The Nation Newspaper

Category: Wednesday

  •  INEC: Security; Examiner malpractice     

    INEC IS NOT A SECURITY SERVICE: INEC has no security responsibility, only security fears, like the rest of us. Please note that INEC is not responsible for any security anywhere. INEC must never be held responsible for security situations, good, bad, ugly or murderous or riotous, in the electoral process. The security of every election from start to finish and environmental security of collation centres, neighbours and personnel is purely government’s job. Period! INEC does not send thugs to burn its own buildings or destroy voting material and card readers or maim or kill its INEC staff or the public. It is only the political parties which do so and they hardly ever get to court or face punishment. The sooner we suspend, ban, fine and jail political individuals and parties under whose protection and on whose behalf common criminals perpetrate such anti-democracy outrages, the sooner will we make our elections more sanitary and secure, allowing millions more to participate. Transgressors must not gain from their criminal theft of the election process. Political crime is crime against our future. We are victims. It is not soft crime or forgivable crime. Only this installs election sanity.

    STOP EXAMINER MALPRACTICE: What measures ensure Nigerian students taking public exams are fairly marked and get results dictated by their performance? We know of, and many have experienced, tertiary institution lecturers and sex/money-for-marks and lowering marks for ‘bad-belle’ and ‘because I have the power’. But what is the situation at secondary school exams and even JAMB? Are result mistakes being made and ignored with students being failed falsely? How many students annually face wrongly downgraded marked scripts without their knowledge? What is the fate of the examiners who do not live up to the teachers code of fairness and honesty but instead disappoint innocent children at their mercy by criminally marking down and underscoring exam scripts? Are there checks and balances to identify this peculiar malpractice among examiners and prevent it from happening? Is there a group within examining bodies like JAMB and WAEC which remarks randomly chosen scripts as quality control? Many examiners are dedicated and thorough. Some are not. Every wrongly marked script is a disaster for the affected student and extra cost for the parents for the resit exam. The student will face immediate disaster, stress, lose time and focus and sometimes be forced to change direction in career with lower expectations and job prospects. The marked-down student goes through the emotional trauma and depression of being publicly known as an exam failure, lose the respect of siblings, family and friends.

    Read Also: Niger legislators query NECO, WAEC fees charged by private schools

    So, the examiners carry a heavy burden of responsibility to be fair and honest as the future of each student is 100% at stake. WAEC and other examination bodies must not wait for requests for remarking before instituting actionable examiners fraud detection plans for monitoring examiners. Exam body Annual Report must include a section on ‘Examiners Malpractice’ and ‘Results of Remarking Scripts’. It is no longer enough to just boast about students caught cheating. How many examiners are caught cheating the students? Remarking scripts and finding their score change by factors of up to 30+ marks demonstrate malicious and fraudulently criminal alteration of documents, and prosecutable offences. Such large changes are not accidents or stress mistakes or technical differences in examination style and preference manifest as finding 2-5 marks difference on remarking. This indicates a non-malicious difference of exam strategy and opinion. The high difference guilty examiners should be removed from the examiners list and actively prosecuted for use of excessive mental forces, wilful damage to the property of students and the examining body with intent to cause mental and financial harm to innocent youth some of whom may find themselves so mentally upset as to attempt and sadly even succeed at committing suicide. Only prosecution will deter others from following that evil path and be a warning to potential perpetrators. On being found guilty, there should be a fine to be paid to the candidate to reimburse the student for needlessly re-examination fees and extra-classes fees and inconvenience. If there is an exam body/examiner agreement, the examiners have to sign, it should be updated recognising that some examiners are cheats themselves.

    Instead of actually reading the script and marking it, maybe because of tiredness from traveling or a late-night party or family or social commitments, the examiner may just glance at the pages and write down some invented or ‘best guesstimated’ marks. This is usually because the guilty examiner knows no one will remark the script afterwards. An examination body policy with compulsory random remarking of one in every 20 sample scripts already examined by each examiner with the remarked scripts randomly chosen by computer may frighten the examiners to do what they are paid to do – i.e. be fair and honest and just to the innocent young student who has paid fully to be examined at that examination by a neutral judge, not a negative or cheating examiner judge. Stop examiner-caused fraudulent results. Yes, we hear and expect that fraudulent results are excessively high. However, we must recognise and search out and red flag fraudulent results which are excessively low. Parents, it is not enough to accuse students of doing poorly and waving their result slip in their faces. Examination bodies must look at poor performance of good candidates and exclude CRIMINAL EXAMINERS MALPRACTICE.

  • NASS: National Library first; E-voting

    As Nigeria@61 in mid-October, celebrates the 61st year, ask if Nigeria PLC on sale to the highest political bidders?

    Our democratic structure, NASS, lacking altruism, refuses to cut by 75%, its Salaries and Perks, SAPping Nigeria dry or restructure Nigeria and stood against comprehensive electronic voting, diaspora and local. These are vicious stabs in the poorly beating heart of a democracy still on life-support.

    Hurray, NASS has caved to public outcry and reversed its selfish ‘Ban on electronic vote transmission’. This 21st century has strange anti-democracy backlashes ‘against modernisation and innovation’ but allowing ‘anti-education’ terrorists to use ‘modernised and innovative’ military transport and weaponry. NASS must learn that ‘Electronic Voting’ is now Course 1-0-1 to legitimise democratic governance. Also, NASS instead of boldly securing for the citizenry a befitting National Library, seeks to selfishly refurbish its own nearly ‘abandoned’ NASS library as a copycat of the American National Library of Congress. The best ideas are often used in Nigeria to repeatedly misappropriate funds. Even book business is dragged into corruption.

    NASS, please ensure that Nigeria’s public National Library is befitting’ before a ‘befitting’ NASS library. If NASS members really read and value books, they would never have taken till 2021 to ‘discover’ the NASS library deficit. Has any NASS official bemoaned the Nationwide Library Book Deficiency of 50-300m for 10-15m students at 5-20 library books each?

    It was shocking  to all that ‘electronic voting’ in Nigeria was not a single act but was Machiavelli-like secretly split into ‘actual electronic voting’ and ET ‘Electronic Transmission of vote results’ – ‘contract-splitting’. Such evil comes from malignant midnight brainstorming in unscrupulous political and technocratic circles previously notorious for ‘home grown’ political manipulations perpetuating a disruptive political agenda.

