The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Demons

  • Forest of thousand demons

    It is time to think about a penance for oil. A time to say sorry, and genuflect for the evil we have done to black gold. It was first the victim. Now, it is no longer just the black gold. It is now a god, a sort of wild, mighty and vengeful deity haunting us.

    It is not like the African ancestor, like Ogun or Oya, or some of the goddesses of the sea in African and ancient myths. Not Poseid on the ferocious Greek sea god who raked up storms and tossed martial ships. Our oil is a god that will not wait to be an ancestor before showing fangs.

    It is mocking with mordant joy our lack of fidelity to the federal idea. We decided to draw up the exclusive list in our grundnorm and made minerals a privilege of the centre. The power elite did not want oil for the Niger Delta owners. For rape mineral, oil, they dwarfed the rest.

    Oil was king, and it had to be beheaded. It was queen, it had to be raped. But no one knew it was a god. They killed it before they worshipped it. Oil also raped the budget. So, all other minerals were left. We scavenged black gold, even though we had the real gold in a number places in huge deposits, including in Osun State and the blood-gurgling effervescence of Zamfara. We had – and still have – bauxite, limestone, kaolin, silica sand, quartz, iron ore, red clay, bitumen, asbestos, marble, gemstone, glass, ball clay, etc. in every local government area.

    But we ravished the imitation of gold. Black man, black gold, black god. The black man in Nigeria plays black god to black gold. We punished the locals who embowelled it. Their farms, their pristine fishing waters, their trees, all defiled like the oil. The licensees and licensers were not local giants but greedy trespassers.

    No, the black gold was easy and they conquered it. They built corrupt empires of personal palaces, home and abroad, or rode in posh cars and corralled concubines or harangued harems. They left the Niger Delta poor and broken, of course not without local quislings.

    Now the god is angry. It has sent its curse all over the land. We are seeing it now in the north where the young are taking over the orgy of rape. It is the tale of two banditries or barbarians. The first banditry was stylised like a bejewelled beast. They asked the white man to come. The idea was hatched in ties and suits and babaringas and agbadas, et al. Officials sanctioned it with soldiers and police. Courts and government agencies anointed it. People went to school to fortify this. Churches and mosques sanctified it and blessed the carpet baggers. They spoke good English, flaunted outlandish accents. It is banditry as refinement and refinement as banditry.

    The other barbarians are howling or shrieking, or dressed in half-torn tops, their faces dripping with grubby perspiration, their biceps greasy with soot. Now, in Zamfara, and along the axis of bandits, we have a good number of them, running rampant. They mine as though entitled. It has taken the bandits for us to know that this thing called mineral wealth is rampant in the land. They say they serve god and brandish the holy book, but they serve gold more. All those who enjoyed the flamboyance of oil wealth cannot even travel without trepidation around the north.

    The bandits now are like the tenants of Fagunwa’s Forests of a thousand daemons. These are not daemons, though, but demons. They are operating from forests and the list of the forests is like an apparition. Kamuku, Kuyambana, Kagara, Gando, Fankama, Fete, Dumburum, et al. in other places, forests are an asset for wealth and glory. Here forests hoist blood and gore. They are ambushing the rich and powerful.

    If oil was left to locals in the spirit of true federalism, all the minerals would have enjoyed the same status. And state governments would have developed the minerals in their own way, enriching their peoples aplenty rather than leaving them to a federal government that only understood how to drill. In Plateau State alone, Governor Simon Lalong told of a man who earned more from mining the state than the state’s total revenue every month. Yet the president said the Nigerian structure is all right.

    When many called for restructuring, some thought they were immune in a state of injustice. They are now victims. Frankenstein monster. The foraging of minerals, especially in states like Zamfara and Niger, is only just beginning. The eruption of young men who could acquire jobs and run quiet families is also about to envelope us.

    The barbarians of refinement gave birth to the barbarians of savage revolt. It is a tale of barbarians versus barbarians. Who is worse? It is hard to say. The word barbarian has been bastardised over the ages.

    We may say they are barbarians. Attila the Hun did not see himself as barbarian, nor did the Norsemen or Magyars in Europe, nor did our ancestors who were displaced and defiled by the colonial overlords.  Nor were the Berbers of North Africa whose name was mangled. Definitions may accuse us, just as Nobel Laureate Coetzee showed in his novel “Waiting for the Barbarians,” where the barbarian is more ambiguous in the story of the locals versus colonialists. Or in Soyinka’s Madmen and Specialists.

    The best evangelists of restructuring are the bandits in the north. They are not wearing cassocks or wielding tesbiu. They are calling for it by banning the rich from taking ostrich rides on Abuja-Kaduna highway, by kidnapping the wealthy, by taxing farmers and rustling cattle, and ripping open the earth for minerals.

     

    El Rufai’s Napoleon complex

    Far be it from me to dabble into definitions of Malam El Rufai as a short man driven by fear. I will not denigrate his gubernatorial “briefness” as OBJ did in his book, My Watch, where he ran the man down with a rhetoric of contempt. I will not compare him to Oscar, the dwarf in Gunter Grass’ novel Tin Drum, who crashed everything in sight by screaming. A public desperado banging his shoes to gain attention.

    I met him the other day at Eko Hotel, and he called me a “journalistic terrorist.” I shot back and said he was a “gubernatorial terrorist.” And I am right. But first, a short history of betrayal. He is the serial genuflector, who knows how to bow and betray. First, it was Atiku Abubakar, who could do no wrong. Done with him, he swivelled to Obj on his knees. His “royal briefness” did same to Yar’Adua. His great mentor is now Buhari, who tolerates him like a worshipful pest. He said he retired four godfathers but is too cowardly to name them. He knows his claim is apocryphal. I don’t know of any godfather in Kaduna. We know of Kaduna mafia, but that was a metaphor for northern military oligarchy now expired.

    El Rufai
    El-Rufai

    He said he wanted men of the Bridge Club to amass cash to unseat Lagos godfather after a tendentious question from his fellow traveller Muiz Banire. He said he would encourage his folks to woo two million of the five million on the voter register who didn’t vote and win them over. Really? In Kaduna where he earned about one million votes, over 3.9 million persons were on the register, and over 1.5 million did not vote, more than his votes. How could he determine that if they voted, he could not be a former governor today?

    He spoke as though Lagosians are morons. There is a reason why they vote the way they do. Is Lagos not ahead of Kaduna in development, far and away? Other than bulldoze his foe’s houses and deploy statistics to divide Christians against Fulanis, he has not made glorious headlines. He was one of the few who quietly plotted to push his presidential candidacy when Buhari was ill. Here is a man who spent fewer times praying for his mentor when he was ill than he spent plotting to replace him. And did I not see him many a time at Bourdillon and Freedom House in Lagos where he paid obeisance to Tinubu, because he wanted something. Now, the same man who paved the way for a platform for him to be governor is now a sinner? He knelt under Buhari, who reached down to raise his hand. Buhari should watch out. Someone he is feeding might bite his fingers.

