongues of your groom. Each deserving student received your prize in unsurpassed dignity, Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of Science; degrees that would excel in any contest anywhere in the world. You were truly Universitas. They were all bachelors, their bloods boiling to be married to you, and one day, return with their doctorates to fully discover you and announce your name to the universe. Yes, the planets sought you; the world sought you; Nigeria would give all his heart for you – so sparkling your soul, intense your purpose, grand your design. Nine years after your birth, 1957 it was, this bumbling intrepid rascal in overblown dusty trousers sweeping the brown clay of Obetiti came to your beehive to taste that bravura honey saved for knights of your kingly libraries to whom learning filled the soul.

    You welcomed me to searching lights at Central Porters’ Lodge and you took me by the hand to Kuti Hall, Wing B, gave me a bed and bedding and blew me a kiss of “Now take care of yourself; call me if you need me. Remember, I do not answer all calls; only those that would lead you to soar to your wildest dreams.”

    Oh, you were magnificent, mellifluous, your voice a subtle sultry invitation to excellence. You gave me endearing and enduring friends of trust and purpose. We were all enamoured of you, running after your elegance and fluid sincerity. We graduated Bachelors of Science and those who sought you still returned to a new life in unbridled pursuit of your priceless endowments. What a world they sought to create: their lives and yours intertwined in a new creation in the African sun – a planet whose epiphany was proclaimed by Africans themselves and east and west would now play a rollicking symphony called University of Ibadan, Kenneth Onwuka Dike the conductor.

    I came to join you later in the seventies that you may take me to places I can only dream of. Yes, you always make me dream. You offer me the world and you give me all the love and joy that this world can ever hope to contain. Over the years you indulged me, gave me your sweetness cooked with fine okra, or ewedu, crayfish, fresh-fish, dry-fish, stockfish, in chewy mouth-watering lumps of arduous work and diligent sporting restlessness. I could exult in my retirement letter in September, 2002, ‘My prayers and good wishes will ever remain with the University of Ibadan.’

    In this new and advancing millennium our million dollar bride, to whom we gave all that thrilled her sumptuous heart, now receives only thousand naira suitors; some even offer insulting hundreds. Things are not what they used to be and you are sad, sitting there, outside Trenchard Hall, right hand on your chin, looking out to a world in sunset, where the moon will soon go to sleep, your heart despoiled by interlopers who do not value the refinement of learning. But do not worry. Yes, I say rejoice: for in postgraduate studies, your bastion of revolving brightness will shine anew. Fresh suitors will wield flywhisks of African culture dripping in the wines of our forefathers, in their virtues, in their nobility, in their assiduousness, in their scientific and social acumen, not yet fully explored, but gradually revealing to all joined to your soul the essence of human love and ingenuity.

    Oh, sweet one, I am here for you; many of us are here for you, and we shall not give up. We shall bear you up and give back some of the gains you showered on us. Maybe it is a dream; if so, have the comfort that you have countless friends from many successive decades and though their hearts and minds may be turned to merely earthly pursuits, they all long for you with astounding strength and vigour. In retirement I come to you, my soul singing praises of joy and peace recounting the love you bestowed on me; the graces I received in everything this earth offers by whatever name they are called. I come to you still, drive along the same Oduduwa Road, the entry to your luminous heart, though the Flame of the Forest trees are all gone. But that does not really matter: we may ask then, what matters: are your suitors still coming for the best you can give them in learning; and are they themselves the brightest and the best? What of the teachers, are they worthy in character and learning? You now lie low in a forest of lawns – what a forest; what a lawn! My heart drops down to the earth to better gain your insight – a new life of a new band of suitors rushing madly around in a world you do not understand. Noble traditions of honour and fortitude have given way to expediency, ‘the reality of the situation’, ‘the Nigerian factor’; how do you feel?

    However it may have been, you have not abandoned me. You take me to the University of Ibadan Senior Staff Club. You offer me and my dear wife, Helen, some Gulders, suya, fresh-fish, goat-meat pepper-soup, and you have kept an army of friends who speak your voice when they say, ‘welcome home.’ One would say, ‘I’m happy I stayed behind in Ibadan so Mark and Helen will always have a home here.’

    You give us friends, old and new, who light our faces with frizzy dazzling joy, with their abiding company, their music, their songs, their dance. And you tell us: ‘I’m all for you, I’m University of Ibadan.’ For ever and for ever you will be my Valentine; in sickness and in health; for richer for poorer; for better, for worse. I shall live with you on the planet of Love.

