Category: Editorial

Before he flopped in the Republican primaries, Newt Gingrich said he would challenge US President Barack Obama to a series of Lincoln-Douglas style debates. With today’s curtailed attention spans, such loquacity would make for poor ratings. But in an election that has so far been worryingly free of credible vision, Wednesday’s 90-minute debate – the first of three – should come as rain on a parched land.

Judging by the campaigns so far, that may be too much to hope. Mitt Romney, Republican presidential candidate, promises to “Believe in America” – and wants voters to trust that a US revival will come on a wing and an unfunded tax cut. Mr Obama simply promises to move “Forward”, although to what, and why, are often hard to discern.

As the underdog, most of the onus will be on Mr Romney. He will need every two-minute rebuttal window he can get. He must clear two very high hurdles – to convince voters the US economy will be stronger under him, and to exude a presidential aura.

On the substance, Mr Romney remains all over the place. He promises to balance the budget while delivering sweeping tax cuts and expanding the military. Vague pledges to close tax loopholes will no longer do. He needs to say which. Ditto on spending cuts.

Likewise, Mr Romney would scrap healthcare reform and the Dodd-Frank re-regulation without saying what he would put in their places. He has promised to reform entitlements yet also preserve Medicare. And so on. Mr Romney will need to dig deep to convince voters that he grasps what is ailing the US economy. Judging by his numbers, most voters do not agree that a large tax cut would deliver a magical cure-all.

As the frontrunner, Mr Obama needs only to avoid being tripped up. But he owes voters an account of how a divided government would play differently in the next four years from the past two. Hope is not a strategy. Playing safe to win is no way to prepare for the steep challenges that follow.

The moderators may have to stick to the debate format’s stultifying rules. The nominees should try to ignore them. The US deserves a real debate. If it does not happen now it never will.

– Financial Times

AHMADU Bello University (ABU), Zaria commemorated the 50th anniversary of its existence yesterday. Founded in October 1962 by the Sardauna of Sokoto and Premier of Northern Nigeria, Sir Ahmadu Bello, as the University of Northern Nigeria, the university was tasked with the fulfillment of several objectives: the production of top-level manpower for a region which was relatively deficient in human resources at the time; the initiation of a process whereby the north was brought into extended contact with the latest trends in science, technology, arts and culture; to ensure that the region’s rich cultural heritage was preserved for the benefit of future generations.

After five decades, there can be little doubt that the revered Sardauna, after whom the university is now named, would be proud of what ABU has been able to achieve. The university stands out among its peers in Nigeria and Africa to the extent and quality of its breakthroughs in different fields of human endeavour. In particular, its achievements in agriculture, education, the arts and political science have won it justified renown across the world.

When it was set up, ABU was one of the three regional universities that were established to complement the University of Ibadan, the other two being the-then University of Ife (now Obafemi Awolowo University) and the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. It quickly became the country’s largest and most diversified tertiary institution, drawing staff and students not just from the northern region but from across the nation. Its huge Samaru campus was by far the biggest in Nigeria, and one of the most beautiful. Its teaching and other staff were drawn from different parts of the world, and brought with them an exciting mix of academic and scholarly traditions which served to enrich the intellectual atmosphere of the institution.

Even by the politically-committed standards of the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, ABU was well-known as a hotbed of student radicalism. Motivated by nothing more than the wellbeing of their country and its people, students and staff of the university were dedicated in their opposition to perceived anti-people policies by successive governments, whether civilian or military. The university’s status as a bastion of progressive sentiment was further strengthened by the conscious policy of admitting students from countries like Angola, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and South Africa, which were in the throes of heroic anti-colonial struggles.

Given its history of qualitative teaching and research, it is no surprise that ABU can count some of Nigeria’s most distinguished citizens among its alumni. They include the late Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, Nigeria’s former President; the current Vice-President, Alhaji Namadi Sambo; the current governor of Kaduna State, Chief Patrick Yakowa; the former governor of Kaduna State, Senator Ahmed Makarfi; the current governor of Bauchi State, Alhaji Isa Yuguda; the current governor of Yobe State, Alhaji Ibrahim Geidam; the former governor of Cross River State, Mr. Donald Duke, the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi; current Minister of National Planning, Dr. Shamsuddeen Usman; former Federal Capital Territory Minister, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai; former anti-corruption tsar, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu; and the Managing Director of Fidelity Bank Plc, Mr. Reginald Ihejiani.

Like other tertiary institutions in the country, the university is beset with a host of formidable challenges. They range from the infrastructural, such as the dearth of teaching facilities and shortfalls in the provision of power, water, good roads and accommodation, to a sharp decline in the quality of teaching and research output.

However, the university has sought to confront these challenges with the intellectual rigour and moral courage that have been its hallmark over the past five decades. What looks like comprehensive plans have been made to use its golden jubilee celebrations as a platform for the resolution of some of the most pressing problems. As it marches forward, it is hoped that Ahmadu Bello University will continue to attain even greater landmarks in teaching, research and community service.

The case of Dr. Sama Ekpo Sama who recently recovered his estate from the Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) after a gruelling 36 years legal battle, is a sad post-card for property investment in Nigeria. At 90 years of age, Dr. Sama had spent a better part of his entire life fighting to reclaim his property from the NPA. This is a sad commentary on our legal system. It also casts the ports authority in bad light, because we fail to see the business sense in spending apparently huge sums of money for legal services, fighting to keep what does not belong to it.

