The Nation Newspaper

Category: Festus Eriye

  • Jonathan channels Shagari

    In Nigerian politics, the more things change the more they remain the same. A cursory glance through the political scene and one could be forgiven for thinking they have been transported back to the Second Republic.

    In the place of fresh thinking, the same old tricks are being exhumed in the hope that they would deliver the same results. Back in the day, a certain Commissioner of Police named Bishop Eyitene who was deployed to Anambra State interpreted his brief as giving then Governor Jim Nwobodo and his Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP) a torrid time. Until his removal, Joseph Mbu in Rivers appeared to have torn several pages out of Eyitene’s copy book.

    Another gimmick deployed by the then President Shehu Shagari’s National Party of Nigeria (NPN) was the appointment of what were referred to as Presidential Liaison Officers (PLOs) in different states of the federation where the ruling party was in opposition. This provocative move came at a time when certain states – especially those controlled by the defunct Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) in the West – refused to recognise the Shagari presidency.

    The PLOs were appointed ostensibly to monitor federal government projects and act as the president’s eyes and ears in those hostile states. In reality though, it was just another way of providing jobs for the boys. More importantly, the PLOs soon began acting as alternate governors.

    As the elections of 1983 approached, they became more openly confrontational towards governors of the opposing parties. If the governor had a convoy, they ensured theirs was evenly longer and noisier. It was the perfect recipe for raising tensions and ensuring that the periods, before and after the elections, were marred by violence and bloodshed.

    Today, the same script is being played out. Take a look at the cabinet that President Jonathan is reconstituting to lead the country into an election year. In all the states where the ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) is in opposition, the ministers or likely ministerial nominees are ‘alternate governors’ – politicians who can make life difficult for the incumbent. That seems to be the primary consideration for getting into the cabinet.

    That is why you have the Nyesom Wikes, Bonnie Harunas, Musiliu Obanikoros, Aminu Walis in the team. If the speculations are to be believed, very soon it would be the turn of the Gbemi Sarakis, Attahiru Baffarawas, Ibrahim Shekaraus to name just a few.

    This new breed are even more powerful now that they have the power of the federal purse to play around with in a manner that the Second Republic PLOs would never have dreamt off. Even worse, today the moral restraints that would have made 80s politicians baulk at certain things have long since disappeared. Anything goes and the scandalous has lost the power to shock.

    It is enough to make you shiver as we edge even closer to another critical election year.

  • Metuh and the APC roadmap

    Metuh and the APC roadmap

    Last Thursday in Abuja the All Progressives Congress (APC) began the process of laying out a distinct vision that sets it apart from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) by holding a one-day national summit. The 10-point document that emerged from the event lays out a plan that focuses on jobs, security and an anti-corruption drive.

    For all those who have been urging the party to outline a platform for governing, this is a welcome development. There is no question that as the elections approach APC and its leaders would be challenged, and rightfully so, to flesh out some of the ideas they have unveiled.

    Not surprisingly, the high profile Abuja outing was being tracked by the ruling party whose spokesman, Olisah Metuh, was not slow in rolling out a response. His take? Of course, the opposition party’s platform was all hogwash – the product of “Janjaweed ideology.”

    For the uninitiated the Janjaweed are an armed tribal militia group in the Darfur region of western Sudan. The word itself is Arabic in origin and refers to ‘a man with a horse and a gun.’

    So what is the relationship between the political and economic blueprint APC outlined and the Janjaweed? Was Metuh just throwing around a word he had ill-digested or is there some connection between the opposition party and the Sudanese militants he would like to educate Nigerians on?

    Not content with savaging the APC platform he descends on its leaders for defending suspending Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Sanusi Lamido Sanusi.

    Among other things he alleges that a leader of the APC who he does not name received a fraudulent N84 billion contract, while another stalwart of the party was paid N5 billion as consultancy by the CBN under Sanusi’s watch.

    It would have helped if Metuh had named names seeing as the administration has not been shy to leak anything that would damage Sanusi. Thanks to the advertising expenditure of the government, Nigerians are now fairly conversant with the alleged sins of the former CBN chief as outlined in the report of the Financial Reporting Council. It is, therefore, curious that the spokesman restrained himself. Is this a case of not have the courage of one’s convictions?

    We’ve been told what these nameless and faceless APC leaders got as contracts. Metuh can now present a better-rounded picture by telling us how many billions his PDP colleagues received from the benevolent CBN while the going was still good.

