The Nation Newspaper

Category: Wednesday

  • Drama at Chatham House

    Drama at Chatham House

    Chatham House or the Royal Institute of International Affairs, as it is also known, is an independent policy institute based in London. Founded in 1920, it operates from an imposing 18th-century house located at No. 10, St. James’s Square in the heart of London. St. James’s Square is the only square in the exclusive St. James’s district of the City of Westminster. It has predominantly Georgian and neo-Georgian architecture with a private garden at the centre. In its first 200 or so years of existence, No. 10, St. James’s Square, was one of the three or four most fashionable residential addresses in London. The square’s main feature is an equestrian statue of William III erected in 1808.

    Chatham House is a non-profit, non-governmental organization. Its mission is to analyse and promote the understanding of major international issues and current affairs. In this regard, the institute offers potential and established leaders drawn from across the world, the opportunity to deepen their understanding of critical issues, propose new ideas and proffer solutions to complex policy challenges and opportunities. There is a historical and symbolical meaning to the name of the organization. No 10 St. James Square, the building housing the organization, had been home to three past British Prime Ministers, including William Pitt, 1st Earl of Chatham, from where the organization simply derives its name.

    Over the years, Chatham House has engaged several governments, the private sector, civil society and its members in open debate and confidential discussions on the most significant developments in international affairs. Each year, the institute runs more than 300 private and public events mostly workshops, conferences and roundtables in London and its other affiliate locations worldwide. What keeps the organization on top of global international affairs rating is its convening power which attracts world leaders who have something to say, as well as, the best analysts in diverse fields from across the globe. It is for this reason that the institute is globally revered in terms of its ability and capacity to give a helping hand to policy makers and government legislations so as to improve global economies.

    Chatham House hosts high-profile speakers from around the world and also undertakes wide-ranging research. One of the most recent speakers is Shinzo Abe, Japanese Prime Minister who spoke on his country’s hostage crisis with ISIS on February 3. So, ordinarily, when on Thursday, February 26, it was the turn of  Major General Muhammadu Buhari, to speak at the think-tank institute, it was in continuation of its immeasurable services in international affairs to the global community. It was nothing abnormal. The Institute was just keeping to tradition. But Nigeria’s desperate politicians will not want to hear anything like that. General Buhari is the presidential candidate of the opposition, All Progressive Congress, a party strongly in contention for the leadership of the country in the rescheduled presidential election slated for March 28.

    Buhari spoke on: “Prospects for Democratic Consolidation in Africa: Nigeria’s Transition.” His speech dwelt on the postponement of Nigeria’s fifth general elections since the country’s return to civilian rule in 1999. It also touched on the fierce political competition among the contending politicians, the current security crisis facing the country, the severe economic challenges linked to the drop in oil price and the challenges of conducting elections in such a complex environment. While there is widespread speculation as to the reasons for the elections’ delay, there is also widespread acknowledgment of the necessity that the elections should take place as scheduled on March 28 and April 11.

    At the end of his speech, Buhari received a standing ovation as he left the conference hall after taking questions from the hordes of reporters who had gathered. The questions centred on his intended policies to chart a new Nigeria and his view on corruption. This interview was conducted within the premises in order to protect the person of the General from the unruly crowd of Pro-Jonathan campaigners who had, by this time, disrupted the peace and serenity outside the building. At the end of the interview, the General and his team were safely led to a waiting security van that took them away from the venue.

    However, it is pertinent to note that before the event began on that day, a group of individuals had gathered at several points around the very serene environment chanting and shouting anti-Buhari slogans thereby attracting curious attention from officials and members of the public. It was discovered that the unruly crowd of people were mostly Nigerian and non-Nigerian students brought to the venue in chattered buses from various educational institutions in Manchester, a distance of about 200 miles to London or about four hours drive.

    Unfortunately, before Buhari’s appearance last week, the same Chatham House was the platform used on January 22, by Sambo Dasuki, the National Security Adviser, who had no business with the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, to drop the bombshell that the general elections earlier scheduled for February 14 and 28, may be postponed. Expectedly, this drew the ire of the public. All the same, the elections were postponed.

    What is baffling in this latest episode is that our politicians have inadvertently exported our traditional but shameful Nigerian factor of renting crowds abroad. You can imagine luring buses load of students with peanuts to come and disrupt such an international event that had the propensity to impact positively or negatively on the image of the country and Nigerians as a people. The funniest part is that these were students who had no idea of what they were “hired and paid” to come and do at the venue as captured on a video recording that went viral in the social media.

    In the video, a lady, who obviously was the arrowhead of the whole arrangement confessed on camera that she brought the dysfunctional crowd from Manchester for the organisers of the anti-Buhari rally for a fee and that she was ready to do it for any other group once the bargain was right. The unruly behaviour of the group on that day caused a lot of disruptions to the usual activities in the St. James area on a normal working day. It was such an embarrassing situation championed by those who claimed to be Pro-Jonathan campaign agents in the UK. Good enough, security officials who were unusually invited from the Metropolitan Police to calm the tensed situation were able to maintain order.

    One sad thing about the melodrama that took place outside Chatham House is that it has exposed the shenanigans of our politicians who are highly intolerant of the opposition while professing that they are democrats. But it appears that the Pro-Jonathan campaigners are not done yet with their London drama. Last weekend, “Wind of Hope Foundation,” one of the amorphous groups in the Pro-Jonathan campaign, took advert spaces in the newspapers challenging Buhari to a sponsored international debate to be held under the auspices of the same Chatham House. This shows that the Pro-Jonathan campaigners were actually caught napping by Buhari’s outing in London and are so desperate to equal scores with him.

