The Nation Newspaper

Tag: war

  • ‘Let’s wage intellectual war against corruption’

    Vice-Chancellor, Littoral University (Institut D’Enseignement Superiur De Littoral) Porto-Novo, Republic of Benin, Prof Olabode Reuben Ayeni, has roused his colleagues on the part of intellectual wayfaring as a veritable instrument of battling corruption.

    “It is high time corruption in Nigeria is confronted intellectually through groundbreaking research rather than mere strength or street protests which I think has done little to convince the leadership to do the rightful. I, therefore, urge all intellectuals on more concerted efforts in this direction.

    Ayeni noted that many Nigerians particularly in the intellectual circle are being eulogised and offered red carpet reception around the world. In view of this, he said those at the home front should step up the campaign to reduce corruption to its barest minimum.

    Prof Ayeni spoke at the induction/lecture of the Institute of Administrators and Researchers of Nigeria (IARN) held at the University of Lagos Conference Hall last Thursday.

    “We intellectuals have to put our heads together because a tree cannot make a forest. Intellectually, we must come up with groundbreaking research on how to move the country forward. The Research must touch on all aspects of our lives-education, religion, tribe, economy, social and psychological, and what have you? Sadly, the virus called corruption has spread to our churches, mosques and other institutions. It is unfortunate that as Nigerians, anywhere you go they see you as a corrupt person. We must make sure that corruption is battled headlong.”

    Ayeni, who was also among 13 personalities that were conferred fellows of the institute, expressed his desire for a symbiotic relationship between Littoral University and the institute particularly in the areas of administration and research.

    He said the unblemished records of many eminent Nigerians worldwide are still opening doors of success, wondering why there are seemingly insurmountable challenges at the home front.

    “I am a Nigerian but living in the Republic of Benin. The authority of that country wouldn’t have given me a licence to set up a university if I do not demonstrate some level of integrity in a French country. I didn’t have to go through any stress or pay a bribe. But they just look at integrity, and sincerity and the personality involved. That is to say Nigerians, irrespective of tribe or religion, are still doing great in the country and we can replicate same at home.

    Other fellows include Chairman Brilla FM, Dr Larry Izamuje; Registrar Redeemers’ University Ogun State Mrs Bolatito Oloketuyi; and a senior staff of the National Assembly, Mrs Abiola Helen.

    Earlier the Director-General of the institute Prof Jacob Etinagbedia congratulated the new fellows. He said as ambassadors of the institute, they must carry themselves with gait.

    He urged them to remain more committed to research and while also contributing to the nation’s development,-two key factors Etinagbedia said earned them the award.

    “We all need to find a lasting solution to the myriads of challenges confronting us as a nation. This is why we at the institute are working round the clock in making sure that ‘it cannot be business as usual’. We will continue to strive to contribute our quota to the development of our great nation.”

    A lecture with the title: Corruption: Major encumbrance to the attainment of Nigeria Vision 2020, was also delivered by the Director, Corporate Governance Business school Dr Nelson Ojo-Samuel.

     

     

  • Cost of war between China and Japan

    Global economists are keeping their eyes glued to the Asia-Pacific region, where a bitter feud is brewing between two of the world’s most powerful nations over a small collectivity of islands in the East China Sea.

    The Chinese government argues that a treaty signed during the first Sino-Japanese War (1894-95) conferred ownership of the islands to China while Japan has long disputed these claims, and today argues that the islands are integral to its national identity.

    The argument came to a head last September, when a boycott of Japanese products led Chinese demonstrators to target fellow citizens who owned Japanese cars. Three months later, the situation escalated when when Japanese jets confronted a Chinese plane flying over the islands; no shots were fired, but the act of antagonism has set a troubling precedent between the military forces of both nations.

    What is the economic implication  of  a war between China and Japan if the crisis persist? Click the link below for a perspective on the issue.

    http://www.onlinemba.com/blog/economic-war-between-china-japan

  • Group counsels Nigeria on anti-graft war

    Group counsels Nigeria on anti-graft war

    A non-governmental body, the Group Against Money Laundering in West Africa (GIABA), has commended Ghana’s anti-corruption war.  The group said Nigeria should learn from the war against against corruption, money laundering and terrorism financing by the Ghanaian government.

    In a statement in Lagos, GIABA said Nigeria has a long way to go in its crusade against fraud.

    GIABA official, Muhammed Usman, who signed the statement, said: Nigeria made a political commitment to address its deficiencies within one year. Nigeria’s efforts were reviewed in February 2011 and found not to fully conform to international standards.

    “Since then, Nigeria has made significant efforts and taken steps towards improving its position, including criminalisation of the full range of predicate offences for money laundering and the passage of the Money Laundering ACT 2012.

    “The enactment of the Anti-Terrorism Act marks a turning point in the implementation of a robust counter terrorism measures in the country”.

    However, the group advised Nigeria to emulate the way Ghana had achieved a leap in the anti-corruption war.

     

  • Boko Haram’s Shekau confirms cyber war

    Boko Haram’s Shekau confirms cyber war

    In case anyone still thinks the Federal Government is not already warring against its enemies and opponents in cyberspace, that person had better think twice. Thanks to the recent video released by Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, we now have a confirmation that the Nigerian government is very active in the so-called fifth domain of warfare, the cyberspace. If in 2009, the United States could declare its digital infrastructure a strategic national asset, and the Pentagon could one year later also set up its U.S. Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) to defend American military networks and attack other countries’ systems, surely it is no big deal for the Nigerian government to hack into Boko Haram’s cyber operations network and undermine it.

