The Nation Newspaper

Category: Wednesday

  • Covid denial: June 12 amendments

    By Tony Marinho

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 3,800,000 among 176,000,000 diagnosed cases and 2.2b vaccines worldwide. Nigerian cases approaching 167,200 and 2,120 deaths with 2.0m+ vaccine doses. Get your second dose!

    Many ask – Is Covid dead? The masks are off. Citizens are following the protocols of hygiene less and less. Citizens have largely jettisoned social distancing in most places. Only two million have been vaccinated out of a population estimated at 160m+, though the actual population is unlikely to be anywhere near the currently boasted figure which I refuse to endorse or reproduce. Perhaps we have parallel epidemics of ‘Covid Denial’, ‘Covid Complacency or Fatigue’, and ‘Covid Resistance’ variously triggered by personal, family, traditional circumstances and biases re-enforced and modified or amplified by the tsunami of contradictory sensationally misapplied and misquoted social media news points and medicine acceptance levels, opposite interpretations of  data and hyped or suppressed aspects of  real and imagined stereotypes all freely correctly or mislabelled as fake or real news.

    There is a great confusion in the land. Many patients try, but fail to enter my clinic without wearing masks, are often very belligerent with my medical staff, all seasoned nursing sisters. The patients attempt to take off their mask when they want to answer my questions, as if I will not hear them when they are wearing them. Of course, we stop such dangerous behaviour in its tracks but know that such patients are not wearing the mask for their own or our good but just because we insist on it before they get what they came for. Many threaten to go elsewhere. I bid them farewell, but none actually leave. They grudgingly comply but refuse to accept any medical educational enlightenment we provide and boldly and boastfully often discard the masks on their exit from the premises, scoffing triumphantly on leaving. To them it is an irritant, cosmetic and covid is other people’s disease.

    No doubt we do have a particular level of resistance or immunity to the virus but that should not lead to bravado or unnecessarily exposure to others as we or the others we meet and interact with, may actually be victims or carriers of the virus. Even if we say it has a very low occurrence and death rate in the country, we must remember that each death to date, both recorded and wrongly recorded, was a fatal blow to a family bringing misery and terror and the pain of sudden loss to the families and friends.

    With the opening up of the air routes and people desperate to travel both ways, in and out of the country for summer, the next three months will be testing times for the country, its citizens and its traveling contacts. It is no secret that there is a third Covid-19 wave abroad. Whether it will reach here in force or be truncated by the wall of vaccination will be determined only by time and careful monitoring and effective Covid protocols. The G7 has offered one billion vaccines or 500-750 million citizens in poorer countries being vaccinated depending on the proportions of single vaccine and double vaccine doses.

    As Nigeria passes the 28th milestone of June 12, the same old complaints are still burning a hole in the heart of the country and citizens. The political class has Nigeria by the jugular. Every year since 1999, we have had time-wasting repetitions of expensive town hall meetings, public hearing jamborees around exactly the same things- eternally unpassed Petroleum Industry Bill, eternally inadequate Constitutional Amendments, escalating insecurity and expected Electoral Bill Amendments. Specifically, because no deterrent has been put in place and the politically- motivated criminally fraudulent and violent misdeeds are so successful, we still face threats. These threats include massive blatant electoral manipulation and anti-voter violence. Thugs, but never the politicians’ own children, are unleashed openly and without remorse and are seen in the service of every political party and political office group from incumbents and aspirants creating recurring nightmares for the public with the citizens hopes, forced to rise and fall hourly, hanging on the media reports as slogans like ‘Change in our time’ is dashed repeatedly.

    The needed constitutional amendments are ‘hiding in obvious view’ and penned by real Nigerians. Every newspaper daily spews out enough citizen driven constitutional amendments to fill a new constitution. The writers are Nigerian citizens so why can politicians not just sift through the suggestions, make a few calls and add the good ideas to their own supposedly non-personal agendas about the needed amendments and move forward?

    The constitutional review is a photo trick and a recurring expense jamboree joke. Nigerians demand long overdue answers to Nigeria’s complicated questions. But the repeated exercises signified nothing as they are constantly rubbished in an unjust misapplication of federal character and a federation only in name.

    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 NASS. We require a ‘Referendum Clause’. We require a single house preferably 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 to the Concurrent List. Nigeria needs ‘Justice’ and ‘Truth’ in fact. The greedy must share Nigeria by being ‘Faithful, Loyal and Honest’.

  • As Kizzy Corbett takes mRNA vaccine research to Harvard

    As Kizzy Corbett takes mRNA vaccine research to Harvard

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    Two days ago, Monday, June 14, 2021, Kizzmekia Shonda Corbett (Kizzy, as she is popularly called) reported for duty at Harvard University. She joined the world-renowned Harvard T.H.Chan School of Public Health as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Immunology and Infectious Diseases. At the same time, she will hold another appointment as the Shutzer Assistant Professor at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.

    Remember her?

    She is the 35-year old African-American woman credited with the groundbreaking research that led to the development of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, using the mRNA technology. The vaccine she pioneered was the first COVID-19 vaccine to go into trial in March 2020. It was the first of its kind in the world and the fastest progress ever toward a vaccine for a pathogen never encountered before.

    It is not surprising, then, that, in announcing her appointment, the Harvard School of Public Health added that Dr. Corbett will head the new Coronaviruses & Other Relevant Emerging Infectious Diseases Lab “to study and understand the interface between hosts’ immune systems and viruses that cause respiratory disease, with the goal of informing development of novel and potentially universal vaccines”.

    I began to track Dr. Corbett’s professional career since March 3, 2020, when she was the only Black person, the youngest, and only woman among a group of top scientists, who received former President Donald Trump at the National Institute of Health, where she was a fellow at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Vaccine Research Center.

    As the lead scientist in the lab’s vaccine development research, she was the one who explained to Trump how the vaccine being developed uses a genetic code sequence, known as messenger RNA (mRNA), to prompt the body’s immune system to react when the coronavirus spike protein is detected. The vaccine would then block the infection process.

    How did Dr. Corbett come about this achievement and what messages is she sending to Nigeria and the world? I can think of three or four.

    To start with, she is telling Nigerian youths to start early and get focused. Rather than join gangs, fraternities, or cults, or go after iPhone or other material things, it pays off to focus on one’s studies from Day 1. Dr. Corbett went to public schools all the way.

