The Nation Newspaper

Category: Commentaries

  • Maku’s unguarded outburst

    Maku’s unguarded outburst

    SIR: Information management is about creating understanding in a society and between various interests. The responsibility of a minister of information should be to market aggregate values of a country to the audience that should include those within the country and outside. It becomes tragic and bizarre when the instrument of communication falls into the hand of those who see it as opportunity to disparage a section of the country.

    Every reasonable Nigerian should condemn the recent outburst of the Minister of Information, Labaran Maku. It is evident that the minister is becoming irascible in his attempt to cover up iniquities or disappointment of the PDP-led government. His tirade against governors Wamakko and Kwankwaso of Sokoto and Kano states respectively failed to address the burning issues confronting the nation today. Indeed, being a northerner, Maku is fully aware of the weight of his ranting and no amount of apology can attenuate a deliberate insult on a people.

    In describing the exit of the five governors from PDP to APC Labaran Maku said “they are like the Fulani nomads, they move from one party to another without shame.”

    One wonders how the Fulani stock in PDP would feel about a government that stoops so low to insensitively unleash inappropriate charade against their culture. In case the minister does not know, there is virtue in migration for legitimate business. It is exploration of new frontiers which helps in human evolution. A static people creates a dull, odious, nauseating and erratic environment where nothing moves – it nurtures a stock of irredeemable revelry that continually snores in hang-over while their house is on fire.

    The two governors that Maku singled out for vilification were very fundamental to PDP fortunes in 2011 general elections by their delivery of strategic votes that ensured the party’s victory. The recent change in the leadership of the party has justified the stance of the patriotic governors that had all along been drumming the necessity for that change in PDP in the interest of the country. It is unfortunate that the patriotic stance was described as “over-size ego” by Maku in a very strange context.

    PDP instigated its present fate, and now that there is strong opposition in APC, the party is at the brink of disintegration. It will be worse for it when APC takes over the mantle of leadership after 2015 general elections. People can be fooled for some time, but definitely not all the time. It is time for change and the train is meandering through every nook and cranny of this country to connect the masses that shall sweep off the debris scattered all over the political landscape of this country by PDP.

    APC is the party of the masses. It is a party that transcends every parochial sentiment. It is a party that provides platform for all those oppressed by the dictatorship of PDP. The fortunes of the party increase with every crass remark by likes of Labaran Maku.

     

    • Mohammed S. Umar

    Sokoto Liberal Democrats Media Foundation (SOLID)

    Sokoto

     

  • Jonathan, Tukur and a government of Jezebels

    I must commend President Goodluck Jonathan for removing Alhaji Bamanga Tukur as National Chairman of the PDP and finally dumping him. It really is good riddance to bad rubbish because that man was a disaster to his party. PDP itself is bad enough but to have a self-conceited and vainglorious ancient dinosaur who is completely fixed in his ways, who believes that anyone and everyone below the age of 60 is still a ‘’young’’ man or woman and who sees the world from the prism and mindset of a 1960’s Viet Nam war veteran that is still suffering from post-war traumatic syndrome was a disaster waiting to happen. This was a man that drove goodwill away from his party in the same way that shelltox drives away mosquitoes from a bedroom. As long as Tukur was in charge the continued demise of the PDP was guaranteed. He was not only a scourge to the ruling party but he was also a beautiful, eager and willing undertaker to it’s long lost glory and a tremendous source of comfort and joy to those of us in the opposition APC. We shall miss him sorely and I must confess that he did a great job for us whilst he lasted. May he enjoy his forced and long-overdue retirement from public office and partisan politics and may he live long enough to see the PDP defeated and an APC President sworn in 2015.

    I also commend the President for removing and reshuffling a large number of his key commanders in the military a couple of weeks ago and then retiring no less than three of his four Service Chiefs just the other day (16th January 2014) and appointing new ones. This was the right and proper thing to do after the precious lives of no less than 7000 innocent Nigerian citizens were cut short by Boko Haram in the war against terror in the last three years. It was also the expedient and responsible thing to do given the fact that no less than 200 of our gallant soldiers were killed in one battle alone against Boko Haram (and later buried in mass graves) just a few months ago simply because they ran out of bullets and after a whole army barracks was burnt down to the ground and the family members of military personnel were slaughtered, again by Boko Haram, just a few weeks ago. Something had to give and heads had to role simply because we were not making any headway in the war against terror and instead we were suffering heavy casualties and embarrassing losses.

