The Nation Newspaper

Tag: circus

  • Without the circus, Davos can get down to business

    In a more innocent age, Davos was a high-minded gathering for intellectuals trying to solve the world’s problems. But the World Economic Forum has gradually become overwhelmed by a circus of rock stars, Hollywood A-listers, big-ticket world leaders and their entourages. The issues may still be debated, but they can feel secondary to the spectacle. It’s easy to forget about the state of the world when you’ve just spotted Charlize Theron.

    Last year’s big-ticket rock star was of course Donald Trump. The US president certainly knows how to make an entrance. His arrival at Davos in 2018 – amid gasps, gawps and selfies from its elite delegates – was among the most memorable of his political career.

    However, he also knows how to make an exit, sometimes before he has even arrived. Unlike his ‘will he, won’t he?’ routine before the Singapore Summit with Kim Jong Un, he not only stuck with his decision to pull out of Davos, but doubled down on it, withdrawing his entire delegation. Theresa May joined him this week, after a harrowing week in Parliament. Poor old WEF founder Klaus Schwab may be the only person having a worse week than the UK Prime Minster. Suddenly, the rock stars are no longer on his bill.

    Last year’s Davos was an event crying out for attention, after a 2017 Forum that was poorly attended and short on headlines. Trump delivered that in spades, making the WEF feel fresh and relevant.

    The shoe may not quite be on the other foot this year, but the WEF could have been the place to reinvigorate Trump’s presidency. Throughout his administration, Trump has been able to point to a US economy that remains a matchless global powerhouse. From a surging stock market to robust job growth, he has claimed credit, sometimes justifiably, for delivering the economic success he promised voters.

    Right now though, that powerhouse looks like it might actually be on fire. With a deficit on track to pass $1 trillion, alongside a stock market that has approached record-breaking levels of volatility in recent weeks, the last thing the United States needed was a record-breaking government shutdown. But that is what they have, delivering more uncertainty and deepening an already cavernous political rift between the branches of government.

    With Democrats controlling Congress, Trump is far weaker at home than he was this time last year. After Fisk recently warned of a downgrade to the United States’ AAA status, and amid sustained sell-offs of U.S. debt from its chief buyer, China, the outlook is rather cloudy, even if the fundamentals of the U.S. economy remain strong.

    In 2018 Davos-watchers wondered if Trump would walk into the Forum and lob a metaphorical hand grenade into proceedings. But rather than rub the globalists’ noses into his America First agenda, his appearance felt more like a charm offensive, short on substance perhaps, but at least mildly reassuring. Now things have changed. With diminished domestic leverage, a wobbling stock market and unrest among sections of his blue-collar base, not to mention startling fresh revelations from Michael Cohen, there may be a need to refocus on old alliances and safe havens.

    Davos, with its unique combination of heavyweight political, business and intellectual clout, might have been the perfect place for Trump to regain the initiative lost in his administration’s parochial focus. As the WEF gets under way on Tuesday, he may wish he was here. Frankly, Theresa May will probably wish she was anywhere rather than Westminster.

    There is a positive to all of this though. The names may not be as big, but there are still plenty of heavyweights attending this year’s Forum. These are serious people, keen to get down to the nitty-gritty of debate and solutions, and less concerned with the political photo opportunity or the landmark speech. So rest easy, Klaus; perhaps Davos will benefit from the absence of the circus.

     

    • Richard Quest, anchors Quest Means Business at CNN

  • Strongmen’s circus

    Symptoms of the strongmen syndrome are not exactly peculiar to Africa, but they are perhaps most acutely class-indicated on the continent. The syndrome is typically showed up in a political leader exerting overbearing, at times exclusive influence on the levers of state power to sustain his hegemony. Even where he submits to statutorily prescribed motions of electoral contests with other aspirants for the office, the outcomes are largely predetermined by virtue of the playing field being rigidly skewed against those challengers, or by the strongman’s outright manipulation of the electoral process through corrupt exploitation of state power. In either event, the results are effectively predisposed in the strongman’s favour to assure his perpetuity in power.

    It is notorious, of course, that Africa is endowed with a motley crowd of strongmen strutting the continent even as we speak. And it isn’t that elections are not being periodically scheduled and conducted in line with respective country’s laws. It is rather that most elections in Africa are heavily weighted against opposition contenders taking on strongmen who deign to subject themselves to the plebiscite.

