The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Needless war over vaccines

    Needless war over vaccines

    Hardball

     

    Honors are large-hearted personal and corporate entities who sacrifice from their plenty to succour others not so endowed. They could have opted to do otherwise, hence they should be appreciated for their noble altruism. Such is the private sector-led Coalition Against Covid-19 (CACOVID), which is eminent in generosity targeted at combating the pandemic in Nigeria.

    Amidst the ravages of Covid-19 second wave across the world, nations have been scrambling for vaccines touted as the panacea for tackling down the virus. The World Health Organisation (WHO) on a number of occasions raised the alarm that advanced nations were cornering the vaccines and marginalising developing nations like Nigeria, thus every opportunity to access the vaccines must seem compelling. It was such opportunity that opened up for Nigeria lately, but a dogfight erupted within CACOVID on how to proceed.

    A member of CACOVID steering committee and major conglomerate, the BUA Group, announced last Monday that it had paid $3.45million (N1.311billion) for 1million doses of AstraZeneca vaccines for Nigeria through the Afreximbank vaccine programme and in partnership with CACOVID. It said the stock was expected in-country by next week, noting that it will be the first set of vaccines delivered to Nigeria since Covid-19 vaccines became available, and assured that it will be administered free to Nigerians. “BUA decided to secure these 1million vaccines by paying the full amount today because (they) became available only last week through Afrexim…BUA is committing to purchase five million doses for Nigeria as soon as they become available through this same arrangement,” BUA Founder Abdulsamad Rabiu was quoted saying.

    In a swift rejoinder, CACOVID’s operations committee dubbed the reported solo payment for vaccines “not factual as CACOVID operates on a collegiate fund contribution model.” The group reported that Central Bank Governor Godwin Emefiele along with business mogul Aliko Dangote and ace banker Herbert Wigwe on 7th February had a call with Afreximbank President Benedict Oramah, who briefed the three CACOVID leaders on a $2billion facility the bank has set up with the African Union vaccine taskforce to procure vaccines for the continent. According to the statement, Nigeria’s share is capped at 42million doses and Oramah explained that 1million doses were ready for shipment to Nigeria in the next two weeks if a down payment was made by 8th February. “At today’s meeting, CACOVID leadership agreed to contribute $100million to procure vaccines for Nigeria, these 1million doses from Afreximbank worth $3.45 million being the very first tranche. CACOVID will purchase vaccines through other credible and subsidised mechanisms such as COVAX,” it added.

    But in a counter-rejoinder, BUA accused CACOVID of playing politics with Nigerian lives, saying it was forced to take up the payment because at the 8th February CACOVID steering committee meeting, there was no agreement reached and despite members being offered the opportunity to donate funds, none volunteered even though failure to pay immediately would mean forfeiting the opportunity to get those doses next week.

    The Yoruba have a saying that if a man is first to see a snake and a woman happens to kill the snake, what matters is for the snake not to escape. It should be same principle with getting the Covid-19 vaccines, please.

     

     

     

  • Madmen and specialist

    Madmen and specialist

    Hardball

    Prof. Wole Soyinka authored the famous play, Madmen and Specialists, gripping in its dark humour; cutting in its sardonic wit. How this play has assumed new relevance in contemporary push-and-pull!

    After a triumphant sortie to Igangan, in Ibarapa North of Oyo State, Sunday Adeyemo, aka Sunday Igboho, flush with victory and folk encomium, got distressing news his house, somewhere in the Sanyo area of Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, had been torched by suspected arsonists.

    After pronouncing his loss, which he put at some N50 million, a clearly pissed Igboho swore his arsonist-traducers would run mad presently!  Talk of madmen and sole specialist!

    It’s not clear yet if Igboho’s arsonists have indeed run mad.  We don’t even know if they would still run mad, after all, that dire Yoruba warning growls: the callow kid insults the Iroko and stupidly celebrates his early triumph.  Does he, stupid child, think the Iroko instantly strikes?

    Still, before pronouncing his dire judgment, Igboho sure must boast some rare powers, some awesome speciality to walk his talk, if it’s not to be dismissed as mere irate bluff.

    You really must feel for Igboho, since his foray to Ibarapa, and later to Ketu villages in Ogun State, was at the behest of folks in distress, mauled, killed and raped by alleged herdsmen.

    Fired by Igboho, the fierce saviour, some of the irate locals committed patriotic arson — set fire to some local Fulani settlements; and, in manic pleasure, watched the victims skip, run, and dash for dear lives!

