The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida

  • One issue, two stands and a controversy

    One issue, two stands and a controversy

    There was confusion yesterday over two contradictory statements credited to former military President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida on the state of the nation. One of the statements, which was signed by Kassim Afegbua on behalf of Gen. Babangida quoted the former president as saying that President Muhammadu Buhari should not seek reelection. In a counter move, another statement by the former president denied authorising Afegbua to issue a statement on his behalf. 

    Text of a statement signed by Prince Kassim Afegbua purpotedly as media spokesman for former military President Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.

    In the past few months and weeks, I have played host to many concerned Nigerians who have continued to express legitimate and patriotic worry about the state of affairs in the country.

    Some of them have continued to agonize about the turn of events and expressly worried why we have not gotten our leadership compass right as a country with so much potential and opportunity for all. Some, out of frustration, have elected to interrogate the leadership question and wondered aloud why it has taken this long from independence till date to discover the right model on account of our peculiarities. At 57, we are still a nation in search of the right leadership to contend with the dynamics of a 21st century Nigeria.

    Having been privileged to preside over this great country, interacted with all categories of persons, dissected all shades of opinions, understudied different ethnic groupings; I can rightfully conclude that our strength lies in our diversity.

    But, exploring and exploiting that diversity as a huge potential has remained a hard nut to crack, not because we have not made efforts, but building a consensus on any national issue often has to go through the incinerator of those diverse ethnic configurations.

    Opinions in Nigeria are not limited to the borders of the political elite; in fact, every Nigerian, no matter how young or old, has an opinion on any national issue. And it is the function of discerning leadership to understand these elemental undercurrents in the discharge of state responsibilities.

    There is no gainsaying the fact that Nigeria is at major crossroads at this moment in its history; the choices we are going to make as a nation regarding the leadership question of this country and the vision for our political, economic and religious future will be largely determined by the nature or kind of change that we pursue, the kind of change that we need and the kind of change that we get.

    A lot depends on our roles both as followers and leaders in our political undertakings. As we proceed to find the right thesis that would resolve the leadership question, we must bear in mind a formula that could engender national development and the undiluted commitment of our leaders to a resurgence of the moral and ethical foundations that brought us to where we are as a pluralistic and multi-ethnic society.

    Nigeria, before now, has been on the one hand our dear native land, where tribes and tongues may differ but in brotherhood we stand, and on the other hand a nation that continues to struggle with itself and in every way stumbling and willful in its quest to become a modern state, starting from the first republic till date.

    With our huge investments in the African emancipation movements and the various contributions that were made by our leadership to extricate South Africa from colonial grip, Nigeria became the giant of Africa during that period. But, having gone through leadership failures, we no longer possess the sobriety to claim that status. And we all are guilty.

    We have experimented with parliamentary and presidential systems of government amid military interregnum at various times of our national history. We have made some progress, but not good enough to situate us on the pedestal we so desirously crave for.

    It is little wonder therefore that we need to deliberately provoke systems and models that will put paid to this recycling leadership experimentation to embrace new generational leadership evolution with the essential attributes of responsive, responsible and proactive leadership configuration to confront the several challenges that we presently face.

    In 2019 and beyond, we should come to a national consensus that we need new breed leadership with requisite capacity to manage our diversities and jump-start a process of launching the country on the super highway of technology-driven leadership in line with the dynamics of modern governance. It is short of saying enough of this analogue system. Let’s give way for digital leadership orientation with all the trappings of consultative, constructive, communicative, interactive and utility-driven approach where everyone has a role to play in the process of enthroning accountability and transparency in governance.

    I am particularly enamored that Nigerians are becoming more and more conscious of their rights; and their ability to speak truth to power and interrogate those elected to represent them without fear of arrest and harassment. These are part of the ennobling principles of representative democracy.

    As citizens in a democracy, it is our civic responsibility to demand accountability and transparency. Our elected leaders owe us that simple but remarkable accountability creed. Whenever we criticise them, it is not that we do not like their guts; it is just that as stakeholders in the political economy of the country, we also carry certain responsibilities.

    In the past few months also, I have taken time to reflect on a number of issues plaguing the country. I get frightened by their dimensions. I get worried by their colourations. I get perplexed by their gory themes. From Southern Kaduna to Taraba state, from Benue State to Rivers, from Edo State to Zamfara, it has been a theatre of blood with cake of crimson.

    In Dansadau in Zamfara state recently, Northwest of Nigeria, over 200 souls were wasted for no justifiable reason. The pogrom in Benue State has left me wondering if truly this is the same country some of us fought to keep together. I am alarmed by the amount of blood-letting across the land. Nigeria is now being described as a land where blood flows like river, where tears have refused to dry up.

    Almost on a daily basis, we are both mourning and grieving, and often times left helpless by the sophistication of crimes. The Boko Haram challenge has remained unabated even though there has been commendable effort by government to maximally downgrade them. I will professionally advise that the battle be taken to the inner fortress of Sambisa Forest rather than responding to the insurgents’ ambushes from time to time.

    In the fullness of our present realities, we need to cooperate with President Muhammadu Buhari to complete his term of office on May 29th, 2019 and collectively prepare the way for new generation leaders to assume the mantle of leadership of the country. While offering this advice, I speak as a stakeholder, former president, concerned Nigerian and a patriot who desires to see new paradigms in our shared commitment to get this country running.

    While saying this also, I do not intend to deny President Buhari his inalienable right to vote and be voted for, but there comes a time in the life of a nation, when personal ambition should not override national interest.

    This is the time for us to reinvent the will and tap into the resourcefulness of the younger generation, stimulate their entrepreneurial initiatives and provoke a conduce environment to grow national economy both at the micro and macro levels.