    For instance, no fewer than four elections are pending in African democracies for the remainder of 2017, with three of those upcoming in the imminent month of August. Rwanda heads up with its election on 4th August and Kenya on 8th August, while Angola has scheduled 23rd August for its general election through which a new president is billed to emerge. Liberians will have their turn at the poll on October 10; and so will citizens of the Democratic republic of Congo (DRC) sometime before year-end if their president, Joseph Kabila, honours a gentleman’s agreement he reached with stakeholders in the wake of deadly protests that trailed his failure to bow out at the expiration of that country’s constitutionally prescribed limit of two terms on December 19, last year. And so, it surely isn’t that scheduled elections are in short supply, but the democracy content of some of those polls is just hugely specious.

    Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame is virtually mummified for a seismic ride to victory over two challengers left on the playing field after others were earlier blocked by the government. Yet he has been in government since 1994 when he frontguarded the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rebel movement that took power in Kigali to end the 1994 genocide, and became president in 2003 in the country’s first multi-party poll.

    Kagame has done very well for his country though: he restored stability to the tiny nation of 12million people and is credited with transforming its landlocked economy, boosting youth employment and trade, staunching poverty and promoting technology as a tool for prosperity. The catch here is that rights groups accuse his government of abuses like muzzling the press, restricting free speech and silencing dissidents – in  some cases, even allegedly assassinating opponents.

    Having already served two seven-year terms as previously mandated by his country’s rulebook, Kagame’s eligibility for the impending poll is by way of a 2015 amendment that revised the constitutional tenure to three five-year terms accommodating Kagame – meaning he could well remain in power until 2034 if he pursues it. He has hinted though that he isn’t so disposed. Appropriating the bully pulpit at the launch of his electioneering in Kigali early this month, he boasted his victory, saying that much was signposted in 2015 when more than four million Rwandans petitioned parliament to change the constitution to allow him run again. But in his acceptance speech as RPF’s nominated candidate last year, he had suggested the 2017 poll would be his last because: “I do not think what we need is an eternal leader.”

    Unlike Rwanda, the field of play is more evenly weighted among contenders in Kenya as President Uhuru Kenyatta faces off with veteran opposition candidate and former prime minister, Raila Odinga. Not that there aren’t other candidates; but the race goes to the wire between these two who had wagered in a close race in 2013, with Kenyatta only edging marginally through to breast the tape ahead of Odinga. Governorships and ward representatives in the country’s 47 counties as well as seats in the 337-member National Assembly are also up for contest, but the jewel prize is the presidency.

    Kenyan elections are haunted by the spectre of violence. But that could well be because of the viable opposition, which then dictates the need for players to be good sportsmen. And so, while Kenyatta has some historical appeal for the top job, being a scion of the first president of independent Kenya, the late Jomo Kenyatta, the failings of his administration since 2013 and sundry corruption scandals have provided the energised opposition a resonant rallying point. Besides, Odinga is battle-tested in presidential races. He ran breathily close to Mwai Kibaki in the 2007 poll that triggered the deadly post-election violence of 2007/2008, and lost by only decimal percentage points to Kenyatta in 2013. That is one reason the sitting government can’t take victory at the impending poll for granted and must give convincing account of its stewardship to Kenyans to earn their support for another term.

    It is an open toss whether Kabila will call the election that is long overdue in his country so he could exit power as statutorily mandated. And Angola is effectively a one-party state where the candidate of the ruling People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) is pre-anointed to take over from President Jose Eduardo dos Santos, who late in 2016 served notice he had enough of direct control of power after ruling for 37 consecutive years. Even then, many suspect he would yet hold sway from the shadows with the massive power and wealth he has amassed for himself and family members over the last four decades.

