The Nation Newspaper

Category: Editorial

  • Pension debt

    Pension debt

    •When will the Federal Govt pay its share of pensions to pensioners?

     

    when will the Federal Government appreciate the need to treat pension matters with dispatch? The question becomes pertinent in view of Lagos State Government’s avid plea to it to pay N13.574billion pension arrears owed pensioners in the ‘Centre of Excellence’. Quite sadly, pension payment has been handled with levity over time, and there seems to be no improvement in sight.

    Mrs. Florence Oguntuase, Lagos State Commissioner for Establishment, Training and Pension corroborated the flippant handling of pension funds by the Federal Government. During her ministry’s ministerial briefing, she unfurled the anguish that Federal Government’s unpaid share of the total pension benefits is causing pensioners in the state. Her passionate plea: “We are appealing to the Federal Government to settle the verified pension indebtedness to the tune of N1, 107,267,537 it owes retired workers of the state government and the N12, 266,652,137 of the workers in the local government.’’ She continued: “The state government, through the Civil Service Pension Office has forwarded applications for the arrears to the Federal Government and we hope they will pay the benefits before the pensioners pass on.”

    Is it right for the Federal Government to foot drag over payment of its pension dues to a state, even when such state has fulfilled its own part of the obligation? Lagos State government paid N18, 031,148,931, its own share of pension benefits to 3,384 retired workers in the state. We are hoping that the Federal Government will not wait until the pensioners pass on before it pays its own counterpart pension for retirees in the state. The Federal Government should stop playing politics with the lives of pensioners, not only in Lagos, but in other states, given the avalanche of arrears it currently owes.

    It has acquired notoriety for abandoning pensioners after years of meritorious service to fatherland. About 98 per cent of federal pensioners are reportedly owed three months pensions. Even retired military personnel across the nation are also reportedly being owed about seven months pensions. Some pensioners that were either underpaid or totally denied their pensions since last November recently took to the streets of Abuja to protest undue interference by Office of the Head of Service. The task of pension affairs was initially taken away from the office of the Head of Service after subjecting pensioners to hardship when the Pension Reform Task Force was established in 2010. The duty reverted to it after the Maina alleged scam in the Pension Reform Task Force Office was unravelled. The entire scenario looks like a vicious cycle.

    Something has to be done to eradicate the suffering of pensioners in the country. For instance, the Lagos State government has commendably established a Pensioner Welfare Office (PWO) to take care of its 14,934 pensioners, apart from promptly paying its own share of the pension dues. There must have been several other states across the nation that have contributed their portion of the bargain but could not access the share of the Federal Government. We wonder the scandalous sum that would by now be owed states! It could not have been ideal for Lagos to request for what belongs to it before such money can be paid. This should not be so if the lives of pensioners mean anything to the Federal Government.

    We therefore call on it not to frustrate governments that are willing and responsive to pensioners’ plight in the country. More importantly, this administration is henceforth called upon to show sufficient sensitivity to the plight of not only pensioners but other Nigerians that it is statutorily obligated to.

  • Weighty indeed

    Weighty indeed

    •NJC should not sweep Justice Okeke’s allegations under the carpet

    The integrity of the National Judicial Council (NJC) and Justice Clara Ogunbiyi of the Supreme Court, was called to question by retired Justice Okechukwu Okeke, formerly the Head Judge of the Federal High Court, Lagos Division, at his valedictory. The retired jurist alleged that Justice Ogunbiyi tried to influence a case before his court, and when he resisted, she instigated petitions against him to the NJC, about a month to his retirement. Speaking before eminent Nigerians, including the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court, Justice Ibrahim Auta; Justice Okeke said he wants to be remembered as ‘a victim of injustice in the judiciary’.

    He dared the NJC to publish, verbatim, the petitions written against him, and his answers to those petitions, for which he was given a ‘serious warning’; so that the public can make their deductions. According to the jurist, Justice Ogunbiyi allegedly communicated her displeasure over his handling of a case to the Chief Judge, and followed up by sending her daughter, Funke, an interested party to the suit, to ask him to discharge an order he made over No 5A, George Street, Ikoyi, Lagos, where the daughter was living; which he ignored. The order that Justice Ogunbiyi allegedly asked him to set aside was made in favour of Assets Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), which resulted in the ejection of Funke and her husband from the premises.

