The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Punch and counterpunch

    Punch and counterpunch

    As the New Year begins, many Nigerians are wondering whether the Herdsmen Question will be resolved or further complicated. Here, a picture of a development that soured celebrations:  “At least, 20 persons were killed in attacks on Benue communities by suspected Fulani herdsmen after they invaded some parts of the Guma and Logo local government areas of the state on New Year’s Day. The attacks, which spilled over to Tuesday, came on the heels of the implementation of the anti-open grazing law, which the Fulani herdsmen considered detrimental to their means of livelihood.”

    At the centre of this alarming drama is the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria, described as “the apex body of Fulani herdsmen in Nigeria.”

    In the context of widespread public alarm, remarks by the Chairman of the Northern Elders Forum (NEF), Paul Unongo, triggered further alarm.  Unongo was quoted as saying in an interview: “I am aware that the most powerful person in Miyetti Allah is Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, who wants to be the next president. If they are fighting for power and Atiku wants to create problems for Buhari, I don’t know. There are so many possibilities.”

    He went on: “The most powerful person who finances the Miyetti Allah is Abubakar Atiku…He has more cattle than anybody in Miyetti Allah. It is an establishment of the big people, a very rich group of Nigerians and they pack small boys to take their cattle all over the place and then buy all these arms to give herdsmen to go and kill people, and the government is doing nothing!”  Unongo reportedly added: “I know; I got my facts partially from him regarding Miyetti Allah when I used to talk to him.”

    Former Vice President Atiku responded through his media aide, Mr. Paul Ibe:  “Let it be known that though Waziri Adamawa is Fulani, he is not a member of Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria nor has he ever been a member. He has also never discussed about that group with Chief Paul Unongo.”

    Then, this addition: “Having said that, it has not escaped our notice that Chief Paul Unongo is the Chairman, Governing Board of Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council, a position he was appointed to in April of last year. Understandably, Chief Unongo would be very grateful to those who gave him such a position and may feel it is his duty to attack and sully those in their bad books.”

    Going by the punch and counterpunch, Unongo and Atiku sounded like politicians playing politics.  Sadly, the Herdsmen Question continues to claim innocent lives. The country needs a resolution of the question, not a display by politicians.

  • Of sycophancy and psycho-phancy

    Of sycophancy and psycho-phancy

    An oriental quip has it that a wise man would rather remain hungry than eat himself to stupor. It may seem a plain, old saying but it is requiring of much elucidation. The sages of yore are warning that you must never allow yourself to become gluttonous at another man’s dinner table nor let yourself be demeaned by any offering or blandishments.

    Why, we are still not done. Made plain further, this saying admonishes us never to be carried away irrespective of how lavish or sumptuous a banquet may be:  approach the repast with grace, dignity, comportment and utmost good sense, suggests. What does it betoken if a guest is found, after a long night retching and making a pathetic pile? What manner of guest would that be, after all?

    This is the crux of the matter at hand today. Hardball has indeed been feeling a bit sea sick over the recent outing of Alhaji Adebayo Shittu, Minister of Communications. The verdant-bearded cabinet member was gung-ho midweek when he announced that his group was poised to open a campaign office in the southwest of Nigeria on behalf of President Muhammadu Buhari’s 2019 presidential quest.

    The boisterous FEC member who spoke with State House correspondents after a visit to President Buhari told a bemused world that though the president was yet to indicate interest in re-election, he deserved re-election.

    Let’ hear him. “By the grace of God, we, his (Buhari’s) ardent supporters who appreciate his worth on behalf of millions of Nigerians, would urge him to re-contest…”

    Prodded as to whether the 2019 campaign had kicked off, he skidded off the tangent saying: “Every day, since he, (Buhari) came into office, all his activities are geared towards letting Nigerians know that they have a savior, rescuer, somebody who is committed to providing relief for Nigerians in all respects, in the area of fighting corruption, insurgency whether in the Northeast or Niger Delta; in the area of repairing the economy and providing jobs and providing social stability in the society.”

    Phew! This mumbo-jumbo must say it all for most discerning readers. Wetin Ministers dey do sef? Some have asked.

    Hardball wagers that the Honorable Minister was more intent on ingratiating himself to his boss and the cheapest line he could find is the re-election buzz. But Alhaji Adebayo probably didn’t know the news of the day or he just couldn’t care.

