The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Comic relief during recession

    There are times people laugh because they don’t want to cry. This kind of laughter is mirthless but helpful because laughing is perhaps more therapeutic than crying.

    The country’s biting economic recession and its bitter socio-economic consequences have a tragic tone, but some characters help to tone down the intensity of the tension.

    One of these useful actors is former Niger State Governor Babangida Aliyu. He gave a rare insight into the country’s troubling economic situation at a public event in Minna, the Niger State capital, on November 12. It was the second edition of the NDEDI annual lecture series, and the theme was “The Emergence of the Current Economic Realities: Expectations on the part of government and the private sector.”

    A report said Aliyu “called for a review of the 1999 Constitution to make it mandatory for all the tiers of government to save from their revenue.” It added: “He further said his administration was unable to save for the rainy day because it was handicapped by the 1999 Constitution.” Please, hold back your laughter. It’s not yet laughing time.

    Now, let’s hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. Aliyu was quoted as saying: “Such a constitutional provision will take care of the type of situation we have on our hands where about 26 states in the country cannot pay workers’ salaries. What the constitution provided for was for all amounts generated to be put in the federation account and shared between the three tiers of government.”

    The comedy continued as Aliyu said: “The constitution did not say we should save anything; what the constitution said is that we should generate and share. It will be illegal for us to say we want to save, the law does not allow it. The 1999 Constitution did not think of any rainy day; it says all money generated should be put in a pool and shared, to the three tiers of government.”

    This line of thought is food for thought. So, the country must blame the constitution for the current economic mess, and not the operators of the constitution who are not robots and are not expected to act like robots. To argue that the constitution’s alleged silence on saving is to blame for imprudent money management at governmental levels, as Aliyu did, is really ridiculous.

    Aliyu’s laughable analysis causes laughter, but it is a cause for concern. It provides comic relief in these hard and harsh times; but, seriously, it does not reflect the serious reasoning the country expects from its leaders.

  • Okota’s LASTMA extortionist gang?

    There appears a LASTMA extortionist gang, preying on citizens, in the Okota sector of the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA), under a trooper simply called Aloma.

    Just follow this Hardball reportage and make up your mind after.

    Friday, November 4.  Citizen Folasade, driving a Toyota Yaris saloon car with registration number AKD 756 AU, had lawful business to transact at Diamond Bank, on Ago Palace Way.  It was 11:25 am.

    On getting there, the security personnel directed her on how and where where to park, since the parking space was almost always overwhelmed by customers’ vehicles.  Though the vehicle jutted a bit at the road, it in no way obstructed traffic.

    But too soon, some uproar outside, between towing LASTMA troopers and the bank’s security people, attracted her attention.  Her car was the centre of the excitement, not because, she would later gather, she did anything wrong, but because the LASTMA personnel had a previous but unsettled scuffle with the bank’s security, to which her car now fell some scape goat.

    In the hubbub, the LASTMA troopers threatened to tow her car, which the bank’ security rebuffed, and everything was turning ugly.  At that instant, one of the LASTMA officials approached her to please allow him to move the vehicle a bit from “towing zone”, so the bawling and screaming parties could have more civil conversations.

    So, she yielded the driver’s seat, moving over to the front passenger’s seat.  But the moment the LASTMA trooper grabbed the steering wheel, he tore out, with great recklessness and bedlam, to their Dibor Street, Okota, operational unit headquarters, nearly crashing the car, in his mad rush.

    At the Dibor Street facility, which also houses a Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) Okota Unit, LASTMA impounded the car and threatened the owner with a N30, 000 “fine”!

    The young woman reported the case to her mother, who was a vice principal at one of the adjoining schools, in the schools complex, on the street.  The teachers, in sympathy with one of their own, went to the LASTMA office, asking officials to explain the “fine”.

    But the LASTMA column, led by “Aloma”, threatened to hold the car over the weekend,  except the owners paid up.   For effect, the troopers deflated three of the car’s tyres.  Meanwhile, the trooper that seized the car, clearly realizing his wrongful conduct, wore another shirt to cover his name, normally printed on the uniform, over the breast pocket.

