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Tag: governors

  • Governors: Traffic can kill business

    ABCDEFGGHI=Avoid Bribery & Corruption Daily Everywhere For Good Governance Here Immediately.

    Improving the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ achieves SDGs and is a challenge at every level of governance including Local Government Areas and private business. However it makes sense to simplify the measurement of ‘The Ease of Doing Business’ and introduce UN-Rating and UN-Recognised Happiness Factor manifest by putting a smile on the face of all interacting with government agencies and agents and not just federal government contact points. Beyond the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ in the secretariat, ministry, passport office or Corporate Affairs Commission, other actions will improve the total business experience. No governor should forget that traffic is a 20-40% unacknowledged chunk of our ‘doing business life’. If your trip to and from the point of doing business is a complicated dreaded nightmare, a potholed journey with uncontrolled chaotic traffic, then your government is failing and has work to do!

    Governors and LGA chairpersons:  There are three often neglected components to the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ in your jurisdiction. 1] getting to the business quickly, 2] doing the business promptly and 3] getting back home quickly. Any morning sometimes from 5am in Lagos and 6-6.30am you may see people struggling to go to business- airports, work, school. A 10-minute delay in leaving home can add 1-2 hours to travel torture. Unfortunately you will rarely find active police and traffic officials at junctions before 7.30-8am. This creates a daily routine but unacceptable and unnecessary transport and security problem. Traffic officials must be in attendance earlier than the traffic jam for easier business access. I pass through three important unmanned junctions on the way to business and each of them deteriorates rapidly into a ‘me -first’ traffic chaos after 7.15am thus making business difficult. Unfortunately at the Awolowo-Secretariat Road junction in Ibadan even when the female police officials are there, one chronically behaves very unprofessionally, openly pursuing a personal agenda soliciting funds from drivers without censure. Fortunately there is a super-efficient traffic warden at the Customs junction 500 metres away. Where are the supervisors? Who trains them? Transport officials must be supervised by governments and security authorities using simple cell-phone recordings to monitor their work and confirm they are on duty to preempt traffic chaos.

    Number two: Doing the business and is a topic on its own.

    Number three- the ‘Ease of Getting Away from Business’ is as important as the business. Governments must care better for the citizen snarled in needless unsupervised traffic. Back in the 80s, we were deprived by our myopic military leadership and subsequent political class of using the inner-city train in Nigeria and are struggling to revive it. After work and during rains, the junctions and roundabouts are not adequately manned by traffic personnel creating a huge traffic jam nightly. The government’s traffic eyes and ears cannot close at 4.00 or 6pm. There must be working modern ‘Traffic HQ’ working 5am-10pm to supervise, deploy personnel or directly monitor and help the citizen get home. Government must study the traffic at junctions and roundabouts until 9-10pm. I often see traffic police strolling to their posts or receiving orders at 7.30am in police stations while traffic is impassable a few metres away. There is only one solution to this difficulty in doing business. Deploy police and traffic officers earlier and keep them on duty later at junction and roundabouts and provide raincoats and umbrellas for the catastrophic traffic when it rains. This progressive traffic management requires great thought, a masterplan, warlike deployment of personnel women and adequate supervision of same to avoid excessive opportunities for corruption.

    We really appreciate the headlong rush by government at all levels to talk freely about the ‘Ease of Doing Business’ an international yardstick to meet the SDGs under the purview of the vice president of behalf of government. Thankfully we have climbed up several notches. But the Nigerian citizens at home and abroad people know the truth when they visit to request government provided services from secretariat, passport and driving license offices and even courts. The media is rife with video evidence of the incompetent behavior common in Nigerian embassies closed for unannounced public holidays without even sending an email to those given appointments for these dates and also failings in passport and visa responsibilities making things successful only at lastminute.com or never.

    Carry out the ‘Ease of doing Business Test’ in your secretariat. Just look for the reaction when you as governor or LGA chairperson ask a cross section of Nigerians to visit any government facility and look for the immediate response – a frown, a neutral face or a smile or indifference. You will probably see an expression of fear. Most often you will get an excuse requesting someone else to go instead because of the expected disrespect, incompetence and deliberate obstructions. Nigeria is seeking to turn from an attitude of hindrance to that of help, from corruption to cooperation, from denials to ‘can do’. What a change. Amen!

    Mr Governor: Traffic is life and government’s main business and not nuclear physics. Judge yourself not only in IGR but also by how you have improved ‘The Ease of Living, Leaving and Entering your state and LGAs’ -traffic- and using government services.  And please remember that No Parking= No business. Traders need to be moved back freeing the roads and taxis, okada, keke, danfo need to be moved away from obstructing junction exits.

  • ‘Governors will back Gbajabiamila for House Speaker’

    Ahead of the inauguration of the Ninth National Assembly, many governors are backing Femi Gbajabiamila, for the House of Representatives Speaker.

    Besides, some legislators eying the post have also step down for the legislator from Surulere I Constituency of Lagos State, according to North Central Coordinator, Gbajabiamila for Speaker, Tunji Olawuyi has said.

    Olawuyi, who is representing Ekiti/Oke-Ero/Isin/Irepodun Federal Constituency of Kwara state, Hon Tunji Olawuyi added that the chances of Hon Femi Gbajabiamila of becoming the speaker of the House of Representatives are brighter.

    Olawuyi spoke with reporters at the weekend in Ilorin, the Kwara State capital, adding that All Progressives Congress (APC) as a party would not make a mistake of what happened in 2015.

    Said he: “In 2015 our party APC left a lot of things unattended to towards the election of the principal officers of the National Assembly. All of that of that has been put behind us. This time around we are not taking chances. We are in serious business this time around. Most members in 2015 were left untamed. There was no clear-cut instruction from the party. It was like they were left loose, but today our party has spoken. The party has taken a position. I think there is coordination now.”