    Contemporary leadership has to be proactive and not reactive. It must factor in citizens’ participation. Its language of discourse must be persuasive not agitated and abusive. It must give room for confidence building. It must build consensus and form aggregate opinion on any issue to reflect the wishes of the people across the country. It must gauge the mood of the country at every point in time in order to send the right message. It must share in their aspirations and give them cause to have confidence in the system.

    Modern leadership is not just about “fighting” corruption, it is about plugging the leakages and building systems that will militate against corruption. Accountability in leadership should flow from copious examples. It goes beyond mere sloganeering. My support for a new breed leadership derives from the understanding that it will show a marked departure from recycled leadership to creating new paradigms that will breathe fresh air into our present polluted leadership actuality.

    My intervention in the governance process of Nigeria wasn’t an accident of history. Even as a military government, we had a clear-cut policy agenda on what we needed to achieve.

    We recruited some of the best brains and introduced policies that remain some of the best in our effort to re-engineer our polity and nation. We saw the future of Nigeria but lack of continuity in government and of policies killed some of our intentions and initiatives.

    Even though we did not provide answers to all the developmental challenges that confronted us as at that time, we were not short of taking decisions whenever the need arose.

    The unchecked activities of the herdsmen have continued to raise doubt on the capacity of this government to handle with dispatch, security concerns that continue to threaten our dear nation; suicide bombings, kidnappings, armed banditry, ethnic clashes and other divisive tendencies. We need to bring different actors to the roundtable.

    The government must generate platform to interact and dialogue on the issues with a view to finding permanent solutions to the crises. The festering nature of this crisis is an inelegant testimony to the sharp divisions and polarisations that exist across the country.

    For example, this is not the first time herdsmen engage in pastoral nomadism but the anger in the land is suggestive of the absence of mutual love and togetherness that once defined our nationality. We must collectively rise up to the occasion and do something urgently to arrest this drift. If left unchecked, it portends danger to our collective existence as one nation bound by common destiny; and may snowball into another internecine warfare that would not be good for nation-building.

    We have to reorient the minds of the herdsmen or gun-men to embrace ranching as a new and modern way to herd cattle. We also need to expand the capacity of the Nigeria Police, the Nigeria Army, the Navy and Air Force to provide the necessary security for all.

    We need to catch up with modern sophistication in crime detection and crime fighting. Due to the peculiarity of our country, we must begin community policing to close the gaps that presently exist in our policing system.

    We cannot continue to use old methods and expect new results. We just have to constructively engage the people from time to time through platforms that would help them ventilate their opinions and viewpoints.

    When the ruling party campaigned with the change mantra, I had thought they would device new methods, provoke new initiatives and proffer new ways to addressing some of our developmental problems. By now, in line with her manifesto, one would have thought that the APC (All Progressives Congress) will give fillip to the idea of devolution of powers and tinker with processes that would strengthen and reform the various sectors of the economy.

    Like I did state in my previous statement late last year, devolution of power or restructuring is an idea whose time has come if we must be honest with ourselves. We need to critically address the issue and take informed positions based on the expectations of the people on how to make the union work better.

    Political parties should not exploit this as a decoy to woo voters because election time is here. We need to begin the process of restructuring both in the letter and spirit of it.

    For example, I still cannot reconcile why my state government would not be allowed to fix the Minna-Suleja Road, simply because it is called Federal Government road, or why state governments cannot run their own policing system to support the Federal Police. We are still experiencing huge infrastructural deficit across the country and one had thought the APC-led Federal Government would behave differently from their counterparts in previous administrations. I am hesitant to ask; where is the promised change?

    At this point of our national history, we must take some rather useful decisions that would lead to real development and promote peaceful co-existence among all the nationalities.

    We must be unanimous in what we desire for our country; new generation leadership, result-driven leadership, sound political foundation, demonetisation of our politics, enhanced internal democracy, elimination of impunity in our politics, inclusiveness in decision-making, and promotion of citizens’ participation in our democratic process. The search for that new breed leadership must start now as we prepare for 2019 election.

    I get worried when politicians visit to inform me about their aspirations and what you hear in terms of budgetary allocations for electoral contest does not cover voters’ education but very ridiculous sub-heads.

    A typical aspirant in Nigeria draws up budget to cover INEC, Police, Army and men and officers of the Civil Defence , instead of talking of voters’ education, mobilisation and sensitisation. Even where benchmarks are set for electoral expenditure, monitoring and compliance are always difficult to adhere to. We truly need to reform the political system. And we must deliberately get fresh hands involved for improved participation.

    We need new ways and new approaches in our political order. We need a national rebirth. We need a rebranded Nigeria and rebranded politics. It is not so much for the people, but for the institutions that are put in place to promote our political engagements. We must strengthen the one man one vote mantra. It is often ridiculous for me when people use smaller countries in our West Africa sub-region as handy references of how democracy should be. It beggars our giant of Africa status.

    The next election in 2019 therefore presents us a unique opportunity to reinvent the will and provoke fresh leadership that would immediately begin the process of healing the wounds in the land and ensuring that the wishes and aspirations of the people are realized in building and sustaining national cohesion and consensus.

    I pray the Almighty Allah grant us the gift of good life to witness that glorious dawn in 2019. Amen. I have not written an open letter to the President, I have just shared my thoughts with fellow compatriots on the need to enthrone younger blood into the mainstream of our political leadership starting from 2019.

