Shocking news!  Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) Chairman Abdulrasheed Bawa was reported saying he has been receiving death threats because of his work, specifically his agency’s fight against corruption.

He was quoted as saying on Sunrise Daily, a programme on Channels Television:  “Last week, I was in New York, as all Nigerians are aware of. A very senior citizen received a phone call from somebody that is not even under investigation.

“What he (the caller) said to him on phone is that; he is going to kill the EFCC chairman, the young man. He said, ‘I am going to kill him. I am going to kill him.’ This is to tell you how bad it is. It is actually real. Corruption can fight back.”

It is unclear what Bawa is doing about the threat or even whether he is doing anything about it. It is a serious matter, particularly because of the mention of murder.

This death threat raises several questions.  Who is the “very senior citizen” in the narrative? Who is the caller that threatened to kill Bawa?  Why did the caller issue such a threat? Is he a possible person of interest to the EFCC? Is he afraid that the agency would eventually focus on him?  Did he expect that Bawa would get to know about his threat?  What did he think Bawa might do, or not do, about the threat?  Why did the caller sound so desperate?  There are other possible questions.

The EFCC boss had introduced the narrative to show that “corruption can fight back.” It is no news that corruption can hit back. Indeed, it is expected that corruption would try to hit back.

The point is: What is to be done when there are signs that corruption is planning to fight back, or is fighting back? Passivity shouldn’t be the response in such circumstances.

A death threat, such as the one issued by the caller in the narrative, should be met with prompt and decisive action. Has the EFCC boss told law enforcement authorities about it?

Bawa shouldn’t just talk about death threats; he should do something about them. He shouldn’t just tell the public about death threats he received; he should say what he has done about them, or what he plans to do. Or does he think such threats are unserious? He should take them seriously.

•This article was first published on June 18, 2021

It is bad news that the number of poor Nigerians has increased to 91 million. “The World Bank estimates that an additional one million people were pushed into poverty in Nigeria between June and November 2021, re­sulting in a total of about eight mil­lion people being relinquished to poverty in 2021; and bringing our nation’s poverty headcount to about 91 million,” Chair­man of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG), Asue Ighodalo, lamented.

That is 91 million Nigeri­ans afflicted by the ‘poverty virus,’ which is every bit as deadly and more infectious than SARS, COVID-19, judging by the numbers,” he added.

Considering that Nigeria’s population is about 214 million, the stated number of the country’s poor is indeed considerable.

The news was food for thought at the launch of the 2022 Macroeconomic Outlook Re­port in Abuja on January 25. The focus was on reforms towards signif­icant improvement in nation­al economic outcomes.

It is noteworthy that the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), in May 2020, said more than 83 million Nigerians were poor. This figure is from its 2019 report on poverty and inequality in Nigeria.

President Muhammadu Buhari, in his national address following the 2020 #EndSARS protests and the resulting anarchy, had boasted that “No Nigerian government in the past has methodically and seriously approached poverty-alleviation like we have done.”

But there are still too many millions of poor Nigerians. This suggests that his administration has not done enough, and needs to do much more, to tackle mass poverty.

Also, in September 2020, when Buhari inaugurated a National Steering Committee to oversee the development of the ‘Nigeria Agenda 2050 and Medium-Term National Development Plan (MTNDP),’ he mentioned the objective of lifting 100 million Nigerians out of poverty “within the next 10 years.”

Lamentably, the current figure does not show a reduction in the number of poor Nigerians but a disturbing rise.

It is useful to identify the markers of poverty. The United Nations (UN) defines extreme poverty as “a condition characterised by severe deprivation of basic human needs, including food, safe drinking water, sanitation facilities, health, shelter, education and information. It depends not only on income but also on access to services.”

The issues that need to be addressed in fighting poverty in the country are clear enough.  If the poverty problem worsens, the country should expect a worsening of the problems caused by poverty. Nigeria cannot afford to allow uncontrolled spread of the ‘poverty virus.’

By this time last year, Sunday Igboho had not run himself into the Benin ditch.  So, the high-pitch “Yoruba nation” fever was on; with Igboho threatening to “kill” anyone, pleb or patrician, that opposed his campaign.

