The Nation Newspaper

Category: Festus Eriye

  • Harris vs Trump: From the outside looking in

    Harris vs Trump: From the outside looking in

    A week from today Americans would have elected the successor to Joe Biden as president. It would either be incumbent Vice President Kamala Harris or former President Donald Trump. Whoever the winner is, this is one election that has put the paradoxes, contradictions and hypocrisies of the United States on full display globally.

    Trump, the Republican Party candidate, built his entire campaign largely on an anti-immigrant theme, stoking fears that grubby foreigners were overrunning the country. Thanks to his efforts, a nation of immigrants has turned full circle, with half its population believing that their troubles are down to hordes from the four corners of the earth. I wonder how native Americans would have felt when Trump’s forebears landed from Germany, Scotland or wherever.

    Truly, the world is changing and we are seeing this same anti-immigrant sentiment sweep across Europe – installing hostile governments in countries that used to be so welcoming to outsiders.

    Trump played this card perfectly in 2016 with the promise of building a wall along the US’ southern border to keep out those arriving from Mexico and the rest of Latin America. He’s reprising the rhetoric in the belief it worked in the past. When he goes to the border for photo ops it’s clear which immigrants he’s targeting.

    That’s why his enduring support among Latinos is so intriguing. The more he demeans, threatens and humiliates them, the more they fawn over him. Many think his hate campaign isn’t directed at them because they are already resident in the States. Yes, the possession of a Green Card may keep them safe from Trump’s promised mass deportations, but it doesn’t shield them from day to day profiling.

    America used to be held up as a moral country with strong Christian foundations. It’s founding fathers fled to the new land from England to escape religious persecution. Now it’s on the verge of possibly opening the doors of the White House to a convicted felon, a man serially accused of predatory conduct, a known philanderer, a divorcee and proven racist. None of these things matter to his gung-ho supporters.

    Throughout its history the US has wrestled with its Christian conscience, and not always successfully. One unique example of that struggle is the civil war that split the country into two halves. The Southern confederates believed the Bible backed their practice of keeping slaves. The Federal side under President Abraham Lincoln thought it ungodly for a man to keep his fellow human enslaved – no matter their colour or station.

    Slavery didn’t end in America through moral suasion but by military conquest of the South. That’s perhaps the reason why slavery didn’t end discrimination. The practice was abolished in 1865 and in principle blacks – at least the male – were allowed to vote. But for many decades all manner of restrictions and hurdles were placed in the path of people of colour, to ensure they couldn’t really exercise this right until the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965. Up till today, the age old scheming to suppress minority votes hasn’t stopped.

    Read Also: Mostbet Promo Codes in Kazakhstan: Your Path to Extra Winnings

    Race has always been a powerful undercurrent in US politics and it’s one reason why no black man was ever elected president until Barack Obama’s landmark victory in 2008. Despite that historic achievement, he would spend the bulk of his presidency fending off attacks suggesting he wasn’t really American. At the head of the birther campaign was Trump; once again, showing his true racist colours. It’s no surprise that at some point during the campaign he found it necessary to question whether Harris was black or Asian.

    Ageism was an issue when Joe Biden was still the Democratic Party candidate. But race came raging back once Harris – a woman of colour – was installed in his place. That undercurrent has dogged the race ever since; so much so that after Trump’s recent Madison Square Garden event one major newspaper – Daily News – ran a huge tabloid headline tagging it the ‘Racist Rally.’

    But the race factor cuts both ways with black voter turnout in support of Harris expected to be critical in determining the outcome. That’s not to say it would go 100% her way. Just like the Latinos, despite Trump’s disparaging remarks about their race, a significant number of black men back him ostensibly because they think he is stronger, and would do a better job on the economy.

    That the race is so close is blamed in part on widespread dissatisfaction with Biden’s stewardship on the economy. Inflation has triggered a cost of living crisis that’s making many to look back with nostalgia at the Trump years.

    For an outsider looking in it’s hard to believe that issues of morality and character are not a priority for Americans. They are more concerned with who will impact their pockets more positively. If it takes a crook to fix the economy so be it.

    That’s not surprising. At the height of the Monica Lewinsky sex scandal in 1998, it seemed certain then President Bill Clinton would be impeached and removed from office. Despite his moral flaws and being caught in a lie or two, he remained popular with the electorate, and clung to power by the skin of his teeth because the economy was booming under him.

    The notion of the American Dream is that nothing is unattainable if you are ready to work for it. That’s why glass ceilings have been shattered in every area except politics – especially the office of president. Hillary Clinton came closest by winning the most votes in 2016, only to be denied by the peculiar Electoral College requirements. It is evident that Harris has learnt some lessons from the disappointment of eight years ago and tried to run a different kind of campaign. It remains to be seen whether she can overcome latent gender prejudices to reach her goal.

    It is amazing that a country which fancies itself leader of the free world just can’t seem to scale this hurdle. This is long after Israel made Golda Meir Prime Minister in 1969; the United Kingdom installed Margaret Thatcher head of government in 1979; and Angela Merkel became German Chancellor in 2005. None of these remarkable women could be described as weak: they held their own against male counterparts from around the world. Perhaps this would be the year when America breaks the mould.

    For decades American democracy was admired across the world as the near-perfect model for governance. Such admiration was why countries like Nigeria embraced the presidential system. Part of what made the US model attractive was the seamless way in which contests were conducted. Electoral hanky-panky was unheard of and losers conceded defeat with grace.

    That was until Trump happened to America. Ever since, denialism and concerted attacks on every pillar of democracy have been the features of his political ideology. When he talks of American decline, he speaks mainly in economic and military terms. But we see before our very eyes a great democracy approaching its next electoral contest with so much tension and uncertainty.

    Even before a vote was cast allegations of electoral fraud were already flying around and there’s widespread expectation the former president won’t concede if he loses. You could be forgiven if you thought we are talking of some Third World contest. It’s a measure of how far America has fallen that when next a delegation from that country arrives these parts to lecture us on how things are done, they would probably be told: ‘look who’s talking!’

  • Life in the time of fake news (2)

    Life in the time of fake news (2)

    The lifespan of a lie can be quite elastic depending on how intricately it is woven. Some can be buried for years, but in the age of social media it can be brutally short.

    That is why I am often confused as to the motivations of purveyors of fake news who know they can be found out in a matter of minutes or hours.

    While the creators have their dubious agenda, those who spread the lies – especially online – probably do so with some advantage in mind.

    Desperate bloggers and website owners who want to attract traffic to their sites would push out the most sensational of stories without subjecting same to the most basic journalistic tests. Even when there are rebuttals that soon expose their lies, they lack the basic decency of acknowledging they goofed. They carry on posting more garbage like nothing happened, just because there’s no consequence for their impunity.

    The more excitable amongst us – especially those who are convinced that Nigeria is the worst country on earth – can’t wait to post the latest bad news as validation of their beliefs. They are only too glad to share their garbage with gullible hordes who have become bad news junkies. So what, on the surface, looks like a manifestation of extreme insanity, clearly has method to it.

    These days the internet, especially social media, has become a sea of lies. It’s not just swimming with barefaced bull, it’s the headquarters of ignorance. Headlines lie, photos and videos tell even bigger lies. The wicked and mischievous can lift a photograph from five years ago and use it to drive a story in a similar context today. The reader would swear he saw the pictures with his own eyes until a rebuttal knocks him back to reality.

    Beginning with the election campaign that threw up Donald Trump as US president, fake news has become a multimillion dollar global industry relentlessly deployed for political ends. Nigerians, quick to pick up on global trends no matter how diabolical – have not been slow to jump on the bandwagon.

    During the 2023 general elections it seemed there was a competition by liars to outdo themselves on social media. Perhaps anticipating the impact that the phenomenon could have in determining the outcome of the electoral contest, then Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, launched a campaign against fake news. It was a non-starter that was quickly brushed aside by malevolent forces who thrive best in polarised environments such as our

    The inauguration ceremonies at federal and state levels following the polls provided another fertile ground for fake news merchants to wreak their usual havoc. While the lies exposed the levels of bitterness and hate in our society, they also made for hilarity just imagining what the mischief-makers were trying to achieve.

