Category: Comments

In a democracy like Nigeria purports to practice, freedom invariably imposes the burden for responsibility and discretion. The right of citizens to free speech by no means confers the licence for hate speech; neither does the right to freely associate or assemble for protection (or projection) of group interests permit for freewheeling infraction of the public peace. But the beauty of true democracy is that it has built into it self-moderating mechanisms, such that perceived or real excesses do not call for a recourse to revision of the fundamental rights of citizens or tyrannous abridgement of the very essence of democracy, which is freedom. It is the system that purges itself.

Take, for instance, the inauguration of Donald Trump as President of the United States (POTUS), which in the last 10 days has sore tried that country’s democratic credentials. With all the buffeting tides, the system is holding up, and that is apparently why that country is often cited as the world’s paragon of democracy. Ironically, it is the foremost symbol of the country’s democracy at the moment, namely Trump, who is pitched on the frontline of undermining the famed system. Or how do we explain that, for a two century-old political practice that is bedrocked on the culture of free and vibrant press, Mr. Trump from Day One of his presidency called an open battle with the American media.

Trump is famously active on Twitter. And ahead of his inauguration he was strongly counseled by Washington’s technocracy to ease up, and thereby to refrain from making policy pronouncements casually on the social media in his new position as POTUS. But he insists on tweeting, and has been reported saying the reason he is keeping the handle is to bypass the news media with ‘alternative facts’ – a coinage of White House senior adviser Kellyanne Conway to describe the official narrative pushing back against what the Trump presidency dubbed “dishonest media coverage” of the crowd size on Washington’s National Mall for the January 20 inauguration.

The beauty, though, is how the American media is standing up to the Trump battle. Journalists batted off and rephrased ‘alternative facts’ for what they really are – falsehoods. When Trump’s camp doubled down in a head-on over what White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer flaunted as “the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration,” mainstream outlets rejoined with visual evidence that showed the 2017 crowd to be a pale shadow of that which attended former President Barak Obama’s inauguration in 2009. At the last count, the American media establishment has rallied to dig in for a long credibility battle with what has been described as the Trump administration’s war on facts.

In the dealing of underhands to the American democracy, the Trump camp found an unwitting fellow traveller on the polar end in pop star Madonna, who said she had contemplated “blowing up the White House.” Madonna is unapologetically anti-Trump and had joined the Women’s March on Washington to protest the Trump presidency.

Addressing the crowd of protesters a day after Mr. Trump was inaugurated, the mercurial songster used the ‘F-word’ three times within a minute, compelling television networks streaming live feeds of the march to abruptly stop filming. “Yes, I’m angry. Yes, I am outraged. Yes, I have thought an awful lot about blowing up the White House, but I know this won’t change anything,” she told the crowd, adding: “We cannot fall into despair. As the poet WH Auden wrote on the eve of World War II: ‘We must love one another or die. I choose love’. Are you with me? Say this with me: We choose love. We choose love. We choose love.”

Here is the catch: Madonna was not hunted down by American security for her slip on a seeming terrorism streak, but her speech sparked a firestorm on social media, with people taking her remarks literally and calling her “irresponsible.” She subsequently had to clarify that her remarks were misconstrued. “I am not a violent person, I do not promote violence and it’s important people hear and understand my speech in its entirety rather than one phrase taken wildly out of context,” she said in an Instagram post on Sunday.

The New York Times reported that crowd counting experts estimated the Women’s March in Washington to be roughly three times the size of the audience at Trump’s inauguration. But there were no interdictions or security assaults on marchers while the protest lasted. Actually, President Trump watched the protest on television, and the only response he obliged was as Twitter-in-Chief: “Watched protests yesterday but was under the impression that we just had an election! Why didn’t these people vote? Celebs hurt cause badly,” he said on his handle. The ‘celebs’ part obviously alludes to Madonna.

Now to our related experience here in Nigeria. For whatever they had hoped to achieve, supporters of the separatist Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) staged a rally in Port Harcourt on the day of Trump’s inauguration purportedly in his support. They avowed their outing as a ‘peaceful solidarity rally,’ and I must say I really haven’t seen any report showing they were armed with anything more than flags, banners and sheer slogans. But that rally hit a storm in an encounter with security agents: the protesters said 11 of their number were killed, with many more wounded and missing; but the Police denied there was any fatality, though they acknowledged some 65 of the protesters were arrested. The Rivers State Police Command later explained that the rally was illegal because IPOB had obtained no permit.