  • Exorcising our demons

    Are you surprised and wondering why there seem to be challenges all over the world? Watching cable news and other channels you are bound to be extremely pessimistic about our country and world. From the senseless Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka to the banditry in Zamfara and renewed killings in other states in Nigeria, the temptation is there to just give up and feel there are no solutions to the demons tormenting our country and world.

    If you’re like this writer who keeps wondering about such things then you need to read “The Fix: How Nations Survive and Thrive in a World in Decline” by Jonathan Tepperman. The timing of this 307 page book could not be better. Critical thinking is needed now than ever. No one appears to agree on fundamental ideas about governing anymore. Issues that can be resolved by dialogue are allowed to fester to the point of conflict because of the ego of elites. Manipulation appears to be a very effective and powerful tool these days.

    The grand ideological debates of the 20th and early 21st centuries – capitalism versus socialism, democracy versus authoritarianism etc – today seem too broad, tired and pointless, and little has come along to replace them. Where there are replacements, it is often hate speech, agitations and ethnic tensions. Globalization, the economic paradigm of our era, has become an epithet in the mouths of insurgent politicians exploiting middle-class discontent on both the right and left.

    The people in power, especially the so-called establishment, still seem surprised by the magnitude of the backlash – by Trump, by Brexit, by Biafra and other deepening anger – and confused about how to respond. And with no one pointing a way through the labyrinth of confusion make situations even dare. Worse still, democracy – seen as the “best” system of governance – itself has seemed to curdle with people yearning for alternatives. But what alternative is the dilemma

    We are in other words utterly adrift, ideologically speaking. It’s hardly a surprise the vacuum of ideas is being filled, in the political arena, by atavistic impulses like nationalism, racism and xenophobia. Jonathan Tepperman’s answer to this “gathering darkness,” as he calls it, is to take a giant step back from the larger, paralysed debate.

    In “The Fix,” Tepperman sets aside ‘Big Think’ in favour of small think: practical, microcosmic solutions to big problems in sometimes surprising places.  From Brazil to Botswana, Indonesia to New York City Tepperman offers what he calls “a data-driven case for optimism” at a time when “most of us have glumly concluded that our governments are broken and our domestic and international problems are insurmountable.”

    The book identifies “the Terrible Ten” and particularly difficult problems, including inequality, immigration, civil war, corruption, Islamic extremism, the resource curse, energy, the middle-­income trap (the difficulty countries have in making the leap from developmental success to wealthy-nation status) and two kinds of political gridlock: what’s not working worldwide. He argues that they are “fixable” when leaders act boldly. For each problem, Tepperman finds a free-thinking and experimental leader (or leaders) who defied the odds and achieved success.

    In the early years of this century, for example, President Luiz Inaìcio Lula da Silva of Brazil developed a ground-breaking poverty-fighting program, Bolsa Famiìlia, which gave small monthly grants to mothers to feed and educate their families. Almost to a tale, these are stories of political pragmatism in the midst of crisis, often involving battlefield conversions by unusually adaptable and able leaders unfettered by “ideological handcuffs.”

    In Brazil, the business community and economists were initially horrified when Lula da Silva, a labour leader who had experienced extreme poverty as a child, was elected president. But the “rabble-rouser metamorphosed into the Great Conciliator,” Tepperman writes, and to address Brazil’s terrible income inequality Lula launched Bolsa Família, an innovative and relatively inexpensive cash-transfer program that didn’t just give people handouts but required “counterpart responsibilities,” including government demands to use some of the money to send one’s kids to school and ensure they are immunized and get regular checkups (along with their mothers).

    Lula ended up winning over even conservatives in his country and dramatically reducing poverty, leading the former World Bank expert Nancy Birdsall to conclude that Bolsa Família is “as close as you can come to a magic bullet in development.” More than 60 countries sent experts to Brazil to study the programme.

    Tepperman also finds successful leadership stories in Mexico, which despite its reputation for runaway corruption and drug violence began to recover under former President Enrique Pena Nieto, who impressively exploited the despair of Mexico’s political elites to forge unprecedented cooperation. In just the first 18 months after his July 2012 election, Pena Nieto “managed to bust open Mexico’s smothering monopolies and antiquated energy sector, restructure the country’s education system and modernize its tax and banking laws,”

    In Botswana, the “cleaner than a hound’s tooth” Seretse Khama lifted his country beyond its dependence on the “resource curse” of diamonds, building what was considered, for a time, one of the best-governed countries in the developing world – a system so structured against corruption that it is, for now, resisting the alleged abuses of his far less capable son, Ian Khama.

    For the past two decades, the democratic leaders of post-Suharto Indonesia have steered their country toward a moderate form of politics that has undercut Islamist radicalism. From his fascinating travelogue, Tepperman offers lessons for a world in trouble: leaders need to think outside the box, embrace the possibilities that crises present, and respect systems of checks and balances. The pragmatic reform tradition that the book illuminates is apparently still alive.

    Though the book is not long, Tepperman goes into impressive detail in each case study and delivers his assessments in clear prose, careful to describe most of his success stories as experiments that could still fail.

    Tepperman has traveled the world to write this book, conducting more than a hundred interviews with heads of state – like Lula, Rwanda’s Paul Kagame, Indonesia’s Joko Widodo and other leaders – and other innovators responsible for these unexpected success stories. His access and expertise make “The Fix” a work of unusual insight, focused on the people and leadership lessons behind the policies.

    Meticulously researched and deeply reported, it presents practical advice for aspiring problem-solvers of all stripes, and stands as a necessary corrective to the hand-wringing and grim prognostication that dominates the news these days, making a data-driven case for optimism in a time of crushing pessimism.

    It is easy to look at Nigeria, and indeed, the world today and see nothing but a spiral of disorder, dysfunction, and decline. In this wonderfully engaging book, Tepperman sorted out political success stories that cut against this gloomy outlook.

    Perhaps the biggest question about Tepperman’s thesis is one he addresses but doesn’t fully answer: whether many of these programs are readily transferable to other places, or are unique to the political culture whence they sprang. In the end, for example, former Mayor Bloomberg’s version of Bolsa Família failed to gain traction in New York, and there are indications it may work better in rural than in urban areas.

    As we grapple with the myriad of “demons” tormenting Nigeria and try to make sense of them, it should be clear by now that these “demons” can be exorcised if there is the political will. Our “demons” are elite inspired, and the starting point is to stand back, take critical look at those talking or agitating and see where their interests lie. It will surprise the majority that some of these interests are driven more by personal aggrandisements than the collective good.

    Yes, there are agitations and counter agitation everywhere; but I still believe Nigeria is better together than divided. Let’s not be scared to sit together and talk.

