The Nation Newspaper

Category: Dele Agekameh

  • Nigeria’s ‘chop-I-chop’ politics

    Nigeria’s ‘chop-I-chop’ politics

    Nigeria is a country richly endowed with abundant natural resources as well as quality human capital. Its population is the highest in the continent of Africa, also with the highest concentration of the Black race anywhere in the world. With this staggering and enviable statistics, one would have expected the country to make remarkable progress in terms of socio-economic development, but it is quite sad that the country is yet to find its rightful place among the comity of nations.

    Of all the reasons that may have been responsible for her socio-economic stagnation, the phenomenon of corruption stands prominently in the vista. Since the independence of the country from colonial rule on October 1, 1960, political leadership and corruption have, like Siamese twins, become interwoven and inseparable in notoriety. The corrupt tendencies of the political class and its wider implication for socio-economic development in the country have remained a big challenge and a handicap for the country.

    After many years of military interregnum with its attendant arbitrariness and absurdities, the introduction of democratic governance in 1999, was widely welcomed as a new dawn in the country’s political affairs. Hope was raised because, after a long period of darkness, a ray of light had appeared at the end of the tunnel. At least, that was the belief of many, if not all Nigerians. Fifteen years down the line, it is doubtful if anything is left in the enthusiasm, hope and aspiration that greeted the dawn of democratic rule in 1999. The reasons are not far-fetched. The average Nigerian has become more pauperised, more disillusioned and more alienated from the scheme of things by the political class who are preying on the vast resources of the country without even allowing the down-trodden, the hoi-polloi, access to the crumbs from the masters’ table, as it were.

    In 1966, four Nigerian Army Majors led by late Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu, gave a number of reasons for the first military coup in the country that took place on January 15 of that year. In his coup day broadcast, Nzeogwu, the kingpin of the putsch said: “Our enemies are the political profiteers, the swindlers, the men in high and low places that seek bribes and demand 10 percent; those that seek to keep the  country divided permanently so that they can remain in office as ministers or  VIPs at least, the tribalists, the nepotists, those that make the country look big for nothing before international circles, those that have corrupted our society and put the Nigerian political calendar back by their words and deeds…” That coup effectively terminated the First Republic and regrettably led to the death of some major actors in the country’s political firmament at that time.

    The immediate reasons for the coup, as encapsulated in Nzeogwu’s broadcast, underscored the nationwide disillusionment with corrupt and selfish politicians, as well as their inability to maintain law and order and guarantee the safety of lives and property. That was in 1966, about 48 years ago. It is quite obvious that the current prevailing atmosphere in the country is an indication that nothing has changed. In fact, Nigeria may have taken a turn for the worse as it appears that the centrifugal force is gradually tearing away and therefore, can no longer hold the periphery. In other words, the way the Boko Haram terrorists are ravaging the northern parts of the country and all forms of criminals are on the prowl in other geo-political zones, the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the nation is almost in jeopardy.

    Not only this. Members of the Nigerian political class have continued to foist their uncontrollable greed and selfishness on the rest of the people because what matters to them is how to feather their own nest. In this case, the rest of the people are abandoned and made vulnerable to whatever vicissitudes of life that may come their way. Perhaps, the late S.M. Afolabi, a Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, Chieftain and former Minister for Internal Affairs captured this aptly few years back, when he  said to the late Bola Ige, a former Attorney-General of the Federation: “We (in the PDP) invited Ige into PDP government to come chop, as in find something to eat”. What this means, and it is so evident today in the country, is that people flock into political parties, not necessarily because of what they can contribute to move the country forward, but essentially, what they hope to corner into their pockets as well as satisfy their cronies.

    Consequently, what exists in Nigeria is a political class that has the capacity to manipulate the machinery of government even from behind the scene. To that extent, corruption has become synonymous with leadership in the country. The most prominent definitions of corruption or what constitutes corrupt behaviour, share a common emphasis on the abuse of public power or position for personal aggrandizement. Furthermore, this ugly phenomenon is referred to as “an impairment of virtue and moral principles”. Therefore, political corruption, an endemic cankerworm that has eaten deep into the foundation of our nation, encompasses brazen abuses by government officials such as embezzlement and cronyism, as well as abuses linking public and private actors such as influence-peddling, fraud, bribery, extortion, among others.

    The political class in Nigeria is so neck-deep in these unholy practices so much that corruption has become an albatross that threatens our democratic process, good governance and as a result, stifle sustainable development of the country. And as the political class promotes corruption within its rank, it becomes more difficult for it to act positively for the benefit of the citizens and the country. In addition, the political class engages in all dirty tricks to suppress opposition, in order to secure and retain power and by so doing, maintain its stranglehold on the country. Also, in its pursuit of unfettered access to funds, good leadership is sacrificed on the altar of corruption. Indeed, the phenomenon of this cancerous political corruption has become a common thread that runs through successive military and civilian political regimes in the country. This is the unfortunate situation in which the country has been enmeshed for quite a long time.

    Over the years, we have seen the development of a vast system of institutionalised political corruption most times emanating from the very top and permeating all strata of government with pervasive and debilitating destruction of the entire society. It is a fact of history that no nation can grow and enjoy steady development in all facets of its national endeavour without the enthronement and institutionalisation of selfless and good political leadership. This is so, because good governance is a sine-qua-non to qualitative development and growth. Perhaps, it is for this reason that the late Chinua Achebe, a world-renowned novelist said, the root cause of the Nigerian predicament should be laid squarely at the foot of bad leadership. “The trouble with Nigeria,” Achebe espoused, “is simply and squarely a failure of leadership… The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability of its leaders to rise to their responsibility, to the challenge of personal example, which is the hallmark of true leadership”.

    Flowing from these, therefore, a leader is expected to demonstrate such qualities as, good character, vision, tact, prudence, and ability to lead by example. This is because people basically ascribe leadership to those who they feel can enable them achieve important objectives or goals. There is no doubt that the actions and inactions of the leadership class which has been managing the wealth and affairs of Nigeria since independence, has become a pitiable hindrance to the country’s socio-economic development. The challenge now is whether we have enough patriotic, sane and clean individuals left to pilot the affairs of this country and initiate the type of leadership that can extricate the country from the woods and take it to its envisioned Eldorado. Until this is achieved, the current crop of gangsters and cheats everywhere will continue to bestride the corridors of power at all levels with their ‘chop-I-chop’ attitude to governance. This way, they will continue to milk the country, stealing the common wealth of the people, as well as, deepening poverty in the society.

  • The festering Boko Haram war

    The festering Boko Haram war

    While the Nigerian political authorities and the military establishment continue to harp on the existence of an imaginary ceasefire, Boko Haram terrorists remain unrelenting in their onslaught against hapless Nigerians, particularly in the theatres of war in the Northern part of the country. In recent times, the terrorists have kept up their ‘winning streak’ by effortlessly over-running several communities in the war-ravaged areas. In several instances, the communities are ‘captured’ as Nigerian troops that could have checked the terrorists’ advance, vote with their feet instead of offering any form of resistance to the rampaging terrorists.

    The latest in a series of success stories for the terrorists is the recent attack and eventual capture of Mubi, the second largest town in Adamawa State. Perhaps, it is not the attack on Mubi that should be of more alarm to followers of events in and around Nigeria’s northeast geo-political zone. More alarming, instead, is the ease with which the terrorists ‘walked-over’ the security forces stationed in the town. Buoyed by this spectacular success, the terrorists demonstrated that they, indeed, meant business by unilaterally changing the name of Mubi to “Madinatul Islam,” meaning, the “City of Islam”. Not only this, as a further confirmation that they were in total control of the town; they introduced Sharia rule and followed suit with the amputation of 10 people for perceived contravention of the Sharia law.