    • Professor Nwagwu is of Paul University, Awka

  • The papal attitude our leaders need

    The papal attitude our leaders need

    The pope, the supreme leader of Catholics worldwide, is respected not only by members of his faith, but by people of other faith. Whether a Muslim, Protestant, Methodist, Anglican, Baptist, Lutheran or Pentecostal, we all rever the pope because of his office. The pope occupies an exalted post which confers on him the moral authority to speak and be listened to by those in power. Even dictators recognise the moral influence of the pope. Whether we like it or not, the pope remains the leading figure in Christendom. We may not like him or his faith, but we cannot afford to disrespect his exalted office.

    It is the office that makes the pope and not the other way round. When the pope speaks, he does so with the authority of his high office. Though popes are human, we have come to deify the office they occupy because we believe that in doing so, we are serving God through them. Since we all want to be on God’s side nobody wants to be seen to do anything that will offend a pope, except such a person is a Joseph Stalin or a Sani Abacha. What did these brutes do? They looked down with disdain at popes. The late  Abacha as military head of state rebuffed entreaties by the late Pope John Paul II to release the late Chief MKO Abiola from detention in 1998.

    The late Stalin as a general in the German army ridiculed the high office of the pope during World War 11. In response to the late British Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s admonition that Poland be spared the agony of the war as a Catholic nation-state in order  to avoid having complicated relations with the Vatican,  the late Stalin fired this riposte : ‘’How many divisions does the Pope of Rome have?’’ The pope may not have troops as Stalin observed but he has something greater than all the soldiers of the world put together. These are the battalions of the Lord’s army, who are willing and ready to take up the pope’s fight whenever the need arises.

    The pope is the commander-in-chief of the Lord’s army. He does not fight his own wars with arms. His weapon of warfare is not carnal. The only weapon he has is the word, which is greater than all the guns, bazookas and armoured tanks in the world. There is nothing that drives home the moral authority that popes wield than the sudden resignation of the current pope on Monday on health grounds. The world is still in shock that Pope Benedict XVI could throw in the towel because he has become ‘’incapacitated’’ by age. Many are shocked because if they were in his shoes, they would not have taken that route. They would have remained in office, wasting state resources on what they know to be a bad case. We are witnessing a thing like this in our own clime.

    Here in Nigeria, resignation is not in the dictionary of public officers no matter how bad their health is. Even when they know that they can no longer continue in office, they will keep it as a secret from the people and be pretending that all is well with them. Illnesses know no status. No matter the office one occupies if he does not have good health, he cannot enjoy that position. Those who say that health is wealth know what they are talking about. He who has good health has everything. He is fit and able to do his work no matter how hectic it may be. The jobs of a pope and let’s say a governor are not easy. They are demanding jobs and those who occupy these offices should be ready to give the job their all. They can only give their all when they are hale and hearty.

    Man has no control over health matters. We can fall ill at anytime irrespective of the position we hold. A master falls ill and a servant also takes ill. The pope’s case has shown that illness is not a respecter of position. Because the rich and the poor can fall ill, it goes to show that there is nothing to be ashamed about when we are indisposed, especially, if we occupy public positions. We should be able to come clean with the people when anything ails us as public officers because by virtue of our positions we have become public property. What the pope has done should be a lesson to all those who hold public office that we should be open at all times. If the pope had kept quiet, nobody would have known that anything is wrong with him, particularly as the Vatican is very good at keeping secrets.

    But because of the fear of God, he told the world the truth about his health and opted to resign from office, something which seems difficult to do in this part of the world. About three years ago when the late President Umaru Yar’ Adua became ill those around him did everything possible to keep it away from the public until he died in the confines of Aso Rock. In recent times, some governors took ill and instead of their people being briefed about these leaders’ ailment, they went abroad under the guise of going on holiday. When their vacations became longer than necessary, the people started asking questions. Instead of providing answers to these questions, their aides resorted to imputing political motives.

    Who is to blame in such circumstance? Those asking questions or those trying to shroud the governors’ true health status in secrecy? One of the governors, Sullivan Chime, of Enugu State is back; the other, Liyel Imoke of Cross River is still abroad. We don’t know what ails Imoke, but it seems his illness may not be that serious as he had time to celebrate his wife’s 50th birthday last year in the United States (US). He is expected to have resumed by now, but he has not. We have no been told why, but when we start writing about it, our reports will be seen as pieces of entertainment to be laughed at just as Chime and his friends did when we carried stories about his illness while he was abroad.

