The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Obi’s new fixation

    Obi’s new fixation

    Just as well: President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima serenaded each other at the Vice President’s 59th birthday.  That is good presidential breeding, away from the mutual brickbats of President Olusegun Obasanjo and Vice President Atiku Abubakar.

    Again, this presidential court politeness is ode to the Muhammadu Buhari-Yemi Osinbajo partnership, which imposed a civil temper, away from the dog-eat-dog gruffness of the Obasanjo years.  Tinubu-Shettima have earned kudos for sustaining that warm civility.

    It’s another plus to the quiet institutional deepening of the APC years, away from the proud chaos of the Obasanjo years though, to be fair, the Goodluck Jonathan/Namadi Sambo partnership was much more civil than Obasanjo-Atiku.

    Tunde Rahman, a presidential aide, puts the Tinubu-Shettima harmony in perspective: “Their relationship is borne out of mutual respect and trust; and fired by patriotic zeal and the need to promote democracy, good governance, and economic development.”

    Rahman states the obvious.  But the danger here is to presume it is — or should be — routine.  It’s not: just as common sense is seldom ever common!  It’s public conduct to be applauded, entrenched and routinized in our democracy.

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    Still, shove the president and deputy aside.  Bring on their spouses.  Wherever First Lady Remi Tinubu is, look no farther: Mrs. Shettima too would be there! Yes, Hajiya Aisha Buhari, the late PMB’s widow, was arguably less activist with her pet project than Mrs. Tinubu.  But Mrs. Buhari and Mrs. Dolapo Osinbajo enjoyed no less camaraderie. 

    It’s the making of an integrated presidential family, that uses the harmony of its nuclear families, to forge policy unity, that balks at all distractions, in a rare determination to face Nigeria’s onerous challenges.  Again, Obasanjo-Atiku were a diametric opposite.

    Still, not even this clear harmony could keep political hustlers, eying 2027, from portraying the Vice President as some useless “spare tyre” that must be changed if the Tinubu machine were to smoothly purr to victory.

    That was, of course, humbug — and the fiercely loyal, dynamic and effective Borno Governor Babagana Zulum, wasted no time at shooting down that nonsense.  The Borno wing of APC North East also poured cold water on any 2027 BAT ticket without Shettima.  Just as well!  You don’t fix what’s not spoilt.

    But Hardball isn’t really bordered by errant political behaviours — politicians will be politicians, angling and hustling for posts and sinecure, at any cost.  It only pushes a constitutional deepening that inserts clauses to respect and honour the office of Vice President — and in states, Deputy Governors.

    You can’t claim a presidential or governorship ticket is incomplete without a running mate, only to win the election and demote your electoral partner as a serf, fated to the whims and caprices of others — including presidential appointees.  That’s simply not right.

    Still, the APC two presidencies so far have started building a powerful convention that gives the Vice President his due.  That should do for the long run.  Bravo!

  • Reckless injustice of mob justice

    Reckless injustice of mob justice

    Mobs play God whenever they visit jungle justice on suspected offenders. They level the accusation, confirm guilt and summarily execute punishment, all in one swoop without giving the suspect an opportunity to be heard out by a neutral party. The punishment for suspects is typically gruesome – lynching. What is worse is that most victims were later found innocent of alleged crimes they were killed for.

    Mob justice claimed another victim last week with the lynching of a lady in Kasuwan Garba community, Mariga council area of Niger State. The victim, a local food seller identified simply as Ammaye, was lynched and her body burnt by angry youths for alleged blasphemy against Prophet Muhammad. Eyewitnesses said trouble began when the lady, a Muslim faithful and well-known food vendor in the area, engaged in a verbal exchange with a young man said to be her nephew. The young man was reported to have jokingly told Ammaye he wanted to marry her to “fulfil the Sunnah,” to which the lady responded with comments considered blasphemous, sparking outrage among the locals. The matter was taken to the palace of the district head of Kasuwan Garba where Ammaye was interrogated, and she allegedly repeated her earlier comments. The district head then handed her over to security personnel for further interrogation. But a crowd of irate youths confronted the security agents, insisting on immediate ‘justice’. Attempts by the security agents to protect her were unsuccessful, as the mob overpowered them and stoned her to death.