  • VC calls for improved girl-child enrollment in public schools

    VC calls for improved girl-child enrollment in public schools

    The Vice Chancellor ( VC ), Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University, Lapai, Niger, Prof. Muhammad Maiturare, on Thursday called for improved girl-child enrollment in public schools in the state.

    Maiturare made the call during the presentation of exercise books and chalks in Dubwa village in Paikoro Local Government Area of the state.

    He said that school attendance by pupils and students should be further strengthened and enhanced to ensure quality learning and better external examination results.

    The vice chancellor expressed satisfaction with the level of enrollment of  indigenes of Paiko in various programmes in the university.

    “We have a sizeable number of students and teachers population in the university,’’ Maiturare said.

    The vice chancellor ( VC ) advised parents to support the various schools’ management committees inaugurated, to ensure the smooth delivery of education in public schools, through materials and financial contributions.

    The President, Paigokni Development Association, Amb. Zubairu Dada, said the association would intensify efforts on educational programmes through the institution of award for best teachers and pupils in public schools.

    He commended the state government’s efforts in education and called for more assistance in teachers recruitment and repair of facilities in public schools in the area.

    Dada said that the two classrooms at U.K. Primary School Paikoro, would be renovated in line with the educational pursuit of the people.

    NAN

  • Unity Bank’s capital base hits N80bn

    Unity Bank’s capital base hits N80bn

    Unity Bank Plc’s capital base has hit N80 billion, up from N31 billion in 2014, Mr Thomas Etuh, former Chairman, Board of Directors, has said.

    Etuh, the immediate past board chairman of the bank said in a post-retirement interview in Abuja that the growth was recorded under his watch, between 2014 and 2017.

    Etuh who retired as the bank’s board chairman a fortnight ago, explained that the bank was able to achieve the feat because of its “agric business” banking.

    “You know Unity Bank is number one in agriculture, in terms of agric lending to small holder farmers; we also have a product for youths because youths own this generation.

    “I came into Unity Bank in time of recapitalisation under Mohammed Sanusi as the CBN Governor and we recapitalised the bank to get it to a national bank where it is today.

    “Interestingly, we are leaving the bank in the capital excess of N80 billion from the N31 billion that we met it,” Etuh said.

    According to Etuh, “the successes recorded by the bank did not come without the contributions of its two major co-shareholders, former President Olusegun Obasanjo and ex-military President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.

    He said: “Obasanjo and Babangida came up with that name `Unity’ after the merger of some Southern and Northern banks.

    “The merger means a lot for Nigeria’s unity. So, having nine banks from different entities, it behoves on the board to also merge the different banks culture into one; and that, we did to make it a national bank.

    “You can see that the bank has flourished in various products which have brought it to stability, and I won’t say it was achieved singlehandedly; it was a collective effort of the board and management.

    The former Unity Bank board chairman named the merged banks to include Bank of the North, Tropical Commercial Bank, Intercity Bank, African Merchant Bank, First Interstate Bank, New Nigerian Bank and Societe General Bank.

    Etuh said that he retired from the bank to focus on agriculture.

    “I retired to start something new in developing the frontier of the agric sector which has always been my first love.

    “I have given a notice since last year that I will be retiring as the bank’s board chairman after I have spent some years.

    “I am leaving the board of the bank, but am a co-shareholder, so, it means that I am still in Unity Bank. I am retired but not tired,” he said. 

    NAN

  • IBB’s children join PDP campaign in Niger

    IBB’s children join PDP campaign in Niger

    Niger State Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidate, Umar Nasko, got yesterday the endorsement of former military President, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.

    Two of his children – Mohammed and Halima – joined the party’s campaign train.

    Mohammed and Halima were present at Nasko’s campaign at Kampala and Sarkin Pawa in Bosso and Muyan local government areas.

    Mohammed, who is also the Director of the Finance Committee of the Nasko Governorship Campaign Committee, was on the podium with the candidate. But he did not speak.

    The presence of the Babangidas in the PDP campaign team ended the speculation that their father was not sympathetic to the PDP.

    Addressing party supporters, Nasko promised to provide more social amenities, if elected next month.

    The PDP candidate said he voluntarily entered into a pact with the people of the state, adding that he would not renege on his electioneering promises.

    Governor Babangida Aliyu, a senatorial candidate in next month’s elections, assured the community of a transformer to be connected to the national grid.

    Aliyu decried the use of religious and tribal sentiments among politicians to deceive the electorate.

    The governor said his administration treated all religious and ethnic groups equally since it came to office.

    Aliyu said: “Niger State has remained peaceful because of the equal opportunities given to everyone in the state.”

  • Babangida returns

    Babangida returns

    •Says I want my rest before talking politics

    Former military President Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida yesterday returned to the country after two months medical treatment in Germany. He expressed appreciation to Nigerians for their concern and care during the period of his medical challenge.

    The former military leader who arrived in a chartered flight landed at Minna International Airport at about 2:50pm spotting a navy blue kaftan with gray stripes and a cap to match. He said he wants to have some rest before he would talk on politics.

    Mohammed, Halimat (his son and daughter), a grandchild and some of his close friends and associates mostly retired military officers were at the airport to receive the former leader.

    Efforts by newsmen to have snapshots of his arrival were barred, but when pressed for an interview at the airport, Babangida simply said, “Alihamadulillahi. I am coming up well. I am grateful to all Nigerians.”

    He was then driven home in a BMW black car with registration number ABJ O1 RY and arrived at his Uphill residence at about 3:15pm and was received by four of his grand children.

    Among those at the airport to receive him were the Minister of Defence, General Aliyu Gusau, Air Vice Marshall Hamza Abdullahi, former FCT Minister, General Halilu Akilu, former director of Military Intelligence, Col. Habibu Shuaibu, former Niger State military administrator, Alhaji Umar Ndanusa and Alhaji Sani Ndanusa, former minister of Sports.