    Seventeen months after that bitter electoral contest, and smack in the middle of a cost of living crisis, the purveyors of lies and ignorance appear to have gotten second wind. Everything and everyone is fair game. Truth has become stranger than fiction. The fictive is the new normal. People just want to believe a lie: it appeals to their need to expect the worst. It feeds their self-pitying side. And boy, in today’s Nigeria, the pity party is in overdrive.

    Here are a few examples from different areas of national life showing that whatever values we once held dear are being swept aside by this strange malaise.

    Ever since he unleashed his economic reforms, delivering in the process a cocktail bitter medicine a society long run on impunity has been gagging on, he’s become everyone’s whipping boy. Everything he does must be thrashed by the embittered. Imagine how all hell was let loose by his decision to take a two-week annual leave in the United Kingdom.

    We were told it was unheard of that a country’s leader would holiday in a different land. When is the British Prime Minister coming to vacation in Nigeria, some asked mockingly. You could argue about the wisdom of taking a break at this period, but only the ignorant would say the president cannot take a break in another country.

    Former British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak whilst in office took a break in California, United States. One of his predecessors, Theresa May, favoured the Swiss Alps. David Cameron enjoyed exotic climes like Ibiza, while Tony Blair once took his break in Barbados. Even the famed Iron Lady, Margaret Thatcher, found time to unwind in Corsica. The list is endless.

    From the ignorant to the downright mischievous. We’ve seen recently how anyone who’s ever come within breathing distance of disgraced rap mogul, P. Diddy, have had their reputation thrashed with insinuations about untoward conduct – especially of the sexual variety.

    One of Nigeria’s biggest musical exports, Burna Boy, found himself at the receiving end when some influencer called Speedy Darlington, suggested his Grammy win was down to services rendered to the embattled American hip hop star. An unamused Burna promptly got him clamped in detention for defamation. It took a video of his accuser’s mother weeping and begging mercy for her only son to melt the heart of the singer. From the the sorry look on the face of the poster, it didn’t appear like he had anything to back his wild allegation, save for a desperate craving for notoriety.

    Read Also: Sokoto: weaponisation of fake news

    Respected General Overseer of The Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG), Pastor Enoch Adeboye, found himself in the eye of the storm recently after innocuously apologizing for having said non-tithers won’t go to heaven. By the time his comments went viral, they came out as though he had renounced tithing as doctrine. The old man was forced into a second round of clarifications within days while the online hordes celebrated like they just bagged an almighty scalp.

    There’s nothing wrong with having a discussion or debate about Christian doctrine. But there’s everything wrong with twisting the words of a man you disagree with just to malign him. There’s everything wrong with twenty and thirty-year-olds hurling insults at an 80-year-old over an argument, the fundamentals of which they have little grasp of.

    From one senior citizen to another. In the last few days, social media has been awash with reports that Pastor Shyngle Wigwe, father of the late and lamented Access Bank GCEO, Herbert Wigwe, had filed suit demanding 25% of his assets in a dispute over the execution of his will.

    Again, once the reports went viral, not many took time to consider whether this sort of demand was something the 90-year-old cleric and retired civil servant, would be involved with. They took to pontificating and passing judgment on the man and his family; others lectured on how the deceased banker should have taken care of his extended family to avoid the unseemly public fight over money.

    It turns out it was all fake news. Pastor Wigwe has denied the claims with grace and challenged the righteous army on social media to visit the court registry to confirm the true picture. In the meantime, who pays for the emotional damage done to the family?

    We take our last example from Ondo State where the governorship election to pick Rotimi Akeredolu’s successor would be holding in a matter of weeks. Predictably, the contestants are deploying everything to win. Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa found himself having to fend off abuse allegations after a doctored video of his lookalike went viral. It certainly wouldn’t be the last of such attacks before voters go to the polls.

    For all their entertainment value, fake news represent a cancer that can tear a volatile multi-religious and multi-ethnic society like ours apart. Such reports can trigger devastating damage that rebuttals that come hours after cannot mend. Even worse, those who act on the strength of the initial account may never get to read the denials.

    Aside being a clear and present danger to our collective security, fake news erode trust in an environment where people desperately need to trust one another and those who govern them.

    That is why the government – executive branch and legislature – must make the fight against fake news a priority. The key challenge remains how to fashion checks that can overcome the blackmail that they are an attempt to circumscribe free speech. The traditional media, especially, has existential reasons to be part of this effort.

    Those who generate fake news and those who gladly spread the poison should be made to pay a steep price. It is the least we can do to stave off tragedies somewhere in the future.

    • This piece is an updated version of an article published in The Nation on June 2, 2019.
  • What’s the problem with Nigeria?

    What’s the problem with Nigeria?

    Yesterday, October I, Nigeria, by choice, under-celebrated the 64th anniversary of its existence as an independent nation. As usual, it was an occasion for many to mournfully chorus how a potentially great country has failed to rise to the levels expected of it. In good times and bad ones, incumbent governments try to put a positive spin on the state of the nation while marking the day. They reel out a litany of actions taken to make life better.

    These are not the best of times for a people who have been disappointed time and again by a succession of military and civilian administrations, so much so that they have become an army of cynics who expect the worst of anyone in power.

    Every new government comes to power labouring to please this audience; very few succeed in doing so. For the Bola Tinubu administration, it has been an even more daunting task because it chose not to conduct business as usual by its choice of policies. It’s not as if some of the ideas like removal of fuel subsidies and floatation of naira were so novel. What was new was knowing the likely consequences, the president chose to trudge down a path his predecessors fled from.

    Some former governors and ministers of a reformist persuasion have disclosed in recent times how they tried to press former President Muhammadu Buhari into removing the wasteful subsidies whilst still in power. They presented him unassailable statistics that made the case. He would grunt to show he understood the payments were impairing the nation’s finances, but resolutely refused to act for fear of the consequences.

    It would be charitable to believe his inaction was down to concern over the devastation it would bring to the country’s majority poor and, even, the middle class. The less charitable would suggest that having been traumatized by experiencing overthrow as a military head of state, he was wary of tempting the fates with a move that would most certainly have provoked social upheaval. So, did he do the right thing by postponing the evil day?

    Read Also: Nigeria @ 64: Aiyedatiwa grants mercy to 117 inmates

    On January 1, 2012, then President Goodluck Jonathan’s new year gift to Nigerians was announcing removal of the infamous subsidies. The following day, protests under the Occupy Nigeria banner spread like a rash across the country. The 120% increase in petrol price was predictably accompanied by burning, looting and at least 16 deaths. The government buckled to defuse the situation.

    Interestingly, at the emergency meeting called to agree a u-turn two critical government officials who backed the controversial policy were noticeable absentees: Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and her Petroleum Affairs counterpart, Diezani Alison-Madueke. Reports back then claimed the former had threatened resignation if the decision to remove subsidies was reversed. Again, the government of the day had no stomach to push through what it was convinced was the right to do.

    The nation’s regurgitation of the bitter pill didn’t stop the successor Buhari government from carrying out some marginal price increase. But it was nowhere near the outright termination of subsidies around which a consensus had built.

    It would be another twelve years after Jonathan’s botched effort before Tinubu made his famous ‘subsidy is gone’ declaration at Eagle Square, Abuja, on May 29 last year. The direct fallout of that action along with the floatation of the naira has been a cost of living crisis the likes of which hasn’t been witnessed in this country for ages.

    Inflation is never popular anywhere and Nigeria isn’t unique in this regard. It doesn’t matter what the greater beneficial goal might be, people don’t want to pay higher taxes, or pay more for goods and services.

    That why in the US presidential election campaign Republican Party candidate Donald Trump continues to mount a strong challenge, despite his criminal conviction and character issues, because most Americans are unhappy about paying more for groceries and services. It’s the same challenge in Ghana and the United Kingdom.

    Tinubu’s critics, even those who during last year’s presidential election campaign vowed to remove subsidies from day one, have been rubbing their hands with glee over the administration’s battle containing the fallout. Their adolescent fun and games over a political rival’s troubles only shows their statements last year were insincere words designed only to win an election.

    They would have continued a system over which a respected economist and minister was ready to resign 12 years ago if it were continued; a system that was leading Nigeria to certain financial paralysis. How on earth does a country function with 97% debt service ratio and think that is normal? How do you pile up ways and means obligations to the tune of N30 trillion and expect there would be no consequences?