Why, some of his boys, goaded into a frenzy, even bounced and bounded into Idiroko, to shut “Yoruba border”; and spoil for a fight with Nigerian Immigration guards, with the air of the Achebe bully who sees someone he can maul, and suddenly becomes hungry for a fight!

For these Yoruba ultra-nationalists, it was heady stuff.  Mere craving for Oodua Republic was nirvana itself.  It was the cock-sure paradise, from the daily Nigerian hell.  And hell certainly was other people (to echo Jean-Paul Sarte’s oft misquoted quip), especially the “Fulani herdsmen” on whom every crime was heaped.

But here just comes a tragic epiphany, in a rude wake-up call: Ake versus Owu, in Agodo, a tiny enclave in the Ewekoro local government of Ogun State.

In this blood-bathed town, the Ake would rule over Agodo over the dead body of the Owu.  Yet both are Yoruba sub-ethnic groups, among those yelling and howling for the “Yoruba nation” nirvana!

Before you could call “Agodo!” some community criminals had invaded the palace and murdered Oba Ayinde Odetola, the ill-fated Alagodo of Agodo and three of his palace officials.  Horror of horrors — that gory murder wasn’t enough.  The slain had to be set ablaze!

If the latest blood-letting had been a one-off, it would still have been highly condemnable.  But lo!  The savagery was  just the latest in a long trail of community bloodbath, with unpunished impunity exacting even more odious impunity.  Oba Odetola’s younger brother had earlier fallen victim, slaughtered too by these savages pushing a senseless sub-ethnic war.

Indeed, the way the Oba was murdered showed how in Agodo impunity had become a norm, while the law enforcement agencies were snoozing.  Were that not so, how would some dregs invade a king’s palace and kill the prime symbol of authority in that community — just like that!

Pray, would such savagery, galloping on four feet, have vanished from these sub-ethnic animals, had their “Yoruba nation” become a reality?

The so-called Ake and Owu stocks of Agodo are fellow Yoruba.  Yet, they murder one another with gusto and condemnable intensity.  Now, how are these animals different from the so-called “Fulani herdsmen” who “Yoruba nation” activists blame for every crime and outrage?  or, is violence tolerable when it is perpetuated by kith-and-kin?

Agodo is a classic collapse of routine security.  Had the first criminals that shed Agodo  blood been apprehended and duly punished, that monster wouldn’t have grown to the extent of violating the palace, killing the Oba and three top aides and setting their remains ablaze.

It’s time to stop this rubbish.  The security agencies must move after these criminals, Ake or Owu. — and their sponsors — and make them pay for their heinous crimes.

It is disturbing that 220 inmates who escaped from the Jos Correctional Centre in Plateau State when gunmen attacked the facility in November last year are still at large. Only 25 of the escapees have been recaptured.

A senior official of the Plateau State Command of the Nigerian Correctional Service was reported saying about 262 inmates “were discovered to be missing” after the invasion of the facility.

“Later, it was discovered that nine of them were among those killed during the crossfire between security operatives and the attackers.

“So far, we have recaptured 25, who fled the correctional facility, while eight of them, who sustained injuries, are still recuperating at the Jos University Teaching Hospital. One of the injured inmates has been discharged from the hospital.

“So, if you subtract the 25 inmates, who have been recaptured, including the nine persons killed as well as the eight inmates from the 262 that were initially found to be missing, you have about 220 who are still missing. That is the situation for now.”

This is a bad situation.  With so many inmates still on the loose since November 28, 2021, it creates an atmosphere of danger. Two months have passed since the incident happened, and the present situation calls into question the capacity of the security agencies.

The official explained why it has been difficult to recapture all the escapees, saying “this kind of special assignment requires adequate funding to achieve the fastest results and that is the challenge we are facing.”

The Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, should ensure that there is adequate funding for the search for the escapees still at large. There is no excuse for not recapturing them.

