The Nation Newspaper

Category: Thursday

  • Latest China-Africa summit

    Latest China-Africa summit

    Recently 52 or so African heads of state and government assembled as they do annually in Beijing to meet with President Xi Jinping in a one-way dialogue in which the Chinese are presented with a list of requests on developmental projects spanning civil and military spheres of life. Most of the African countries are already indebted to China and they are not really in positions of serious binary negotiations. Sometimes the African countries are just like Oliver Twist asking for more and more without understanding Chinese oriental mentality of asking for their last pint of blood from them and their children when their loans mature.

    Orientals are generally not in the habit of forgiving creditors their debts. It is not just in their character and I am afraid that Africans will in future learn to their own detriment that the Chinese like other Orientals are incredible task masters not because they are wicked but because it is in their blood. There is no free lunch anywhere in the world! Whatever loans the Chinese are giving out now will be collected with interest in future or assets will be seized when the debtors are not able to pay. The experience of Sri Lanka which took generous Chinese loans for the development and modernisation of their ports and when they could not pay, the Chinese simply seized the ports in lieu of the money owed.

    I hope the African states will open their eyes when taking Chinese loans or any loans at all because they are not grants. Many of the projects the Chinese funded like the TANZAM railways running from  Zambia to Tanzania  built  between 1970 and 1975 like the “UHURU RAILWAY “ is now not running  and is virtually out of commission and has gone into a state of almost total disrepair and is being repaired with another loan of $1 billion provided by the Chinese. In our own case in Nigeria, the Kaduna- Abuja railway has been rendered hors de combat because of terrorists attack and bureaucratic thefts and it thus cannot pay its way. The Lagos-Ibadan railway is hardly a tale of success and the Azikiwe airport to Abuja runs fitfully and not always and only God knows the fate of the Kano- Katsina- Zinder railway all built with Chinese money. The intercity railway in Lagos stands to succeed if the bureaucratic shenanigans and corruption are minimised.

    The problem of these railways is that only sections are complete. For example the Lagos-Ibadan railway is the southern portion of the line going to Kano. Without its completion, it can hardly be expected to pay its way. We also have the problem of Nigerians not willing to pay for infrastructural modernisation because they think government owes them a living! Toll roads and bridges are objects of protest and damage in Nigeria whereas in the civilised parts of the world, people are made to pay for new roads, railways and other means of modern transportation and communication. There is a need for civic education to inculcate into our people the primary responsibility of citizens to pay tax. 

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    Bill Gates on a recent visit to Nigeria pointed out that Nigerians do not pay taxes. Of course it is generally known that only salary earners pay taxes while business people hardly pay taxes no matter how wealthy they are. They simply bribe their ways through. The complaint is that taxes are routinely stolen. I am afraid we have come to a point  in our country when we have to put our feet down and say no more stealing and police the state to prevent arrant looting after all thieves are people not spirits. If we are serious we can do it. China that we run with begging hats and plates in hand to was one of the most corrupt societies in the world. China and India used to struggle with each other about which country was worse than the other until China of Mao Tsetung decided to deal brutally with any rogue pilfering from state coffers .Anyone pilfering was met by bullets. People sat up and this severe retribution continues till today. Until we do this, corruption will continue until it destroys this country. The China we all run to borrow money was within my lifetime abjectly poor until the Chinese revolution in 1949. The country continued to engage in life and death struggle with poverty until Deng XIAOPING took power and ruled the country between 1978 and 1989 and completely transformed the country from being in the backwoods of development in the world into what it is today the second most powerful country in the world, second to the United States and on the cusp of overtaking it in the next decade or two, all things being equal. The phenomenal development of China within a living memory should be what our people should try to emulate. Borrowing money and opening our markets to all kind of junks was not the Chinese way to development. The way the Chinese mobilised its huge population for development should be an example which a country like Nigeria should follow rather than importing all kinds of Chinese goods into our country. Instead of wasting our time and the little money we have on constitutional debates and writing and rewriting our constitution, we should take our ploughs, hoes and cutlasses and go to farms with the aim of not only feeding ourselves but the rest of the world as Americans do.

    I am opposed to all the presidents of Africa queuing up in foreign countries to beg for assistance when we are endowed with available land, sunshine, water, air, minerals underneath the earth, flowing water that can be harnessed for hydroelectricity. It is not just the perennial trip in Beijing that I am opposed to; I am also opposed to all African presidents going to Paris as begging children every year for France. The same goes for the similar phenomenon in London, Washington, Tokyo, New Delhi, Berlin and Madrid and who knows when even puny Lisbon will follow. These African rulers will fly in their executive jets costing millions of dollars to purchase to beg for money which is sometimes not up to the cost of their planes.  We are told that the Chinese is sharing $50 billion among the 52 African states assembled in Beijing. This means some of these presidents would go home with less than $1 billion when prorated. It just doesn’t make sense when the monarch of Britain, heads of state and government in Germany, France, Spain, and Italy rents planes from their national airlines when they want to fly and make an impression. No one can begrudge the United States, Russia and even France for using executive personalised aircraft’s for  their trips abroad, after all, they make them and can afford them without borrowing or breaking the backs of their people to buy them.

    If there is need for all African countries to meet with these powerful countries for assistance, let the AU decide that as from now onwards. African ambassadors would represent their countries in bilateral relations one-on-one and if they have to be met as a collective, there should be no problem and for the countries that have no ambassadors in these major capitals, they should be represented by neighbouring countries ’ambassadors or those of regional organisations like Economic Community of West Africa- ECOWAS or SADC or such regional bodies. This annual jamborees reminds me of what the late President George Walker Bush said about such international jamborees. He said the smaller countries speak longer than the bigger and more important participants representing important countries and that their long speeches are simply ignored. I hope this is not the case with these African jamborees simply providing comic relief for the government leaders of busy and serious countries!