    Sadly, nasty political gambles have spanned mathematical creations like 12  2/3 of states, ‘annulments’, third term magic, reversible/deniable zoning, money under the hat or in the belly of an agbada or babanriga, votes in a phantom pregnancy or a pot belly for ever-reoccurring ‘stuffed ballot boxes ’, ‘snatched ballot box’,  the criminal falsification and fraudulent replacement of ‘voter results’ during transportation from polling booth to the collation centre. Add the debatable value of contract-splitting  specifically for corruption like Contract 1 for clearing of gutter and the never executed but awarded Contract 2 for clearing of the rubbish dumped by the cleared gutter rubbish. The rubbish then falls back into the gutter with zero gain and financial cost. Add non-corrupt contract splitting ‘supposedly’ to speed up the job like the two contractors on the 120km Lagos-Ibadan Road and, shame on an obstructive NASS which diverted N120b budgeted ‘job-finishing funds’ to NASS constituency projects’ not finished to date after 8+ years later. Add snakes or other creatures supposedly found in the transformer and office safe chopping all the money. As you have worked to improve the country, some Fellow Nigerians sat around actual tables discussing ways to implement these crimes against Nigeria, in thousands of places and many times over, nationwide in honour of the elusive true Federal Character! The court martials surrounding the Fayose Ekiti Elections confirm such election disruption meetings. Wherever good men and women sit to save and serve Nigeria best, others sit with self-service and destruction of the nation and the electoral process as goal.

    Read Also: Firm challenges cooperatives societies on benefits of E-voting

    Thankfully INEC chairman, Professor Mahmood Yakubu  is nobody’s ‘yes man’ and refused to be silenced just because NASS had spoken. He risked being humiliated or sacked or even having false accusations of fraud and threats. He immediately protested, also a credit to the INEC commissioners, on behalf of voters, against electoral corruption-motivated misinformation. Others joined, including media, CSOs and international organisations assisting to drag Nigeria into modern electoral processes.

    Well, congratulations to Professor Yakubu and all others; NASS has approved Electronic Voting and Electronic Results Transmission. This will speed up and help sanitise the process. It removes travel time with extra security challenges to staff and theft or alteration between polling booth and collation centre, the headquarters, speeding up the electoral process in 70-80% of the country. If only Nigeria’s courts were fully computerised and backed up.

    The next battle is for ‘Diaspora Voting’. Nigerians get $17-24b annually from Nigerian remittances. Diaspora Nigerians want to vote and would have a huge election impact. Presumably that is the fear of the anti-diaspora voting lobby which would lose power.

    However, the battle for free and fair elections cannot be won if NASS still approves excessive ceilings for candidate spending – president N2b, governor N1b and senator N500m with background 70% Nigerian poverty. No politician or political party is ‘humanitarian’. Money nearing these figures must be raised and spent by each candidate, cumulatively dwarfing budgets for states and many federal ministries. All this money must be recouped, by every single politician in and out of office as 10-70% first line deductions, during political office usually from nearly phantom contracts, fictitious contracts feeding insatiable -political party structures, supporters, as political favours for election investors or for planning a ‘next  election war chest’ of maybe N100b’.

    How can a governor perform with such deductions from the budget? Our winner-takes-all politics creates losers who pester same-party state governors who cut infrastructure, pensions and salaries of workers to ‘help’ pay up such ‘political debt’. The people lose perpetually. Knowing us, the midnight manipulators may manipulate even this NASS assent into malignant manifestation – like the rubbishing of Federal Character. A luta continua. Victoria non–acerta.

  • Antivaxxers and the rest of us

    Antivaxxers and the rest of us

    It was in 1955 or so. We all marched into class after morning devotion to the school band’s tune of jenti-jenti. We had hardly settled down in class when mothers rushed to school, some with drooping breasts flapping their bare chest, shouting: Dokita doridori. O ma ti wa ooo (The doctor that injects the head has come!). With the doors crowded up by children, screaming to get out, some of us headed for the windows, climbing over benches and desks and flipping over to the grounds below. It took years before some of us found out that we were all running away from smallpox vaccination.

    The truth is that vaccine hesitancy has been with us ever since the smallpox vaccine was first developed from cowpox virus in 1796. It was the modern version of the vaccine, developed in the mid 20th century, that created a big scare in schools in the old Western Region in the 1950s.

    Our problem then was ignorance, buoyed by lack of information about what we were being protected against and how safe and effective the vaccine was. Once we were persuaded by the authorities (teachers and local dispensary staff) that we were being protected from untimely death, we all lined up for the vaccine.

    Today, vaccine hesitancy started as a combination of ignorance and misinformation spread on social media about the vaccine. It has now developed into full blown vaccine resistance. What is worse, it has blended with ultra-right nationalist ideology. In the United States, it is an extension of former President Donald Trump’s misinformation about COVID-19 and the resistance against face masks. Today, it is a component of the Big Lie created by Trump over the 2020 presidential election, which he lost, but which he claimed was fraught with fraud.

    The American press dubbed it the Big Lie because the “massive” fraud alleged by Trump and his lawyers did not exist. Over 60 so-called election fraud cases were thrown out by the courts for lack of evidence. And after two, three, or even four recounts in some states, no such fraud was detected. As a result, the election was duly certified in all 50 states and by Congress as having been won fair and square by President Joe Biden.

    The irony about Trump is that he encouraged and promoted investment in vaccine production, secretly got the jab early in January, 2021, but will not call out his supporters, who are leading the vaccine resistance campaign.

    The activities of the antivaxxers heightened with the recent reopening of schools. In the USA and Europe, antivaxxers crowded school gates and school compounds, threatening school staff, insulting parents, and scaring the kids they are supposed to protect. The details of what they say and do need no glorification by being reproduced.

    What needs debate is the long-term implication of the present trend of resistance to erstwhile normative practices. Antivaxxers appear not to be bothered by the psychological effects of their actions of young children, who are being confused about the vaccine intended to save their lives. Some kids cried as their parents were heckled by antivaxxers at their school gates. Nor are some conservative politicians bothered by the actions of their supporters, who continue to push the BIG LIE and vaccine resistance.

    It is rightly argued that it is their right to protest government policies or actions they do not agree with. The question is the substance of the disagreement and how it is being expressed. The issue here is about public health. COVID-19 is a viral infection that travels from person to person. The longer the virus stays in a community, the higher the probability of infecting more persons and even of developing resistant variants.