    The old lie was that fuel subsidy was the only thing the poor were benefiting from the country. In reality it did nothing for the millions living under or slightly above the poverty line, because many still contemptuously refer to us as taking over from India as the poverty capital of the world. So much for the joys of perpetual subsidies!

    What is wrong with Nigeria? The same labour unions who insist that government should have fixed refineries before pulling the plug on subsidy, infamously frustrated former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s bid, in the twilight of his reign, to offload the government-owned companies to private interests. They ensured that the Umaru Yar’Adua administration as one of its first acts in office reversed the policy.

    The same unionists who with populist posturing lash Tinubu for not waiting for the refineries to work, cannot explain why 17 years after they blocked the sale they are still out of commission. Meanwhile, between 2013 and now, Aliko Dangote, one of those who wanted to buy the refineries, has managed to build the world’s largest single train facility with the ability to process 650,000 barrels of crude per day. It is already selling petrol and diesel.

    If for over 25 years government refineries haven’t worked, who would guarantee a timeframe within which they would come alive. Would the country have survived financially until that uncertain time in the future? Those who have questions to answer are the lot who couldn’t fix the facilities for nearly three decades.

    Social impact is important but it shouldn’t be the only yardstick for judging the Tinubu reforms. No one knows what the consequences would have been for those who are hardest hit by the cost of living crisis in the event of a total economic collapse, which most certainly would happen, if we do nothing.

    While some focus on the pain, something is quietly happening across the landscape. Nigerians are paying unprecedented prices for petrol but are slowly adjusting to the new reality in different ways. That they are not on the streets wreaking havoc is subtle evidence of this adjustment.

    For years, we’ve had a sense of entitlement over oil; believing that because we produce crude we are entitled to enjoy cheap refined petrol which we don’t produce. We don’t make the same arguments over solid minerals, or expect to eat cheap chocolate because we export cocoa. Ultimately, petrol is just another product that should sell at the appropriate price.

    I have heard people retort angrily when comparisons of petrol price in other nations show ours isn’t the most expensive. They quickly ask what the minimum wage in those countries is. But simply economics tells us you fix prices by adding up cost of inputs, profit margin and other variables. You don’t bake a loaf of bread and check the national minimum wage before fixing the price.

    As we allow fuel prices to rise and fall like those of other products, government should intensify efforts at entrenching non-petrol driven transportation like CNG mass transit buses, intra-city metro, inter-state trains and electric cars. This would liberate the economy from the stranglehold where PMS prices automatically affect every other thing.

    Much of what Tinubu has implemented are things that administrations that came long ago thought were the right prescriptions for fixing a dysfunctional economic system. What was absent was the lack of political will. Well-meaning Nigerians should pray his policies work, the nation stabilizes and begins its journey to a prosperous place. The alternative would be a return to square one – not really an option when you consider how far we’ve traveled from that location in 16 months.

  • Edo: One poll, two referendums

    Edo: One poll, two referendums

    In many jurisdictions, off-cycle or mid-term legislative and gubernatorial elections are cast as referendums on the government at the centre. Where the administration is struggling, usually the ruling party’s flagbearers at different levels are punished. Last Saturday’s governorship poll in Edo State was set against the backdrop of a lingering cost of living crisis that has put many on edge.

    Some of the shock that trailed the victory of Senator Monday Okpebholo, candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), flows from this. But it confirms that politics is not as straightforward as solving a mathematical equation; it’s more complex. It reaffirms the old truism that all politics is local.

    Many will recall that the February 2023 presidential election was held against a canvass of harsh measures taken by the then President Muhammadu Buhari administration. Those actions had observers questioning whether APC was really keen on winning the poll. In January, it unveiled the naira swap policy that vacuumed the currency out of circulation. An irate citizenry, unable to access their funds through the banks, were primed to unleash fury against the ruling party.

    As if the currency change wasn’t bad enough, fuel pumps also ran dry across the country – triggering a spike in prices. At the height of the crisis an exasperated APC presidential candidate, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, blurted out at a campaign stop in Abeokuta, Ogun State, that the measures were aimed at stopping him from winning. They were believed to be engineered by forces within his own party who weren’t too thrilled at the prospect of him becoming president.

    He then declared defiantly that even if every naira note was recalled or fuel taps shut, Nigerians would vote and he would be elected. His prophecy came to pass: the rest is history.

    Again, many who were incredulous at APC holding on to power last year, despite the blowback arising from its badly-timed policies, forgot that the dynamics which determine poll outcomes are unpredictable. Elections are not always won by the most pleasant, eloquent, educated candidates; building roads, bridges, schools and hospitals is also no guarantee that an incumbent would be returned to office. Sometimes, mundane matters like likeability, gender, misinformation, ethnicity, hate make the difference.

    Still, Nigeria’s current economic struggles were a gift which the opposition parties could have made a meal of. But it wasn’t an issue that resonated. All those who had been waiting to write the obituary of the Tinubu presidency were left scratching their heads – even predicting that if the trend continued, he might be very difficult to dislodge in 2027.

    Read Also: Abia govt to implement new minimum wage for civil servants in October

    If one side failed to make the poll a referendum on the performance of the ruling party, their rivals successfully turned it into payback time for outgoing Governor Godwin Obaseki who had managed to transform everyone he could find into political foes.

    If the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP) who are making the usual noises about Nigeria’s democracy being in ICU would be honest, they were defeated not account of rigging, but because they came to the fight with a divided house, one whose arrowhead had been successfully defined as the villain of the piece.

    It wouldn’t be a Nigerian election if there were no allegations of manipulation and vote buying. Unfortunately, none of the leading parties – including the distraught losers – is in a position to point fingers.

    The PDP lost this election because its outgoing state leader Obaseki, forgot how he won a second term. Orphaned by the APC on whose platform he had served his initial term, he ran to the likes of former Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, who accommodated him and handed him a party ticket that seemed to be heading to former House of Representatives member, Omoregie Ogbeide-Ihama.

    Denying Obaseki the APC gubernatorial ticket in 2020 split the ruling party. Buhari and the governors wanted him to be the flagbearer. When this didn’t happen, the governors turned their backs on the Adams Oshiomhole-supported Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu. They boosted their colleague financially and morally away from public scrutiny. It was so bad that the party couldn’t hold its grand finale rally due to the coldness of the governors. The result was the comprehensive defeat of the APC slate.

    Unfortunately, in less than four years, Obaseki’s desperate need for control saw him scattering the intricate coalition that sustained him in power. He was a one-man wrecking ball.

    He quickly fell out with Wike and his supporters in the so-called Legacy Group of Edo PDP led by Chief Dan Orbih. This group also included Ogbeide-Ihama who had sacrificed a ticket that was virtually his. The governor humiliated and hounded his erstwhile deputy, Phillip Shuaibu, out of office because he didn’t want him as his successor. This was the same fellow who betrayed his benefactor Oshiomhole to join forces with those who secured the governor a second tenure.

    Anyone who knows anything about the Binis knows how much they revere the Oba of Benin. Constitutionally, the governor may have the whip hand over the monarch, but many a politician has learnt the hard way that crossing the palace is a one-way ticket into the power wilderness. But Obaseki would have none of that – as he engaged the Oba in a well publicized public dispute over custodianship of returned artifacts.

    By election time last weekend, the governor had managed to assemble and unite a stellar cast of formal and informal opposition whose common interest was defeating him, and everything he represented. Even Oshiomhole who had failed in his bid to install his choice as APC candidate, ate humble pie and fell in line, just for the sweet pleasure of seeing his upstart godson fall. Little wonder the rally cry of the governor’s foes was ‘Ofonee’, – ‘It is finished’ in local parlance.

    Obaseki was not a candidate in the election but it was really all about him. He ensured the party picked his preferred candidate, Asue Ighodalo, much to the bitterness of local politicians who felt they were more qualified and had better pedigree to win an election in Edo.

    It wasn’t as if Ighodalo was a bad man. If anything, his profile was such that any party would have been glad to have him under different circumstances. He is a well-heeled corporate lawyer and boardroom titan. But his very identification with the governor became his undoing. In the course of trying to woo back disaffected PDP members he was told bluntly that they had no issues with him but the person behind him.