    Lastly, we should point out that it is not yet a crime for Nigerians who are not PDP members to win contracts from government agencies.

  • Jonathan’s campaigns

    Jonathan’s campaigns

    In last few weeks President Goodluck Jonathan, PDP National Chairman, Ahmadu Muazu and a whole armada of ruling party bigwigs have been crisscrossing the country holding political rallies to welcome defectors from other parties, and lay down the marker for what is shaping to be a bruising general election in 2015.

    They were in Sokoto to welcome former Governor Attahiru Bafarawa. In Owerri they celebrated the return to PDP ranks of the likes of ex-Governor Achike Udenwa, Senator Chris Anyanwu and others. The train has since visited Kwara where Jonathan made pointed remarks about the Saraki dynasty. Yesterday, they rolled into Minna for another of such rallies.

    Interestingly, Minna is the home turf of a one-time member of the rebel G-7 governors, Babangida Aliyu. He is the same man who regaled us with tales about the existence of a one-term pact between Northern leaders and the president.

    Speaking a few days before the rally he not only said Jonathan would not make a 2015 declaration in Minna, but also that the president wasn’t actually campaigning.

    Really? Given the speed with which Aliyu repented of his G-7 ‘rebelliousness’ it is not surprising that he would say anything in defence of his new cause. During these rallies Jonathan does not discuss Keynesian economics: he talks pure, undiluted politics. We don’t need anyone to tell us that the president is bending the rules and campaigning even before the race has been flagged off. Thankfully, he has the police on his side.

  • The audacity of the Abachas

    The audacity of the Abachas

    One of the many reasons thrown up by government for marking Nigeria’s centenary is that the coexistence of the country’s disparate ethnic groups for this period was worth celebrating. Strangely, the many millions who should have been in raptures over such an epoch were less than enthused and stayed largely detached from what ended up being another staid government event.

    Ironically, this expensive birthday came at time a national conference to discuss the many unresolved questions about our coexistence is about to commence.

    Over and again, those who have called the conference have declared that Nigeria’s break-up was not up for discussion. At the same time, there are elements insisting that dissolution this shotgun union be open for discussion. In the end the centenary was just an expensive party celebrating a marriage that is still in grave danger of crashing.

    It is not just the ironies that stand out, many have equally pointed to the insensitivity of throwing this lavish event at a time when Boko Haram insurgents were slaughtering school children in their beds, and laying waste to significant chunks of the North-East.

    Indeed, in other climes some of those who were being celebrated with gold medals draped around their necks would have been strung up the gallows for their serial crimes against the country that again, ironically, was feting them.

    It was this unbelievable paradox that the Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, was addressing when he rejected the award bestowed on him because of the inclusion on the honours list of the late military dictator, General Sani Abacha and others who had plundered Nigeria’s treasury.

    In his statement titled “The Canonisation of Terror”, he spoke of how the celebration of Abacha called into question “the entire ethical landscape into which this nation has been forced by insensate leadership”.

    For those with very short memory, he reminded us of the former dictator’s reign of terror during which time he seized the late Chief M. K. O. Abiola who had been duly elected Nigeria’s president on June 12, 1993 and threw him into detention. The process of usurpation eventually cost Abiola and his wife, Kudirat Abiola, their lives.

    It was a period of routine assassinations and arbitrary detentions. Free speech was non-existent and many who dared disagree with the man who projected an inscrutable front hiding behind dark shades day and night, fled for their lives. Death squads roamed the land. Phantom coups were the preferred means for dispatching those whose loyalty to the despot could not be guaranteed.

    It was a time when many national institutions – the army included – were progressively destroyed. Nigerians were introduced to Abacha’s Chief Security Officer, Major Hamza al-Mustapha, who became so powerful and feared that generals who were his superiors in rank quaked in their boots whilst in his presence.

    Not content with stripping the people of their rights, confidence and all that they held dear, Abacha supervised the transformation of Nigeria into a pariah nation with his handling of the execution of the writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni activists.

    Of course, many of the centenary honourees are not too choosy about the company they keep. They gladly received their medals and enjoyed their two minutes in the bright lights. Not so Soyinka. But he is within his rights to spurn what the Abuja event planners had to offer.

