Category: Hardball

Hardball

What actually happened at the Lekki Toll Gate, Lagos, on the evening of October 20, 2020?  Did soldiers indeed “massacre” civilians engaged in a peaceful protest against abuse of power by the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad of the Nigeria Police Force, known as SARS?  The Lekki protesters were the focal point of the nationwide #EndSARS protests.

Of course, the Nigerian Army is at the centre of the probe by the Lagos State Judicial Panel on Restitution for Victims of SARS-related Abuses and Other Matters.

But there are indications that the army is not cooperating with the investigators. The General Officer Commanding 81 Division, Maj. Gen. Godwin Umelo, and the Commanding Officer, 65 Battalion, Bonny Camp, Victoria Island, Lagos, Lt. Col. S.O. Bello, have failed to appear before the panel, which has summoned them twice. In particular, Lt. Col. Bello is a person of interest because he led the battalion involved in the Lekki shooting under investigation.

The Commander of 81 Division, Brig. Gen. Ibrahim Taiwo, had testified before the panel, denying claims that soldiers shot #EndSARS protesters with live bullets during the operation. However, the panel was not expected to limit its probe to Brig. Gen. Taiwo’s testimony, which explains why it summoned Maj. Gen. Umelo and Lt. Col. Bello.

It is unclear why the two officers shunned the panel’s invitation. But there is no justification for their failure to honour the invitation. They are expected to appear before the panel not only to clarify the issue but also to exculpate the army. Their non-cooperation is bad for the army’s image.

The army should be concerned about its image. It should avoid being seen as acting as if it is above the law. It should be conscious that it is supposed to operate under the law in a democracy.

It is reassuring that the panel’s chairman, retired Justice Doris Okuwobi, ordered that fresh summons be issued to the concerned officers. “Service shall also be made to the Office of the Chief of Army Staff…,” she said.  It remains to be seen how the army boss, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, will respond.

It is noteworthy that the army’s version of the Lekki incident is marked by twists and turns. The army initially claimed its personnel were not at the toll gate when the incident happened, then later admitted it had deployed soldiers to the place with live and blank bullets, maintaining that soldiers shot into the air and did not kill any protester.

If the army has nothing to hide and is not afraid of the panel, it should cooperate with the investigators.

Hardball

UNLESS something extraordinary happens about the pace of ongoing registration of Nigerians for the National Identity Number (NIN) by the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), the deadlines set by government for linkage of the NIN with phone numbers by subscribers look totally unrealistic.

Government, through the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, had on 15th December, last year, directed all telecoms operators to block phone lines registered on their networks that were not linked to respective subscriber’s NIN by 30th December. Following public outcry against the brevity of the deadline given for implementing the sudden policy, government granted a three-week extension for subscribers already having their NIN till 19th January, 2021, and six-week extension for subscribers who do not yet have the NIN till 9th February. It was not clear how telco systems were to delineate between those who already had their NINs and those who did not in applying the different deadlines. Also not certain is how the new policy affects foreigners resident in Nigeria and subscribed on local networks: will they be registered for NINs to link with their phone numbers; or will another criteria be required, say the number of their international passports; or will they be exempted altogether from the NIN-phone number linkage?

Given that many Nigerians typically lay back on civic measures until there is a deadline compelling them to act, the threat of disconnection from telco networks has forced huge crowds to NIMC centres seeking registration for the NIN. It was the pressure on those centres that NIMC workers leveraged on last week Thursday in calling a strike that grounded applicants’ quest for the critical number. Many offices and registration centres of the identity commission were shut against desperate members of the public, as the Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN), NIMC branch, ordered members off work over alleged welfare issues, including exposure of staff to Covid-19 infection and non-provision of personal protective equipment. Although the strike was reported suspended on Friday, workers weren’t due back at their duty posts until today, Monday – a huge time loss on the deadline already pressuring desperate applicants. Even the agency’s management acknowledged the challenges. “The (NIMC) wishes to assure members of the general public that glitches experienced in the enrollment process are being resolved and normal enrollment would resume shortly. We apologise for any inconveniences caused and wish to assure you of our continued excellent service,” it said on its twitter handle @nimc_ng.

This is a most inappropriate of time for NIMC workers to have issues with things needed for the registration exercise, given the urgency out there to beat the deadline for disconnection from telco networks. But even if all needs were met now, the deadlines yet ought be extended to defuse pressure on registration centres in view of the raging Covid-19 pandemic: registrants need some breather, just as NIMC staff do.