  • Labour pain

    Labour pain

    From the word go, Labour Party (LP) was not a strong platform. Its strength is only in its name, no more, no less. Its promoters’ intention was and still is to ride on the back of workers to make it a popular bastion, just like the Solidarity Movement of Poland which brought Lech Walesa to power in Poland in 1990.

    Workers anywhere in the world are a formidable group. They are politically and socially aware more than any other segment of the society because of their pro-activism. Mark you, many of them may not be educated, but what they lack in learning, they have in abundance in self confidence and readiness to stand up for their right, even at the risk of death. This has always been the strength of labour, not its political sagacity.

    Fighting for workers’ right is not the same as the contest for political power. In the former, one is faced with a nucleus of people who knows where one stands and vice versa. That is a straight fight between employer and employee. Even at that, there are still some Uncle Toms who are ready to sell out and betray their colleagues for a mess of porridge from the master’s table. The latter is not that straightforward. The political field is filled with mines which must be circumvented to get to power. One cannot rely on a relative to achieve that, not to talk of a fellow worker.

    LP was founded in 2002 as Party for Social Democracy (PSD) before changing its name in 2003. It was created  with high hopes by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), which in the face of the prevailing political circumstance felt a need for a party with social leftist idea – in short a workers party – that will address the need of the hoi poloi. It has not been smoothsailing for the party from inception. LP has been moving from one leadership crisis to the other since birth 22 years.

    Contrary to its founders’ expectations, it has not flown the way they thought it would. Even some founders of the party abandoned the platform to contest election on the crest of other parties. This tells how confident they are in their own baby. The crisis dogging the party today can be traced to 2021 when Julius Abure, its then National Secretary, was elected as National Chairman through the instrumentality of NLC. Abure came into office following the death of his predecessor, Alhaji Abdulkadir Abdulsalam, in 2020. The former Deputy National Chairman, Calistus Okafor, who felt he should succeed Abdulsalam kicked, all to no avail. The crisis was suppressed, but it has now returned to haunt the party.

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    The owners of the party, NLC, have been pushing for Abure’s exit for months now, but the embattled chairman dug in, with a convention in Nnewi, Anambra State, in March where his mandate was renewed. He enjoyed the confidence of the party’s 2023 presidential candidate, Peter Obi, and its only governor, Alex Otti of Abia State, to entrench himself in office. Now, the chickens have come to roost. The love between Obi and Abure has gone sour, and Otti who hitherto was more or less seen as an outsider by the duo, seems to have now earned Obi’s trust.

    Though Otti’s deputy, Ikechukwu Emetu, superintended affairs at the Nnewi convention, it was crystal clear that the governor and Obi deliberately stayed away from the show in order not to offend the centrifugal forces that want Abure out at all costs. Abure’s calulation was that by slyly renewing his mandate as chairman he would have the party in his pocket. Things are not working out that way. The crisis is rather deepening than abating. To save the party from itself and the wrong path Abure is taking it, Otti, its sole governor, with Obi’s support convened a stakeholders meeting in Umuahia, the Abia State capital, on September 4. The meeting sacked the Abure-led National Working Committee (NWC) of the party and named a 29-member caretaker committee led by Mrs Nenadi Usman to replace it.

    Abure is figting back like a wounded lion. Just as he did when NLC started the campaign that he must go, Abure is not taking things lying low. He has broken ranks with Obi, his benefactor, arguing that the party has no national leader, a position hitherto unofficially perceived as Obi’s by virtue of his being LP’s standard-bearer in the 2023 presidential race. When the going was good, Abure had declared Obi as the party’s sole candidate for the 2027 presidential election. He has now, like the sole administrator of the party that he has become, withdrawn the ticket from Obi. Abure did not spare Otti either. He said the Abia governorship ticket was also open.

    With Obi and Otti now given the NLC treatment by Abure, the LP crisis has become worse. Abure, it seems, is only interested in remaining chairman, come what may, umindful of the consequences for the party. It is his selfishness that has brought LP to this pass. The pain the party is going through is self-inflicted. From all indications, LP has not become a party yet. Its leadership, and trustees, that is NLC, as well as candidates and elected public officers like Obi and Otti, treat it as a special purpose vehicle (SPV) to acquire power.

    LP will continue to run into crisis if its modus operandi remains unchanged. No serious party is left at the whims and caprice of political upstarts because they have deep pockets. It was by chance that LP came third in the last presidential election. The main factor for that surprise showing was the Obi-dient movement, a group of young and not-too-young Nigerians who desired a change for their country but placed their bet on the wrong horse. For LP, it is still raining, the downpour is coming. Mark my word.

  • The floods next time

    The floods next time

    The North has come under the siege of flood. Virtually every state in the region has experienced flooding. While those of us in the South are praying for rain, it is this same element of nature that is wreaking havoc in the North. As I watched the surging flood that submerged Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, on television on Tuesday, my heart went out to the victims of the disaster. Yes, it is a disaster.

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    Rain is supposed to be a blessing because when it falls it brings soothing relief to man and the environment. We cannot say that of what happened in Maiduguri; Jigawa and other northern states. The Nigerian Meteorological Agency (NIMET) warns every year of flooding accompanying heavy rain, and the likelihood of the bursting of dams that should collect the rain water, but many states are still caught flatfooted when the disaster happens. What is the cause? Lack of planning for the predicted disaster? Or the refusal of the authorities to  institute long-term measures to avert the disaster?

    NIMET cannot be warning against the same thing year in, year out, only for the nation to be caught in the throes of disastrous flooding every rainy season. I watched with mouth agape as Vice President Kassim Shettima waded through flood, with his aides, to get to the palace of the Shehu of Borno, Abubakar Garba, to commiserate with him over the disaster. The government must act fast before flood wipes away some parts of the country.

  • The tribal war in Northwest

    The tribal war in Northwest

    Those who live in denial according to Yoruba aphorism often focus on treatment of rashes while ignoring the more deadly and life- threatening leprosy affliction. Unfortunately, as a nation, it is in our character to expend energy in addressing symptoms instead of facing our demons. 