    But Liberia is different oyster. The country is up for the taking by any of the political contenders after President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf steps down in October at the end of her country’s constitutionally prescribed maximum of two five-year terms. Actually, ex-footballer and former Ballon d’ór winner, George Weah, is being touted as the brightest prospect of a successor. Weah, currently a senator, is of the opposition  Congress for Democratic Change (CDC) and had run close races with Johnson-Sirleaf of the ruling Unity Party (UP) in both the 2005 and 2011 presidential elections. He is likely to face off with Vice President Joseph Boakai, who will be running on Johnson-Sirleaf’s legacy, as well as Jewel Howard-Taylor, ex-wife of former warlord Charles Taylor and twice-elected senator from Bong county. And if Weah makes that cut, Liberia will join Nigeria, Ghana and The Gambia in the sub-region to post erstwhile opposition parties in power.

    Democracy is generally healthier where opposition is strong. And that is because the reality of a viable alternative compels accountability by a ruling party and better locates the power of choice in the hands of voters. Nigeria, to my mind, must thus be deliberate in cultivating viability of opposition – even if for its nominal sake – to ensure a robust and accountable democracy.

  • The Evans circus

    The Inspector-General’s Intelligence Response Team (IRT) arrested Chukwudidumeme Onuamadike (referred to as Evans) on June 11, in Lagos four years after declaring him wanted for kidnapping. The elusive crime lord has allegedly confessed to masterminding a number of high profile crimes and his love of luxury and style of operation has created a myth around his personality. The media, for self-serving purposes, have reinforced this myth through blanket and tactless publication of information regarding the suspect’s operations. This regrettable circus, tacitly aided by the authorities raise fundamental questions about the Nigerian value system and the strategic understanding of Nigerian criminal justice system actors of their roles.

    I have nothing but iconic regard for the officers and men of the Nigeria Police Anti- Robbery units- SARS, FSARS and the IRT, in spite of the negative perception of these units because of their modus operandi. Juxtaposing the enormous operational handicaps (funding, capacity, interference, weaponry and public hostility) that these units confront with and public expectations (which expects Abba Kyari and his men to perform crime solving miracles), one can only come to the conclusion that it takes extreme courage and an uncommon dedication to duty to achieve the positive results that these men have posted in recent times. However the ‘Evans spectacle’ that the media has created with the implicit support of the police authorities undermines the Nigerian criminal justice system and exposes police operatives to unnecessary risks.

    One of the primary principles of any democratic criminal justice system is the independence of roles and cooperation of components; this presupposes that the processes of arrest, trial and punishment are handled by different agencies. And each component must restrict its operation to its constitutionally sanctioned space. The police duty in functioning democracies excludes the power of trial and conviction. While questions have been asked about the compatibility of the current criminal justice regime with the indigenous value systems of the Nigerian people, the current criminal regime in Nigeria guarantees the rights of the accused persons, irrespective of the crime he or she is charged with. Section 36(5) of the Constitution explicitly makes everyone charged with an offence ‘innocent until proven guilty’; Section 34(1) entitles every Nigerian to respect and dignity of his or her person; and ultimately our constitutional order prohibits the turning of an accused person to a ‘ human trophy’.

    The Nigeria police’s unconventional celebrations of the arrest of Evans and the management of the case since his arrest highlights some of the worsening flaws in the Nigerian criminal justice system and raise some unsettling questions. Is it an exercise in public relations or an image laundering exercise? Is it a direct message to other deviants in the society that the police are out to get them? Is it a deliberate strategy to influence the outcome of the trial of Evans if he ever makes it to trial, by pressurizing the judge to convict irrespective of the weight of evidence adduced? Is it an attempt to distract the drama loving Nigerian public from their woes? Or a subtle indictment of the judiciary which is widely perceived as corrupt and incapable of convicting high profile criminals? Or is it just an expression of low self-esteem or low expectation by the Nigeria Police?

    Or can it be said that the police has finally succumbed to the oddities in the Nigerian polity? (After all a Nigerian politician sees nothing awkward in celebrating a handshake with former president Obama?)

    The public mismanagement of Evan’s arrest, especially the publication of seemingly classified operational undermines security and jeopardizes ongoing police operations. It would not be strange if kidnappers henceforth insist on million dollar ransoms and hold hostages for years, decentralize operations and move operational base to Ghana or find ways around electronic tracking. Is it recklessness, sheer incompetence or transcendental sense of invincibility that has made the Nigeria police allow the exposure of the identify of officers involved in the arrest? Online videos of officers celebrating the arrest, of policemen posing with the suspect expose officers and their families to unquantifiable risk and that is why security agencies across the world jealously protect the identity of operatives.

