The Nation Newspaper

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  • Fuel and the death of Labour

    Let’s face up to it: the labour movement in Nigeria is on life support. Its potential to exert pressure towards influencing governance processes has been demystified, and it may require wholesale reinvention to regain the historical stature.

    The movement’s undoing was its internal contradiction. It was touted as an ‘organised labour movement,’ but had carried on for some time now in sheer disorganisation propelled by irreconcilable factions. At the threshing floor, last week, the movement found an undertaker in the Muhammadu Buhari administration, which seized on its dysfunction to subdue a headstrong faction of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), while holding a pliant faction of the congress and other labour centres in check. Eventually, the headstrong faction bit the dust in an ill-advised venture to call out the public in rage against the recent increase of the pump price of petrol to N145 per litre. But the entire labour movement was no less the loser: its legendary solidarity and defining ideology – ‘an injury to one is an injury to all’ – was fatally done in. Now, each labour centre is for itself and solely bears the burden of its chosen path. As they say, it is every man for himself and God for us all!

    It wasn’t that the fall of labour was unforeseen. The movement had it coming since the NLC split up in March 2015, following a shameful inability to manage an internal election into its leadership. In consequence, the Ayuba Wabba squad led some affiliate unions of the congress away in one direction, while the Joe Ajaero camp headed off with other affiliate unions in another direction. The two factions have ever since dug down in their trenches and have refused to be reconciled. As a result, labour is presently a house divided, and hardly presents a common front on any single issue.

    With the universal effect of the new fuel price on all workers and other Nigerians, one would expect that labour centres would for once attain to a common cause in unity of purpose. Well, they only almost did. The Wabba-led faction of the NLC and the Trade Union Congress (TUC), along with their civil society allies, served the government an ultimatum to back down on the new price or face public mass actions that they planned to call. For its part, the Ajaero faction of the NLC did not join the Wabba-TUC initiative, but rather issued a separate ultimatum – literally to the same effect. Oil industry unions, including the Nigeria Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers (NUPENG) and Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN), however voiced qualified support for the price hike.

    Only that, even with the semblance of a consensus, this was one issue on which labour leaders grossly misjudged the public mood. If they had hoped to re-enact the crippling mass protests against fuel price increase that were staged in 2012 under the former Goodluck Jonathan administration, they apparently overlooked the fact that the labour movement now lacks the kind of cohesion it had in 2012, and that the context of the price increase by the present administration differed in a large measure from what obtained in 2012.

    And really, you could say the latest call to mass actions was presumptuous. When labour leaders asked Nigerians to make ready for a drawn-out strike against the government by stockpiling food and other essential provisions, they apparently didn’t consider that a majority of citizens were having enough challenge affording provisions barely enough to get by for just one day at a time. This is particularly so, with unpaid salary arrears to workers in many sectors, about which the labour leadership hasn’t done much to win them some succour. Also, there are unprecedented levels of inflation in the economy at the moment that severely constrain the average citizen’s purchasing power and, in effect, the ability to stockpile provisions. Besides, many Nigerians had been so roughened up by recent shortages in fuel supply at petrol stations across the country that they would readily swallow the bitter pill of a higher price to get steady supply at the pumps. And then, perhaps most significantly, not a few citizens have come to terms with the reality that payment of trillions of naira by government in subsidy to fuel marketers was simply unsustainable: it was a corruption ridden scheme that served only a few at the expense of many.

    And so, the call to mass actions didn’t resonate with the public, even though the warriors in labour did not appear to have realised this. The government, of course, seized the moment to persuade some of the labour centres against the threatened strike and it succeeded. On the eve of the expiration of their deadline, the TUC and the Ajaero faction of the NLC dumped all plans for a strike and settled for continuing dialogue with the government, which, apparently for good effect, threw in a legal weapon by way of a restraining order against labour from the National Industrial Court (NIC). But the Wabba camp chose a different tack: it stormed out of the meeting with government and defied the NIC order to stay its course on the threatened strike. Only that in doing this, it ended up tipping the labour factor over the precipice. For instance, the talk by government of further negotiations with the labour unions and other interest groups makes a good sound bite; though I dare say that labour, as a pressure movement, has lost its clout and can only hope now in the moral conscience of the Muhammadu Buhari administration for a fair deal. We really must refrain from overstating things here, but I think it should give freedom-loving Nigerians cause for worry that what seems left of the labour movement in the near future are no more than pulsating nodes of a supine bulldog securely leashed by the government.

    Most Nigerians have accepted the latest increase in the pump price of petrol as an inevitable, if painful policy decision by the government. Still, it would seem that labour missed an opportunity to break down its petty barriers and coalesce, to correctly represent the interest of citizens to the government. Negotiating palliatives with government isn’t the most important task for labour leadership in the circumstance. There are many questions with the fuel price policy as presently formulated, and labour could help in holding the government to thinking through.

    For instance, the perennial shortage in fuel supply was linked to the fact that independent marketers left importation of refined fuel to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) because they could not source forex at the official rate. The government said the new fuel price was less about subsidy removal, and more a function of the prevailing rate of forex at the parallel market. The new pricing template is thus in the expectation that independent marketers would source foreign exchange from parallel sources to complement fuel importation by the NNPC. One question to ask, though, is where the parallel market would get its supply of forex to meet expectedly huge demands by independent fuel marketers. And then, would marketers’ recourse to the parallel market not worsen the scarcity of forex and further inflate the rates at that source? In such event, what happens if the marketers find the new price template unattractive and yet decline to engage infuel importation? Would we not be back to inadequate supply, and would that not compel further increases by government in pump price ad infinitum?

    Questions, and indeed many more questions. Labour would be much help to the citizenry by engaging the government to think through. But it needs cohesion and unity of purpose to do this.

  • We cannot be free until they are free

    The name Sir Henry Urmston Willink (1894-1973) does not ring a bell in the modern day Nigeria. It was not so about 59 years ago.

    Sir Willink was a British politician and public servant. He rose to be British Minister of Health from 1943-1945. He later became Vice-Chancellor University of Cambridge between 1953 and 1955. His papers are held till today at the Churchill College Cambridge.

    On September 2,1957,Sir Abubakar TafawaBalewa(1912-1966) deputy leader of the NPC and Federal Minister of Transport was appointed Nigeria’s First Prime Minister by the then second Governor General of Nigeria, Sir James Wilson Robertson(1899-1983) who served from June 15 1955 to November 16 1960.

