The Nation Newspaper

Category: Opinion

  • Rejuvenation of Nigeria’s industrial sector

    Rejuvenation of Nigeria’s industrial sector

    Over 50 years ago the increasing demand for, and government policy of self-sufficiency in food production, necessitated the call for establishment of a local fertilizer production industry. By the late 1960s and early 1970s, Nigeria established the first fertilizer firm in Nigeria, the Federal Superphosphate Fertilizer Company (FSFC), Limited, Kaduna. The company was a federal government project and produced among other products, Single Super Phosphate (SSP) fertilizer. The construction and installation of equipment started in 1974 and was completed in 1976 immediately after which production started.

    Between 1985 and 1991, the textile sector in Nigeria recorded an annual growth of 67 per cent and as at 1991; it employed about 25 per cent workers in the manufacturing sector. At the time, 180 textile companies employed about one million people.

    As part of its strategic plan for pulp and paper production for domestic and export markets, the government commissioned the Nigeria Paper Mill, Jebba, Kwara State, in 1969; Iwopin Pulp and Paper Company (IPPC), Ogun State in 1975 and Nigeria Newsprint Manufacturing Company (NNMC) in Oku-Iboku, Akwa Ibom in 1986. The government’s plan was for the three pulp and paper mills to provide tonnes of different papers in their thousands every year and of course, their performance was encouraging and promising. As of 1985, the Jebba mill, which was to be the largest in West Africa, was producing 65, 000 tonnes of Kraft paper, liner and chipboards, sack Kraft, and corrugated cartons per annum. These plants have ceased to exist.

    These factories did not break even, not to talk of re-investing their surplus cash and profit in the acquisition of technological capabilities and skills required to adapt, operate, and maintain the imported technology in use. Within 10 years, 80 per cent of trained technical staff of FSFC had left. The same fate befell Ajaokuta and Aladja Steel complexes, Nigeria’s Aluminium Company, Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria (ALSCON) and several state-owned projects. All are moribund.

    The reasons include low plant availability due to a priori poor technical preparation during the investment processes. Other factors include project and financial mismanagement, vested interest and weak bureaucratic capacity. These examples count among the thousands of white elephants that litter the industrial wasteland in Nigeria.

    The above sums up the pattern and mechanics of industrial failure in Nigeria. Three points. First, industrial technological capability mastery is a critical factor of success. Nations and firms accumulate this through continuous technological efforts over a long time. Second, it is also clear that technological knowledge is not easily absorbed, imitated or transferred contrary to conventional wisdom. No nation is willing to give another, science and technologies that made them rich. A nation must be deliberate and make explicit investment in acquiring the wide range of technical expertise required in all cycles of the project life. These include the capacity acquisition right from pre-feasibility, investment, operation and maintenance and so on. Third, specialized human capital does not consist only of theoretical knowledge; a nation must engage in learning by production, learning by maintenance and learning to innovate by its own citizens. These are imperatives in the technology acquisition process.

    State capacity and technological capabilities

    The lessons from the collapse of these industrial firms and failures of performance reveal the paucity of state and bureaucratic capacity. The political and bureaucratic support pillars were absent or weak. Politicians were more interested in skimming rents from the large-scale investments rather than setting goals for completion and performance

    To understand the fundamental challenges of industrial failures and slow economic growth, I apply two concepts to anchor the discussion. First is the notion of State Strength and State Scope. The former we define as the capacity of the state to command loyalty—the right to rule legitimately—to extract the resources necessary and provide services, to maintain that essential element of sovereignty, a monopoly over the legitimate use of force within defined geographic boundaries.

    Clearly, state capacity (executive, legislative, and judicial) and state institutions exert significant influence on outcomes such as economic development, civil conflict, democratic consolidation, and international security.

    The state, be it federal or provincial/state, has a defined scope, which are the key functions it performs including education, health and security for example. When a state takes on more than it can handle due to too wide a scope and constrained by necessary resources, it experiences government ineffectiveness.

    The second concept is industrial technology capability. There is a strong connection of science, technology and engineering in any nation’s quest for national security, food security and health sovereignty. I make bold to say that the capstone of national development differences among nations is the difference between industrialized and non-industrialized economies. The capacity to effect changes and to deliver what leaders promise is what separates the weak and strong, the wealthy and poor, nations. The quantum of collective productive capabilities that they possess make the all the difference.

    Read Also; How Nigeria can achieve industrialisation, by Dangote

    According to a study of ‘growth miracles’ by the World Bank in 2008, only 13 countries in the world have been able to sustain an annual growth rate of 7% or higher since 1950. Only two countries, both with small populations and highly idiosyncratic economic structures – Botswana and Oman – are among the group of 13 that have not grown because of industrialization [World Bank, 2008]. Additionally, countries and regions that have de-industrialized or prematurely de-industrialized have experienced a slowdown in economic growth or, at worst, declining economic growth. The faster the rate of manufacturing, the faster the rate of economic growth (Kaldor’s Law).

    What should be done to ensure effective governance for industrial progress?

    It is hard to decouple the political economy and national leadership and governance from what befall universities, companies, science and technology (S&T) laboratories and research institutions. For oil-rich nations, oil wealth tends to be a barrier to building and nurturing quality S&T institutions that undergird industrial and scientific dynamism. National institutions have been degraded because bureaucratic and political elites are deeply entwined in corruption, patronage, and granting of privileges to friends and associates rather than to the most competent. Bad governance has been far more debilitating and explains in large part why oil bonanzas over several decades have undermined   the performance of Nigeria’s oil-dependent economy.

