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Tag: Nwabueze

Nwabueze: PMB must listen to this oracle
Nigeria remains in a flux. So much happening, yet our lives remain painfully in regression or static at best. Worse still, we all seem to have exhausted ourselves. One cannot help forming the eerie imagery of duelers now prostrate in the dust after a long affray – pile of bodies half covered by dust, barely alive…

And we have been through all the issues over and over again, yet it’s either that there is nobody out there or there is acute hearing challenge. Today, there is simply nothing fresh to comment upon; same old humdrum about catching suspected thieves. At a time like this, a pot-pourri of small issues proves handy. I was to pick on Jimoh Ibrahim and his antics in the upcoming Ondo State governorship race. Someone needed to tell him to eschew his perennial rascality and allow us to tend to our democracy. This column was going to tell him that in some detail.

One was to poke at Ibe Kachikwu’s phantom refineries and the wildly escalating crises in the petroleum sector. There is also the adjunct matter of a renewed wild-goose chase in the Chad basin for oil and Nigeria’s burning of billions of naira in this 30-year old quest. One’s attention was also drawn to the APC governors’ tiff with the president over sidelining them in the federal appointments booty.

But all of these issues had to be swept aside upon reading a note from Professor Benjamin Nwabueze to President Buhari. For those who may not know, Nwabueze is an octogenarian, an elder statesman and one of the most rigorous minds of his age alive today. Of course, his glittering academic and work lives have been subjects of tomes of books. An academic and legal titan, he is by miles, the most prolific and most cerebral of his time.

His prodigious work ethic and intellectual eminence is like luminous morning sun and is evident in the constitutional history and law faculties of numerous African countries.

Prof. Nwabueze has been a strident critic of this administration; sometimes uncomfortably so. But the old man is a die-hard patriot who is deeply passionate about his convictions in matters concerning Nigeria.

Rising from a meeting of the Igbo Leaders of Thought (ILT), a body he chairs, he urged PMB to change his style of governance. He did not say anything new other than merely reinforcing the cogency and indeed, urgency of some irksome matters. Since we want the government to take an especial note of these things, here are bullet-points:

Herdsmen palaver: this matter of licentious herdsmen being perceived as some kind of nascent islamisation of Nigeria is utterly dangerous. And it is gaining currency in the south of Nigeria. This column does not believe in the religious imputation and colouration of the cattle-rearers’ brigandage, but the presidency does not seem to appreciate the situation.

From Kaduna to Benue, Kogi, Enugu, Ekiti and indeed even Abuja, cattle and their breeders are on the rampage, killing, maiming and destroying farms. Yet the president cannot seem to respond appropriately and adequately. It is as if he has given a tacit nod to these marauders. Nwabueze warns about a matter that might throw the nation into an unquenchable conflagration if nothing is done urgently.
- Appointments in the nation’s security services: this singular action of PMB will not only haunt his tenure but has pork-marked his presidency, his persona and his history. He has also left a dangerous precedence that will plague the polity for a long time. It is difficult to explain how about 15 key security and strategic positions are parcelled solely to his kinsmen.
He also mentioned the recent sack of over 40 officers in the Army and wondered if it is by accident that most of them are from the South?
- Nwabueze advised PMB to release Nnamdi Kanu of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) unconditionally and engage the people in dialogue, noting that the demand for self-determination does not necessarily mean secession. His words: “Political agitations for self-determination are taking place in various parts of the world, in Europe, Asia, America, etc. The agitators are not massacred with state- owned arms and ammunition, but are brought round for dialogue. The situation here should not be different. Dialogue is the approach.”
- Of corruption fight, noise and propaganda: he says while ILT is not against the fight against corruption, the manner it is being prosecuted is unacceptable. “The fight is highly skewed against perceived opponents of the party in government. People are arrested and bank accounts are frozen without due process…” He noted that a few current appointees have been fingered in monumental corruption, but the government pretends not to notice.
- On the economy, the Avengers and recession: he averred that this is the worst economic situation ever and urged the government to address the immediate cause by engaging the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) in a dialogue.
Prof. Nwabueze said so much more. But we will conclude that any thinking government would not only listen to him carefully, but would do well to keep a line of communication with him.

Abia’s dirty politics

Abia State in the Southeast of Nigeria is tagged ‘God’s Own State’, but its politics has been anything but godly. Indeed, some desperate politicians in the state who cannot live down their fall from power and serial humiliation at the polls have continued to wrestle in the muck and be-splatter mud to anyone in sight.

One target of this dirty fight is the immediate past governor, Chief Theodore Ahamefule Orji, who has been the relentless butt of media attacks by his fallen godfather and former ‘owner’ of Abia State. All manner of hack writers and newspaper advertorials are deployed every week to shoot down one man.

In utter show of desperation, the last set of advertorials has those jaded pictures of Chief Orji supposedly in a shrine taking oath. It is shocking how blackmailers shamelessly publish photos, which showcase their evil handiwork in the first place.

But Chief Orji has nothing to be ashamed of. Any patriot must be willing to make even the ultimate sacrifice for the sake of his people. A great leader must be ready to go to any shrine – if that is what it takes – to retrieve his people from a dark, fetish abyss to a new day of light and progress. In fact, those TA Orji shrine pictures should be mounted on billboards across the country to show the courage of one man and the persecution he had to suffer to make Abia the safe, peaceful and unshackled state it is today.