    On Gbajabiamila’s chances, the legislator continued: “His chances are bright. The good thing is that we have left no stone unturned. We are so determined for success to come our way. If there is any one in the 8th assembly going to the 9th assembly, no one can be compared to Gbajabiamila. It is like preparing for an examination, if you are going to pass you will know from your preparations.

  • Southwest Senior citizens set for legal battle with governors

    RETIREES in the Southwest geopolitical zone under the auspices of the Nigeria Union of Pensioners (NUP) yesterday threatened to institute legal action against the 36 state governors over their failure to pay accumulated arrears of gratuities and pension.

    The pensioners vowed that they would institute the case in the next two months in line with the provisions of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) to determine if it was lawful or not to owe them their entitlements.

    NUP Southwest Zonal Chairman Chief Ayo Kumapayi and its secretary,  Olusegun Abatan, handed down the threat while speaking with reporters at the end of their zonal meeting in Akure, the Ondo State capital.

    Abatan said the legal action became necessary in view of the rising cases of sick and dead pensioners as a result of unpaid entitlements by Ogun, Lagos, Ekiti, Oyo, Osun and Ondo states as well as other parts of the country.

    Kumapayi, who was supported by the Ondo State NUP Chairman, Chief Raphael Adetuwo and other chairmen and secretaries from the six states, blamed failure of the state governors to pay their gratuities and pension regularly on “reckless spending on humongous salaries and allowances of political office holders”.

    He said: “Humongous salaries and allowances of public office holders, especially senators and House Representatives members who take home N13million and N14million monthly need to be reviewed. How can those people will be collecting such huge money in a country where 80 per cent are battling to meet daily meal.”

    The NUP zonal leaders also demanded the review of law setting up the Revenue Mobilisations, Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC) to empower it to place all the political office holders, including the President, governors, ministers, Federal and state lawmakers on the same salary scale with civil servants from Grade Level18 to Grade Level 25 .

    The step, the pensioners said, would save the country’s economy from collapsing and enable government to have more money to take care of the needs of the less-privileged Nigerians, who are wallowing in abject poverty and deprivation.

    They said: “President Buhari should use his second term in office to do something about such take home by our federal lawmakers. They should be placed on same salary scale with the civil servants to reduce pressure on the nation’s economy.

    “Let the President be on GL 25, Vice President will be on GL 24, governors on GL 23 downward like that. This will save our nation from reckless and killing due to non-payment of salaries and allowances.”

    The Southwest NUP hailed Buhari for huge step taken recently to grant local government financial autonomy, saying the decision would prevent many state governors from spending local governments’ funds “as a pocket money”.

    Also speaking, the NUP National Deputy General Secretary, Chief Joseph Okunade, said the national leadership of the pensioners was in full support of the legal action against the state governors.

  • A tale of two governors

    On a walkway in front of Ali Modu Sherriff Primary School, a girl of about nine appeared. Fatimatu, a Boko Haram orphan, frail and cherubic, stepped into the presence of Kashim Shetima, the Governor of Borno State.

    She was not attending the school, which was overlooking the street. Shettima named the institution after a man who boasted that his people, including kids like Fatimatu, could never know he was a failed leader because they did not read newspapers.

    It is time to muse on that man, and how the biography of one man can make a difference, for good and ill.

    Borno then was not what Borno is. The signs sang in low register, but the omen was stark. Ali Modu Sherriff was governor, and took his position as shepherd like a peacock. He belongs to the class of cynical men who want to lead in order to diminish. He had no joy for posterity. He had no plan for it. So he disdained prosperity.  It is not too clear today if his cynicism came from breeding or from a contrived sense of contempt.

    But Sherriff loved to be sheriff, and that meant he was both cop and governor. He had to be a democrat. He did not love that. He embraced tyranny. He was no hypocrite. He is like the hawk in Ted Hughes poem, Hawk Roosting, in which the hawk has no penitence about preys. Except that Sherriff’s lack of hypocrisy opened him up to the sort of hubris that would have sainted him if he were a pretender.

    Such persons are a metaphor of leaders as crisis. Sherriff was a crisis as governor, and it began to show not when Yusuf, the licenser of Boko Haram, was murdered. That happened later. It was when he said that he did not care what the newspapers wrote about him because his people were illiterates.

    He took refuge in ignorance. He knew, so his people didn’t. Prophet Amos said “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.” Sherriff did not care because he thought they would remain so forever. He probably wanted to fulfil the wrong intent of Prophet Isaiah’s lament: “The leaders of these people cause them to err; and they that are led of them are destroyed.” He wanted to be like the Roman emperor Nero, who wanted to wipe out all Christians. When asked what history would say of him, he replied, “By the time I have finished with them, history would not be sure if they ever existed.”

    At least Nero counted on a literate world in future. For Sherriff, history did not count. Not long after, the unlearned boys crystallised Sherriff’s idea, and so Boko Haram was born. They said Western education is sin, or haram. Sherriff’s idea had taken root. The army of the ignorant had been unleashed. He was the philosopher as portent, the prophet of mayhem and disaster in the land.

    The young who could not read looked for family. Yusuf gave them. Those who had no roof over their heads, he gave shelter. Those who were hungry, he gave food. Those whose libido burned around their loins, he gave wives. He created an alternative society. He had formed a mini-theocracy, an army of the Almighty. It was a coalescence of the underclass. His crusading ardour paid off with Boko Haram.

    Sherriff had degraded Borno into a failed state. It failed because of many things. Principally it failed because he made himself into a feudalist in a democracy, and because he did not think his people deserved to be enlightened. Awolowo’s free education, a generation earlier, shed light on youth. Sherriff afflicted his people with moth-eaten minds.

