Idon’t know if it is appropriate for the old saying, “How are the mighty fallen”, to come into play here. But chai, life is a joke. Full of ironies. Tosses us up and down. And, I just wonder, and ask myself, why we struggle, so much, to impress life, instead of allowing it to deal with us as it deems fit.

You know, atimes, after so much struggles, arranging and packaging out lives, life just laughs, and deals an inexplicable blow on us. Or, how does one explain what has happened, politically, to the immediate past Transportation Minister, Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi?

Of course, you know Amaechi. Who doesn’t?  He comes as big as one can imagine. As large. And as loud. Ambitious. Blunt. Atimes, no niceties. Sure-footed. Fine boy, no pimple, with a closely knit family. Many people admire the, often, “public affection”  between him and his wife, Judith. He calls her his best friend, confidant, wife of his youth. Awwww! Nice.

You know all those.But for the purpose of this write-up, I need to do a brief re-introduction  of Amaechi.

Amaechi’s journey to Politics began when he was appointed a Special Assistant during the Government, in Rivers State, of Chief Rufus Ada George and his Deputy, Dr Peter Odili. Amaechi was attached to Odili’s office. He had always been attached to Odili – long before then.

The Military, headed by maximum leader, General Sani Abacha, sacked that Government. It was an Interim one, hurriedly put together by then (Military) President, General Ibrahim Babangida, when he stepped aside.

When General Abacha,  passed on, and the gentle-looking General Abdulsalami Abubakar stepped in as the Head of State, Politicians and politics came alive again. And Amaechi was, of course, with Odili.

While Odili contested for the office of the Governor, Amaechi went for the House of Assembly. The strong speculation is that Amaechi was, allegedly, defeated by Uche Okwukwu,  but somehow, he made it to the Assembly. And Odili made sure Amaechi was installed Speaker of the House, a position he held for eight years.

From there, Amaechi’s luck  propelled to high heavens.More than any of those who contested for the Presidential Primary of the APC, Amaechi had held more challenging and responsible and respectable  political offices. Here goes:

Two-term Speaker of the House of Assembly.Chairman Conference of Speakers, Nigeria.Two-term Chairman, Nigeria Governors Forum.Two term Minister of Transportation.For two times, Director General of President Muhammadu Buhari Presidential Campaign Council – 2015, 2019.

How solid and rich can one’s  credentials be?

As a Governor, he knew how to use power. Ask  the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, the brilliant Joseph Mbu, during Amaechi’s time as Governor. He showed the guy pepper and fire, at once. Mbu, a sure-footed Officer, withstood the fire, and closed his eyes to avoid Amaechi’s pepper.

Then, Amaechi faced then President Goodluck Jonathan. Stubborn guy, strong-willed,  Amaechi was the one who leaked the controversial, non-proven story that over 45 billion US Dollars were missing during  Jonathan’s administration. Ask then Central Bank Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, former Emir of Kano, he said so. Amaechi was the one, who, as a Governor, led the rebellion against Jonathan. And, he was the one who introduced  APC to Rivers State and the  South-south.

As a Grade A Minister, under President Muhammadu Buhari, he was very powerful. There were many times he showed raw power. He knew how to have his way. Ask former Managing Director of the Nigeria Ports Authority, the elegant Hadiza Bala-Usman. Amaechi dealt with her. He was a powerful Minister, very powerful.

So what happened to Amaechi? The Amaechi who not a few people thought was being groomed, by President Buhari and the powers-that-be in the North, to succeed him in office. He served the North. No doubt, he did. Check out the number of landmark projects he executed down there, especially, in Daura. When he was given the high profile title – Dan Amanar Daura – by the Emir of Daura, Buhari’s Emir, many thought ”ah, that’s it, he will succeed Buhar.” Especially, as Nigeria’s First Lady, the no-nonsense Aisha Buhari, did the unprecedented. She visited  Amaechi and his wife, Judith, in their home, bearing gifts, to congratulate him on the Daura title. The pictures were flaunted. And many took that visit as an endorsement of Amaechi as  Aisha’s husband’s successor in office.

So, what happened? Or, what has happened. How did Amaechi suddenly, so suddenly, become anonymous? Is it not the same Amaechi who called a former Minister of Aviation a thief on National Television? Why has he been so quiet, politically? How did his larger than life image disappear? Where has all that power gone to? Why has he become irrelevant, politically, both in Rivers State and at the National level? It is like cold water has been poured on him. Has Amaechi suddenly become history?

Not a few people think so. And they point accusing fingers at Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, the   one man riot squad of Nigerian politics who not only showed his Party, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP,  pepper but destroyed it, and ended Atiku Abubakar’s every four-years Presidential run, unless the Courts say otherwise.

You would recall, dear readers, that Amaechi and Wike were of the same PDP. They were good friends. Aside from the fact that both of them belonged to the influential Odili Political family, Wike stood by Amaechi when former President Olusegun Obasanjo stopped Amaechi from running for the Governorship seat of Rivers State, which Odili had ceded to him.

Wike fought for Amaechi who was in exile in Ghana. And when the Supreme Court, in one of its inexplicable rulings, declared Amaechi the Governor, even though he did not stand for election, Amaechi rewarded Wike by making him his Chief of Staff. But it was a relationship bound not to last. Two strong, stubborn, ambitious people, they were bound to be caught in a power struggle.

At that time their relationship with their mentor, Odili, had become cold. When Wike was literally shipped to Abuja by Amaechi to become a  Minister of State, Education, Wike  found “his feet”, and according to him, literally crawled back to the Odilis. And his relationship with Amaechi continued to go down the hill. Then, a combination of a few things made Amaechi  dump the PDP for the APC.