    Justice Okeke claimed that his rejection of the overtures infuriated the Supreme Court justice, who instigated three petitions against him, and despite his answers, the NJC went ahead to warn him over the electronic and print media on April 26 and 27. Justice Okeke wondered how the NJC could, byits letter of May 13, wish him a ‘happy retirement after putting in years of dedicated and meritorious service to the judiciary, particularly at the Federal High Court’; just a few weeks after publicly warning him for an alleged misconduct. The incongruity of threatening to sack him barely a month to his retirement, he alleged, was the result of undue influence by Justice Ogunbiyi.

    In our view, the allegations by the retired jurist are weighty, and the NJC owes Nigerians an explanation; as the allegations, if not factually debunked, impugn both the integrity of the learned Justice Ogunbiyi and the NJC. Indeed, if the retired justice was threatened for the reasons he claimed at his valedictory, then the NJC owes him a restitution of his integrity, in the overall interest of our judiciary. The least the NJC can do is to meet the challenge posed by Justice Okeke that the council should publish the query and his answers, under the Freedom of Information Act. The greater interest of the public will not be met if that august guardian angel of the nation’s judiciary keeps mum on this occasion.

    A similar allegation of undue interference was alleged by the suspended President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Ayo Salami, against the former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Katsina-Alu. Unfortunately in that case, the wronged person, Justice Salami, was further punished by the NJC then headed by Katsina-Alu when he cried out that the former CJN was trying to influence a matter before him. As we speak, Justice Salami has remained suspended despite the reversal by the NJC of its initial findings that he be suspended. Unless the NJC quickly restores its integrity over Justice Okeke’s allegations, there is the likelihood that a reasonable man can genuinely doubt the integrity of the entire members.

     

  • New Lekki-Ikoyi bridge

    New Lekki-Ikoyi bridge

    •Another commendable initiative by the Lagos State govt

    Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola (SAN) on May 29 commissioned the Lekki-Ikoyi Bridge. The architectural masterpiece, being the first cable/suspended bridge in Nigeria and the entire West Africa, is replete with aesthetic grandeur. The 1.38km bridge constructed by Julius Berger links Ikoyi-Alexander Street to Lekki-Admiralty Way. The grand construction has a price tag of N29 billion, which, though huge, is worth its while in view of its primary essence of easing traffic congestion in that ever busy strategic part of the country’s commercial nerve-centre.

    Construction of the bridge commenced in October, 2008 and was completed and certified for use some weeks back. The engineering ingenuity is a plus to infrastructural yearnings of Lagosians and the nation, especially in the sphere of transportation and traffic management. The main bridge, ingrained in quality engineering, has a total length of 466m. The length of its Cable Bridge which is the suspended section is 170m and the height of its pyron is 87m from water level navigational requirement. The clearance average is 9m above high water level. The width of the bridge, which is the carriageway, is 8m by 2; its walkway is 2.0m by 2; road works at Ikoyi end is 338.7m while road works at the Lekki end is 311.5m.

    The Lagos State government deserves commendation for this bold attempt geared towards solving the traffic gridlock between Lekki and Ikoyi. However, we cannot feign ignorance that this laudable official initiative; especially that of ceding the place to a concessionaire has been accompanied by reservations by some members of the public who feel that tolling the bridge could be discriminatory. Some even argued that the toll of N300 is exorbitant.

    Their concerns are genuine since we would not subscribe to any government’s idea that tends to price infrastructure out of people’s purse. After all the bridge, some would say, was constructed with the people’s money- for their own good and its use ought to be free, or at least reasonably within what the majority can afford. The truth, however, is that nothing good and qualitative comes free in contemporary times. There is a price for everything and that of bringing development, through this bridge, as epitomised by the prescribed toll, should be endured by the public in Lagos.

    Moreover, the Lekki-Ikoyi axes are inhabited by well heeled members of the society who should be able to pay the toll. Also, the governor has restated that there are other routes for those who may find the toll too high since the use of the bridge is optional. If the bridge is indeed funded by government in conjunction with a private concern, it only makes sense that money invested must be recouped. This is the only way by which investment in such infrastructural benefits can easily be encouraged in future. But this is not to say that the government cannot bend over backwards to see if the demands of those who feel the toll is too high can be met half way such that would be fair and equitable to all sides.