    While Awo’s seed fattened the west with prosperity, Sherriff’s bred a colony of monsters with killings, rapes and rapines. His successor Kashim Shettima served as Zenith Bank’s general manager and posted the most transaction – of up to one billion naira a day – in any bank branch in the country. It was now the wasteland. A wasted mind gave us a wasteland.

    That gives us an irony. The same Shettima became governor, and recently named a primary school after Ali Modu Sherriff in Maiduguri. It was, also for irony, when he was inspecting the school that Fatimatu came along and Governor Shettima insisted to his commissioner of education that she must be admitted to the school. Fatimatu is now a Boko Haram orphan of hope.

    Who knows, from that seed of an hour, Shettima just planted an eternity of potential geniuses. Fatimatu can be a Marie Curie, the famed physicist, or Chimamanda, or Yaa Asantewa, or Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, or Benazir Bhutto or Margaret Ekpo. In the school, a Fatimatu would not want for breakfast, or a soap to wash her body, or a bed to sleep on or a notebook to solve a maths problem or stroke out a thoughtful essay or an electric light to study at night. She will not suffocate in a sweltering weather. She would not fear for VVF or assault from oversexed adults or a prospect of premature betrothal.  A boarding school with modern amenities will nurture, comfort and protect her.

    The kind of Borno State that Shettima is bequeathing is a state of renewal. In spite of the smouldering zeal of Boko Haram, the state is in its best ferment. It is now a state of a new adventure. It reminds one of Joseph Conrad’s graphic capture of England in its age of adventure. In his Heart of Darkness, he described the men as “hunters of gold, or pursuers of fame, they all had gone out on that stream, bearing the sword, and often the torch, messengers of the might within the land, bearers of the spark from the sacred fire.”

    Fatimatu was like the girl in Jim Crow America, who was guided to school in the 1960’s because American racism forbade anyone to illumine the black mind. In Fatimatu’s case, it is a culture epitomised by Sherriff and his fellow travellers on a Neanderthal boat.

    But unknown to him, men like Shettima had already been unfurled in Borno, and the same democracy we lament will ensure that girls like Fatimatu will bloom in season, and this is the season. And she will fulfil what Conrad wondered when he wrote, “What greatness had not floated on the ebb of that river into the mystery of an unknown earth! … the dreams of men, the seed of commonwealths, the germs of empires.”

    So, from the ebb, the Fatimatus will float to a great unknown. Even as Shettima is about to bow out, his successor, the tall, self-effacing work horse of a professor who sold firewood and drove taxi to fund his education, will take that task to the next step. Babagana Umara Zulum, the Marshal Plan Governor-elect, will now ensure that the Fatimatus will not be what Conrad calls “a lurid glare under the stars.”

    Sherriff represents all that is wrong in the north and Nigeria. Shettima lights up the antidote. The choice is ours. Emerson said, “There is properly no history, but the biography of great men.” Whose biography beckons us?

     

    For Omo-Agege

    The air is still frenetic in Abuja, especially now that the battle for the leadership of the Senate absorbs the nation. One of the positions taking prime spot is that of deputy senate president, and it looks good for Senator Ovie Omo-Agege. He should get it as the top person from the South-south. He has been around, and his recent victory at the Court of Appeal affirms his legitimacy. This caps a second victory, the first being his tiff with the Senate leadership under Bukola “Eleyinmi” Saraki over some rowdy men in the Senate, especially when they had no evidence against him. They were trying to blame a security lapse on a man who walked in at the same time.

    Senator Omo-Agege

    We need a Senate of responsible engagement with the presidency, not an adversarial one. The Saraki Senate has been an impulsive hawk, seeing enmity first before progress. It was fight for fight’s sake, and Omo-Agege has been a contrarian voice against that mind-set of instinctive pugilism. We don’t want doves for doves’ sake as lawmaker, but we want the people first.

  • Governors, successors on collision course

    In this report, Associate Editor, Sam Egburonu and Assistant Editor, Dare Odufowokan, take a look at the festering feud between Ogun and Imo states’ outgoing governors and their successors, as the May 29 handover date draws nearer.

    AS the May 29, 2019 handover date for the inauguration of new governments in most states of the federation draws closer, The Nation observes that the battle of wits between the outgoing governors and their successors, especially in Imo and Ogun states, have become more intense. Just as the media is daily awash with tales of how the governors-elect in the two states are raising alarms over how the two outgoing governors are allegedly digging ‘death traps’ for the incoming administrations, the concerned outgoing governors are also accusing their would-be successors of undermining their authorities.

    This fight is however not limited to the two southern states, though sources said the intrigues seem to be more pronounced there. From Imo state to Ogun state; Oyo state to Bauchi state, name it, the festering face-offs between outgoing governors and their incoming counterparts appear endless, raising concerns over how many of these governors-elect will relate with their predecessors when they eventually mount the saddle in a matter of days. Will these successors build on the successes of their predecessors? Will they allow the outgoing governors to have says in the new administrations or are we going to see an open break down of relationships between the old and the new governors after swearing in? These are questions only time can answer, especially in Imo and Ogun states, where the battle lines seem very bold.

    Ogun

    In Ogun State, amidst allegations that the state government has denied the transition committee set up by the governor-elect access to some state-owned facilities for inspection, the camps of Governor Ibikunle Amosun and that of his successor, Dapo Abiodun, are said to be at loggerhead as the inauguration date inches closer. Reliable sources within the two camps told The Nation that contrary to the ‘all is well’ posture being put out by the two politicians, the friction created between them by the last governorship election is yet to smoothen out.

    “Governor Amosun is bitter Abiodun won the election and he is not hiding his disappointment, even in the way he is relating with the governor-elect and his people currently. The governor elect’s people too are aware of this and they are reciprocating in the same manner. This is making the work of the transition committees very difficult. The two camps are also throwing accusations and counter accusations over some actions of the outgoing administration,” a source said.