    The Shekau confirmation of cyberwarfare comes after he tried to explain why he took so long in refuting the claim of one Abu Abdulazeez who claimed to have had the mandate of the Boko Haram leader to declare ceasefire and request for dialogue with the Federal Government based on some tentative agreements with the Borno State Government. According to Shekau, he made several attempts to upload a video message denouncing the call for dialogue or announcement of a truce. Every time an attempt was made, he moaned, the Nigerian government either summarily removed the message from the internet or blocked it altogether. Shekau did not say whether the sect has finally got the software to override the government’s interference.

    Hardball intends no insinuation, but it is significant to note that al-Qaeda is fairly adept at cyber war and would not mind pursuing its nihilist intentions by generously distributing to agents and affiliates the skills to conduct their own successful operations in cyberspace. So, too, is Iran, which seems to be giving both Israel and US a run for their money in cyberwarfare. Who can forget that in December 2011, Iran claimed to have hacked into a US spy drone called RQ-170, compromised it, and brought it down safely in Iranian territory? Naturally, the US denied losing any drone through cyber war, insisting, however, that the unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) crashed after handlers lost control of it.

    But more spectacularly, there was the recent combined US/Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear programme, particularly its uranium enrichment program, which is at the centre of its nuclear militarisation process. In 2009 and 2010, the US and Israel deployed the so-called Stuxnet computer virus to sabotage the enrichment process. After Iran recovered from that attack, the two countries deployed an even more virulent cyber weapon identified as W32.Flame said to be “capable of penetrating a system, stealing sensitive data and turning on cameras and computer microphones to obtain additional data or change settings on computer systems.” The war continues, with all manner of footloose cyber warriors, some of them young and independent, causing havoc and gloating with satisfaction.

    Nigeria’s Boko Haram commanders will be bracing up for more attacks. Let us, however, hope that they are not quite stable or smart enough to be on the offensive in the fifth domain of warfare. For if the Americans and their Israeli partners are having headaches coping with Iranian cyberspace affront, imagine what migraine the lowly placed Nigerian government cyberspace managers could have from motivated cyber militants. More importantly, while it may be in the national security interest for Nigeria’s cyberspace warriors to subvert extremist groups like Boko Haram, we must hope that the government ninjas would not be tempted to expand the frontiers of cyberspace war to undermine civil liberties and invade the privacy of citizens. To this extent, therefore, it may not be inappropriate to ask whether the National Assembly Intelligence Committees (House and Senate) are really carrying out their oversight functions in these delicate areas.

     

  • Inside Ogedengbe’s house of war

    Inside Ogedengbe’s house of war

    High Chief Oyekanmi Ogedengbe Obanla IV who occupies the royal stool of his forefathers laments that his grandfather and great Yoruba warrior, Ogedengbe Agbogungboro, has not been given his deserved honour. Taiwo Abiodun, who visited the royal house in Ilesha, reports

     

    His name rings, bell across the length and breadth of Yorubaland. In the wars that raged in the land in the 18th century his name featured prominently. He fought in many battles that conquered many cities and towns in Yorubaland. He became a war legend by dint of his brawn. However, in spite of his exploits and being a ‘saviour’ of his kinsmen he seems to have been forgotten. His grave in the royal house is unmarked.

    Lamenting this neglect, the ruling Obanla IV said, “ In the year 2010 when the family members celebrated 100years of his exit, some institutions of higher learning, state governments and individuals made pledges to make sure he was accorded honour befitting his status. Osun State Government promised to turn the royal house into a tourist attraction centre while the University of Ibadan and Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile- Ife were not left out as they too announced their pledges but none has come up to redeem their pledges.”

    The mystery royal house

    At the entrance to the big compound is the drawing of two guns across each other, signifying the house of a warrior. Obanla IV pointed at the drawing and said, “ those guns there are sign that this is a warriors’ family house. We have no other job than going to the warfront. I believe it runs in the family, Ogedengbe’s grand children are about 24 in the Nigerian Army, excluding those in the Air Force and the Navy,”he boasted.

    In the big compound are courtyards and rooms of different sizes. It is full of dark and windowless rooms! To view the war relics in the room, one needs a candle light. The room looks so secretive and fearsome, but most of the walls have caved in, while some of the log of woods and the iron roofing sheets are still very strong.

    According to Ogedengbe IV, there are about five courtyards in the compound and each courtyard has about 20 rooms .”There are cell rooms or guardrooms here where the late Ogedengbe used to punish his slaves , family members and followers whenever they committed any offence. There are sacred rooms where no one enters but the late warrior only. Some rooms were used as armoury where arms and ammunition were kept while he also had rooms where he kept his juju or charms.”

    A box in one of the rooms was filled with remnants of juju and various charms of different types and sizes. As the reporter was being conducted round he was warned to steer clear of touching any of the materials or be ready to bear the consequences. A forbidden exit for strangers in the courtyard was shown to this reporter too. Saucers, which were said to have been used by the late warrior for eating, guns, daggers and long necklace the late warrior used in the 17th century, were all on display in the palace, with his photographs conspicuously hung on the wall.

    The big shrine which he used to visit to perform rituals before going to war has been preserved for posterity. It is called Atoni, named after his mother’s farm.

    A forgotten hero?

    Obanla IV is not happy at the way his grandfather’s valour and gallantry have been relegated. According to him, the Osun State government is yet to fulfil the promise that it would turn the courtyard into a tourist centre or monument. He is also unhappy over the relocation of the late warrior’s statute in the town and failure to rebuild his grave. He said, “The university of Ibadan promised to come here and build a tomb on the grave, they demanded for the relics of the war like guns, clothes and his other personal effects but nothing has been heard from them again. The Osun State Tourism Department said they wanted to turn this place into a tourist attraction centre when we celebrated 100 years of his death in 2010 but nothing has been heard from them again. I know that the Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola appreciates culture and history, he will definitely do something.”