Hardball

IT is understandable that the Nigerian Army wants to be seen as not only fighting bandits but also winning the war against insecurity. But the army’s claims of success have been contradicted by locals in the affected areas who claim that the army has failed.

The acting Director Defence, Media Operations, Brigadier General Benard Onyeuko, represented by the Nigerian Army Operations Media Coordinator, Colonel Aminu Ilyasu,  told journalists in Katsina State on January 6 that the army had killed 220 bandits and destroyed 197 bandits’ camps from June to December last year. He also said the army had rescued 642 kidnap victims, foiled 167 cases of attempted banditry and 81 kidnap attempts.

This picture was meant to reassure the public that the army had not failed in its effort to counter insecurity in the Northwest. The spokesman also stated that 73 AK-47 rifles, 194 Dane guns and 53,200 ammunition were recovered. Also recovered were 7,761 stolen cows and 1,876 sheep, he said.

He added that the army had arrested 335 suspected bandits, 326 illegal miners, 147 bandits’ informants and collaborators, 14 bandits’ arms suppliers, 24 rustled cattle marketers and 46 bandits’ logistics suppliers.

However, instead of applause and commendation, this narrative was greeted by complaints from some community leaders in Dansandau Emirate of Maru LGA, Zamfara State.

A community leader, Alhaji Nuhu Dansadau, for instance, was reported saying bandits were still terrorising the locals, flaunting AK-47 rifles even during the daytime. “The military operation did not make any meaningful impact, particularly in Kuyanbana forest,” he was quoted as saying.

People had deserted their villages because of persistent attacks from bandits, he claimed, naming some of the abandoned villages, including Jesa, Kalhu, Tasa, Gazamba, Yartsaba, Magamar-Danbata, Anguwar Doka, Kwangerawa and Maidoraiyi. He told a reporter: “As I am talking to you now, there are over 700 people who are waiting for vehicles to convey them to other places.”

Another community leader, Alhaji Ibrahim Tofa, lamented that “despite the deployment of the military, the bandits are still attacking us.”

It is unclear if the army had exaggerated the result of its intervention in order to attract public praise. It is also unclear if the mentioned community leaders had exaggerated the presence and activities of bandits in their areas in order to create a picture of increasing insecurity.

The truth is that when insecurity is effectively tackled, there would be no such collision of narratives as the reality would be clear to everybody.

Hardball

IN the middle of the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, 100 Nigerians have been banned from travelling out of the country for the next six months “due to non-compliance to the mandatory Day 7 post-arrival COVID-19 PCR tests.”  After flying into the country, they were required to go into self-isolation and do a COVID-19 test seven days after arrival. It is unclear why they failed to obey the rules.

The Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19 did not name those affected by the travel restriction, but released a list of their passport numbers and said they had been contacted. “Defaulting passengers have been notified and will be prevented from travelling out of the country during this period,” Chairman of the Presidential Task Force on COVID-19 and Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha, said in a statement.

Also, a “top source in PTF” was reported saying that the list of the affected people had “been sent to the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) and other security agencies to stop them from travelling out.

“Any further defiance may lead to the cancellation of their passports. We are no longer going to tolerate any laxity on the part of any Nigerian, no matter how highly-placed.”

Tough talk, but equally tough action was necessary to ensure that the concerned travellers followed the rules. By failing to observe the seven days’ isolation or present themselves for the PCR repeat test on day seven, they constituted a danger to the public.

It is noteworthy that Mustapha earlier said 20,216 inbound travellers had failed to show up for the post-arrival test. It is indefensible that such a great number of people shunned such an important test. It is also indefensible that the authorities had no response to such dodgers beyond announcing their number.

It’s puzzling that the authorities failed to name those affected by the travel ban. If, indeed, they had ignored the procedure, there was no reason to protect their identities. Naming them can have deterrent value.  This is no time to encourage test dodging by failing to expose dodgers.

Preventing the dodgers from travelling out of the country for six months does not address the possibility that they could have the coronavirus and spread it within the country.  Nigeria has recorded more than 90,000 cases of COVID-19 and more than 1,300 deaths.

Test dodging is condemnable because it endangers others. But if the dodgers behave irresponsibly, the authorities should not encourage irresponsible behaviour. COVID-19 is a public health crisis, and no one should be allowed to compound the problem through their irresponsibility.

