The Nation Newspaper

Category: Wednesday

  • Re: al-Mustapha -now that the ‘canary’ is free

    Re: al-Mustapha -now that the ‘canary’ is free

    Bar possibly the entertaining but tragic spectacle that has been running for a while now in Rivers State in the apparent face-off between the presidency and the state’s governorship, no story has grabbed media and public attention this month like the acquittal and discharge two Fridays ago of Major Hamza al-Mustapha, the chief security officer of the late head of state, General Sani Abacha, following his nearly 15-year prosecution for complicity in the murder on June 4, 1996 of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola, wife of Chief M.K.O. Abiola, the presumed winner of the June 1993 presidential elections.

    Certainly even more than the tragi-comedy playing out in Rivers, al-Mustapha’s acquittal and discharge has generated more emotion than any other story in recent times. The 53 odd texts and a few emails I received in reaction to my column last week on the subject captured the varied sentiments expressed about the judgment. The reader will find the sample of those reactions published below interesting and certainly, in the case of the longest one I received by email, quite thought provoking, not least because the writer gave himself the answer, perhaps inadvertently, to his charge that al-Mustapha’s prosecution was selective – far from being a mere “pawn in a complicated national chess game for which IBB and OBJ are the major players” al-Mustapha was the only CSO (or ADC) of a head of state in this country’s history that chose to make himself its “de facto head of state,” to use the author’s own words.

     

    Sir,

    It is trite to say that one can be viewed as a hero in some quarters and villain by others at the same time, because that is the nature of human behaviour. Al-Mustapha cannot be different – he is only human. The question is no longer that of culpability or otherwise of Mustapha in the heinous crime for which he was charged, since he has been exculpated by a court of competent jurisdiction, unless, of course, a superior court of law rules otherwise.

    What rankles is the barely concealed verdict of guilt that permeates the articles of virtually all those who have written on the subject. Whatever happened to the time-worn dictum of being innocent until proved otherwise?

    Agreed, Mustapha’s swashbuckling and devil-may-care persona, combined with a tendency for loquaciousness, can rub people the wrong way. But, does that make him a criminal? Like they say, the cloak does not make the monk, or put it more appropriately, a broken tooth does not make a thug!

    Let truth be told. Mustapha is a victim of circumstances. As de facto head of state during the Abacha regime, almost every top ranking official, whether in government or out of it, and top echelons of the private sector, kow-towed to him in order to get to Abacha. In our kind of economy where fortunes are made or lost purely from how close you are to the seat of power, one could easily understand the desperation with which some of the richest (I will not use respected) men groveled before this young major for favours.

    Therefore, by the time Abacha died it was payback time. They say hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. Well, that is only true when you have not faced the wrath of a man forced to swallow his manhood in the pursuit of economic gains. They swarmed Mustapha, each with a dagger as sharp as a dragon’s tail and a cudgel fitted with spikes, demanding to cut their pound of flesh. They did not quite get their pound of flesh (death), but they got something close to it – a fifteen year detention in a maximum prison that will surely leave some psychological and physical scars.

    We must all engage in some serious soul searching before making judgment. This is why.

    Some high profile murders were committed during Babangida’s regime, with Dele Giwa’s murder as the most touching. In addition to this, he set us on the path to perdition by annulling an election won fair and square. And yet Babangida, his ADC, and CSO are all free men.

    Obasanjo’s case is worse. Political heavy weights were killed as if they were cockroaches, culminating in the murder of irrepressible Bola Ige. Not done with us yet, he imposed an invalid with a terminal illness on us, knowing full well the political repercussion. Then the coup de grace – he manoeuvred a starry-eyed, bare feet school teacher, into a position of power. Today, Obasanjo struts the political landscape like the conceited peacock that he is, insulting our sensibilities with what he calls ‘successful mistakes’. Neither his ADC nor his CSO were ever charged.

    OBJ and IBB are two peas in a pod, each trying to occupy a larger space in the pod, at the expense of the Nigerian state.

    If anyone should take the blame for Abiola’s murder, IBB should be liable for setting in motion events that culminated in Abiola’s death, even though he never physically murdered or caused Abiola’s murder. OBJ, on the other hand, should be held responsible for imposing political brigandage and economic profligacy, the type never seen before.

    These Siamese twins are the two gentlemen who need some investigating. Mustapha is just a pawn in a complicated national chess game for which IBB and OBJ are the major players.

    Manjadda Iman, Sokoto.

     

    Sir,

    Your article today is a radical departure from your usual harsh tone against the major. I do not begrudge your loyalty to Gen. Abdulsalami, but you should be objective enough. Maybe you never imagined the poor major would be released in your lifetime. Now you are writing like the coward and hypocrite that you really are. Now we know those who are really afraid of freedom for the major.

    Joseph Kolo, Minna. +2348035550445.

     

    Sir,

    Your write-up on al-Mustapha was good and unbiased. It is heartening to know you can engage the nation in such a serious discourse without ethnic or religious colouring. Your prediction on Mustapha throwing his hat into the ring sooner than later is equally apt. But will he have the space to operate as his billionaire traducers are still the ones dictating de pace of Nigeria and Africa?

    Sam Madugba, Owerri +2348037110950

     

    Sir,

    Your dislike and hatred for al-Mustapha is clear. Remember your mentor Abdulsalami cannot do any favour to you on the day of judgement.

    +2348026891730

     

    Sir,

    The piece on Al-Mustapha is thought-provoking. Nigeria is still a neo-colonial state and al-Mustapha represents a neo-colonial army. What, I think, should bother social scientists is the future of Nigeria under moribund capitalism which is based on self-interest.

    Amos Ejimonye, Kaduna +2348039727512

     

    Sir,

    The canary has suffered enough from your boss and from your pen. To you and your boss he is a villain but to us it is otherwise.

    +2348037657033

     

    Sir,

    I am a frequent reader of your Wednesday column. But I’ve never agreed more with you on any issue as I did on al-Mustapha’s release. Even if he was innocent, I hope through his imprisonment Allah has touched his heart and rid him of his widely believed heartlessness and ruthlessness.

    Mustapha +2348033037936

     

    Sir,

    That was a good piece – balanced, reportorial and advisory. al-Mustapha might have got justice courtesy the prosecution’s fumbling and bumbling. However some questions remain: will Kudirat ever get justice? Will the question of who killed Kudirat ever be answered like similar ones in the past; those of Dele Giwa, Uncle Bola Ige, Harry Marshall, et al?

    Muyiwa Makinwa, Ile-Ife. +2348058475238

     

    Sir,

    How about Jonathan/al-Mustapha ticket, come 2015?

    Zakaria Ismail, Kano.+2348037878033

     

    Sir,

    From the evidences made public right from the start linking al-Mustapha to Kudirat’s murder, not a few Nigerians had expected that he was going to be convicted at the end of which a presidential pardon or amnesty could be expediently considered. That way, anybody who is or will be in the position al-Mustapha was with Abacha regime and did what he was said to have done can be certain a day of reckoning must surely come. But to be so discharged and acquitted with impunity even with so many evidences that implicated him in the murder is no less an encouragement to his likes that may still be found in our government any day. This portents a very bad omen for the country.

    Emmanuel Egwu. +2348037921541

     

    Sir,

    Celebrating such a character is wrong. He should not be a worthy role model to any youth in the North.

    +2348036972332

     

    Sir,

    By al-Mustapha’s acquittal, it is not yet uhuru as God’s judgement will surely come.

    Omololu Joshua, Akwa-Ibom. +2348052134277

     

    Sir,

    Anybody who is not ethnically motivated knows who killed Kudirat. With our conscience we see him every passing second. The one that pulled trigger is different from the one that directed the act that drips of infamy.