    ‘’When I read in the papers how I died in India, we then turned Nigerian papers to entertainment forum. We read what they wrote about me and laughed. It became an amusement kind of thing’’, he told reporters in Enugu on Tuesday. The joke, your excellency is rather on you. If you had provided the information you gave on Tuesday, there would have been no need for speculations in the papers about your health. Sir, there is nothing to be ashamed of if we are ill. We are all human, whether a governor or a reporter; so, the report was not to mock you; it was to draw attention to your health challenge. You knew from the outset that you were going abroad for cancer surgery; so, why did you keep the information to yourself?

    Were you afraid that we will wish you death under the surgeon’s knife? That is where you got it wrong sir. If you had told us we would have prayed for a successful surgery for you as the world is today praying for the pope. If the pope can tell the world that he is ill, why can’t governors in Nigeria do the same? Why should we as public officers be afraid to inform those we lead of our illnesses? The other day, Hillary Clinton was diagnosed of blood clot and as she was being taken to  the hospital, her aides released information about her illness. That is how it should be, but unfortunately our leaders do not think so because they have something to hide.

    There is no big deal about illnesses because they will come and go, if we are not destined to be killed by them. Our leaders tend to make a mountain out of a molehill with the way they handle issues relaing to their health. They are too secretive about their well-being as if it is an abomination to be ill. What happened in the case of the late President Yar’ Adua should have taught them a lesson, but they will never learn. But it is not too late; they can still learn from how Pope Benedict XVI  handled his own health challenge. May God give us leaders who are forthright, down to earth and can connect with us.

     

  • Lord Lugard and the 1914 Amalgamation of Nigeria

    Lord Lugard and the 1914 Amalgamation of Nigeria

    The Federal Government has announced that it will celebrate the centenary of Nigeria’s ‘Amalgamation’ on January 1, 1914 by Lord Lugard, then the newly appointed and first British Governor-General of colonial Nigeria. The elaborate celebrations which started a week ago with a glittering state banquet at Abuja are intended to last a whole year and will include, among other projects, the development of a brand ‘new city’ in Abuja. The National Assembly does not appear keen on supporting the projects proposed and is not keen on providing funds for the celebrations. There is also very little public enthusiasm about the entire programme. The celebrations will cost a lot of money and, to address public concern about the huge costs involved, running into billions of naira, the Federal Government has assured the nation that all the expenses involved in the celebrations will be borne by the private sector. But investments of this nature by the private sector do not come without a price in the form of huge contracts that are usually abandoned. Somehow, the private sector will find a way of recouping such a bad investment as the one being proposed.

    Now, there is no doubt about the historic importance of the 1914 amalgamation in Nigeria’s history. It was the first time that the British colonial administration in Nigeria tried to bring the culturally diverse people of Nigeria together under one central colonial administration. Without the amalgamation Nigeria would not have developed or emerged as one country. Instead, we would now have two, or possibly three, different countries. But the manner in which these celebrations take place is equally important. The question is why should we, as a nation be seen to be celebrating the 1914 so-called ‘amalgamation’ of Nigeria by the British colonial power? The Federal Government argues that Nigeria is not a historical accident and, having existed for nearly 100 years as a country, merits celebration. It is important that we get Nigeria’s colonial history right. If we do, it will be obvious to us that we should not be celebrating such a dubious event in our colonial history, as the ‘amalgamation’ was the direct product of British imperialism in West Africa.

    To suggest, or argue, as the federal authorities did, that Nigeria is not a historical accident, but a pre-ordained entity is a distortion of Nigeria’s history. Nothing can be further from the truth. This claim should not go unchallenged, or else we will be creating a false and terrible legacy. Before British colonialism in Nigeria, several kingdoms such as the Oyo Empire, the Fulani Emirates, and the Benin Kingdom already existed in Nigeria, and might have evolved over time as nation states. It was British imperialism that eventually destroyed these empires. Before its independence from British colonial rule in 1960, Nigeria did not exist even as a distinct state, recognised by other foreign states. It was only recognised as a mere British colony, a British dependency that, for all practical purposes, did not have any state identity at all. It was simply part of British West Africa, the Southern part of which was for a while governed by British colonial representatives from the old Gold Coast. Its acquisition by Britain as a colonial territory was actually accidental. It was the direct consequence of Anglo-French rivalry for trade and free markets in Africa.