Not a few people believe that Amaechi, more than anything else, left the PDP because of Wike. They say Wike was too strong for him in the State. And, even though Amaechi was Governor, Wike caged him.

That was how come Wike stopped Amaechi from installing his own successor. He defeated Amaechi, and became the Governor.

With Wike as Governor, Amaechi was finally caged. He ran Amaechi out of the State. Federal might could not save him. It was from that time that Amaechi’s influence in the State began to wane.

Of course Amaechi’s office as Minister for Transportation gave him a lot of power and influence, and visibility, but it couldn’t save him. The APC was unable to win any significant position in the State. Not encouraging. But at the Federal level, within  APC, Amaechi reigned. In his State, he had no tap root.

At the Presidential Villa, Amaechi reigned too. Otherwise, how was he able to carry out so many projects in Daura which earned him that high profile title from the Emirate? How was he even able to remove the high profile and privileged Bala-Mohammed from the Managing Directorship of the NPA?

When Amaechi picked the Presidential form for the APC Primary, many thought it would be a “goooooal” for him. But many too felt he lost it the day he declared, in Porthacourt, his interest to run for the office.They said he made a fundamental mistake when he ran round the venue to show he is very healthy. They say it was not a diplomatic move, seeing that the state of Buhari’s health was a subject of controversy. “What did he want prove?”, they asked. “Was he, indirectly,  mocking the President’s fragile health?, others murmured. When he lost to Tinubu, not much sympathy went his way from his Party members.

His non reappointment as a Minister by Buhari, after the Presidential Primary was seen as a sign that Amaechi had fallen out of favour. Perhaps, he didn’t take note. But the worst awaited him in the hands of Wike who found a way to shunt him out of the APC.

Wike took over the APC in the State, and  made Amaechi irrelevant  in a Party where he was among the top 20. At the National level, Wike convinced them Amaechi is a paper-weight politician in the State. Every who is who in the APC began to ignore him.

In Rivers State, Wike became the man to go to. The toast. APC leaders, Including APC Governors, would visit Porthacourt and ignore Amaechi. They would go and dine and wine with Wike, and not even have the courtesy of placing a phone call to Amaechi to tell him “We are coming to your State, or we are in your State.”

Amaechi was reduced to a nobody in the Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign Council. He had no role to play. It is even doubtful he was invited to most of the rallies. To the extent that when the APC Presidential train and team arrived Porthacourt, Amaechi was nowhere to be seen. He chose to be absent. The APC cut a deal with Wike behind Amaechi.

By doing that, they indirectly told the former powerful Transportation Minister that he had neither power nor influence in Rivers Politics again. They knew where the power was. It was with Wike.

On 25th February, the day of the Presidential election, Amaechi played no role for APC. Wike was in charge, and by hook or crook, delivered the candidate of Amaechi’s Party to spite his own Party’s Candidate. Amaechi contributed nothing, many in APC taunted him later.

To rub it in, to show that he was in charge, on the day of the Governorship election, Wike played the opposite role. He sent Amaechi’s  APC Governorship Candidate, Tonye Cole,  crashing, and delivered the PDP  Candidate. There was no “pim” from Amaechi then, and still no ”pim” from him till date. He is just there!

A couple of weeks ago, a number of APC members, thought to be loyal to Amaechi, rose against him. They said he was no longer  the APC leader in the State, a position he cherished so much. They accused him of anti-party activities. Only a couple of people spoke up for him.

A few days ago, two of his closest allies were suspended by the Rivers APC. Can you imagine that? He was saved the humiliation by the National body which  rescued him from that embarrassment, by canceling the suspension.

Just by playing smart, by playing a double game, by eating his cake, and still had it tucked away in his pocket, Wike reduced Amaechi to a nobody in APC.

Nobody knows exactly what Wike wants. Will he dump  the PDP for APC, a Party he swore he hated to the sky and back? Many think his plan is to,  eventually, rebuild the PDP and lead it. Nobody should doubt that, especially, in the PDP. The Party Leaders  were all there, mopping, when Wike, single-handedly,  killed and buried the Party. They did nothing. He removed two of their National Chairmen, one after the other from office. They did nothing. They were afraid of him. Still are.

This order day, he flaunted Tinubu on PDP’s grave, in Porthacourt, danced and peed on it. Effectively, Wike is the leader of both the PDP and the APC in Rivers State.

But back to Amaechi.

Does he regret dumping PDP for APC?  Perhaps, yes. Afterall, he, allegedly, worked for the APC Presidential Candidate, Atiku Abubakar, in the Presidential election. Too late. Made no impact. But for the Coup he led against Jonathan and PDP, the Party which gave him all in 2015, PDP could still have been in power.  Perhaps. He and his fellow Coupists, most of whom have fallen by the wayside, could still have been parading as the powers-that-be.

But, perhaps, he has no regrets. Being the Minister for Transportation for eight years is a big deal. Yet it pales before what he gained in the PDP, and could have continued to gain.

However, he should be consoled that he is not the only “big politician” in Rivers State who Wike has reduced to nothing. They are many. He reduced them to empty drums. Just noise makers. In Rivers, politically, it seems there is none, man enough, to do, or say “pim” before Wike – the Jagaban of the State, the Jagaban of the PDP.

So, will Amaechi ever rise again, politically? Probably. Age is on his side. But my guess is not very soon. And that’s sad. He had such a bright future, politically. But now, he is just “siddon look.” Bewildering.