    Chris Arukwe, Awka. +2348034704286

     

    Sir,

    Alhamdullilah, Haruna your master Abdulsalami yaji kunya’. Allah is great. Please help me tell him.

    Maina Bukar +2348036424319

     

    Sir,

    A worldly Judge may deliver a verdict the way he likes BUT, the evil that men do will forever live after them.

    Oni Olayinka, Ogba. +2348052324941

     

  • JB/ RCC: ‘4 year Contracts of Urgent National Impotence Vs Emergency works; Ogere FRSC 

    Julius Berger (JB) and RCC have the ball squarely in their court over the former Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. The Jonathan Go-slow causing opening in Friday revealed that the contract will cost N167billion or $1,113,333,333 or $1.1billion for 127km ie N1,314,960,629 or N1.3b/ kilometre. In foreign exchange that is an amazing $8,766,404, $8.7million/kilometre. Wow!!! Talk about the streets of Nigeria being paved with gold for some people. At current crude oil prices at a guestimate of $100/barrel, the figures are also interesting. The total cost of the contract is 11,133,333 barrels of crude. That does not sound much to oil rich Nigeria -just 5+days of oil deliveries at two million barrels per day or, according to media bunkering outcry reports, just a month of bunkered oil.

    Someone with internet savvy should please compare and publish the price of a kilometre of road worldwide to see if we are getting a competitive price. We may respect JB as builders of fine roads and bridges and are forced by authorities to tolerate RCC. Can we blame RCC for the Ibadan-Ife Road? We have thousands of Nigerian engineers doing a lot of nothing due to lack of patronage and payment for past contractual projects by governments –the so-called internal debt calculated in trillions of naira. What is the terrain that will cost this amount of money? Widening the long bridge to six lanes?

    But even more importantly, why on earth should the job take four long years or 1460 days or 1252 working day excluding weekends? The Chinese are building the tallest building in the world in just six months. This contract has long since been a deadly laughing stock among Nigerians like the East West Road, the Second Niger Bridge and the ‘Power Failure Projects’ which have all rightly been called ‘Contracts of Urgent National Impotence’!

    With millions of lives affected by the Expressway daily, surely it should be an 18 months or even under a year ‘Contract of Urgent National Importance’. Why no urgency, day and night work, 24/7 work with 10 different teams doing 10km each on each side? There are millions unemployed ready to be recruited and trained. Even the army of NYSC professionals can be deployed to participate in the work.

    Enough is enough. Four years or not, the first assignment for the contractors should be ‘Emergency’, to quickly inspect the road and fill all potholes, of which there are about 1000 serious life-threatening ones  and fill in jagged road edges in over 500 spots. This palliative strategy is not a joke but life-saving and time saving and should be implemented now, this week and completed in seven days. Let the contract begin! There should be no more road deaths due to potholes and jagged road edges which cause vehicles to swerve and crash. Let no Nigerian die on the expressway from today. This burden we place on Julius Berger and RCC management, chief executives and shareholders. They have not get a contract with Nigeria but with Nigerian travellers –men, women and children who simply want to get from A to B, Lagos to Ibadan safely.  ‘JB/RCC, come over to Macedonia and save us.’

    Will the Federal Ministry of Works again be rightly or wrongly accused of devilish delays, diversions, placing greed over service to the nation, corruption and all manner of machinations to cause obstruction? We must remember that there was already an approved design and work on the third lane had successfully gone from Lagos to beyond the Redemption Camp before Obasanjo revoked the World Bank contract in order to concession it. And what a disaster that decision was for Nigerian travellers. Do Nigerians not deserve an apology for having been forced to suffer for so long and being so shoddily treated by those supposed to act in their greater interest-politicians and civil servants? How much was the World Bank contractor paid by Nigeria as compensation for that unnecessary termination of very good work-in-progress? Left alone the entire Expressway would have had three lanes on reach side more than four years ago, now we must wait for four more years. Note that General Gowon says the original plan was for three lanes. Who chopped the third lane- financially or politically thus condemning us to 30+ years of misery?  We should all pray that the Federal Ministry of Works behaves with the above-board moral rectitude and dispatch required in this urgent matter. Just recently on July 6, I witnessed a 9.00am four lane deep, 15km long, about 10,000 vehicles with maybe 100,000 citizens, at a standstill on the Lagos Ibadan side. And on July 21, there was a disastrous 25km four lane wide line of static traffic from Ibafo to well beyond ‘Redeem’. Simple maths tells us that 25km of four lane traffic, with a lane on either side of the two lane road should actually be a 50km two lane traffic jam. Is that not a disaster in evolution? While this disaster was unfolding all the FRSC could do was to stop me at the permanent Ogere FRSC check point for driving licence and fire extinguisher check for the sixth time in my short life.

    Coming back to Ibadan on July 7, there were two accidents and the unrepentant extortion of one FRSC vehicle with its officers endangering their lives and reducing the road lanes from two to one in order to randomly select victim vehicles.

    • To be continued

     

  • Poor Riliwan!

    There is no doubt that the meteoric rise in crime and criminal conducts in the country is as a result of a breakdown in societal values, norms and morals. And of course, Nigeria may not be alone in this loathsome path. This is because the economic downturn in recent times has really led to family dislocations everywhere as many young couples now seek divorce soon after walking down the aisles. Not only this. The lack of economic power has led to avoidable squabbles in many a matrimonial home. In most cases, these quarrels have resulted regretfully in both parties going their separate ways at the slightest jolt. This way, many couples have been torn apart.

    When two elephants lock horns, it is the grass beneath them that absorbs the pain and anguish. Major cities in Nigeria are today brimming with children who cannot readily point at their family homes. Some have lost touch since they were toddlers. They probably were born without anybody standing in as a father. In many instances, the women, who are usually at the receiving end of unplanned and unwanted pregnancies, have fallen victims of abandonment and neglect from the men they thought were their lovers. These women are abandoned right during the pregnancies or shortly after putting to bed either because of poor financial power of the men or some other irreconcilable differences. And the society has no clear-cut way to address these issues or ameliorate the unfortunate situations.

    Today, the rise in juvenile delinquency, drug addiction, criminality and other dangerous vices that are inimical to law and order in the society is due to the fact that many youths who roam the streets have no guardians or parents to call their own. They simply find their ways to bus-stops, vehicles’ loading points, depots, den of criminals and other innocuous dungeons as they search for the elusive daily bread.

    Take the case of one Riliwan, whose plight was recently brought to the fore by a national newspaper. Seventeen-year-old Riliwan was said to have run away from his father’s house in Abuja to Lagos because he (his father) threatened to kill him. Riliwan narrated his story to a reporter who encountered him in a bus en route Abuja to Lagos. He said that he ran away from home at Tungamade, Abuja, without the knowledge of his father, who he described as a disciplinarian. Riliwan was described as ‘looking scared and tired’ when the reporter met him. The reporter said, though Riliwan claimed to be going to  Church Street in Idumota, Lagos Island, to meet his mother, his description did not show that he knew his destination. According to Riliwan himself, he decided “to run away from home due to maltreatment and death threats from his father.” Hear him:  “I left home without the knowledge of my father. He has always maltreated me. He is always threatening to kill me. Each time I needed something from him, he would turn me down. I am not feeling the fatherly love and I am not happy to be with him any longer. That is why I decided to run away to meet my mother in Lagos. I was told that my parents divorced since I was three years old. I had to abandon my education at Junior Secondary School One (JSS1) because my father refused to pay my school fees. Each time I came home to tell him that his attention was needed in my school, he would not go.”