It is alarming that a December 2021 report said 5,238 inmates escaped from various prisons across Nigeria within a one-year period from October 2020. Within the period, there were “15 incidents of jailbreak and eight were successful,” the report said.

In Imo State, for instance, gunmen attacked a correctional centre in Owerri, the state capital, in April 2021, and freed 1,844 prisoners. Officials said 84 inmates were recaptured.

In September 2021, armed men attacked the prison facility in Kabba, Kogi State, and freed 240 inmates. About 114 escapees were recaptured.

The following month, the Abolongo Custodial Centre in Oyo, Oyo State, was attacked and 837 inmates escaped from the facility.  The interior ministry said 262 had been recaptured, and released information on 575 on the loose.

The number of inmates still at large is a cause for concern.  It is unacceptable that such a large number of escapees have not been recaptured.

With about 16 months left to the expiration of his present tenure, Governor Bello Matawalle of Zamfara State last week called up 250 fresh hands to join his administration, avowedly to ensure that good governance reached the grassroots. Director-General on Political Affairs and Inter-Party Relations Mikailu Aliyu, who announced the measure in Gusau, said the new appointees comprised eight directors-general and 242 senior special assistants. He explained that the governor since inauguration in office had appointed 25 commissioners, 55 special advisers, 72 directors-general and 12 board members, with the new hands bringing the total tally of appointees to 1,700.

Sometimes in the parlance of the power elite, ‘getting good governance to the grassroots’ is a coded euphemism for rewarding political support by sharing political appointments at a ratio of a given population size. The designation of the particular government official who announced the new appointments in Zamfara hinted at the possibility of that being a major consideration. In that respect, at Zamfara State’s estimated population of about 9.3million people, the new appointments brought the ratio of political appointees to one per about 5,500 people. If that by any means was the underlying motivation for the new appointments though, it was a wasteful jamboree of political gratification in a state wracked with the challenge of insurgency and terrorism, and requiring creative ways – not only to ameliorate the direct effects of the insecure environment on the socio-economic lives of state residents, but to also address the root causes of insecurity and ultimately upend the menace.

But if political payback wasn’t the motivation behind those new appointments, it is difficult to see anything else to justify it. Governor Matawalle has been in office for almost all of three years out of his four-year tenure and it is curious that it is only now some gaps are being acknowledged in the machinery of governance, requiring a haul of aides to beef up. On one hand, it has been an egregious loss of time on the tenure statutorily prescribed for delivering on the social contract with the people. On the other hand, it is highly moot much can be done within the time remaining in the tenure, considering that the new appointees will yet take some time to settle into their assignments amidst the political dispensation going into an electioneering year, which is notoriously distractive to focus on governance. Of course, it may well be that the Zamfara governor made the appointments simply to fortify his own structure for a re-election bid; but if so, it is a deplorable waste of public resources to engage political officers for personal ends whereas they will be paid from state coffers.

You must feel for Tope Alabi, an Ikeja, Lagos-based lawyer, for writing the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), to probe the monthly heists, masquerading as estimated bills, Ikeja Electric (I.E.) slams on its customers.

Indeed, it is nothing but severe financial crime, bordering on economic sabotage, for a corporate to insist on being richly paid, for services it cannot prove to have delivered.

The Nation, on January 20, reported Mr. Alabi’s latest move.  In that report, I.E’s response, via Felix Ofolue, its head of Corporate Communications, was at best procedural cant.  Mr. Ofolue claimed there were processes to reconcile disputes in bills — which may well be.

But who would trust a corporate, unfaithful in small matters, to be upright in big ones?  How can I.E (which cannot trace those who consume the power it claims to push out but arbitrarily bills everyone, using common averages) be trusted to set up a credible claims resolution system?

It’s corporate distrust, stupid!  Indeed, it’s a scandal that the Federal Government would just sit there and allow these corporate brigands to continue scamming innocent customers — and brigands are  what these unconscionable DisCos are, of which I.E. is the biggest and perhaps the greediest for prime payment for lousy service.

What Mr. Ofolue and his I.E. don’t get is that the lawyer’s is the civil path, no matter how embarrassing to the DisCo.  Mr. Ofolue can therefore embark on all the cant he can muster, in starchy and arrogant defence of an I.E. system barely anyone trusts.