    Britain was not really looking at the time for new colonies, or territories in West Africa, but for trade and free markets. In 1861, the British acquired Lagos as a colony after gun boat diplomacy (state terrorism). But in 1865, the report of a parliamentary select committee of the British House of Commons had advised against any further acquisition of colonial territory in West Africa. The old Gold Coast (now Ghana) and Sierra Leone had already been acquired as British colonies. This report was accepted by the British government and dampened imperialist impulses for a while. But by 1885, the informal sway exercised by British merchants in the delta area, which led to Jaja of Opobo being exiled from the delta area by the British Consul, had been formalised at the 1885 Berlin Congress that simply divided Africa as spheres of influence of Britain, and the other European powers in Africa.

    The Africans were neither present at the Berlin Congress nor even consulted about the manner their territories were divided among the European powers. It was a shameful episode in the history of human civilisation, of which even the European colonisers cannot really be proud. It was just as bad as its precursor, the slave trade. Northern Nigeria was simply handed over as the Niger Coast Protectorate to the Royal Niger Company, a British chartered trading company operating in Nigeria, in much the same way as large parts of British India were handed over to the British East India Company. In 1885, the British had proclaimed a Southern Protectorate in Southern Nigeria after the conclusion of fraudulent and unequal treaties with the Obas there. In 1900, the two protectorates of Northern Nigeria and Southern Nigeria, as well as the colony of Lagos, were separate entities. As at that point, there were three separate British dependencies in the territory that was later named as Nigeria, by Flora Shaw, the wife of Lord Lugard, and colonial editor of the London Times, with extensive connections in Whitehall.

    Sir Frederick (later Lord) Lugard was to play a key role in Nigeria’s subsequent colonial history. He had originally being brought to Northern Nigeria in 1895 from Uganda for military campaigns by George Goldie of the chartered Royal Niger Company and was the man who conquered Northern Nigeria militarily. Sokoto, the seat of the caliphate, was the last Northern territory conquered by the British in 1903. His military campaign in Northern Nigeria included his famous march to Borgu and the race to Nikki which formed the basis of British claims to Northern Nigeria. It was as a result of his successful military campaign in the North that on January 1, 1900, he was appointed the first British High Commissioner for Northern Nigeria, after the administration of the area by the Royal Niger Company had been brought to an end and a British protectorate formally established there. This was some 15 years after a separate and distinct British protectorate had been established in Southern Nigeria.

    Even then, Britain had no definite plans for the future of its new colony. There was no real debate in the British House of Commons about what to do with its new colony as there was no real enthusiasm among leading British politicians for acquiring new colonies. The emphasis in the British colonial office was on keeping to the barest minimum the cost of administering this vast territory. There was little long range planning in Britain for the future of its new colony. In the event, Nigeria was at first left and ruled in three distinct parts, later reduced to two units, Northern and Southern Nigeria, and in 1912 placed under Sir (later Lord) Lugard as its first British Governor General of colonial Nigeria.

    •To be continued

     

     

  • Metaphor of the round leather (5)

    The rambling youth who abandons his farm to seek greener pastures on his neighbour’s land is never as manly as the starving cow which kicks over its food bucket, leaps over the barnyard fence to run after its calf at milking time. Even the maternal cow commands greater respect than the Nigerian youth. Even a plough-wearied bullock tilling barren land excites greater dignity than the youth who passionately maligns Nassarawa United, Rangers of Enugu and Gateway FC to worship A.C Milan, Manchester United among others.

    Some would rave that I have made a sweeping statement but the tragedy of the Nigerian youth at home isn’t any different from that of his peer in diaspora. A pitiful lust remains their woe; it’s a hankering for undeserved luxury, base sentimentality and unearned greatness. It is what drives a 38-year old Masters Degree holder and soccer enthusiast in the United Kingdom to call Super Eagles’John Obi Mikel, a failure even though he, the 38-year old, washes the anuses of mental patients in a low budget geriatric home in the UK and Mikel earns about £80, 000 a week playing for Chelsea Football Club in the same country.

    The 38-year old soccer buff was pissed with Mikel and his team mates’ performance at the on-going African Cup of Nations (AFCON) 2013. He thinks they constitute monumental disgrace to Nigeria. And he painstakingly states so on his Facebook social networking page. Some would claim he has every right to criticize and condemn the Nigerian Super Eagles, so does every Nigerian who loves to see and breathe and talk fantastic football.

    But this is hardly about the ignorant youth’s debatable logic or Mikel’s deep pocket, it’s about the rabid inclinations of the Nigerian youth and soccer enthusiast to criticize and condemn everything Nigerian within and outside the exciting world of soccer. It was fascinating to see the nation’s youth unite in condemnation and virulent abuse of Nigeria’s Super Eagles over their perceived lackluster performance at the ongoing AFCON 2013. It doesn’t matter that the hastily constituted squad was meant to use the on-going tournament fine-tune in depth and strength. No sooner than the tournament began than the Nigerian soccer enthusiast began to fantasize of the team’s incontestable right to excellence and invincibility even though it was ill-prepared to function and gel as a team.

