The Nation Newspaper

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  • The barrage of bile against Tambuwal

    It is normal for a public figure, a successful one for that matter, to attract occasional sneer, derision or outright envy. But it is abnormal when such a thing is turned into an organised mob of muckrakers with a mandate to smear the target personality by every available spit they could get. This is the case with an on-going mudslinging against Governor Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, using the free passage of all garbage offered by the handy social media.

    A recent example of such trashy offerings; one that went viral on account of the key words deliberately used to attract curious readers and to easily smear is titled “Tambuwal and the politics of Buhari’s illness,” penned under an obvious pseudonym of Mamman Abdullahi. From the very first sentence of the piece, the emotion of the hatched men is laid bare. The intent, as the opening line crudely puts it, is to paint Tambuwal’s 30 years of public life as one characterised by “betrayals and treachery”. Lies upon lies are lined up; spun from contemporaneous events and purported historical antecedents of Tambuwal to paint him – as the agenda setting first line puts it – a betrayer and treacherous person.

    First, let me say that I am an innocent bystander in this issue. I am intervening because I knowledgeable enough about most of the issues raised in the initial article. I am not holding brief for Tambuwal, and the fact that he knows nothing about this work gives me the pleasure to state what I know without inhibitions or guidance from him. The said article stands on no factual ground. It is sheer concoctions. At best, it is not more than a spectacular fictional narrative skewed together by a fertile mind with agenda for grave mischief. To accuse Tambuwal of selling himself to be appointed as vice president – a vacancy that does not exist, is not only funny but a clear assault on truth, and on the man’s personality and intelligence. In truth, chasing shadows (which is what vying for a non-existent post is) is the least thing that can be inferred in Tambuwal’s dealings as a public servant.

    Tambuwal is a man of faith with a strong sense of gratitude to the almighty who elevated him from being a legislative aide to first, Nigeria’s Number Four position, and now the first citizen of his state. This has never been lost on the Tambuwal that I know. For him, and all people of faith, chasing after another thing when you are not half-way into what God almighty blessed you with is some mark of ingratitude. For emphasis, Tambuwal has never had divided attention since assuming the position of the Governor of Sokoto State. He has executed his mandate in such a way that today, midway into his first term of four years, the consensus in Sokoto is for him to carry on for additional term.

    It should also be stated that as someone who has been actively involved in politics since the beginning of this dispensation, Tambuwal has developed extensive network of friends, associates and admirers, so it is foolish and mischievous for any of his engagements with such associates to be interpreted in any narrow manner. From his time in the National Assembly, it is clearly evident that it is in his nature not to abandon his friends because of the trappings of power.

    Will Tambuwal work to undermine Buhari? Certainly not! Recently, a story of Tambuwal’s 2012 visit to the then opposition leader, Buhari in Kaduna was shared online. That year, Buhari had returned from a medical trip and Tambuwal, as Speaker, led some of his colleagues to Buhari’s house for a sympathy visit. Not a few in the Green Chamber, especially those of the ruling party, raised eyebrows at the visit. Their thinking was that as a member of the PDP, Tambuwal should not be seen publicly hobnobbing with Buhari. But Tambuwal stood his ground and insisted that politics aside, Buhari, being a former Head of State, deserved respect and recognition.

    As if sensing the little controversy the visit would elicit, Buhari asked Tambuwal why he wasn’t afraid to visit with a full compliments of reporters. “We’re here to see how you are feeling and to pray to Allah for bringing you back home safely,” the Speaker told him. At the end of the visit, Buhari thanked Tambuwal profusely; saying for identifying with him when it was risky to do that, Tambuwal had shown genuine concern for his well-being. He also prayed for him as he departed.

    While the writer and his sponsors ignorantly dropped the name of Abubakar Shehu Tambuwal in a bid to deceive the readers, we were all living witnesses to Shehu’s directive to his supporters to support the candidature of Tambuwal during the last electioneering campaigns in Sokoto even though they don’t belong to the same parties. If Abubakar Shehu Tambuwal has issues with Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, would he have supported him against his party in 2015?

    Tambuwal’s brand of politics is one that embraces friends and foes alike. It is in public domain that the current Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, was one of the staunchest opponents of Tambuwal when he aspired to lead the lower legislative House in the year 2011. But immediately he won the election, Tambuwal made Dogara the chairman of the all-important House Services Committee. His opponent in that election, Mulikat Adeola-Akande, was made the Majority Leader, the first time a female would hold such an important position in the country.

    Do I need to remind us of Tambuwal’s relationship with former President Olusegun Obasanjo? After kicking against Tambuwal’s emergence as Speaker, Obasanjo eventually became one of Tambuwal’s mentors and he had this to say a few days ago in Abeokuta: “Mr Governor, I would apologize that I am going to embarrass you small. When you emerged as the Speaker (in 2011), you know I was not satisfied; because that was not the arrangement of the then PDP. It was the former administration and the then leadership that did that and I expressed my view. When you came to me, I told you that you were not the problem, but the party then. I told you that I am pleased by the reports I got of you as the speaker, and again I am still getting good report of you in your state. You are one of the examples of the youth that have been doing well in politics.”

    One person who cherishes Tambuwal’s political dexterity is the National Leader of the APC, Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu. Despite the seeming differences of opinion following the election of principal officers of the National Assembly last year, Tinubu had this to say about Tambuwal when he visited Sokoto for an event at Usmanu Danfodio University: “Governor Aminu Tambuwal represents the new hope of a new progressive political era. The people of Sokoto made a good choice in electing him governor. A man of and for the people and a true patriot, his commitment to advance the welfare of the people is remarkable. We must support him in his mission to bring greater development and prosperity to Sokoto for the benefit of all of her people.”

    Adjudging Tambuwal as a betrayer because of changing political allegiances is a mark of political ignorance and dishonesty on the part of the mudslingers. Politics is opportunity and all politicians vie for opportunity to serve and to work with like-minds. If a platform or political alliance loses focus, is collapsing or no longer viable, it is unwise to wait for the roof to collapse on one’s head. President Muhammadu Buhari, for example, moved from the ANPP when it was obvious he was being frustrated internally, to form the CPC. And when CPC proved impotent as a political machinery to achieve his ambition for the nation, he collapsed into the alliance that formed the APC. There is nothing wrong with such moves.

    One is entitled to disagree or even hate Governor Tambuwal for whatever personal reason, but the allegations levied against him is almost the zenith such malicious undertaking could attain. It is not just because Tambuwal’s name is smeared but also because of the dangerous namedropping and dragging of the names of very important and responsible personalities just to achieve the sinister aim of portraying Tambuwal – who from all indications, is minding his business – in a very bad light.

     

    • Abubakar, a Quantity Surveyor, wrote from Aso Drive, Abuja.

     

  • Buhari @ two: Past is present

    “To be educated is, after all, to develop the questioning habit, to be sceptical of easy promises and to use past experience creatively” – Chinua Achebe

    Two years into the four-year mandate of the Muhammadu Buhari administration, the human condition in Nigeria is still very much the same. The government has made a good show of scratching the surface of things. Its snail speed, which is not even the problem, has not yielded the filling fruits of change that it bells out with deafening clangour. Let us not pretend about it, the two years of the Buhari administration have only secured train tickets for Nigerians for a journey to a land called change. The train has refused to show up; hence the passengers in their numbers have remained stranded at the train station of increased unemployment, insufferable economic hardships, and avoidable and mind-numbing killings.

    The rains of wanton disregard for the rule of law, deliberate lack of accountability, proud disinterest in speaking to the people, unhelpful rebuttals, and arrogant demonstration of paternalism have all wetted the Nigerian passengers at that humiliating station in those spectacularly uneasy years. Even when there exist some baskets of achievements here and there in those two giddy years, the dominant narrative is still that the Nigeria of today is not markedly different from the ones preceding the second coming of President Buhari.