    I was expecting the usual critical intervention from government spokesmen berating Soyinka for turning down his country’s ‘honour.’ When the attack did come it was not from the quarters you would expect, but from some Abacha children falling over themselves to defend their late father’s legacy! What a legacy!

    Gumsu, daughter of the strongman, declared that while she was a lover of books written by Soyinka at a younger age, she now found his comments “foolish, stupid and insignificant.”

    A son, Sadiq, berated the writer for criticising successive governments without offering himself for an elective position. Among other things he said: “I believe brilliance is not perfection. I have grown and watched you criticise regime after regime and at that young and naive age I was thinking why wouldn’t this man contest to be president so that Nigeria can be saved?

    “I would have defiantly voted for Mr. Soyinka if it would have brought an end to Nigeria’s woes. To my utter surprise, I heard about your FRSC leadership and how funds were misused and a great deal of it unaccounted for. “Oh my God! In the end he turned out to be just the same as everybody else” were my next thoughts. My hopes for you all ended up in great disappointment”.

    It is possible that the two Abacha children were too young when their father was terrorising the country to understand the trauma that Nigerians were subjected to. That can be the only explanation why people who should hang their heads in shame over the reproach brought upon their family line by their patriarch have the audacity to speak in the manner in which they have done.

    But then there was no need for Soyinka or his defenders to respond. Barely, two days after familial emotions got the better of the Abacha’s, the United States government announced that it had ordered the freezing of $458 million in assets stolen by their father and his accomplices and hidden in European accounts.

    In the past Nigeria had traced $1.3 billion which the general plundered and hid in different banks in Europe. The biggest chunk amounting to $500 million came from Switzerland in 2005. A further $1.1 billion remains trapped by litigation in France, the United Kingdom, Luxembourg and the Channel Islands. Some estimates claim that stolen funds traced to the Abacha could be as much as $5 billion.

    Commenting on the U.S. seizure, Mythili Raman, Acting Assistant Attorney General said: “This is the largest civil forfeiture action to recover the proceeds of foreign official corruption ever brought by the department. General Abacha was one of the most notorious kleptocrats in memory, who embezzled billions from the people of Nigeria while millions lived in poverty.”

    Abacha was not just a brutal dictator under whose watch scores of Nigerians lost their lives and were denied their rights; he was also a thief who stole billions while millions were wallowing in hunger and poverty. He was not just greedy beyond belief; this sort of greed was akin to sickness. That is Abacha’s legacy. It is not something his children should be proud of.

    Rather than raise their voices against Soyinka for pointing out the truth, they should be burging their heads in shame while the nation cleans up the mess left by their father.

  • Boko Haram: Nigeria’s military on the spot

    Boko Haram: Nigeria’s military on the spot

    Sometime in 2011 a private in the Nigerian Army was arrested by agents of the Lagos State Environmental and Special Offences Task Force for driving in the dedicated Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) lane at the Obanikoro area of the city. Angered at the audacity of the officials, the man left and soon returned with his comrades-in-arms and a full-blown army-police clash ensued.

    In my column that weekend I excoriated soldiers who thought they were above the law simply because they wore fatigues. I suggested that whole lot of them be shipped off to the North East where they could work out their aggression tackling a Boko Haram sect that was fast becoming a nuisance. At that point government was still addressing the issue mainly using the police and secret service.

    I soon received a text message from an officer who while taking my caustic comments in good humour denied that military men only had contempt for the police. He pointed out that the army was always being called in to clean messes left behind by the Nigerian Police. He boasted that if the military were the ones handling the young insurgency, they would sort it out in three months.

    This week I was reminded of that boast as the death toll from the attack on the Federal Government College, Buni Yadi, Gujba Local Government Area of Yobe State hit 60. In nearby Adamawa State, a further 32 persons lost their lives in separate attacks by Boko Haram in three towns. Overall the body count for February is over 300 and rising.

    Early in December last year, the sect swept unhindered into Air Force bases located near the Maiduguri airport. They left in their wake scores killed and five aircraft razed. It was a stunning and embarrassing blow to Nigeria’s military pride, and it occurred with the armed forces firmly in charge of managing the war against the insurgents.

    Eight months after President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, and gave the military extensive powers to stamp out the killings, the performance of the military is under scrutiny. Disturbing questions are being asked and nobody is providing answers.

    Frustrated and angry governors are raising posers. Bewildered legislators are scratching their heads wondering what on earth is going on. The questions cover everything from strategy to rules of deployment, funding and motivation.