    Her experience also points to the significant role of mentorship. Her Elementary School teacher detected her promise early. She told her parents, when she was in the fourth grade, to support her by placing her in advanced classes. The same teacher would later describe Dr. Corbett as “The best in my 30 years of teaching”.

    Dr. Corbett did not only start early, she also focused on what she wanted to be. First, without knowing precisely what type of scientist she would be, she began to focus on Mathematics and the sciences. While in High School, she began to embrace biomedical research, when she had her first experience in working in research labs with scientists. She would spend her following summers in various labs, learning and participating in biomedical research.

    Starting early and focusing on her studies earned her accolades and scholarships for her bachelors and doctorate degrees as well as internship at the NIH. She would later join the Vaccine Research Center of the Institute as a postdoctoral research fellow and remain there for the following six years.

    A key experience that really prepared her for vaccine research was her doctoral dissertation research in Sri Lanka, where she studied how people produce antibodies in response to dengue fever, and how the genetics of dengue fever impact the severity of a disease. As part of her dissertation research, she worked as a visiting scholar at Genetech Research Institute in Colombo, Sri Lanka.

    Her meritorious dissertation work and her previous internship at the NIH earned her a research fellowship at the Institute’s Vaccine Research Center. While working on previous coronaviruses (SARS and MERS) at the Center’s lab and elsewhere, she was able to identify a simple way to make spike proteins that are stabilized, immunogenetic, and manufacturable. It was this experience that prepared the way for quickly developing the mRNA vaccine as soon as the genes of the new coronavirus vaccine (COVID-19) were sequenced.

    From a small town and little known Elementary School in North Carolina, Dr. Corbett became the saviour of the world. Time Magazine quickly recognized her as one of 100 top innovators. In her profile for the Magazine, world famous Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, puts it modestly this way: Dr. Corbett has “been central to the development of the Moderna mRNA vaccine and the Eli Lilly therapeutic monoclonal antibody that were first to enter clinical trials in the U.S.” and that “her work will have a substantial impact on ending the worst respiratory-disease pandemic in more than 100 years.”

    There are numerous lessons here for the Nigerian government at federal, state, and local levels. There are thousands of Corbetts in the Nigerian educational system, from elementary grades to postgraduate level. Unfortunately, however, the system no longer provides the necessary infrastructure and ecosystem for desirable educational outcomes. Facilities are poor, if at all available. Teachers are neither well trained nor sufficiently remunerated. Classrooms are poorly equipped or not equipped at all. Students have become disinterested in learning in environments that fail to nurture their potentials.

    The hiring of Dr. Corbett by Harvard University is in itself a message to Nigerian universities on how to maintain high standards or raise them. Having trained and worked in the American university system for over three decades, I can imagine the “juicy” offer made to Dr. Corbett to move from NIH to Harvard. As indicated earlier, the offer includes a dual appointment and a new lab to head.

    True, Nigerian universities are constrained in terms of how much salary they could pay, but nothing stops them from creatively attracting and rewarding outstanding scholars, researchers, and even public servants (who qualify). But, no, our faculty specializes in going on strike for remuneration and past allowances, fighting for unmerited promotion, or struggling to become the next Vice Chancellor. Unfortunately, some University administrations and even Governing Councils contribute to the malaise.

    Finally, whatever happened to the billions allocated to vaccine research in Nigeria? And where are the vaccines claimed to have been purchased for billions of Naira?

  • Sights and sounds of Nigeria’s democracy

    Sights and sounds of Nigeria’s democracy

    By Festus Eriye

    Nigerian leaders traditionally use the Independence Day or May 29 inauguration anniversary for reporting on the country’s progress. After President Muhammadu Buhari re-designated June 12 as Democracy Day, office holders now have an added platform for making their case.

    Buhari’s predecessors chose to speak to the country from time to time through the closely-choreographed ‘Presidential Chat.’ But the taciturn new helmsman quietly shut down the talk shop – doling out face time to the media with his famed frugality.

    I have had the rare privilege of interviewing him in Kaduna whilst the then Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) was in formation and in Aso Rock on his first anniversary as president. He was sufficiently chatty and amusing but couldn’t be accused of being voluble once he was done with his two favourite talking points – corruption and indiscipline.

    So imagine the surprise when, sandwiched between May 29 and June 12, he granted two major interviews to Arise Television and the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA). For those who had become used to his rare interactions with the populace, it was close to an overdose.

    They were as freewheeling as Buhari interviews would ever get – focusing on issues of moment like insecurity, secession, banditry, restructuring, potential coup plots, Twitter ban, infrastructure and the likes.

    Anyone whom listened closely couldn’t have missed the president moaning about how unfair Nigerians were to him. He ticked off all he had done for them in six years and reminded them of where they were coming from. He admitted there were challenges but implied no leader had been so good to them.

    Many of his ‘ungrateful’ compatriots were only too glad to provide a rebuttal to the presidential gab fest on the remaining social media platforms, with Twitter safely quarantined. They recalled the good old days in ‘Egypt’ when one US dollar exchanged for N192 and a bag of rice sold in the region of N10,000.

    They remembered when talk of insecurity referred mainly to the depredations of Boko Haram insurgents in the Northeast, and a time not too long ago when people were not too scared to visit their farms.

    Some recalled a period when Nnamdi Kanu and IPOB were a joke, Sunday Igboho was unheard off, and the closest thing to a radical Yoruba nationalist was Gani Adams.

    It was their own way of answering two questions: Are you better off today than you were six years ago? Is Nigeria’s democracy working for you?

    In the Southeast on May 31 Biafra Day remembrance these questions were answered after a fashion. In a test of wills IPOB ordered all in the zone to stay home in protest. Elected representatives of the people like governors asked them to ignore the order and go about their business. Guess who they obeyed?

    The entire region was largely shutdown as people elected to remain indoors. Many say this was down to fear of being caught in the crossfire between militants, unidentified gunmen and security forces.

    In the same Southeast an even more overt assault on the democratic process has been unfolding with coordinated arson attacks on offices of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The clear intent is to destroy infrastructure for holding any elections in the zone.

    Meanwhile, on June 12 – that reminder of the most cynical subversion of a people’s will in recent history – the Southwest, Abuja and some others aped what played out in the Southeast on May 31.

    Again, the people voted with their feet fearing that the anarchic violence of the #EndSARS protests would be reprised. But this anniversary wasn’t just about deserted streets and shuttered shops: it was also about the failed promise of protest.

    But for a few diehards who gathered at Ojota in Lagos and were swiftly dispersed by teargas-firing policemen, even the most frustrated of people chose to lick their wounds and sulk indoors. It was as if many had come to terms with the futility of protesting.

