In 1991, Nigeria was in the full throes of the interminable transition to civil rule programme of General Ibrahim Babangida. The effort by the regime in 1991 to relocate their terminal date from 1992 to 1993 coincided with a planned meeting in Ibadan, south-west Nigeria, of the leadership of the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS). 

At the time, the security agencies had secreted on major campuses around the country assets masquerading as students. The University of Ibadan was no exception. The unsuspecting NANS leadership were taken by surprise when the SSS swooped on their meeting, abducted their entire lot and dumped them at the Kirikiri Maximum Security Prison in Lagos with notice to no one. The abductees included then-president of the NANS, Mahmud Aminu; their Svengali, Bamidele Aturu, as well as other notables in the movement such as Naseer Kura and Funso Omogbehin.

To make the grab look lawful, the regime issued a back-dated order for their detention under the State Security (Detention of Persons) Decree No. 2 of 1984 effectively making them hostages in law. On a routine professional visit to the Kirikiri Prisons in 1991 to see some other detainees, the then officer in charge (O/C) of records at the facility pulled me aside and whispered about the presence in the prison of the leadership of the NANS. Until then, nearly 10 days after they went missing, no one knew where they were. If Mungo Park had made the journey, the history books would probably have recorded that he “discovered” the then leadership of the NANS in Kirikiri Prisons. 

The lead lawyer for such matters then was Kanmi Isola-Osobu, a brilliant life bencher who was also a lawyer to Fela Anikulapo Kuti. Kanmi’s office was opposite Adekunle Police Station in Yaba, Lagos; beside Dr. Tunji Otegbeye’s hospital. There were no cellular phones. I visited Kanmi’s office on a Monday afternoon to brief him about the students in the hope that he could lead the legal proceedings on their behalf. He was busy. With a familiar glint lighting up his face, Kanmi later informed me that he had been busy lubricating the struggle.

The case went before Nureini Abiodun Kessington, whose court at the time had a deserved reputation as the graveyard of bloated professional egos. With subversive invention, Kessington promptly ended the abduction of the student leaders and ensured that they were released with no substantial interruption to their academic careers or lives thereafter. 

Those of us who became active against military rule then were inspired largely by two things. One was the hope that the end of military rule would see the end of such practice; the other was the dutiful resistance of some courageous judges like Kessington. In hindsight we may have been naïve about the nature of power and about the resilience of its methods. A quarter of a century after the end of military rule, the practice continues to prosper. To make matters worse, courageous judges appear to have become extinct.

First, the politicians discovered they could emulate the soldiers. In January 2017, Audu Maikori had been a lawyer for nearly sixteen years. He was a leader in entertainment law in Nigeria and president and chief executive officer of a thriving start-up in the sector known as Chocolate City Group, with interests in radio, television, events, movies, and music. A son of Southern Kaduna, Audu was also a powerful voice and amplifier for the sufferings of the people under then Governor of Kaduna state, Nasir el-Rufai.

On or around 17 February 2017, police officers from the Kaduna state command of the Nigeria Police Force abducted Audu from Lagos and embarked on a cross-country dash with him; first to Abuja where he was detained in the police cell in Asokoro. The following day they ferried him to Kaduna for further detention. After two days of detention, the police in Kaduna granted him bail.

It was in Kaduna that Audu discovered that his abduction was in connection with a post on his Twitter feed about the crisis in Southern Kaduna. A fortnight after Audu’s release on bail, Nasir el-Rufai while headlining the Social Media Week in Lagos on 4 March, promised that he was “trying to link the dates of [Audu’s tweets] to attacks that may have happened the next day on Fulanis and if we are able to establish that causation,…. we know what it means.” Under his orders, the police snatched Audu again and this time detained him in nasty conditions in the State Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). He had become a hostage in law.

Audu subsequently sued el-Rufai and the police. On 27 October 2017, John Tsoho, then a judge of the federal high court, issued a judgment invalidating Audu’s abduction from Lagos. The judge held that “a warrant of arrest issued by a Magistrate in Kaduna was not valid for execution in Laos, except and until endorsed by a court in Lagos. Not even a warrant issued by a state high court can be validly executed in another state without endorsement by a competent court within the state where it is to be executed.” He awarded N40 million in damages against Governor el-Rufai. After the court of appeal reaffirmed the essence of the judgment by the federal high court, el-Rufai appealed to the supreme court to assert his right to abduct Nigerian citizens at will and hold them as his own hostages in law. 