    Interestingly, this gesture shows responsive governance in Lagos where more cars are plying the roads because of the restrictions placed on commercial motor-cycles from plying certain routes in the state.

    We note the governor’s reported statement at the commissioning of the bridge that the primary objective of the bridge’s conception is the need to provide a transport infrastructure that would strategically alleviate the intractable traffic gridlock in the Lekki-Ikoyi areas.

    However, it is necessary to remind Governor Fashola that it is not only elite areas such as Lekki, Ikoyi and Victoria Island that need bridges to solve their traffic problems. Other areas, including Abule-Egba, Pen-Cinema in Agege and Ajegunle in Apapa need vehicular overhead bridges at their major junctions to reduce traffic situations that motorists encounter daily on such roads.

     

  • Wrong-headed strategy

    Wrong-headed strategy

    100 percent profit repatriation not enough to entice foreign investors

    PENULTIMATE week, Vice-President Namadi Sambo was on hand to offer a cocktail of sweeteners for foreign investors seeking a piece of the Nigerian action. Prospective investors, he declared at the ground-breaking ceremony of Idu Industrial Park in Abuja on May 23, would be allowed to repatriate their profits 100 percent.

    He also restated some of the existing incentives such as the 140 percent capital allowance in research development, 20 percent capital allowance for five years on local raw materials utilisation, as well as 30 percent tax relief and expenditure on public infrastructure.

    Given the fetish that the Jonathan administration has made of foreign investment in the last two years, it is at once tempting to see the recycled incentives as new. The truth however is that none of the measures outlined by the Vice-President can be said to be outside the provisions of the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission Act No. 16, 1995 and the Foreign Exchange Monitoring & Miscellaneous Provisions Act No. 17 of 1995.

    Indeed, both legislations, now in their 18th year, have remained the fulcrum of the foreign investment quest. They guarantee foreign investors unrestricted remittance of dividends or profits from their investment in Nigeria, subject as it were, to evidence of capital importation issued by the banks on behalf of the Central Bank of Nigeria; they also contain provisions for repatriation of capital in the event of liquidation, in addition to a cocktail of other incentives.

    Debatable still, is the effectiveness of the provisions in attracting the much-desired foreign investment.

    That is not to take anything from the administration’s efforts to ramp up the drive for investment. No one denies that the economy needs all the help it can get to energise it. Indeed, foreign investment would seem the best bet to fast-track the sorely needed technology transfer and to boost employment.

    However, as the Federal Government may have found out by now, it is one thing to roll out incentives; it is another to secure buy-in by prospective foreign investors. We must say here that as far as the quest to attract foreign investment in the last 18 years goes, the result, even with the best of efforts, has been a mixed grill of sorts.

    First, we know enough of the profoundly loose, laissez faire environment where just about anything can pass for ‘foreign investment’ not to appreciate the challenge of sifting the wheat from the chaff from the hordes said to be scrambling in. Second, a number of so-called investors see Nigeria as a country where anything goes; the latter explains the ease with which foreign companies flout our regulations – and this can range from abuse of expatriate quotas designed to regulate the influx of foreign personnel, to other sundry practices which border on economic sabotage.

    The question is – where are the safeguards to ensure that genuine investors as against the flight-by-night investors are the ones coming in? Have appropriate lessons been learnt from the collapse of the nation’s capital market, when the exit of foreign portfolio investors at the onset of the global credit crisis brought the roof down?

    Rather than dissipate all the energies in futile pursuit of foreign investors, the Federal Government could do a better job of creating the enabling environment that would not only foster the growth of businesses but also make local ones truly competitive. It seems about time our charity began at home.

    We have no doubt that much of the current efforts to market the so-called incentives would have been pointless were the appropriate infrastructure to be in place. True investors obviously need very little persuasion. What stands them apart is their ability to sniff opportunities wherever and whenever they may be found.

    That, apparently seems lost to our officials.