    We now know that if a high proportion (at least 70 percent) of the population is vaccinated, then fewer and fewer people will be infected. That’s what is known as herd immunity. That’s why wealthier countries, which produced the vaccines, engaged in vaccine nationalism, that is, the practice of getting a high proportion of their population vaccinated before selling or giving out vaccines to low income countries. It is the airplane philosophy of giving yourself the oxygen mask first before assisting others.

    Against this background, antivaxxers are disrupting the health of the entire community, by preventing those who want to get vaccinated from doing so. If they don’t want the vaccine for themselves, that’s fine. But why heckle others, who want to protect their children by getting them vaccinated? It is this public health angle that has given scientists and some public officials the most concern.

    A bigger question is how to stop the present trend of resistance before it snowballs into a movement that cannot be controlled. Perhaps a starting point is to appeal to the antivaxxers’ sense of reason. They need to know that many contagions, such as smallpox and chicken pox, were eradicated or at least severely limited by vaccination.

    Even more importantly, they need to know that in countries, such as the United States and Britain, the unvaccinated currently carry the brunt of COVID-19 infections in their communities. In other words, COVID-19 is fast becoming the disease of the unvaccinated.

    Perhaps the biggest problem is the linkage between face masks, vaccination, and politics. The linkage of the resistance to face masks and vaccination with the politics of the right in the United States portents serious danger for the future of democracy in that country, because the same crowd is also the conveyor of the BIG LIE.

    Nigeria is lucky that the virus has not been as devastating as previously predicted. The category of antivaxxers still does not exist less than 4 percent of the population is so far vaccinated. It is when a high percentage of the population is vaccinated and critical health measures have to be taken to protect others that antivaxxers show up in reasonable numbers. That’s what’s going on now in the United States and Britain.

    The closest to the antivaxxers in Nigeria is the “No Koro” crowd, that is, those who deny the existence of COVID-19. So far, such people have been lucky, because the virus has not been as contagious as it could be or as it has been Brazil with comparable population and climate. There is, therefore, no reason at this point to take drastic measures to contain their denial. Let’s hope it will never come to that.

  • Southeast as Nigeria’s giant conundrum

    Southeast as Nigeria’s giant conundrum

    We are at a historical juncture where the Southeast is fast trading places with the Northeast and Northwest as a major source of worry.

    The escalation of separatist violence marked by attacks on security agents, police stations, properties of top politicians, as well as the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) sit-at-home campaign, shows no sign of abating.

    If the Federal Government thought the extraordinary rendition of the group’s leader Nnamdi Kanu from Kenya would lead to a collapse of pro-Biafra agitation and violence, the reverse has been the case.

    In the last few months we’ve witnessed the shocking assassinations of notable figures like former presidential adviser, Ahmed Gulak and Dr. Chike Akunyili, husband of the late Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Dr. Dora Akunyili. Both were brutally executed in the street.

    Scores with lesser profiles have been murdered for daring to flout the sit-at-home diktat. Some had their dwellings razed for openly criticising the tactics of the secessionists. Individuals and corporate organisations have lost billions as their trucks and goods were vandalised.

    Even when one or two governors ventured out of their Government House fortresses to encourage citizens to step out on the so-called ‘Ghost Mondays,’ they were ignored because people know who calls the shots in the region these days.

    Such is the scale of the violence that campaigns for November’s Anambra governorship elections have been thrown into disarray. Major parties like the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) have shut down public appearances for fear of attacks.

    The greater fear is that on polling day we may witness historically low turnout that renders the whole exercise a charade. How are security forces that haven’t been able to stop killings in normal times expected to provide cover for electoral officers in isolated communities on Election Day?

    This spectre of violence prompted Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, to injudiciously suggest that declaration of a state of emergency in Anambra was a distinct possibility.

    Many ridiculed him for being so gung-ho about declaring an emergency in Anambra, while not advocating the same strong medicine in his Northwest home turf where bloodthirsty bandits have killed hundreds, sacked rural communities and disrupted the educational system. They have a point.

    Malami and other senior Federal Government officials should actually be taking a broader view of what’s unfolding in the region. It’s bigger than just delivering some semblance of elections through a show of force.

    Long after the polls have come and gone, the mess in the Southeast would be waiting for someone to clean it up.

    Truth be told, neither government nor IPOB can have it their way. The militarisation of the region and deployment of intimidation hasn’t extinguished pro-Biafra sentiment. A new low was reached last week when soldiers apprehended popular actor Chiwetalu Agu for wearing a robe depicting Biafra colours complete with the rising sun symbol.

    Some may not be as brazen as the thespian by putting their sentiments on public display in such manner, but many harbour a fondness for Biafra in the Southeast.

    Senate Minority Leader, Enyinnaya Abaribe, recently estimated that over 30 separatist groups currently operate in the region. Twenty years ago the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) was the only one, and it was viewed as something of a joke.

    The only way to reverse that growth trajectory is to engage in a battle for hearts, not a shooting war. It’s difficult to sustain a union based solely on military might. Where there’s a will, people ultimately find a way – no matter the might of the state. This is a struggle that’s going to outlive President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration because the sentiments driving it are deep-rooted.

    The Spanish situation is a good example. The Catalan independence movement has been at it since the mid-19th century. When separatist leaders called protests following the jailing of some of their colleagues in 2019, the streets of Barcelona were jammed by tens of thousands of demonstrators.

    They don’t have their own country yet and may not in the foreseeable future, but political parties pushing their agenda have wormed their way into the mainstream, advancing the independence cause.

    The big problem in the Southeast is the gulf separating both sides. IPOB wants nothing short of an independent Biafra, by referendum if possible. But since government will not serve up balkanisation of the country on a platter, it’s increasingly embracing guerrilla struggle. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have the military wherewithal or political support – internally and externally – to prevail that way.

    Using hate-fuelled rhetoric hasn’t won it many friends. The promotion of Kanu as an almost messianic, cult-like figure has repulsed many in the establishment and political classes who have no appetite for a revolutionary journey to an uncertain destination.

    Central to the challenge facing IPOB is the huge population of Igbos who witnessed the civil war, for whom the memories are still vivid and horrendous. They are in no hurry to embark on a sequel – not for all the pleasures of having their own homeland.