    Infrastructure and economic growth are closely related. We estimate Nigeria’s infrastructure deficit at $100 billion annually. This is three times the total 2021 federal budget, projected at $34.51 billion. Clearly, one of the most significant barriers to industrialization, value addition and competitiveness of Nigerian firms is poor infrastructure. According to a recent Financial Times (FT) report: “The congestion at the port in Lagos has become so bad that it can cost more than $4,000 to truck a container 20km to the Nigerian mainland these days, almost as much as it costs to ship one 12,000 nautical miles from China”. The estimated loss in economic activities is $55 million per day.

    The lessons of the last 50 years of Africa post-independence show clearly that Nigeria continues to lag far behind in technological capacity to diversify its economy. The economy is poorly diversified in its technological production base and export basket. The country routinely experiences disproportionately large volatility and huge swings in fundamental economic variables. This is especially so as the country is resource-dependent and vulnerable to external shocks. The recent nexus of pandemic and the resulting global financial crisis is illustrative.

    • Prof. Oyelaran-Oyeyinka is Senior Special Adviser to the President on Industrialization, African Development Bank (AfDB).

  • Conservative northwest and ravaging banditry

    Conservative northwest and ravaging banditry

    Some ruffians emerged abruptly in the Northwest and enthroned the rule of terrorism under the republic of violence.  Labelled as bandits, they are devoted to only brutish and indiscriminate killings of human beings, perpetrating looting, raping and arson with great passion.

    The mainstream of the wretched of the Northwest are mainly the casualties of these heinous and senseless killings. Their troubled world is controlled by excessive and persistent fears of incessant attacks by the bandits as if they were state enemies. Having degraded their living to the theatre of game of death, their costly blood has become cheaper than water which cannot circumvent the horrors of the evil men. The merciless assassins have murdered the peace of the downtrodden and installed sorrow, tears and despair unabated.

    Alarmingly, banditry is now a mega industry recruiting and breeding more terrorists to hike the general level of mass destructions and dislocations of law and order in the Northwest. In spite of the efforts by our gallant soldiers, yet it is obvious that the expected light to be sighted at the end of the tunnel is still a big mirage.

    What is the way out then?

    The Northwest, largely populated by the Hausa-Fulani, is conspicuously trapped between the devil and deep blue sea. It is on the brink of a precipice because it lacks the political will to decipher and acknowledge its deeply-rooted social diseases spreading destructions, but is pre-occupied with fruitless battling with symptoms as the only remedy to our socio-economic turmoil. Consequently, we are timid or hypocritical in interrogating ourselves some thought provoking questions which are inevitable for salvation.

    For instance, how did we find ourselves in this embarrassing mess today? How bad are we doing and how well are the other geopolitical zones developing? Who are the originators of our lingering predicament? How are we going to uplift ourselves from the zone of self-destructions to self-actualisation?

    Why are we allowing subversive tendencies to shape our social living? What will be the future of the Northwest if this notorious cankerworm persists?

    These questions should be hitting and knocking hard on our minds and stimulate us to wake up from our protracted slumber in order to rescue us from further drifting by departing from the danger zone of conservatism.

    Read Also: There will be no insurgency, banditry before my tenure ends – Buhari

    Undoubtedly, this unbridled criminality (banditry)  is a product of our regional failure as well as the collapse of our jingoism. In the Northwest, there is scarcity of foresight on where we want to be and how to reach there because we have imbibed the culture of ‘ misplaced fight’. Our belief is predominantly focused on doing the right thing instead of doing things right. While the former is negative and conservative in reality, the latter is positive and progressive. Thus, our socioeconomic infection is not given the treatment it deserves just as a doctor refuses to diagnose a disease and allows the patient to die.

    I candidly view banditry as a symptom of a contamination called conservative society. The more we deliberately discard this fact, the longer the end of banditry and hence the turbulent journey.

    Recall that a conservative society strives by reproducing and conserving the conditions of its own survival.  Essentially therefore, the Northwest is not ready to usher in a paradigm shift to eliminate its destructive socioeconomic and political structures. Michael Oakeshott argues that to be conservative is to prefer the familiar to the unknown, prefer the tried to the untried, the limited to the unbounded.

    Are we guilty of boycotting new discoveries for a new Northwest or not?

    As a people, we are proud to preserve the extreme class of the rich and the extreme class of the poor. This gives rise to class antagonism, class distinctions and the rest. Whatever the factors for this orthodox arrangement are, it is not a socioeconomic setting that strives in all the other geopolitical zones of Nigeria.

    Of course, the Turji Bellos, Adamu Alieros and the other bloody terrorists are just a symptom of a social infection. That is why they are acting the script of human catastrophes in the Northwest and we are not analysing their devilish activities beyond the surface level. These unrepentant villains are products of our ailing system of a class society among others. To buttress this point, some interviewed bandits confessed to having been neglected in terms of enjoying social amenities and left without acquiring Western education. Nevertheless, that could not be a genuine reason for gruesome killings.