    This is the very matter I wish to address in this piece. In claiming, as the title of this piece announces, that for Nigeria the past is still the present, I do not wish to be understood as looking in the direction of that disappointing behemoth called government. It will not be Nigerian government if its actions and policies significantly improve the quality of life of the people. The past remains the present in Nigeria because a considerable number of Nigerians are comfortably docile, joyously uncritical, and are outlandishly satisfied with easy, simple answers. Democracy in Nigeria is weak and malnourished because many Nigerians do not tend to it. Governance in Nigeria is distressing and killing because oodles of the people do not contribute to it. Elected and appointed public officials in Nigeria live above the dictates of the grundnorm because a large number of Nigerians either kick feebly in response, are totally indifferent, or too often work the accordions of approbation. The history of poor, enslaving, punishing governance in Nigeria remains the reality of the present because speaking up and asking the hard questions are an anathema to multitudes of Nigerians.

    To be more specific, the Buhari administration was swept into office by a huge tidal wave of uncritical and saccharine approval. Few Nigerians lobbed the stones of germane and uneasy questions, but a disproportionate majority fenced them off, frenetically declaiming that a Daniel had come to hand down the condign judgement to the knaves diluting the broth of justice and good governance in Nigeria. They stubbornly refused that the Daniel be asked a few questions on how he intended to achieve his lofty vision of change.

    My take is that had candidate Buhari been subjected thoroughly to a blaze of the right questions, had he been taken through the fiery furnace of scrutiny, we would have known the depth of his vision, the practicability of his ideas, his readiness for the job and, more importantly, the core weaknesses of his thoughts and capability. That knowledge, I insist, would have empowered Nigerians to help his administration in its undertakings. No, it does not mean that if we had done that, a vastly better Nigeria would have emerged by now. The fact is that we would likely not have travelled some of the disconcerting roads of the last two years. Candidate Buhari became President Buhari without his feet sustained in the fire of critical engagements in all relevant ramifications. The fault, therefore, is not entirely in the punishing myopia and alarming contradictions of the Buhari administration. It is in many Nigerians who have erroneously understood their duty as “citizens” to be praise singing, fawning, and genuflection rather than an engaging role of questioning, keeping watchful eyes on the government, and doing much more than taking its words and promises at their face value.

    The administration has been so indulged, cossetted, and lovingly over-accommodated that it has become abysmally emboldened to insult decent minds with a scorecard positively portraying the administration’s Lilliputian achievements in exaggerated tone in wanton denial of what actual reality serves. Whether it is the repudiation of the logic of pluralism as evident in the nature of the president’s kitchen cabinet, the uncoordinated anti-corruption waltzing, the flagrant disobedience of court injunctions, the unworkable economic policies (when it manages to put up something like policy), or, among many more, the kindergarten handling of the President’s unfortunate duel with what ails him, a number of Nigerians are convinced the Buhari administration is infallible and changing the country as promised. They do not see that their blind, uncritical support for the administration hurts it more than it helps it. They do not understand that the great and mighty works they wish to really happen in the lifetime of this administration are not happening because, like the administration, they spare no moments to reflect and examine the methods and manner of the administration.

    Democracy and good governance continue to elude Nigeria not only because those who call the shots are phoney, struggling democrats and are not (wo)men of ideas and visions, but it is also because a great number of Nigerians lack basic knowledge of civics and do not understand that citizens’ roles in a democracy are not to praise government, go to sleep and expect that while they sleep the government will not sow tares among the wheat. Every Democracy Day since 1999 has become to Nigerians the paradox of a past being the present. Things change in far little ways and worsen in ocean measures because too many Nigerians do not understand their roles. In other words, you cannot correctly blame blind leadership as the bane of good governance in Nigeria without identifying blind, worshipful following as strongly instrumental.

    If democracy in Nigeria is to mean more than having elections and peaceful transition of power from one underachieving civilian head to another with a truckload of promises, if good governance is truly to endure and be enjoyed, Nigerians in their substantial number must begin to speak up, ask the hard questions, demand accountability, pamper no government, and be alive to their other duties as citizens. Uncritical citizens do not make a good country. Citizens without the questioning habit ruin a country quicker than they are able to contribute to its progress.

    But for their massive critical citizens, countries who are today reference points in the practice of democracy and increasing realisation of good governance would have treated the world to different discomforting narratives. Nigeria’s story cannot be different; if this country is to change to a land of prosperity, rule of law, good governance, justice, and equality, many Nigerians must put off their slavish caps and don the one that allows them to think, question, and reject tokenism and ensnaring propaganda. More than ever before, this is needed now if the Buhari administration is to be remembered for good.

     

    • Ademola is a public affairs analyst based in Bodija, Ibadan, Oyo State.

  • Proposed Radiology Bill

    The bill to establish, a National Council of Radiology and Radiation Medicine (NCR), which is intended to provide for the control and practice of the profession of Radiology, Radiation Medicine, Nuclear Medicine, Radiotherapy, Radiography, Medical Physics and Technology and for related matter (2017), reportedly sponsored by Hon. Patrick Asaba is drawing the irk of other professionals particularly Radiographers. The protesters consider the bill as an attempt by radiologists, who are specialist doctors, to disingenuously haul other related professionals, who are not doctors, into a council that they will control.

    While the introductory part of the bill confirms the incorporation of radiotherapists, radiographers, medical physicists and technologists who either have their own regulatory bodies or should have theirs, into a new proposed body, a rundown of membership of the proposed council shows why the bill, if passed, could ignite crisis in medical sector. The bill reserves the chairmanship of the council, permanently for a radiologist, while the other listed professionals shall be retained as ordinary members.

    The import is that doctors, who specialise in radiology, will be substantially in charge of regulating radiographers, radiotherapists and other related professionals. The bill if passed will gift those to be regulated two professional regulatory bodies, with all the implications for them, and this may include payment of double dues for the same service, double jeopardy with respect to disciplinary act, where there is allegation of unprofessional conduct, and even conflict of interest where there is an internal dispute between the various professionals that the bill will regulate.

    Again, there could disputes over standards and acceptable training programmes, from the two bodies that will subsequently regulate the professions. For instance, medical doctors are presently regulated by Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN), while Radiographers are regulated by Radiographers Registration Board of Nigeria (RRBN), both statutory bodies, with responsibilities to regulate the different professions. Their responsibility include determining standards, admitting new qualifiers, punishing misconduct among other responsibilities.

    Should the proposed bill become law, a doctor or radiographer will subsequently be compelled to belong to two professional bodies. Indeed, if the proposed bill in the public domain, represents the one before the National Assembly, then it is no more than a poor imitation of the Act establishing the RRBN. According to Frank Offor, a radiographer, who had canvased seriously against the proposed bill, claiming that such a bill if passed would disrupt the health sector, the proponents of the bill merely took the RRBN Act and changed RRBN for NCR and Radiographers for the potpourri of professionals.

    He warned that such an act will add to the subsisting crisis in the health, much of which derive from the disputes over ego and wages between the different professionals in the sector. For instance, each time the federal government, after protracted industrial crisis increases the wages of doctors, complementary personnel like nurses, rise up in arms, asking for a commensurate increase in their own wages, in comparison with the doctors.

    Within the medical professions, there is also contention over spheres of influence. While the medical doctors and pharmacists are always slugging it out over dominance, there is also usually the dispute about which of the two, is straying into each other’s area of core competence. There is also the dispute between medical laboratory practitioners and doctors with accusations and counter-accusations of over-stepping professional spheres of competence. It is noticeable that whether in the laboratory, pharmacy or clinic, there are no strict adherence to arrears of training, and Mr Offor argues that the proposed bill could trigger crisis in radiology practice.

    The NCR bill in one of the section hopes to gift the council, the power to determine the standards of knowledge to be attained by persons seeking to be either Radiologists, Radiographers etc. Conversely in section 10(1) of the Radiographers (Registration, ETC) Act, the requirement for obtaining registration as a radiographer was listed, and it includes attending a course of training approved by the RRBN, whether at home or abroad. Should the proposed NRC bill becomes law, a radiographer will be registered based on registration with the RRBN.

    Furthermore, in the section 1(k) of NCR bill, the council is to be empowered to discipline radiologists, radiotherapists, radiographers and medical physicists, in conjunction with their various boards or council for breaking the provisions of NCR bill. Again, in the RRBN Act, dealing with Penalties for Unprofessional Conduct, a radiographer who contravenes any of the rules listed therein will be dealt with by the Disciplinary Committee constituted under the Act, and having powers to punish. Should the NCR bill become law, a radiographer, like others will face two professional disciplinary committees, apart from a possible civil or criminal trial?