    The inauguration committee put in place by the governor-elect had, during the week, raised alarm that it has been denied access to some major government facilities that would be used for various events on May 29.

    The facilities named include the MKO Abiola Stadium where the inauguration is meant to take place.

    Also mentioned is the Valley View Hall inside the Government House. The hall is being planned as the venue of the inauguration dinner, as well as the Cultural centre at Kuto area of the capital city. Spokesperson of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state, Tunde Oladunjoye, while speaking on the development, accused the outgoing administration of not co-operating with the governor-elect’s team towards the forthcoming governorship inauguration ceremony in the state

    Responding to the allegations in a letter from the office of the Secretary to the State Government, Taiwo Adeoluwa, the government said the facilities were still being used for government business, and as such are not available for the transition committee to inspect or prepare down for any of the events that will be part of the inauguration ceremony. Adeoluwa added that the facilities may not be available until about a few days to the May 29 inauguration.

    “The challenge, however, appears to be that most of the facilities indicated in your text message  the Valley View Auditorium, the Presidential Lodge, Mitros, June 12 Cultural Centre, Stadium  are currently being used for the routine business of governance and therefore may not be available until about a few days to the May 29 inauguration as we had duly notified during our inaugural joint meeting of Monday, April 29, 2019.

    “As you are aware, the state is preparing for the working visit of His Excellency, President Muhammadu Buhari, during the third week of May to inaugurate a number of legacy projects in commemoration of this administration’s end-of-tenure. Understandably, all hands are on the deck and most of the named state facilities will be in use. During the month of Ramadan, the state organises and engages in a number of daily programmes, culminating in the state’s special Iftar for which we routinely use many of the named facilities,” the statement said.

    Meanwhile, party sources said with the development, it has become almost impossible for the Abiodun camp to make further preparations for the inauguration ceremony. “What we are witnessing is strange. It has never happened before in our state. Not even when Amosun won in 2011 and Otunba Gbenga Daniel had to hand over to him. This type of brazen denial of public facilities didn’t happen. Some people must call Amosun to order before it is too late,” a party leader said.

    The Nation also learnt that joint meetings of the two camps ahead of the inauguration, which are necessary to fine tune the process that will lead to the event as well as ensure a hitch free ceremony are not being held in spite of earlier directive by the governor to the transition committee he instituted to regularly meet with Dapo Abiodun’s team led by the deputy governor-elect, Noimot Salako-Oyedele, to work out modalities for the hand over.

    “The last time we were to meet, we got to the venue only to be told that the meeting was not going to hold as the SSG was unavailable. I think that has happened twice or so now. And when we asked questions, they said they are still busy with then activities of their government. I am afraid that these people are just unwilling to cooperate with us towards the inauguration. It is sad that we all claim to belong to the same party,” another source lamented.

    Failed truce?

    Some weeks back, in a move that gave the impression that a smooth inauguration ceremony was on the way in the state, Amosun had inaugurated a 26-man transition committee to interface with the associates of the governor-elect, Abiodun. The committee, which comprised of 15 members from the team of the governor-elect and 11 members from the outgoing administration, was headed by the deputy governor-elect, Salako-Oyedele and the SSG, Adeoluwa.

    Amosun also announced his readiness to hand over to Abiodun on May 28, 2019. The outgoing governor said his transition committee had been put in place “since December 2018.” He added that keys to the Government House and the Presidential Lodge were ready if Abiodun wanted to move in immediately. Amosun promised to be truthful, accurate and helpful by presenting “a comprehensive handover note” on May 28, in a bid to ensure a seamless transition of government in the state.

    “We will be in position to hand over a comprehensive handover note to you on May 28, 2019. By God’s grace, 28th of May, 2019, we can sit down like this and hand over to you. We have not been sleeping so as to have a smooth running of the transition. Government House, Oke-Igbein is ready, if you want to move in tomorrow. Both the Presidential Lodge and Government House are ready. As soon as you tell us when you need the keys, we will make them available,” he said.

    But reports emanating from the transition teams in the state appear to be contrary to the promises made by the governor above. According to a party leader, it appears the governor and his people are more optimistic that the election tribunal will upturn Abiodun’s victory soon. “That is the only explanation for the way they are behaving. We have never had an outgoing administration that is this uncooperative with its successor in Ogun State,” he said.

    Meanwhile, a fresh face off is brewing between Amosun and Abiodun over the appointment of some monarchs in the state and other activities of the outgoing administration. The APC in the Ogun State has declared that Abiodun will reverse all appointments and installation of traditional rulers as well as review of employments of new entrants into the state’s workforce done by Amosun’s administration after the March 9 governorship election.

    On Wednesday, the State’s Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Olajide Ojuko, resigned his appointment. Ojuko in his letter of registration said he is quitting because of Amosun’s recent installation of traditional rulers in the state. Sources told The Nation that the Awori-born commissioner is quitting in protest of plans by Amosun to install Egba Obas in some villages around Ota being claimed by the Aworis as belonging to them.

    “It pained me from the bottom of my heart to give a notice of my resignation to a boss I love so much. By my appointment, I represent my people from Awori stock, my local government and the entire state. After service, I will have no choice but to go back home and settle down with my family and my people with total peace of mind. Recent events are making me to believe that this plan may not be feasible if I have to continue serving in my capacity as the honourable Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs.

    “The ultimate, therefore, is that I shall become an outcast among my people. At my age, this is avoidable. My background as a civil and public servant is to be obedient and loyal to my boss, but your recent directive on the issue of Obaship in some areas in Ota State Constituency runs against my conscience, the wish and yearnings of my people that I represent,” Ojuko had said, giving insight into the real reason why he left Amosun’s government.

    Imo

    Perhaps more than in any other state, Imo State has remained a hot spot since the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared the Peoples Democratic Party’s governorship candidate, Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, as the governor-elect ahead of the AA’s candidate, Uche Nwosu, who had out-going Governor Rochas Okorocha’s blessing and support.