    The election has been won and lost fairly – never mind the standard noise. A united opposition could have made it a referendum about 17 months of Tinubu’s administration, instead the APC successfully turned it into one about Obaseki’s divisive eight-year rule. He wasn’t on the ticket yet his shadow loomed so large over the real candidate such that those who would vote, could not because of Ighodalo’s qualities overlook the outgoing governor’s sins. They had become joined at the hip.

    This election may not have been perfect but it is a marked improvement on the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) efforts in recent years. Last year, so much mischief was made of the commission’s failure to post results seamlessly on iREV. By 11.00pm last Saturday over 97% of results had been put up for viewing. Less than 24 hours after, a winner was announced.

    This was a poll over which not one person has been reported killed! As far as Nigerian elections go that’s just amazing. There might have been the usual logistics delays in places but these things happen.

    INEC is always a convenient scapegoat, one to be blamed by diabolical politicians. But it is perhaps time to turn the spotlight in the right direction. Those who buy votes or send thugs to snatch election materials or just wreak havoc, are politicians. It doesn’t matter if the best arrangements are made, they would always find a way to discredit the process. Perhaps, it dulls the pain of losing somewhat for them. Imagine for one moment if the outcome had favoured them. The supposedly abysmal performance of the poll organizers would have been swiftly ignored. Such revolting hypocrisy!

  • A protest and its aftermath

    A protest and its aftermath

    In a way, it was good that the so-called #EndBadGovernance protests happened to the just over one-year-old Bola Tinubu government. He was hardly afforded the customary honeymoon period because right from the inauguration podium, he snatched ‘honey’ from many mouths with his declaration that ‘subsidy was gone.’

    It was a move that presidents who came before him were too frightened to make, knowing the consequences in a country that has been dependent on imported fuel for ages.

    But it was a decision around which a national consensus had formed. Leading presidential candidates like the People Democratic Party’s (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, and the Labour Party’s (LP), Peter Obi, committed to scrapping it. The latter even came up with a fancy soundbite – calling the subsidy regime ‘organised crime’ that he would remove from day one.

    In the event, the responsibility fell to Tinubu who won the election to do the honours. If Atiku and Obi had won and were true to their words, they would probably have faced the same inflation demons that were unleashed with more expensive imported fuel.

    So, the question is really not whether removing fuel subsidy was the way to go, because it was killing Nigeria. Even the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) had accepted it had to stop. The only point of cavil was when. They wanted refineries fixed first, an efficient mass transit system in place etc etc. Given that our four public-owned refineries have been under repair for nearly two decades, acceding to the unions’ demands was akin to permanently postponing the evil day.

    We know that up till last year, Nigeria was spending 97% percent of her earnings on servicing debts. A country that deep in the financial hole cannot pay for much else with the miserable three percent that is left; that includes paying for subsidy. The financing to continue delivering cheap fuel to the people would have to come from borrowing or cutting all sorts of unorthodox deals with our crude to raise cash. There were really no easy options left for this country and only those deceiving themselves would pretend there are.

    The new president had the option of continuing with the same old arrangement and face the very real possibility of the country not being able to meet its internal and external obligations, or dare to step where angels wouldn’t even tread.

    He bit the bullet by scrapping subsidies and ending multiple exchange rate regimes. We can argue all day as to whether it was wise to do one, not to talk of the two in one fell swoop.

    The cost of living crisis has been ferocious. We’ve seen in Kenya where President William Ruto pulled off the same fuel subsidy removal gambit, that the impact on prices can be bruising. Ever since, the consequences of those actions have hung over this administration like an ominous cloud.

    Tinubu spent much of the last 12 months staving off a potentially devastating national strike by the unions. But the best of his interventions haven’t slain the inflation monster. Courtesy of the new policies, federal and state governments now have more money to spend. We now know that state governments have received an estimated N570 billion in relief funds aside their higher takings from the Federal Account Allocation Committee (FAAC). This is in addition to other measures calculated to take the edge off the blow to the average man’s pockets.

    Read Also: Kaduna protests sponsored by external forces, says Gov Sani

    The common man doesn’t scrutinise the nation’s accounts and probably doesn’t care that Tinubu stepped in to meet the country spending 97% of her revenues on debt servicing. He is hungry and food prices are out of reach, so he blames the president. Cartels that have been feeding fat on fuel imports, and probably have a hand in ensuring that refineries never work, would certainly not be pleased that the new man wants to snatch the lollipop out of their mouths.

    Conscious of the unrelenting cries about hunger and hardship, Tinubu has even had to execute a u-turn, approving a short term food importation exercise – something he had vowed not to do earlier this year. If so much is being done to assuage suffering, questions have to be asked whether this flood of cash and other palliatives are percolating down to the vulnerable targets.

    Clearly, they haven’t. Meanwhile, the pressure continued to mount with ominous warnings. It would take the Kenyan protests to give coherence to the muttering across the country.

    However, by plunging into a copycat agitation without putting local perspectives into consideration, the organisers saved the Tinubu administration from what could have been a more serious challenge if they had solely framed their agitation around hunger.

    These protests meant different things to different people. That was why the list of demands had at least 15 items. Everyone jumped on the bandwagon: ethnic jingoists, separatists, failed politicians and their supporters nursing hangovers from last year’s polls, rebels without a cause, anarchists, agent provocateurs from the diaspora, idealists with their heads buried in the clouds, ‘experts’ who haven’t successfully run their own lives but presume to have the blueprint for saving Nigeria etc etc.

    Many initially embraced the action because ‘hunger protest’ was something they could relate to. Alas, it was just a smoke screen for those with a more ambitious agenda of making the country ungovernable and ultimately unseating an administration they cannot abide. For such people ‘peaceful protests’ wouldn’t hack it and an uprising had to be manufactured.

    Nigeria has 36 states and six geopolitical zones. The violence has been most pronounced in the Northwest and Northeast. The North-Central zone was largely quiescent with the exception of Plateau State. There were protests in the three Southern zones but not of the feral nature seen up North. Sulking over a multitude of grievances, leading Southeast figures had campaigned in the weeks leading to the protests for their people to stay out of it, sensing that this was actually a political slugfest masquerading as a revolution.

    I am sure that the organisers expected more from Lagos given its peculiar circumstance as Tinubu’s home state and its past history as epicentre for popular agitation. There were indeed protests but the government and stakeholders had for weeks pushed a counter narrative that the state would not allow a repeat of the #EndSARS carnage. That robust and uncompromising message, along with a court order limiting the protests to specific locations, helped in defanging what could have become another episode of burning and looting similar to what happened in 2020.

    As it turned out, the streets were largely empty on the first two days of the protests. This wasn’t necessarily in solidarity with the goals of the agitators, but rather a wise decision by those who had been burnt in the past, to stay out of harm’s way. They knew from bitter experience that Nigerians don’t do ‘peaceful protests.’

    What has played out in Kano, Kaduna and certain parts of the North has been very revealing. Following an age-old pattern, almajiri – many of them not up to 10 years old – have been let loose on the streets in an orgy of looting and destruction by faceless sponsors. In Borno State, Governor Babagana Zulum confessed that 95% of the so-called protesters were underage.

    These are the same sort of children handed Russian or Nigerian Army flags in Kano and Kaduna to solicit a coup or foreign intervention. Those behind this sinister plot would rather it all went to hell than for the current administration to continue in power. They thought to undermine Tinubu but have turned many off by selling the discredited military rule option. Baying for Russia to bail them out is hilarious given that that country is still trying to disentangle itself from its Ukraine misadventure.

    There is abysmal poverty in Northern Nigeria, no doubt, but no one should blame it on a one-year-old administration. Many leaders from the region who have been attacking the president ought to hang their heads in shame having been part of governments that have led Nigeria for the bulk of her years as an independent nation. In all the years they led this nation – especially in boom periods – they did nothing to lift up their people. They created the mess they want the incumbent to clean up in 12 months.

    By politicising these protests, the enemies of the administration have shown their hands and done their worst. They sought to give Tinubu a bloody nose, even unseat him, but failed. The unintended consequence of their actions is that they’ve given him and his team the breathing space to pursue the path of recovery they have chosen.

  • Nigeria’s ‘me too’ protests

    Nigeria’s ‘me too’ protests

    If you follow the headlines and social media chatter, by tomorrow Nigeria should be a heaving cauldron of rage. Promoters of nationwide protests are promising ‘10 Days of Rage.’ One of the groups led by veteran agitator Omoyele Sowore that has identified with the action has ‘Revolution Now!’ as its rallying cry.