    Others are Alhaji Hassan Jalo, the national chairman of National Democratic Party (NDP), Alhaji Abubakar Muye, former Minister of Finance and a Justice of Supreme Court, Justice Musa Datijo. A short prayer session led by his childhood friend, Alhaji Mohammed

    Babangida who looked fresh and in high spirit, told Journalists that he was in good condition. He said, “I am feeling better, I want to use this opportunity to appreciate all my compatriots (Nigerians) for the goodwill and gestures they expressed during my absence.

    “I have been deeply touched by their (Nigerians) love and their affection and their prayers. I want to use this medium to thank each and every one of them.”

    On how he felt about the apprehension generated about his health while in Germany, IBB said, “the apprehension is no longer there, I thank Nigerians I am coming up well. Alihamdulillahi.”

    When asked how he would cope with the pressure of the build up to 2015 in the face of his failing health, the highly elated former leader said he has been following political events in Nigeria while in Germany and that he would talk after he has rested enough.

    “I missed all of you that welcome me, especially my local champions (Journalists). I look forward to all of you to sit and chat with you and talk about politics as we always do. For now I want to rest.”

    Gen. Babangida left the country on September 6 in with Aminu, his son, for his routine medical checkup but had to undergo a bone, related surgery which prolonged his stay in Germany. His prolonged stay however, fuelled the rumour that his health was deteriorating, a development that made President Goodluck Jonathan to visit him during one of his trips to Europe.

    A four-man delegation by Niger State government led by the Commissioner for Agriculture, Professor Kuta Yahaya also visited the former military leader last month to ascertain his health condition before last week’s visit by the governor, Dr. Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu.

    It was also gathered that the national chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Adamu Mu’azu, and former Niger State governor, Abdulkadir Kure also visited the  General.

    The Niger State government and aides of the former leader however allayed the fear being expressed as they claimed that Babangida was in good health.

     

  • I’m in good health, says IBB

    I’m in good health, says IBB

    Former Military Head of State Gen. Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBB), who is recuperating in Germany after a surgery, yesterday promised to return home soon.

    He spoke with reporters in a telephone conversation facilitated by former military Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar, when the latter visited Niger State Governor Babangida Aliyu in Minna, the state capital.

    Gen. Babangida left for surgery in Germany on September 6.

    Shortly after exchanging pleasantries with the governor, Gen. Abubakar put a call through to Gen. Babangida and put the handset on speaker to enable reporters hear and speak to him.

    Gen. Babangida, in a sharp and lively voice, said he would soon return home, but did not specify the date.

    He said: “I appreciate all those who have expressed concern about my health. I am much better and I will soon return home.”

    Abubakar, who was with Alhaji Umaru Ndanusa, Babangida’s close friend, said it was customary for him and Gen. Babangida to visit the governor during Sallah.

    He urged politicians to play the game without bitterness.

    Aliyu said he was happy when the delegation sent by the state government to check on Gen. Babangida in Germany came home with news that he had “significantly improved”.

    He said: “When the team members came back, they told us they had a conversation with him for hours. It was a pleasant information compared to what we heard before.”

    A family source told our correspondent that Gen. Babangida is expected back on Friday.

     

     

     

     

  • IBB in high spirits, says Niger govt

    IBB in high spirits, says Niger govt

    •To return Oct 10

    A four-man Niger State government delegation that visited former military President General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida (IBB) in a German hospital said the retired leader is in perfect condition.

    He is billed to return by October 10 after a surgery for a bone-related ailment.

    The delegation, led by Commissioner for Agriculture, Prof Yahaya Kuta Mohammed, spent over three hours with the former military leader at the private home  where he is recuperating.

    Babangida left for routine medical treatment on September 6 in company of Aminu, his second son.

    His doctors ordered a surgery for Radiculopathy, an ailment he sustained during the Civil War.

    The government’s visit followed a similar visit by President Goodluck Jonathan.

    Other members of the delegation included the Chief of Staff, Umar Nasko, IBB’s cousin and Director-General, State Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Focal office, Dattijo Aliyu and Managing Director State Development Company Mohammadu Aliyu.

    It was learnt that Governor Mu’azu Babangida Aliyu  planned to lead the delegation but could not make it due.

    It was also gathered that three members of the team told the governor that the former leader was recovering.

    A member of the delegation, who pleaded for anonymity, said the team informally briefed the governor of Babangida’s condition.

    “We were with him (IBB) on Sunday and Monday. He was in high spirits and in good health.

    “He is responding positively well to post-surgery therapy.

    “I was with him yesterday after our team had stayed with him for over three hours.

    “The team leader delivered the goodwill message to the General.

    “He was in high spirits and good frame of mind. The General is good to return home anytime.”

    A family source said Babangida will return home after the Sallah celebration.

    “Baba has been advised to return after Sallah to keep him away from the crowd and well-wishers who usually visit him during the period.

    “Hopefully, we expect him on or before next week.”

     

  • Babangida’s triumph of hope over reality

    Babangida’s triumph of hope over reality

    Last Monday, the New Telegraph, the latest “new kid on the block” in Nigeria’s newspaper world, led its maiden edition with an interview with former military president and a favourite whipping boy of the Nigerian media, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida.

    The interview was quintessential Babangida, the Maradona of Nigeria’s politics; the man artfully dribbled past virtually all the sensitive questions the newspaper’s reporters tried to pin him down with, to wit, such questions on his opinion about the performance of President Goodluck Jonathan and that of the governor of his Niger State, Dr. Muazu Babangida Aliyu, or about the latest, now famous, altercation between his “boss”, – his own word – General Olusegun Obasanjo, and the president, etc.