    Now, how is the Ibarapa/Ketu arson different from the Sanyo, Ibadan arson, of which Igboho himself was prime victim, were his kith-and-kin, in-situ too, scurried to safety?

    Maybe it was arson for a good cause versus arson for a bad one?  But the stark truth is impunity is impunity; and it never ends well for anyone.  So, it must be condemned: at Ibarapa, at Ketu, at Sanyo.  It is the futility of self-help!

    Even in the Bible, the Gospel downgraded the Mosaic law of an eye for an eye, for a more civil approach to navigating conflicts.  Some also later quipped that an eye for an eye soon leaves everyone blind!

    Imagine!  The dashing Igboho, in whose name other citizens’ property were razed in moral fury, became so impotent he could only threaten his traducers with “instant madness”, when some midnight felons torched his own asset?

    Self-help exults no people.  No one, no matter how powerful, escapes the peril of self-help.  That is why all must subscribe to civil means to settle disputes — no matter the level of instant provocations.

  • Brass hat envoys

    Brass hat envoys

    By Hardball

     

    Less than two weeks after they left the military and were replaced as service chiefs, President Muhammadu Buhari last week tapped ex-brass hats for appointment as non-career ambassadors. The nominees, whose names he sent to the Senate for consideration and approval, are former Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Abayomi Olonisakin (rtd.), former Chief of Army Staff Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai (rtd.), former Chief of Naval Staff Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas (rtd.) and former Chief of Air Staff Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar (rtd.). Also tipped is a retired Chief of Defence Intelligence, Air Vice-Marshal Mohammed S. Usman. In a letter to Senate President Ahmad Lawan, the President said he made those nominations in line with specified constitutional provisions and urged the red chamber to accord his request expeditious attention.

    The ex-service chiefs took office in 2015, and amidst persistent insurgency, killings and kidnappings of hapless citizens by criminal actors, the President came under intense pressure to sack them and allow fresh initiatives and vigour in the battle against insecurity in Nigeria, especially since they had exceeded the statutory benchmarks of 60 years of age or 35 years of service. At least on three occasions, the National Assembly by way of resolutions asked Buhari to do away with the service chief as it seemed apparent they had reached their limit and could do nothing new to arrest the escalating trend of insecurity. But those calls were for long spurned as it was argued it was the President’s prerogative to determine wo he works with, and that he had insights into their services and the security situation that fell beyond the public’s grasp. When eventually their replacement was announced 26th January, it was widely seen as long overdue to give the top brass deserved rest and time for self-replenishment.

    But the President thought differently, and on 4th February sent in their names for confirmation as ambassador-designates. Sections of the Nigerian public went into overdrive with criticisms of the move, wondering what’s the haste in thrusting the ex-commanders into the most civil of the civvies (i.e. diplomacy) with their military uniforms barely off. Government said it was “rewarding hard work and exceptional sacrifice” and described the transition as normal in decent democratic societies; but critics questioned those motives.

    Whatever one makes of this move, it is reassuring to see a President famed for suspended motion act with haste for once in the nominations. It took several months of inaction before the envoys last confirmed by the Senate got assigned duty posts; we must wait to see if this set will make a difference if confirmed.

    Talking about transition in other societies like the United States, if a General leaves service, he isn’t allowed to take any government job until seven years after unless by special waiver from Congress. It will be a precedent in re-acculturation to see the how hard boots adjust shortly after giving military orders to taking directives from a civilian supervising minister. So, Nigeria may be about teaching the world how to make brass hat envoys. C’mon, let’s look on the bright side!

     

  • Russian logic

    Russian logic

    Hardball

     

    How about this: getting a suspended sentence converted to a real one, because you got flown abroad, for a life-threatening case?

    Is the court saying you should die, sticking to the sentence terms?  But frown at rallying for treatment, to stay alive, to serve your sentence?

    That is some grim categorical imperative, that would have made Immanuel Kant, the philosophical author of that rigorous concept, bristle with envy!

    Yet, that appears the verdict of a Moscow court on Alexei Navalny, Russian dissident and arch-critic of Russian strongman, President Vladimir Putin.  Some Russian logic!

    While serving a suspended sentence in 2020, Navalny, on board a domestic flight to Moscow, got critically ill.  He was alleged to have been poisoned with a nerve agent, that put his life in peril.  The poison was first alleged to have been slipped into his tea.  Later, Navalny himself alleged it was slipped into his underwear.