    The Pro-Jonathan campaigners should learn to be proactive and not reactionary. After all, when TAN (Transformation Ambassadors of Nigeria) was junketing all over the country in the recent past, they had a free reign. All these rough tackles are very demeaning. What the present situation calls for is strategic thinking, proper planning and execution. Nothing more. The beauty of democracy is the opportunity to associate freely and canvass opinions or views without any hindrance. This is exactly what those who practice true and genuine democracy have always preached. Nigeria cannot be an exception.

    From what is currently going on in the polity, it is like two trains on high motion, are furiously coming from opposing direction and nobody is saying anything. The only way to avert the looming catastrophe is to allow the people to freely choose their leaders without being coerced, intimidated, blackmailed or arm-twisted in any form. That is how we can guarantee peace and sustainable development in this God-given (not forsaken) country.

     

  • Our Girls; Funeral for murdered ‘Toilet Paper’ Naira;  Any resurrection?; Indian budget lessons

    Our Girls; Funeral for murdered ‘Toilet Paper’ Naira;  Any resurrection?; Indian budget lessons

    Our girls are still missing since April 15, 2014 and Boko Haram bombs are taking lives daily. The regional armed forces are doing a good job and soldiers are paying the supreme price totally unsung, as usual. Let us pray.

    Ask yourself of this 2015 ‘democratic’ election: How Much, Who, Where, How and Why? How much is spent by parties? Who is paying? Where is the money from? How does it escape government coffers? Nigerian Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and investigative journalists must deliver the truth about the ‘EVIL ELECTION EXTRAVAGANZA’. Go on. Work out the cost of this election, lethal and financial, and provide an ‘ELECTION COST FIGURE’. Nigeria is ripped off as politicians, our servants and employees, shamelessly spend a FRIGHTENING FINANCIAL FIGURE. Today we address this and the prevention of the funeral of the naira.

    There is an immeasurable cost in political mistruths rampantly regurgitated without intelligent interrogation by the mindless media. There are deaths and injuries which require monitoring and quantifying by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) so far reporting 58 deaths, including 28 police officers. The National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) is a dangerous army needing to be demobbed, registered, tagged and all its members’ vehicles numbered for safety and recognition.

    NOW HEAR THIS: Apparently National Assembly (NASS) is considering the ‘Budget 2015’. Four items are glaringly missing from the budget which will stop the naira’s death and reverse it towards N150 in the first instance in its resurrection.

    First is the question of the ‘NAIRA AMOUNT’ for the ‘SECRET & CORRUPT REIMBURSEMENT OF ELECTION EXPENSES’. Incoming party members will in 2015 generously  reimburse themselves and their parties for real and imagined campaign expenses with interest by ‘illegally’ removing budget funds through bogus hyper-inflated’ phantom contracts. This cost can be calculated as an important research project by NISER, Political Science Associations and university students by a collation of a count of the cost of millions of items of election as following: The T-shirts and face caps in tens of millions, party clothings, posters- one billion, billboards, newspaper and radio and TV adverts, rent a crowd + organisation x 10,000 events and rallies nationwide and half a million+ bags of rice ‘stomach infrastructure’ and  inducements, bribes and ‘gifts’ to ‘show the enlightened party pathway’ to royal fathers, pastors@N7billion, imams@?billion, atheists and hundreds of groups and counter-groups and organisations set up for ‘party activities’. Also estimate the huge legal fees, N15m/SAN and N1-5m/lesser lawyers by some 2011 estimates before the naira fell to toilet paper value, of the endless court cases. The ‘2015 Election Reimbursement Figure’ will be billions and even A TRILLION NAIRA, up to 30% of the budget. The removal of this money will ‘ruin’ the budget even as Due Process and the Bureau of Public Procurement claim to save billions. This is stealing from every baby, child and adult Nigerian.

    The second figure missing is the opportunity for savings from an ‘Expected reduction of the political burden on the budget’, from ‘cutting salaries and perks, of all political office holders and political appointees by 50-75%’.

    Thirdly is the opportunity for budgetary savings by ‘REDUCING THE NUMBER OF POLITICAL OFFICE HOLDERS AND POLITICAL APPOINTEES BY 50%’.

    Fourthly, the budget misses out the opportunity for savings by getting all such political persons mentioned above ‘TO WORK ‘PART TIME’ AND FOR A SITTING ALLOWANCE’ except for ministers and commissioners.

    A word about our current currency collapse. Currency is national pride and currency appreciation is a goal of every leader except in Nigeria where the aim is a weaker naira to get more government naira for fewer dollars. ‘Currency stability’ is a mantra by economists and bankers but what is ‘currency stability’ when your currency has been made into toilet paper? Who needs stable toilet paper? Let our leaders pull our currency back from the brink of this this VERY Nigerian-made instability N210+:$1. If not, in a month or two the same economists will be praising the ‘new stability’ of N210+:$1 and fight any improvement or reversal to a stronger naira. Remember only the citizen gains from a strengthening naira as the naira buys more dollars. If you are a politician with dollars to change to naira to pay for salaries or elections, then a weak naira gets you more naira for the dollar. A politician with a foreign account will never improve the naira and will applaud the naira collapse because each $1m will buy N210m instead of N150 three months ago. Shamefully, since the time of recently 80 year old Gowon and 90 year old Shagari, happy Birthday to you, and all those in the picture of Shagari@90 ‘Past Heads of State’ responsible for our predicament, it has never been on any Nigerian civilian or military government’s agenda to ‘appreciate the naira’. Since poverty is ‘less than a dollar a day’, the fall of the naira plunges another 30% of the population below the poverty line in shameless ‘largest economy of Africa’. We require to drastically resurrect the naira from the toilet before the economists say ‘stability is better than appreciation’ of the naira. Wanted: A Nigerian leader to Resurrect the Naira –and Nigeria.’

