The Nation Newspaper

Category: Editorial

  • Whodunnit?

    Whodunnit?

    •The US Embassy has denied the USAID allegations. So, what foreign hands are Boko Haram sponsors?

    Just as well: the US Ambassador in Nigeria, Richard M. Mills, Jr., just banished any supposition that Boko Haram may have enjoyed any American sponsorship.

    “There is absolutely no evidence that I have seen that has occurred,” he declared.  “Certainly if we ever had evidence presented to us that a programme funding was being diverted to Boko Haram, we would immediately investigate along with Nigerian partners.”

    Indeed, it hardly makes any sense.  Why might the US Agency for International Development (USAID) sponsor Boko Haram and other global terror groups?  The same United States that has battled global Islamist terror as an article of state faith?

    Yet, that was what US Congressman, Republican Scot Perry, suggested at a congress committee session to cut wastes, with USAID in harsh focus.

    “Who gets the money?  Does that name ring a bell to anybody in the room?” he opened with a flurry of rhetorical questions. “Because your money, your money, US$ 697 million annually, plus shipments of cash funds in Madrasas, ISIS, Al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, ISIS, Khossan, terrorist training camps.  That’s what it’s funding.”   Any further proof?  None.

    This was a clear play to the gallery, to achieve a set goal. Indeed, but for parliamentary privilege that confers on it some legitimacy, it ought to have been clear it was another parliamentary gas to settle local political scores. 

    However, how Americans play their local politics is not of interest to us here.  Still, it’s legitimate to infer that some US lobbies appear determined to tar USAID.  So, throwing into the mix international politics, which is USAID’s forte, makes eminent Machiavellian sense.

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    First, all the mentioned terror groups belong to different generations, which different US administrations, Republican or Democratic, have all slammed.  Then, Boko Haram got mentioned as part of Perry’s emotive stacking of cards.

    Still, Perry’s allegations worked up some firestorms in conspiracy theories.  Not a few linked the allegations to the ouster of the late Muamar Gaddaffi of Libya, under the Obama Presidency, linking such alleged duplicity to secretly funding Boko Haram. 

    But why would the same Obama go all out to kill Osama bin Laden and bludgeon his Al-Qaeda, yet would funnel American funds, by stealth, via USAID, to sponsor Boko Haram, another terror cell?  Again, it makes little sense.

    Still, if USAID was not involved in funding Boko Haram and other terror cells, not to mention the various bandits currently plaguing Nigeria’s North West and part of the North Central, mainly Niger, Nasarawa and Benue, who do the funding?

    There are locals, in the terror epicentres, claiming they sighted foreigners, mostly white faces, allegedly landing helicopters and dropping awesome military grade arms in the middle of forests — for client terrorists to pick up?  If these faces were not Americans, then who were they?  Surely, they couldn’t have been ghosts, if these claims are true?

    Could there then have been some rogue fifth columnists, among international aid agencies, that have somewhat infiltrated legitimate aid operations to wreak havoc?

    Dr. Patrick Dele Cole, famed historian and Nigeria’s former Ambassador to Brazil and Argentina, saw through the Perry allegations.  If all USAID gave in bulk to Nigeria were products (drugs to treat HIV/AIDS, vehicles and sundry logistics — hardly cash — aside paying generously own expatriates on foreign field work, where is that cash to pass to Boko Haram to acquire those sophisticated arms and ammo?

    That’s a good question.  But also could there be possibilities of a few officials turning rogue — if not of USAID, then of other players in the foreign aid sector?

    Perry may have voiced a wild allegation.  Still, it offers Nigeria a golden opportunity to get to the root of terror funding in Nigeria.  If such a probe spots the culprits, and the government is able to successfully block such funding, then the war against terror would have been partly won.

    But this can’t be achieved without a thorough investigation.  This is the time to go for it.

  • Egbetokun’s kind gesture

    Egbetokun’s kind gesture

    •It is soul-lifting that the police force has cleared 13 years backlog of insurance benefits

    Insurance benefits are crucial for all workers. They provide financial protection against unexpected events like accidents, illnesses, or even death, by allowing the workers to access medical care without necessarily tearing their pockets or depleting their savings, and also to ease payment of their dependants insurance claims in case of death.

    If these benefits are good for workers generally, we can then appreciate that they will be much more so for people in the security services, like soldiers, policemen, etc., who are faced with life-threatening situations almost all the time, due to the peculiar nature of their jobs.