    How could he start re-election campaign at a period the citizenry are roiling under acute fuel shortage; a time of national blackout as a result of grid collapse; a time of savage bloodletting in Benue, Rivers and Borno States? How could a Minister deign to kick off electioneering before INEC has given the go-ahead?

    This is sycophancy gone hay-wire. Hardball terms it psycho-phancy!

  • Husband and wife

    Husband and wife

    Ekiti State Governor Ayo Fayose is a newsmaker.  Interestingly, his wife, Mrs. Feyisetan Fayose, is also interested in making news. Indeed, she grabbed the headlines as the New Year began.

    According to a statement issued by her Special Assistant (Media), Gbenga Ariyibi, she made remarkable remarks in Ado-Ekiti during the New Year thanksgiving service. Mrs. Fayose was quoted as saying: “I want to plead with everyone, don’t hunt for the downfall of this government; don’t even try it. God is looking at you, and God is watching. Don’t hunt for the failure of continuity. Why? Because our God is a God of continuity, our leader is carrying the unusual grace, if you don’t want to be disgraced, don’t hunt for the downfall of this government, don’t hunt for the failure of continuity, I have said my own.”

    Although she did not clarify what she meant by “continuity,” it was clear she meant that her husband and his ideas should not be challenged or opposed.  It is noteworthy that Governor Fayose had caused a stir last year when he named his deputy, Prof. Kolapo Olusola, as his successor. The state is expected to elect a new governor this year. Justifying his choice, he had said during a thanksgiving service to mark his third year in office:  “I wanted Kayode Osho, but the Lord said it is Kolapo Olusola and I had no choice but to obey.”

    Could this be the continuity his wife spoke about?  Well, that may well be the case. But there is another matter, which may also matter. Last year, Fayose had declared his intention to run for president in 2019, boasting, “I can say expressly that I am well equipped in terms of knowledge, experience as well as physical and mental capacities to hit the ground running as soon as I assume office as President of Nigeria in 2019.”

    Husband and wife seem to be on the same page.  The statement also quoted Mrs. Fayose as saying:  “God told me expressly years back that he needed Ayo Fayose in Nigeria. What brought about this is, I was praying that the trouble of this man was too much, that I want God to take politics away from his heart, to separate him from politics, that I have had too much, but God said leave him to me, he is in the hollow of my palm, I need him in Nigeria, it is not only Ekiti, that he is just passing through Ekiti State.”

    What a couple!  They are together in the business of using God’s name to promote their interest.

  • Magical money

    Magical money

    We almost labeled this piece “Paper money” but that would connote one of several other things and ideas. For instance, paper money would easily stand for one of those capital or money market near-monies like treasury bills, scrips or certified bank cheques. Of course, it also simply means currency notes as opposed to coins.

    Magical money on the other hand, is about some unreal, even fantastical monies that exist only in the dreams of the purveyors. This seems to capture the issue of the day better – and we speak about state budgets.

    Nearly all the 36 states of the federation (plus the Federal Capital Territory, FCT) have released their spending plans for this new year. This is quite salutary we must commend. For good or for ill, if the federal government could be so speedy with her annual appropriation bill, so much would be different. But hardly have we been able to get our federal budget ready by January in the last two decades or so. Story for another day.

    We are considering state budgets which often arrive timely but are in truth, fantastical and comical even. First, what is often presented as appropriation bills are not worth the papers they are printed upon (and these things come in tomes!).

    They are at best, formalities; mere annual rituals. The truth is that most so-called state budgets start and end the day they are presented in the State’s House of Assembly. In most instances, the governor is the budget and the budget is the governor’s. Hardly any reference is made to the budget document through the financial year.

    This explains why trillions are budgeted and spent annually but little impact is felt across board – development continues to recede and poverty multiplies.

    This year, (2018) 34 states have already proposed N8. 4 trillion against N6.180 trillion of 2017. Here are some points to ponder: five states – Ekiti, Bayelsa, Ondo, Yobe and Plateau have recurrent expenditure out-running capital bills. What this means in simple terms is that these states are consuming more than they deploy for infrastructure.

    How does one explain a situation in which the recurrent votes of some states are far more than the entire budget of most states? Does more money by any chance mean more running costs?

    Akwa Ibom and Lagos are in this category but Cross River is the mother of them all. Cross River of course pulled off what many have called a caper with its out-of-this-world N1.3 trillion budget. But more troubling is that her recurrent (spending money) of N390 billion is far more than most states’ entire budget.