    What was indisputable was that life was ebbing out of a screaming Navalny, as his airplane made emergency landing.  After initial stabilization, he was flown to a German hospital, which confirmed that indeed, Navalny was a near-victim of a military grade, lethal nerve agent.  However, the German medics nursed him back to health, in company of his distraught wife.

    But January 17, Navalny headed back to Russia, and landed right into trouble!  For starters, Russian state agents diverted his airplane to another airport (from the one hundreds of his doting supporters were waiting and cheering), though still in Moscow.  From there, he was wheeled straight into gaol, sparking outrage, local and global.

    When the dust cleared a little, Navalny was back in the dock: accused of breaching the non-travel terms of his two-and-a-half-year suspended sentence.  Pronto, the court threw him into the slammer for real!

    Again, that voice-of-Jacob-hands-of-Esau Moscow court verdict set the global sympathizers of Navalny seething; and his local Russian supporters storming the streets, country-wide, in forceful but peaceful protests.  The court could have been the gaoler.  But the long arms, of the slight, lean and mean Putin, was clear in all the political-judicial manoeuvres.

    From Navalny, however, hardly a retreat, hardly a surrender.  Even while being trundled into gaol, Navalny was all jab and hook at his formidable opponent, in this Russian rope-a-dope.

    “The reason why it all happened is one man’s hatred and fear ….” Navalny roared.  “I mortally offended him by surviving an attempt at my life … and then I committed an even more serious offence: I didn’t go into hiding.”

    And how about this for the closing flourish of Round One? “Murder is the only way he (referring to Putin) knows how to fight … We all remember Alexander the Liberator and Yaroslav the Wise.  Well, now we’ll have Vladmir the Poisoner of Underpants!  That’s how,” Navalny landed his stiff clincher, “he will go down in history”!

    Even the Russian logic, has its own roiling street echoes!

  • Justice done, but needlessly delayed

    Justice done, but needlessly delayed

    Hardball

     

    Justice has its victory day, like it just did in Cross River State where Justice Akon Ikpeme was lately confirmed substantive state Chief Judge. Her lordship overcame 14 months of intrigues by the House of Assembly, with suspected complicity of State Governor Ben Ayade, to deny her the office. Those intrigues should never have happened.

    Cross River has been without a substantive chief judge since November 2019 when Justice Michael Edem retired. Ikpeme, who is the most senior judge in the state judiciary, ought to step into the office in line with statutory provisions and legal tradition, but the assembly until last week refused to confirm her because of her family ties to neighbouring Akwa Ibom State. Ikpeme is of Akwa Ibom parentage but was born in Calabar when Akwa Ibom was part of Cross River (Akwa Ibom was carved out of Cross River on 23rd September, 1987 by the Ibrahim Babangida regime). Besides, she is married to a Cross River man and has been working for decades in the Cross River judiciary. The assembly’s refusal twice to confirm her as chief judge, with perceived collusion of Ayade, had set the state government at odds with the National Judicial Council (NJC).

    Following Edem’s retirement, NJC recommended Ikpeme for appointment and the governor forwarded her name to the legislature for confirmation. Allegedly under pressure, he also swore her in as acting CJ. But when the assembly declined to confirm Ikpeme, saying she posed a security risk despite being married to a Cross Riverian, Ayade tapped the second most senior judge, Maurice Eneji, to serve as acting chief judge. It was a move that irked judiciary stakeholders.

    Eneji’s term as acting CJ was renewed by Ayade, but NJC declined to recommend him for substantive appointment and the governor was forced to swear in Justice Eyo Effiom-Ita on 19th October, 2020 as acting CJ – making it the fourth time the position was occupied in acting capacity. Ita’s tenure ended on 18th January, 2021 and NJC declined to renew, insisting that the most senior judge be sworn-in. Amidst pressure plied by senior lawyers and other eminent Nigerians to do accordingly, Ayade, in a letter dated 20th January, re-submitted Ikpeme’s name to the house of assembly for confirmation as chief judge.

    During a brief sitting that lasted under an hour last week, the legislature unanimously confirmed Ikpeme as substantive CJ. House Speaker Eteng Williams said the assembly “got new facts…got documents that we needed,” adding that what the lawmakers did was to stabilise the judiciary. Shame to the lawmakers and co-conspirators that they hitherto destabilised the judiciary with a queer notion of indigeneship that did not acknowledge place of birth, marriage and career history as qualifying criteria – in an age that we need do away with indigeneship requirement altogether. But it is better late than never that they’ve backed down.