  • Blood sucking demons!

    Whose hitherto troubled by some of the commonly held beliefs in this country, have cause to heave a heavy sigh of relief. Respite has come from an unusual quarter- the Federal Road Safety Commission FRSC which has taken up the challenge of faulting some of the touted factors often blamed for the recurring accidents on our roads.

    Obviously worried by the pervasiveness of these weird beliefs and their effects on increasing accident rate, the FRSC came out boldly at the flag-off of this year’s “ember months” sensitization campaign to debunk the notion that accidents are caused by some blood sucking demons on the roads or sent by some mystics.

    Hear Samuel Obayemi, FRSC Zonal commanding officer, Zone RF9 Enugu: “There are no blood-sucking demons on the road to kill you; stop believing that someone from you village wants to send accident to you through the air. If you drive safely, you must arrive safely. He spoke on the theme “Safe driving, Safe Arrival”, contending that human factors were responsible for most of the road crashes in this country.

    The theme of this year’s ember months’ sensitization campaign and the specific item of our weird beliefs that create hindrances in the enforcement of safe driving habits are well thought out. A clime with high level of illiteracy and pervasive poverty as ours, nurtures all manner of mundane beliefs and weird ideologies. With this disposition, it is easy to find a good number of people ascribing and rationalizing their misfortunes on some unseen hands or evil persons.

    Death is not regarded as a natural phenomenon as someone somewhere must have a hand in it even when its cause is identifiable. The same thing goes for any and every sickness, accidents on the roads and misfortunes of all hue.  It is heart refreshing the FRSC has come to terms with the fact that for it to make real progress in accidents’ reduction, it must identify and address some of these beliefs that are not borne out of empirical evidence. The notion that accidents are caused by some blood-sucking demons or sent by enemies, are quite common on these shores even among the very educated and more fortunate ones. And this has had deleterious effects on campaigns for safe driving habits. Those who believe accidents come from some supernatural forces or are levied by someone somewhere are unlikely to take seriously the safety measures regularly rolled out by the commission. That is why the FRSC is drumming it into the ears of all that accidents are caused and if we take the necessary safeguards, their rate will be substantially reduced. It goes without saying.

    The sermon of the commission can also been deciphered from the self-fulfilling prophesy adumbrated in the notion of the ember months. There is the general feeling that there is something; an unseen force in the ember months that cause accidents. The feeling is that accidents are bound to happen more within those months than the others. While it could be true that a higher rate of accidents had previously been recorded within that timeframe, the reality is that they have nothing to do with supernatural forces levying death on travellers.

    They relate positively to the high rate of travels within that period; the actions and inactions of drivers and commuters that accentuate roads accidents and their clinging tenaciously to the strange belief that accidents occur at a higher frequency within that period. And because they have come to believe that accidents must occur during the period, they act in such ways as to allow that prophesy find fulfilment. That is why the FRSC has come in to disabuse the minds of the people to the reality that there is no such a thing as accidents must occur more during the ember months.

    There is no such thing as blood thirsty demons waiting on the roads to lick blood from the accidents they caused. There is also no such thing as someone from your remote village commanding awful powers to levy accidents on the roads. Most of the accidents stem from actions and inactions of drivers and can be reduced through safe driving habits. That is the message; the sooner it is internalized, the better for us all.

    Not surprisingly, all manner of people have sought to capitalize on these weaknesses to prey on the less fortunate ones. All manner of pastors, televangelists and preachers hype the fear of the unknown to fleece innocent and gullible ones for personal advantage. At major motor parks, prayer houses, it is common to hear preachers banishing blood sucking demons, breaking the yoke of evil spirits and enemies that cause accidents on the roads. Sometimes, the emotions these preachers evoke are even capable of frightening the commuter that something ominous may happen along the way.

    But at the end of all that, you will still find the motor park preacher or pastor asking those moved by the ‘spirit’ for some support. Sometimes, one wonders whether the calamities they presage their messages on, is to frighten commuters to pay restitution in form of offerings to avert the foreboding scenarios they painted along the way.

    The FRSC has a lot of work to do in this regard. It will have to contend with the antics of sundry pastors and preachers both the legitimate and fake who regularly drum it into the ears of members that accidents and sundry misfortunes are either caused by some supernatural powers, enemies or curses from our forefathers. Obviously, the FRSC cannot succeed in this visionary campaign without the support of all arms of the government, religious bodies and our educational institutions.

    This brings to focus the alliterative allure of a radio advertisement in one of the stations in Imo State sometime ago. It went like this: ‘Ibibi abubu onu, bibie abubu onu’, (neutralizing curses, neutralize curses).  This Igbo advertisement was so professionally crafted and repeated so many times that it drew irresistible appeal.

    But what was the message all about? The said man of God was inviting all and sundry to his place of worship so as to have all the curses from their forefathers neutralized. For him, everybody has a curse hanging over his head for which he and only he had the key to their neutralization. Such is the power of the kind of misinformation the FRSC will be contending with. It is not going to be that easy. But they should not relent.

    As I was putting this article together, I stumbled on a message in the social media titled “the lies of ancestral curse”. The author of that very educative and informative message chronicled some of the atrocious acts committed by the forefathers of some of the advanced countries we admire as epitome of progress, development and all that is good in life. Yet, the atrocities committed by their forefathers did not hold them down as their peoples are rated among the most progressive and most prosperous in the world today.

    The British Empire was built on conquest and colonization; millions were starved to death and killed in India and parts of Africa. The United States of America was built on the extermination of Native Americans and enslavement of African Americans while Germany caused the two world wars that claimed millions of lives, yet the atrocities of their forefathers did not hold them down from making tremendous progress. The post queried why the touted atrocities of our forefathers that are not even of public knowledge should be our undoing, barring us from progress and accounting for all the misfortunes we encounter in life?

    That is the issue. Our misfortunes have nothing to do with so-called curses levied by our forefathers.  Neither do we have any basis to be liberated from such phoney curses. They remain devious machinations of sundry preachers and occultists intent on fleecing the unsuspecting and gullible for their personal gains. There is no such thing as curses holding us down, causing accidents and sundry misfortunes for which we require liberation (Ibibi abubu onu).

    Misfortune is part and parcel of life irrespective of race, colour and level of social attainment. Road accidents must happen if we pay scant attention to safety rules. That is the powerful sermon of the FRSC during this ember months and beyond.

  • ‘Road accidents, demons and realities

    ‘Road accidents, demons and realities

    Many people have written articles on road accidents in Nigeria using such outlets as newspapers, magazines and journals. These articles address the causes and consequences of the ugly scenario within the context of the overall development of the country. Certainly, much more papers will still follow, until there is at least, a semblance of normalcy or sanity in the system.  It is against this reality, that this article gains its relevance. Road accidents are a societal problem with a monstrous status. It is neither Eastern nor Western. In other words, road accidents are a global phenomenon. As a result of this, they (road accidents) still occur in developed geo-polities like Britain, United States of America and Germany. This is in addition to such Asian countries as India and China.