    The police is the most visible symbol of state power and the primary institution of social control in the hands of the managers of public safety and consciousness in Nigeria. Policing is too consequential to be treated without utmost care. To deliberately or negligently expose operatives to danger or to prioritize private interest above strategic security needs is to threaten the security of the citizenry

    The media mystification of Evans inadvertently glamorizes crime and instructs Nigeria’s poor and desperate youth population on the fortune that can be made from crime. In a land of limited opportunities where millions are permanently stuck in generational poverty, glamorizing Evans is a siren song that so many youth will find irresistible. The subliminal message is simple – form gangs, get guns, kidnap the rich and their families, demand ransom in millions of dollar and live the dream life that the society has refused to give you. After all, it is the age of get-rich-or-die-trying, for the youth death is a far country.

    Strangely, the poor management of Evans has sired some peculiar Nigerian oddity- the free/forgive Evans movement. Whether these persons are motivated by pure mischief, self-interest or understandable anger at the impunity of the political class is immaterial; what shocks is the brazen validation of violent crimes by a section of the Nigerian population. This would have been avoided it the police authorities managed the arrest with more circumspection.  And even then, the question should be asked– what are our values as Nigerians?

    The Police mishandling of Evans’ arrest points towards a definite conclusion- a criminal justice system that is deeply flawed and in dire need of holistic reform. An effective criminal justice system is one of the key pillars on which the rule of law is built.  A country that gets its criminal justice system right has effectively addressed a great part of its governance concerns because of the centrality of the criminal justice system to order and stability.

     

    • Osasona is a Research Associate at the Centre for Public Policy Alternatives, Lagos.

  • Magu and the Senate: Time to end the circus

    For a while now, Nigerians have been bemused and worried at the same time by the seemingly unending circus that the nomination and Senate confirmation of Ibrahim Magu as chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) has become. President Muhammad Buhari’s strong confidence in Ibrahim Magu is only rivalled by the Senate’s disdain of and contempt for him. As the two elephants fought over Magu’s suitability or otherwise as the country’s top corruption czar, Nigerians and the fight against corruption were the worse for it. Thankfully, it would appear an end is in sight for this long running saga.

    Twice the Senate has refused to confirm Magu as the EFCC chairman but the presidency remains determined to retain him in that position regardless. Until now, there has been a media frenzy feeding off this stalemate with no indication as to the president’s next line of action. However, last week, the vice president, YemiOsinbajo, gave the clearest indication yet of the president’s thoughts on the matter. Speaking to a cross section of journalists, Osinbajo, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, advanced legal reasons for government’s stance. It is the opinion of the presidency that going by section 171 of the 1999 constitution, as amended, the president does not necessarily need Senate’s confirmation of Magu’s appointment. He also disclosed that President Buhari did not find the DSS report on Magu meritorious enough to negate his nomination. The vice president also indicated the readiness of the president, if necessary, to resubmit Magu’s name to the senate for as many times as it takes the senate to confirm him. It is worthy to note also that a huge number of legal experts support the position of the law as espoused by the vice president. It is argued and convincingly too, that the  effect of section 1 (1) &(3) read together with Section 171 (1) &(2) of the 1999 constitution as amended, is to void section 2 (3) of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission Act which requires that a nominee for the agency’s chairmanship be subject to confirmation by the Senate.  Since this provision of the Act is inconsistent with section 171 of the constitution, it becomes void to the extent of its inconsistency as per section 1 (1) &(3). In other words, since section 171 (1) &(2) does not require Senate’s  confirmation of the appointments of heads of government agencies like the EFCC, and the constitution is superior to the EFCC Act which requires such senate confirmation, Ibrahim Magu automatically becomes the substantive chairman of the anti-corruption agency and will hold office for such period as stipulated by law.

    The reasoning of the presidency is not only sound in law, it is also a lot of common sense. Everything is not politics. While it may be politically savvy for the president to drop Ibrahim Magu to diffuse executive versus legislature tension, such move may deal a death blow to the administration’s anti-corruption fight. Also, since the matter involves interesting constitutional issues, it will enrich our democratic jurisprudence to have the Supreme Court give an opinion in the event that the Senate is minded to challenge the presidency’s reading of the law. That is what the judiciary exists for. It is hoped that the Senate will come to terms with this legal reality and move on, or opt for a legal challenge at the Supreme Court. I agree with the presidency and the Senate is best advised to let go and move on.