    On September 26 1957 the British government appointed Willink to chair a commission to inquire into the fears of Nigerian minorities and means of allaying them. The commissioners arrived in Lagos on November 23, 1957 and between that date and April 12, 1958 they held public sittings and had private meetings and discussions in each region, in Lagos and in the Southern Cameroons.  They returned to London on April 12, 1958.

    In its report published on July 30, 1958, the Commission stated that although real fears existed in every region, it was satisfied that setting new states would create problems as great as those they sought to eliminate.” In every region, the fears expressed were of a government based on a tribal, or in the North a religious, majority. Rightly or wrongly, it was feared that the regional governments, secure in their majority, would not be ready to respond to criticisms or to meet the wishes of the minorities”.

    Other members of the commission were Gordon Hadow, Phillip Mason, J.B. Shearer while K. J. Hilton served as the secretary. The commission published 108 pages for its conclusions and recommendations.

    The Willink recommended as follows: “We were impressed in both the Western and Eastern Regions, with the special position of the people, mainly Ijaw, in the swampy country along the coast between Opobo and the mouth of the Benin Rivers. We were confronted, first, with their own almost universal view that their difficulties were not understood at headquarters in the interior, where those responsible thought of the problems in quite different forms from those they assumed in those riverine areas; secondly, with the widespread desire of the Ijaws on either side of the main stream of the Niger to be united. We cannot recommend political arrangements which would unite in one political unit the whole body of Ijaws; we do however consider that their belief that their problems are not understood could be largely met without the creations of a separate state which have rejected for the reasons mentioned elsewhere. 27- This is a matter which requires a special effort and the co-operation of the Federal, Eastern and Western Government; it does not concern one region only. Not only because the area involves two regions, but because it is poor, backward and neglected, is the whole of Nigeria concerned. We suggest that there should a Federal Board appointed to consider the problems of the area of the Niger Delta. In this we would include the Rivers Province without Aboada or Port Harcourt and would add the Western Ijaw Division…”.

    “We do not contemplate that the Board should carry out the works which it recommends; this would be left to the Regional Government(except in the case of exclusively Federal schemes) and the annual report of the Board would include a report on actual progress. We consider that this arrangement should be temporary and it should be the object of the Board to conclude its work within ten or twelve years when provision for development had gone far enough to make it possible for this arrangement to be abandoned….Our proposal would provide some financial inducement to the Regional Government, but its sole ultimate sanction is the working of the domestic machine and the value of votes; it is more likely to be successful if there is such a balance in the Federal House of Representatives that every seat is of importance. The declaration of the Ijaw country as a Special Area would direct public attention to a neglected tract and give the Ijaws an opportunity of putting forward plans of their own for improvement. It would be difficult for either Government to justify to the electorate either a blank refusal to accept a plan recommend by the Board or a failure to implement an accepted plan; in this, as in all our recommendations, we assume a desire to continue with democratic institutions; it is on this assumption that all the steps leading to independence are based.”

    These were part of the suggestion by Willink commission.

    It should be noted that the first discovery of oil in Nigeria in-bloc OML 29 onshore at Oloibiri in Ogbia Local government of the present Bayelsa State was made on January 15, 1956 and production did not start until 1958. I am not sure Sir Willink was aware of the discovery of oil before making the suggestion.

    The 1963 constitution married the suggestion of Sir Willink.  In section 159 of that constitution “(1) there shall be a board for the Niger Delta which shall be styled the Niger Delta Development Board… The Board shall be responsible for advising the Government of the Federation and the Governments of Eastern Nigeria and Mid-Western Nigeria with respect to the physical development of the Niger Delta…” No region in Nigeria has so far been designated as “special areas” except the Niger Delta and no region also has suffered environmental calamity as Niger Delta now with no land and no water with heavy military presence.

    It was the spirit of Willink report that gave birth to Decree 22 of 1992 which led to the creation of Oil Minerals Producing Commission (OMPADEC). Same to NDDC. Same to the Amnesty programme. Contrary to recommendations of Sir Willink, states have been created in the region as well as local governments yet the problem persists. So when you read about oil fields been bombed in Niger Delta and ugly incidents, one is bound to ask, ‘what do these people really want?’ We need to go beyond asking such a question. There seems to be a disconnect between them and us. We don’t seem to understand them and they don’t understand us. At times they don’t understand themselves. The situation in the region is much more complex than imagined.

    One of their leaders Major Isaac Jasper Adaka Boro (1938-1968) while being sentenced to death by hanging for fighting the cause of Niger Delta as the leader of the Niger Delta Volunteer Force by Justice Phil Ebosie in Port Harcourt on March 27 1966 under the regime of General Thomas Johnson Umanakwe Aguiyi Ironsi(1924-1966) said his people “had long sought to separate not because they loved power but because their conditions were peculiar and the authorities did not understand our problems. There is nothing wrong with Nigeria. What is wrong with us is the total lack of mercy in our activities”.

    To the people of Niger Delta, I plead that violence has never solved and will never solve any problem.

    I have visited the Niger Delta area several times and with billions of naira poured into that region by the central, states and local governments and oil companies also for developments, it is still the same old story-misery, frustration, poverty, neglect, militancy, etc.

    A leadership that emerged from there recently, failed to address the chronic problems of the region and made worse their plight by distributing massive wealth to just few who eventually lost focus. Pity.

    In spite of that, the central government cannot give up on Niger Delta which at present provides most of Nigeria’s wealth, just like the government cannot give up on other parts of the country too including the north east region that is completely devastated today as a result of religious insurgency. In the words of James Baldwin (1924-1987), the black American novelist in his essay titled, MY DUNGEON SHOOK,” We cannot be free until they are free”.

     

    Teniola, a former director at the presidency, resides in Lagos.

     

  • Between 2012 and 2016

    Between 2012 and 2016

    So many activists, celebrities and politicians who protested against Jonathan’s deregulation bid in 2012 and have now gone silent in the face of the new measures, have been dismissed as hypocrites by some opposition voices.

    It is amusing watching some of them labouring to justify their new stance. Some say they now back deregulation because they trust Buhari, others say the country was awash with petrodollars and could afford to pay for subsidies.