    Another intra-discipline challenge the NCR will have is what becomes of the responsibilities of the radiologists, whose members are also beholden to MDCN. Would they repudiate members of that council, which is for all medical doctors, regardless of their subsequent specialization? Where a doctor has specialized in radiology, and has disciplinary issues, will he face both the NCR and MDCN disciplinary committees? Will he also pay membership dues to both bodies, and where there is a dispute between doctors and the other professions, what happens?

    While the professions sought to be united in the NCR are inter-related, the training programme is wide apart. While to train as a radiology is a postgraduate training, radiology, radiotherapist and others are first degree courses. Moreover only medical doctors can subsequently train as radiologists. The import is that within the council, there will be rivalries and disputes, with the air of superiority that the radiologists are bound to have. Even the provision in the bill that in appointing the chairman of NCR, only the professional association of radiologists will be consulted, portends crisis ahead.

    Perhaps what the radiology family needs is a voluntary association, more concerned with promoting excellence and research in radiology, radiation medicine, nuclear medicine, radiotherapy, radiography, medical physics and technology and other related disciplines. Such a body should promote medical journals, engage in research, attract research grants and advise governments and regulatory bodies across the radiology disciplines. Membership of such body can be geared towards enhancing radiology practice and its related discipline, instead of the mere appropriation of power and resources, which is the main interest of many professional bodies in Nigeria.

    Instead of wasting energy to create another regulatory body, the leading lights in radiology, radiation medicine, nuclear medicine, radiotherapy, radiography, medical physics and technology and related discipline should be more concerned as to how to add value to the existing body of knowledge in radiology and its allied disciplines. So, I substantially agree with the letter by Frank Offor, published by this newspaper recently, that efforts should be made by relevant authorities to avoid any action that could precipitate avoidable crisis in the health sector. A critical review of the NCR bill is therefore appropriate.

  • Dogara’s two years of legislative activism

    Dogara’s two years of legislative activism

    On June 9, 2015, the Eighth Assembly was inaugurated with Bauchi-born lawmaker, Hon Yakubu Dogara, as 14th Speaker of Nigeria’s House of Representatives.

    In his inaugural speech – the Speaker made a solemn declaration and pledge to wage an unprecedented legislative war on Nigeria’s problems. True to his words, all available statistics and records indicate that the House under his able leadership has broken all previous records set by their predecessors since independence in 1960.

    It is important to state that the parliament uses three or four measures to function in a democracy; these include the very act of legislation or law-making, resolutions, oversight and the last one – which is least known and hardly appreciated – is the instrument of public petitions.

    Early in the life of the House, Hon. Dogara inaugurated a committee of eminent jurists and legal luminaries, i.e. the statutes or law reform committee, which was charged with the responsibility of reforming the entire gamut of Nigeria’s laws which had previously never been done since we adopted the Statute of General Application in 1800. For 200 years or more, we have been operating British laws without localizing them to the extent that some of Nigeria’s legislations have penalties in Pound Sterling and some even have description of places in England!

    The panel worked and turned in more than 300 bills, 130 of which were read in one single day; a feat unprecedented in Nigeria’s legislative history. In total, 1064 bills were introduced, 166 have been passed, 500 are undergoing legislative scrutiny while the remaining are in various stages of the legislative mill. The President has also assented to 27 non-budget related bills, out of which 23 emanated from the House.

    This has surpassed records set by all previous assemblies at midterm put together, thanks to Speaker Dogara’s foresight, vision and patriotism.

    Instructively, the Eighth Assembly also addressed a total of 610 public petitions from ordinary Nigerians through the committee on public petition. This is one critical and important work of the parliament that is rarely known and hardly appreciated by pundits and critics. The committee meets every day and addresses cases of violation of human rights, illegal termination of appointments and sundry matters. Through this, hundreds of people have gotten back their jobs and had their rights restored. This is the true work and meaning of representation. This record, too, is unprecedented.

    The House also carried out landmark investigations on different sectors of the national economy such as oil and gas, procurement, corruption issues, security matters, financial matters, banking matters, AMCON, railway, communication and privatisation, among others. Many more investigations are ongoing, all in accordance with section 88 and 89 of the 1999 Constitution which vests in the parliament, the responsibility of exposing corruption and waste in government.

    The House under Speaker Dogara also helped with regular interventions to stabilize the polity. For example, during the fuel price crises, the House reconvened on a Monday to discuss the issue which helped in calling off the industrial action by the labour unions as nerves were calmed.

    The Speaker also helped to mediate between the federal government and the Nigeria Medical Association and the National of Association of Resident Doctors during their strikes, thereby averting a major crisis in the health sector.

    Again, in these eventful two years, Speaker Dogara introduced an innovation into Nigeria’s legislative history: sectoral debates. Ministers appeared before the House to answer questions relating to their ministries and sectors in an effort to diversify the economy and a Tactical Committee on Economic Recession was set up, in addition to passage of many economic bills and resolutions – which the President acknowledged in his budget speech last December – and also the passage of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission Bill, which will help check monopoly and manipulation by multinationals and grow small scale businesses and local entrepreneurs.

    Also for the first time in history, budget reforms were implemented with the introduction of a new Budget Process Bill (sponsored by the Speaker) to regulate the timeline for budget activities and put an end to the lingering problem and vicious circle  of non-implementation of budgets, which has stifled the execution of developmental projects since 1960. Dogara and his colleagues also collectively resolved and opened the National Assembly’s budget in response to agitation by Nigerians.

    The Appropriation Bill is now passed at plenary with full details, as was done in the passage of 2017 budget. Two thirds of committee members also now sign committee budget reports before they can be presented for consideration, and even staunch critics now agree that the budget process has generally been made more transparent and accountable.

    The Speaker’s Legislative Initiative on the North East has resulted in the passage of his North East Development Commission Bill, which is awaiting presidential assent. This is in addition to concerted efforts aimed at giving financial and administrative autonomy to local government councils through the constitutional amendment exercise.

    Pensioners were also not left out, as it was Hon. Dogara who intervened in resolving non-payment of pensioners for three years. He has also championed efforts to amend the Constitution to remove the age barrier for elective offices with the introduction of the #NotTooYoungToRun Bill, which will see that even 30 year-olds are eligible to run for Presidency in order to open up the political space and ensure youth inclusion in politics and governance. Before this, the Speaker set another record by hosting student leaders from all public and private Nigerian universities for two days in the National Assembly where he interacted with them and inspired them to strive for greatness.

    From introduction of E-Parliament: e-voting, digitalization and archiving which are being perfected, amendment of the Public Procurement Act to increase mobilisation to contractors so as to hasten execution of projects and check the problems of abandoned projects, and the introduction of electronic and diaspora voting in the Electoral Act. Hon. Dogara became the first ever Speaker to personally sponsor seven bills, or even stepped down from chair to sponsor a motion on the “Urgent Need for Resettlement, Reconstruction, Recovery and Rehabilitation of the devastated North East region”.

    The House under Speaker Dogara is also at peace with itself, working harmoniously with the Senate and ensuring better Executive-Legislature relationship to ensure good governance because as the Speaker often says, they must not fight in order to work and deliver dividends of democracy to Nigerians.

    As he rightly reminded his colleagues exactly two years ago that members of the House are heirs to a long tradition where debates are robustly undertaken and where radicalism flows as an institutional prerogative, the House under Dogara has truly demonstrated that it is the bulwark for the defence of the rights and privileges of the common man, the champion of the rights of the weak and poor and anchor for the wellbeing of the Nigerian people.

     

    • Hassan is Special Adviser on Media & Public Affairs to Speaker Dogara.

  • Thoughts on June 12

    Today is June 12, and there seems no better time than now to engage in historical reflections, and as well to prospect for lessons from that symbolic date for our nationhood compass.