There must be a limit to bitter politics and campaign of calumny isn’t there?
October 28, 2016
Nwabueze cautions Buhari on style of governance

Elder statesman and Chairman of the Igbo Leaders of Thought (ILT) Prof. Ben Nwabueze has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to allow the constitution to guide his policies and action, adding that the agitations across the country are for restructuring of the federation.

The call, which was contained in the communiqué issued by the ILT at the end of its recent meeting in Enugu, the State capital, said it is disappointing that after one and half years in office, the government is yet to find its feet and address the challenges of governance.

The communiqué, which was signed by Nwabueze, reads in part: “The ILT decries the extreme polarization of the country along religious and ethnic lines, as a result of actions of the political parties and the Federal Government, particularly through the Islamization process and the invasion of the Middle Belt and southern states by armed agents and jihadists equipped with assault weapons, euphemistically and deceptively labeled herdsmen.”

It goes on to define Islamization as: “when the Quran is brought in as part of the law to regulate the lives of the people, as is the case in 12 northern states. It also states the action of the Federal Government that has aided the polarization of the country to include, among other things: “the appointment of the President’s kinsmen, tribesmen and fellow adherents of the Islamic faith to critical positions in the security services – Chief of Army, Inspector General of Police, Minister of Defence, Minister of Internal Affairs, National Security Adviser, Director-General of the Department of State Security Services (DSS), Chief of Staff, ADC to the President, Chief Security Officer (CSO) to the President, Private Secretary to the President, Protocol to the President, Director-General of Customs, Director-General of Prisons and Director-General of Immigration”.

Nwabueze advised the Buhari administration to release Nnamdi Kanu of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) unconditionally and engage the group in dialogue, saying the demand for self-determination does not necessarily mean secession.

His words: “The Federal Government must respect the laws of the country. Agitation for self-determination is not necessarily agitation for secession, as is conclusively demonstrated in the insightful judgment of the South African Constitutional Court; agitation for self-determination is therefore not a crime; beside it is guaranteed by the United Nations and the African Union Charter.

“Political agitations for self-determination are taking place in various parts of the world, in Europe, Asia, America etc. and the agitators are not massacred with state-owned arms and ammunition, but are brought round for dialogue. The situation here should not be different. Dialogue is the approach.”

Nwabueze, said the Federal Government has inundated Nigerians with unceasing noise and propaganda about fighting corruption. He added that while the ILT is not against the fight, “what is unacceptable is the way and manner the fight is being prosecuted”.

He added: “The fight is highly skewed against perceived opponents of the party in government. People are arrested and bank accounts frozen without due process. The world news media, Cable News Network (CNN) announced that a serving minister has over $700 million in one account in the United States and we are not told what the Federal Government has done to probe him.

“The current Chief of Army Staff is alleged to own houses in Dubai, to own farms etc. and we are not told what efforts have been made to ascertain the true source of his wealth.

“Appointments to sensitive positions in the public service so far shows a high degree of corrupt practices. As Junaid Mohammed revealed, the Aso Rock is controlled by cousins, nephews, brothers and blood relations of the President. Nepotism is incontestably a form of corruption.

“There are observations that the recent purge of over 40 personnel in the army, spanning ranks of Lt. Col to Major Generals, may have been motivated bu considerations other than those of the public interest. Is it mere coincidence that they are mainly from the Southeast and southern states?”

The constitutional lawyer warned office holders not to exhibit arrogance of power, by not forgetting that they are elected by the people and are expected to serve the people.

On the economy, he said the present situation is the worst ever in the country’s history. He added: “We call on the government to address the immediate causes of the recession, which are linked to the activities of the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA) aimed at avenging the injustices perpetrated against the area. They should be engaged in dialogue, not disdainfully rebuffed with thtreats to crush them as insurgents; they are only militants protesting against injustice, like the Boko Haram insurgents. The government should find answers to the recession, and not indulge the self-deceit of blaming it past administrations.”

October 25, 2016
Arrested judges should step aside, says Nwabueze

Elder statesman and constitutional lawyer Prof. Ben Nwabueze, has advised the judges arrested by the Department of State Services (DSS) on allegations of corruption to step aside until the allegations levelled against them are resolved.

He also blamed the makeup of the National Judicial Commission (NJC) for the rot in the judiciary, saying it is not the appropriate body for the functions assigned to it.

Backing the call made by the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) that judges whose houses were recently invaded by the Department of State Security Services (DSS) and currently facing allegations of corruption should step aside until their cases are sorted out, Nwabueze said: “If I were one of the judges, I will not feel comfortable sitting on the throne of justice.

“I will feel most uncomfortable and embarrassed.

“I will step aside until investigations are carried out and I am vindicated.

“That is why I agree entirely with the position taken by the NBA. Let them step aside.

“But, unfortunately, it may turn out in the end that they are innocent.”

Asked what he would have done differently with regard to the allegations against the judges, Nwabueze said he would not have used the DSS to handle the matter, adding that what the agency has done amounts to usurping the duties of the police.

He said the instrument provided by the constitution to handle such matters is the police.

He added: “I would have used the police, incompetent as they are, to investigate the allegation thoroughly, and any judge found wanting after investigation would be prosecuted.