    He expressed displeasure over the decision to replace the late Ogedengbe’s statute placed at the roundabout in the town with that of Owa Ajibogun, saying the decision to place Ajibogun’s statue at the roundabout and remove Ogedengbe’s was unfair and standing history on its head. “My father’s statue was erected here at the centre of this town in 1934 by Captain Bower, and it was here the Army Parade paid homage and saluted him as a warrior but when Oba Aromolaran came he removed it and placed the statute of Owa Ajibogun, the traditional head of warrior in Ilesa, instead of Ogedengbe’s. Ajibogun was the first Owa but he died in Ibadan. It was his children that got to Ilesa. Ajibogun never reached here. It was the present monarch, Oba Aromolaran, who replaced it and placed a cutlass in Ajibogun’s hand. Now when the soldiers are celebrating and marking the fallen soldiers they are misled and would go to Ajibogun instead of Ogedengbe to pay homage. I want this to be corrected. We the family members of Ogedengbe are not happy at all.”

    Asked whether he would renovate the tomb if there is no response from those who promised to assist, he said, “I would have renovated the grave but I was advised to leave it for the government knows how and what to do with it.”

    Kiriji War

    According to Obanla IV, the war that made his grandfather popular was the war between the Ibadan /Oyo and Ekiti/Ijesa in the 17th century. It was caused by the consul who seized a warrior’s wife while she was on her way to Imesi to give her husband, Fabunmi, food and palm wine.”They did not only seize the food and palm wine from her but they also raped her. When she told her husband, Fabunmi, he was annoyed and went after the Oyo consuls, and started beheading them and sending their bodiless heads to Ibadan. This annoyed Latoosa the Generalisimo of Ibadan who swore to reduce Ijesa and Ekiti to rubbles. It became a war between Ekiti/Ijesa and Ibadan. In fact, it was the first civil war before Biafra.”

    “Ogedengbe used to get his weapons through trade by barter by exchanging his slaves for arms and ammunition from Germany. These weapons were imported by one Mr. Braham who used to come from Germany to buy slaves in exchange for arms and ammunition from Ogedengbe.”

    During the war, he said, Ogedengbe exhibited his magical feat. Each time he observed that his foot soldiers were tired he would just touch the trees which would transform into human beings and would fight the enemies. “Not only this, he was so powerful that when he was beheaded while fighting, he quickly used his bare hand to cut a woman’s head to replace his severed head to search for his own! When he saw his own head he removed the woman’s head from his neck and replaced it with his own and continued the war!

    “While the war was going on, he appeared and disappeared. It was not a myth or imaginary, my late father told me all these stories and they were real,” he affirmed, adding, “In a place in Edo State, he rescued them and today they worship his cap and built a shrine for Ogedengbe there!”

    He continued, “Ogedengbe had powerful charms that made him to be feared! When he was to be taken to Iwo (exile) by Captain Bower who came with his aides, one of Captain Bower’s aides struck Ogedengbe’s second in command, head, Alimoro, with sword, the sword broke into four pieces but Alimoro too cut off the aide’s hand. Seeing the hand on the ground Ogedengbe picked it and blew air to it and glued the hand back! He was powerful and strong, he had juju.”

    Describing his ‘charmed’ war clothes, Obanla said, “his war jacket was so heavy that about four people used to carry it yet it is hung on a spider’s web. But the British took that away. However, we all know it would not be possible for them to take it away without the connivance of some of Ogedengbe’s foot soldiers.”

    There was the story that when he returned from war, the people offered to make him king but he declined, saying he was a warrior and would not be able to go to war while on the throne. His refusal led to suspicion that he would continue to levy wars and the chiefs became afraid. They reported him to the Governor General in Lagos. He was ordered into exile. This annoyed him and led him to curse Ijesa people that “they would carry their loads but would not be able to place it on their heads!”

    “While in exile, he became more popular as the public trooped to see the strong and powerful man whom everybody dreaded but for a fee while the money realised went into the government purse. In fact , people came from foreign countries to have a glance at this great warrior , Ogedengbe who became a celebrity “, the grandson said.

    House of legacy

    Ogedengbe’s palace is full of strange things. He said strange things used to happen in the palace, “strange things are happening here, for example we use to hear strange voices in the night and also the booming of the guns, clanging of metal objects and the shrill cries of dying men like the ones we heard in war!. Not only this, at times Ogedengbe would appear wearing his war jacket or white apparel while the monkey would be screeching and the dogs too would be barking. There is nothing we demand for that will not be provided each time I am in need and I go to his grave to cry.“We keep Gboroko Kapee , a monkey here. It is compulsory to keep it for it has a purpose. The late Ogedengbe had four, my father Ogedengbe II had three while my late brother Ogedengbe III who did not spend up to one year on the throne kept too. A man once came here to harm my father while on the throne , it was the monkey Gboroko Kapee that discovered it for it started behaving strangely as it defecated and slammed it on the man’s face. When the man was searched we found charms on him, he confessed that he came to harm my father. An owl once came here, and it is a bad omen and the monkey started screaming, on the second day we heard that one of my brother’s sons died.

    “We offer sacrifice every week in this compound, and here we worship Ogun, god of iron called Iwude, and it is compulsory for the Owa to come here spend hours with us during the festival.”