    This is why we are surprised that such motivational benefits could have been left unpaid for about 13 years for our policemen.

    This much was revealed by the Inspector-General of Police (IGP)),

    Kayode Egbetokun, during the unveiling of the Police Insurance Claims Management Portal (npfinsuranceclaimsmgt.ng) held at the Goodluck Ebele Jonathan Peacekeeping Hall, Force Headquarters, in Abuja, last week.

     Egbetokun also presented cheques to the next-of-kin and beneficiaries of deceased police officers at the occasion.

    Egbetokun said at the event, which also featured the inauguration of a specialised training programme for insurance desk officers nationwide that : “At the outset of this administration, we met an alarming backlog of unsettled insurance claims from 2010 to 2023.

    “This unfortunate reality left the families of our deceased officers in financial distress, a situation we found unacceptable and determined to change.”

    His administration therefore “took immediate steps to engage defaulting insurance providers and enforce compliance, and through these determined efforts, we have made remarkable progress.”

    The disbursements included N17.8 billion paid to 6,645 beneficiaries at eight separate presentations before last week’s event. Another tranche of N3b was disbursed to 706 beneficiaries, covering insurance policy years of 2020 through 2021/2022, 2022/23 and 2023/2024 at the occasion.

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    The first question that comes into mind is why the police authorities allowed the unsettled claims to pile up for this long? This case demonstrates how government agencies take debts for granted and allow them to unduly accumulate. Did they think they can get away with it? Didn’t those in charge know that this is a typical example of what goes round comes around? That it was only a matter of time for them too or their relatives to be in the shoes of those affected by the unsettled backlog?

    Or was it that the government did not release funds for the payment?

    This backlog, unfortunately, exposes problematic police management over the years.

    Anyway, we commend the incumbent IGP for this remarkable progress that has reduced the debt profile. This shows the priority he has given this aspect of police welfare. And it is a win-win for all  — the Federal Government, the beneficiaries, the serving officers and the country at large.

    For the government it means reduction in its debt stock; it brought smiles to the faces of the beneficiaries and at the same time rubs off positively on the serving officers who are rest assured that should the unexpected happen, their dependants would not suffer the double jeopardy of losing their loved ones in the line of duty, and at the same time being left without financial succour.

    Ultimately the ordinary man too would benefit from the improved security that such gesture should engender.

    We implore the government to never again allow such debts to accumulate. Our policemen are confronted by all manner of security threats and the least we owe them is to ensure they are adequately motivated. One way of doing this is to pay them deserving wages in service promptly, and ensure that their beneficiaries do not become beggars or liabilities to others if their breadwinners die in active service.

    It is also important to know where the problem came from. If money was allocated for the payment of these claims, then those who defaulted in remitting them as appropriate should be called to account for it. It is immaterial whether they are still in service or they have retired. Gone should be the days when people play yo-yo with public funds and go scot-free.

  • Step down

    Step down

    •CBN reads riot act to bank directors with toxic loans

    Just like last year when it ordered chief executive officers (CEOs) and chairmen of banks who failed to publish their annual financial statements of account 12 months after the end of the financial year to be fired with immediate effect, the apex bank has again read the riot act to those privileged top guns in the financial services industry.

     However, this time around, the order is on directors with non-performing insider-related facilities. They are required to step down immediately from the board.

    The affected banks are also directed to “commence immediate remediation of the loans through the recovery of the collaterals, including the shareholdings of the affected directors.” The circular, dated February 17, was signed by the bank’s acting director of banking supervision, Adetona Adedeji. It says the new measures are in line with its moves to strengthen corporate governance and risk management within the banking sector.

    Without the apex bank necessarily admitting that much, the measures, taken together, touch upon the roots of the widespread abuses for which the nation’s financial services industry has long acquired global notoriety.  For, just as the failure to publish annual financial statements on due date not only sustains the illusion of performance and thus allows inept management to carry on as they please, the reckless culture of insider-borrowing with absolute disregard for laid-down rules

    has bred the open license, free-for-all bazaar that has somewhat defined the financial services sector.

    And, just as the debate on which of the breaches is more toxic might well be an open one, their undeniable impacts in undermining the integrity of the financial services industry are certainly beyond disputations.