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    Niger State Police Command confirmed that the incident occurred on 30th August, at about 2:00p.m. A statement by command spokesman, Wasiu Abiodun, said a reinforcement team of security operatives was mobilised to the scene, but the woman was already set ablaze before the team arrived. The statement noted that normalcy had been restored, adding that efforts were underway to identify, arrest, and prosecute those involved in the crime. Mariga council chairman, Abbas Adamu, also confirmed the incident and assured that calm had been restored to the area.

    The Kasuwan Garba lynching occurred barely one Ammaye week after a woman mistaken for a kidnapper was killed by an irate mob at the popular Ipata market in Ilorin East council area of Kwara State. “Information received was that a woman, suspected to be destitute, was sighted wandering around the community. Misinformed members of the public wrongly suspected her to be a kidnapper. In the ensuing confusion, an irate mob descended on the woman, inflicting serious bodily harm,” a statement by the police in Niger State said. A police patrol team that raced to the scene rushed the victim to the General Hospital, Ilorin, for urgent medical attention where medics confirmed her dead because of injuries she sustained.

    Incidents of jungle justice recur perhaps because perpetrators are scarcely brought to book. Authorities usually talk tough, saying they would hunt down the culprits but rarely do. And so, the reckless injustice of mob justice continues…

  • Lagos-phobia

    Lagos-phobia

    Lagos-phobia, from panicky Lagos-phobics, has come with own grim humour — even among Lagos-philes trying to fend off the toxic attacks.

    Lagos-phobia comes from emotive warriors, pitching nothing but crude sentiments, because they are fast running out of credible facts.  Yet, the next polls are some two years away!  Long may their despair last!

    The latest Lagos-phile, caught in that web is Daniel Bwala.

    Now, Bwala’s is a peculiar story.  He, it was, that scrammed from the winning camp, on account of the so-called “Muslim-Muslim” ticket.  Well, Bwala — poor Danny! — would later make a brusque u-turn.  Now, he admirably defends the policies of this same “Muslim-Muslim” ticket, a living proof it was all empty gas, to win or lose elections.

    But in fending off the charge that President Bola Tinubu focuses “all” infrastructural projects and investments in Lagos, Bwala made the points (and brilliantly a too):  New York (in the United States), London (United Kingdom), and Paris (France) gross more investments than any other parts of their respective countries. 

    Why?  Because they make money — more than any other —  for their nation’s till.  So, the investments are theirs by right.  That excellent parallel makes the Lagos case. Case closed?

    Not quite!  In the ardour of the moment — it was a TV programme — he lapsed into that verbal howler: “Lagos is a no man’s land …”!  But as he clambered back to the Tinubu camp from the losing Atiku’s, he also made a quick u-turn to declare Lagos belonged to the Yoruba!  It’s all in the course of a day’s work!

    Still, slip or no slip, Bwala was, as they say with that popular cliche, “on point”.  This latest bout of Lagos-phobia (just because it’s the president’s home base, suggesting  “nepotism”, is hare-brained.  It comes mainly from northern lobbies, at their wit’s end, trying to bad-mouth legacy projects.  But to be fair, southern lobbies too blackmailed the late PMB with such cynical charges.  It shows how toxic Nigerian politics is.

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    It’s all a verbal equivalent of shutting your eyes just because you hate what you’re seeing.  But that hardly makes it all go away!

    That blackmail of Lagos just won’t wash, coming  mainly from ex-PDPs (the Atiku faction of PDP that just moved to ADC and are making all the racket) who very early from 1999 sat glum when then President Olusegun Obasanjo declared Lagos was a jungle, and said he had no apologies!

    But guess who started the furious race to “de-jungle” Lagos and retool its economy, while the Abuja of Obasanjo and Atiku sneered?  It was a certain Governor Bola Tinubu, whose Lagos truly came into its own under his first successor, Governor Raji Fashola!

    If these guys think such cheap blackmail would stop any sane government — not the least Tinubu’s — from making Lagos to go back to Obasanjo’s dream “jungle”, they had better start thinking again!

    After Blue and Red rail lines, which Lagos cobbled together despite PDP’s Abuja, the Green Line, with the first section of the Lagos-Calabar coastal highway, is Lagos getting its due, as the nation’s money-spinner.  So, Lagos-phobics labour in vain with their desperation.

    Eko o ni baje!  That’s the spirit — and the logical path to tread too!

  • From Baba Iyabo without malice!

    From Baba Iyabo without malice!

    Baba says he writes without malice.

    Which Baba?

    Which Baba?  The Ebora Owu now!