    In a sign of the times governors like those of Kogi and Cross River and the police in many states issued threats against citizens participating in protests. Dissent suddenly became anathema in a supposedly democratic environment.

    Meanwhile, the president who obviously had a lot bottled up relished his primetime opportunity to vent and had a word for every one of his troublers.

    For IPOB he hit great heights of creativity, describing them as a dot within a circle with nowhere to go. He suggested they rethought their agenda given that they had property all over the country. This created some confusion as to whether he was referring to Kanu’s crowd alone or Igbos in general.

    It is academic now whether something was lost in translation: his comments hit a nerve. That notorious reference to the dot and circle is now the subject of a thousand memes and T-shirts.

    The president was in fine fettle in the second interview; promising ‘more than fire for fire’ for separatists, bandits, kidnappers and their tribe. While some of these groups are just about criminality, others are thriving because of the political mistakes of national leadership over time. Seeing as the best way to fight fire is with water and not fire, many were waiting for some reconciliatory sop but heard none in Buhari’s riot act.

    It was also evident the president and half the country are still poles apart on how to handle the vexed issue of herders. He came out for open grazing – proposing to exhume some ancient gazette backing grazing routes. Southern governors and their Benue counterpart, Samuel Ortom, remain resolute in their opposition. It is now emerging that the so-called legislation only existed in the Northern Region and had no nationwide reference.

    How interesting that amidst Nigeria season of democratic celebration the government launched a sneak attack on the scope of free expression with its Twitter ban. Officials have been labouring unsuccessfully to argue they are following trends, as the world is fast embracing social media regulation.

    Starved of their daily Twitter fix the government and some presidential aides have signed on to some Indian app called Koo hoping, no doubt, to trigger a nationwide stampede to Koo Kooland. It hasn’t happened.

    So far, the cure-all Twitter ban which is hurting many innocents, hasn’t put Kanu or Igboho out of business, neither has it halted late Abubakar Shekau’s legions in their tracks.

    But Nigerians are shock absorbers who keep believing that democracy will outlast attacks from non-state actors and those acting in the name of the state.

  • Buhari and the Twitter story

    Buhari and the Twitter story

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    “When sorrows come, they come not in single spies, but in battalions” -Claudius, in Shakespeare’s Hamlet

    Perhaps no statement could have captured the current Nigerian situation better than the above Shakespearean dictum. Virtually everything that could go wrong has gone wrong with Nigeria, earning the country negative assessments on all international indices. Only last week, John Campbell and Robert Rotberg piggybacked on these negative assessments to declare that Nigeria has failed or is on the brink of failure.

    While responding to these assessments, by denying the negative label, the Nigerian government was caught again in yet another problem. In responding to escalating insecurity in the Southeast, President Muhammadu Buhari, in a tweet, invoked the civil war of 1967-70 as a benchmark for treating the IPOB separatist agitators in the region. Understandably, the reference to the civil war angered the people in the region, leading to angry protests by them.

    Although the President was right that many of the separatist agitators were not born during the civil war, its use as a reference point for “treating” them was unpresidential. Indeed, the reference to the civil was unnecessary. Buhari cannot be excused by attributing the tweet to his social media handlers. They merely transcribed what the President said and put the text and the video on Twitter.

    True, it is more or less second nature for the powerful in Nigeria to threaten subordinates and the less powerful, Buhari’s threatening tweet is utterly insensitive of the lingering scar of the civil war on the Igbo psyche. It also adds a painful gloss to their feeling of marginalization by the Buhari administration. Their protest against the tweet is clearly understandable.

    Equally understandable is Twitter’s immediate decision to delete the tweet and the video for violating its “safety rules”, which frown at violence, threats, harassment, hateful conduct, and child sexual exploitation, among others.

    Buhari’s tweet was not the first to be taken down by the platform for threatening others, or for abetting violence. Former US President Donald Trump’s tweet was not only deleted twice for this reason, his account was permanently suspended after the second deletion. Although he had lost reelection, he was still in office when all this happened.

    It was not only physical violence that violated Twitter’s safety rules. Symbolic violence is also frowned upon. That’s why the tweets by President Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, Nicola Maduro of Venezuela, and Iran’s leader, Ayatollah Khomeini, were also deleted, either for promoting ineffective drugs to cure COVID-19  (Bolsonaro and Maduro) or for denigrating vaccines that have been proven to be effective against the virus (Ayatollah). Twitter’s reading of their tweets led the platform authorities to believe that the unhelpful messages from these leaders could, and in fact did, put millions of people in danger as the coronavirus ravaged their countries.

    Buhari’s reaction to the deletion of his tweet, by banning Twitter completely from Nigeria, is yet another instance of his slip into authoritarianism. The ignominious action puts him in the company of authoritarian leaders, who have taken the same action or built firewalls for surveilling users of digital media in their countries and even beyond. They include the leaders of China, Russia, North Korea, Turkey, Vietnam, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirate, and Iran. Notwithstanding the pretend elections in some of these countries, none of them is a democracy. Rather, they are the hotbed of digital authoritarianism.

    No wonder then that leaders of major democracies have appealed to Buhari to lift the ban on Twitter. They see the platform as a vehicle for freedom of expression, which is central to the nurturing of democracies throughout the world. Neither these leaders nor Nigerians for that matter would like to see Buhari slip into the authoritarian days of military dictatorship when, as Head of State, he issued Decree No 4 to inoculate his government against the free press.

    Also regrettable is the Nigerian government’s excuse for banning Twitter, when everyone knew that it was no more than a knee-jerk reaction to the deletion of the President’s tweet. Why not ban Twitter much earlier? Blaming the platform for “activities that are capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence” flies foul. It is laughable in the face of persistent insecurity, political corruption, out-of-control borrowings, educational decline, and infrastructure decay. If all these problems were addressed, there would be little or no activity online for the government to complain about.

    The difference between the “activities” on these platforms and the President’s action is that the President has all the power to muster followers and all security agencies to enforce his threat. The world witnessed the influence of presidential power in the United States in January 2021, when Trump’s followers stormed the US Capitol to prevent legislators from certifying the election that he had lost. However, because of the strength of American institutions, Trump’s tactic failed and the insurrectionists have been rounded up and charged.

