The Nation Newspaper

Category: Wednesday

  • Captive Youth: Go Ghana, Go!!

    By Tony Marinho

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 3,150,000 among 147,500,000 diagnosed cases and 1.002billion vaccines worldwide. Nigerian cases approaching 165,000 and 2,070 deaths with 1m+ doses given.

    The cold-blooded murder of our children – three of 18 kidnapped Greenfields University adds to the blood of souls kidnapped in educational institutions including the 35 youth from School of Forestry for 48 days added to the tragedy of Chibok, Dapchi, Kagara, Jangebe kidnappings. There are now millions of youth with PTSD, Post Traumatic [to others] Stress Disorder, cut off from education added to the five million IDPs poorly supplied with food. Students cannot study in violent circumstances. Fear fills Nigeria’s classroom.

    Attention Channels Television and others, please show better detailed maps of Nigerian states. Maps must be geographical educational. Good Nigerian LGA maps are used on Channels 400-418 and even 419[??Ha-ha].

    Why are we so economically down? Why has NASS not yet cut a kobo of its share of our money? That over-bloated N125b organ thrives while the federal government emasculates medical doctors of their house job internationally accepted pay.

    Know that Nigeria is gravely ill and in an ‘I can’t breathe’ situation as regards electricity, economic, education, security, productive job growth and even intelligent traffic solutions which increasing traffic attacks and okada motorcycle mayhem. Why? Electricity because of its low, less than 6,000Mw provision, and its high wicked tariffs and criminal ‘guesstimated bills’! Economic with its less than $50b-75b foreign reserves minimum to reverse the ‘toiletpaperisation’ of the naira. Security because there is no safe place anymore. We cannot protect our children. Every parent is terrified.

    ‘No to restructuring’ proponents must look at Ghana. Let us congratulate Ghana, senior by three years of independence since 1957, Ghana more companies and organisations see it as a safe, secure, EODB- ‘Ease of Doing Business’ hub. The latest are Hyundai and Kia planning assembly plants by end of 2022. Remember Nigeria has failed to complete a simple 110Km road, miscalled the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, in 15 years and moved the goal post again to end 2022, perhaps!! Remember that the Long Bridge section of the road is almost permanently under murderous night siege by ‘under the bridge’ killers with no effort to erect a permanent army camp under the bridge or securing the area with barbed wire and other obstacles. Not nuclear physics, just I-love- My-People’s Security 1-0-1! These murderers have killed or attacked anyone with arrogance. So why will international business and international bodies not go elsewhere -to Ghana for example.

    PS in case you think Ghana is a mistake or a blip, know that the other motor assembly companies already in Ghana are Toyota-Suzuki, Nissan, Kantanka Volkswagen and Sinotruck under Ghana’s Auto Development Program employing 3,600 assembly and 6,6600 manufacturing and millions of market people servicing them with supporting food, transport, housing, education and commercial jobs. Tell that to those against restructuring before they preside over an empty dead country.

    What has Ghana got that we have lost? Time was that the size of Nigerian market mattered when Dunlop, Land Rover, Peugeot, Volkswagen, Exide and a thousand other companies provided millions of jobs. Then we had the population, some degree of efficiency and manageable corruption until stagnated, backward and pedestrian ethnic advantage/disadvantage ancient not modern IT policies with the ‘Corruption Cancer’, smothering everything. This created administrative corruption bottlenecks, bad roads which all paralysed imports and exports, strangled and clogged the roads and port, and contaminated the goods and human passport/visa travel industry.

    It was not overnight but 50 years of mismanagement of the company called Corporate Nigeria that has led us to this failure. Yes, we see trains everywhere! Good but not good enough! It affected Ghana in the past but Ghanaians solved their main problem -poor leadership failure. Ghana put the fear of public execution into the future leadership. They then climbed out of the abyss of corruption and incompetence led by late Jerry John Rawlings and because Nigeria stagnated, Ghana overtook Nigeria on the road to creating a ‘DFE-Developmentally Friendly Environment’. We saw it coming and did nothing to improve. Go, Ghana Go!

    Nigeria’s genuine 1960s boast of ‘Giant of Africa’ was correct then but zero to poor leadership make it correct today only in our population size with no patriotic leadership for sustainability and warlike ‘Execution of Giant Developmental Visions’. Business needs a big market, yes, but also peace, security, affordable power and professionalism to kill corruption at Nigeria’s ports to allow business and pleasure to breathe freely. In tearful irony we ask leaders ‘Can Nigeria catch up with Ghana?’ If not, we will be a recipient of other countries’ finished goods- a new colony. When we allowed CINS -Corruption, Incompetence, Negligence and Selfishness in, mediocrity paralysed our development plans and 1970s’ N1= $1.5 plunged to N410-485:$1. No politician cared! They just demanded or stole more naira!

    Our youth need help. Oyo State’s YERI, Youth Empowerment REWIND Initiative, tackles drug and jobless problem of ‘Youth Restiveness’. Governor Makinde in 2020 paid prize money to athletes owed since the 2018 National Sports Festival and paid new winners for 2021.  Oyo State’s governor is also supporting a young golfer’s clinic. All federal and state efforts must make a mighty ocean of positive care for Nigeria’s 50m youth a priority or we may all pay.

    A good Floyd murder verdict. But black officers are barred from seeing the convict. Behind closed doors is he being treated like a king?

  • The Pantami palava

    The Pantami palava

    By Festus Eriye

    Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, is in hot water over statements he made in the past that amounted to paeans to terror groups like Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.

    In one of the quotes from his teachings in the 2000s, Pantami declares: “We are all happy whenever unbelievers are being killed. But the Sharia does not allow us to kill them without a reason.”

    “Our zeal (hamasa) should not take precedence over our obedience to the sacred law.”

    Responding to questions about his views on Osama Bin Laden during a lecture about the Taliban, he said of the late Al Qaeda leader responsible for the attack on New York’s World Trade Centre that claimed over 3,000 lives in 2001: “I still consider him as a better Muslim than myself.”

    Leading to the comments becoming public, Pantami had reacted indignantly to the publication by a national newspaper of unverified claims that he was on some US terror watch list. But while he was threatening legal fire and brimstone, his vocal skeletons started tumbling out of the closet.