“I won’t spare anybody, but I won’t do this Gestapo style of investigation.”

Nwabueze said though the judiciary is “stinking with corruption,” it is not necessary to undermine its credibility.

He added: “We should find a way of investigating and prosecuting those who are corrupt, but not by this police state method.

“You can’t disgrace an institution because of one or two rotten eggs. There is a better way to do it.

“But here you have a President that is already prejudiced against the judiciary. He doesn’t believe in all these democratic methods.

“He believes in personal power and the National Security Act has equipped him with the personal power that he wants, and he is exploiting it.

“That act should be expunged from our statute book. “

Nwabueze said the NJC has not acquitted itself well with regard to fighting corruption within the judiciary, and that this is owing to the fact it does not have enough powers.

He said: “The NJC is not the appropriate body for the functions assigned to it.

“The body needs to be revamped for the effective discharge of the functions assigned to it.

“It is meant to be a body to discipline judges, but because it is made up of judges, it cannot work.”

The constitutional lawyer, 85, said beyond the NJC, a lot of things are wrong with the country’s legal system.

These, he said, include the system of investigation and prosecution of the police, which is not efficient.

“It is slow, cumbersome and the problem is compounded by corruption. It is corruption that has made it slow,” he added.

October 22, 2016
‘Ekwueme, Anyaoku, Nwabueze not IPOB commanders’

The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has said that its preferring Dr. Alex Ekwueme, Emeka Anyaoku, Ben Nwabueze and others to negotiate on its behalf did not mean “these great Igbo elders are IPOB commanders”.

A statement by the spokesmen Emma Nmezu and Dr. Clifford Iroanya said the clarification was necessary because “some enemies of peace have deliberately and mischievously twisted our suggestion to mean that they are members of IPOB”.

The statement reads: “It has come to our notice that avowed enemies of peace have mischievously twisted our suggestion that the visiting US congressional delegation meet with Anyaoku, Ekwueme, Nwabueze and others, to mean that these gentlemen have suddenly become IPOB members. This is not so, hence this clarification.

“Three weeks ago, the US Consular General visited the Southeast on a fact-finding mission. Surprisingly, he met with the APC executives in Enugu State and predatory elements of moribund Ohanaeze Ndigbo, where road construction, second Niger Bridge, appointment for more Ndigbo into Buhari’s cabinet e.t.c, were presented to the delegation as reasons for our agitation.

“Two days ago, another US delegation, led by a senior staff of the US embassy in Nigeria, met with Ohanaeze at Nike Lake Hotel, Enugu, over our agitation for freedom from the hostile prison called Nigeria.

“Well-meaning and conscientious people expressed outrage and shock, wondering why these delegations are avoiding the most credible names from our political space.

“World over, fact-finding teams usually seek out the most credible names in their search for the truth, not organisations like Ohanaeze, that are well known as political jobbers and government errand boys, whose sole agenda is how to establish a self-serving relationship with the present government as they always do and have done with previous governments.

“IPOB maintains our position that these visiting delegation ought to endeavour to meet and speak with credible names like Anyaoku, Nwabueze, Ekwueme, and co. That does not mean they are IPOB commanders.

“Convinced that over 90 per cent of our people are standing with IPOB today, we dare the Nigerian government to organise a referendum to ascertain the authenticity of our demand to freedom. Our assertion that these and future delegations endeavour to meet with Ekwueme, Anyaoku and co, did not make them IPOB commanders. We also would wish them to meet with other credible opinion leaders from the clergy, traditional rulers, town union leaders, and even student union.

“Discreetly arranging them to meet with Ohanaeze and scurry away the next day is suspicious, more importantly, hiding their visit from IPOB, whose agitation led to their visit in the first place is dubious.

“This clarification became necessary because we learnt from these great men that some journalists are sending them emails asking them if it is true they have been appointed IPOB commander.”

March 11, 2016
IPOB picks Ekwueme, Anyaoku, Nwabueze to negotiate on its behalf

The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has chosen Dr Arthur Nwankwo, Dr Alex Ekwueme, Archbishop Anthony Obinna, Gen. Alex Maduebo (rtd), and some others to negotiate on its behalf.

A statement by its spokesmen Emma Nmezi and Clifford Iroanya described the chosen elders as “credible and bold to speak the truth without being easily compromised”.

The statement reads: “It has come to our notice that some selfish individuals, who deliberately misconstrue our genuine intentions towards the restoration of Biafra, are parading themselves as custodians of our present agitation.

“We have been reliably informed that Ohanaeze Ndigbo has hijacked the proposed visit of US Congressmen to Biafraland, thereby positioning themselves as the mouthpiece of IPOB. This is a blatant lie; we have not mandated this group to represent us in any capacity.

“That US Congressmen are in Biafraland today because of the hard work of IPOB. If anyone is concerned about the plight of Ndigbo, they should initiate an action plan to address them, not waiting for the blood of Biafrans to be shed so they can pontificate on the way forward.

“We do not deal with washed out political contractors and compromised merchants of misery speaking for us. We value our reputation and warn that anybody dealing with any group that is not IPOB under the command of Nnamdi Kanu, our detained leader, is engaging in an exercise of futility.

“Our focus now is to ensure our leader’s release before negotiations. We would view anyone discussing or attempting to cut a deal without the knowledge of IPOB’s leadership as an enemy of the people.

