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Tag: Olusegun Obasanjo

  • Where’s the ‘third force’?

    It was former President Olusegun Obasanjo who, in recent history, touted the doctrine of a third force in Nigerian politics.

    In a fiery open letter to President Muhammadu Buhari last January, he shredded the incumbent’s performance credentials and pitched in against his seeking another term of office. Obasanjo, however, sensed he was up against a brick wall with his gratuitous counsel as far as it pertains to the president and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC); but he also foreclosed a return to the old path of nationhood when the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was in the saddle. And so, he threw up the idea of a third force as his proposed alternative.

    The former head of state said the PDP now in opposition had not shown better behavioural traits than when it was in power. “As the leader of that party for eight years as president of Nigeria, I can categorically say there is nothing to write home about in their new team. We have only one choice left to take us out of Egypt to the Promised Land, and that is the coalition of the concerned and the willing – ready for positive and drastic change, progress and involvement,” he wrote.

    Obasanjo didn’t seem to think through how the third force would emerge as a veritable force, independent of the first and second forces that he sought to consign to the history bin though. Besides, his conceptualisation of the new force was notoriously foggy. But he did make some attempt at sketching its basics, saying the force should be a movement that need not be a political party – one to which all well-meaning Nigerians can belong. “That movement must be a coalition for democracy, good governance, social and economic well-being and progress, a coalition to salvage and redeem our country,” he explained.

    Although he granted that nothing should in the course of time stop such a movement from satisfying prescribed conditions for fielding candidates for elections, the ex-president said he would relinquish its membership at that point so that he could, for his part, remain non-partisan.

    Obasanjo presented his idea of a third force as a civic action and public-centred movement, if only in the short to medium term by his envisioning. His motives have never been widely trusted to be altruistic, and he seems too fixated already with a personal agenda to orchestrate Buhari out of power. But we must isolate the ‘third force’ idea, which on face value touts a promise to widen the scope of citizens role-playing in the political space. Few other groupings have touted a similar promise, such as the National Intervention Movement led by eminent rights lawyer Olisa Agbakoba and the Red Card Movement inspired by respected civil activist Oby Ezekwesili. None has, however, mustered the political impact of Obasanjo’s proposition.

    Perhaps owing to the ex-president’s spurious motive, the third force idea was still-birthed on arrival and Obasanjo is himself back in the partisan fray. But that is to be expected, because from the moment he broached the idea, noting has stayed true to the avowed fundamentals. On the heels of Obasanjo outing with the proposal, for instance, his political ally and former Osun State Governor, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, stepped up to arrowhead a membership drive. But like Oyinlola, notable responders were mainly political actors recycled from this country’s inglorious past.

    In apparent desperation to get into electoral action, the purported movement was hastily collapsed last May into a political party, namely the African Democratic Congress (ADC). The ADC itself has since then pooled with a number of other political groupings to integrate their 2019 agenda with that of the PDP through a recent memorandum of understanding. That, perhaps, explains why most PDP presidential aspirants have visited Obasanjo at his Abeokuta, Ogun State, base to seek his blessing.

    On the other hand, some other parties have signed up to a working alliance with the APC in pursuit of Buhari’s re-election bid in 2019. Hence, the political space remains dominated by two-force contestation.

    It isn’t that our country is under-served in terms of existing political parties. Nigeria presently has a motley crowd of 91 parties – with 23 new parties registered recently by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in addition to the 68 that previously existed on the commission’s roll. Only that most of those parties are no more than what they ostensibly are: nominal existences on INEC’s records.

    Worse is that with no restrictive criteria in our electoral laws for parties to be placed on the ballot, the huge number of registered parties promises to compound INEC’s logistics for conducting future elections. Consider, for instance, the bogus size of ballot paper that would be required to reflect every political party – pretenders as well as true contenders – fielding candidates in an election.  Besides, nominal parties have a hidden potential to play the spoiler in electoral outcomes by nitpicking rules for the conduct of elections and laying ambush against inadvertent lapses by other players in the process to contend the validity of results. Yet, INEC must keep registering new parties as our country’s electoral law provides once minimum conditions are met.

    It isn’t that the huge number of parties is in itself the challenge. India perhaps has the largest number of political parties – totalling 2,075 as at April 2018, and with more yet getting registered. But the Indian system clearly defines territorial relevance for its parties, such that the country has only two parties namely the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Indian National Congress (INC), simply called Congress, dominating its national politics. Israel, with a voter population of just about 6million persons, as well has numerous political parties. The country, however, operates the proportional representation system that accommodates many of those parties in its 120-seat Knesset (parliament) and compels every emerging prime minister and his/her party to negotiate coalitions with other parties.

    Nigeria, for her part, operates the first-pass-the-post, winner-takes-all model that gives dominant political parties a permanent edge over all others; hence the unyielding two-force nature of our electoral space. The United States from which we adopted the model as well has dozens of political parties, but few ever get to qualify for ballot placement because there are stipulated preconditions that vary from state to state.

    Besides, many of those parties have sundry objectives that are not limited to seeking electoral offices; these include climate change, environmental issues, and as well controversial rules of social conduct like same sex rights and marijuana use. Only the Republican and Democratic parties cross-cut all 50 states and Washington DC in seeking offices, hence the bi-party nature of that country’s electoral system. The difference in Nigeria is that there are no restrictions for ballot access, and so weak parties wheel and deal in and out of electoral contestations without offering the electorate any real alternative.

    But we do need the third force – to be sure, not according to Obasanjo’s warped image of it – to moderate the mutually aggressive contestation for power by the existing two-force blocs, and make space for ordinary citizens to play a greater role in the political process. Among other things, we need that third force to instill the code that politicians can’t prostitute with membership of political parties out of sheer self-interest, without bearing the cost in the form of rejection by voters at future elections. We need the third force to prove the point that political power lies with the people, it is only delegated and could well be withdrawn from partisans during elections.