    Rather than tamping down the fire, his initial attempt to browbeat the newspaper snowballed into a raging inferno.

    Many have called for his resignation – arguing that anyone with such extreme views had no place in government.

    Sensing the crisis could consume him, Pantami dismounted inelegantly from his high horse to renounce the comments. He now says he’s changed his position and that he made the remarks as a young person. Unfortunately, some of these troubling statements were made in the 2000s – long after he had exited his teens.

    The minister claims to have changed his views, but we only have his words about this convenient repentance. Is this conversion genuine or a contrivance to save his skin and secure his high office?

    I suspect there may be more gems to be exposed from the complete works of the minister as scrutiny of his past positions intensifies.

    While critics turned up the heat on social media with #PantamiResign, his supporters and sympathisers circled the wagons with #PantamiWillStay. The duelling hashtags show how desensitized and un-shockable we have become.

    His backers want him let off the hook, arguing he has recanted. We all have our past, they argue.

    Everyone has a past but not all are in public office. If you have an interesting past, public office is the last place you want to be because it comes with scrutiny.

    The minister insists his views have evolved. Defending himself during his Ramadan tafsir session at the Annur Mosque in Abuja last weekend he gave examples of American leaders who changed their views on issues.

    “If we recall, President Joe Biden of the United States, then as a Senator in America, did not support the invasion of Afghanistan by his country,” he said.

    “And at that time, I also did not. So, anything that will lead to war is what I have always been against. That is why I don’t like injustice.”

    I hardly see the connection between the two cases. But while we’re at it, let’s talk about a recent American example of someone who paid a price for her verbal indiscretions. In early March, the White House dropped Neera Tanden as nominee to head the Office of Management and Budget after senators across party lines revolted over her past vicious criticisms of the legislators.

    Some are defending the minister based on ethnic or religious solidarity, without considering any moral principle. For them, those seeking Pantami’s resignation are anti-North or anti-Muslim. This is emotional blackmail that won’t wash.

    Read Also: Senate moves to cut cement prices

    This isn’t a North versus South or Christian versus Muslim thing, it’s a moral quandary. It’s about national security. If an individual confronted with these controversial statements and unanswered questions about his activities in the university can cling on selfishly without considering the damage to government and country, we must ask what horror you have to perpetrate in Nigeria to be held accountable.

    The revelation of Pantami’s views is a conundrum for Buhari’s government.

    For one thing, Nigeria has a serious problem with radical Islamists and terror groups who have turned the North into a tinder box and the Northeast, particularly, into a war zone.

    The transformation of the region into a fertile ground for extremist ideologies is the result of the unregulated activities of preachers who sowed radical ideas over several decades – everyone from Maitatsine in the 80s to Mohammed Yusuf with his Boko Haram in the 2000s.

    Some of these groups have been inspired by the activities of Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Today, the so-called Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) is making common cause with Boko Haram – devastating huge tracts of Nigeria territory.

    The conflict they brought has displaced and killed thousands over the years. No one can put a figure on the number of fellow Muslims that suicide bombers from these terror groups have killed in mosques across the North through the years.

    Even with an economy on crutches the government is spending billions prosecuting this war that doesn’t look like it will end any time soon.

    Despite the best efforts of the last three administrations there is evidence that saboteurs and collaborators from within the system have been providing oxygen for the insurgency. The government just announced the arrest of over 400 such collaborators said to be channelling funds to Boko Haram.

    Pantami is no ordinary Nigerian. He sits in the Federal Executive Council and is privy to government secrets and plans at the highest level. With the huge row that has broken out over his past, a cloud of suspicion would always hang around him for as long as he’s in public office.

    People have resigned for lesser reasons. Former Minister of Finance, Kemi Adeosun, did over her NYSC discharge certificate saga – just because she didn’t want to be a blot on the image of an administration that had integrity as its calling card. No one argued then that the bulk of her critics were Southerners.

    For as long as Pantami remains he will be a distraction. This was something Adeosun understood and she quit in the larger interest of the nation.

    Those encouraging him to cling on pretend he’s offering some service to the nation that only he can provide. Truth is no one is indispensable.

    He’s damaged goods politically. Every day he remains reflects badly on the administration and feeds the conspiracy theory mills. If the president decides not to dispense with his services, he only reinforces certain stereotypes about his government.

     

  • Generator Tax; Eastern Standard Gauge!

    By Tony Marinho

     

    Oyo State Please Cancel Murderous Business Generator Tax; Eastern Standard, not Narrow Gauge Rail Please!

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 3,100,000 among 142,000,000 diagnosed cases and 800+m vaccine shots given worldwide, Nigerian cases approaching 164,500 and 2,070 deaths with 1m+ doses given.

    In Oyo State, the business community and even hospitals  find themselves being strangely charged a new tax for the essential survival need to substitute for a government’s failure to provide 24/7 electric power -a  ‘Generator Gaseous Emission Charge [Tax]’, coated as an environmental charge. Are businesses responsible for shunning a perfectly good grid in favour of our generator use? Generators are a necessity for income generation not a luxury. No renewable source can power an office or hospital requirement for 10-20 air-conditioners, machinery, fridges, etc. The governor and government should please withdraw this tax, actually immoral in nature  and further made immoral by backdating it to two years and payable within 14 days  but typically delivered the day before expiry of the ‘period of grace’  a real disgrace! Governors, please protect your loving citizens and businesses.

    The evidence is overwhelming of a Nigerian history of maximum irresponsible politico-military governance manifest by the almost total negligent or deliberate refusal to implement anything continuously in brilliantly professionally conceived 5-10-20 year ‘Development Plans’. These were ignored in favour of deceptive Utopian futuristic ‘Visions’. Though articulated by heroic Nigerian professionals, they were destined to be totally ignored by those who commissioned them. The ‘visions’ were used to ‘photo-trick’ the eternally hopeful, intimidated, underserviced and desperately ‘hopelessly hopeful’ citizenry. A citizenry so in love with Nigeria that it suffered fools in office, hoping that the office would confer paternal wisdom and good works -an unfulfilled ‘citizen and country vision’ even in 2021.