  • Amaechi’s impeachment moves

    Amaechi’s impeachment moves

    Jonathan has himself to blame for over-heating the polity

    ON May 29, ironically the National Democracy Day, the newspapers were awash with anti-democratic news: a Presidency lobby, led by a South-South governor, allegedly armed with a war chest of N7 billion, was prowling around the 27 pro- Amaechi law makers in the 32-member Rivers State House of Assembly, to corruptly lure some of them to join an alleged impeachment conspiracy against Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi.

    Normally, such an allegation should have been flatly dismissed as a hare-brained piece of gossip. More telling for democratic institutions, it should have been dismissed on account that the Presidency of the Federal Republic was too refined, too cultivated and too elevated for such a scheme. Still on institution building, such alleged illicit attack on the office of Governor, no matter the perceived rascality of its temporary occupier, should not even be contemplated, given the imperative of strengthening federal institutions, in Nigeria’s shambolic federal system.

    Besides, the reports alleged that the target was seven legislators. This, other things being equal, would amount to N1 billion per induced legislator, if indeed the allegations were true. But seven added to five only amounts to 12, 10 short of 22, the two-thirds majority needed to unseat a governor in a House of 32. But the Jonathan lobby has proved itself capable of such desperation, since the president’s war against the governor started.

    For a rumoured bid for Vice-President in 2015, Godsday Orubebe, Niger Delta affairs minister, opened the fray, lampooning Governor Amaechi for using the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) chair to ridicule President Jonathan, a god Orubebe’s tone suggested everyone must worship, even if he is only a federal republican president, who is under checks and balances.

    Thereafter, the federal authorities grounded the governor’s aircraft, literally mid-air. As it turned out, the House of Representatives probe on the matter, by its justice committee (chaired by Ali Ahmad) and aviation committee (chaired by Nkeiruka C. Onyejeocha), found the Minister of Aviation to have suborned the relevant aviation agencies to pursue a witch-hunt against the governor. The probe committee therefore recommended the governor’s aircraft should be de-grounded.

    As the air power show went on, there were threats of withdrawing security details from Governor Amaechi, the Rivers State Speaker and the rest of the legislature as well as from other ranking members of the state government entitled to state protection. Eventually, good sense prevailed when AIG for Zone 6, Jonathan Johnson, dismissed such talks and openly apologised to the governor, even if Mbu Joseph Mbu, the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, had shown reckless partiality in the matter. So, when Governor Amaechi alleged that his life could be at risk, he sounded easily believable.

    Then after the NGF election was lost and won on May 24, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Working Committee (NWC) slammed an instant suspension on Governor Amaechi. Though it claimed the action had no bearing to the NGF win and loss, it showed its bad faith by saying it suspended Amaechi for refusing a “lawful order” to undo what was a clear function of the Rivers State legislature – the reinstatement of the Obio-Akpor Local Government elected executive, which the legislature earlier suspended to investigate alleged sleaze.

    It is on account of this perennial bad faith that any fair mind must address the latest allegation of illicit impeachment. For attempting to go for broke – law and justice be damned! – just to crush an opponent, Jonathan destroys nobody but himself. To start with, a president that sides with illegality just to gain a temporary advantage, turns nobody but himself into a mere joke.

    Again, by warring against Amaechi so recklessly, the president tragically undermines Nigeria’s federalism. The governorship is no presidential poodle. Both are creations of the law. By the same unthinking aggression, the president further smashes up his party in a grand delusion of smashing the governor. For a president who seems desperate to run again in 2015, it is a classic case of cutting your nose to spite your face.

    President Jonathan must know this: he might boast huge powers. But the conceit of thinking his word is law is not one of them. He is restrained by law as any other citizen. So, thinking he could bring the house down, just because a citizen is pressing a right he does not especially fancy, would only push the president into the doldrums.

  • Religious freedom under attack

    Religious freedom under attack

    Violations of religious liberties have increased in some areas of the world, a U.S. State Department report says, singling out Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, China, even Belgium.

    “Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.”

    So says the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations in 1948. But a voluminous report issued by the State Department last week demonstrates that those lofty principles continue to be widely dishonored. In some areas, the violations of religious liberty have increased, with a rise in sectarian violence, an increase in anti-Semitism and a proliferation of blasphemy laws that are used to suppress not only religious but political dissent.