    In Riliwan’s estimation, he was vulnerable to abuses and disdainful treatment in his father’s hands because his mother had left him many years ago. He rightly or wrongly believes that all will be well with him by the time he sets his eyes on his mother. “I believe that things will turn out for the better in Lagos when I see my mother, although she is not also aware that I am coming,” he said.

    Riliwan added that he learnt that his mother was married to another person. Unknown to this poor soul, that could also be another source of trouble for him if the mother’s new lover is the intolerant type. Riliwan also said that before he left his father, he worked as an assistant in a bakery to survive. He said: “I feed myself because nobody cares. Anytime my step-mum gave me food, we had to sneak into the house because my father must not know. So the bakery became my life. I earlier tried to apply as an apprentice with an engineer but he requested to see any of my parents. When I informed my father, he ignored me.”

    When the reporter later visited Church Street, Idumota, a few days after the encounter, he could not locate Riliwan. Residents of the house where his mother supposedly lives could not confirm Riliwan’s arrival in the house or the area. What this means is that, Riliwan, possibly did not arrive at his initial destination safely or he might have changed his mind to go elsewhere on a second thought. The implication is that Riliwan could now be a potential area boy, armed robber or drug peddler prowling the streets of Lagos anytime soon.

    The pathetic case of Riliwan is symptomatic of the appalling situation many youths of today are confronted with. Riliwan, like other children in his shoes, out of lack of care from their parents, simply abandoned school and their families. As soon as they bolt out of their parents’ abode, they are embraced by the waiting arms of hardened criminals, drug addicts, drug peddlers and other social misfits who employ their services to ply their ‘lethal’ ware or commit crimes of unimaginable proportion against innocent and law-abiding citizens. The issue of abandoned youths, therefore, becomes a good preying ground for criminals who are perennially looking for new recruits to their nefarious ways of life.

    Let us look at the rise and spread of Boko Haram in the northern part of the country. Most of the converts to Boko Haram’s stupid and destructive doctrine are easily children and youths who have no parental or guardian control. The havoc they have wreaked on the economic and social fabric of the society, especially in the North-East of the country reverberates all over the globe. Today, Nigeria features prominently in terrorists’ map everywhere. No thanks to these misguided and abandoned youths who are hypnotised and brainwashed into taking arms against their fellow men.

    Though the governments at both the federal and state levels are now trying hard to curtail the excesses of these bad elements in the society, the havoc has been done. Now it is a sort of stick-and-carrot approach to end the regime of bombs and deaths. The federal government has since May this year imposed emergency rule on three most volatile states in the North-East. They are Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states. The military are prowling every nooks and cranny in these states, smoking out insurgents from their various hideouts.

    In this month of Ramadan, Kashim Shettima, the governor of Borno State, has gone a step further. Just last week, Government House, Maiduguri hosted some unusual visitors. The visitors, numbering 50, were made orphans through the satanic activities of the Boko Haram sect. They were guests of the governor who invited them for the traditional iftah (breaking of fast). In addition to the cosy meals they had with their host and other dignitaries in attendance, they all bagged scholarships to pursue their education. The scholarships are designed to cut across orphans from both Muslim and Christian homes, as the government has promised to also host orphans from Christian homes during Christmas. The governor then impressed it on government officials, wealthy residents and charity organisations to assist the orphans in their midst.

    Like Shettima said, it is now the duty of other arms of government, charity organisations and wealthy Nigerians to take a cue from this gesture. We must understand that, without lending a helping hand to the needy, especially the downtrodden in the society, we can never attain the much-sought-after peaceful co-existence. Even in the Scriptures, it is clearly written: “Be your brother’s keeper”.

     

  • al-Mustapha: Now that the ‘canary’ is free

    al-Mustapha: Now that the ‘canary’ is free

    Last Friday, July 12, brought an end to one of the most celebrated and longest running murder cases in the country. On that day, Justice Rita Pemu, reading the unanimous decision of the three-woman panel of the Appeal Court sitting in Lagos, discharged and acquitted Major Hamza al-Mustapha of the charge that he conspired to murder Alhaja Kudirat Abiola in Lagos on June 4, 1996. Kudirat was the wife of Chief M. K. O. Abiola, the putative winner of the annulled 1993 presidential election.

    Predictably, the verdict has divided Nigerians right down the middle along regional, if not sectarian, lines; whereas most Northerners seemed to see the verdict as the vindication of a long persecuted hero, most South-Westerners seemed to see it as the untenable exoneration of a certified villain.

    This division was clearly reflected, on the one hand, by the hero’s welcome the major received in Kano, his adopted state – he is originally from Yobe – and, on the other hand, by the rejection of the verdict by Afenifere, the Yoruba umbrella cultural organisation and by the Gani Adams faction of the Odua Peoples Congress, the leading Yoruba militia. (It must be noted here that Dr. Fredrick Fasehun who leads the other faction, and who indeed claims to be its original founder, has not only consistently said he believed in the innocence of al-Mustapha. He has vigorously campaigned for his release from prison.)

    al-Mustapha’s plight started on October 21, 1998, when he and several other officers were arrested on suspicion that they were in illegal possession of arms, among other allegations. This was barely four months after the sudden and mysterious death in June of Head of State, General Sani Abacha, whose chief security officer he was. He was to remain in jail for nearly 15 years charged, along with others, with various crimes, including complicity in the murder of Kudirat and Chief Alfred Rewane, a chieftain of the anti-Abacha crusaders who was killed in October 1995, and of Major-General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua who died in prison in 1997, accused of attempting to overthrow Abacha.

    The major was also charged, again along with others, with the attempted murder of Mr Alex Ibru, the late publisher of The Guardian and Abacha’s internal affairs minister, and the attempted murder of Senator Abraham Adesanya, the leader of Afenifere. In time he was also charged in 2004 with an attempt to overthrow the elected government of President Olusegun Obasanjo even while still in detention.

    If all this looked like too much to charge one man with it was mainly because the man ingeniously painted himself in the image of an officer whose only crime was to have carried out his duties to his principal to the best of his ability and in the process to have secured the integrity and security of the country.

    For one year after he was first picked up, al-Mustapha remained in detention without trial. In October 1999, five months after Obasanjo was sworn in as civilian president, he sued the government for the violation of his human rights. The courts agreed and said he should be released. The government ignored the order. Instead al-Mustapha was charged with several murders and attempted murders including, ironically, that of Senator Adesanya who, along with several Afenifere chieftains, including Chiefs Ganiyu Dawodu and Ayo Adebanjo had been charged by the Abacha regime for the murder of Kudirat!

    The clever intelligence officer that he was, al-Mustapha chose to blame his predicament not on the government that chose to prosecute him. Instead he chose to blame the government of General Abubakar Abdulsalami that first detained him. The former head of state, he said, wanted him out of circulation because the general knew he knew both Abacha and Abiola did not die naturally but were murdered and he also knew how allegedly complicit the general was in the deaths of the two, the first in June and the second the following month.

    If his choice of who to blame for his predicament and of the platform to make the allegation – the Oputa panel set up by Obasanjo in 1999 but which began its hearing in 2000 on abuses of human rights in the country since 1979 – was to create a diversion from the charges he was facing, he succeeded beyond his wildest imagination. Suddenly public attention shifted from his many alleged abuses of power, as probably the most powerful chief security officer of a head of state Nigeria has ever seen, to the alleged crimes of General Abubakar.

    One newspaper that seemed to have captured the shift in public mood was the defunct The Comet. In an editorial on December 4, 2000 aptly entitled “al-Mustapha: Let the ‘canary’ sing publicly,” following al-Mustapha testimony before Oputa, the newspaper said “Nigerians deserve to hear everything from al-Mustapha since he has himself, under oath promised to tell the truth and nothing but the truth. He should be allowed to tell his version of the events and if he incriminates anybody or groups of persons, they too should have their days at the Oputa Commission.”

