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  • Who were the Nazis? Definitely not Polish

    Who were the Nazis? Definitely not Polish

    I have read with great interest the publication “Auschwitz: Inside infamous Nazi concentration camp,” in the Sunday, November 13 edition of The Nation. I’ve decided to react because the article, although very well written, requires an absolutely indispensable clarification which was not included in the text. The author uses the term “Nazi” several times but never clarifies who the Nazis were. At the same time there are a few references to Poland and the readers may get a strong impression that Nazis were nobody else but the Polish people and the Polish government. It is a complete falsehood that has to be corrected.

    Please allow me to explain:

    On September 1, 1939 Poland was invaded by Germany under the rule of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi party. After a one-month long war Poland was conquered and consequently disappeared for long six years from the map of Europe. The Polish Army was defeated but had not surrendered to the Germans and no armistice was signed. The Poles continued to fight during entire World War II, but as insurgents or illegal combatants, not as soldiers on the battlefield. When captured, the Polish resistance fighters were executed or sent to concentration camps like Auschwitz. Germans established so called “General Governorate” on the territory of Poland, ruled by a German Governor. There has not been any official collaboration between the Polish people and the German occupiers. What the German officials, police and armed forces were doing at that time in the occupied Polish territories was exclusively their own responsibility. There simply was no Polish state or even an interim Polish administration allowed by the occupiers.

    About 40 concentration camps were created by the German Nazi occupiers all over the territory of the conquered Poland. One of those was the infamous KL. Auschwitz, located near the Polish city of Oswiecim (Auschwitz in German). Those were German concentration camps, run entirely by the German occupiers. It is therefore logical that the infamous welcoming motto “Work means freedom” above the Auschwitz main entrance gate is written in German language.

    After the German invasion of Poland, the anti-Jewish policy escalated to the imprisonment and mass murder of European Jewry, The Nazis established ghettos (enclosed areas designed to isolate and control the Jews) in major cities. Polish and western European Jews were deported to the ghettos, where they lived in very overcrowded and unsanitary conditions. After the June 1941 German invasion of the Soviet Union. Nazi leaders started to make preparations for the implementation of a “Complete Solution of the Jewish Question.” As part of that operation, first killing centers (camps) were established, with the main purpose of the mass murder of Jews. In their gas chambers about two hundred thousand of Jews were killed. In the spring of 1942, Germans designated Auschwitz as a major killing facility. Before the end of the war (May 1945), approximately 1.5 million people, including 1.2 million Jews and 90 thousand Poles, were murdered at Auschwitz. In all, during the II World War German special forces (SS) and police murdered nearly 2,700,000 Jews in the killing centers, by asphyxiation with poison gas, by shooting or starvation. The “Final Solution” was an euphemism for the mass extermination. It called for the murder of all European Jews by gassing, shooting and other means. It is also commonly known as the Holocaust – two-thirds of the Jews living in Europe before World War II.

    When railroad lines were built in the 19th century, the little town of Auschwitz found itself at the junction of three empires (Russia, Austro-Hungary and Prusia) and thus the crossroads of central Europe. There were almost 50 train lines coming into Auschwitz, making it a significant regional railroad hub. Railroad lines could easily reach Auschwitz from numerous European cities. In addition, Auschwitz already had a deserted army barracks before the war, with a potential to expand. All those reasons decided that Auschwitz was selected by the Nazis for a concentration camp which later became a symbol of the Holocaust.

    About six million Polish citizens lost their lives in the II World War, which makes 17% of the entire pre-war population of Poland. Out of the six million casualties almost three million were Polish Jews, including two million murdered in the concentration camps.

    The II World War finished more than 70 years ago. Germany today is a completely different country compared to the Nazi Germany. It is a democratic, modern and friendly neighbor of Poland, and a key member of the European Union. Poland and Germany, both members of the EU, have been in friendly relations for years.

    Allow me to conclude by expressing hope that his letter helps to clarify that the Auschwitz atrocity of human debasement and brutality was neither organized or run by a Polish administration or the Polish people, as well as explain why the Polish people are offended by insinuations that Auschwitz was a concentration camp “in Poland” or a “Polish concentration camp.”

    I also hope that The Nation, following its honourable tradition of presenting professional, honest and objective journalism, will publish this article or some other kind of statement clarifying the matter for the Nigerian readers.

    With kind regards.

    • Dycha is Ambassador of Poland in Nigeria
  • Aregbesola’s 6th year: To make the sun shine on our land

    Aregbesola’s 6th year: To make the sun shine on our land

    “I have travelled the world and traversed the length and breath of Nigeria, first as a businessman and then as a politician. Endowed with that exposure, I have studied the state of our state and have seen the roots of our problem.

    “I have seriously tried to identify the ills that have stood between us and our progress all these while. I have identified the dark shadows preventing the sun to shine fully on Osun State and these I will offer to you…”

    In 2011, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, Governor of Osun penned the lines above in a 133-paged book titled Rauf Aregbesola and the Future of Osun: Inspiring the Youths for a Better Tomorrow.

    On Sunday 27th, 2016, it would be six years exactly into the two term administration and second years of his second term.

    About the time he wrote those words some six years ago, it was at the beginning of, in reality, confronting the multi-dimensional, hydra-headed problems which could only have necessitated the need for a Messiah in Osun in the first place?

    In education, this was the time he contemplated shutting down the entire school system for a total reconstruction because of the parlous state of the schools. This was the time the threatening population of the Osun youths who had nothing whatsoever to do stare him in the face and threatened the peace of the society. This was the time when, despite being completely an agrarian state, food security had yielded to hunger owing to no clear cut policy on agriculture. It was the time criminals assumed there was a haven for them in Osun. It was the time what Osun boasted as cities, even at the state capital, no more than rickety human settlements hallmarked by failing and falling walls and scattered roofing. It was a time that yearned urgently for urban renewal.

    It was not only that Osun lacked the resources to bring it back to life. It was also a victim of lack of courage to embark on risky ventures out of which the fortune of the state could have been altered for good. A state with N300million monthly internally generated revenue would need some other ‘miracles’ to witness development. Nothing ventured, they say, nothing gained!

    The six years of venturing have gained for the state, a phenomenal development template that clearly gives an insight into what the future holds, especially for the younger generation in Osun. Though the state recently marked its 25 years of creation, the totality of the growth witnessed in six years makes those of the first 19 years pale into total insignificance going by all indices.