    Thus, for example, over 37000 people die in road accidents yearly in the U.S, with a population of over 325 million. Similarly, more than 130000 persons perish on a yearly basis due to road accidents in India. That is to say, that 377 people die daily in the country (India). However, the political leadership of each of the above countries continues to improve on the situation, through the lens of appropriate policies coupled with implementation.  Their roads are being regularly maintained and/or paved. Although the entirety of the human species is in jeopardy due to modernity, every serious segment of the global village has to craft its own strategies for survival and progress. Nigeria cannot be an exception.

    According to the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics, 11363 road accidents occurred in 2016. In the process, 5053 people were killed, out of a total of 30105 that sustained injuries. Commercial vehicles had the highest percentage (53.8), followed by private vehicles (44.5) and government vehicles (1.65) as well as diplomatic cars (0.1). Indeed, between January and June this year, at least 2673 people were involved in road accidents in Nigeria. This country lost an average of 15 people daily during the first half of the year. This should be a source of great concern for all well-meaning Nigerians and their friends. Nigeria has a huge landmass of over 923000 square kilometres, with road networks of 193000 kilometres, out of which only 28980 kilometres are paved.

    There is no doubt, that Nigeria has the largest road networks in West Africa. But given the low level of Nigeria’s social and technological sophistication including the primitive culture of looting public treasury by the political class, a separate ministry of transport is urgently needed. This becomes a bit more manageable than the current architecture, with three sensitive issues and activities- Works, Power and Housing lumped together. In fact, this is a huge joke!  It leads to inefficiencies arising basically from excessive bureaucracies and of course, endemic corruption. The price of this anomaly (in a country where blatant thieving of people’s common wealth, is becoming a way of life), is the increasing rate of carnage on our roads or glorified death traps. Most of these roads have no drainage systems including culverts. The foreign contractors handling these projects pretend not to know the right thing to do. This is what can never happen in their countries where accountability level is much higher. In Nigeria anything goes because unalloyed patriotism has been put to sleep by those who govern us.

    Anybody with the faintest idea of fairness and/or sound judgement would not deny the fact that the Buhari administration inherited this monumental mess. Successive governments failed woefully to show sufficient commitment and willpower to build good roads and/or properly maintain the existing ones. Nigerian political leadership generally lacks patriotism. Arithmetic of power and avarice or primitive accumulation of wealth, have become their fetish. This explains the reason why the country is crisscrossed with totally damaged roads, most unbecoming of the “Giant of Africa.” No foreigner enters Nigeria without willy-nilly becoming a prayer warrior. Having made very close to half a trillion dollars from crude oil in less than 60 years – a figure that is higher than that of international aid ($300 billion) to the entirety of Africa, the Nigerian political leaders at different time-periods must  apologise to all Nigerians for impoverishing them by mismanaging the collective resources in a blatant manner. With due respect to these political leaders, Nigerians need their unreserved apologies otherwise posterity would condemn them.

    But surprisingly, most of these leaders are still being celebrated by the same people who have been thoroughly abused. Does it mean that many Nigerians have memories like a sieve? Personal aggrandizement and insatiable longing after materialism have combined to dwarf their (political leaders) humanity. The followership cannot afford to gloss over this fact. Our docile, sycophantic mentality which cannot be separated from facets of the age-old Nigerian culture and tradition encourages perpetuation of bad, people-insensitive governance by the Nigerian political class. The abysmal situation, with the attendant problem of dire poverty on an unprecedented scale, underscores the reason why many religious or near-complete business centres litter everywhere in the country. There is fire on the mountain! We cannot run away because this is the country where God has planted us. We are not here by accident! Therefore, the flames have to be quenched as quickly as possible, before the fire consumes our todays and by the same token, tomorrows.

    Apart from bad roads, there are other factors that militate against sanity with respect to transportation in this country. One of them is the superstitious belief that demons live, wine and dine on most Nigerian roads, and that they can cause accidents any time they like. They love such dilapidated expressways as the Lagos-Ibadan; Ibadan-Ilesa and Lagos-Ore-Onitsha. Human blood and flesh are their culinary delights. Nigerians are very good in glossing over fundamental issues and unknowingly, turning God into a triviality through the platform of endless praying without taking practical steps when the need to do so arises. Man is a mini-creator or put succinctly, a producer/consumer.  Most Nigerians today erroneously believe that God must do everything for Nigeria while they shirk their own responsibilities. However, a few courageous religious leaders are not keeping quiet in the face of injustice, religious bigotry, ethnic insularity and administrative cluelessness that characterize the Nigerian political space.

    Apart from the imaginary demons, many drivers still believe that “juju”- African magical force, is capable of protecting them anytime accidents occur. Consequently, they engage in all kinds of road indiscipline like over-speeding and drunk-driving. This is more common among commercial drivers, who often have the challenge of fatigue among other things to grapple with. Rickety vehicles dot the Nigerian landscape largely because of chronic material poverty that makes it difficult for owners of these vehicles to change spare parts as of when due. Although the Federal Road Safety Commission, founded in 1988 is trying hard to reduce road crash deaths to the barest minimum, it needs to do much more. More road signs are needed. Non-adherence to lane driving, in the absence of road/traffic signs, has sent many Nigerians to their early graves. The Ibadan-Ilesa expressway in the south-west is a good illustration of this. Sections of this expressway are often easily (and suddenly too) turned into a single carriage way, without any warning signs. This situation has led to many accidents there. The careless Nigerian road users and government (that does not provide good roads) are in fact, the demons. The Federal Road Safety Corps members should do more patrolling of these roads. There should be heavier penalties for offenders. It is lamentable that two separate, serious road accidents occurred in the Kara axis of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, within one week in November. Lives were lost. Similarly, on November 27, another multiple accident occurred on the Ochadamu-Ayingba road in Kogi State. In this case, three persons died.

    All the Nigerian roads can be fixed, despite the current poor state of the economy. This is if the federal government is sincerely ready to fight corruption- the age-old monster staring Nigeria in the face. The Nigerian political space both historically and systemically, remains a web of confusion, visionlessness, mediocrity and maximum deceit. Who will save us from ourselves?  Giving specialist assignments to people on the basis of political patronage is an invitation to failure. Some of the best persons from within and without Nigeria must be engaged, if indeed, we want to move forward as a country. Our Ministry of Works has to be managed by engineers, and transport geographers among other specialists. They have to be men and women of proven financial integrity and not a bunch of clever rogues. This should apply to other sectors of the economy. In sum, the perceived demonization of the Nigerian roads would certainly begin to disappear in the face of good education, transparency, probity and unalloyed patriotism including self-less political leadership.