    It was precisely 24 years ago that the 1993 presidential election held – an event firmly niched in Nigerian annals as the boldest democracy landmark, and perhaps the highest point yet of this country’s nationhood experience. The June 12 poll was landmark, on the one hand because the Nigerian populace determinedly overrode sundry landmines laid by the military elite on the path of the country’s restoration to civil rule to stage an election that was globally acclaimed as credible. On another hand, that election provided citizens a platform – the first of its kind in Nigeria’s history – to break with primordial loyalties in casting their votes.

    Of the 30 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) that made up the federation at the time, Chief Moshood Abiola of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) won in 19 plus the FCT, polling more than eight million votes, while Alhaji Bashir Tofa of the National Republican Convention (NRC) netted 10 states with some six million votes. Although the late Abiola – a professing Moslem – fielded another Moslem, Babagana Kingibe, as running mate, his victory was resounding across ethno-religious lines as he polled nearly 60 per cent of the total votes cast, and only in two states (Kebbi and Sokoto) did he fail to secure at least one-third of the ballots. Actually, Abiola defeated the NRC flag bearer in his home state of Kano. And though the tycoon was never formally installed as President owing to self-perpetuating shenanigans by then ruling junta, his hijacked victory was the foundation on which the present political republic was erected when civil rule was eventually restored in 1999.

    Twenty-four years on, there is an enduring fascination with the June 12 presidential poll, because it revealed a latent possibility of Nigerians forging a consensus on national goals and aspirations. Such rare consensus would be blind to the primitive fault lines in our nationhood that have historically pitched citizens against one another.

    The logic of June 12 was that Nigerians, in 1993, wanted an end to the long years of military rule. They sensed that then ruling regime of General Ibrahim Babangida was in no hurry to relinquish power despite avowals to the contrary. And so they rallied around the cause of democracy, for which the Abiola-Kingibe ticket merely provided a preferred choice among available alternatives. Voters across ethnic and religious divides in that election cared less if Abiola came from the outer space, or if his running mate were his own blood brother. They made the choice that indexed a collective resolve to force the hand of the reluctant junta and ease it out of power. Abiola’s mandate from the June 12 poll eventually became a crosscutting rallying call for pro-democracy struggle against military rule. And much as Babangida initially dallied on letting go of the reins, he could not help ducking out by ‘stepping aside,’ with succeeding contraptions of government made considerably ill at ease until the military negotiated a tactical retreat to their barracks. Not even the notoriously despotic regime of the late General Sani Abacha survived the heat. Sadly though, Abiola died (actually, suspected murdered) in that struggle and became the Nigerian democracy’s equivalent of the Marxist revolutionary, Ernesto “Che” Guevara.

    While it is likely pro-democracy activists would characteristically hold memorial activities today in remembrance of the late democracy icon, and in commemoration of the June 12 presidential election, truth is that this country at the moment has lost the nationalist innocence that poll symbolised to rabid separatist passions. By all known accounts, not since the unfortunate civil war of the mid-1960s has ethnic consciousness taken on such intensity in the Nigerian nationhood as we have seen in recent times, and with separatist threats hitting a markedly reckless pitch. The rumble over the last week, for instance, was with the purported three-month notice by a so-called Coalition of Northern Youths (CNY) to citizens of Igbo stock resident in the North to leave or be ‘mopped out.’ The group also advised northerners resident in the Southeast states to reciprocally return home. Members of the youth coalition said they were responding to the May 30 sit-at-home order by separatist Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) in its 50th anniversary commemoration of the ill-fated Biafra Republic, which had shut down social and economic activities in major Southeast towns.

    It was helpful that leaders of the North swiftly rose against the purported quit notice by Arewa youths, while the Federal Government moved to reassure citizens of their constitutional right to live in any part of the country they choose without any molestation. Kaduna State Governor Nasir el-Rufai ordered immediate arrest of the youth leaders who signed the provocative statement, and his colleagues in the Northern Governors Forum (NGF) jointly disowned the coalition and as well promised measures guaranteeing the right of all Nigerians to live in any of the 19 states comprising the three geo-political zones of the North.

    “We are one nation tied to a common destiny. The governors of northern Nigeria are not in alignment with those pronouncements and we will take whatever measures are necessary to safeguard the lives and properties of all Nigerians living in any part of the North,” NGF chair and Borno State Governor Kashim Shettima said in Maiduguri on behalf of his colleagues. In like manner, Information and Culture Minister Lai Mohammed urged Nigerians to feel free to reside in any part across the country that they choose because government has the capacity to maintain law and order. “There is zero tolerance for actions and speeches capable of inciting one part of the country against another, and the security agencies are fully on the ground to deal decisively with any individual or group that engages in incendiary activities,” he said.

    It is quite instructive that the principle of commitment to nationhood that our leaders now seek to insure through strict security enforcement was what voters enacted by volition in the June 12, 1993 poll. We need not pretend about it: not a few Nigerians have lost self-motivation to nationhood. And so, it might just help if we revisit the old landmarks in quest of where the innocence was lost.

     

  • A nation in captivity

    We have just celebrated another year of democracy and did some stock taking. The Democracy Day came when the agitation for re-structuring was gaining strong momentum. We have just witnessed the “Biafra sit-at-home” which seems to have been very effective! The leadership in Nigeria continues to preach unity and the benefits of our staying together as a nation (the ideal) while those outside the leadership loop are pressing their call for restructuring (the pragmatic). Given all that one has encountered in over six and a half decades of earthly existence and given the benefit of hindsight, one should be able to take some position on these issues.

    My emerging conclusion is that Nigeria continues to remain captive to the past military governance and as long as the key operatives of that military era are around, no meaningful action can take place on the future of Nigeria. We will continue to live under the illusion of unity which makes any tinkering with the unitary state they created by decrees – a failed legacy of the military – almost sacrilegious.

    The last democratically created sub-division of Nigeria was Mid-Western Region in 1963 when we moved to four regions. Up till that time, Nigeria was manageable and we were relatively prosperous. We are now 36 states – all created by the military, gasping for breath with all but Lagos and may be two other states pitiably dependent on the federal government to survive.

    Because these military men of yesterday fought in the civil war which they caused, they have virtually made it impossible to review Nigeria’s structure. We are here talking of the Gowons, the Obasanjos, the Danjumas, the Buharis, the Babangidas – that generation of military men who progressively ruined Nigeria and institutionalized the damage to our values. They remain in control of Nigeria till this day and no matter our views, we remain somehow “subservient” to them and to their whims and caprices.

    It is observed that from October 1, 1960 to date, people with military background whether they were in khaki or agbada have ruled Nigeria 68.6% of the time while “pure” civilians have ruled for only 31.4% of the time. Projecting Buhari’s tenure to 2019, it would be 69.7% (or 14,935 days) military and 30.3% (or 6,489 days) civilian. By the same token, the North has ruled 69.3% of the time compared with South’s 30.7%. Projecting to 2019, comparative tenure would be 70.3% (or 14,334 days) North versus 29.7% (or 6,362 days) South.

    So far, the military class has refused to accept responsibility for Nigeria’s woes! Even the civilian leaderships, except Alhaji Tafawa Balewa, were created and enthroned by the military. An interesting observation from the statistics above is the strong correlation between military and northern domination of power. This clearly suggests that for the North, there is a strong interface between the military and the political class while in the South, the interface is weak or non-existent.

    Let us take a look at some of their legacy institutions, Gowon’s National Youth Service Corps, Obasanjo’s Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and the structure of the nation.

    The National Youth Service Corps programme was established by General Yakubu Gowon and it was heralded by protests and demonstrations across universities in the 1972/73 academic session. Decree 24 of May 22, 1973 eventually established the NYSC “with a view to the proper encouragement and development of common ties among the youths of Nigeria and the promotion of national unity”. According to their web site, “the NYSC scheme was created in a bid to reconstruct, reconcile and rebuild the country after the Nigerian Civil war”. The war ended 47 years ago! Forty-four years after NYSC was established, the unity underlining its establishment has continued to elude us.

    Graduates continue to get conscripted as if we are still in the military era. Even joining the armed forces and the other security agencies is voluntary. Why should service in NYSC continue to be by coercion? Yet as long as Gowon is alive and with so much of his emotion attached to the scheme, no meaningful review of the NYSC can take place, not to talk of outright cancellation.