    Nigeria and India face similar corruption problems. Any party solving Nigerian’s economic problems and working on the 2015 budget should tune Channel 413 and study the Indian Finance Minister Jailey’s 2015 Budget. Even toilets are budgeted for. NISER, economists, political students and all Nigerians must learn important lessons from the Indian Budget commentaries.

  • Our Girls; Politicians, bankers: No corruption difference? Fight ‘Illegally legal’ NASS salaries for life

    Our Girls; Politicians, bankers: No corruption difference? Fight ‘Illegally legal’ NASS salaries for life

    Our girls and many of our people have been missing on, before and since April 14, 2014. Many others, over 10,000, lie dead in mostly unmarked graves and there are the perhaps millions displaced or injured. The recent King of Saudi Arabia was also buried in an unmarked grave even though he had almost $20 billion, not as rich as Dangote whose name appears in the Swiss branch of HSBC discussions about international tax evasion and undisclosed secret bank accounts confirming international bankers’ fraud. In the 60s, the magazine West Africa advertised Swiss Accounts. Corruption has been around forever.

    The civil service, political and economic banking class all stink of manipulative corruption igniting the historic anti-corruption stance of the Buhari campaign facing the reactionary ‘who-is-who’ in ‘Who is afraid of Buhari?’ on the other side. Millions of Nigerians are frustratingly sick of the personal and public service cost of corruption consuming as much as 50% of budgets of most LGAs, states, federal government organisations.  This cost of corruption is murderous and is an election issue and an affront to national pride. Corruption thought is seen in the high political wages; bankers’ corruption is seen in high bank rates and destructive naira value. Political corruption includes a weak security strategy, near-perpetual darkness, potholes filling our roads, poor education and health delivery systems, high graft in government functions and services, cost of doing business, the greedy open hands of all uniformed organisations, poor return on the contract naira, the education exodus to Ghana, the growing Diaspora population and even worse – the corrupt funding of political parties by government/ contractor corruption.

    African leaders could have directed the Africa Union to declare ‘2015-2025 -The Solar 10 Years’ and negotiated the cutting edge solarisation of Africa as an ‘African-Anti-Poverty, Job Creation’ strategy against the invasion of fortress Europe and as a priority of development from village to Presidential Villa. Of course very few African countries have the criminally low power supply that Giant of Africa, Nigeria, has. The Nigerian citizen has been punished by politics for ever. All our powerlessness, suffering, falling naira, high interest rates are all caused by a lack of true leadership. It seems the leaders have got well ahead of the followers in ‘benefits’. In Nigeria we have a ’Politicians’ Paradise’  Vs a ‘Citizens Cesspool’ of preventable suffering from which we foolishly smile and applaud when we get chairs in a classroom or a few potholes filled or  a 31% pass in WAEC or ‘only 20 deaths from Ebola’ or a 50kmph slow-train while they get a new presidential plane.

    People wake up!! Do not applaud at the dregs given you while they steal us blind. Nigeria was never supposed by God to be so bad.  God gave us oil, geological minerals, millions of hard working people, 12 hours daylight a day, a good climate filled with solar energy, a naira valued at $1.2:1Naira in 1970. Where have they gone?

    Last week the National Assembly, NASS approved for themselves new salaries-for-life for certain national officers within the NASS. This is after receiving huge unknown Salaries and Perks, while in office which are SAPping our budget dry. All this in a country where politicians are regrettably the highest paid in the world while they cannot pay others their salaries and pensions. All this in a country whose currency has plummeted from N150 to 200+ or 25% and whose oil revenues have fallen by 50% through falling oil prices and reduced demand.  Is this ‘Salaries for life’ law a copycat law from the USA, EU or UK? Is there not a body which fixes Salaries and Perks for political office holders? This body perhaps called the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal something has failed yet again to curb the politicians who are drinking greedily from the near-empty well of Nigeria’s budget. But these politicians are already stupendously wealthy at the nation’s expense. How greedy can a man get? How many golf courses, private jets or mansions in different continents does a man need while fellow Nigerians are protesting seeking unpaid salaries and stolen pensions and food for children? This law giving life salaries and perks to even one NASS member is an insult to our sensibilities, morally reprehensible and though NASS may make it legal, it is an illegality and must be challenged in the courts as ‘ILLEGALLY LEGAL’. Today officers, tomorrow everyone in NASS. This must be challenged in court and some political parties must take this as a key policy strategy like the excessively high political salaries and the need to cut the NASS and state and LGA from ‘full time’ to ‘Part-Time with Sitting Allowances’. The politician appears as a blood-sucking leech on Nigeria’s budget. This political class must be stopped before there is nothing left.  Nigeria has had seven+ years of plenty stolen and faces politically induced seven years of resultant famine.  We need a change.

    Apologies for a missing sentence on Feb 18. The full paragraph was: Nigeria’s builders must visit The Pan Atlantic University Lekki, Lagos has a fantastic eco-friendly building, Enterprise Development Centre, powered by solar energy. All Nigeria’s buildings must be eco-friendly buildings. Of course Africa’s traditional mud and grass buildings were eco-friendly. There is a new National Solar Policy suggesting that all new houses under the new Nigerian Housing Policy and all new government and corporate buildings must include renewable energy, solar. These are huge policy steps

     

  • How Jega became the devil

    How Jega became the devil

    If you are looking for evidence of disarray within the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) ranks, look no further than the mixed signals it is sending over how it views its newest bête noire – chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega.