Two years later, judges and magistrates invented jurisprudence to ground the practice of hostage-taking through law. Unlike in Audu’s case, the police officers who abducted Steven Kefason from Port Harcourt in May 2019 could not even be bothered with a warrant. After snatching Steven, they secreted him in a cell in Mini Koro, Rivers state overnight before ferrying him by road in a brutal ride to Kaduna. Over three days, they denied him food, access to communication or personal sanitation.

In Kaduna, Steven was interrogated in equally brutal conditions under the personal supervision of the governor’s legal adviser. The reason for the abduction – it turned out – was a tweet by Steven around 20 April 2019 in which he said that “while over 12k Kajuru IDPs are living in a terrible condition, their LG chairman, Cafra Caino, was hosting his old school mates to a birthday party at Kajuru Castle….” The facts were not in dispute but el-Rufai nevertheless instructed the abduction of Steven on charges of incitement and injurious falsehood. One month after Steven’s initial abduction, the magistrate in Kaduna denied him bail on 20 June 2019 because, according to the magistrate, “while on bail, [he] further made social media posts further insulting the person of the Governor and that of the Chairman of Kaduna and Kajuru LGAs respectively.”

On February 27, 2020, Peter Mallong, a judge of the federal high court in Kaduna, denied Steven’s request for judicial review of his abduction and the decision of the magistrate claiming, in an extraordinary travesty of jurisprudence that he was bound by the decision of the magistrate to deny bail because the issues were the same and the parties were largely the same. Following his abduction, Steven suffered as hostage in law for over six months with no redress and came close to losing his life. The injustice of the judgment cried out to the Heavens for redress. 

In July 2023, Peter Mallong died at 60. 

Those who wonder how the country ended up with the utterly shameful charade being orchestrated in a squalid courtroom in Ekiti in the case of Dele Farotimi have Peter Mallong to thank for having written the manual on judicial enablement of the practice of rendering citizens into hostages in law. This narrative has wider ramifications.

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. 

The case of Dele Farotimi, a lawyer and author, has raised concerns about the treatment of individuals by the police and courts in Nigeria, particularly in libel cases. Farotimi who has just been granted another bail was arrested and detained following a petition by Afe Babalola, a prominent lawyer, who alleged that Farotimi’s book, “Nigeria and its Criminal Justice System,” contained defamatory statements against him. The petition led to Farotimi’s arrest by the Ekiti State Police Command, who then arraigned him before a magistrate court. The court granted an order remanding Farotimi in prison custody.

This curious case has sparked worries about free speech in a democracy. The arrest and detention of Farotimi have been seen as an attempt to silence him and stifle criticism of the Nigerian justice system. The fact that the libel case against Farotimi hasn’t been properly filed has also raised concerns about the misuse of the legal system to intimidate and harass individuals. Ultimately, this case highlights the need for greater protections for free speech in Nigeria and the importance of ensuring that the legal system is not used to silence critics and stifle dissent.

Meanwhile, as the civil society organisations including the media have been worried about the case that has led to continued detention of the lawyer is still dominating public discourse, there are some remarkable lessons about the same libel case by one of the world’s greatest complainants against the media, in fact, the President-elect of the United States, Donald Trump who actually tagged the U.S mainstream media as “the enemies of the people”. The former president actually sued a major television network ABC News and here are some of the outcomes so far all of us including the elder statesman, Aare Afe Babalola can learn from.

The recent $15 million libel settlement between Donald Trump and ABC News is a significant development that offers valuable lessons for media outlets, politicians, and the public. At the heart of the dispute was a comment made by George Stephanopoulos, claiming that Trump was found liable for rape, which was said to be inaccurate.

‘Significance of the Settlement’
The settlement is a substantial win for Trump, who has long accused mainstream media of bias and defamation. The $15 million payout, along with an apology and an editor’s note from ABC News, demonstrates that media outlets can be held accountable for inaccurate reporting. This settlement also highlights the challenges of reporting on high-profile individuals, particularly in today’s polarised media landscape. The case serves as a reminder that even slight inaccuracies can lead to costly legal battles and reputational damage.

‘Lessons for media outlets’
There are significant lessons for media outlets and media law scholars in this regard:
Accuracy is paramount: The settlement emphasises the importance of accuracy in reporting. Media outlets must ensure that their reporting is thorough, accurate, and unbiased to avoid costly lawsuits.