    Feeling at the mercy of Aloma and his boys, the teachers resorted to pleading; and some negotiation ensured, even as the young lady insisted she committed no offence to merit any surcharge.

    At the end, the Aloma-led troopers extorted N5, 000 from their victims.  What is more?  Aloma gloated about  “forming (pretentious) London girls who had no money in their pockets”!  To which the young lady retorted: “Even if I had money, would I spend it bribing LASTMA, after doing nothing wrong?”

    This then was the odyssey of a lawful citizen, on the Okota sector where LASTMA is empowered by law to ease traffic.  From Aloma and Co’s conduct however, it would appear some of the troopers rather take lawless advantage of their lawful duty.

    But is this a one-off thing?   Or a daily contagion on innocent but voiceless citizens?

    That is what the LASTMA authorities and the Lagos government should find out.

  • Distinguishedly insensate

    Yoruba have the aptest proverb for today’s discourse: a nkii, a nsaa, oni oun o mo eni to ku. This translates roughly to mean that one is so insensate and impervious to happenings around his surroundings. It means one is so inured and lost in his ways he is hardly aware of the goings on in his environment.

    It connotes an extreme state of selfishness. Igbo has a coarser version about the game that kept chewing coolly as the hunter struts, frets and shoots at it. Shall we call it a provocative state of inuredness: that rarefied and elevated state in which a man is so comfortable he does not only feel, he also sees not nor hears.

    Hardball posits that this is the stage Nigeria’s National Assembly (NASS) has gotten. And there are over a dozen ready examples to prove this point but one, the most recent that we know will suffice just fine.

    A report last Friday reads that “Senate indicts own committee over fresh budget padding.” And there is a rider to this headline which says: “Accuses members of colluding with FIRS.” The story is about how the Senate pooh-poohed the report of its Finance Committee on the budget of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS). The Senate claimed to have uncovered a padding of about N10 billion, accusing committee members of colluding with the FIRS.

    It is noted that the FIRS’ N146 billion budget is riddled with “ambiguous figures” and “questionable of capital projects.” Here are a few examples: N960m for computer equipment; N1.5b for purchase of office equipment while N440m would go for supplies of office materials. And some more: office maintenance will gulp N530m; N700m for fuelling of utility vehicles and N750 is budgeted for fuelling of generators. The madness goes on and on!

    But most remarkable is the discovery that almost every item listed as part of capital expenditures was captured in the 2015 budget of the FIRS.

    Two quick concerns: the matter of budget padding has been raging in the House of Representatives for sometime now culminating in the forced ouster of its Chairman of Appropriation Committee, Abdulmumin Jibrin. It was, to say the least, a disgraceful episode which has opened the eyes of the populace to the shoddy methods of their elected members. It thoroughly diminished the hallowed chambers and worsted the members.

    But apparently, members of the NASS have no scruples and honour may not be part of their legislative ethos.

    The second point is that it does not seem to matter the state of the economy and the living conditions of the populace. All they seem to do is to crave for pork and cream off the gravy with a wanton and insatiable urge. Let the economy be damned, let the people be damned and let the country be damned! This must be the chant of our elected legislators who are supposed to aggregate their wisdom and knowledge to uplift the country.

    Well, if they continue to be so insensate, they may be roused someday… hope not by something sinister.

  • Ambition without morality

    Ambition comes with various qualifiers. Among the possibilities: tall ambition, high ambition, reasonable ambition and realistic ambition. On the reverse side: short ambition, low ambition, unreasonable ambition and unrealistic ambition. Of course, there are other possibilities.

    Talking of ambition, Senator Dino Melaye, the chairman, Senate Committee on the Federal Capital Territory, provided food for thought in an interview published on November 6. The interviewer asked Melaye: “You were the brains behind the ‘Like-Mind’ senators; a platform through which Saraki became the Senate President. Now, he is facing the Code of Conduct Tribunal over discrepancies in the declaration of his assets. Why didn’t you advise him to resign honourably?”

