Category: Hardball

Who is ‘the state’? That is  one question ex-United States President Donald Trump must have chewed upon and resolved in his own favour, even when he’s no longer in office. Effectively, it is sheer grandeur of delusion; but it isn’t something to put past the former leader who had shown a disposition to imperial power like never before seen in that bastion of democracy.

Trump, last weekend, branded current President Joe Biden an “enemy of the state” and slammed last month’s search of his Mar-a-Lago, Florida resort by the FBI. Speaking at a rally in Pennsylvania, his first public outing since the 8th August FBI raid, he described the search as a “travesty of justice” and warned it would produce “a backlash, the likes of which nobody has ever seen.” People familiar with the workings of the American governance system say Department of Justice and the FBI acted independently of the White House in the raid, but Trump dubbed it an “egregious abuse of the law,” telling cheering supporters: “There can be no more vivid example of the very real threats to American freedom than just a few weeks ago, you saw, when we witnessed one of the most shocking abuses of power by any administration in American history.”

The former president, who is mulling another run for the White House in 2024, also hit back at Biden’s recent speech in which the incumbent said his predecessor and Republican supporters “represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our republic.” Trump accused Biden of having given the “most vicious, hateful and divisive speech ever delivered by an American president,” telling supporters: “He’s an enemy of the state. You want to know that.” Alluding to his ‘Make America Great Again’ movement, he added: “Republicans in the MAGA movement are not the ones trying to undermine our democracy. We are the ones trying to save our democracy, very simple. The danger to democracy comes from the radical left, not from the right.”

When Trump branded Biden an “enemy of the state,” he perhaps considered himself an embodiment of the state. That possibility is not too far-fetched in view of his acutely imperial inclination. He did not put it exactly into words, but that might only be from a tinge of modesty when compared with French King Louis XIV who was said to have in 1655 declared to the parliament of Paris: “I am the state.” Trump wasn’t a monarch, but during his presidency he acted much like one against the broad canvass of republicanism that characterises the American political culture. It is one disposition that obviously isn’t easy to shake off.

Samuel Ortom, Benue State governor, may soon jump the Wike ship to protect own self-interest.  Ortom is the mythical rich onion of the PDP crisis.  The more you peel, the more the rot festers.

For starters: unlike Wike ever crowing over his project strides, Ortom is no high performer.  Indeed, whenever Ortom dives into his bruising “Fulani herdsmen” tales, a fellow on Facebook always notes: end of the month; salaries as usual have entered “voice mail” and our Tiv ultra-nationalist is on to his normal attention-diverting stunts, from Benue hurting pockets!

Besides, as first, emergency APC governor; then, as return-of-the-native second-term PDP governor,  Ortom is guilty of what Wike accuses  Abubakar Atiku, Aminu Tambuwal and Bukola Saraki of: rank opportunistic fellas that abandoned their party at its time of need, only to rally back to call the shots.

For Ortom, that cynical opportunism hasn’t reached an expiry date.  He has a Senate race to run — a ticket from PDP.  Would it not be suicidal campaigning against Atiku, his party’s presidential candidate?  So long, Wike!

It appears Fulani wiles may yet triumph over Ikwerre brashness!  Still, that hardly hands Atiku a lasting victory when the crunch comes.

How the rut and stench of cross-party whoredom oozes from the PDP crisis is simply benumbing.  Daniel Bwala, virtually last night’s APC spokesperson-nominee, this morning doing just fine as PDP’s Atiku Campaign Organization (ACO) spokesperson, is dreaming dreams about Atiku winning the presidency without Rivers votes.  Rich dreams!

But if you think Wike is the victim here, thus condoning his brashly, trashy bragging, you’re not entirely correct.  His fate too is crass opportunism gone awry.  That led to his bloc’s “enthronement” of Iyorchia Ayu as national chair — the same Ayu Wike and co now decree must fall on his sword!

The Wike bloc checkmated everyone to “instal” Ayu.  On that, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, was a double victim: first kissing bye-bye his dream of national chair; then being crushed by Seyi Makinde’s candidate, Taofeek Arapaja.  Arapaja!  That fellow indeed boasts busy and powerful arms to fight and brawl — that’s what that evocative name means in Yoruba — the way he badly thrashed Oyinlola for PDP deputy national chair (South)!

Still, all these manoeuvres were undertaken by Wike and co, for Wike’s own presidential dream (read: “southern” presidency).  The plan was that with the North grossing the PDP national chair, the presidential ticket was exclusively the South’s.  That has proven a costly delusion, which brews fresher crises by the second!