    It then concluded that al-Mustapha must be given maximum protection to tell his story in public. It took the major about 12 years to retell his story in public. This was in August 2011 when himself and his co-defendant, Lateef Sofolahan, said to be an aide to Kudirat, testified before a Lagos State High Court sitting in Igbosere to their innocence in her murder. On this occasion not only did he repeat his allegation of being persecuted for what he knew, he also added a new claim that the chieftains of Afenifere had been heavily bribed into silence by General Abubakar over the death of Abiola.

    Predictably the same media that had hailed him over his accusation against General Abubakar turned completely round to condemn him as an inveterate liar.

    In between Oputa in 2000 and the Igboshere High Court, himself and his co-defendants in other murder cases, namely General Ishaya Bamaiyi, a former army chief, James Danbaba, a former commissioner of police, Colonel Jibril Bala Yakubu, a former Zamfara State military administrator and Rabo Lawal, head of the Aso Rock Villa anti-riot squad, were cleared of all the other charges. He and Sofolahan were, however, left to face the charge of murdering Kudirat. Their case was re-opened in July 2011.

    Following their August testimonies, the trial judge, Justice Mojisola Dada, adjourned the case to November for counsels to both sides to submit their written addresses after she had rejected their position that they had no case to answer. At the November hearing she fixed January 30 for judgment. On that day she found them both guilty and sentenced them to death by hanging. To rub it in even more she had very unkind words to say to each of them. al-Mustapha, she said in effect, was a ruthless enforcer for his principal who “felt obliged to silence any voice against the government of his boss” and felt he was “untouchable.” As for Sofolahan he was, she said, “a gold digger, a Judas Iscariot, who sold his master.”

    Predictably there was much rejoicing in the Southwest and much gloom in the North.

    Equally predictably al-Mustapha appealed. Last Friday, the Appeal Court overturned Justice Dada’s verdict. “There is no evidence,” Justice Pemu reading the court’s judgement said, “that the appellants conspired to murder Kudirat…There is even nothing to show that the appellants had the intention to murder the deceased.”

    The court’s grounds for overturning the Lagos State High Court’s verdicts seemed unassailable. First, the prosecution said it would bring a dozen witnesses against the accused. It brought only four. Second, the testimonies of the two key witnesses were not only contradictory, the two were to later recant their statements because they said they had been bribed and threatened at the same time to testify against the accused. Third, the bullet the prosecution claimed had been extracted from Kudirat’s head was never tendered as exhibit as the prosecution had promised.

    Predictably last Friday’s judgement saw a reversal of roles between al-Mustapha’s sympathisers and those who disliked him. It also left many questions unanswered not least of which is, so who killed Kudirat?

    We may never know the answer. However, what we do know for certain is that vindication or not, al-Mustapha will remain a hero for some and a villain for others. In between there are probably many more who don’t give a damn either way right now.

    It is the opinion of these that al-Mustapha should worry about as he begins a new life after so many years in prison. If, as he said in a BBC Hausa interview last Saturday, he has truly learnt his lesson about “how some people use the judiciary and power against the poor” – a charge he knows all too well he cannot escape as the most powerful chief security officer of a head of state this country has seen – and if, as he also said, he had come to understand his religion well, he is likely to get the sympathy of such people.

    One can only hope that he will not, like many a born-again Muslim or Christian, revert true to type as soon as he gets another opportunity to be in power- something which is not unlikely, especially in a country like ours where public memory is ever so short.

     

     

     

     

     

  • CBN and medical tourism; Kudirat Abiola and Rewane murders: Al Mustapha free?

    Apparently NHIS is recruiting Accenture to assist it in‘re-strategising’. NHIS should note that Accenture will be paid up-front and well, something the NHIS does not do with its partners. Accenture should ask why NHIS delays payment of bills from doctors by up to six months with the attendant opportunities for ‘I-beg-pay-me-now’ chop-chop corruption. Accenture should recommend that NHIS pays within one month of bill receipt. Accenture should recommend that even if there is a dispute on the bills of one or two patients then the rest of the bill should be paid immediately while the disputed bills are being sorted. Doctors, clinics and hospitals cannot survive if their money is ‘NHIS Withheld’ and getting finder’s fee bank interest for someone. Accenture should investigate the approved poor fees chargeable by the medical teams for services rendered. Good services cost good money. That is why NHIS has recruited Accenture. Accenture should recommend that NHIS extends the act and pays its medical [practitioners better.

    Back to the issue of medical tourism. To pay for a N4.8m medical machine we must divide by N1,500/patient = 3,200 patients, a few years work, at a scan charge of N1,500/patient without adding salaries, rent, generator, taxes or Nigeria’s ‘Anti-inflation’ interest rates of 21-25% per annum. The cost of a similar scan per patient in USA is $200 or N30,000 ie. 160 patients would cover the machine cost – a few weeks work. As 7Up says, ‘the difference is clear’-ly against us –Nigerian doctors and professionals. Not every doctor practices in Abuja, or Ikoyi/VI.

    How many times have soldiers used ‘hospitals are mere consulting clinics’ as an excuse for coup plots? Do you know what the sign ‘O/S’? It means ‘out of stock’ and it could mean suffering and death for the patient. How can a hospital not have oxygen at midnight when your child is gasping? The ‘happiest people’ in the world are also the ‘most foolish’- swallowing suffering so easily! Doctors did not create the scenario of medical tourism and doctors cannot solve it. They suffer mentally and are as much victims as the citizen who cannot afford to travel abroad for treatment and has inferior treatment from outofstockitis of the good quality drugs and equipment.

    Do you know the doctor’s pain of knowing what to do and knowing how to do it but being prevented from doing it by a lack of equipment? Even worse is to be told to ‘manage’ with obsolete facilities – a waste of skill. Doctors did not cause medical tourism but they know who did cause it and doctors can diagnose the problem and offer simple treatment. Listen to the professionals’ needs. Those who did cause medical tourism are the self-serving civil servants and politicians who cut and cancel medical budgets for Nigerian citizens and are themselves on frequent medical tourism trips abroad sometimes disguised as official government trips –someone has to pay! Those who cause medical tourism in Nigeria are sitting in CBN making base interbank interest rates –MPR- 12% and approving 21-25% interest rates for commercial banks. Doctors and other medical professionals are often trying their best and failing. Bankers ‘make it’ in Nigeria even as they refuse medical loans. Doctors need tools as the new 21st Century medicine is high-tech and machines are upgraded or changed every few years -except in Nigeria where second hand equipment is mostly our lot. Nigeria usually gets the leftovers, as usual! We do not even fund or carry out adequate research into malaria-our major killer.

    If only Sanusi had announced a new CBN ‘Anti-Medical Tourism Plan’ with special entrepreneurship ‘self-development/self-recognition’ loans and even medical practice development long term 4-5 year 2-5% interest loans to professionals across capital-intensive disciplines professions including Medicine. This would allow doctors in and out of government hospitals and other medical professionals to acquire the life-changing cutting-edge equipment needed to deliver high quality services. Only then will we face the medical and other tourism threats on equal footing– with quality equipment and services at home.

    Remember, every patient would travel if the opportunity arose. This confirms a lack of faith in the system- a systemic failure, not a doctor failure! The Nigerian professional is at an all-round disadvantage –financially, access to new equipment and even professionally as it takes money to travel abroad to train on new equipment –money that is not easily recovered from an NHIS which wants to pay minimally for services rendered and does not countenance or take full cognisance of the changing and rising cost involved in providing those medical services in the field. Add the necessary acquisition of second hand, often rubbish, equipment because medical establishments often cannot afford the newest and the best. This is the long established tokunbo-isation of medical equipment and medicine.