    The beauty is: you can be a part of that force simply by getting your voter card ready for the impending 2019 elections.

    • Please join me on kayodeidowu.blogspot.be for conversation. 

    (This piece was first used some four weeks ago. It has been slightly updated and is being reused here in view of the topicality of its focus).

  • An emboldened presidency takes the fight to its traducers

    It is not funny that whereas in decent jurisdictions, lawyers are known to be promoters of decency and decorum in the polity, it is mostly the reverse in Nigeria.

    They are a legion and for so long the presidency was their plaything.  But no more. Ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo had started out on about the busiest pilgrimage to the Villa but I think he met more than his match in the Katsina mafia that has the president firmly encircled from the get go. And the music changed. There had been a slew of reasons on the social media as to why it became impossible for President Muhammadu Buhari to meet the many alleged requests of the pilgrim but to the honest observer, many of them are out rightly outrageous and most unlikely to issue from Obasanjo who, nonetheless, has never hidden his heartfelt desire to rule Nigeria from behind the shadows. So consuming was this that he single-handedly inflicted his two successive successors on the country in what would, on the long run, prove to be no more than a chimera.

    He has started out on a very cordial basis with Buhari and regularly frequented the Villa until the bubble burst but the man who has made it his business to harass, lecture or thoroughly flagellate every other Nigerian head of state, besides himself, will not let this latest insult go unrewarded.

    Why?

    In what  was apparently nothing more than practicalising the Yoruba quip: ‘let us call the mad man the husband of the wife so we can pass easily’, the duo of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Chief Bisi Akande had, in those trying hey days of the APC, when PDP was throwing all manner of roadblocks on its way, led other chieftains of the new party to the highly venerated redoubt  of the former president to  curry favour, and seek his support,  knowing how eagerly he wanted his onetime protégé, President Goodluck  Jonathan, who was the latest of those who shortchanged the mercurial ex-president, out of office. Knowing Obasanjo as we do, he must have arrogated to himself a huge part, if not all, the groundwork to Buhari’s eventual victory in the 2015 presidential election. There was, therefore, an unquestioning entitlement mentality which Buhari and his minders, however, frustrated. Buhari, therefore, must not miss his comeuppance. And that will come furiously much later even if the wily ex- president will couch it as working in the national interest.

    Obasanjo would, albeit, not be the only general who would go after President Buhari. He had come to office brandishing anti-corruption like he doesn’t know where Nigeria’s past military mandarins fit in that narrative. He has shown his hands early in how some military top shots in the Jonathan government were being made to account for the nuisance they constituted to the country while in sensitive offices with many of them ready to plea bargain in cases of heists running into billions of naira. Indeed, one there is who, despite several bails granted him by courts, remains smack in confinement, despite all manner of recriminations from democracy and other groups.  Fear subsequently gripped some of the generals who have no way of knowing whether Buhari, at his second coming, might transmute to that Pharaoh who would not a Joseph know. And there were a glut of reasons to fear least of them, deals in oil blocks, in several billions of dollars unaccounted for, but which transmogrified into eye popping mansions hewn straight out of rocks in several parts of the country and billions of dollars it’s owner knew not how to spend. Naturally, these powerful men could not look askance as Buhari was, fortuitously, away on an extended medical leave outside the shores of Nigeria, and so erupted serpentine conspiratorial meetings about which the citizenry was not   told a thing. Buhari who had, in another era, spent many months in confinement after serving as military Head of State, would not be twice fooled as he had placed, in charge of literally all arms of the nation’s security agencies,  men who under no circumstances, would let him down regardless of the obviously agonising criticisms he had been subjected to on this account.

    But what do the griots say about self preservation being the first order?

    Without a doubt, some blood pressure must have risen a few notches this past week when, as part of the presidency taking its fight  back to its traducers, the vice president, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, in faraway United States, was quoted as saying the following whilst fielding questions from a cross-section of Nigerians at a town hall meeting in Minnesota: “Relying on OPEC statistics on oil revenues accruable to Nigeria under successive administrations between 1990 and 2014, not much was done in infrastructure development in spite of the huge oil revenues earned. Continuing, he said:  under the Babangida/ Abacha administrations (1990 – 1998) Nigeria realised 199.8 billion dollars. Under the Obasanjo / Yar’Adua governments (1999 – 2009), the country got 401.1 billion dollars; and during the Jonathan administration (2010 – 2014), Nigeria got 381.9 billion dollars. “The question that we must all ask is what exactly happened to these huge resources?  Where is the infrastructure? It is necessary to bear in mind that this government, despite earning only 94 billion dollars up until 2017, has spent N1.5 trillion on capital and infrastructural development which is more  than any previous government  since 1990 has spent.”

    Nigerians must ask these people running helter skelter, forming all manner of coalitions, asking Buhari not to contest as if we were in Myanmar when they were in office; and doing everything to assist  the most notoriously corrupt political party ever  in Nigeria, back in power in a bid to see Nigeria itself  finally feature in the Panama papers.

    Nor was Vice President Osinbajo, this past week, alone in this fight back.  Kudos to the Acting Chairman of the EFCC, Mr Ibrahim Magu, who also bared it all, decrying the brazen infractions of some senior lawyers which, he says, border on criminality. He was addressing the annual NBA conference holding in Abuja where he said: “We are very worried that on a number of occasions, some members of the NBA have elected to side with those who do not want the good of Nigeria. I believe it is part of the professional ethical code of lawyers to ask questions as to the source of their clients’ wealth. It is amazing that a senior lawyer can accept professional fees of N1.7 billion naira from a politician without scruples! (I ask: was his brief to sell crude oil?) The same lawyer with a turnover ofN3, 765,414,995.24 only paid valued added tax of N7, 051,928.24.  (Correct. Obviously because he didn’t personally own all the money). Continuing, he said: “The N300million cash payment which the senior lawyer received from a South South state government in an election petition matter in 2016 was never captured in his tax submissions to the Federal Inland Revenue Service. (How can, when he is no fool?)