    The first sign of Boko Haram’s expansionist tendency came in August this year, with the capture and occupation of Gwoza, a hilly town in Borno State, now rechristened “Darul Hikma” or “House of Wisdom” by the terrorists. There, they swiftly hoisted their flag and immediately converted the town to their operational headquarters. Since then, they have continued to dig in and propagate their own version of Islam. A major military offensive at the onset of the emergency rule in May 2013, had appeared to put the terrorists on the defensive by flushing them out of their strongholds, but the military seemed to have failed to sustain the momentum and allowed the relentless hoodlums to retake some of the areas they had initially abandoned. The matter was made worse by widespread refusal of troops deployed to confront the terrorists to engage them because of lack of adequate firepower. This has led to the institution of various army court marshals to try the allegedly mutinous troops.

    With Boko Haram’s unprecedented gains in recent weeks, the group appears to be inching closer to achieving its goal of carving out a strict Islamic state across northern Nigeria. They have killed no fewer than 13,000 innocent people, displaced several others and destroyed hundreds of schools and churches in a wave of terror aimed at carving out an Islamic state in Nigeria. It is quite unfortunate that these terrorists seem to be waxing stronger in this war. This is attributable to lack of seriousness and commitment on the part of our leaders – the politicians and the military top brass. Apart from this, the endemic corruption in the country has taken a toll on the government’s ability to effectively prosecute the war. The reality is that, rather than throw everything into the fray, our defence planners appear to be engaged in cutting corners for pecuniary gains. It has been insinuated that some of the armoured vehicles recently brought into the country and branded as new ones, have constantly developed problems of overheating, while no fewer than 20 of them, may have been captured by Boko Haram.

    Perhaps,the most nauseating aspect is the inability of our military leaders to accept that things are not really going the way they should be in the ongoing war. Rather, the military has been consistent in defending the indefensible. Soon after Boko Haram terrorists overran Gwoza and made a huge capital out of it, Chris Olukolade, the first Major-General to be produced by the Public Relations Corps of the Army and Director, Defence Information, DDI, had this to say: “The claim is empty. The sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Nigerian state is still intact. Any group of terrorists laying claim to any portion of the country will not be allowed to get away with the expression of delusion and crime…” The DDI’s braggadocio has since paled into insignificance as the terrorists have remained undeterred in trying to realize their badly-craved Islamic Caliphate.

    As the terrorists conquer one village and town after another, so also do they increase their war arsenal as they move on. The conquest of Gwoza fetched them at least 200 AK 47 assault rifles belonging to the police which they allegedly carted away following their attack on the Police Academy in the town. Those arms are certainly part of what Boko Haram is now using to wreak havoc all over the place. Similarly, the attack on Mubi not only boosted the armoury of the group, but it also enriched its stock of food items and overall war chest. Report has it that food items, money and weapons seized by the terrorists in the town, will be enough to sustain their activities for a year. The resources seized so far, the reports say, are exclusive of contributions to the terrorists from like-minded jihadist groups and their non-combatant members who are wealthy business moguls.

    The truth is that five years after the emergence of Boko Haram, Nigeria does not seem to have an effective strategy for dealing with these misguided elements and their deep commitment to waging war against the country and its people. It is a shame that almost two years after a state of emergency was declared in the three North-east states of Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, the government and the military, have not been able to contain the menace of these terrorists. Nothing illustrates this obvious helplessness than the inability to rescue the Chibok school girls who were violently removed from their school premises in the Chibok community, Borno State, on the night of April 14. Since then, except for various permutations and apocalyptic guesswork, no efforts have been made to secure their release. They have, therefore, remained marooned in a strange environment where they are constantly tortured, abused and dehumanised.

    Rather than confront them headlong militarily, the government is shamelessly willing to dialogue at all costs even though it is clear that nothing from what Boko Haram wants to achieve is Islamic. So trying to dialogue with them is a waste of time as they would only agree to do so if they were losing the war. For now, they don’t seem to be. Hence, they have turned down requests for dialogue and even amnesty. Certainly, the solution is in the battlefield. Therefore, Nigerians should be security conscious and give useful information to the security agencies. To win this war, the security agencies need the cooperation of all.

    If there is to be any silver lining in the horizon any time soon in the country’s so-far disastrous handling of Boko Haram, it must start with the re-awakening of our security apparatuses and perhaps, even the President himself, to the need for a profound rethinking of our strategy to contain and combat this scourge. The alternative is to accept the victory of genocidal, murdering religious extremists, over a vast territory that they intend to use to propagate their jaundiced version of Islam. The most important aspect about any purported Islamic State in such an atmosphere as Boko Haram rules over is that it is easily a vector for attracting training and funding from terrorists all over the world. Surely, Nigeria needs a new analysis, a new language and new strategies that relate to defeating a viral system that spreads across national boundaries.

    Sad enough, the politicians aren’t giving a damn. The only thing that matters to Nigerian politicians right now is the 2015 elections through which they hope to continue to perpetuate themselves in power willy-nilly, to the detriment of the peace, progress and development of the country.  At the rate we are going, if care is not taken, we might wake up one day and discover that Nigeria is no more. A stitch in time saves nine!

     

     

  • The coming North/ South ‘brawl’

    The coming North/ South ‘brawl’

    After several months of suspense and drama, President Goodluck Jonathan has finally declared his intention to seek re-election next year. And last week Thursday, he made a triumphant-esque appearance at Wadata Plaza, the national headquarters of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, in Abuja, to pick his party’s nomination and intention forms. A day before that, the arch-rival opposition party, the All Progressive Congress, APC, held an Extra-Ordinary National Convention at the Old Parade Ground, also in Abuja. There, the party welcomed into its fold, Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, Speaker of the House of Representatives, who had just dumped the PDP to pitch his tent with the APC. With these two events, the campaign trails towards the 2015 general elections seem fully laid out.

    However, Jonathan’s formal entry into the race for a second term as President of Nigeria did not come as a surprise. It is coming more than a year since several groups that were daily mushrooming over the country’s political landscape, had been holding rallies complete with all forms of acrobatic display and break dancing, to highlight what they consider to be Jonathan’s unique selling points. But getting the President to pick up his party’s nomination for the Presidential ticket did not come without intrigues. First was a break-away faction of the PDP which initially featured seven sitting PDP governors and some other top officials of the party. Eventually, five of the aggrieved governors defected to the rival APC. On the heels of this, Bamanga Tukur, the then chairman of the party, was unceremoniously eased out of office and compensated with the post of chairman of the Nigerian Railway Corporation after he refused an offer to be sent to ‘Siberia’ as Nigeria’s Ambassador to China.

    Next, the President’s minders turned their attention to Sule Lamido, the Jigawa State governor who, for several months, had put up an uncompromising stance over his 2015 ambition to become President on the platform of the PDP. He was made to recoil into his shell. Of course, we are all aware of the gargantuan harassment that was unleashed on Rotimi Amaechi, the governor of Rivers State, who was initially rumoured to be gunning for the post of Vice-President to Lamido. It was the same tug of war that led to the bastardization and eventual balkanization of the Governor’s Forum into two factions.

    The scramble for and partition of the once-stable Governor’s Forum was preceded by the formation of a hitherto non-existent PDP Governor’s Forum headed by the loquacious Godswill Akpabio, governor of Akwa Ibom State and an unapologetic presidential megaphone.  Several other acts of cajoling and alliances followed in the bid to clear the way for Jonathan, culminating in the multiple PDP stakeholders’ endorsement of the President as the party’s sole candidate for the election. While all this was going on, the President kept mum on his actual intention even though his body language made it clear that he had made up his mind to run. His strategy to seek re-election was all-too-clear to see with his foot soldiers orchestrating various forms of it at every forum.