    The International Religious Freedom Report for 2012, which was released by Secretary of State John F. Kerry pursuant to a 1998 act of Congress, is unsparing in describing violations of religious freedom even in countries allied with the United States. For example, the report notes that Pakistan has been the scene of violence against Christians, Hindus and Shiite Muslims, and it accuses the government there of enacting intolerant laws. In Egypt, it says, there has been little accountability for perpetrators of religious violence. In Saudi Arabia, “the public practice of any religion other than Islam is prohibited, and the government enforced restrictions on religious freedom.”

    Not all of the offenders were Islamic states. In China, one of eight nations designated as “countries of particular concern,” the government’s respect for religious freedom declined during 2012, according to the report, particularly in Tibet and the Xinjiang region, home to Muslim Uighurs. The report’s inventory of restrictions on religious freedom even included Belgium, where courts upheld a ban on face coverings that made no exception for Muslim women.

    A major theme in this year’s report was the enactment of laws making it a crime to insult religion, which, as Kerry noted, “are frequently used to repress dissent, to harass political opponents and to settle personal vendettas.” Ironically, the same U.N. General Assembly that approved the Universal Declaration of Human Rights encouraged the enactment of blasphemy laws by voting three years ago to condemn the “defamation of religions.”

    In the aftermath of the report’s release, some questioned its utility because it is primarily an exercise in information-gathering and does not trigger any sanctions. The same complaint is leveled against the State Department’s annual report on the state of human rights in various countries. But there is value in an objective and open-eyed accounting, even if U.S. diplomacy sometimes must be guided by factors other than a foreign nation’s respect for individual rights. And sometimes, though not often enough, governments can be shamed by the truth into changing their behavior.

    – Los Angeles Times

  • What has changed?

    What has changed?

    Two years after, Jonathan’s government is still groping in the dark

    On May 29, President Goodluck Jonathan released a 234-page document detailing activities of his administration in the past two years. Amid virulent criticisms by Nigerians, the President said critics and cynics were unfair to him and his administration.

    When his government was inaugurated in 2011, he unfurled a Transformation Agenda aimed at fast-tracking national development in all the key sectors and facets of life. Two years after, it is auspicious to assess the journey so far.

    There appears to be four major challenges confronting the country and threatening its survival. One, the economy and employment generation; two, electricity generation, transmission and distribution; three, corruption, and four, security. On a general note, too, every government is expected to deepen democracy and institute better parameters for good governance. How has President Jonathan’s team fared?

    The assessment is even the more imperative because the government actually assumed power before May 29, 2011. Following the ailment that held his predecessor, the late President Umaru Yar’Adua down, Jonathan assumed office as Acting President, with full constituent power in February 2010. Eventually, when Yar’Adua passed on in May, he was sworn in as President in accordance with the constitution.

    Really, in 40 months, what has changed? The economy is still comatose, with millions of our youngsters roaming the streets years after they had left school. The factories are not growing and many of the multinationals, citing challenges, are relocating to neighbouring West African countries. To be fair to the Federal Government, the problem was inherited, but the election of 2011 was not just to maintain the status quo. President Jonathan was invested with the power and responsibility to make necessary changes and ultimately make the difference.

    The pervasive insecurity in the land has firmly planted Nigeria on the map of terrorism and raised fears of possible disintegration. In many parts of the North, gun-toting men strike at will. Even the well-heeled have been felled by the guns of insurrectionists. Last month, 92-year-old Alhaji Shettima Ali Monguno, a First Republic minister and elder statesman, was abducted from his home in Maiduguri, thus spreading the fear that no one was safe. On May 14, realising that the crisis spawned by insecurity was fast making Nigeria a laughing stock in the comity of nations, the president declared a state of emergency in three states. That could be said to be a necessary step, but it could be grossly inadequate if not complemented by other actions.

    Generator business continues to thrive as power supply remains epileptic. This is taking a toll on the social and economic lives of the country. Small-scale businesses are worst hit, thus depriving the people of prosperity and frustrating any move to upgrade the country as a true giant of Africa. It is the same excuses; the thermal stations are not fired as gas supply remains a major challenge. But, what do the people want from their government- a litany of excuses or breakthrough?