    Overcoming their initial fear, more of such individuals are speaking out, denouncing the heavy material and psychological toll of the violence and sit-at-home campaigns on the region.

    It appears what IPOB is selling isn’t sufficiently attractive, that’s why they are pushing it using terror. While images of deserted streets may represent short term propaganda gains, the collateral damage from the group’s scorched earth approach is alienating many ordinary people. It’s the surest way of short-circuiting their struggle.

    The best route to restore normalcy is for all sides to recognise the limitations of their present approach and admit the existence of legitimate grievances that should be addressed.

    For all the talk of reconciliation following the war, distrust between the Southeast and the rest of Nigeria is latent. This needs to be dealt with in an open and honest manner. Where errors have been made, like other zones having six or seven states and the east just five, this can be revisited.

    Whatever solution is envisaged must acknowledge that Kanu is already trapped in judicial proceedings and there’s no conceivable way out but for the process to run its course. If he’s convicted, some future president, in the spirit of national reconciliation and healing, may decide to offer him an amnesty.

    But the region’s political office holders, would-be presidential aspirants, must urgently seize the initiative because their territory is being destroyed daily in a slow-burn ‘second civil war’ that’s currently playing out.

     

  • Nigeria PLC@61 – C is for Covid and Corruption

    As we continue to bask in the sunshine month of October, celebrating our 61st year as an independent country we must ask if we have served Nigeria well considering all the natural resources it has provided at our fingertips?

    Nigeria PLC needs a Board Meeting and a Poll of the people, on the way forward. It should vote on the need to cut back on its cost of governance and the national and state assemblies. For years we have demanded a cancellation of one of the houses of NASS especially the senate. It is truly a dangerously consumptive and needless luxury for the NASS members which we, the company members and shareholders, cannot afford especially at this time of falling value of life and currency nearing N600:$1, as any Nigerian CEO will tell you. Nigeria PLC cannot afford the salaries and perks, SAP, self-allocated far in excess of any political group pay anywhere, even in the prosperous developed countries. SAPs must be cut by 75% and/or the political class placed on the upper levels of an elongated Civil Service Salary Scale-Level 17,18, 19 20, 21, 22.

    But more importantly, there requires to be a massive campaign against corruption with full expose of its consequences in the past, present and future for Nigeria PLC’s survival as a company. No country in the world can prosper and grow with more than 10% corruption. However here Nigeria PLC survives, defying the odds, with 30,40,50,60,70, 80, 100% and more corruption. We are a country on life support with many already left out as corpses and victims of violence. Oxygen supplies are running dangerously low and anyone knows what oxygen is to survival from Covid. Nigeria may have survived Covid, so far, but it is definitely succumbing to the big C so common in everything we do- CORRUPTION. CORRUPTION IS NOT INSTITUTIONAL, it is MAN-MADE. The determination of corruption percentages to be inflated and added into contracts or removed on receipt of contract fees, the passage of envelopes and bank funds, the removal of funds, the diversion of materials, the creation of fake contracts and especially witchcraft phantom but very expensive workshops are all man and woman made.

    How do we get the individuals in institutions to imbibe the sense of honesty still to be found in the likes of Charity Bassey and Josephine Agwu who returned money found and also late Professor Dora Akunyili who returned left over ESTACODE even as we have lost her husband to murderous highway terrorists, and those unsung honest citizens of whom Professor Is-haq Oloyede is a current leading light.

    Read Also: EFCC: Asset declaration for bank executives not witch-hunt

    Individuals destroy every good thing in Nigeria. EFCC has identified N157,000,000,000 Pension Fund, approximately N1000/Nigerian, fraud after a N84,000,000,000+ fraud, N500/Nigerians in the NSITF-founded to provide poverty alleviation measures to members. All funds stolen by individuals, Fellow Nigerians put in the place of trust. They did not steal only our money but also stole and destroyed the present and future comfort of tens of thousands of family members. They stole a large bit of the Nigerian fabric and helped destroy the naira’s value. Both were compulsory deductions from staff and offices. Spectacularly immorally, citizens and companies would be jailed for not making the payments into fraud-ridden organisations. How stupid! What system allows such cash asset stripping on such a scale and still expects a proper outcome, without adequate checks and balances, to nip such nefarious activities from onset? Prevention is better than cure! In this age of forensic auditing and massive angry unemployment, how is it possible that such huge amounts of money cannot be stopped before they are stolen? What happened to continuous monitoring? Why are the funds so easy to steal?

    But we have repeated this process so many times that it appears ‘a normal expected occurrence’ and not an aberration. Where were EFCC and the auditors community and the boastful oversight NASS when the first N1m, 10, 100, 200, 500, 1000m was stolen? No whistle blowers? Where were the gatekeepers? Every month Nigerian companies are forced ‘mumu’ to pay the NSITF even after the mind-bending theft of N84+b. Will more theft take place?

    Why do our best systems fail? Experience teaches us to expect fraud everywhere because that is what has been revealed a thousand times! In the light of history, any government would be foolish not to anticipate and counter a huge fraudulent backlash from ‘trusted’ civil servants, contractors and vendors. Yet, we wait for many years, stupidly laughing at the ongoing huge damage, initiating belated fire brigade mechanisms aimed at ‘discovering’ the fraud. Look at JAMB, scamming youth of N5-7b every year for many years, many people in education probably ate their money, and nobody did anything.

    At 61, we are the third most insecure in the world. We are at the wrong end of indices worldwide. How can people steal N157b from pension funds, depriving tens of Nigerian thousands of families of a lifeline and forcing many youth into depression, suicide and criminality and their parents into depression, suicide and death from derivation of funds for housing, health and sustenance and for further studies and work-life support of children?

    NARD has called off its strike for 6-8 weeks. Mr Government, are these strikes necessary? Yes, because government neglects its duty. NUPENG strike was narrowly averted but the price of diesel went up demonstrating immorality of proxy marketers.

  • Corporate Nigeria PLC 1960-2021 Audit

    By Tony Marinho

    Nigeria @61. Deconstructing the blame game. It is strange to see government officials blaming self-determination groups for being terrorists with no mention of the real origin of terror from unbridled, protected, unprovoked, premeditated AK-49-wielding herder terrorists whose murderous antics over many years but especially since 2015 have culminated in so much destruction even before the advent of hordes of killer bandits and political thugs gone drug-mad. The cost of their Triangle of Terrorism weighs down every single home in Nigeria with fear and sadness in a country once strangely winning the ‘Happiest Country’ in the world trophy. What a fall from grace to disgrace caused by political action and inactions? This terrorism fills IDP camps, penetrates millions of homes where citizens sleep with both eyes open. How many Nigerians are questioning Nigeria’s foundations and ask ‘What have I done to my country that it is doing this to me?’