    Now, with Jonathan in the fray, the roller coaster for next year’s election is in full swing. That this coincided with the defection of Tambuwal to the APC shows that the two dominant parties, PDP and APC, have unwittingly transformed the country into a two-party state, as they are set to lock horns in the 2015 elections particularly the presidential election. With the array of political juggernauts in the APC, mostly those who once wined and dined with the PDP and have, therefore, mastered the election ‘winning’ tricks of the PDP, the coming election bears the imprimatur of a keener contest than most previous ones. This will be a sharp departure from the elections of previous years, 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2011, in which the PDP as the outright dominant party, dictated the tune all over. For the first time in the history of elections in this country, the conservative octopus seems vulnerable to defeat at the hands of a seemingly formidable progressive opposition.

    However, like most elections, many factors will influence the outcome of next year’s polls. For the presidential election, which will come first and which is the Holy Grail the two  mega parties have trained their sights on, Jonathan obviously has an advantage as a sitting President. His party has been in power since the country’s return to democratic governance in 1999, almost 16 years ago. During this period, the party has monopolised power at the centre as well as being in dominant control of nearly two-thirds of the 36 states of the federation. Therefore, the party can boast of significant presence all over the country and this will come in handy during election because democracy is a game of numbers. Also, the party has stupendous financial muscle which gives it a huge war chest for the elections. Besides, the party has unfettered access to the machinery of government including propaganda machinery and all coercive apparatuses in the security and non-security services.

    On the other hand, though the APC parades hordes of tested and influential politicians with huge followership at national, regional, state and local government levels, the party is yet to make up its mind on who to field as its presidential torch-bearer. Right now, those jostling for the party’s ticket are from the npart of the country. In actual fact, whoever finally emerges as APC’s presidential candidate, will determine how far the party can go in its quest to wrest power from the hands of the monopolistic PDP.  And except the party has some fast cards in its kitty to play in this high stakes game, the PDP may have built an unassailable head start in the campaigns using its well-oiled propaganda machinery. In this case, the APC must work assiduously to get its message of redemption and national re-birth down to the electorate all over the country with lightning speed.

    At no other time since the end of the country’s civil war – 1966 to 1970 – has the country become so much divided, so much polarized, along tribal and religious lines than now. This is because politicians continue to whip up primordial sentiments all over the place in order to woo supporters for their narrow, selfish interests of winning election at all costs. For Jonathan and his Ijaw ethnic group in the South-south geopolitical zone of the country, winning the forthcoming election is like protecting a finally-discovered treasure having searched to the end of the world to find it. Much of the oil that is the mainstay of the nation’s economy flows from the creeks of the South-south. As a result, the people of the region sees the retention of the Presidency by a son of the region, for another four years, as a legitimate claim having been zoned out of the power equilibrium of the country since independence in 1960.

    For the northern part of the country, the region is still brooding from the political ‘calamity’ of losing the presidency in 2010 owing to the untimely demise of President Umaru Yar’Adua, a development that paved way for Jonathan, who was Yar’Adua’s deputy, to assume power. This, perhaps, was one of the remote causes of the widespread violence, arson and brigandage that greeted the presidential election in some parts of the north in 2011. Since the APC is bent on featuring a northerner as its presidential candidate, there is a very good chance that the coming presidential contest will be a North/South and Christian/Muslim affair. In that case, whichever way the pendulum swings, it could trigger some catastrophic consequences for the country. If this happens, it will be the proverbial fight between two elephants in which the ordinary man on the street bears the brunt as the metaphorical grass. The only antidote to this is to ensure free and fair elections next year. But with the type of desperation being exhibited by our politicians, this may appear to be a mere wishful thinking or a tall order. May God help us!

     

  • The enemy next door

    The enemy next door

    It appears there is no truce in place between the federal government and Boko Haram terrorists who have been waging a fierce war against the state especially in the north-east part of the country. Now it is increasingly getting clear that what we have been treated to in the last couple of weeks are half-truths, denials (that are not even subtle) and mere propaganda – all designed to achieve pre-conceived political agenda. At any rate, the release of the abducted Chibok girls from the hands of Boko Haram has since assumed some level of desperation in the form of a hurriedly-concocted ceasefire agreement. The agreement, if there was ever anything like that, collapsed even before the ink had dried on the paper on which it was signed.

    The concern of this column is not whether there was actually a truce or if the truce ever worked. It is about the characters that engineered the truce. The public is not availed the opportunity to identify those involved in the negotiations. Therefore, it is difficult to decipher the real intention and motive behind the (supposed) ceasefire. Nobody knows whether it is for the sake of the country, for political aggrandizement or any other reason in the interest of certain groups or individuals for that matter.

    However, we are aware of the involvement of neighbouring Chad and its President, Idriss Deby, a former military leader and now a politician, who has been presiding over the affairs of his country since he seized power in a military coup in 1990. He has been actively involved in the ceasefire talks.  Deby was born into a family of the Zaghawa ethnic group in the Ennedi region of northeastern Chad, one of the many ethnic groups holding on to power in that country. He joined the army in the early 1970s and went to France in 1976 to train as a pilot at a time the country was in the grip of a long-running civil war.

    He returned to Chad in 1978, in the heat of the conflict and threw his support behind Hissène Habré, leader of one of the rebel groups, who was then serving as prime minister. He rose rapidly in the army. He later emerged as a leader of Habré’s forces and helped Habré to seize power and become President in 1982. Habre made Deby, who had then become widely recognised as a brilliant military strategist, Commander-in-Chief of the Chadian Armed Forces. Deby moved against Habre, his Principal, in 1990 and became President.

    From his background, Deby is a veteran of several conflicts between the various rebel groups vying for control of power in Chad. His long years of experience in the intrigues and internecine conflicts that have plagued his country in the past, must have come in handy for him in trying to resolve the conflict between Boko Haram and the Nigerian state. But the peace talk between the Nigerian government and the terrorists, which is being mediated by the Chadian government, has been called into question since it was announced by the military following the refusal of both parties to respect the ceasefire deal. Though, Boko Haram is yet to make an official comment on the ceasefire, its fighters have continued to attack villages in the North-east prompting many people to wonder whether, indeed, a peace talk had taken place at all.

    The terrorist group has been responsible for the killings, abductions and the displacement of many Nigerians in the North-east. In spite of these horrors, the Chadian government maintained that Nigeria’s deal with the terrorists to free the Chibok schoolgirls would still go ahead. The emergence of Chad as a peace negotiator between Boko Haram and Nigeria did not come as a surprise. As far back as the late 1960s and the early 80s, alien bandits suspected to have their base in neighbouring Chad, Niger and Cameroun, had been pillaging the North-east part of the country where Boko Haram now holds sway. Thousands of villagers in Nigeria’s North-east zone had been sent packing by these criminals mostly populated by itinerant rebels seeking for means of livelihood after being displaced from their own countries especially Chad.

    Banditry by Chadian hoodlums along Nigeria’s North-east region is an age-long problem. If it is not harassment of Nigerians, or forceful occupation of Nigerian territory, it is armed carnage in which innocent Nigerians are maimed, killed or their properties seized. The irony is that most of the time, the Nigerian government seems helpless over the situation because the government regards Nigeria as a ‘big brother’ to other African nations. But all along, the fear of those living in Nigeria’s northeast had always been that the rebels may one day declare that Nigeria’s north-east belongs to them. A number of people had expressed dismay over the nonchalant attitude of the federal government over the Chadian miscreants’ atrocities which continued to grow beyond control in many cases. The activities of the miscreants had resulted in  a lot of victims being scattered across different parts of such towns as Baga and other neighbouring towns in Borno while others were forced to migrate outside Borno State.

    In spite of this, the government had consistently treated with levity, information given to it by the people directly affected by the banditry of Chadian criminals, putting faith, instead, on wrong data that do not paint the true picture of the situation on ground. This body language from the Nigerian government obviously encouraged the Chadian charlatans who had ceaselessly, continued to unleash terror on Nigerians. The Chadians’ atrocities could be traced as far back as the 1960s. But with the outbreak of the Nigerian civil war in 1967, either owing to fear or other considerations, coupled with the tension within the country then, the Chadian atrocities reduced with many Chadians vacating the shores of Lake Chad.

