The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • JK’s quixotic freedoms

    Jimi Agbaje aka JK, the Lagos Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate for the March 2 governorship election, somewhat cuts the picture of a Don Quixote — at least by the thematic plays of his campaign road boards, all stressing “Freedom”.

    In one of such, with a background of multi-lane traffic gridlock, JK decreed: “Freedom from traffic”.  But how?  Lagos would be rid of most of its cars or, by some open sesame, JK would conjure freeways, so that the notorious Lagos traffic would vamoose – just like that?  How exactly does Candidate Agbaje hope to implement his “Freedom from Traffic”?

    There is even a more dramatic one, since it junks the physical, and romps into the psychological, if not the outright psychic.  Enter JK’s “Freedom from Suffering” – and bang, the giant picture of a destitute woman, sitting woe-begotten by the road side, conjures that pathos!

    Indeed, JK is right: nobody wants to suffer.  Indeed, other things being equal, suffering should not, in Pentecostal Christian-speak, be anybody’s “portion”.  Yet, suffering is as old as human history itself.

    It is even more riveting, as a concept.  Appreciate enjoyment — who doesn’t?  Still, without suffering, you probably wouldn’t cherish enjoyment.

    Which brings the discourse to the vital question: how exactly do you eliminate “suffering” – through infantile slogans, as JK has done, just proclaiming “Freedom from suffering”?  Ha!

    Indeed, the way JK goes about mouthing his “freedom” slogan suggests just spurting out whatever comes along, in the name of electioneering sloganeering.  Incidentally, looking back as JK’s record, in his eternal bid for Lagos governor, that is not even new.

    In 2015, squared with a relatively unknown Akin Ambode, JK came up with the stupendous “Ocean Economy”, his own idea of exploiting the Lagos aquatic splendor.  But again, he didn’t exactly say how he would do it.  The giant street boards just glared at you: “Ocean economy”, aside from his rather catchy “JK is okay”.

    Ironically, it seems another epoch now, though it’s only four years: “JK is okay” would appear not part of the deal this electoral season, though it was the catchiest of his slogans in 2015. It would therefore appear the battle-weary Agbaje is becoming progressively jaded as he rushes big into each electoral fray, and yet falls hard, to parody the lyrics of Jamaican reggae great and living legend, Jimmy Cliff, in his famous hit, “The bigger they come, the harder they fall”.

    Still, cut JK some slacks – he has a right to be weary, and maybe jaded!  Against Babatunde Fashola  (2007) and Ambode (2015), he stumbled.  It doesn’t look as it would be any different this time round, against Babajide Sanwo-Olu.  So, you could understand if some fatigue sets in.

    Both Fashola and Ambode have gone on to make their mark on the Lagos landscape.  Yet, all JK could conjure is some political bondage, needing emergency “freedoms” – his democratic choice!

    Still, that is no excuse for JK to just spurt “Freedoms” and hint at sheer magic.  He should carefully articulate his case, or risk being the Lagos political Don Quixote, tilting at windmills!

     

  • APC Cross River and INEC’s pick

    It must be a hard time to be the chairman of the National Electoral Commission,especially now, a few days to the first round of polls. Most recently, when many thought the saga of the Rivers State All Progressives Congress had reached the end of the tether, the court came with a twist.

    But it is not clear sometimes how the electoral umpire decides what court judgment to uphold if it only contradicts another court of coordinate jurisdiction. A case in point is the APC conundrum in Cross River State, which has somehow found itself outside the radar of national discussion, but it is brewing in the innards of the party in the Niger Delta state.

    Cross River was one of the APC states embroiled in parallel primaries last year, and the battle swung from the ballot to the court rooms. It was an intense fight between two APC bigwigs in Cross River State. They are Pastor Usani Usani, the Niger Delta affairs minister, versus Senator Owan-Enoh.

    As was the case in Rivers and a few other states, each of the kingpins in the primaries won their own primaries. It seemed like impunity on a tangent, each big man pulled off his own impunity and each claimed to be the real candidate for governorship polls come March 2.