    But wait for this: it is more than her N310 billion entire budget for 2017 – If this not magical?

     

  • The dead don’t need jobs

    Obviously, it was a blunder that shouldn’t have happened.  How did the dead appear on the list of appointees to the boards of Federal Government agencies?

    Here is a report of what happened: “Some of the dead persons on the list released included late Senator Francis Okpozo, who died in December 2016 but was named the chairman of the board of the Nigerian Press Council. Another was Donald Ugbaja, the late Deputy Inspector General of Police who died in November but was listed as one of the members of the Consumer Protection Council. Also on the list was the late founder of Fidei Polytechnic, Rev. Christopher Utov, who died in March but was listed as a board member of the Nigeria Institute of Social and Economic Research.”

    The report continued: “Included on the list was the late Alhaji Umar Dange, an APC leader in Sokoto State, who was appointed as a board member of the Federal Medical Centre, Ebute-Metta. Similarly, Kabir Umar, a former Emir of Katagum in Bauchi State, who died on December 9, was on the board of the Federal Medical Centre, Azare, Bauchi… another appointee, Ahmed Bunza, died at Usman Danfodio University Teaching Hospital, Sokoto, and was buried May 22. Bunza was reported to be a staunch supporter of the APC. He served as the sole administrator of Jega Local Government Area of Kebbi State.”

    This evidence of confusion was bad enough and hard to defend. But Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, tried to defend the indefensible in an interview with journalists in Abuja. Said Shehu, the defender: “This is a historical list. It dates back to 2015. The President asked all state chapters of the APC to forward 50 names for appointments to the SGF through the national headquarters of the party. The then SGF, Babachir Lawal, presented the report in October 2016, one year after he was commissioned. The report was disputed by state governors, who said they were not carried along or the list was not representative enough.”

    Shehu continued: “So, the President constituted a new panel chaired by the Vice President… The panel did its work and turned in its report early in 2017. The President had his health challenges during that period. Now that he is back and strong, he asked the SGF to go and release the list. There is nothing scandalous or extraordinary about what has happened. If a list was compiled over about two years ago, obviously some people would have died. Nobody can stop that from happening. Whoever is dead will be replaced. There is nothing extraordinary about it.”

    What a simplistic defence!

  • George was ‘ere

    He is no doubt a phenomenon. No, not the new Liberian President-elect, George Weah; Hardball refers here, to the man in the synagogue, Prophet T.B. Joshua.

    This is not to downgrade the stature of Weah or the magnitude of his election victory, again, no. It is to report that love him or hate him, Prophet TB must have something going for him. Consider that last October, after the stalemate in the Liberian election, Weah, one of the contestants, had raced to Lagos Nigeria.

    He had no other destination than Prophet TB’s the Synagogue Church of All Nations (SCOAN). Do you, dear reader, need an interpreter to know why Weah was visiting TB? While addressing his august visitors during his homily, the man of God let it be known that even Weah’s co-contestant and incumbent Vice-President, Joseph Boakai had also requested a meeting with him.

    But here is how Prophet TB handled what you might consider a conflicting schedule. First he did not tell his audience whether he eventually granted audience to Boakai but he had this to say to the Weah crowd:

    “My brother is here today because he loves his country and wants God’s choice for his country. He is not here to impose himself. What does God say about his country, Liberia? That is why he is here.

    “We are not herbalists or witch-doctors; we are people of God. God’s choice is our choice. We cannot pray against God’s will,” Prophet TB noted as Weah nodded in agreement.

    Some would say Prophet TB has just ‘conquered’ another land. It is said that he does not plan churches but plant instead, heads of government.

    The late John Atta Mills, President of Ghana was so taken to TB he would have handed half his territory if he could. He thought TB divined his ascendancy. So was former Malawi President, Joyce Banda. She practically lived in the Synagogue during her time. She was sure Prophet TB healed her husband of stroke.

    Tanzania’s President, John Magufuli is a staunch member of SCOAN. Zambia’s former President Fredrick Chiluba came visiting ; so was Morgan Tsvangirai (Zimbabwe); Winnie Mandela, Zulu King, Zwelithini, name them.

    In a good year, Prophet TB gets visited in his downtown Lagos sanctuary by more heads of state and foreign dignitaries than most African leaders. Who can count the sports stars and celebrities seeking the face of this Prophet?