    The end of the Nigerian Civil War in 1970 coincided with the outbreak of hostilities in Chad which resulted in the bloody coup that terminated the life of President François N’Garta Tombalbaye. As a result, many of them fled into neighbouring border towns and islands within the north-east region of the present-day Borno State and environs. Since then, they have not looked back. At a point, their atrocities became so worrisome that series of reports were forwarded to the Shehu Shagari civilian government between 1979 and 1983. Consequently, in 1982, General Muhammadu Buhari, who was then the General Officer Commanding, GOC, 3 Armoured Division, Nigerian Army with headquarters in Jos, stormed the affected zones and chased the miscreants out.

    But if Nigerians thought that was the end of the matter, they were dead wrong. No sooner had Buhari withdrawn his troops from the area, than the rebels started to make a comeback, this time, in full force. Today, many of the villages have fallen under the control of the Boko Haram terrorists who are mere offshoots of the Chadian rebels. Due to the incessant violent eruption in Chad, most Chadian nationals, including their displaced troops; have found Nigeria a haven where everything is available, including uninterrupted harassment of the citizenry. While their women take to prostitution in several parts of Borno State, a greater number of their men find in banditry, a lucrative business which has now become properly structured and entrenched by Boko Haram .

    Successive governors of Borno State including the late Mala Kachalla, who was governor of the state from May 29, 1999 to May 29, 2003, raised sufficient alarm through several security reports warning that unless concerted efforts were made, several towns and villages along Nigeria’s border with Chad may be occupied by Chadians. One of the reports advised that in tackling the Chadian-Nigerian situation, “dialogue through diplomacy would be the best option but without prejudice to our ability to resort to military action to flush them out”. Since then, nothing has changed. The situation has only gone from bad to worse, resulting in the current situation where Chad, a country that appears to have inadvertently let loose bandits to prey on Nigerians, is now trying to rescue Nigeria from the holocaust. What an irony! What a pity!!

     

     

  • Nigeria: Beyond the Ceasefire

    Nigeria: Beyond the Ceasefire

    It was largely unexpected. But when it came, it came with a bang. Everybody was held spell-bound. Perhaps, this illustrates the news that filtered in last Friday to the effect that the Federal Government and the Boko Haram terrorists have agreed to cease hostility. Announcing the ceasefire in Abuja at the end of the conference on Nigeria-Cameroun Trans-Border Military Operations, Alex Badeh, an Air Chief Marshal and Chief of Defence Staff, CDS, told a bewildered nation that “the agreement to cease fire has being concluded and all involved are to comply”. This is ostensibly to give room for negotiations.

    Although, the terms of agreement are not yet clear, it was learnt that one of the major requests of the government is the release of the Chibok schoolgirls. Boko Haram terrorists had kidnapped more than 276 schoolgirls on the night of April 14, more than 190 days ago, from Chibok, a sleepy community in Borno State. Till date, the girls are being held captive at unknown location(s). The kidnap has attracted international condemnation, leading to the now famous #BringBackOurGirls# protests across the globe. On their part, the terrorists were said to have demanded for the unconditional release of some of their ‘fighters’ in the custody of the Nigerian military.

    It appears that Nigeria’s close collaboration with the governments of Chad and Niger Republic, led to the yet-to-be firmed up truce. Though the identity of those negotiating on behalf of the Federal Government is still shrouded in secrecy but the representatives of Boko Haram were said to have been led by one Danladi Ahmadu who is said to be the group’s Chief Security Officer. General Idriss Derby, the Chadian President, facilitated the entire ceasefire deal.

    The sudden news of the Federal Government striking a ceasefire deal with Boko Haram, the blood-thirsty and ruthless fundamentalist group, seems to be a breakthrough many people in Nigeria and the international community had long awaited. It is believed to be the first step in the journey to finding lasting peace after several years of death and destruction that has gripped Nigeria and threatened the country’s sovereignty. President Goodluck Jonathan had told the United Nations General Assembly last month that the extremists had killed at least 13,000 civilians. Hundreds of thousands have been driven from their homes, many of them farmers, causing a food emergency in the north-east of the country where the terrorists’ campaign is domiciled with collateral effect on other parts of the country.

    The transition of the group to suicide bombings and open commando-style attacks across its areas of operation in the North-east and other parts of the country, including Abuja, the seat of government, over time, added new dimensions to the wave of terrorism in the country. The abduction of the Chibok schoolgirls on April 14, this year, remains a huge testament to how sophisticated the group had become. Some days after the abduction, Abubakar Shekau, the unabashed leader of the group of death merchants, threatened that he would sell the girls. Two months after, a man claiming to be the deputy leader of Boko Haram, gave a radio interview in which he claimed that the terrorist group had held preliminary peace talks with Namadi Sambo, Nigeria’s Vice-President, in Saudi Arabia. The group issued a statement two days later rejecting the claim and disowning the man as an impostor. Appeals by stakeholders, including the United States, United Kingdom and others could not make the terrorists shift ground. Instead, dozens more schoolgirls and boys, young women and men, have been kidnapped by the terrorists in a five-year-old reign of terror.

    Many attempts have been made in the past, by the Federal Government, to contain the activities of the group either on the battlefield or at the conference table but all to no avail. After five years of almost relentless death and destruction, this ceasefire offers a modicum of relief particularly to Nigeria’s northeast geo-political zone and the whole country in general. There is now hope for a period of calm as serious negotiations for a broader deal get going between the Federal Government and Boko Haram. But a number of thorny issues are yet to be tackled, including Boko Haram’s demilitarisation, as well as the mechanics for monitoring the ceasefire. Even more contentious is how the territories like Gwoza, Bama and the other communities now being occupied by Boko Haram, are going to be handed back to their legitimate Local Government  Authority. Without resolving all these issues and many more, the current ceasefire agreement is as opaque as anything.

    In my candid opinion, I do not think there is anything to jubilate over yet, at least, for now. My fear is that Boko Haram might have agreed to a ceasefire following recent renewed onslaughts on their positions by the Nigerian military. This offensive had recorded significant success including the death of Abubakar Shekau, the terrorists’ leader, either in his original form or in the form of an impostor masquerading as the original Shekau. This turn of event has delivered a devastating blow on the operational capabilities of the terrorists, hence, their resolve to call or accept a truce, possibly, to enable them to re-strategise and plan. This is why I believe the current ceasefire is unnecessary and ill-timed. Already, the killings in the affected areas by the terrorists have not abated even with the ceasefire in place. The military should have been allowed to completely decimate them by pursuing them to any level before such a ceasefire could be contemplated.

    If the military had been allowed to chase them to say, Cameroon, there is no way they could have survived. The Cameroonians would have mowed them down or apprehended them. As it is, this truce could potentially afford them the opportunity to plan and re-arm themselves for more destructive and destabilising exploits. Another thing is that, contrary to expectations and what we are being told, the terrorists, who are simply blood-thirsty, may not release the Chibok girls after all. They may have promised to release them as a ploy to buy time.  If we look at it critically, the terrorists are still holding on to Gwoza, Bama and other communities in the North-east which they have delineated as Islamic Caliphate. With Nigerian territories firmly in their hands, why should the Federal Government want to negotiate?

    The issue of the Chibok girls which Boko Haram is now using as bait, reminds me of

    the Beslan School hostage crisis, also referred to as the Beslan School siege or Beslan massacre, whichstarted on September 1, 2004, and lasted for three days. It involved the capture of about 1,100 people, including 777 children, as hostages. After three days of standoff, the whole saga ended on the third day, that is, September 3, 2004, when Russian security forces entered the building after several explosions, using heavy weapons. At least 334 people were killed as a result of the crisis, including 186 children, with a significant number of people either injured or reported missing.