    For instance, whereas our visionary forbears bequeathed on to us a federal system, celebrated by over two-third of the nations of the world for its ability to guarantee ‘unity in diversity’ in a multi-ethnic society, we traded it for a unitary state.

    But when the aggrieved deprived and marginalized individuals and groups fought back against the state that took over the control of their lives, their resources, the right to impact their values and culture in the education of their children, the roads they pass through and even the water they drink, instead of addressing the fundamental problem which requires simple political solution, we decided to focus on symptoms which find expression in crisis of legitimacy, massive corruption, economic sabotage, terrorism and banditry, kidnapping for ransom, weaponisaton of religion etc. by those who have lost faith in the state’s capacity to protect them.

    Unfortunately, the state has failed the north-western states with a total population of 24,244,722 (1991 Census) in their ongoing tribal war. But just as the northern parasitic elite misadvised Muhammadu Buhari to focus on the symptoms in 2016, they last week once again misled President Bola Tinubu to believe that “the deployment of necessary military assets and manpower would ensure that these criminal elements were flushed out and the peace restored back to our communities.”

    Since we passed through this same path not too many seasons ago, those who are  today hailing the relocation of military chiefs along with the Minister of State for Defence, Bello Matawalle, who has promised  to be “on the ground in the Northwest with the CDS and other military chiefs, leading our brave men and women in uniform… to liberate the people of Sokoto, Katsina, Zamfara and Kebbi states and the entire Northwest region” either have short memories or are suffering from selective amnesia.

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    What is going on in the northwest is a tribal war. And solution is political bargaining and compromise. And if there are still misgivings as to the nature of social dislocation that led to tribal war between the ruling Fulani hegemonic class and conquered Hausa tribe that came to the open shortly after inauguration of Buhari as president in 2015,  the July 25, 2022 BBC  airing of “Bandit warlords of Zamfara”  erased such doubts. The broadcast also traced the sources of the social dislocation in the affected states to ethnic rivalry over control of political and economic fortunes of their different communities.

    The major protagonists did not weigh words as to the causes of their intense hatred for each other. One attributed source of their anguish, to ‘the closing down of traditional grazing routes and systematic exclusion of Fulani from government businesses. They therefore have no regret in the mindless killings of their arch enemies, the subsistence farmers. And for their grief, the Hausa farming community vigilantes of Kurfa Dunya swore: “If allowed, we will kill every Fulani man, even in the town, because they killed our mothers, our fathers, our children, and dumped their bodies here”.

    In fact, Ibrahim Dosara, one time Zamfara State Commissioner of Information did not only identify the genesis of the rivalry between the two tribes that had co-existed for centuries, but proffered possible solution. According to him, the “genesis of rural banditry in Zamfara as elsewhere in the northwest started with a conflict between the Fulani and Hausa communities in the state leading to 2,619 deaths, 1,190 abducted and 14,378 livestock rustled with 100,000 people  displaced from their ancestral homes between 2011 and 2019.”  And for him, the cheapest and most cost-effective way to reduce hostility was institutionalisation of community policing especially since “Zamfara lacks enough security forces from the federal government to secure the lives and properties of the people in the state”.

    But Buhari’s government which conceitedly arrogated to itself the power to know what the people wanted without asking them continued to live in denial. In fact, it gave  the impression that  aggressors that confiscated villages sending victims to IDP camps, were ghosts  until ex governors Abdullahi Ganduje of Kano, Aminu Masari of Katsina and Nasir El Rufai of Kaduna confirmed the terrorists were indeed Fulani herdsmen mostly from outside the country.  Sheik Gumi went a step further by going into the bandits’ den to obtain their demands which include amnesty and re-integration into our security services and larger society.

    And as if to confirm that the Fulani believe in their just cause, Aliyu Marafa the Emir of Yantoro (dethroned and later reinstated) turbaned Ado Aileru, a notorious Fulani gang leader who was on the run after leading a massacre in the village of Kadisau in June 2020 and for terrorizing residents and motorists elsewhere in the northwest, as the Sarkin Fulanin.

    Community policing as suggested by Ibrahim Dosara would have produced a balance of terror especially with recruits drawn from the warring Fulani and indigenous Hausa people compelled to jointly confront their demons. But President Buhari and his defence minister, Bashir Salihi Magashi, opposed state and community policing not controlled from Abuja.

    For them to “rout-out, arrest and prosecute armed bandits, vicious kidnappers for ransom and cattle rustling gangs operating in Zamfara State”, what Zamfara needed were a full battalion of special forces; “Operation Maximum Safety with 510 police personnel and 40 patrol vehicles”, “Joint Intervention Team of about 1000 police personnel, counter terrorism unit (CTU), federal special anti-robbery squad (FSARS), anti-bomb (EOD) squad, and conventional policemen” and Air Force’s indiscriminate bombing from the air.

    Ten years down the line, little has changed except that hostility has spread across the whole of the north-western states.

    President Tinubu who admitted preparing hard for this job in the run up to the election rightly identified community and state policing as one of the ways to address insecurity among local communities. One is therefore not sure of the new information at his disposal compelling him to align with the position of self-serving winners-take-all northern leaders who have always opposed compromise and political bargaining in resolving crisis of nation building.

    Tribal war is a factor of most multi-ethnic societies where dominant ethnic group try to lord it over smaller ethnic nationalities.  Europe for centuries fought tribal wars over the rights of groups to protect their values and culture. There was temporary cessation of hostilities after the 1648 Westphalia Agreement. It was not until after the two so called world wars which were in fact tribal wars, that Europe swore “never again”, with institutionalisation of federal system that protects groups and individuals from the tyranny of the state.

    Since distributive justice or concern for fair allocation of resources among members of the community is at the core of the tribal war between warring Hausa and their Fulani compatriots, what is required is compromised bargaining  especially as we have discovered that any other option will only prolong their nightmare.

    President Tinubu who won last year election by securing northern elite consensus is uniquely positioned to serve as an independent arbiter. He cannot afford to miss this historic opportunity to right the wrongs of the past especially where the northern establishment has roundly rejected policies that guarantees a measure of egalitarianism in the north.