    Yet current realities should have made the scheme become voluntary while interested graduates should have registered for participation in their final semester. Deployment of corps members should have been within their geo-political zone of choice excluding their states of origin. No consequential and discriminatory rules should have been attached to participation and non-participation.

    We are all aware of multiple tragedies that have befallen corps members over the years. I lost a relation in Port Harcourt who was shot by militants while in uniform, on his way to his passing out parade. NYSC has outlived its usefulness and potential as tool for promoting national unity! It should be scrapped or be made voluntary.

    JAMB in its present form is a retardant to national progress and an assault on equity. When JAMB was introduced in 1978, there were 13 universities in Nigeria of which seven were in the south and six in the north. Quota-based admission with differential cut-off marks was an attempt to distribute admission to favour the educationally disadvantaged states, a crude attempt at balancing between merit and federal character. The story is very different today.

    All the 36 states and the FCT have at least a federal university. All except Zamfara and FCT have state universities. All but 13 have private universities. In all, there are now 153 universities in Nigeria made up of 40 Federal, 44 states and 69 private. It is time that the universities compete among themselves in the market place. A good university would attract brilliant students while a not so good university will attract applicants who are average in academic capacity. Goodness would be determined by the quality of graduates over time and their productivity in the work place.

    The role of JAMB should be to conduct the standard examination for purposes of national standard and simply makes the result available to all universities. Students should be free to apply to any universities of their choice, as many as they wish while those universities should be free to admit students as they deem fit. JAMB should not place any students into any university. JAMB should be to Nigeria what Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT) for example is to the USA. But it would seem that so long as Obasanjo is around, no meaningful review of JAMB and its proper role placement can take place.

    Nigeria is trapped under the jackboot of the fast-becoming ancient military that fought the civil war. They were the people who fragmented Nigeria and imposed current structural imbalance on us. To institutionalize their hold, they put it all in the constitution and made sure we did not see the constitution until May 29, 1999 when they transformed from Khaki to Agbada/Babanriga. Today, Nigeria has become too fragmented to be viable. Only two to six states can stand on their own out of 36! While I don’t wish these surviving warriors dead, they need to firmly step aside in the interest of Nigeria. We too need to help them achieve this task of taking a break from national involvement and influence if we are to meaningfully achieve the elusive unity. It is time for a meaningful change.

     

    • Otunba Oguntuase writes from Lagos.

  • The Kaduna Declaration: Owelle & the Biafra Question

    Growing up as a girl in Zaria, one of the places we used to go to on holidays was Jos the Plateau State capital.  Back then, a leisurely drive round the city would not be complete without going past the sprawling complex as it were, of off-campus hostels.  It was a thing of awe back then to learn that those structures were built and released by a single individual, the Igbo businessman Rochas, strictly for the use of off-campus students.

    OwelleRochasAnayoOkorocha was an icon, the symbol of prosperity and philanthropy; the pillar of education and industry, especially in the northern part of the country.

    In addition to students’ hostels around the Plateau capital that I know of and other areas there, he also did a lot of intervention in the area of subsidizing education for northern students at secondary and tertiary level.  In view of the fact that private intervention in education was not common then, he was and still is a most treasured person in the north.  Later on, he established a model secondary school in Owerri, his state capital where everything was absolutely free, right down to the stockings on the feet of the pupils.  It was not until several years later that the American philanthropist and television show host Oprah Winfrey would set-up such a free, qualitative boarding school in South Africa.

    Certainly over here in Nigeria, his feat is yet to be duplicated.

    In the course of time, he tried very hard to take control of policy and decision-making; he contested for the seat of president of the federal republic.

    Sadly Rochas played into the hands of the Peoples’ Democratic Party and was given a runaround in the guise of contesting the party’s presidential primaries, which he too danced away from in dramatic style.

    It became expedient for him to set his sights a few rungs lower, also to decamp to another party.

    Masterful political engineering, and the result was OwelleRochas contesting and winning the Imo State Governorship race and becoming Imo’s Number One Citizen.

    Not done with his political moves, his foresight had him and all his political acolytes joining the All Progressive Congress (APC) at a time it was inconceivable for someone from the South East to do so.  Today, APC is the ruling party.

    He did contest the last presidential primaries on that platform, but even though he knew the slot was going to the north, he still decided to go ahead for the sake of testing his popularity at the primaries.  It was a very good outing, all things taken into consideration, and his fourth position, beating even other northerners is a pointer to his political muster.

    Rochas is an open, personable fellow, and even though an aunt of mine, dearly departedhad told me never to swear for anyone else besides myself, I will take the risk and say that Rochas is not only down to earth but is also a faithful husband to his wife, a cherished virtue to possess!

    Just this year, Rochas invited all South East governors whose disagreements were becoming glaring and public, to a very successful peacekeeping meeting in the region. His visionary and pragmatic leadership is no more in doubt.  Bringing me to the Question OfBiafra.

    When Chief Ralph Uwazunuike came out with the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB), it jarred like a discordant tune, to my ears.  Biafra?  Isn’t that the other word in the Nigerian (Biafra) Civil War!!

    Now it has been revealed that many Igbo leaders dismissed Ralph then as a joker.  But the speed at which the Igbos embraced the movement was astounding.

    On observing this, what did the federal government do?  Chief Obasanjo, then president got Ralph arrested and locked up for 3 years without trial.

    The emergence of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB led by MaziNnamdiKanu was met with similar dismissiveness:  These people were not born/were too young/never witnessed – the civil war and that is why they are agitating for Biafra, Biafra they don’t even know what they are talking about – and so and so on.

    But while Nigeria lost no sleep over IPOB, it was as if the international community had just woken up to a bright spark on the Nigerian horizon.  The world turned attention slightly off Boko Haram and onto the Biafran issue, while IPOB gathered momentum at the speed of wildfire.

    In a swift reaction, the IPOB leader too was slammed behind bars where he remained for close to two years before he was recently released on bail, granted under very stringent conditions.

    But Kanu’s continued detention made international human rights associations begin to weigh in.

    In Nigeria, the support base widened. Yoruba politicians and groups now back the movement.  One western governor publicly gave his support.

    The Pan – Igbo groups, which had erstwhile stayed aloof gave their solidarity. And so it was that a stay-at-home heroes Day was designated for May 30th for all of South-East.  Even the millions of Igbos in diaspora went out on the streets.  The success of the exercise was unprecedented, and the near total compliance indicates the need for a change of approach.  It is now clear that our government cannot keep doing the same things and expect different results.

    Ike Abonyi is a political journalist of over three decades experience.  In his ‘Leaked Memo to NnamdiKanu’ he said it is “a fact that Biafra is at the heart of every reasonable Igbo person”.

    I add that serious discontent is in the heart of every reasonable Igbo person, so there is urgent need for a platform for their views to the aired, devoid of fear of arrest or of nonchalance to their perceived grievances.  I am all for self-actualization, it is part of man’s intrinsic rights in the UN Charter.  I am also a firm believer in dialogue for straightening out thorny issues. Now, is the Biafran agitation for a separate government?  Restructuring?  A Biafran State?  Not participating in the 2019 elections, since theirs will need be sooner?  Return to regional government?  It is all unclear to me.  I like to go with the chair of the South East Senate Caucus, Sen. EnyinnayaAbaribe; he said the success of the heroes Day is an indication of the need for negotiation.  And then BAM!  Exactly one week after the Heroes Day, the deafening silence from the government has just been punctuated by the loud Kaduna Declaration.  It is quit order to all Igbos in the north, the have three months to leave, or else!

    There is great need for Igbo leaders to moderate the discourse along with the MASSOBs and IPOBs.

    Great caution should be taken as to those to encapsulate the discussions.  The known Igbo political leaders rushing to identify with the Biafran movement now are only doing so because they have not been accommodated in the current federal government.  Their belief is that ‘they’ must ‘be’ in every government, if not so they start hollow agitation.  They gave their wide birth to the movement all the while until now.

    This is where a true Igbo leader, but one who is acceptable to all sides is needed, I suggest the person of OwelleRochasOkorocha.

    Deploying nebulous people like Chief Jim Nwobodo as Igbo leader would only make the delegation a laughing stock nationally!