    The lesson to be learnt here is that rather than negotiating with the terrorists or meeting any of their demands at all, as the Federal Government is now doing or is about to do with Boko Haram, the Russian government plunged itself headlong into the crisis and successfully got rid of the terrorists. Though at a high cost in terms of human casualties, that action drove fear into other would-be terrorists who have since kept their distance. That is exactly what we should have done long ago instead of allowing the terrorists to flex muscles and railroad the government into the negotiating table. It will only embolden the terrorists who have adopted brigandage as a way of life. As it is now, the ceasefire we now have doesn’t seem like a military affair. It is a political ceasefire. And I doubt if the military had any input in all these.

    Anyway, though the terms of the ceasefire agreement are yet to be made public, nevertheless, the hope is that both parties would respect the terms of the agreement and allow genuine peace to return to the country.

     

  • Still on Brazil 2014 (2)

    Still on Brazil 2014 (2)

    Still focusing on Nigeria, there can be very little doubt that the team’s final outcome in the group games was exactly what should have been realistically expected from the team by even the most ardent and optimistic of supporters. Qualifying from the group was a beautiful feeling even amidst the largely predictable loss to Argentina in the last group game when the Eagles lost 3-2 in a thrilling match. And with regard to the dearth of quality throughout the squad, this became clearer as the tournament progressed and the demand for a wider use of squad depth was required. It was not merely cluelessness on his part that Stephen Keshi could not make some changes when everyone expected him to do so. It was not as straightforward as everyone thought because, right there on the bench, the team did not seem to have the sort of players you could bring on to really change things radically. And so the coach was, in my opinion, severely hamstrung.

    Players like Shola Ameobi, with all due respect to his professional experience and commitment, went to the World Cup short of what the tournament requires. Others like Mikel Obi and Victor Moses, although went with a higher reputation but never lived up to expectations in many regards. Victor Moses seemed uninterested, and never bothered to put in any extra yards. And in truth, the Chelsea FC of England attacker has been like that – lazy, lifeless, uninspired and uninspiring – for some time now. It is the reason he was flogged out on loan to Liverpool FC last season and also why he barely played also for Liverpool during his loan spell with them. As for Mikel, he created more problem for his central midfield partner, Onazi Ogenyi, who, as a result had to run double shift of midfield duties in playing his own role as well as covering for the near-absence of Mikel who seemed more interested in losing the ball from opponents even when it seemed easier to give it to a team mate than trying to prove how physically strong he was. Although this weakness in Mikel’s game had been obvious even before the tournament started, and was all too glaring for all to see, the obvious lack of other players in the squad with the experience and mental know-how (relatively speaking) required to replace even a so-obviously ineffective Mikel meant that changes by the coaches were a premium choice to have.

    Of course, the culmination of that was that once Michael Babatunde got injured in the last group match against Argentina, the Eagles were faced with a big battle to plug a largely Mikel-induced Babatunde-sized hole. It therefore came as no surprise that the moment Onazi got injured during the last 16 match against France, things went horribly pear-shaped very quickly with the shape of the team, especially in the midfield engine room, falling apart beyond redemption. But why take players to the tournament at all if some of these players could not be counted on to come in to help change things a bit? And the answer takes us back to the fact that, at the moment, we simply do not have enough players playing at a high enough level of competitive club football to supply the national team with the required players for a level such as the World Cup.

    So, in a few, simple words, the failure of African teams – with the relative exception of Algeria – at the World Cup cannot be too far removed from individual and collective absence of tactical discipline as well as lack of quality at the highest level. Discipline here also applies to off-field issues that dogged a few of the teams at the competition.  Cameroon, Ghana and even Nigeria, to some extent, fall into this category. Cote D’ivoire also unsurprisingly got it wrong for the umpteenth time at a major tournament despite boasting arguably the finest collection of African players of the current generation plying their trade for some of the best football teams around. One does not require the services of a Sharman to know that the Elephants came short, once again, because they failed to harness their undoubted potential into an individually and collectively astute team, tactically and technically.

    As for Nigeria, Keshi did not seem to have been allowed to operate with exactly a free hand in spite of what many would think. There were some whispers that Joseph Yobo for instance, as well as one or two other players, were foisted on him. Also, he seemed to be working perpetually under the menacing gaze of the NFF, the sports ministry and others – who were merely praying for him to falter in order to crucify him. Obviously, Keshi himself cannot get away without sharing in some of the blames. As the coach of the team, if one may ask, why was it that the Super Eagles did not have a plan as to what to do with set pieces other than to simply lump the ball towards the penalty area and hope that there is a lucky connection in favour of the team? Tactically, more astute teams always seem to be able to be inventive with set pieces, and while they don’t always work to plan, at least, it keeps providing the opponent with surprises. Costa Rica, for instance, tried a particular routine on free kicks three or so times in their group game against Uruguay and eventually got a goal from it in the second half. Germans provided a routine against Ghana which looks rather comical and even nonsensical simply because it didn’t go to plan. France scored their second goal against Nigeria from what was an intelligently executed corner kick routine. In a similar vein, defending corners and free kicks, the best teams often have a clear strategy – Germany triumphed due, in some ways, to doing this well. And there is where you put the blame on the doorstep of Keshi and the coaching crew.

    There is also some measure of indiscipline we took to the tournament which you cannot necessary coach or ‘un-coach’. For instance, on the field, Osaze Odemwingie, who came from the wilderness back into the team, was, without doubt, one of our better players at the tournament. But there was something wrong in his overall game altogether. The needless urge to hug the ball and showboat, especially in risky zones like in and around his team’s defensive third, was reminiscent of some of the reasons Keshi might have elected to keep him out of the team for a period in the first place. He did that a lot in the previous matches but it became more glaring in the crucial match against France, getting away with it a few times before eventually losing the ball that led to the corner kick leading to the fatal second goal. That answers why some of us felt the team was not primed to go further than they did get: if your most experienced players would act like Osaze did, then what hope do we have on the other less-experienced players?

    The hope is that by the time the next World Cup comes around, Africa and in particular, Nigeria, would have imbibed enough lessons from this latest failure at the grand global stage. More realistically though, I think we should be planning more for the World Cup after that (2022) or even the one after that (2026). It took Spain a planning process that began in approximately 1992 to get to win the World Cup in 2010. Similarly, Germany could be said to have arguably started on the road to winning the 2014 World Cup around a decade-and-a-half ago, following a very wretched campaign at the European Championship in 2000. And that is merely just a phase of more concentrated preparations as the Germans have always attended tournaments with teams good enough to jostle with the best. We simply must be more realistic in our expectations and more committed to the true growth of the sport by building better stadia, committing more resources, and the whole gamut, to the game.

    • Concluded)
  • Still on Brazil 2014 (1)

    Still on Brazil 2014 (1)

    The 2014 edition of the greatest show on earth, as the FIFA World Cup is affectionately called, has come and gone. And in many ways, Brazil, ably supported by their guests of 31 football squads from 31 countries across six continents, certainly put up a great display of football at the highest level of the sport over a period of 31 days. Next time out, in four years’ time to be precise, the football world turns its attention to Russia, where the 2018 edition of the quadrennial tournament, is scheduled to take place. Until then, many of the serious-minded football nations of the world will spend the time in-between planning towards the next world cup, identifying players who will, all things being equal, play a major part for their countries come June/July 2018 in the cold wintry conditions of Russia.

    It is really funny how, here in Nigeria, we always put out jingles during World Cup tournaments that allude to our number in population as well as our spirit as a nation. In the run-up to and during the recent World Cup in Brazil, different groups and corporations painted billboards and our television screens green-and-white with enthusiastic messages. One common thread that ran through the messages was “we have all it takes” to beat the best at the World Cup, perhaps, simply because we are Nigerians or Africans with a special indomitable spirit and population strength. Patriotism is all fine and good, and I could never see a sin in being optimistic. But then again, I believe that optimism must always be tempered with a healthy dose of rationality. As they say, luck is usually basically a case of preparation meeting opportunity at some point. And that is where I have issues with our seemingly incurable optimism and unfathomable expectations on our sporting teams at each meet.