    Melaye answered: “I am not Bukola Saraki. I don’t speak for Bukola Saraki. And I cannot speak for Bukola Saraki. But all I want to say is that if Bukola Saraki thinks he is guilty, he should resign. But if he thinks he is not guilty, there is no reason he should resign. I say it without fear or favour that what Bukola Saraki is passing through is not prosecution. It is persecution. You don’t punish a man for being ambitious. The reason Saraki was before the Code of Conduct (Tribunal) in the first instance was because he was being ambitious.”

    He continued: “President Muhammadu Buhari is also an ambitious character; having contested (the presidential) election three times and he got it (won the poll) the fourth time. That shows how ambitious he is and then getting to the presidency now, he should not be queried for being ambitious. I am also ambitious; I want to be the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. It is God that gives power to whosoever he wishes. So for me, the CCT trial is a kangaroo one and at the end of the day, nothing will come out of it. Just as the case of forgery was withdrawn, this in due course won’t see the light of the day.”

    Talking of Saraki, it may be said that he showed vaulting ambition politically, considering the contentious method by which he became Senate President. Beyond this, it may also be said that his ongoing corruption-related trial is quite another matter, and he will have to prove his innocence. As for the withdrawn forgery charge against him, it was a curious development.  Obviously, President Buhari’s presidential ambition and how he pursued it cannot be categorised with Saraki’s method by Melaye’s sophistry. Clearly, it remains to be seen whether Melaye’s presidential ambition is realistic.

    Perhaps Melaye needs to understand that ambition without morality is not the kind of ambition the country needs for progress.

     

     

     

  • Blasphemy? In 21st century Nigeria?

    What is Nigeria?  Some medieval theocracy, in which blasphemy was the most terrible crime you could commit?

    Or a 21st century democracy, where curious citizens read, and shake their heads against past chequered crimes in the name of God, of which ‘blasphemy’ was a prime example?

    Hardball was condemned to these troubled thoughts following a news story that claimed the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) was demanding justice for a woman allegedly killed for blasphemy.

    The victim, according to the story, was one Mrs. Bridget Agbahime, 74 and Christian, allegedly killed in Kano, earlier in June.  The CAN angst stemmed from the alleged “release, without trial, of the five suspects accused of killing” Mrs. Agbahime.

    Fumed Kwamkur Samuel, CAN director of legal and public affairs, of the Agbahime affair: “This is a highly provocative and insulting act on our collective sensitivities as a democratic nation, if newspaper reports are correct.”

    Now CAN, with all due respect, since the Ayo Oritsejafor years, has maintained a consistent penchant to chase shadows, when it should focus on its essence, no thanks to over-exposure to court politics.  Even the current CAN presidency has not quite totally weaned itself from this penchant.  That has cost CAN dear in credibility and integrity.

    So, maybe the natural instinct here is to dismiss CAN as over-reacting as usual, and playing the politics of religion, in which CAN is almost always playing the victim.

    Still, the Agbahime affair is one CAN call that should not be dismissed.  True, the CAN response from Mr. Samuel sounds tentative, since his anger appeared conditional on “if newspaper reports are correct”.  That suggests CAN didn’t confirm the alleged release of the alleged killers of Mrs. Agbahime, before rushing to react.  That is not good enough.

    Even then, any hint to suggest that a citizen in 21st century Nigeria is murdered for “blasphemy”, and the alleged perpetrators of that crime are let loose on the society, ought to inflame everyone.

    That is why Hardball fully supports the CAN call to the Kano State Government and the Inspector General of Police to wade into this scandal.  If found to be true, they should rearrest the suspects and send them to trial right away.

    Not only that.  Whoever was complicit in this attempt to slaughter justice should also be brought to book.  We can’t have a bunch of killers pounce, at their whim and caprice, on lawful citizens, coldly take their lives and justify their felony on “blasphemy” — whatever that means!

    But the news of the alleged release may well be false.  If so, Nigerians have a right to know.  A thorough investigation will bring all these out.  With the truth established, both CAN and those it accuses would get social justice.

    Besides, such a finding would reassure everyone that the Nigerian state would secure justice for the late Mrs. Agbahime — and that never again would the country tolerate such callous spilling of innocent citizens’ blood.