    Surely, there is nothing in the new directive that could be said to be outside of the bank’s remit as the guarantor of the monetary system stability. However, if our understanding that the guidelines which the bank now seeks to enforce are already in the books, is right, raising questions about the pervasiveness of the malady, more so at this time, would, more than being appropriate, be absolutely necessary. For a problem that has become historic, somewhat, it is clearly a measure of how ingrained that elite pathology of mindless impunity has refused to go away.

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    Now that the CBN has gone beyond admitting the problem to escalating it as a matter of grave concern, Nigerians wait to see what happens next. Surely, it is hard to imagine that the apex bank does not already have the list of the actors involved. So, what could be wrong with the CBN directing the ignoble lenders to do the public duty of publishing the list of those individual directors known to have breached the sacred rule?

    And what about the other actors that watched while those grave violations took place? Wouldn’t they be just as complicit? This takes us to the routine circular from the apex bank, directing the exit of the offenders from the banks’ boards.

    Considering that the issue at stake touches on corporate governance and the institutional integrity in the financial services industry, the text might have been well directed, albeit inoffensively so, given the typical conservatism of the sector; on the whole however, it appears to have generally understated the dire implications of a pathology that has so undermined our critical institutions to such point that leaves pretty little left for salvage.

    Now that the apex bank has kicked off the process, Nigerians can only wait to see the extent to which the banks will comply. Hopefully, the next time around will see the CBN act proactively and decisively, as against tepid appeals on banks for compliance. Given how far and how deeply such corporate malfeasances have festered, the time for the latter should be seen as long gone. 

  • Denial of visa to CDS

    Denial of visa to CDS

    •Federal Government must investigate and appropriate actions taken

     The diplomatic quarrel between Nigeria and Canada over the denial of visa to Nigeria’s Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Gen. Christopher Musa, and his entourage, was avoidable.  Gen Musa, while welcoming those who participated in the Invictus Games in

    the North American country emphasised that the Nigerian military was duly invited to the ceremony by the Duke of Sussex, and that the foreign ministry was aware of the visa applications denied.

    He said the team captain, the medical doctor and the physiotherapist were all denied visas.

    If the claims are correct, then the Canadian embassy should apologise to Nigeria and the applicants.

    Clearly, foreign relations is based on the principle of reciprocity, and no foreign country should escape the consequences of abusing the bilateral relations with Nigeria. If the Canadian embassy, without justification, treated the highest ranking military officer in Nigeria with contempt and disrespect, then our foreign embassy must be alerted to give back to the Canadians a taste of their diplomatic dish.

    But, considering that the matter is about Nigeria’s diplomatic relationship, we expect the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to be telling Nigerians what is going on.  Speaking at the Defence Headquarters, Musa said: “On the issue of visa denial … we received an official invitation, followed due process, and complied with all requirements. The Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Minister of State, the NSA – everyone was aware of the journey.” He went on, “for reasons best known to them, many crucial team members were not granted visas. The question remains – why?”

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    In his reaction earlier, the National Security Adviser (NSA), Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, in exasperation had un-diplomatically thundered, Canada can “go to hell.”

    We thought that a person of the CDS’s standing should have a diplomatic passport, and his visa application will be routed through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which will accompany it with a note verbale. In diplomacy, such an application will not be denied by a friendly nation.

    A retired Nigerian diplomat, Ambassador Rasheed Akinkuolie, in an interview, said: “High officials of the rank of the CDS, COAS, and Service Chiefs should normally hold diplomatic passports. Application for visas of such top officials should be routed through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and forwarded with a note verbale. He went on: “In this case, denial of visa will be inconceivable.

    ”So, Nigerians need to know who did what, and whether the error was as a result of mistake by the applicants, or that Canada merely spurned its friendly relationship with Nigeria. The CDS affirmed that the Federal Government is investigating the incident, and we support a probe by the relevant ministries and agencies. The disrespect should not be swept under the carpet, to avoid a recurrence. If the error is from our side, those concerned should own up and accept responsibility for their mistakes. 

    As the NSA and the CDS said in their reactions, Nigeria is an important country that deserves the respect of other nations. Their message that the incident is a wake-up call for all and sundry to work hard to make Nigeria greater is in sync. The way a country is treated in diplomatic circles is a reflection of how the country is viewed by other nations. The officials who treated the visa applications of the CDS and his team with contempt may have done so because they have a jaundiced opinion that everyone applying for their country’s visa is seeking a permanent relocation. 