    Buoyed by an ideological bend which places people at the centre of every development initiative, the Aregbesola years have instituted a new governance culture never known in the history of the state but which has ignited a new passion for inclusion. There is a huge sense of participation by the people, seeing that there is something in everything for everyone. With a carefully woven six-point action plan serving as the guidelines for every policy, there is an astounding correlation which makes one dovetails into another in the growth agenda.

    Aregbesola combines the ideologies of legends who had gone down in history as proponents who not only brought developments to their people but liberated them from manacles of mental and material poverties.

    In order words, it is not only that this six-year old administration is building mega-schools to permanently change schools orientations; putting in place physical infrastructure to last for decades to come; creating a new generation of citizenry alive to their duties to the society, the administration comes across as one with a mission to free the minds of the people and set them on a path to personal fulfilment and realizations.

     More than five decades ago, the late political icon, Chief Obafemi Awolowo wrote in his autobiography that “the duty we owe to the present generation of young people would have been amply discharged if we were able to provide for them school buildings which would last 50 years.” The massive educational infrastructure the Aregbesola administration is reputed for today in Osun reminds those who care to note of the ideals and the good of the people which the late sage preached. The Awolowo recipe for good governance appears in all the sectors that the administration touches.

    With education reforms that include new learning environments, technology-driven teaching especially at the High School level, restructured curricula and re-orientated personnel, there is a renewed hope for emergence of a new generation of Osun citizens growing up equipped with the means to be relevant in any knowledge-driven society.

    Since Aregbesola had written in his book earlier mentioned that “Osun is blessed with younger people with the power to astonish the world with greatness,” it then follows that his programs in all sectors are tailored towards motivating these younger people who have been endowed with the power to stun the world.

    From restoring hopes to the despondent, to opening new windows, youths have found in the Aregbesola era a new vista of opportunities in technology, agri-business, volunteer services and functional education with which they can face the future. Gradually therefore, the Osun youth has come to the realization that rather than wait for the government, he only needs to tap the opportunities provided to be an active participant in the emerging egalitarian society.

    In these past six years, the six-point action plan -banishing hunger, unemployment, poverty, functional education, healthy living, promotion of communal peace- have combined to achieve one thing which is George Washington’s “aggregate happiness of the society which is best promoted by the practice of a virtuous policy.” That, Washington had said, “ought to be the end of all governments.”

    • Okanlawon is Director, Bureau of Communication and Strategy, Office of the Governor, Osun State.

  • Getting out of economic recession (2)

    The following proposals are pertinent and likely to help in making the programme successful: •Use existing villages as nuclei for the agricultural settlements. •Provide low-cost accommodation using local materials as much as possible. •Provide basic infrastructure & facilities (boreholes, electric generators, etc). •Offer attractive wages, allowances & other incentives. •Provide farmland for the participants. •Recruit and mobilise suitable experts, resource persons and facilitators. •Give suitable mobilisation, orientation, education, training & sensitisation to prospective participants. •Promote the development of various branches of agriculture i.e crop farming, poultry, fishery, piggery, ranches for cattle, goats and sheep, etc. •Recruit, mobilise and assist blacksmiths for large-scale production of local farm tools i.e cutlasses, hoes, etc. •Encourage and popularise the use of local farm tools.

    •Promote the turning of WASTE to WEALTH in the programme by •Encouraging sourcing of scrap metals, iron rods, old tyres (for cutlass,/ knife handles), etc for sale to the blacksmiths; •Setting up refuse dumps for organic waste to be turned to manure for use on the farms thereby reducing the need to buy fertilizer. •Provide for the spiritual, health, educational, recreational and other needs of those to be involved in the programme. •Provide storage facilities. •Encourage and facilitate the establishment and growth of smallscale agro-allied industries in each agricultural settlement. •Let the scheme take priority over the urban-centre housing scheme which usually favours middle and high-income classes almost to the exclusion of the masses which the proposed programme should target. •Engage graduates of tertiary institutions with relevant specialisations. •Post NYSC members to the agricultural settlements. •If need be, declare a state of emergency for the programme or make it a crash programme as it is aimed at arresting hunger and insecurity! •Take concrete steps to IMPROVE the public transport system directly or through private transporters.

    Very often there is traffic congestion which is commonly called “Go slow”, with attendant stress, loss of many man-hours, etc. A careful look at the cars on the roads then usually shows that most of them have only 2 or 1 person in each 5-seater car. This means that only about half of the number of cars are required to convey the commuters on the road at the particular time. Barring the “BIG” people, most commuters would like to save themselves the strain, stress and cost of putting their cars on the road if they could EASILY get COMFORTABLE public transport. With fewer vehicles on the road there would be a lot of savings in terms of fuel, manhours, stress, depreciation (roads, vehicles, human bodies), etc. By that there would be higher standard of living with lower cost of living! It should be noted that the proposed programme is without prejudice to mechanised farming which is modern and has economies of scale.

    The proposal is predicated on, and informed by, the realities of the prevailing circumstances of the country and aimed at achieving desirable goals soonest. Emphasis is placed on THE NEED TO LOOK INWARD i.e. •Use what we have to get what we need •Realise that it is an illusion to expect technology transfer from other countries •Develop our own technology albeit gradually The realities include scarcity of foreign exchange to fund mechanized farming, lack of maintenance culture and mass unemployment with resultant adverse effects as stated earlier in this piece. The goals include the following: •Employment for the poor, hungry and angry masses •Decongestion of the cities and minimisation of insecurity •Achieving food sufficiency with prospects of having surplus for export •Raising the people’s taxable capacity, boosting government’s internally generated revenue (IGR) and promoting high environmental sanitation.

    •Reducing significantly the pressure on the infrastructures and facilities in the cities •Raising the people’s standard of living and lowering the cost of living generally Incontrovertibly, the proposed programme will have some problems; but a problem is not solved by running away from it. The proposed programme requires strong political will, sincerity of purpose, proper planning (as failing to plan is planning to fail), involvement of relevant professionals of high integrity, transparency and accountability. It also requires synergies among appropriate “MADO” i.e. Ministries, Agencies, Departments and Organisations (e.g. Ministries of Agriculture, Labour, Works-Housing-Power, and Finance). Religious bodies, Civil Servants, Teachers, Cooperative Societies, Big Companies, and individuals can be encouraged to key into the hunger-eradication aspect of the programme.