    Read also: We’re yet to review our position on Rivers APC, says INEC

    But we cannot have two candidates and the only way to resolve it was in the court of law. Again the matter had to go to court. But it must be borne in mind that the national office of the party in Abuja, just as in Ogun State or Rivers, had their own favourite son. Just as Tonye Cole was the son after the heart of the APC in the centre, so Senator Owan-Enoh captured the imagination of its Abuja headquarters.

    With this in mind, each of them fought the battle before the bench, and each secured a verdict in their favour. So, the minister and senator thought they were on track to launch onslaughts on the incumbent governor. But as it is the party is divided, but the INEC has now decided to pick a candidate.

    This is one of the inconsistencies in the candidature of this dispensation. Why would INEC pick Own-Enoh when two courts of equal powers say each of them is qualified? The INEC boss, Professor Mahmood Yakubu, had lamented the contradiction of verdicts from courts of coordinate jurisdiction. And Cross River is one of them. Maybe that accounted for the court ruling that forbade INEC to release the list of candidates. INEC listed Enoh as the Cross River State gubernatorial pointsman.

    It would give impression of preferential treatment when it did not do so for Zamfara and Rivers States. It is a crisis of the rule of law that INEC must address for fairness.

  • Universities, not high schools

    Chief Afe Babalola, SAN, founder of Afe Babalola University, Ado Ekiti (ABUAD), just outed with an idea: unified university examinations for final year degree students.

    Addressing ABUAD’s matriculation and award conferment on distinguished alumni, Chief Babalola said he would do a position paper on his suggestion, to the National Universities Commission (NUC) and the Federal Ministry of Education.  Meanwhile, he called for support for his new elixir, to build up strong public opinion.

    Hardball finds Chief Babalola’s suggestion rather weird.

    What really is a “final year examination”?  From the course system that universities have adopted right now, there is really nothing like “final year” examination.  Because the courses are broken down into smaller bits, and stretched over the course duration, the so-called “final year” examination starts with the fresher’s first semester examination.  So, ab initio, what the chief suggests is already an anachronism, except he can demonstrate, in his position paper, how you can bend the course system to accommodate a “final year examination”.

    But even if the course system were to be jettisoned, and the “Almighty May-June” were to stage a comeback, Hardball is still at a loss how a unified examination, like the Junior Secondary School (JSS) and Senior Secondary School (SSS) examinations, conducted by the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) and the National Examinations Council (NECO), fits into the university concept and culture.

    Without appearing fixated with set ideas, Chief Babalola’s latest suggestion is a manifestation of the worrying neo-secondary school syndrome, oozing from the camp of Nigeria’s university investors, simply because they could marshal capital to build fancy structures and attract good staff, no thanks to the progressive under-investment in public universities.

    The chief is calling for unified university final exams.  Yet, the university lobby is calling for the scrapping of a central matriculating exam.  In any case, they have managed to position a pot of gold, which they call “post-JAMB test”, with which they manage to fleece helpless youths, all in the name of “standard”.  Pray, how come a central matriculation exam is heresy; but the new Babalola doctrine is hoped-for new orthodoxy?  It just does not add up.

    But still on neo-secondary school fixation: you have universities that have faculty uniforms, those who decree their hostels are nothing but secondary school dormitories and campuses just glorified civilian barracks, where students need passes to enter and exit!  Now, crown all of these with a centralized degree examination, and what do you have?  Is the Nigerian university system progressing or retrogressing?

    In his Paradise Lost, John Milton shed much light on free will, which he argued God had given every human.  But bear the consequences – good or bad – however you exercise that free will.  That is more or less the concept and culture of universities — almost unfettered intellectual freedom to soar.  It is on that scholastic wing that universities find their niches and build the character of their products for the future.

    That is why the university is conceptually an open sky for free intellectual spirits; not a golden cage for scholastic zombies.

     

  • Against the law

    What is the use of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) if its provisions are not respected by those who should supply requested information under the law?  The FOIA, signed into law in 2011, was “hailed as the death-blow to corruption and lack of transparency in governance.” But the law has not been as effective as expected.