    O, that one!  What has he done this time?  Floated another “third force”?

    He just wrote another letter.  No, another book, actually: claiming his public letter-writer career was with no malice to anyone, senior or junior.

    Really?  He said that?  Are you sure?

    Of course, I’m sure!

    How old is Baba now?

    He turned 88 in March.

    I see!   People still tell themselves honest lies at 88?

    What do you mean?  You say Baba is lying?

    Didn’t say that — and don’t put words in my mouth.  Still, for Baba to claim his letters bore no malice is rather stretching the truth.  Everyone knows he has a mortal fear of anyone — before or after — towering over him.  It’s simply insane paranoia!

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    What do you mean?

    Well, take IBB.  Baba swore and swooned at him without end, claiming he was no model of governance.  I can’t defend IBB.  But as soon as Baba completed his term as elected president, he built himself a hilltop mansion — just as IBB.

    But …

    Not only that!  But for the stiff opposition from us, he plotted a third term — another hidden agenda that he accused IBB of.  So, we smoked him out as we smoked IBB.

    Okay, but aren’t you being too harsh on him?

    Harsh!  On Baba Iyabo?  Don’t make me laugh!  I hear he claimed — in his new book: or is it extended letter? — that Buhari’s government was the worst ever.  Yet, Buhari and Osinbajo, his deputy, never tore at each other, as Obasanjo and Atiku did, at times over using government money to buy cars for girlfriends!

    True.

    Baba earned good revenue — oil windfall.  Yet, his deepest thinking was “debt forgiveness” (whatever that meant), not public works.  He left no legacy, aside his OOPL — a personal vanity shrine.  Buhari had an empty till.  Yet, he built roads and rail — one of the rail stations face-to-face with his OOPL.  Now who’s the failure, here?

    Yes, that.  I hear he says Tinubu is only marginally different from Buhari?

    Another vanity.  Baba did “reforms” but everything else collapsed — roads, rail and power. On power, he spent billions of Naira, with little returns.  Tinubu too is doing reforms, but is also building roads and rail, vital arteries, long neglected.  Yet Baba crows to suggest he’s better than anyone. Look, the old man is just delusional!

    True.

    If his delusion keeps his bitter soul happy at his departure lounge, so be it.  But we know him, even more than he knows himself.  No malice?  Give me a break!

  • Hear El Rufai, after the shellacking

    Hear El Rufai, after the shellacking

    The man Nasir El Rufai always makes a good copy for the journalist only because he is not a man to copy. He is a bombast, a stormy petrel, adept at undermining others. He brandishes statistics of which he himself is the researcher, compiler, promoter and reporter. He has a contemptuous attitude to facts in as much as he bastardises memory.

    He thinks the universe is populated by him all alone, and so he can take liberty with conscience and other people’s dignity. He just stepped out into the spotlight a few days ago for a television interview in which he tried in vain to ride roughshod on his viewers because the fellow who interviewed him either forgot his audience knows one or two about asking a good question and one or two about tendentious questions that coddle an interviewee. Maybe the interviewer just does not care what the audience thinks, or he thinks he can bamboozle the audience because El Rufai always believes he is a good orator.

    The man says he can beat the president in an election next time, and one would expect that he would have had to answer a question or two about the shellacking last time, a few days ago in his homestead of Kaduna State. He was the one who boasted. He was the one who lost, and he was the one who was not asked why he lost and so badly after he lost so terribly. He even said 30 million Nigerians have moved to poverty, and where did he get the figure. Go ask the on-air questioner why he did not ask.

    Rather he was accusing, again without evidence, that his former party, The All Progressive Congress (APC) disturbed the meeting of his party. Hardball would have asked him why that could happen when the African Democratic Congress (ADC) was actually the one who lost. So why would a winner, and confident one at that, want to disturb the meeting of a loser? Maybe he should address speculations that the new baby – not really a baby since it was coerced into a new identity – already has internecine conflicts. 

    He called his successor Uba Sani, now Governor of Kaduna State, his boy – imagine the petulance of calling a man of over 50 years, a governor, a senator, with multiple university degrees, a fighter of human rights credentials “my boy.” He said he was not his friend in one breath and his friend in another, and said he made him. Why not ask him why the man you said you made so disgraced you in public in an electoral contest. Did Sani not just make El Rufai the boy?