The PDP has put itself in a terrible bind.  It’s not looking pretty, since every solution seems to resurrect past griefs and old hurts.  This is no place for any party to be, seven months to a crucial election — and with no crow-able records to flaunt for its earlier 16 years in power, it just might be morning yet on the party’s long, long day of woe.

They rated us as the third force,” one of the ‘combatants’ Kingsley Ogga, the African Democratic Congress (ADC) Kogi chair and double chair, ADC Forum of State Chairmen, rued in Abuja.  “But today, the way they are handling this party, they are trying to kill it.”

The question is who are “they” in the two contexts that Ogga painted?

“They”, in the first context, is no more than a hyperbole for former President Olusegun Obasanjo.  In his usual election-era fancy, he “divined” a “third force” on the virtual eve of the 2019 general elections.  After the move hardly flew, despite all the media hype, he anointed ADC as the “third force”, in a fit of Hobson’s choice.

Though floating on crass cross-opportunism by allowing itself to be sucked into Obasanjo’s gambit, it’s rich for Ogah to claim “they” dubbed his ADC the “third force”.  “They” is nothing but Obasanjo — and maybe ADC velvet ranks, who zestfully hugged Obasanjo in mutual delusion.  That fetched them nothing beyond a sole Kogi House of Representatives seat.  So long for “they” and their phantom “third force”!

“They”, in the second context, are ADC members falling upon themselves in a virtual fight-to-finish.  That is reminiscent of Fela, the Abami Eda’s classic tune, “Ojuelegba, confusion centre”.

In that monster hit, Fela sung of traffic coming from right, from left, from up, from down, all locked in anarchy that left everyone trapped in the gridlock!

Well, the in-fighting in ADC would appear just that.  Imagine the ADC national chairman, Ralph Nwosu, “suspending” the party’s presidential candidate, Dumebi Kachikwu, for alleged anti-party activities!

But virtually before the ink got dried on that suspension order, announced in a statement by Bamidele Ajadi, ADC deputy national chairman (Politics), Kachikwu supporters cried foul.

The order is a joke, they insist, because Nwosu had allegedly been party chair for 17 years and should therefore resign.  “For good 17 years, he has been the national chairman,” Ogga fumed, “it’s not right”.  Seventeen years!  Is the ADC national chair then some eternal clan chieftaincy?  But that could also be emotive red herring.  If he was elected for those 17 years, why not?

In any case, from either side is a harvest of darts.  The Nwosu side accused Kachikwu of undermining ADC’s image and ruining its integrity by an offensive video broadcast.  The Kachikwu side, mainly ADC state chairmen, claimed the National Working Committee (NWC), which purportedly took the suspension decision, was not known to law, since its tenure had expired.  Ojuelegba — confusion centre!

It’s amazing how a flight of fancy, mixed with free-wheeling opportunism, can unhinge a modest party, which allowed itself to be cloaked in a borrowed robe.

Third force indeed — of utter and unending confusion. Ojuelegba!

Claims by the Nigeria National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited of widespread haemorrhage in its supply chain have come under fresh scrutiny. And those claims just do not seem to be holding up to the integrity test. Consequently, they do not relieve the oil giant of its governance responsibility, and the earlier it faces up to the task the better.

NNPC Group Chief Executive Officer Mele Kyari, last week, relayed the narrative of the bleeding supply system. He said crude oil theft had become such pervasive phenomenon that it involves religious clergy, community leaders and government officials among others. Efforts to prevent the theft, according to him, has resulted in more than 700,000 barrels of crude oil being locked in daily. Speaking at the weekly State House Briefing organised by the Presidential Communications Team, he said no fewer than 295 illegal connections were detected on a 200km stretch of pipeline in one instance. “Because of the very unfortunate acts of vandals along our major pipelines from Atlas Cove all the way to Ibadan, and all others connecting all the 37 depots that we have across the country, none of them can take delivery of products today. The reason is very simple. For some of the lines, for instance, from Warri to Benin, we haven’t operated for 15 years. Every molecule of product that we put gets lost,” he stated inter alia, adding: “We discovered that some of the pipelines were actually connected to individuals’ homes. And not only that, with all sensitivity to our religious beliefs, some of the pipelines and some of the products that we found are in churches and mosques…”

At least two issues arose concerning Kyari’s media briefing. One is that, with the NNPC boss code-switching between crude oil theft and refined products supply chain, it wasn’t clear which exactly he was referring to. Then, he said nothing about measures taken against identified suspects of oil theft beyond the supply network being shut down, which isn’t governance but abdication.