    I end with a word to the IPOB group. Read OlusegunAdeniyi’ book ‘The Last 100 Days of Abacha’ where he tells of the political drama that the political ‘leaders’ of that time staged and what happened after the then head of state fixed them all up.

    The known political leaders of that time in Nigeria’s history had gone all across our horizon shouting loudly- On June 12 We Stand.

    The Head of state simply called the self-serving politicians and put them all in top government positions.  He knew they couldn’t care less about any cause.

    On June 12 we stand?  Of Course they did not, and here is Nigeria still standing!

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  • Restructuring as panacea to Nigeria’s developmental challenges

    Fifty years ago, Nigeria fought a civil war over the issue of restructuring. Last week, Deputy Senate President Ike Ekweremadu at the World Igbo Congress (WIC) held in Enugu, insisted that “the minimum Ndigbo demand of Nigeria is a restructure of the federation so that every component part of it can substantially harness its resources, cut its coat according to its cloth, and develop at its own speed,”

    He wants the Igbo “peaceful struggle for a better deal within the Nigerian commonwealth sustained.”His demand is not different from that of Niger Delta militants that want a restructured Nigeria where they will control their resources or even Boko Haram that believes the solution to the poverty and neglect of the north eastern part of the country is theocracy.

    But perhaps more significant was  the last week successful shutting downof the whole of the South East and some parts of Rivers and Delta states  on the order of  those most Nigerians have often dismissed as ill-informed spare parts sellers in spite of the counter order by the  elected governors of the affected states.

    I think this is a call on Nigerian leaders to stop playing the ostrich. It is better to discuss the process of restructuring the country through dialogue instead of through another war.

    The battle for an acceptable structure for Nigeria is as old as the Nigeria state. The colonial master in view of our cultural differences had advised states be created  along the lines of cultural development of each federating unit in order to ensure each group develop at its own pace without interference from others.

    But for many of our political elite, with the prospect of independence, their concern was how to succeed the outgoing colonial masters as the new inheritors of power with all the privileges associated with it. They, therefore, urged the colonial masters to ignore our cultural differences which they claimed had been amplified by accident of colonial rule.

    Hugh Clifford, Governor General of Nigeria in December 1920, for instance reminded our educated elite who were in fact thinking of a united West African nation that the over 350 ethnic groups in Nigeria were at different levels of cultural development. He insisted the idea of a united West Africa will be like talking of a European nation which would be an absurdity.

    Reminding them that ‘the Hausa of Zaria are different from the Bantus tribes men of Benue valley’, he said he wished “the impossible were feasible that a collection of self-contained and mutually independent native statesseparated by difference of history and tradition and by ethnological,racial, tribal political social and religious barriers, were indeed capable of being welded together into a single homogenous nation.”

    He therefore advocated a “national self-government that secured to each separate people the right to maintain its identity, its individuality and its nationality,its own chosen form of government, which had been involved for it by the wisdom and accumulated experiences of generation of its forbearers”

    Oliver Stanley, the colonial Secretary of State also warned that it was the presence of the colonial masters that was keeping Nigeria and most African colonized states together and predicted a descent into turmoil by warring sects and groups if they left. Forus in Nigeria, it happened only five years after independence and leading to a civil war and the death of about two millions Nigerians. Congo, descended into chaos within a year of independence and the hostility has continued almost sixty years after

    For efficient administration, Dr Nnamdi Azikiwe,one of Nigeria founding fathers whohad rejected cultural differences claiming it had been amplified by accident of colonial rule advocated a restructured Nigeria based on eight provinces

    1. Northern Province, consisting of Katsina, Kano and Zaria
    2. North Western Province, consisting of Sokoto, Niger and Ilorin

    3 North Eastern Province,consisting of Borno, Bauchi and Adamawa

    4 Central Province:Kabba, Benue and Plateau

    1. Southern Province: Warri, Benin, Onitsha and Owerri
    2. South Western Province: Ondo, Ijesha, Abeokuta, Oyo and Lagos
    3. South Eastern Province: Calabar and Ogoja
    4. The Cameroons.

    Awo who had in 1947 warned that “Nigeria is not a nation. It is a mere geographical expression; there is no Nigeria in the same sense as there is the English, Welsh, or French; the word Nigeria is a distinctive appellation to distinguish those who live within the boundaries of Nigeria from those who do not” saw restructured Nigeria as a philosophy of opportunity to enable each ethnic group progress at its own pace. He thereforewent on to suggest the ten main ethnic groups as the basis of a restructured Nigeriai.e. Hausa, Fulani, Ibo, Yoruba, Kanuri Ibibio, Munshi, Edo, Nupe and Ijaw.

    Tafawa Balewa in 1949 also admitted that. “The amalgamation of southern and northern Nigeria provinces in 1914 has existed as one country only on paper; it is still being far from being united. Nigeria unity is only a British intention for the country.”

    However, the consensus was Bode Thomas’s recommendation of the division of the country into three permanent regions, each with its own political party. The three regions according to him can thereafter send their best to the center to preside over the affairs of Nigeria. Thus at independence we had three regions. The Midwest region was carved out of the West in 1963.

    This structure was destroyed by the military whose only method is hierarchical control. To ensure total control from the top, the military opted for creating states to satisfy many of the restive groups in the country. We have ended up with 36 states and 774 LGAs – all of them looking up to the center for handouts.

    ENEMIES OF RESTRUCTURING

    The first enemy of a restructured Nigeria is the military that has tried to build Nigeria in its own image since its misadventure into politics in 1966. As custodian of Nigerian constitution, all the military ought to have done in 1966 was revert to our independence constitution. Instead of that, they have introduced all forms of social engineering programmes such as NYSC, Federal Unity secondary schools, Federal Universities, quota admission into universities, civil service and the army.

    They have also divided the country into a dysfunctional 36 states and 774 local government structure, all in an attempt to continue to maintain their relevance. There are also the political elite, especially the military-created new breed politicians, who represent only themselves. GeneralOlusegun Obasanjo, for instance, became president even after he had been roundly rejected by his local government and ward.

    We also have the economic elite who acquired their wealth as contractors to government. Many of them served as fronts for the military. They are the major beneficiaries of an ill-implemented privatization programme through which a total investment of about $100b the nation made between 1970 and 1999, was cornered by the elite whoconfiscated Nigeria Airways, NICON, Federal Palace Hotel, Hamdala Hotels, AP, NEPA, Nigerian Vegetable Oil Limited among many others for a paltry $1.5b.  Of course, Nigerians who have become wealthy multi billionaires in their forties without owning industries or inheriting wealth, will do everything to sustain the current system. And since they control the wealth, they also control the media which they have continued to use to dismiss informed Nigerians who canvass for a change, as ethnic irredentists.

    But what is the way forward?

    We cannot achieve much without a theory. Because of the peculiar nature of man, model builders from Aristotle to Kenneth Wheare have tried to come up with models to provide solution to man’s unique problem.Our leaders are therefore not being called upon to reinvent the wheel. We can learn from the experiences of other multi ethnic societies.

    Let us first look at Europe, where state formation ran its course, through tribal warlords to divine right of,it was discovered the nation state was inhibiting the freedom of individuals and group identity. Knowing that‘modern democracy favours the individual as bearer of rights and privileges and not groups’, they opted for federalism that convers status on communities. The federal arrangement ‘formally recognizes groups’ identities as legitimate and autonomous participants in the political process by asserting that formalrelationships are a part of individual liberty and identity.’

    Following the assertions of some model builders such as Daniel Elazer, who after two devastating world wars  said “federalist revolution is the only safeguard for peace and stability in a rapidly changing world” and  Pierre-Joseph Proudhon, a French model builder who predicted “the 20thcentury will open the age of federations or else humanity will undergo another purgatory of a thousand years”, most Western nations including former unitary states like Spain and Belgium went on to embrace a federal arrangement

    Unfortunately our self- serving elite in Africa have continued to play the ostrich while the former colonial masters who have been vindicated are increasingly becoming more apprehensive about their post-colonial states degenerating to failed states characterised by weak, ineffective and corrupt central government as a result of misrule by their new rulers.