     

    • Prince Nwaeze Onu

    E mail: nationalpathfindernewspaper@gmail.com

     

  • Ekiti circus

    Looking back now, James Hadley Chase, the late English writer of American crime thrillers, couldn’t have been more laconic, titling one of his best sellers, The Guilty Are Afraid. That simple, almost casual truism is turning Ayo Fayose’s Ekiti into a circus, with hilarious echoes of “double vote of confidence.”

    And hurray!  For those who burn precious forex going abroad in search of titillating circuses, good news!  Fayose’s Ado Ekiti boasts the best parliamentary circus in town.  There, you would meet a full complement of clowns, pooh-poohing a report they don’t even have; and comically pronouncing a “double vote of confidence” — whatever that means — on a party the report purportedly indicted!  Indeed, the guilty are afraid!

    At plenary on January 19, the Ekiti legislature got rather over-excited over the Gen. Adeniyi Oyebode-chaired military board of enquiry that probed the secret audio recording, which captured the alleged voices of Ayo Fayose, Musiliu Obanikoro, Iyiola Omisore, Jelili Adesiyan and another person.  The party was hectoring and bullying Brig-Gen. Aliyu Momoh, on why he had not implemented their rigging masterplan, which Obanikoro, then minister of Defence (Army), boasted was a mission from the president.  The board commended servicemen that foiled, while also indicting those involved in the rigging plot; and proscribed due reward and punishment.

    Does the Ekiti legislature have a copy of the report?  That is doubtful.  In any case, none of the over-excited legislators at plenary brandished any copy.  But like Samson shorn of his hair of grace and power; and fuming to his doom, the Ekiti legislators were lashing out with wild allegations.

    They had gathered intelligence, they claimed, that the Federal Government was on the brink of using the findings of the report to remove Governor Fayose, their comical “opposition leader”; and if that failed, “assassinate” him outright. The Ekiti Assembly, with all 26 members Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) partisans, accused President Muhammadu Buhari of alleged dictatorship, bent on muscling the opposition.

    But wait a minute!  Has Fayose been found guilty?  Could he even be tried right now, even if the report indicted him?  Doesn’t he have constitutional immunity as sitting governor under extant Nigerian laws?  So, if he cannot be tried, how can somebody forcefully remove him from an office he has constitutional security?

    Or, has it been found that it was really Fayose’s voice badgering the poor army one-star general, simply because some illicit coins had changed hands? And if indeed Fayose was caught, metaphorically with fingers locked in the cookie jar, and he did cause the election to be rigged in his favour, is the clownish assembly scared that it would lack the guts to remove the governor, when confronted with notorious facts, since all are gubernatorial puppets?

    Ah, the bit about “double vote of confidence” is so reminiscent of the famous Wole Soyinka anti-Negritude poetic movement quip: a tiger does not proclaim its tigeritude!  When a legislature starts making a thunderclap of “double vote of confidence”, does that translate to double diffidence in its own confidence?

    Really, this assembly should get real.  Lawmaking is too serious and the legislative chamber too sacred to be left to clowns.

     

  • That circus of ‘name and shame’

    Now that things have relatively quietened down after the last bout of industry-scale ritual of ‘naming and shaming of delinquent borrowers, we can now reflect on the aftermath of an exercise that has done more to confound than resolve problems. Until most recently, I probably assumed that debt is not necessarily a vice. With perhaps the exception of our cash-hung economy, my understanding was that debt constituted the main fuel on which modern businesses run – a serious business at that.  Whether we are talking of a giant corporation or a struggling household business in some remote corner of town; debt is like oxygen – the presence/absence of which determines whether or not a business will live or die.