    For Tinubu therefore, addressing symptoms cannot be an option. With tribal war amidst ravaging poverty and about 10m of out of school children in the northwest, with Niger Delta political leaders unable to end crude oil theft in their backyard and with political elite elsewhere in the country busy importing the labour of other societies in the name of commerce, his much cherished economic crusade will be doomed.

  • Stop messing up with education of our children

    Stop messing up with education of our children

    Between the Federal Ministry of Education and some states, we are hearing pronouncements on educational policies that give us citizens some concern especially parents and those who are seized with the question of the education of our children and grandchildren and about the educational trajectory of the country. The Federal Ministry of Education shocked the whole country, by issuing a decree, as if we were in a military regime, that children under 18 should not be allowed to take JAMB university entrance examination and those below certain age should not be allowed to take the Senior School examination. Also Lagos State suddenly announced it was converting the College of Medicine in its university into a University of Medicine. These two developments gave me worry and if some of us don’t speak out, these two authorities will think they are doing the right thing.

    The federal minister of education who made one of these announcements is totally wrong. First of all, education is still on the concurrent constitutional list on which both the federal and the state governments have jurisdiction. I am waiting for any state government to challenge this federal announcement because it is wrong. No government should be able to tell parents whether their fast learning children should be arbitrarily restrained from entering a university because a minister says so, or should a minister be able to restrain a child from taking senior school leaving examination which is a prerequisite for sitting for JAMB examination. If this policy holds, parents would be forced to asking their children to take Ordinary and Advanced level examinations of external examination bodies in order to give their children opportunity to enter universities. In this way, the minister would have found a market for external examination bodies to the detriment of the local ones.

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    In places like Canada and the United States, children enter universities with different state qualifications not a unified homogenized qualification like in Nigeria. There are smart children who get first degrees in Harvard and Oxford universities in their teenage years because they are gifted children and it doesn’t seem as if our own regimes make allowance for such gifted children because everyone is brought down to the lowest pedestal of the average and dullest people in the country.

    I pray that this action of the federal minister of education would be challenged in the courts for clarification and also in order to protect the interest of smart and precocious children who have no voice in what amounts to abridgment of their educational progress.

    The idea of University of Medicine began in Ondo State where a so-called university of medicine domiciled in a rented section of the Adeyemi College of Education in Ondo State for years before apparently having its own campus. When this unique institution was established, I asked then in this paper what this university of medicine was all about. Can medical students be trained without knowledge of basic sciences like Physics, Biology and Chemistry? Certainly these medical students would  be expected to go through basic sciences in which case the university of medicine would have to have departments of basic sciences and also Biochemistry, Physiology and Anatomy, knowledge of which are critical to the study of medicine. In modern medical schools, students are expected to have knowledge of the sociology of the country within which their knowledge will be practiced. Education nowadays tries to widen the knowledge of students outside the narrow confines of the specialized fields of study. This is why a university of medicine should be part of a developed comprehensive university, not an isolated university of medicine. Even if there are universities of medicine in the developed countries, must we blindly copy them without their level of development and the resources available in such countries? Since the Ondo example, the federal government has in the last few years established such universities of medicine in Oturpo, in Benue State and another one in Ila-Orangun , Osun State presumably to honour Brigadier-Gen. David Mark and Chief  Bisi Akande  who are political bigwigs in the country without counting the cost of such establishment even when other old dilapidating federal institutions are collapsing.

    One also wonders where medical teachers are going to be found for these universities of medicine. There is no surplus of such teachers in Nigeria or anywhere as far as I know. In the case of Ondo State, it is not even able to fund its universities of technology in Okitipupa, Owo and its premier university in Akungba. The technical equipment and structure for such a highly specialized university of medicine can only be purchased in forex-denominated currency. Is it with the billions of naira that will fetch a mere million dollars that they would use to fund this so-called university of medicine?

    A poorly trained doctor armed with the scalpel to perform surgery will be a licensed murderer. By the way, what happened to Muhammadu Buhari’s University of Transportation in Daura? Recently the Customs Director-General announced his department was about to announce a university of Customs and the Department of Immigration is ready to roll! Not to talk about different arms of the military! The university idea has become a joke in Nigeria.

    When Lagos State announced that it was setting up a university of medicine this October, I said to myself here we go again. The reasons adduced for it were shortage of doctors in state hospitals because of resignation of their doctors for foreign appointments. The state did not say people went elsewhere because of poor remuneration but we the people know this is what happened. We all know the reason why doctors are fleeing the country is poor wages and emoluments. The announcement by the Lagos State governor went further to state that the new university of medicine would graduate 1500 doctors per year.

    I asked myself whether the institution would just be told to go and graduate 1500 doctors as if it were a factory. What will be the size of 1500 graduating medical university? Where are the teachers that would graduate 1500 doctors? This is simply impossible and if it is possible, these brand new doctors would be poorly trained physicians. None of the old medical schools in the country can graduate a third of such figures annually. This is not a solution to the problem of resignation.

    For the sake of argument, would the new doctors be tied down by shackles to the hospitals? I have not heard of universities being set up like this before. Was there any study done about the feasibility of this enterprise? Even with the acclaimed resource endowment of Lagos State, it will not be able to fund adequately its new university of medicine along with recently established universities of technology, of education and the old LASU which is not adequately funded.

    State governments should not just jump into the running stream of establishing universities on the whim of the chief executive. States concerned with the health of their people should provide potable clean water and embark on programs of preventive medicine rather than poorly conceived establishments of universities of medicine. Universities that are universities are serious enterprises. The federal and state governments should have deep thoughts about  establishing new universities when it can hardly fund the current ones. It is indeed time for the federal and state governments to roll back some of the mushroom universities that they have established in recent times.

  • DNA and the paternity show

    DNA and the paternity show

    Civilisation brought a lot of things in its wake, especially in Africa. The continent was and still is a place, where the people are their brothers and sisters keepers. They look out for one another whether or not they enjoy filial bond.