    By every definition, revolution suggests a violent overthrow of the existing order. Equally, the promise of rage from mobs of the people, directed at those in authority is ominous. Little wonder that the government is taking the threats seriously. It is mobilising as if war is imminent. Everyone from governors to ministers and sundry supporters of the administration have been preaching peace – trying to talk would-be protesters out of their proposed action.

    It’s fast turning into a typical Nigerian farce. While anti-government protesters are frothing at the gills with righteous rage over the cost of living crisis, supporters of the administration who argue that the protests are just another political ploy of frustrated election losers to secure regime change by any means necessary, are equally mobilising to have their say. It could just turn out to be 10 days of duelling rallies.

    Since the beginning of the year discontent has been bubbling under the surface as food and petrol prices spiked. The long drawn process of negotiating a new minimum wage  – with a brief labour strike thrown in to spice things up – deepened that air of tension.

    But much as the raw materials for agitation have been present locally, this protest is far from original – with most of those backing it admitting to receiving inspiration from the recent violent uprising in Kenya. Those protests left parts of central Nairobi in ruins, with 40 dead and the country in shock over what had just played out. The youthful protesters could claim a victory of sorts after President William Ruto withdrew the contentious Financial Bill which came with myriad taxes.

    Read Also: Tinubu inaugurates southern Nigeria traditional rulers

    For Nigeria, there are parallels to the situation in Kenya. Ruto took office in 2022 following a bitter election battle in which his predecessor didn’t back him. On his very first day in office, he scrapped the country’s age-long petrol subsidies – triggering fierce criticism as prices spiked. This mirrors President Bola Tinubu’s journey. He, too, emerged after an ugly electoral battle which his rivals fought up to the Supreme Court. He announced the end of fuel subsidies at his inauguration and floated the naira. What followed was raging inflation that has so far defied a myriad of interventions.

    For those who are ever ready to copy the latest fads in other countries as panacea for Nigeria, the Kenyan example looked attractive given the president’s quick capitulation on the Financial Bill. But after the smoke cleared and the hotheads had a chance to review the wreckage, it was debatable what the riots achieved. One of most notable enhancers of the protests, parliamentarian George Ndung’u was forced to issue a craven apology for his role in the crisis after seeing the consequences of what he had fanned.

    For those who are so gung-ho about protests, the assumption is that they can bring about much that is good. Unfortunately, beyond venting and being a channel for people to let out their frustrations, they don’t achieve much. After the burning, maiming and killings, Kenya hasn’t become heaven just because someone set a part of parliament on fire. You then have to wonder whether somebody’s proposed ‘10 days of rage’ would bring the price of rice down to N18,000 or a litre of petrol to N180.

    The presumption is that the president and other leaders at different levels are so oblivious of happenings in the country that they require nationwide protests whose eventual outcomes are unknown, to wake them up or force them to work miracles they’ve been unwilling to produce until now.

    One of the key weaknesses of the protest supposed to start tomorrow is the woolly way in which it is conceived. Officially, it is tagged the #EndBadGovernance protests. But what constitutes good or bad governance? A shopping list that has been floating around on social media has among other things the return of fuel subsidy and release of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu as demands. This is the same subsidy that all presidential candidates at the last election committed to remove.

    For some naive souls who will join themselves to the protests, it is supposedly about hunger. But the nebulous demand for an end to ‘bad governance’ plays into the hands of those who insist that it is the latest political chess move by embittered election losers.

    One of the clear lessons of the #EndSARS protests is that it had a clear, achievable goal that was captured in its name. For as long as the focus remained on police brutality and terminating the Special Anti Robbery Squad (SARS), the agitation went swimmingly.

    The government quickly capitulated and scrapped the unit. But the organisers didn’t know when they had won. Instead of moving on they began tacking on new demands in the giddy and vain belief that their newly-discovered street power was all-conquering. It was overreach that played into the hands of the authorities.

    Unlike the Buhari regime which initially responded in a lackadaisical manner to the #EndSARS crisis in Lagos, the Bola Tinubu administration isn’t taking things for granted. That certainly comes from experiencing at first hand how quickly an out-of-control protest nearly brought the country’s commercial nerve centre to its knees. The scars are still fresh. Many of the facilities that were razed by protesters still out of commission.

    Given that no price can be put on human life, the discourse in the aftermath largely revolved around whether there were killings at the Lekki Toll Gate. Everyone has their own version of what happened at that location on that sad night. What didn’t become cause celebre are the killings that happened elsewhere. Policemen were murdered, their stations razed. Prisons were forced open and dangerous criminals let loose. Most of those escapees are roaming free, wreaking havoc till this day. No one can forget the haunting images of scores of newly-bought BRT buses casually burnt in the name of rage.

    No one who lived through that episode would take the threat of a similar protest by faceless organisers lightly. Wisely, the government has acknowledged the right of those who have been hurt by its policies to protest. Where there is a departure is that those who are quick to parrot constitutional guarantees of freedom of assembly are not so fast to state that the rights of protesters don’t supersede those of other Nigerians who want to get on with their lives, or to get to their work place in peace.

    Given our past experiences, none of these organisers can guarantee things won’t spiral out of control, or that their protesters won’t be hijacked by other forces.

    The country is at a critical juncture. President Tinubu’s reform may have had a bruising effect, but he has also made an effort to provide relief. They are by no means enough. But the charitable must admit that he’s only had a year to do the job. His critics expect him to perform transformational magic in that time.

    He is supposed to banish fuel scarcity that has plagued the country since the 70s in 13 months. From 1999 to 2023, billions of naira were ploughed into turnaround maintenance of the nation’s refineries, yet none is working as of date. Tinubu is supposed to simply lay hands on them and they miraculously come back to life.

    Most of the so-called demands of the protesters are things that only a military dictator can deliver. The president on his own cannot amend the constitution or restructure the country without the National Assembly. The release of Kanu is matter complicated by many court cases. It’s pointless discussing some other ridiculous demands which only confirm that those who wrote them have been spending too much time watching TV talking heads.

    So would Nigeria go up in flames tomorrow as some fear? I doubt it very much. A damp squib would be delivered because those driving these ‘me too’ protests are not clear as to what they expect out of this action. They are keen to start something but have no exit strategy. Like those who came before them with #EndSARS they will soon discover that rage has its uses, but it can also be badly abused; and good governance goes beyond conjuring another trendy hashtag. Hopefully rage will give way to constructive engagement.

  • Nigeria’s food price puzzle

    Nigeria’s food price puzzle

    The image that comes to mind as the Federal Government struggles to rein in inflation is that of a cowboy battling to break in a bucking bronco: a tough, chaotic and unpredictable process. Officials leading the charge must feel a sense of frustration that all measures – orthodox and unorthodox – are only producing the most modest of effects.

    In January 2024, headline inflation in Nigeria was 29.90% – relative to a rate of 28.92% in December 2023. The latest figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) put the rate for June at 34.19%, while food inflation is racing ahead at 40.87%. There are those who dispute these numbers. One national newspaper quoted the President of the National Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA), Kelvin Oye, as saying the rate was closer to 90%.

    Let’s admit that inflation is a global problem at this point and was an issue in the recent United Kingdom (UK) polls. It would be one in the United States and could have a bearing on how the November presidential elections turn out – beyond the questions around Joe Biden’s age. At 400%, it is highest right now in Venezuela. The rate in Zimbabwe is 172.2%, Argentina 89.6%, Sudan 76.1%, Turkey 50.6% and Ghana 45.4% just to mention a few.

    So, should we celebrate Nigeria’s official rate of 34.19%? Perhaps not, given that there are a few countries in Africa and elsewhere where the rate is in low single digits. But it doesn’t matter whether similar problems exist in the North Pole; people just want solutions to their day-to-day troubles with upkeep.

    The inflation rate could crash to levels that most households were used to, but that’s no guarantee that high prices are going to drop. It’s just that they stop rising at a dizzying clip. For instance, property owners who have hiked rent are unlikely to revert to old rates if inflation is tamed.

    Read Also: Wike woos Nigerians in Diaspora over infrastructural development

    Several weeks back, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) tried to highlight a bit of good news. It had identified a decline in month-on-month increase for about a quarter.