Clear apologies and corrections: ABC News’s apology and editor’s note demonstrate the importance of clear and prompt corrections. Media outlets must be willing to acknowledge and correct mistakes to maintain credibility.

Understanding of legal nuances: The case highlights the importance of understanding legal nuances and complexities. Media outlets must ensure that their reporting accurately reflects the complexities of legal cases.

Lessons for Politicians
Consequences of litigation: The settlement demonstrates that litigation can have significant consequences, financially and can affect reputation. Politicians must be cautious when pursuing legal action, as it can backfire and damage their reputation.

Importance of media relations: The case highlights the importance of maintaining positive relationships with media outlets. Politicians must work to build trust with journalists and media outlets to avoid misreporting and defamation.

Thick skin and strategic communication: Politicians must develop a thick skin and strategic communication skills to navigate the challenges of modern media. This includes being prepared to address inaccuracies and misinformation promptly and effectively. There may not be any smooth relationship between Trump and the mainstream media in his second term as Elon Musk, Trump’s most trusted digital media baron, has already declared the mainstream media persona non grata in the new media ecosystem in the United States.

Broader Implications
The settlement has broader implications for the media landscape and the relationship between politicians and the press. It highlights the challenges of reporting on high-profile individuals and the importance of accuracy, fairness, and transparency in journalism.

In the main, the ABC News $15 million libel settlement to Trump serves as a reminder of the importance of responsible journalism and the need for media outlets to prioritise accuracy and fairness in their reporting.

The nexus between strategy of Trump and Babalola
The ABC $15 million libel settlement to Trump and Afe Babalola’s use of the court and police to detain Dele Farotimi, author of a book he claims defames him, may seem like unrelated cases, but they share some common lessons.

Power of libel laws: Both cases highlight the power of libel laws in holding individuals and media outlets accountable for false or damaging statements. Afe Babalola’s actions demonstrate that individuals can use libel laws to protect their reputation but without having to use the police to torture the accused, while the ABC settlement shows that media outlets can also be held liable for false reporting.

Importance of fact-checking: The ABC settlement payment to Trump emphasises the importance of fact-checking in journalism. Similarly, Afe Babalola’s case against Dele Farotimi highlights the need for authors and publishers to verify the accuracy of their content to avoid libel claims.

Consequences of false reporting: Both cases demonstrate the consequences of alleged false reporting, which can lead to financial losses, damage to reputation, and even long-drawn litigation.

Need for media literacy: The ABC News settlement case underscores the need for media literacy and critical thinking in consuming information. The ABC News case, for instance highlights the importance of verifying information through reputable sources to avoid spreading misinformation.

In conclusion, while the ABC settlement payment to Trump and Afe Babalola’s case against Dele Farotimi may seem like unrelated cases, they share common lessons about the power of libel laws, the importance of fact-checking, the consequences of inaccurate reporting, and the need for media (law) literacy.

But Elder Babalola should also consider 10 reasons most leaders, politicians and business barons avoid defamation lawsuit:

Fear of scrutiny: Defamation lawsuits can lead to increased scrutiny of their activities, which may expose their corrupt and unethical practices.

Loss of reputation: A defamation lawsuit can damage their reputation, even if they win the case.

The negative publicity surrounding the lawsuit can be detrimental to their business and personal interests.

Financial consequences: Defamation lawsuits can be costly, and the financial consequences of losing a case can be significant.

Fear of discovery: During a defamation lawsuit, the discovery process may reveal information that the corrupt and unethical barons would rather keep hidden.

Intimidation tactics: Corrupt and unethical barons may use intimidation tactics, such as threatening to sue for defamation, to silence critics and avoid accountability.

Lack of transparency: Unclean barons may operate in opaque environments, making it difficult for critics to gather evidence and build a strong case against them.

Influence and power: Corrupt barons may have significant influence and power, which can be used to silence critics and avoid accountability.

Fear of retaliation: Critics may fear retaliation from filthy barons, including physical harm, financial ruin, or damage to their reputation.

Limited access to justice: In some cases, corrupt barons may have significant resources and influence, making it difficult for critics to access justice.

Culture of impunity: In some environments, corrupt barons may operate with a sense of impunity, believing that they are above the law and that they can avoid accountability.

Meanwhile, appeals for Dele Farotimi to apologize to Afe Babalola before a proper trial are misguided and can undermine the principles of justice and free speech. Here are several reasons why:
Presumption of innocence: In any democratic society, an individual is presumed innocent until proven guilty. By demanding an apology before a trial, Babalola’s supporters are essentially presuming Farotimi’s guilt.