    If our governments have made judicious utilization of scarce resources for overall inclusiveness, heartless bandits would have been trained as medical doctors saving lives instead of killing innocent and vulnerable people. Some would have been coached as engineers constructing infrastructures instead of destroying them. Related to this is the fact that the governments of the Northwest have continued to abandon agriculture as the mainstay of the economy in which there is no wealth creation to reduce the level of poverty among the people despite our vast and fertile land. It is also lamentable that we do not have a single university of agriculture which can be effective in revolutionising farming activities.

    To conserve and sustain the conservative order for our underdevelopment, we are more interested in building powerful individuals rather than constructing a strong and virile region in which the average and ordinary people will pass through a dignified living. With this negative trend, our powerful persons are not interested in living for the less privileged in our midst but they concentrate their vast resources to build a new world that is completely different from theirs. This uncharitable character is a training ground for the evolution of envious and broken men and the end result is what we have today.

    The bandits of our generation are too unrefined that they enjoy killings of the innocent like chickens! This notwithstanding, they are not pure evils but the negative of positive evil. It is therefore condemnable that our conservative structure is the positive evil, the father of banditry. Bandits can be killed on a mass scale but no amount of armoured tanks can eliminate banditry if this conservative setting remains unchanged.

    Thus, we must go back to the drawing board to launch heavy assaults against the disease and not the symptom. The Almighty Allah categorically states that He does not change the condition of a people until they change their condition themselves.

    • Abdullahi writes via aaringim68@gmail.com

  • For best practices in early childhood education

    For best practices in early childhood education

    SIR: Former US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton encompassed an uncommon agenda in her manifesto during the presidential campaign in 2016 to succeed Barack Obama.

    Clinton said, ”If we want our children to thrive in tomorrow’s economy, we must invest in our children’s future today, starting with our youngest learners, especially those from our most vulnerable and at-risk communities”.

    She vowed to revamp early childhood education (ECE) towards grooming a new breed of society such that in about 50 years’ time, they would birth a stronger world.

    Clinton’s vow about investing massively in early childhood education towards producing a well-developed society was logical.  During her 75th birthday on October 26, she reiterated, “Nearly 60 percent of children in the United States start kindergarten unprepared, and need interventions for success in school and in life”.

    If this is the situation in a top-ranked nation like America, imagine a developing country like Nigeria with a gross deficit on funding to education and childcare due to meagre resources. Suffice to say that thinking outside the box remains a realistic means to remedy the deficits, thus, the Reggio Emilia approach comes to bare. The approach places a demand to collaboratively invest on childhood education as children’s solid development determines the future of any society.

    Reggio Emilia is a cosmopolitan city of about 130,000 people in the Emilia Romagna region of Northern Italy. Over the past 50 years, their school system has spawned an innovative method of preschool education that has become famously known as the Reggio Emilia approach. It believes that parents and the wider community have collective responsibility for children through an inclusive, village-style approach that engages children, parents and the community as all being essential components to the learning process.

    Read Also: Northeast governors and the education sector

    Essentially, it inspires children to present their ideas and learning in diverse forms: art, drama, dance, music and others, other than just numbers and letters.

    From statistics, fewer than one in three children ages 3-4 attend early childhood education (ECE) globally. In Nigeria, over one in three children, that is, 36% attend. Overall, at least 10 million children are not enrolled in ECE nationwide. This submits that large inequalities persist: 8% of the poorest children versus 78% of the richest children. Thus, bridging the gap calls for concerns considering ECE compelling benefits.

    Early quality learning entrenched as the second target of United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal-4, seeks to ensure that, by 2030, “all girls and boys have access to quality early childhood development, care and pre-primary education so that they are ready for quality primary education”. This is on account that quality pre-primary education is a key strategy for improving higher learning and education outcomes.

    Scientific research over the past 30 years maintains that the most important period of human development is from birth to eight years old. During these years, the development of cognitive skills, emotional well-being, social competence and sound physical and mental health builds a strong foundation for success well into the adult years. Significantly, in early childhood, learning through play is pertinent as it enables learning to take place at an amazing speed, and has proven to be a magic wand to school enrolment alongside retention as children spontaneously, cheerily learn critical skills and develop as they play.

    Furthermore, early childhood is a critical period for stimulating the environment, when adequate nutrients, social interaction, and billions of integrated neural circuits are established. At the same time, a child develops the capacity to relate to others, learn and solve problems, alongside positive learning, health, well-being and economic outcomes throughout life. The ECE is aimed at ensuring that children enter primary school at developmentally appropriate levels of school readiness; readiness to learn for optimal outcomes, so, early childhood education should be augmented.

    • Carl Umegboro, umegborocarl@gmail.com

  • Soludo and limits of blind ambition

    Soludo and limits of blind ambition

    Last month or so, Chris Ngige, Minister of Labour and Employment, was on Politics Today, the popular current affairs programme on Channels Television. There, his host, had asked him a direct question about his choice between Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Peter Obi, of the Labour Party (LP), both contesting for presidency in 2023. It could have been an attempt to corner or bait him, in some way, for maximum effect, as journalists are trained to do.

    But beating the former Governor of Anambra State, two-time Senator and now Minister in the game of politics is akin to carrying coal to New Castle, or selling snow to the Eskimos. Trust the old political horse, to see through the obvious trap. Adept and well pruned, he cleverly did the needful – jump and pass – as the local people would say.

    “I have my PVC, I have only one vote. On election day, I’ll go and cast it for a candidate of my choice.”