    But the Agbahime case, with Hardball’s skepticism, should draw CAN back to the straight-and-narrow of its early years.  Then, every CAN statement had a tinge of the divine, that no mortal dare questioned!

    That was hyperbole, of course.  But it shows how far CAN appears to have departed its pristine essence.

    It’s time to go back.

  • One country, two rules

    Let’s start with two wise but complicated sayings. The first is about the hunter shooting for game and hitting repeatedly. In exasperation, he wonders whether his arrow was designed for the tree for why would it always miss the game and hit the same tree.

    And the explanation here is simple: why would one simple problem dog a country for about 50 years. It must jolly well be that such a woebegone country is either created for such a calamity or the tumour is meant to see off the country. Or both, perhaps?

    Well, dear reader, let’s proceed to the next saying because in  African tradition to explain a proverb is to suggest that either the listener is dumb or the recounter is cynically mischievous or vice-versa. The second wise word is: if you treat one wife the way you treated the other, there would never be bad blood or such a need to harvest skulls and break jaws to make one’s point in situations of tenuous polygamy.

    Dear Hardball buff, this excursion in the land of proverbs is all about two recent events in the polity. The first is Kano Magistrates’ Court freeing five persons standing trial for the alleged murder of a 74-year-old woman trader.

    Chief Magistrate Muhammad Jibril discharged the five accused and terminated the case as advised by the attorney-general of Kano State. Said the Principal State Counsel, Rabiu Yusuf, who represented the state’s attorney-general: “Having gone through the case diary, the attorney-general of Kano evaluated the facts in accordance with sections 130 and 150 of the Criminal Procedure Code, presented legal advice.

    “The legal advice presented to the court dated June 24, states that there is no case to answer as the suspects are all innocent and orders the court to discharge all the suspects.”

    The world had been outraged on June 2nd this year when Madam Bridget Agbahime was murdered by a mob in Kano market over allegations of blasphemy. As the story went, she had questioned a neighbour-trader in the market why he would do ablution right in front of her shop. And the neighbour, chanting blasphemy, mobilised a mob.

    The second matter is like unto the one above: the Executive Committee members of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Northern Chapter, last week met President Muhammadu Buhari in the Presidential Villa. The matter that is heavy on their hearts which seems to have defied every rule, authority or institution – including commonsense – is the abduction of a 14-year-old Christian girl, Habiba Isiyaku, who is being held in the Emir of Katsina’s palace.

    CAN had made a representation to the palace; it had made a plea to the Katsina State Police Commissioner without any headway. Now it has taken its case to Aso Rock, hoping that good sense would prevail.

    Let’s close with another wise word: it says, let he who knows how to pound use the mortar and he who knows not let him pound on the floor.

  • Heartless contractor

    In July, following the release of alarming statistics by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) indicating that nearly 250,000 children were suffering from “severe acute malnutrition” in Borno State as a result of Boko Haram’s terrorism, it was expected that by October the number of those needing assistance would have increased.

    Appropriately, in response to the chilling news, the Federal Government declared a nutrition emergency in the state, and Minister of Health Prof. Isaac Adewale was quoted as saying that “more children might die if we don’t do something quickly.” The conflict triggered by terrorism in the country’s north-eastern region is said to have displaced 2.4 million people since 2009, and has stretched food insecurity and malnutrition to emergency levels. Over half a million people reportedly require immediate food assistance, and the majority of them are either displaced by the conflict or members of the communities hosting the displaced.

    So it is disturbing that an October 30 report said Senate Leader Ali Ndume was disturbed by alleged diversion of grains meant for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the Northeast. Ndume made the troubling allegations in Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, while delivering grains for IDPs supplied by the Federal Government.

    Ndume said 31 trucks of grains were missing out of the 300 approved by President Muhammadu Buhari in April.  His words: “I am passionate about the issue of the missing 31 trucks of grains because I am an Internally Displaced Person (IDP) myself. After being given the trust to transport the grains, somebody went and diverted it; I am assuring you that the EFCC is doing its job on the matter.” Ndume added: “When we dug up we found it was a cartel, a syndicate or at best a group of thieves doing this to us; there was a great connivance and heads will roll.”