How true is the claim that Nigeria is subsidizing PMS consumption in other neighbouring countries? In January 2022, the Minister of Finance, Zainab Ahmed, declared that the daily PMS consumption rate was 65.7 million litres. The NNPC stated that the average daily PMS supply from January to August 2022 was 68 million litres based on truck-out data. But, the daily PMS consumption rate was 44.4 million litres. The difference was never delivered and reflected the padding of PMS consumption data for corrupt purposes. The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, argued that PMS smuggling was responsible for the discrepancy in data from different government sources. He stated, “The imported products come to Nigeria, and from there filters out of our borders to neighbouring countries. We are inadvertently subsidizing the whole of Africa.”

This IMF smuggling argument is premised on the price differential between PMS prices in Nigeria and neighbouring nations. The PMS price per litre in Nigeria is $0.573 while the prices in the neighbouring countries of Benin, Niger, Chad and Cameroon are $1.093, $0.976, $0.847 and $1.093 respectively. However, the area covered by Benin, Nigeria, Niger, Chad and Cameroon is not a free market zone where product supply react seamlessly with price stimuli. These are nations with market boundaries that constitute impediment to unrestricted price induced PMS volume flows. During the 2023 Presidential campaign, the Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, stated ““How can we be subsidizing fuel consumption of Cameroon, of Niger, of Benin Republic. No matter how long you protest, we are going to remove subsidy”. However, in 2023, the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Niger Republic for the importation of petroleum products.  There is obvious no smuggling of Nigerian PMS into Niger.

In September 2022, the Nigeria Customs Service questioned the PMS smuggling assumptions of the NNPCL and government. The NNPCL had claimed it loaded 98 million litres per day in trucks to meet the nation’s estimated 60 million daily PMS consumption needs. The Customs comptroller-general, Hameed Ali, asked “The issue of smuggling, if you release 98 million litres in actuality and 60 million litres are used, the balance should be 38 million litres. How many trucks will carry 38 million litres every day?”. Since it will require 1151 PMS tankers with 33,000 litres capacity crossing the borders daily, the smuggling argument broke down. A simple input output volume balance of petroleum products in the region shows that no PMS is smuggled into neighbouring countries. For example, Niger’s Zinder refinery has a 20,000 barrels per day (bpd) capacity. In 2015, Niger produced 15,280 bpd of petroleum products and imported 3,799 bpd for an input volume of 19,079 bpd. The country consumed 13,000 bpd and exported 5,422 bpd into Chad and Benin for an output volume of 18,422 bpd. Therefore, Niger had a net input of 657 bpd. Chad produced 0 bpd of petroleum products and imported 2,285 bpd for an input volume of 2,285 bpd. It consumed 2,200 bpd and exported 0 bpd for an output volume of 2,200 bpd. It had a net output of 85 bpd.

Cameroon produced 39,080 bpd of petroleum products and imported 14,090 bpd for an input volume of 53,170 bpd. It consumed 42,000 bpd and exported 8,545 bpd for an output volume of 50,445 bpd. It had a net input of 2,725 bpd. Benin produced 0 bpd of petroleum products and imported 38,040 bpd for an input volume of 38,040 bpd. It consumed 44,000 bpd and exported 1,514 bpd for an output volume of 45,514 bpd. It had a net output of 7,474 bpd. The total net output of surrounding nations in the region was 4,177 bpd. In 2015, Nigeria produced 35,010 bpd of petroleum products and imported 223,400 bpd for an input volume of 258,410 bpd. It consumed 316,000 bpd and exported 2,332 bpd for an output volume of 318,332 bpd.  It had a net output of 59,922 bpd. Let us assume that the net regional output of 4,177 bpd from neighbouring countries was smuggled from Nigeria, there would still have been was a net output of 55,745 bpd which was never imported into Nigeria nor smuggled to neighbouring countries.

We have shown that no PMS is smuggled to neighbouring nations. This is an IMF argument to justify the corruption in the subsidy regime. In 2011, the average daily PMS consumption rate was 31.2 million litres, while the government paid fuel subsidy of 2,110 billion Naira on based on  an estimated PMS consumption rate of 56.9 million litres. The difference of 25.7 million litres per day was said to have been smuggled out of the country. In reality, this difference was due to companies making false subsidy claims on undelivered fuel. These corrupt practices were revealed by the 2012 Farouk Lawan House of Representative Ad-Hoc Committee investigation and report. The committee found payments for billions of litres of petrol that were never supplied, and more than $6.8 billion refunds due to the Treasury. The Federal government’s Aigboje Aig-Imoukhuede committee also indicted 25 companies. It identified an over payment of $2.5 billion and questioned an additional $1.5 billion worth of transactions. In 2012,  1,360 billion Naira was paid as subsidy for the importation of 43.1 million litres of PMS per day. But, the daily PMS consumption rate was 32.4 million litres. The remaining 10.7 million litres per day of PMS was never delivered. Nobody have gone to jail for this theft of public funds. PMS daily consumption rate should be measured with certified dynamic flow meters such Coriolis meters and a Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system to eliminate the falsification or padding of PMS daily consumption data for corrupt purposes. If existing refineries are repaired and more refineries built, there will be no need for a PMS price hike under the guise of fuel subsidy removal.

AS an undergraduate in Great Ife, the Obafemi Awolowo University, I was a member of the Students Representative Council, the parliament. Whenever we met, the generality of the student body surrounded the venue to observe. The idea was that the parliament represented the students, so they have a right not only to observe, but also influence it. In a far limited sense, that is what is called the gallery; except that while the gallery can be cleared, same does not apply to the parliament.