    On the face of it the volte face appears hypocritical. But think of it this way: only a fool or egotist would not change his mind on a matter when confronted with superior arguments. Rigidity on an issue even when the cold facts are staring you in the face is not a virtue.

    Of course, there’s also the political dimension to the two episodes. Jonathan handed the opposition something to beat him over the head with and they did so with gusto – hurting his government and image.

    Now the PDP-led opposition has the opportunity to serve the now APC rulers a dose of their own medicine. But what do they do? They are whining in social media; waiting for the El-Rufais, Shehu Sanis and Femi Falanas of this world to lead the charge.

    This model of doing opposition business would only guarantee yesterday’s men a long stint far away from the corridors of power.

  • Kachikwu: Of style and crisis management

    “You can’t control the fact that people will annoy you, what you can control is your reaction” – Buddha

    These are trying times for Nigeria and Nigerians. The times are even more trying for the government of President Muhammadu Buhari. Juxtaposed against the swagger that characterized the boisterous presidential campaign of the President’s All Progressive Congress party (APC), many will be wondering at the turn of events. The swagger is gone. All is now sober. For once, the arrogant posturing of some of his close allies has started to give way to sombre reality. If the contrary had been the case, one would have lost hope in the Nigeria project. As of today, his government is missing out miserably on some of the most fundamental metrics of his campaign notably, the price of fuel and the value of the naira.

    There is a consolation though. The fact is that these performance deficits do not necessarily stem from palpable inaction by the government.  Falling oil prices, poor revenues, sabotage of oil installations and renewed insurgency in various parts of the country have contrived to pressure the government far beyond what had been anticipated.

    Expectedly, Nigerians are angry, very angry indeed. That anger rose to flammable levels last Monday when Minister of State, Dr. Ibe Emmanuel kachikwu heeded the summons by the House of Representatives. His mission was to answer questions on the recent deregulation of fuel prices, an action that ought to have been taken a long time ago, if successive administrations had mustered the political will to do the needful.

    Like labour that had flown into a rage over the deregulation, some members of the House of Representatives came dangerously close to throwing decorum to the winds when they insisted that the minister, who was there specifically to answer their summons, literally stood him up, insisting that he should not be allowed in. The National Assembly does not have a reputation for showing such disrespect to ministers though one cannot forget in a hurry how the same House of Representatives had once shown utter disrespect to former minister of finance, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala.

    As we ponder the events of the past few weeks, it makes sense not to lose sight of some, or at least one, of the positive revelations of the fuel conundrum. It has to with the crisis management dexterity of Ibe Kachikwu. Not everyone, no matter how endowed, can absorb the barrage of criticisms from and, at times, outright sabotage by the various interest groups that sought to score political points by the crisis. But Kachikwu who until his appointment, first as Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) before being elevated to Minister of State, Petroleum, had not been known to operate within the public sector, rose to the challenge with resolute calmness and remarkable wisdom. That is why the astute handling of the fuel saga by the minister and his team will stand out as a case study in crisis management and social responsibility.

    It will be recalled that in the wake of the crisis, the minister had cleverly deflected the barrage of criticisms, some from unexpected quarters, most especially, his All Progressive Congress (APC) party. In time past, we have seen ministers in similar situations fly into a rage, some fingering all manner of detractors and adversaries. Kachikwu would have none of those. In the face of these provocations, he maintained a dignified silence; where he thought there was need to talk, he politely offered very candid replies steeped in knowledge and disarming elocution. Thus, he was able to take the wind from the sails of his critics.

    We can only speculate on the likely turn of events if, had he, on that fateful Monday, descended to the level of the lawmakers who disrespectfully stonewalled him as he arrived the National Assembly to defend the actions of the government. So many scenarios could have played out. In anger, he could have walked away. He could also have refused to co-operate with the lawmakers by hedging and ducking. He did none of these. Rather, he demonstrated extreme self control and methodically disarmed the Reps.

    Watching Kachikwu’s demeanour throughout the fuel saga, one will not be wrong to conclude that he is an exponent of Buddha’s maxim that, “You can’t control the fact that people will annoy you, what you can control is your reaction”. In the face of provocation, Kachikwu refused to be angry; he remained calm, respectful, methodical and focused. Reeling out empirical information to support the government’s decision, he struck at the patriotic instinct of the lawmakers. To him, the issues at stake were too fundamental to warrant any distractions. In the end, the government’s case was made.

    So persuasive and compelling was the government’s position, as presented by the minister, that the House promptly directed labour to sheath its sword and suspend its strike. Here, again, he proved the masters right. It was James Allen who asserted that: “Self control is strength. Right thought is mastery. Calmness is power”. Throughout this crisis, the minister of state, petroleum has exhibited a large dose of each of these virtues and for the first time, majority of Nigerians are beginning to jump into the deregulation bandwagon.

     

    • Bature, a policy analyst and business strategist wrote in from Abuja

  • Abia PDP congress and internal democracy

    Abia PDP is at crossroads. It is gasping for breath. Yes, it suffers from self-administered poisoned chalice. The hegemonic clique that calls the shot is bent on holding to its siege mentality. In fact, what played out in the last state congress was a rehearsal of democratic despotism that held the state by jugular and emasculated the robustness of party politics. The initial betrayal of the unchanging spots of the leopard was the illegal inauguration of a State Congress Committee, peopled by virtually the same persons that turned the last PDP primaries in Abia to Bureau De Change. The grim harvest of the committee’s merchandising with the then aspirants was an unprecedented level of internal sabotage, double-dealing, back-stabbing and a large army of fifth columnists during the 2015 general elections in the state.

    On the face value, empanelling a committee for the congress, could be viewed as administrative pro-activeness, but underlying the  illegal committee’s mandate was a tall order to limit the political space and cut to size those with towering profile termed “non- conformists”. That brings to the fore the illegality of the State Congress Committee. It is only the national leadership of PDP that is empowered by the constitution of the party to appoint members of Congress Committee. As a corollary, the Abia PDP Congress was without the usual fanfare; no tenor; no fragrance. Abia’s first-eleven in PDP, the likes of Chief Ojo Maduekwe, Prince Vincent Ogbulafor, Senator Ike Nwachukwu, Dr. Uche Ogah, Senator Adolphus Wabara, and Professor Ihechukwu Madubuike were conspicuous by their absence. Do not lose sight of the fact that the party had lost to the ruling APC, the likes of Senator Nkechi Nwogu, Chief Emeka Nwogu, Senator Chris  Adighije, Chief Anthony Ukasoanya; no thanks to the unresolved issues of 2014 gubernatorial primaries and ‘animal farm’ treatment meted to them by Abia ‘trinity cabal’.