    After all, the abuse of Federal Character, spectacularly disgraceful under the current government, which campaigned on a ‘restructuring platform’, is demoralising and disregards sensibilities of millions of Nigeria’s people. Buhari watchers since the 1980s are not disappointed in their predictions of Federal Character failures. However, the citizens feel that they are in a place where the key words of ‘Being Nigerian’ – Justice, Peace,  Equity and Unity -are mere words with no demonstrable ‘Faithful’ execution constitution to guarantee a belonging – Federal Character. The result of true Federal Character is that Nigerians sleep better as a person from their area -sadly even if is a thief – is awake supposedly representing and protecting their interest at the table of power. Political balancing and ethnic balancing go hand in hand conceptually. Basically, ethnic groups do not trust other ethnicities to act positively in their favour. This conviction that ‘only our man or woman can have our interest’ arose out of long experience of being Nigerian, waiting forever for the elusive and too often denied constitutionally-guaranteed mostly unobtainable ‘Dividends Of Democracy’. The problem is amplified by the repeated ‘winner takes all’ attitude and actions of parties and many top people in government and in MDAs and parastatals where the ethnic stamp of the head of each organisation even determines the language and mode of dress at meetings.

    The new wave of coups in West Africa after the world had ‘abolished’ coups, even the ones the usual suspects, colonial masters or USA or USSR, orchestrated during and after the cold war, and branded as heinous  crimes,  is  a dangerous trend which many feel are precipitated by bad politicians. Sadly, the story of coups in West Africa fulfils the adage ‘full of sound and fury signifying nothing much’ except short-term terror and long-term negative growth and prosperity  of the general citizenry and country and a considerable and sustained treasury-terrorism. Truly altruistic and idealistic notions are quickly dissipated observing the adage that ‘absolute power corrupts absolutely’. So enough of the past. But no, the past haunts us with its recurrent leadership. Yet there are truly great young leaders who have proved themselves and they are not Methuselah. Nigeria will survive happier quicker with total commitment to Federal Character, build our foreign reserves, live the words of Nigeria’s National Anthem and Pledge and being nice to all Fellow Nigerians. Sadly, these sworn-to words are just mumbled words by politicians. Why demand them from anyone seeking confirmation for holding political office, just to embarrass them before NASS.  The nation has subjugated itself to the CINS – Corruption, Inefficiency, Negligence and Incompetence -and unbridled greed for power and unearned and undeserved wealth of the political class to efficiently run the Business of Governing Nigeria PLC.

    The road where we are now in 2021 ‘Nowhere’ has been a 61year-old long sad one, the disappointment of many millions. Which CEO would not pay salaries and pensions? Which CEO would spend 15 years and still not-fix a 120km road that is among the top three most used road in Nigeria-the Lagos Ibadan Road? Which CEO would repair the same stretches of road and bridges, with irregular monotony, and not build new ones in new directions for the benefit of the masses?

    Which CEO would allow maintenance funds to be diverted from ‘the 7-year colonial maintenance cycle’? Which CEO approved the Theory of science subjects so that the money for practical science, chemistry, biology, physics could be stolen, depriving the youth of the adage that ‘a picture is worth a 1000 words’?  Which CEO would ignore the health and structured education of the workforce? Which CEO would reject research as a weapon of development? Which CEO would not provide security for all staff? Which CEO would not grow the reserves of the company for the benefit of all shareholders, born and unborn? Which CEO would criticise every audit of and complaint and refuse to implement changes that are obviously beneficial to all corporate staff countrywide?

    And finally which CEO would explain the huge number of Fellow Nigerians wishing they were somewhere else, attested to by the estimated 10 million diaspora Nigerians, an entire West African slave trade exit,  to which we can add the terrible experience, including death by drowning in the Mediterranean and other forms of death, disease, disability, trafficking and forced prostitution among Nigeria’s frustrated, disappointed and abandoned youth trying to escape from a poorly performing Corporate Nigeria .

    Should NYSC be suspended totally for dangerous states for safety reasons?

  • Foreign athletes with Nigerian heritage

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    Azuka Onwuka’s article, How Nigerians are being tactically de-Nigerianized (The Punch, August 10, 2021) drew wide readership for various reasons. First, it was timely, coming right after the conclusion of the Tokyo Olympics. By analyzing the role of participants with Nigerian heritage, who competed for other countries, it allowed readers to elongate memories of the Olympics games they just watched.

    Second, the article drew attention to the spread of the Nigerian Diaspora across the globe. Many athletes with Nigerian heritage competed for countries in North America, Western and Eastern Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and even Oceania.

    Third, by arguing that these Nigerians were being de-Nigerianized for competing for other countries, because Nigeria could not nurture their athletic aspirations, Onwuka provided social media game for perpetual critics of President Muhammadu Buhari as if the declining performance of Nigerian athletes in global competitions started with his administration.

    Fourth, Onwuka linked the plight of these athletes with that of other Nigerians who have escaped, or are trying to escape, from Nigeria’s harsh social, political, and economic conditions. This linkage resonated with readers familiar with the repatriations of stranded Nigerians from Libya, Lebanon, and other places in the last few years.

    These athletes and desperate escapees are not in the same category, however, and they should not be painted with the same brush. Besides, the athletes with Nigerian heritage, who competed for other countries, are not Nigerians for the purpose of the competition. They competed as nationals of the countries they represented at the Olympics. It is a naïve view of nationality that sees them as Nigerians. To insist that such athletes are Nigerians is to insist that former President Barrack Obama of the United States is Kenyan because of his Kenyan heritage.

    There are two broad groups of athletes with Nigerian heritage overseas. The first group consists of those who were born overseas and automatically assumed the citizenship of their country of birth. In some cases, such athletes have one Nigerian parent, while the other is a citizen of the athlete’s country of birth. Some of them have never been to Nigeria and don’t even have immediate plans to do so. It is their prerogative to compete for the country that allowed them to hone their skills.