    Corruption has become a badge of honour under the Jonathan administration. Those who have been convicted by the courts are cleverly let off the hook by the government once they pledge their support to the national ruling party and the narrow political interest of the President. A number of others, convicted for pillaging the treasury, were allowed to slip through the dragnet of the law by merely pleading guilty. A few who were convicted and jailed have bounced back into reckoning as officials of the ruling party.

    Others undergoing trial are helped to stay on course under the guise that the rule of law adjudges one innocent until he is found guilty by a competent court of law. Graft cases that have been charged to court since 2007 are still at the stage of taking pleas. Technicalities are explored by defence lawyers to frustrate dispensation of justice. And, in all this, it appears the office of the Attorney General of the Federation merely looks on, suggesting complicity.

    The government is not known to have come up with profound solution to national problems. It is a government that continues to award contracts but gets little done, thus compounding the woes of the citizenry. The Second Niger Bridge has been touted as a flagship project of the government, yet, nothing has actually been done. At a time that the government is making the second bridge a talking point, the existing bridge is sinking.

    The political scene underlines the incompetence of the government more than any. For example, the political crisis imposed on Rivers State by the powers-that-be and the May 24 election of the Nigerian Governors Forum (NGF) exposed the huge joke that the Jonathan administration is and made nonsense of its commitment to true democratic ethos. It is a matter for regret that in the Presidency’s desperation to remove the chairman of the forum, lies were told, illegalities committed while the President continues to play the ostrich, insisting that he has no hand in the NGF election crisis. It is obvious that the country has to be restructured to allow for healthy competition among component units. The current system is incongruous with the tenets of federalism and, for a multicultural and plural society like Nigeria, a unitary system can only be a source of tension.

    All national institutions are deliberately undermined and free speech has been under assault as media houses and journalists have been consistently harassed in the past two years. It is not out of place to say the government is a democratic disaster. While other African countries such as Ghana are growing and engendering confidence of the people in the state and government, Nigerians are told, by the actions of their government, that they must fend for themselves in all circumstances.

    Is the future bleak? As 2015 beckons, we call on Nigerians to put the government on its toes and insist on full scale electoral reforms that would put a true government of the people in power.

     

  • Gamaliel Onosode at 80

    Gamaliel Onosode at 80

    •In celebration of Mr. Straight and Fastidious

    He is acclaimed to be straight and that can be taken to mean both literally and metaphorically. This is because for most of his 80 years which he turned May 22, he has managed to keep a physique that is lean, trim and ramrod upright. Gamaliel Oforitsenere Onosode is also acclaimed to be a highly disciplined man and one may need no other proof than the fact that he seems incapable of growing a tummy, not even an onion-sized one, the way ‘big men’ of his age and clime are wont. In fact, his ways are so decidedly his, so defined that you could never mistake G.O. Onosode for someone else. Even his voice too – high-pitched, clear, authoritative and seeming to be always loud – is a testimony to this enigma.

    Onosode is the kind of man who defines his era, but that has to be in a different civilisation. For here in his place of birth he excelled all right, but his dour environment only encrypted him like an incubus which allowed an occasional peek of sunshine. In all his marvelous efforts and glorious achievements, Onosode remains that breath never exhaled; he is a tree that could have been an Iroko and perhaps the great political leader who never found a party.

    He studied Classics at the University College, (now University of Ibadan) on multiple scholarships (State Scholar and University Scholar, 1954-1957) for he was extremely brilliant and top of his class. As attestation to the quality of his mind, he won the Department and Faculty Prize; he was elected Cambridge University Jebb Scholar (1957). Onosode however, did not end up in the academia as was to be expected; he played in the boardrooms instead, earning the uncommon status of perhaps heading the most number of boards in Nigeria today.

    He also chaired panels, boards, councils, commissions and committees in both public and private sectors. The list is quite long: Cadbury Nigeria Plc, Nigerian Institute of Management, Federal Military Government Projects Review Committee, Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Limited, CFAO Nigeria Limited, Nigeria Stockbrokers Limited, Crusader Insurance Company (Nigeria)Limited, Dunlop Nigeria Plc, Niger Delta Environmental Survey, Global Missions Board, Nigeria Baptist Convention. There may be over 50 more if we add directorship and trusteeship of all sorts of businesses, bodies and groups.