    This massive Nigerian governance irresponsibility is measurable in failure to meet old United Nations Millennium Development Goals and now UN-Social Development Goals, Transparency International, and all other groups and resulted in Nigeria’s current government’s unflattering boast of ‘less than 6,000Mw electricity for 60 years of a hard-working 160million plus citizenry, free since 1960! A boast painful to the suffering citizenry! I question the currently bandied population figure. Just check the real and imagined voters and voters’ cards in any recent election and our pathological habit of inflating any figures for political, religious or ethnic advantage, since at least 1956 census as being about 30% above the actual population. Look at the purported number of foreigners believed to illegally NIN-registered. Were the computers taken across borders? Can anything honest and ‘good for all’ and truthful ever come of any counting in Nigeria – even numbers of dead at crime scenes?  In contrast to our free Nigerian state, the country we fought for against apartheid, South Africa, had been bequeathed 45,000Mw electricity for a 45m population by ‘hateful’ white supremacists. Should the British have given us more electric power pre-independence to compensate for our current inadequacies? Everyone in office in Nigeria is actually impotent or held hostage by the sectional power behind every throne. Certainly, almost all governors almost uniformly also failed to deliver at the local level -Ogbemudia, Jakande and perhaps Peter Obi and Zulum being examinable exceptions.

    Today each Nigerian requires an alternative power source, candles, rechargeable lights, solar or one of the estimated one million generators, from tiny ‘I fine pass my neighbour’ to giant generators. These, since around 1978, have polluted the air our pregnant women, children and babies’ breath, preparing for a life of environmental and social hardship. Add noise pollution and loss of billions of darkness-hours from school learning, sanity-inducing leisure and business-ease crashing national achievement level academically and in business costing trillions. Yes, the brilliant will be brilliant, overcoming even a pigsty-classroom and dark home environment. However, the average student and the majority are average, and would perform worse in a dark pigsty-class than dark home – too many obstacles to success.

    Can anyone explain why we did not 1999-2007 spectacularly tackle railways though I do know Obasanjo  commissioned the totally honest Engineer CSO Akande, former Head of Service to Western Region to redesign the railway system in Nigeria and the Canadians, the Americans, British, Indians and Japanese all offered railway improvements. Neither they nor the citizens won. Thankfully, though at what loans cost the Nigerian railways is coming awake? The slow pace caused grief to Nigeria’s millions. The railways were actually starved and then deactivated and actually destroyed for 40 years redirecting cargo movement business to lorry transport. This in turn destroyed the road and also the Apapa Port network. We have and are still paying that ‘negligence price’ even though there is welcome appreciable improvement, but still too slow.

    Fifty years post-Civil war, why is it the old narrow gauge 1.067m allocated to the Eastern Corridor and not the modern faster standard gauge 1.435m. What is good for the goose is good for the gander. Smoothen the curves, flatten the hills. Why robbing Peter to pay Paul.  The minister must summon ability to fight for equality of services to his own citizens in the Federal Executive Council? He should speed up trains for his people! The loans will be repaid from eastern oil money.

    True Nigerians SHOUT OUT …..

    NO DISCRIMINATION: ‘TRUE NIGERIANS want Eastern Corridor Standard Gauge!   

    A government which builds standard gauge for speed and foreigners ‘for free’ must know charity, ethnic equity and rail uniformity begin at home and must manifest in the Eastern Corridor!!

  • They are criminals too

    They are criminals too

    By Niyi Akinnaso

     

    “When you catch criminals, you always get Fulani among the group because of their lack of education, their ignorance and their poverty.”

     

    —Othman Ngelzarma, Secretary General of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, speaking at the Arewa Consultative Forum on Thursday, April 8, 2021

     

    Once you begin to explain why you hit someone in the face, you have already admitted that you committed the offense—that you, indeed, hit someone and that, possibly, it was not even in the face alone. Such was the case with the explanation offered for Fulani cattle herders’ criminality by the Secretary General of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, Othman Ngelzarma. Speaking at the Arewa Consultative Forum on Thursday, April 8, 2021, in his capacity as Secretary General of MACBAN, Ngelzarma must be deemed to have spoken for the Association.

    As such, this would be the first official admission by MACBAN that Fulani herdsmen are among the criminals, who have been plundering farmlands and committing various crimes, including rape, murder, and the kidnapping of their victims for ransom. This is very significant: Rather than obscure the truth by shifting all the blame on foreign herders (from Mali, Niger, or Chad) or on some uncategorized bandits, as some Northern leaders have been doing, Ngelzarma hit the nail on the head.

    Victims of the atrocities of Fulani herdsmen, who have been cowed into avoiding to name their assailants for who they are, can now feel free to call a spade a spade. They can now ignore the politicization of Fulani herdsmen’s atrocities by Fulani leaders and other politicians, who cry ethnic stereotyping whenever some Fulani herdsmen are pinpointed as criminals.

    Even presidential spokesperson, Garba Shehu, once warned against linking herdsmen’s atrocities with a particular ethnic group: “… to define crime from the nameplates … which group they belong to, the language they speak, their geographical location or their faith is atavistic and cruel … We need to delink terrorism and crimes from ethnicity, geographical origins and religion.” The question is: How do we catch and bring the criminals to book if we don’t know who they are, the language they speak, and where they come from?

    Shehu’s choice of words is fascinating, to say the least. Take the word “atavistic”, which invokes reversion to practices of an earlier period. If anything is atavistic about the topic at hand, it is the insistence of the Fulani on a nomadic way of life in this modern age, when other cattle-rearing nations have moved way beyond that practice, for example, to adopting ranching and employing hydroponic technology to grow grass from cereal to feed their livestock.

    Interestingly, MACBAN moved us closer to the modern age by suggesting that the pastoralists be settled in grazing reserves: “We have over 400 grazing reserves in the country but only three are in the Southwest – Oyo and Ogun. All the other grazing reserves are in the North. Put together, there are about five million hectares. If these can be utilised, it is enough to settle these … pastoralists.”

    This suggestion is not new. Northern Governors recently supported ranching as the way to go. Some of them, such as Governor Umar Ganduje of Kano, have actually embarked on ranching projects, while many others are still reluctant to do so, either because they lack the political will to move ahead or because they are waiting for assistance from the Federal Government.