    While the grant or refusal of visa is the prerogative of every sovereign nation, the prevailing view amongst many that Nigeria is irredeemable is sad. We believe that Nigeria is redeemable and our collective effort will make it possible.

    Nigerians must believe in the future of their country, and no foreign nation should be allowed to treat our citizens with disrespect.

  • Cost of leadership

    Cost of leadership

    • Delta Steel firm’s sale for peanuts is symptomatic of our poor choices of the Obssanjo-Atiku era

    Nothing illustrates better the astronomical cost in terms of retarded socio-economic development and the attendant continued impoverishment of the vast majority of Nigerians than the country’s flawed and largely failed privatisation of public enterprises programme.

    The poor, incompetent and corrupt leadership responsible over the years for a privatisation exercise that has become an albatross on the economy was once again revealed when the Director -General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), Mr Ayo Gbeleyi, appeared before the House of Representatives Committee on Public Assets to testify on a petition arising from the privatisation of the Delta Steel Company, (DSC), Aladja, Delta State.

    Residents of Camps 2, 4 and 5 which were estates and plots of land owned by the DSC had petitioned the House that they had been under intimidation and harassment by the police and other security agencies since 2015 to vacate the estates, which had allegedly been used as collateral to raise loans by parties involved in the privatisation of the company, presumably without the knowledge of the affected residents.

    Responding to questions before the committee, Mr Gbeleyi said the BPE had, in pursuance of the Federal Government’s privatisation policy under President Olusegun Obasanjo but under the supervision of Atiku Abubakar, sold 80 per cent of the DSC’s shareholding to a private company, Global Infrastructure Nigeria Limited, (GINL), in 2005, while the Federal Government retained 20 per cent shareholding.

    Thus, the DSC, which was valued at over 700 million dollars was sold to GINL for 30 million dollars. According to Gbeleyi, residential buildings and plots of land belonging to DSC were used to settle the entitlements of workers and pensioners of the company. After taking ownership of the DSC on terms that can only be described as a monumental rip-off, GINL used the assets of the company as collateral to obtain a loan from Ecobank. The story got murkier when, as a result of non-performance of the loan, the Assets Management Company of Nigeria (AMCON), acquired the assets of DSC in 2015 and sold them to Premium Steel and Mines Ltd.

    Although AMCON has the statutory responsibility of intervening to acquire and take measures to save failing entities from collapse, its involvement only appeared to have compounded the woes associated with the privatisation of the DSC.

    The representative of AMCON at the hearing, Chukwuemeka Umunakwu, of its legal unit said the company acquired the assets of DSC used as collateral to obtain loans from four banks to prevent the facilities from collapsing. He revealed that AMCON acquired the assets at N22 billion and sold them to Premium Steel and Mines at N32 billion. However, Gbeleyi had earlier stated that the transactions between AMCON and Premium Steel and Mines Ltd was done without the involvement of the BPE, which would have provided clarifications on earlier contractual agreements.

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    Furthermore, the BPE acknowledged awareness only of the loan taken by GIHL from Ecobank but not those from three other banks that AMCON had listed as the creditors.

    The representative of the Accountant -General of the Federation, Kabiru Ademola, the Director of Finance in the office of the Accountant -General, acknowledged receipt for payment of

    N3 billion by BPE in respect of sales of 80 per cent of DSC assets to GIHL. But he said the Accountant-General of the Federation was yet to receive any response from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on the claim by AMCON that it had paid N32 billion derived from the sale of DSC assets to Premium Steel and Mines to the Federal Government’s Treasury Single Account (TSA).

    It is curious that the Office of the Accountant -General seemingly has no record of such a transaction.

    Since the BPE’s director-general had earlier stated that the residential buildings and plots of land owned by DSC had been used to settle the entitlements of workers and pensioners of the company by GINL, the claim by the petitioners that the assets used as collateral by GINL to obtain the Ecobank loan did not include the residential buildings appears to have some plausibility. How and why then did AMCON and Premium Steel and Mines Ltd include these residential buildings in the assets they used as collateral to raise loans from four banks as they claim?

    But no less disturbing is their claim that information available at the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) indicates that the loan obtained by GINL from Ecobank was N250 million and not N7 billion as stated.

    These are all issues that require meticulous investigation to uncover the truth and ensure that the law is enforced in the interest of justice and the public good.