    On the D-day of the state congress, the charade took an unchecked flight. First, the moderator of the event goofed by naively missing the Speaker of Abia State House of Assembly from the list of protocol. The costly tomfoolery nearly turned the event into disarray. Take note that there is a ‘manhunt’ for the Speaker’s seat by the same ‘cabal’. Second, a dangerous misnomer and a monumental breach of protocol were glossed over. The former governor and his hordes of praise singers and bootlickers took the shine off the incumbent governor who was already seated before them. Unknown to many, the late entrance of the former governor was premeditated. The  contrived ‘ovation’ that greeted the former helmsman’s appearance at the venue of the congress was intended to send a message that the old horse is still in charge and invariably, dissuade any attempt towards eye ball-to-eyeball assertiveness by the incumbent. The incumbent governor, in his characteristic calmness, maintained his cool but his mood was not ecstatic throughout the event. That was why the governor deserted the rubber-stamp casting of votes midway and that brought the event to a laughable end.  The congress was a joke taken too far. While the illegal State Congress Committee was busy doctoring the lists of new party officials that emerged from the wards, in the guise of harmonization, the big show of shame reached a crescendo at the state congress event.

    After the excruciating experience of screening of the ad-hoc delegates under a scorching sun, the delegates, at the arrival in the hall were ambushed with the announcement of the names of would-be state officers of the party without undergoing any election, which they came for. The pin-drop silence that greeted the daylight robbery was as confusing as it was nauseating. Questions reared up in people’s faces. Agitated minds were rife. Murmurings ensued but like a typical slave camp, nobody dared to interrogate the mockery with democracy apparel. The hot bags of sachet water served the delegates in the name of entertainment heightened the tension. And our great ‘democrats’ boasted and celebrated the muzzled voices as acquiescence. They pontificated that it was the most peaceful in the history of democracy. Peaceful, my foot!  Peace of the graveyard! It is comparable to the ‘peace’ between the biblical Jonah and the fish. While Jonah was languishing in solitary hopelessness in the womb of the fish, the fish was enjoying its aquatic environment with Jonah intact.

    Abia North Zone is even the worst casualty of the whole mess.  The deputy chairmanship slot allotted to the senatorial zone was awarded to a person with legendary political liability in his Ward, Local Government and the state. A ranking member of House of Representatives from the zone stoutly opposed his selection at a meeting held at the Deputy Governor’s Lodge before the sham election called state congress but the cabal’s penchant for snubbing cerebral personalities in the state made the unpopular person to assume the position. The illegal State Congress Committee constituted by the ‘cabal’ to carry out a hatchet job in Umunneochi Local Government in the same Abia North also  worked at cross-purposes with the committee set up by the PDP national leadership. While the federal committee conducted the Local Government Congress in the presence of INEC, Police and DSS as monitors, the illegal committee brandished another list of Local Government and Ward officials of PDP, cooked up by contractors and business men with no democratic trajectory. Confusion almost set in but the maturity displayed by the torchbearers of the party in the area saved people’s revolt against those on the path of a psychopath. Indeed, Abia PDP is walking on clutches having been amputated by contradictions of greed, propaganda and pocket autocracy. The days of reckoning are imminent.

     

    • Nwaubani Ejike wrote in from Umuahia.

  • Obasanjo on Buhari

    The recent outburst credited to retired General Olusegun Obasanjo on the occasion of a lecture he is said to have delivered at Covenant University Otta, Ogun State on May 14, regarding the competence or lack of competence of President Muhammadu Buhari in the areas of economic policy and foreign affairs visibly represents a gross indiscretion that deserves to be strongly condemned by all right-thinking citizens of Nigeria.

    In the first place, it is very unfair that Obasanjo should take undue advantage of the fact that President Buhari once served under him in the Nigerian military to make unguarded statements based on his alleged assessment of Buhari’s characteristics as a military officer. The people of Nigeria did not elect President Buhari to perform military duties, so we have no need whatsoever to know how he was graded by retired General Olusegun Obasanjo in the course of his military career.

    In the second place, Obasanjo is probably one of the least qualified to offer opinions on the current state of the country or on the quality of President Buhari’s performance in public office.

    The fact of the matter is that Obasanjo hardly achieved anything worthwhile in the course of his two stints as Nigeria’s Head of State, first as a military ruler from February 13, 1976 to October 1, 1979 and as a democratically elected president from May 29, 1999 to May 29, 2007.

    The vast majority of unbiased political commentators agree with the observation that has been made that all through his years in public office as Nigeria’s Head of State, retired General Obasanjo consistently revealed himself to be self-opinionated. As the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating: If Obasanjo had any meaningful contributions to make to the running of Nigeria’s national affairs, the time for him to have made such contributions was while he had the power to put his ideas into practice while he was Head of State.

    Why didn’t he do so then?

    It makes absolutely no sense for Obasanjo to start pontificating now about what ought to be done or not done by the current Nigerian President.

    Obasanjo has had his turn: What he should now do is to withdraw peacefully to his farm and his so-called African Leadership Centre in Otta and allow his successors to implement their own solutions for Nigeria without any further interference from him. After all, can retired General Obasanjo be said to have been successful during his lengthy cumulative terms of office as Nigeria’s Head of State?

    Did Obasanjo leave any worthwhile legacy behind after his stints in office?

    If the truth is to be told, one must conclude that over 70% of Nigeria’s current problems should be laid at Obasanjo’s doorstep. Obasanjo’s sins against the people of Nigeria are simply too many to be recounted in detail!

    To begin with, he might have been forgiven for having been a lacklustre successor to General Murtala Mohammed if he had not gone out of his way during the build up to handing over power to an elected civilian leader to do all that lay in his power to prevent Chief Obafemi Awolowo from being elected President, choosing instead to foist a weak, incompetent and confused leader on the nation in the person of Alhaji Shehu Shagari.