    Small plots of land may be provided for able and interested people in the cities to complement the food-production efforts of the agricultural settlements by planting food crops like maize, yam, vegetables (e.g bitter leaves) and fruits like pawpaw, banana and plantain. The tree-planting programme of government can accommodate mango trees, colanut trees, etc. Where land is not available, people may be sensitised to having VEGETABLE POTS just as they have FLOWER POTS! In particular, big religious organisations should be committedly involved in the programme with a view to drawing people close to God by reducing sinful crimes which mostly result from unemployment, poverty and hunger. They should be bothered that the prevalence of sinful crimes and insecurity in the society is an indication of failure on their part! Many religious bodies cater for the educational and health needs of their members by establishing schools and clinics or hospitals.

    In the same way, they should cater for the food needs of their members and even non-members. They can do this by having farms, vegetable gardens, fisheries, poultry, potable-water treatment plants, etc. After all, it is commonly said that a hungry man is an angry man; and when one is angry one cannot properly listen to the Word of God and behave well which is the primary aim of religion. In conclusion, government should re-order their priorities, take the driver’s seat in the vehicle for the proposed programme, do fool-proof planning and engage professionals/experts of proven integrity for efficiency and effectiveness of the implementation of the proposed programme. Nigeria can be made great! May God help us. •Concluded •Obisesan is a former Deputy General Manager (Finance & Administration) Federal Housing Authority, Festac Town, Lagos. 08023447370 and 08144305132 .

  • Agriculture financing and economy diversification

    THE Nigerian banking system plays the important role of promoting economic growth and development through the process of financial intermediation. One of the more recognised ways of creating jobs, reducing poverty and achieving economic growth and development is by the timely extension of credit to the to the agriculture sector through the activities of Deposit Money Banks (DMBs). The agriculture sector contributed 22.5 per cent to Nigeria’s overall gross domestic product (GDP) in the second quarter of 2016 and real agricultural GDP growth for the period was 4.53 per cent (year on year), per data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).

    This is higher than the headline GDP figure (-2.07 per cent) suggesting that recent interventions in the sector by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and DMBs are paying off. For example, DMB’s credit to the agricultural sector as a percentage of total loans has more than tripled to about 4.9 per cent today from below one per cent in 2009, based on data from the CBN. In recent years, the sum of over N1.7 trillion of seed funding, has been set aside under five CBN intervention programmes to stimulate development of various agricultural value chain segments from primary production to market access with multiplier effects that cannot be overemphasized.

    These programmes are meant to support small, medium and commercial/large scale agriculture. Some of these schemes include the Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme (N69 billion); Commercial Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme (N200 billion); the Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (N200 billion); and Small and Medium Enterprises Credit Guarantee Scheme (N200 billion). In addition to funds created by the CBN, the DMBs have also set up agriculture desks in their respective organisations signaling a renewed commitment to support and sustain the growth of the sector. Some of the successful CBN and DMB agricultural financing intervention schemes include the he Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme (CACS) under which tremendous progress has been recorded.

    For example, from inception in 2009 a sum of about N266.025 billion has been released to the economy through 20 participating banks funding about 347 projects. The analysis of the number of projects financed under CACS by value chain showed that out of the 347 CACSsponsored projects; production accounted for 57.06 per cent while processing accounted for 33.14 per cent distantly followed by marketing, storage and input supplies. A total number of 29,046 jobs were created which include 11,717 direct and 17,329 indirect jobs during the period under review while five out of the 310 private projects are owned and managed by women. Some banks have also been at the forefront of supporting agriculture financing and offering micro-loans to farmers.

    Union Bank of Nigeria (UBN) and United Bank for Africa (UBA) are examples of such lenders. Union Bank has over a sustained period of time, provided revolving micro credit to rural farmers as a means of driving investment in the agriculture sector while UBA in 2009, floated a private sector funding scheme of N50 billion to support agriculture and agro-processing industries in Nigeria. The projects are targeted at all segments of the agriculture chain, from small and medium scale farmers to large, industrial farming projects in poultry, fishery, crop cultivation, production, plantation, farm machinery, and hire services. Union Bank was recently named the “Best participating bank in Nigeria” – CBN Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme Fund (ACGSF) and “Best Commercial Agriculture Bank” – Nigeria Agriculture awards. The Greener Pastures Initiative is Union Bank’s flag ship agricultural initiative that provides support to small-holder farmers and cooperative’s, and focuses on harnessing the relationships built through the Bank’s long -standing Agribusiness department.

    UBA on its part was also honoured recently with an award as Nigeria’s biggest lender to agriculture by the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI). UBA’s Agriculture fund is part of the bank’s Food for the Nation program, and is aimed at improving food security, poverty alleviation, and providing a timely boost to Agriculture. UBA has sustained its commitment to the Agriculture sector by committing an average of seven per cent of its loan book to agriculture financing and was one of the two banks selected in 2010 to administer the N200 billion Agriculture Fund set up by the CBN because of the bank’s commitment to agricultural financing as well as its spread across the country.

    The UBA facility will be available to farmers at below single-digit interest rates through three credit products namely, the Agriculture Credit Support Scheme, Agriculture Credit Guarantee Scheme, and Food Security Support. Beneficiaries who must be practicing farmers and belong to farmer’s associations or co-operatives throughout the entire agriculture value chain can also avail themselves of facilities provided by the scheme through any of the over 750 business offices of UBA. Projects to be financed include rice, wheat, maize, millet, sorghum, cassava, yam, poultry – chicken and eggs, animal husbandry –cattle – as well as fish farming. Nigeria’s agricultural revolution has been reinvigorated and deposit money banks are well positioned to provide the financial support required to make Nigeria not just self-sufficient but to become a net exporter of processed food items. •This article, written on behalf of Bankers Committee, is one of the series focused on raising awareness around Nigerian banks’ commitments to agriculture financing and diversification of the economy.

  • Moving against land grabbers in Ogun

    An insurance executive in Lagos who sought to relocate to Ota, Ogun State and probably bring along foreign partners for a new firm was held back by reports of the violent activities of land speculators. He gathered that these land grabbers otherwise called Omo onile were a force to reckon with if you wanted to develop your legitimate property either for business or for residential purposes. He told me he had acquired the land and was ready to move to Ota but was scared that heavily armed rival gangs of these indigenous speculators would stall the project and frustrate his expatriate partners. Eventually he spiked the idea.