    Yet Prophet TB who fills national stadia’s in South America during his outreaches is much vilified at home. He is actually considered evil by some.

    While he is quick to tell you that Jesus was also loathed at home, Hardball must remind once again that his latest friend is President George Weah of Liberia.

  • Brutish police

    Brutish police

    Pictures of police brutality painted by Olusegun Adekoya who reportedly experienced it directly were thought-provoking, frightening and disgusting.

    A report said the former official of Amuwo Odofin Local Government, Lagos State,  “claimed he was ”severely beaten” up by men of the Inspector-General of Police Intelligence Response Team (IGP IRT) over the July 21 killing of a businessman, Mr. Emmanuel Ubah, aka Onwa in Festac Town… He said he was bundled into a vehicle by men of the IGP IRT and taken to their office near the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad (FSARS) office at Ikeja. According to him, he was stripped and beaten in a bid to force him to confess to a crime he did not commit.”

    Take a look at this picture. Adekoya said: “I was arrested on December 12. About four officers surrounded me.” I asked: ‘What is my offence’? They said I was going to die there. The next thing, the officer brought out his gun and shot at the right side and at the left side of me and said: ‘I’m going to kill you here and nothing will happen!’ I told him I was innocent… I received the kind of dirty slaps I had never received in my life by different officers in mufti…The more I talked, the more I was beaten.”

    Here is another picture: “They took me to Cell 2. I was pushed towards the toilet where about 40 people were standing. I stood there till daybreak. All my legs were shaking. I was transferred to Cell 3, which they call Jankara Cell. So many detainees were protesting their innocence. Some had been there for eight or nine months without seeing their families… There were many with wounds and could not walk. Some had sores on their body.”

    Adekoya said he was released on December 16, following the intervention of Lagos State Commissioner of Police (CP) Imohimi Edgal who found out that he was innocent after questioning his accuser.  Hear him: “If not for the CP that God used to intervene in my case, I don’t know what would have become of me. My doctor told me that my eardrum has been cracked. Something was coming out from my ear. I still feel severe pains all over my body.”

    The victim intends to sue the police for damages, according to his lawyer, Adesina Ogunlana. He should do so without delay. The police behaved like brutes.

  • Tom, Jerry and Shekau

    Dear reader, who on earth does not know Tom and Jerry, T&J? The animated cartoon series that centres around Tom, the house cat defending his territory and Jerry, the irritant mouse.  This effervescent animation was first created about 77 years ago in the US and has remained fresh across generations of television viewers across the globe.

    Come off it, you must have seen this stuff sometime if you reside on this planet!

    As you may well know, it is always about Tom’s visceral outbursts in attempts to capture the annoyingly irrepressible Jerry. The plucky mouse would go to any length to provoke the burly homeowner who always in a fit of rage, seek to annihilate the rascal and obliterate him even.

    Of course, sometimes, their kerfuffles would lead to total overturn or even razing of the house.

    The news on Christmas Day that Boko Haram (BH) leader, Abubakar Shekau is now crippled and on wheelchair immediately reminded Hardball of this epic cartoon.

    It is reported that a former BH Chief Intelligence Officer, Abdulkadir Abubakar, who was said to have been captured last June, confirmed that Shekau is crippled.

    The pursuit of Shekau who took over from sect’s founder, Mohammed Yusuf has been not unlike a cat and mouse fight or Tom and Jerry if you prefer.

    But while T&J is a hilarious slapstick animation series, BH and Shekau have turned out to a mirthless , blood-thirsty gang that has unleashed terror and mayhem on Nigeria these past eight years. Not even the Nigeria-Biafra civil war seared the soul of the nation and tested the Nigerian military so much.

    In like manner that Tom would chase Jerry into fire and hailstones and flatten him even, believing that he had extirpated him; the same way the Nigerian military has pursued Shekau to the ends of Sambisa ; sometimes announcing his obituary. But Shekau may have become our sardonic Tom.

    He was reportedly shot and injured in 2009; said to have been kill during a raid of his Sambisa forest camp in 2013. In September 2014, it was reported that the Camerounian military had killed Shekau.

    He supposedly released a video in October of same year mocking the allegation that he had been killed. In August 2015, Chadian President asserted that BH had been decapitated and Shekau replaced. Yet another Shekau video followed, debunking.

    August 2016, the Nigerian Air Force announced that Shekau was fatally wounded in air raids. But one month after, yet another video was released showing a ‘Shekau’ alive and well.