    Party chairman, Adamu Muazu, now says the ruling party has absolute confidence in Jega’s ability to organise free and fair elections. Coming against the backdrop of the demonisation of the man by leading members of PDP – like head of the Presidential Campaign Council, Ahmadu Ali, spokesman, Femi Fani-Kayode and Ijaw leader, Chief Edwin Clark, this conciliatory statement was a tad suspicious.

    It was reminiscent of the public show of support that some owners of struggling English Premier League clubs often extend to their embattled managers. Perhaps it was to lull the unsuspecting fellows into a false sense of security. More often than not, days after receiving the dreaded vote of confidence they get the sack.

    Predictably, Muazu was calling Jega a liar twenty four hours later when he received a delegation of Africa Union (AU) election observers in Abuja.

    One of the buzzwords of the Goodluck Jonathan administration is ‘transformation.’ After the theatrics of the last fortnight, I now concede that PDP is truly the party of ‘uncommon transformation’. In a matter of weeks they have managed to convince themselves – only – that the mild-mannered Jega is a devil with two horns.

    How this dramatic transformation has come about remains a mystery. But the relationship has so deteriorated that Clark and his group not only demanded the INEC chief’s resignation but also his arrest. Some so-called ‘Goodluck Jonathan Lagos Grassroots’ group has been placing full-page advertisements in newspapers listing what it considers evidence of the electoral umpire’s bias. The adverts usually end with an earnest prayer or wish for his resignation.

    This is the same man that supervised the enthronement of Jonathan as president in 2011 even when his chief rival, Muhammadu Buhari, was crying that the polls were rigged.

    He is the same fellow who oversaw the Ekiti State 2014 governorship polls. When Fayose ‘defeated’ Fayemi the commission was lauded even when only 476,870 prospective voters, representing 64.98 percent were eligible to vote in the exercise.

    INEC in the state received 732,166 Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) for distribution but only 476,870 were collected. Out of this, approximately 65% that were eligible voters even less – 360, 455 – not up to 50% of those on the roll, took up the option of exercising their rights. PDP didn’t quibble about statistics back then; they joyfully claimed ‘victory’.

    Now the party’s Presidential Campaign Organisation is demanding 100% PVC distribution as the basis for assessing INEC’s success or failure. In 2014 in Ekiti, 65% was wonderful, in 2015 that level of card release has become not only unacceptable; it is evidence of Jega’s partiality.

    Although he has firmly stated that the polls earlier slated for February were shifted on the strength of a letter written to him by Service Chiefs demanding a six-week postponement, the ruling party insists on pushing its version of events that it was also down to the commission not being prepared.

    Well, PDP got its postponement, but it harvested widespread condemnation for forcing it through at gunpoint. Hell hath no fury like a drowning incumbent or party – especially when handed a pyrrhic victory. The speed with which the military high command rushed out its pledge of ‘neutrality’ after the contentious shift, underscores how damaging the military’s meddling has been for the powers-that-be.

    Jega would have been crowned with a halo by now if only he had sung from the ruling party’s smeared hymn sheet and accepted his commission was unprepared. Unfortunately, the professor doesn’t do political karaoke!

    In the hands of the PDP, the INEC boss has now been conferred with a special talent for ubiquity that only a Nigerian equivalent of the Scarlet Pimpernel can manage. He’s been seen by ruling party agents – here, there and everywhere. Today, when he isn’t holding meetings with the Northern Elders Forum (NEF), he is closeted with All Progressives Congress (APC) top shots in the agreeable environs of Dubai to plot the best way to ease Buhari into Aso Rock. That is according to the spooks at Legacy House.

    He has, according to PDP, come up with a scheme that has ensured that PVCs were distributed in such a way that they all landed in APC strongholds. Only a ‘naughty’ professor could have pulled that off.

    As though his litany of sins were not enough to send him on pre-retirement leave immediately, Jega has suddenly developed a suspicious fondness for technology. It is enough to infuriate any patriot who’s not a supporter of the opposition.

    Why can’t we return to the perfect 2011 TVCs since many haven’t received Temporary Voters Cards (TVCs), the PDP has asked? Never mind that only PVCs were used in the Osun and Ekiti elections and no one asked for Jega and his team to be strung up on trees.

    And what is this strange device called the card reader which would require a team of nuclear scientists from NASA to test properly before they can be used by dim witted Nigerian voters? The fact that we all use ATM machines, debit and credit cards, is no reason to burden us with such sophisticated things as PVCs. Truly, Jega must be a devilish alien sent to cause confusion in Nigeria.

    But hang on for a minute. Didn’t Jonathan promise at his Lagos rally that he was now going to fight corruption with technology? His team was probably tuned to a different frequency. If our great leader is now a convert to technology, why are his people still unbelievers – rooted in the dark ages?

    Indeed, Jonathan has even boasted that it was under his watch that Nigerians first started bothering about voters’ card. Before him, I suspect, voters were probably content with identifying themselves using palm fronds. Truly, a president with many firsts!

    In the past, opposition parties were usually the ones to moan about the partiality and incompetence of INEC and its predecessors. For the first time ever a government in power is rolling out its entire machinery to demonise and destroy the electoral arbiter. For me, it is a sign that the commission’s leadership is inching in the direction of impartiality.

    When the elections finally hold on March 28 and April 11, they will not be perfect. There would be much for all sides to criticise. The losers in this bitter contest are bound to end up in court. However, I find it interesting that PDP is setting such standards for INEC before it would accept the results of the coming polls.

    Among other things, it is demanding that every registered voter must have a PVC – even those who refuse to make the effort to go and pick up theirs; every card reader must be proven to be functioning; better still, let’s go back to TVCs; it even wants to get into the commission’s internal administrative arrangements to ensure that APC sympathisers are not in the majority!