Undermining free speech: The demand for an apology can be seen as an attempt to stifle free speech and criticism. Farotimi, as an author and lawyer, has the right to express his opinions and critique the justice system.

Lack of due process: A proper trial ensures that due process is followed, and both parties have an opportunity to present their cases. By demanding an apology before a trial, Babalola’s supporters are circumventing this process.

Apology as admission of guilt: An apology can be perceived as an admission of guilt. By demanding an apology before a trial, Babalola’s supporters are essentially asking Farotimi to admit to defamation without a proper investigation or trial.

Precedent for Intimidation: If Farotimi is pressured into apologising before a trial, it sets a dangerous precedent for intimidation and silencing of critics. This can have a chilling effect on free speech and open criticism.

Disregard for the rule of law: The demand for an apology before a trial disregards the rule of law and the principles of justice. It is essential to allow the legal process to unfold without external pressure or interference.

Let’s examine why libel case should not be treated as if we were going to war: Already, there are curiosities surrounding the claims by Chief Afe Babalola, SAN, that a younger lawyer, Dele Farotimi, defamed him in a book on the judiciary. For this, the police had invaded Farotimi’s chambers, assaulted his staff, threatened two of his lawyers with guns and, practically abducted the lawyer. He was first dragged in handcuffs before a Magistrate Court in Ado Ekiti, Chief Babalola’s hometown where he is a legend. The Magistrate first denied Farotimi bail. While the bail conditions were being argued, the Inspector General of Police Kayode Egebtokun had Farotimi brought from prison to a High Court to face new charges: cybercrimes. Another bail was granted in this case which Farotimi had not perfected at press time.  Then while still being held in prison, Babalola and his supporters filed more charges against Farotimi before courts in Abuja, Ibadan and Port Harcourt.

The Babalola Chambers additionally, petitioned the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee to remove Farotimi from the roll of Nigerian legal practitioners. But in the case of Donald Trump vs ABC News, the ABC News anchor, George Staphanopoulos who allegedly claimed that Trump was found guilty for rape wasn’t arrested by the U.S police high command, nor was the ABC News operations disrupted at any time before the influential news organisation opted for the settlement of $16m dollars. What if elder Afe Babalola had filed a lawsuit against Dele Farotimi without humiliating him, would that have made any difference? Why is the accused being tried in Ado-Ekiti at the instance of the accuser in a democracy? Is this a warning signal to those who would like to deconstruct and critique the current systemic malaise in the country? Let’s manage allegation of defamation like Trump and his supporters. The trial of Dele is becoming messy and complicated. Simplify and dignify it, AGF!

Very soon, Chinese boys and girls will be selling pure water on our highways. Many of them will out-sprint our own hawkers and there will be messy street fights. Write down that prediction and remember to acknowledge my copyright to that prophecy when it comes to pass.

But, wait! What prediction are we talking about when we already have hundreds of thousands of Chinese nationals all over Nigeria – from the aquatic splendour of Lagos to the arid wonders of Sokoto. The Chinese have embedded themselves into our society unobtrusively. They have meshed with our communities and, if I may borrow an expression invented by Prof Wole Soyinka, many of them have not only frolicked here but also wifed here.

I have seen mixed race children with Chinese features in many rural communities in Northern Nigeria. You can’t miss their facial features – almond-shaped or slanted eyes with pronounced epicanthic folds, dark irises, flat noses, prominent cheekbones and flat facial features. The Chinese are members of the Mongoloid race – one of the three main races in the world, the others being Negroids and Caucasoids.

Invasion

The current Chinese invasion of our urban and rural spaces is intriguing because the Asian immigrants, unlike their caucasian counterparts, live, wine and dine with the local people and are therefore, to some extent, stakeholders in the affairs of those communities. Their children won’t be regarded as immigrants but as locals. Someday, they will claim their political and traditional rights and provide leadership for fellow local “brothers and sisters”.

That, however, is not the worrying aspect of the massive emigration of Chinese nationals to Nigeria. It is normal for people all over the world to seek better livelihood in other lands. What is worrisome is the capacity of the newcomers to outnumber the original natives. When you’re talking numbers, the Chinese are heavyweight champions. I checked the current population of that country in real time as I was writing this piece and it was 1,417,794,773. The US comedian, Richard Pryor, would tell you the hidden connotation of having that huge population, “A billion people, that’s some…!

