Category: Hardball

It’s no news that Senator Joshua Dariye is behind bars.  In June 2018, a Federal Capital Territory High Court had found him guilty of “criminal breach of trust” and “criminal appropriation.” He was sentenced to 14 years in prison, but the Court of Appeal later reduced his prison term to 10 years.

Dariye, a former two-term governor of Plateau State from 1999 to 2007, got into trouble for diverting N1.126bn from the state’s ecological funds. The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) prosecuted him, and he ended up in jail.

Before he was jailed, he had been elected senator twice, first in 2011, and then in 2015. He was sent to prison while serving as senator representing Plateau Central senatorial district.

This means he is not doing any legislative work at this time. But, curiously, the popular logic that says “no work, no pay” has not been applied in his case. Isn’t it applicable?

The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) asked a Federal High Court in Lagos to “stop the Senate President Bukola Saraki from paying former Plateau State governor, Senator Joshua Dariye, N14.2 million monthly allowances while he serves out a 10-year prison sentence for corruption because such payment violates Nigerian law and international obligations.”

A May 19 report said Dariye “continues to receive the N750, 000 salary and N13.5m monthly running cost from the National Assembly, 11 months after his conviction…This implies that his total earnings have risen from N85.5m in November last year to N171.1m in May. The sum is separate from a severance package he is supposed to receive as an outgoing member of the National Assembly.”

Is this defensible? The Director of Information at the National Assembly, Mr Agada Rawlings, was quoted as saying the payments were in order. “The point there is that his seat has not been declared vacant, “he explained.  ”You’re looking at the moral side of it but we are looking at the constitutional side. There are two issues that are at stake. Dariye, as of today, is still a senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. He has not been recalled. Secondly, the Independent National Electoral Commission has not declared his seat vacant. As the management of the National Assembly, we do not have such powers to do anything otherwise until the law speaks otherwise…  The only constitutional provision to declare a seat vacant is on the basis of recall or death of a member.”

When a senator is in jail and, therefore, not working, should he get paid for not working?

The catch-call of those days used to be: “Say it loud, I’m Black and proud!” That was in the 60s and 70s of Black renaissance and liberation; the days of Black power, cool, kinky and bushy Afro hair. Black was beautiful, Black was strong and Black was stepping Onto the horizon with a new esteem after a period of dehumanizing slavery and alienation.

However, after about 50 years of this movement to self-rediscovery and consciousness, the Black brother is still in the cold, not quite knowing where the rain began and whence he got drenched. Marcus Garvey, Kwame Nkrumah and even our own Nnamdi Azikiwe (Zik of Africa) would be frowning in their resting places right now.

Blacks (Nigerians, Africans and peoples of African descent) are not only paying huge sums to be spirited abroad to the White man’s land, they would do jobs not befitting of even slaves of their forbears days.

Nothing is sacred or off the limits as long as there are a few coins of foreign currency to pick up. Desperate African ladies are made to sport with dogs, horses and even robots, to the amusement of the masters. Desperate Nigerian teens are now taking White grannies for wives in a bizarre oedipal twist.

Today, the Black guy is the clean-up man of Europe, America and even Asia – the stains and grimes and porridges! Embassies and High Commissions make a fortune daily charging arbitrary fees from hordes of Africans in a stampede to flee from their burgeoning hell. They are making enough revenues to found new empires!

But here is the latest news: Nigerian applicants are reported to top the list of asylum seekers in Canada. Well, that’s no big deal. The news is that two out of three applicants claim they are homosexuals who are being persecuted at home.

There is a same-sex prohibition law in Nigeria and frustrated youths are seemingly making hay of it. According to report, at the end of December 2018, Nigeria had 12,138 pending applications at the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada. That is 17% of total applications and far ahead of second laced Haiti at 6,811. Crisis-torn Haiti used to be number one.

Since lies would eventually show up for what they are, Canadian officials have identified unusual patterns in sexual orientation claims filed by Nigerian refugee seekers. And they say they are galled by the negative impact it would have both on the system and on legitimate claimants.

Well, Hardball thinks there needs to be devised, instruments for testing and detecting an individual’s gay status. Alternatively, claimants should simply prove their status!