     

    • Prof Ogundele is of Department of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Ibadan.
  • How we conquered the ‘demons’ in Cocoa House -Odu’a Investment Company’s ex-CEO Jimoh

    How we conquered the ‘demons’ in Cocoa House -Odu’a Investment Company’s ex-CEO Jimoh

    Dr. Adebayo Jimoh, a former Group Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Odu’a Investment Limited and currently the Chairman of Osun State-owned bank, Omoluabi Savings and Loans Plc, is a thoroughbred technocrat. Fondly called Mr Turnaround by admirers, thanks to his efforts in reviving the then ‘sick’ South West- owned business, Odu’a Investment Company Plc, he is a member of the Governing Council of Fountain University Osogbo, Chairman Synergy Cotton and Agro- Allied Limited and member, Board of Directors, Ibadan Business School, among others. In this interview with GBENGA ADERANTI, the son of a merchant of gold and diamond speaks about his growing up outside the country, why he left his job as a lecturer, the influence of his father on his business acumen,  among other interesting issues.

    You finished as the best graduating student in your faculty when you did your bachelor’s degree and repeated the feat at post graduate level. Why didn’t you stay in the university system as a lecturer?

    It is true that I was the best graduating student not only in my department but also in the whole faculty. I had the best result and I was offered an appointment. I wanted to immediately take do master’s programme. I left the University of Ilorin to go to the University of Ibadan to do my MSc in Industrial Psychology with the aim of doing a doctorate. At that time, I was interested in being a lecturer. While I was in the University of Ibadan, I was also the best student in the class and the University of Ibadan held me and offered me an assistant lecturer position, so I stayed in the academics.

    I started as an Assistant Lecturer in the Department of psychology. In the cause of it, I saw that I was more attracted to industry, at least put to practice the theory of psychology of industrial and organizational behaviour and of human behaviour. I thought I would just go to the industry for a while, but I went into industry and I got stuck. That was why.

    Any regret leaving your job as a lecturer?

    Not at all, I have no regret. In industry, I first of all joined John Holts as a management trainee in 1983, and I rose through the ranks in John Holts with lots and lots of exposure, lots and lots of training, lots and lots of assignments, lots and lots of tasks, lots and lots of projects that I had to deliver both within and outside Nigeria and within the team work, because British multinational companies believe in team work. I rose to the rank of group executive director in charge of group operations for Nigeria and West Africa sub-region. I was there for a while before another call came for me to move to Odu’a Investment Plc. So I didn’t regret exit from the academics. Rather, academics prepared me for opportunities to put to practice the theories in the class. So, there was a kind of town and gown relationship. They blended very well to assist me in my career path.

    You speak like someone that did not grow up in Nigeria

    You are probably right. My father was an itinerant trader. He found himself in the then Gold Coast in 1947, and he was involved in the exploration and mining of gold and diamond with the British colonial government in Ghana. Then, it was Gold Coast, and he used to travel a lot between the Gold Coast, Liberia, Sierra Leone and other foreign countries on boat or by ship. Because he had exposure and he had interaction with the British people. I wasn’t born in Nigeria; I was born in Ghana.

    I was lucky, because of the exposure my father had. He immediately put me in an international primary and nursery school with 26 nationals in that school. Each nationality had a flag in that school. I was privileged to have attended Hectre International School, one of the pioneers of British international Schools in Ghana. I grew up with Europeans and Americans and I imbibed their culture. I was in Ghana for all my developmental years. It was at the point my father exited and came to Nigeria that I had to come to Nigeria. And when I came to Nigeria too, I was lucky. I had good education and I grew up through it. It was not as if I was born by a rich person or any privileged person, but by the wish of God.

    Tell me about the influence of your father on your career.

    You are quite right, my father was a businessman in Osogbo. He is late now. He died on May 1 this year at the age of 101 years. He was the Babaloja of the main market in Osogbo. Before he became the Babaloja, his Oroki Bread was one of the fastest growing bakery businesses in Osogbo. So he was purely a businessman. What he taught me was diligencealways do the right thing and always get prepared because the opportunity will come.

    My father was a long term person. He would tell you that you don’t just get information and get prepared for today, whatever is readable, read it. Whatever you have to learn, learn it. Whatever you have to acquire, acquire it, because the opportunity will come. He also believed in maintaining relationship based on integrity. More important is the diligence part of it: do it right, make sure that whatever you cannot defend publicly, you don’t do it. Only do what you can defend. So, those were the traits I picked from him.

    At the time you picked up appointment with Odu’a Investment Plc, the conglomerate was said to be ‘sick’. What situation did you meet and how did you turn it around?

    I would give that credit of Odu’a turnaround to the leadership team that I was able to put in place; the support of the board I worked with. And it may interest you that in Odu’a, I worked with seven chairmen and more than seven boards. I worked with governors from all parties because I was in the saddle for nine years. The standard was four years renewable, but I had another year to brand up.

    The team that I worked with was focused and they believed in the dream. And the dream was simpl: let’s make this place better than we met it. The first thing that we did to prove that it was possible was the Cocoa House which was built by our forefathers. At the time I came in as the group managing director, the place was abandoned and was dilapidated. All that you found in Cocoa House were rats and rodents, and the place was totally unkempt. I said this is an asset that we must revive. The reaction from some people was ‘nobody touches Cocoa House’.

    There were so called demons and all my predecessors since the place got burnt just abandoned it. I said I would not abandon it. I’m moving into the last floor of Cocoa House. We moved in after rehabilitating the entire Cocoa House, which now stands as an edifice for Odu’a even for the Development Agenda for Western Nigeria (DAWN) Commission. I gave them the 10th floor. I want to believe that the place is fully occupied. Before we moved in, the place was totally abandoned. That was the first test that there is nothing that it is not possible if you are determined.

    When we had achieved that, we went into real estate development. The greatest asset we had was the location, and in real estate development, the first thing you want to look for is the location, because that is what you are selling. Most of our assets were in good locations, but they were thoroughly ran aground. So we went into what you call Property Redevelopment Programme (PRP), and we started with the Orange Court that is in Ibadan. We built an estate on a property that was formerly occupied by a bungalow of three-bedroom with a large compound.

    When we finished Orange Court, we went to Almond Court. We did the shopping complex, then the big one, the Shoprite Mall of the old UTC building, which Odu’a used to use as its head office. When we finished that in Ibadan, we built a Shoprite Mall in Apapa, Lagos, the Apapa Mall, through a partnership programme.

    So, to answer your question on how we did it, it was the belief and the spirit of leadership and the team with sincerity of purpose and the support of the governors and the board. That was what we did to get Odu’a back to a level where we were no longer borrowing to pay salaries. We had a good number of staff. We established Farmer’s Academy in Oyo, in Osun to train our youths in modern agriculture, which has now become the major focus of all states in agriculture.