    Nigeria may have attended the World Cup as champions of the African continent, but that did not automatically make the Super Eagles a superior football outfit than any of the other teams which attended the tournament as non-champions of their continents. The fallacy and hollowness of believing in the hype of attending the World Cup as champions from an African perspective, has been brutally exposed several times in the past as no African champion at the tournament had ever made it beyond the round of 16 matches. In fact, only once previously – Nigeria in 1994 – had a team attending the tournament as champions from Africa progressed out of the group stage of the World Cup in contemporary history of the FIFA tournament. And if we needed any further reminders, only last year, at the FIFA Confederations Cup in Brazil, Tahiti, which came into the tournament as Champions of Oceania, got heavily mauled by every team in their group, including Nigeria, scoring only a solitary goal (against Nigeria) in the process.

    At every sporting tournament, different teams or individuals, take part with varied levels of expectations. It is no less so at the World Cup where teams participate with their respective level of what to expect. Of course, the level of expectation is always tied to the level of preparation prior to the tournament. However, what the tournament proved to all was that the foundation of a successful outing is built around the core ingredient of genuine player quality in addition to the overall individual and collective discipline of the team members and, of course, the passion to win. But then, it is worthy of note that passion alone does not drive a team forward without a good dose of any of the other ingredients.

    Brazil, for instance, wobbled along until they eventually fell flat on their face. This is because though they had some players of genuine quality, notably Neymar Da Silva, the poster boy of the tournament, they nevertheless didn’t quite have enough quality and balance throughout their team to make them into a full force of genuine tournament heavyweights to inspire much confidence in supporters and fear in opponents. In the absence of that, the team merely sought to feed on the nation’s fervor and the hope that Brazil’s reputation as five-time winners of the trophy and arguably the number one football nation in the world, would see the team through. Ordinarily, this would have worked in a field where the quality of the other teams was not as good as what Holland, Argentina, Colombia and the eventual winners, Germany, presented. However, in this case, Brazil suffered horribly because they had failed to get the proper mixture of the interplaying ingredients right whereas Germany did and duly triumphed.

    While Brazil seemed like a really bad car with only good bodywork and one or two other parts to brag about, some of the other teams were a clear example of Keke NAPEPs, hoping to triumph over Mercedes, Renault, etc, in a Formula 1 race – an absolute impossibility. From an African standpoint, no country stood any realistic chance of getting beyond the quarter-finals even if any had somehow managed to get to that stage of the competition. On paper and purely based on the collection of players at their disposal and the clubs the players ply their trade with, Africa’s best hope at the tournament were perennial underachievers, the Cote d’Ivoire. But then the Elephants, as the Ivoirians are nicknamed, are considered underachievers because even on the continent, despite having had some of the continent’s finest football players for over a decade, in recent years, the team has always flattered to deceive as evident in the damning reality that the likes of Kolo Toure, Didier Drogba and Yaya Toure still do not have an African Cup of Nations’ medal to boast about.

    Invariably, assessment of Nigeria’s performance at the tournament ends up producing as many different takes as there are people willing to comment on it. On my own part, the truth is that we simply do not have the team and or players, and we have not had the type of players to really, based purely on quality, get beyond the round of 16 teams at the tournament. And I expressed same sentiments before and after the knock-out match against France on Monday, June, 30 – a match the Super Eagles lost 2 – 0, having acquitted themselves really well during the first half.

    One trend to support this is the argument that from the 16 teams that had qualified from the individual groups and were pitted against each other in a group-winner-versus-group-runner-up match-up, none of the group runners-up managed to knock out any group winner. This means that all the eight group winners progressed to the quarter-finals. Certainly, it is simplistic to merely look at it in such a black-and-white manner. A few of the runner-ups surely gave their group winner opponents a tough time before getting eliminated eventually. Costa Rica, for instance, eliminated Greece on penalties after 120 minutes, same way as Brazil eliminated Chile. Mexico came agonizingly close to upsetting Holland before losing 2 -1 to two goals from the Dutch in the closing minutes and into injury time. The USA were, perhaps, even more valiant, dragging Belgium through 120 minutes of football before succumbing to a 2-1 defeat also. The two finalists did not also have things all their own way as Argentina only knocked Switzerland out having been dragged through an extra 30 minutes of football following a stalemate over 90 minutes. Germany, on the other hand, had to stave off stubborn resistance from Algeria, arguably Africa’s best, most balanced and disciplined team at the tournament. The Algerians also dragged the eventual champions through extra time before their European opponents’ extra quality eventually told. In the end, it is worthy of note that only Colombia’s 2-0 victory against Uruguay, and Nigeria’s defeat to France by a similar score line were the only straightforward affairs for any of the winners. The reality, however, was that it was no mere coincidence that, in each case, the group winner had that extra quality in fortitude, stamina, star quality or tactical know-how to overcome the challenge of a group runner-up en route the quarter-final.

    • (To be continued)

     

     

  • Thinking about Nigeria @ 54

    Thinking about Nigeria @ 54

    Celebrating October 1 each year has become an annual ritual in Nigeria. That day in 1960 marked the end of colonial rule and the enthronement of indigenous leaders in the country. Today, exactly 54 years after, the country is still groping in the dark and tottering on the brink. The low key nature of the independence celebrations, since a few years back, is a confirmation of the bad times. It appears the older the country becomes, the farther it drifts from its promised land. Not even the advent of civilian governance in 1999 has brought anything significantly different. I say civilian governance because that is what we have in Nigeria today, not the democracy we all crave for.

    In essence, our claim to democracy is a ruse. The reasons are glaring for any discerning mind. More than 15 years of civilian governance and 54 years of independence have brought no tangible respite for the long suffering Nigerians. Just look around. More and more people are being sentenced to a life of dependency, want and penury on a daily basis in the country. As a result of this, crime and criminality have taken over on a frightening scale previously unknown in history.

    At the moment, the north-eastof the country is almost being excised from the rest of the country due to the activities of a few misguided individuals who have taken up arms against the country and their fellowmen. Not even the much-publicised killing of the real or fake Abubakar Shekau, the acclaimed leader of the notorious terror group known simply as Boko Haram, has brought much relief. More than 200 schoolgirls abducted from their school in Chibok community, Borno State, are still marooned in the evil forest of Sambissa, also in Borno State, where the hoodlums have turned into their operational headquarters. The other day, one of the innocent girls (if the reports are true), almost half dead, was abandoned in one of the villages in Borno State. By the last account of her health status, she was foundto be four months pregnant with visible evidence of depression and trauma metamorphosing as some mental illness. Her case is a signpost of the calamity that has befallen the innocent schoolgirls who have been denied the comfort of their parents and families to forcefully co-habit with criminals, drug-addicts, rapists and people on the brink of lunacy. For these girls, there is nothing like independence; what they need and crave for today, is freedom from the hands of their tormentors.

    As it is, not only the abducted girls desire freedom; those left behind in Chibok and other villages in the North-east that are currently ravaged by terrorists activities are all desperately looking forward to their emancipation from the hands of their torturers. Recently, the media reported that no fewer than 150 refugees from Nigeria, holed up in a border community in a neighbouring country, were feared dead as the terrorists descended on them and snuffed out their lives. For those ones too, there is nothing like independence celebration.

    So, in view of all these occurrences, do we deserve to celebrate the country’s independence at all this year? Certainly no. The day should have been converted into one huge prayer session all over the country in supplication to God Almighty to come and liberate the country from the current pains and anguish confronting it. But our leaders seem to be thinking in the opposite direction, perhaps, because they are comfortable anyway. Why do we pretend that things are normal at a time they are abysmally abnormal?