    What is sauce for Jega should be sauce for Jonathan. Perhaps we should apply the same high standards set for INEC to assess the PDP’s presidential candidate. Before he can be reelected Nigerians want 24 hour electricity, perfectly tarred federal roads in cities and nicely-finished inter-state highways.

    We also demand the return of all Nigerian territories seized by insurgents – in other words, the country as Jonathan received it in 2011; the return of the abducted Chibok girls unharmed; pipe borne water; health care in every hamlet, a 10% drop in crime rate; single-digit inflation rate; single-digit unemployment rate etc – just to mention a few things on our shopping list. Good luck Jonathan!

     

  • Mbu the Brave

    Mbu the Brave

    The newly posted Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG), Zone 2, Joseph Mbu, fancies himself a special kind of cop. He came to national attention for his confrontations with Governor Rotimi Amaechi whilst he was Commissioner of Police in Rivers State.

    While the clashes between the two were often under the cloud of partisan politics, Mbu obviously rates his time in Port Harcourt as the high point of his law enforcement career. Ever since, he hasn’t stopped regaling us with tales of how he “tamed Amaechi.” He is clearly proud of this “accomplishment” – if that is what it is. But I wonder when the humiliation of a state governor or disrespecting his office became the hallmark of policing.

    Mbu is clearly fascinated with governors – that’s why he’s been going around making snide comments and threatening them. His outbursts are supposed to show us how brave he is: the only police commissioner in Nigeria who can confront a governor. Congratulations Mr. Commissioner! Now we know you have hair on your chest!

    While the police officer’s former utterances have been entertaining, he entered dangerous territory at a meeting last Thursday at the Ogun State Command, Eleweran, Abeokuta. In briefing his men on how to handle the coming elections he said: “If one of my men is killed, I shall kill twenty of them but don’t shoot first. If they shoot you, shoot back in self-defence. Anybody who fires you, fire him back in self-defence.”

    Let’s be clear: anyone who shoots at a policeman must face the law and pay the price for his crime. It is totally different matter, however, for a senior police officer to be encouraging his men to engage in murderous reprisals.

    In which of our statutes is it written that 20 citizens must be killed for the death of one policeman? This is an outrageous statement that makes you wonder about the sorts of excesses which Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and others have blamed our police for.

    There’s a limit to self-lionisation and overzealousness. It is always wise for public officers to choose their words carefully. Mbu has spoken. But when he orders such a shooting he will suddenly discover the limits of the powers of an AIG!

  • Presidential sackings and their consequences

    Presidential sackings and their consequences

    Jonathan hinted in his recent TV media chat that he had the power to sack Jega. That is in dispute. But it was also in dispute whether he had the power to remove former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi – until he pulled the suspension trick. He did it and nothing happened. Sanusi went to court, but to all intents he had disappeared into the sunset.

    Some are already suggesting that were the president to pull the same stunt with Jega, the heavens won’t fall. But that depends on what we are thinking would happen.

    Many would expect to see protesters taking to the streets and hurling stones in frustration. Those sorts of emotional outpourings don’t last and can easily be contained using brute police or military action. However, there are consequences that are not as dramatic as bonfires but are potentially more devastating and enduring.

    For one thing it would damage the credibility of the current electoral process irretrievably. The tension that has followed poll shift would be child’s play compared to that which would greet a Jega sack.

    Election postponement has thrown the financial markets into a panic because of the uncertainty it has created. The naira is taking an unprecedented battering. Nigerian businesses and wealthy individuals are losing billions because of the collapse of the currency. Investors are putting any moves into the Nigerian market in abeyance until a clear picture emerges of where the country is headed.

    All of these things could result in massive job losses. The fall in the value of the naira against the dollar and other major currencies is bound to set off inflationary pressures – especially where producers have imported components in their production chain.

    Let no one delude themselves that trying to mess the electoral process further by threatening, undermining, or even removing Jega would have no consequences. There would be a price to be paid and it would be steep.

  • ‘Our Girls; Election postponement; Fear of Buhari; Political posters vs classroom edu-posters

    Our Girls and Our People’ are still missing since April 15. Hope unfortunately dwindles.

    Today I was expecting to further encouraging you to gear up to get your PVC and get you and your friends and family out to vote on the 14th February for the candidate of your choice. Nigeria’s warped political uncertainties and manipulations have overtaken even such an expensive day as election day. Elections are very, very expensive social implications for the citizens as well as government. Tens of thousands have changed wedding and other community function days. Office, movement, and market shutdowns cancel incomes for that day. Now the shift to March 28 will paralyse millions of pre-planned activities for that day.

    Unfortunately, the 2015 elections will not be the most important thing that will happen if it happens. Politics is not everything though the way politicians operate ‘kill or be killed’ policies on the innocent citizens is frightening. Nigeria is also suffering from negative political scheming by those seeking to continue their grip on power. What is even more important is that many families will be bereaved and members will fall ill, some will die or be diagnosed with deadly disease daily. Suddenly for them politics becomes meaningless. And though the elections, newly ‘postponed’ to March 28th, in the first instance, will ruin or rejuvenate our lives and may still result in more deaths and injuries, a major emotion, love, is again in the air.

    Newsflash: Hotels and Restaurants and bars and clubs and event places can quickly restore St Valentine’s Day to a full day and not just a fear-filled post-election evening! As a result of St Valentine’s Day love, February 14th, hundreds of thousands of unions and resultant marriages will hopefully last longer than the unholy political unions seen today.