    However, the opacity, untidiness and outright corruption so obvious in the privatisation of the DSC is not an isolated exception. Rather, it is the norm that is mirrored in the botched privatisation of scores of public enterprises under Obasanjo that remain non-functional and inefficient because of their flawed and fraudulent transfer to incompetent hands without the technical expertise or financial capacity to deliver, despite the political connections that enabled them take over multi-billion Naira enterprises at a fragment of their values.

    A critical example is the power sector which continues to perform inefficiently and sub-optimally since the unbundling in 2013 of the defunct Power Holding Company of Nigeria (PHCN) into 11 distribution and six generation companies which possess neither the professional track record nor the financial wherewithal to discharge their obligations under the contractual privatisation agreement.

    The privatisation process of companies across diverse sectors of the economy was found to have been tainted as the civil society organisation, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) aptly put it by “damaging allegations of corruption, presidential interference, and abuse of due process in the selection of core investor, valuation of public enterprises, pricing of shares/assets, determination of workers’ terminal benefits and use of proceeds of privatisation”.

    It is thus unsurprising that when members of the House of Representatives Committee on Privatisation visited the BPE in 2018, the agency’s boss at the time, Mr Alex Okoh, said 37 per cent of privatised companies were underperforming, with many involved in protracted legal disputes. Consequently, he was reported by the media as affirming that “The benefits of privatisation which should have been better management, job retention, job creation and technical advancement, empowering local communities, improved tax revenues and corporate social responsibility projects for communities have not happened because state assets went into the hands of economic buccaneers in a privatisation process that was used mainly for political patronage”.

  • Edwin Clark

    Edwin Clark

    •Nationalist, technocrat, community leader

    Many will agree that, at 97, Edwin Clark lived a full life. He was a nationalist, technocrat, ethnic leader, regional virtuoso, teacher, lawmaker, community leader and, sometimes, an agitator.  It is understandable that when he took his last breath, everyone knew a major figure in Nigerian history had departed.

    Before he died, he had a resonant voice for the restructuring of Nigeria and for the south-south region from where he hailed. He believed the region should enjoy its fair share of Nigerian power and wealth, especially since that region

    is the proverbial goose that has laid the golden eggs for the nation’s dinner table for most of its life.

    Not many agree with his style, though, or even the integrity of his voice since it

    was often tainted with partisan brio.

    For instance, when he was an unofficial adviser to President Goodluck Jonathan, he was domiciled in the president’s bias and defended the bumbling of the nation’s leader and was believed to have benefited from access to the president. His voice for restructuring was more than a little muted when critics thought his principal was falling short of that goal. He did not say much about the failings of the president in retooling the economy as well.

    But once President Jonathan was out of office, he regained his hubris as fighter for justice, and he became the moving force for the establishment of the Pan Niger Delta Forum. The body has, however, been invaluable in trumpeting the demands of the region and nudging the rest of the country in responding to the agonies of his people.

    He sometimes has also been seen for good and for ill as an Ijaw leader, a role he took on more forcefully as during this republic. But at the tail end of the military era, he was a major player during the Ijaw-Itsekiri conflagration that took toll on both sides and has crippled many communities, including Warri. Warri is yet to recover from the depredations of those years. But Clark was seen as stoking the war rather than serving as arbiter.

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    Yet, for most of his career, he had served his country with energy and devotion right from the pre-independence years. He was first a teacher after he had graduated from the Government Teacher Training College, which has now transformed into the Delta State University, Abraka.

    He moved to the United Kingdom to study law at Holborn College, and there his verve began as a political animal as a member of the West African Students Union. But back home, his first stint was as a council member in Bomadi under the aegis of the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons.

    His quest for federal system began in the aftermath of the 1966 coup when the nation searched for a working formula, and Clark was part of the Midwest Region’s delegation that rejected confederation.

    As a technocrat, he served both at the Midwest level as well as at the centre. Between 1966 and 1975, he was the commissioner for education during which the Midwest College of Technology was set up. It formed the seed bed of the University of Benin. He later served as the commissioner for finance for the Midwest State. He was later to serve as commissioner for education under the federal military government under Yakubu Gowon.

    He joined the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) in the Second Republic, and served as a member of the National Executive Council and state treasurer in the then Bendel State. He became a lawmaker as senator in a tenure that was short-lived by a military coup.