    And this current news about Shekau being wheelchair bound. But most remarkably, coming from a former chief spook of BH…

    and Hardball asks: who is Nigeria military’s Chief Intelligence Officer? We dare say that this war is not about air-raids lest bomb the whole house chasing a rat!

  • The house Mark bought

    Reacting to moves to probe how he acquired a particular mansion in Abuja, former Senate President David Mark reportedly said that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) was “chasing shadows.”

    The house, said to be built on 1.6 hectares of land, is located in Gudu, Apo, Abuja, and was the official residence of the senate president before Mark bought it. A report said Mark described the accusation by the EFCC that he purchased the house illegally as “spurious, contrived and baseless.”

    Senator Mark defended the purchase in a statement by his media assistant, Paul Mumeh,  arguing that  “the property was duly offered for sale, bidded for, and he purchased like any other person would in line with Federal Government’s Monetisation Policy that was started during the time of President Olusegun Obasanjo.”

    He added:  “I had the right of first refusal. Even if I did not purchase it, someone else would have. I am a law-abiding citizen. I did not flout any law. Curiously, four houses occupied by the then Presiding Officers of National Assembly were offered to the occupants. All of us, me as the then President of the Senate, Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, the then Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole and his Deputy Bayero Nafada were all given the same offer. I am at a loss as to why it is now a subject of contention.”

    Mark has taken the matter to court, challenging the notice of investigation served on him by the Special Presidential Investigation Panel for Recovery of Public Property (SPIPRPP).  The panel had asked Mark to quit the property or “show cause” why the Federal Government should not “enforce the recovery of the property for public good.” Fundamentally, the panel argued: “The said house is a national monument, which should never have been sold.”  If it should never have been sold, then it should never have been bought.

    Why is it that those who sold this national property saw nothing wrong with selling and the person who bought it saw nothing wrong with buying?  Something is indeed wrong.

    Lamentably, as Mark’s defence suggests, this may not be an isolated case.  This is why the authorities should go after the others. Mark chose to play politics when he said: “If this persecution is about politics, my political party and the 2019 elections, I dare say that only God and Nigerians would decide.”

    It is clear that he doesn’t grasp the principle involved.

  • Of Christmas, grace and angst

    Of Christmas, grace and angst

    Here we are again, that season of bright colours is upon us again. But this year, it seems to have come like a thief-roused-you-in-your sleep! You get up groggy-headed wondering what the heck is going on; then you realize an intruder is in the house. And your medulla races rapidly from bemusement to anger, then angst – in that order.

    This is the situation for Hardball and surely, for many of his compatriots. (You may take it to the bank for this Hardball fellow has the best hunches in the land).

    For a clime that bottomed out last year and has been roiled in the muck of recession since then, it is understandable the bright, red and green colours of Christmas are dulled. No country operates at sub-optimal; at sub-zero and expects its citizens to be gay at Christmas. Which other country, a major oil producer at that, is working and living at below zero percent?

    And speaking of a major oil producer, how can citizens  spending most of the season on queues at the filling stations be happy?

    Fuel scarcity ; poor power supply; queues at filling stations spilling into the highways impeding traffic especially for travelers… they sit there for hours cursing the day they strayed into this land, hauling pellets of abuses to whoever they believe is responsible for their woes. In this cycle of angst and abuses, who says there is no mystical potency to the tongue?

    Now is it the stars of the Black man or some malevolent sprites that would not allow him make good? How come a country that’s bequeathed with billions of barrels of crude oil cannot refine the product and maximize her immense bequeathal? Hardball must have asked this same question over a thousand times in different media and at different times.

    For over three decades; yes thirty years, Nigeria has been importing the bulk of her petrol needs along with over one dozen other petroleum products! All by-products of crude oil which she exports on the cheap and imports at premium prices.

    Why has this most important solution to Nigeria’s economic ills eluded over half a dozen successive governments including the current one? Stopping petrol products importation is the magic wand any government needs to wave. Why is everyone blind to this fact?

    Refining is almost as old mankind; so is power generation technology a commonplace knowledge. Yet most cities of Nigeria are in darkness even on Christmas Day… degeneracy continues to creep in on us like evil worm. Payment of salaries becomes cardinal achievement amongst our governments…and many of my compatriots would sing the carols on empty stomach today. Angst in a state of grace…