    What is new in the MACBAN Secretary General’s suggestion is the need to settle pastoralists in one place in order to educate them. This is a direct acknowledgement of the pastoralists’ lack of education as well as the failure and rejection of nomadic education in meeting their educational needs.

    The question about Federal Government assistance to livestock farmers generated national controversy, when the Federal Government attempted to reintroduce Rural Grazing Areas (RUGA), a 1946 colonial policy long disrupted by urban development and land grabbing practices. The controversy was not unconnected with the bad blood already generated by the Federal Government’s inchoate responses to the herdsmen-farmers conflicts. There was also the argument that livestock farming is private business from which the Federal Government should stand clear.

    However, it makes sense for the Federal Government to cast a wide net now in view of its focus on agriculture as central to its diversification and food security policies. Nevertheless, in order to be seen as fair, the Federal Government should not invest in livestock anymore than it invests in other agricultural products. The bottomline is that each state should assist its own farmers both to guarantee food security and to contribute to GDP. Whatever assistance the Federal Government wants to offer should be channeled through the state governments but made public so that the end users would learn about it.

    The MACBAN spokesperson did not stop at blaming illiteracy and poverty for the herders’ criminality. He also cited cattle rustling as reason for the herders’ engagement in criminal acts. According to him, “The Fulani cattle breeders have lost over three million cows to cattle rustling. We sleep as wealthy people with lots of animals, but wake up as poor people due to cattle rustling”.

    Was the loss of cattle enough reason for sponsoring the herders’ criminal activities, especially kidnapping? Your guess is as good as mine. But listen to the MACBAN spokesperson: “We all see on social media; when these herders who are engaged in crime are asked about how much was given to them out of millions collected from their victims, they would say N30,000, N40,000. This is to show that some big merchants are behind this.” This is an issue that the intelligence agencies should have investigated. The country’s weak security architecture, especially intelligence gathering, should be strengthened, if we are ever going to stop this vicious cycle of cattle rustling and kidnapping for ransom.

    However, what MACBAN did not address is even more important than what it addressed since we always knew that illiteracy, poverty, and unemployment made youths ready recruits to banditry. MACBAN is silent on the herders’ access to dangerous weapons, especially AK-47, which emboldens them to engage in criminal acts. After all, there are millions of illiterate, poor, and unemployed youths in rural areas across the country who do not engage in kidnapping for ransom. It is high time MACBAN took a strong position on weapons ban for herders unless it still has something to hide.

     

     

     

     

     

  • With governors like Matawalle…

    With governors like Matawalle…

    By  Festus Eriye

     

    With governors like Zamfara’s Bello Matawalle, there is little hope for respite from much of the existential crises that have consumed large swathes of the North and, by extension, much of Nigeria.

    Last month, the Emir of Anka, Muhammed Attahiru Ahmad, told a visiting delegation of newly-appointed service chiefs that the state was under siege by 30,000 bandits.

    Two weeks ago, Matawalle’s Press Secretary, Ibrahim Dosara, amplified the statement by confirming that indeed tens of thousands of freelance gunmen were operating across six states in the Northwest.

    He further revealed that close to 3,000 people were killed by bandits between 2011 and 2019, while over 1,000 were kidnapped within the same period. In that time, N970 million (almost one billion naira) was paid as ransom, while over 100,000 people were displaced from their ancestral homes.

    These statistics tell a tale of misery that is ongoing with no end in sight. Confronted with the harsh reality that he’s been outgunned and his domain overrun, Matawalle has adopted the pragmatic approach of negotiating with the bandits – that’s if you call cutting deals with a gun to your head negotiation.

    You would think that the governor has enough on his plate, fighting a losing battle to pacify his territory. The same individual presiding over a state where hundreds have been killed by gunmen under his watch and can only conjure a policy of appeasement of criminals, has suddenly transformed into an avenging angel in disputes happening hundreds of miles from his home.

    Last week, he made headlines after seeming to back reprisal killings against Southerners for the deaths of Northerners caught up in ethnic clashes down South. If this were to have issued from the mouth of some parasitic rabble-rouser claiming to be representing regional interests it would be condemnable. But to have come from a chief of state is absolutely reprehensible.

    What the ‘governor’ was saying was that he wouldn’t lift a finger in the event of indiscriminate retaliation against arbitrary ‘Southerners,’ for sins committed by persons they probably has no personal or communal links with! Is that just? Is that legal? Is that human?

    He may yet come out to claim he was misquoted as is often the dodge of politicians caught with their foot in their mouths, but the damage is already done; the suggestion has already been made. Hopefully, Matawalle would be proud to claim credit if indeed some future reprisal killings take place.

    All lives matter and every soul is precious. There’s no excuse for killing innocent Northerners down South and vice versa. Still, everything must be put in proper context. Shasha, for instance, was a spontaneous incident that spiralled out of control.

    The governor’s posturing and childish mouthing of the cliché “no region has a monopoly of violence” appears to suggest some sort of regional contest in savagery. But truth is there’s no campaign for extermination of Northerners anywhere in the South.

    If anything, several state governors have vigorously moved against excitable agitators and reassured non-indigenes in their midst of safety. Indeed, in the intervening period between the Shasha and Ibarapa incidents, calm has been restored and people have largely moved on with their lives. It is hard, therefore, to understand the occasion for Matawalle’s outburst.

    More Northerners are being killed in Zamfara each month than have died from ethnic clashes in the South in the last one year. It would have been expected that the governor’s charity would begin from his troubled home.

    Matawalle should be worrying that many in his largely agrarian state cannot really practise farming because of the activities of bandits. Zamfara is racked by poverty, disease and illiteracy. Two reports on human development index – Radboud University Nijmegen (2018) and another by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) 2016 – rank the state 32nd out of Nigeria’s 36 states.

    Rather than making these challenges his priorities, the governor is politicking, plotting to defect to the All Progressives Congress (APC) for reasons best known to him and threatening innocent citizens while taking a break from his scheming.

    Zamfara is part of a region that is deeply traumatised and crying out for bold, visionary and innovative leaders. The troubles of the North should concern the rest of Nigeria because the consequences of the unaddressed turmoil would inevitably spill over to the South.