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    He was not asked properly why the State is so peaceful compared to his time, especially southern Kaduna where he made them hostage to sectarian and ethnic violence. Rather he said they were paying ransom. Nuhu Ribadu, the national security adviser, had an answer: No, sir. No ransom. Just pure efficiency that Nasir didn’t have.

    But the real question should have been, why was he worried about ransom when he El Rufai, by his own confession, paid the predators who kept attacking the weak and vulnerable? This is the making of a pharisaic politician who has not learned how to be sober.

    Was he not the one who has not been able to provide answers to how he devastated the Kaduna finances? Was he not even ashamed that places like Birnin Gwari were prostrate every day he was governor. The cattle market was rattled out of existence by gunmen and he was part of the team that followed then candidate Bola Tinubu with what looked like a battalion to the place. Now no one needs a pistol to wheel into town. Why can’t he address that.

    El Rufai spoke to friendly interview, not an interrogator but a co-conspirator against the facts on the land.

  • Red card for exploitation

    Red card for exploitation

    Some state governments, within the last month, moved against exploitative tendencies by operators of elementary and secondary schools that have imposed heavy burdens on parents. A modern-day practice at the lower level of education is for school operators to organise ‘graduation’ parties for pupils at every final class from kindergarten/nursery up to secondary school, for which parents are billed exorbitantly aside from their core obligation to pay school fees. Usually, pupils are brainwashed by operators to put parents under maximum pressure to pay for the vanity fair, with parents who can’t readily afford the extraneous commitment pressed hard by children insisting they be not left out of the parties, which they often equate to their very pupilage in the schools.

    Imo, Benue and Ondo are among states that have outlawed graduation parties for pupils of elementary and basic levels. Imo government with immediate effect banned schools from staging graduation parties for kindergarten,  nursery and Junior Secondary School (JSS) students – a move it said was aimed at reducing financial strain on parents and redirect attention to academic development of children. Education Commissioner Bernard Ikegwuoha, in a 15th August memo addressed to parents and other stakeholders, also directed school proprietors to stop yearly change of textbooks to enable pupils to pass down what they used to younger siblings.

    On graduation parties, the memo said inter alia: “In line with the 6-3-3-4 education system in Nigeria, graduation ceremonies and parties are only permitted for Primary 6 graduating pupils and Senior Secondary School (SSS) 3 students. Henceforth, graduation ceremonies and parties for kindergarten, nursery and Junior Secondary School 3 students are hereby abolished. This policy aims to ensure that students, parents, stakeholders and schools focus on the academic achievements of students at the end of their primary and secondary education cycles.”

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    On textbook usage, the memo said schools must now adopt approved lists and use them for a minimum of four years to enable siblings to reuse textbooks. He warned proprietors against frequent changes, noting that the practice imposed financial burden on parents and undermined educational stability.

    Benue State government issued a similar directive. Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Education and Knowledge Management, Helen Nambativ, in a memo dated 21st August, said the policy would take effect from the 2025/26 academic session. “All compulsory school graduation ceremonies in Benue State are hereby abolished, especially for kindergarten, nursery and basic schools,” the memo stated, adding: “The unpopular use of restricted, customised education materials such as text/exercise books in Benue State schools, making them non-transferrable to subsequent learners, is hereby abolished.”

    The catch is, same trends apply to all states in the federation and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). Authorities concerned should waste no time taking a cue.

  • Reunion ritual

    Reunion ritual

    For the umpteenth time, Nigerian security authorities organised a reunion for rescued kidnap victims and their families. More than 128 people, who had been held by bandits in Kaura Namoda, Zamfara State, were reunited with their families in a ceremony in Abuja on August 26.

    According to the National Coordinator, National Counter-Terrorism Centre, Maj. Gen. Adamu Laka, the victims were freed in security operations carried out in two phases this month. He said 42 persons, comprising 14 males, 27 females, and a toddler, were rescued on August 14. He added that 88 individuals, made up of 34 males and 54 females, regained freedom on August 19.

    “With their recovery process ongoing, we are now handing them over to the Zamfara State Government for reintegration with their families and communities,” he explained.

    There are inevitable questions: What happened to their captors? Where are the bandits who kept them in captivity?

    The National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, in his address on the occasion, did not provide answers to the critical questions about the whereabouts of those who had kidnapped the individuals that were reunited with their families at the event.

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    Ribadu said: “Let me be unequivocally clear: this work will continue. There will be no respite in our operations. There will be no safe haven for those who terrorise our citizens. We will hunt them, we will find them, and we will bring them to justice – or they will meet the same fate as the many kingpins already neutralised by our forces.”