The idea that parliamentarians are autonomous and should not be influenced either in picking their officers or legislating, was ridiculous.

Given that background and consciousness, I find it a huge joke for some legislators-elect to demand that the leadership of the 10th National Assembly should be determined by members alone without influence from outside, including, the ruling party and the President-elect.

It is wishful thinking to expect the in-coming Executive to be disinterested in who becomes the Senate President, Speaker or their Deputies. Even the legislators diverting the country’s attention on such a matter know they are joking. Otherwise, they would not be littering our cities with their billboards and posters soliciting to be elected into the leadership of the National Assembly when they know the general populace, being neither Distinguished Senators nor Honourable Members, are not eligible to vote in the hallowed chambers.

I have not read about these legislators or their horde of supporters making a case for pro-people programmes the next Assembly should pursue; how to check the financial recklessness of previous assemblies, or the content of the character of those aspiring to lead the Assembly. It is all about zoning, sharing offices, and by extension, cornering the resources of the country.

Some even warn that the scenario of the 8th Assembly when Senator Bukola Saraki broke ranks and got himself elected against the position of the party, should not be repeated. I ask: why not? Was the rebel Saraki leadership not far better than the out-going rubber stamp Assembly leadership?

The idea that only National Assembly members should determine who the Senate President or House Speaker should be is as ridiculous as saying politics should be left to politicians alone. Even when the Constitution empowers the President to pick ministers, he cannot be allowed to do so without pressures and interference from various groups, parties, communities and interests, including the National Assembly. Indeed, it will be ridiculous to expect one man alone to pick a minimum of one minister from each of the 36 states without outside interference.

Even if we all close our eyes and play deaf to the process of NASS members electing officers, that would not mean the Assembly will be independent; a parliamentary leadership that wants to sell out will do so irrespective of whether its ascension was backed or rejected by ‘outsiders’. In any case, the idea of whether the NASS is independent or not would not be determined by its antagonism to the Executive.

The fact is that the way the NASS runs is so compromised that it cannot be independent of the Executive. First, it pays its members all sorts of allowances and emoluments, outside what is officially approved. And that is to the extent that the net payment to a member of the House of Representatives comes to some N10 million ($21,621) monthly and that of the Senator, N14 million ($32,272) monthly.

Secondly, the Assembly pads the National Budget so heavily that President Muhammadu Buhari in his 2022 Budget claimed that the NASS inserted 6,576 new projects in the budget, including over 1,500 into the budget of the Federal Ministry of Agriculture alone. These insertions are done without regard to needs, feasibility studies, conceptualisation, design, costing or availability of funds. This, as we are aware, is an annual ritual in the NASS.

Thirdly, the parliamentarians hijack executive responsibilities by awarding themselves ‘constituency projects’ which they cost, award, implement, supervise and approve by themselves.

Perhaps a more fundamental issue is the electoral process that produced many of the NASS members which we all know cannot stand the most basic of scrutiny. Some were not even candidates produced through normal party primaries; and for many, their elections were characterised by financial inducement, blatant vote-buying, intimidation and violence. In summary, the process which produced some NASS members was criminal.

For many legislators, investing huge sums in getting elected into parliament is a worthy investment because the returns are very high; perhaps the highest and safest investment in the country.

So, what we truly need in Nigeria is not the so-called independence of the legislator from the Executive, but his independence from an un-parliamentary culture. A critical step is to make it so unattractive that only those interested in serving the people will seek election into parliament. I am never tired of making a contrast between the Nigerian Senator who for the work of making laws collects an obscene net of $32,272 monthly or $387,264 annually, and his Cuban counterpart who receives not a single cent for doing the same work. While the Nigerian Senator claims to be doing legislative work full-time and lays claims to other monies, including for vehicles, the Cuban Senator has a full-time work and being a legislator is part-time. So in Cuba, after a normal day’s work, while his fellow workers are going home to their families or for relaxation, the Senator is heading to the National Assembly for the voluntary part-time work of making laws. Therefore, where in Nigeria a Senator may be willing to buy votes, employ thugs and violence in order to get elected or re-elected, the Cuban Senator does not buy votes, and may not even be too keen to get elected. Yet, the quality of law making in Cuba, is not inferior to that in Nigeria. If anything, going by the pro-people laws in Cuba, the Cuban National Assembly is far superior to that of Nigeria.

This is not about a socialist or non-socialist system, it is about basic human decency. For instance, Mahmud Ahmadinejad, the two-term President of Iran who left office in August 2013, did not retire into stupendous wealth like former Nigerian Presidents. He merely returned to his work as a lecturer in the Civil Engineering Faculty of the Iran University of Science and Technology.

When he returned to his teaching job after a ten-year absence, he told his colleagues and students: “I am very happy to be back, as if I am home.”

Again, unlike former Nigerian Presidents and state governors who have convoys of expensive cars, including bullet proof ones, Ahmadinejad has been seen going to work in crowded buses. He has no fear of being mobbed because he was and remains part of the Iranian people.

On August 17, 1980, the 6th Commonwealth Law Conference convened in Lagos, then capital of Nigeria. After the arrival courtesies were dispensed with, it fell upon Shehu Shagari, civilian president of Nigeria then in office for 10 and a half months, to declare the conference open. The keynote speaker was Jeremiah Obafemi Awolowo, Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and leader of the opposition Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), who had run President Shagari desperately close in the contest for Nigeria’s presidency only one year before.