    Children grow up together under the same roof without drawing attention to who their biological father is. There is no need for that because children are seen as precious gifts from God to be cherished, loved and treated with care.

    Why bother over who the father is when every elder that is around whether known or unknown is considered as the father of a child. Father is called many endearing names. To some, he is Daddy or Baba, to others, he is Papa, and to people in the part of the country I come from, he is Abame. It is a name that every man loves to bear. At a certain stage in life, a man craves the title because of the prestige and honour it confers. Society also pressures him to make haste and become a father.

    Fathers are revered. They are treated as demi-gods. It is believed that they can do no wrong. In any gathering that they speak, people listen with rapt attention. ‘Dake, Baba n’soro’ (keep quiet father is speaking), those perceived as interrupting daddy when he is talking are told.

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    The African father takes the prize when it comes to fatherhood. Every child in the household is his. None is a bastard, that cursed word, which in recent times has scattered many homes in the wake of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) tests that are conducted to determine the paternity of a child. DNA is a molecule that contains the genetic code that is unique to every individual. Those days, even where it is common knowledge that a child is not sired by the father, the man takes the child as his and life goes on. These days people want to know the truth for certain reasons and many otherwise happy homes are the worse for it.

    In the good old days, people knew about certain things and kept the secrets to themselves for the good of all. Children are the heritage of God and the way they come to the world does not matter – the least of all being that they are sired by a man who had an affair with a married woman. Who cares? They wonder, adding: who knows what the child may become tomorrow? It is because of that pregnant tomorrow, which many no longer seem to care about today, that the child is not stigmatised. He is not seen as no less a member of the household because of the circumstances of his birth.

    There was a traditional way of determining the paternity of a child before the advent of DNA, but no family resorted to it because they saw no need for such a ‘test’ because of what it may expose. It was better to keep such issue within the family to avoid the shame that comes with knowing the truth. It is not today that men and women have been having extramarital affairs that resulted in babies.

    In the interest of all, the babies are protected to avoid a huge crisis. Today, this protection has been jettisoned by men who desire to know the truth in order to set their minds free! In most cases, the truth comes to light when they are planning to travel abroad in search of greener pastures. Whichever way the truth emerges, it leaves a sour taste in the mouth and a long-lasting bitterness against the offending party.

    The latest report on DNA Testing released by a firm whose record in this field is well known has again brought to the fore the issues surrounding the need for the test, especially for children who have lived for years with a father who has seen them through school as well as catered to their needs all their lives. Should a DNA test be allowed to disrupt such a happy home because of the escapades of the mother?

    Is the desire to go abroad worth all the trouble of having a DNA test that will destroy an age-old marriage and turn the lives of the children upside down? DNA is good, but its aftereffect seismic shocks are ill winds that blow no good. Serious considerations must be given to its dire consequences of destroying homes and separating grown children from a father they have known all their lives, who is now in his twilight years. How many men can live with the fact of knowing that the child they love so much is not biologically theirs?

    That man, I daresay, is not yet born. It is only a goat that learns of its impending death and still eats. It is a bitter pill to swallow. So, is it not better not to know the truth and live in peace than to know the truth and become a living dead? According to Smart DNA, paternity uncertainty remains high. It said 27 per cent of paternity tests came back negative.

    What this means is that more than one in four men tested were not the biological fathers of the children. The result is alarming. It shows that many married women are unfaithful. This damning report is an indictment of married women. What is the essence of being married, but going out with another man to the extent of having a child for him? The moral and social implications are incomprehensible.

    How will these mothers feel if their sons’ wives play the extramarital game that result in babies too? Will they find it in their hearts to forgive their daughters-in-law? DNA is a personal matter, with wide implications for the society. It must be handled with care and every sense of responsibility to avoid its debilitating consequences. After all, it is not the fault of the children, but of their mothers’ who chose to be unfaithful. The fear of DNA may yet deter other married women from engaging in away games.

  • Dangote breaks the mould!

    Dangote breaks the mould!

    On Tuesday, Dangote Refinery went to town about rolling out petrol, at long last. That same day, the pump price of petrol which shortage in the past few months has paralysed many parts of the country shot up from N568 to between N855 and N897 per litre at NNPC retail outlets. Many motorists had been buying at higher prices at private outlets, ever before the official hike.

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    As much as price matters, the major concerns of motorists is the availability of the product for which they have been keeping vigil at filling stations for weeks now. If Dangote can address the availability issue, and that at a modest price, it will be well and good. Nigerians have suffered enough for petrol and allied products.

  • Twinkle, twinkle, to the dust

    Twinkle, twinkle, to the dust

    In Voltaire’s Bastards, J.R. Saul analyses how a mortal hankering to stifle divinity and demote the Creator inspired an earthly race for renown through image commodification.

    This dubious quest is native to Nigeria, where millions of youths are successively conditioned, under the neon glow of fame’s fleeting allure.

    Society superintends this psychological amputation of its young in the manner that beggars maim their children, to habituate them to their future pigeonholes.

    The enthrallment with celebrity has led us to a whole new state of mindlessness. Digital broadcaster, DSTV/Multichoice, understands this “truth” hence it sinks its fangs into the minds of the youth, as the falcon does to weaker fauna.

    There is no one to protect the young from the aggressive cues the broadcaster insinuates into their psyches. The fault is hardly with DSTV/Multichoice, however, but with Nigerian parents who leave the task of raising their wards to the purveyor of dross.

    The blame goes to a Nigerian leadership stymied in a swamp of questionable freebies and patronage. Even the press, which ought to serve as a shield and last bastion of resistance to the South African broadcaster’s perverse programming is enslaved to its tokens.

    Yet, the BBN show must be appreciated for its unwelcome and stark revelations. In the grotesque theatre of its annual circus, Nigeria suffered a gruesome exposure to its 2023 BBN All-Stars edition. What should have been a mere footnote in the annals of entertainment became a harrowing display of ignorance and a tragic reflection of the depths to which Nigerian youth have sunk.