Now this is a tricky one. Even Hardball knows enough to step gingerly around this one; a wise man must handle the matter of the opposite sex with uncommon equanimity and the measuredness of a sage. If only because you are a man and in some way or the other, you would need a woman or her service. So matters of femininity must be treated with the delicateness they require.

Now, do not take the above title literally; it’s not about the complexion and tone of the fair sex. Notwithstanding that most of us African men now have a bit of difficulty discerning the real texture and coloration of the skin of the typical African belle. Over the years Western civilisation – not to mention cosmetics – has eroded the rich tonality of the original African woman’s skin. The much-cherished luscious glister of the female dark skin was organic aphrodisiac of sort, especially in the half dawn moments of conjugal co-efficiencies.

But this is not about new-day African woman skincare methods; far from it. Hardball is troubled here today, about the make-up (again, not cosmetic), character and constitution of the average Nigerian woman. Who is this person? What is her psychological state? Is there a common glitch bordering on the pathological and homicidal?

Now consider this story before we return to the question of the true colour of the African woman: a housewife in Owerri West Local Government of Imo State reportedly forced her niece to eat a dead chicken raw.

As recounted by a neighbour, she was returning from her shop and overheard the woman (Ugochi) telling someone to finish that thing. She was going to pass by but the anguished cry of a little girl ignited her curiosity. She stopped to look and behold, she saw the little girl (Chiamaka) eating a dead fowl raw. She was aghast and beckoned on other residents. According to the witness’s account, the little girl, who looks like a seven-year-old even though she is 12, is subjected to perpetual torment by her aunt.

The accused (Ugochi) denied that the chicken was raw: “It is not true that I asked her to eat the chicken raw, although I was angry. I came back and met my fowl dead. When I asked her what happened, she said she didn’t know. I forced her to cook the chicken and eat it.”

Hardball asks again: what is the true colour of a woman? Some have wagered that it only comes alive when you keep her in charge of another woman’s child.

Recently, cases of hot water baths, hot iron burns, solitary confinements, sometimes in chains, are rife – always against the other woman’s child. This psychopathic tendency would stand a good academic study; Hardball recommends.

It is ironic that the presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the February 23 election, Omoyele Sowore, is at the centre of a corruption-related controversy.  Sowore is the founder of online medium Sahara Reporters, which encourages people to report stories about corruption in Nigeria. As President of the University of Lagos Student Union Government between 1992 and 1994, he campaigned against cultism and corruption. This context made the corruption allegations against Sowore particularly striking.

There is no doubt that the AAC is divided.  The result is that there are members of the party who no longer recognise Sowore as its chairman. A report said the party’s National Executive Committee (NEC) had suspended Sowore and nine others for six months. Leonard Nzenwa became Acting National Chairman, pending the election of a substantive national chairman. Those suspended were accused of fraud, “particularly on inflow of illegal foreign funds into the party and personally retaining same in contravention of Section 225 (3) (4) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended).”

Other allegations against them were that they failed to convene or hold the mandatory quarterly meeting of the NEC, and usurped the functions of all organs of the party. The sanctions followed a thorough appraisal of the state of the party under Sowore’s leadership, it was said.

Sowore’s reaction further demonstrated that the party is in crisis.  ”It has come to the notice of the office of the Chairman of the African Action Congress that a group of suspended members, induced by financial reasons and anti-progressive politics, gathered in Abuja today, 13th May, 2019, and purportedly held a NEC meeting,” he said in a statement he signed and circulated. “These members, led by Leonard Nzenwa, former national secretary, who was suspended for financial impropriety and anti-party activities, have demonstrated by their actions that they have never been, and have never shared, the core beliefs that those of us in the African Action Congress hold.”

Sowore then announced magisterially: “Leonard Nzenwa is hereby expelled from the party, and the misguided individuals who participated in the Abuja meeting are suspended from the party until investigations reveal the extent of their involvement.”

It is curious that Sowore sounded like the accuser and the judge at the same time. It is unclear whether the expulsion and suspensions he announced had the backing of others because he gave the impression that they were his decisions, not collective decisions.

It is something to think about when a self-defined corruption fighter is accused of corruption.