“IPOB has chosen Dr Arthur Nwankwo, Dr Alex Ekwueme, Archbishop Anthony Obinna, Gen. Alex Maduebo, Prof Ben Nwabueze, and Chief Emeka Anyoku as credible elders who will speak the truth without compromise.”

March 10, 2016
Nwabueze on corruption and national question
My attention was drawn to Prof. Ben Nwabueze’s write-up on the Buhari administration’s war on corruption by Steve Osuji in his Friday, October 23 column in The Nation titled: Nwabueze on Buhari: Elders as critics? The write-up may have appeared as some advice for President Muhammadu Buhari, but to the discerning, it was another tirade against the president’s anti-corruption crusade from the so-called Igbo Leaders of Thought of which the esteemed constitutional scholar is its public face – if not its sole member – going by the fact that the elder statesman is the only signatory to the organization’s always negative stance either through articles or advertorials on policy issues of the Buhari administration.

The first strand of Nwabueze’s piece was his patently odious plea to Buhari and Nigerians in general that “corruption is not Nigeria’s Number One Enemy.” The other leg was his tutorials that our inability to recognize that the socio-cultural underpinning of Nigeria’s ethnic nationalities has always been the bane of our growth and development and not corruption, which he crystallized into what he called the “National Question.”

For starters, Nwabueze marshaled all the strengths he could muster to advance his argument that eradicating corruption should not be our over-arching priority, but finding a lasting solution to the National Question. Like the strength of an octogenarian, Nwabueze’s vigorous defence of his National Question at the expense of the most egregious, in-your-face, and heaven-may-fall corruption never witnessed in Nigeria’s history that happened under Jonathan’s watch became feeble at best. It beats one’s imagination why Nwabueze would continue to discount the mood of the Nigerian electorate who wanted corruption to be concretely tackled once and for all. More importantly, our erudite statesman may have inadvertently frittered away his moral authority with his position on corruption. Nwabueze it was who, before the presidential election, told his Igbo nation that it would be in their best economic interest to re-elect Jonathan even when it had become very glaring to Nigerians and the international community that the “shoeless boy” from Otuoke had made corruption the fundamental objectives and directive principles of state policy. Before his first trip to the United States after his inauguration, it was the same Nwabueze who told President Buhari to “let bygone be bygone” by not lifting a finger against this hydra-headed corruption monster.

As much as it is within the rights of our eminent scholar to weigh in on issues of national importance with a view to giving the nation his perspectives that comes with age and rigorous intellectual analysis, the heart of the matter may be that Nwabueze is finding it very difficult to live down the fact of Jonathan’s electoral loss. It’s baffling that the same Nwabueze, who admitted that “the revulsion against corruption that has involved trillions of naira worth of crude oil pirated from the country’s oil wells by government officials and their agents/associates… [that] reached the highest pitch of outright thievery in the last years of the President Goodluck Jonathan administration, and has given rise to widespread yearning for decisive action against it” would call the president’s war on corruption a “make-belief” that “rests less on concrete actions and results actually accomplished and more on propagandist talk…purposely designed to charm the minds and hearts of people, already eagerly yearning for action.”

It is not uncommon for an octogenarian such as our revered legal luminary to have forgotten so soon that it was not his personal or intellectual influence, nor the votes of his South-east region of which he’s its Leader of Thought that threw up Buhari to once again attempt to clean the Augean stable, but the Nigerian electorate that gave Buhari the clear electoral mandate strictly on account of the “three fights” he said he would engage in if elected, which included wrestling down the corruption monster in accordance with democratic tenets. For Buhari to now act otherwise which is Nwabueze’s preferred option in his latest write-up, would have been grossly irresponsible and out of character for a leader who has been lauded around the world as having the highest integrity quotient in Nigeria’s leadership history. Buhari does not need “propagandist talk…designed to charm the minds and hearts of [the] people” who handed him the incontrovertible mandate to do something about corruption.

It’s difficult for one not to wonder that Nwabueze’s ‘injunction’ to PMB to abandon his corruption war is not some frantic and insidious attempt to protect certain geo-political interest that predominated in the Jonathan administration and had used the opportunity maximally to cash-in. Otherwise, why was Nwabueze unhappy that Jonathan and some of his key ministers are being demonized with what Nigerians now know as facts? Nwabueze may have been relieved that Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala has shamed her enemies because she was not the Jonathan’s minister that allegedly carted away as much as $6 billion. But our former Minister of Finance and the Coordinating Minister of the Economy may one day have her day in court because even though $20 billion may not be missing as alleged by the erstwhile Central Bank governor, now the Emir of Kano, she admitted that what was missing was $10 billion, which was never accounted for before the termination of a government in which she held the country’s purse strings.

Since “President Buhari does not qualify to be hailed and idolized as liberator and national hero…unless and until he effectively and successfully comes to grips with the National Question which Nwabueze went further to describe “as Nigeria’s predominating and daunting problem [that have] been left largely untackled over the years”, one must wonder why our renowned constitutional scholar did not advise Jonathan to set up a real and authentic national conference that would have addressed the National Question once and for all when he had the golden opportunity to properly reposition the country in the six years he was in the saddle.