    A video of BBN housemates bungling a simple quiz went viral, revealing the stark truth: these so-called stars could not answer questions that even elementary school pupils would ace. When asked, “What is 7 multiplied by 0?” one female housemate confidently replied, “7,” oblivious to the simple truth that it is zero. She subsequently claimed that Nigeria’s first president was Olusegun Obasanjo, even though it was the late Nnamdi Azikiwe. And still another, with tragic irony, identified the man on the N100 bill as the late Nnamdi Azikiwe, when the correct answer is Obafemi Awolowo.

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    One housemate was asked what CAC stands for and she replied “KAK, certificate…,” not minding that the correct answer is Corporate Affairs Commission. Another female housemate stated that the body responsible for making laws in Nigeria is the judiciary even though the correct answer is the legislature.

    In pursuit of N100 million and an SUV, inmates of BBN’s amorality jailhouse shun dignity, decorum and presumed good breeding, to engage in wanton sex, voyeurism, and tantrums.

    In previous editions, some housemates had sex in a public toilet, before a global audience.

    The scene prefigures the transition from high morality to decadence. The antics of youth in the debate about the BBN depravity, for instance, emphasise a throwback to primordial whim.

    One hyperactive youth responded to my critique of the show, stressing that it offers youths, like him, a limitless opportunity to ‘blow’ (attain renown). To that, I responded: “Should terrorism be legalised because perpetrators make a fortune from it? But he retorted: “Oga na English u dey speak.”

    If the latter’s retort is regrettable, the housemates’ bungling of the quiz, sexual escapades and societal applause, are even more heartbreaking. These are not mere lapses, but alarming signs of a society in freefall.

    Despite the housemates’ woeful grasp of basic knowledge, millions of youths continue to worship them as cult idols, oblivious to their intellectual and moral bankruptcy.

    The tragedy deepens as dubious demagogues, seeking to exploit the celebrities’ social capital, court their endorsement to sway the votes of their blindly obedient followers. The consequences of such manipulations are better imagined.

    In this clime, blind celebrity worship becomes a dangerous distraction. The time wasted keeping vigil to view the sexual escapades of BBN housemates could be better spent growing a garden, playing football, painting a picture, reading or writing a book. Yet, the obsession persists, fostering a culture of “dumbing down” of an entire generation and their blind projection of celebrity bias.

    We have seen this “dumbing down” manifest from the botched 2020 #EndSARS protest to the so-called 10 Days of Rage, otherwise known as the #EndBadGovernance protest. The recent revelation by the Nigeria Police Force, that the 2024 #EndBadGovernance protest was masterminded by one Andrew Wynne, also known as Andrew Povich or Drew Povey, a British national, wanted for allegedly orchestrating a plot to overthrow the Nigerian government, establishes the need for the youth to be more circumspect in aligning with causes marketed by their favourite entertainment or political celebrities.

    The malady is endemic, spanning social and professional circuits, as many youths enter the corporate workforce armed with little more than an entitlement mentality and an aversion to responsibility.

    The blame must be shared. Parents who left their children to be raised by a despoiled, sensationalist media, a compromised government and broadcast regulator, and an inefficient school system are complicit. They jointly superintend the perversion of our social institutions into factories of folly, producing cannon fodder for the mindless mob.

    The fascination with celebrity costs Nigeria more than can be accounted for. It has triggered an astronomical quest for accidental renown via frivolous attempts to set world records—longest kissing hours, massage sessions, cooking marathons, and even crying marathons.

    Yet, amid the hustle, the nagging question persists: “To what end?” More youths commit their imagination and passion to extreme and featherbrained quests, chasing after the wind.

    We must return to grassroots empowerment and mobilisation around constructive industry as an antidote to societal decay. This requires fostering a culture of accountability, decency and social responsibility. The youth must be taught to resist the commodification of their identities by social media platforms, the false promises of instant celebrity and influencer capitalism.

    The interaction between the public arena and the celebrity hopeful channels primal fantasy even as it skirts the borders of a business transaction. The result ultimately manifests in transient celebrity or the flipside of renown.

    Nonetheless, the proverbial 15 minutes of fame thrive by the same artifice, the same choreographed ruse, the endless exploitation of lust by fame junkies that never seem to peter out.

    Yet the obsession with DSTV/Multichoice’s BBN show thrives by the broadcaster’s smirking depravity and the sudden melting of inhibitions of its Nigerian public. It’s like the holocaust and apocalypse. Society stands at ground zero, incinerated by the South African invader. The latter’s Nigerian staff play pimping pawns; soliciting secondary pawns comprising fame junkies and fortune hunters, eager to live like caged animals or guinea pigs, in the broadcaster’s televised dross – for a material prize.

    The shows’ participants simply cheat themselves of a learning experience; they circumvent a slow, steady, enlightened path to acclaim, to self-intoxicate in accidental celebrity. Unknown to them, the instant fame and opportunities in which they luxuriate are merely flash currents in the electric moment before lightning strikes, and they are reduced to rubble: celebs, glitter and all.

    A glance behind the glitter usually reveals something more than a colourful paradise. It invalidates the deceptions of fame and instant wealth. It is akin to what Saul Bellow likened to picking up a dangerous wire fatal to ordinary folk or rattlesnakes handled by hillbillies in a state of religious exaltation, in his novel, Humboldt’s Gift.

    Many who grasped these super-charged wires and serpents have been found to incandescence in acclaim for a little while, and then they wink out, which leads to a more profound suspicion of celebrity.

  • Patriots and President’s Hobbesian choice

    Patriots and President’s Hobbesian choice

    The Patriots led by Chief Emeka Anyaoku recently visited President Tinubu. The group declaring that “what we have now does not make for effective internal security measures,   does not make for rapid economic development and does not make for satisfactory social development, say, in education and health” made two demands on the president. First is “The convening of a National Constituent Assembly of directly elected individuals, on a non-political basis, from the 36 states of the federation, possibly three individuals per state, and one from the FCT with the mandate to produce a draft people’s democratic constitution”.  And “The draft constitution produced by the Constituent Assembly, to be put to a national referendum and if approved, should then be signed by the president as the genuine Nigerian people’s constitution.” 