    Odu’a saw that at that time, there was the need to imbibe knowledge-driven agricultural practices as against old subsistence level of agriculture. We gave out scholarships to poor but brilliant students from western Nigeria. At the time I left, we had given scholarships to more than 1,000 students in universities. Some of them were physically challenged people. Subsidiaries that were not initially doing well, which I knew and the management knew were not doing well, were not within the growth sector of the economy. We had to wind them down and focus on new areas. We couldn’t do everything; we created the platform for the next leaders to build on.

    You are involved in many organisationsLafarge, Fountain University, and other places. How do you manage your time?

    Time management is the function of the mind. The mind has to understand that there is nobody that has more than 24 hours in a day, but people could turn the 24 hours to very profitable, fruitful and productive level while others would waste it. If you look at the board that I served and the institution that I served, they were very strong institutions, and I tried as much as possible to prioritise my business. I also have my own private business. I’m into agriculture. I export cotton. We supply support for fishermen and the Lagos State Agricultural Service input with outboard engines, water pumps to support agriculture. That requires our ability to effectively manage and prioritise our needs. I still gave time for my own entertainment, my own leisure and my own vacation.

    If you look at equipment servicing and manufacturing which you mentioned, the country seems not to be doing very well in this area. What could have been responsible?

    Nigerians had been used to what I call disposable method of living. We never had the concept of maintenance that is providing after sales service for most of the things we do. And there is no country that develops without providing basic infrastructural development. And no infrastructural development can happen without supporting equipment, and these equipment must be properly managed, serviced maintained, and well implemented in line with the warranty policies of the manufacturer. The area of equipment that we do now is in agriculture equipment support. We do fishery agricultural support, we provide those services and training for people that will learn and buy into it.

    There is no country that will transfer technology to you. You either acquire it or steal the technology for your country. A very simple example is in equipment that we supply the northern market right now. The first set of equipment was brought in from China. Subsequently, our local engineers are now fabricating those equipment and they are performing similar functions like the imported ones. It is necessity that has created that invention. You can no longer get FOREX. So the disposable behaviour of our people has changed now to maintenance and adaptable behaviour and what I call exploration. So we have also become inventors. Our people are inventing simple basic equipment, and I believe we are going to go further.

    What you are saying in essence is that there is a future for this country in terms of equipment manufacturing?

    I tell you that that there is a big future for this country if we continue to support and train people on what I call skill acquisition, and it is a basic SME project the bank of industry is supporting. It is a project where technically minded students from secondary schools, vocational institution and polytechnics are trained in the art of maintenance of equipment, and they are now fabricating those equipment and the equipment are performing similar functions as imported ones. It may interest you that in the northern Nigeria now, ploughs, hoes, disks, harvesters, wheel barrows which used to be imported are now being fabricated and now produced and used by the local people.

    Modern processes are in place now with some established fabrication centres including agro allied food processing machines for slicing food products, for harvesting food products, for cutting, for drying, for baking. Nigerians have started doing this. So there is a lot of future in that area and probably the shortage of Forex is a blessing that has made us think on how to support agro allied industry, which is our greatest strength but for so long forgotten because of oil.

    Tell me about something you are not going to forget in a hurry as the GMD of Odu’a Investment?

    What I will not forget in a hurry basically is the reaction and the usual attitude of the owners of businesses in Nigeria to foreign direct investment. A lot of owners of businesses, even Odu’a Investments shareholders, believe that whenever foreign direct investors, even local investors, are coming to support any business, they think they have come to take away their business. And I want to say this loud and clear that we should open our economy to investors and we should make the investment climate very conducive for people to support and people to operate within and not to be suspicious of every step that investors take to enhance productivity or enhance the GDP growth of our businesses. That has always been a problem, and until we have a mindset of yes, let’s trust these investors.

    But I will say we should always verify facts. We will keep on losing investment opportunities to other neighbouring West African countries. When they come to Nigeria and we create all sorts of bottleneck in the system, they move to other countries that have less bureaucracy, people that have confidence and people that are open to foreign direct investment, and they establish their industries there. That is one thing we need to change.

    You are currently the Chairman of Omoluabi Mortgage Bank. If you look at this state, majority of the people are civil servants and some of them have not received their salaries for a while. If they take loans from the bank, how are they going to pay back, considering the economic situation in the state?

    Actually, that is probably the major reason why such banks are necessary in the system, because they are development finance banks. They are banks that support SMEs. They are banks that support first time house owners. They are the banks that want to support investors that want to develop the real sector. It is true that majority of the states in the South West are civil servant states, except for Ogun and Lagos, but they need to be well sheltered. They need to acquire investments that are centered on available raw materials in their localities. Not all of them can have access to standard deposit of other banks like bigger banks that are in the system.

    The mortgage finance banks provide that interlude, the gap between the bigger banks and those that do esusu (daily or collective contributions). We target our customers in that region of market. First time house owners, professionals and artisans, they have better interactions, and I would say this to you, they are the most organised people. They form themselves into cooperatives and they know how to manage their cooperative and they hardly default if you make the system workable for them. And you can make the system workable for them by supporting and directing them in terms of how to apply the loans they take from the bank, and that is what we are doing.

    Right now, Omoluabi Mortgage Bank has been upgraded. We are going to do recapitalization to increase our shares capital. We are working with some very strong institutions and the Federal Mortgage Bank to ensure that we support professional bodies and unions to have affordable housing for their people. By the time they retire, they will have a place to put their head.

    What efforts are you making to see that Omoluabi Mortgage does not go moribund like other government schemes?

    Definitely, it will outlive its founders. Omoluabi Bank was established in 1993 as a savings and loans scheme by the government, but as we speak now, Omoluabi is more or less like a private liability company. It is quoted on the stock exchange and it is highly regulated. We now have a strong system in place and the state government, which is the core investor, is already divesting their interest for private people to run. The board that I head was recently constituted with competent professionals to lead the bank. The state and civil service bureaucracy will definitely not be part of our portion.

    If you had the opportunity to change something about your life, what would it be?

    I think if I look at my history, I will say thank God for how far I have gone. I will say that what I will do more is to be more involved in youth development programmes, because the greatest problem we have now is the teeming youth population that is coming up without any direction, and that is the danger or a time bomb waiting to explode. I would have loved to be in a system where I would be able to make a lot of changes in the lives of the youth. But I don’t think it is late. I’m looking up to the opportunity to be more involved in youth programmes, though it could be expensive, it is something I’m looking forward to.

    How was your growing up like?

    My growing up was very good. I had very good friends. I grew up in a very good environment and my parents were very loving up till the time my father died, he was still loving, and I keep my friendship very strong. I have a good family, my wife, my children, I’m a grandfather and I’m very happy.