    “Yet when he got wind of EFCC investigation he was quick to take advantage of the VAIDS window as cover to shield himself from the Commission’s dragnet. Another senior lawyer who is quick to advertise himself as the nemesis of the EFCC, has a turnover of over N5.1billion (where is his factory?) with an assessed total tax liability of over a billion naira between 2010 and 2017. Sadly, he merely declared a meager N8million as gross earnings for 2014 and 2015, and N10million for 2016″ (I suspect these were monies for undeclared payments for other entities and those accounts should be properly scrutinised).”

    He went on, mindful of the danger these people constitute not only to the country, but to their much younger colleagues: “I can go on and on. The catalogue of brazen infractions by senior lawyers that border on criminality is legion. The tragedy is that these so called smart senior lawyers are supposed to be role models for the young lawyers. Young lawyers who worry about their future and the future of the noble profession in Nigeria must rise today and demand the cleansing of the mercantilist tendencies of some of the learned silks. The tragedy is that these so called smart senior lawyers are supposed to be role models for the young lawyers.”

    It is not funny that whereas in decent jurisdictions, lawyers are known to be promoters of decency and decorum in the polity, it is mostly the reverse in Nigeria. Worse is the fact that these are the same persons who have waxed lyrical, writing thesis, upon thesis, querying President Buhari on his take on the rule of law vis a vis national interest, whereas they would think nothing of selling Nigeria for the almighty dollar.

  • Refusal of court orders and refusal to prosecute ‘protected’ criminals: the buck stops with the AGF and the President, but only in the last instance!

    It was Olusegun Obasanjo that first drew my attention to perhaps the single most troubling wart or disfiguration on the body of the rule of law in the post-military period that began in 1999. I am talking of course of the open and notorious defiance of court orders by the federal government of the federation. If I remember correctly, the casus belli was a serious disagreement over control of the local governments of the country, either by the government at the centre or the state governments, with particular reference to Lagos State, the prime disputant or litigant in the case. The Supreme Court ruled in favour of Bola Tinubu and Lagos State, but Obasanjo completely refused to obey the ruling of the highest court in the land, a bad omen for a nation that was just returning to civilian, democratic rule after the long reign of the military dictators.

    I look back to that faceoff between OBJ and the Supreme Court and I must admit to a naivety on my part because I had thought then that Obasanjo could not get away with it. I confess now that I didn’t exactly know who was going to stop Obasanjo and how they were going to achieve that necessary task. All that was on my mind was the expectation, the hope that since we were no longer under military rule, since this was a president in mufti and not in battle fatigues, Obasanjo would be forced to obey the ruling of the highest court in the land. He wasn’t; and moreover, he got away with it, just as if we were still in the age of the all-powerful military autocrats.

    Well, following last week’s column on the Buhari administration’s steadfast refusal of court orders granting Sambo Dasuki bail while being prosecuted for what is perhaps the worst case of mega-looting supervened by one man in our country, my mind went back to this whole issue of defiance of court orders by the federal government in what is supposed to be a post-military, democratic epoch. In my great unease about this matter, I spoke with and exchanged emails with many compatriots. It was in the process of these “conversations” that it occurred to me that there is actually a flip side, an underbelly to the impunity and notoriety of refusal of court orders and this is the unwillingness and ultimately refusal to prosecute protected criminals. This recognition came to me after someone reminded me of the cases of Babachir David Lawal, Abdulrasheed Maina and Ayo Oke all of whom, in spite of the enormity of their crimes, have never been prosecuted by the Buhari administration.

    Dear readers, which is worse – refusal of court orders or an unwillingness amounting to refusal to prosecute protected criminals? Is it even productive to compare and weigh the scale of justice aborted and denied involved in each of them when in fact the two refusals are perpetrated by the same institutional agents? And speaking specifically of the refusal to prosecute, isn’t it probably the case that what we know, what we see is only the tip of an iceberg? For one politically exposed case like that of Babachir Lawal or Abdulrasheed Maina, how many hundreds – perhaps thousands – of unknown miscreants go unheralded and unknown? This is for me the bottom line: the refusal to prosecute proven criminals is the enabling foundation, the condition of possibility for the refusal of court orders that is much better known and more widely condemned simply because it ostensibly carries a much greater political punch against the Buhari administration.

    If all I have so far been saying or arguing in this piece seems rather despondent, let me hasten to say that actually, despondency is not the emotion, the sentiment that I feel. And what is the basis of my optimism, you might ask? Well, simply this: following the “conversations” that ensued after the publication last week of my column on Sambo Dasuki, I went and downloaded a PDF copy of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act of 2015 and reread all the 48 Parts and 495 Sections of it, hoping to find something in it that could provide a way out of the dilemma. It was in the process of this probe into the provisions and intricacies of this exceptionally humanistic and idealistic law that is ACJA that I made a discovery that startled and enthused me. What is this discovery? This is it: whoever is the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) has enormous powers to make the rule of law work in our country, the rule of law in its own right but also with regard to justice, fairness and equity to the downtrodden and the underprivileged in our country.

    To give a sense of the philosophical and ethical bases of ACJA, I quote from the so-called “Explanatory Memorandum” that serves as a sort of preamble to the document:

    This Act provides for the administration of criminal justice system which promotes efficient management of criminal justice institutions, speedy dispensation of justice, protection of society from crimes and protection of the rights and interest of the suspect, the defendant and the victims in Nigeria.