    Yet despite the fact that both

    moves

    were commendable they will

    change nothing because they are both too little and too late. The PDP will continue to sink because it is a political party that has lost it’s bearing and it’s soul and it has mortgaged it’s conscience. It has also lost the source and strength of it’s inspiration and moral authority in the distinguished person of President Olusegun Obasanjo who really was the glue that bound the party together and kept it going against all odds. Though Obasanjo remains in the PDP he has also wisely opted out of participating in it’s affairs. This is a manifestation of his disgust with the President and the former National Chairman and he has now become the official ‘’navigator’’ of the newly emerging power in the field of Nigerian politics which is known as the APC. Frankly speaking the PDP has become a party that is beyond redemption and the removal of Tukur cannot change that. I say this because no sensible person will go back to a stinking carcass simply because the head of the dead animal has been cut off and thrown away. A carcass remains a carcass whether you cut off it’s head, legs or any other part of it’s body or not. Whichever way, it remains as dead as a dodo and it only awaits a formal burial. The truth is that the vultures are already feeding fat on the rotting and decaying cadavar of the PDP and whether anyone likes to hear it or not the truth is that that party can never be whole again. As I said 8 months ago it is a party that has been rejected by God and whose leaders are suffering God’s judgement for their unjust, gluttonous, wicked, foul and evil ways.

    In the same way I have to say that no matter how commendable and honourable in intention the recent changes in our military High Command may be they will achieve nothing either and, in practical terms, they will serve absolutely no purpose. This is because the morale of the army is very low due to the massive losses that they have recorded in the war against Boko Haram and because they have a Commander in Chief who does not care about their welfare, does not ‘’give a damn’’ about their fortunes and does not have the guts to lead and inspire them with strength and courage. Worst still he has refused to arm and equip them properly or give them a free hand to fight and prosecute the war against terror with the ruthless precision and decisive resolve that is required. They say that if an army of sheep is led by a lion it will win every battle. In the same vein they also say that if an army of lions is led by a sheep it cannot win any battle. The latter is the case in Nigeria. In our military we have an army of lions who are well-trained, professional, strong, courageous, ready to go and capable of doing anything that is required of them as long as they are properly-led, well-armed, well-equipped, well-motivated, well-supplied, adequately encouraged, thoroughly inspired and well-supported. However that same army of noble and courageous lions is led by a sheep who, by his own words, has told the world that he is not a lion, he is not a warrior, he is not a fighter and that he is not a king. If anyone has any doubts about that permit me to refer you to my essay titled ‘’A President Without Balls’’ and the two updated versions of the same essay titled ‘’The Gutless Eunuch and Spirit of the Jagaban’’ and ‘’The Gutless Eunuch and the Lion King’’ respectively. They can all be found on my website-www.femifanikayode.org or you can just google them. To have such a man as Commander-in-Chief actually encourages and tempts the enemy to attack us because weakness and a reluctance to lock horns and engage and to be strong, forceful and decisive when provoked or attacked always attracts aggression. As long as such a weak and uninspiring man remains the Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces please be ready for more casualties and more losses regardless of how lion-like, courageous or professional our soldiers may be.

    However there is hope. If Good

    luck Jonathan wants his for

    tunes and the fortunes of his party to change and if he wants peace to return to our shores he simply has to take the following nine steps.

    1. He has to resign as President forthwith and undertake to stay out of Nigerian politics for the next 10 years.

    2. If he cannot step down, he must give a public undertaking to the Nigerian people that he will not run for re-election in 2015 and he should not change his mind at the last minute.

    3. He must apologise to Nigerians for the mess he has created of the economy and ask forgiveness for his manipulative ways and the gross incompetence and ineptitude that he has displayed while running the affairs of this country over the last three years.

    4. He must write a letter of condolence and pay a token fee of compensation as restitution to the families of every single one of the 7,000 innocent Nigerians that have been killed by Boko Haram in the last three years.

    5. He must take off the kid gloves, stop interfering and give the military the green light to use all necessary means to prosecute the war against Boko Haram and he must win that war.

    6. He must remove one Esho Jinadu who is better known as Mr. Buruju Kashamu (a rather strange name that does not have it’s origins in Yorubaland but instead sounds like a low quality brand of Indian tea) as the leader of the PDP in the Southwest and honour the demand of the American Courts and the ruling of the Nigerian Federal High Court and Court of Appeal by extraditing him to the United States of America to answer serious charges of drug smuggling in that country forthwith.

    7. He must direct his Ijaw supremacist kinsmen to desist from threatening the lives of other Nigerians that oppose his government and who keep threatening brimstone and fire and the dismemberment of Nigeria if he is not allowed to come back in 2015,

    8. He must direct Chief E.K. Clark, his new-found political father and mentor, to stop insulting the Yoruba people and desist from attacking our leader Asiwaju Bola Tinubu on his behalf.