    In an earlier piece titled ‘The wild, wild North’ I had written concerning the challenges facing the region: “Security interventions may be useful in the short term, but they are not enduring answers. For one thing we don’t have enough soldiers and policemen to cover the vast territory that is Northern Nigeria. Isolated communities can never be covered for 24 hours and would always be at the mercy of the killers. What we need are solutions that provide vocational alternatives for the perpetrators of violence.

    “At the root of the troubles is a mixture of economic and religious causes. Banditry and kidnapping are enterprises that generate revenues through cattle rustling and ransom payment. The bandits in Zamfara have also been linked to illegal mining activities.

    “Our reality is that there is greater illiteracy and unemployment across the north compared to the rest of the country. For as long as the leaders of the region don’t develop their local economies, but remain hooked to the dwindling allocations from the federal purse, the situation can only get worse.

    “Unfortunately, a succession of northern governors and political leaders haven’t shown that they understand the gravity of the problem or the urgent actions needed to address their situation. It is a shame that a region that has produced the largest number of our Heads of State never thought it expedient to let their charity begin from home. Now the region is reaping grievous consequences of failure of leadership.

    “This crisis has taken five decades to come to a head and it will take more than bombings and posting of police commissioners to address.

    “The time has come for leaders of the North to develop a blueprint for economic restoration of the entire region so it can close the gap with the rest of the country. It should be a document that all will agree to implement on a cross-party basis. Today’s crisis transcends mundane partisan affiliations.”

    Hopefully, the likes of Matawalle would awake to the gravity of the crises confronting them.

     

  • Advert; Spraying; Stop Okada-Kekemania

    By Tony Marinho

     

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 2,975,000 among 137,000,000 diagnosed cases and 800m vaccine shots given worldwide. Nigerian cases approaching 164,500 and 2,070 deaths with 970k shots given.

    The huge number of greeting adverts for birthdays in the time of Covid, poverty and insecurity show dangerous insensitivity. Some Nigerians still live in the imaginary ‘all is well’ world and pay millions for ‘one day wonder’ greeting advert.  I believe such adverts, congratulatory or in commiseration should be banned or heavily taxed-50%. Imagine if the over N50m spent on birthday wishes adverts was donated to 50+ orphanages, widows or youth groups including the Red Cross, Boy Scouts and Blue Crescent in appreciation of celebrant or deceased. Our youth are dangerously uneasy, restless and undereducated, having been cheated and underserved by governance and individuals. That money could have been business start-ups for 100 or 200 youth or empowered many youth groups and got them jobs. Even the recently late Prince Philip, sadly dead at 99 years and husband to Queen Elizabeth 11, is being mourned by ‘donations to charity in his name!’

    There is still a lot of money around. The social media shows sickly scenes of $100 dollar bills and small mountains naira notes being swept up with brooms from the floor in their hundreds into empty champagne cartons and large plastic binbags, at events from weddings, birthdays to burials. Called ‘spraying’ it is now a grotesque art form. It used to be bundles would be broken and the money put on the recipient’s chosen body part. Some used a machine money sprayer. Now, the ‘money bricks’ are just removed from the cellophane, put on recipient and taken away by the hopefully honest relative or assistant. Sometimes, up to 10-20 bundles of N500x100 notes or N1,000×100 are sprayed. All this is camera recorded so that the counting can be accurate. The sprayers seem cruelly unmindful of being surrounded by struggling and financially down, hungry and angry- ‘hangry’ staff who are internally outraged at such profligate display and ‘waste’ while they earn so little. In extreme cases such a display involves the opening of pink champagne and pouring six or 12 bottles onto the head of the ‘big boy‘ being sprayed.

    It had been hoped that some traditions, identified as negative even though started with good intentions, would be stopped by modernity, current poverty and Covid. It is as dangerous to society as the more violent traditional practices. Spraying is serious social misconduct and not praiseworthy.

    Do police and the military debrief each and every victim of kidnapping and banditry to learn more about the individuals, dress mode, colours of clothes tribal marks, the languages spoken, the names shared and locations to build up a state computerised database to be shared with relevant agencies and members of society and quickly crosschecked with information on other attacks in order to plan solutions to this day-and-night nightmare facing the entire nation? As people migrate so do these devilish and murderous evil doers.

    Government continues, unchecked and uneducated, in its poor labour relations, manifest by the absolutely unnecessary government failures that forced the recent strike by the Resident Doctors which has thankfully been called off after some decisions were made. Could those decisions not have been made routinely long ago and executed responsibly?

    Okada-keke marwamania: So our tricycles, Keke marwa, are made in Oyo State by Yamaha. That is good business in one way. Tricycles are better than okada but worse than the minibus which is worse than a 30-seater bus in terms of the environment, safety of road-users, fuel consumption and pollution per passenger. Mass transit has lost in the transport war in Ibadan to a plague of high pollution, high space occupancy okada and keke marwa, multiplying, filling lanes, 30 or 40 at traffic lights. Other road users are being strangled while running the gauntlet of left, right and centre manic riding causing a tightening choking noose as they swarm like hornets of the road avoiding the empty layby lane. Like lethal children they speed, zigzag and stop subjecting all around to great danger and often death and injury. Untrained, uncontrolled since birth, they ignore traffic laws and, at junctions, they even cut across cars blocking every single space. Who will educate them on lane discipline, and road courtesy? An okada is a high-speed lethal weapon in the hands of an excitable undisciplined untrained person especially a youth. This created trouble and traffic mayhem with more lives being lost and more misery on the road- the Okada epidemic.

    LAUTECH seeks to be among the top 10 in the world. A tall order which requires a huge investment to pay past salary arrears and modernise the university in content. Fortunately, due to past good work, LAUTECH is the best among all state universities. But technology education is international, not a state or local issue. It is international.  If our leaders want the best salaries and perks and drive the best cars, what do our children deserve? They deserve the best lecture-rooms, the best laboratories, the best research facilities, the best technology tools, the best

    Another marker burnt Araromi Auto Market. Was it arson or accident, mistake or mischief? There are huge loses. Every time there is a fire, we ask about fire services. Beyond widening roads, better fire training and prevention and services with more available firefighters and engines and quicker communications. Naturally no one had insurance.