    It is entirely symptomatic that in the detailed account of this sorry episode in Nigeria’s recent history in his carefully researched book entitled “People, Politics and Politicians of Nigeria 1940-1979 (published by Heinemann Educational Books), the late Chief Bola Ige had no hesitation in designating General Olusegun Obasanjo as the real mastermind of the obnoxious 12 two-thirds fraudulent Presidential election formula that was maliciously concocted by Chief Richard Akinjide, and which permitted the 1979 Presidential elections to be stolen by a cabal of reactionary political adventurers led by Obasanjo, who handed the Presidency over to Alhaji Shagari, thus setting the stage for Shagari’s disastrous performance as a do-nothing and know-nothing Nigerian President…

    A few years later, during the uproar over the annulment of the free and fair Presidential election that was won by Chief Moshood Abiola in 1993, retired General Obasanjo provided strong backing for General Ibrahim Babangida’s illegal and highly reprehensible act by publicly declaring that Abiola was “not the messiah”…

    Within this context, Obasanjo must bear some degree of responsibility for the subsequent emergence of General Sani Abacha as fascist ruler of Nigeria.

    Most ironically, Obasanjo eventually fell out of favour with Abacha because he felt that, having helped to install Abacha in power, he could order this evil military dictator around and talk down to him…

    However, rather than agree to dance to Obasanjo’s tune, Abacha promptly clamped him in jail!

    As often happens to the proverbially over-clever tortoise trickster (ijapa) in Yoruba folk tales, it was a situation in which Obasanjo eventually fell victim to his own convoluted over-clever manoeuvres.

    Quite tellingly, on his release from prison following the providential demise of Sani Abacha, Obasanjo did not turn over a new leaf or endeavour to learn from his past mistakes!

    How well did Obasanjo perform in office after he wangled himself into power in1999?

    The fact of the matter is that in many respects, Obasanjo’s two terms in office as civilian President proved to be an unmitigated disaster for the people of Nigeria!

    Another of Obasanjo’s sins against the people of Nigeria was the loss of the Bakassi peninsular to Cameroun.

    As for the manner in which the funds that served to build the white elephant Obasanjo library in Abekuta, this was one of the most shameful episodes in a long series of activities that Obasanjo engaged in both during and after his tenure as civilian President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

    Even though widespread allegations of financial impropriety have never been conclusively proved against him, it is widely believed within informed circles that Obasanjo may actually be the richest man in Nigeria as a result of his alleged ownership under assumed names and fronts of substantial stocks and interests in giant financial conglomerates as well as in several major banks within and outside Nigeria.

    It is for reasons such as this, as well as the unresolved mystery of the Siemens bribery case that people in informed circles tend to collapse into uncontrollable fits of laughter whenever Obasanjo struts out in public with bogus claims of having valiantly fought against corruption during his tenure of office.

    Unfortunately, Obasanjo’s habitual tortoise trickster manoeuvres eventually went awry when Dr. Goodluck Jonathan ultimately refused to dance to his tune, prompting a deeply frustrated and angry Obasanjo to dump his erstwhile protégé and begin campaigning to have Buhari elected President.

    In recent times, there are signs that the wily trickster is once more up to his usual tricks, in view of the fact that General Obasanjo has been observed sneaking in and out of Aso Rock at regular intervals since Buhari became President, under the pretext of offering “advice” to his former military subordinate.

    Within this context, it is highly probable that Obasanjo has now grown frustrated over President Muhammadu Buhari’s seeming unwillingness to dance to his tune, hence his latest treasonable statements about Buhari’s alleged unsuitability to lead Nigeria in the economic and foreign affairs fields…

    It’s all deja vu!

    The Nigerian security agencies would do well to keep a close watch on Obasanjo, in view of the fact that his statement that ‘the good thing about democracy is that the power you have to elect a leader is also the power you have to remove him’.

    Forewarned is forearmed! A word is enough for the wise!

     

    • Dr  Balogun, a film maker, author and musician, sent this piece from Cotonou.

  • Crime of being an innovative indigenous firm

    The penchant of many Nigerians for foreign-made products is so much that one has reasons to sometimes believe that those Nigerians themselves are imported!

    As a people, many of us love our things foreign: from the crown of our head to the sole of our feet. The average Nigerian—especially those that qualify themselves as people with taste—would typically prefer an imported product over one made locally, even though the locally made product might be of superior quality. That is the extent of our love affair with everything non-Nigerian.

    However, if no one at all prioritises and patronises Made-in-Nigeria, it shouldn’t be the Nigerian government – which is supposed to be the biggest promoter of local industry. But as hardly anything in Nigeria is close to the ideal, instead of consciously supporting local industry, successive Nigerian governments seem to have perfected the act of killing local industry. And so far, the current government has not proven to be any better. For us as a people, the Latin saying, nemo dat quod non habet—”no one can give what they don’t have”—is true. Hence, we, “foreign Nigerians”, can only give what we have; therefore we have always put our kind in government.

    So, it did not come as a surprise—for a nation that imports toothpicks—when it recently appeared in the news that more foreign IT firms were about to make inroads into the Nigerian market. If it were about a decade ago when the Nigerian software space was not as mature as it is now, that news may have been negligible, but not now when the IT industry and specifically the software sector in Nigeria is coming into maturity and capable of being a top foreign  exchange earner for Nigeria. However, if a few weeks from now, a top official in the private or public sector announces in sweet-sounding words that a deal has been signed with more foreign IT firms, it would not come as a surprise.

    According to the Office for the Nigerian Content Development in ICT (ONC), Nigeria loses over N1 trillion in foreign exchange annually to the importation of ICT devices and software. Of the said amount, N250 billion is lost annually to the importation and maintenance of foreign software. There is no better proof that Nigeria is a top global dumping ground of foreign-made software than the banking sector, where more than 90% of Nigerian banks currently use foreign software from India, Jordan, Switzerland, Finland and other parts of the world for their various banking needs. Their reliance is not because local technology cannot meet all their needs, but because they lack belief in local firms.

    If private firms can be forgiven for depending on foreign solutions when there are capable local replacements, government cannot be forgiven for doing so. Nigerian governments at all levels have been the biggest culprit of favouring foreign software over local software. Examples of this abound: at the federal level, GIFMIS at the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) is powered by a software from Estonia, a country of 1.3million people (about 500,000 people less than the population of Ibadan); ITAS at FIRS is powered by a software made in Canada; IPPIS at OAGF is powered by a software from USA; Biometric Verification Number (BVN) at Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS) Plc is powered by software from Germany; RTGS at Central Bank of Nigeria is powered by a software from Sweden.