    9. He must give a public undertaking that the other four Presidents that run this country with him and that act as his ‘’co-Presidents’’ will also step down with him forthwith or, if he insists on staying till 2015, give an undertaking that he will fire them with immediate effect and bar them from playing any role whatsover in the running of the affairs of our country from now on.

    Those four co-Presidents are, in order of seniority, 1. Dame Patience Jonathan (our amiable First Lady)

    2. Allison Dizeani Madueke (the Minister of Petroleum Resources)

    3. Stella Oduah (Minister of Aviation) and

    4. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala (Minister of Finance and the Co-ordinating Minister).

    President Goodluck Jonathan, even though he is the public face of the small cabal of co-Presidents that presently rules Nigeria and even though he is the one that was given a lawful mandate from the Nigerian people in 2011 to lead our country, comes a distant fifth in the pecking order. He is co-President No. 5.

    Yet it is not too late. If our Presi

    dent can find the courage to take

    these steps, peace will return to Nigeria immediately and our people will once again have hope. The problem that we have in our country today is not an ageing former Party National Chairman called Bamanga Tukur who had lost touch with reality, who never knew how to play the game and who did not know when to call it quits. And neither was it a set of tired and exhausted army commanders and Service Chiefs who did their best but who received no real and tangible support or encouragement from their Commander-in-Chief in the field of battle. The problem that we have is the President himself- a President who prides himself on his own weakness and incompetence . A President who is as confused and as clueless as the comic character, called Chancey Gardner in the celebrated 1970’s Peter Seller’s Hollywood blockbuster titled: Being There.

    A President who does not understand the meaning of the word ‘’class’’ or ‘’honesty’’ and who breaks his own word consistently. A President who has abdicated his responsibilities, destroyed his own political party, divided his own country, alienated his own friends, humiliated his own mentor, abandoned his own people, brought ridicule to his own faith, cowers before his own officials, betrays his own governors, scorns the international community and breaks his solemn oath to protect and defend the Nigerian people. A President who does not even have the nerve or the guts to call to order any of the numerous Jezebels that control him. He is the problem we have in our country today and until he resigns, is impeached or is voted out of power nothing will change and Nigeria will continue to go from bad to worse. That is what you get when you vote for a man who never wore shoes to school. May God deliver our country.

     

    •Chief Fani-Kayode is former Aviation Minister

     

  • Defecting senators and PDP’s hypocrisy

    Democracy has many definitions and interpretations across schools of thoughts depending on the ideological leaning or interest of the contending scholars. Samuel Lipset offered one of the initially recognized classifications of contemporary democracy which he hinges on majority rule and minority rights. Morlino developed Lipset’s hypothesis further by describing a democratic system as “a set of institutions and rules that allow competition and participation for all citizens considered as equals characterized by free, fair and recurring elections. Though, definitions of democracy may vary for obvious reasons, its unique features are clear and incontrovertible across the contending perspectives. Among such are accountability (every democratically elected government is accountable to the people, to whom it owes its existence) and proper conduct of elections. The true representatives of the people must emerge through credible electoral process for us to expect them to be accountable to the people.

    One very important feature of democracy that, distinguishes it from other systems of government is its guarantee of freedom of association. According to Lane Kirkland, famous American labour leader, who served as AFL-CIO President for 16 years, “Democracy depends on stable, representative institutions. It depends on the right to organize. It depends on freedom of association.”  The  UN General Assembly, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 20, 1948, also states that “everyone has the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association and that no one may be compelled to belong to an association.”

    The exercise of freedom of association by all classes of people in a given society has always been at the heart of the struggle for democracy around the world, and it remains at the heart of society once democracy has been achieved. Without freedom of association, other freedoms lose their substance. It is impossible to defend individual rights if citizens are unable to organize around common needs and interests. As one labor leader put it, “Freedom of expression without freedom of association is the right to speak freely in the wilderness.”

    Freedom of association is the right to mingle with or dissociate from, join or leave, relate or disagree with groups purely out of a person’s own choosing, and for the group to take collective action to pursue the interests of members.  It is both an individual right and a collective right, guaranteed by all modern and democratic legal systems, including the United States Bill of Rights, article 11 of the European Convention on Human Rights and the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and international law, including articles 20 and 23 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and Conventions 87 and 98 of the International Labour Organization.  The 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in Section 40 makes it clear that “Every person shall be entitled to assemble freely and associate with other persons, and in particular he may form or belong to any political party, trade union or any other association for the protection of his interest.”