Nwabueze’s allusion that the president’s “inadequate educational qualification, which disables him from understanding fully…the complex ideas and issues involved in governing Nigeria” was most disingenuous. It was a deliberate disregard and wanton disrespect for a man who had not only held all the important positions in the land including its chief of state, but a man adjudged by world leaders as having the right leadership credentials of integrity, discipline and incorruptibility. It’s such an unfortunate irony that these attributes were first identified in Buhari not by our acclaimed intellectual powerhouse like Nwabueze, but by some stark and hopelessly illiterate Nigerians from the arid north who would probably first turn a book upside down before they would struggle to pronounce even a word. Sometimes we can learn a thing or two from those we call ‘dummies.’ For Nwabueze to be asking President Buhari to focus his energy on the National Question at this material time is akin to a doctor first spending his precious time asking a patient on life-support about his relationship with his neighbours. Nigeria must be stabilized first by Buhari’s surgical operations of obliterating the Boko Haram insurgency, the killing of corruption before it kills her, and recalibration of the economy that will open up job opportunities for our teeming jobless youths. It’s only then that the nation can have the strength and energy to seriously address Nwabueze’s National Question.
- Odere is a media practitioner. He can be reached at femiodere@gmail.com
November 5, 2015
Youths honour Ekwueme, Nwabueze, others

Former Vice President in Second Republic, Dr. Alex Ekwueme was among leaders honoured by the Igbo Youth Movement (IYM) in Enugu.

Others were ministerial nominee Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu, former Secretary General of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Prof. Ben Nwabueze and author and traditional ruler, Igwe Vincent Chukwuemeka Ike.

The occasion was the 16th anniversary of the IYM, an event which Onu described as an assemblage of the best of the best in Igbo land.

Actor and comedian Mr. John Okafor (Mr. Ibu) was also honoured.

They were considered to have distinguished themselves in the service to the Igbo nation and the entire country.

Another actor and comedian Chief Chika Okpala spice up the event with jokes.

The major plank of the occasion was saving the Igbo language and culture from extinction. And a quiz competition was held among pupils from post primary schools in that regard. In all six pupils from various schools contested and the winner carted home the first prize of N50,000, while the first and second runner up went home with N30,000 and N20,000 respectively.

Interesting aspect of the quiz was the failure of the pupils to give correct answers to the questions: “who was the vice president of Nigeria in 1979?” and “who was the first executive governor of Abia state?” The personalities referred to by the questions were right there sitting before them and were introduced as such before the quiz.

President of IYM, Evang. Elliot Uko told the gathering at the prestigious Nike Lake Resort that the idea of the quiz was to ensure that the Igbo Language and culture did not get extinguished. He lamented the situation where Igbo parents no longer speak Igbo language to their children and it was more pathetic to see Igbo children in Igboland that could not speak Igbo language. “Go to Ajegunle, you will see Igbo children whose parents are both Igbo but can only speak English and Yoruba,” Uko emphasized.

Coming to the awards of honour, the IYM leader insisted that the group does not hounour money bags and those with questionable interest in the course of Ndigbo. It as well do not honour governors and other lip service politicians but honour those who are role models of Igboland.

“It is for those leaders and distinguished men and women who showed and beamed the light for for others to follow”, said Uko.

Ekwueme and Nwabueze were honored with the plague of “Visionary leaders for Sacrificial leadership to Fatherland” while Ogbonnaya Onu was honored with the plague of “Decency in Politics, Honourable and Perseverance”.

Ekwueme in his response regretted that Igbo language and culture was gradually going into extinction. He pointedly stated that predator of Igbo language is English. “It is disheartening that each time an Igbo meets a fellow Igbo man, they exchange greetings and communicate in English language. We should try and make the Igbo language and culture things of pride”, he counseled.

Ekwueme recalled that when he was sworn in as the vice president in 1979, he was adorning full Igbo attire.

Nw abueze in his own response said Ndigbo should not allow the Igbo language get lost, particularly this generation. “Our generation is passing. We look up to those of you in their forties to take the baton from us. Leadership is not a joke. Let those of you in their forties and fifties brace up and take the mantle,” Nwabueze challenged.

Ogbonnaya Onu said It is widely known that a people without history is like a car without petrol.” It is when a people know who they are and what they represent that they can better organize themselves in the pursuit of both individual achievement and collective fulfillment. It is with this that they can muster the necessary will to play an important role in a society’s development process.

“Today, our society is faced with the danger that the Igbo language may not survive for long. It is sad that most of our children find it difficult to communicate in our native tongue. The attraction of foreign values has become almost an obsession that has weakened our self confidence and injured our self esteem. We give alien names to our children as if the saying; “tell me your name and I will tell you who you are”, is no longer true. We celebrate alien ways of life and denigrate our own indigenous practices. Festivals and observances which defined our beliefs and identity are no longer being observed as they should.

He assured: “I wish to assure you all that the APC led Federal Government of President MohammaduBuhari will initiate visionary and sustained efforts to help Nigerians rediscover their rich past. In doing so, such efforts will be guided by the knowledge that cultural reawakening is an important tool in the economic, social and political development of our beloved country. It will also draw strength from the history of development efforts in other parts of the world which tailored their development processes to meet the peculiar cultural demands of their respective peoples. It will promote cultural renaissance as a conscious effort to build a new Nigerian civilization that will win respect for the nation in the global arena.”