     

  • Beyond Sanwo-Olu’s Executive Order

    Beyond Sanwo-Olu’s Executive Order

    By Festus Eriye

    Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has begun life as chief executive of Nigeria’s most prosperous state with comforting surefootedness. If morning shows the day, then there are plenty of reasons for Lagosians to be hopeful that this unruly, sprawling city can somehow be made liveable.

    On his first day at work, while some were taking new wives and sacking democratically elected local government chairmen like military despots, he signed an Executive Order outlining the six major areas on which his administration would focus.

    Under the acronym ‘THEMES’, he outlined a plan of action that put the challenge of tackling traffic and environmental problems up top. Lagos, to put it mildly, is a very dirty city that urgently needs a clean-up.

    It is also notorious for its gridlock. Not much has changed since Fela Anikulapo-Kuti sang about the infamous traffic jam at Ojuelegba in the 70s. From decade to decade since then, administrations have come and gone with the confusion being replicated in different areas of the city.

    From Maza-Maza to Mile 2 to Kirkiri to Apapa, from Oshodi to Ikeja and Agege, from Mile 12 to Ikorodu, the hapless denizens of the city have come to accept that half their lives would be spent in some ‘Hold-up’ or ‘Go-slow’.

    A terrible situation was made worse by the massive construction of the last two years of the Akinwumi Ambode administration, coupled with the government’s capitulation over enforcement of its own rules regulating the activities of commercial motorcyclists.

    Today, travelling on most Lagos roads is a hellish experience where, if you manage to avoid crushing the ‘okada’ darting in front of you without warning, you are most likely to be careening into some crater that has been left unattended for ages.

    To compound matters, there is the human aspect which no governor has been able to crack. On most of the city’s streets people are a law unto themselves. Very few obey basic rules. Driving against traffic is par the course on any given day. If you stop at the traffic light when it turns red, you are the crazy one! Lawlessness on the road has become cultural; it’s the way we roll in Lagos.

    Another depressing angle is that those supposed to enforce the law, have become willing enablers of the madness. Traffic officers and other security agents encourage unruly commercial buses to clog up choke points, they turn a blind eye to offences especially where there is some financial benefit to them.

    Indeed, for most of these officers the disorderliness is profitable. Unfortunately, they are the very ones expected to implement the governor’s call to orderliness! I can just imagine their enthusiastic embrace of the task!

    It is nice to see the governor, putting traffic management, road improvement and environmental issues, at the top of his agenda. In the last few days I have noticed officers of the Lagos State Traffic Management Agency (LASTMA), policemen and soldiers moving traffic along at some of the most notorious problem spots.

    However, while Sanwo-Olu’s efforts are commendable, my worry is about sustainability. How long will his zeal last? Lagos roads and road users need to be tamed. These are people used to a culture of impunity; many have come to believe that you can get away with murder – if not scot free, then at least for a fee.

    They are not going to swiftly repent of their ways and methods just because the new governor waved an Executive Order under their noses. When no one is watching or present to enforce the rules, they quickly revert to type.

    The governor and his team can build the best roads and bridges, if they don’t get the people to embrace a new culture on the road, nothing will change.

    Sanwo-Olu has to project to a people who have become addicted to lawlessness that he would be unrelenting in enforcing the laws as they concern road use and the environment. He has had the seemingly obligatory photo-op arresting some danfo driver driving against traffic. Everyone’s done it: Babatunde Fashola nabbed an army colonel, Ambode bagged a commercial bus driver. He cannot stop there.

    It would be a bitter disappointment if the promising enthusiasm and zeal of these early days is allowed to dissipate – returning us to the chaotic and ungovernable Lagos we have become used to, and resigned to as our lot.

    • This article was first published in The Nation on June 9, 2019.

     

  • Condolences without change; House-job!!

    Condolences without change; House-job!!

    By Tony Marinho

    Corrigendum: Pls note that in the last article the word ‘Computer Olympics’ is one word and not two words ‘ComputerOlympics’.

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 2,870,000 among 132,000,000 diagnosed cases and 550m vaccinated worldwide; Nigerian cases approaching 164,000 and 2,060 deaths.

    The death of Yinka Odumakin like too many deaths is a disappointing shock to all who have a successful ‘Nigeria for all’ as a goal. The media waves are overflowing with deserved glowing tributes delivered with lightening speed from political and social figures. All mourning. The president, Nigeria’s sometimes resident chief mourner, has from his medical UK visit, joined. He has sent more mourning messages than any other president, a condolence message almost daily for five+years. Victims keep piling up faster than he can mourn them. It is surprising that he actually knew and worked with late Yinka Odumakin during one of his presidential bids. Of what use is a glowing mourning tribute to his life’s fight against tyranny and for true federalism, devolution of powers, true federal character and fiscal honesty, good governance, if his mourners ignore his words? Nigeria is witnessing an aberration that must not become the norm or we will all be mourned or mourners. We must learn from the dead.

    No amount of condolence or congratulatory messages will save Nigeria. We have to take the messages not from the condolences but from words left by the dead and actualise those words in our country before ages of nation-building crumble to dust creating 50-million trans-border refugees. Nigeria needs changes now before it is thrown over the precipice of despair.  We can no longer pretend things are alright when they are all wrong. Politicians have rejected good governance in favour of those features of the military days which late Yinka Odumakin and others were forced to fight so strenuously against. May God grant Yinka and others dying from whatever cause in Nigeria rest in perfect peace.

    Easter is a time of hope. So the promise ‘Death to Life’ personified by the Risen Lord, resonates at this time of IDPs, farm killings so painfully dismissed as exaggerated when even one was too many, a cold-blooded murder, absolutely provoked. Increasingly in Nigeria children are asking ‘Am I going to die?’ Mr. President, the custodian of security. ‘How many more condolence messages will you write before you win the war against violence in Nigeria?’

    More policemen and a reported policewoman murdered. The supreme price. The country must become more accountable. The states need to do much more to correct their criminal lack of security. A principal had both hands cut off and someone has the insensitivity, the hardness of heart to say such unprovoked vile evil unbridled bloodthirsty violence is exaggerated. I am a doctor and have in my life’s work encountered much human-on-human damage from childhood catapult eye injuries to sports accidents to okada attacks and okada high speed murders and mayhem to police brutality to cult stabbings and beatings to rape and domestic violence and now mindless farm murder, village, town and now city disfigurement by local gangs springing up everywhere. What manner of man is this man? Even the Good Samaritan separating fights often gets injured in an eye causing permanent blindness or gets stabbed in the neck or abdomen. And then there is the mental stress from being inflicted with or living at the time of such violence.