    Ogedengbe not a name

    Obanla IV said Ogedengbe is not a name but an appellation.”Many did not know that Ogedengbe is not a name but a nickname. The warrior’s real name is Orisaraibi Apasanforijiwa but was nicknamed Ogedengbe because of his prowess in fighting. He was a great wrestler that could face eight to nine people at a time! He would carry his opponent up and slam on the ground without stress, no matter how hefty the opponent is. It was from this that he got the appellation Ogedengbe, which was used to describe how he used to lift his opponents up and slam them on the ground.

    His birth was a mystery, it was said to have been predicted by an oracle that a powerful man would be born. Immediately he was delivered his mother died and it was believed that he killed his mother so it was in annoyance that they dumped him in a small pit where traditional weavers work, wanting him to die too. On the third day his cry was heard and baby Ogedengbe was found to have been covered with ants and rubbish. Everybody was surprised that he was still alive, he was later taken care of till he grew up with his uncle who was a blacksmith manufacturing dane guns in the Atoni village. When he was 16 he shot and killed a pregnant woman, seeing how grievous his offence was, he escaped and fled to Ijoka in Ilesa

    “We are praying to the OOdua race as a whole not to let history die. How many people remember this Ogedengbe again? We even read it in history but now we don’t teach history as a subject again. We have rich and powerful history that cannot be wished away.”

    On a final note, he appealed to the governors of the Southwest region, to, in the spirit of the regional integration, return the teaching of history to the school curriculum so as to teach our children the history and valour of the Yoruba race.

     

  • PDP’s vicious war

    PDP’s vicious war

    The on-going war of attrition among PDP leading light in the face of massive unemployment of our youths, infrastructural decay, 13 years of unfulfilled promises and monumental corruption by its members, is one more evidence that the party doesn’t give a damn about Nigeria. For the greed of its members, PDP that has continued to act as if it is answerable to no one is prepared to drag the nation down along with itself.

    A distinguishing characteristic of any political party is a consensus of members on identified values and principles. But as we have seen in the last few years, there is nothing PDP ever agreed upon. Its leaders, like warlords fight vicious wars over everything, including sharing of our common wealth, but never on behalf of helpless Nigerians.

    In case we have forgotten, it was their members that told us how, under the guise of privatization and commercialization, they shared the nation’s once thriving blue-chip companies among PDP members and its sympathisers using the BPE. They waged a vicious battle over the sharing of prime lands and properties the nation inherited from her colonial masters.

    Lest we forget, it was Senator Bukola Saraki who became the whistle blower over the fuel subsidy scam of about N2 trillion for fuel neither imported nor delivered to Nigeria. The Farouk Lawal whose committee uncovered the scam was found to be like other many PDP men, a man with feet of clay.

    While we have been christened as one of the most corrupt nations on earth, PDP leaders, because of greed cannot even agree on what constitutes a corrupt practice. Leading members of PDP openly accept gifts from contractors. Our lawmakers attribute allocating unmerited salary packages to their members in a nation that cannot pay a minimum wage of N18, 000 to the ‘Nigeria factor’.

    While ex-President Obasanjo, who PDP leading members swore spent close to N10billion on his failed third term bid, claimed during a CNN interview programme last week that “the level of corruption in the country was rising, and Jonathan’s government was not doing enough to stem the tide”, President Jonathan claimed, “…most of these things we talk about corruption are not even corruption”. For him if there is corruption, since “Nigeria has more institutions that fight corruption than most other countries”, the government is also fighting corruption.”

    It is obvious that the removal of Olagunsoye Oyinlola as PDP national secretary which has deepened the current crisis was self-inflicted. His removal was the outcome of a suit filed by a faction of the party’s Ogun State chapter. The court agreed with the faction that the former governor was not fit to hold the post of secretary of the party. Justice Abdul Kafarati also gave a helping hand when he declared “The plaintiff’s suit is not based on an intra-party dispute; rather it seeks to enforce the decision of the Lagos Federal High Court on the grounds that it violated an earlier FHC order of February 16, 2012.”

    Then the question you ask yourself is why has South-west PDP opted to bite its nose in order to spite its face? Now while Oyinlola who has already told an appellate court in Abuja that Justice Abdul Kafarati who removed him from office erred in law by assuming ‘ jurisdiction over an intra party dispute’, Bamanga Tukur, the PDP chairman who like the South-west PDP saw the departure of Oyinlola as a way to get even with his tormenting PDP governors, has quickly planted his only loyalist in the National Working Committee, NWC, Solomon Onwe as acting national secretary leaving both the victorious and the vanquished South west PDP factions to lick their wounds.

    The South-west PDP decision to throw away the baby with the bathwater which is no doubt a clear evidence of a house divided against itself, is a mere reflection of the war of attrition of a party embroiled in a web of intrigues at the national level.

    Meanwhile, there is an alleged subtle threat by about 21 governors elected on the platform of PDP to quit the party unless its national chairman, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur, resigns.

    Tukur himself carries a moral burden as his son, along with other sons of leading lights of PDP are facing criminal charges for allegedly defrauding of government of billions of naira for fuel neither imported nor delivered to Nigeria.

    President Jonathan and his godfather, Chief Obasanjo, are also said to be embroiled in a crisis of confidence over the choice of Tony Anenih, the master ‘fixer’ of 2003 and 2007 elections, and Ahmadu Alli former PDP chairman who as chairman of PPPRA presided over the appointment of about 140 independent petroleum marketers, some of whom are standing trial for alleged theft of about N2trillion, as BOT chairman. What more indignity can a people be subjected to?

    And as the de facto leader of an embattled party, President Jonathan was alleged to have personally identified Bode George as member of those to reform the Board of Trustees (BOT) of PDP. Those close to him are saying the choice was informed by a desire to recoup some of the South-west goodwill the president squandered through some of his anti-South-west policies.