    Who lost? A superficial verdict would be that our man lost the opportunity to open new frontiers in business in Ogun. Really? The ultimate loser was the Ogun State government which had left the vandals unchecked. It lost the taxes that the projected insurance firm and its employees would have paid into its treasury; it also blew the chance to depopulate the labour market; it gave the impression Ogun was not habitable nor was it safe for investment, business and tourism, all massive revenue earners and employers of labour.

    But last week, good news came when Governor Ibikunle Amosun took a firm step to outlaw that perception of his state as the den of the criminal activities of the Omo onile. He signed the anti-land grabbing bill into law with quite stiff penalties for its infringement. Imprisonment for 25 years or death sentence awaits anyone found guilty of the offence of land robbery.

    The law prohibits “forcible entry and occupation of landed properties, violent and fraudulent conducts in relation to landed properties, armed robbery, kidnapping, cultism and allied matters incidental thereto…” According to the law, death sentence applies when a life or lives are lost in such forceful take-over of land. Kidnappers also risk life sentence.

    After signing the bill into law, Amosun said the state would not be a “comfort zone for criminals.” He had tough words for them. He declared: “We want to let people know that Ogun State would not be comfort zone for any criminal or so-called Omo onile (land grabbers). They have engaged in maiming, killing and lawlessness. But now the law will go after them. We are now having enabling law to prosecute and anybody that runs foul of this law of course will have himself or herself to blame… I want to believe that with the operation of this law, criminals will run away from the state.”

    The state Commissioner of Police Ahmed Iliyasu said at the signing of the law in Abeokuta: “This is a clarion call to all criminals, armed robbers, kidnappers, cultists and so on that there is no place for them in Ogun State. They should relocate because there is no room for them. We are ready to enforce the law.”

    The birthing of the new law taming the land grabbers has excited residents, investors and tourists with Ogun notably Ota as their destination. Ota in particular has been economically and developmentally been stagnant for decades due to the reign of terror put in place by the vandals called Omo onile. They sell and re-sell the same land many times over to a thousand and one persons. They encroach upon occupied property and break down perimeter fences to make way for new and exorbitant transactions. They exact outrageous levies when you start to develop your property. And during construction they move in again to demand even more killer sums. They form violent gangs that disturb the peace of the community. They maim and kill when resisted. In a word, they are a law unto themselves, forming parallel governments where they operate.

    Their existence has retarded the development of Ogun State. For a state contiguous to Lagos, Nigeria’s most populous boasting the largest economy, Ogun ought to be benefiting immensely from this proximity. But investors do not want to come in, fearing they would be grounded by the land robbers. They are apprehensive about their personal security and safety. They fear for their families and what might happen to the enormous capital they would be pumping into their planned undertakings.

    The economic weights of their businesses in Ogun would lead to the resurgence of the economy and the empowerment of the citizens. In turn, these would enlarge the purse of the government to enable it attain massive social and economic renaissance. This is what Ogun State needs in this era of economic recession. The activities of the Omo onile are particularly harmful to two of Amosun’s Five Cardinal Programmes, namely Increased Agricultural Production/Industrialization and Rural and Infrastructural Development/Employment Generation, respectively the third and fifth objectives. Pray, how do you achieve these strategic programmes when land, the major ingredient for the success of these ventures, is in the killer grasp of criminals?

    Those who want to heed Amosun’s call to move into the state to reside there or run their businesses are now assured that they have a government that would use the rule of law to shield them from murderous marauders. A good government is known by its ability to protect and secure its citizens as well as save them from the fear of those who would prey on them and their legitimately earned money. Indeed the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria states this unequivocally in the early lines Chapter 2 of the document. Providing “security and welfare of the people” is the “primary purpose of government,” according to the sacred scroll.

    The next step of the Amosun administration is to establish a task force statewide to patrol the inner communities and enforce the law. The presence of members of this task force will check the gathering of the land grabbers as they are wont to do when planning to molest the citizens. The government should also set up active helplines to reach when there is a violation of the new statute. That is how the neighbouring Lagos State is implementing its own anti-land gabbing law it promulgated in August this year.

     

    • Ojewale, a writer sent in this piece via bmrtbo@yahoo.com.

  • Aregbesola, six years on

    By tommorow November 26, we will commence the seventh year of  Rauf Adesoji Aregbesola’s epic contributions as governor of the State of Osun. Hardly any governor in the history of Nigeria has attracted controversy  as this personality known popularly as Ogbeni.

    At least not in the last 17 years that democracy resurfaced in Nigeria has any governor’s actions and perhaps even speeches been prone to such testy public discussions.

    And rightly so, because he, Aregbesola, did unique (or as he himself styled it, unusual) things that nobody dared to do before him, to the extent that not a few of his critics didn’t quite appreciate. Although most people who are beneficiaries of his programmes kept faith in what Aregbesola did and is capable of doing.

    Before he was sworn-in as governor on November 26, 2010, lawlessness and insecurity of life and property were existential concerns in Osun.

    It was in this atmosphere of near anarchy that he introduced his unusual programmes and rebranding of the state. All hell broke loose, and the opposition also ‘rebranded’ him – so-to-speak – as an anarchist!

    However, the ‘confusion’ that people, (especially his PDP opponents) who he defeated in the 2007 election accused him of introducing into governance, has become the catalyst for unprecedented transformation in the state of Osun today.

    What Osun is now, in contrast to what it had been all of 19 years before the advent of Aregbesola’s administration, is the difference that Aregbesola himself engineered.  And what the future will become based on what the present is, shall in effect be the historical perspective from which Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola would be holistically assessed.

    History will not only justify Aregbesola’s ideas and programmes,  it will vilify his critics. His mistakes will be acknowledged, but that will not diminish the quality and effect of his actions and service delivery.

    That is the context in which Ogbeni Aregbesola will be presented in the future that will tell the story of today. It would not matter that TRUTH flew out the window of today’s reality. We are currently living in a post TRUTH world – in a time of collapse before the new spiritual era.

    So, people like Ogbeni Aregbesola may not place rationally in the warped reality that untruth has created. That is the world in which PDP critics of Aregbesola,  and those who back them operate and exist.