    Government statistics may offer hope, still they are cold comfort to the housewife who steps into a market and feels as though consumables have been vacuumed by an unseen force. The frustration that comes from not being able to buy what you intended, the terror involved in heading home with a half-empty basket, are hard to describe.

    Government is feeling the heat; what with people baying about hardship and the opposition celebrating every new piece of bad news. At some point several months ago, President Bola Tinubu pointedly said he wouldn’t sanction food imports. He was apparently anxious about the potential impact on local agricultural output.

    After holding out for several months, the administration has executed a u-turn and rolled out a raft of measures such as removal of tariffs on a range of imported grains. Given the challenging circumstances and urgency required, the move has been fairly well received.

    But African Development Bank (AfDB) President, Akinwumi Adesina, an important voice on economic matters on the continent, wasn’t impressed. He called the latest policy depressing, warning that it could hurt local agricultural production.

    His worries are similar to those that stayed Tinubu’s hands earlier in the year and are relevant. That said, they don’t answer the question as to where local output that can produce the swift respite the country needs is to be found. Hunger is a potent political weapon that can do irreparable damage to any administration. Food inflation is fast becoming a national security issue that anarchists and sundry mischief-makers can manipulate to destabilise the country.

    There’s no shortage of theories as to why food prices have gone through the roof. One of the most popular puts it down to insecurity ravaging the nation’s food baskets. Bandits have chased people away from farms across the Northwest, whilst farmlands in large swathes of Middle-Belt states like Plateau and Benue remain unsafe for farmers due to the activities of gunmen and herders.

    In many states down South, people have abandoned farms because of faceless killers and kidnappers. With rural communities losing their innocence, local staples like garri and yams are now out of the reach of many. Would it have been better to do nothing, let the situation fester in anticipation of a miracle without a time frame? I think not. Hunger needs to be assuaged immediately.

    Another factor driving food inflation is extortion by security agencies who clog the roads with checkpoints. Farm produce in the hinterland is still relatively affordable. But there have been reports that farmers have to pay a premium to navigate the route from farm to market. It isn’t just policemen and soldiers who are involved, even local toughs have gotten in on the racket. When the protection money is added to high transportation costs and other expenses, the eventual price of food is beyond the average man in urban areas.

    I was told recently of how market cartels fix prices at extortionate levels – far above what the selling farmer asks for his produce. The activities of these middlemen is devastating and often underrated as a factor driving high prices. While the government might be leery about getting involved with pricing, it can’t just sit back and watch a greedy few manipulating things to the detriment of the larger population. The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) needs to investigate and intervene robustly.

    To restore food productivity to former levels, the country has to neutralise bandits, kidnappers such that farmers feel safe enough to return to their isolated plots. This won’t happen overnight given the massive landmass of the country, porous borders and ungoverned spaces. We will never have enough policemen or soldiers to protect every square meter. New security arrangements involving collaboration with local communities have to be developed. These, too, require time to conceive and implement.

    We should be heartened by fact that just as we would never have enough security agents, violent criminals would never be that many to overrun every inch of Nigeria. There’s still enough safe space to improve productivity and tackle the demand and supply conundrum. If there is sufficient supply leading to a glut, prices will crash – especially with perishable commodities. But what we’ve had so far is population explosion meets declining productivity, delivering the current perfect storm.

    A couple of days ago the government released 750 trailers laden with rice to the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and local government areas across the country. This is just another palliative plaster that cannot heal the weeping wound. What would work is laser-like commitment to the myriad initiatives that are announced daily. We’ve heard of huge hectares being put to cultivation by federal and state governments. Niger recently launched a massive mechanised farming initiative. Southwest governors have vowed to produce food eaten in their region going forward.

    The twin hammer blows of naira devaluation and removal of fuel subsidy have had their knock on effects in terms of cost of inputs and transportation. It will take a while for adjustments to be made.

    The challenges fuelling high food price cannot be addressed in one fell swoop. There are also no easy options. While food importation looks like a risky gambit which can depress local agricultural productivity over time, it’s instructive that the government settled for a solution that isn’t open ended. Limited to an 180-day window, the measures could have the desired effect of providing sufficiency in our markets while giving room for anticipated harvests to come in the same period.

    It is expedient that the government fights escalating food prices with all its got. The average person is more concerned with quick wins like cheap food. They compare the price of basic staples like rice, garri, beans and on such basis draw conclusions as to the success or failure of administrations. Grand legacy projects are fine, but people still remember with nostalgia when a bag of rice sold for N18,000. Dealing with such basic needs first, provides the calm environment every government needs to accomplish its long term objectives.

  • The pilgrimage to Daura

    The pilgrimage to Daura

    It’s the age of instant analysis. Never mind that many would-be analysts are the least qualified to analyse. For them, body language, facial expressions are supposed to mean something even when they have no real significance. So, President Bola Tinubu, sitting on the second row at the recent inauguration of South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, with other foreign leaders, meant a diplomatic snub for Nigeria and a personal insult to him.

    It makes me wonder why the South Africans would take the trouble to invite one of their most important continental partners to the celebration only to embarrass the leader publicly. It’s not logical.

    Every picture supposedly tells a story. But in an age where images, audios and videos are constantly being faked, how believable are the stories they tell? People with a certain mindset, who want to believe what they want, won’t care.

    No wonder photographs of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar with former Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal, in tow, visiting former President Muhammadu Buhari, in his hometown of Daura, had many in a tizzy. The images, we are told, represent incontrovertible evidence of a budding scheme to get rid of the barely year-old Bola Tinubu presidency.

    To top off the ‘mountain’ of evidence, former Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, soon popped up in Buhari’s sitting room for what looked ordinarily like the regular courtesy visit, but which we have also been assured is another chess move of a grand coalition of Northern forces committed to regime change come 2027.

    Although, it didn’t happen in Daura, a third clutch of photos showing former Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, meeting with El-Rufai had some crowing joyfully that political mischief aimed at their bete noire, was afoot.

    Read Also: Tinubu, APC salute National Secretary Basiru

    An official statement by the former VP explained that his visit to Katsina was to condole with the family of former Governor Lawal Kaita on the loss of their matriarch. He only detoured to Daura for a courtesy call on Buhari. Such explanations weren’t enough to cool the ardour of conspiracy theorists. The vast majority of published reports completely ignored the statement, choosing to focus on their preferred narrative.

    It would be understandable if indeed the toing and froing was tied to the politics of 2027. After all, the supposed plotters all have something in common – deep-seated grievance against the incumbent president. Atiku who thought he would finally end 30 years of frustrated bids for the presidency in 2023, hasn’t reconciled himself to the fact that his one-time ally and friend beat him to the prize.

    Determined to make one more bid to achieve his lifelong ambition, in the last one year he has implemented a strategy of putting himself in the shop window with unrelenting attacks on the administration.

    One of the greatest mysteries of the transition between the Buhari and Tinubu administrations, is how El-Rufai became estranged from a man whose candidacy he enthusiastically promoted last year. Who can forgot how the then All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate publicly pleaded with the then Kaduna State governor to be part of a future federal government. He refused to take no for an answer until he received that commitment.

    Tinubu would go on to nominate El-Rufai as a cabinet member. However, strong opposition arose in the National Assembly, causing him to withdraw from consideration. Some of the former governor’s associates argue that the President could have done more by using the weight of his office to get him over the line. What Tinubu did or didn’t do isn’t available in the public domain.

    What is clear is that such legislative roadblocks to the clearing of influential cabinet nominees are not new. In 2015, former Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, found his ministerial bid imperilled at the Bukola Saraki-led Senate. While others with lesser political profiles waltzed through the process, his clearance was held up by formidable forces with strong grudges against him.

    In a bid to save his nomination Amaechi became a regular presence in the National Assembly, pressing buttons among his old pals in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). He didn’t wait for Buhari to pull his palm nuts out of the fire. He was wise not to. After all, the former President didn’t lift a finger when his anointed candidate for the Senate Presidency, Ahmed Lawan, was upstaged by Saraki in a stunning revolt early in his presidency.

    Perhaps, we would one day get to know what went wrong between El-Rufai and Tinubu. We may also find out how he managed to fall out with incumbent Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani, who he virtually installed as successor. Allegations of corruption which the state House of Assembly has levelled against him, are tried and tested tools deployed by political godsons to break free from overbearing godfathers. Who would have predicted that El-Rufai who, at a 2019 Bridge Club lecture in Lagos, proffered ideas for breaking the yoke of godfathers would today be downing a dose of his own prescription? How could this unthinkable turn of events have come about in less than a year?