    The irony about Buhari’s Twitter ban is that it was his administration that actually popularised the platform in Nigeria in recent years just as Trump did in the United States. All members of Buhari’s cabinet have Twitter handles. So do Governors, Commissioners, and legislators in national and state assemblies. It had become the major platform for sharing information with the public and getting the people’s feedback. The Nigerian Center for Disease Control has been using it to great effect in providing updates about COVID-19. In this sense, Twitter is like a prescription drug, which has side effects. You continue to take it because it is beneficial to your recovery. You have to tolerate the side effects.

    The bottomline really is that the Twitter story has created an unnecessary distraction, by allowing the government to focus on illegitimate agitators, who are advocating secession, at the expense of legitimate agitators, who are advocating restructuring. The separatists want change through violent means, while the restructurenists want change through constitutional means. Buhari’s tweet indicates that he wants to meet separatist agitators with violence but he cares less about the agitation for restructuring the country. Yet, one of the major goals of restructuring is to avoid continued separatist agitations.

    At the end of the day, Buhari’s Twitter ban is a serious mistake. If the goal is to prevent a certain group from using the platform for communication, it will move to another platform. In the meantime, Twitter’s useful service to his administration would have been lost. And the security problems will sadly persist.

  • When Buhari came for Twitter

    When Buhari came for Twitter

    By Festus Eriye

    Birds of a feather flock together. Last Friday, Nigeria joined the likes of China, North Korea, Myanmar, Iran, Turkmenistan and Turkey in blocking Twitter.

    One thing common to these countries is repression and denial of citizens’ rights to freely express themselves or exhibit dissent.

    In Myanmar, for instance, Twitter was blocked following widespread resistance to the February military coup that toppled the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.

    It’s important to note that of 195 nations in the world today, just eight have taken this sort of action. It’s sad that a government that advertises itself as ‘progressive’ is the one behind this retrogressive move.

    Much has been said about what the country loses daily while the ban subsists. But just as important is the danger posed to constitutionally guaranteed rights.

    The immediate background to this saga is the deletion of President Muhammadu Buhari’s tweet where he threatened to deal with separatist groups “in a language they understand.” This was widely interpreted to be a reference to the Nigerian civil war of the late 60s.

    A day after Twitter took down the post claiming it violated the platform’s rules, the hammer came down. Would government have acted out of the blues had the tweet not been deleted? I doubt it.

    The president’s spokesman, Garba Shehu, has since stated that the sanction wasn’t just about Buhari’s tweet. He said the site had become a major channel for spreading misinformation and fake news and a threat to Nigeria’s corporate existence.

    In reality, Twitter is just a microcosm of the internet which is itself an ocean of misinformation and fake news. So why not go the whole hog and ban the internet because it harbours things that are untrue or is abused by people whose intentions are malevolent?

    Threats to national security and corporate existence cannot be limited to the activities of Nnamdi Kanu and his Independent Peoples of Biafra (IPOB) in the Southeast or the #EndSARS episode. The net must be spread to include the reign of bandits in the Northwest, the Islamist insurgency in the Northeast, killer herdsmen who have left their bloody imprint from Benue to Ibarapa and the legion of kidnappers who have blanketed our landscape.

    Are we now blaming Twitter alone for all these evils that have overtaken our land?

    In desperate defence of the government some argue that Nigerians may have a right to tweet, but no freedom is absolute. However, in making that argument they unfairly convict all 40 million Twitter users in the country of abusing the platform to undermine national security.

    There are millions of small business owners, corporate organisations and government institutions all using the platform for positive ends. Within Aso Rock there are prolific tweeters who joyfully deployed the app to fight Buhari’s critics and other ‘enemies of state.’

    Why should millions of innocent individuals and organisations be punished unjustly and stripped of their rights because of the sins of Kanu and #EndSARS promoters?

    One big challenge with this ban is that a law or order you cannot enforce doesn’t qualify to be so called. In this instance there’s no specific legislation outlawing tweeting in Nigeria. There’s no Executive Order to that effect. Laws in this country are still made by the National Assembly, not the Presidency.

    That didn’t stop Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, from threatening to arrest and prosecute users of Twitter. But he’s about to discover that through the ages whenever people are confronted with unjust orders or laws they resort to civil disobedience.

    Prominent Nigerians, anonymous ones, civil society activists and organisations, are openly defying him and tweeting. He has two options: one is to arrest people for using Twitter and worsen the government’s PR mess. The other is to do nothing – realising there aren’t enough jail houses to accommodate the dissidents in their numbers. Nothing is more embarrassing than when a government is made to look toothless.

    There are also those who have emotionally argued that deleting Buhari’s tweet was somehow an insult to Nigeria. I disagree. Twitter is a private company with terms and conditions for using its platform. Our president doesn’t have to own an account on the site. This wasn’t a bilateral arrangement between two sovereign nations. He walked in with his eyes open and subjected himself to the imperfect judgment of Twitter administrators.

    Let’s not forget that this same organisation shut down former US President Donald Trump’s handle. He didn’t jail the company’s executives for their action, neither did Americans moan about some supposed slight to their great leader.

    This whole episode is damaging for the president because it stirs up all the old stereotypes about his past as a military ruler who took an axe to civil liberties.

    It is equally damaging for the country. A nation that should be Africa’s democratic example by expanding freedoms has chosen the bad company of those who would limit them.

    Little wonder that Twitter chose to site its Africa headquarters in Ghana despite Nigeria’s massive market and potential. Imagine if that facility had been located here at this time!

    Imagine how the ban is presently playing before investors looking to place their resources somewhere on the continent. Imagine how much this helps when we make our next arms buying pitch to the same Western countries that have denounced the ban as undemocratic.

    If the government were truly concerned about fighting misinformation the worst thing they could have done was to take down Twitter. The speed at which a naughty tweet goes out is the same speed at which a fact checking post neutralises it.

    Love it or hate it there are very few platforms in the world today with the instant communication power of Twitter. What a shame that the government has ignored all its positives and thrown the baby out with the bath water.

    For a regime run by politicians this administration has exhibited an incredible talent for alienating its support and acquiring enemies. The day before the ban there were millions of apolitical Nigerians who were largely indifferent to it; today they are furious that a part of their lives has been snatched away for less than convincing reasons.

    But it isn’t too late for the government to craft a face-saving exit from the mess it has created.

    At a time when it should be focusing on insecurity and economic challenges confronting the country, every day spent on this nonsense is a wasted opportunity.