Reputed lawyers have argued that police permit is not required for public rallies in Nigeria, following from a 2007 verdict of the Appeal Court that has not been challenged at the Supreme Court. In that verdict, the Appeal Court affirmed a 2005 judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja, to the effect that the provisions of the Public Order Act, Cap. 382, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 1990, which prohibit the holding of rallies or processions without police permit are invalid, having regard to Section 40 of the 1999 Constitution and Article 11 of the African Chatter on Human and People’s rights (Ratification and Enforcement) Acts, Cap. 10, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 1990.

But let’s leave the fine points of law aside here. Peaceful rallying is a legitimate form of expression in any democracy, and we need to learn to live with it in this country. That is what is entailed in our present dispensation. Just think on it: if they were not acting out the authoritarian playbook, what would security agents have lost if they passively accompanied those IPOB protesters on their procession, only to intervene to contain any recourse to violence if ever such occurred?

Democracy has its demons, but the culture also prescribes acceptable ways of exorcising them. When last I checked, these do not include midnight security raids to arrest suspected civil offenders.

And that is the challenge I have with the attempt by operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS) last week to arrest the General Overseer of Omega Fire Ministries, Apostle Johnson Suleiman, in Ado Ekiti. The clergyman was in the Ekiti State capital for a two-day crusade, and DSS operatives reportedly stormed his hotel at about 2a.m. on Wednesday to arrest him apparently in connection with a video trending on the Internet in which he had directed his members to levy jungle justice on any Fulani herdsman who strays into his church.

Suleiman said he spoke against the backdrop of wanton killings in southern Kaduna on which the authorities are yet to get a handle; I would hold that he is liable for hate speech and intemperate leadership. Still, he could have been invited for questioning by the DSS rather than be raided. As it similarly happened recently to Justices that are now being prosecuted for graft, these midnight raids on suspects of civil offences make one ‘feel Hitler in these streets.’

At a time when international stars like Tiger Woods, Oscar Pistorius and Bill Cosby whom the world has always revered are falling and crashing because of ugly scandals and even heinous crimes, this man’s honourable life has made him stand out even from among the worlds’ best.

Edson Arantes do Nascimento – The Brazilian Football Superstar PELE has built his name over long years both as a brilliant player on the pitch, and more importantly beyond his playing days and outside the pitch. His scandal-free life and magnetic appeal have raised him to iconic status.

And with the death of Mohammed Ali last year, then I daresay that Pele is the current living legend that this world has now, and his busy schedule, at his age is testimony of his greatness and fame. I would not wish for Nigeria to be the one to unjustly tarnish his hard-earned name, a name that commands an appearance fee that is jaw-dropping anyday.

One of the columns last month in Thisday is titled “Goodswill Akpabio’s $300,000 gift to Pele”. The columnist opens with “…imagine a state like Akwa Ibom sending $300,000 to Brazilian football legend (Pele) as appearance fee just to grace the opening of a stadium in Uyo.”

Inasmuch as the money was payment of a fee and not a gift or a ‘dash’ as it is called in Pidgin English, nevertheless it has morphed to same by virtue of a breach of contract on the part of the Akwa Ibom Government in not keeping their own side of the bargain and sticking to the date of engagement. We are now told that the current government is still struggling to retrieve the money from Pele. The agent who sealed the deal insists that Pele is not liable as he is not the party that breached the agreement. Moreso, he says his client was already committed to another engagement as at when the date for the opening of the stadium was rescheduled. The agent is spot on and the request for the refund is UNJUSTIFIABLE.

At any rate, the visiting African Presidents to the stadium opening as well as the spectators on the paid, dedicated cable channel would have been forever thrilled to have had our Nigerian international football stars and Olympic gold medalists like J. J. Okocha and the Prince of Monaco – Victor Ikpeba grace the same occasion at a far more manageable cost.

$300,000. At the official exchange rate 2 years ago that would translate to an appearance fee of over Sixty Million Naira paid up. As at today, the sum is over N146 Million, at the current rate of N487 to the dollar.