    Remita, the well-known local software deployed by the Nigerian government, has been shot at from many quarters, either out of ignorance or because the shooters are against the positive changes the solution has brought to Nigeria. What Remita has done is that it has prevented the formerly prevalent thieving of government resources and has helped to institutionalise transparency in governance. So far, the Federal Government has been able to save more than N3 trillion through this locally made solution, and there is nowhere any top official of the federal government goes that they don’t sing the successes achieved with Treasury Single Account (TSA) which Remita powers. But if anyone told you that the providers of the software that has practically single-handedly brought an end to corruption in Nigeria have not been paid for more than a year (even though it is being used to pay government till date), you won’t believe it. But that is the truth. Such can only happen in Nigeria!

    Why does Nigeria hate her own so much? In a shabbily put-together report on its false allegation of fraud in the implementation of TSA, the Senate documented that “In spite of the initial relative advantage the bespoke solution, as  Remita,  could  have  over  the   globally  accepted Commercially available  Off The Shelf (COTS) software like SAP, Oracle Financials, Epicor, Navision etc., a desirable strategy is a two-step approach that starts with locally designed bespoke software solution and transiting to the more sophisticated and tested COTS.”

    There is no evidence greater that the Nigerian government—not exempting one that shouts CHANGE from the roof of its voice—doesn’t see local technology as capable of fully solving Nigeria’s challenges. Nigeria also appears to be buried under rubbles of inferiority complex, which have deprived us of the sense of appreciation for what is ours. As was said of Nazareth, it has been asked of Nigeria: “Can anything good come out of Nigeria?” Yes indeed, a lot of good is already coming out of Nigeria, but Nigerian are their own greatest enemy.

    According to the Ease of Doing Business Index of 2015, Nigeria is one of the worst places to do business in the world, after emerging 170th place among 189 countries ranked. In Nigeria, you’re literally your own government. Therefore, many businesses have either died or are awaiting death. The least one expects of successive Nigerian governments that have failed to provide power, the most vital element of a thriving economy, is support for local businesses who have managed to survive despite myriad of challenges. But no, not only does the Nigerian government not provide a conducive environment for businesses, government appears to be all out to stifle local businesses who manage to survive the tough environment.

    One of the most common excuses for the rejection of Nigerian solutions is that they are often not up-to-par. Sometimes, that’s only a perception that impinges us from overlooking products that have potentials or those that meet the standard. What we forget is that no solution is ever up-to-par the first time, not even those we have grown accustomed to importing. The solutions we import into our country were first grown by their own countries. Had their countries jettisoned them as we do ours, there would never be anything good enough for us to use.

    As a matter of fact, the taste of Nigerians for imported products is affront on our collective capability as a people. It is saying that we are a nation bustling with more than 170 million people without potentials. We are indeed our own enemies because we have not learnt to appreciate and nurture our inventions. Our taste has grown too accustomed to eating the fruits of other people’s labour, we strangle out those who manage to be innovative among us.

    Nigeria should truly value her own and stop despising the days of little beginning. Instead of running down local businesses, we should make conscious efforts to be a part of the growth of what is ours. There isn’t any reason, for instance, why Nigeria should be exporter of IT solutions that have been used and trusted locally. There is no reason Nigeria cannot export its TSA solution to the rest of Africa and the world, and by so doing, earn handsome foreign exchange. As a people, we need to stop being the only hindrance between where we should be and where we are.

     

    • Chukwuemeka, an IT expert wrote in from Lagos.

  • Abuja 2016 and Lake Chad region

    The tone and tenor of speeches of Heads of State and government at the Regional Security Summit hosted on Saturday by President Muhammadu Buhari suggest that the countries in the Lake Chad region are looking beyond the Boko Haram terrorism.

    Smart leaders they are, they didn’t present themselves back-slapping each other in a congratulatory mood over the enormous feat they have accomplished in the last 10 or so months, substantially reducing the terrorist threats in the region to the point of being described as a mopping up operation.

    They were conscious of the fact the Chibok Girls have not been found. No success can be declared in this war without the girls being found and reunited with their families.

    In addition, the world has come a long way since Gorge W. Bush stood there atop the ship “Abraham Lincoln” being saluted by the flight deck crew to read a speech announcing an end to the Iraq war. “The 2003 Mission Accomplished” banner dominated the background as he spoke. But with hindsight, the world knows that the war against Iraq is still work in progress.

    The then American President, George Bush was to say to a CNN interviewer a few years later that he regretted the outlandish display. In November 2008 specifically, Bush indicated that he regretted the use of the banner, stating that it conveyed the wrong message.

    There are many who believe that the United States is still paying a price for that massive public relations failure.

    In all probability, the world would have benefited more from the leaders if the summiteers in Abuja had to say everything on the war situation as it enters its end in their territories but they, instead, chose to dwell on the promise of the future and what can be done to steer the economy and humanitarian situation into better times.

    While acknowledging the progress so far made, the summiteers who included French President Francois Hollande, Nigeria’s Muhammadu Buhari and 10 other African Presidents, prime ministers and delegates concluded that defeating Boko Haram terrorist group will require a sustained comprehensive approach based on clear and coordinated plans of engagement at at the regional level. Such an approach, they said, must confront challenges relating to effective security operations, providing civilian security and civil administration, restoring stability, and promoting economic development and job creation to break the cycle of violence in all countries where Boko Haram is active.

    Among other things, they  recommended the enlistment of local community and religious leaders as constantly hammered on by President Buhari; increased intelligence sharing; the prioritization of the public education system and sparing no effort in the continuing search for the Chibok schoolgirls and all those abducted by Boko Haram by pooling intelligence resources.

    The leaders also agreed to support the victims of sexual violence or forced marriage by Boko Haram, and the need to provide them with appropriate support including reintegration to communities; that defeating the insurgency requires more than a military solution but that it also requires government-led development action to tackle the root causes of insurgency in the Lake Chad Basin through the development of education and economic opportunities.

    The summit agreed to address the humanitarian situation affecting millions of IDPs, refugees and host communities in Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger. The critical situation of the inhabitants of the newly-liberated towns and villages was also adjudged to be very pathetic. The summit agreed to provide and rehabilitate facilities in the devastated towns and villages with a view to creating conditions for citizens to live without fear of violence and return to conventional life and called for additional support from the international community. They, in addition, took special note of the 20,000 unaccompanied children (below the age of 18 years) displaced by the conflict and over 6000 minors, under the age of five years, and agreed to work together with international organisations to reunite those children with their families.