    Now, Ngige, is a serving Minister on the platform of the ruling APC. But he is from Anambra State. Not only that he’s one of the most prominent Igbo men alive today. Given that the generation before him, which tried and failed, is fast receding and thinning out, he shares in the burden of producing an Igbo man as President of Nigeria. So, between party loyalty and that onerous duty, lies the imperative of emotional intelligence. How far critics faulted him for being reticent, during that outing, would therefore be hinged on how such individual appreciated his peculiar circumstances, or politics in general.

    Don’t forget the story of Obi and Ngige, which is supposed to make them the bitterest political enemies there is. Indeed, they are, actually. They don’t see eye to eye, politically speaking. But there is a limit when it comes to the larger picture. That’s what the Minister, seems to underscore and for which history would record him at the appropriate time, for recognising the dictum – all politics are local.

    Even Dave Umahi, Governor of Ebonyi State, Emeka Ihedioha, former Governor of Imo, seem to be at home with this reality also. Regrettably, Chukwuma Soludo, the current Governor of Anambra State doesn’t. His outing on Channels Television on Thursday, October 10, 2022, exactly a month after Ngige underscored that much. It was the direct opposite of Ngige. Such tactlessness, naivety and total lack of emotional intelligence! For a man who is supposed to be the current father of Anambra State and the bastion upon which the Obi campaign ought to rest on! Terrible.

    Read Also: FULL TEXT: Soludo’s statement on Peter Obi – History Beckons and I will not be silent (Part 1)

    Hear him on the programme, few hours after presenting a N258.97bn 2023 budget proposal to the Anambra State House of Assembly in Awka, Soludo told his host on the programme: “I think there was something I read about somebody speculating about whatever investment. With what I’ve seen today, the value of those investments is worth next to nothing. So, let’s leave that aside.”

    See the background. Obi arrived in office in 2006 with a clear economic template. He decided to keep a fraction of the yearly state revenue as savings as part of its template for long-term economic programme. This was to be followed with investments in businesses with potentials for yielding high dividends that would add to the financial pool.

    His thinking was actually tailored at recreating the magical economic feats of countries like China and other Asian Tigers – a strong financial husbandry – a pool of funds the state would rely on in future as a bulwark for massive investments and expansion of the industrial base to the extent that it wouldn’t have to rely anymore on the federal allocations that comes at the end of the month, but transform Anambra into a model of a distinct, self-sustaining entity of an economic hub, not only in Nigeria, but even Africa.

    In other words, the investments and savings were never meant for his own government, but his successors, giving that he had just eight years, maximum to be in office. By the time he was exiting office, he had a huge reservoir of N75 billion, captured in local and foreign currencies at various banks.

    Outside other investments totalling N27 billion, in such entities as Nigerian Independent Power Project (NIPP), of N9 billion and Orient Petroleum of N4 billion, among others, he made a huge input into the SabMiller company, a local offshoot of the International Breweries Limited, totalling $12.5 million as one of the landmark achievements in this regard.

    Now, this is what Soludo, completely rubbished. In fact, the controversy had started when months ago, the governor had to come out openly to debunk a story credited to Obi that the SabMiller investment, had grown to $100 million. It has not been confirmed that the former governor actually made the claim. Nonetheless, the vehemence with which Soludo, who practically came out smoking, went about the rebuttal, raised not a few eyebrows about his intentions.

    It is against this background that the Thursday outing is being situated. What was the governor up and about with those snide comments and scornful body language for? What purpose were those sneering, contemptuous and disdainful dismissal of Obi’s efforts meant to achieve?

    Now, you don’t need to look further for the answer. It lies in one element – politics. How? Well, this was the selfsame Soludo, who in September 2021, acknowledged the sterling performance of Obi in the state. During the governorship debate prior to his election, when the issue of the former governor’s achievements came up, the same Soludo, rather than dismiss, actually hugged them with pride, only that he argued that the feats were achieved as governor of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).

    He couldn’t bring himself to cricise Obi then, knowing the consequences, but rather retorted – yes, those achievements were made because he was implementing APGA programmes. What has changed between then and now that the mention of Obi’s name, would conduce such obvious disdain?

    As he had always argued, if he were any other Nigerian governor, he would have pocketed the money he lodged in those investments and savings and heavens wouldn’t fall. After all, Nigerians were witnesses to how Willie Obiano, his immediate successor sweated it out in the confines of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) the exact day he handed over and tried to sneak out of Nigeria.

    Has anyone heard about the case again? With the frenzy created initially, anyone would have thought that Obiano would be in and out of the courts trying to extricate himself from the allegations of monumental pillaging of the commonwealth of Anambra, he was accused of. Obi never suffered such indignity, either as governor or any other public office he has held, including as Chairman of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).

    So, where did he go wrong? That he decided to invest money and not steal it or that he saved for posterity and not steal same? Intriguingly, Soludo, a supposed world-class economist, who ought to be at home with figures, should have told his audience, what the investments were worth, even if just one kobo. But did he?

    By implication, he appears to be telling the world that Chief Obafemi Awolowo is to be blamed for the collapse of the O’odua Investment Group (OIG), and the companies under it that saw the rapid growth of Western Region at his time, including the effortless prosecution of free education or that Saduana of Sokoto, Ahmadu Bello, should similarly be blamed for the collapse of the Kaduna Textile established by then Northern Nigerian Development Company (NNDC) or that Michael Okpara should be assailed for the the parlous situation of Golden Guinea Brewery, Nigercem or Hotel Presidential Enugu.