    Most political philosophers are of the opinion that freedom of association is essential to the development of civil society and thus very vital in the strengthening of democracy. Not only this, it is also an important fortification against all forms of despotism. It is typical of dictators to view free organizations as threats and target them for repression, takeover, or closure. The hallmark of a totalitarian state is the destruction of structures and institutions that encourage freedom of association.

    It is from the foregoing that one would like to analyse recent political development in the country, with particular consideration to the defection of politicians from one political camp to the other. It would not be an understatement to state that the recent arrival of the All Progressive Congress, APC, on the Nigerian political scene, has radically altered the political landscape in the country. The party’s ability to gain a significant in road, within such a short period of its existence, into places hitherto regarded as People Democratic Party, PDP, strongholds is already creating palpable fears among PDP stalwarts across the country. It has now suddenly dawned on PDP and its group of day-dreamers that their ludicrous plan to rule the country for 50 un-interrupted years is becoming an illusion.

    It is, however, disappointing that the leadership of the National Assembly, particularly the Senate, has been acting in undemocratic manners by deliberately frustrating attempt by 11 defecting PDP senators to officially notify the Senate of their new political preference. It is rather amusing that Senate President, David Mark and his co-travellers in the Senate, have found it expedient to hide under curious  legal pretext in their bid to thwart the wish of these defecting senators. It is equally laughable and hypocritical that the PDP-led senate leadership has suddenly found legal justification as a basis to temporarily delay the aspiration of the defecting senators. In 2003, when the late Dr. Wahab Dosunmu dumped the Alliance for Democracy (AD) and later defected to the PDP, it was a big celebration in the Senate. Ditto for Senator Musiliu Obanikoro who took his mandate with the AD to the PDP and was equally applauded by the largely PDP dominated Senate.  In fact, Senator Adeseye Ogunlewe was not only applauded for dumping the AD for PDP, he was compensated with the position of Minister of Works. This is just to mention a few instances that reinforce PDP led senate leadership hypocritical stance on the defecting PDP senators.

    What those behind the APC initiative has done should be commended by all stakeholders in the polity. They have been able to achieve what respected political leaders in the previous republics could not accomplish. If the opposition leaders in the second republic, for instance, had achieved such feat, the ruling National Party of Nigeria, NPN, could have found the task of re-election a tough call in the 1983 general elections. By implication, the country would have been rescued from the political and economic woes it was thrown into by the ruling NPN. This is the first time in the socio-political history of Nigeria that opposition parties have braced the odds to come together in order to build a solid party with a broad outlook and national identity. It is a bold attempt to forestall the tendency of turning the country into a one party state which the PDP, for obvious reasons, would have preferred.

    To consolidate democracy, restore a functioning economy, and promote sustainable economic growth, we need to tolerate and encourage the political preferences of every Nigerian. To deliberately complicate the aspiration of Nigerians to freely associate with the political party of their choice is inimical to democratic principles. For democracy to truly be the government of the people, it is important that the political inclination of everyone is respected and protected. Indeed, as it is often said, and truly so, power belongs to the people, but certainly not for people whose freedom of association is being curtailed.  God bless Nigeria!

     

     

    •Ibirogba is commissioner for information and strategy, Lagos

     

  • Our newsstand parliamentarians

    SIR: ‘Newspaper’, the oldest medium of modern mass communication was an exclusive reserve of the elites in urban towns and cities in the good old days. The role of newspaper in the nationalists’ agitations for self- rule in the pre-independence era was enormous with far reaching successes.Newspapers maintained their unrivaled enlightenment pedigree until the advent of radio and subsequently, the television in mass communication. Thus, the competition and other factors such as decline in reading culture, low advert revenue; technology innovations have dramatically signaled the convergence of media landscape.However, within the topsy-turvy existence of the newspaper, a renewed phenomenon emerged. Newsstands are ubiquitous sight in Nigerian’s urban towns and cities hence pockets of persons refer to as ‘Free Readers Association’. This group pays a token to read any daily or weekly publication.

    The realities of economic hardship resulting in low or lack of purchasing power, decline in elitist self-esteem, low reading culture, alternative access to information, general apathy to social, economic and political developmental information has necessitated the agreement of convenience between the vendors and readers.

    In the face of this avalanche of factors, newspaper patronage by today’s young and old literate Nigerians dwindles by the day. However, a reprieve hovers in the horizon for newspaper readership as soccer and its related activities supply ventilation for the urban and rural youths and adults alike.