    The second group consists of young Nigerians, who went overseas to study, took to athletics in the course of their studies, and eventually nationalized. Some of them, especially footballers and basketball players, even went to the university on athletic scholarship.

    The truth is that, outside of Nigeria, athletes are nurtured as professionals, and they are treated specially for their talent and for their business value. Some of these athletes are identified early and nurtured, sometimes by their parents but often by coaches in their schools or community playing grounds.

    Such is the case with the Onitsha-born Ebelechukwu Agbapuounwu, whose mother migrated to Bahrain and married a Bahraini. In no time, Ebele converted to Islam and took on a new name, Salwa Eid Naser. She got a couch, a scholarship, and other incentives to nurture her sprinting career to gold standard. She went on to win the 2019 World Championship in the 400 metres, with the third fastest time in history of 48.14 seconds. Unfortunately, she could not compete in the Tokyo Olympics, because she was suspended owing to three whereabouts failures as well as failure to show up for competition one time or the other.

    Naser’s case illustrates three interesting factors in the making of great athletes. One is the combination of talent, interest, and appropriate skills, which could then be improved upon by a good coach and trainer.

    A second major factor in the making of a great athlete is the combination of self-discipline, determination, and consistency in following through on necessary practice routines and competitions.

    The third factor is the assistance of family, friends, coaches and the government in preparing athletes for competition. Countries also offer rewards to victorious athletes. For example, the United States, which has an abundance of talents, awards $37,500 for Olympic gold, whereas Singapore, which is hungry for good athletes, awards a whopping 1 million dollars for Olympic gold. Nigeria’s reward for medals is still too small to get her on the international rewards table.

    An even more lucrative reward for athletes is an endorsement or sponsorship, which can pay them huge sums for promoting a product, a service, a programme, or a project. Sports heroes, such as Jay Jay Okocha and Nwankwo Kanu, continue to benefit from such endorsements even after retirement.

    There’s no denying the fact that the Nigerian government continues to fail our athletes. Perhaps no one makes this point better than Sunday Oliseh, former Eagles captain and coach, who was Nigeria’s defensive midfielder on the team that won soccer Olympic Gold in the 1996 games. In his autobiography, Audacity to Refuse, Oliseh recalled the failures of the then National Football Association and the Nigerian government in their preparations for the 1996 games: “Believe me, in my whole career as a soccer player, I think we’ve never had it so difficult to prepare for a tournament … We lacked in equipment, infrastructure, we lacked even in things as little as medical facilities … we lacked in food, we lacked in everything, so we were just like abandoned children”. That was 25 years ago!

    Against this backdrop, Onwuka really was not saying anything new. What is really needed now is not the perpetuation of the complaint tradition but concrete proposals on how to improve on the present regime of government failure in sports. The starting point is for the government to recognize sports as some capital-intensive business and not simply as recreation.

    This implies that the government must invest in sports as business, by including it in its annual budget and funding it as it funds education and health. It must provide the necessary infrastructure for sports. Finally, the government must offer appropriate incentives to the athletes, whose talents and skills are needed to sustain the business.

    Fortunately, the current Minister of Youth and Sports, Mr. Sunday Dare, has been in the forefront of needed changes. In addition to setting up a 14-member Committee to reposition sports and attract investment to the industry, he led the revival of abandoned Surulere and Abuja national stadia. Realising the financial limitations of the government, Dare’s ultimate goal is to attract both public and private investment to the sports industry.

  • Wanted: Repentant billionaires- save the naira

    By Tony Marinho

    Nigeria deserves that just as doctors treat patients, wealthy legitimate and ‘repentant billionaires’ join forces to lend, give or anonymously donate to the Foreign Reserves of Nigeria in a bid to achieve a background stability magic figure of $100b or at least $50b Foreign Reserves cushion. Nigeria and the naira deserve to live after its services in petroleum and other resources to make some enormously wealthy while paradoxically so many millions wallowing in infrastructural and social poverty. This is manifest by associated hunger, loss of immediate and future status, loss of power of income growth and a tsunami of growing anger and insecurity sweeping across our fear-torn and beleaguered country.

    We face so many preventable threats. Most of these threats would never have occurred if only those who boastfully empowered themselves politically and even militarily over 60 years to protect and lead, not mislead the growing country had done so with Truth, Honesty and Faith and Justice and Equity -words flippantly used by politicians but almost never practiced by them. The results of their collective leadership failure at federal, state, LGA and ward levels are manifest in the millions who have left the country some drowning and dying by other means. Add the millions in IDP camps, driven from their ancestral lands and homes. Add the millions of youths facing an uncertain present and future employment prospects. Add the millions of living and dead workers and pensioners and their dependents, also dead or alive, denied or short-changed of their salaries and pensions as and when due, disrupting family life in the nuclear and extended families.

    The naira’s 1980-2021 40-year precipitous fall – huge devaluation [$1,000=N546 in 1980, $1=N546 in 2021] especially on the ever-greedy black market continues to turn our hard-earned money into cheaper than a single sheet of toilet paper. Who are behind the black market in Nigeria? Why is the rate so poor, which board of governors or corner forex trader, which company head wakes up every morning and says ‘This will be the exchange rate today’ and we all sheepishly follow to throw our hard-earned naira at them and are actually grateful for the few dollars we get?

    Why is the demand on the black market so high? Can that demand be reduced by giving Nigerians across the counter forex for those no-paperwork-items, petty cash items like family clothes and accessories, medical journals and gift items for friends and family? Is that wrong? So why can I not go to my bank and buy a few dollars or pounds to send for presents at Christmas or for a birthday?

    When I was young, we went to any post office to buy foreign exchange Postal Orders. We soon spoilt that opportunity and required Travellers’ Cheques for the same purpose and an airline ticket to get foreign exchange unless we were on ESTACODE, a luxury not extended very far down the food chain. On the other side of the Foreign Exchange problem are the political and other classes, especially bankers whose collective decisions have serially abused and killed the foreign exchange opportunities which in turn have now made rubbish of the value of our currency. They are directly responsible in devaluing for 40 years, the work of our hands and the worth of our lives. Shameful that they refuse responsibility for our hellish life today.