    Borno State Governor, Kashim Shettima, got things going by claiming the insurgents were better equipped and motivated than Nigerian soldiers. This very serious charge drew a typically defensive riposte from President Jonathan who offered to withdraw the troops for one month to test the theory about their ineffectiveness.

    For his part, Adamawa State Governor, Murtala Nyako, has made the equally grave claim that there may be Fifth Columnists sabotaging the efforts of the military from within. The allegations arise from a string of strange deployments that preceded the Buni Yadi slaughter and some other recent high profile attacks.

    Wondering why soldiers were always late in arriving at scenes of incidents, he said: “In Buni-Yadi, Yobe State, the soldiers withdrew from checkpoint hours to the attack. Who ordered the withdrawal? In Shuwa and Michika, soldiers withdrew, shortly after that Boko Haram attacked, who ordered the withdrawals”?

    “We also have the case of Gen. Mohammed Shuwa who was killed in Maiduguri by the so-called Boko Haram. There is an army unit there, but they didn’t respond during the attack. Who told them not to respond?

    “The Air Force base was raided in Maiduguri. There was a military base nearby; who gave the base the order not to respond during the raid on the Air Force base?” Questions, questions!

    As though worries about unseen hands manipulating the situation were not bad enough, we now have to contend with reports of soldiers in Adamawa abandoning their checkpoints and fleeing into the bush – leaving five villages at the mercy of the insurgents according to reports by Associated Press.

    Why would soldiers who are trained to kill or be killed, who are supposed to provide protection for the people, cut and run before the enemy? It all comes down to the same issues of equipment and motivation raised by Shettima. Anyone would beat a retreat in the face of superior firepower.

    They would definitely scamper before insurgents who joyfully embrace death if they see no reason to die for their country. It is not just the hapless troops in the middle of nowhere who have to deal with the question of motivation. How many are willing to die for Nigeria? It just becomes an issue because it is the business of the military to die, and turning tail before the enemy is one of the most serious offences a soldier can commit.

    So how do we begin to turn things around seeing as current efforts are doing very little to deter the terrorists? The first battle that needs to be won is that of finance. Reports indicate that the insurgents who struck at Buni Yadi drove into town in nine brand new Toyota Hilux vans. Each of these vehicles cost more than N6 million at today’s prices. How many do they have in the fleet? Who’s paying for them? Individuals and organisations with very deep pockets obviously.

    But no matter how rich they are they cannot be more endowed than the Nigerian state. That is why it is scandalous to even imagine that the insurgents can be better armed than our soldiers. What do we spend our huge defence budget on if troops can’t get the armament they need to prevail in battle?

    The ongoing war against terror provides the window to review not just the pattern of defence expenditure, but the entire structure of our military. All over the world countries are reforming their armed forces based on their peculiar security challenges. It is obvious that for Nigeria in the foreseeable future those challenges would be terroristic – rather than conventional.

    In addition to throwing more money at the problem in a targeted way, we need to throw in more troops. Yobe State Governor Ibrahim Gaidam has made this demand and he should be supported. We can learn from the example of the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    When it seemed like the security situation in both countries was spiraling out of control, the Americans implemented a “surge” policy that introduced thousands of new troops into the theatre of conflict. The upshot was that the spiral of violence was contained. The North East is crying out for a surge that limits the room the enemy has to maneuver.

    But that surge should not contemplate the temporary relocation of the Nigerian Army’s headquarters to the North East as suggested by senators. That would simply be an empty knee-jerk reaction that will not materially change much. If anything it exposes the nation to psychologically devastating attacks against symbols of the Nigerian state like happened with the assault on the Nigeria Police headquarters in Abuja.

    Much has been said about addressing social and economic conditions that provide a ready recruitment pool for terrorists. It is hard to fault that. Still, the point needs to be made that Boko Haram is unique. They are an implacable foe that would settle for nothing less than victory for their evil ideology. The only thing that can stop them is defeat. That is why it is important to get our military strategy right.

    There’s no question that some progress has been made in limiting their activity to the North East. These days stories of IEDs going off in city centers in the North West are rare occurrences. Still more needs to be done. It begins with the military and President being humble enough to admit that their current strategy is not working and is in urgent need of a review.

  • NEITI and NNPC’s ‘complex’ accounts

    When the suspended Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, alleged that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was yet to remit $10.8 billion to the Federation Account, the oil firm’s leadership accused him of confusion and ignorance.