    You have only one wife as a Muslim?

    I have just one wife and I’m happy with her.

    Tell me about Osogbo you grew up in and the Osogbo of today?

    There is a lot of difference. Osogbo is growing and opening up as a trading and economic hub. The difference between when we were growing up and now is that now it is a state capital, and as a capital of a state, it comes with a lot of blessings in terms of people, infrastructure and in terms of lots and lots of facilities which we didn’t have then. But peace of mind reigned when we were growing up and the fast development being seeing now has created a lot of drive and pull of people coming to live in this place. I’m happy that the population of Osogbo town keeps exploding, and that is a very positive development for retail trading, for housing, for commerce and for industry.

    The biggest news is that Osogbo today, in terms of per capital, has the best power supply in the whole of the country. So I’m saying that anybody who wants to establish industry and is looking at low cost of energy should explore Osogbo and Osun State.

    Any political ambition?

    I don’t have a political ambition. But I’m operating in a political environment and I have taken up political appointments. So, I will always be happy to be associated with politics.

    While you were outside the country, did you at any time suffer any form of discrimination?

    Yes, that is real. Discrimination in terms of being given equal opportunity, discrimination in terms of not having the opportunity to be put on the same playing ground, fees and bills. Fees that a foreigner would pay was always different from what indigenes pay, and I see that as discrimination. And you not being able to seek for some job positions which are reserved for indigenes even you are fully prepared, even when you have the capacity, it does not come your way. That is why I think it is very important things for us as Nigerians to grow our economy to the extent that we will have a need except for international appointments to seek menial jobs abroad.

    What is that fashion item you can’t do without and how does your wardrobe look like?

    I can’t do without a wristwatch. I have very few of them but they are unique to my taste and unique to my support.

  • Still on Buhari’s lingering ‘demons’

    •Hazards of cult worship of a struggling President

    There is an epiphany of morality in President Muhammadu Buhari, a vision of hope and romanticised ‘Change’ that the severely exploited and hapless citizenry would die for. Buhari rode to power chanting change and promising a radical, progressive departure from the pilfering and profligacy that characterised public office before his emergence.

    Buhari’s emergence however, complicates our perverse dynamics of corruption. His immediate past predecessor was no revolutionary – Goodluck Jonathan was no hero and he never pretended to be one. He was not interested in upsetting the status quo or ridding the country of sleaze. He understood that Nigeria throve on vice thus he simply played the role of passive leader and enabler. His infamous ‘Stealing is not corruption’ declaration accentuated imagery of his leadership as a moral and intellectual aberration.

    Enter Muhammadu Buhari, the redeemed dictator, self-proclaimed martyr and moral crusader. Buhari’s publicised distaste for corruption incites the separation and tension between moral and amoral personae. The attendant backlash from profiteers from the corrupt order, further accentuates the thrill of seduction and revolt against the incumbent president’s  anti-corruption campaign.

    In the ensuing melee, hard choices have to be made and unpopular decisions taken, often to the detriment of the nation’s longsuffering citizenry. Although there are estimated benefits in the long run, very few Nigerians are ready to accept that the obnoxious hike in pump price of Premium Methylated Spirit (PMS) from N87 to N145 for instance, was a necessary evil amid the country’s bordello of chaos and institutionalised corruption. And a fewer number of Nigerians, including Camp Buhari, are willing to accept a further hike in fuel price.

    Many more have lost patience with Buhari’s apparent incapacities at steering the nation to safe waters from its current abyss of strife and corruption.

    Notwithstanding his seeming incapacities, you can’t help but admire Buhari’s his valour and resolve to recoup the country’s looted funds from public officers that served in former President Goodluck Jonathan’s highly corrupt and disgraceful administration.

    But like I averred in recent past, President Buhari’s touted anti-corruption fight should only be taken seriously when culprits get sent to jail to serve sentences that befit their crimes. Nigerians should neither accept nor entertain any attempt at granting looters of public fund the luxury of ‘plea bargain.’

    If Buhari grants them such right, then he would be legitimising their corrupt acts and he would by default, have supported and applauded the mass murders and impoverishment committed by every public officer and their associates caught with the country’s looted funds. President Buhari ought to realise that looters of public fund are mass murderers.

    For instance, money that could have been used to arm the military to crush terrorism, repair damaged roads and fund the country’s ailing health sector have been embezzled by miscreants in power. Consequently, thousands of lives have been lost to terrorist attacks, ghastly accidents on bad roads, poor health facilities.

    The deaths of these hapless souls brutally hacked down in their prime by terrorists, bad roads and health sector, are blamable on the men and women that conspired to divert fund initially earmarked to resolve these problems.

    There is no gainsaying Nigeria is still afflicted by political profiteers comprising the ruling class and various segments of the poor, struggling masses. In the ensuing degeneracy of politics and cultural ethos, the hero we know today may morph into a dreadful monster. Given that power is the brandy of the turncoat, there is need to persistently scrutinize President Buhari uncompromisingly.

    For instance, his touted anti-corruption fight remains noise-making at the moment. When the ‘corrupt’ get prosecuted and sent to jail for their misdemeanor, Nigerians will believe him. And despite his touted reduction of his salary and that of his deputy, President Buhari is not working pro bono. He is being paid for the work he does. And it’s an open secret that his cozy allowances among other frills of being President and living in Aso Rock are the stuff the finest fantasies are made of.

    Buhari has been cuddled enough, by the media and his most ardent supporters. Nigeria needs him to work now. And no matter the floweriness and duplicity of spin accorded his performance so far, very little has changed since he became President. It is sad to note that the steadier electricity supply oft cited by his diehard apologists as a dividend of his leadership has since petered out. Electricity supply has become worse and despite the increase in electricity tariff, Nigeria currently runs the risk of a total blackout according to the Minister of Works, Power and Housing, Babatunde Fashola.

    And even though he vowed to crush Boko Haram by December 2015, it is clear that President Buhari didn’t achieve any such feat hence he should learn to be more tactful and modest in making future pledges. The military and police’s recent fiasco with the Shiite Muslim sect elicits greater apprehension among the citizenry – many are worried that President Buhari and his re-invigorated military might have sown the seeds of another bloody, villainous insurgent group masquerading as Muslims.

    While we acknowledge that his touted honesty and integrity exerts reasonable pressure on corrupt individuals and institutions to do a cartwheel away from corruption, it need be reiterated that his anti-corruption stance and ‘government with a human face’ propaganda will continually resonate as a desperate, corny lie, until the judiciary begins to sentence looters of public fund to severe jail terms.

    Buhari needs to divorce himself from sycophancy, vanities of power and decadent luxury emblematic of Aso Villa if truly he possesses the morality and Spartan discipline frequently ascribed to him. And contrary to claims that he has a great team to work with, he doesn’t.