    Where are the Nigerians dedicated to give service to Nigeria as opposed to those Nigerians, especially in power, scheming to denigrate Nigerians to a nonsense state? The whole world is watching the buffoonery of ‘the largest economy in Africa’ as it is makes a fool of political reasons masquerading as Boko Haram insurgency in four North Eastern states. We now effectively announce that we will crush Boko Haram during the next six weeks in a military pincer movement between Nigerian forces and AU Chad and Cameroon forces. Armed with this intelligence will Boko Haram stand and be destroyed or, more likely, melt away to reappear after the ‘assault’.

    There are so many rumours and much innuendo attached to the shocking, but not entirely unexpected, postponement of the elections. INEC’s obvious incompetence, though not admitted to by INEC, in distribution of PVCs can be addressed by immediately devolving the distribution to the original registration centres for 1-2 weeks. INEC must employ more hands or encourage local volunteers to assist employed staff to reduce waiting times. Nigerians must remember that many of the remaining cards belong to the dead since 2011, deceivers who illegally registered from Chad and Niger and the downright lazy who will not collect their cards out of sheer laziness or, worse still, unless they are offered ‘incentives’ to sell them. When will we learn that to be ‘fed’ money or rice to ‘vote wrong’ against our conscience soon results in our becoming ‘fed up’ with bad governance? Nigerians must decide now that rather than ‘vote wrong’ it is far better to ‘starve’ during the next 6 weeks and ‘vote right’ for our future, than to take petty bribes and rice to vote, only to be side-lined with poor governance and bad infrastructure for the next four years.

    The rumours churn about the unquenchable ‘Fear of Buhari’ being the beginning of malevolent scheming among military and civilian cohorts with less than clean hands who presided over the corruption and stagnation of Nigeria these past 40 years. Horror of horrors there is an insulting but unfounded rumour of a plan to install ‘in the interim’ the last of the formerly secret military triumvirate which many believe has helped to ruin Nigeria and keep it negative over-centralised and against true Federalism. Evil is alive. Remember the successful but Machiavellian plans of the Association to Bastardise [Better] Nigeria? It seems to have mutated into a worse group, promoting evil to disenfranchise Nigerians in 2015. By the way the triumvirate is made of familiar but not particularly respected names Babangida-Abacha-Gusau alias BAG. Only Gusau has never been president even for a ‘interim day’. What is his ambition? Never has one man Buhari, of fiscal integrity, caused such terror.

    Nigeria is currently immorally plastered with political face posters at 1000+/ candidate totalling 10-20million posters at N1-200/poster and multimillion naira electronic boards nationwide at a total cost of N3-5 billion confirming that politicians know that ‘A Picture Is Worth 1000 Words’ in elections. Why do politicians not transfer this knowledge to the children in Nigeria’s 1,500.000 classrooms? Nigeria must introduce ‘A10-20 Posters Per Classroom Policy’ to create jobs, and provide friendly classrooms and get equity between political and educational posters. Governments should buy school posters especially as their posters deface school walls.

    The NNPC forensic audit is a triumph for the Nigerian people and should be adopted for NPA, FAAN, Customs and all slippery organisations handling our money.

    World Cancer Day: Medknow reminds us that prevention by diet, environmental and lifestyle changes, early detection, treatment and care reduces the cancer burden.

    Collect your PVC and Happy Valentine’s Day.

  • Saint Valentine’s Day massacre or miracle?

    Saint Valentine’s Day massacre or miracle?

    Even as I write this there are indications that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was still facing intense pressure to shift the polls earlier scheduled for February 14 and 28.

    But if the commission sticks to its consistent position of being ready, then six days from now Nigerians would be voting in the most momentous polls since the return of democracy in 1999. All portents are indicative of a seismic shift in the country’s power calculus. It is a measure of the heightened stakes that political tension has reached boiling point.

    Most foreign analysts have been projecting a very close and competitive race – with the winner and loser being separated by hundreds of thousands of votes and not millions as was the case in 2011. Other local estimates suggest that the gap might be much wider.

    One year ago if anyone had told stalwarts of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that they would be fighting for their political lives, they would have laughed him to scorn. The reality is that they are staring at the abyss.

    The opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) has reasons to be optimistic. This was the party that the cynics never gave a chance. Some prophesied that it would be history in 12 months. Others expected an implosion as the different strands competed for party positions, and ultimately for the presidential ticket. Instead of the expected infighting a miraculous cohesion has taken hold of the party – imbuing it with a momentum that may very well propel it into Aso Villa.

    So how did the PDP blow an electoral contest that it could have won comfortably had it handled its internal contradictions differently? How did President Goodwill Jonathan succeed in tossing away the cross-party goodwill that elevated him to Acting President courtesy of the Doctrine of Necessity contrivance?

    How did he dismantle the 2011 coalition that neutralised the northern lobby for the presidency which was then using the agency of the PDP’s internal zoning arrangements? How come some of those who fought hardest to enthrone him have become his fiercest critics?

    Today, a party that once believed it could re-enact in Nigeria the sort of dominance that the African National Congress (ANC) enjoys in South Africa; a party that once boasted it was the largest on the continent and would reign for 60 years, now faces the real prospect of ending up a shrivelled behemoth. It all happened on Jonathan’s watch and he must take responsibility.

    Unlike under the more malleable parliamentary model, the election cycles under the presidential system are fixed. Everyone knows that the United States elects a new president every four years on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. The Nigerian constitution which is fashioned after the American document also specifies a fixed time frame for holding the polls.

    That timetable is inviolable except under very extreme conditions which are equally spelt out in the constitution. So if a president is battling with a depressed economy and low approval ratings, he has no choice but to face the electorate.