    Anyway, the governor should be told by those close to him that hiding under one finger is impossible. He should quit being clever by half, because no one can eat a crab in secret. The walls have ears and what is hidden in the dark is usually exposed by light. Many know where he’s coming and that road has been trod in the past.

    We hear that he has been promised that he would be the next President if only he could scuttle Obi’s chances. It was said that immediately he showed early signs of supporting Obi, including offering him the Anambra Government House to launch his campaign, the hounds moved in to sow the evil seed of ambition in his heart. Don’t you know you’re the one we’re preparing for the job? That was it. Like Macbeth, whose vaulting ambition led astray, our governor has not relented in providing his own bit to the massive plot to stop Obi, ever since.

    How sad that in his obvious blindness, he couldn’t hear that the same promise is being made to his compatriots next door by the same people. Sadder still is that he couldn’t even recollect the fate of others before him. But ambition is a deadly phenomenon sometimes.

    Our governor, my governor, must however not forget that though envy and jealousy made the brothers of Joseph throw him into a well and later sold him as slave, God gave him authority with which he saved Israel. That Soludo doesn’t see the hand of God in Obi’s present journey, even with his education, is what beats me. But, passing six no be passing sense!

    • Igboanugo, a Publisher of Whirlwindnews, wrote from Lagos

  • ….Soludo, the solution

    ….Soludo, the solution

    Epic! The handicraft of a philosopher-king. One, I dare say not many of our political leaders have the facility of language and clarity of thought to seamlessly transmit such profound thoughts from mind to print, personally.

    Professor Soludo, with this, you just reaffirmed the value/virtue I saw in you back in 2004 (first as Economic Adviser to OBJ, before being appointed CBN governor that transformed Nigeria’s financial landscape forever) and has glued us together ever since, not just as friends but brothers.

    Read Also: Leave Soludo alone

    All through your political tribulations from 2010 – 2021, never did I see or hear you ever barter your nobility nor mortgage your high principle — whether in the face of tempting offer or tantalising assurance of instant political profits.

    Truly, you are a man of steely character, profound knowledge and Solomonic wisdom, completely detribalised.

    With this, you just rekindled my conviction that, ultimately, the sacred duty of intellectuals to community and country is to rise above ethno-religious loyalties and tell the truth, always.

    Quintessential Soludo, the Solution!

  • Before Buhari, Nigerians had ‘good luck’

    Before Buhari, Nigerians had ‘good luck’

    SIR: Before the general elections of March 2015, ex-president Goodluck Jonathan’s international reputation was not a strong one. He was initially an accidental president who, despite his relative inexperience, ascended to lead the country when his principal, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, passed away in 2010.

    In 2011, Jonathan surprised many observers in and outside Nigeria by securing the Peoples Democratic Party’s (PDP) ticket for the presidential election; and eventually emerging victorious. Among the candidates for the election, Jonathan appealed to the masses. His ‘I had no shoes’ speech endeared him to the majority of Nigerians, who saw him as one of them; someone who had experienced their pains and hardship.

    With his campaign slogan, ‘A breath of fresh air’, Jonathan promised a break from the old, and mostly retrogressive, way the country had been governed in the past. However, his tenure was characterised by soaring insecurity and instability in northern Nigeria as the Islamic terrorist organisation based in northeastern Nigeria, Boko Haram, gained strength and territory. If anything tore the Jonathan government apart, none did as the Boko Haram insurgency. The government struggled for years for a response while the bloodthirsty group ran amok, killing, maiming and displacing Nigerians in, mostly, northern states in its bid to form an Islamic caliphate within Nigeria.

    Though his administration fell largely short of expectations, Jonathan performed impressively well in office. But as the votes were counted in March 2015, he conceded defeat to Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress (APC), famously asserting that ‘nobody’s ambition is worth the blood of any Nigerian’, an unprecedented and courageous act in Nigerian politics which caught many Nigerians and Nigeria-watchers by surprise.

    Seven years after President Muhammadu Buhari took over power, we are yet to make a scratch in addressing the nation’s teething insecurity challenges; we are yet to make a go at resolving the country’s epileptic power supply, even as we are dealing with unemployment, inflation, and poverty. Indeed, the poverty rate in the country is alarming and has never been this high. One cannot help but wonder whether the current administration’s policies and interventions are realistically pulling Nigerians out of poverty or pushing us further back into it.

    Read Also; Who wants Mele Kyari dead?

    Nigerians needn’t remind the Buhari-led APC administration of what the naira/dollar exchange rate was before their ‘super economic policies’ brought the naira to its knees. Or, perhaps, the prices of commodities before their arrival on the scene.

    In 2015, Nigerians were seduced by the deluge of honey-like and unrealistic promises of the APC. Consequently, we abandoned our first love only to realise that we were chasing shadows; that there are two senses of the word ‘change’, positive and negative, and that the APC government brought the latter. Buhari had hinged his campaign promises on three cardinal points: fighting corruption, tackling insecurity and creating jobs. It is shameful that after almost eight years in office,  the more the government says it is addressing these issues, the worse it gets.