    In this wise, I must say that the controversies that have trailed the exercise is hardly surprising. It is a measure of the banality that the debt instrument has become particularly in our clime. After all, those who hunger for it a la credit – that is its other name – hardly ever gets it while those who get it are those who hardly needs it. Call it the Nigerian paradox; it explains why the manufacturer who has a factory to run – whose operations are hobbled by dearth or inadequate working capital – is left dry in the sun while the economic vagrant, whose only net-worth is in the number of cars in his convoy, commands all the attention. It is at the root of why the Zungeru cash cropper cannot cut an impression with our stiff-necked banker while the fuel importer is given free rein into the vault.

    To be sure, yours truly would have been most surprised is if the parties involved had quietly sorted out their mess while allowing the rest of us some peace. However, for an exercise that was said to have been designed to shake up the so-called delinquent players, it seems doubtful that it achieved anything of substance aside ruffling a few feathers. Yes, it stoked anger – lots of it – and with it threats and here and there. Beyond that, there is as yet, little evidence that it achieved much in terms of getting the wayward debtors to pay what they owe, and certainly far much less in addressing a problem that has become rather systemic.

    No wonder the exercise ended as an elaborate farce – which is what made it tragic. For if merely by the tone of its letter of April 22 to banks and discount houses, the apex bank left no doubts about the seriousness it attached to the exercise. The relevant part of the letter read – “The CBN has managed to keep the banking industry safe and sound in collaboration with all members of the Bankers’ Committee….But some data shows that it is increasingly becoming difficult for some debtors to pay up their loans. So it was decided that going forward, one thing that we may do is to stop them from getting access to foreign exchange. This is to ensure the continuous safety and soundness of the banking industry”. That understandably was the reason behind the pill handed the so-called delinquent debtors – the three months of grace, effective May 1, during which they were to turn their accounts from non-performing to performing status, failing which their names would be published in major newspapers.

    After two massive shakedowns – call it – comprehensive, industry-wide restructurings both of which were massively promoted as designed to deliver a brand new financial services industry – it says a lot about how very little has changed that the very afflictions that necessitated them – the appetite for uncalculated risk, sundry abuses of insider credit and other forms of abuses – have simply refused to go away. Merely by what the CBN letter suggest, the plague appears to have morphed into sublime but no less malignant forms.

    For sure, we know who is getting what. The oil and gas sector tops the bill. The reason is not far fetched; that is where money could be made without breaking a sweat. You ask how? Tell me of a sector that would shell thirty-something percent interest all in a year’s cycle of investment and I would show you a modern-day Robin Hood come to town. It also happens that the sector which claims the lion share of the available credit also carries with it the maximum risk.

    Now, this is far from pronouncing guilt on everyone as charged. Indeed, I am reminded of an a rather interesting riposte fired by the powerful Federation of Construction Industry (FOCI) – a body that has on its membership list, big names like Julius Berger Plc, C&C Construction, Costain West Africa, Hitech, Brunelli Construction, Jagal Nigeria, G. Cappa Plc, PW Nigeria Limited, Dantata and Sawoe and RCC – in the wake of the publication of the debtors list. Their position was simple: the CBN cannot isolate ‘delinquent debtors’ from the toxic environment which produce them. The body gave the example of the Federal Ministry of Works which it claims owes its members over N500 billion just as it admonished the apex bank to also publish names of government ministries, departments and agencies indebted to their members for Nigerians to have a fair appreciation of the problem. Here is how their President Solomon Ogunbusola puts it: “We are indebted to banks and CBN is threatening our members, saying that it will publish their names as chronic debtors. How can you explain it that someone borrowed money from the bank for two to three years and government refuses to pay for the contract done with the money? What will CBN do to government that refuses to pay the contractor? The names of such governments must be published too”?

    I am also aware of another set of people – those whose names have no business being on the debtors list as published. And we are not here talking of few muddled up names but individuals, who despite not having borrowed a dime from the banks, have had their reputations sullied by their appearance on the infamous list. Again, it says a lot about the appalling record-keeping in the financial sector as a whole that those charged with keeping custody of other people’s funds cannot be trusted to keep a clean list of debtors. When added to the poor judgment behind a good number of the credit decisions, the financial services sector would emerge as standing in graver risk than anyone could have imagined.

    That, to me is the salient danger we must reflect upon, more so at these difficult times.