    From allegation of massive looting to the latest showdown at the state House of Assembly, associates of Okorocha and supporters of the in-coming PDP government have been at each other’s throat, thus creating suffocating tension ahead of the May 29 handover.

    It latest face-off began after the declaration of PDP candidate as the governor-elect when the party cried out that officials of the out-going Okorocha administration are looting the state dry. Secretary of PDP in the state, Ray Emeana, told newsmen: “We’ve continued to receive credible and verified information about the wanton plundering and looting of public infrastructure and government property by suspected agents of the outgoing administration of Governor Rochas Okorocha.

    “It is regrettable that these illicit activities have continued to intensify with every passing day, as we count- down to the last days of the tenure of the current administration on May 29.

    Although the Okorocha-led government assured the people that it would hand over peacefully to the new administration, the atmosphere had remained charged as the incoming government continue to allege calculated ploy to rape the state before handover. Secretary to the State Government, Mark Uchendu, who gave the assurance, added that the government expects the governor-elect, Emeka Ihedioha, to “further consolidate on Okorocha’s achievements.”

    But the tension … when Okorocha, in a move that attracted heated controversy inaugurated a six-man committee to see to the implementation of six new universities, colleges of education and polytechnics at the tail end of his government.

    The matter became a subject of debate when the governor-elect, Emeka Ihedioha, protested the move before the National Universities Commission (NUC), praying it not to honour the approval of more universities in the state that owes salaries.

    The political tension further deepened last week when the state House of Assembly suddenly sacked the 27 Local Government Chairmen in the state.

    Hon. Chika Madumere (Nkwerre) who moved the motion for the immediate suspension of the chairmen cited alleged contempt shown by the chairmen to the legislature by failing to appear before the house to give account of the fiscal states of the LGA’s.

    But just before the end of the week, the drama in the House changed dramatically, when the Speaker read a letter upturning the suspension of the chairmen, only for the other lawmakers to oppose the Speaker’s move and to subsequently set the process in motion to impeach him. Although the 21 out of the 27 lawmakers of the Assembly said that Wednesday that they have suspended the Speaker, Acho Ihim, the matter remained complicated because before the conclusion of the suspension process, the Speaker, Ihim, quickly adjourned the ongoing plenary and escaped with the maze.

    Commenting on the ongoing confusion and the subsequent political tension, Dr. Kingsley Nwanma, a political scientist in Owerri, told The Nation that “the intrigues can all be traced to the rivalry between the Okorocha group and the others on the handover of his government. Here in Imo, there are stories of massive looting still going on in Owerri, there are stories of attempts and moves to ensure that the incoming government fails. People are worried that the outgoing government top officials can stoop down low enough to cart away desks and chairs. The in-fighting has become so pronounced that some even doubt if the handover would be peaceful as the government promised.”

    A source close to Imo State Government House told The Nation on Friday that the handover tension is even within the Government House more than we can see outside. This, according to him “is more because of the huge debts currently owed public officials, including the Deputy Governor and other top aides to Governor Okorocha himself. Some insiders told us that the Deputy Governor’s salary has been almost the same as that of the commissioners and that governor’s aides, including PAs have been receiving half of the statutory salaries and allowances they were supposed to get. Right now, these people are kicking as nobody believes the incoming PDP government will pay these monies. Even the drama that is still ongoing in the House can be traced to disagreements within the loyalists of the outgoing governor who may want some form of settlement or the other before the handover date.”

    The atmosphere is so tensed that even the much advertised valedictory football match being planned by Okorocha in Imo has been dismissed by his critics as another jamboree aimed at squandering the state resources.

    Notwithstanding the fears, mistrusts and disagreements, observers said Imo and Ogun states seem poised for a new dawn. What that dawn holds for the people still remains to be seen

  • Labour urges governors to pay pension arrears

    The Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) has called on state governments owing pensioners to pay them as soon as possible to reduce their hardship.

    Its National President, Comrade Ayuba Wabba, made the call in Kano during NLC state delegates’ conference.

    Wabba, represented by his deputy, Alhaji Nasiru Dangwandu, said the call was necessary because some state governors had failed to pay retirees their entitlements.

    Lauding President Muhammadu Buhari’s assent to the new minimum wage bill 2019, tWabba said it would be a testimony to good governance if governors ensured payment of such arrears to beneficiaries.

    According to Wabba, NLC is committed to improving the welfare of workers.

    He pledged that NLC would double its efforts toward achieving the objective.

    He said: “But we completely rejected the proposed increase of Value Added Tax as a means of funding the 2019 budget.

    “We warned that any increase in the VAT or PAYE would not only rob workers of the minimal relief from the increase in the minimum wage, but would also leave our economy in dire straits.”

    Wabba urged the government to consider progressive ways of financing the budget and to adopt progressive taxation to capture more people in the tax net, in addition to ensuring that luxury items are properly taxed.

    He urged employers to begin the payment of the new minimum wage immediately.

    The state chairman of the NLC in Kano, Comrade Kabir Minjibir, said the union had recorded tremendous success in its effort to ensure welfare and rights of workers.

     

     

  • Should outgoing governors be starved of funds?

    Governors-elect from some states like Imo, Oyo and Ogun recently cried out against outgoing governors’ last minutes withdrawals and spending. In this report, Associate Editor, Sam Egburonu, sought the views of some public administrators and others on whether outgoing governors should be starved of funds, when they should stop awarding new contracts or making huge payments, etc., and if attempt to stop them from accessing funds would amount to shutting down of governance?

    ALLEGATIONS of last minutes withdrawals and awards of bogus contracts have sparked off verbal exchanges between some governors-elect and the outgoing governors. The Nation investigation during the week shows that this controversy has further worsened the already strained relationship between the political leaders and parties involved.