    The main opposition party, PDP, was not trying to paint the ruling party black when they lamented that ‘the Buhari-led All Progressives Congress government has turned our nation into a wasteland, devastated her economy, shattered our national dreams, crushed the hope of citizens and set our country backwards.’ The statement was factual. This sentiment was also expressed by ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo who said he was embarrassed about how President Buhari is running the country, stressing that Africa’s most populous black nation is moving towards becoming a failed state. Obasanjo is, apparently, not alone. Wole Soyinka, poet, essayist and first African Nobel prize winner, concurred with the ex-president’s assessment, describing the country as a crumbling edifice on the edge of collapse.

    The foregoing scorecards on the current administration prove that things have gone from bad to worse under President Buhari though the government is always quick to reel off its quotidian achievements at every slightest opportunity. This informed prominent Islamic scholar Sheik Murtala Sokoto’s description of President Buhari’s praise singers and sycophantic admirers as liars and hypocrites.

    Nigerians can only hope that his successor will be able to get Nigeria back to its erstwhile place among the comity of nations: the giant of Africa.

    • Ezinwanne Onwuka, ezinwanne.dominion@gmail.com

  • Tyranny of the vocal minority

    Tyranny of the vocal minority

    SIR: While Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), has steadied his campaign on critical issues – economy, security, education, healthcare and the like – some other presidential candidates have been dutiful in advancing hate and fake news.

    It is dispiriting that some young people enlist themselves into morbid mobs to tear down divergent voices for some assumed political messiahs. Patriotism is defined around the choice of candidate, and not on allegiance to national ideals. It is very unfortunate.

    Youth unemployment should be a critical issue this season. The current unemployment rate is put at 33 percent. It is really concerning. There is no doubt that this is a vector of a spectrum of social anomalies. With a youth population of over 120 million, it is imperative that young people are at the heart of policymaking in Nigeria.

    In his Action Plan couched as ‘Renewed Hope’, Tinubu delineated seminal elements to harnessing youth potential. He says, as president, the youth will not be exploited to do the bidding of the government. He says his administration will aim to cut the youth unemployment rate in half within four years through entrepreneurship and job creation as well as through social and political empowerment.

    On the entrepreneurship and job creation plank, Tinubu says his government will work with the CBN to develop suitable incentives to encourage commercial banks to target low-cost loans towards a given quota of youth-led enterprises. He says commercial banks will also be encouraged to ensure their loan application processes are simplified and give greater priority to young people with marketable ideas, and that federally owned and affiliated banking institutions will immediately be mandated to develop similar schemes for young entrepreneurs.

    Read Also: ‘Tinubu ‘ll be worker-friendly president’

    The APC presidential candidate says there will be an increase in intergenerational, business mentoring and cooperation with two million volunteer entrepreneurs and professionals across the nation committed to working with the youth to find employment, hone job skills and create businesses.

    This is clearly a plan and an antiserum to the contagion of youth restiveness and delinquency. It is disturbing that young people on the internet resort to promoting ethnic and religious prejudices, and passing sentences, threats, and curses on those whose political choice is at variance with their preference.

    Concerning are the chronic onslaughts by supporters of Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), against citizens from the southeast who do not support his bid. They threaten to cause harm, curse, and use every vile instrument in Frankenstein’s toolbox to drive fear and intimidate differing voices. Such hate and prejudice should not be found among well-meaning citizens.

    Chukwuma Soludo, governor of Anambra State, became a casualty of the Obi Red Army when he only confirmed the obvious. In an interview in 2018, Peter Obi had claimed he invested $20 million in International Breweries on behalf of Anambra State while he was governor. This is a company he has interest in.

    But Soludo said Peter Obi’s purported investments in Anambra are worth next to nothing.

    It is disturbing that despite the promise of issue-based campaigns by contending political parties, the entire political expedition is dissolving into a free-for-all with divisive methods, slander and fake news deployed, particularly by opposing parties.

    The rippling of a fake statement purportedly emanating from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) alleging a probe of Tinubu is a clear breach of the sanctity of the campaigns. Although INEC quickly torpedoed the fake statement, the attempt underscores the predatory and sinister complexion of our politics.

    As I often say, if we divide the country during the campaigns, we will have to live with the consequences of presiding over a divided people. If the purpose of seeking power is for the good of all, then we must begin by keeping the campaigns clean. What is the good of power when the next government will spend the next four years struggling to mend fences and manage diversity without success?

    We will only be reinventing a parlous wheel. If we sow hate during the campaigns, we will reap hate afterwards. The travails of the past years should teach us not to make campaigns about ethnic and religious prejudices, threats, curses, slander, and fake news.

    The parties going down this scorched and serpentine path must beat a retreat.

    • Fredrick Nwabufo, fredricknwabufo@yahoo.com

  • Nigerians living without government

    Nigerians living without government

    SIR: The lack of a functional system of government for many years has made Nigerians indefatigable.  They have suffered and complained for their leaders to institute a system of governance that can afford them a meaningful life but all to no avail.  The government has been unable to provide the three basic facilities that constitute a modern society.  The road infrastructure is collapsed.  The electricity supply is epileptic.  The water distribution has gone moribund. These infrastructures are not mentioned to say that security of lives and a stable economy are not guarantees of a good government but those are lofty expectations for most Nigerians.

    The ingeniousness of Nigerians has prevailed in the face of a ruinous system.  Citizens have started to do on their own what the government cannot do with the enormous wealth of the country.  Private and commercial houses are not completed without a good water supply system via borehole.  The same efficiency applies to electricity supply through a generating plant.  The third leg in the tripod that sustains a modern living is still handicapped.  Major road construction has been decapitated by a shoddy ambition.  This misappropriation has not stopped well-meaning individuals from undertaking massive road constructions in their local communities.