  • Bishop Shina Peters!

    Bishop Shina Peters!

    Hardball

    Guess the latest Bishop in town?  Sir Shina Peters (SSP)!   His Afro-juju genre took Nigerian music by storm from 1989, when he released the monster hit, Ace.

    Till the late 1990s, he was ace sex symbol and electrifying stage performer, who used his youth to push his catchy, seductive music.  “Asiko awa youths re,” he crooned in one of his popular hits, “e ye binu wa.”  (It’s our time as youths, don’t begrudge our fame).

    SSP, the Aladura boy wonder in General Prince Adekunle’s juju band in his teen years, who peaked as dashing Afro-juju creator and dancehall impresario in his adult youth, is now, at 62, Cherubim and Seraphim (C&S) Bishop Oluwasina Isaac Akanbi Peters!

    Waoh!  SSP himself crowed, of his new status:  “Bishop with swagger, God above all”!  The Aladura boy, who started music in the church; and freely mixed riffs, churchly and secular, in his long music career, is now Aladura Bishop!  How things change, yet remain the same!

    Read Also: Shina Peters becomes Bishop

    The C&S sect has a rich, percussion-driven musical tradition: pulsating, gripping, vigorous and merry.  Under its founder and Patron Saint, Mose Orimolade Tunolase, it was among the first wave of Nigerian native Pentecostals, that rebelled against the cultural imperialism of the European Orthodox churches, at the turn of the 20th century.

    This clash of culture was espoused by the poet, Gabriel Okara, in “Piano and drums”.  The dour European churches emphasized the solemn piano. The vibrant  African churches embraced the drum, shunned monogamy and pushed syncretism of church and African tradition.  For them, frenetic dancing and singing were magnets to draw and keep their flock!

    SSP, the musical essence, was, well, the virtual secularization of exciting Aladura music.  So, between the church boy wonder and latter-life Bishop, there appears little change — except in the use of youth, to drive his music, at its peak.

    At 62, SSP is junking that allure of youth — hardly eternal!  Bishop Peters is contemplating old age with more permanent traits: the Aladura faith that not only shaped his life from the cradle but also gave his secular, popular music wings to soar: a musical syncretism of the holy and the profane, so long as it itched the legs to dance, and charged the arms to boogie down, without a care!

    This metamorphosis is a lesson to those who push youth as near-exclusive political talent.  Youth is exclusive to no one.  On the contrary, it’s the patrimony of everyone.

    Everyone must be young.  It’s the very beginning of the biological process from birth.  But old age is the exclusive grace of fewer people.  It takes braving the aging process and surviving to tell the tale.

    So, don’t come strutting your youth, as SSP once strutted his on stage, as political pitch.  Youth is fleeting, as is clear of Bishop Peters.  But the essential Shina Peters remains, whether as popular artiste or as Aladura Bishop.

    Bench mark more lasting traits, not youth that fades and wilts like the rose under intense heat.  That is what gets you through life’s crucible.

  • Academic exercise

    Academic exercise

    Hardball

     

    Some measures in government are unavoidably merely to fulfil all righteousness: whereby you see that the letters of the law have been kept and you are better off not probing about the spirit of the law. Such is the reported request by President Muhammadu Buhari for Senate consideration and approval of new military chiefs named last week and who have taken full command of their respective duty post.

    The president last Tuesday, 26th January, announced the appointment of Major-General Lucky Irabor as the new Chief of Defence Staff, Major-General Ibrahim Attahiru (Chief of Army Staff), Rear Admiral Awwal Gambo (Chief of Naval Staff) and Air Vice-Marshal Isiaka Amao (Chief of Air Staff). This was on the heels of his accepting the resignation and immediate retirement of General Abayomi Olonisakin (Chief of Defence Staff), Lieutenant-General Tukur Buratai (Chief of Army Staff), Vice Admiral Ibok-Efe Ibas (Chief of Naval Staff) and Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar (Chief of Air Staff), who had been serving since 2015 and who had been subjected to intense calls for their removal to allow for fresh initiative and vigour in the battle against insecurity in Nigeria.

    Obviously due to the peculiar and sensitive nature of military operations, the new helmsmen moved in immediately to take over the flags from their predecessors who were swiftly “pulled out” of their respective service and command post. By Thursday, last week, all the new service chiefs had settled into the saddle.