    He revamped his interest in education in his hoary years when he founded his own tertiary institution, the Edwin Clark University.

    He will, therefore, be remembered as an Aristotelian man of affairs.

  • Ayo Adebanjo

    Ayo Adebanjo

    •Indeed, the controversial man is gone!

    He was conscious of his linkage with controversy. During a conversation with his daughter in an undated short video that went viral after his death on February 14 at the age of 96, he foretold that his passing would be announced in this way: “Ayo Adebanjo, leader of Afenifere, the controversial man, is gone.” 

    Indeed, he was at the centre of various controversies. A notable instance was his passionate support for Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) ahead of the country’s 2023 presidential election, which alienated him from Afenifere, the Yoruba socio-cultural group he co-founded. The group had backed Bola Tinubu, who ultimately won the election and became president. Adebanjo had argued that it was the turn of the Southeast to produce the president based on “equity.”

    However, it is a testimony to his positives that President Tinubu, in a posthumous tribute, described him as “a political leader whose decades of unwavering struggle for justice, democracy, and national unity have left an indelible mark on our nation’s history.”

    Yet he was regarded for good reason as more contrarian than principled and was accused by former governor of Oyo State, Bola Ige, as a military sellout.

    His political consciousness, which led to his activism, dated back to the colonial era when he was attracted to the nationalist Nnamdi Azikiwe. According to him, “As a Zikist, I was buying the ‘West African Pilot’ when I was in Standard Five… We were committed to reading Dr Azikiwe’s column… But when Chief Obafemi Awolowo came and preached federalism, I, like many others, were convinced; that was how I joined the Action Group (AG).”

    Born in Isanya Ogbo, in present-day Ogun State, he worked as a reporter for ‘Daily Service’ at some point and became the pioneer organising secretary of AG from 1947 to 1953 when he travelled to England where he studied Law.

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    He returned to Nigeria and worked as a lawyer in Awolowo’s law firm. “I was still in his chambers when we were accused of treasonable felony because we went to Ghana to study the activities of the Convention People’s Party (CPP),” he said. Awolowo, a former premier of the old Western Region, was tried for treasonable felony in 1963. Adebanjo was in exile in Ghana until the military toppled Kwame Nkrumah’s government and sent him back to Nigeria where he was imprisoned under the military. 

    A committed follower of Awolowo, he joined the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), which was founded by Awolowo and was dominant in western Nigeria from 1978 to 1983.

    President Tinubu noted that following the annulment of the country’s historic June 12, 1993 presidential election by the military, Adebanjo “joined the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) as one of the leading voices against military dictatorship, helping to galvanise a movement that became the bedrock of our collective struggle to reclaim democratic governance.”

    Under him as acting chairman, the Alliance for Democracy (AD) produced six governors in the Southwest states in 1999. The party, formed in 1998, had adopted the Afenifere agenda as its official manifesto. He attributed the progressive party’s loss of dominance to members who “got blinded by ambition,” and wanted to “sideline the elders.”

    He was a consistent and zealous advocate of federalism and restructuring. He argued that a Sovereign National Conference was critical to Nigeria’s existence, saying, “we must agree to live together based on terms and conditions agreeable to all.” In a published interview in 2024, he declared that “there can be no progress until that constitution is thoroughly changed… You are amending a constitution that is already broken down.” He was referring to Nigeria’s operative 1999 constitution, which was written under military rule but has been democratically amended multiple times, most recently in 2023. His recommendation: “Let all the federating states be autonomous. Let’s go back to the 1963 constitution. No more, no less. Anything short of that, you are just wasting your time.”

    The title of his 2018 autobiography, “Telling it as it is,” reflects a personality at home with controversy. His views on federalism and restructuring remain relevant to the search for answers to the National Question in Nigeria.

  • It’s about data

    It’s about data

    • News of 6,000 Nigeriens on our database makes a genuine social register imperative

    Citizens are invaluable in the race for national development. Next to that is data. A good data base, that is. From the news that about 6,000 citizens of Niger Republic were found in the National Social Register, a contamination poses a problem to any benefit that may accrue from a data of integrity.

    That explains why President Bola Ahmed Tinubu directed an inter-ministerial committee to ensure a comprehensive data for the National Social Register for the Federal Government’s social investment programmes.

    That the data could be so compromised is a reflection of the porous process of registering persons. So, it is not enough to register but to investigate how such a high figure could enter our database. Two, how long has this happened? If we know how they entered the system, we ought also to find out what benefits they have illegally enjoyed from their imposture.