    The simple way to recognise them is to listen to those critics in Osun who think that Aregbesola is the worst thing that ever happened to the state. They are the scoffers.

    The discussion however, is not about these traducers,  it is about the relevance and significance  of the Ogbeni Aregbesola’s appearance in the state of Osun’s history.

    As a journalist (a ‘historian in a hurry’), and a lawyer, I owe my profession a duty to be on the side of truth. And if the truth be told, Rauf Aregbesola is the best thing, politically, socially, economically, and in terms of security, that Osun has ever known in its 25 years as a state in Nigeria.

    You, dear readers, don’t have to believe me. To authenticate this assertion, you have to spend some time to investigate by coming to Osun to see things practically yourself and talk to people. That’s only when you will access the truth.

    Mankind is moving away from TRUTH. Lies or deceit or disinformation is the major news, because the negatively disposed make the headline news. That is why the enticing news you can read or hear or  watch about Aregbesola in Osun is negative, salacious and horribly untruthful ones about the man. It is the nature of our collapsing world.

    However, there are certain questions that should be answered; and we demand the right answers for them.

    If Aregbesola’s ideas and programmes were as horrible as the opposition would suggest, why would the British Parliament ask him to come explain how he was managing the school feeding programme?

    Why would the federal statistical record place primary school enrolment in Osun as the highest in Nigeria, if Aregbesola’s education policies were wrong?

    Why would the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics have confirmed that Osun is the best governed state in the country as it relates to human capital development index, poverty index, unemployment index and environmental cleanliness?

    Why would the Director, Central Bank of Nigeria, Osun defy protocol to give credit to Aregbesola’s policies that re-ignited economic activities in Osun like it had not been seen before?

    Why did acknowledgement come from a Police Chief that Osun is the best secured state in the country?

    These are just few questions that will lead you to a whole host of investigations that will produce results different from what Aregbesola’s critics had been propagating.

    What history will record of Aregbesola’s tenure will be totally different from the lies that make news headlines today.

    Aregbesola has significantly convinced the people of Osun the his revolutionary agenda for change is producing not just prosperity but a new Osun that can compete and excel in economic, social and human capital development that stand a modern state out of the crowd.

    We will be a part of that history when we give an account of APC Aregbesola-led government in 2018.

    The story is still unfolding…

     

    • Oyatomi is the  Director of Publicity, Research and Strategy of APC, State of Osun

  • On Federal Govt’s 500,000 jobs initiative

    A 2015 World Bank statistics indicates that 100 million Nigerians live in destitution while a recent data from the same body confirms Nigeria as one of the five poorest nations in the world. The nation’s high unemployment rate is partly responsible for this frightening statistics and heart-breaking rating. That our country is in deep-rooted unemployment web is further confirmed by the highlights of the Unemployment and Underemployment Watch for first quarter of 2015. According to the report, a total of 17.7 million people between ages 15 and 65 either unemployed or underemployed in the labour force in the first quarter of 2015. The report further asserts that the number of unemployed people (861,110 people) in the first quarter 2015 was more than the number of employed people within the same period (504,596 persons).

    Similarly, official figures from the National Bureau of Statistics puts unemployment figure at about 20% (about 30million), but this number still did not include about 40million other Nigerian youths captured in World Bank statistics in 2009. By implication, it means that if Nigeria’s population is 140 million, then 50% of Nigerians are unemployed, or worse still, at least 71% of Nigerian youths are unemployed. This is particularly disturbing and counterproductive because at least 70% of the population of this country are youths.

    Former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor and now Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, once revealed that while the Nigerian economy grew at the rate of seven percent for the past six years, unemployment has actually doubled at same period. He submitted that security crisis and internal uprising across the country were products of chronic poverty and mounting joblessness. So, unemployment has grown to become a monster with many faces. Many have become victims of drug addiction, rape cases, kidnapping and other such criminal vices, no thanks to unbearable unemployment situation.

    No doubt, the Federal Government is aware of the enormity of the unemployment challenge.  This, perhaps, is the reason for its much touted 500,000 employment initiative for unemployed graduates. It is a remunerated volunteering programme of a two-year period that engages graduates in their direct communities, where they will assist in improving the shortfalls in the education, health and agriculture sectors. They will own tablets that contain essential information concerning their precise engagements and other such crucial information. They are also to be provided teaching, instructional and consultative solutions in four major focus areas namely basic education, agriculture extension services, public health and community education (civic and adult education). They would also be trained in skills that could enable them exit after two years to reasonably feasible opportunities. They are to be paid a monthly stipend of N30, 000.

    After initial hiccups, recent reports have it that the first 200,000 beneficiaries of the scheme would commence work by December 1. According to a statement from the Office of the Vice President, where the project is domiciled, of the 200,000 first set, 150,000 would be engaged in teaching, 30,000 would work in the agricultural sector while 20,000 would serve in healthcare delivery. Altogether, the scheme plans to engage and train 500,000 young unemployed graduates.

    Though, in practical terms, the programme is yet to take off, major stakeholders such as the Nigeria Labour Congress, Nigeria Union of Teachers and Students bodies have lauded the initiative. Organized Labour particularly hailed the efforts on the premise that any scheme that could offer a massive amount of youths employment opportunity is worth commending. While reacting to the plan, President, Nigerian Union of Teachers, NUT, Michael Alogba-Olukoya, extolled the project as “a right step in the right direction’’.

    Critics of the initiative have, however, called for caution concerning its prospect. To them, it is rather laughable that the federal government is exploiting the unemployment situation in the country to further enslave young Nigerians. They wonder why a scheme that pays young Nigerian a miserly N30, 000 per month should be celebrated, considering our current harsh economic condition in which those with improved pay merely grapple to survive.  How productive could a young graduate with a monthly pay of N30, 000 actually be in an inflation ridden economy?

    To critics of the project, the meagre N30, 000 pay packages for beneficiaries might further compound the employment woes of young Nigerians as prospective employers could follow suit by offering them peanuts.  Besides, critics also wonder whether it is morally rational for the federal government to take up 500,000 Nigerian graduates for a job that has little or no future prospect, taking into consideration its two year duration.  This, to detractors of the scheme does not really add up.