    However, the one question the man would not quibble about was on the unity and integrity of Nigeria. Nothing, he said, can ever shake his faith in the existence of Nigeria as one country – not the terrible Boko Haram insurgency and certainly not the National Conference, which critics of President Jonathan, including this reporter, say looks like a red herring the President hatched up to, at the least, divert attention from his dismal record, and at worst, lay the ground for rebellion by the oil-rich Delta region he comes from, should his presidential bid for another term, which he has not declared but which he is widely suspected of harbouring, fail.

    In his interview, General Babangida said he was not in the least disturbed by the reports at home and from abroad that the 2015 election could break Nigeria. “I am,” he said, “not disturbed by such reports. I am confident it (the election) would make us stronger. Two thousand and fifteen will make us stronger.”

    The general’s unshakable faith and hope in Nigeria’s unity and integrity is understandable. If nothing else, the man fought a war to keep Nigeria one as a young officer and he has a bullet still lodged in his body to show for it. However, with all due respect, his faith and hope are, I believe, the triumph of emotion over reality – the reality that the preponderance of those around President Jonathan have little or no faith in the country as a legitimate and united entity.

    When the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, unfolded the programme for the National Conference last Thursday, he declared that the one subject, which is non-negotiable at the conference is the “indivisibility and indissolubility” of Nigeria. In saying this, Senator Anyim merely reiterated the President’s well known stance that he will never allow the country to disintegrate under his watch. Certainly not, he said on one occasion, after its various peoples have lived together as one family, for better and for worse, for a 100 years since their colonisation by the British.

    Perhaps the President is sincere about his commitment to the unity and integrity of the country. But when, on the one hand, several of those close to the President threaten to break up the country unless he remains President beyond 2015 and nothing happens to them, and on the other hand, when those who say there will be violence if the President rigs the election are routinely harassed by the security forces, you cannot, in fairness, blame those who ask questions about the sincerity of the President’s commitment.

    Even more worrisome, in this respect, is the incredible fiscal irresponsibility of his government as exemplified by the fuel subsidy scandal, which has largely gone unpunished and by the over trillion naira waivers and exemptions it has given well-connected importers, not to mention budgets in which recurrent expenditures have consistently been more than double the capital expenditure. Such fiscal irresponsibility cannot but make any reasonable and sensible person wonder if those in authority believe there’s tomorrow for the country.

    Then, of course, there is the predictable grand oil theft that has gone on since the government handed over the security of the country’s oil regime to a few former Niger Delta militants about two years ago for huge sums that were sufficient to arm and equip our Navy and other relevant public security institutions to do a much better job. So grand is the oil theft that the big multinational oil companies and even our Finance minister, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, have expressed grave concerns about the country’s dwindling oil revenues.

    Government’s apparent indifference, to say the least, about this scale of oil theft alone, not to talk of the other reasons I have mentioned for concern about the President’s commitment to the country’s unity and integrity, reminds me of the Economics Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman’s five “rules of reporting” in his 2005 compilation of his columns titled: The Great Unravelling: From Boom to Bust in Three Scandalous Years to which I once drew the attention of readers of this column back in 2012. The book was about what Krugman called the “world-class mendacity” of the President George Bush and his vice, Dick Cheney, in covering up their phenomenal unravelling of the American political economy in three short years after coming to power.

    One of Krugman’s rules of reporting a government like Bush/Cheney’s which was similar to President Jonathan’s in its disregard for orthodoxy, was that a reporter must do his homework to discover the real, as opposed to the declared, goals of those in authority. What they did before they had power, he said, was a sure clue to their real intentions.

    Before the federal might went to the Delta region, more specifically to the Ijaw, it was an open secret that most of the region’s leading citizens in both public and private sectors funded, equipped and supported the region’s militancy. That militant attitude has been much apparent as the guiding principle of public policy in President Jonathan’s administration.

    This attitude is at the root of suspicions that there is a hidden agenda in the National Conference, especially given its timing so late in the President’s tenure. These suspicions have now been strengthened by the fact that the President alone will nominate about one quarter of the 492 delegates, none of whom will be elected. Worse still, is the rule that any division over an issue will be settled only by two thirds majority. Clearly this is a recipe for confusion and chaos.

    Over 21 years ago, The Economist (August 21, 1993) published an interesting survey on the country, titled: “Nigeria: Anybody seen a giant?” Among other things, the survey speculated about the prospects of the country breaking up. This was long before the more recent American scenario about Nigeria becoming a failed state.

    The self-styled newspaper gave five reasons for and against why the country could break up. The memory of Biafran civil war being too fresh may, it said, be an argument against a break up. But it quickly countered this argument with the point that this might not stop a slide into ungovernability, something the country has experienced long before the Boko Haram insurgency. Second, it said the argument about the country’s huge internal migration leading to more integration of its various people has, on the contrary, only led to resentment by “indigenes.”

    Third, it said, the argument that too many rich Nigerians have invested in the country to allow it to break up is no guarantee that the country would remain stable. Fourth, the argument that the rich world, led by an America hooked on cheap oil, cannot afford to allow the country fall apart, the magazine said, could be easily countered by the argument that should the country face any rebellion, the rich world would find it relatively easy to seal off the oil rich region and keep the oil wells pumping. Finally, the argument that the military was always on hand to intervene to stop the country sliding into chaos was, it said, undermined by the fact that the military itself had long become divided, politically and otherwise.