    This later day re-awakening buoys newspaper patronage to sport pages and soccer based publication exclusively. The soccer news perhaps attracts this segment of society a great deal to newsstands to catch a glimpse of headlines and scores. The debates that ensure every day at these stands dwarf debates on the floors of both upper and lower houses of the national assemblies.

    The soccer publications and sport pages of daily publication become the saving grace for newspaper publishing enterprises in Nigeria today. Other catchy and screaming political or crime news are done justice to as snippets to enrich the parliament for the day.

    So heated and lively are the topics and patterns of discourse that there seems to be uniformity among the ubiquitous group of ‘Free Readers Association’ across the length and breadth of the country. Their sights at city centres and strategic locations in urban towns and cities give hope that Nigeria will never lack future parliamentarians. The only difference is the divide between soccer and politics; while one stirs intense passion, the other stirs passion and asserts control through the instrumentalities of power.

     

     

    •Comrade Ogbu A. Ameh,

    Abuja.

  • Make education priority at National Conference

    SIR:The Community Defence Law Foundation, CDLF, calls on the conferees at the proposed National Conference that education must be given a priority. It is no longer news that our educational system over the years have gone from bad to worse due to previous governments lackadaisical attitude to it, thereby making our educational sector not worth its’ salt.

    The 492 conferees about to gather in Abuja for the conference to discuss the soul and anatomy of Nigeria must consider discussing education very seriously. Education is the bedrock of any developing nation in the world and must be treated sacrosanct. The United Nations recognizes this importance and as such encouraged member countries to allot 26 percent of its total budget to education. In Nigeria today, public schools, institutions are academically weak, not run professionally, while infrastructures are fast decaying or completely non-existent.

    The conferees must not only discuss politics, religion and ethnic based issues, but must include education as one of its very urgent national issues. In our universities for instance, the libraries do not have enough books, magazines, journals that aid research during study. The science laboratories are not with any modern facility that supports science and technology study either, this is part of the reason why majority of our science students are not well exposed to practical knowledge of their field of study.

    The high cost of education in most Nigerian secondary and tertiary institutions is retrogressive. A country where the minimum wage is N18,000 per month for workers do not encourage mass education of its people. One of the primary agenda for discussion at the conference should and must be education for all citizens, the modalities at achieving and financing it. To achieve national greatness as a nation the mass of our people must be educated.

     

    •Uzodinma Nwaogbe

    Abuja

  • If gold rusts…

    How, how would Geoffery Chaucer, he of the famous Canterbury Tales, have reacted to the Church of England lobbying the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) to help the lobby to cancel Nigeria’s new anti-gay marriage law?

    And the double whammy: that the Church of England’s leading lobbyists, in this pro-gay marriage crusade, are the Archbishop of Canterbury (global head of the Anglican Church) and Archbishop of York, both prelates who reside in the Church’s holy of holies.

    Chaucer, the chronicler-satirist, would probably chuckle and, half-mirth, half-pity, declare: “If gold rusts, what would iron do!”

    Both Archbishops, of Canterbury and York, have “reported”, to the global Anglican Communion, the two errant governments of Nigeria and Uganda, so outrageously misguided to move against gay-marriage, making themselves affronts to the cultured world. Waving what they call the Dromantine Communiqué of 2005, their Lord Bishops, with all canonical rage at their disposal, appear to be calling for the stiffest of punishments for these errant zealots, who appear to love Christianity more than the original “owners”.

    But from what canon is Their Lords Spiritual arguing their case, the Dromantine Communiqué or the Bible? Oh, in the Dromantine Communiqué, they sure have a winning formula: the sentimental claptrap about everyone being a child of God, entitled to His love, no matter how deviant or perverse, and assured of pastoral care and friendship. Hardly a crime!

    But another question: from what cannon did the archbishops get their calling? It could not have been a fanciful communiqué, a conventional fad to toady up to the gay lobby, to corral their offerings and tithes, in the face of a drying Western church. So, all the talk about the love of God to everyone and abiding pastoral care might just be bunkum – some pitch to embrace carnality to spread a peculiar spirituality. It is the classic commercial universe, in which the church is just one of the sectors, pushing just another product!

    Still, what does the Bible say? For one, it is so alarmed at the moral depravity of sodomy (the un-deodorised acts of gays and lesbians) that it utterly destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah. So hot was Jehovah’s ire against sodomy!

    Even the New Testament talks of doing the will of the Father, and cautioned against the illusion of mushrooming in sin and yet expecting grace. Even Paul excoriated sodomy in very harsh tones. So, does the Bible conform to this new bible of convenience, the well loved Dromantine Communiqué, which these two archbishops now dote on?