    As the outgoing governors accuse the governors-elect of lacking the right to challenge them, concerned observers have raised some issues arising from the controversy. While some wonder if denying outgoing governors of access to state funds months before the expiration of their tenure would not amount to a move to close down governance, others said there is the urgent need to legally stop reckless spending by greedy outgoing governors who, in a bid to gather state resources for their personal retirement may put the in-coming government in unnecessary financial stress.

    Dr. Sani Ajala, an attorney at law with bias in fiscal constitutionalism, who practises in Abuja summarised it when he told The Nation that “A governor-elect has no constitutional, statutory and procedural basis until sworn into office to meddle in the statecraft of his state. Similarly, an outgoing Governor of a state, by resorting to last minute fleecing of the assets of his state and brazen financial recklessness is simply warming himself and associates to safe passage to prison.”

    Explaining the genesis of this ugly situation, Ajala said: “Let’s bear one thing in mind, if the machinery of the civil and bureaucratic service of a state is strong, the wanton disregard for extant financial/budgetary regulations will effectively be checked. But then, experience has proved otherwise due to the pervasive greed and kleptomania in our system.”

    These verbal exchanges first caught public attention mid-March when the Governor-Elect of Imo State, Emeka Ihedioha, openly warned financial institutions against engaging in any last-minute transaction with the outgoing government, an action he described then as “illegal.”

    While addressing journalists in Owerri, the state capital, Ihedioha said “persons or groups involved in such activities will be doing that at their own peril.”

    Ihedioha, a former Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, said “May I use this opportunity to warn all those who may be tempted to do illegal last-minute transaction with the out-going government, particularly financial institutions which may result in further burdening the state with unsustainable liabilities that they will be doing so at their own peril.”

    Ihedioha’s outburst trailed allegation that the Governor Rochas Okorocha  led Imo State Government withdrew a whopping N17 billion shortly after the March governorship election in which the governor’s candidate, Uche Nwosu of Action Alliance lost to the Peoples Democratic Party’s Emeka Ihedioha.

    The Imo State chapter of PDP had accused Okorocha of withdrawing the alleged N17bn “from four banks in three days and of converting government property to personal use.

    The state PDP Chairman, Mr. Charles Ezekwem, who made the allegation, said in a press conference in Owerri, “that between Tuesday, March 12, 2019 and Thursday, March 14, 2019, Okorocha made withdrawals from Access Bank, Zenith Bank, Unity Bank and Skye Bank (Polaris) amounting to over N17bn.”

    The party also alleged that, “Okorocha and his cronies transferred ownership and re-registered more than 150 government vehicles to individuals.

    “We are also aware of the rampant issuance of Certificates of Occupancy to family members and friends of the Okorocha family”, the party said.

    In his initial reaction to the allegation, Okorocha, through his Chief Press Secretary, Sam Onwuemeodo, said, “There is a government in place and until May 29, 2019, that government should continue to work in the interest of the state and her people and also continue to carry out programmes and policies for the same purpose, until its tenure ends. To begin to harass or give directives to financial institutions in the state is an act of hostility and they should know that.”

    In another reaction Okorocha argued that “with its meagre federal allocation and a paltry Internally Generated Revenue, Imo State did not have the N17bn said to have been illegally withdrawn” by him.

    Imo is not the only state where the governor-elect had to raise such alarm. Recently, the Adamawa State Governor-Elect, Alhaji Ahmadu Fintiri, cautioned out-going Gov. Mohammed Bindow’s administarion against what he described as “last minute employment and award of bogus contracts.”

    Fintiri, in a statement issued by his media aide, Mr. Solomon Kumangar, also urged banks not to give “arbitrary loans” to the out-going government.

    “The governor-elect wants all unnecessary expenditure and last minute employment, not done in the past four years, halted forthwith.

    “Similarly, all last minute awards of bogus contracts without following due process should stop.

    “Adamawa belongs to all and any action to the contrary would not be condoned.

    “Banking institutions are hereby cautioned against giving arbitrary loans or overdrafts at this time as this will be at their own risk.

    “Civil servants who get involved in shoddy transactions, aiding and abetting fraud will have themselves to blame if discovered,” he said.

    Other states where such desperate calls have been made include Ogun and Oyo.

    Soon after his declaration as the winner of the governorship election, the Oyo State Governor Elect, Engineer Seyi Makinde, openly cautioned civil servants in the state against conniving with politicians ‘to rush out contracts at this eleventh hour.’

    Makinde said this in a statement made available to journalists and signed on his behalf by Prince Dotun Oyelade.

    He alleged that as soon as it became certain that he had won the election, “certain, top politicians in government started putting pressures on civil servants to hasten and/or originate contracts and facilitate payments of contracts that are yet to be satisfactorily executed.”

    According to him, “The implication of such illicit deal should be very clear to any government worker who indulges in such collusion.

    Similar controversy is also raging in Ogun State where the All Progressives Congress this Friday warned banks and other financial institutions against granting what it called “last-minute loans, overdrafts and other financial instruments to the outgoing governor of the state, Ibikunle Amosun.”

    The party alleged that Amosun was planning to obtain loans and overdrafts two months to the end of his tenure.

    In a press statement issued in Abeokuta and signed by its Publicity Secretary, Tunde Oladunjoye, the party warned banks and financial institutions not to succumb to alleged threats and pressures from Amosun to obtain loans.

    “It has come to our notice that the outgoing governor has been exerting pressures on banks and financial institutions to grant frivolous loans, overdrafts and other instruments immediately Prince Dapo Abiodun was declared governor-elect.

    “We are equally aware that files and other sensitive government documents are being moved out of government offices on the order of the outgoing governor, His Excellency, Senator Ibikunle Amosun.”