    The president while assuring them of “listening to their two major requests on the path to referendum which should lead to constitutional measures that will fit our diversity and governance so that we avoid conflicts and break-ups”, however added that he is “currently preoccupied with economic reform, his first priority after which he would look at other options, including constitutional review as recommended along other options, as soon as possible”. Having emerged from the trenches, President Tinubu understands the yearnings of Nigerians and the imperative of identifying with those aspirations.

    Before the current intervention by the Patriots, there had been calls for constitutional reform by other concerned groups including the late Enahoro’s ‘Movement for National Reformation’ (MNR), Pro-national Conference Organisation (PRONACO),  National Democratic Coalition (NADECO), foremost socio-cultural  ethnic groups such as Afenifere, Ohanaze, Pan-Niger Deltal Forum (PANDEF) and Middle Belt Forum, (MDF) for whom periodic agitation for restructuring of the country is a crusade. Other leading lights and stakeholders in the Nigerian project across the country have also actively supported the crusade for a return to the federal arrangement, the basis for the coming together of the country’s different multi-ethnic nationalities at independence.

    Most of the above groups also believe resolving our crisis of nation building should be a crusade that must necessarily precede the quest for economic prosperity. In fact, many believe the failure to first resolve our political problem is responsible for all other socio-economic problems including massive corruption, crisis of legitimacy, participation and penetration, sabotage of the economy by groups fighting for distributive justice in the Niger Delta as well as those unpatriotic groups undermining the economy of the country through importation of the labour of other societies.

    As proof of failure of successive leaders to address our political problems, they also pointed out the zero-sum struggle for power by leaders of ethnic nationalities, election rigging and electoral violence as well as massive corruption. All these they added found expression in the collapse of government economic initiatives including Obasanjo’s ‘Operation Feed the Nation’ the various ‘River Basin Authorities’ projects, Shehu  Shagari’s “ Green revolution” (Alhaji Umaru Yar’Adua’s 7-Point Agenda where he identified seven sectors of the economy as the engine room to the transformation of the entire economy, and Goodluck Jonathan  “Transformation Agenda” including  unbundling of PHCN and its sales to incompetent political stalwarts.

    President Tinubu who said no one should sympathize with him because he asked for the job is no doubt aware of the effects of putting the cart before the horse or attempting to sweep the political crisis under the carpet. This is why he today has a Hobbesian choice to make.

    But he is a risk taker who attained power thorough grit and wit. He challenged his APC party’s oligarchs including President Buhari, VP Osinbajo, Abdullahi Adamu, his former party chairman who tried to outwit him by imposing a consensus candidate on the eve of the primary and his ever disloyal Southwest governors, with bravery and tenacity. And that turned out  a rehearsal for his final battle which he fought with great perseverance and unyielding determination against warring PDP and its surrogate, the Labour Party, crowded by crude, rude, unthinking mob called ‘obidients’ whose only commodity is intimidation of rivals.

    And also working in his favour was the fact that as the only 2023 presidential candidate that emerged without the endorsement of the ‘owners of Nigeria’, the powers and principalities, he could afford taking risks.

    In his Yoruba base, where electorate are often described as discriminatory voters, he lost two of the six states, Osun and Lagos where he had reigned supreme for over 20 years. He lost all the southeast states, won two in South-south and shared the northern states with Atiku Abubakar.

    If with his frightful experience while navigating the mine-invested route to the Nigerian presidency, threat to a possible second term bid because of punishing effects of his harsh economic policies on Nigerians who believe they are being punished for the sins of untouchable parasitic elites that stole the country blind, he stubbornly insists on first solving economic problem before addressing the political problems he admits threaten our very survival, we can see in President Tinubu a politician who promises hope while praying for a miracle. And that is what separates the real politician from a venal man of many words.

    And this is why  President Tinubu alone knows how he intends to win the war on an economy under daily  assault of crude oil thieves, importers of fake products and where manufacturing firms like Nestle and PZ are declaring loses of between N262.5b and  N76 billion while some parasitic banks are targeting  N1 trilion pre-tax profit for a year.

    I guess Tinubu is not afraid of failure because unlike his errant predecessors, he sees himself as providing selfless service to a country that has been serially  betrayed by self-serving overbearing leaders interested only in exploiting, for political gains, the innermost fears of the poor electorate that look up to them for leadership.

    For instance, the health of Nigeria could never have been the concern of Aguiyi Ironsi who whimsically promulgated his Decree 34 of 1966 that turned the country from a federal state to a unitary state or the succeeding military adventurers that splintered the country to 36 states and 774 local government areas to consolidate Ironsi’s initiative.

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    Babangida could not have been serving anyone but self by foisting Structural Adjustment programme (SAP) on Nigeria despite its wide rejection by Nigerians and his imposition of an interim contraption on the country after Nigerians had expressed their preference for MKO Abiola’s presidency by giving him a landslide victory in the 1993 election. A leader who sets out to truly serve Nigeria wouldn’t have waged five years’ war against Nigerians as Abacha did. And only Obasanjo’s political children who crowned him ‘the father of New Nigeria’ after presiding over the sale of Nigerian total government investment of $100 billion for a paltry $1.5 billion and sharing of Nigeria physical properties including national monuments among political cronies and civil servants are deceived  and not Nigerians.

    Buhari couldn’t have been serving Nigeria by presiding over the total collapse of the nation’s economy and the pacification of the North including his Katsina State by bandits and herdsmen.

    I am sure Tinubu the politician knows his survival and credibility is anchored on finding accommodation for the demands of the Patriots and the faithful implementation of his “three-year economic revival plan targeted at addressing Nigeria’s socioeconomic challenges, prevailing adversity, unemployment, insecurity, and poverty whose highlights, are food security; poverty eradication; growth, job creation; access to capital; inclusion; rule of law; and fighting corruption.”