    ‘It says a lot about the appalling record-keeping in the financial sector as a whole that those charged with keeping custody of other people’s funds cannot be trusted to keep a clean list of debtors. When added to the poor judgment behind a good number of the credit decisions, the financial services sector would emerge as standing in graver risk than anyone could have imagined. 

     

    Glad to be back

    I must apologise that yours truly made a rather dramatic disappearance from this page for more than four weeks running. Some personal exigencies dictated that I take some time to sort things out. Now, I am back, fully refreshed to continue in the struggle to make our nation what it truly deserves to be…

  • PDP circus show begins

    PDP circus show begins

    The Nigerian political sphere is replete with mind-boggling wonders. But quite sadly, the surprises of the polity are not usually for the larger interest of the people but to serve the greed of the few power mongers around. When all seemed to be going reasonably smooth for the coming February elections, the National Security Adviser (NSA), Col. Sambo Dasuki, in a manner akin to what happened in previous notorious administrations, called for a shift in the scheduled February elections.

    It was during his recent appearance at the London think-tank, Chatham House, where he reportedly delivered a lecture titled: “Nigeria’s Insecurity: Insurgency, Corruption, Elections and the Management of Multiple Threats.” Dasuki, at the question and answer session, scandalously sought the postponement of the February elections by three months. His reasons: “INEC had distributed 30 million cards in the past year but had another 30 million to hand out.” He further pointed out that despite the fact that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) chairman had assured him that the commission would meet up with the February date, he (NSA) still ‘thought it will make more sense to take more time and there was a 90-day window during which the election could legally take place. It costs you (INEC) nothing; it’s still within the law.’

    Since the NSA spoke, it was as if other puppeteers of President Goodluck Jonathan were waiting for a man of his standing to set the template before they start parroting same. Except for the leading opposition party, All Progressives Congress(APC), and perhaps another party, the others without insignificant political presence have queued into the shameless call for a shift which obviously was meant to scuttle the impending electoral loss awaiting the president and his ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the coming general elections. The United States, through her Secretary of State, John Kerry, had told the Nigerian government that the general elections must hold as scheduled. Rather than re-echo this, it is frightening to note that our president merely stated the cliche that the ‘May 29 handover date is sacrosanct.’ What a nebulous response to a serious challenge! So, it means that even if the elections are shifted, the May handover date will stand. One can’t but laugh!

    This column wants to know what kind of handover the president wants to do because his statement is pregnant with frightening imports. But the truth is that Nigerians will take nothing other than handover to a democratically elected president and governors come May 29th. Any contrary thing could be an invitation to avoidable anarchy. And this reminds of Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679), an English philosopher best known for his political thought. He was concerned with the problems of social and political order. He talked about how human beings could live together in peace in order to avoid civil conflict. Hobbes advocated obedience to an unaccountable sovereign (under the presumption that the sovereign would be reasonable and responsible). And that this could be a person or group empowered to decide every social and political issue. Failure to do this according to him could lead to what he called a “state of nature” that is anarchical where the life of the people is ‘brutish, nasty and poor.’

    But looking at the past and current situations in the country, it is doubtful if Hobbes contemplated human beings, especially politicians, as purely self-interested or egoistic. This poser has been the speck on the theory of this founding father of modern philosophy because it gives no reverence to the need for good ethics, morality and conscience as parameters for leadership obedience by the governed.

    This postulation becomes more germane through the way and manner that otherwise men of honour are clamouring for a shift in the February elections which to this column, is quite damning. Yours sincerely wonders if public morality and the larger public interest have impact on a politician’s or public office holder’s decision on public affairs. The impunity against morality and character going, especially on this clamour for election postponement by the ruling PDP has underscored the fact that conscience as the inner voice that warns us in our overt conducts that somebody may be looking is lacking in the party and the government it runs. The directing minds of the parties behind this condemnable scheming have no feelings for the groaning Nigerians that are tired of the misrule of the PDP and President Jonathan.

    What the presidential surrogates behind the plot are doing is to lay the perfidious ending for the president except reason prevails. Let the president be reminded that they did same thing to military despot Ibrahim Babangida as Head of State before he was ignominiously forced to step aside; late tyrant Sani Abacha suffered similar fate from his bootlickers, while the same set of politicians/aides deceived and encouraged former President Olusegun Obasanjo to pursue a well-designed orchestrated disgraceful end. One will perhaps be correct to state that Obasanjo ended abysmally with the ultimate collapse of his Third Term agenda through which billions of state funds were reportedly disbursed as alleged gratification to politicians perceived to be strategically positioned to bring that inordinate ambition to fruition.