    The choice has been widely criticized not just by South-west PDP faction opposed to the politics of Bode George, but also by legal practitioners, civil rights groups, Anti-Corruption Network and Coalition against Corrupt Leaders, all blaming PDP for its disrespect for the public.

    While Dino Melaye, who became an anti-corruption crusader after falling out with PDP, claims Bode George’s choice was because “almost everybody in the party (PDP) is an ex-convict”, while, Debo Adeniran the Chairman of CACOL, said the “PDP’s decision was akin to legalising corruption”. Bode George, he said, “would infest others with criminal virus because he exemplifies corruption”.

    Except that we are all victims, no one would have wept for PDP and the selection of George as a key player in the final lap of its war of self destruction. I however sympathise with President Jonathan principally because of his penchant for sticking out his neck for indicted South-west PDP leaders. I want to believe his choice is often borne out of lack of sufficient understanding of the culture of the Yoruba, his over-reliance on advice of self-serving advisers, or informed by what his political enemies describe as his “politics of perfidy”.

    Jonathan who rose to become the president of Nigeria ought to have known that those who used constitutional means to dislodge Obasanjo from his stolen empire following the massively rigged 2007 election are products of a culture that produced those that ensured those who sowed the wind during the rigged 1965 western regional election, reaped the whirlwind. Their PDP kinsmen may share PDP world view, but are products of a culture that celebrates dissent in the face of arbitrariness and fraud.

    In Yorubaland, it is said that Eniti o jale lerekan, ti o da aran bori, aso ole ni oda bora’ (literarily meaning that a man who had been indicted for stealing, who later turn out in expensive damask dress is wearing a stolen dress). In case the president doesn’t know, the dissent among the Yoruba when it comes to dealing with intra-cultural conflicts that borders on fraud and arbitrariness is more vicious than when PDP engages in squabbles over sharing of our resources

     

  • The President and NCC’s dirty war

    The President and NCC’s dirty war

    In contrast to the oil sector which has remained a by-word for corruption, waste and inefficiency since the seventies, there is widespread public perception that the old telecommunication sector, at least from the advent of mobile telephony some eleven odd years ago or so, has turned into an excellent demonstration of how privatisation can turn the fortune of an economic sector around.

    This public perception has a sound basis. Today mobile phones number in their tens of millions in sharp contrast to less than 15 years ago when fixed phones were only for the well-heeled or well-connected and numbered only in their few thousands. Mobile phones have also been relatively cheap to buy and use compared to what we had before, if not compared to elsewhere in the world. Not least of all, the services the private phone companies provide have been making quite a bundle for their shareholders and users alike.

    Behind this public perception of a relatively efficient and profitable telecommunication sector, however, there seem to lurk a level of corruption which seems different from that of the oil sector less in its nature than on its depth and scope. Indeed there are experts I know who believe, given the way Nitel, the government telecommunication company, was privatised, corruption in the sector is worse than in the oil sector, regardless of the public perception.

    We may quibble about the depth and scope of the corruption in the telecommunication sector, but no one can deny that it is there – and that it is big.

    Any Doubting Thomas need only refer to recent newspaper reports of how the management of the Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC), the regulator of the industry, has been washing its dirty linen in public.

    It would seem the first blood in the commission’s running feud was drawn by Dr Bashir Gwandu, NCC’s Executive Commissioner (Technical Services), who has been at daggers drawn with the Executive Vice-Chairman of the commission and its chief executive, Dr. Eugene Juwah, almost from the day Juwah took over from him as acting chief executive following the retirement of the penultimate chief executive, Mr Ernest Ndukwe, a couple of years ago.

    On October 8, Leadership ran a front page lead story in which it alleged that President Goodluck Jonathan had approved a waiver of a little over 1billion Naira to a company, MTS First Wireless Services, which Dr. Juwah had worked for and in which he had shares before it went belly-up a few years ago. This was also before he became the CEO of NCC. The insinuation in the story was obvious.

    Even the most casual reading of a full page advert entitled “Mr. President, Please Save NCC now!”, published in the Daily Trust of October 23, among other newspapers, and signed by five members of a Business and Technology Publishers Forum (BTPF), which they claimed is “a professional body of seasoned Nigerian journalists who are actively engaged in the reportage of Business and Technology especially ICT in the country,” can only lead one to conclude that Juwah and his sympathisers believed the source of the Leadership story was Gwandu.

    Predictably, the BTPF advert’s conclusion was that the only way the P4resident can save NCC is to sack Gwandu who, it alleged, has been a serial saboteur of the commission’s management since he was first appointed a commissioner about seven years ago, all, they said, in his bid to become the commission’s CEO.

    BTPF is not alone in its call for Gwandu’s sack. Sources close to the supervising ministry say it too would not be averse to sacking the executive commissioner.

    The President may yet succumb to the pressure to do so, even though this would not be so easy because it requires the approval of the Senate. But even it were so easy, the President would be ill-advised to listen to the BTPF because sacking Gwandu will not make the issues involved in the now open management feud in the commission and about which Gwandu is accused of talking to the press, to go away. On the contrary, it can only raise questions about the President’s oft-stated commitment to fight corruption. For, there are indeed sordid goings-on at the NCC.

    First, no one has denied that the President has approved a huge waiver for the MTS with which Juwah had had links. I believe the insinuation in the Leadership story that this was his handiwork is somewhat unfair to the man. He may have worked there before, but the initiative for the waiver did come from him. Instead it came from his supervising ministry. Besides, the President did not have to approve. So even if he had a residual interest in MTS, the blame for the waiver should go to the minister and the president.