Imagine being regaled with the tale of a hunter being made an army chief because he has acquired such ‘native’ powers that could help him quell any adversary. It is such ribaldry as this that would evoke the kind of raucous laughter that brings people to their knees.

It is also in situations such as this that mother would often chip in a note about the mirthfulness of vice: meaning that it is extreme situations that often evoke laughter in us. This statement often has the effect of making all around come back to their senses, to contemplate the magnitude of such humorous moment.

Tales emanating daily from the now bandit country of Zamfara State and environs have become so grave they are the most ribald jokes in the land.

Here are some sample headlines. “We pay ransom to bandits daily,” LG chief. “Bandits demand N20 million from five villages to avoid attacks.”

“We can’t go to farm again,” says Emir. “Emir and Defence Minister bicker over bandits.”

This is the point of this piece. While many Nigerians are beginning to make jokes of the rising scourge of banditry in the northwest of the country, what is unfolding may aptly be described as the sovereignty of banditry. Yet another autonomous entity has emerged amongst us.

Imagine a country’s Air Force mobilized to pursue bandits and common criminals; there would probably ensue as many collateral casualties as there are dead bandits. Sure enough, there are and the chairman of the traditional council of Zamfara State and the Emir of Anka, Alhaji Attahiru Ahmad has had a running cross fire with the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, over the civilian casualties in his domain.

Speaking to the Minister of Interior who recently came visiting, the monarch said that about 13,000 of his people have been displaced by bandits. Many of the villages are deserted as his people are escaping to towns or out of the state. Food scarcity looms as farming would be secondary to a man running for dare life.

Left to Emir Ahmad, he would have fired the Defence Minister, he said in exasperation in national newspapers. And there lie the posers: are the right people in the right security posts? Are bandits Fulani herders as some claim or are they bona fide bandits as Myetti Allah insists.

Again, is the problem being tackled? Consider that no sooner had the election ended than the so-called leaders began to chase shadows: one is making a job of dicing up his emirate in blind vendetta while another is on a mission to vanquish some perceived godfathers… and their people perish daily in avoidable circumstances.

Sovereignty of bandits.

The Igbo have a saying to the effect that you could only have a heap of palm bunches while it would be an abomination to find a heap of skulls. In other words, they are reflecting on the sacredness and sanctity of life. Imagine the grotesque picture it would make to find a huge harvest of human heads as if they were a harvest of palm nuts.

This is the impression that comes to mind upon reading the muddled missive emanating from the presidency concerning the current spate of killings and insecurity around the country. Confronted on the dire security challenges hobbling the nation, presidential spokesman, Mallam Garba Shehu responded thus: “If you ask me about the biggest security (challenge) we met on the ground, it is the Boko Haram and I will score this administration 98 per cent coming this far because Boko Haram is now confined to the fringes of the Lake Chad. As a matter of fact, they jump in and out and mainly occupy communities that have not been re-occupied by their owners.”

However, according to the Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, about 1,071 Nigerians lost their lives in crime-related cases across the country in the first quarter of this year. But by the reckoning of Mallam Shehu, despite the recent rise in killings, banditry and kidnappings, the figure was still better than that of the previous administrations.

It is close to saying that your heap of skulls is higher than mine; or your casualties are more than mine.

But many individuals and groups have expressed offence at to Mallam Shehu’s claim. Most recent is the apex Islamic body, Jama’atu Nasri Islam (JNI). Speaking through its Secretary-General, Dr. Khalid Abubakar Aliyu, it said: “Overtime, JNI has been calling on Muslims to fervently pray for the restoration of security, peace, stability, progress and development in Nigeria. We once again reiterate same call, as the situation seems to be deteriorating with armed banditry, kidnappings, theft and abject poverty on the increase.”

The Northern Elders Forum (NEF), led by Prof. Ango Abdullahi was more forthright: “I don’t understand what the reaction from the presidency is expected to convey to the public. They should be concerned that the security failures are everywhere, including the hometown of the president. Obviously there is more insecurity in the North today than during Jonathan’s leadership.”

The presidency’s reaction suggests that we all have become inured to the unbridled wave of banditry, bloodshed and sheer carnage that has infested the country. It also suggests a loss of control; a surrender and a sour testament that criminals may have seized the initiative from the government.

Deep think required, not morbid comparisons.