    Thousands of hungry and jobless immigrants from ex-colonies are flooding the metropolitan nations in droves. In 2011, France experienced first-hand, the anger of the hungry when frustrated homeless immigrants descended on the properties of their wealthy hosts. In 2012, it was the turn of Britain as angry youths freely moved around London, looting and setting fire on malls. Anarchy is slowly creeping into Italy, Greece and Spain.

    But the West is prepared  to forestall the looming anarchy as a result of migration of frustrated, desperate jobless youths to Europe where the percentage of the unemployed is in some places is as high as 30%. The starting point is checking the greed of their own citizens and their collaborators in the poor African countries manned by incompetent thieving political class.

    In 2013, US President Barack Obama had during his second inauguration warned: “The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few or the rule of a mob”. The French, after the massive destruction of property by disgruntled immigrants have become very active in Ivory Coast, Guinea, Tunisia and Mali. Then UK Prime Minister David Cameron, speaking in Davos ahead of the G8 meeting held between  June 17 and 18  2013, in Lough Erne, Northern Island, UK, had complained openly about squandered “Nigeria oil exports worth almost a hundred billion dollars”, an amount he said was “more than the total net aid to the whole of Sub Saharan Africa”.

    Our structure, our former colonisers have confirmed, is the bane of our society. All our country’s woes – crisis of revenue allocation, corruption, infrastructural decay, collapse of educational sector as well as religious intolerance, stem from the unworkable federal arrangement selfishly imposed by the military and sustained by those benefiting from the anarchy – especially the parasitic federal government whose major preoccupation is sharing what does not belong to it, cornering in the process over 50% of what others produce.

    Restructuring is a win-win situation for Nigeria especially the dominant ethnic groups. It will for instance  allow the acquisitive Igbos, who after fighting a war and is today at the forefront of agitation for restructuring, to look beyond taking pride in  thriving in other people’s land,to plough back some of their wealth in their communities to end the revolt of the poor who have been forced into criminal activities instead of just building ‘a place of the people’ among the squalor of the poor and the deprived, as the great Ozumba Mbadiwe once did, or their Abuja representatives who kept their peace while $34b of the $44b allocation for the dredging of River Niger was shared with no work done while the current Deputy Senate President occupied the same position under David Mark.

    And for the South-west, restructuring will put an end to the mischief of Yoruba leaders who dabble into other ethnic groups’ affairs in the guise of exporting Yoruba values which have often led to the devastation of Yoruba land by vengeful ethnic warlords and their collaborators. Restructuring will allow the new Yoruba leaders to devote their time and talents to the unfinished Awo agenda and his compatriots’ crusade to create an egalitarian society that supports free education, free health services, full employment and life abundance for their people.

    Restructuring rather than an elusive search for national character or common vision is a win-win situation for all. For instance, it will be sweet justice for some northern states’ ex-governors like Sani Yerima of Zamfara State who according to retired Ambassador Olu Aina ‘underwent indoctrination and exposure in all the training camps of Osama Bin Laden,’ before coming to launch his political sharia with fanfare supported by some northern leaders  The Lamido of Adamawa who during the  2014 Constitutional Conference said that if Nigeria became ungovernable , he had  about two million Fulani who live across  in northern Cameroon and Chad to fall back on, will have an option to do exactly that in a restructured Nigeria.

    Dr Alex Ekwueme, a former Nigerian Vice President as well as NADECO have endorsed a six geo-political zonestructure for the nation. The 2014 Constitutional Conference midwifed by President Goodluck Jonathan recommended fiscal federalism and decentralization of the police force among others. The new geo-political zones according to them will be forced to look inwards to finance their developmental programmes.

    • Excerpts from lecture delivered at the 2017 Caleb University Political Science and International Students Association (CUPIRSA) Week, 5th June 2017, at Caleb University,Imota, and Lagos State.
    • Dr. Jide Oluwajuyitan was a former Executive Director (Editorial and Advertising) The Guardian Newspaper Limited, a former Executive Director, Vintage Press, Publishers of The Nation Newspaper and a former lecturer at the Department of Political Science, University of Lagos.

  • How Aregbesola will be remembered

    A song writer penned this song ” we shall be remembered, we shall be remembered by what we have done”. One of the founding fathers of newswatch magazine Ray Epku recently asked in his article in Guardian if Aregbsola will be remembered by his state. We know that history is written by a Victor. Every public office holder starts writing his story from the moment they are elected.

    Aregbesola will certainly be remembered for several unforgettable good deeds. The Philosopher states ” the best way to live is to live in the present and not attempt to shape the future ” Assuming Ekpu lives in Osun, he might have realised that the question is unnecessary, but few days later, a PDP gubernatorial candidate in the state, also stated that the state has nothing to show as an achievement for the past six years. Just as it is often said that when lies is allowed to prevail for long it might be taken for truth. There were three groups of men in the state who nursed defeat they suffered as a result of Aregbesola’s victory at the polls. The first group were those who held to power due to Electoral manipulation for three and a half years when they were sacked by the Court of Appeal. Some have since joined the APC.

    The second group were the men that were counting on the time that the gubernatorial election will come to their zones, but the court verdict blew off their chance. This second group are much more desperate. One of them vowed in 2014 that he must win the election at all costs, failure which he was ready to die. He tried but failed but has since refused to die. The third group were the political hangers-on. They benefits from the power that be. The change of power has since rendered them beggars and haters of Aregbsola administration. Initially, they falsely alleged that the incumbent governor suffered from cancer, but when that kite failed to fly, they took to criticise him that he was doing nothing in the state.

    Later when Aregbesola turned the whole state to construction sites they were dumbfounded and started saying that the state indebtedness is beyond redemption. So far, there is no local government councils areas that have not seen the impact of Aregbesola’so administration. The six-point integral Action plans: Banish Poverty, Banish Hunger, Banish Unemployment, Restore Healthy living, Promote Functional Education, and Enhance Communal Peace and Progress continue as the guiding principles till date.

    Will Aregbesola be remembered? Yes, he will be remembered as the man who whose mandate was stolen by the then incumbent but fought legal battle for three and half years to regain it to the extent that the then Federal government was much more concerned that the Electoral Law was amended to ensure that future Electoral litigation do not exceed six months. Aregbesola will be remembered as the first governor in Nigeria that employed 20,000 youths under the Osun Youths Employment Scheme (OYES) within 100 days in office. If his critics forget and go ahead that the man has done nothing for the past six years in office, the youths in their various wards and local governments areas will stand to counter their negative comments that they were the beneficiaries of Aregbesola empowerment.

    Their parents and relations will speak to the electorate that they have become employers of labour through the OYES SCHEME. About 40 of the former beneficiaries of the scheme will mobilise their households that they became landlords through the OYES Scheme, and that if the scheme has not been on the ground they might still be wandering about seeking for jobs that are not available. If political opponents failed to see what the man Aregbesola has done in the state for the past six years, the students that were formerly learning in shred and poultry sheds will celebrate the icon of modern innovator of Opon Imo learning device that contains over 64 text books, past questions and answers in WAEC EXAMINATION NECO and JAMB. A device that was acknowledged by UNESCO and even WAEC. .

    An educational device that made Osun and the helmsman to receive several awards across the globe. The over 20 newly constructed High Schools, 22 Elementary Schools are enough cynosure for those with eyes irrespective of tribes, colour or religion. It is no more news that President Muhammadu Buhari was dumbfounded as to how the governor was able to fund such facilities despite the economic downturn. Apart from the modern facilities that were provided in these new schools, the schools were given befitting school buses to transport students to and from schools. We may forget that the man provides free school uniforms for over 75000 students across the state, but will the parents and pupils forget? But in case they do, in the future when it shall be asked who introduced the same uniforms for all the pupils in primary and secondary schools whose name will they mention? Free meals are daily being served across the state to the extent that the state experienced geometrical increase in the school enrolment in the primary schools above any other states in Nigeria. The free meals scheme has also provided markets for both farmers and poultry farmers beyond the state.