But even using this week`s official exchange rate of $305 to the Naira, then going by the current standard of N5,000 monthly payout (!) to the poor, that would mean N91,500,000  that could possibly have been utilized, is just not available.

But like I said, that money should not be pursued at all. There are far weightier matters to pursue. And the people involved are within, highly visible and accessible.

The state newspaper corporation has been wobbling along for 2 years now without a General Manager. Same way, it has been wobbling along trying to keep up with the printing of its papers because of a certain man named Chief Edwin Igbokwe. He is the widower of Nigeria’s Lady of Songs, a name she was known by even in some states across America where she was made an honorary citizen. Late Christy Essien’s husband had a wonderful idea to trade on his wife’s name and fame and “get into” Akwa Ibom Government in order to receive contracts and privileges from there.

And so he was in and out of that state for a number of years doing his business, and even when he went there for this purpose – all the same he made sure the state was responsible for all his upkeep, travel and expenses.

He snagged a contract to import and supply modern equipment for the printing press of the newspaper corporation. The only thing was that Igbokwe had issues with the term ‘Modern.’ However, this smart guy never let on until the millions he charged had been paid him.

The machines he supplied from India were not only disused and unserviceable, but had vital components missing! They were also outdated so there was no more manufacture of spare parts. Those machines were outrightly defective, but as far as Igbokwe was concerned, it was: Junk Delivered. Done Deal!

The previous state government realized it was in a quandary and asked for a refund. That was when a contract document – more like a Magic Scroll to me, was brandished. It had provisos such as: This Contract Must Never Be Re-Examined Forever, etc! And there were other wonders such as this.

Well, it is that type of money I reckon that the government needs to go after. Goodness knows the corporation needs the money and the equipment, right now.

How about the contract, in billions for one to supply generators to keep streetlights in the major cities on throughout the night? In a state where an Independent Power Plant was opened to great applause! These street generators are diesel operated and your guess is right – the same person has the contract for powering up the street generators. The yearly drain on the economy by this state of affairs is horrendous. It is colossal.

What is economical is to cancel that contract and utilize cheaper power alternatives. Bayelsa state uses solar powered streetlights. Methinks this makes real economic sense because all day in the tropics the sun is shining to charge solar batteries – then all night, stored solar cells power city streetlights. Easy!

But the thing that just gets me is this system of Subsidy and Taxation even where this world has long moved away from the former.

Referring again to the Thisday column, the writer asks: “Why should a state where its citizens lack access basic things of life like water (!) …squander money? …Its governments spend like drunken sailors.

Indeed the case of Akwa Ibom is a serious one. It is shocking to believe that the state government subsidizes every viewing of movies at the Silverbird Tropicana Cinema House.

Subsidizing Going to the Movies!!! It’s incredible, it’s hard, but it’s true.        These are the things the current government met on ground, and had no part in initiating.

But since it is going after some past payment today, then these are the things the government should want to go after or even cancel outright, as the case may be.

A petition over the corrupt printing press deal needs to be sent to Court of Arbitration, for justice to be done, like the National Industrial Court of Nigeria, for instance.

And I would humbly suggest that the state government move quickly and send a nicely worded apology to the World Living Legend Pele for the seeming infraction, and thence lay that matter ever to rest.

NIGERIA is a nation that is defined by perpetual strikes. The nation’s economic landscape is crippled by all manner of strikes from all significant sectors of the economy— education, oil and gas, health, power, etc. The lack of attention to industrial relations dynamics therefore constitutes one of the fundamental detriments to a sustainable national productivity in Nigeria. Once the economy is forcefully powered down by constant strike actions, then it becomes extremely difficult for the economy to keep up an efficient productive flow. We should also not be unmindful about the role of the public service in this regard.

The public services play a huge role in determining the national productivity of any state especially in developing countries. And hence, their industrial relations dynamics ought to constitute a critical dimension which should be factored into any reform of employer-employee relationship. But now add to this mix the decrepit state of the public service, and then you know that Nigeria’s democratic governance is in a very bad shape! In the preceding part of this series, we examined the mess in which Nigeria’s productivity profile is mired.