    So Al Mustapha is acquitted, free and riding high in Kano. Will Kudirat Abiola, Alfred Rewane and other Abacha-era victims also be freed and resurrect from their graves so their loved ones can also welcome them with parades, parties and prayers. Will they be reinstated in their own ‘armies? Will the Abacha-era death games begin again? Will the bloodshed during the Abacha regime ever be explained, avenged or apologised for? So who killed them or did they kill themselves? Those who think political murder is an acceptable ‘joke’ or legitimate game plan will pay some way, no matter how many millions have been secreted away.

  • Zamfara as scapegoat

    A  few weeks ago, the issue of arming the vigilante group in Zamfara State became a subject of high-wired politics at the hollow chambers of the National Assembly. It almost deteriorated into fisticuffs when two senators engaged each other over the debate. Since then, the issue has become a subject of intense debates all over the country, more especially in security parlance.

    Now the arms have arrived in the country. This has opened a new page in the roiling controversy. Pronto: the federal government has seized a total number of 1,500 double-barrelled guns imported by the Zamfara State government for distribution to its vigilance group. Reports say Muhammed Dahiru Abubakar, the Inspector-General of Police, personally ordered the seizure of the arms said to have been imported from Ukraine based on the alleged contravention of firearms laws of the land.

    This is certainly not a good time for Abdulaziz Yari, the Zamfara State governor. Yari is claiming that the state needs the lethal weapon so badly in order to curb the incessant armed robbery attacks in the state. The attack, he claims, has become too worrisome due to the terror, pains and death which the men of the underworld usually unleash on innocent citizens of the state whenever they struck. The governor was said to have felt betrayed by the police hierarchy, which was said to have earlier granted a silent approval to the state to import the arms.

    The issue of arms importation came about when the state was facing serious challenge of armed robbery in 2012. Yari was said to have reached an agreement with the state police commissioner on the need to set up a vigilance group.  The meeting agreed that the vigilance group should be armed. The governor then decided to import double-barrelled guns which he hoped would be licenced by the police through a dealer in Kano.

    It was learnt that the importation tactically bypassed the Presidency because of the belief that individuals could buy double-barrelled guns and apply for licence thereafter.  The state government must also have thought that the Inspector-General of Police would give approval for the arms because he is an indigene of the state and he is also aware of the security challenges facing the state.

    Sha’aba Lafiagi, a senator and vice-chairman of the Senate Committee on National Security and Intelligence, had, on the floor of the Senate, alleged that the Zamfara State governor had purchased guns and ammunition to arm vigilance groups in his state. Lafiagi alleged that the governor had approached the IG for a permit after he bought the guns.

    When the news broke out, the Nigeria Police Force denied issuing gun permit to the Zamfara State government to be used by vigilance group in the state. In a statement, the police had insisted that it was an offence for a person to have in his possession or under his control any prohibited firearms without a licence granted by the President of the country or the IG. “While vigilance groups and other sincere community efforts towards safety and security are encouraged to work in partnership with local police authorities, the conduct and practice of such groups must be in total conformity with the law of the land.”

    Making justification for the purchase of the arms, Ibrahim Birnin Magaji, Zamfara State Information Commissioner who spoke on the issue in a recent interview aired on the Hausa Service of BBC, said the number of policemen in the state were not enough to protect the lives and property of the citizens. The arms, according to him, would be distributed to members of the vigilante group living in the areas and who know every nook and cranny of the state. The idea, he said, “is to enhance the security in the state and help the security personnel in carrying out their duties by taking them round the state.”

    Just as Zamfara arms were being confiscated, Peter Obi, the governor of Anambra State was distributing about 300 fully fitted security vehicles to 177 communities in the state. He also handed over N230.1 million to the communities to be shared among them at the rate of N1.3 million per community. This money is for the payment of salary of 10 members of each community’s vigilante group. Before this latest gesture, the state had, sometimes ago, put together a form of vigilante outfit which was then known as Bakassi boys, to bring sanity to the appalling security situation in the state.

    Now, Zamfara is being made a scapegoat for deciding to take the bull by its horns, as far as security is concerned in the state. That sounds unfair. Perhaps, Yari, the governor of the troubled state needs to talk to his brother governors in the Niger Delta to find out the means by which they have been fighting oil pipeline vandals and other miscreants without raising eyebrows from any quarters. Any of the militant leaders can also give him a pep talk on how to import firearms without really stepping on toes.

    Whichever way this issue is viewed, I personally think that Yari is just unlucky as many states have established and are still establishing vigilante groups to fight off hoodlums from their states. If we take the issue of the entire North, it may be apt to believe that the insurgency in the North-east, which necessitated the emergency rule slammed on Adamawa, Yobe and Borno states, may have a spiral or collateral effect on a contiguous state as Zamfara. Those who are terrorizing the indigenes of Zamfara could as well be some remnants or renegades of Boko Haram who are out to fill their pockets and stomachs. And we all know that this new generation of crooks have always beaten our lethargic security system to the game.

    As for the Police and other security agencies operating in the state, it is true that they may lack enough manpower or even firepower to withstand the volcanic onslaught of the bandits. But adequate operational strategy could be employed to beat the hoodlums to their games. In the past, a number of security agents have been found either wanting or of complicity with criminals, the very criminals they are employed to track down. This, they do, for pecuniary gains in a rat-eat-rat society such as ours.

    Recently, the military claimed that they were part of internal security arrangements in 28 out of the 36 states of the country, including the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. This is alarming. What this means is that we have almost lost the whole country to hoodlums who have overrun everywhere. Had it not been for the presence of the military in strategic locations in some volatile areas of the country, probably the story could have been different by now.

    But beyond throwing tight security cordons everywhere, we must urgently find a way to put able-bodied men and women back to work as well as put food on people’s tables. This way, I believe that once we find solution to poverty and hunger in the society, the likes of Yari will not need to import large quantity of arms and ammunition to protect the citizens. On the other hand, the security agencies, especially the Police, should rise up to the occasion in view of the tongue-lashing they get every day on the sickening security situation in the country. They need to demonstrate that they are equal to the task.

    Security is one of the most important statutory requirements that a governor needs to accomplish in order to be able to govern the people. Be this as it may, one can clearly understand the predicament of the Zamfara governor at the moment. That is why we should not condemn Yari for the importation of the lethal weapons. Rather, we should blame a system that is not working, a system that has pauperized everybody, a system that cannot provide jobs for school leavers and food for the teeming hungry mouths all over the place. It is a pity. A great pity indeed!

  • Pontius Pilate strikes again

    Pontius Pilate strikes again

    I read an online reaction to a story on the political crisis in Rivers State that went something like this: ‘If you have a quarrel with your wife, blame Jonathan; if your dog falls sick, blame Jonathan.’ The implication is that President Goodluck Jonathan is being unfairly criticised for his perceived role in fanning fires threatening to consume the state.

    Picking up on this, the Presidency issued two statements distancing it from the storm. One by Jonathan’s spokesman, Reuben Abati, said in part: “There is absolutely no factual basis for suggestions that some of the politicians involved in the current dispute are acting at the behest of the President.

    “President Jonathan certainly did not instigate the crisis in the Rivers State House of Assembly and as President of the nation he will never support any actions that negate his avowed commitment to the rule of law.”

    Is the president taking undeserved flak for the show of shame in Rivers? I don’t think so. I will add that anyone expecting a video showing Jonathan at the head of a mob descending on the assembly, or hoping to hear some tape recording of the commander-in-chief giving marching orders to Joseph Mbu’s men, will wait in vain.