    In a country bereft of good people and leaders of character, Onosode would earn his place anywhere on the globe as a man of conscience and shining integrity. Why do you think he is so much sought after to be at the helm, not just because he is brilliant; he is simply a gem, a rarity in a famished land where honest and decent men are few and far between. He must be a classic example that honesty meshed with brilliance, rigour and industry will never fail.

    From 1960 up until the early 1990s, Onosode was the authority to be referred to in merchant banking, stock broking, development economy and even manufacturing. By the time he was 30 years, he was already Secretary, Nigeria Idustrial Development Bank (NIDB) which was known then as Investment Company of Nigeria and at 40, he was chairman and chief executive officer, NAL Merchant Bank.

    It is difficult to hold anything against Mr. G.O. Onosode except that he was too straight, too strict and perhaps colourless. You are not likely to catch him in a big Owanbe party and he once said in an interview that he was not one to go to the stadium on a Saturday afternoon to watch a football match. He is also too down to earth to deserve a seat in the pantheon of Nigeria’s big men. Unimaginably, he chose to live in the Surulere suburb of Lagos State; a part of town not good enough for his senior managers when he was at the height of his corporate glory. He still lives there till today. He could have owned half of Ikoyi and Victoria Island if he was a wee bit covetous. We salute Mr. (yes, he is simply Mr.) Onosode as he turns 80 years. Shall we just say that he is a rare gift that Nigeria never really accepted or fully utilised.

  • Familial storm

    Familial storm

    •Mandela’s children’s battle over the potentate’s estate while he still lives reminds us of ourselves

    Sadly, one of the world’s most revered figures, South Africa’s Nelson Mandela, who turns 95 next month, has found himself in circumstances that echo the immortal wisdom of Sophocles, the famous Greek tragedian, who wrote in Oedipus Rex, “Call no man happy until he carries his happiness down to the grave in peace.” In his twilight, physically frail and mentally weak, he is, perhaps undeservedly, faced with the embarrassment of filial torment. The former anti-apartheid politician, who served as the first black President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, and a recipient of the prestigious Nobel Peace Prize, has had his peace murdered by the actions of otherwise intimate family members.

    Two of his surviving daughters, Makaziwe, founder of the House of Mandela wine label, and Zenani, the South African ambassador to Argentina, reportedly filed court papers on April 9, alleging that George Bizos, housing minister Tokyo Sexwale and Mandela’s ex-lawyer, Bally Chuene, were never appointed as shareholders or directors of Harmonieux Investment Holdings and Magnifique Investment Holdings. The three have ignored a request for them to leave the companies. The two companies, linked to Mandela, are worth about $1.7m (£1.1m).

    Interestingly, the women reportedly filed the legal papers two days after their father was discharged from hospital, where he was being treated for pneumonia. The two companies were set up to channel proceeds from the sale of Mandela’s handprints for the benefit of himself and his offspring. The prized handprint, said to have been accidentally created while working on a sketch inspired by his imprisonment on Robben Island for his anti-apartheid posture, features an image resembling the African continent.

    However, in defence, Bizos, 84, a renowned human rights lawyer, one of Mandela’s oldest friends who has known him for 65 years, and defended him in the celebrated Rivonia Trial of 1963 against a possible death penalty was quoted as saying, , “There is no basis to the allegations. We are not hijackers. We don’t hijack things. The public should ask themselves why five years later these allegations are being laid. We are confident we were regularly appointed at the wish of Mr Mandela five years ago.” It is worthy of note that Sexwale, 60, was a fellow prisoner with Mandela on Robben Island.

    This unflattering development has betrayed the existence of lamentable cracks within the Mandela family. It is instructive that Mandela’s other daughter, Zindzi, is not involved in the court action. Makaziwe and Zenani have been criticised for alleged greed and insensitivity, charges that apparently have the ring of truth. In the first place, it is confusing that it took five years for the two sisters to legally challenge the alleged “hijackers.”