    But Senior Special Assistant to the President on National Assembly Matters (Senate), Senator Babajide Omoworare, has made the point of informing the public that President Buhari, via a letter dated 27th January, 2021 is seeking Senate approval of the new service chiefs in line with Section 18 (1) of the Armed Forces Act Cap. A. 20 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria. The aide explained that the president’s letter is aimed at dispelling insinuations that he intends to bypass the National Assembly in the appointment of the service chiefs, saying: “It is on record that this same procedure was adopted when the immediate past service chiefs were appointed…It will be recalled that the National Assembly will only resume plenary on 9th February, 2021 when, hopefully, Mr. President’s communication for consideration and confirmation of the nominations for appointment of the service chiefs would be undertaken.”

    Even though he touted this step as setting the present administration apart from others that never sought and obtain NASS approval for the appointment of service chiefs, you can’t help wondering whether it isn’t the ultimate academic exercise. The circumstances that have played out present the lawmakers with a fait accompli and it seems obvious the Senate proceedings wouldn’t make much difference now. Seriously, can confirmation be withheld at this point? But the good thing also is that the confirmation hearings promise a platform for the new chiefs to unveil their agenda for tackling insecurity. They better seize it.

     

     

     

  • Elite noise

    Elite noise

    Hardball

     

    The Ohanaeze Ndigbo’s response to the appointment of new service chiefs was instructive.  Away from the hair-splitting, ethnic radicalism of the John Nwodo era, Prof. George Obiozor, famed academic, former ambassador and new Ohanaeze president-general, opted for a more conciliatory tone.

    Ohanaeze hailed President Muhammadu Buhari’s choice of Major-Gen. Leo Irabor as new chief of Defence staff, especially saluting the nativity of the beneficiary as ethnic Igbo, though of the Niger Delta hue, from the Western Igbo stock of Delta State.  That was commendable, he stressed, for the president ought to be hailed as finding a fellow Igbo worthy, as top dog, in his new security infrastructure.

    Still, while ours is ours, mine would continue to be mine.  While Gen. Irabor belonged to the South-South geo-political zone, no South East scion was still represented, in that core conclave.

    So, the president should please make amends, when the retirement-bound current inspector-general of Police (IGP) exits — and everyone would live happily ever-after: except, of course, a counter-lobby growls that a “mere” IGP isn’t core security enough!

    Technically, you could hardly fault the logic, tact and wisdom of the Ohanaeze pitch.  True: South East is unrepresented as service chief.  But true too: Ohanaeze risks being interpreted as saying Irabor, though Igbo, is not Igbo enough, under Ohanaeze’s acid test!

    That sure could be mischief.  But then mischief would appear part and parcel of the trade — of jockeying for legitimate share, in a multi-ethnic democracy like Nigeria’s.

    Of course, there is also the politics of identity, fuelling vicarious satisfaction — no crime!  That’s why CNN featured a Black American woman who said she broke down in joyful tears, at Kamara Harris’s pick, for US Vice President.  In Barack Obama’s new book, A Promised Land, some African-American, Latino and Asian-American White House valets told President Obama he wouldn’t know what his emergence, as president, meant to their White House tribe!

    Tingling pleasures, of the politics of identity!  Again, no crime.

    Still, the way Nigeria’s ethnic majors log on to the politics of identity racket is rather nauseating.  Anytime appointments — major or minor — come, ethnic champions whip out their tribal microscopes to scour the list, for kith-and-kin.

    Absence of such fuels jeremiads, that swear the country is cascading into a ditch.  Presence powers jubilant triumphalism, suggesting that with a co-ethnic there, nothing can go wrong; and proclaiming the union recharged!  Yet, neither assures the success or failure of the new appointee.

    And what if the slew of minorities join the racket?  Enter, babble of the neo-Tower of Babel!

    Where an appointee comes from is elite noise.  Without prejudice to fairness in appointive spread as befits a just federation, a heathier consensus should be on quality of service, not the nativity of the appointed.

     

     

  • Hero or villain?

    Hero or villain?

    Hardball

     

    HE had always been very active in local politics, but he soared into national consciousness some two weeks ago with a quit notice on herdsmen in the Ibarapa, Oke-Ogun area of Oyo State. He accused the herders of killings, kidnappings and rapings of community natives. And though he is neither the state governor nor a conventional security chief to issue such an order, his cause found resonance with the local folk such that he commanded more credibility and following with them than the regular agents of government. These summarise the exploits of Yoruba rights activist Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho.