    But this is politics and the president’s acts of omission and commission, his wife’s ungainly stamping on the Rivers political terrain, have left indelible fingerprints of the presidency all over the crime scene. Supporters know better than to expect a written script. They simply decode their leader’s body language and utterances to decipher where he’s headed.

    That is the reason why till today former President Olusegun Obasanjo swears he never ordered anyone to prosecute a Third Term Agenda on his behalf.

    But millions were squandered in pursuit of the goal; his henchmen in the National Assembly actively pushed the idea, and never once did he denounce the project with the vehemence that would have stopped the jobbers. Is it any surprise that Obasanjo’s disavowal of the plot continue to ring hollow?

    Let’s examine Jonathan’s denials in the light of what we know. Months before the May election that re-elected Rotimi Amaechi as chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF), the president let it be known he wanted the incumbent out. He called governors individually and made his pitch. That was how signatures on that piece of paper endorsing the president’s choice were collected.

    After the spectacular failure of presidential might to deliver, Jonathan quickly issued another statement distancing himself from NGF intrigues.

    His denial could have amounted to something if he hadn’t revealed his partisan interest in the matter thereafter by recognising the losing candidate, Plateau State Governor Jonah Jang, as NGF chairman at an Aso Villa event!

    The man received only 16 votes out of 35! Aside from further entrenching the diabolical Nigerian trait of never accepting unpalatable electoral outcomes, his endorsement of Jang only got him mired deeper in the quicksand of NGF politics.

    From the moment Amaechi decided – against Jonathan’s wish – to run, hitherto cold relations became glacial. When the courts sacked the state Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) executive friendly to him, the new gang loyal to Abuja made it clear they were out to execute a hostile agenda.

    Things that have unfolded in recent days have been the object of speculation in newspapers. Shockingly, both the outlandish and the illegal have played out as projected. Despite an overwhelming numerical disadvantage, the Evans Bipi-led Gang of Five pressed ahead with their power grab in an assembly that sits 32. What could have given them such courage than comfort in powers greater than a governor’s? Check the chain of events in the preceding weeks.

    State Commissioner of Police, Joseph Mbu, who reports to the president’s appointee, Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar, had just been engaged in a public slanging match with Amaechi. Among other things he called the governor a ‘despot.’

    Did this civil servant get even a slap on the wrist for his outrageous conduct? No way! How else will anyone interpret that episode than to conclude that the police chief had the backing of higher powers to go toe-to-toe with the ‘heady’ governor?

    While Ameachi was still digesting that helping of humiliation, Her Excellency the First Lady of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Dame Patience Jonathan, swept into town. Interestingly, she had come to play the role of ‘Mother of the Day’ at the wedding of Mr. Bipi – leader of the Gang of Five.

    In the course of those celebrations, the Right Honourable First Lady fired off a couple of political missiles in the direction of Amaechi. Among other things she said Port Harcourt which used to be a pleasant place to visit under former governors had degenerated under the incumbent. She them went on to heap praise on Amaechi’s nemesis, Minister of State for Education, Nyesom Wike.

    Later that day, she met with the ‘Gang of Five’. The following morning virtually all newspapers were agog with reports that madam had come to tidy up the impeachment of Amaechi.

    Although, her spokesperson denied that her visit to Port Harcourt had anything to do with piling more woes on the governor, anyone who knows the formidable dame would have taken the explanation with a generous helping of salt.

    Mrs. Jonathan has redefined the role of president’s spouse. She was never going to be a glamour puss – content with parading in pretty clothes, doing good works. She has taken things to another level: now we have a First Lady who is both political partisan and enforcer.

    The dame has been credited as one of the major pillars behind the president’s rise. She has not allowed a little thing like the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) clearance stop her from flagging off her husband’s 2015 campaign. Whatever she was doing in Port Harcourt was certainly advancing those interests. And someone will say the president’s not involved.

    I have watched the horror video of last Tuesday’s events at the Rivers State House of Assembly. At some point, Bipi is enveloped in a friendly embrace with some unidentified individual who appeared to be trying to calm him. After hearing out the peacemaker, the warrior-lawmaker could be heard muttering: “But why must governor came (sic) here to supervise beating up of my colleagues; why must he insult the president; why did he insult my ‘mother’…”

    Is the president involved? In Bipi’s words you have your answer. Jonathan may not have been physically present but what is going on is all about his personality and political clashes with the governor.

    Back in 2011, in a moment of exasperation with his critics deriding his laidback style, the president declared he was neither Pharoah, nor a lion or general. I agree that given the package we were sold in that election year, the man Nigerians voted back then would not fit those descriptions.

    However, in the light of what has happened over the last few months, and the constant of denials of the obvious, I think a more appropriate comparison would be Pontius Pilate. He released Jesus Christ to a baying mob and thought that by washing his hands with water he could free himself from blood guilt. How wrong he was. Jonathan’s name keeps ringing in this Rivers matter because he’s involved.

    He can show that his hands are clean by doing what Obasanjo failed to do in the face on the Third Term accusations: denounce in clear, unambiguous terms every unconstitutional attempt to unsettle Rivers State.

    A few days ago the Federal Government denounced the street-instigated military coup in Egypt. To keep silent in face of similar underhand tactics in the president’s backyard would be height of hypocrisy.

  • Sanusi’s CBN ‘Medical Tourism’: Bigger medical budgets, Medical entrepreneurship

    Sanusi’s CBN ‘Medical Tourism’: Bigger medical budgets, Medical entrepreneurship

    Medical tourism’ complained about by CBN’ Governor Sanusi saves the lives of those who can afford it or have sufficient government-CBN connections for them to pay. For over 40 years, we doctors were strangled and made medically impotent by government-orchestrated limited budgets and obsolete equipment. For how long will Nigeria be satisfied with the cheapest medical equipment? We in medicine manage to cater for the ‘rest of us’ -100+million or are forced to go on strike to guarantee ‘minimum facilities’ and remuneration compared to the bullion raked in by politicians. Nigeria operates a ‘Minimum Medical Service’ when we can afford ‘optimum’ or ‘gold standard; services for our people. Medical tourism is about citizens’ rights to maximum medical services which we in Nigeria can easily afford by increasing medical budgets, eliminating corruption in the medical delivery system and providing 24/7 electricity.

    As I write, the Indians are coming with medical equipment bought with loans from Indian billionaires and banks at 3-4% to ‘take over’ medical services and ‘improve’ hospitals providing ‘superior service’. If Nigerians had cheap and easy medical loans, would we not have the best equipment also?  Many doctors, including me, seek N2-4.8m soft loans for the best ultrasound and other machines payable over 3-5years at 3-5% interest per annum –like for a car in the 1970s. Why should hard working professionals in Nigeria, who deliver services, be denied government perks and tax breaks that rice, cement, sugar, tobacco and oil marketers got in every military and political era that made Nigerians paupers and them billionaires? I too would like to be billionaire but I would prefer to serve my patients with better equipment! God knows we have worked hard. But life is worthless in Nigeria. Ask any teacher or patient.

    But even sartorially elegant and ‘wise’ Sanusi, his CBN and banks have got it wrong. It is simply a ‘lack of funds’ issue. The problem is not with the medical tourists’ right to obtain the best for themselves. In fact the medical tourists are as wise as Sanusi as they have the good sense to avoid contracting more diseases and even dying in dirty-walled and filthy ‘mattressed’ casualties in concentration camps called hospitals. Even if we refuse to get good equipment why is it impossible for Nigeria’s budgets to paint hospitals and clinics quarterly, annually, before they get filthy? Visit any government casualty room. You will be sick! The problem is with the money supply side. Nigeria constantly fails to provide funds for cleanliness and cutting edge medicine. The national and state budgets and the CBN fail to recognise government hospitals, let alone private medical practice among others, as genuine profession-driven entrepreneurship strategies. Yet private practice employs tens of thousands of Nigerians in hospitals and clinics. Is that not ‘Medical Entrepreneurship’?