    It took Clemens Westerhof four years to build the excellent squad that served Nigeria for well over a decade but the Nigerian youth and soccer enthusiast wants Stephen Keshi to parade a perfect team in three months. When the team drew against Zambia and Burkina Faso, not a few of their peers cursed and demeaned them as the worst things to ever happen to Nigeria. When they beat Ethiopia 2 – 0, their peers at home ridiculed them endlessly, claiming they shamefully managed to win by penalties. However, nothing compares to the ill-will accorded the team as it prepared to face the Ivorien team.

    The”Super Chickens” will fall to the might and soccer prowess of Didier Drogba, Yaya Toure, Africa’s current best footballer and their Ivorien team mates, claimed the Nigerian press and other soccer buffs. Eventually, the Super Eagles put a lie to prophesy of doom by their peers at home and abroad; they simply outclassed and dominated Drogba, Toure and team mates from the first blow of the whistle to the end of the match. The Super Eagles beat Ivory Coast 2 – 1.

    It hardly matters what final fate await the Super Eagles in the ongoing tournament, what truly matters is their spirited disavowal of the abject disloyalty and rabid sentimentality of Nigeria’s soccer loving youth.

    Currently, Nigeria is afflicted with youth irredeemably dim and misty in persona and worth; like spent shadows, they incarnate an insensible perspiration towards the sun. Their contempt for Nigeria extends beyond their disdain for Nigerian soccer. Like the beautifully dull and half-witted, this generation of youth encapsulates an inordinate contempt for everything Nigerian. They would dump the Nigerian dream for scraps and crusts of the American dream, British dream, South African dream, Malaysian dream, Ghanaian dream and even the Malian dream to mention a few.

    One cannot pontificate enough – even by unrelenting self-righteousness –to lay a foundation of true understanding and compassion for their plight. I speak of the unrepentant critic forever mounting the soapbox in his living room, courtyard or public bar to curse our leadership and curse the times even as he does nothing to improve the times.

    It’s even more tragic to see a journalist in his youth incarnate such pitiful citizenship despite expectations that he ought to know better. Such character that will play muscle to the most hideous politician for the paltriest fee often turns around to blame politicians for everything that is wrong with Nigeria. This young Nigerian journalist that I speak of espouses more bleakness and disdain for the Nigerian dream than his contemporaries from every other professional divide.

    By his contemporaries, I speak of children of the rich acquiring the best of Ivy League education abroad funds stolen by their parents. I speak of Nigerian youth cum self-styled intellectuals washing the anuses of the senile in geriatric homes and hospices abroad, even as they return home to belittle the impoverished teacher and farmer burning out under the worst living conditions, with dignity.

    I speak of postgraduate alumni from Nigeria driving cabs, cleaning public toilets, robbing, scamming and trafficking their sisters, daughters and mothers to foreign brothels for a fee. Then I speak of the very successful living abroad and yet propagating as much venom as bloody solutions to every problem in our fatherland.

    Lest I forget the maddening horde of Nigerian youth whose clamour for change is meticulously smothered no sooner than they gain access to vulgar privileges they whole-heartedly condemn as the excesses of the ruling class. With this shameful lot, the Nigerian journalist in his youth brazenly casts his lot every time he incites cheerlessness and contempt for everything Nigerian.

    What pleasure is there to be derived from ridiculing one’s heritage just for the pleasure of doing so? The one who derives his thrill from doing so, himself becomes an everlasting jest, oftentimes to his great loss. The Nigerian youth who does so besmirches the essence of true citizenship and grace. But aren’t we all identifiable with such character?

    To this, many will vehemently object but it still doesn’t belie the fact that left to our devices, we shamelessly abide with degeneracy. Little wonder, the hue and cry over the removal of fuel subsidy has abated to a burp. Little wonder the profligacy and sleaze of the Nigerian ruling class became acceptable to hordes of cowardly revolutionaries that threatened to “Occupy Nigeria.”

    The infinite cowardice in our hearts shall continue to betray the mutinous duplicity of our battle cries. The Nigerian youth is undoubtedly a researcher’s delight; every hour he substantiates the fraudulence of grief and revolutionary marches this side of the divide.

    Why are we in desperate haste to protest the corruption of the ruling class only to cower at decision time? Why do we demean the electoral process despite its worth as the most powerful revolutionary tool yet?

    • To be continued…