    Given what seems, at least to me, to be the greater weight of the counter arguments against the country’s break up, it seems Senator Anyim’s decree that the unity and integrity of Nigeria are off limits for the National Conference is no more than an expression of pious hope. The country may indeed not break up. But it would not be because of his, or for that matter, anybody’s mere say so.

    The conference itself was probably conceived in bad faith and is unlikely to lead to any good for the country. Delegates to the conference may disappoint sceptics like me and produce a useful report but the record of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party in dumping such documents into their trash cans makes it difficult, if not impossible, for any reasonable man to believe this time things will be any different.

    To be brutally frank about it, I do not understand the basis for General Babangida’s confidence that not only will all be well with Nigeria beyond 2015, the election that year will make it even stronger. Nigeria may be Africa’s and the Blackman’s giant in the sun but it is yet to have leaders that will turn its feet of clay into nimble ones that can stop it from tripping over itself.

     

     

     

     

     

     

    FEEDBACK

    My column of three weeks ago on the return of Chinweizu, the poet, author, essayist, literary critic, Pan Africanist and veteran newspaper columnist to the pages of Nigerian newspapers after a very long absence, received nearly sixty texts in response. Over a dozen of those responses offered to send me copies, original and photo, of his controversial book, The Anatomy of Female Power, which seemed to have gone out of circulation almost as soon as he’d published it. Perhaps the man himself did not read my piece in which I tried to take him up on his argument that our present constitution is an imposition of a Northern military cabal, but he did not respond to my request for a copy of the book.

    A friend has since delivered a copy to me in person. I wish to thank him and all those who offered to send it to me, mostly by mail.

     

     

  • Return of Chinweizu and all that

    Return of Chinweizu and all that

    It’s good to know my good friend, poet, author, essayist, literary critic, Pan Africanist and, not least of all, newspaper columnist, Chinweizu Ibekwe, simply self-identified as Chinweizu, is alive and well(?). Not too long after his controversial 1990 book, The Anatomy of Female Power, provocatively subtitled A Masculinist Dissection of Matriarchy, the man simply vanished from the Nigerian radar.

    Appearing at a time when the late Mariam, wife of former military president, General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, had elevated the state of First Ladyism in the country to an unprecedented height, Chinweizu’s Anatomy was as harsh a criticism of female power in or out of the corridors of power as you could get anywhere.

    Predictably the book provoked a huge protest from the female folk. Speculations were rife then that Mariam took its attack personal and vowed to obstruct its circulation. If this was true, the late First Lady was not alone; among others, the late celebrity journalist, May Ellen Ezekiel, vigorously campaigned in her popular column in the rested Clasique, that every woman owed it to herself and to the female gender to kill the book’s circulation.

    If MEE, as she was then popularly known, were alive today she would’ve been celebrating the success, beyond her wildest imagination, of her campaign. Today, when the book should be compulsory reading for all, given the way Patience, President Goodluck Jonathan’s wife, has transmogrified First Ladyism, it is almost impossible to find a copy. All the libraries in Kaduna, my city of residence, and all the bookstores that I have searched in Kaduna, Abuja, Lagos and Ibadan, Nigeria’s book publishing capital, have no copies. My requests for the book from mutual friends like the managing director of Guardian Newspapers limited where Chinweizu once plied his trade, Mr Emeka Izeze, drew blank. Another mutual friend, Chief Ikechi Emenike, also a journalist and magazine publisher, who had five copies lost all over time and couldn’t remember exactly to whom.

    Indeed most mutual friends didn’t know where to reach Chinweizu at to find out from him where to get a copy. Some said he was in far away America, feeling not so well and had chosen to remain somewhat incommunicado for personal reasons.

    You can then imagine my pleasant surprise the other day when I saw his half-page response in The Guardian (Thursday, December 12, 2013) to two newspaper interviews by my friend and primary school class mate, the radical Kano politician and medical doctor, Dr Junaid Mohammed – one in the Sunday Sun of December 1, 2013, the other in The PUNCH of December 6, 2013 – in which Junaid threatened bloodshed should President Jonathan run next year (Sun) and said supporters of a Sovereign National Conference (SNC) were only asking for civil war (PUNCH). Chinweizu’s article, entitled “To Junaid Mohammed and Shariyalanders”, was vintage him; pungent, precise, rigorous and highly readable, if also largely propagandistic.

    The following Thursday, December 19, the newspaper again carried another half-page article by the man, this time his intervention on the controversial 18-page letter to President Jonathan by former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

    His main thesis in both pieces was characteristically provocative but equally propagandistic; Nigeria’s current Constitution, he said, is “a self-interested creation of Northern generals, for the parochial interest of Shariyaland,” and, as such, it must be replaced by new Constitution created through the National Dialogue/Conference and approved by the people through a referendum before the next election. The Junaids and the Chief Obasanjos of this world who raise questions about the competence and integrity of President Jonathan and about his fidelity to the deals he makes and his fairness to all sections of the country, he said, are merely trying to divert attention away from what he obviously believes is the very urgent need to do away with the current “illegitimate” constitution.

    The current constitution should go, he says, not only because it is an illegitimate imposition of Northern generals. It should go also because, by the immunity it has granted the president and state governors and their deputies and by its ouster of Chapter II on the fundamental objectives of government as justiciable, it has become “the godfather of corruption” in Nigeria.

    Chinweizu is clearly in agreement with a group of his fellow Igbo elders, led by Professor Ben Nwabueze, which recently issued a statement after a meeting in Enugu rejecting any national conference which is not sovereign and whose outcome is not subjected to a referendum. Their belief that the current constitution is an imposition of Northern generals does extreme violence to the facts of constitution making in this country and their insistence on the sovereignty of the conference and subjecting it to a referendum is simply impractical, given the one year left before our next elections. On his part, Chinweizu’s argument that the Constitution is the godfather of corruption in the country simply stands logic on its head.