    Labouring to defend his dismissal of Sanusi during his last media chat, the president referred to how the CBN chief had tied himself up in knots bandying different figures allegedly not remitted by the NNPC.

    Now, it appears that the list of the ‘ignorant’ and ‘confused’ is getting longer. A presentation made by the Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, before the Joint House Committee probing the Berne Declaration report, has claimed that not only was Nigeria losing an estimated $8 billion annually through the crude oil-for-refined products exchange arrangement, aka crude oil swaps, NNPC may have failed to remit $22.8billion to the Federation Account.

    Berne Declaration, a Switzerland-based non-governmental advocacy group published a report titled “Swiss Traders’ Opaque Deals in Nigeria” last year.

    The report alleged that every year Nigeria loses billions of dollars as large volumes of oil are exported for well below the market price. It further alleges that the subsidy scheme for imports of refined petroleum products was systematically defrauded.

    NEITI’s Ahmed told the House Committee on Petroleum Resources (Upstream) that the findings came out of its audit report on the finances of the oil corporation for 2009 to 2011.

    Quick as a flash, NNPC spokesman Dr. Omar Farouk Ibrahim reacted to what he argued was an orchestrated campaign of calumny designed to tarnish the corporation’s image. He said sensational headlines had been written misrepresenting the contents of the NEITI report. Significantly, Ahmed has not retracted her assertions before the committee.

    When she appeared before the hearing Ahmed said, “There is similarity in NEITI’s audit report and the Berne Declaration report. The report has a lot of substance in it. NEITI will go back and link the Berne Declaration report with the NEITI audit report.”

    But until Ahmed comes up with damning evidence against the corporation, NNPC executives can sleep soundly – after all they are the only ones who understand this oily business and its peculiar accounts.

    Even statutory agencies that should be combing through the corporation’s books are throwing in the towel. At its budget defence before the Senate Committee on Drugs, Narcotics, Financial Crimes and Anti-Corruption, the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC) said its inability to probe NNPC over the years was down to the ‘sophistication’ of the corporation’s accounts.

    Professor Olu Aina, Acting Chairman of the Commission’s board said: “The account of NNPC is so sophisticated that it would require hiring financial experts to study it for needed investigation the cost of which, however, cannot be afforded by us now due to underfunding.”

    As it was in the beginning, so it is now and forever – the words of Sanusi et al against those of executives who keep telling the rest of us “you can’t understand this!” Truly, we just can’t understand: except if the NNPC spokesman is suggesting that NEITI has now merged with the All Progressives Congress (APC).

  • Hurray! Jonathan snares his quarry

    Hurray! Jonathan snares his quarry

    Given his talent for amassing enemies you didn’t need a prophet to tell you that former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Sanusi Lamido Sanusi’s tenure was likely to end in tears.

    In the end he has been nudged out of the door courtesy of some dodgy contrivance of officialdom called a “suspension.” Given the roadblock set up in Section 11 (f) of the CBN Act 2007 which requires the President to seek the approval of two-thirds of the Senate in order to remove the CBN Governor, this “suspension” was the quickest way of getting rid of him.

    The official line is that Sanusi’s removal was down to acts of ‘financial recklessness, violation of due process and the mandate of the CBN.’ Presidential spokesman, Reuben Abati, then listed a litany of sins such as “persistent refusal and negligence to comply with public procurement act in the procurement practices of the CBN; unlawful expenditure by the CBN on intervention projects across the country, deploying huge sums of money without appropriation and outside the CBN’s statutory mandate.”

    From where I stand it is hard to determine Sanusi’s guilty or innocence. Still, it is rich hearing this administration which stands accused of similar malfeasance levelling these allegations.

    This is a government that is straining to explain the whereabouts of $10.8 billion from crude oil sales proceeds which the erstwhile CBN boss insists the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is yet to pay into the Federation Account.

    This is an administration which is unable to explain what happened to billions expended on funding kerosene subsidy by the same NNPC. Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aminu Tambuwal, has said the monies were spent without authorisation.

    This is the same administration which the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) has accused of presiding over the emptying of the Excess Crude Account (ECA). The allegation that $5 billion is missing from the account remains unresolved. According to CBN figures, the ECA had $11.5 billion in December 2014 but by January 17, 2014 that amount had dwindled to $2.5 billion. Many would attribute this evaporation of cash to “financial recklessness.”