    What makes this alleged stealing of foodstuff meant for hunger-stricken IDPs more terrible and more terrifying is that Ndume further alleged that it also happened when former President Goodluck Jonathan was in power. He said: “There is a second phase of the case coming up because they also stole our grains during the regime of President Goodluck Jonathan; I am going to follow it up too. Jonathan ordered the release of 600 trucks and they stole more than 100 trucks out of it… I will follow it up because it is the same contractor.”

    Who is this corrupt contractor, and why has the said contractor not been arrested and arraigned? Talking about it is not enough. Those who should do something about the heartless contractor should swing into action.

  • Some George-an logic

    The political roforofo (mud) fight, over the tussle on the Ondo Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) rightful candidate in the governorship election, is attracting more partisans by the day.

    Since the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), bowed to a court order and replaced Eyitayo Jegede, SAN, with Jimoh Ibrahim as the PDP candidate, the polity has had no peace.

    First, Ondo Governor, Segun Mimiko, stormed Abuja to confer with President Muhammadu Buhari on the imperative of not allowing Ondo to “burn”.

    Then, a lobby from the Ibrahim camp alleged bribery of the panel of judges handling the case, forcing the thoroughly embarrassed judges to recuse themselves; and returned the case file to the Court of Appeal president, for re-assignment to other judges.

    Well, the latest joiner of the fray is the inimitable Bode George, incidentally a former military governor of the old Ondo State (now Ondo and Ekiti states), who reportedly crowed, at the height of the hubris of military rule, that the Ondo folks would know a “Lagos boy was here”.

    Old man George is not finding the Justice Okon Abang order, unhorsing Jegede, funny at all — and he is not coy to say so. That is perfectly legitimate and democratic.

    What is neither democratic nor legitimate is George’s rather quaint logic of blaming INEC for obeying a court order, even if he admitted that, before that order, INEC had dutifully listed Jegede (and would likely follow any future orders, however the pendulum swings).

    Hear Pa George: “Even, until Abang’s mischievous ruling, the INEC had rightly listed Jegede as the legitimate candidate of the PDP.  Now,” he queried, “why upset the apple cart?”

    But pray, how is that INEC’s business or headache?  If INEC did something (which George admitted was ‘right’) but the court ordered otherwise, what is INEC’s fault in all of that?  Upsetting the apple cart or not, it is the courts George should be talking to, not INEC, doing its job as a lawful corporate citizen.

    But, of course!  Demonisation of persons and institutions, because they cannot get their way with them, is the standard fare of Nigerian politicians.  So, George was only beating an over-beaten path!

    From INEC, George also latched onto the Presidency, in a case clearly the judiciary’s.  He wanted the president — virtually at least — to overrule the courts, even he has no direct locus standi, beyond that his own party would also contest the Ondo governorship.

    “I appeal to President Buhari to ensure that justice invariably prevails in Ondo State. Though the case is now before the appellate court, the body language of our president is equally important in ensuring the preservation of our democratic tenets.” Is he the Chief Justice of Nigeria?

    Besides, the “body language of our president”?  Is the president then some Draco or Solon, lawgivers in antiquated Greece, evolving its democracy?  Or an elected president in 21st century Nigeria, who though operates in a democracy still evolving, is nevertheless bound by constitutional checks-and-balances?

    Now, if George pushes a “body language” now to favour his party, how can he, in all good conscience, not to talk of sound logic, declaim a body language that, in future, disfavours the same party?

    Yet, George provides the antidote to his George-an illogic, by his pitch to the judiciary.  Hear him: “Our judges must at all times refrain from arbitrary rulings that can plunge our democracy into the abyss. Justice must prevail in Ondo State.”

    About time!  At long last, the old man is properly directing his message!

  • Nigeria’s pastries parties

    It is often rendered in the plural form – pastries. It refers to all manner of food made from flour and dough. Breads, cakes and the usual fast food fair, such as burgers, donuts, meat-pies, sausage rolls, muffins, cookies and uncountable other dough derivatives.

    Modern man is actually fixated at the oral and of course, anal stages of his development (or even a configuration of both), but let us stick with the oral. And before you begin to ask what Hardball’s fixation about modern man and his duodenal proclivities, the story is actually about  Nigeria’s political parties as a metaphor for modern man stuck to his mouth.