    Anyone who has taken time to study the current 1999 Constitution will agree that there are only minor differences between it and the 1979 Constitution. The latter was drafted by a committee of some of Nigeria’s best lawyers and social scientists led by late Chief Rotimi (Timi the Law) Williams, a leading Yoruba and one of the country’s first Queens Counsel and Senior Advocate.

    The draft was debated by a mainly elected Constituent Assembly under the chairmanship of the late Justice Udo Udoma, one of the most respected justices of the Supreme Court and a South-Southerner who was by means a lackey of Chinweizu’s Northern generals. The CA itself comprised some of the most astute Nigerian politicians and critics of military rule.

    General Olusegun Obasanjo, whose administration finally enacted the Constitution into law, is, as far as I know, Yoruba. True, his administration was under the watchful eyes of some Northern generals. However, these generals never had any Northerner’s mandate to take the decisions they took. In any case, these Northern generals rarely took any decisions without the consent of their fellow generals from other sections of the country.

    Except, of course, if Chinweizu is saying of all the Nigerians who made the 1979 Constitution only the Northern generals have a mind of their own it is untenable for anyone to say that the Constitution was an imposition by a cabal of Northern generals.

    Give or take a few minor amendments the 1999 Constitution is the same as that of 1979.

    As for the argument that we need a brand new Constitution, one can counter it with the American saying that if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. Yes, our Constitution, like everything human, isn’t perfect and as such needs fixing every once in a while. But our problem, one must never tire of repeating, is less our Constitution than our attitude. In other words, anyone who thinks, as Chinweizu and Professor Nwabueze do, that a brand new constitution will banish our problems must be suffering from a grand delusion. Constitutions don’t implement themselves. People do. And without the right attitude which, unfortunately, is in the end not a matter for legislation, no Constitution, no matter how near-perfect, can solve anyone’s problems.

    However, assuming for argument’s sake that we do need a brand new constitution, it is truly amazing how anyone can imagine that we can get it, with referendum and all that, before the elections due in a year’s time. Or, as Professor Nwabueze and other likeminded leaders insist, we can get it based on the ethnic groups of this country as building blocks.

    First, under our Constitution the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will require a law by the National Assembly to conduct elections into a Constituent Assembly. For now Section 15 (a) of the Third Schedule gives it powers only to conduct elections into the presidency, governorship and national and state assemblies.

    Second, money is an object in these times when governments are finding it hard to pay even salaries, essentially due to government profligacy. Third, time itself is an object considering how the minimum time it takes to enact and implement laws is on the scale of months not days or even weeks. Fourth, no one knows for sure how many tribes we have in this country. Also the populations of the tribes we know have never been captured by any of our censuses to enable us decide what weight to give to each group in allocating the number of those to represent it since it makes no sense to give them equal representation in a democracy.

    In pursuing his thesis Chinweizu claimed believers of Sharia like Junaid have since been waging a war against Nigeria through Boko Haram. He also condemned Obasanjo for trying to hold President Jonathan to promises he said the president made in 2011 to serve only one term.

    As a Muslim who believes in Sharia and as someone who believes one’s word should be his honour, I can easily expose Chinweizu’s positions as mere propaganda. However, these are matters for possibly another time. For now one would only like to say welcome back Chinweizu, and if you happen to read this piece please let me know through a text to the phone number on top of this column how I can get a copy of your Anatomy of Female Power.

  • Between OBJ and GEJ and others in-between (I)

    Between OBJ and GEJ and others in-between (I)

    Last weekend, Leadership (December 21) published a story in which it quoted former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, (OBJ) as saying on his Facebook wall on December 20 that, following his controversial December 2 letter to President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan (GEJ) which he ominously titled “Before it is too late”, it was time Nigerians turned on the heat in the polity so that only the best party should win the next general elections in 2015.

    “It is now time,” the newspaper quoted him as saying, “to turn up the heat. May the best party win.” In the light of his letter in which he admonished his estranged benefactor and godson to shape up or ship out, Obasanjo’s call for Nigerians to turn on the heat was clearly his coded way of asking Nigerians to throw out the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the next elections, the very party that gave him the platform to rule the country as its first elected president since 1985 and a party which he once boasted will rule Nigeria for a long, long time, if not forever.

    His call for Nigerians to turn up the heat also looked, at least to me, like a call on the select Nigerian leaders – Generals Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, Abdulsalami Abubakar and Theophilus Yakubu Danjuma and Dr Alex Ekwueme with whom he said he had shared the content of his letter and who he also said shared his concerns – to speak out in his support.

    So far none has and it’s highly unlikely that anyone of them will. Up till now the only one among them who has said anything about the letter is General Danjuma and he has categorically said he will not criticise GEJ in the open. “I have complete and unimpeded access to the president,” he said in a goodwill message to the 6th Abuja Festival of Praise on the night of December 20 in response to what he said have been repeated calls by the press for him to say something about the letter, “and if I have anything to say to him, I will do so face to face. These are difficult times and we must be careful, especially as leaders on what we say in public.”

    The general’s argument of unimpeded access to the president precluding his speaking out does not look quite tenable; in November 2003 he spoke out against Obasanjo as a president that he said he found out was under the spell of a cult-like clique. At that time he had just left Obasanjo’s administration as the defense minister and he had complete and unimpeded access to the Obasanjo.