    Also, it is ironically curious that the sisters seem to be battling for what is already theirs by arrangement. This is because Mandela reportedly set up the fund as a safety net for his offspring, whom he, nevertheless, expected to pursue independent lives in spite of their father’s financial legacy. In addition, their action does their father a disservice, given his supremely positive iconic image and global stature. It would appear that their sense of entitlement based on their filial relationship to Mandela has been carried too far; and they have demonstrated a love for material treasures over familial affection. This is a truly disappointing episode.

    Perhaps even more worrisome is the scenario of internecine feud among family members after the patriarch’s exit. Here, at home, with the legal fisticufs of the Ibrus and Ojukwus, this sort of rumbles are dark patches of the human.

    It is relevant to reflect on the upbringing of Mandela’s children, against the background of his political activism and 27-year imprisonment for opposition to white minority rule in his country. Evidently, he was not around in their formative years. Mandela has married three times and fathered six children, three of whom have died. Makaziwe was born by his first wife, Evelyn Mase; Zenani and Zindzi, by his second wife, Winnie. His marriage to Evelyn lasted from 1944 to 1958, and Winnie from 1958 to 1996.He is now with Graça Machel whom he married in 1998. He reportedly has 17 grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren. This is the family that is threatened by an ominous storm.

     

  • Tax criminality

    Tax criminality

    • It is time to go after defaulters and tighten the noose on a leaky system

    What has long become a prevalent culture of corporate tax evasion has suddenly caught the attention of the Federal Government. From the blues, the government suddenly just realised that the practice of tax evasion by companies in the country is detrimental to the country’s interest.

    Dr. Yerima Ngama, Minister of State for Finance, in his address at the opening ceremony of the African Tax Forum in Abuja bemoaned the shoddy state of tax system thus: “At the last count, about 350,000 companies have not rendered tax returns in the country. So, we need to strategise, we need to research and find out what can be done to improve tax rendition and tax collection.” How come it took the government this forum to wake up from its slumber to realise the importance of taxation to national development?

    The country’s low tax contribution of seven per cent to Gross Domestic Product (GDP) ratio is saddening, especially when in neighbouring Ghana, tax contribution to the GDP ratio is about 21 per cent. Even in better managed but less endowed countries on the continent, tax contribution to GDP ratio is 10 per cent. The nation can do better by discouraging difficult-to-monitor informal businesses that currently stand at 45 per cent and inspire formal business conducts widely respected for adoption of civilised accounting principles – renowned for compelling the making of tax returns necessary to calculate the tax liability of companies by the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).

    Failure to render tax returns by companies has become a disgusting feature. Sometime ago, some leading foreign airlines operating in the country admitted to non-remittance of the five per cent Passenger Fuel Surcharge on their tickets to the Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) as required by global aviation practice. Also, the Nigerian Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (NEITI) once reported that major multinational oil companies, including the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, habitually underpay taxes and statutory remittances due to the government. Even the House of Representatives recently identified several state enterprises that defaulted in filing tax returns.

    The need for the country to shift focus from oil revenue by making tax generation the ultimate objective of the economy is long overdue. Most governments across the world, even in countries that are equally blessed with oil are doing that successfully. Within the country too, Lagos, Ogun and Rivers states have proved to be good examples of how to deploy tax to achieve the goal of real development. The Lagos State Government has sued 20 companies operating within its jurisdiction for defaulting in tax payment. Why not the Federal Government, if only it can shed its toga of tax immoralities through questionable import duty waivers, among others.

    Moreover, the leadership should curb its obscene practices. For instance, Nigerians would not easily forget how former President Olusegun Obasanjo, as a sitting president, used his influence to induce, in 2007, the donation of over N7 billion that was used to build his Presidential Library. Also, President Goodluck Jonathan turned the other way when a powerful company donated a N6 billion church in his ancestral village in Otuoke, Bayelsa State. Such self-serving presidential patronage is detrimental to a workable tax system.

    The time for the government to stiffen the laws on tax evasion on erring companies and establishments is now. Tax evasion and avoidance by companies remain one of the greatest problems plaguing tax administration in Nigeria and it should not be allowed to derail her fiscal policies. This corporate criminality must stop.