    The FOIA is: “An Act to make public records and information more freely available, provide for public access to public records and information, protect public records and information to the extent consistent with the public interest and the protection of personal privacy, protect serving public officers from adverse consequences of disclosing certain kinds of official information without authorisation and establish procedures for the achievement of those purposes and for related matters.”

    Based on the FOIA, Saturday PUNCH reported that it had sent a letter to the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), requesting copies of asset declaration forms of some Nigerians who were in power. The newspaper said the bureau had refused to release the requested information more than seven days after it made the request.  The lawful time frame for official response is seven days.

    The newspaper said in its February 2 edition: “Saturday PUNCH had on January 24 written to the CCB asking for copies of asset declaration forms of the Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari; Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Boss Mustapha; Minister of Labour, Dr Chris Ngige; Minister of Works, Housing and Power, Babatunde Fashola (SAN); Minister of Communication, Adebayo Shittu; and Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi.”

    Saturday PUNCH  had also sought  from the CCB the asset declaration forms of  Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed; Minister of Agriculture, Audu Ogbeh; Minister of State for Transportation (Aviation), Hadi Sirika; Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami; Director-General, DSS, Yusuf Bichi; and Finance Minister, Zainab Ahmed.

    The newspaper’s letter contained other requests: “the number and names of political office holders who have yet to fill and submit their asset declaration forms for whatever reasons” and “the number of names of political office holders the Code of Conduct Bureau is investigating over issues relating to asset declaration forms.” In addition, the newspaper asked for the names of political office holders “yet to comply with the bureau’s directive to visit it for verification.”

    But, according to the newspaper, “eight days after the application was filed and acknowledged by the bureau, the information requested was not made available to Saturday PUNCH, neither was there any written notice to state the reasons for the denial.”

    The bureau’s unresponsiveness is contrary to the letter and spirit of the FOIA.

  • What is Mohammed’s crime?

    After the clear failure of bluff and bluster, over the Onnoghen affair, the Nigerian never-frazzled elite are withdrawing into their coven to cook yet another deal.

    From media reports, lobbies are lobbying the government to give suspended Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Walter Samuel Onnoghen “safe landing”.  That is euphemism, or elite-speak, for not applying the full force of the law, just because the accused person is their cherished member.

    Well, if the mass of the people have such sick luxury, what would protect the society from criminality?  That is story for another day!

    For now, however, part of the reported deal is for Onnoghen to resign or be retired, but to shield him from prosecution.  Other reported part of the deal would be Onnoghen forfeiting his controversial undeclared “juicy” bank accounts, allegedly heaving and bulging with foreign currency.  Though this part remains unconfirmed, it would reportedly constitute the plea (bargain) for mercy.

    But then is another reported part: that acting CJN, Ibrahim Tanko Mohammed, too must step down and be retired.  For what exactly?  Because he made himself “available” for swearing in, when the CJN’s position was not vacant — really?  That is the moral sewer, masqueraded as “due process”, by the pro-Onnoghen attorneys.

    Yeah, right!  The embattled CJN was there.  But he had become such a moral leper and such a legal albatross to everyone, that even a vacuum would have much more life and presence.

    If anything, therefore, acting CJN Mohammed should be celebrated as a patriot, whose courage gave procedural hypocrisy a short shrift, helped to apply the shock therapy that would, in due course, be known as signal for the beginning of the end of the Onnoghen judicial era; and also point to the long-awaited redemption, for the sleaze-soaked judiciary.

    Besides, the Onnoghen camp, beating a retreat, from a gambit it feared it had been routed, should not be allowed to benefit from defeat, by dragging down another.  Mohammed is not accused of any crime.  He cannot pay for helping to right the wrong in the stinking Bench and Bar.

    Besides, Nigeria has paid dearly for such soulless trade-offs in the past.  Gen. Ibrahim Babangida cancelled Nigeria’s cleanest election ever.  Instead of everyone condemning that evil, moral cowardice ensured it snowballed into a sickly controversy.  Its eventual “resolution”, after Gen. Sani Abacha’s sudden death?  MKO Abiola’s own shocking death, barely one month later Abacha’s death.