Crisis time comes when customers are riled enough to react.  Remember that Achebe quip about the thief stealing too much for the owner not to notice?  Hardball prays things don’t hit that disastrous path.  But I.E. appears working extra-hard at that.  High time someone pulled these folks, bent on corporate suicide, from the brink.

Mr. Alabi complained of a N466, 484. 56 cumulative bill, from March to November 2021, despite even having a pre-paid meter.  Apparently, those “automatic charges” (as the lawyer put it in his letter to EFCC) are growth areas where I.E. would rather play, against pre-paid meters that allocate due bills for legit power consumed — even if I.E. gets paid before service!

For I.E. “automatic charges” are a winning joker: premium payment for premium darkness!  Is that not more nourishing than miserable tracking by pre-paid meters? But how long would that sweet cake turn pure poison?

All through December, I.E. power supplies virtually collapsed, at times dipping to a recent all-low of no more that four hours a day.  During that crisis December, no home hardly had up to 12 hours a day.  January has remained more or less the same.

Yet, the December bills are out and — for that premium darkness — hardly any home got less than N40, 000 bill, while those with pre-paid meters had less than a quarter of that?

The most annoying thing is the I.E. disconnection gang preening all over the neigbourhood; and the firm itself tidying up its cooked bills and ordering the browbeaten customer to pay –or else?

For how long will this nonsense continue?  The Federal Government should stop this illicit gravy before it leads to rage, unrest and avoidable catastrophe.

Although government has for the umpteenth time extended the deadline for Nigerians to link their phone numbers with their National Identity Numbers (NIN), that mandate remains a tall order for many citizens who can’t get through hurdles being encountered with the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC). As at mid-2021, the commission said it had registered some 56million out of the country’s estimated 200million people. In the National Development Plan 2021-2025 launched late December 2021 by President Muhammadu Buhari, government projected that the commission will enroll about 2.5million people monthly over the next three years.

But the process is a travail for many Nigerians who have come up against frequent server outages and a huge backlog of persons waiting to be issued their NIN, resulting in alleged extortion of hard pressed registrants by NIMC database staff. Registrants seeking correction of errors in their names, date of birth, etcetera are reportedly extorted of bribes by staff to speed the process through a long queue despite their having made the required Remitta payments. For many, the wait has been unending, lasting several months.

The frustration is compounded by sheer inaccessibility of NIMC through lines and platforms it advertised for customer interface. In posturing as an easily accessible public agency, the commission on its web page outlined a painstaking customer care procedure that is effectively a ruse because if you try, you can’t get through with enquiries, requests and complaints. This procedure, anchored by NIMC’s customer care unit, involves four channels of interface namely email, phone call, direct interface with customer care officers and the social media. But none of these channels is in reality available. The commission touts a general contact line beginning with 0700 that, whenever you call in, perpetually relays a recorded message notifying you all agents are busy and you should rather send a message to 100, which is a bottomless voicemail pit to which you send messages and never get acknowledgement, much less actioned response. There are other lines being paraded, all beginning with 0815, but calls to these lines get dropped preemptively and never connect. In pretention of keen customer responsiveness, the commission even touts an escalation path where issues not resolved at lower levels could be taken up to the Manager, Customercare and further up to the Principal Manager, but both officials’ phone lines are perpetually ‘not available’ when you call. Meanwhile, other touted contact channels are dummies. Mails sent into customercare@nimc.gov.ng as well as servicom@nimc.gov.ng either bounce back or go into ‘God-knows-where’ because there is no automated acknowledgement pending necessary action as is customary in modern communication, and neither would you get eventual response to issues raised. NIMC not only boasts 24-hour service with its contact channels, it touts a response time of within 24 hours, resolution time at first level support within 24 hours, and resolution time at second level support within five working days. But try those contact channels and you’ll get neither response nor resolution  forever.

NIMC is an agency under Dr. Isa Pantami-led Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, but it can’t be accessed by digital platforms. Big shame!