    It is significant that foreign nationals know the value of being on the register than most Nigerians. Evidence of a slow growth of the register has been in the numbers.

    Part of the challenge is lack of adequate enlightenment. This is a role not only for the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), but also for the National Orientation Agency (NOA). Illiteracy has been a factor. Which is an irony because the vast majority of the unlettered, who populate our rural areas, stand to benefit the most from the fruits of a national database.

    We also need to know if Nigeriens are not the only foreign nationals taking advantage of a loose data administration in the country. Nigeria has for long served the social needs of our neighbours. Taking advantage of the free movement clause of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) charter, foreigners throng the nation and avail themselves of the social services. Governors in the southwest of the country, especially Lagos, have often noted how our hospitals have accommodated many a foreigner.

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    There is no doubt that we complain that we do not have sufficient facilities or resources for our needs. For us to share them with interlopers is regrettable. We cannot advance a xenophobic position but we should have control over who comes in and leaves, and what impact they have on our resources. Lagos, of course, is the top victim of this influx.

    We cannot handle all this without a rigour in our immigration policies. It helps us to track not only the persons but also our bounty. We can note, too, that some of the criminals under the thumb of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) have not even been our ECOWAS neighbours but Asians, especially the Chinese who have recruited Nigerians to perpetrate some of the crimes that undermine our economy and social fabric.

    Again, there is no better time for a national database than now, with efforts to reach the poor and underserved with the establishment of the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs. For them, good data means not only food, not only jobs, and not only shelter. It means justice. Yet, we cannot forget the firestorm of controversy over a database as a buoy to distribute palliatives to the poor.

    If it was urgent then, it is even more so now that foreigners would be getting benefits instead of Nigerians.

    If we have a database, it makes it easy to make other government decisions and predict government policies. Technology is our great help here, as we can digitize every facet of government.

    With digitization comes not only transparency but faith in transparency, and with that comes faith in government. The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, George Akume, has said that getting the National Identity Number (NIN) would become the ticket to social services. Which is correct.

    That makes a great data even more compelling.

  • Bad market

    Bad market

    • Raids on producers and sellers of fake drugs should be sustained

    Last week was a bad week for unscrupulous Nigerians involved in the business of fake and substandard drugs and allied items. It was a week that the cups of these Nigerians were full, as the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), raided three of their main centres in Lagos, Aba in Abia State and Onitsha, Anambra State, notorious for the production, adulteration and sale of these products. 

    As the Director-General of NAFDAC, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, said, enough was indeed enough.

    During the raids, over 3,000 drug shops

    were sealed in Lagos, while 24 truckloads of fake drugs were confiscated in Anambra and Abia states. The agency uncovered a major operation depot where expired drugs were being repackaged and revalidated for resale at Umumeje Village in Osisioma Ngwa area of Abia State. The illicit business was being run from multiple buildings close to the Ariaria International Market. 

    NAFDAC personnel were accompanied by a joint security team in order to provide security for the officials and ensure that the exercise was successful.

    Seized items consisted of expired potassium chloride, allergy medications, immune boosters, and cholesterol treatments as well as machines used to rebrand and alter expiry dates.

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    “This operation follows extensive data collection and intelligence gathering, which revealed large-scale repackaging of counterfeit drugs in the market,’’ Prof Adeyeye said.

    We commend NAFDAC for the raids which revealed a disturbing volume of adulterated and substandard medications worth billions of naira. Imagine a situation where, in Lagos alone, more than 3,000 drug shops were sealed, while 24 trucks of 40-foot containers were also confiscated in the other two locations. We can only imagine the harm these drugs could cause to unsuspecting members of the public if allowed to go into circulation. Interestingly, some of the adulterated and expired but repackaged drugs carried equally faked NAFDAC numbers; a seal of approval that the drugs are safe for human consumption. This is all many of the drugs consumers need as proof of their genuineness.

    Yet, these are just some of the ways by which some Nigerians shortchange

    unsuspecting compatriots with regard to fake and adulterated drugs. It baffles our imagination the extent some people can go in search of sudden wealth. Some importers of drugs even go to the extent of asking drug manufacturers abroad to reduce the contents of the drugs, specially produced for Nigeria, in order to make super profits. That explains why many people complain about lack of efficacy of some drugs.