    Bankers’ dilemma

    A top banker with one of the banks named in the Imo State’s case, who pleaded not to be named, told The Nation that the development has put bankers and banks in an unfortunate dilemma. “How can you refuse to do business with a sitting governor and how can you choose to offend a governor-elect, who you know will be in-charge in the next four years. The matter is too complex and unfair to bankers and the banks. I plead that the matter be clearly defined. At what point should we begin to deal with the in-coming government officials,” he asked.

    Call for legal framework

    Dr. Ajala is of the view that there is the need for a legal framework to avoid such financial recklessness. As he puts it, “since the primary function of government is the protection of lives and property and since it abhors vacuum, much as an in-coming governor reserves the right to speak out against perceived systemic stripping of the resources of the state that he’ll soon be the man at the helm of affairs, a meaningful monitoring of financial transactions of his State with the view of constituting a strong committee to review the approval/expenditures of the state 100 days retrospectively is more tactical than needless filibustering with the sitting governor who is yet to exhaust his mandate of four years.

    “To accentuate the mechanism of recovery of expenditures tainted with last minute recklessness, robust legal and justice framework is imperative. And sadly, this twin sectors are at the moment inflicted by debilitating virus both at the centre and the constituting States of the Federation. And yet, no harm in trying by a seriously change minded in-coming governors such as Hon. Emeka Ihedioha of Imo State,” he said.

  • Textile workers knock governors for abandoning pension scheme

    • Hail Buhari on Micro Pension Plan

    THE National Union of Textile Garment and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria has condemned  governors yet to implement the Contributory Pension Scheme (CPS), saying they have no excuse 15 years after the scheme kicked off.

    Speaking with reporters in Abuja, the union’s Secretary-General, Comrade Issa Aremu, lamented that 19 governors were yet to domesticate the scheme. He said this was against the Pension Reform Act of 2014.

    He lamented that while some governors were finding it difficult to sign their workers onto the scheme, they  had devised ways of making political offices pensionable.

    Aremu faulted the practice where governors after serving for two terms of eight years become entitled to pension.

    This, he noted, is against the International Labour Law, which prescribed 10 years for a worker to be entitled to a pension.

    He said: “We are excited that we are having an inclusive pension scheme. What will make the scheme sustainable depends on the success we have recorded from those who have really been in the scheme.

    “Even for the formal sector, there is still so much work to be done. We  have about seven million workers covered and for the formal sector, that is not enough and I see some private sector employers that are not part of the scheme.

    “The one that is not acceptable is that some state government have not subscribed to the scheme. As at the last count, only 17 states had signed to the Contributory Pension Scheme.

    “This is a compulsory scheme and it should go round. I think the organised labour has to do more because if we are concerned about life at work through wages. We should also be concerned with life after work using pension.”

    He added that civil servants in many states were not covered, noting that this implied that when they left work, they would not have much to fall back on.

    He added: “This is unacceptable because these are governors who decided to make a non-pensionable job of two terms to be pensionable and this is a scandal that must be interrogated.

    “They all copy these laws to make two-term governors collect pensions to death. This is against the labour law, which states that one must work for a minimum of ten years to be able to get a pension. Two terms for governors are eight years.”

    He called on the National Pension Commission to intensify its enforcement mechanism so that many workers would be captured in the  scheme.

    “The pension scheme has guaranteed regular payment for our members. We, in the NLC, are not only advocating minimum wage for those who are working but we want a minimum pension for pensioners.

    “The large army of workers are in the informal sector and they have been excluded from the scheme. They need to think of life after work because this micro pension is vital for the workers.

    “This scheme should be able to cover 80 million people in the workforce and the informal sector covers about 70 per cent of the organised private sector.”

    Aremu, however, commended President Muhammadu Buhari for the Micro Pension Plan, which extends retirement benefits to informal sector workers.

    According to him, the President’s stamp would legitimise the CPS for informal and informal sectors.

    “If implemented, pension coverage will be more inclusive to include millions of self-employed who for now are not assured of life after work no less they are assured of life during work due to income inadequacy.

    “There will be sustainable investable funds for socio-economic development. So far, with as many as 8.5 million formal sector workers covered, as much as N8.7 trillion pension assets have been accumulated.

    “With potential 80 million workforce, the potential for accumulated workers’capital is better imagined. Micro pension is certainly a sustainable measure against mass income poverty that has pushed workers in both formal and informal sectors into the abyss of poverty.

    “With the micro pension launch and expected attendant increase in pension assets, there is no doubt that the nation is also assured of investable funds for poverty alleviation as well as wealth generation,” he said.

  • The southwest governors

    But for the timely intervention of leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the southwest before the last General Elections, the rampaging Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) would have ‘captured’ at least three more states in the region, in the elections and the preceding election that ushered in the new government in one of the states, Osun, last year. Indeed, what happened in Osun State in the gubernatorial election last year was a narrow escape for the APC, and, as I have always said, needlessly so. Yet, it was not that the tell-tale signs had not been showing long before the election. I remember that, as far back as August, 2014 when the then incumbent governor, Rauf Aregbesola, was reelected for a second term, I had warned in an article on this page titled “Beyond Aregbe’s victory : For the progressives, it’s time for introspection” (August 17, 2014). The result of that year’s governorship election was more emphatic than the one that ushered in the Aregbesola government in its first term, but there were tell-tale signs that all was not well.

    Lest we forget, the Court of Appeal ruled that Aregbesola had 198,799 votes as against PDP Olagunsoye Oyinlola’s 172, 880 in the 2007 governorship election. The APC governor in 2014 had 394,684 votes as against that of the PDP’s aspirant, Iyiola Omisore’s 292,747 votes. I had argued, inter alia, in that piece that “…The political leaders in the region have to learn to sell their programmes to the electorate instead of putting up a ‘know-all ‘or being arrogant or messianic in doing things. And, when, like all mortals they find they are wrong, they should not hesitate to reverse themselves. That is one sure way to keep the predators at bay.”  Two weeks earlier, (i.e. on August 3, 2014), I had argued (in my article titled “Let Aregbe do it again”) for the reelection of the Aregbesola government. The truth was; long before then, I had, like many others, been seeing the warning signs of the danger that loomed in the state.