    Again, President Jonathan must realise that Nigerians no longer want him but CHANGE. Except he wakes up from his deep political slumber, he may not be realising earnestly that these same set of choristers/political bigots that destroyed former leaders are presently goading him to an avoidable political precipice. It is high time he realised that his game is up because he has demonstrated in six years of being at the saddle that he does not have the capacity to rule this country. What the country needs most at this crucial period is a party that could inspire the country to do what she is capable of being.

    The elections must hold as scheduled because there is no sincerity of purpose, truthful justice and realistic reliability in this odious call for election postponement by the PDP and the president’s henchmen. This column is almost certain that the words of gratitude of presently suffering Nigerians and the future generations will not be kind on these political jesters in PDP and other atmosphere- fouling political parties of negligible consequence. This circus show by the PDP and President Jonathan on election shift is unacceptable. It is a sad repeat of the better-forgotten history that has, sadly, taken the country to nowhere.

  • And the circus begins… (1)

    Feelers from the political scene in recent times, indicate that the ‘battle’ for 2015 has begun in earnest. I use the military term usually associated with warfare because as many in this country would attest to, politics here is like war. And like most battlefields, it’s not a place for the weak and lily-livered.

    Anyway, the politicians have stirred from the self-imposed short break they took after the last general elections in 2011 and are gearing up for the next one. The scheming, underground deals and the other things associated with politicking in Nigeria have started. Already, some casualties in this political battlefield have begun to emerge. Last week, the National Secretary of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola was removed by a Federal High Court in Abuja, a move that some political observers see as a fall-out of the alleged cold war brewing between President Goodluck Jonathan and his erstwhile godfather, former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

    As for the ex-military leader and two time Head of State, its obvious that the old warhorse is up to his old tricks and shenanigans again. When he left office in 2007, I cannot remember Nigerians holding a referendum to pick him as the undisputed kingmaker in the country. But Obasanjo as everyone knows, is like a man with a drum beating in his head- he picks his own tune and he dances to it energetically, unmindful of whether others around him like the music or not. In other words, he does not care about others opinions and does whatever he wants to do, at any cost. He has assumed that role with his usual abraggadocio and domineering ways.

    Now, his body language and reports from various quarters show that he’s shopping for a new ‘prince’ to crown in the next political dispensation, having allegedly fallen out with his beloved godson, Jonathan. In this quest, the feelings and desires of the majority of the citizens for good governance that will usher in progress and prosperity in the country, do not count. What Obasanjo wants, Aremu gets.

    And there lies the tragedy of this country. For far too long, the political leaders have been grossly unfair to Nigerians. All the scheming and deals struck at those clandestine meetings they usually hold during ‘vampire hours’ (that is at midnight or early hours) are all geared towards one thing: self. It’s all about self-interest, self-aggrandizement, self-preservation and other pecuniary reasons. To this lot, the word ‘people’ which democracy is all about, does not exist.

    In fact, the ancient Greeks who invented this form of governance would shake their heads in wonder at the manner in which our politicians have re-invented democracy. Here, it’s more like, ‘government of the ruling class, for the ruling class and by the ruling class.’ But for how long can this state of affairs be sustained? Not too long because the dire consequences of such mis-governance, which is an abnormality in the first place, are becoming too glaring to ignore.

    The rate of poverty, unemployment, hunger and other unfortunate fall-outs of bad governance and misuse of resources have reached crisis level. The only way to turn the tide is to put the people back in democracy.

    This has been harped on for years by activists, civil society groups, the media and other concerned Nigerians alarmed at the way the country is being run. But most of our politicians, drunk on the power, money and other perks of their high offices have grown blind and deaf to the cries of the long-suffering citizens which have reached the heavens itself. Like Nero, who played music on his fiddle while ancient Rome burnt, the politicians are too busy enjoying these perks to care about the common man.

    As some say, it will take a miracle for these people to listen or change. But listen they must because the alternative is too harrowing to contemplate.