    Nigerian Economic and Social History Research will judge the abuse of our democracy – the poisonous ‘Exclusive List’ harshly used for its power of destruction, instead of development. The dreaded and deadly ‘Exclusive List’ hindered the growth of Nigeria and is applied like a negative economic war weapon to reduce the benefit to others. Practiced today, the Exclusive List’ is a veto power against the development of Nigeria as a unit and many of the individual constituent parts. The Exclusive List has become a noose around the neck of Nigeria used to empower the few while pauperising many.

    Nigeria should distribute VAT differently, better and more in favour of those states paying VAT. We must cut the Exclusive List misused power to precipitate more underdevelopment of everywhere but liberalise the ‘Concurrent List’ with devolving powers to the periphery.

    Is it not frightening that courts prosecute all manner of criminals who have mostly been forced into crime because the real criminals are never prosecuted because they remain in power? Even judges who deliver deliberate or accidental misjudgments go free even when judgements are reversed

    Wearing any uniform, police, literary, paramilitary and even plain clothes detective is an increasing dangerous. We mut respect the good among them.

    Nigeria needs: A 75% reduction in governance costs by cutting political ‘Salaries And Perks’, SAPing us dry. States should pay for their representatives sent to National Assembly. We require a ‘Referendum Clause’. We require a single house preferably House of Representatives and cancellation of most of immunity clause. We require E-voting for diaspora and local citizens alike. We require decentralisation of the federal system with more powerful states and a weaker centre with marked move from the Exclusive List reserved for the Federal Government to the Concurrent List with more funds for states. Nigeria needs ‘Justice’ and Truth in fact, not word alone. The greedy must share Nigeria with all Nigerians, just like in that Nigeran Pledge written by Felicia Adebola they force children to swear to but refuse themselves— to be ‘Faithful, Loyal and Honest’.

  • Osun at 30: The anniversary colloquium

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    Nine of Nigeria’s 36 states were created on August 27, 1991, by the Ibrahim Babangida military administration, many of them being carved out of erstwhile bigger entities. The new states were Abia, Delta, Enugu, Jigawa, Kebbi, Kogi, Osun, Taraba and Yobe. The celebrations of the 30th anniversary consisted of the typical menu: a Press Conference; the Governor’s speech, touting achievements; and a state banquet and awards gala.

    However, Osun chose to be different by adding an intellectual dimension to the celebrations. It was a colloquium, whose objectives were: (1) to discuss the developmental strides in the State of Osun since creation; (2) to highlight the roles played by key actors till date; (3) to assess key lessons from the past; and (4) to make suggestions and recommendations for attaining greater heights. Instead of the Governor touting achievements, it was the panel that critically assessed what had been, and still could be, accomplished.

    The template for the discussion was provided by Chief Bisi Akande, who gave the keynote address, which was then amplified by two groups of discussants. One group, consisting of five panelists, was physically present in the hall-Dr. Yemi Farounbi; Mr. Babajide Kolade-Otitoju; Professor Siyan Oyeweso; Mr. Steve Nwosu; and Ms. Zainab Okino. The other group, consisting of five panelists joined via Zoom-Mr. Titilayo Laoye-Ponle; Dr. Segun Aina; Dr. Reuben Abati; Ms. Bamidele Ademola-Olateju; Mr. Mahmud Jega. Unfortunately, however, one of the virtual panelists could not join for unavoidable reasons. I was the moderator of the panel.

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    In his keynote, Chief Akande provided the historical background to the creation of Osun state, highlighting the political units-Native Authorities, Divisions, and Provinces-that were combined, recombined, and then separated from old Oyo state in 1991. However, the thrust of his address was what he termed “unit of development”, by which he means a community, consisting of a cluster of villages or a group of streets within a three-mile radius with a primary school as its nucleus. The primary school within such a community becomes a target of development. When such a community is able to attract a secondary school, then it becomes an “optimum community”.

    In the spirit of the Nigerian constitution, “the primary school vicinity must also attract local government clean water supply, electricity and energy, health facilities, housing and sanitation services and Agro-allied activities, etc.”. Furthermore, the state, which is responsible for secondary schools, “would also be expected to design government budgets to site projects to target the essential needs and happiness of the people around the primary and secondary schools in the optimum communities”.

    Chief Akande’s address engendered a spirited discussion. Oyeweso elaborated on the historical trajectory of the state, highlighting landmark achievements of each of the nine administrations to date. He particularly highlighted the contribution of the first Head of Service and also Secretary to the Government, Chief Inaolaji Aboaba. His pioneering effort in linking the government’s policies and their implementation by the civil service laid an indelible foundation.

    Both Dr Abati and Dr. Farounbi commented on the intellectual roots of the concept of optimum communities (OptiCom, for short), tracing it to Professors Ojetunji Aboyade and Akin Mabogunje. Dr. Farounbi further elaborated on the adoption of the concept by the Unity Party of Nigeria under Chief Obafemi Awolowo as a strategy to deliver the maximum benefits to the largest number of people.

    Other targets of development within such communities include mineral resource sites, tourist sites, local markets, and the palaces of monarchs. Furthermore, political units, such as wards and local governments, could also be targets of development. Such was the case recently in Osun, where as many as 332 Primary Health Centres were built or renovated with one in each ward. Mr. Otitoju also noted that, since Osun state has the largest number of urban centres per state, they also should be regarded as centres of development in order to reduce the perennial exodus of Osun residents to other places, including the large outflow of Ejigbo residents to Côte d’Ivoire.

    The conversation then centred on education and its role in development to which virtually all the panelists contributed, thus reinforcing the nucleus of Chief Akande’s keynote address. Ademola-Olateju, Nwosu, Abati, Farounbi, Aina, and Okino all addressed the importance of education in developing the human capital base of the state.

    It was acknowledged that the state had made great strides in education in the last 30 years. The number of schools and school enrollment skyrocketed, especially in the last eight years, due partly to the school feeding programme and partly to classroom expansion in the new state-of-the-art school buildings. Correspondingly, educational achievement improved to the point that Osun school leavers became competitive nationally. A student from Osun schools came second overall in the last JAMB examination. Educational expansion is particularly notable in higher education: The number of universities grew from one to eleven within 30 years.

    This invigorated the focus on human capital development. There was agreement on the need to establish Innovation Hubs to train the youths in digital innovations and the use of technology to boost entrepreneurial skills. Such knowledge and skills are important in linking the state with the growing knowledge economy and in creating employment opportunities. In order to facilitate the participation of the students in secondary and tertiary institutions, Internet access should be provided in the schools through partnership with various digital access providers.