That contest ended up being decided by the Supreme Court of Nigeria in a judgment memorably described as being “a compromise between law and political expediency”. At the head of the bench that decided the case was Atanda Fatayi-Williams, at the time the Chief Justice of Nigeria. As famous as this judgment would become, the antecedents arguably proved to be more lasting in their influence on Nigeria’s politics and institutions.

The relevant part of the story begins on August 16, 1979, when the Federal Electoral Commission, (FEDECO) headed by Michael Ani, announced Shehu Shagari of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN) as the winning candidate in the elections to return Nigeria to civil rule. Three of the five presidential candidates in the contest repudiated the result, setting up what would become an epic election dispute. Obafemi was one of the three.

The Electoral Act of 1979 under which the vote took place anticipated that there could be a dispute and conferred on the Supreme Court the jurisdiction for final decision-making on disputes concerning the presidential election. The panel to hear the disputes were to be led by the Chief Justice of Nigeria but the then incumbent, Sir Darnley Alexander, was due to retire on August 24, 1979, a mere eight days after the announcement of the result and well before the Supreme Court was due to begin hearing the presidential election dispute.

Three days before the retirement date of Chief Justice Darnley Alexander, on August 21, 1979, then military Head of State, Olusegun Obasanjo, an army general, requested to meet Atanda Fatayi-Williams, then a Justice of the Supreme Court, at the seat of power in the Dodan Barracks in Lagos. At the meeting, Obasanjo offered Fatayi-Williams the office of Chief Justice in succession to Sir Darnley.

In his memoirs, ‘Faces, Cases, and Places’ published in 1983, Fatayi-Williams claimed that this offer “was totally unexpected, and, for the first time in my life, I was at a loss for words”, adding that Obasanjo “watched my discomfiture with relish and delight”.

Some of his peers on the Supreme Court were not so sure. Fatayi-Williams was admitted to the Bar of the Middle Temple in London in 1948, one year after Chukwunweike Idigbe and three years later than Dr. Egbert Udo Udoma, both of whom were his peers in the Supreme Court. Fatayi-Williams was from Lagos; Idigbe came from the then Mid-West; while Udo Udoma came from the then South Eastern State. Idigbe became a judge in 1961, before being appointed to the Supreme Court in 1964. His service on the Supreme Court was, however, fractured by the Nigerian Civil War.

Udo Udoma, who also became a judge in 1961, had enjoyed a career as a lawyer, minority rights activist, campaigner, politician, and federal legislator before being appointed a judge in 1961. Two years later, in 1963, he became Chief Justice of Uganda with the understanding that upon the end of his tenure in Uganda, he would return to a position on Nigeria’s Supreme Court. This came to pass in 1968 when General Yakubu Gowon appointed him Justice of the Supreme Court. Atanda Fatayi-Williams arrived court in 1969 as a junior to Udo Udoma and, strictly speaking, to Idigbe.

In his memoirs, ‘The Eagle in Flight’, Udo Udoma recalls that upon the retirement of Chief Justice Adetokunbo Ademola in 1972, the then-ruling Supreme Military Council considered five names for appointment to replace him, namely: Professor Taslim Elias, who was then the Attorney-General of the Federation; John Idowu Conrad Taylor, then Chief Justice of Lagos (as the office was then known); Dr. George Baptist Ayodola Coker, Justice of the Supreme Court; Rotimi Frederik Alade Williams, a senior lawyer in private practice; and Udo Udoma himself. Fatayi-Williams was notably not in the running. In the event, the military preferred Taslim Elias, who had served them well as Attorney-General.

When a new military regime relieved Elias of the position in July 1975, they settled on Sir Darnley Alexander, until then a little-known Chief Judge of the South Eastern State, whom Udo Udoma had recommended for that office.
In 1979, the stakes in the appointment of Chief Justice were very high: the presidency of Nigeria could depend on it. Udo Udoma, who lived with medically induced disabilities, writes in his memoirs that: “Justice Fatayi-Williams, then also a Justice of the Supreme Court, registered a solemn protest on the ground that he saw no reason why I (Udo Udoma) should be given such a high post as the Chief Justice of Nigeria despite the fact that I was an amputee. He felt strongly that the SMC under the leadership of a Yoruba man like himself would not be justified to ignore him who then had no handicap. He then contacted several Yoruba men, including Chief S.L. Edu, to contact General Olusegun Obasanjo as Head of State to plead his case.”

Continuing, Udo Udoma records that these “intrigues succeeded and he was preferred to me because, in his representation, he was able to convince General Olusegun Obasanjo that since Alhaji Shehu Shagari as a Hausa-Fulani, was contesting the office of President of Nigeria and had chosen Dr. Ekwueme, an Igbo man, as his running mate as Vice-President, both of whom were likely to win, then the office of Chief Justice of Nigeria ought to be filled by himself, a Yoruba man, especially as Chief Obafemi Awolowo was sure to lose the election.”

Udo Udoma published these lines in 2008, 28 years after Obafemi Awolowo’s keynote to the Commonwealth Law Conference in 1980. In that address, Chief Awolowo alleged that the appointment of Fatayi-Williams to the office of Chief Justice in 1979 came with an implicit bargain concerning the determination of the election petition of that year. He also claimed that days before the Supreme Court announced the decision on 26 September 1979, Chief Justice Atanda Fatayi-Williams leaked the decision of the Court to General Obasanjo who desired to be reassured that he could proceed with the inauguration date of 1 October 1979 as planned.