Hardball

SHOCKINGLY, a new report by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) exposed the magnitude of bribe-for-judgement cases in Nigeria’s justice sector from 2018 to 2020.

A survey of 901 people, including 638 lawyers, 124 judges and 25 court staff revealed stinking corruption, “mostly in electoral and political matters.” There were 114 participants who did not indicate their roles.

“The money involved in the high-level corruption in this sector was categorised into money demanded, offered or paid. Demands are made by court officials including judges, while bribery offers and payment are made by lawyers and litigants,” the report said.

It added: “The total amount of money reported by the Justice sector respondents as corruptly demanded, offered and paid between 2018 and 2020 was N9,457, 650,000.00 (N9.457 billion).”

If more than nine billion naira was “demanded, offered and paid” to influence the course of justice within the period, it demonstrates that the business of corrupting justice is profitable.  The result of the survey indicated that 63 lawyers paid or offered N5.77 billion as bribes for a favourable judgement.

Of the 63 lawyers, female lawyers paid or offered N918 million as bribes, and male lawyers paid or offered N4.815 billion as bribes to influence the course of justice. Eleven judges reported experiencing offers or payment of millions and billions of naira as bribes.

Obviously, bribery involves bribe-givers and bribe-takers. It is a point to ponder how the bribe-takers favoured the bribe-givers because of the bribes. Why did the bribe-givers consider such bribes necessary? Without giving bribes, would they have got unfavourable judgements in the cases concerned? Did such bribes guarantee favourable judgements?

Did the bribe-takers who delivered judgements favourable to the bribe-givers feel guilty of perverting justice? Were such judgements later reviewed by superior courts, or did the violation of justice stand unremedied?  There are many questions.

Corruption in the country’s temple of justice is not new. The new report only shows that it is thriving.  In 2016, for instance, a collective of “Concerned Lawyers” protested that not all lawyers and judges were corrupt. “We are embarrassed by a few of our privileged colleagues who bribe judges, talk to them behind doors to pervert justice…We have a duty to this country as ministers in the temple of justice,” said Femi Falana (SAN), who was in the forefront of the image-redeeming campaign.

The authorities in the justice sector should take the ICPC report as a wake-up call to prevent the temple of justice from becoming a market of buyers and sellers.

Hardball

AFTER nine months of ditching work, lecturers on the platform of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) suspended their strike last Wednesday, 23rd December. But it was not all-clear yet for industrial temper in the tertiary sector: the union warned its members would head back to the trenches without notice if government fails to meet its obligations under the new pact reached with them.

Also, the sheathing of swords by the teachers’ union did not translate to immediate reopening of the long-shuttered schools. In his statement, ASUU National President, Professor Biodun Ogunyemi, said in view of the raging Covid-19 pandemic, the schedule for reopening of the schools lies with government which recently ordered partial lockdown measures to arrest the pandemic’s second wave. In effect, even with the call-off of the crippling ASUU strike, students must await a respite in the Covid-19 siege to get back to studies.

ASUU had pulled the plugs on academic work in universities on 9th March, accusing the Federal Government of failing to honour a 2009 agreement and Memorandum of Understanding entered into with the union. In the 2009 deal, government agreed, among other things, to provide funds for revitalizing decaying infrastructure in public universities and set up visitation panels to ascertain the actual state of respective institution. Another major grouse of the union with government was over its implementation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), which ASUU argued negated the autonomy of universities and proposed the University Transparency and Accountability Solution (UTAS) platform in the alternative.

Well, it took nine months for government to come to fresh understanding with the teachers; it is thus highly important that this new deal does not fall through again to warrant fresh recourse to industrial hostility by the teachers, who are getting paid for all the months they were on strike whereas students have lost a whole academic session on their studies – time that can by no means be recovered.

Students have always been the loser in ASUU strikes. If now it is being said their return to studies will await abatement of the new Covid-19 wave at ‘God knows when,’ Hardball says, ‘No!’ ‘No!’ Time having been wasted more than enough already, universities should devise mechanisms to get teachers to immediately begin teaching online. To be sure, the teaching should be closely monitored and evaluated to ensure maintenance of standards. Teachers got paid for the idle months, but a huge task that awaits them (if they haven’t thought of it) is jumpstarting for assiduous academic work the brains of students who had gone on to other ventures over nine months of academic idleness. But then, that is where they will earn their pay, and the earlier they get started the better.