    It is with this “preamble” in mind that one can appreciate the weight that the Parts and Sections dealing with the powers and responsibilities of the Attorney General of the Federation exert on us with their comprehensiveness, their thoroughness and their acuity. Relating this observation to the subject of this discussion, I propose the following reading of the text of ACJA that goes to the heart of the grave dereliction of duty behind the crime of refusal to prosecute protected criminals: it is the AGF not the President, it is Abubakar Malami and not Muhammadu Buhari that is responsible for prosecuting all known cases of criminals in Nigeria. As simple as that? Yes, as simple as that!

    Dear readers and compatriots, many, many times we read or hear of complaints that Buhari it is who does not permit the prosecution of politically exposed criminals like Babachir Lawal and Lawal Daura.  We read of powerful, heartrending protests about thousands of murder suspects in many areas of the country, some of them arrested, that are never prosecuted, with the protests directed at Buhari and not at the AGF. But please, go to the text of ACJA and you will find that the document is very clear, very specific as to where the responsibility lies – with the AGF and not the President. As a matter of fact, there is not a single mention of the post of the President in the text of ACJA!

    Of course, there will be readers who will assert that I am merely quibbling here, that since the AGF is the appointee of the President, non-performance of crucial duties and obligations pertaining to life and death, crime and punishment by the AGF should, in the final analysis, be laid at the feet of the President. I am not quibbling here and neither am I being disingenuous. If ACJA so deliberately and extensively specifies on whose shoulder lies responsibility for justice, fairness and equity for all in the administration of the criminal justice system in Nigeria, why shouldn’t we make that high public and legal officer – the AGF – the primary object of our complaints and protests when justice is aborted and denied? To put this in very concrete terms, what indications do we have that AGF Malami has ever tried at all to have Babachir Lawal prosecuted and was only prevented from doing so by Buhari? None, no indications at all!

    Right now, newspaper headlines and banners are rife with hints that Buhari is about to decide the fate of Lawal Daura. Well, let’s be clear about one thing, at least as far as the law is concerned: it is the AGF and not the President that should take the action necessary to prosecute Lawal Daura for the siege on the National Assembly. Yes, behind the scenes Buhari may direct his AGF not to have Daura prosecuted but in the first instance, calls for Daura’s prosecution should go to the AGF, not the President.

    For those who may still be inclined to think that there really is no serious and consequential distinction to be made between Buhari and Malami on responsibility for the grave dereliction of duty that is behind the refusal to prosecute protected criminals, there is this unassailable aspect of ACJA: it actually stipulates, very extensively, that whoever is the AGF must be a person of great uprightness, conscience and compassion, especially in the interest of the oppressed and the downtrodden of our society. Please, compatriots, do not forget that ACJA came into being on the heels of the great injustice, unfairness and inefficiency that pervade the administration of criminal justice in our country.

    And do not forget, compatriots, that, even now as we are debating these issues, ACJA 2015, in its full dimensions, is yet to be implemented by our law courts, which in effect means that ours is still one of the most unjust legal orders in the world. Think, compatriots, of the thousands killed and or maimed in the herdsmen’s attacks on farmers and their communities, in comparison with the paucity of those arrested for these murderous onslaughts, together with the even more rare instances of their prosecution. Think also, dear readers, of the other thousands murdered through political, militia and inter-communal rampages. These are the things people have in mind when they state that for most of its peoples, Nigeria is not only one of the toughest places on the planet in which to live, it is also one the most regrettable lands in the world in which to die. Also, these are the things that prompted those who drafted ACJA and saw it through from draft to legislation to make the AGF the one on whose shoulder lies its actualization.

    Please do not get me wrong. In the final analysis, the buck stops with both the AGF and the President, with both Malami and Buhari. But only at the very last instance. In the first, second and third instances and up to even the thirty-seventh instance, the buck stops with the AGF and all the Attorney Generals of the 36 states of the federation. In ACJA, the AGF has the responsibility to coordinate the activities of all these other chief law officers of the country. This means that in reality, Abubakar Malami or whoever is the current incumbent of the post at any point in time is the one on whom lies the responsibility.

    In conclusion compatriots, I have one very simple “solution” for this dilemma: push hard, very hard on Malami; insist that so far in his tenure, he has been a great misfit, an unconscionable obstacle to the execution of the obligations and responsibilities of his office; if Buhari stands by him – as I expect that he will – know only then, compatriots, that the buck has moved from the AGF to the President. Only then will we at last come to see that the refusal to obey court orders is nothing if not the other side of the refusal to prosecute protected criminals.

     

    Biodun Jeyifo

    bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu

     

  • Obasanjo, defections can’t stop Buhari – Tinubu

    The National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, on Tuesday said that he was confident President Muhammadu Buhari would win the 2019 elections.

    Tinubu made the statement in Lagos while addressing party members at a stakeholders meeting of the state chapter.

    He said that the president had acquitted himself as a leader so far inspite of the challenges of governance.

    The APC leader condemned what he called the frequent attacks on Buhari-led administration by former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

    He said that the criticisms of Obasanjo were in bad faith, pointing out that he could not stop Nigerians from re-electing the president.

    “Our president, President Muhammadu Buhari has done well, he deserves another term, and we will support him to win because he is our man.

    “Forget about Obasanjo’s letter and his frequent attacks on our president, he cannot stop the president because Nigerians would re-elect him.

    “Obasanjo has spent his own time; he should leave Buhari alone and face his business because he cannot tell us who to vote for.

    Read Also: Tinubu attacks Obasanjo on letters

    “He is part of some of the challenges we are facing in the country today, because he did not lay the right foundation when he was president,” he said.

    Tinubu added that the exit of some members from the APC would also not stop the re-election of President Buhari.

    The chieftain said that the party was unshaken by the defections and was on course to recording victories in the 2019 election.

    Tinubu said that the results of the Kogi,Katsina and Bauchi bye elections, in which the APC was victorious, were a precursor to the pattern of the general elections.

    “I congratulate the winners in the election and their victory is proof that our party is getting more popular by the day.