  • Reserves, recruitment, ‘just’ constitution

    By Tony Marinho

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 3,740,000 among 17,400,000 diagnosed cases and 1.6+b vaccines worldwide. Nigerian cases approaching 167,200 and 2,120 deaths with 2.0m+ vaccine doses. Get your second dose!

    Over 81 Nigerians drown needlessly in Kebbi out of 160+. Overcrowding? No compulsory life jackets worn? Shameful negligence by captain and authorities!

    It is difficult pretending to our children that in the avalanche of warlike violence, murder and mayhem, kidnappings, road robberies etc. there is a bright immediate and distant future for Nigeria’s 80-50m youth inhabitants even if the elders are cannon fodder. Getting children to and from school or NYSC callup or for a job interview is dangerous. In our own Nigeria?

    Certainly, we had a sweet 1960’s dream turned sour by political machination and now a Breaking News running nightmare film with graves of thousands upon thousands of needless, unrequited dead.

    With an estimated 75-100,000 deaths and 5+million Internally Displaced Persons, more recently. About 120+ killed in Burkina Faso impact Nigeria’s future from regional instability. Nigeria’s armed forces are still recruiting too few Nigerians to fight and garrison the attacked communities and roads on our fluid front line. Nigeria needs to recall our seasoned Armed Forces Reserves.

    Nigeria requires a million personnel, even with drone technology to impact the enemy. They can easily be paid for by senate either suspending or sacrificing itself or Community Development Projects in the national interest. Nigeria needs soldiers not senators.

    The Americans have come to train as we sack over 30 Major Generals??? Their job appears to emphasise water training. I thought our main enemies were land-based ISIS-WA and Boko Haram, some herders and ‘bandits’ who, lacking ideology, cannot be dialogued with as they always exterminate their chosen ‘enemy’ – even unborn babies, school and tertiary students. The Niger Delta militants and IPOB, land and water based, can be dialogued with by achieving the inclusive good governance practicing ‘Justice and Equity’ to get ‘Peace’ and ‘Constitutional Changes’ refused since 1999.

    We need a ‘General Call Up and Mobilisation’ and commandos to defend our roads and communities. Will every city become Maiduguri? Nigeria faces too many one-sided firefights, most recently in Kebbi where 88-100 were murdered and a vicious attack in Igangan, Oyo State. Fire and brimstone everywhere.

    Nigeria also lost a widely known Christian evangelist TB Joshua, suddenly at age 57. May he RIPP, Amen.

    Nigeria would have been better placed if the constitution had been written and signed by ‘Peace and Justice Reign’ and ‘Faithful, Loyal and Honest’ people glorifying unjust selfish sectional interests.  We were given it at gunpoint without demanding a clause for referendum. ‘We the people’ exited dictatorship with a constitution that perpetuated injustice and one ethnic agenda over all others.

    Since before the civil war, Nigeria and the citizens of Nigeria have been annexed by the powerful military class and then milito-politicians and their proxies. But the miracle of the country’s survival is solely because the rest of us were left alone to struggle against all the demons of an underperforming government at all levels. Hence each family became its own LGA and excelled in a survival strategy called ‘I de manage’ i.e., coping with adversity and disaster and lack of expectation of good governance. Not satisfied with our survival our farms mysteriously became targets for a massive cow invasion with crops for lunch and slash and burn techniques, taught not incidental.

    But as with almost every anti-humanity ambition it need never have happened. There is still enough in Nigeria for all and more. It is the distribution, the greed and the corruption and selfish ethnic agendas that are problematic. History tells us that all human dynasties arose and fell on arrogance and greed where peace would have been gain and a long reign and no reactionary rebellion. Is this why they abolished history? Greedy unjust leaders die in the rubble of their once great cities. Imagine the wealth and the millions of houses torched by wars since forever. Imagine if they had never been destroyed but allowed to grow in peaceful commerce. Imagine if no one had ever been legally murdered in war. The world has had 110-117b humans of whom estimated 1-2% died from war, but some cities and countries lost 100% of their citizenry. Would ‘Peace and Justice’ not have been better?

    The constitutional review, amendment or whatever is a recurring expense jamboree joke on Nigerians, full of sound and fury, with serious Fellow Nigerian citizens, not greedy but wanting justice and equity, providing easy answers to Nigeria’s complicated questions. But the repeated exercises signified nothing as the glaringly just solutions have been rubbished by entrenched powers wrongly benefiting from an unjust federal character and a federation only in name.

    Since 1999 we call for: A 75% reduction in governance costs by cutting ‘Salaries and Perks’, SAPing us dry with politicians taking service far more sacrificially. States should pay for their representatives sent to NASS. We recommend a ‘Referendum Clause’. We recommend a single house preferably representatives and cancellation of most of immunity clause. We recommend respect for the Diaspora funds inflow by approval of e-voting for diaspora and locally. We recommend a looser just 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’.

     

  • Greenfield; RIP Nathaniel Oyelola

    Tony Marinho

     

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 3,520,000 among 169,200,000 diagnosed cases and 1.6+b vaccines worldwide. Nigerian cases approaching 167,000 and 2,075 deaths with 2.0m+ vaccine doses. The second dose begins. Get yours!

    Greenfield students freed for N180m! But Greenfield youth blood was viciously shed and some are dead. By what right do murderers commit this wrong? Is this ‘murderous musical chairs’ as two killed, 200 students taken in Tegina, Niger State. The taking of life is not taking a husband or wife? Many have died for being in the right place, their homes, farms, schools, and communities, but at the wrong time – the invasion of farms and communities to destroy hard work and human food crops in a vicious ‘slash and burn’ strategy.

    Where is the peace? Where is this destruction pushing us? Are we not being cornered and baited to react to give credibility to counter overreaction? The dead shout deafeningly in the silence of their unmarked graves – each one with an unsung, heart-written name never to be forgotten even if not written. America celebrates Memorial Day replicated worldwide. We have our, often unkempt, war memorials and too few ‘honour monuments’ to exploding civilian murderous casualties. In the past, one was likely to die violently on our terrifying roads from reckless driving, treacherous – secretly dug- or maintenance-abandoned potholes, fallen/exploding petrol tankers and high-handed ‘accidental discharge’ police checkpoints. Recently, we died in violence, murdered while defending our farms and homes rather than quietly of ‘natural causes’ in our beds at 70+. No timespan or quantity of bloodshed will make ‘Violence’ acceptable as a ‘Natural Cause’ of death.