    Tough talk! However, he gave no clue as to whether the bandits involved in the two cases had been arrested or killed. If they were not arrested and were not killed, what happened? Did they escape?  How were they able to escape? 

    When the authorities are silent about kidnappers in kidnap cases in which kidnappees regain their freedom after the intervention of security agencies, it suggests that the kidnappers are free and may well strike again. That’s dangerous.

    It is disturbing that kidnappings not only continue in the country but are also on the rise. More than 2,000 people were reported kidnapped across 24 states of the country between January and July 2024, according to SUNDAY PUNCH. The newspaper’s research focused on reports of kidnapping published in four Nigerian newspapers in the period, namely The PUNCH, The Guardian, The Nation, and Vanguard.

    The scale of the country’s security crisis, which includes kidnapping and banditry, evidently demands greater counter-action from the authorities.  The reunion ritual that has become familiar always leads to more questions than answers.

  • Long overdue resolution

    Long overdue resolution

    It is unsurprising that the unreleased girls kidnapped in Chibok, Borno State, in April 2014, continue to make the headlines. The same is true of Leah Sharibu, the unreleased Christian schoolgirl abducted in Dapchi, Yobe State, in February 2018.  The whereabouts of these victims are unknown. The unresolved abductions mean that there is no closure. This is mainly why they remain in the news.

    The National Coordinator of the National Counter Terrorism Centre, Maj. Gen. Adamu Laka, brought up the matter again during a multi-agency meeting on anti-kidnapping, organised in collaboration with the United Kingdom’s National Crime Agency in Abuja, on June 29. He made an effort to reassure the public that the authorities had not forgotten these unresolved abduction cases, and were still pursuing freedom for the victims.   

    Eleven years after Boko Haram abducted a total of 276 girls from the Government Girls Secondary School in Chibok, Borno State, 87 of them are still believed to be in captivity.

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    Also, Leah Sharibu was among the 110 schoolgirls kidnapped by Islamist terrorists from the Government Girls’ Science and Technical College, Dapchi, Yobe State, more than seven years ago. Sadly, five of the kidnapped girls reportedly died in captivity. Others abducted with Leah were set free a month after the incident. Those released were Muslims. Leah, the only Christian among them, was not released because she refused to renounce her faith and convert to Islam.

    On the Chibok and Dapchi incidents, Laka said: “Since when they were kidnapped, those who were rescued were not just rescued one time; It was a gradual process. Negotiations were conducted to get them out. Operations were conducted… I was in the theatre, and I know what the military and intelligence agencies put in to rescue the initial set of the Chibok girls.” He added: “We haven’t given up hope on them; some of them were married to some of the insurgents. Some have come out.”

    He continued: “There is the issue of this lady, Leah Shaibu. We are not always talking about it. It doesn’t mean we don’t care. It doesn’t mean we’ve forgotten about them. We are still on it. Our prayer is that the whole 87 or 80 plus that are left will be rescued by God’s grace.”

    Talk is cheap! The authorities must recognise the time factor, and that the resolution of these kidnap incidents is long overdue.

  • Atiku, no desperado

    Atiku, no desperado

    Now, don’t you laugh: Atiku Abubakar, former Vice President of the Federal Republic (1999-2007), says he’s not desperate to be president!  Don’t laugh!

    You still guffawed, didn’t you?  Even after near-stifling to violently repress a good laugh?  Sympathies!  The truth is Atiku may well tell that fib to the marines!  Why do conceited politicians feel the rest of us have saw dust for brain — why?

    Indeed, since his ungraceful tussle with his principal, the graceless bully who tried to crush his No. 2, during their best-forgotten presidency, Atiku has been the living proof of extreme desperation to become president.

    Now, that’s no crime.  Being president or any other office is within Atiku’s constitutional rights.  But what rankles is the hypocrisy of denying such open secret, behind some silly modesty.  It can only wash with the naive, with the simpleton.

    “Atiku Abubakar’s plan is to build a better Nigeria.  So, it’s not about him being the president,” an Atiku proxy, Prof. Ola Olateju, of Achievers University, Owo, Ondo State, told an African Democratic Congress (ADC) crowd in Lagos.

    The snag is Atiku feels such a government is virtually impossible without him — and there lies the humbug.  It’s mere cant because all his post-2007 actions paint the perfect picture of a political desperado, which got worse as the years rolled by.