    “Those who want to defect can defect, that is their problem. APC remains unshaken and these people will know the reality in the election,” he said.

    He commended the National Chairman of the party, Mr Adams Oshiomole, saying members were pleased with what he was doing in the party.

    He said that the direct primary system was good for democracy, and the party would adopt it to conduct its primaries.

    Tinubu urged members to play by the rules in electing candidates at the primaries.

    He urged the members to mobilse others to obtain their Permanent Voter Cards as that was necessary for victory in 2019.

     

    NAN

  • Leave Obasanjo alone, Yoruba group tells Soyinka

    The Yoruba Consultative Forum (YCF) has condemned what it called campaign of undisguised calumny by the Nobel Laurette, Professor Wole Soyinka against former Nigerian President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

    In a release issued in Lagos Tuesday and signed by its President, Professor Tejumade Akintoye Rhodes, YCF said “Professor Wole Soyinka ” has definitely crossed the bar of decency and civilized literary grace”.

    “At a time when everyone is nudging Obasanjo forward as the courageous rallying point against the present dislocations in our polity, Soyinka is salivating in some primitive laceration of the old soldier, reveling in poisonous vendetta and egregious abuse against Obasanjo.

    “In Soyinka’s warped cosmology he insists that Obasanjo is not the fit and proper person to lead the new movement against the warped national polity. This is malicious, undignifying, spurious, a drooling mechanical twaddle bound for literary garbage.

    Read Also: You’ll perform as president, Obasanjo tells Lamido

    “Of course Obasanjo, like all of us is not perfect. But he is a courageous man, a superlative patriot who contends with any errant power with thorough sincerity, with masterful resolve to rectify the observable wrongs.

    “Soyinka has now eroded his once Sterling Heights of great crusader and crashed his status to a Lilliputian pamphleteer, angry at the world, pouring venom everywhere without tactical purity”, YCF said.

    The Yoruba Consultative Forum said it has  now resolved to engage Soyinka “with balanced intellectual vigour wherever he erupts again in his crude vitriol against Obasanjo”, saying enough is enough.

  • Fear of Buhari’s second term

    Prancing across the country and making desperate stomp speeches, laced with bile and toxic invectives aimed at the Muhammadu Buhari –led federal   government, former President Olusegun Obasanjo exemplifies the panic and   fear that have gripped Nigeria’s traditional political elite about the   prospects of President Buhari’s second term. Former military president, Ibrahim Babangida in the recent past has quipped that Nigeria will be better with a younger president who is digitally literate when it is doubtful whether Narenda’s Modi, who is leading India, world’s  largest liberal democracy and making remarkable progress in reforming the  economy, is even computer literate.

    Babangida, himself a former discredited military dictator, whose regime was known for the notorious culture of ‘settlement’, a derisive euphemism  for massive state-directed corruption has his shadowy imprints in all the  unfolding political shenanigans to stop President Buhari from winning a  second term in office.

    The poster boy of state-minted billionaire, former defence minister, Theophilus Danjuma has previously raised alarm, alleging army-directed pogrom against residents of some local communities. While he may have recently gone quiet, trenchant voices at the helm of stop-Buhari campaign, echoes his political body language.

    From the n-PDP, r-APC to the recent political quake that rocked the National Assembly in which a record number of the ruling APC legislators jumped over to various opposition parties, but especially to the People’s Democratic Party, (PDP), is the remarkable crystallization the trepidation that have dogged a section of the political class of a second term in office by President Buhari. The prospects of Buhari’s second term in office is particularly stunning and  terribly ruing, given that he was previously considered un-electable until the  political elite completely squandered the very last of their political  goodwill, forcing them to gravitate around Buhari’s famed credibility and  popular appeal. In massively hitching a ride on his credibility and popular appeal, they actually intended to overthrow the values he stands for, from  within. Nearly three years into the unnatural cohabitation, the  disgruntled elite are fast peeling away, coalescing around the power  oligarchs in desperate effort to return the country to the familiar  terrain where politics and public office holding makes the roaring returns  of instant fabulous wealth.

    Nearly one year ago, President Buhari was a total political write-off, struggling with health challenges and barely managed to survive his worst health scare, according to him.

    His full-fledged war against corruption, the veritable mainstay of the political class has considerably heightened and started taking its toll. The putative but potent prophecy of the wife of former President Goodluck Jonathan, Patience

    Jonathan during the campaign for the 2015 Presidential election that a Buhari victory will haul politicians to jail at unprecedented scale is proving ominous. After running the rings around the judicial process for more than  a decade, former Taraba and Plateau governors, Messrs Jolly Nyame

    and Joshua Dariye are currently serving long jail sentences for  corruption. In this instance, no corrupt member of the political class, worth his or her spine, would sit idly by and watch President Buhari’s re-election for a second term despite party affiliations. The judges who are now actively dispensing justice and handing out severe punishments to political itchy fingers who vandalized the commonwealth did not drop from  the sky but have been with us all along, only that now, they have  sufficient political ambiance of non-interference and zero political backlash against their careers to discharge their duties according to the law.

    To add to the worries and dilemma of some sections of the political class,  President Buhari signed the Presidential Executive Order, No 6, the  first-ever frontal assault on the humongous but dubious assets  effortless acquired by most of the predatory and lousy elites. Since the publication and signing of the executive order, the public space has had to endure the fury of the political class and their allied commentariat.

    The PEO-6 has been variously described as an assault on constitutional democracy, an attempt to a power grab and even orchestrated executive emasculation of the judiciary. But very few have taken pains to observe that the normal ambience of liberal democracy and its associated constitutionalism have deep technical holes in our peculiar clime, from which many soiled fat cats of our public life have happily escaped with their loots. It is undeniable that extraordinary circumstances required extraordinary measures to contend and contain. The section of the Nigeria political class adept at manipulating formal public institutions, taking advantage of their fragilities have maliciously up-ended the due-process, the core content of constitutionalism and any inclusive social order.