    Many specialists still inside government facilities have personally acquired specialist skills which waste away without saving any Nigerians because the skills need cutting-edge equipment maliciously cut by politicians from the hospital budget. Though these hospitals are often named ‘specialist’ there is nothing specialist delivered to the patient-just mediocre medicine. Do you know what a radiologist, radiotherapist, neurosurgeon, laparoscopic surgeon, plastic surgeon, orthopaedic surgeon or a maxillofacial trauma surgeon or an obstetrician and gynaecologist need to deliver maximum service to Nigerians?

    Recent open heart surgery, kidney transplants, being bandied around as breakthroughs, are not new. They were performed 35 years ago in Nigeria by Nigerian doctors but the programmes died in an ‘agony of broken medical dreams’ from political budgetary neglect by idiotic governments when the title ‘Centres of Excellence’ was created to make a laughing stock of ‘Centres of Extreme Suffering’. From that time Nigerian medicine was dragged into disrepute and thousands of medical professionals wisely fled with their qualifications abroad to cater better for family and brain. Locally professionals were rendered redundant by the politics. Even in private practice the cost of cutting-edge medical equipment to replace obsolete machines is a huge obstacle to entrepreneurial development.

    Nigerian medicine requires petrodollars to be like medicine abroad. It demands cutting-edge equipment – the main ‘medical tourist attraction’. In Nigeria, cutting-edge equipment paradoxically costs more than in the UK. Decent medical loans are not available but N5million loans and N500,000 obituary pages are plentiful to bury the dead.

    Sanusi’s CBN should earmark N1billion for professionals in government and private practice for cheap, easy loans for ‘Professional Entrepreneurial Development’ in self-recognition, guaranteed by the NMA or their professional body.

    Even the ‘wise’ NMA has failed to negotiate such loans for its 30,000+ membership, though it has an annual budget of N2-300million of its members’ money. Can the NMA suspend most of its huge budget for administration, travel and five-star hotel accommodation and put N100m per annum for 20 years towards a powerful N1-2billion NMA Bank or NMA Coop Bank to guarantee its membership equipment and loans and get international grants? The NMA should also insist that state NMA should not beg governors for vehicles but save N1m/annum/state in a ‘Vehicle Fund’ to guarantee a new NMA vehicle every four years. Myopia!  If government refuses to improve medicine, the NMA should take up the challenge and lead in Medical Entrepreneurship promotion if CBN will refuse to recognise ‘Medical Entrepreneurship’ and prefers to merely criticise those who want the best medical care worldwide.

    To be continued.

     

    PS Please pray for those using delayed, damaged and ‘dead’ on the misnamed Lagos Ibadan Expressway.

     

  • FG’s mandate to Unilorin

    On his maiden visit to the University of Ilorin in the last week of June, the new Pro-Chancellor and Council Chairman of the University, Prof. Chukwuka Okonjo, came with a message from the Federal Government, the institution’s proprietor. The respected Obi of Ugwashiuku, Delta State, told a cross section of the university stakeholders that the Federal Government, worried by the wonky standard of education in the country, has a new mandate for the University of Ilorin to help salvage the nation’s dwindling global educational rating and restore Nigeria to its former position of reckoning in world universities’ ranking.

    He further disclosed that the authorities in Abuja are worried that despite the fact that Nigeria is the second fastest growing economy in the world today, none of its universities is ranked among the best 5000 in the world. Obi Okonjo however explained that the antecedents of the University of Ilorin have given the government some confidence that with the necessary support, the University could make Nigeria proud. “There used to be a time when Nigeria used to feature as one of the best 200 universities in the world”, the Council Chairman said, adding that “It is important that you understand that we are in a new era; the people in Abuja want you (Unilorin) to show that Nigeria can deliver and within the next two or three years, they want you (Unilorin) to ensure that Nigeria is among the best 500 universities in the world”.

    Keen watchers of the steadily rising profile of the University of Ilorin in the last five to six years are not at all surprised by the decision of the Federal Government to pick the university to pioneer the implementation of this noble vision. Over the years, the university has proved to be a centre of academic excellence. In the past four years, Unilorin has been consistently ranked the best university in Nigeria by different international ranking agencies including Web of World Universities (Webometric), which ranked the university the best in Nigeria for three consecutive years of 2009, 2010 and 2011, and one of the best 20 in Africa. Statistics have also shown that the University has the most stable and consistent academic calendar in the country, which makes it the most sought after institution by admission seekers.

    All these feats are not lost on education policy makers in the country, who, at every given opportunity, do not fail to acknowledge the numerous giant strides recorded by the “better by far” university. During their separate oversight visits to the University on May 7, 2013 and June 1, 2013, members of the House of Representatives and Senate Committees on Education could not hide their impressions about the academic excellence and environmental aesthetics of the university as well as the peaceful and orderly comportment of its staff and students. The respective chairmen of the two National Assembly committees spoke glowingly about the university.

    The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Education, Senator Uche Chukwumerije, who led his colleagues to the institution, commended it for maintaining a stable academic calendar for over 10 years, noting that it is a great achievement for any university in Nigeria to maintain such academic excellence despite the prevailing challenges. He said that “this academic stability is a feat which should make the University of Ilorin a model to all universities in Nigeria.”

    Similar sentiments were expressed about four weeks earlier by members of the House of Representatives Committee on Education, led by Hon. Shehu Garba. After meeting with the university management and a drive round the campus to inspect on-going and newly completed projects, the lawmakers gave kudos to the university “for its accomplishments in the areas of academic excellence, efficient system of administration, environmental beautification, infrastructural development and sustained high ranking among universities in the world.”

    The leader of the House of Representatives team further noted: “As a Nigerian I am very proud to be at the University of Ilorin. I graduated close to 30 years ago and I am worried by what has become of the standard of education in our country since then. But for me to be here and seeing what I have seen, I feel very hopeful and I feel elated that in the midst of the decay that we have an institution of excellence with very beautiful infrastructure.

    He went on: “I believe that it is not just the beautiful infrastructure; that we are all aware of the ranking of the University of Ilorin in the comity of universities in the world. You are one of the few universities in the country that is often mentioned outside Nigeria as a centre of academic excellence. And so I feel very proud to come here to see things for myself. I must commend the Vice-Chancellor and his able team for the good things they are doing. I must say that you have a lot of prospects to build on what you have been able to accomplish to give us something that we can be proud of that we have an institution in this country that can be compared with any reputable university in the world.”

    It could be seen from the foregoing that truly, the confidence that the Federal Government has on the ability and willingness of the University of Ilorin to deliver on the new mandate is not misplaced. And it is heart-warming to note that all stakeholders in the university community are enthusiastically keying into the government’s vision, a situation that makes its implementation easy and its attainability assured.

    While assuring the Federal Government of the University’s readiness to implement the government’s new vision to the letter, Obi Okonjo, said the new university council, under his chairmanship, has taken up the government’s challenge and prayed God to lead the council to formulate appropriate policies to achieve the task. Also, the university’s Vice-Chancellor, Prof. AbdulGaniyu Ambali, noted that the Federal Government has given the University of Ilorin a big task, adding that “every staff member of the university has a responsibility to champion this new thinking of the Federal Government”.

    Prof. Ambali also said, “It is heartwarming that the Federal Government, based on our antecedent, has singled Unilorin out to be the pioneer of the new formula of tertiary education in the country and we are ready for the task.”