    Fake and falsified medical products pose significant threats to public health. It is either they are ineffective at treating the illness, as they may contain incorrect ingredients or incorrect dosages. Or they are directly harmful to patients if they contain contaminants or toxic substances. In some cases, they may even kill the consumer or patient.

    We want such raids to continue unannounced to deter those involved in the illicit business. When this is done persistently, they would be forced to look for better ways to make money.

    However, much as we support regular raids on these centres of death, prevention, they say, is better than cure. We would want a situation where the fake drugs that can be prevented from entering the country are stopped at the points of entry because we have also had situations where such products had been intercepted and destroyed.

    Again, it is not enough to seal off the shops or warehouses where these fake products are kept or produced, or confiscate the contaminated drugs; those behind the fakery should be apprehended. In the raids under review, not much was heard of arrests of the masterminds of the fake and adulterated drugs. Nigerians would be more than happy to know the merchants of death behind this illicit business.

  • No controversy

    No controversy

    •Supreme Court affirms Amaewhule’s faction as authentic Rivers assembly members

    The judgment of the five-member panel of the Supreme Court, led by Justice Uwani Abba-Aji, which dismissed the appeal filed by Rivers State Governor Siminalayi Fubara, inviolably affirms the judgment of the Court of Appeal of October 10, 2024. The counsel to Fubara, Yusuf Ali (SAN), had sought to withdraw the appeal, but following the application by Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), and Joseph Daudu (SAN), counsel to the respondents, that parties have joined issues, the apex court agreed with their submission, and dismissed the appeal. By that dismissal, all the findings of the Court of Appeal remain the final judgment which the parties must obey. To argue otherwise, as some eminent lawyers and lay persons are doing, amount to flagrant misrepresentation of the laws of our country.

    By the rules of our legal procedure, the judgment of the high court is final, unless appealed against and upturned at the Court of Appeal. Furthermore, the judgment of the Court of Appeal is final, unless appealed against, and turned at the Supreme Court. Where as in the Rivers State case, an appeal to the Supreme Court is dismissed, the judgment of the Court of Appeal stands as the final judgment in the case.

    The three-member panel of the Court of Appeal, led by Justice Joseph Oyewole, had on October 10, affirmed the judgment of Justice James Omotosho of the Federal High Court, sitting in Abuja, delivered on January 22, 2024, nullifying the passage of N800 billion state budget, by four members of the House of Assembly led by Victor Oko-Jumbo. The high court, among other findings, affirmed Martin Amaewhule as Speaker of Rivers State House of Assembly, and condemned the effort by the executive to ride roughshod over the legislature.  On appeal by Governor Fubara, Justice Oyewole, while dismissing the appeal, held that: “By encouraging four members of the Rivers State House of Assembly out of 32 to constitute the basis for legislative activities, the appellant (Fubara), as Governor of Rivers State, was operating with 12.5 per cent of the entity constituting Rivers State.”

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    He further held that “in a constitutional democracy, the foundation of every act must be located in the Constitution as the grundnorm” and “autocracy is out of place in constitutional democracy.” It is strange that despite the clear and unequivocal pronouncement of the high court and the Court of Appeal, which the Supreme Court has not set aside, by dismissing the appeal, the camp of Governor Fubara is going ahead with the constitutional aberration of relying on four members out of the 32-member house of assembly, as the authentic state legislature. Buoyed by persons who have no stake in the state, or those who may be merely interested in the lucre from the executive arm of government, Governor Fubara is making a mockery of our constitutional democracy.     

    What Governor Fubara is doing amounts to a gross abuse of his office, as envisaged by section 188 of the 1999 constitution (as amended). While we do not wish him ill, we believe that as a democratically elected governor, he is bound to obey and give full effect to the provisions of the constitution, which includes obedience to the judgment of the courts of the country. He cannot choose and pick which provisions of the constitution, that he swore to uphold, to obey.

    After exhausting the rights of appeal, he is bound to obey the final judgment of the appeal court. We urge him to retrace his steps and seek a common ground with the 26-member house of assembly, so that a modicum of constitutionality will return to his exercise of the office of governor. The so-called attorney-general of the state, who was screened by the illegitimate four-member legislature, owes his principal the duty to guide him right.

    Governor Fubara must stop his unconstitutional conducts, and if he fails, the full weight of the constitution must bear on him and his collaborators.