Nearly all the protagonists involved in this story are no longer alive and their stories are hidden away in books, whose existence most Nigerians do not know about. The only one alive, General Obasanjo, an otherwise prolific author, has not held forth on these issues. The full facts of what transpired may never be known publicly.

In 2008 and in 2019, judges who sat on controversial presidential election petitions in election years enjoyed quick judicial elevation from the parties in whose favour they decided. Also in 2019, a chief justice was sacked ostensibly because he could not be trusted to determine presidential election petitions in a predictable way in the manner that his would-be successor could. What seems clear is that since 1979, judicial appointments and decision-making in election petitions have always enjoyed a relationship underpinned by a whiff of quid pro quo.

Those interested in following the fate of the presidential election petitions whose consideration is ongoing in Abuja, Nigeria’s federal capital, may wish to remember that there are currently only thirteen serving Justices of the Supreme Court, which leaves the court with eight vacancies to be filled by a new government.

Politicians have learned to turn election dispute resolution into auditions for the shifting of judicial deck chairs. First, they rig elections in order to get the opportunity to rig the courts with judges ready to help them to validate rigged elections. That is the legacy of the unspoken antecedents of Awolowo v. Shagari.

A lawyer and a teacher, Odinkalu can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Congratulations, King Charles III. The whole world literally stood still as the major networks of the globe tuned to Westminster to report the incredible cultural spectacle of your coronation. The global community felicitated as one family with the United Kingdom, gluing its eyes to the show stopper.

Before God and man, Charles III ascended the throne of his forebears, assuming the position of King of England and the commonwealth realms. He is head of state of fifteen sovereign states — the United Kingdom, Antigua and Barbuda, Australia, the Bahamas, Belize, Canada, Grenada, Jamaica, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Solomon Islands, and Tuvalu.

In addition, there are also three Crown Dependencies, fourteen British Overseas Territories and two small associated states of New Zealand: the Cook Islands and Niue. Although the British empire expired a long time ago, the British monarch still has some kind of imperial reach and significance for many people outside his immediate geographic location.

The multicultural dimension of the reach of the English throne was aptly showcased during the coronation rites. The choice of officiating personnel was thoughtful and representative. Ancient rites were incorporated into the modern ceremony with a seamless gliding between traditional superstition as encapsulated in the idea of the globe, and Christianity which is the religion of state. Kudos to the British for staging a first class spectacle.

There is something fascinating about culture. Any culture. When closely observed, one finds incredible similarities between peoples; one discovers, too, that the essential hypocrisies that separate the royal from the plebeian are basically the same, especially when both are beneficiaries of historic injustices. You torture no one but yourself when you attempt to use the measuring rod of morality to assess thrones and their occupants. If tempted to do so, remember the wise counsel of the toad: leave me out of any tale where tails are mentioned.

The beginning of every reign marks the birth of another era for good or for ill. Fate is an inveterate teaser. It taunts us with possibilities. Will the new king surpass his long=reigned mother, Elizabeth II, in royal housekeeping to ensure that the mystique surrounding the House of Windsor is not completely eroded and the sheer nakedness of the royals exposed?

In today’s world, it is not quite possible for any king to replicate the power and reach of Genghis Khan (ca. 1162–1227) whose Mongolian Empire spanned the entire Asian continent from the Pacific Ocean to modern-day Hungary in Europe. It was the largest empire ever, and the emperor had a large appetite for cruelty, conquest and destruction.

Neither is the kind of serial adultery and single minded infamy that characterised the reign of Henry VIII permissible now. But, given its history and circumstances, the coronation had its own string of ironies.

One couldn’t help remembering that the coronation was happening in a church created by King Henry VIII when the Pope refused to allow him take another wife after his first marriage to Catherine of Aragon. In retaliation, he broke away from the Catholic church and formed the Church of England of which he was head. He was therefore technically able to give himself permission to do as he willed. In the end he married six wives in the following order: Catherine of Aragon (the mother of the future queen Mary I), Anne Boleyn (the mother of the future queen Elizabeth I), Jane Seymour (the mother of Henry’s successor, Edward VI), Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr.

One must notice, too, the storied matrimonial circumstances of the new king and queen who are both divorcees. In another age and time, that would have counted against them, but if anyone needed evidence that some aspects of the monarchy were moving with the times, there it is.

Perhaps, Edward VIII who abdicated the throne in order to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson and became known as the Duke of Windsor, would feel vindicated in his grave. His abdication speech still resounds around the world: “I have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as King as I would wish to do without the help and support of the woman I love…”

The British establishment seems to have now come to terms with the contemporaneous trend which is more libertarian: Marrying for love cannot be demonised. Moralists can eat their hearts out.

Symbolism aside, Charles III is ascending the throne at a time of great turmoil in the world, especially in Africa where the iniquitous policies of British colonialists of yore continue to fuel conflicts in the region. Many analysts argue that the main reasons for Africa’s poverty are the slave trade and British colonial exploitation. As head of state, the English monarch is a principal beneficiary of the wholesale looting of the African continent and the dehumanisation of the people.

How does a king begin to redress centuries of injustice in this modern era when he is no longer the chief executive of state? One of the moral scandals of modern governance is the fact that slave owners were compensated for agreeing to release their slaves during the Abolition while the slaves themselves who had suffered the dehumanisation have never been compensated to this day.