    This matter is informed by the sudden realisation that in recent memory of political parties in Nigeria that is since 1999, the business has been about the stomach.

    In fact, one cannot seem to help but imagine political parties in Nigeria as pastries shops where enticing arrays of edibles are on display. Nothing else matters here but the munchy, crunchy fanfare. So are Nigeria’s political parties. Let’s call them pastries parties: nothing going on except power position and perquisites.

    Since 1999 to date, not one party has been able to rise beyond what Hardball wants to describe as pastries inanities. And it doesn’t matter whether it’s a ruling party or a fallen one. In fact, the more entrenched and influential a party is, the more bitterly fractious it is. You always get the impression of wayward children gathered to share a candy.

    For 16 years from 1999 to 2015, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) never had a moment of respite, nor did they give Nigerians peace of mind. Hardball would bet that young people of today do not and may never know the civilised way of organising a political party.

    At every level, from the headquarters to state, local government and ward levels, there was an endless festival of rancour and acrimony. Unfortunately, this has continued in the PDP today even after its crashing fall from power.

    If Nigerians thought that the All Progressives Congress (APC), which recently unhorsed the PDP, was going to be a model of how to organise a political party and use it as engine for driving the political economy of a country, they must be sorely disappointed if not disillusioned now.

    Like in PDP, there is always some feud going on in APC since it ascended the helm of the polity last year. It reminds of one of the grimmer Igbo sayings: gbute isi, gbakwata agban. Roughly: a situation of “harvesting of skulls and yanking of jaws.”

    As you read this, the demons of the land are bursting the soul of PDP; the APC is bleeding profusely; rent in many parts; APGA’s fairly new chairman has just been toppled… on and on, the sad movie goes, pastries parties all.

  • Contractual nonsense

    Strangely, the new Director-General, Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), is singing a strange song about the status of a controversial contract with a controversial Niger Delta ex-militant. Dr. Dakuku Peterside was quoted as saying that Chief Government Ekpemupolo, aka Tompolo, is still recognised as a NIMASA contractor.

    Peterside dropped the bomb on October 30 while speaking with reporters in Port Harcourt after attending the funeral of a leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Godpower Ake, in Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni LGA of Rivers State.

    In reference to Tompolo’s company, Peterside said: “The contract is you, Global West, go and acquire assets for NIMASA. Acquire security boats, acquire intervention vessels and acquire helicopters. When you acquire all those things, we will pay you back within a period of 10 years. Now, you help us in the enforcement and whatever revenue you generate above what we are earning now, it will be shared between Global West and NIMASA. That is a different contract and it is still subsisting till now. It has not been cancelled. It was not terminated. I will continue to say that there was nothing wrong with that model but that model was abused and it is subject to investigation by the EFCC.”

    The question is: If the model was abused, what should happen to the abuser if the abuse is established beyond a shadow of a doubt? Surely, this is not a difficult question to answer.

    While the alleged abuse of the model is being investigated, there is another important question: How was Global West supposed to acquire the capacity to “acquire assets for NIMASA…Acquire security boats, acquire intervention vessels and acquire helicopters?” This approach to asset acquisition by NIMASA is ridiculous.

    On the question of helping NIMASA “in the enforcement,” it should be stressed that the dubious security contracts from which Tompolo benefited downgraded the regular security agencies in favour of militiamen and enriched militia leaders to the detriment of the country’s security personnel who should have been empowered to perform their duties.

    It is noteworthy that an October 27 report said: “Tompolo and others were arraigned in absentia on April 18 on 22 counts of conspiracy, stealing, advance fee fraud and money laundering.” The report also said: “EFCC, in the 40-count charge also before Justice Ibrahim Buba, said the suspects allegedly diverted N34 billion for personal use. It alleged the money accrued from the public private partnership agreement between NIMASA and Global West Vessel Specialist, said to be owned by Tompolo.”

    While it is true that allegations remain allegations, it is equally true that these allegations are weighty enough to weigh down any so-called contract with the accused. This is a case of contractual nonsense.