    The fear of Buhari’s second term is certainly raising the political temperature as the prospects look bright but given that the panic is only within some section of the political class, shows that the majority of Nigerians understood the imperative to consolidate the gains of bringing discipline and some order to politics and public life.

    The APC leadership, including President Buhari, should let all those who wish to leave their party to freely do so, without bothering to appease them because, in the long run, the ones who are convinced and believe in the core values espoused by President Buhari are far more useful than those with mere interests.

    After the Cuban revolution, former brothel owners, who helped make Cuba, a casino colony of the United States of America were eagerly sneaking out of the country.

    But, leader of the revolution, Fidel Castro, promptly threw the gate open asking any Cuban who could not reconcile himself or herself to the New Cuba to leave. Despite the number that left, the revolution survived and thrived, ushering in, universal literacy and healthcare to all Cubans. More than 60 years, even after the exit of its first generation leaders, the revolution is still standing.

    President Buhari certainly in his first term that is gradually rolling to an end has not done everything right. While the pattern of criminal violence has kept mutating from one dangerous form to another, his security apparatus has not been sufficiently proactive in identifying and containing it and it has been very easy to lay charges of connivance against them. Official claims of political sabotage by detractors are too feeble to be taken serious.

    Despite evident and palpable hardship among many Nigerians, government’s current focus on key fundamentals that could over time, create the enabling environment for inclusive and sustainable economic development is in the right direction.

    A political will to sustain key current economic initiatives, accelerate the war against graft, and steadily return Nigeria to Nigerians in all ramifications of freely choosing their own government and holding it accountable are part of the many reasons, most Nigerians are standing by President Buhari, despite the vacillation of some sections of the political class.

     

    • Onunaiju is a journalist based in Abuja.

  • Obasanjo’s medical tourism in Bayelsa

    Former President Olusegun Obasanjo was in Bayelsa State recently. The Owu chief’s second coming this year to the Ijaw state was devoid of politics. He was in Bayelsa for his routine medical check-ups.

    The former President’s medical trip to Bayelsa surprised many a politician of his caliber. Usually Obasanjo would take his health matters to an undisclosed hospital in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.

    Politicians in Obasanjo’s class most times shun hospitals in Nigeria and take their medical inquiries to notable health facilities abroad.

    They lack confidence in health facilities located within the country. They can’t imagine subjecting their lives to homegrown medical practitioners. It is risky. But Obasanjo shunned his American hospital and raced down to Yenagoa to undergo his annual medical procedures.

    What did Obasanjo, whom most people consider hard to please see in Bayelsa? It could be recalled that sometimes in February this year, the former President was a guest of the Bayelsa State Governor, Seriake Dickson. The governor invited him for a working visit in the state.

    Obasanjo was taken round legacy projects of Dickson in different parts of the state. He saw Dickson’s projects in various sectors of the economy especially in the areas of education, health and agriculture.

    The former President who inaugurated and toured some of the projects poured encomiums on the governor. He was particularly impressed by the state-of-the-art medical equipment at the Bayelsa Diagnostic Centre (BDC) and the Bayelsa Specialist Hospital.

    He appraised the vision and mission of Dickson in the health sector.

    The Owu chief then reflected on the medical equipment obtainable in his hospital abroad and the ones he saw in Bayelsa. There was no difference. He immediately promised that instead of going abroad he would come to Bayelsa for his medical tourism.

    Obasanjo made good his promise. He came on Monday this week. Though, the former President arrived the state very late in the night, he reported to the specialist hospital close to the Government House. His medical procedures commenced that night.

    The former President himself gave reasons why he abandoned the USA for Bayelsa. He said the move was to fulfill a promise he made earlier in February when he inspected medical facilities built by Dickson.

    At about 8am on Tuesday, Obasanjo was already at the VIP wing of the specialist hospital where he ran some tests in various health departments accompanied by senior medical staff of the specialist hospital.

    The former President was later driven to the Bayelsa Diagnostic Centre (BDC) where some medical experts took him through medical equipment at the centre. Obasanjo, who emerged from the centre after spending a few hours was full of smiles.

    Explaining the medical procedures he went through and why he chose Bayelsa, he said: “Last time l was here in February, l did say that l would want to come and patronise the facilities here because l was impressed with what l saw then.

    “Having made that promise, l had to fulfill it. I started last night with the gadgets l had to wear to sleep with to check my blood pressure while l am awake and while l am sleeping. This morning, l started with blood, urine tests.

    “I went through the whole process of heart test. They looked at other internal organs such as kidneys, liver, spleen and all the internal organs. Eventually, l had semi-sleep in the MRI where my brains were examined.

    “It may be of interest for you to know that the doctor said my head is correct.  I want to thank all the staff for their commitments. I went through the machines, the way l used to go through them where I normally have my medicals at Atlanta, Georgia.

    “We have trained Nigerians and the machine here. I got my results and it is the same thing l had in USA. The difference is that it is cheaper here than there”.

    The former President praised the efficiency of the health insurance scheme instituted by Dickson. He is a registered member of the scheme.

    And he immediately his receipt to show that he pays N14,000 monthly to remain an active member of the scheme.

    He said: “I am also a beneficiary of the health insurance in Bayelsa and l pay monthly. And again, it is good to know that health insurance is very good because when you are need of attention and you don’t have money but you have insurance to take care of you. I have done and paid for one year and half. My health insurance is N14,000″.

    The former president insisted that it is more cost-effective patronising good medical facilities at home like the ones in Bayelsa than traveling to other countries for the same purpose. He said he spent N350,000 for all the medical procedures he went through in Bayelsa.