To achieve its aims on the African continent, the British unleashed many atrocities in every direction of the compass — The Mau-Mau uprising (1952) in which historian Caroline Elkins believes up to 100,000 could have died; The Iva Valley Massacre in Enugu; The Aba women’s riot in 1929; Sotik Massacre in Kenya (1905); Chilembwe uprising in Malawi (1915); and the countless atrocities in Southern Africa. There are also numerous unedifying tales from Ghana, Sierra-Leone, Liberia and other countries where British colonialism once held sway. In Asia, between 12 and 29 million Indians died of starvation under the control of the British Empire,

It may be convenient to have historical amnesia but the truth must be told. Britain financed its Industrial Revolution and prosperity from the looting of Africa and Asia. The coronation itself was, in a way, a sad reminder of how the English monarchy appropriated gems from Africa and Asia to adorn its crown.

St. Edward’s Crown worn by King Charles III is made of 22-carat gold and 444 precious and semiprecious stones, including 345 rose-cut aquamarines, 37 white topaz, 27 tourmalines, 12 rubies, seven amethysts, six sapphires, two jargoons, one garnet, one spinel and one carbuncle.

In the same vein, Queen Camilla wore Queen Mary’s crown which has a gold-lined silver frame and 2,200 diamonds. In response to serious opposition by cultural and political activists from India, Iran and other countries, the crown did not feature the infamous Koh-i-Noor diamond, a 105.6-carat stone mined in India with a long, disputed history that is seen as a symbol of the United Kingdom’s looting past. It was reportedly fitted instead with Elizabeth II’s Cullinan III, IV and V diamonds originally from South Africa.

For those of us in the former colonies, therefore, the coronation of King Charles evoked a potpourri of emotions. Parts of the ceremony looked like slices of the coronation of the Olu of Warri in Nigeria’s Delta State despite the differences in race, history, culture , etc.

And, like in Africa, there was the sub-text of royal intrigues and gossips, with some members of the royal family and their plebeian media pugilists doing their damndest to further drive a wedge between the royal family and the estranged Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan. There’s no shortage of hate and ill-will out there.

One former Labour minister and diarist, Chris Mullin, suggests that Meghan Markle is a “cuckoo” in the royal nest and her “woke Californian hang-ups” are likely to destroy her marriage to Prince Harry, and the Duke of Sussex will “come limping home”.  Talk about taking an analgesic for another person’s migraine! Calvin Miller must have had people like Mullin in mind when he famously said, “Humanity is fickle. They may dress for a morning coronation and never feel the need to change clothes for an execution in the afternoon.”

Back to the question: How does a king begin to redress centuries of injustice in this modern era when he is no longer the chief executive of state? If the king is interested in some form of reparation to former colonies (including the return of their artefacts and precious stones), he knows how to deploy his soft power to achieve his goal. That is why Providence made him understudy his mum for seven decades.

If God saves the king as the British Anthem prays, He probably will have mercy on the kingdom too. So let it be with Charles III.

Who will set some Nigerian leaders free from their liking for U.K. Medical Doctors? Who will be paying for the outgoing President Muhammadu Buhari’s medical treatments in U.K after May 29, 2023? Will Buhari curb Buhari’s obsession with the U.K universities (for his children) and healthcare system for more than 40 years? When shall we begin to get answers to our questions on what really ails our leaders who continue to travel abroad for even dental and ear problems?

When should we the people insist on getting answers to the questions on whether we have the right to know the health status of our leaders and public servants generally? When can we know the nature of the health challenges of our leaders? When shall we have a National Assembly that will take newspaper editorials on accountability, responsibility, public good, pubic interest seriously on the day of publication? Will President Bola Ahmed Tinubu sign a covenant with Nigerians that he too will not be travelling to United Kingdom and France for medical examination from May 29, 2023?

When will all medical professional bodies in Nigeria stir the conscience of our leaders by robustly protesting irresponsibility, hypocrisy and corruption of our leaders who continue to shun healthcare system they pretend to be funding? Why do our leaders continue to set up even Universities of Medical and Health Sciences when they know that they don’t expect any good out of them?

When will the Office of the Citizen begin to set up mobilisation committees to begin to organise civil actions against all these spineless members of national and state assemblies who cannot question executive rascality and excesses all over the country? And this: how many newspaper editorials, and special documentaries and commentaries should the mainstream and social media do before the federal and state governments can show responsibility to develop the Nigerian healthcare delivery system to serve the country? Who will deliver us from our reckless dealers who call themselves leaders who always meet even their waterloo in U.K?

Is there any takeaway for them that one of our leaders and his wife are currently in jail in the same U.K because they went there to look for a medical service that should have been provided at home if the leader had done well as a leader of the legislature where they have approved billions of naira for healthcare in the last 24 years?

These questions became germane again at the weekend when it was clear that our leader who was in the United Kingdom for the coronation of King Charles 111 on May 6 is still spending time with his dentist in the same U.K where he had in 2017, spent 104 days on health grounds. What is more curious, our President-elect we would not like to be infected by this very reproachful Buhari’s passion for medical tourism in the U.K is in Europe too.

The Nigerian leader who left the country on Wednesday, May 3, 2023 joined others for coronation of Charles III and his wife, Camilla, as King and Queen of England on Saturday, May 6.

The Presidency had earlier been silent on Buhari’s date of return. But a statement signed by Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, on Tuesday last week noted that the President could not return because of a dental care. Adesina told the nation that the President would still be in the United Kingdom for another five days for a procedure already initiated.

The presidential spokesman had, in an earlier statement, said:  “Ahead of the coronation, the Commonwealth Secretariat would take advantage of the gathering of leaders in London to play host to a summit for Presidents and Heads of Government of Commonwealth countries on Friday, May 5.” The President participated in the summit, which deliberated on future of the Commonwealth and role of the youth.