    So, for failing to decry IBB’s crime, Nigerians endured Abacha’s iron rule; Abiola’s condemnable death; gaol for Olusegun Obasanjo and Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, from which Yar’Adua never came out alive; Obasanjo’s controversial presidency, in which all he did was birth another sixteen seedy years of rot; and finally now, a judiciary enveloped in Onnoghen’s shame.

    Let Onnoghen carry his cross or take whatever deal to spring him from justice.  But let no one feel the acting CJN Mohammed is fit collateral damage.  He is not and should not be.

  • Odd neutrality

    There were levels of drama at the January 29 All Progressives Congress (APC) rally at the Dan Anyiam Stadium in Owerri, the Imo State capital.

    This is how the Imo State governor introduced himself while addressing President Muhammadu Buhari at the rally: “Let me remind you sir, I am Owelle Rochas Okorocha, I am the founder of APC in Imo State and I am the only governor in the whole of Southeast from APC. As it stands today, those that challenged us, those that came with the Army and Police and DSS are now sitting boldly as the owners of the party. Let me say to you that, it is Iberiberism Chapter I vs I.”

    The party’s chairman, Adams Oshiomhole, had presented the APC governorship candidate in these words: “The APC is not in alliance with any party; we are capable of delivering the President. We have come to present a new hope to Imo people; Senator Hope Uzodinma will win and restore good governance in Imo. APC will win in Imo State.”

    Interestingly, Okorocha’s son-in-law and Action Alliance (AA) governorship candidate, Uche Nwosu, was at the APC rally. Okorocha wants Nwosu to succeed him, and has said so loud and clear. Okorocha, who is an APC senatorial candidate, is supporting Buhari for president and Nwosu for governor. Nwosu had defected to AA from APC after failing to get what he wanted.  The state chapter of AA has endorsed Buhari, and promised to secure one million votes for him in the presidential election.

    Buhari obviously needs all the votes he can get. His re-election campaign is a serious matter and he means business. So the AA endorsement may well be attractive to him.  Perhaps this explains why he dramatically asked his party members to vote for a candidate of their choice in the Imo State governorship election, and not necessarily the APC governorship candidate.

    A report of the APC rally said: “President Buhari, who broke his silence on the crisis rocking the party since the party’s governorship primaries, urged APC members to vote for any candidate of their choice across party lines irrespective of inter or intraparty squabbles.”

    This means Buhari and Oshiomhole are not on the same page regarding who APC members should vote for in the Imo governorship poll. This also means Buhari and Okorocha may be on the same page concerning the governorship election.

    Obviously, Okorocha doesn’t want the APC governorship candidate to win. Obviously, he wants the AA governorship candidate to win. Though Buhari stopped short of endorsing another party’s governorship candidate, his non-partisanship was odd because he was expected to endorse his party’s governorship candidate.

    The rally was a partisan event. In partisan politics, there is no room for non-partisanship.

     

  • Between Saraki and Onnoghen

    Between Senate President Bukola Saraki and damaged Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Walter Onneghen, there are ample running parallels.  It is little surprise, therefore, that Saraki, clutching a suspect mandate, is rushing to the Supreme Court, on a suspect mission.

    Everyone knows how Saraki sold off his former party, the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), to corral the Senate presidency.  Everyone also saw how his brazen desperation led him to trade off the Deputy Senate Presidency (the majority party’s right by common sense, convention and law) to the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).  It was a riveting study in concentrated perfidy.

    Even after all those had crashed, in his failed bid to lure APC members back to PDP, to willy-nilly maintain his Senate presidency, he had grimly held on to the chaff of office, as a minority senator, when everyone knows the grain left him when he defected without quitting his office.

    Therefore, a delusion-powered desperation must have galvanized him to issue a personally signed statement, joining the technicality assembly on the Onnoghen question.  Bristling with that delusion, he promptly summoned an emergency Senate plenary, to try and grandstand and rail-road the Senate into his latest Onnoghen gambit.

    But reality must have dawned when Saraki suddenly realised he could be playing the Yoruba “sigidi” (mud sculpture) thirsting for a splash in the stream.  Or in popular Igbo-led lingo, of the volatile Senate presidency of the Olusegun Obasanjo era – that he might just be gliding towards the proverbial “banana peel” that could smash his humpty-dumpty!