    He noted that it was cheaper compared to the cost of similar procedures abroad. He said it would have cost him to get similar services and standard in the USA. So, instead of traveling abroad, he advised others to come to Bayelsa. He said that the results of his tests showed that he is as fit as a fiddle adding that the doctor only asked him to drink more water.

    “I got my results and l am as fit as a fiddle. The doctor said the only thing l need to do is to drink more water. The same thing you can get anywhere in the world, you can get it here. Why do you have to travel?”

    He insisted: “Wherever we get best practices, let’s spread it. When l was here last February, l saw the standard of the facilities here that could be used by all Nigerians. There is no need for a Nigerian to say he is going to Dubai, UK, America for medical checkups.

    “I came here last night, before 1 pm what l started at 8am came to an end. I went through all the medical checks, that l would normally have gone through anywhere. The eye, the mouth, the head and the doctor showed me what my brains looked like.

    “When l looked at he said my brain is clean and clear and l said, it means my head is correct. Not only that the cost I reasonable. The services were superb. So, what people were going to Dubai, India, America, UK, Saudi Arabia for is here in Bayelsa”.

     

    Obasanjo prays with Dickson

    On the eve of his medical check-ups, Obasanjo prayed with Dickson. He joined the governor to observe the state’s monthly thanksgiving service at the King of Glory Chapel, Government House, the chief hailed Dickson.

    He said under the governor, God took control of the affairs of Bayelsa and its people. He remembered that prior to the administration of Dickson, the state was notorious for militancy and insecurity.

    He urged leaders especially Governors who desired to perform well in their states to come to Bayelsa and learn the secret of Dickson’s success. The elder statesman expressed appreciation to God for giving the governor the spirit of praise and thanksgiving. He said nothing is more important than man’s relationship with God.

    He said: I want to thank God for the life of Governor Seriake Dickson, for doing this to honour God. This is what happens when youput God first. All other things happen the way God has ordained them to happen.

    “The peace of God is here. Bayelsa used to be dreaded for militancy and insecurity and now people are asking what is happening in Bayelsa State. If you are a Governor and you want to do well, come to Bayelsa and learn the secret”.

    In his remarks, Dickson thanked Obasanjo for being an instrument in the hand of God. He said God remained the state’s source of strength.

    He recalled that despite the 2016 recession that hit the country, his administration continued to break the frontiers in the health, education, infrastructure sectors among others.

    Dickson stressed that Bayelsa is the only state with a Thanksgiving Law in the country. He explained that he emulated the former President by building an Ecumenical Centre for the worship of God in the state, appointing clergymen, holding morning devotion  and state memory verse.

    He said the state went ahead of others in terms of infrastructural and economic development. He called for continued prayers, understanding and support for the state, its leadership and the country at large.

     

  • Colonial road rehabilitated in Enugu

    It used to be the only link road from Enugu to the western and northern parts of the country before the construction of the Enugu-Onitsha express road during the military regime of Olusegun Obasanjo.

    Miliken Hill Road, with 25 serpentine curves stretching 3km, was abandoned by successive administrations ever since the completion and use of the Enugu-Onitsha Express Road. Lying several metres atop a narrow ledge overlooking a deep and scary valley, the road became a haven for criminal elements. There were no safety wedges to block vehicles from fallen into the scary valley said to be home to mighty pythons. There were no also street lights to illuminate the curves against the dangers and perils of night.

    At the receiving end of all this were the people of Ngwo who use it as the only access road to their community. They had made representations to successive governments for the rehabilitation and upgrading of the road, but all to no avail.

    But their sorrow and lamentation recently came to an end. Tears of joy flowed thanks to the intervention of Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State.

    The Miliken Hill Road or Ngwo-Enugu Road, was constructed in 1909 during the colonial period by countless labourers drawn from neighbouring villages, using pick and axe to cut through the thick bush of the hill’s stony base.

    Miliken Hill is a famous tourist attraction in the beautiful city of Enugu. Indeed a visitor to Enugu who had not gone to Miliken Hill is said not to have visited Enugu. History has it that in 1908, a British expedition on its way to the Middle Belt from Awka sighted the hill at Enugu Ngwo, one of the ten villages that comprise Ngwo community, and reported back to Lagos.

    Interest in the mineral potential of the hill compelled the colonial government to send a team of mining engineers to the place in 1909 to prospect for silver, but the team struck coal instead. The Europeans decided to settle at Enugu Ngwo on the top of the hill now called Hilltop (Enugu), from where Enugu derived its name up till this day.

    The 3km-long meandering Miliken Hill Road was constructed because of coal discovery under the hill and was named after the head engineer who designed the road.

    Due to years of neglect, the narrow and undulating Miliken Hills Road gradually became a death trap before Ugwuanyi came to the rescue.

    There was wild jubilation among the residents of Enugu particularly the Ngwo people during the commissioning of the newly reconstructed and modernised road with street lights for the first time since it was constructed in 1909. It will now also provide an alternative route for travelers plying the Enugu-Onitsha Expressway.

    Inaugurating the road amid excitement from residents of the state and road users, Governor Ugwuanyi stated that the project is a “great infrastructural asset and rich heritage of our coal city state”.

    Ugwuanyi also inaugurated other legacy projects in the rural areas such as the Ebonyi River Bridge in Ikem, Isi-Uzo Local Government Area and Obollo Eke – Agala – Okpaligbo road in Udenu LGA in keeping with his dministration’s grassroots development initiatives.

    Describing the road as “our natural roller coaster”, Ugwuanyi disclosed that “no road in our environment affords tourists and motorists the beautiful view of Enugu that this road offers.”

    He said, “I stand here today with joy in my heart, buoyed by the happy faces of Ndi Enugu, to inaugurate this reconstructed historic and legacy Miliken Hill road; a renowned tourist attraction hose history is consistent with coal discovery in our state in the early 20th century.