    Another grouse of critics against the scheme is the rationality of government (public sector) directly employing people in a country where the recurrent expenditure is often well above 70% of the budget, especially when considered that many states can presently not even pay those in their employ and the federal government is talking about borrowing from foreign sources to fund the budget. In the 21st century, it is a free market module economy that creates jobs not governments.

    However, my take on the job scheme is that though it doesn’t really represents a resourceful and holistic approach to tackling the excruciating unemployment miseries in the country, it, nevertheless, would help in relieving some of its beneficiaries, albeit temporarily, the pains and frustrations of  redundancy. Equally, the skill that some of them would acquire through the various training programmes, as being proposed, could open more and better opportunities for them in life. On the argument that the private sector should take initiative for job creation, as true as this is, the way things presently stand in our nation, the private sector might not be able to rise up to do that in the next five years. It is a common knowledge that most private ventures in the country have been downsizing in the past few months.

    Having said this, however, the federal government truly needs to do more than the 500,000 jobs approach if we are really serious about curtailing chronic unemployment in the country.  It must come up with inventive strategies that would enhance the thriving and expansion of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) in the country. In an economy like ours, the growth and development of SMEs remain a major catalyst for economic resurgence and wealth creation.

    Also, all tiers of governments must give adequate attention to development of infrastructure. Weak infrastructure is inimical to job creation and economic growth. The government, especially, needs to do more in ensuring stable power supply. Small businesses will, no doubt, flourish with un-hindered power supply. Equally, multi-national firms that have closed down due to unstable power supply could come back if the power situation improves. This would not only bring up new jobs, but will certainly restore lost ones.

     

    • Ogunbiyi is of the Ministry of Information & strategy, Alausa, Ikeja, Lagos.

  • Ugwuanyi and BugdIT report

    The recent report released by BudgIT, a data-simplifying civic organization, which listed Enugu, Lagos and Rivers as the only three states out of the 36 states of the federation that can fulfill obligations to their workers, was not only a remarkable feat for Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State but also a demonstration of his managerial instinct to navigate the state through the current economic crunch.

    The verdict, which is widely adjudged as objective based on facts and figures, flaunts the commitment of the governor to advance good governance and deliver on his campaign promises to the people of the state despite the current economic recession.

    It has also showcased the governor’s ethos in prudent management of the state’s lean resources for the well-being of the people through accountability, transparency, financial discipline and application of the best economic practices that would engender sustainable growth and development.

    Enugu State is third from the bottom of the federal allocation chart. It is also predominantly a civil service state with high expectations from the people borne out of the long held belief in the expansion of the state’s economic potentials.

    It would be recalled that Ugwuanyi in his inaugural address promised to govern by example, to lead a lean government to free up resources and channel them to the real development issues, which include the welfare of the workers of the state. He had assured the people that every kobo of the state “will be utilized transparently and in a way that adds value to your lives”.

    A critical review of the activities of the administration shows that the governor had made good his promise to lead the state on the path of administrative ingenuity and prudent management of its lean resources as a catalyst for the entrenchment of good governance and socio-economic development.

    It is pertinent to note also that among the three states listed by BudgIT that are still able to meet their recurrent needs, Enugu is the least in terms of federal allocation and Internally Generated Revenue (IGR).

    As a civil service state, Enugu is not economically viable like Lagos and Rivers states which generate huge resources from commercial activities; still it was able to make the list alongside the two economic giant states – a feat, which many have described as outstanding.

    It is on record, that while Ugwuanyi’s administration pays workers’ salaries regularly, it has also embarked on numerous massive infrastructural development of the state with some road projects completed for inauguration in December.

    The governor in a bid to alleviate the pains motorists pass through while plying some federal government roads in the state, recently embarked on the quality rehabilitation of the failed sections of the Oji River- Ugwuoba- Anambra State border (by old road) and 9th Mile – Nsukka – Benue State border, despite the nation’s financial drought and huge sum of money the federal government is owing the state on past rehabilitated roads. In the words of the governor, “this administration cannot sit down and watch road users suffer this much on the roads, hence the need for the rehabilitation”. The road intervention, which has the backing of the State Executive Council, has equally given credence to the governor’s vision to “deploy government services to create fair and equal opportunity for every willing citizen to make a living and create wealth, educate our children, and enjoy life in a peaceful and secure environment”.

    On the vision to take development to the rural areas as part of the grassroots development initiatives to create new urban centres, boost socio-economic activities, create employment opportunities and reduce the pressure on Enugu metropolis, Ugwuanyi’s administration only recently flagged off 35 development projects spread across the 17 Local Government Areas of the state. All these capital projects and other remarkable feats in various strata of the economy are ongoing while the state is still able to fulfill obligations to its workers.

    Reacting to the BudgIT’s report, the state chapters of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) were the first to applaud Ugwuanyi for his vision, administrative ingenuity and sheer dexterity in prudent management of the state’s lean resources.

    In a statement jointly signed by the state Chairman and Secretary of the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC), Comrade Igbokwe Chukwuma Igbokwe and Comrade Ben Asogwa, the workers said that “it was an exceptional display of quality leadership for the governor to pay salaries regularly and still execute capital projects, despite the current economic crisis in the country”.

    The labour leaders added that “for Enugu to be listed alongside Lagos and Rivers as the only states in the federation still able to meet their recurrent needs, shows that Governor Ugwuanyi is a visionary leader who is committed to the wellbeing of the people”.

    On his part, the state chairman of the PDP, Hon. Augustine Nnamani, said that the party was not surprised by the BudgIT’s report, stressing that “Ugwuanyi had maintained a culture of financial discipline that has helped his administration to save cost and ensure that its lean resources were adequately utilized for priority issues that would add value to the lives of the people of the state”.

    The party therefore, urged the governor to remain focused and steadfast in his vision to advance good governance and deliver on his campaign promises to the people of the state in line with the PDP manifesto.

    Also commenting on the BudgIt’s report, the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) during a solidarity rally in commemoration of the 67th anniversary of the slaying of 21 workers agitating for better working conditions at the Iva Valley Coal Mine, in Enugu, paid glowing tributes to Ugwuanyi for prioritizing the welfare of workers in Enugu State and ensuring that their wages are paid regularly.