October 23, 2015
Nwabueze counsels Buhari on appointments

•Appointments should reflect equity and social justice

Foremost legal scholar Prof. Ben Nwabueze has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to respect the principles of justice and equity, warning that any deviation from them ould constitute a violation of the constitution.

He also advised the President to administer the country in a way that will create doubts about his commitment to one Nigeria, true federalism and national unity.

The former university don criticised what he described as President Buhari’s “dictatorial disregard of the commands of the constitution,” adding that the neglect of the Southeast in his recent appointments was worrisome.

He said the appointments clearly revealed that the President has discriminated against the Ndigbo, thereby subjecting the race to a feeling of alienation.

Nwabueze stressed: “By concentrating in the North nearly 80 per cent of his 31 strategic appointments and by excluding the Northeast completely, a feeling of alienation, of not being wanted, may have been created on the part of those so disadvantage or excluded. A feeling of alienation may grow into that of disaffection and disloyalty.”

He added: “If the state is he product of a social contract, then, all citizens should count equally in relation to it.”

Nwabueze said, for Nigeria to justify its status as a democratic state, it should treat its stakeholders with fairness and promote equity and social justice.

The legal scholar lamented that President Buhari has not accorded priority to equality, advising him to make amends.

He said: “The actions of President Buhari since his assumption of office seem to fly in the face of the necessity for equal treatment of citizens, regardless of differences in ethnicity and in their religious and political affiliations, and of the compelling rationale for the principle of equal treatment as articulated above.”

September 8, 2015
Why Buhari must ignore, Nwabueze, Clark, Okunronmu

I think President Buhari should worry more about how to keep his own side of the social contract with Nigerian voters. Elders who claim to speak for Ohaneze and old Afenifere, associations of less than ten veteran politicians, saw no evil and heard no evil. Now that the chickens have come home to roost, elders who behaved as if they didn’t have stakes in Nigeria are using their control and influence of the media to jam our earlobes with howling newspaper headlines such as ‘outrage grows across Nigeria’, ‘more outrage over Buhari appointments’, ‘Buhari’s lopsided appointments’ split the north’, ‘Buhari’s war against the south’etc

And why is the country being heated up? The APC spokesman Lai Mohammed and Governor Adam Oshiomhole made some disturbing disclosures. They claimed N3.8 trillion of the N8.1 trillion earned from crude oil between 2012 and 2015 was not accounted for by NNPC; they spoke of $2.1b unauthorised withdrawal from the excess crude account; missing N109.7b royalty from oil firms;N6b allegedly looted by ministers, 160b barrels of crude worth $13.9b lost between 2009 and 2012.; $15m from botched arms deal with South Africa and N183b yet to be accounted for in NNDC, $700m taken from the Sovereign Wealth Account for the second Onitsha Bridge without any bridge and the money-gobbling Onitsha-Owerri-Enugu dual carriage that is leading nowhere. Added to all these are ‘a mind-shattering $2.2billion-arms scandal and an alleged $6.9 million fraud by chief of security (CS)) to ex-president Jonathan committed under the guise of buying three mobile stages for Jonathan’s campaign

But these are all mere allegations which according to Olisa Mentuh, PDP spokesman are ‘irresponsible, reckless and provocative ‘bandied imaginary figures’. But while one would have expected our respected Nwabueze to wait for the judicial process to start, he chose to issue a statement titled ‘Corrupt Practices: “Igbo leaders position on probe of past governments’, where he argued against limiting the probe to the administration of Jonathan which according to him ‘would be ‘selective, unjust and unfair’. He speculated that such a probe will be used to humiliate political opponents of government. The question to ask is why Prof. Nwabueze has chosen to fight for those who have neither been accused nor charged. As for Chief Edwin Clark, ex-president Obasanjo who he alleged is corrupt must first be probed. But for many, that Chief Clark is only just discovering that Obasanjo is corrupt after he had single handedly promoted Jonathan from deputy governor to governor, vice-president, and President with grateful Jonathan describing Obasanjo as the third most important influence on his life after God and his parents is a measure of the quality of his advice to Jonathan who ended up describing Obasanjo as a ‘motor park tout’.

And those who have taken up arms over appointment forget we run a presidential system where the buck ends on the presidents table. As soon as Buhari named Dr Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu as the Group MD of NNPC, an institution that controls over 75% of the nations earning, Dr. Ezeife, who had openly expressed lack of faith in Buhari, said the position was not enough for the Igbo. But with the filling of some 30 positions, ranging from his chief of staff, national security adviser and SGF, a post he gave to a pastor from one of the minority ethnic groups in the north, perhaps as an answer to Dr Eziefe and others who said they mobilised against Buhari for fear of Islamisation of the country, these permanent Igbo office seekers have decided to heat up the polity. They now say the SGF position recently vacated by Anyim Pius Anyim ought to have been ceded to Igbo by a president they said they don’t trust. Didn’t he say he “belongs to all and he belongs to no one”? – they reasoned. And suddenly Kachikwu ceased being an Igbo man but a Delta Igbo. And those who have suddenly forgotten South-South and South-East cornered 30 out of the forty most important parastatals in the country only yesterday, ostensibly on behalf of the Igbo poor are now set to wage war against Buhari for appointing those he trusted. The thousands of offices yet to be filled, they openly argue, is not as important as being a member of the kitchen cabinet of a president they said they would mobilise against if another opportunity comes up tomorrow.