    So, Omo Baba Oloye beat a sudden retreat, and headed for the Supreme Court, for an interpretation of the law.  No big deal about that, in normal circumstances.  But could Saraki, in all good conscience, do that without a plenary resolution, committing the Senate to it?

    Okay, even if you want to play in the realm of “delegated legislation” (broadly speaking), can a minority senator, desperately hanging on as “Senate President” commit the entire house to minority, if not Saraki’s personal, whims?

    But of course!  Riggers of the system don’t really bother themselves with such careful introspection.  Armed with cynical philosophy that evil would always trump evil, they just rush to do the maximum damage.

    But now to Onnoghen, who would, from the way he has played the unfolding Judiciary’s greatest scandal, appear Saraki’s judicial parallel.

    Assets the CJN appears not able to explain, he claims he “forgot” – and put in the realm of “mistake”.  But he knows that is pathetic and patently silly defence, at least going by the forensic reasoning of his sacred profession.

    A person with honour would have quit.  Even if he doesn’t care about his personal prestige, the Judiciary’s institutional honour should have swayed him.  But no!  Sit tight is the game.  Procedural angling is the strategy.  But sure disgrace and defeat is the result.

  • Absurdity

    Ogun State Governor Ibikunle Amosun wants the public to accept that he is on course politically. But the issue is whether his political course is acceptable.

    Amosun further publicised his political course at a service to mark the 60th birthday of the Archbishop of Lagos Ecclesiastical Province and Bishop, Diocese of Remo, Most Rev. Michael Olusina Fape, at Our Saviour’s Anglican Church, Ikenne, Ogun State.  Vice President Yemi Osinbajo was there. Both politicians are members of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

    The governor, whose second term ends this year, defended his endorsement of the governorship candidate of the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) instead of his party’s governorship candidate. According to a report, Most Rev. Solomon Kuponu had observed that Amosun’s preference for a candidate different from his party’s candidate could confuse the electorate and create discord.

    Amosun was quoted as saying in response: “I won’t take our people for granted and it is for us not to have violence in the state and to continue to live together in peace, that all of us in All Progressives Congress, in Ogun State, took the decision. It is rather unfortunate that the people fighting us right and left, do not know what we have all agreed, since two years ago, that in the spirit of fairness, justice, equity and peace in Ogun, let us now look at our brothers from Ogun West Senatorial district.” This is Amosun’s story, saying why he is supporting the APM governorship candidate, Adekunle Akinlade, and not supporting Dapo Abiodun of the APC.

    But Amosun wants to be senator, and he is campaigning on the APC platform. Why does he want to be an APC senator, and not an APM senator?  If the APM candidate is good enough to get his support and the APC candidate isn’t good enough to get his support, there is more to this than meets the eye.

    Amosun is free to support Akinlade, but it is absurd that he is doing so at the expense of Abiodun, his party’s candidate. No rationalisation can make this rational. It is interesting that Amosun was quoted as saying:  “For me, in the final analysis, anyone that wins should win and I will personally embrace the person, because I don’t want anything to spoil the good administration that the good Lord has helped us to build in the state.”

    But Amosun doesn’t want his party’s candidate to win, which is an absurdity.

     

     

  • Pray, is “The Force” on the ballot?

    It’s amazing how politics and the media owe a lot, of their racy clichés, to combat-speak.

    At the dawn of the Nigerian Civil War (1967-1970), Prof. Wole Soyinka, pushed for a “Third Force”.  Then a young and fierce government critic, WS was neither for Nigeria nor Biafra,.

    So, that neutral force, in his thinking, would neutralize the Nigeria-Biafra belligerents; and perhaps avert civil war.  For that WS, who would later become Africa’s first Nobel Laureate for Literature, got clamped into detection by a nervy Nigerian side.

    Only last year, former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who never shies away from crunching clichés, and pretending they are his original ideas, moved with fan fair, the need for a political “Third Force”.  Everyone knew the old man was mortally scared of looming irrelevance.  But the dummy he sold was a rally for the younger folks to elbow aside both APC and PDP, and take over power.