A more damning blow to NNPC’s narrative was the query raised by Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Customs, Hameed Ali, over estimated daily consumption of refined product. Speaking at a hearing by House of Representatives Committee on the Medium Term Expenditure Framework for 2023-2025, Ali punctured the claim that NNPC supplies about 98million litres of petrol daily when actual consumption is estimated at 60million litres, saying: “If we are consuming 60million litres of petrol per day by their own computation, why in the world do you allow the lifting of 98million litres per day?” He indeed questioned how 60million litres could be said to be consumed daily when consumption pattern can’t be same every single day.

NNPC needs to do a lot more that complain about the bleeding supply network. It is its responsibility to stop the bleeding.

Enrolment into Ondo public schools has been dwindling and the state government isn’t happy about it. But the government only equivocated last week on what it wants done about the trend.

Ondo State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) Chairman Victor Olabimtan went into what turned out to be overdrive in canvassing patronage of public schools. He invoked the ‘live-by-example’ dictum and forbade public school teachers from enrolling their wards in private schools. A statement on his meeting with headteachers across the state’s three senatorial districts reported that he frowned on dwindling number of pupils in public schools despite government’s efforts and threatened that teachers would henceforth be held liable for drop in school enrolment. “The SUBEB chairman condemned in strong terms the attitude of some teachers taking their biological children to private schools and ruled that it has become an offence for any public school teacher to take his/her wards to private schools,” the statement said.

Shortly after Olabimtan’s statement, Ondo State Governor Oluwarotimi Akeredolu recalibrated the touted ban on teachers enrolling their  wards in private schools. A statement by his spokesman said there was no law forbidding teachers from enrolling their children in private schools or any school of their choice despite government’s commitment to public education. Outlining sundry achievements by the Akeredolu administration in improving the public school system, the statement added: “It is based on this background that teachers in public schools were urged on moral ground to enroll their wards in public schools for confidence-building. This will increase enrollment and further encourage government to embark on more upgrades to public schools. There is no policy or law in Ondo State that forbids anyone in the service of government, including teachers, from enrolling their wards in any school. However, there is always a place for moral burden. It is, therefore, not an offence for teachers to enroll their wards in any school of their choice. But it will be morally wrong for teachers who are proud of their work to put their wards in private schools.”

But there’s nothing wrong really if public school teachers are statutorily barred from enrolling their wards in private schools. Actually, it shouldn’t be just teachers but all government officials – especially those with mandate relating one way or the other to improving the education sector. And neither should they be permitted to send their children abroad for education, even when they could afford to so do. Since an enabling law to this end does not already exist, there is urgent need for one at all levels of government. The Nigerian public education system is in shambles, and a desperate ailment warrants desperate remedy.

There is a local saying that it’s a strange sight to behold a masquerade that should be seen only at night parading in broad daylight. A street protest by policemen is nothing short of that. Policemen essentially are maintainers of law and order, such that when others stage rowdy demonstrations against authority, it is policemen that are called upon to safeguard the peace. But when policemen go on demonstration, it is uncertain who could be called in to preserve the peace.

That was the unsightly dilemma recently when constables recruited for community policing in Kwara State went on a street protest over alleged non-payment of their salaries. They massed around the airport axis in Ilorin and trudged the highway rowdily, spewing invectives on authorities for allegedly shortchanging them and denying them their entitlements while exploiting their services. You could hear some of them cursing that they were even made to buy their own uniforms. The protest march, which left many residents of the state capital confounded, was a damning commentary on the state of policing in Nigeria.

The police high command, however, dismissed the constabularies’ protest as an unwarranted act of mischief aimed at embarrassing the institution. Force Public Relations Officer Olumuyiwa Adejobi, in a statement last week, said the constables had no basis for their protest because they were volunteers who took the job knowing full well there was no remuneration attached. “The Nigeria Police Force…wishes to state unequivocally that the Community Policing Constabulary Scheme of the Force is a purely voluntary service commenced by the Federal Government to train and incorporate individuals with prior paid employment who desire to spend their spare time assisting the police in its simple police tasks within their various communities,” Adejobi said, adding: “It therefore came as a rude shock that members of the scheme were protesting non-payment of salaries in Kwara State recently when the ultimate purpose and rule of engagement of the scheme is to promote community partnership in crime control via the presence of respected members of the public, with a source of livelihood, partnering with the Force under the scheme to render voluntary service for better and improved policing within their communities.” According to him, the constables are not direct employees/personnel of the Police but of their respective communities at divisional and state levels.

But policing pro bono, with all the hazards?! That whole idea smacks of the levity with which relevant authorities take the concept of decentralizing and domesticating policing functions as entailed in the advocacy for state police. There’s no halfway house to getting security better fortified at the grassroots, and the constabularies’ strike in Kwara State just proved that.

By its controversial burial adversary, IPOB seems to have reached a dead end — and here every pun is intended!