Productivity is a key central factor in achieving competitive edge in global economy as well as in making democratic governance an empowering force for the citizens. The required productivity paradigm shift thrives on a tripod: effective identification of the possible barriers and obstacles to productivity; industrial relations; and skills development and certification and a new national work ethics and service delivery culture.

Industrial relations are cogent because productivity is directly proportional to the framework of employment and existing labour relations existing in a country at any point in time. Thus, industrial relations dynamics has the capacity to inhibit or even paralyse labour productivity, as it has indeed been doing for a long time.

The unionization of government employment became inevitable given the facts that government in Africa became the largest employer of labour and government operations also became increasing bureaucratized and depersonalized to the point of alienating the individual employees. Thus, growing disaffection, especially with government policies which often affect employees negatively, as well as the robust employment package of the private sector, convinced public workers of the need to engage an intermediary between themselves and the management. This is where the trade unions stepped into the framework of employment relationship.

With the employees, employers/management and the trade unions, we are therefore faced with a complex and volatile industrial relations which require a reform intervention if it is to serve as the democratic basis for an evolving productivity paradigm. Nigeria’s labour relations matrix is essentially adversarial. It is defined around the trope of friends and enemies, or the logic of relational antagonism—if you are not for us then you are certainly against us.

This dynamics places the management perpetually against trade unions. And this is even over matters that require straightforward resolution. Let me illustrate. The public service today is the key driver of productivity in Nigeria. Public service productivity is significant because the public service deploys an enormous workforce whose performance capability injects a productive energy into the economy. Unfortunately, the public service productivity dynamics is undermined by internal structural weaknesses. One of the most germane is the bloatedness of the institution that is supposed to deliver world class service in terms of democratic service delivery to the citizens.

The solution to civil service bloatedness has a global benchmark—downsizing. But the word “downsizing” is anathema in the vocabulary of the Nigerian trade unions. And, in spite of its obvious relevance to achieving productive efficiency, the unions deploy their entire adversarial arsenal towards rejecting its implementation. And the management continues to downsize in most inhuman and tragic manners. Being adversarial therefore implies that all industrial relations issues are cast in antagonistic terms: While labour is permanently interested in improving pay and working conditions with subdued interest in productivity and upward labour-related cost pressure, management’s primary interest is in productivity and costs control, including pay cuts.

The challenge is to get the problem of productivity on the table, and to make all parties see it for what it is—the sine qua non for any economic flourishing and development in Nigeria. There is also the imperative of outlining the significance of an efficient public service in facilitating productive optimality. Efficiency is a function of a lean, intelligent and competent workforce sufficiently motivated to increase the productivity level that instigates economic growth. There is a critical connection between high/low productivity and employment/ unemployment.

The need to connect the right dots in the relationship between the two makes the government and the trade unions significant actors in the productivity process. And it makes collective bargaining a crucial factor in achieving high productivity. We can therefore hazard a hypothesis that: That the first condition in the determination of a productivity process that balances between high productivity and an adequate employment dynamics begins from a proper conception and conduct of a conducive industrial relations.

Bringing the trade unions and the management to the same table is a function of transcending the adversarial bargaining process and shifting the concern to a developmental model that casts the labour-management interaction in the light of a social dialogue meant to facilitate a partnership for development.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO)’s social dialogue framework of labour relations constitutes a fitting framework for achieving the paradigm shift to a partnership dynamics. In industrial relations term, social dialogue is domesticated into the context of collective bargaining.

This would require that the parties agree on certain basic issues worked out under a participatory decision making framework that is free of mutual distrust, antagonism and a joint vision of national development. However, what encouraged the logic of adversarial industrial relations in the first place are some of the existing challenges which are usually lost in the attempt to understand and mediate the reform of industrial relations. Ordinarily, collective bargaining is the fundamental strategy of achieving and maximizing this social welfare function.

The idea of collective bargaining serves as the conceptual framework around which the employees, the trade union and the employer, the three parties to industrial relations, attempt to clarify their cases and resolve their differences. However, the process is often conceived as a zone of conflict which is often seen through an adversarial template in which the three parties are arrayed against one another as ‘friendly enemies.’