    Dr Aina emphasised the need for the government to support private sectors in the establishment of Innovation Hubs across the state, such as the Opolo Global Innovation, which resulted from the Osun State Economic & Investment Summit held in 2019. In addition to Innovation Hubs, it is recommended that the government should create innovation funds by sourcing funds from the private sector, NGOs, and development partners. Such funds, if well managed, should seed investment support and grow innovative ideas toward impact and commercialization.

    In order to guarantee a prosperous future, the state is urged to develop a long-term plan and invest in leadership training through leadership workshops and the allocation of leadership responsibilities in government and other state institutions to youths under 40. This is particularly necessary, given the large youth population in the state. They had better be trained now for their own government in the future, by paying more attention to the cultivation of civic, democratic, and cultural values. This is necessary to  guarantee the type of future we want for our kids.

     

  • A quiet man at work

    A quiet man at work

    By Festus Eriye

    Thirty years ago President Ibrahim Babangida created a clutch of new states. By military fiat Abia, Adamawa, Anambra, Delta, Edo, Enugu, Jigawa, Kebbi, Kogi, Osun, Taraba and Yobe were born.

    In the last few weeks many of them have been celebrating the landmark anniversary – some with justification over clear achievements, others for simply staying afloat in the face of progressive economic decline of the last 10 years.

    Osun, like most of its age-mates or even those older, continues to battle challenges of dwindling revenues, rising debts – problems compounded by others thrown up in the post-COVID-19 environment.

    Perhaps that’s the reason for its relatively muted celebrations or maybe it’s a reflection of the personality of Governor Gboyega Oyetola who now presides over the affairs of the state. By most descriptions he is quiet, low-key and gentlemanly – preferring to operate away from the headlines and let his work speak for him.

    The contrast with his predecessor and erstwhile boss, Rauf Aregbesola, who he served as Chief of Staff couldn’t be more stark. The former governor was a colourful and gregarious personality given to breaking out in song and dance at official functions in his time in office.

    Under him the state embarked on a slew of ambitious infrastructural projects – everything from dual carriage roads, flyovers to even an airport – in his attempt to drag the sleepy state into a time of accelerated development by the scruff of the neck.

    But those interventions came at a steep price: a massive debt burden that left the state at the mercy of banks and unable to meet obligations to its workers. The upshot was that Osun was regularly in the news over its struggles with salary payment or its attempts to do so using unorthodox formulas.

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    Ordinarily, payment of salaries shouldn’t be anything to crow about. In some jurisdictions labour laws demand that workers whether in public or private sectors be paid by the 25th of every month. But such is the state of the economy that those paying promptly now look like magicians.

    Against the backdrop of where Osun is coming from perhaps Oyetola is justified in taking pleasure that workers are now paid promptly because the state’s receipts haven’t dramatically improved, and the excuses of past years are also available to him.

    One other area of noticeable change is the education sector. He took office with controversy still raging over a signature policy of the Aregbesola administration. The state had scrapped the 6-3-3-4 system which operates nationally – leaving it out of sync with the rest of the federation.

    Schools across the state were renamed and a common uniform imposed on all. It was an unpopular policy which drew flak from all sides, with some angry alumni associations suing the government. Oyetola as governorship candidate faced awkward questioning during a television debate as to whether he would continue with the policy if elected.

    He couldn’t be seen to be disagreeing with the government he was still part of, nor could he afford to lose voters hoping for change. His deft response was that no policy was cast in stone; they could always be reviewed if they no longer met the needs of the people.

    True to his words he initiated a review on assumption of office – appointing a panel of eminent educationists who advised a reversal of the policy. Given the context and expected blowback, it was evidence of steely character that Oyetola pressed ahead to implement the recommendations and by so doing defanged what had become a political albatross.

    For any governor seeking to quickly project an image of action and progress, one low-hanging fruit is road construction. The incumbent approved the construction and rehabilitation of 10 roads across the state his first 100 days in office.

    He pressed on with the Osogbo-Gbongan, Osogbo-Ikirun, Osogbo-Ilesa and Ife-Osogbo roads inherited from the last administration. In the capital, construction of a network of roads in the Alekunwodo area is one example of urban renewal that has transformed the largest ward in the state.

    In the centre of town, the Olaiya flyover is rising – inspired by an accident at a major intersection which claimed lives. The project which hopefully will avert such tragedies in future is billed to be completed by end of November.

    The Osun anniversary comes at a time of intense national debate over who between federal and state governments should collect Value Added Tax (VAT). The argument is part of a larger discussion about how states can enhance Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). Many are realising that receipts from FAAC cannot sustain them.

    Of the 12 states created in 1991 only Edo and Enugu are in the top ten in terms of IGR ranking. Osun places a respectable 14th out of 36 states in annual figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) for 2020. But at just short of N20 billion what it generates is a far cry from the likes of sixth-placed Ogun which raised N50 billion and top-of-the-pile Lagos which raked in N418 billion.

    This shortcoming is clearly driving Oyetola’s strategy for transforming the state’s finances and informs the projects he’s giving priority. For instance, the Dagbolu International Trade Centre which incorporates a bonded terminal aims to restore the state’s historic past as a logistics/distribution hub for major manufacturers and conglomerates. The project is leveraging on the Federal Government’s ongoing revitalisation of railway assets.

    But the most arresting of these initiatives is the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Oyetola administration and international mining firm Badger Mines Limited for exploitation of the state’s gold reserves.

    While the final report of prospecting investigations is awaited, hopes are high that large tracts of rural areas are sitting on deposits estimated at 15.3 million ounces. Interestingly, that same process has discovered deposits from the platinum family of minerals – potentially broadening earning possibilities. The state has also acquired mining licences in Zamfara and a couple of others.

    The joint venture Omoluabi Badger Mines has a world class Gold Buying and Refining Centre at Osu – manned by locals as well as expatriates from South Africa, Zimbabwe and Germany. Here gold is bought off artisanal miners through an operation linked to global databases – guaranteeing they get going rates based on quality of product.

    One official joked that the refinery was their own “Eleme Petrochemicals.” If ongoing mapping finally establishes the existence of gold in commercial quantities, mining could open an era of sustained prosperity in this state, long after crude has become old hat.

    It’s a vision Oyetola would be looking to sell going into the next election cycle.