But purporting to lecture — more like hector — the Igbo on how to bury their dead, IPOB appears essaying a handshake that reaches straight at the elbow!  Again, that is raiding the dead zone, to reach the dead end.

Yet, but for its popularity — or notoriety? — plaguing its way, the IPOB funeral advisory is not unreasonable, though IPOB clearly over-reaches itself by its threat against mortuary facilities in the South East.

Emma Powerful, the IPOB spokesperson that is often carried away by his own bombasts, struck a rather reasonable tune this time round: “Our people have turned burials into a carnival and asking families to pay levies or debt for their dead ones. This is an abomination and must be stopped forthwith,” he declared — hardly unreasonable.

Not so the follow-up threat, if the Igbo didn’t stick to IPOB’s new diktat of bury-your-dead-within-three-days: “This strategy may include compelling the shutdown of so many mortuaries littered all over our land.  The only dead bodies that can be allowed to stay longer in the mortuary are those in court or under police investigation.”

After its flailing and failing Monday sit-at-homes, this is another messianic nonsense IPOB would be hard pressed to push.  Moving against mortuary facilities is like the hare-brained Monday sit-at-homes: its sweet surface is agitation and propaganda.  But its bitter core is economic, badly hurting the pocket.

If IPOB feels it can move from one virulent attack on the pocket to another, though under the not unreasonable pitch of having more decent and less costly burials, it has well and truly reached a dead end.  You can’t continue to play false messiah over people’s livelihood and expect something terrible not to give.

Indeed, the feedback suggests the people would just ignore the new diktat with the contempt it deserves, just as they had ignored IPOB’s earlier decree to stop eating beef, simply because the Fulani breed and supply cows.  Aside from the vital protein value of beef, many of the cows are owned by Igbo merchants, though many of them engage Fulani expertise in cattle breeding.  So, those guys would kiss their livelihood goodbye just because of IPOB’s propaganda?

If IPOB attempts any crude campaign against funeral homes and their mortuary facilities, it can only harvest further notoriety, which only fastens its looming irrelevance.

For IPOB, it’s not the best of times — and the mortuary campaign is dark but fitting metaphor.  It’s a wilful, if fretful, way to reach a dead end.  About time!

Those who dismissed Harold Lasswell’s magic bullet theory of mass communication perhaps never reckoned with the Twitter generation.

That theory, in ascendancy around the World War years (World War 1: 1914-1918; World War 2: 1939-1945), assumed that the mass media message was a “bullet” – and such a magic one that when “shot”, it would just “pierce” the mass audience, who then would sway, willy-nilly, to its magical tenor.  Sheer magic, there!

But other theories would challenge this assumption; and insist the audience indeed filters mass media messages through some physiological, psychological and indeed socio-cultural screens before reacting one way or the other — without prejudice, of course, to the well and truly hare-brained, who are in the micro-minority.

The Twitter mob goes against this grain.  That, however, is where many of Nigeria’s so-called “youths” luxuriate.  There, with a fetid zone of caustic abuse and free insults, inanities are treasured business.  That was the case at the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) parley in Lagos, to which many presidential candidates headed to sell their programmes.

Kashim Shettima, the APC vice-presidential candidate, was there to sell his joint ticket with Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.  He stuck to facts and verifiable figures: voters should judge the duo on the strength of their joint gubernatorial achievements (Shettima: Borno, from 2011-2019; Tinubu: Lagos, from 1999-2007).

Both featured at two different times from Nigeria’s democratic journey from 1999: Tinubu, at the very beginning when he set a Lagos template that continues to be a national reference.  Shettima, at a very difficult time for Borno and its Boko Haram crisis.  Yet, Shettima pointed to hard-to-beat achievements in both states, urging the voter to judge by candidates’ past records, and not by some fanciful rhetoric of colourful lies.

You would have thought such a challenge would draw traction to the past records of rival tickets, with the expected clash of facts and figures opening a sane path to voter wisdom — but no!

What interested the Twitter mob was how Shettima dressed: the sneakers he wore, how he buttoned his suit and his sartorial gait!  Like water running over smooth stones, whatever Shettima said had absolutely no impact on these “youths”!

You would have expected a more serious-minded commune to shun the invite to inanities.  But these millennial mob just needed a half — no, a quarter — invite to latch on to such inanities and yammer away!

Yet tomorrow, after making a bad choice, the same crowd would drone and cry and screech, lamenting how things were ringed against them!

Nigerian youths must cultivate the culture of solid introspection, not turning mere tech into some self-corrupting opioids, to merrily display their full emptiness.  If you doubt, check their social media exploits, with Twitter as prized handle.

It’s a dreary window into happy self-retardation.  No youth progresses with such happy liability.