Each of these parties has a specific interest it is statutorily meant to protect and pursue. Ordinarily, these roles are supposed to be complementary for maximization of social and public goods. In practice, however, they inevitably lead to serious conflict since none of the three parties may see eye to eye in the resolution of the conflict – presumably an ingredient of benevolent and participatory development. In other words, each of the parties actively seeks to intervene and interject in the modus operandi of the other to achieve what it considers to be its legitimate responsibility.

The unions are concerned with ensuring that the terms and conditions of work are favourable to their memberships, the management actively pursues drive to increase profit and keep cost at a minimum, and the government is concerned with monitoring and facilitating the process of engagement, regulation and the policy environment. In the public service, these parties also have a common interest in the ministry, agency or department which they pursue through efforts to maximize social welfare and promote inclusive development. Instituting a paradigm shift in industrial relation dynamics translates into dealing decisively with some of the underlying shortcomings in the collective understanding of collective bargaining as a critical tool for ensuring labour-management relations that is development-minded.

Some of the existing challenges leading to this situation are: non-implementation of collective agreements; non-negotiation of expired collective agreements; lack of respect for the sanctity of collective agreements; lack of consultation and exclusion of stakeholders from major decisions; outsourcing of work processes; non-adherence to due process in application of disciplinary measures and court orders/judgments; ignorance on what comprises management prerogatives and workers’ rights/privileges; jurisdictional scope of unions; absence of internal transparency and accountability in union management; etc. Since productivity is taken to be the joint objective of the parties in the bargaining framework, then a win-win approach to redefining industrial relations becomes imperative as the foundation of collective bargaining. This “soft” or interestbased bargaining does not in any way assume that bargaining and negotiations will be smooth and unproblematic. What it sets out to do is to appeal to the interest of the parties involved. The win-win approach is founded on three insights.

First, the entire bargaining process has as its endgame the social welfare of Nigerians, and the deliverables of democratic governance. This understanding will limit a lot of industrial actions that, unwittingly, spell untold agonies and hardship for those the unions and government are fighting for. Second, negotiation and collective bargaining should be based on concessions and compromises. This means arriving at suitable decisions with which the parties to the bargaining can live. Once it is accepted that each proposal is negotiated based on its merits, then that spells the end of the mindset that wants all proposals satisfied.

Third, there is a deliberate cordiality that hit at the problem but is professional with the other parties and their interests rather than just reacting to their positions. The transformation of Nigeria’s productivity profile is a joint project. It requires harmonious industrial relations that put people and productive efficiency at the forefront of labour-management disagreement in a manner that clarifies significant issues of national development. And so we return to the issue of downsizing as a cogent response to the pernicious cost of governance drain on the Nigerian economy. Once downsizing is put in perspective, the fear inherent in it disappears.

This is because labour sees it as inevitable as long as those to be let go would be properly taken care of in a humane post-retirement scheme, and government sees it immediately as the only means of achieving a capacityready public service that capable of achieving world class status because it delivers services efficiently. Thus, if industrial relations dynamics are not considered a significant focal point of reform, then the paradigm shift in national productivity already has its Achille’s heel. •Olaopa, Executive Vice-Chairman, Ibadan School of Government & Public Policy (ISGPP) t o l a o p a @ i s g p p . c o m . n g ; tolaopa2003@gmail.com

AT is, indeed, a year like no other for Yahaya Bello (YB), Governor of Kogi State. One year in Luggard House, Lokoja, is enough time to take a bird’s eye view of a most turbulent and fairy-tale rise to power for someone I want to dub a child of destiny. Let me confess upfront that I write as a brother and kinsman from the same Senatorial zone as the Governor, who probably knows him a shade beyond the call of duty and not as an aide or publicist. I seize the opportunity of this auspicious first anniversary to purvey a touch of brotherly candidness, while leaving a proper showcase of his 365 days in office for those who have that duty to do.

It would be trite to recount here the epic circumstances that brought this pleasant introvert and artful grassroots political strategist to power. A man who upon losing the All Progressives Congress, APC, primary to Prince Audu Abubakar, had resigned to fate and had gone about running his vast businesses. But fate was not done with him yet as we have come to see. The sudden demise of the Prince, that colossus of Kogi politics, had thrown him into the power equation once again.