    Also, all the staff unions on campus and the student body have expressed their readiness to continue to give the management the necessary complementary support in its determined effort to ensure the full and successful implementation of the new government mandate. This is reassuring, as it means that all stakeholders in the university are on the same page. And nothing demonstrates this assurance better than what the Unilorin Branch Chairman of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Prof. Abdulwahab Egbewole, said during the meeting between the council chairman and leaders of all the staff unions in the university, i.e. ASUU, SSANU, NASU, and NAAT. The ASUU leader said, “The mantra of our union, which is unionism for development, coincides with the vision to make the University of Ilorin the best in Africa”.

    What more evidence does one need that at Unilorin, the urge for advancement runs in the veins of every stakeholder? And, to put it succinctly, that is the secret of the University’s quantum leap in all spheres of its endeavours these past few years.

    To be sure, the University of Ilorin is ready, willing and able for the task ahead, a task that is in synch with its founding philosophy of excellence in teaching, research and community development.

    • kogun is Deputy Director, Corporate Affairs, University of Ilorin

     

  • Egypt: Thumbs down for Morsi

    Egypt: Thumbs down for Morsi

    The security situation in Egypt has continued to deteriorate following last week’s ouster of Mohammed Morsi, the country’s first freely elected civilian President. Morsi was overthrown by the Egyptian military following weeks of widespread protests over his style of governance, which many described as “high-handed, autocratic and uncompromising”. For some time, the country has been plagued by a crumbling economy resulting in shortfall in fuel supplies and electricity, among other unbearable hardships foisted on the Egyptian people for quite some time now.

    On July 1, the Egyptian army delivered a 48-hour ultimatum that required Morsi to find a quick resolution to the political impasse. He could not. At the expiration of the deadline, the military high command, led by Abdul Fatah Saeed Hussein Al-Sisi, more commonly known as General Sisi, took over Egypt and installed Adly Mansour, Chief Justice of the Supreme Constitutional Court and a foe of Morsi, as interim President. After the change of government, the army suspended the constitution and has been carrying out massive crackdown on members of the Muslim Brotherhood on charges ranging from “inciting violence to disturbing the general security and peace” of the country. With this, the country seems to be hooked on a cliff-hanger as the Muslim Brotherhood are largely displeased about the turn of events.

    Prior to the ouster of Hosni Mubarak from office in 2011, the Muslim Brotherhood has been engaged in sporadic violence for the control of political power. The exit of Mubarak opened a vista of opportunity for the organisation who wrestled power from the hands of the politicians. It is, therefore, expected that Egypt could relapse into a regime of violence if the present situation is not properly managed. For now, fighting has erupted across the country between supporters of Morsi and his opponents, leaving several people dead and many more injured. The violence erupted as Morsi’s supporters held massive protests across the country, calling for his reinstatement.

    Morsi became the nation’s President barely a year ago, but failed to fix the nation’s ailing economy or improve its crime statistics, among other accusations. Human Rights Watch said he had continued abusive practices established by ousted Mubarak, who ruled Egypt for three decades with iron-fist. Numerous journalists, political activists and others were prosecuted on charges of ‘insulting’ officials or institutions and spreading false information.

    Surprisingly, the United States, U.S’ reaction to the unfolding political scenario has, at best, been tepid and measured. The Barack Obama administration is turning to top officials of his government to tout democracy, political transparency and peaceful protest for Egypt, a message that has taken on a hollow tone. This is just as everybody seems to be eagerly awaiting a quick and responsible return of full authority to a democratically elected civilian government as soon as possible in the country. But behind the scenes, the U.S. was signalling to Egypt and its allies that it accepts the military’s decision to depose Morsi, and was hoping that what fills the vacuum of power would be more favourable to U.S. interests and values than Morsi’s Islamist government.

    However, those hopes were tempered by very real concerns that a newly emboldened military would deal violently with the Muslim Brotherhood thereby sending Egyptian society further into chaos and making reconciliation more difficult. The Obama administration’s stance, which carefully avoided the legal implications of calling the military’s intervention a coup, won something of a bipartisan endorsement last Friday from Republican Representative, Ed Royce of California, and Democrat Eliot Engel of New York, who issued a joint statement that criticised Morsi for not embracing “inclusiveness, compromise, respect for human and minority rights, and a commitment to the rule of law.”

    Indeed, the Obama administration is facing difficult choices. If it denounced the ouster of Morsi, it could be accused of propping up a ruler who had lost public support. Yet, if it supported the military’s action, the administration could be accused of fomenting dissent or could lose credibility on its commitment to the democratic process. This is probably why the administration is acting as if it accepts what happened in Egypt – and actually believes it could turn out for the best with the Islamist Morsi no longer in charge. At the same time, officials are attempting to keep their distance, laying down signposts for what they want to see in the long term while challenging the military to make sure that happens.

    The concern being expressed all over the place is that, in the short term, the situation could spiral out of control, with the military using the clamour in the streets as an excuse to confront the Muslim Brotherhood with excessive force. By laying emphasis on U.S. aid in conversations with Egyptians without cutting it off, the U.S. leaves room for the escalation of the situation if need be, but it is also ready to work with Egypt’s new government if it moves in the right direction. The military leaders have assured the Obama administration that they were not interested in long-term rule following the overthrow of Morsi. The swearing-in of Adly Mansour, the head of the Supreme Constitutional Court as the country’s interim President, illustrates the military’s desire to be seen as committed to quickly returning the nation to civilian control.

    Whichever way the present political configuration is viewed, there is a threat of imminent chaos looming over the country. Since more than 22 million signatories drew the line on the sand for Morsi, everybody knew that the days of the regime were numbered. By far, this 22 million outnumbered those who had voted for him barely a year ago because he was not elected with a landslide but a slim victory, which arose from the coalition of several interests.

    No sooner had he stepped into office than Morsi started baring his fangs. He collided with the courts in 2012 and gradually alienated the people. He toyed with power and, by so doing, he inadvertently wrote his own obituary. Morsi was a complete disaster. As an engineer in power, he would have demonstrated what it takes to sustain his regime but failed woefully due to his complacency and obduracy. Morsi’s government was a regime because even though he emerged through the ballot box, Egypt has never been a full democracy. Morsi would have been a transitional regime to real democracy in the country, but he bungled the great opportunity to write his name in gold. He just did not demonstrate or develop sufficient understanding of what to do. That was why the military stepped in to stop the drift.

    It is hoped that being the epicentre of Arab civilisation, Egypt will quickly get itself together. But people are still divided over what to call what happened last week. Many say it was a coup. Many others disagree, preferring to call it a popular revolution. Those who call it a people’s revolt or revolution may be right after all. However, in Jurisprudence, when a drastic change has been brought about outside the constitution, it amounts to a coup. Nevertheless, when you have an obdurate regime, a self-seeking, self-centred government, the military will always step in.

    Therefore, the exit of Mohammed Morsi signals the collapse of religious politics in Egypt. This is because the Muslim Brotherhood politicised religion and stifled opposition. According to the Egyptian constitution, political parties are allowed to exist but religious political parties are not as they would not respect the principle of non-interference of religion in politics and that religion has to remain in private sphere so as to respect all beliefs. The Muslim Brotherhood failed to take any cognisance of this.

    Though the African Union has a non-obligatory clause not to recognise unconstitutional governments, but as the situation stands today, this may not hold much water in Egypt where a successful revolution has just taken place. While Egyptians are happy for the change, many African countries are mortified. I believe the other African States should only be wary of the military if the leaders are not accountable, if they are reckless or condoning corruption. These are sure recipes for military take-over!