    The eggs consumption by the pupils went beyond the supply of the local farmers to the extent that farmers in Kwara State now sells for the state cooks. As if that was all the state need to serve as a model to the Federal government who has since adopted the free schools meal. The United Kingdom was highly impressed by the school meal programme that the governor was invited to address the UK parliament over it. On the introduction of free schools meal in UK, each parent was projected to save about £50,000 annually. A prophet they said has no respect except in his own home, while our people fail to see that a healthy and well fed children will learn better and perform excellently well, a foreign country saw the importance. The Americans do say “aren’t seen nothing yet”. In case those who claimed the man cannot be remembered for anything, maybe they are always flying to and from the state otherwise they are likely to have passed through the trumpet bridge that is under construction at Gbongan.

    They are likely to have been to Orileowu or to Osogbo, Ilesa, Ikirun Ile Ife, but in case they have not let them ask from anybody from any of the 30 local government areas and the newly established Developmental areas if they have experienced any road construction the answer will likely be positive. The health sector and those that have been saved due to the nearest of hospitals and maternity will remember that a man was in charge of the state for six years past. The accident victims that were saved through the prompt response of the O Ambulances will remember that Aregbesola saved them from death. The REHAB, the agency that pick and rehabilitate the mentally challenged people across the state will forever be grateful for the man that rescued and rehabilitated them and gave them a new life to live. •Obaditan is an aide to the Osun governor

  • Obasanjo’s grand strategy for National Security

    MINDFUL of the need for National Security and with a Military background, President Olusegun Obasanjo (80) upon inauguration 18 years ago, in conjunction with his National Security Adviser, General Aliyu Mohammed Gusau (74) the “spy master” and his Chief of Staff, General Abdullahi Mohammed (78), produced a blue print for National Security. He adhered to that blueprint throughout his tenure. And it helped him. Except for the Odi massacre of December 1999, the religious crisis in Zamfara and in Jos, there was less National Security crises during President Obasanjo’s than that of his successors. Such a security strategy is missing these days. Let us take a look at the blue print and see whether it could be applied in the country today. •For the guidance of all element of the Executive arm of government, I hereby direct that the concept of National Security which will apply during my Presidency shall be the aggregation of the security interests of all individuals, communities, ethnic groups, political entities, and institutions, which inhabits the territory of our great country, Nigeria. This is in affirmation of the paramount importance which I attach to safety, security and the prosperity of individuals and institutions within Nigeria and what belongs to Nigeria and Nigerians abroad. •Consequently, our national security policy shall focus on the preservation of the safety of Nigerians at home and abroad and the protection of the sovereignty of the country and the integrity of her assets. While giving impetus to the fulfillment of these responsibilities by the Government of Nigeria, the broad concept of national security, which I hereby prescribe, requires the cooperation and participation of all stakeholders in ensuring national security. Therefore, the administration of national security by all elements shall canvass the commitment of all citizens and institutions to the promotion of security and to other important interest of our dear country, Nigeria. •The primary objective of national security shall be to strengthen the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to advance her interest and objectives, to contain instability, control crime, eliminate corruption, enhance genuine development, progress and growth, improve the welfare and well-being and quality of life of every citizen. This objective shall be achieved through regular consultation and adequate coordination of the resources and activities of all elements of government and the civil society. The following cardinal principles shall be of overriding consideration: •Effective coordination of public policy to ensure that all sectors work in harmony to achieve stated objectives. Policies, which are incongruent with the overall objective, must be identified and adjusted appropriately. •The pursuit of individual and community security in tandem with state security. •The cultivation of a symbiotic relationship between security and human development, human rights and welfare, to ensure that contemporary and potential security problems are reduced through appropriate socio-economic policies. •A security sector which is society-friendly and whose objectives are in congruence with democratisation and the entrenchment of civil society and rule of law. •The maintenance of an effective security system, which the nation can afford. Consequently, security system, which the nation can afford. Consequently, security needs will not be allowed to outweigh the developmental imperative of civil society. Emphasis shall be on adequate, but lean and effective security organs enhanced by modern operational methods and technology. •In the drive to achieve greater efficiency the national security process shall be information-driven. I hereby further direct a renewal of the emphasis on the harnessing of information from all sources within and outside government, the pooling and interconnectivity of the resource base of security agencies, ministries and parastatals and the integration of the information so derived into a form most suitable for policy and decision making. The National Security Adviser shall continue supervise this process and is hereby charged with the responsibility of ensuring that the enhanced process, which I have envisaged, begins to yield positive results soonest. •Our Foreign Policy, Defence, Economy, Social Development, Law and Order form the core of our national security. Each element fits into the grand national strategy of this administration as follows: •Economy: National security is intrinsically linked to the state of the economy. Nigeria’s economy is affected very significantly by the international economic situation. We have a virtual mono-product economy, which is dominated by crude oil export. The domestic by crude oil export. The domestic economy has been in recession for over a decade. The revival of the economy has been slow to take effect. We have to reverse the economic decline, control destructive consumption habits, revive industrial production and growth, restore the functionality of utilities and services, ensure appropriate pricing and create more jobs with living wages. We must be part of the globalization in every sense. Some analysts have identified problems in the coordination of our economic policies with the grand strategy. I am determined that all the economic forces should be made to pull in the same direction. Concomitantly, economic policies will be consonant with the dictates of national security. The Chief Economic Adviser will continue to ensure the coordination of the administration’s economic policies through regular consultation with the appropriation authorities. •Social Well-being: The greatest danger to national security outside external aggression is individual, family or community insecurity brought about by preventable or avoidable social condition of poverty, food insecurity, unemployment, community strife, inequity, oppression lack of justice. These conditions easily lead to indiscipline, loss of trust in authority, frustration, apathy, desperation, agitation, anarchy, lawlessness and violent conflicts. Every effort must be made to deal effectively with the issue of poverty eradication, ensuring justice and equity, eradication of corruption, provision of essential services, food security, potable water, universal basic education, basic healthcare delivery and employment. •Foreign Policy: The relationship between Nigeria and the world, especially neighbouring West Africa is vital to her national security. The magnitude of attention paid to national security may invariably be graduated in concentric circle of proximity, shared interest and like-mindedness. I believe strongly in the economic integration of the ECOWAS sub-region. This is why we are pursuing the Fast Track Integration of the community with other members. Nigeria’s other commitments in the international community, namely, OPEC, UN, OAU, NAM, G77, etc. demand a very active and vibrant foreign policy. The changing realities of the international economic and political landscape require us to rekindle friendship in the Far East. The objective of our foreign policy vis-à-vis the grand strategy is peace, security and prosperity through friendship. We will strive to resolve any dispute through dialogue, resorting to force only as the last recourse and only to defend our sovereignty and integrity. Our foreign policy shall include the promotion of foreign investment, trade and debt remission while we protect Nigerian interest everywhere and we work for justice, fairness and equity globally. •Defence: The armed Forces are the bastion of our national defence. They provide deterrence against physical aggression. They are also to provide aid to civil authority in the event of national emergencies and internal crisis. We shall continue to pursue the strategy of adequate defence. To this end, I have directed the infusion of fresh funds for the rehabilitation of the armed services and the upgrading of their equipment, training and readiness up to the standard demanded by our national, regional and international commitments and territorial defence needs. The armed forces face the challenge of modernization and transformation from a praetorian guard into a nimble, effective and efficient defence machinery. Our defence strategy shall include the development of local defence industries. It will include assistance to friendly neighbouring countries and participation in sub-regional and regional defence initiatives. •Law and Order: The safety of lives, the security of property and the maintenance of law and order are, to me, very important priorities. We will continue to invest in the Nigeria Police Force so that they can be more effective. We are examining other strategies for encouraging the development of efficient and orderly private security enterprises to aid the police in curbing the high crime rate. We are also enhancing the capacity of the appropriate agencies to fight corruption, detect crimes, ensure the quick dispensation of justice and the reformation of offenders. I am impressed by the cooperation between the law officers and the law enforcers. The increase in the effectiveness of the security and the Law Enforcement. Agencies in the past year are noticeable and must be encouraged. The promotion of internal security at all levels will continue through proactive intelligence, the reduction of tension, the management of traditional agitators and prompt action against those who are bent on disrupting peace and instability. Law Enforcement Agencies should treat individuals with civility and firmness, respecting the rights of the individuals and obeying the rule of law and due process. The judiciary is an indispensable and crucial part maintenance of law and order. •Teniola is an ex-director in the presidency