Again, we wonder whether our legal system would make adequate compensation for the 36 years the old man lost, fighting a just cause. Indeed, considering that money is fungible, would it not be right that there is ample opportunity for the courts to grant Dr. Sama aggravated damages in the circumstance? The report also suggested that the NPA took advantage of its members of staff to sit on a property belonging to another business investor, for 36 years, while making a hash of our legal system.

The NPA’s action calls for an internal enquiry, to see who was benefiting from this legal rigmarole, at the expense of their members of staff. Even if the NPA had appealed the judgment, that in itself would not amount to a stay of execution. What could have served that purpose was the filing of a stay of execution before proceeding on appeal. We are afraid that an appeal alone or pending appeal is not enough to prevent the execution of a valid judgment.

Had Dr. Sama not been blessed with longevity, he would not have lived to see the end of the case, after being in court for more than three decades. The legal twists and turns are disgusting, as they are unbelievable. In our opinion, this calls for national effort to strengthen the judicial process. The opportunities for abuse by a recalcitrant defendant, exploring all manner of subterfuge to ridicule the judicial process must be eliminated. We are aware that some states, including Lagos State, have taken steps to strengthen their rules of procedure to reduce the chances for procedural abuse; we urge other states to do same.

At the national level, there is the need to strengthen the appeal processes both at the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court to ensure that cases don’t linger for years. In arguing for the restructuring of our federal system of government through the devolution of powers, the trajectory of Dr. Sama’s case strengthens that argument. For, in a functional federal system, a lot of cases should not go beyound the state or regional apex court. A case of landlord and tenant is municipal in nature, and the cost and time spent going forth and back under our present legal system is unreasonable.

As we stated at the onset, the economic implication of the debacle Dr. Sama went through is partly why there is crisis in the housing sector. While neglect on the part of government has made housing a nightmare in many bourgeoning cities, many private investments are wary of putting money in the sector, because of the tenuous legal system. To add to the crisis, is the near total absence of a functional mortgage system in the country, and this is partly because those in government have access to unearned resources, to build their own houses, and so do not care about a functional mortgage system.

While we congratulate Dr. Sama, the leadership of the NPA should be ashamed of exploiting and abusing the legal process to gain this disingenuous advantage for 36 years. They should not hesitate to pay the old man off, for using his estate for 36 years. For the courts, this is a classical case of justice delayed, that nearly denied justice.

While President Goodluck Jonathan in military ceremonial gear, billeted in Aso Rock and reading a fanciful message on Nigeria’s improved security, a gun-bearing mob of lunatics, numbering no less than 50, hawked hot deaths to defenceless citizens in their sleep. At the end of it all, no less than 48 students from three tertiary institutions in Mubi, Adamawa State, lay dead. No less than 50 others, according to media reports, lay wounded.

In a grim and morbid irony, a few miscreants murderously proclaimed the near-death of statehood on the very anniversary Nigeria proclaimed its arrival at statehood 52 years ago! What is a state if, with all its apparatus of legal coercion, it cannot protect its citizens?

This is an umpteenth failure of security and intelligence that is not only painful, but also intolerable. From the demonstrable incompetence of the Jonathan administration on security, it could well be a wild try to warn that such should never happen again. But one thing is clear: with mass slaughtering of innocent citizens, victims might just start resorting to self-help. The days of anarchy might just be approaching. That must be averted at all cost.

The Mubi massacre brought the security crisis in the North to a new high low. For the first time, students from three different tertiary institutions, Federal Polytechnic, Mubi, Adamawa State University and the School of Health Technology, were targeted, in a bloody but cowardly operation that lasted no less than two hours, from about 12 midnight to around 2 am. While the victims from Federal Polytechnic, Mubi and the School of Health Technology were attacked in rented hostels outside the campus, the students of Adamawa State University were shot and knifed right on their campus, though the attackers gained entry from the rear!

So, whatever happened to the presumed inviolability of Nigeria’s university campus? Since the beginning of the Boko Haram plague and its senseless and cowardly killings, the university campus as a safe haven has almost become a myth. So, are a bunch of misguided criminals leading the country full gallop back into the Stone Age, with this wanton killing of innocent and defenceless students?

The security and intelligence failure from the Mubi massacre – and that has been a disturbing pattern from previous killings – is shocking and utterly condemnable. A report had it that the attacking gang first disabled the telecommunication masts, to forestall the victims calling for help. That reportedly was done during the day. And at night, they struck!

Even then, another report quoted Godfrey Okeke, the Commissioner of Police for Adamawa State, as saying he got whiff of the attack at 2 am but neither he nor his men got to the crime scene till the following morning. Why that late response? There are even suggestions that the violence might be a fall-out from the student union election in the Federal Polytechnic, Mubi, which was reportedly contested on North-South divide. That could shed light on the attackers reportedly coming with a list, and butchering whoever was on that list.

But even if that were true, it underscores an even more culpable failure of intelligence – for a crime of that magnitude to be planned, and for the intelligence network not to have a clue! That is absolutely condemnable. But then, that is the story of the triumph of Boko Haram and allied criminal attacks: it is after the stallion has bolted that the security agencies jerk awake to bolt the stable gate! And the umpteenth “investigations”, after irreplaceable lives are lost, begins! This is not just good enough.

President Jonathan had better snap out of this security incompetence– and fast too! A situation where a few bad elements wantonly kill fellow citizens, and what the presidency does is just gawk is intolerable. The government must act now! The assailants must be apprehended and brought to book. The Mubi massacre is butchery gone too far!