His entourage includes Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, his Information and Culture counterpart, Lai Mohammed and National Security Adviser (NSA), Maj.-Gen. Babagana Monguno (rtd). Others are Director General, National Intelligence Agency (NIA), Amb. Ahmed Rufai Abubakar, Chairperson/Chief Executive Officer, Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, among other senior government officials.

As people were still smarting from the news that our out-going leader who is generally believed to be very close to the Archbishop of Canterbury was still in the U.K for five more days, there was a newsbreak within the same week that the President-elect Bola Ahmed Tinubu too would be in Europe on investment drive and fine-tuning of the transition details.

According to a statement by his media aide, Tunde Rahman, the President-elect, was on an investment drive to Europe. Mr. Rahman said the former Lagos State Governor was billed to hold business talks with multi-sectoral players in manufacturing, agriculture, fintech and energy. The statement noted that the trip would also create a conducive environment for the president-elect to fine-tune his transition plans and programmes, as well as policy options without unnecessary pressures and distractions.

The statement reads: “During the visit, the President-elect will engage with investors and other key allies with the goal of marketing investment opportunities in the country and his administration’s readiness to enable a business-friendly climate through policies and regulations…Already, meetings with multi-sectoral actors in Europe’s business community including manufacturing, agriculture, tech and energy have been lined up.”

They added this: “Asíwájú Tinubu hopes to convince them of Nigeria’s readiness to do business under his leadership through mutually-beneficial partnerships premised on jobs creation and skills acquisition…Reviving the country’s economy forms a major plank of Tinubu’s Renewed Hope agenda and the meeting is part of his efforts to re-establish Nigeria’s importance in the global economic chain and create empowering opportunities for the country’s huge youth population.” Who will set us free from this “modern-day slavery” that our leaders’ recklessness has triggered? When shall we be set free from the United Kingdom, after all?

On August 15, 2021, in the heat of COVID-19 ambush, I wrote an article here tiled, ‘Buhari and Tinubu in London: The significance’ https://guardian.ng/opinion/buhari-and-tinubu-in-london-the-significance/|.  In the article, I lamented the fact that President Buhari who was then on a medical vacation in the United Kingdom actually met Bola Ahmed Tinubu who had then reportedly displayed a walking stick. This is an excerpt from the Inside Stuff then:
…That is why I would like to repeat the point I have been making since 2017 here when our elected leader on whose table the buck should really stop that it is not gratifying to note that the leader of the most robust economy in Africa has been flying to London for medical examination more than 60 years after the same London granted us independence and republican status.

The other day some cheeky and unchiselled commentators on digital platforms were even arguing that it is not good enough for us that our leader has been travelling to London for medical check-up; when his only son had a power-bike accident, he was flown to Germany for proper treatment and whenever his wife isn’t feeling fine she always flies to the United Arabs Emirate (UAE) where another great man and our former vice president, Atiku Abubakar prefers as his Plan-B home. Great men’s charity should always begin from abroad.

The other big man, whose cognomen is Oba l’ola, Yoruba people’s metaphor for ‘tomorrow’s king’ wasn’t around in his domain at the last Sallah celebration. He wasn’t in his empire a few weeks ago too when the crucial local government council elections were held. Yet his absence wasn’t noticed as they, as usual, won all the Council seats. Anyway that was how his supporters and indeed his people confirmed his rumoured medical condition, which has just been confirmed that it wasn’t a big deal, after all. He was seen with the commander-in-chief he assisted to seize, I mean return to power in 2015.

It can now be seen by all of us who have been circulating some dangerous intelligence that despite the secret pact so many eye-witnesses have hinted at, the lanky beneficiary of his 2015 stratagem would not honour the covenant to hand over to him, after all. We have all seen the great friends, political mentor and mentee together in London where it is said they have always met to renew their loyalty to each other concerning that #Covenant-2023.  All doubting Thomases have thus seen that the two friends are as fit as fiddle.

Don’t misconstrue the walking stick you thought you saw: it is a symbol of wisdom, which comes with old age. It is also a badge of royalty for Oba l’ola (Furure King) in the old Western region. Don’t read their body language anyhow in the United Kingdom. They are great men and we have all felt great seeing them together in high spirit. They need our great prayers for good health and indeed healing too for our great nation as Nigeria’s leader returned home at the weekend. It wasn’t clear whether Oba l’ola too returned home at the weekend.

And so as our leader has returned to his kingdom after the great summit on education and examination of his health in the United Kingdom, he should listen to the voices of wisdom and reason, which most of us have been reiterating since 2017 that Nigeria’s commander-in-chief should take advantage of his summits and health-care experiences in London to invest purposefully in even a few hospitals where our leaders and our people and indeed Africans can also be cared for….’

This is the conclusion of the article then, which I still believe in:
…And so the urgent task before Buhari and Tinubu who rule Nigeria from Abuja and Lagos is that next time, we would like to see them after their medical examination in a Nigerian hospital. As they return home, the two great men should note that their greatness will be diminished by their abysmal failure to invest in even two British-class hospitals in Abuja and Lagos where they rule Nigeria.

We don’t want to see them abroad together again on any health grounds. They need to pay attention to at least the University of Abuja Teaching Hospital (UATH), National Hospital Abuja, (NHA), University of Lagos Teaching Hospital (LUTH) and Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH). These are the low hanging fruits they can easily invest in to prevent the reproach of a great nation whose great leaders always fly over ill-equipped hospitals to get treated in great hospitals abroad. Who will tell our leaders to remove this reproach from Africa’s most strategic country?