    But make no mistake. All this is not about Christianity or morality. The theology of gay rights is all about the Western Church struggling for nourishment, and it would not mind even Mammon providing that daily bread. But that is okay, if it is okay by the western society.

    What is not okay is the evangelisation of arrogant imposition, hiding behind “human rights”; and these clerics have become the latest champions of the negative. Your Lord Bishops, even the blind can see through the veil!

  • Reps’ and their 50 questions

    SIR: The Nigerian nation never ceases to throw up interesting, sometimes absurd scenarios. The latest of these is the ongoing face-off between the Coordinating Minister for the Economy and Minister of Finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, and the House of Representatives Committee  on Finance, over the budget and the state of the economy. The committee had asked the minister to furnish it with information and answer to a set of 50 questions which the minister obliged the committee. Last week however, the committee, through its chairman, Abdulmumini Jibrin, rejected the minister’s response out of hand, insisting that “some questions were either not answered, partially answered, ignored or completely misunderstood”. Consequent upon this, the minister has been sent another set of 50 questions and mandated to appear before the committee for further questioning.

    There is something not quite right in the present face-off. Indeed, it is actually members of the House of Representative Committee on Finance that have questions to answer. While it is true that the minister is the coordinator of the economy, it is also true that she is not alone in ensuring that the economy does not go to the dogs. The House of Representative, through its committee on finance, ought to realize that Nigerians are not fools and cannot be hoodwinked into shifting blames for the parlous state of the economy to the finance minister alone.

    How accountable are the lawmakers themselves? How have they been expending the monies allocated to them for constituency projects and oversight functions? What have they to say about the humongous amount being paid out to them every month in salaries and other emoluments, the bulk of which forms part of our recurrent expenditure?

    Can these men, in all honesty, wash themselves clean of the hushed allegation making the round that they routinely collect bribe in order to approve ministry budgets and other spending?

    We cannot forget the case of Honourable Farouk Lawan. We cannot forget that this is a parliament whose members have been routinely implicated in sundry cases of bribery leading to aborted investigation into corruption cases. Can this House consider itself morally upright enough to ask the minister the so-called 50 questions?

    No nation can expect to be great if the leaders will always think that they can always pull the wool over the eyes of the citizenry. For sooner than later, it would be revealed that no matter for how long falsehood may have been travelling, it will take only a small moment for the truth to catch up with it. Nigeria is our collective heritage and we cannot allow a bunch of self-serving people to keep it down in perpetual thrall.

     

    •Issachar Odion,

    <mail4issachar@gmail.com>

     

  • The complex politics of Tambuwal

    The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt. Hon. Aminu Tambuwal, may at times appear ambivalent, but the fact remains that the young lawyer from Sokoto State has succeeded in carving a niche for himself as a formidable force in present day Nigerian politics.

    This derives essentially from the way he has very skillfully managed the affairs of the Green Chamber of the National Assembly in the last six years of the current democratic dispensation.

    He has succeeded in not compromising the integrity and independence of the House to the delicate point where many have wondered whether he was still a loyal member of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

    Rt. Hon. Tambuwal became Speaker against the tide of the wishes of the leaders of his party. Majority of his colleagues in the House had voted for him to lead them as they saw in him a leader who could protect the constitutionally guaranteed independence of the legislature and play effectively the role of a check on the executive and judicial arms of government.

    So far, he has served this purpose to the point of self-sacrifice, as ought to be the case.

    Because of some of the pro-people positions that he and the House under his charge have adopted, which have been construed as anti-establishment, there have been attempts to surreptitiously remove him as Speaker, but these attempts have always been foiled, largely because of the mass followership he enjoys among his colleagues in the House, across party lines and across the geo-political zones of the country.

    Many have come to agree that to a large extent, the House of Representatives has been the bastion of resistance to policies and programmes of government that appear to be anti-people. The House under Tambuwal has asked relevant questions that have raised the consciousness of the people concerning troubling issues and that have brought to public knowledge critical information that would, otherwise, have remained shrouded in secrecy to the detriment of the masses of Nigeria.

    With as yet unsurpassed courage, this otherwise youthful legislator has spoken truth to power, often in a most humble and respectful manner, which inspires hope that a dispensation of issues – based politics without bitterness is around the corner.

    Tambuwal has spectacularly succeeded, where many others failed, in commanding followership across party lines, and has often spoken out in commendation of political office holders, especially governors, of parties that are not the PDP, which forthrightness had, at times attracted criticism to him from his party members, especially those from the states controlled by the office holders he had publicly applauded, including Governors Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State, Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State and Adams Oshiomhole of Edo State, all of who belong to the opposition All Progressives Congress, APC.