    In his own attempt to defend himself from the charge of conflict of interest in the case, the Executive Vice-Chairman told Thisday (October 21) that the allegation was an attempt by enemies of the Jonathan administration to discredit its record of performance.

    “It is,” he said, “now obvious that there is a motive and an agenda by some elements who are enemies of this administration and who are bent on stopping us from excelling.” Coming from someone I do not believe should be blamed for the MTS waiver, this is rather disingenuous.

    As Juwah himself said in the interview in question, the waiver came about because of moves by a new putative owner of Starcomms, Multilinks and MTS to merge and transform the three into a company that can compete with the Big Four in the industry, namely MTN, Glo, Airtel and Etisalat. All three merging companies, he said, applied for waiver but only MTS was given. This, he said, was because of the three, only MTS had gone bankrupt. This was in 2007. “It was,” he said, “no longer a going concern unlike Starcomms and Multilinks.”

    Surely as an industry consultant, Juwah must know that when you buy companies, as the chap he said was behind the planned merger of the three did, you buy them with all their assets and liabilities. Why was it necessary for anyone to ask government to shoulder the liabilities of MTS?

    Juwah, obviously, could have done better than trying to defend the indefensible.

    Then, of course, the MTS is not the only indefensible going-on at the NCC. There is even the more serious issue of the improper underselling of spectrum in no bid deals, the two most prominent of which were the sale of one spectrum to Open-Skies Limited led by Chief Emeka Offor – someone whose permanence in the corridors of power is almost legendary – and a similar sale of another spectrum to another company with the almost cynical name of Smile Communications Limited (Could it be that its owners enjoy smiling all the way to their banks at the expense of others?).

    In both cases the spectrums could have fetched the country much, much more that the price at which they were sold. And in the case of Open-Skies, not only did it pay peanuts for its spectrum; it failed to meet the deadline for payment more than once. Worse, it did not and still does not have a licence from NCC to use any spectrum.

    Worse still, at the time the company bought the spectrum it was yet to be properly retrieved from the Nigerian Police Force to which it had initially been allocated for security purposes but which it had failed to use.

    Again, it seemed more than mere coincidence that Open-Skies rushed to complete its payment only after the police had acquired a $406 million security surveillance system in preparation for the use of the spectrum. This can only fuel suspicions that Open-Skies acquired the spectrum merely to speculate with it, akin to land speculation.

    Certainly the President should move to save the NCC, as our telecommunication beat reporters have urged him to in their advert. However, what he should move against is not Gwandu but the messy goings-on at the NCC which the commissioner has been complaining about but which our concerned reporters see as the antics, indeed, “the lies of an ambitious Commissioner,” to use their own words.

     

  • ‘How Lam prevented another civil war’

    ‘How Lam prevented another civil war’

    • Ex-CPS recalls the late gov’s encounter with Buhari

     

    But for the maturity and wisdom of the late former Governor of Oyo State, Alhaji Lam Adesina, Nigeria could have been plunged into a second civil war.

    A former Chief Press Secretary to the late Governor, Chief Kehinde Olaosebikan, yesterday said in Abuja that a conflict between Yoruba and Hausa-Fulani would have thrown the country into another war.

    He told our correspondent that a former Head of State, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, had led a combative delegation of Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) to meet Adesina in 2000 in his office.

    According to him, “Precisely on the 13th of October, 2000, former military Head of State, General Muhammadu Buhari, in company with former Military administrator of Lagos State, General Buba Marwa, had led a heavy team of Arewa Consultative Forum in a combative mood to the office of the governor in protest against the alleged killings of over 69 Fulani cattle herders in Saki Area of the state.

    “General Buhari whose arrival to the Secretariat complex was preceded by scores of lorry loads of Hausa men and boys said pointedly at the executive council chambers of Oyo State that his team came to meet the governor to seek reasons why the people of Saki should not be dealt with for killing Fulani herdsmen. He did not stop at that, Gen Buhari accused Governor Lam Adesina of complicity in the killings and using his position as governor to pervert justice.

    He quoted the former Head of State as accusing the former governor of shielding the culprits. According to the General, they therefore wanted immediate stoppage of the killings, justice and compensation for the mass killings of the Fulanis or vengeance across the country.

    Olaosebikan added: “As weighty, indicting and provocative as the General’s allegations were against the governor, Alhaji Lam Adesina remained unperturbed as he only fired back with his own well-coordinated arsenals in form of refined strategy, robust explanations and effective engagements.

    “Lam Adesina identified all the points raised by the General and simply asked the heads of the organisations directly involved to respond.”

    He quoted Lam Adesina as saying: “ Before I thank you for this visit, you have come to tell me something, I also want to tell you something and that something is to make an appeal. General Buhari has been a former Head of State, Brigadier Marwa has governed Lagos for some time and with credibility… so you are national leaders of this country. Even though, by accident of birth, you are from the North, so you can be born anywhere, may be next time when I am coming to the world I will be born in the North or the South South.’

    He attributed the manner in which frayed nerves calmed to the level-headedness of the late governor, thus preventing what could have led to another civil war.

     

  • Achebe and the facts of the civil war

    Achebe and the facts of the civil war

    SIR: Every Yoruba man or woman living has reason to be angry at anything that is capable of portraying late Chief Obafemi Awolowo in bad light, no matter how factual. Awo as he was popularly called was a hero to the Yoruba race. His matchless achievements in various fields of human endeavours especially in the field of education ensured that the children of the poor got educated in the West. Awo was a Yoruba before being a Nigerian and he made no pretence about it while alive. As a war time federal commissioner of finance in the regime of General Yakubu Gowon, he presided over the war budgets. He was seen as a powerful voice in that administration. Gowon used him to get the support of the Yoruba on his side during that war. Therefore the reactions of so many Oduduwa sons and daughters over the historical analysis stated by Prof. Achebe in his recent book ‘’There Was a Country: A Personal History of Biafra’’ is expected.