    “The great excitement that greeted the reconstruction of this legacy road is therefore consequential and our gratitude, most profound, goes to God Almighty for affording us the means and commitment to deliver this project”.

    Ugwuanyi urged motorists to drive safely and with care.

    While inaugurating the other projects, Governor Ugwuanyi noted that they were “in keeping with our policy to open up the rural areas and encourage the all-round economic growth of the state.

    “We were also motivated by our resolve to alleviate the sufferings of our people and give them a new lease of life wherever they may be in the state,” the governor added.

    A leader of Ngwo community and former Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Chief Dubem Onyia expressed gratitude to Ugwuanyi for keeping faith with his promise to reconstruct and modernise the road with street lighting and other safety measures.

    Onyia stated that the road was symbolic and very significant to the people of Ngwo, Enugu State and the entire Igbos”, saying that the governor has wiped out their tears for good.

    He maintained that no government had reconstructed the road after it was built, appreciating the governor for his prompt intervention on the road. He equally reassured the governor of the people’s unflinching support for his re-election in 2019.

  • Apapa gridlock: Fed Govt may revoke port concession agreement

    As stakeholders blame shipping companies, others for bedlam

     

    The federal government might revoke the seaports concession agreement it entered with terminal operators during the administration of President Olusegun Obasanjo.

    Minster for Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi said this on Thursday during the stakeholder meeting on the lingering bedlam occasioned by activities of truck drivers to and fro Apapa seaport.

    The meeting which was chaired by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo (SAN), was held at the headquarters, Western Naval Command  (WNC), Apapa.

    According to Amaechi, he would submit the issue to the Federal Executive Council  (FEC) for a possible revocation of the concessions because the concessionaires were not sticking to the terms of operation.

    He said: “Concessioners not sticking to terms of agreement. We might have to go back to the FEC to ask for a revoke of the concessions. We are currently reviewing the concession agreement.”

    Meanwhile, stakeholders at the meeting blamed the shipping companies, tankfarm owners as well as the federal ministry of works for the congestion, noting that while the company and tankfarm operators had refused to operate holding bays for their trucks, the ministry was too slow in repairing bad portions of the roads.

    Read Also: Apapa gridlock: Lagos suspends approval for tank farms

    They also accused the shipping companies of deliberately fuelling the traffic through its demurrage policy, which makes empty containers flood the roads so that they could beat deadlines and collect their money.

    According to the Managing Director, Nigerian Port Authority (NPA), Hajiya Bala Usman, the shipping companies were acting in disregard of the law.

    She said: “The attendant disregard by shipping companies to patronize holding bays cannot be tolerated. Shipping companies are not above the law in Nigeria and they must act in accordance with the law.

    “We have sanctioned three shipping companies, which are among the largest operating in Nigeria. We withdrew their licenses for 10 days. Upon the review of their 10 days suspension, it was extended to additional five days. Presently, they do not have vantage services within Nigeria.

    “We have noted the concerns about empty containers. What we need to do is ensure that the same volume of containers that come into the country go out.

    “Shipping companies have over the years, made Nigeria a dumping ground. They have also instituted a fee where by, every importer is rushing into the port to drop their containers or risk losing their money.

    “Shipping companies are refusing the operationalisation of holding bays. Ordinary, when you import goods, the empty containers should be returned to the holding bays of the shipping companies. It is their responsibility to move it from the bays to the port.

    “The shipping companies are not above the law. We will keep sanctioning them until they comply and operationalize their business. The container repositioning fee they newly introduced is not acceptable. “The Vice President has written to us demanding clarity and we have cleared that nobody should pay for empty container repositioning. We need to define a location and day, possibly Saturdays and Sundays, where empty containers are moved into the port locations in preparation for them to be taken out to the vessels.

    “Nigerian government would not continue to absorb the cost of your none operationalisation of holding bays. Sixty percent of the trailers on our roads are empty or hawking. They come out without having any business and hope to secure one. “So, NPA is working on licencing trailer parks. In fact, only trailers from such parks can come into the port. We have received four proposals on that and we are working in collaboration with Lagos State Government. The trailers would be at the parks and only come out when called upon.

    “Then, truck owners’ association must ensure compliance of their members. Any truck found idle on the road would be impounded and the association dealt with.”

     

     

  • Obasanjo rejects front row seat at Afreximbank Abuja meeting

    Former President Olusegun Obasanjo on Friday caused a stir at the on-going African Export and Import Bank (Afreximbank) Annual Meeting in Abuja, when he chose to sit among the participants instead of occupying a front row seat reserved for him at the Congress Hall of Transcorp Hilton.

    Obasanjo have no reason for his action although he arrived late at the event.

    Before Obasanjo’s arrival, Mr. Boss Mustapha, Secretary to the Government of the Federation; Governor Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State; Finance Minister Kemi Adeosun and Albert Muchanga, African Union’s Commissioner for Trade and Transport were already seated.

    He arrived when Benedict Oramah, the President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Afreximbank was delivering his address of welcome.

    Earlier, the meeting witnessed the opening ceremony which featured a documentary on the history of Afreximbank’s 25 years of existence.

    Read Also: Soyinka: Obasanjo failed woefully

    George Elombi, the Executive Vice President of Afreximbank had also delivered his introductory remarks.

    But when Bronwyn Nelson, the Editor-at-Large of CNBC Africa who was moderator of the event, walked up to welcome Obasanjo at the entrance with the aim of ushering him to his seat, the former Nigerian president refused and chose to sit on an empty seat on the right row of the hall.

    The audience was surprised at Obasanjo’s action including the other dignitaries in front of the hall.

    After Oramah’s speech, Muchanga and Nelson went to persuade Obasanjo to take his seat.

    The former president, however, complied and followed them to his seat.

    He shook hands with the dignitaries starting from Mustapha to El-Rufai, Oramah and Adeosun among others before sitting.