    Igboho asked herdsmen in Igangan, Ibarapa north council area of Oyo to leave within seven days following reports of the killing of some natives that he blamed on the herders. The quit notice naturally generated much tension, with ethnic warriors like him across the divide fiercely threatening blowbacks. Curiously, the Federal Government, which swiftly (many would say rashly) rebutted a variant of such order by Ondo State Governor Rotimi Akeredolu from which Igboho is suspected to have drawn inspiration, was suddenly lost for words in responding to the activist’s wild cat initiative. The onus fell on Oyo State Governor Seyi Makinde to repudiate Igboho’s order and invite the police to arrest “criminals” fomenting trouble in the guise of protecting the interest of the Yoruba. Subsequently it was reported that Police Inspector-General Mohammed Adamu had ordered that Igboho be arrested and transferred to Abuja.

    But the activist wasn’t fazed by the threatened arrest; and upon expiration of his seven-day notice last Friday, he and his supporters stormed Igangan to expel the herders, precipitating a clash with the non-natives and forcing the Seriki Fulani to flee. Earlier when he showed up in the community, he was accorded a rousing welcome by the townspeople. “Kidnappers cannot rule over us, they can’t take over our land from us. It belongs to us…,” he asserted inter alia. Apparently bolstered by the reception in the Oyo community, he has vowed to extend his cause to all other Southwest states and indeed Kwara.

    Not only did Igboho’s cause resonate with community locals, it elicited some tacit sympathy from Yoruba elite. Obviously, however, it wasn’t that Igboho’s self-help approach was being endorsed as right, only that the approach seemed compelled amidst suspected lack of capacity or willingness in government to tackle down the security challenges faced by the people. Already, there are reports the activist is being considered by Southwest governors for possible enlistment to head the regional security outfit, Operation Amotekun.

    Igboho is by no means the example of a law-abiding citizen, but the circumstance that threw him up lends him the relevance he has and only effective engagement by government with the security challenges will take away that relevance.

  • Belated reorganisation

    Belated reorganisation

    Hardball

     

    It is unclear why President Muhammadu Buhari finally named new service chiefs this week after ignoring the loud public demand that he should do so for more than three years.

    The new service chiefs are: Major-General Leo Irabor, Chief of Defence Staff; Major-General I. Attahiru, Chief of Army Staff; Rear Admiral A.Z. Gambo, Chief of Naval Staff; and Air-Vice Marshal I.O. Amao, Chief of Air Staff.

    They replaced General Abayomi Olonisakin, former Chief of Defence Staff; Lt-Gen. Tukur Buratai, former Chief of Army Staff; Vice Admiral Ibok Ekwe Ibas , former Chief of Naval Staff; and Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar , former Chief of Air Staff.

    The old service chiefs, appointed in July 2015 by the president, had been targets of intense criticism following escalating insecurity in the country. Curiously, Buhari thanked them for their “overwhelming achievements in our efforts at bringing enduring peace to our dear country.” Going by public assessment, they failed in the fight against insecurity, particularly in the war on terror, which is mainly why the people demanded their removal.

    As Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, Buhari was expected to redesign the country’s problematic security architecture to achieve the desired result, and changing the old service chiefs was considered necessary to bring about positive change.  It is noteworthy that the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) and the National Assembly had emphasised the need to restructure the country’s security architecture to tackle nationwide security challenges.

    President Buhari had appointed the service chiefs, and he could fire them. But he had been unwilling to relieve them of their positions. It was puzzling that he claimed to want to minimise insecurity but also wanted to keep service chiefs who had been unable to minimise insecurity.

    Importantly, according to a report published in February 2020, the tenures of the old defence and service chiefs should have expired in July 2017, based on the Armed Forces Terms and Conditions of Service.   The report cited Section 8 of the public service rules which stipulates that the compulsory retirement age for all grades in the service shall be 60 years or 35 years of pensionable service, whichever is earlier.

    Also, the report cited Section 4 of the harmonised terms and conditions of service officers (2017) which states that military service of an officer is a period of unbroken service in the armed forces of Nigeria from the date of commission to the date of retirement from service.

    The report said: “Each of the service chiefs has, however, spent above the stipulated service years. Olonisakin, 57, has spent 38 years in service. Buratai and Ibas, both 59, have been in service for 36 years. Abubakar, 59, has spent 40 years in service.”

    The point is President Buhari should have removed the old service chiefs much earlier. He encouraged illegality by keeping them in office beyond their time.