    One other major step toward a lasting solution towards permanent peace in the region is identified as coming through the acceleration, specifically within three years, of the implementation of the Lake Chad Development and Climate Resilience Action Plan as presented on the margins of COP21 in Paris in consultation with communities of the Lake Chad. It is hoped that the accelerated implementation of the Action Plan would go a long way in bringing development to the Lake Chad Basin.

    For Nigeria in particular, the period of the summit was used to receive an important visitor described as a friend of Africa, Francois Hollande who, in a literal sense killed two birds one stone. He engaged his host, President Buhari in a bilateral meeting in the early part of the day and in the afternoon, joined the other leaders at the summit. The two presidents reviewed the activities of the Multinational Joint Task Force, MNJTF and the progress made since the Climate Change agreement, COP 21 in Paris. President Hollande gave commitment to Nigeria on the resettlement of IDPs as well as his continuing support towards the reestablishment of full security in the Lake Chad region. Five agreements were signed between the Nigerian parties and their French partners.

    In the margins of the security summit, the President also received in audience and at their request, Presidents Macky Sall of Senegal, Patrice Talon of Benin and Idriss Deby Itno of Chad.

    The President also had audiences with the British Secretary for Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Rt. Hon. Phillip Hammond, the U.S Deputy Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and the Deputy President of the European Union Ms Federica Moghereni.

    President Macky Sall raised concerns about the need for the emergence of a good candidate for the chairmanship of the soon-to-be vacant African Union Commission in view of the decision of Mrs Zuma not to run for a second term. He told President Buhari that his country has such a capable candidate.

    Although this summit also discussed a yet-to-be fixed donors conference on the rebuilding of the LBCD areas, the EU brought the good news of the plan to spend 140 million Euros in that regards in the next five years.

    The EU also announced a plan to spend 40 million Euros in the reconstruction of the North-east. The US promised an immediate return of Nigeria’s stolen $350 million held up their country. China, the African Development Bank, ADB, the Islamic Development Bank, IDB, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, IMF have all pledged various contributions they will be making.

    President Muhammadu Buhari’s just-concluded Regional Security Summit, which was the second after the initial one by President Hollande in Paris two years ago, has produced a communique unprecedented in terms of the strong words used and the space devoted to fighting terrorism, post-conflict resettlement and rehabilitation as well as ways of bringing social and economic justice, growth and development to a battered  part of Africa. It also unveiled an expansive security cooperation agenda that binds the West and Central African states to their U.S., European and Asian partners towards a lasting peace, itself a prerequisite for progress and development in the region and the continent. In spite of the foot-dragging by some participants, President Buhari’s key takeaways will include a benign consent to a partnership of the willing to  recharge the Lake Chad with waters from rivers in Central Africa.

    On account of these milestones, the leaders had no hesitation is agreeing to make the regional security summit a regular one.

     

    • Shehu is Senior Special Assistant to the President  (Media and Publicity)
  • Who will help the NCC?

    Who will help the NCC?

    Your subscription to …. monthly has been renewed successfully and 150.00 deducted from your account. Your service will be renewed on 2016-05-31. To cancel, text NO TGM to 4900. Thank you!”

    That was one of the frequent and obtrusive SMS that delivered to my phone. Was that a problem? Yes. The problem was that I never subscribed to any ‘Monthly’ news alert and the bigger problem was that N150 was deducted from my voice call balance.

    At N150 per week, I was going to be losing N7, 800.00 just for this rogue service each year. If I multiply that by 10 out of the more than 37 other short codes that send me unsolicited offers every other 15 minutes, then I stand to lose anything in the vicinity of N78,000 each year and that is minus the caller tunes that can be accidentally subscribed to.

    Following the direction given, I sent ‘NO TGM to 4900’ and the response I got was “you are not a subscriber of requested SMS Alert Service. To Know About More Services, Please Type HELP and send it to 3307*.” Yet, my N150 remained deducted.

    Contacting the network provider’s customer care via the online chat platform was a lesson in time wasting. The lady at the other end of the chat maintained or feigned that sense of helplessness throughout the duration of the exchange. I simply terminated the chat and resolved to never use that line again since I have been similarly debited for a caller tune I didn’t order as well as countless other deductions that I didn’t know of until I notice an unusual speed at which my remaining airtime balance is depleted.

    I find it difficult to blame the network provider for this theft, instead I blame the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, which has the power and regulatory wherewithal to protect me from this criminality. More than the N150 that was extorted from  me, I also hold the NCC responsible for every single kobo that I lost to bad quality phone calls that I was charged for. If NCC did its work of enforcing standard and quality, these unwholesome and sharp practises by the telecoms would not be happening.

    My hope that a recent consultative forum organised by the NCC to discuss its draft regulatory framework on Value Added Service (VAS – which forms part of those robo calls and marketing SMS) in Lagos would bring an end to my troubles was dashed.

    It was immediately clear to me that the NCC has little muscle to call the shots in the face of the big telcos. The network providers more or less shoved its draft regulatory framework back in its face even though the media reports that followed attempted some damage control.

    I don’t know what compromise rendered the NCC into such a toothless bulldog or impotence, but to the extent that my phone line is serviced with my hard earned money, I have my demands for our dear regulator.

    There is a reason why regulatory systems exist worldwide and we cannot be an exception in Nigeria. The NCC cannot come up with a draft framework that is meant to protect Nigerian consumers of telecom services and then quickly back away because the network operators are not comfortable or agreeable to it. If they can get away with this, how soon before they would unilaterally decide to impose other outrageous tariffs regimes on us?

    The concept contained in the draft framework hinted at taking away the value added service component away from the network operators and vesting same functions to other segments of the sector like developers, hosting companies and aggregators. Since this concept is said to be in my interest as a subscriber, then the NCC has no business compromising my interest the way it is doing.

    If I understand correctly, an aggregator would have been able to evaluate, screen and vet a content before sending to me only if I have indicated interest in receiving such by signing up for it.

    The freedom from being bombarded with unsubscribed, unwarranted and unwanted messages and the like is something that the NCC and its partners – as the network operators have become – must not attempt to take away from me.