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    Progressive Nigerians have pushed the government to the margin with their actions and moved to the centre to administer a quality of life that is obtainable within the resources of a global economy.  They are not leaving the growth of the society to the crippled hand of government.  They struggle by all means to attain massive wealth and use their riches to build a better society.  It has even reached to a stage where the wealthy compete to outdo each other with their acts of community development.

    It may sound foreign to a young Nigerian that at some point in the life of the country, the government adequately provided the basic amenities.  Water, electricity and good roads were seen as natural designs like flowers on a beautiful landscape.  People took those services for granted as the least the government can do to show their presence.  Today, they are shameless.

    The independent mindedness of Nigerians is a blessing in disguise.  A way has opened out of the thickest jungle.  The determination by prosperous citizens to stay at pace with the global community has redefined the role of government.  Their humanitarian contributions have made an immeasurable difference and minimized the function of the established authorities.  Perhaps the government can meet the citizens half way and complete the monstrous road rehabilitation works going on in most highways.

    • Pius Okaneme, Umuoji, Anambra State.

  • Sultan Dasuki: Six years on

    Sultan Dasuki: Six years on

    In 1965, when the then Prince Ibrahim Dasuki was being awarded the Commander of the Order of the Niger (CON), his breath-taking citation said that the prestigious national honour was “in recognition of his services to Northern Nigeria and for his tact, integrity and industry,” and that “He is renowned for his sympathetic consideration to others.”

    What sounded like the peak of a career was, for the accomplished public servant, the beginning of illustrious service to the nation. The moment showed that he had paid his dues, having risen to become a globally-acclaimed leader in holding various strategic positions in both colonial and post-colonial civil service in Northern Nigeria.

    It’s been six years since Dasuki’s passing, enough time for us to reflect on his legacy and service to the nation objectively. Whether as a public servant or a community leader, Dasuki’s leadership was guided by an acknowledged passion to make a difference and leave the world better than he found it. He was an excellent student that went as far as Oxford University to develop himself and prepare him for a busy life as a technocrat. He would also be fondly remembered as that dutiful private secretary of the late Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello, in what’s considered the golden period of public service in the region.

    It was, of course, Dasuki’s application of intellect to solve critical national problems in his later years that would earn him accolades and recognition by distinguished organizations and organizations within and outside the country. He was awarded honorary doctoral degrees by the Federal University of Technology, Minna, and the University of Abuja for his administrative and intellectual impact and contributions to national development. His track record, therefore, made his selection for the award of Accomplished Pioneer Public Servant by Presidential Committee on Nigeria’s Centenary Celebrations a worthy honour. His legacy was pronounced in every phase of Nigeria’s pursuit of growth ever since he joined the colonial civil service.

    Dasuki’s formal education, after years of Qur’anic studies, began at Dogondaji Elementary School in 1931, before proceeding to Sokoto Middle School. At Kaduna College, which is now known as Barewa College, he stood out as he had in his previous schools—in the words of his contemporaries like Shehu Shagari—and demonstrated peerless capability to deliver as a civil servant. He began as a clerk in the treasury office of the Sokoto Native Authority and then joined Gaskiya Corporation, the publisher of the influential Hausa newspaper—Gaskiya Ta Fi Kwabo.

    Read Also; Remembering Alex Ekwueme

    When Dasuki left for Oxford University in 1955 for a one-year Devonshire Course at Queen’s College, he returned prepared for more responsibilities in the government. The programme exposed him to the global practices in public administration, and more polished to guide the evolving public service towards a productive course. He was posted to Pankshin Division in the Plateau Province as Assistant Divisional Officer (ADO), and then appointed as the Deputy Secretary of the Northern Nigerian Executive Council in 1957.

    As a diplomat, Dasuki worked at the Nigerian Embassy in Sudan, a return to an earlier career path he established when he was posted to Saudi Arabia to serve as Pilgrim’s Officer. He was known for his diplomatic interventions to protect the interests of Nigerians in and around the holy land, some of whom had run into troubles with the authorities there and ended up in jail. He rose through the ranks to become Permanent Secretary of the Northern Nigerian Ministry for Local Government before he retired.

    Dasuki‘s retirement from the regional civil service in 1968 kick-started his venturing into serving the public even more while pursuing his private enterprises and interests. He would be remembered for his role as the chairman of the Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) from 1969. His wisdom in creating District Offices in four locations—Zaria, Bauchi, Ibadan and Enugu—instead of the over-concentration of administrative functions in Lagos was revolutionary.

    Northern Nigeria’s commodity export market was revolutionized by Dasuki when he served as the chairman of the Northern Nigeria Marketing Board. His reforms brought about price stability and regulated operations of buying agents and acquisitions of export commodities in the Northern region. In all the positions Dasuki occupied, his first objective was to establish the means to achieve and sustain efficiency. This inspired the recommendations of the 1976 Dasuki Local Government reform, which were not adopted by the government. Nigeria’s local government system is still paying for the government’s refusal to heed Dasuki’s advice.

    It’s interesting that even in 2020, about four years after Dasuki’s passing, he was remembered for the solution he devised for our political administrators. His Royal Highness Maigari of Lokoja, Muhammed Makarfi II, reminded the nation on the need to revisit and implement the 1976 Dasuki Local Government reform, arguing that it’s the most practical “solution to the barrage of problems facing the third tier of government.”