    I wish I could lay my hands on some other write-ups where I had warned of the looming take-over of some of these states, like Oyo and Ogun; I would also have loved to quote copiously from those articles.

    But that is not necessary, at least for now. The major elections have come and gone. We can heave a sigh of relief. The worst is probably over, at least for now. Oyo is already lost to the PDP as foretold by many. Ogun would have followed the same trajectory, again but for the APC leaders’ intervention. What some of these southwest governors do not realise is that they may be the direct losers of elections, but the consequence of the loss is felt by the generality of the people of the region. Sadly, the loser in the Ogun State governorship election would have been the party’s candidate and not the outgoing Governor Ibikunle Amosun who has had his two terms. Just the same way the incumbent Governor Gboyega Oyetola would have lost to the PDP if party leaders had not come to his rescue at the nick of time. Yet, both Aregbesola and Amosun somewhat managed things well when seeking second term for themselves. The good thing is that Amosun has been shown that the party is bigger than him or his desire. No one would try what he did in the military era.

    It is not by accident that Lagos State is the only state that has never fallen to any other political party since the return to civil rule in 1999, of the six states in the southwest, thanks to the indefatigability and political sagacity of the man, Bola Ahmed Tinubu. Yet, it is this same man that some of those who had caused the fall of their states in the region to the ‘enemy’ despise and seek to diminish in stature, after in some instances cringing to him to get into political offices. As I have always argued, I have nothing against people who might have issues with Asiwaju Tinubu. That is only natural; especially in a politically active region like the southwest. Even the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo had people who were opposed to him and whatever he stood for. But when such people happen to be the very persons that climbed on Tinubu’s back to power, it is imprudent to want to stab him in the back for selfish political gains. That is why till this moment I admire Olusegun Mimiko. He proved he was the issue when he dumped the PDP to contest under the Labour Party, won the governorship election in Ondo State and was sworn in in 2009. The only thing is that that franchise has expired, as the same Mimiko could not muster enough votes to see his senatorial ambition through.

    So, Senator Babafemi Ojudu, special assistant to the president on political matters would appear wrong to have blamed the political apathy in the region on some ‘self-sufficient elite’. Ojudu had, while reminiscing on the outcome of the presidential election, promised that the (APC would address the question of voter apathy in the region. But, if Lagos, in INEC’s record, had 5.5 million registered voters, and only about 1.5million (less than 18 percent) voted in the presidential election, it was worrisome indeed. Ojudu said, inter alia: “our leaders must do more recruitment of people into the electoral process. We must tell the self-sufficient elite to take interest in voting; this is the best way to get it right.” This is where I have issues with Ojudu, The point is; it is the political leaders themselves that are largely responsible for the apathy. Unless the governors are not part of the political leaders; then I can agree with Ojudu. Some of us had been warning of the catastrophe looming in the southwest when we saw the way some of the governors were behaving like Lords of the Manor.

    The voter enlightenment that Ojudu spoke about is only a minute part of the problem. Even when we accuse the ‘self-sufficient elite’ of not voting, the attitude of some of the governors in the region is enough put-off, even to the ordinary folks; not to now talk of the elite. The point is; the Yoruba people would always want to assert their pride. They would never want to be seen in any position suggesting being condescending to people that they supposedly put in government. When a governor talks so rudely to people and they clap for him for having such a caustic tongue; he should watch it; he would get his result on Election Day. Some of these governors just have to learn how to bridle their tongues, especially when speaking in public. People who are too big to mind their language in public need not vie for such public offices, unless they were not the ones that offered themselves to serve. In this business of elections, the elector is king.

    One should not be tired of saying it; some of the APC governors messed up big time and this was evident in the result the party got even in the last governorship and state house of assembly elections. It was clear before the March 9, 2019 governorship election in Ogun State that the candidate of the incumbent Governor Ibikunle Amosun would be trounced at the poll.

    As I had said in some of my write-ups on this vexatious issue, what I hate about some of these governors is the way they humble themselves when looking for the positions only to get there and become too big for their boots. Many of them see good press as part of their birthright. If you write a whole page praising them for doing their job, they won’t see that. The only thing they see is the one or two sentences in the full page where you criticise them; whereas their counterparts from the other regions will call to engage and thank you even if you lampooned them.

    Let the APC leaders in the southwest beam their searchlight on Ondo State before the next governorship election there. Quote me, the state is likely to go the way of Oyo State if things continue the way they are. I guess what His Excellency’s reaction would be like after reading this piece. But, that is not important to me now. What is important is not to allow the people of Ondo to take the unusual decision of wearing their caps on their navels instead of their heads. That is what we have in the southwest when the people are provoked unnecessarily.

     

  • Breaking: Governors in meeting with NSA over security, elections 

    Governors and the National Security Adviser (NSA), Babagana Monguno, are locked in a meeting ahead of the forthcoming general polls.

    The meeting which is at the instance of the NSA is currently ongoing at the national secretariat of the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF), Abuja

    The country’s security situation is expected to dominate discussion.

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    The same scenario played out few weeks to the 2015 general elections which eventually led to the postponement of the poll so as to allow the military make a last push against the Bono Haram sect who were then occupying almost the entire Local Government Areas in Borno and some part of Adamawa and Yobe states.

    A source said the meeting was called to update the governors on the security situation in the country ahead of the general elections.

    It was also gathered that the NSA intends to present to the governors the security arrangement with the aim of ensuring their support.

    A communique is expected to be released at the end of the meeting.

     

    Details later…