Hardball

The unfortunate feature about Nigerian politics is that things happen that should make us laugh, but we end with streaks of tears. They are not just comedy. They may be farce, but the word that many can associate with them is the absurd. Some call it the theatre of the absurd. Even that expression has been flogged almost to death.

Such a dimension has cropped up in Cross River state, a state known to amuse with its festivals. But this has spilled over to elections, and why not? Life is how we play and dance.

It is the drawing of swords between two senatorial gladiators within the PDP over the just concluded senatorial bye-elections. It is a story of two candidates, two certificates of return, two court judgments. The paradox though, is that it is one election, and one senatorial seat. Who can beat that for a stage play, Nigerian style?

After all, the two squared off at the party primary, and when it was between Stephen Odey and Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe, the National Electoral Commission was present. The first burlesque was when Jarigbe hinted he could not accept the polls result because INEC was not present. Then INEC announced there and then that they were present. Just like Donald Trump who alleged that his party, the Republican Party, was edged out of the polling area against all evidence.

The result had shown that Odey won by a wide margin. The playgets interesting. The INEC issued Odey a certificate of return, and of course there was fanfare in Odey’s camp. Dolour draped your face if you were Jarigbe. Jarigbe, ever the optimistic politician, thought he could do what others have done in the country when they cannot win the hearts of the people. They try to capture the hearts of the judges. Win one, lose one. One plus one could give you one. It becomes Jarigbe one, Odey zero. But if there are two goals one has to be an offside, because it is not a league match. It is like the football cup final. One person must win and go home in an elimination match. At that point there was only one foal and one win. Advantage Odey.

Jarigbe abandoned the court in his state and lined up for a court, first in Port Harcourt, and then in Abuja. That is after he scored 0-2in Calabar court.

So, the appeal court rules in Jarigbe’s favour, and, watch this, the same INEC that gave Odey a certificate of return also handed Jarigbe one. So we have two senators certified for one senatorial seat. INEC gave a certificate without withdrawing it. So, there. Where do we go from here?

Jarigbe now rejoices, and wants to be sworn in a senator of the federal republic. Wait there. Enter senate president. Lawan first faces stalemate, and he eventually says he cannot swear in two people. He eventually swears in Odey.

Here we go, the drama unfolds. The question is, how can and should the court upend the will of the people. Or will it? Wait and see.

Hardball

A ROGUE, 9001, roams on the Airtel network.  How complicit is the network in the roguery?  Is it unaware of the havoc 9001 daily causes?  Or it is part of the whole racket?

That is what the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) should find out, to save innocent subscribers.

Now and then, 9001 props up – at least on Airtel line 08023596231 – and pops the lie, in an annoying text: “Thank you for requesting for VERTO FUN GAMERS DAILY (capitalization its) at N20. 0.  Please reply: 1 Buy + auto renew. 2 Buy once. 3 Reject.”

That was a blatant lie, for the subscriber never “requested” for any game, VERTO or no, not to talk of earning a marketers subversive “thank you”, prelude to clinching a willy-nilly deal.

For the umpteenth time, subscriber 08023596231 would pick 3 (Reject); and each time 9001 would respond: “Congratulation, – [what the hell for?] – your reply has been taken successfully, soon you will receive a confirmation”.

In a few hours on, the same e-harassment would repeat itself and the whole travesty is gone through all over again – tiring!

The only saving grace is that the text is charged free – no deduction from your account.  But the not-so-graceful ordeal is that the same text soon comes back, harassing you, most annoyingly, to buy a service you never requested, but which 9001 insisted you did!  Some cheek!

Time was when such phony marketing was routine – indeed, an epidemic – with most of the networks; with the Telcos proceeding to net off money for services neither requested nor used; or for products willy-nilly sold in the worst tradition of Hobson’s choice, in that golden age network rip-offs.

Still, thanks to subscribers’ cries and NCC interventions, that racketeering-at-subscribers’-expense tapered off.  Is that old habit creeping back again?

That is why the NCC, as the industry regulators, should probe this 9001 Airtel foray.  Subscribers cannot afford to be gamed by e-smart Alecs, on Telco networks, while the NCC looks on.

Starting a sales pitch with brazen lies is bad enough.  Pestering subscribers, again and again, even after turning down the initial pitch, is the limit of corporate insensitivity, if not outright criminal obduracy.

It’s high time NCC called Airtel to order.