    Five years later, he said even more terrible things about his former friend and boss. In an interview with The Guardian (February 17, 2008) marking his 70th birthday he condemned Obasanjo as “the most toxic leader that Nigeria has produced so far.” The country, he said, “took him out of jail and made him a president; he abused Nigeria, he deceived Nigeria and he deserves a second term in prison and we will make sure he ends up there.”

    By then Obasanjo was, of course, no longer president but, on General Danjuma’s own contention, his friend still ruled Nigeria by proxy “through Yar’Adua, his puppet.” At the time Danjuma still had complete and unimpeded access to his friend and to President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

    So if the general has rejected calls for him to speak out on Obasanjo’s letter, it would not be because you speak truth to power only when you do not have complete and unimpeded access to those in power.

    In any case his attack on Obasanjo back in 2003 would not be the first time he’s spoken out against those in power even when they were completely accessible to him. There has to be other reasons for his reticence this time, probably foremost of which is his well publicised falling out with Obasanjo over the former president’s successful move to partially take away the oil well the general had been allocated by the late military head of state, General Sani Abacha, an oil well which has since proved one of the most lucrative in the country.

    As for Generals Babangida and Abubakar and Chief Ekwueme, they too, like General Danjuma, are more likely than not to maintain strategic silence, strategic because while they know much of what Obasanjo said in his letter is true, as we shall see next week, God willing, they do not want to offend or embarrass President Jonathan with whose government they’ve been doing good and brisk business in many sectors of the economy.

    Their strategic silence is also probably because they believe Obasanjo lacks the moral authority to condemn the president for all the offences he has charged the president with, not least of all the charges of bad faith and divisiveness. For, make no mistake about it, before Jonathan came along, Obasanjo was the most divisive president we’ve had in this country and someone whose word you took to your bank at your own peril, as I have tried to show in innumerable articles I have written about the man on these pages and elsewhere, one of which I shall reproduce on these pages in two weeks time, God willing, for its relevance to the ongoing controversy about his letter even though mine was written eleven years ago.

    The point of all this is that clearly Obasanjo is on his own in this letter writing business as a strategy of wrong footing President Jonathan. Worse for him, it seems the heat he wants President Jonathan and the PDP to be subjected to has been turned on him, first, from a quarter he – and probably most Nigerians, including this reporter – least expected and, second, from the reply to his letter by his erstwhile godson.

    Once upon a time, Mr. Femi Fani-Kayode, before he became arguably the most trenchant defender of President Obasanjo during his second term, described him as a Mr. Know-It-All and a stooge of not only the much maligned “Fulani caliphate.” Fani-Kayode said Obasanjo was also a stooge of “his Western European backers…and his friends at the IMF and the World Bank.” The man, he concluded, in that clearly malicious article in The Comet (March 18, 2001), since rested, “may end in utter disaster and shame.”

    At the time Fani-Kayode wrote those words not even he in his wildest thoughts could have imagined that the former president’s “disaster and shame” would come in the shape of a daughter who seemed to have benefitted most from being an Obasanjo, namely, Iyabo, a veterinary doctor and a PhD in public health.

    Iyabo is not the first to visit opprobrium upon her father; years ago Gbenga, her brother from the same mother, accused his old man of sleeping with his wife in a sworn affidavit. Being a man apparently with a crocodile skin, the accusation did not appear to “shake his coat”, as we say in local parlance.

    Iyabo’s charge against her father in a letter that was indeed a “red hot exclusive”, as the editors of Vanguard which published it on December 18 described it, must have rattled the man no end. Inspired, as she herself said, by her father’s 18-page letter to President Jonathan, she wrote her old man an 11-page letter dated December 16 in which she accused him of being “a liar, manipulator, a two-faced hypocrite” and a cruel and criminally negligent father and husband. Disaster and shame don’t come any worse than someone your own loins sired and who most people thought was your favourite, saying such unprintable things about you to the whole world, especially at a time you’d picked to fight a critical battle of your life.

    It was a sign of how much he was rattled that he called her while he was visiting in the US where she is now resident to confirm if she could indeed pen such blasphemy. Equally, it was a sign how much shame she must have known she has brought unto her family that she initially denied writing it.

     

     

    Feedback

     

    Re: The persecution of Governor Lamido

    Two weeks ago I promised to publish a very thoughtful reaction to my piece on the subject above last week but didn’t. My apologies. Below is a shortened and edited version of the reaction.

     

    Sir,

    I am yet to see people from the North call out their leaders to account. But instead what we have seen is people demonising Jonathan. I am not saying ‘don’t question Jonathan.’ All I’m saying is, let’s question from home first.

    I am a Muslim and from your name you seem to be one also. So let me use the religion angle.

    Tribal leaders in the desert and outside the Arabian Peninsula came to Prophet Muhammad (SAW) and gave their allegiance to Islam and the Prophet himself agreeing to be ruled by him. Many people say that Islam was spread by the sword. But it only happened because of the leadership of the Prophet and the justice that reigned in Islam. Today many in the West are beginning to understand how Islam was spread.

    If the Prophet was seeking justice outside his kingdom without firstly, trying to clean up his own house, do you think Islam as we know it would have existed? But of course if you are a Muslim you most likely already know all of these. I hope we can do what is right. May God make it easy (for us all).

    Abdul’Aziz ibn Ibrahim

     

    Sir,

    I’m neither your fan nor apologist because I can’t stand your ethno-religious irredentism. But those who attacked you because of Lamido’s article should, if they can read English, read where you said, “This does NOT, of course, mean Lamido’s sons should not be prosecuted & their father exposed as….a hypocrite…”

    Myk Aiyemo – Abuja

    +2348052355655