    It is different with the parliamentary system where the Prime Minister could choose to call elections at a time when he or she enjoys relatively good polls and all other conditions favour victory. They would call such elections even when their tenure has not expired.

    Compared to 2011, Jonathan and the PDP are returning to voters in terrible shape. Four years ago, the ruling party quickly rallied its ranks after the heated primaries. Northern governors moved to mollify sections of the region which felt they should have been given another bite of cherry on account of Umaru Yar’Adua’s demise.

    The party’s southern flank was intact and energised. Such was its goodwill that it even entered into unofficial electoral arrangements in the South that delivered millions of votes to Jonathan.

    Back then Muhammadu Buhari’s Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) was monstrous up north but a virtually non-existent minnow down south. The APC didn’t even exist in the imagination of its prime movers. Today, it provides Buhari with what he lacked in 2011 without losing ground to Jonathan and the ruling party.

    Aside its internal divisions, the ruling party’s greatest albatross is the Boko Haram insurgency that has claimed between 20,000 and 30,000 lives in five years and led to the displacement of 1.5 million people internally.

    The terrorists control at least 14 local government areas across three states in the North East, and their activities have devastated the economy of the region.

    But the most graphic symbol of the failings of the administration regarding the insurgency remains the over 200 Chibok schoolgirls abducted by terrorists from their dormitories in the dead of night almost 10 months ago. Hopes of them ever returning are fading fast just as repeated pledges by the president to free them now ring hollow.

    In any election an underperforming economy can kill an incumbent. It is just Jonathan’s luck that despite the nice sounding claims of Nigeria’s economy being the largest on the continent, conditions are deteriorating. The collapse of crude oil prices and the crash of the naira against the dollar have grave implications. States and some federal government agencies have been experiencing difficulties paying salaries as their share of what normally flows from the Federation Account takes a hit.

    Already, government has introduced austerity measures that could see it unable to deliver critical new infrastructure or finish those that are already ongoing. The outlook is truly bleak and it is a nightmarish condition under which any politician would approach the electorate.

    For the APC and its candidate, Buhari, the prospects could not be better. Not being the incumbent he doesn’t face Jonathan’s peculiar challenges. But he too has to defend the record of what he did in office 30 years ago. He has to defend his character as well as every niggling thing the PDP can find to throw at him – including the entertaining claim that he’s a stark illiterate who didn’t go to secondary school.

    Ordinarily, Buhari’s record as a former military dictator contains enough to make any political strategist salivate. However, such are the dire conditions in the country today that people are more willing to forgive him his ancient sins than to contemplate that the Jonathan we’ve known in the last five and a half years would be radically transformed in the next four.

    Another thing working in favour of the former military ruler is time and that peculiar Nigerian tendency to move on quickly. A generation of voters has entered the register since the general ran the country. Most of them don’t even remember the ‘atrocities’ that the PDP would want them to be outraged about.

    But even those who are old enough to recollect the days of queuing don’t mind that he tried to do something about the problem of indiscipline – even if his methods were draconian. Thirty years on it remains a problem and it is appealing to have an alternative candidate with a reputation for confronting the issue.

    What should tell the PDP which way the wind is blowing is that despite the slew of advertorial bombs hurled in his direction, Buhari sails on unscathed. He appears to be cut from the same cloth as another septuagenarian politician – former United States President Ronald Reagan – who was also the target of such savage attacks from his opponents but always emerged undamaged. That led to commentators dubbing him the “Teflon President” after a synthetic material of the same name on which nothing ever sticks.

    He is equally helped by the relative unity in the ranks of the APC. The party surprisingly has managed the fallout from its primaries better than the PDP.

    Another important factor that many are not recognising is what can best be described as ‘ruling party-fatigue’. It is that affliction that comes upon the electorate in different countries from time to time and causes them to turn upon their long time rulers. They just get fed up with the same set of characters and want a change. How interesting that the APC’s rallying cry is ‘change!’ Sixteen years after Nigerians may just have come down with a bad case of ‘PDP-fatigue’.

    I return to where we started and predict that if the elections were to hold today, the PDP and Jonathan would need a miracle to win. Any postponement within the window anticipated by the constitution might not help the ruling party much. If anything, it could even anger voters and make them more determined to kick out the party.

    So this Saturday, if it goes ahead, Nigerians are likely to witness a St. Valentine’s Day electoral massacre if Buhari wins, or the political equivalent of Lazarus rising from the dead if Jonathan prevails against the odds. But then miracles can happen given that the president keeps the company of some of the biggest pastors in the land!

  • A Nigeria without oil

    I like most people, have condemned the recent threat by a group of ex-Niger Delta militant leaders – among them Chief Government Ekpemupolo, aka Tompolo, Asari Dokubo, Boyloaf and others – to go to war if President Jonathan is defeated at the polls. They equally vowed to cut off Nigeria oil supplies as reprisal for the looming ‘insult to the Ijaw nation.’

    Having gotten over my outrage, I have thought about their comments, some more and now think we should be thanking them rather than chastising them endlessly.

    The way oil price is nose-diving, who knows how low it would fall? The Central Bank Governor has already warned that the days of the $100 per barrel crude are gone for good. So when the price breaks the $10 barrier – and it is possible one day – what would we do? When sales can barely cover production costs what would we do?

    Tompolo and his pals may actually be doing us all a favour by cutting off the oil. While it has funded some development over the years, oil has been more of a pain in the neck for Nigeria.

    Not too long ago I attended a seminar organised by an NGO – FIND – where speaker after speaker bemoaned the lack of discussion of serious policy issues by politicians. One speaker pointed out that some of the landmark achievements of this country were attained without oil revenue.