Self serving Igbo leaders who fraudulently swear in the name of their people to secure positions have their counterparts in the Yoruba country. The self-styled Southern Nigeria Peoples Assembly (SNPA) hosted by Mimiko in Akure last week where President Buhari was criticised for what was described as “his lopsided appointments and selective war against corruption”, was the same group which in January this year endorsed Jonathan for reelection in Enugu. Unfortunately at the Akure gathering, Mimiko and his relevance-seeking group spoke not for the Yoruba but for themselves. Yoruba are often more concerned about a leadership that will guarantee fairness and justice for all. As Bode Thomas argued during the constitutional debate leading to independence, Yoruba quest for regionalism was to prevent the country from being subjected to the rule of a one-eyed-king. During the 1959 elections, Awo offered to serve as Zik’s deputy. He voluntarily resigned as Finance Secretary and de facto Prime Minister under Gowon after the civil war. If Yoruba supported MKO Abiola in 1993, it was because he was the best material in that election, a fact confirmed by his landslide victory all over the country including military barracks and in Kano where Tofa was floored in his constituency. Yoruba rejected Ernest Shonekan the impostor and was literally chased out of power through the judicial process. It was for the same reason Yoruba rejected Obasanjo who lost his Abeokuta ward election in 1999 when the military and those who constituted themselves into the hegemonic power bloc in Nigeria graciously decided to allow a Yoruba man become president. In the not too distant past, the Yoruba supported Tambuwal to become the Speaker of the seventh assembly against a Yoruba candidate. It is therefore a disservice to the Yoruba nation for Mimiko to give a wrong impression that the Yoruba are fighting Buhari’s government they helped to put in place over appointments.

The mood of the nation today allows Buhari to ignore the noises of errant elders, and if he so desires, seek from his Daura village a minister for Abuja Territory who would not cede prime Abuja land to a sitting president, his wife and a Secretary to government, Ministers of Petroleum and Finance who will not jointly preside over the theft and disbursement of N1,7triilion to fuel fraudsters, a Minister of Defence who will be loyal to Nigeria instead of fighting the president’s dirty political wars in the colours of ‘Ekitigate’, pacification of Oshun and disruption of public work with soldiers in Lagos, a Minster of Education who will not be too engrossed mobilising militants for the president’s reelection bid while universities and polytechnics shut down for close to a year and a Minister of Internal Affairs who will not fleece young job seekers of over N1b and end up supervising state murder of some of them through sloppy arrangement. And if it is from Daura he can find a replica of ‘Kashikwu’, said to be a round peg in a round hole for NNPC, to clean up other stinking parastatals, he has the support of Nigerians.

September 3, 2015
Attacks on Buhari’s war against corruption – The case of Nwabueze

Last week’s piece on Bishop Mathew Hassan Kukah’s objections to President Muhammadu Buhari’s declared war on corruption during Dr. Goodluck Jonathan’s presidency, has elicited by far the largest number of reactions to this column so far this year – 84 texts and three emails in all. Out of the 84 texts, only three vehemently disagreed with my criticism of the bishop. Another six or so shared my view, but disagreed with my hunch that religion had much to do with the bishop’s position. The rest were critical of him with no caveats.

I think the number of the readers’ reactions alone suggests that most Nigerians, regardless of religion or tribe, consider the fight against corruption the country’s topmost priority. If my guess is right, Professor Ben Nwabueze must then belong to a minority who think otherwise. For the professor, religion, specifically Islam, and not corruption, poses the greatest threat to Nigeria’s peace and progress.

In an over 3,300-word interview in The PUNCH of August 9 he said so categorically. Asked by the newspaper if he agreed with the widespread public opinion that corruption posed the biggest challenge the country faces, he said no. Corruption, he said, was only “the second biggest.”

The first, he said, “is the crisis arising from the religious divide. That is the first and the most terrible. After that comes corruption. All other things are subsidiaries.”

Our Constitution, he said, contained two contradictory ideologies, one favoured by Christianity and the other by Islam. The ideology preferred by Christianity, he said, is democracy, whereas that preferred by Islam which is based on Sharia or Islamic Law “favours theocracy and other forms of dictatorial rule.”

The conflict between these two ideologies, he said, has landed the country in the middle of a big crisis which, he said in effect, Buhari is incapable of resolving in favour of democracy because he is an agent of Islamic theocracy.

“He,” the professor said, “has many restraints; he has many constraints. He is not a free agent. Whatever may be his personal characteristics, he is not a free agent. HE WAS CHOSEN AS THE APC’S (ALL PROGRESSIVES CONGRESS’) PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE AT THE PRIMARY FOR A PURPOSE; TO TRY TO IMPLEMENT AN AGENDA. I WON’T GO ANY FURTHER. His ability, his capacity to fight corruption decisively is constrained and restrained by some factors, mostly religious.” (Emphasis mine).

As a professor, especially of law and, for that matter, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Nwabueze should know better than reach a verdict based on conjecture rather than facts. Clearly, however, his barely disguised conclusion that Buhari was elected the presidential candidate of APC to impose an Islamic theocracy on Nigeria is without any basis in fact.