    Former APC National Vice Chairman (Northwest), Salihu Lukman, accuses Sani of fanning his erstwhile benefactor’s troubles to please Tinubu. This, coming from a close associate of El-Rufai, is evidence of bad blood. It would be naive not to believe that someone who is deeply aggrieved would look for payback.

    Kwankwaso, too, has his own agenda that would drive him to seek out allies to secure his interests. His desire to build a political redoubt in Kano is threatened by the missteps of the Abba Yusuf New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) government – among suck cock-ups being hasty demolition of multi billion naira property as initial acts of governance, as well as the ongoing emirate stool crisis pitching Lamido Sanusi against Aminu Bayero.

    As the crisis drags on a sense of paranoia has taken over with Kwankwaso believing that the Federal Government is only looking for the perfect excuse to impose a state of emergency and pinch his prize. It is enough to force an ambitious politician to seek out the most unlikely of allies.

    On the surface there’s enough reason for these political figures to make common cause. But to suggest that recent trips to the sleepy town of Daura is to enlist Buhari as part of grand Northern political plot against the incumbent president is to to make a mountain out of a minute molehill.

    There are no permanent friends or foes in politics. Still, there’s so much history between those supposedly scheming that we should swallow these tales with good helpings of salt. We are expected to believe that Atiku will suddenly be embraced by a Buhari on some so-called political agenda. For their part, El-Rufai and the ex-VP have had a well-advertised antagonistic relationship, with plenty of name-calling over the years.

    Beyond grievance there’s not much that binds them together. In reality, this would be nothing more than an Alliance of the Disgruntled (AD). There’s nothing to suggest that the retired president would have anything to do with such an arrangement.

    True, many believe he wasn’t truly supportive of the ambition of his successor. However, once Tinubu emerged as the APC’s pick, he made his peace with reality and toed the party line. Since leaving Aso Rock he hasn’t done anything to suggest he is interested in political meddling or in becoming an alternative power centre. If anything, in words and deed he has indicated he wants to be left alone to enjoy his retirement and also wants distance from the FCT to allow his successor run the show.

    Even if he harboured political ambitions, Buhari of today doesn’t have the same pull as he did in 2015. Eight years battling Nigeria’s demons dulled much of the messianic glow that propelled him to power. You only need to look at how APC’s vote haul has declined over the last three election cycles. By 2023, with large swathes of his home state Katsina under the thumb of bandits, the ruling party lost the presidential poll there.

    Buhari’s track record shows that he’s largely conformist. He will not turn against his party and it’s leadership. He is content to play the role of statesman and isn’t going to become another Olusegun Obasanjo who fancies himself a kingmaker – chucking verbal bombs about.

    If Daura has become a Mecca of sorts in the last one year, it’s because former office holders are queuing to pay respects to the town’s most famous son who was once their principal. This sort of traffic is not unheard off concerning respected former public figures. Anyone reading more into these courtesy visits is probably battling a bad case of premature electoral fever.

  • Nigerians and silver bullets

    Nigerians and silver bullets

    A little over 13 years ago, a 53-country Gallup poll scored Nigeria 70 points – rating it the most optimistic nation on earth. It even outperformed Britain which only managed 44 points. People were incredulous given that the country was still grappling with the old demons of poverty, corruption and violence.

    Last year, the Global Happiness Ranking after analysing data for four years beginning with 2020, placed the country 95th out of 146 countries polled worldwide and sixth in Africa.

    Many would compare the findings above with their reality and cry: lies, damned lies and statistics! Today, the buzzwords are ‘hunger’ and ‘hardship.’ They are in most newspaper headlines; on the lips of many people. It’s not dissimilar to the situation in early 2023. What with the fuel scarcity and Godwin Emefiele’s disappearing naira.

    Pain has never been popular anywhere in the world. Even the most stoic people just bear it and carry on, waiting for better days. In a notoriously impatient nation uncommon economic challenges have created an air of crisis. Everyone wants a solution and they want it now.

    You can say the current problems have come about because fuel subsidy was removed and the naira floated. You can even hark back to the N30 trillion ways and means outlay which the Central Bank under Godwin Emefiele afforded the Muhammadu Buhari administration and, in so doing, snuffing life out of the naira.

    What you cannot ignore is that many are cashing in to make a bad situation worse. Some are doing so to make a point and justify their political choices; others, simply out of spite and hate.

    Such is the breakdown of trust between government and the governed that not many believe anything that comes from officialdom. That’s why claims of sabotage are often quickly dismissed as propaganda and excuses. Of course, we know the economic problems are down to more fundamental structural issues.

    They have been long in the making and would require an extended period to unmake. It’s the politically-incorrect thing to say in an environment where many expect a silver bullet to be deployed to bring dramatic change.

    You hear people tell the president to do something urgently. They warn the country is sitting on a keg of gunpowder, about to be blown to smithereens. For all the alarm bells they have rung, I am yet to hear anything that approximates a magic formula. I suspect that’s because no one has it.

    Instead, there have been a few short, medium term and long term solutions proffered. The trouble with these is the assumption that our problems are down to systems of governance only, ignoring the human dimensions to our troubles. It is for this typically Nigerian factor that methods which work optimally elsewhere, fail woefully down here.

    One of the more interesting proposals is the move by 60 members of the House of Representatives to return the country to the parliamentary system of governance.

    Spokesman for the so-called Parliamentary Group, Abdulsamad Dasuki, which has introduced a constitution amendment bill, argues that the failings of the presidential system are glaring.

    He said: “Among these imperfections are the high cost of governance, leaving fewer resources for crucial areas like infrastructure, education, and healthcare, and consequently hindering the nation’s development progress, and the excessive powers vested in the members of the executive, who are appointees and not directly accountable to the people.”

    If proponents successfully navigate the long road to passage, the amendment would take effect in 2031.

    The strongest selling point of their plan is cost-cutting. Perhaps the 2031 vintage of the parliamentary system would work if foreigners are imported to implement it. We’ve travelled this road in the First Republic and it all unravelled in just five years.

    The same factors of ethnicity, regional competition, personal ambitions, corruption, violence and incompetence which the military used as excuses to intervene in January 1966 are still there today. If this system was the cure-all that the country needed, the military under the late General Johnson Aguiyi-Ironsi wouldn’t have introduced a unitary system. They would have returned power to the next in line following the death of then Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa-Balewa.

    As part of the process that preceded the Second Republic, a Constituent Assembly presided over by the late Justice Udo Udoma engaged in lengthy debates that ultimately rejected the parliamentary system and plumped for the American presidential model. Many of the members were active participants in the First Republic – with experience in the system that some would have us believe is Nigeria’s solution today.

    The British parliamentary system is 223 years old and still going strong. The American presidential system invented in 1787 is even older. Both nations have had their challenges. The United States fought its civil war. They never changed their way of governance – beyond occasional amendments; they changed those who ran the system.

    Read Also: Traditional ruler urges Nigerians to support Tinubu’s administration 

    For all its imperfections, Nigeria’s democracy has been self-cleansing. The Fourth Republic is 25 years old. In 2015 an incumbent president lost to the opposition candidate and handed over peacefully. Some would have us junk this model completely because of present challenges. The replacement would be something we last experimented with 60 years ago.

    At least, we can credit the Parliamentary Group for proposing that which can be actualised through lawful means. In the last few weeks we’ve also received proposals from the lunatic fringe in the form of calls for military intervention.

    Although the Chief of Defence Staff, General Christopher Musa, has strongly denounced those soliciting soldiers to embark on treasonable actions, yesterday Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General Taoreed Lagbaja, reiterated the military’s commitment to defending democracy and constitution.

    While many may not have taken the coup talk seriously, whatever unease may have existed probably came from the recent rash of such excursions in the likes of Niger, Mali, Gabon and others.

    An even stronger reason for dismissing it is because there was such solicitation by the Anyone-but-Tinubu gang in the days following the declaration of the results of the February 2023 presidential elections. Their goal was to scuttle the inauguration of the winner. They never got over their loss and see in current challenges an opportunity for regime change.