    Nigeria established the first television station in Africa without oil; the NECOM Building in Lagos was erected without petro-dollars – the list is endless. I can think of scores of countries that are better off than us economically and don’t have oil in their territory.

    So rather than being some tragic occasion for bloodletting, the ex and future militants might just be doing everyone a favour by carrying out their threat. Surely there can be life in a Nigeria without oil if we start envisaging such a future now.

  • ‘Our Girls’; Call Violent Politicians ‘Boko Haram’; Police: Fashola’s IT Gift; Deliver Election Baby!

    Our Girls and Our People’ are missing since April 15, 2014 with kidnappings before and after that date. This kidnap strategy has fed the cross-border modern slavery trade for generations. A family sold a 10 years old daughter ‘hoping’ she would become a martyr to enhance their status. If male martyrs get seven virgins, what do female martyrs get? Thankfully, Chibok, security and election violence are ‘issues’ on the lips, if not hearts, of election candidates and the electorate must keep candidates on their toes.

    It was not nuclear physics to predict that the evil Boko Haram would strike again in Maiduguri after failing last week. Are they an invisible group, moving hundreds of men and weapons, by ‘military magic’ on invisible roads and with no possibility of interception? Yes, they will murder to eliminate spies and gossips. But the Sunday February 1 attack on Maiduguri was predictable and preventable if many more troops were deployed.

    Increasingly ‘unknown’ police and armed forces personnel pay the supreme price. MEANWHILE WE PARTY. The number of 2014 murdered personnel is not available but approaching 1000. What value does Nigeria place on its uniformed personnel at Nigeria’s four ‘warfronts’ Boko Haram, Fulani herdsmen versus farmers, ‘Armed Robbery and Kidnapping’ and Politics with ‘Violence’ as if the word ‘politics’ makes it more acceptable to be killed and as if it is alright for ‘upright’ politicians to plan, finance and carry arms? House burning is house burning, murder is murder, whether by Boko Haram, Fulani herdsmen attack, armed robbery or by political thuggery. Politicians are Boko Haram if they use violence or cheat. Why does the serving Nigerian uniform corrupt the memory of dead fallen comrades with almost ritualistic public bribe-taking on streets and in police stations nationwide? Greed? Thankful we have an anti-bribery weapon in citizen cell phones and cameras with media ready to air uploaded material.

    Everyone must change. We wished that by January 1, all the yellow fever-traffic wardens, including the five on Sunday February 1 feeding frenzy duty at  Zenith Bank/Osuntokun Junction, Bodija, Ibadan, and police nationwide had received a 2015 Anti-Corruption Circular, asked them take an Anti-Bribery Vow to stop bribery activities with ‘Immediate Buhari-Idiagbon Effect’. They have role models like the fine gentleman Yellow Fever traffic warden at Customs/Secretariat road Junction Ibadan, who is worthy of media coverage, promotion to investigative duties and other rewards. Such a nearby contrast shows true Nigerians are alive and in uniform and with a good heart. FRSC has changed from the concept of the founding fathers. It must answer hard questions about its enhanced ‘Stop Traffic on The Highway’ policy as seen with perfection at Ogere, Lagos-Ibadan road. An FRSC with ‘Internal Affairs’ investigative teams must receive bribe complaints, monitor and keep their men and women in line – yes, even women in uniform take bribes. Female politicians are not exempt.

    Why would a father or mother, in full view of 30 people, stoop so low as to stand on the road, with hand out for a bribe from a commercial vehicle probably carrying their own relations? Nigeria’s children witness this dehumanising scene and when asked to draw pictures of uniformed personnel, often draw them with a hand outstretched for a hand out. The past IG Abubakar stopped checkpoints, saving Nigerians N12-N24 billion annually in bribes. Checkpoints returned first to ‘crack down’ on tinted windows and then ‘fake’ driving licences.

    What will the new IG please save us from? According to witnesses, and the Nigerian and UN Human Rights Commissions, ‘uniforms’ commit offences like murder by accidental discharge, falsification of evidence, torture with beatings, pepper in private parts, broomstick up the penis, rape in unlawful detention, illegal bail fee demands et cetera. The equipping of the first of a planned 100 police unit scheme with ‘modern’ IT technology by the Fashola Lagos State Government is a 30-year federal failure to modernise police records and forensics. Like with refineries, it pays someone for police IT to malfunction. It is a nationally reproducible opportunity to enter the 21st Century in crime recording with digital, still and video camera evidence, computerised records for accurate data entry and easy retrieval and cross-referencing of crimes and networked criminal records like names, faces, fingerprinting, addresses, contacts and evidence documentation. The governor mentioned it could cut out the outdated demand by police and courts to hold victims’ stolen assets like vehicles for years pending the case result and punishing the victim of the crime further.

    As we deploy over 1,000,000 hopefully anti-corruption police, NYSC members and Civil Defence for the February elections, let Nigerians ensure that beyond prayers for ‘A Safe Violence-Free Delivery Of The Election Baby’, we deliver all voters, empower ourselves to record on cell-phone camera, upload to pre-planned websites –identify your preferred website now- and disseminate any witnessed political violence and authentic results. Only then say ‘Amen’.

    If a murderer or thief can stop or be stopped, a politician can stop violence. Politicians: Stop violence or be stopped and prosecuted and go to prison, 10 years, for instigating or financing GBH- Grievous Bodily Harm!

    February 14 is Valentine’s Day. Was February 14 chosen as Election Day out of ignorance or wisdom? Red is for roses not blood. Flowers are for love not funerals. ‘Show Love not War!’ Happy February 14 in advance. ‘READY your phone camera. STEADY your audio recording. GO viral and VOTE’.