    On Monday, more than 300 people were conferred with national honours. While a good number of them could have merited it, some of them were mere misnomers. Among them is a former governor of an oil-rich state of the Niger Delta region of the country who, in a bid to avoid prosecution for corruption and other financial malfeasance while in office, approached a court and obtained a “perpetual injunction” from prosecution. Today, he has been rewarded with a national honour. And there are so many other shameless ones in the same boat with him who have been so honoured in the country. Nigeria we hail thee!

    In the past few years, particularly under the current democracy, the country has again and again demonstrated either unwillingness or lack of capacity to tackle corruption, the hydra-headed monster that has eaten deep into the fabric of the nation. The country is still enmeshed in the $9.3 million money laundering embarrassment that was discovered in far away South Africa. The government said the money was meant to purchase arms to fight the ongoing terrorists’ war in the country. If that excuse was meant to draw sympathy, it has failed and woefully too. The reason is that Nigerians do not trust their leaders because of their high propensity and proclivity to manufacture and tell lies. The same government enacted a law banning her citizens from travelling out of the country at anytime with an amount exceeding $10,000. Now, the government had the effrontery to pack $9.3 million in cash in three suitcases to go and shop for arms across the counter somewhere. Besides, those who ferried the money out are not government officials, while the vessel or the jet used belongs to a known government apologist and bootlicker in cassock.

    There is no amount of explanation that can erase the guilty verdict the people have passed on the government. The public deserve to know the identity of the two couriers involved in this illicit transfer of money that has gone awry. As for the funky man in cassock, it might be too late for him to retrace his steps since he appears to be easily swayed by filthy lucre, for which he makes no pretensions within and outside the country. At least, he is well known all over the place as a commercial ‘Man of God’ who will stop at nothing to smile to the banks to the detriment of his perceived faith. One thing is that he should not allow his greed and selfishness to pit the two major religions against each other in a war of attrition. Based on his antecedents, that is the danger his unguarded pursuit of worldly things could pose to the corporate existence of this country. After all, there is no need putting on a cassock and behaving more like a Boko Haram convert.

    That takes us to the Synagogue church. The building collapse, regrettable and painful as it may be, looks more like an end time thing. For many years, one man suddenly appeared on the scene from nowhere and started equating himself with the trinity and we were all clapping. Within a few years, he built a stupendous empire with many fairy tales of magical prowess. Now that it seems the chickens are gradually coming home to roost, the same man is crying foul and attempting, at least by his body language, to extract sympathy from the public. If people troop to his miracle city in droves, must he only corner the proceeds from such pilgrimages? Why not out-source, for instance, the lodging, accommodation and feeding of his teeming pilgrims to competent hands? Instead, the man embarked on what a Warri man will call “long throat”. Now see what he has caused for himself and the country. For lack of any serious thing to say, he said that the more than 115 people that perished were “martyrs of faith”. By the way, how many of these martyrs are his relations or offspring? And the man is still walking free all over the place. Anyway, that is a story for another day.

    On the political turf, the wave of endorsements and collation of millions of signatures, real and imagined, including the break dancing and the orchestra by our politicians on the threshold of the general elections scheduled for next year, does not give much cheer about the future of the country. Something is seriously wrong. That reminds me of that bespectacled tyrant, General Sani Abacha of blessed (or unblessed) memory. Nigeria we hail thee!

  • Don’t spill their blood

    Don’t spill their blood

    It has almost become a recurring decimal in our national history. Every now and then, there are upheavals in our security agencies, particularly the military and to a large extent, the army. During the military era, from 1966-1999, except for the brief interlude between 1979 and 1983, military uprisings in the form of coup d’états, were regular features of our political life in Nigeria as one group of military adventurers upstaged another in a rat race to control the levers of political power. In the political chess game, much blood was spilled.

    After the military handed over to a democratically elected civilian government in 1999, the spectre of coups seems to have receded. However, what we are now contending with are some forms of insurrection now and again. In 2009, the nation had to grapple with the revolt by returning soldiers from Liberia, who took to the streets in Akure, the capital of Ondo State, southwest Nigeria, accusing some of their commanders of short-changing them. During the subsequent trial, the soldiers alleged that many of them were arrested but some of them were let off the hook after paying $150 ‘ransom’ to a particular officer. They said the officer freed those who paid the bribe and refused to let go those of them who refused to cooperate. Besides, while the soldiers who protested injustice were jailed for life, the officers got away with light punishment, mostly demotion.

    Now, almost the same scenario is playing out once again exactly five years after. In the current one, 12 soldiers have been sentenced to death by firing squad by a military tribunal. Their sentence was the climax of a military court martial involving the arraignment of 18 soldiers on a six-count charge for their involvement in a mutiny on May 14. That day, some aggrieved troops opened fire at a car carrying Major-General Ahmadu Mohammed, the General Officer Commanding, GOC, 7 Division of the Army, based in Maiduguri, Borno State. The General Court Martial ended its sitting at the Mogadishu Barracks in Abuja last Monday. It sentenced 12 of the 18 soldiers to death by firing squad; one was sentenced to 28 days imprisonment with hard labour, while five others were set free.

    The soldiers had claimed that they were ambushed while on a special operation in Kalabalge Local Government Area near Chibok in Borno State, where over 200 girls were abducted from the Government Secondary School, a month earlier. They alleged that, after the operation, the soldiers, who arrived the location at night, were asked to return to Maiduguri by their Commanding Officer despite their plea to be allowed to return the next morning, as the night trip was considered too risky. Unfortunately, halfway through their journey, they ran into a Boko Haram ambush, resulting in the death of more than 10 of them while others suffered various degrees of injuries.

    This incident angered the soldiers, prompting them to rebel against their superiors while the GOC was shot at. The incident compelled the Nigerian Army to replace the GOC at the time. Alarmed by the development, the military authorities arrested the soldiers and instituted a military board of inquiry into the circumstances surrounding their conduct. The soldiers were slammed with six counts, including insubordinate behaviour, false accusation, mutiny, absence without leave (AWOL) and conduct prejudice to service discipline. The punishments for the offences under the Armed Forces Act (AFA) include death, imprisonment and dismissal with ignominy from the armed forces, among others.

    Since last week when the death sentence was passed, the fate of the 12 soldiers has become a source of worry to so many Nigerians. Many have viewed the sentence as capable of impacting negatively on the ongoing campaign against the Boko Haram terrorists as well as demoralise the rank and file of the military. They urged the military to put its house in order and fish out “all the Boko Haram apologists within its ranks and check the excesses of some security operatives who betray their oath of allegiance to the country through sabotage”, the type that led the soldiers’ revolt against their superiors. But some retired military officers have also insisted that the soldiers deserve to die in keeping with military discipline.

    Well, it is good for the military to retain its long tradition of discipline. Any right-thinking person will also not hesitate to condemn the high temperament exhibited by the soldiers in response to the avoidable calamity which befell their colleagues due to needless “orders from above”. It is a pity that some of those now talking about discipline at all cost have also infringed on the law at one time or another and were spared the bullets. However, the lesson from this episode is that the military should put its house in order so as to prevent this ugly thing from repeating itself. The issue of insider sabotage has become too pronounced in the military in recent times. The other day, some senior officers were court-martialled for selling weapons to the terrorists. This is a sad development for a military that wants people to take it seriously.

    What this implies is the fact that there are Boko Haram members in the security forces, particularly the military, which is why it has been pretty difficult to neutralise the terrorists all this while. In most cases, the terrorists appear to be ahead of the military in terms of weaponry and intelligence gathering. This is probably why the soldiers have often taken to their heels when confronted by the terrorists.

    There are rumours that some senior military officers who, before the Boko Haram crisis, were not that buoyant have now suddenly become rich overnight, with fat bank accounts, while the terrorists are daily making mincemeat of the innocent rank and file due to lack of adequate, up-to-date weapons. Few weeks back, a contingent of about 480 Nigerian soldiers had to run into neighbouring Cameroun for sanctuary when they were almost routed by the ragtag Boko Haram terrorists. The Defence Headquarters had to downplay this shameful conduct by describing it as a “tactical manoeuvre”. Tell me, which tactical manoeuvre will make a large contingent of a country’s army to stray into another country, with most of them looking half-naked, dirty and weary?