    It is becoming rare to see Nigerians transit in peaceful great old age. Such role models need studying. One such highly respected person to achieve this personal milestone was Pa Nathaniel Olufemi Oyelola buried last week. To achieve the age of 92 years sings a beautiful song of a life very well spent, in reasonably good health and a wonderful family support system to provide healthcare and personal mental needs to survive the roller-coaster years of surprises -often unpleasant. What has he not seen? Such surprises include political surprises with all forms of governance and mis-governance imaginable and unimaginable, and economic surprises with the decimation of the country’s currency from pre-independence holed West African penny coins strung together with string to an honoured naira, negligently pauperises over a lifetime from $1.5:N1 to today’s $1:N495. Complete the surprises with recalling the peculiarly malicious and governmentally irresponsible non-payment of pension shattering old age financial stability plans and damaging personal integrity and position in the home falling from the pedestal of breadwinner.

    Add the collapse of infrastructure particularly water and light, specialties of Papa, a distinguished engineer in the Western Region government who also became Director of Works providing such infrastructure to his constituency -the University College, Ibadan turned University of Ibadan where I studied in the 67-71s. We must add having to endure and become inured to the variable TLC-Tender Loving Care regimens.

    Beware, sometimes the elderly fall foul of ‘Tender Loathing Carelessness’ from cunningly deceptive carers. Care is a game of human roulette, Nigerian or Russian. For the older pensioners among us, to have to parade walking and then, as health fails, with walking stick, in wheelchair and worse, sometimes twice yearly for pension verification punishment-for-being-alive exercises is the most insultingly demeaning infliction on the aged. To be verified repeatedly by not-always careful, respectful infant civil servants with variable respect for elders is a bitter pill to swallow after a life of genuine old school service at any level.

    Having distinguished himself in Government College and the University College, Ibadan, Pa Nathaniel Oyelola trained abroad as an engineer. He worked most of his life where he had studied. He formed with ‘The Magnificent Seven’ a University College, Ibadan student club called the Pyrates Confraternity, aka National Association of Seadogs standing against the decadence prevailing at the time and requiring academic brilliance from its members, integrity, and a stand against discrimination on grounds of ethnicity or financial standing. This was reiterated by his widow Dr Pat Oyelola when she thanked the Pyrates Confraternity for its grand and solemn participation of in obsequies for Pa Nathaniel Oyelola. The Pyrates were led to the funeral by Professor Wole Soyinka who with Ralph Opara, Pius Oleghe, Ikpehare Aig-Imoukhuede, Nathaniel Oyelola- yes, Olumuyiwa Awe and Sylvanus Egbuche, established the Pyrates in 1952 in UCI.

    Imagine the exhilaration of the formative years of those great men and women in Nigeria’s chequered history. This was before the Machiavellian poisoning of the motives and modus operandi of such groups which led to cancellation of the Pyrate Confraternity’s undergraduate clubs and concentration on charity and graduate clubs.

    Appreciate the family led by Dr Mrs. Pat Oyelola, past vice and acting principal, International School, UI and attentive children, HPSM, a combined credit to their parents and established medical, aviation, architecture and educational professionals in the image and likeness of their genetic origins. Commiserations on your loss and Congratulations on your lineage and legacy!  May he Rest in Perfect Peace. Amen.

    Nigeria raises the bad and diminishes the good. No one can diminish the role model Pa Engineer Nathaniel Oyelola.

    How do we stop this rampage across Nigeria so we can all leave life’s unpredictable stage dying simply respected and loved ‘Grandpa and Grandma’ in great old age- the birth prayer for every baby?

     

  • The agitators

    The agitators

    By  Niyi Akinnaso

     

    It has become central to Nigeria’s political tradition that disagreements, group demands, spiritual supplications, and even prophesies multiply as the presidential election draws near. Although the election is still about two years away, several factors have converged to make this political tradition rather toxic this time around. The undercurrents are brewing that the election may be disrupted because of a convergence of negative factors: (1) Growing insecurity (marked by Boko Haram insurgency, banditry, rustling, herdsmen-farmers clashes, kidnapping and robberies); (2) the coronavirus pandemic; (3) weak governance; and (4) economic decline, resulting partly from the economic effects of the pandemic, partly from pervasive corruption, and partly from poor implementation of government’s economic policies. This has resulted in rising inflation and rising costs of living.

    These developments have led to serious social, political, and economic consequences. On the international stage, Nigeria ranks very low (in the bottom pile) on ALL recent international indices (Corruption Perception Index; The Poverty Index; Global Terrorism Index; Human Development Index; Chandler Good Governance Index; and Fragile States Index).

    At the domestic level, unemployment has soared and many more citizens have joined the band of the poor, making Nigeria the twin capital of youth unemployment and poverty. Hunger and anger combine to push many a youth to crime, while persistent insecurity, lopsided appointments by the President, and his uncharitable aloofness to pressing national problems have pushed many citizens to advocate alternative paths to self-fulfillment or self-determination.

    Accordingly, two main groups of agitators have emerged. On the one hand, there are agitators who want Nigeria restructured through legitimate means, by calling for the modification of the existing constitution, the development of a new constitution, or reversal to the 1963 constitution. What will the reconstituted country look like? Should the four regions of old or the present six geopolitical zones constitute the federating units? Or should the present 36 states stand? These are the various options on the table.

    The ultimate objective of the restructurenists is to ensure that the federating units have more powers and more resources, including the control of the police and local governments in their territories in order to better secure the lives and livelihoods of local populations. Essentially, they are calling for true federalism, involving the devolution and decentralization of powers, resource control, and a revenue sharing formula that favors the federating units, rather than make them dependent for survival on a center often unresponsive to local problems. Will their aspirations be met? How soon and by what means? These remain open questions. Whatever the outcome might be, the vast majority of Nigerians, including most Governors support the agitation for restructuring the country. Following the boost given to the agitation by the 17 Southwest Governors across party lines and heavy-weight political leaders in the region, many more Governors from other parts of the country have joined in.

    On the other hand, however, there are agitators who are advocating the breakup of Nigeria so they could go their own separate ways. They’ve grown so tired of the futile calls for restructuring that they want to restructure the country on their own terms, by creating nations of their own. These separatists have lost faith in the contraption called Nigeria and they are in a hurry to leave. There are currently two such separatist movements-the Indigenous People of Biafra in the Southeast and, more recently, the Ilana Omo Oodua in the Southwest.

    However, both separatist groups are roundly rejected by the governments in their respective states.  They are and remain non-state actors. How will they leave Nigeria? Will Nigeria allow them to go? If they unilaterally declare independence, are they ready to face the consequences? Are they aware of what happened to Catalan separatist leaders in Spain?