    He has taken partisan politics to a new level where performance must be encouraged and, indeed, celebrated, as strategy to motivate public office holders to wake up and effectively compete with those that are seen to be setting the pace. That is the way to go, especially if the country is to experience rapid socio – political and economic development.

    As the country is progressively heading towards a political system that will be dominated by two major parties, Tambuwal’s sagacity would be further tested and indications are that he would continue to side-step the landmines that dot the political landscape of the country.

    The recent decampment of 37 members of the PDP to the APC which has changed the political calculations in the Green Chamber, will, indeed, test his political sagacity and his popularity again as he would, literally, be presiding over a House that is now dominated by members of the opposition party.

    Tambuwal’s caustic  criticism of the presidency in recent time, especially on account of corrupt practices and the calls by the APC and some other stakeholders for the executive arm of government to be probed as well as for impeachment proceedings to be initiated against the president would present the Speaker with fresh challenges that he must, also, frontally, tackle.

    Equally sure to task his political skills is the directive by APC to its federal legislators to block bills brought before the National Assembly by the presidency especially the budget bill. Many have concluded that if the APC’s directive is carried out to the letter, it would lead to a shutdown of government and how Tambuwal handles this new challenge would determine the new height that he would attain in the nation’s political ladder.

    The expectation of close watchers of this new kid on the bloc is that he would, as has been his practice, approach these new challenges with the best interest of the masses of Nigeria uppermost in his heart and with the foremost consideration being the need to safeguard the country’s fledgling democracy.

    He has positioned himself properly as a beautiful bride in the current political dispensation and the ruling party as well as the opposition must strive harder to court and win him over as he  is, without doubt, a major political asset.

    Many are convinced that with youth, eloquence, sagacity, ability to command followership all in his favour, Tambuwal is a fit and proper material for higher office than the one he currently occupies. What would need to be determined would be whether the time for such ascendency would be now or in the near future and the political platform through which such promotion would materialise.

     

    •Theophilus wrote in from Kaiama, Kolokuma/Opokuma LGA of Bayelsa State.

  • Cartoon

    Cartoon

  • Power shift, Delta North and Macaulay

    Power shift, Delta North and Macaulay

    I have followed with keen interest the torrents of reactions to a press interview purportedly granted by the Secretary to the Delta State Government, Comrade Ovuozourie Macaulay, published in the Guardian Newspaper of Friday 24th January 2014.

    The responses had manifested in strident attacks on the personality of the SSG by the State Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Chief Peter Nwaoboshi followed by all manners of denunciations from phantom groups and individual in paid newspaper advertisements.

    The thrust of the negative reactions was a news report written by Mr. Hendrix Oliomogbe, Asaba Correspondent of The Guardian supposedly from the proceedings of a press briefing held in the office of the SSG attended by Press Corps drawn from the print and electronic media.

    In the story published by The Guardian on Friday 24th January 2014, Comrade Macaulay was quoted to have expressed his views on the much celebrated issue of PDP pact on power shift regarding the Anioma people and the 2015 Governorship seat.

    As one familiar with events, let it be put clearly on record for the first time, that Comrade Macaulay never in the course of the press briefing, which I attended said the Anioma ethnic nationality has no legitimate right or moral justification to produce a governor in the next democratic dispensation, under the PDP.

    While the formal meeting with the press in his office lasted, the SSG at no time aired any contentious or derisive viewpoint on PDP pact and the clamour of Anioma people for power shift. The opinions attributed to Comrade Macaulay in The Guardian report were completely warped. He was quoted out of context.

    It is an unfortunate act of indiscretion that an unprovoked clique of ethnic traducers have emerged to attack the SSG for what he did not say.

    Let it be clarified for the sake of good reason that the fulcrum of Comrade Macaulay’s mind set on the 2015 Governorship ambition by the Aniomas is that the people should seek the path of consultation, accommodation, inclusiveness, tolerance, open heartedness as the trajectory of their collective desire.

    Macaulay’s innocuous pulse carries a life line, in aid of Anioma governorship agenda not ill will. He deserves commendation not condemnation.

    It is in this light, that any unbiased observer would view as sad and objectionable the aggravated assaults on the person of Comrade Ovuozourie Macaulay in recent media publications.

    There are no gaffes as terrible as ignorance and indiscretion. By the way, who can be more Anioma than Macaulay? Is it not banal to sing to a choir? Who loves egalitarian or cohesive Delta more than Macaulay?

    One fact the Anioma ethnic jingoists attacking Macaulay probably do not know is that he is not a stranger in Delta North. Macaulay may be Isoko having hailed from Owhe-Ologbo in Isoko North Local Government Area, but he is also blessed with a proud ancestry rooted in Delta North and Delta Central.