    In any case, this death sentence is like handing over a special commemorative trophy to the Boko Haram terrorists for a job well done in depleting the ranks of the country’s army as well as demystifying them through all forms of humiliation on the battlefield. Many a time, Nigerian troops complain about lack of adequate kits and equipment as well as inappropriate welfare to prosecute the campaign against Boko Haram. Spilling the blood of these soldiers will only be the surest way to completely demoralise the rank and file of the Nigerian soldiers, who, as it is, are the ones bearing the brunt of this war. This is why they may be aggrieved and ready to explode at the slightest prompting.

    This is the time for the federal government and the military leadership to look into the grievances of soldiers rather than dragging any of them to the stakes for execution. Prior to the incident which has now put the lives of at least 12 soldiers on the line, the soldiers at the Maimalari Cantonment had ceaselessly complained about insufficient ammunition, food and allowances. We cannot continue to lose our soldiers to official indiscretion, high-handedness and maltreatment by higher officers.

    It is clear that if the GOC had exercised his discretion properly, the ambush that led to the death of some soldiers that night would have been avoided. In that case, the soldiers would not have had any cause to confront him, not to talk of firing at him or his car. There is no doubt that mutiny in the military is a grievous offence which should not be encouraged because of the security implication, but we have shed too much blood in this country unnecessarily, than to continue to railroad our young ones to their untimely graves. This is why the circumstance and facts of the mutiny should be taken into consideration.

  • The ink dries for Dimgba

    The ink dries for Dimgba

    That lonesome evening of Saturday, September 6, I was alone, sitting on the sofa in my room, ensconced in thoughts. Suddenly, I looked up to the television set that was doing its own thing unnoticed for some time. Behold the news scroll on the AIT station: “Dimgba Igwe, Vice-Chairman, Sun Newspapers, dies at 58.” At first, it did not as much register in my consciousness as I stared blankly at the television set unable to comprehend whether what I had seen was true, could be true or was totally true. Immediately, I sat up, waiting for the news to come round again. Then it came again and again and again.

    By now, the journalistic instinct in me had woken up. I reached out to my cellphone. As I held it, trying to put a call through for more information about the shocking news, the first name that came to mind was Eric Osagie, whom I choose to call “Omonoba”, meaning “Prince”, in Edo language. I have known and bonded with Eric way back to his days of sojourn with the now rested Weekend Concord. Fate joined us together in 1986 and, since then, we have bonded till date. When Eric was with Concord, there was no time we met that his discussion will not veer off to Mike Awoyinfa and Dimgba Igwe, the professional Siamese twins, who were his bosses and were and are still his bosses in the Sun newspapers. I know that Dimgba has transformed from the terrestrial world to the celestial clime, but he is still a boss. As they say, “once a boss is always a boss.” Even though Dimgba is no more, he will forever remain a boss to all those who passed through his tutelage.

    During the brief interregnum when Concord went off the streets, Eric still maintained his close contact with the duo of Mike and Dimgba, who had then produced their first book. I remember that Eric was involved in marketing the book as he moved all over the place soliciting for buyers. Soon after, the Sun newspapers hit the newsstands. Eric came on board. Each time we met, he never ceased to talk about Dimgba and Mike in glorious terms. It was through his many narrations that I got to know Mike and Dimgba more. Eric mirrored them. Though he never uttered the word “mentor”, but the innate passion with which he spoke about them with love and stylish fervour, they are, no doubt, his mentors and, by extension,  same to so many others.

    So that night, I put a call through to Eric. It rang endlessly without any response. That was quite unusual. My worse fear was confirmed when the 10’o clock news that night said Dimgba Igwe’s death was caused by a hit-and-run driver while he was jogging around his neighbourhood in Okota, a suburb of Lagos. I am quite familiar with that Okota axis of Lagos, which I explored in and out for three years, between 1989 and 1991, when I was working at Champion newspapers, located at Ilasamaja. I am also familiar with the Apata Memorial High School, around where the murderous driver decided to end it all for Dimgba. That area, at that time, was highly notorious, perhaps, because of the ethnic concentration in that place.

    Anyway, I couldn’t reach Eric that night as he did not return my call. Throughout the night, the thoughts of the life of someone of that status being extinguished in such a reckless and callous manner, punctured and punctuated my sleep all through. It was a sleepless night in which my mind kept wandering while I eagerly awaited the flash of daylight to signify another day. My hope was that the newspapers, which my vendor brings before 7a.m every day, will throw more light on the greatest puzzle of the year that Dimgba’s untimely death represents. The newspapers arrived, as usual, just a few minutes to 7a.m. As they were being handed over to me on the bed, my phone rang. The caller was Eric. Both of us were too much in haste to talk about Dimgba’s death, so much that we could not exchange greetings.

    “What happened to Dimgba?” I thundered. Eric answered: “My brother, na so we see am o”. “How did it happen?” I queried further. Eric replied, “You see, nobody really knows exactly what happened, but we heard that he was knocked down by a car while he was jogging early in the morning and somebody picked his phone and called his wife”. Eric and I then went into a long conversation over the incident. Eric blamed his death on the lack of appropriate and adequate medical facilities in the country. He narrated how they took the injured Dimgba to one or two hospitals where there were no surgeons to attend to him, until he was rushed to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital, LUTH, where the surgeons there, tried unsuccessfully to stabilise him before he finally died.

    While Eric Osagie was agonising over the dearth of appropriate emergency medical care in the country, which might have hastened the death of Dimgba, I simply told him to look beyond that because it could be a simulated assassination. Let us look at it this way. Jogging around that spot where the incident occurred could have been or was a routine which he did religiously. In that case, he was vulnerable to any hit man or hit men lurking around to commit havoc. All they needed do was to lay ambush ahead of his appearance along that route that unholy morning. As he came around, quite oblivious of the satanic plot, he could have even unknowingly jogged past the vehicle bearing his killer or killers. As soon as the killers were sure of their target, the vehicle would rev into life, move quickly and dangerously crush the target in the usual, crazy manner of driving in Nigeria, particularly in Lagos, to make it look like an accident.

    But what could be the motive for such heinous crime? Just anything! Anything that upsets another person could precipitate such criminal act. Here was a man so much married to his job and the gospel. Those close to him say he could not hurt a fly. But he was in business – the business of writing books and, perhaps, some other things along the line. For sure, he couldn’t have been involved in shady deals that might warrant settling scores with death. But then, you never can tell. Petty jealousy and inferiority complex, of which I was a victim in the recent past, could lead an aggrieved person to commit anything. Whatever it is, I believe we all must learn a lesson, or two, from this tragedy.

    Moreover, in this era of technological advancement, what has happened to our so-called policy on e-policing?  Is it too much to install CCTV at notorious crime scenes and very busy areas? This, I believe, would have solved the puzzle that Dimgba’s death has become. Or at least, keep murderers in check. It’s time we put on our thinking caps. It’s Dimgba’s turn today …

    Dimgba lived. Now, he is dead. Stone dead. Never to move either his limbs or fingers again to write the beautiful prose that stood him out in the firmament of journalism in Nigeria. How cruel death is, the monster that devour both the young and the old at will! The dead do not glorify death or tremble at its sight. They just walk away to eternity. It is the living that feels the pain, the anguish, the bereavement and sense of loss. More than a million cries or an ocean of tears can never retrieve the dead. As we weep and gnash our teeth in solemnity with the family, friends and acquaintances left behind by our brother and our comrade-in-arms in the fight against the buccaneers and the oppressors in our midst, we must face the stark reality that Dimgba Igwe has played his part and gone forever. He now sits with the Saints. Well, the police, must fish out whodunit!