A man of eloquence, sharp mind, surprisingly gentle disposition and good nature, Providence seemingly thrust power upon him, willy-nilly, and in the last one year, he has continued to project peace and offer reconciliation to all at every turn. We know he has never stopped reaching out to his co-contestants; making it understood that Kogi people represent for him the Y and the X at every turning point of this political equation; not the office nor the inherent perks and perquisites. To prove that he is not one to stoke the embers of discord in his party, he was recently photographed respectfully greeting Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the APC numero uno, during the public presentation of President Muhammadu Buhari’s biography in Abuja. Besides being an unwavering party man and conciliator, I have come to find his loyalty to people and to the causes he believes in quite extraordinary.

As I found out in the course of our interactions, his loyalty to President Buhari is almost addictive to the point that he almost alienated a very senior parliamentarian and mutual friend when the lawmaker’s relationship with the president was frosty. For the Kogi Central stock of Kogi State of which I belong, the coming of Bello, the Ebira-born political maestro, is for us, akin to Barack Obama winning the Presidential election in the United States. It is a first-ever opportunity for our minority tribe to occupy the Government House in our highly heterogeneous state. It was a source of joy and excitement for the likes of us. And as a major stakeholder, it is my wish that Governor YB makes a major difference.

I am from Magongo, and knowing that my mother is from Ogori, Governor YB had recently teased that I am the REAL Ogori-Magongo! A man of simple ways, the last time I visited Lokoja, he drove (he would rather drive himself as much as possible) to meet me and my younger ‘siblings’ (B & F) at our apartment. At certain points, I almost had to remind him that he is now governor and that people are liable to take him for granted if they find him too humble and self-effacing. Not being your typical Nigerian politician, he has remained what I want to call a ‘triangular politician’. Do you remember in the university days, those students who used to shuttle from hostel to lectures and back to hostel? You would predictably find GYB go from home to work, to the mosque and back to home or work.

GYB hardly socializes; as much as possible he shuns social gatherings and ceremonies. Some people have begun to tag him as snobbish on account of this, but that is far from the truth. I think it is a mark of his professional training and his work ethic. And let me say that going by the initial traits, I believe he will acquit himself well in office over the next three years, or seven years. And I say this with all sense of responsibility. One year is a short time and, no kidding, it is also time enough to work the vision and set the tone for a glorious era in government.

From what I see and what some people have said, I think he is on track. Devoid of the initial shenanigans and distractions that roiled his early days in office, he has laid out his blueprint and, indeed, gone ahead to draw his roadmap. Many would speak about the long-drawn screening exercise of civil servants in negative terms, but he has said he is actually on a mission to sanitize not only the badly compromised pay system, but to revamp the civil service. His mission is known as New Direction Agenda (NDA) and he says his priority is Education. His administration has acquired three schools from three zones as Centres of Excellence and Unity; they are the first in a series to be designated as such to raise future leaders and worthy ambassadors of the state.

A number of schools have enjoyed renovation as well as received instruction materials. He has said Agriculture will be a main thrust of his administration. So many programmes have been initiated in this regard but most notable is the 20,000 hectares of land to Dangote Group for the cultivation of rice. Twenty one earth-moving plants have been given to each of the local government areas to help them drive year-round farming. He has promised to give the local government councils full autonomy – including financial.

This would be the greatest thing that would happen to my state since its creation, if he can pull this off and drive its implementation, including making them accountable. If this happens, the impact would be enormous as the state would enjoy rapid integrated development. Some residents insist that Kogi is more secure today than GYB met it, having drastically tinkered with the security architecture of the state. They also say Lokoja is much cleaner today than a year ago when he took office.

Apart from employing many more street cleaners and designating many more dumpsites, Kogi State Environmental Sanitation Exercise has been initiated . What more can I say? I had promised at the beginning that this is not a forum to promote the activities of GYB, but I guess I got a little carried away.

I urge the Governor to stick to his modest plan which he himself designed. There will be resistance to change, but he must be resolute and faithful to his roadmap in order to leave lasting legacies. He should also lead with the fear of God, compassion, truth and justice. He should listen to his people and carry them along. •Abrams, Member of the Newspaper Proprietors Association of Nigeria, is the Publisher/Editor-in-Chief of FRESH FACTS Newspapers (Email: abramssegun@gmail.com).