    In its attempt to justify the dramatic “suspension” the presidency claims that the ex-governor’s infractions and reign of recklessness lasted for most his tenure. This raises natural questions as to why wait until three months to the end of the man’s tenure to bring him to book – given that government was so concerned about the health of the CBN.

    What was wrong in 2009 is wrong in 2014. Why did President Goodluck Jonathan tolerate Sanusi’s excesses for virtually all of his tenure?

    Apparently, public officials engaging in malpractices is fine so long as they remain good boys who don’t paint the government in bad light. When Sanusi was feverishly defending the removal of petroleum subsidy on national television in January 2012 his ‘sins’ were overlooked.

    But they suddenly became unforgiveable and deserving of a suspension because he allegedly leaked an embarrassing letter about the mismanagement of the nation’s finances to former President Olusegun Obasanjo. He exacerbated matters by his further revelations about missing monies at the National Assembly public hearings.

    Government spokesmen say the sacking was not about Sanusi’s utterances at the Senate. They can tell it to a platoon of marines. It is clear this drama isn’t about transparency. On that score the government is in no position to point fingers at anyone. This is clearly a vengeful political act designed to spite a man who dared the president.

    In any country the office of president is a powerful one – but it is more so in developing nations like Nigeria with baby democratic institutions, and where constitutional rule is still evolving. Often, presidents get away with murder unchallenged. Examples abound from Cameroon to Zimbabwe to Gambia where the leaders’ very words have become law, the police and military his personal enforcers to deploy as he deems fit.

    But while we must respect and honour leaders as symbols of our sovereignty, let’s not lose sight of the fact that the office of president is a creation of the constitution. He’s not a monarch whose word is law. Even modern day monarchies are regulated. He’s not some infallible deity who must be worshipped and revered. He is a fallible human prone to the same foibles and frailties that are common to men.

    So, to President Goodluck Jonathan we say congratulations. You finally got rid of Sanusi. What an achievement sacking a man who was just a couple of months away from retirement! It must feel good letting another of your ‘enemies’ know how awesome your powers are as president.

    For the former CBN boss suspension may turn out to be the least of his worries. There may be something or nothing to the negative claims about his tenure. In heat of his purge of CEOs who had turned their financial institutions into personal piggy banks, he used to boast about sending offending Managing Directors to jail. I doubt whether he would want Jonathan and his men to give him a taste of his own medicine. Perhaps they may just stop at destroying his reputation.

    Some have pointed out that Sanusi’s ouster bears an uncanny resemblance to that of the former President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Isa Salami. Whereas the judge still had two years to go and was clearly not in a hurry to depart, the CBN Governor had repeated again and again that he didn’t want a second term.

    Until the very end the powers of the president to suspend Salami was a matter of intense debate. Another issue was whether the National Judicial Council (NJC) and the judiciary were correct in surrendering the powers to regulate their branch and hand same to the president. Till date many insist it was a blunder on the part of the NJC.

    But once the suspension was activated it was sustained until Salami’s voluntary retirement. There are those who would say that the presidential move against Sanusi was just a cynical ploy to get a troublemaker out of the way knowing that his only option would be a recourse to the snail-speed courts. In the end even if it is decided that Sanusi’s removal was illegal, it would be an academic exercise that would only inform any future actions by other presidents.

    A court ruling on whether Jonathan was right or wrong may be immaterial to Sanusi’s career progression, still it is important to test whether the constitution has made Nigerian presidents as powerful as they think they are, or whether a conniving public has allowed egotistical men to launch unending and unchecked power grabs.

    It would be interesting to watch what the National Assembly would say or do. Would it take a clear position on this presidential maneuver? The Presidency is throwing everything at Sanusi in a bid to destroy him. He is being investigated by every agency that has a name. That is fine.

    But who will examine a powerful president’s actions? The courts for one: the legislature also if they would rise to the occasion. Can we trust this National Assembly to do their duty?

    The courts may take the rest of the decade to decide if the President has violated the laws in this instance. Ordinary Nigerians don’t have those same constraints. They can reward him if they feel he has done well or make him pay a political price if he has overreached. Time will tell.

  • 2015: Beyond the defections

    Nigerian politics has come a long way. In the past defectors who crossed party lines for whatever reason were viewed as a detestable subset of the political class. They were often denigrated as desperate people who stood for nothing and would flee a sinking ship at the fight sight of water.