    Only the total clueless would consider the military a viable option. Nigeria is not Niger. It is a strategic and massive country with over 200 million people. The world won’t stand for military the meddling in its governance. It would be swiftly turned into a pariah with the pain flowing to us all.

    Nigeria of 2024 is a totally different proposition from the country it was in the heydays of coups in the 70s and 80s. The world has changed politically and technologically. We saw in the experience of Turkey how in 2016 a putsch was frustrated by the populace using social and traditional media.

    Despite our frustrations with politicians and the process, the last time Nigeria was under the military was 25 years ago. It is the longest stretch of civil rule ever in this country and evidence of our commitment to democracy. The reactionary forces who would love to take us back forget that when soldiers intervene, they don’t just sack individuals, they overthrow the constitution with all the rights it guarantees.

    They bulldoze every political institution – be they presidents, senators, Reps, governors, state assemblymen, local government chairmen etc. It doesn’t matter whether the office holders are APC, PDP, Labour Party or APGA. That’s why people must be careful what they wish for.

    Perhaps, the most annoying aspect of military intervention is the presumption. A bunch of unelected gun-toting soldiers impose themselves without our consent. They govern without proof that they can do a better job than those they ousted.

    A history of modern Nigeria can be titled: ‘How the Armed Forces Underdeveloped a Nation.’ They come promising to clean up but end up worse than the bandits they toppled. Long after his death, Nigeria keeps receiving repatriated millions of dollars looted by General Sani Abacha whilst he was Head of State.

    Some West African countries that allowed they to be seduced are learning the hard way. Take Guinea for instance. In September 2021, General Mamady Doumbouya overthrew President Alpha Conde.

    The junta banned all demonstrations in 2022 and arrested several opposition leaders, civil society members and journalists. Internet restrictions imposed three months ago were lifted recently, just days after unions declared a general strike over rampant inflation and hardship. The Guinean military haven’t been an improvement on the flawed democracy they truncated.

    Every country goes through trying times. In the 80s, it was as if half of Ghana emptied into Nigeria. When they were humiliated and chased out of this country, departing in cramped lorries, with their belongings stuffed in Ghana-Must-Go bags; they left to begin the long process of fixing their home. It wasn’t long before Nigerians started flocking there to buy property and enjoy stable electricity.

    It’s time we accepted that only hard graft and staying the course will get us out of the woods, not aimless chasing after silver bullets.  

  • Democracy: Significance of 25 unbroken years

    Democracy: Significance of 25 unbroken years

    In today’s Nigeria, it’s fashionable to be angry, negative and cynical. That, perhaps, explains why a major anniversary in our national evolution went uncelebrated amidst the din over spiralling inflation, a rising and falling naira, the Lagos-Calabar super highway, minimum wage and national anthems – old and new.

    On May 29, 1999, Nigeria’s Fourth Republic took off with President Olusegun Obasanjo at the helm. Just six years earlier, on June 12, 1993, the country had trooped out to vote in landmark elections that would be celebrated as about the freest and fairest in our history.

    Conducted under the so-called Operation A4 arrangement developed by noted political scientist and then chairman of the National Electoral Commission (NEC), Professor Humphrey Nwosu, voters queued behind their preferred candidates and the outcome in each unit was determined by a transparent headcount that left no room for manipulation.

    What followed with the annulment of the results would go down in history as one of the high points of impunity under military rule. The cancellation plunged the nation into six years of tension and instability marked by brutal suppression of human rights and regular rumours of coups.

    Some of these were trumped up charges just designed to purge potential rivals or supposed enemies. It was in one of those episodes under the regime of General Sani Abacha that Obasanjo found himself charged with plotting the overthrow of the junta. Despite international pressure to grant him and his co-accused reprieve, he would be convicted and jailed.

    For perspective, it should be pointed out that as at 1999, Nigeria had been independent for 37 years. Thirty of those years were under the military following the putsch of the 1966 and the subsequent coups and counter-coups that dominated the period leading to the onset of the Second Republic in 1979. That democratic project would be short lived – truncated in 1983 by soldiers suffering from power withdrawal symptoms.

    The great tragedy of military rule in Nigeria is that it prevented a democratic culture from taking root. Each time there was a coup, the constitution was suspended and all structures for civilian rule scuttled. The country would then be ruled by strange contraptions like a Supreme Military Council (SMC) or an Armed Forces Ruling Council  (AFRC). They were accountable to no-one and their word was law. Penalty for opposing them was harsh detention or in other instances the death sentence. Some of the nation’s brightest officers would perish at the stakes, no thanks to the unending cycle of coups.

    Given that their intervention was illegitimate, the juntas were always under pressure from the international community to restore constitutional rule. Their response was usually to propose halfhearted transition programmes like those under General Ibrahim Babangida that often led to nowhere. Abacha equally cooked up a plan which, in reality, was a contrivance that would have seen him transmuting from military dictator to civilian president. But for the unscripted intervention of death, he would have gotten away with it.

    To achieve a pre-determined end there were all kinds of harebrained experiments. At some point, politicians were branded Old Breed and New Breed using very opaque parameters. Those in the former category were barred from participating in the political process – never mind what their human rights entitled them to. In reality this was just a manoeuvre to exclude some of the more experienced people from governance.

    At the height of his manipulation of the process, Babangida created two artificial parties – one left of centre and the other to the right of the ideological spectrum. Politicians were then herded into these sterile camps like cattle.

    The upshot is that each time the transition ended properly, the new operators of the system embarked on a steep learning curve. In many cases institutional memory became a casualty. It’s hard to imagine what kind of country we would have had, what sort of development would have taken place, had the military not meddled for 30 years.

    Read Also: DSS alerts on Democracy Day “sinister” protests

    The juntas thrived at a time when the nation was flush with petrodollars. But rather than enunciating the sort of development vision that military rulers like Park Chung Hee used to transform South Korea or Suharto adopted to change Indonesia, our soldiers were satisfied with bingeing and squandering Nigeria’s riches on white elephant projects.

    The waste of trillions from the General Yakubu Gowon era through the Babangida years could have delivered the foundation for economic prosperity which the governments that came after are still struggling to lay. The consequence is a nation still wallowing in poverty in 2024.

    The economic challenges facing the country and the backsliding into junta rule of Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso, Gabon and others in West and Central Africa, has made some who were too young to experience military dictatorship think it’s an attractive option to move the country forward. It’s not.

    Their time at the helm is evidence that soldiers can be more corrupt and incompetent than the civilians they toppled. The term ‘settlement’ – another word for corruption – became popular under Babangida, while Abacha turned the Central Bank into his personal piggy bank. Twenty six years after his demise in 1998, Nigeria continues to receive repatriated millions of dollars he had stashed away in several European havens.

    To have stuck with democracy for 25 unbroken years is evidence of our acceptance of this way of governance. There is much to criticise in the way we’ve practiced it since 1999. Still, we must be restrained in our condemnation and begin to look more critically at how to improve. There are no perfect democracies anywhere. That’s why hundreds of years after practicing it, millions of Americans who backed Donald Trump in 2020 are now certified election deniers. Our polls may not be perfect but there has been noticeable improvement through the years.

    What is evident is that the people expect more from the system. The fact they have not received the sort of dividends they anticipated reflects in their disenchantment – resulting in many voting with their feet. In 2003, the highest voter turnout was recorded at 69.1%. This has dropped with every election cycle since – hitting an all-time low last year with just 26.7%.

    Restoring the people’s belief in the process, encouraging greater voter participation should therefore be the focus of the political class as the journey to the next 25 years begins. That’s why the federal government’s decision to sue the 36 states over local government autonomy is just one baby step to enable the grassroots feel the impact of government. More needs to be done in this direction.

    Unfortunately, many office office holders – especially in the legislative arm – are haring off in the wrong direction, totally oblivious of what’s important. They are busy with proposals to return the country to parliamentary rule as though it has not been tried in these part. Others think the country’s greatest challenge is restructuring presidential and gubernatorial tenure to a single six-year term.

    These are elite concerns that have no bearing on where the shoe is pinching the average citizen today. Our focus should be on making democracy work for the majority of our people, not in reinventing the wheel. That means deploying all the resources of government at all levels to lift our teeming millions out of abject poverty. Until we have that reset, the disconnect between governors and the governed would continue to widen.