    His maternal grandmother was originally an Amai native in Ukwuani Local Government Area of Delta State, the economic jewel of Anioma land. He speaks Ndokwa with received pronunciation better than the natives. His paternal grandmother came from Orogun in Ughelli North Local Government Area. He understands and also speaks Urhobo. He is a unique Deltan.

    Again, any condescending characterization of Comrade Macaulay is laughable. Who can beat his pedigree? Recall that Delta Central Coalition (DCC) in an advertorial published in the Vanguard of Tuesday, January 28, 2014 had noted in rude recklessness: “A man lucky to have moved from humble beginning so swiftly, so dizzingly to the amazement of many, as a civil service, TV Journalist to an exalted office responsible to the entire State should be more circumspect.”

    The obscure group was obviously taking a cue from an earlier statement credited to Delta PDP Chairman Chief Peter Nwaoboshi where he referred to Macaulay as an ordinary “Journalist” who came to fortune in government. This is an affront on the noble profession of journalism.

    Contrary to such uninformed posturing, no individual or group of persons can lay claim to relevance or significance in Nigeria’s social or political landscape more than the journalist.

    DCC and their paymasters need to be reminded that Doyens of modern Nigeria like Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, Dr. Herbert Macaulay and Chief Obafemi Awolowo were all journalists! Patriots like former NDDC Boss, Chief Onyema Ugochukwu and former Governor of Ogun State, Chief Segun Osoba to mention but a few distinguished themselves as journalists, just as Macaulay rose from being a reporter to a management staff before he voluntarily retired in 2004 without blemish.

    For Comrade Ovuozorie Macaulay, his immense contributions to journalism, trade unionism and governance in Delta State and beyond are marked for the record books, clearly unassailable.

    As pioneer chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, (NUJ) Delta State Council beginning from March 1992, he made a resounding impact unparalleled till date, gaining all time respect among his peers and the general public. As Chairman of the Delta State Chapter of the Nigeria Labour Congress NLC, he championed the struggle for workers rights, culminating in the building of the best NLC State Secretariats in Nigeria, today in Asaba, the heart of Anioma.

    Even at his own personal risk, Comrade Macaulay as labour leader mobilized Delta workers to stop the military under Walter Feghabor administration from spending 1.6 billion Naira left in the coffers of the State Government in the twilight of Army disengagement in 1999, which the present PDP Chairman, Peter Nwaoboshi was a beneficiary.

    He was in exile for three weeks when the civilian government of Governor James Ibori took over, a selfless sacrifice that earned him commendation for helping to stabilize the state.

    These are facts of history. Macaulay’s unreasonable self appointed assessors may have also forgotten so easily or chose not to remember, his sagacity or administrative savvy in helping the State Government to end the bitter ethnic Warri crisis from the 1990s to 2004 as Commissioner in-charge of Inter Ethnic Relations and Conflict Resolution.

    What the mischief makers and attention seekers castigating the personality of the SSG need to know is that his impeccable credentials and contributions to the growth and development of the State qualify him as an eminent Deltan, patriot and extra-ordinary leader worthy of all respect.

    In the same vein, it is obvious that the SSG as a man of peace, integrity and good breeding has high regard for the person and office of the State PDP Chairman Chief Peter Nwaoboshi and indeed respect and love for the entire people of Anioma who are also his kindred. But respect should be reciprocal.

    For those beating empty drums of ethnic separatism, they need to be informed that the SSG as a completely detribalized Deltan is at home in Delta North. For the records Macaulay remains one of the first and earliest non Asaba indigenes to settle in the State Capital along with his family since the creation of Delta State in 1991. He was among the first non-Asaba persons to put up a building in the state capital, at a time when most people including those castigating him now, could not visit the state capital as a result of ethnic hatred.

    Macaulay’s highest economic investment, a multi-million naira integrated agricultural farm employing over 160 youths is located in Ndokwa, Anioma area.

    Given his excellent track record as a fine journalist, outstanding labour leader and distinguished public officer, his views on issues should be taken in good faith as the counsel of the wise.

    Those seeking Anioma Governor in 2015 have the liberty, no doubt. But they must show great tact and discretion in a complex multi-ethnic society like Delta, where the views, sensibilities and interests of others must be respected.

    Those who seek power must display high level of tolerance and be able to accept constructive advice.

    Macaulay is a friend and brother, who means well for the Anioma nation.

    Let the Anioma people be guided.

    Chris Anana, a veteran journalist wrote from Asaba.