    While international observers acknowledge the seriousness of these developments, they are not in agreement on their implications for the status or future of the Nigerian state. This disagreement is best illustrated by two recent articles on Nigeria, one by Robert Rotberg and John Campbell, published in Foreign Policy (May 27, 2021), and the other by Fola Aina and Nic Cheeseman, published in Foreign Affairs (May 5, 2021), in reaction to Campbell’s book, Nigeria and the Nation-State, published last December. The May 27 article makes basically the same argument as the book.

    While Rotberg and Campbell see a failed state, Aina and Cheeseman called for caution against “doomsayers”. The latter anchor their caution on Nigeria’s resilience and what they call “more inclusive and sustainable” political system.

    Aina and Cheeseman are right about Nigeria’s resilience. However, what they see as more inclusive and sustainable political system is more of a mirage than the lived realities of Nigerians on the ground. To be sure, there are policies and principles aimed at greater inclusiveness, such as the Federal Character Principle enshrined in the constitution. But such policies are observed more in the breach than in implementation. Only recently, Southwest Governors had to call on the President to federalize key appointments as required by the constitution.

    True, Campbell had sounded the alarm before as election approached, but the situation was never this dire. This time around, he is pretty close to how Nigerians at home and abroad feel about their country today. It is difficult to reach any other conclusion from the combined whammy of negative factors and unfavourable international assessments highlighted above. They place Nigeria squarely in the “Failed” category, when evaluated along the theoretical dimension of Strong-Weak-Failed-Collapsed states. The data simply do not fit anywhere else.

    Interestingly, Aina and Cheeseman are concerned that categorising Nigeria as a failed state “can be used to justify the imposition of external solutions-for example, foreign state-building efforts that emphasize militarized solutions at the expense of socioeconomic and environmental ones”. But it is important not to deceive the Nigerian government about the current situation of the country.  Complacency could move the country from the Failed to the Collapsed category.

    It is worth emphasizing that things have never been this bad in Nigeria. Not even during the civil war (July 6, 1967 to January 15, 1970) was the entire country gripped by the current degree and varieties of persistent insecurity and economic strain. If Buhari’s term were to end today, he would have left Nigeria in much worse shape than when he assumed power. Unless he wants that to be his legacy, he must act now to restructure the country. He must also ensure that the separatists do not disrupt the 2023 election as they have boasted.

     

  • Buhari and the Southern governors

    Buhari and the Southern governors

    By Festus Eriye

    After Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, dismissed the Southern governors resolution banning open grazing in their states, President Muhammadu Buhari’s position on the matter became all too predictable.

    The only surprise is he didn’t double down on the vehicle spare parts analogy, preferring to wrap his opposition in the garb of constitutionality. The ban, he said, in the statement by his spokesman Garba Shehu was of “questionable legality.”

    Thankfully, the president, however grand and lofty his office, isn’t the court. He is entitled to hold an opinion and we’ll see about legality and constitutionality when the judiciary weighs in.

    Following their Asaba summit, the governors announced they intended to visit the president to push their proposals. But on the strength of the statement bluntly rejecting the grazing ban, such a parley has become moot.

    Still, I am stunned that the president could so casually dismiss the consensus of half the country over which he presides – if you add Benue that makes 18 out of 36 states – choosing the ‘my way or the highway’ approach.

    Whether out of shock or anger, Ondo State Governor Rotimi Akeredolu who chairs the Southern Governors Forum has released a statement questioning whether Shehu actually spoke for Buhari or some other unnamed interests.

    But that’s irrelevant because the president hasn’t come out to disown his spokesman on the grazing ban statement or any other such release ever. It’s inconceivable that such a position would be ventilated without authorisation by his principal.

    However, there are fundamental questions arising from Buhari’s comments. Just like his top law officer, he presents this matter as being mainly about the rights of herders to carry on their business in any part of the country.

    Such attempts at making the governors’ action seem like a causeless effort to abridge the constitutional rights of some Nigerians is dishonest.

    It is also insensitive because it fails to admit that in exercising their rights they trample on the rights of people who just want to go their farms in peace and meet their investments intact.

    There are well-documented cases linking herders to crimes like rape, kidnappings and murder. Recently, former Minister for Agriculture and chairman of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) admitted their involvement in the violence, but blamed thousands of foreigners who cross our borders unhindered for the bulk of the atrocities.

    Driving the violence is their sense of entitlement that they have right to enter a total stranger’s farmland and let their cattle run riot over his crops without consequences.

    A few years ago, no less a personality than Chief Olu Falae, former Secretary to the Government of the Federation and one-time presidential candidate, suffered the humiliation of being taken captive by herders. He recounted how year after year they would invade his farm and set acres of palm trees on fire. His protestations were often met with threats of physical harm being done to him.

    Such tales through the years never provoke empathy towards those who suffer losses as a result of the excesses of the pastoralists, instead we’re constantly assailed with blind, one-sided justifications for perpetuation of an outmoded practice.

    It is amusing to hear the president talk about how the problem between herdsmen and farmers has been with us for ages. Is he arguing that crime and injustice be allowed to continue just because they have been with us for long?

    Buhari dismissed the governors’ ban as offering “no solution” and yet this very idea is growing on many north and south of the country. Indeed, it would be very wrong to think opposition to the open grazing ban is unanimous in the north.

    Many governors, prominent individuals and groups like the Northern Elders Forum (NEF) have come out to embrace it, acknowledging that the anachronistic practice of marching cattle for hundreds of miles had become a lightning rod for conflict in the face of development and exploding populations.

    The ban isn’t even a new or original initiative of Southern governors, neither is it correct to cast it in terms of a power show by one region against the other. In fact, a constitutionally recognised body had prepared the template the governors reiterated.

    Back in April 26, 2018, a meeting of the National Economic Council (NEC) presided over by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo approved the recommendation of its sub-committee that open grazing of cattle be banned across the country.

    The three-man sub-committee on herdsmen/farmers clashes constituted by the government in February 2018 was headed by Ebonyi State Governor, David Umahi.

    It was specifically mandated to unravel the causes of clashes and dialogue with relevant stakeholders to end the killings of innocent citizens.

    Other members of the sub-committee were Governors Simon Lalong (Plateau), Samuel Ortom (Benue), Darius Ishaku (Taraba), and Bindow Jubrilla (Adamawa).