     And if he is voted out in 2027 by the electorate for either not turning the fortune of Nigerians around or for failing to instituionalise a federal system that liberates individuals and groups from the tyranny of the state, he will return home a fulfilled man having tried his best.

  • Sitting with Osuntokun – 2

    Sitting with Osuntokun – 2

    By Samuel Akinnuga

    One of the characteristics of great leaders is the ability to produce (mentor) even greater leaders. I should expect that applies to those who become professors. And for those who earn the honour of emeritus professor, it must be a given. Osuntokun has a bragging right in this respect. Let me put it this way: he’s had a bountiful harvest from his sowing in this field – distinguished academics of note in the fields of history and political science that he taught at one point or the other. Again, I beg the reader’s pardon for sticking purely to academic fruits and leaving out those who are active in the field of politics. To be fair, one of the professors I mention below ended up in politics but it’s his credentials as a professor that earned him a place on the list.

    From his time at the University of Ibadan (Jos Campus): professors Ehiedu Iweriebor and Sonni Tyoden; University of Lagos: professors Abayomi Akinyeye, Hakeem Tijani, Taiwo Akinyele, Femi Adegbulu, David Aworawo, Abolade Adeniji, Victor Ukaogo and late Armstrong Adejo; University of Maiduguri: professors Kyari Mohammed and Ademola Adeleke. Some of them became vice chancellors, for example, Tyoden (University of Jos). Others like Akinyele (Maranatha University) and Mohammed (Nigerian Army University) are currently serving. Talk about impact!

    Prof and I then discussed leadership for a while. When I asked which leader made the greatest impression on him as a young man, he started by making comments about the triumvirate of Zik, Sardauna and Awo. To him, Zik was “a very impressive man.” He continued: “I admired Zik’s intellect…he was thoroughly educated in the Western sense. He was a nationalist to the core. He was well-read and would often add spice to his speeches by quoting some obscure author. He was loved all over the country, even in the major cities and towns in the old Western region.” He admired Sardauna for his practicality and far-sightedness. “Sardauna was a practical and far-seeing man. He was one of the people who appreciated Awo’s viewpoint on federalism, not on principles per se, but to protect the interests of the north.” And then Awo. Of the three, “Awo made the greatest impression on me. I admire his steadfastness, discipline, commitment and hard work. He was honest enough to admit at the time that Nigeria was a geographical expression, realistic enough to appreciate our differences and understood that the best way to harmonise these differences was to have a proper federal government.” With respect to discipline, “he was able to discipline himself and his followers. He made it impossible for any of the ministers in his government to own more than a plot of land in the government reserved areas.” Osuntokun should know this. His elder brother was Awo’s minister in charge of the Ministry of Lands and Housing.

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    Speaking on the impact of his leadership, he continued: “Awo was a visionary. His foresight gave his people a head-start with the free education policy. I was a beneficiary in Class 6; benefitted for one year before leaving for secondary school.”

    While this part is really about looking forward, I guess an emeritus professor of history cannot resist the itch to look back. In his reflections on the country’s mistakes of the past, he holds the view that “The coup of 1966 destroyed the basis of a federal union in Nigeria. And it has worsened. There is so much bitterness in Nigeria. By creating more and more states, we have made things worse. Politics should be domiciled in the federating units. What we have now is a situation where development plans and other important matters are centralised, leaving no room for individual initiative.” Osuntokun was quite effusive at this point. He believes that the right system in place can be effective in curbing the excesses of public (and even private) officials. As he put it, “The corruption in this country is because no one is ever punished. If punishment is swift, corruption would be minimised and bad behaviour would be reduced.”

    In his message to the young generation, Osuntokun harps on impact and making a difference: “Wherever you are, try to make a difference. Whatever assignments you have been given – in public or private – try to lay a good example. Let people see that you have something to offer. Do whatever you have to do to make sure you have an impact.” From this point, the teacher in him took over: “If you are a lecturer, do not be absent in your classes, prepare well for your lectures. Students will be happy to come to your class if they know that they’ll learn something new. As a teacher, assess dispassionately; do not have favourites and do not collect money from your students. Let people remember you for being fair.”

    He then touched on the point of uprightness and courage: “Be upright, if we all are upright in this country, even the economy will pick up. Young people should be upright. And they should also speak up when things are going wrong. This can come at a price but it is worth it. Some of us were incarcerated for speaking up without any trial. Whoever finds himself in a position of leadership should always speak truth to power.”

    Osuntokun also had a message or two for those in public life, or those who are preparing for a role in public life. His view is that “they should read biographies of successful leaders around the world. Whoever gets to the top would have paid the cost. If you are a leader, look at what others have done in other countries. The sad thing is our leaders don’t read. Even the memos that are written for them, they don’t read them.” He goes on in his charge: “Please familiarise yourself with what is happening in the world. The world is a global village. Align yourself with positive developments around the world.”

    When he spoke at this point, I could tell that the comments came from a deep place, almost as though he was suddenly reminded of the cost of leadership failures and found himself comparing the disparateness of what used to be and what is. Hear him, “In my youth, we used to have public water in our houses but all that is now history.”

    I end this with his own words:

     “As a historian, I’d like to suggest a few things like it is done in the US. You cannot become a citizen of the USA without knowing the history of the country. You have to know about the history of the country before you can be a leader. Many of our leaders are absolutely ignorant about our own history. I recommend that citizenship training should be introduced in our curriculum. We are in a situation where our young people know more about the histories of other developed countries and cities than the history of their country.”

    I am 100% with Osuntokun on that. If our own leaders don’t know about their own country, what then can they really give? Please think about that for a moment.

     And that’s it! What more can I say? Thank you, Emeritus Professor Akinjide Osuntokun, OON, FNAL, FHSN, Baapitan Oyo.

    •Concluded!

    •Akinnuga is executive director, The Adeyinka Adesope Foundation.