    Describing him as the man with the magic wand, the NLC’s head of Industrial Relations and Organizing Department, Comrade Emmanuel Ugboajah, who represented the body’s national president, noted that the solid accolades Enugu State received as one of three states that is regular in taking care of basic responsibilities of its workers was because the governor was committed to prudent management of resources and welfare of the workers, urging him to share same with his colleagues.

    Ugwuanyi who had reassured the people of his resolve to ensure even development of the state, attributed the feat his administration has recorded so far to the grace of God and prudent management of the state’s lean resources.

    From all indications, it is obvious that Ugwuanyi is at his peak in providing the dividends of democracy for the people Enugu State. Enugu state is truly in the hands of God.

     

    • Amoke writes from Enugu.

  • America’s Electoral College and Democracy

    “…that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” – Abraham Lincoln’s memorable Gettysburg’s Address of November 19, 1863.

    Few textual critics, if any, can improve on Abbey Lincoln’s concise definition of democracy as “government of the people, by the people, for the people”. In what sounds like a derivative of that classic definition, democracy may be said to be a system of government by the majority of eligible voters of a state, typically through elected representatives; a rule by the majority; a government in which the supreme power is vested in the (majority) of the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held elections.

    The political structure in the United States of America, where the emergence of the President and Vice-President depends on a so-called Electoral College, established by Article Two of the United States Constitution (1787), whereby the voice of the majority (popular vote) is bridled by a political artifice called electoral college vote is the very antithesis of “government of the people, by the people, for the people” and can, therefore, not be dignified with the name of democracy.

    Each state appoints a number of electors equal to the number of Senators (i.e. one hundred in all) and of Representatives (i.e. four hundred and thirty-five in all) to which the states may be entitled in the Congress, in addition to three electors from the District of Columbia and one elector each from the states of Maine and Nebraska. Those figures yield a total of 540 electors. Any presidential contender who wins at least 50 per cent, or 270 thereof,  becomes President of the United States, even if majority of the electorate (popular vote) prefers his/her opponent with the popular vote!

    Why, one may wish to know, is there any need for “Election Day” (always announced with fanfare) or popular election such as happened on November 8, when the popular vote counts for nothing in the final analysis? For example, if, for the sake of argument, the two major presidential candidates polled 269 Electoral Votes apiece, the 435-strong House of Representatives would be asked to decide which of the two candidates becomes President of America, the Popular Vote notwithstanding! In the recent presidential election in the US, the non-partisan Cool Political Report had candidate Hillary Clinton at 62,825,754 popular votes in contradistinction to candidate Donald Trump’s 61,486,735 (or 47.9 percent to 46.9 per cent, respectively. Another 6-9 million votes were cast for third-party candidates, including Libertarian Gary Johnson, Green Jill Stein and independent David Evan McMullin. That translates to 53.1 per cent of voters casting their ballots for candidates other than Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by more than one million votes, but lost the Electoral College Vote (she polled 232) to Trump (who allegedly won 290).

    The 2016 presidential election in America made Trump the fourth President to lose the popular vote but win his spurs against his opponent. In 1876, Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, with 4,036,298 popular votes, won 185 Electoral College votes. His opponent, Democrat Samuel J. Tilden, won the popular vote with 4,300,590 votes, but won only 184 Electoral College votes. Hayes was elected President. In 1888, Benjamin Harrison, with 5,439,853 popular votes, won 233 Electoral College votes. His main opponent, Democrat Grover Cleveland, won the popular vote with 5,540,309 votes, but won only 168 Electoral College Vote. Harrison was elected President. In 2000, Republican George W. Bush garnered only 50,456,062, and his main opponent, Democrat Al Gore, got 50,996,582 popular votes. Even so, Bush became President as he polled 271 Electoral College votes to Al Gore’s 266. Usually and almost ineluctably, candidates that lose the popular vote but become Presidents via that load of hocus pocus called “Electoral College Vote” turn out to be particularly unsuccessful and unpopular Presidents! It is strange that all the beneficiaries of the Electoral College Vote peculation have been Republicans!

    The Electoral College is, essentially, a vestigial structure—a relic of a bygone era in which the founding fathers specifically fulminated against a nationwide vote of the American people to choose their next President. Instead, the draftsmen of the constitution, (particularly Delegates Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts and George Mason, the man, of Virginia) gave a small, lucky group of people called the “electors” the power to make that choice, arguing that “the people (popular vote) haven’t the requisite capacity to judge the respective pretensions of the candidates.”

     Such was the origin of the Electoral College, which makes the election of the Chief Executive of America a despicable simulacrum of democracy. The outcome of a presidential election in the US is really just settled in a few so-called swing states. Today, only 12 of the 50 states in the US control about 53% of the votes in the Electoral College.

    On the basis of the odious political contrivance called Electoral College Vote, an undisguised enemy of democracy, (and hoping there was no “malicious software” in the election machines), Donald John Trump has been elected President-elect of the US. He had consciously made far-reaching electoral promises: he will build a wall to separate the US from Mexico and will make the latter to pay for the cost of the wall; he will transfer the Israeli capital from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem; he will defeat ISIS; he will repatriate all undocumented immigrants; he will stop all Moslems from entering the US; he will resile from the multilateral Climate Change (Paris) Agreement; he will contract out of the NATO confraternity; he will stop the carnage on US streets; he will appoint a Special Prosecutor to prosecute, and put, Hillary Clinton in jail…

    Whether or not he becomes popular or unpopular during his first four years in office, or remains President after the November 2020 presidential election, or, indeed, will be impeached as predicted by the same polyhistor and Presidential Historian, Prof. Allan Lichtman, who predicted his victory in the 2016 election, will depend, largely, on the extent to which he fulfils, and the manner in which he executes, his 2016 electoral promises. One hopes that the American electorate will hold him to account!

     

    • Akiri, an attorney writes from Lagos.

  • Yoruba’s precarious future in Nigeria

    To say that the Yorùbá have a precarious future in the national entity called Nigeria is not to say anything that uniquely applies to the Yorùbá alone. Almost all the major ethnic groups have one reason or the other to exercise legitimate fears about their future existence in Nigeria. What is however unique about the assertion is that each nationality would have to find its own unique means, usually internal to its cultural dynamism, to deal with the problem of nation-building and the national project in Nigeria. What is called the Nigerian national project is the attempt by any plural state to deal with the multitude of centrifugal forces that often threaten to overwhelm the objective of nation building. In Nigeria, these forces come in the form of religious fundamentalism and ethnic divisiveness which consistently defeat the centripetal objective of building a civic nationalism that will, all things being equal, give birth to a truly Nigerian nation. In other words, the nation building effort in Nigeria has only a chance to work if the Nigerian government has all the supports and loyalties it requires.