    What Achebe wrote in his book is not new as so many Nigerians especially Ndigbo have known this before now. Why it is raising much dust now could be because it is written by a literary giant of Achebe’s calibre. Many Ndigbo believed and still do, that Awolowo hated them and are quick to make references to what Achebe wrote and other issues.

    Take for example, in 1979 Chief Awolowo as presidential candidate of Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) came to Aba in one of his electioneering campaigns and told his audience that if he became president, he will ban the importation of stockfish and second hand clothes. Hardly had he finished the statement when stones began to fly from various corners of Etche Road Primary School field venue of the campaign. Ndigbo saw Awo’s statement as another economic blockade coming if he wins that election.

    For a race that was just recovering from the devastating effects of civil war, and considering the fact that many Ndigbo have embraced buying and selling these stuffs as a means of sustenance, Awo’s statement was viewed with all seriousness. I recall late Dr. Chuba Okadigbo’s reaction that “it is callous for anybody to think of banning items that are apropos to Ndigbo”.

    Recall also that the indigenization decree of 1973 was primarily targeted at Ndigbo to ensure that they did not rise again. Or how else can one explain the giving of twenty pounds to any account holder of Igbo extraction after the war no matter how much he or she has in account before the war broke out? With that paltry sum, Ndigbo could not participate in the indigenization programme and a large chunk of the companies were bought by a section of the country.

    The time has come for the true account of the civil war. Nigerians need to know who did what and it is idiotic for anybody to ask that an apology be tendered when such facts come to the open. What Achebe has done is a tip of the iceberg. Others should emulate him so that those who do evil will know that a day will come when everything will be brought to the public domain.

     

    • Ijoma M. Okey.

    Bompai Kano.

     

  • The fog of war

    The fog of war

    A few years back when I ran a column on 40 years of Biafra, my cell phone crashed from invectives of malicious fury. The overwhelming line from the rage was that I exercised the temerity to address a matter that I should have left in the grove of silence. I had tackled the Nigerian civil war and the opportunities missed for peace instead of the headlong rush to hostilities and I fingered Odumegwu Ojukwu and the genocidal bigots of the North for blame.

    Ironically, when Chinua Achebe published his now tempestuous work, There Was A Country, the Yoruba intelligentsia and political elite were up in arms, clobbering him for not keeping silent on issues like his charge of genocide on Obafemi Awolowo.

    I welcome this debate. Achebe brought his grand image as role model and Africa’s preeminent novelist to bear in his book. After reading, I discovered a wasted opportunity. His haunting style and limpid prose fell prey to a tendentious logic. Mostly, the book is marked by what he did not say than what he said. For a book that generated storm for its boldness, its lack of virtue derives from well-calibrated silences. For instance, he condemned the absence of the civil war from school curriculums. But he did confront some fundamental issues of the Nigerian crisis of the 1960s.

    The first was the pogrom. Igbo died in droves but the circumstances of that dark cloud of our history still loom over us. Nothing even Aburi, where Yakubu Gowon and Ojukwu parleyed like adversaries, tackled them. If important numbers of an ethnic group dissolved in the genocidal savagery from another ethnic group, how did anyone expect the nation to go on without justice being visited on those involved? It was a mercurial moment as Igbo ran away from what they thought was home. Tears, blood with carion flesh was Igbo in their own country. Relatives saw relatives expire just before they too vanished under the prejudice of knives, daggers and guns.

    Ojukwu was urged to ask Igbo to return to their various towns and businesses outside Igboland when no one had prosecuted the murderers. They wanted a nation built on a lie. The Igbo decision to go to war was difficult to fault. When the civil war came, there were stories of insensate killings. Federal generals lined up men, women and children and executed them in cold blood. All of these were well-documented. Rape, beatings, arson and other manifestations of abuse became routine parts of the story in eastern Nigeria.

    When the war ended, Gowon did not address these issues. He was only interested in bringing Ojukwu to trial, which reinforced the suspicions by historians that the egos of Ojukwu and Gowon overwhelmed any sense of propriety on the eve of the war. Gowon denied ever knowing of the barbarous cruelties of his generals who even defended their actions openly. Why were they never brought to trial? If Ojukwu and his men on the Biafrain side committed offences against the Geneva Convention, why was he also not brought to book on his own show of ruthless hubris?

    The militancy in the Niger Delta, the ethno-sectarian blisters in Jos as well as the eruptions of Boko Haram come from a nation that failed to address the fundamental issues that ruptured the nation in the 1960s.

    Up till today, all those who committed war crimes or genocide in the Second World War are being tracked around the world and tried. The Balkan crisis of over a decade ago still makes headlines today with the trials of generals like Karadzic. After the Rwandan earth clotted with brotherly blood, the nation could not be reborn without cleansing the past with trials and prosecutions. South Africa had its truth and reconciliation moments.

    If Ojukwu’s goal was secession, why did he occupy the neutral Midwest with all the tales of rape, harassment, curfew? Achebe wrote as though he had no evidence. It seemed Ojukwu wanted the Midwest oil? Why was he heading for Lagos?

    Achebe’s book has presented us with an opportunity. Too much malice festers in the Nigerian blood for us to look across ethnic aisles as a fraternal brood. We still evince what novelist Sembene Ousmane calls the “perfidy of lies and hypocrisy of rivals.”