    These antecedents were why Dasuki’s emergence as the 14th Sultan of Sokoto was seen as a progressive cause, and he didn’t disappoint in acknowledging our realities. To drive inter-faith relations in our volatile space, he established the Peaceful Coexistence Committee (PCC) to tackle the cycle of religious clashes and communal disturbances across the country. He played this role as the front-line guardian of Islam, and demonstrated that Islam is a religion of peace and that it accommodates other faiths.

    Some of Dasuki’s greatest contributions to Islam in Nigeria were the establishments of institutions that still serve as the umbrella for Muslims and against the mischief of charlatans. He invested his vast resources in the founding of Jama’atu Nasril Islam (JNI) and the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA). These organizations serve as the vanguards of Islam in Nigeria to date and bear bold memories of Dasuki‘s self-sacrificing commitments to noble causes.

    Dasuki died at age 92 on November 14, 2016. It’s even more memorable that he died on the anniversary of his turbaning as the Sultan of Sokoto. Perhaps, this was to make those behind his deposition as Sultan reflect on the injustice that instigated the action. He’s long been vindicated by history. His participation in Nigeria’s story from its creation until his demise deserves to be immortalized by the country in and outside his home state. His enduring legacy would always be around to remind us of the debt we owe him, including his haunting words during the politics that characterized his emergence as Sultan in 1988: “It is my firm belief that Allah can make you a ruler at the time He wants you to be, and remove you at the time He wants,” he said in reacting to the antagonism of those aspiring to be Sultan, and then added, “I am extending my hand of brotherhood to all those who aspired to the Sultan position.” This will always remind us of the impermanence of everything. May Allah repose his soul.

    • Gata a media practitioner and public affairs analyst writes from Abuja.
  • Putin can cling on to power, but his legend is dead

    Putin can cling on to power, but his legend is dead

    Despite some frenzied speculation around Russia’s loss of the occupied Ukrainian region of Kherson this week, it is still too soon to predict when and how President Vladimir Putin will surrender power – whether it will be because he is ousted, retires or simply dies in office.

    However, what we can already see are some of the processes which may shape and prompt that departure. More to the point, even clinging on to power, Putin will never live up to the image he had created for himself.

    Especially in the early months of the war, there was much excited speculation about his health, with claims that he had everything from blood cancer to Parkinson’s. Much of this has subsided, especially as the puffy aspect and odd twitches that were fastened upon as proof seem to have passed.

    It was unsurprising that this would attract such interest, offering something of a deus ex machina for Western governments eager for a quick solution to the dilemmas of the conflict.

    However, according to US intelligence officers who have studied the question, while Putin may well have recurring health issues – he has long been known to suffer from back problems and may even be suffering from a condition that has compromised his immune system, explaining the extreme measures taken to shield him from Covid-19 – there is no sign of anything likely to lead to his imminent death or incapacity.

    Yet he is 70, and his health really has become an existential question for the system. After all, while the Russian constitution stipulates what happens if he dies in office – the prime minister steps in as interim president until early elections can be held – there is no provision in case he is incapacitated for any substantial length of time, nor is there a vice president able to stand in for him.

    This is exactly the kind of political crisis which might generate an intra-elite struggle, which could bring down this regime.

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    After all, for now, the chances of a palace coup are scarcely greater than those of Putin being toppled by protests in the streets. Multiple security forces balance each other: in Moscow, for example, the military garrison, a special division of the National Guard and the Kremlin Regiment, all report to different chains of command. The Federal Security Service watches all three – and the Federal Protection Service in turn watch them.

    So long as Putin is able to control the heads of these so-called “power ministries” and they command the loyalties of their agencies, he seems hard to topple.

    However, for all he looks firmly in control, what is happening is that his system is becoming increasingly brittle, losing the resources which in the past have provided the resilience to respond to unexpected challenges.

    Obviously, this means financial resources. As sanctions bite and the costs of war escalate, money is getting tighter. Almost a third of the 2023 budget (more than 9 trillion out of a total 29 trillion rubles) will go towards defense and security. This leaves proportionately less to support regional budgets and keep struggling industries afloat.

    However, it also means weakened legitimacy and the goodwill of the security services and local elites. Putin’s approval ratings have always been artificially high, given that there is no meaningful opposition for him to be measured against, but they are nonetheless falling.

    Putin’s military machine is broken; his country’s economy so scarred that it will take years to recover; his reputation as a geopolitical mastermind in tatters.

    The National Guard, the key force charged with controlling protests in the streets, has been decimated fighting in Ukraine. Members of the National Guard are also angry that they were used as cannon fodder in a war for which glorified riot police were neither trained nor equipped.

    Meanwhile, while the grumbling within the elite remains carefully muted, it is evident. Just as he did during Covid-19, Putin is dumping the hard and unpopular work of raising “volunteer battalions” and keeping the war economy running onto his regional mayors and governors. While some, like St. Petersburg Governor Alexander Beglov, have seized this as an opportunity to court Putin’s approval, many others are quietly appalled.

    All this makes predicting the future of Putin and his regime even more difficult. Even brittle and stagnating regimes can hold on for a long time. Tsarist Russia was arguably brain-dead by 1911, when the brutally reformist Prime Minister Petr Stolypin was assassinated, but it still lasted through three years of catastrophe in the First World War before crumbling in 1917.