    There is however a dimension of political economy to all ethnic maneuvering and agitations within the Nigerian national space. Relationship in the Nigerian space is defined around the allocation of scarce national resources, especially the oil revenue. Within Nigeria’s lopsided political system, Nigeria’s oil resources provide one singular reason for the jostling for the status of the president amongst the various politically heavy ethnic nations. The implication of this is that the status quo of a unitary “federalism” provides enough justification not to reform the system. But it is exactly the reform of the Nigeria “federal” system that the Yorùbá have dedicated themselves to for far too long. One aspect of Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s national legacy is built around an ardent advocacy for restructuring Nigeria’s constitutional status to reflect a truly federal framework. Federalism operates on the understanding of the parity of autonomy between the federal and the state or regional governments. It was as if Awolowo knew the enormous structural and political impediments that are arrayed against the Yorùbá’s creative deployment of their heritage and capacities within a unitary national space.

    Outside of a truly federal system, everything else is a dangerous political game founded on ethnic relevance. Mario Vargas Llosa, the Peruvian writer, understands the essence of this game: “Real politics…has little to do with ideas, values, and imagination…and everything to do with manoeuvres, intrigues, plots, paranoia, betrayals, a great deal of calculation, no little cynicism, and every kind of con game.” Unfortunately, even Awolowo was equally caught within the snare of this real politics which he understood very clearly, and which most of his books and ideas were meant to anticipate and undermine. That underlying dynamics of Nigeria’s politics pitted him against his erstwhile associate, Chief Ladoke Akintola. Both are Yorùbá, and that tragic drama between them constitutes one of the high points of Nigerian political history. It is as if Nigeria itself is so rigged to make a terrible example of the Yorùbá nation. Those considered to be in good standing for the Yorùbá leadership seems already compromised by real politics. We are all witnesses to the politics of annulment that turned MKO Abiola’s political victory into tragedy that is still all too fresh. Chief Ernest Shonekan propped, ever so briefly, a lacklustre government, and then Chief Olusegun Obasanjo surfaced. Even Obasanjo’s energetic presence was compromised by the powerful rumour of a northern political endorsement which undermines whatsoever lasting restructure Nigeria could have achieved.

    The Yorùbá have ventured boldly into the boiling cauldron of the national real politics, and on each occasion, have been burnt. It seems therefore a very wise move that rather than continuing with a rigged system, a conference of all nationalities becomes the next best thing to rescue a true federal system from being swallowed within the depth of realpolitik. The agitation for the Sovereign National Conference (SNC) has been as vociferous as the Yorùbá have made it. From the MKO Abiola’s June 12 saga through the Abacha dictatorship, there was a gradual convergence of progressives, from NADECO to the Afenifere. At the centre of that progressive politics is Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, another Yorùbá. But now, within the very sure unfolding of Nigeria’s realpolitik, the present political travails of Tinubu contrasts with his heroic personality some few months ago before the election of President Buhari.

    What does the profile of Asiwaju Tinubu imply for a Yorùbá project of self-determination in Nigeria? There is no doubt that Asiwaju Tinubu is phenomenal. You may not like his politics but, give it to him, to design and implement the strategy that unseated a sit-in government as witnessed in 2015 is simply ingenious and unparalleled. The heroism of the pro-democracy days coupled with recent political struggles to put in place a progressive party coalition that brought in the Buhari administration, together gives him a significant and formidable presence in Nigerian politics. In fact, Tinubu’s political charisma envelopes the South-west robustly in a manner that holds promises for the Yorùbá agenda. However, the very name “Tinubu” throws up different and often contradictory political vibes. I am not sure even his supposed influence in the Southwest is overwhelming, just like Awo’s never did – a testament to the republican credentials of the Yoruba.

    A credible future for the Yorùbá cannot, as a matter of course, be built around a single individual or even a single issue for that matter. The essence of the Yorùbá political advocacy has been tied around the significance of the sovereign national conference. But that issue faces two serious snags. The first is the growing perception that the SNC is a camouflage for a hidden Yorùbá secession project. The second is the determination of the federal government to preserve Nigeria as is. Nigeria’s has become a “no-go area closed to national discourse. This is one of the things that make the national question intractable in Nigeria. We want to achieve national integration yet we are unwilling to enter into an open discourse about it. We seal up the very issue that could serve as the opportunity for a robust national conversation. At the heart of the national question in Nigeria is whether or not the union is a viable one; whether we all want to stay together, and if so how. But if, according to the government, Nigeria’s unity is non-negotiable, then the Yorùbá cannot continue barking up the futile tree. Thus, after two doomed national conferences, it seems it is now time for the Yorùbá to change the game plan, except if there is a chance opportunity to deploy force with too many inherent risks it portent.

    The Yorùbá status in Nigeria is a political issue but its resolution must necessarily go beyond politics. We are all familiar with the political travails of Awolowo, Akintola, Abola and the unfolding troubles of Tinubu. A more significant effort would draw on a pan-Yorùbá spirit to reach far and wide into every aspect of Yorùbá professional endeavour to develop a credible matrix around which the Yorùbá future can be tabled and discoursed. Of course, the matrix would feature such Yorùbá heavyweights like Tinubu and Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, as well as all other Yorùbá elders and leaders of thought. And OBJ really might wish to take this as one of his last patriotic duties given the immense social capital that his newfound non-partisan stance has yielded. It will also feature the full spectrum of the Yorùbá elite across Nigeria. Empowering the Yorùbá people in the South-west ought to be a sufficiently pan-Yorùbá platform around which the Obas, Southwest governors, Yorùbá thought leaders, Yorùbá social and economic elites would do well to coalesce.

    At the end of the day, when posterity is evaluating today’s events, what would matter for the Yorùbá would not be how each Yorùbá leader has survived and achieved political fame. Rather, what would matter is how each generation of Yorùbá leaders deployed their endowments to the furtherance of an agenda that unashamedly led to the empowering of the Yorùbá agenda in Nigeria.

     

    • Dr Olaopa, is Executive Vice-Chairman, Ibadan School of Government.