    He has characters that have been embroiled in scandalous cases of corruption and administrative ineptitude in the past. Nigerians accepted him (Buhari) and his team not because they are the best that we could ever produce but because they represent that excusable part of our cancerous bulk that could pass our body.

    The citizenry see the ruling class as a primitive tribe of predators grossly inured in corruption. On the other hand, some love to see Buhari as our saviour. Contemporary boondocks legend paint a portrait of him as a warrior in wolf-skin vest, brandishing a shield of steeled morality and a stone-axe forged to hack down monuments that the corrupt ruling class built to entrench corruption.

    There is no gainsaying his emergence as President via the March 28 elections was a welcome development. But besides his bid to recoup looted funds from corrupt officers of the last administration, how does he fare as an administrator?

    Buhari’s touted morality was ennobled by widespread admiration and cult worship of him. The cult worship is gradually petering out. Nigerians, just like this writer warned, had set him up for failure. More sections of the press and the citizenry have stopped cuddling him. The truth dawns like eternal damnation; Buhari is not doing too well at the moment. His performance is below par.

  • Of demons, villa ghosts and Nigerian paralysis

    SIR: Sadly, acknowledged bright minds are now waxing strong in superstitious theology and pseudo-spirituality. Society is guided by the philosophy it embraces. Because theology is the mother of all philosophy, every society will become what it theologizes!

    What ensnared the villa, and indeed the country itself, was corruption in all of its forms. Attributing metaphysical basis to our individual and collective irresponsibility is a shifty way of blaming everything on Satan!

    No be Satan’s fault. Na our fault! Forget Lucifer and his demons; corrupt leaders inflict more harm on a country than the beasts from Dante’s Inferno. Every money stolen whether by a president, governor, minister, legislator, civil servant, contractor or judge catapults the fleecing of the land to infernal magnitude.

    Let all thieves cough their loot. Roads will be built, environment will be cleaned, schools will be renovated, hospitals will be equipped, airports will be maintained and lives will be preserved.

    Mega million naira egunje are commonplace in government offices. Meanwhile, the elevators in the buildings that quarter those offices are not working. The clinics are not equipped, the electronics constantly fail. And those whose dereliction of duty inflicts such disrepair blame demons and principalities! Hogwash!

    Consider the fact that Islamic Qatar and Saudi Arabia are working as are Singapore and Pakistan. Christian England and USA are working as are Italy, France and other countries proffering Christianity. Israel has prospered with its Judaism. Hindu India is working. Atheist China and Russia are working. Bhuddist Japan is working. Multicultural Malaysia is working. Does God hate Nigeria so much that he puts half of the demons of the world to live there? Or might it be that the righteousness which exalts a nation is defined by ethical behaviour and moral rectitude rather than by theological malarkey?

    Our people, especially opinion moulders must wake up from this hocus-pocus super-naturalist worldview. You reap what you sow and sleep on the bed you lay.

    There was an Orisa edifice in Oregun in Ikeja that prevented the expansion of an important road. Contractors feared moving the edifice which had been erected as far back as anyone could remember. After Governor Bola Tinubu took office in 1999, I offered to help to negotiate with the chief priest of that Orisa to remove the edifice. I proffered that the law of eminent domain, operated worldwide, allows any government to displace private interest for the good of the larger public.

    Should the chief priest refuse to negotiate, I offered to kidnap the Orisa, burn it and dump its ashes in the Atlantic. I dared the Orisa to visit its wrath on me.  Governor Tinubu had a better idea. He and Julius Berger made a better offer to the chief priest. The Orisa and its chief priest relocated within a month. The road was renovated and expanded. It is now called Kudirat Abiola Way in Oregun, Ikeja.

    If there were ghosts disturbing them in Aso Villa, they should long have given others the key.  As a friend of mine asserted, he would have lived with all the ghosts and gotten the job done. We must accept no excuses. Anyone who cannot overcome the ghosts should leave the job alone; let’s get professional ghost-busters to run the country.

    Ghosts always bow to determined humans!

     

    • Sola Adeyeye

    Chief Whip, Senate.

    National Assembly, Abuja.

  • Journey to the afterworld

    Journey to the afterworld

    H.A. Goodman’s book: Breaking the Devil’s Heart: A logic of Demons Novel takes one on a journey to the afterworld. It’s a story that captures and exposes Satan’s antics against humanity.

    Goodman delves into a Satan’s unknown thoughts in always looking for opportunity to trade on the human soul.

    The novel centres on Stewarts (Mr. Willoughby) a former CIA agent who thinks he has a mandate in his “after -life” to destroy Satan’s ploy against humanity that is not aware of how hard the devil is making sure that his plans will be futile.

    The novel makes one understand that the devil is only interested in souls who are living an unpleasant life. “Hell” was referred to as “The Company,” a financial institution in the present day New York Stock Exchange. As stocks, derivatives and shares are been traded on the floor so also in the “the company,” human souls are being traded in this instance.

    As there are stockbrokers trading on shares for companies so also there are “market makers” who trade on human souls for the devil.

    Goodman clearly portrayed the latent ability of human imagination. It helps to understand that in the realm of the spirit there is on distance. For Stewart to know what is going on in the mind of his girl friend Layla, who is a partner with Stewart, there had to be a contact of Stewart‘s spirit with that of Layla’s.

    The main characters in this novel, Stewart: Mc Willoughby a former CIA agent and also a history teacher who had worked for the agency for year before he died. It was in his “after life” he reincarnated back to earth to accomplish what has always been on his mind: “Break the Devil’s heart.”

    Layla: Ms O’ Toole, a former English teacher in her late twenties has the same ambition as Stewarts and is always found around as a result to her intimate relationship with Stewarts.

    Adrain: former student to Layla who appeared at the middle of the novel contributed greatly in accomplishing Stewart’s desire in destroying the devil’s plan to hunt down the human soul.

    In terms of the credibility of the characters in the novel, Stewarts who had worked in a criminal detention department in CIA was given an unusual task that had never been addressed before by the agency or any other government organization: Find the root of evil and learn ways to destroy this impulse within mankind.

    H. A. Goodman’s novel is to make the unaware to be aware that there is a spiritual world controlling this physical world. His intention in the book is to

    awake the “unawakened” that the devil is not as lazy as we are, he works on a daily basis to make sure humans partake in his punishment in reality for eternity.

    He wants readers to understand the dynamics, ploy and antics the devil uses to lure and cajole people to succumb to his plans.

    For those who doubt the existence of heaven and hell, the novel proves that they exist.

    It also proves that good has always prevailed over evil no matter the enormity of evil. Those who want to understand more about spirituality will find the book very interesting, though it will take some level of maturity to understand the message.

    For one to understand the intention and purpose of this book you have to read page by page to the last word. It is a fiction story well told that is hard to put down once you start reading.