    As a doctor, I must resist the attack and misinformation peddled about the institution of the HOUSE OFFICER in medical hierarchy.  The House Officer cadre is the first employment step on the professional life of a fully qualified doctor who must, by law, complete a one-year House Officer-certified rotation of three months each through four specialities: obstetrics and gynaecology, medicine, surgery and paediatrics before full registration. During the period of one year, the fully qualified doctor is given a provisional licence by the Nigerian Medical and Dental Council, NMDC, to practice under supervision of seniors in the profession. The work period is called a ‘house job’ because it is hard, gruelling, run-around, result chasing, blood-taking, technique perfecting 12-20 hour per day for one year. A House Officer has a clearly defined and vital work-horse work schedule within the medical delivery system. It used to be the prerogative of federal hospitals and state governments, and the few private hospitals registered for that purpose who could take and pay House Officers.

    With typical no forward planning for products of new universities, Nigeria now produces more doctors annually than there are spaces registered to its regulatory body MDCN to take them. Unfairly, the backlog or overflow from say year 2018 was not guaranteed places before the new 2019 batch was employed leaving some without House Jobs for two or three years and unable to become fully registered. The new government system is to unify the registration and place the doctors in that central pool into posts nationwide. Typically government is trying to change the rules of engagement and undermine the already rubbish salary structure due the doctors for the house job. Governments must not undermine internationally instituted professional structures. Worldwide, house job is the first paid job on the lowest step on the employment structure of a medical doctor. Why should a serving minister, also a doctor, say otherwise? Why must politicians ruin every profession, even their own former profession, except politics in Nigeria??

  • Cuba’s strategies to combat COVID-19

    Cuba’s strategies to combat COVID-19

    By Niyi Akinnaso

    As Nigeria spends billions of Naira to purchase drugs, PPEs, establish new labs for PCR tests, and supplement coronavirus vaccines donated by COVAX to combat COVID-19, the small island nation of Cuba has been swimming in self-sufficiency, by producing its own drugs, PPEs, and vaccines. It has commenced the vaccination of health workers with its own homegrown vaccine, the Soberana (Sovereign) 02. It is one of five vaccine candidates being developed in various laboratories in Cuba.

    The feat did not just come overnight. It is a result of decades of investment in biotech and biopharmaceutical industries, leading to over 30 years of vaccine development by the island nation.

    However, vaccine production is only one of Cuba’s major strategies to combat the scourge of COVID-19 in the country. In addition to the non-pharmaceutical measures adopted universally, particularly mask wearing, hand washing, and physical distancing, Cuba developed two key strategies to combat COVID-19.

    The first strategy is the manufacture of drugs and medical equipment specifically to treat COVID-19 infections. Accordingly, the National Center of Biopreparations (Biocen) immediately focused on the manufacture of several of the main drugs used to treat COVID-19 infections.

    Similarly, PPEs were produced and distributed to healthcare workers and then to all citizens to protect themselves. To this end, the Cuban government repurposed a school uniform factory to produce masks instead. Finally, a prototype ventilator was quickly produced and, once found effective, was later mass produced to treat COVID-19 patients. These efforts resulted from collaborations by the Neurosciences Center; the Grito de Baire Enterprise, affiliated with the Military Industries Union; the Center for the State Control of Medicines and Equipment and Medical Devices (CECMED); and the National Design Office.

    Simultaneously, the government went full force into vaccine research, drawing upon its decades of experience in vaccine production and freely available literature on COVID-19 vaccines. Two preeminent labs in the country were deployed to this purpose. The Finlay Vaccine Institute focused on three vaccine candidates: Soberana 01, Soberana 02, and Soberana Plus.

    The Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology produced the other two vaccines, namely, Abdala and Manbisa. Soberana 02 and Abdala. All five vaccines benefitted from preliminary work by the Center for Molecular Immunology, which “fermented” mammalian cells that directly produced the RBD antigen used in producing the COVID-19 vaccines. It is this method of vaccine production that made it possible for these vaccines to have little or no effect on their recipients.

    Another interesting feature of Cuba’s vaccines is storage. Unlike other vaccines that require special temperatures for storage, the Cuban vaccines can be stored and transported at regular refrigeration temperature. This makes it very attractive to countries, which have difficulty with vaccines kept in unusually cold temperatures.

    Of Cuba’s five vaccine candidates, Soberana 02 and Abdala have reached the most advanced stage of Phase III clinical trials, the former being a little ahead of the latter. Both have proved to be safe and effective in clinical trials, with little or no side effects. Even the World Health Organization has also confirmed that the two vaccine candidates in Phase III clinical trials were effective and safe in previous clinical trials. However, how effective on a large scale remains to be seen.

    Nevertheless, many countries have already expressed interest in the Cuban VOVID-19 vaccines. They include Venezuela, Mexico, Vietnam, Pakistan, India, and Iran. Cuba is still open to partnerships with other countries in order to be able to ramp up production. Nevertheless, it hopes to vaccinate all of Havana, the main island, by the end of June and the rest of the country by the end of the year by which time it is hoped that 100 million doses would have been produced.

    There are two unique features of the Cuban vaccine production technology. First, a nasally administered vaccine is added to its array of intramuscular vaccines. This nasal vaccine is Mambisa, now in Phase II Clinical Trial.

    A second unique feature is the production of a vaccine specifically for convalescent patients, recuperating from treatment for COVID-19. This is supplemented with follow-up assistance from medical institutions through a Basic Work Group, consisting of specialist doctors, epidemiologists, and rehabilitation specialists. Cuba is so far the only country to have included this type of vaccine in its array of vaccines. Besides, no other country is pursuing as many as five vaccines simultaneously.

    The Cuban effort should be understood against the backdrop of over 60 years of pernicious trade embargo imposed on the island nation by the United States, intensified recently by the regime of former President Donald Trump. The social, political, and economic sufferings resulting from the embargo were intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic, which limited Cuba’s exports and shut down the tourism industry, one of the mainstays of the Cuban economy.