No doubt religion is important to Nigerians as a means of identity. A survey in the country ahead of the April 21, 2007 presidential elections by the American Pew Research Centre titled “Nigeria’s Presidential Election: The Christian-Muslim Divide” suggested that the vast majority of its people regarded religion as more important for their identity than their nationality, ethnicity and continent. Among Christians the percentage was 76 for religion as against nine for nationality, six for ethnicity and eight for the continent. For Muslims the percentages were 91, five, zero and three.

The same survey, however, showed that both groups favoured democracy over any other form of government. Among Christians the percentage of those who said free and fair elections with a choice of at least two political parties were “somewhat or very important” was 86 as against 13 who said it was “not too or not at all important.” The percentages for Muslims were 93 and four.

It’s been eight years and two presidential elections since Pew’s survey. However, given the enthusiasm with which Nigerians have participated in those elections, it is very clear that they have not changed their minds about their preference for democracy whatever their religion.

That enthusiasm alone must make one wonder on what basis our learned professor reached his verdict that Nigeria faces a greater danger from our religious differences than from corruption.

In his interview, Nwabueze at first says he would not spell out the powers constraining Buhari from fighting corruption and propelling him to impose Islamic theocracy on Nigeria. “I won’t,” he said, “go any further” in naming Buhari’s puppeteers.

Over halfway through the interview, however, he went ahead all the same to name two. The first, he says, is “the invisible government of Nigeria” whose existence is known to only a few. The other, he says, is “a group of die-hard Islamists determined to impose Islamic (Sharia) system of government on Nigeria.”

The first group, he claimed, is led by former military president, General Ibrahim Babangida and former head of state, General Abdulsalami Abubakar. The group, he added, has been strengthened by former president, Olusegun Obasanjo, who has since left the erstwhile ruling Peoples Democratic Party.

He named no names in his group of “die-hard Islamists,” but elsewhere in the interview he did say Boko Haram was a manifestation of the group as the local wing of global jihadists.

Conspiracy theories come at dozens a kobo. However, the professor’s theories of an “invisible government” led by Babangida dictating policies and programmes to President Buhari, and of the leadership of Boko Haram sect as yet another godfather of Buhari, must rank as one of the cheapest form of demagoguery. Certainly it ranks as the most laughable because it is no more than an attempt by an otherwise brilliant scholar to elevate beer-parlour gossip to the level of serious scholarship.

Actually it is worse than laughable because even in beer parlours it would be hard to find anyone who does not know that there has really never been any love lost between Buhari and Babangida since the latter overthrew the former as head of state in August 1985 in a bloodless palace coup. In any case, if the professor’s invisible government truly existed and Babangida was its patriarch, how come he couldn’t even fulfil his proverbial wish to step back in to power since the return of democracy in 1999?

As for General Abdulsalami being a chieftain of Nwabueze’s invisible government, anyone who has followed the man’s military career would testify to the fact that a more apolitical person is hard to find. And only the most credulous person would believe the professor’s claim that Obasanjo, with his huge ego, would play second fiddle to anyone in any group in this country.

In his over 3,000-word, two-part essay published by The Guardian last month which he claimed to be the position of Igbo Leaders of Thought – I have my doubts about his claim because associations of people don’t go announcing their positions through longish essays – he said the group objected to Buhari limiting his probe of corruption to Jonathan’s presidency alone because that would be selective and cannot put an end to the vice.

The professor is obviously right to say that fighting corruption under Jonathan alone is selective. However, he is wrong to argue that the fight will succeed only if it includes corruption under Jonathan’s predecessors all the way back to 1985 under Babangida.

His assumption here is obvious; it is possible to eliminate corruption. That assumption is patently false. As long as there is human society there will be corruption. What is important, however, is to have a system that makes corruption difficult and also punishes the corrupt whenever he is found out. In Nigeria’s history, no administration has made it so easy to steal with so much impunity as Jonathan’s. Such was the impunity that he could not even rely on his men – and women – not to steal the money meant for his election victory, an impunity which resulted in an incumbent losing an election at the national level for the first time in the history of this country.

Because it is not possible to end corruption, the fight against it must never fall into the danger of allowing perfection to be the enemy of the good. Fighting all corrupt cases simultaneously is perfect but even our professor cannot deny that starting with the most obvious case is a good start. Nor can he deny that Jonathan’s presidency holds the gold medal in the race for self-aggrandisement because, as he himself said in The PUNCH interview in question, corruption today has assumed “buccaneering” proportions.

At 84, Professor Nwabueze should be concerned about his legacies. Some of the most notable ones among these are hardly what his children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren can be proud of. Among these is the Unification Decree of 1966 which he was a principal author of and which eventually led to our civil war. Another one he masterminded was the decree which established the Interim National Government under Chief Ernest Shonekan in 1993 which, in turn, paved the way for the venal dictatorship of General Sani Abacha.

In between the two decrees he became – and continues to be – a leading advocate of Nigeria as a federation of ethnic nationalities, a most reactionary idea you can think of in a world that has since become a global village and where the wealthiest countries are melting pots of diverse creeds and cultures instead of patchworks of their constituent parts.

Let it not, in addition, be said of him that here was a man who used his brilliance to try and scuttle the first attempt by any administration in this country to seriously fight corruption.

Note

I am sorry I am unable to reproduce the reactions to the last two pieces today as I promised last week due to space constraint. Next week, God willing, I’ll devote the entire column to some of the reactions.

September 2, 2015