    In 2007, he teamed up with the defunct Action Congress (AC), when the vengeful President Obasanjo tossed him out of PDP: an internally displaced person (IDP).

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    Shortly after, he left AC to gobble his old vomit, going to prostrate for old nemesis, Obasanjo, to be admitted back into PDP, turning his back on his old AC benefactors.

    President Goodluck Jonathan won the PDP ticket in 2011, and won own term, after completing the late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s, who had died in office.  But when Jonathan had ideas of a fresh term, the “non-desperate” Atiku stormed off and “ported” to APC, the new merger.  Muhammadu Buhari (Allah bless his soul!) won the APC ticket and the presidency.  That was 2015.

    Again, that “non-desperate” crave for power saw Atiku scramming back to PDP, which gifted him its ticket for 2019.  But PMB beat him black and blue!  Against President Bola Tinubu, the APC candidate in 2023, it was as Jimmy Cliff, reggae ace, sang: the bigger they come, the harder they fall!

    But the Atiku damage came well before his umpteenth defeat.  To sate his power desperation, he re-christened himself the “candidate of the North”.  Thus, with the help of Peter Obi, a fellow opportunist, they smashed much of PDP bastion in southern Nigeria — with Obi’s LP triumph, which was PDP’s loss essentially.  Another loss for Atiku.

    Now, ahead of 2027, peripatetic Atiku has not only rebranded as “pan-Nigerian” from the northern candidate of 2023, he has also scuttled into ADC, just because he knew PDP wouldn’t again waste its ticket on a serial loser, obsessed with power.  But for all PDP has done for him, all Atiku could repay the poor party is preening betrayal, just to grab power!

    Yet, he says he’s not desperate?  Toh!

  • Battle over power tariff

    Battle over power tariff

    An age-old maxim says when two elephants fight, it is the grass that suffers. Electricity consumers in Enugu State are like that grass, as they were lately pitched in blackout by the Enugu Electricity Distribution Company (EEDC) that is at loggerheads with the Enugu State Electricity Regulatory Commission (EERC) over the latter’s reduction in tariff to be paid by premium Band A customers. The electricity distribution firm cut power supply to state residents by as much as 50 percent in retaliation against the regulatory body’s decision to cut tariff.

    EERC had in July unilaterally lowered the tariff to be paid by Band A consumers within the market jurisdiction to N160/kWh from N209/kWh, effective from 1st August, claiming it had such power under the Electricity Act 2023. Chairperson of the commission, Chijioke Okonkwo, said the newly prescribed rate was cost reflective. According to him, the tariff cut followed the regulatory body’s review of tariff and licence applications by MainPower (EEDC’s successor firm) as the new subsidiary company that operates in Enugu State. “We reviewed their entire costs, using our Tariff Methodology Regulations 2024 and the supporting Distribution Tariff Model to get an average price. The price is low due to some reasons, including the fact that the Federal Government is subsidising electricity generation cost…,” Okonkwo argued inter alia, adding: “Breaking this across the various tariff bands means Band A will be paying N160 while Bands B, C, D and E remain frozen.”

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    The tariff slash raised concern among electricity distribution companies (DisCos) and generation companies (GenCos), especially as they feared other state electricity regulatory commissions could take a cue from the EERC. Meanwhile, opinions differed among industry stakeholders, with federal regulators and market operators arguing that uncoordinated tariff adjustments could undermine the operational and financial sustainability of the electricity industry.

    EEDC’s way of pressing its displeasure was cutting power supply to Enugu consumers by 50 percent. This prompted the Nigerian Independent System Operator (NISO) to call a mediatory meeting on 13th August in Abuja. At that meeting attended by agents of the EERC and EEDC, among other key stakeholders, NISO said the recourse taken to by EEDC had serious operational implications particularly for transmission and service-level agreements at national grid interfaces. “Fair prices, sustainable business operations and a stable electricity market are not mutually exclusive; they require transparency, coordination, and mutual respect,” NISO Chief Executive Abdu Mohammed said before the meeting moved behind closed doors.

    The sectoral reform by which power has been devolved to states to regulate electricity distribution within their respective jurisdiction faces a litmus test in the Enugu electricity market. Reason must be allowed to prevail, without consumers being made casualties of a turf war between market operators. And stakeholders should work to ensure the Enugu crisis isn’t replicated in other market jurisdictions.