    In the face of the American trade embargo and the withdrawal of support by the Soviet Union, following its collapse, Cuba quickly decided to invest in human capital development, focusing on medical education, biotechnology, and the pharmaceutical industry. In Cuba, education is free at all levels, although it has a strong political and ideological emphasis. The fruits of the focus on education are threefold: One, Cuba’s literacy rate is one of the highest in the world, at 99.8 percent. Two, the supply of professionals, especially medical personnel, to other countries is one of Cuba’s major exports. Three, Cuba has developed skilled personnel and expertise in the production of drugs, vaccines, and medical equipment. No wonder then that Cuba has one of the best healthcare systems in the world.

    No matter what one thinks about Fidel Castro and communism, one factor that cannot be denied is strong leadership and commitment to development. Until Nigeria has such a visionary leader we may have to continue to beg, even with money in hand, for drugs, medical equipment, and vaccines.

     

  • SUBEB posters: ‘Computer Olympics’ pls?

    Tony Marinho

     

    COVID-19 deaths approaching 2,800,000 among 128,000,000 diagnosed cases worldwide, Nigerian cases approaching 163,000 and 2,050 deaths. Disclosure: I have had my first dose of AstraZeneca vaccine in one of multiple Ibadan LGA facilities. I recommend you see the relevant source to get vaccinated.

    Death of a uniformed policewoman following being shot at polling booth has shamefully gone unnoticed and so far, unpunished. No outcry for her or the others killed that day. Why? Her picture should be front page across Nigeria as should as for all the dead killed by Boko Haram and kidnappers. Catch the murderers and their handlers and there needs to be more police.  Bomb blast at another Bye election? What manner of despicable deadly and wickedly evil politician and political thug deprives the innocent of their lives merely for being present?

    There are electric vehicles in Kenya. Any plans for Nigeria?

    Congratulations to Seyi Makinde of Oyo State for authorising the regular payment of its counterpart funding to access the delayed 2018, 2019 and now 2020 SUBEB grant with consequent renovation of over 100 schools. Bricks and blocks are good but ‘Books and Picture Posters Build Brains Better’. It is time every government accesses its allocated SUBEB fund as a sacred political and moral responsibility to its teachers and youth to prevent uneven education across the country with the consequences of ‘under-educating’ segments of Nigeria’s youth in every state. This will avoid consequent repeating the unemployability and societal upheaval seen post ENDSARS.

    SUBEB should fill every primary classroom wall with exciting, inspirational education books, some ‘made by’ the teachers/students and others in collaboration with the tertiary educational and industrial centres in and out of the state.  Is it not a pity that the state’s’ polytechnics and institutes and research centres are not invited to make a ‘Polytechnic/Industrial Poster Series 1-50’ or ‘CRIN Poster Series’ or ‘Forestry Poster Series’ or ‘IITA Educational Poster Series’?

    Why does University of Ibadan, UI, not have a multi-streamed ‘UI Primary and Secondary School Subject Based Poster Series 1-500’. I believe that SUBEB with counterpart funding should include ‘A SUBEB School Poster Series’ in its portfolio. State governments must call for SUBEB to allocate 1-5% funds to turn classrooms in Nigeria into ‘Child and Teacher Friendly Environments’ by making SUBEB Educational Posters a funded agenda line item.

    It is disgraceful seeing the Chibok and Dapchi classrooms and any classroom near you empty of education wall charts -items readily available in other African and all foreign countries and huge missing link of education in Nigeria. Sadly, 26+ years after Educare Trust started this campaign, the country’s education elite still ignore this vital weapon. Truly ‘A CLASSROOOM PICTURE POSTER is worth 1000 words worldwide EXCEPT IN NIGERIA where bare walls fail to inspire empty brains of our Nigerian children in our Nigerian schools. Watch any video of any public school wall and weep as you compare it to schools of similar children abroad and even in private Nigerian schools.  We are deliberately under-educating our public school children and will continue to be punished for it during riots and community disturbances!

    What is war? What is a war-like response to an attack on a state and an insult to the government? The Kaduna 2020 Security Report reveals over 900 murdered [30 buses of 30 citizens], and over 2,000 kidnapped [60 buses of 30 citizens] and nearly 8,000 animals [160 trailer loads of 50 animals], rustled with untold millions [N500-1billion] in ransom paid. This is a terrible toll paid by Nigerians for citizenship. This proves it is not ‘localised border intra-tribal warfare’. The states of Nigeria face vicious war against the unarmed citizenry aimed at ending or stealing their lives, livelihoods and lands.

    The security outfits are also losing precious lives. Our thoughts are with the deceased, victims and their protectors even as we expect a larger warlike footprint. Our 39 students tragically kidnapped are ‘MIEA’s ‘Missing in Education Action’. ISIS-WA when reinforced, as anticipated by analysts, will be merciless to security and bandits and unarmed Nigerian citizenry. Our government must learn from last week’s Mozambique attack close to the Total mega-gas plant.

    The Tokyo 2021 the first Zoomed Olympics is a small example of what the Olympics could mean to billions. The Tokyo 2021 Olympics is going ahead but there will be no foreign fans and restricted local fans relying on the digital media to broadcast events and champions. About 10 years ago, I advocated a worldwide ‘Computer Olympics’ available with continuous and monthly/quarterly/ half-yearly/ annual authenticated updates in which any participant or teams of participants could perform at the local level and upload their authenticated record up to the ‘Computer Olympics Data Base’. Such a ‘Computer Olympics Data Base’ would be segmented by age, sex, achievement and targeted record in a ‘Computer Olympics Multi-Event Sports Ladder’. Zoom etc could be used for some team events but it would be valuable for individual events.

    One day athletes worldwide will video-record their achievements, performed under an authenticating local authority, and Zoom/WhatsApp etc them in for evaluation and placement on the ‘Computer Olympics Ladder’ and eventually recognition year-round. Every four years the Olympics in its current forms Summer, Winter would not be compromised. Please send this ‘Computer Olympics’ suggestion to all IOC members you know.

    Happy Easter2021, May the Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ actualise our Greater Nigeria where the guns are silenced, mutual respect grows and Nigeria grows in peace.