    Needless to say, that “Third Force” crashed even before it took off, and the Owu fox has since moved on to hysteric letters and allied meddling.

    But somewhat, the pull of “force” endures.  The other day, Fela Durotoye and Kingsley Moghalu, two presidential candidates, announced they were pulling forces together, to “disrupt” the so-called big two – APC and PDP – from winning.

    If you recall, Oby Ezekwesili, pulling out of the presidential race, also celebrated how she had used her APCN ticket, now thrown back at the party, to disrupt the Big 2 from winning.

    Pray, how do you start a campaign not to win but to prevent others from winning?  Is that not an electioneering, nay political, equivalent of a dog in a manger; that cannot function, yet prevent others from doing so?

    But it all goes back to the conceptual emptiness of pushing “youth” or “old age”, as political asset or liability.  Neither is totally useful or useless.  But when you now push youth, as if it were some open sesame to solve all problems, you merrily bury yourself in a deep, deep ditch.

    That would appear the long-and-short of the so-called youth challenge to Presidency 2019.  When things got so tough, between 2015 and end 2016, the “youths” started an emotive campaign: don’t blame those behind the PDP-era debacle; instead pounce on those trying to clear it all; and finally, happen on a self-serving eureka: only the “youth” hold the Nigerian redemption magic.  Others are too daft – so, they should vacate power for them! And for good measure, blare: APC and PDP are all the same – the youth have said do!

    But hard into electioneering, the bitter crow is served.  That is why Oby pulled out without much ado but tried to hide everything behind bluff.  Durotoye and Moghalu too, are announcing a “coalition” less than 25 days to a crucial poll!  Besides, is “The Force”, their coalition, on the ballot?

    It’s no crime for youths to crave political power – anyone can dream.  But reality demands much more critical thinking, clinical networking and punishing organisation.

    Anything short of these is just grating noise.

  • Not a man of honour

    Nnamdi Kanu, the controversial leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), grabbed the headlines yet again with a tweet on January 26. “I am back in the UK to continue our excellent work to liberate #Biafra from the pit of darkness, Nigeria,” Kanu tweeted.

    A report quoted a seemingly corroborative statement by Britain’s foreign ministry: “We provided assistance to a British man in Israel. Due to our obligations under the Data Protection Act we are unable to go into any more detail.”

    The report also said: “The former London estate agent was seen standing in the dark outside Leeds Bradford Airport in northern England, wearing a winter overcoat and jumper. The photograph was undated but is understood to have been taken in the last few days.”

    Kanu, who is leading a separatist campaign, had reappeared in Israel last October, 13 months after his disappearance in September 2017.  Of course, Kanu is free to disappear and reappear as often as he wants. But there is the issue of his trial for “alleged offences of conspiracy to commit acts of treasonable felony and other related offences.”

    Kanu had disappeared while on bail granted by a Federal High Court on April 25, 2017, after many sympathetic voices had called for his release from prolonged detention for separatist activities. His sureties had been asked to account for his whereabouts, but they seemed not to know.

    Kanu’s lawyers had argued that the Nigerian army authorities should be made to produce him because he allegedly disappeared during an operation by soldiers. A military exercise in the Southeast, “Operation Python Dance,” was ongoing at the time soldiers allegedly invaded Kanu’s house in Afara-Ukwu Ibeku, Umuahia, Abia State.

    It is interesting that Kanu is moving from place to place. But he seems to be avoiding Nigeria where his sureties have been asked to produce him, which isn’t surprising.  Last November, a Federal High Court in Abuja ordered Kanu’s sureties to pay N100 million each to the court for failing to produce him in court since he was granted bail in April 2017.

    The three sureties are:  Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe , a Jewish High Priest, Emmanu El- Salom Oka BenMadu,  and an accountant, Mr. Tochukwu Uchendu.  The sureties have gone to court to challenge the trial court’s order against them.

    It is obvious Kanu hasn’t been fair to his sureties. He has not acted like a man of honour.