    I further gathered that the framework would have made it possible for me to see the phone number of the organisation or person that is spamming my phone so that I can call them back to deliver my own version of ‘cease and desist’ order. Since this will firmly put me in charge of what content gets sent to my phone, I want this guideline approved like right away.

    These changes are not too much to ask even though I must concede that it would be too much to ask if the NCC is an enforcer for the network operators instead of working for Nigerians.

    This piece is therefore a wakeup call to other Nigerians to demand that the NCC pushes through the necessary policy framework to make sure that the exploitation of subscribers under any guise is stopped forthwith.

     

    • Dr. Kolawole, a university teacher, writes from Keffi, Nasarawa State.
  • Beyond fuel fire fears

    Beyond fuel fire fears

    The fearful but inevitable decision by President Muhammadu Buhari’s federal government to increase the pump price of Petroleum Motor Spirit (PMS) from N86 to N145 naira, per litre further increases my fears for his government. My concern is that progressively, there is an increasing coalition of challenges, conspiring to render this government a fire fighting agency for the better part of its four year tenure. Unfortunately, these mutating forces keep igniting new fires, here and there, and unless the government seizes the initiative, PMB and his team may spend the next three years mobilizing to put out fires instead of the much awaited gains of his change agenda.

    No doubt, our country is not in a position to endure another round of the unconscionable and cruel fuel import bazaar as witnessed under the discredited regime of President Goodluck Jonathan. So, even if PMB do not possess his frugal credentials, for which he was elected our president, the national treasury is just not capable of sustaining another round of a serial rape in the name of fuel subsidy when our country is yet to fiscally recover from her recent painful experience. Between the devil and the deep sea, the federal government chose to plunge into the seas even when it is infested with man-eating sharks. Painful as the new cost of fuel is, I cannot but wish the government luck.

    But just as the federal government’s agents, were meeting in their conclave to increase the cost of fuel which would disappoint many of her grassroots supporters, a new fire is being set-up in the Niger Delta. For reasons which are not fare-fetched, the unresolved malcontent in the region is morphing into another round of national crisis. Unless PMB has the grace to quickly resolve the new challenge before it mutates, a wrong footing may seize the fiscal and mental energy of the government, just as the war on Boko Haram did to the government for the past one year. Were these to happen, the government may spend another year or two, to quench the fire, and the beleaguered and expanding league of the dispossessed common man may not survive the deepening trauma.

    Yet, as warned by the French President last week, the fire of Boko Haram insurgency has not fully died despite the huge achievements of PMB to tame the wild beasts. Also smouldering by the corner is the resurgence of the armed herdsmen, who as even admitted by the President, constitute a major national challenge dating back in time. Add all these to the prevalent hardship in the country, now made more precarious by the increase in cost of fuel, and the inevitable inflation that would follow, to gain an insight into the challenges ahead. With the wages inadequate, with the inadequate wages unpaid for months in many states, the government must brace up for a disillusioned populace. The way to go is to sit down and dialogue, on what to do with our beleaguered economy.

    For the Niger Delta seething with monumental historical injustice, arising from a gunboat appropriation policy of the hydro-carbon resources of the region, since 1969; that region will for the foreseeable future, always bear disgruntled children, who will intermittently try to ignite a fire, to burn down the nation. To pretend or deny this historical challenge is to live in self-denial. However, the real tragedy is that despite the seizure of the abundant natural resources of the region, allegedly for our national good, the political and economic power elites, both in the region and elsewhere, have made Nigeria one hell-hole, now comparable to Afghanistan that has been at war, continuously for many decades.

    So, while the forceful unification of countries, to will Germany into existence by Iron Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck, and the forceful appeasement of several city states, otherwise known as Risorgimento, to form Italy, give the citizens of the countries, a sense of pride, the kleptomania that is the lot of Nigeria has made it fanciful, to have pretenders to local heroism, intermittently kick at our country’s balls, just to show how weak, our country is. Such is the challenge in the Niger Delta, now championed by a so called Niger Delta Avengers; and such is how one Nnamdi Kanu, literally from nowhere, suddenly thrusting himself up, and gained noticeable traction as a champion of a new Biafra movement.

    If the statement credited to our President that oil was not yet discovered in Nigeria when the civil war was fought to keep the country one is true; then it runs counter to the assertion by his predecessor, President Olusegun Obasanjo, that the civil war was fought over oil. Of course, Obasanjo’s determined use of the federal power to crush the militancy in the region became a hydra headed monster which President Musa Yar’Adua was compelled to appease; and for which the Vice Presidency was trusted on the laps of Goodluck Jonathan, who later became our President.

    So, unless President Buhari appreciates the historical complexities and exhibits wisdom and tact, he may be laying the ground for another major distraction to his presidency, and if care is not taken, one that may fuel the other seething fires across the country. Going forward, the president must always appreciate that the Niger Delta has been badly treated. If in doubt, he should ask for a discrete report of the destruction of the region, despite the billions of dollars, extracted from its backyard, to sustain our country. Of course, some of the local leaders have been complicit in this rape. But can that complicity turn to good roads, clean water, clear sky, aqua life, farm land, electricity, access to education, and even refined petrol, that our common need and greed has denied them?

    Recently, our foreign Minister Geoffrey Onyeama echoed the determination of the government to recharge the Lake Chad region in order to provide economic opportunities to the north east region. That is a right decision. But if after such billions of dollars are spent, the region fails to benefit, maybe because the budgeted resources are stolen, it will be foolish, to hope that the problems, like the Boko Haram insurgency that it helped to fuel, would go away. So, when people tenaciously argue that enough resources are flowing into the Niger Delta region, but choose not to acknowledge that the nation’s kleptomaniacs also conspire to steal the money, then they have not given their thoughts to the circle of underdevelopment.

    The enemies of this government know that any insurgency in the Niger Delta, is like a tsetse, perching on the scrotum. But even more worrying is the absence of economic activities, for many, across the country. In an encounter with somebody who should know, I got the impression that some privileged persons in government are using their influence to secure foreign exchange for few business men and women, at a handsome fee. The claimant who knows that this column advocated for change during the last election, mocked me that we are progressively regressing into a new pseudo-import-licence era, with all its abuses. If that is true, I hope those involved will get their fair share of PMB’S bulala.

    But how do you viciously kill a tsetse fly, perching on the scrotum, without destroying your manhood?