    So this was clearly a “solution” that was approved by NEC in clear contradiction of the Buhari statement which dismissed the Asaba resolution as offering “no solution.”

    On the contrary, what the Presidency has been pushing in terms or ranching, RUGA or by whatever name called, doesn’t offer an immediate response to ongoing, pervasive criminality and bloodletting that has frightened many off their farms in large swathes of the country.

    It doesn’t address the fears of people that their ancestral lands could be cleverly taken from them through these so-called RUGA initiatives given historical precedents. In the face of fierce opposition in the South is it any wonder that governors were falling over themselves to deny they had made land available for such businesses?

    The fear is deep-seated and one press statement isn’t going to dispel it, not when many feel – rightly and or wrongly – that the president isn’t impartial on the matter.

    It’s good that the Buhari raises legal questions about the ban. He cannot stop states from making laws for the safety of their people and if the open grazing ban becomes one such legislation so be it. After all, Justice Ifeoma Ojukwu of the Federal High Court, Abuja last week affirmed the right of states to implement such laws. The best he and Malami can do is challenge such acts at the appropriate courts and hope they would be struck down.

    The maiming and pillaging going on in most governors’ domains is mindboggling. They can’t just sit back helplessly while Buhari takes his sweet old time to address the problem – just because it’s something that predates the Amalgamation.

  • In search of a viable path to restructuring

    In search of a viable path to restructuring

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    Throughout human history, calls for the reorganization of the polity have taken various forms. In many cases, the agitations for reorganization are framed in terms of demands for certain concessions, certain rights, and the ability to do certain things within the agitators’ geographical space. In federal systems, such demands are couched in terms of devolution of powers to the federating units. The goal is to strengthen the federating units so they could exercise greater control over their own destiny, including managing their own resources, controlling their own police, and depending less and less on the central government, except for certain activities, such as national defence and foreign affairs.

    In more extreme cases, the demands take the form of separatist agitation by which the agitators seek to constitute an autonomous entity. This is often a last resort by minorities locked in pluralist states, who feel cheated or neglected, such as Catalans in Spain;  Moros in the Philippines; Tamils in Sri Lanka; and the Igbo and Ijaw in Nigeria. Such separatist agitations often result from failure by the central government to take the calls for reorganization seriously enough in the first place.

    However the agitation is expressed, it is often rooted in people’s experiences or fears of marginalization, oppression, cheating, or deprivation of access to desirable political goods, especially goods to which they feel entitled.

    Both restructuring and separatist agitations are going on simultaneously in Nigeria today, against the backdrop of lingering social, political, and economic problems. Youth unemployment is at an all time high. So is the poverty index. Inflation is rising. So is the cost of living. The education and healthcare industries are in disarray. There is more decay than repair in infrastructure (roads, bridges, public buildings, water and power supply).

    The agitations are exacerbated by rampant insecurity, the scale of which the nation has never experienced. Boko Haram is pummelling the Northeast. Bandits are maiming and killing in the Northwest. Fulani herders are rampaging farmlands and whole villages in other parts of the country. Everybody is feeling the heat. Farmers are afraid to go to their farms. Prowling kidnappers and armed robbers have made highways unsafe for travellers. Workers are scared to commute to work. People feel unsafe even in their own homes.

    It has become apparent that the federal government alone cannot solve these problems. Yet, the states have neither the powers not the resources to act.

    It is within the above contexts that the Governors of the 17 Southern states came together recently to agree on the way forward, echoing popular demands by their respective constituents. They issued a communique in which they agreed on 12 key issues, including (1) the decision to ban open grazing of cattle in any of their states, being the source of agony and low agricultural productivity in their states; (2) the call to the Federal Government to review appointments to Federal agencies in line with the Federal Character principle; and, most importantly, (3) the need to restructure the country in order to achieve true federalism, including the devolution of powers, the establishment of state police, and the review of the revenue allocation formula in favour of the federating units.

    This last issue on restructuring really is the main focus of the Governors’ recommendations. Others are supportive political or diplomatic additions.

    Not unexpectedly, the opposition to their recommendations has come largely from the North, including a jaundiced statement credited to the presidency; an uninformed reading of the constitution by Attorney General Abubakar Malami; and the questioning by some Northern politicians of the audacity of the Southern Governors to speak on behalf of their own people.

    While attacking the position of the Southern Governors, none of the Northern critics offered alternative solutions to the national problems highlighted by the Governors. Columnists, who castigated the Southern Governors, either for offering well known solutions or for not going far enough, missed the symbolism of a joint position on 12 issues by 17 of the country’s 36 state Governors from three different political parties (9 PDP, 7 APC, 1 APGA), representing three of the country’s six geopolitical zones and about half of the country’s population.

    It is reasonable, however, to ask of the Southern Governors, What next? There are several additional steps they must take. First, they must all speak henceforth with one voice on the issues they agreed on, both in public and in private. They have so far done so, and they must continue.

    Second, They must mobilize their constituents-monarchs, religious leaders, opinion leaders, party leaders, and sociocultural organizations to sing the same song with them. Again, fortunately, Afenifere, Ohaneze, and APC leaders in the Southwest have thrown in their support.

    Third, it is particularly necessary for all their House Assembly members as well as their representatives at the National Assembly to work arduously on their agenda. In particular, the states should follow the lead of Ebonyi, Ekiti, Ondo, and Oyo in passing anti-grazing laws in order to provide necessary constitutional backing for their declaration.

    Fourth, the Southern Governors must work with their representatives in the NASS to pursue their agenda for whatever it is worth, should any of them ever come to the floor of either chamber. For whatever it is worth, the Governors jointly should prepare memoranda on relevant items on their agenda that each of them will submit to the Constitution Review Committee of the NASS, when it sits in their zone.

    In pursuance of this objective, they should seek the support of like-minded Governors in the North, especially in the North-Central, to have their NASS members support the Southern Governors’ agenda. It is worth emphasizing that the 17 Southern states have as many as 51 Senators in a 109-member chamber. If they are unanimous in their voice, all they need to win on any bill is 5 additional Senators or more. Similarly, they have 169 members in a 360-member House of Representatives. They need additional 12 members or more to win.

    There are, however, reasons to doubt the usefulness of additional national dialogue as suggested by the Governors. The nation’s recent history shows that the government has never acted on the resolutions of previous dialogues, not even the ones organized by the political party in power.

    What is needed is an engineered path to restructuring, the like of which the Southern Governors have initiated. They must stand by their resolution and continue to work out the details through necessary constitutional channels.