    It is out of that tainted blood that Achebe churns out what should have been another masterpiece from the storied author. We cannot also address the pogrom without addressing some of the issues that triggered it. Did the Hausa-Fulani fear the ascendancy of the Igbo, and was that the reason for the thirst for Igbo blood? Was the Nzeogwu-led coup an Igbo agenda or the coincidence of more Igbo officers at the prime? Achebe failed to address the issue comprehensively. He did not drop an ink on why it failed in the east.

    On Ironsi, he argued that the general repulsed his attackers. But he did not even tackle the other suspicion as to whether the man had a tip-off or was spared by the majors. He merely painted Ironsi as reconciliator. On Decree 34, Achebe did not address the possibility that the law gave the Igbo advantage over other ethnic groups and some saw the decree as anointing that move. Some scholars wondered if Ironsi enacted the law out of hegemonic hubris or naivety. We shall never know. But Achebe feigned ignorance of this naunced perspective.

    Columnist Mohammed Haruna recalled a writing of a former New Nigerian head who was confronted after the Nzeogwu-led coup by writer Cyprian Ekwensi and other Igbo who claimed they had come to “take over.” There was no doubt of Igbo dominance of the civil service. If the Hausa-Fulani preened over their dominance, why should another group not try for power? It is the story everywhere. Only in the U.S. today is there a conscious effort to restrain such hegemonic pride. At the time of the Nigerian crisis, America resented voting rights for blacks. It was the extraordinary statecraft of President Lyndon Johnson that compelled Congress to enact the Civil Rights Act against the majority impulses. His Democratic Party has lost the South since.

    Even today, Ijaw openly flaunt their position because Jonathan is president. The point is not that a group cannot win, but that everything has to be done by rules agreed upon by all. The Igbo, including Achebe, have shied from admitting the obvious. Achebe claims Igbo are the most progressive people in Nigeria but falls shy of admitting that the Igbo seek to dominate. I would have loved him also to address the issue of Igbo political class that continues to play a game of mercantilist subservience and selling out the whole group for a mess of contracts and sinecure positions.

    On genocide, we cannot deny that many Igbo died of starvation. We cannot also deny that Awolowo saw “starvation as a legitimate weapon of war.” His singular move to change currency was, from the federal side, a policy of genius. It was death knell to Biafra. Achebe argued that Awolowo did that to foster his ambition and he wanted to kill many Igbo in order to ensure that. Awolowo’s assertion about starvation and war would have nailed him forever as a sadist of war. But history documents his visit to Biafra, even at the risk of dying in the hands of Adekunle. He returned wondering what happened to all the food sent to Biafra. He discovered that the food probably went to the soldiers. Sad as it was, you cannot feed your enemy soldiers.

    Achebe did not tell the story of the economic divide of Biafra. The soldiers and bureaucrats did not starve. This was well-delineated in Chimamanda Adichie’s Half Of The Yellow Sun and other books. Achebe suffers serial dislocations and one’s heart goes out to him as he tells the story of how his family escapes death from a bombing just when his mother reels in her death bed. But the writer does not show he and his family crave for food. He actually has two cars while ordinary Biafrans survive on desperate vegetables and lizards.

    Achebe will be veering into psycho-history to show that Awolowo intended to starve ordinary civilians with the currency policy and not to win the war. War policy has consequences. In the war against Iraq, General Colin Powell said: “Our strategy in this war is very simple: first we are going to cut them off, and then we are going to kill them.” Civilians tragically suffered deprivation. In such consequences, we cannot forget the slogan during the American civil war: “Richman’s war, poor man’s fight.” Awolowo wanted to win the war. What ambition did Awo want with Gowon when he was already second in command in the government? If he wanted to be president anointed by Gowon, would he not want the love of Igbo to win the election? Achebe was not clear with prose.

    Why did Ojukwu not open the food corridor, a thing that forced an expatriate adviser to resign? Ojukwu was believed by some to have allowed the starvation because it served as a potent propaganda tool? Was that true? Was it true that Awolowo saved all allocations to eastern Nigeria and gave them after the war? Why then did we not see massive rehabilitation in the east after the war? What did Asika do with the money? Was it even enough after all the depredations of war?

    The Igbo have remonstrated against the indigenisation decree and have accused Gowon and Awolowo as targeting them. The more this matter is examined, the more one is convinced that the Igbo suffered unfairly from that law. They had lost everything. That law put them at a disadvantage. But it is a credit to the genius of the race that they have bounced back in spite of such disadvantage.

    Why did the issue of abandoned properties not go through vigorous trials? That was one of the most vicious parts of the after-war imbecilities of the Gowon administration. Clearly Gowon’s reconciliation efforts were half-hearted.

    We did not address many issues and that is why they reincarnate. We can still look back, not in anger but for truth. We have done so without equity or truth. History continues to mean different things to different Nigerians. And we act according to our past. What one group sees in history, another denies. “I met history, but it didn’t recognise me,” wrote poet Derek Walcott. What history recognises the Igbo does not recognise the Yoruba. It is only if we have the courage to convene a body of truth and reconciliation, with the culprits named and victims vindicated, that we can avoid the replay of past eruptions. In future plotters will know that evil has official penalties. It is only then that we can fulfill Elie Wiesel’s words that “for the dead and the living we bear witness.” Or else the dead will continue to haunt the living in the Boko Haram, militants and the human infernos of Jos.

    Historian Cornelius Tacitus wrote in The Histories about the civil war that wracked Rome after Nero and how the tissues of its imperial splendour suffered from egos, greed, plunder, malice and lies. One of his epochal lines was, “conversation increases with hope.” Rome lacked that gift of hope. For us, we need conversation with the past. Without it, we cannot guarantee a future without rancour. That is the gift of Achebe’s book.