    These days the defector is king. He is courted by even presidents as Goodluck Jonathan did not so long ago when he led a colourful rally in Sokoto to welcome serial defector, former Governor Attahiru Baffarawa into the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

    All parties are in on the act. The All Progressives Congress (APC) was the major beneficiary of the first wave of defections last year. But it is now crying foul that the eventual destination of potential carpet-crossers is being determined with generous cash inducements by the PDP.

    As though the whiff of the scandalous that trails them wherever they turn were not bad enough, a comical turn was introduced into the matter not too long ago. Former FCT Minister, General Jeremiah Useni, who heads the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) miffed that his party had lost one of its few national legislators went public to correct certain wrong impressions.

    He said the instruction given to the representative by the party was actually to defect to the PDP! Apparently, the man got things mixed up and landed in APC. So far there’s no indication that he’s retraced his steps.

    It is tragic that as we head for 2015 the basis on which political parties would be asking us to vote is how many defectors they managed to attract into their ranks. Although I believe that individuals should be allowed to freely join and freely depart any party or organization, many of those who are fleeting from place to place are not doing so for any firm convictions.

    In most instances the reasons are as pedestrian as ‘I wasn’t made head of the party in my state’ or ‘I was denied ticket for some election.’ In the end when their personal quest fails they, without any sense of shame, quickly return to their vomit.

    I was reading about a couple of politicians in Imo State apparently afflicted by the wandering disease. They had been in APC but now have seen the light and are set to be received with fanfare by President Jonathan. Just trying to make sense of how many times two of them have switched parties makes me dizzy.

    There’s a lie that has been sold to the public for too long. It claims that Nigerians don’t bother with issues when they vote. Nothing can be farther from the truth. I know of incumbents who were punished by voters for their appalling record whilst in office.

    The electorate will focus on those things we prioritise. A celebration of defectors is not a game that will do the parties – especially the opposition much good. They must begin to focus like a laser on Jonathan’s record in office. Anything short will allow the other side to define them in those terms that play to our primordial and emotional weaknesses.

  • Sanusi and the missing billions

    Sanusi and the missing billions

    It is hard to find the model of the Central Bank boss which Sanusi Lamido Sanusi copied as his time in that position unfolded. From day one he was determined to be himself. Never one to shy from offering strong views, it meant hurtling into every controversy feet first.

    For many, that was okay in a newspaper columnist or activist, but unseemly for a Central Bank governor. Sanusi would not hear of it: after all he had made clear to those who appointed him that he was set in his ways.

    Usually, Central Bank bosses are taciturn. Whenever they spoke it was akin to an oracle descending from a height to commune with ordinary mortals. The entire nation would pay attention and, sometimes, the weight of the pronouncement would send shivers through markets across the world.

    Such is the weight of the utterances of the likes of the Paul Volkers, Alan Greenspans, Ben Bernankes, Mervyn Kings of this world. In Nigeria, Central Bank chiefs have never had that almost mythical standing that the aforementioned names conjure. However, when you think of names like Clement Isong, Adamu Ciroma, Abdulkadir Ahmed, Joseph Sanusi, you think conservative and low key – not flamboyant and outspoken.

    This preamble is not meant to be criticism of Lamido Sanusi’s personality and how that has affected his job as Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor. Rather it is an attempt to make sense of the tepid impact of the thunderous allegations made about the management of the Nigeria’s finances by the nation’s top banker.

    Is it a case of the man having made his opinion so readily available on every topic – especially those polarising, political ones that have nothing to with his role as Central Banker – that today not many pay much attention when he speaks? Has he talked his way into irrelevance?

    Or is it the case that scandal and malfeasance in public office have become so common place they have lost their shock value? We have found ourselves in the gutter for so long and have now accepted the stench as part of life?

    Could it also be that President Goodluck Jonathan and his administration are so stuck in their ways they would see no evil and hear no evil? Has the president who in a moment of frustration once declared that “he didn’t give a damn” now reached the point of thumbing his nose at his critics – daring them to do their worst with every fresh charge?

    In a different country the magnitude of the claims being made by the CBN Governor would have triggered a political tsunami that could have brought down a government. Here, he makes these explosive allegations, the head of the richest government parastatal issues a dismissive rebuttal and life goes on as though the exchange was conducted in Greek and the rest of don’t understand, or the issues thrown up are not important enough to ignite serious inquiry by the legislature and law enforcement agencies.

    In December 2013, Sanusi stirred the pot when he claimed that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was yet to remit $12 billion to the federation account. Finance Minister, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala interjected that the amount was actually $ 10.8 billion. There was supposed to be proper reconciliation of the figures by all parties involved to ascertain when the said sum was actually missing.

    But before this could be done, the NNPC blithely announced that the exercise was unnecessary. Apparently, it had accounted for the “missing billions.” The portion that was supposedly not remitted had been spent on fuel subsidy, pipeline repairs and sundry expenses. Some official I cannot now recall actually retorted the money had been spent by all Nigerians because we all benefit from the petroleum subsidy.

    That was the explanation for a $10.8 billion hole in the country’s finances. Rather than being disturbed the government would soon launch a counter attack against Sanusi for daring to ask questions. At some point Jonathan even demanded his resignation for allegedly leaking a confidential letter to the public. The president was more irked by the politics of the situation than the morality.

    Following the truce brokered after the CBN Governor refused to go quietly, many thought he would keep his counsel to himself in the few months he has left. Not so. Speaking this last week at the resumed Senate hearing on the alleged missing crude oil funds, Sanusi dropped a new bombshell – alleging the NNPC was yet to account for $20 billion ( over N3 trillion) being part of oil sales for the period between January 2012 and July 2013.

    This time, NNPC Managing Director, Andrew Yakubu, dismissed Sanusi as ignorant because the “CBN is a banking outfit, not a petroleum outfit.” He blamed the repeated claims by Sanusi on a lack of “understanding of the technicalities of the oil industry.”

    Yakubu’s comments are not only insensitive, they are disrespectful. What technicalities I ask? We are talking here of figures and keeping proper accounts. Serious issues are being dredged up that require rigorous explanations – not some trite comment. Even if the CBN Governor and his entire team of experts are as “ignorant” as Yakubu claims, it is his responsibility to expose that “ignorance” and enlighten the public with concrete evidence.

    Whatever Sanusi’s personal shortcomings may be, it would be totally irresponsible for the legislature and law enforcement agencies not to follow up on the grave allegations being made by no less a person than the governor of Nigeria’s Central Bank.

    Even if the “missing” monies were expended on the most laudable of causes it is important to establish how we got to the point of the funds being spent.

    These are the critical posers that demand clarity. Sanusi alleges that the NNPC was actually operating an unauthorised subsidy scheme through which the Federation Account lost $100 million monthly to what he calls a “racket.” Criminal activity is being imputed here.

    He has challenged the corporation to produce authorisation allowing it to purchase kerosene at N150 per litre from federation funds only to sell same at N40 per litre, “knowing full well that this product sells in the market at N170-N220 per litre.”

    These are serious issues that demand urgent clarification. That is the only way to know if Nigeria is truly being bled dry, or whether Sanusi is just an ignorant fiction writer who only wants to be remembered only as a mischief maker.

  • CP Mbu gets his reward

    CP Mbu gets his reward

    Former Rivers State Police Commissioner, Mbu Joseph Mbu, would be remembered for a long time in Nigerian political folklore not for his crime-fighting skills, but for how he became the issue as local politicians jockeyed for ascendancy.

    His role in the dogfight between Amaechi and the First Family and their surrogates represents a new low for a police force that does not rate too highly in public opinion. Many drew parallels between Mbu’s actions and those of another infamous Police Commissioner, Bishop Eyitene, who the then ruling National Party of Nigeria (NPN) used to frustrate former Anambra State Governor, Jim Nwobodo.

    Some have been celebrating Mbu’s transfer from Port Harcourt as though his new posting were some sort of punishment. Hardly! In terms of how they are prized two of the most coveted postings in the Nigeria Police are the commissionerships of Lagos and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

    It would seem that those whom he served so faithfully have rewarded Mbu with a plum posting. Many had canvassed that the man be sent Borno State where his aggressive and partisan policing methods would have helped the government achieve their April 2014 deadline for snuffing out the Boko Haram insurgency.

    But while Amaechi and his supporters may be heaving a sigh of relief, senators would be well advised to invest in a couple of rubber bullet-proof vests. A certain Senator Magnus Abe would tell them that with Mbu in town that is a wise investment!