To further contextualise the matter, we simply have to remember that the population of the entire continent of Africa is 1.5 billion.

China has the capacity to “neutralize” the numerical strength of several Nigerian ethnic nationalities. If the Chinese decide on a programme of encouraging 15 percent of their population to settle in Africa with Nigeria as a favourite honey pot, they will be the largest single homogenous ethnic block within most of the individual countries and will rightly determine its fortunes, based on the mantra of one-man-one-vote.

Just consider the figures: 15 percent of their population is 212,700,000, enough to distribute all over Africa and emerge as the most populous ethnic group in many countries of the continent. Imagine if there was a 40 million Chinese population in Nigeria! If you analyse figures coming out of Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), it will take some doing to outvote or out-rig the hypothetical Chinese!

I’m not advocating a Trump-style “nationalist” racial cleansing, neither am I oblivious of the positive contribution of some foreigners of Chinese descent to the manufacturing sector of Nigeria’s economy. I am rather interested in seeing the bad eggs among the lot identified and removed from circulation as the law demands.

Demarketing Nigeria

I have been a victim of racial profiling in some foreign airports on account of the categorisation of Nigerians as pathological criminals. To discover that some of the cybercrime for which Nigerians have been classified as past masters were actually designed, orchestrated and supervised by Chinese nationals operating in Nigeria in plain sight is, therefore, galling.

Just the other day, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) blew the lid off one of such Chinese-led criminal outfits operating from a seven-storey building in Victoria Island, Lagos.

There were 792 suspects in all, including 148 Chinese, 40 Filipinos, two Kazakhstani, one Pakistani and one Indonesian.

The foreign nationals used the facility to train their Nigerian accomplices on how to initiate romance and investment scams and also used the identities of their Nigerian accomplices to perpetrate criminal activities. It is a massive computer-based operation.

Nigerian accomplices, who are assigned WhatsApp accounts linked to foreign telephone numbers, especially from Germany and Italy, engage victims in romantic conversations as well as phantom business and investment discussions to trick them to shop on the purported online investment shopping platform called www.yooto.com.

So far, the EFCC investigations have shown that the Nigerian accomplices don’t know who the real owners of the “company” they work for are, because the workers are not offered letters of appointment and are usually paid either in cash or through a private account.
I see a big problem looming in the horizon if Chinese nationals continue to come to Nigeria to establish criminal enterprises using Nigerian names. Had the shoe been on the other foot as indeed happened several times in some foreign countries in the past, the media would be agog with news of Nigerians duping the Chinese. Now it is the Chinese who are duping Nigerians and also swindling the whole world using Nigerian names to commit the crimes.

Criminals

In the northern part of the country, the Chinese are all over the mines stealing mineral resources and establishing protection rings. They have become part of the “insecurity architecture” of the country. I hear that they also run human trafficking rings operating under “Omerta-style” codes of secrecy. They sell goats and may soon start selling “pure water”. In the Southeast (Enugu) recently, one of them was nabbed for attempting to smuggle out some precious stones mined in the state.

Many of these foreign criminals enter the country on 90-day visas and remain here even though they are out of status because we don’t do due diligence after allowing them into our country. It probably would have been tolerable if they speak well of Nigeria outside. No, many of them feel superior to blacks generally. In words and deeds they show that they have no respect for Africans.

Four years ago, during the COVID scourge, blacks were singled out for special ostracisation and dehumanisation in Guangzhou Province of China. In my column in Daily Trust at the time, I wrote a piece titled “Racist China”:

“Some Africans resident in Guangzhou are now virtually destitute and are looking for any opportunity to return home. Many of them claim they are treated like lepers in public and targeted for additional COVID-19 tests without ever seeing the results. The police and public health bureau in Guangzhou claimed that officials had responded to false rumours that 300,000 black people in Guangzhou were setting off a second epidemic. How can black people be so accused when it is widely suspected that the origin of COVID-19 is linked to the Chinese propensity of eating anything with four legs except a table – maggots, scorpions, millipedes, roaches, bats, lizards, worms, etc” (https://dailytrust.com/racist-china/)

Destroy The Armada

Nigeria’s Interior Minister, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, has his work cut out. This “Armada” of undesirables must be routed.

And I ask the Chinese, how can you treat my people like excrement in your own country and then compound my existence by coming to my country to commit crimes in my name? Whoever does that and expects to walk free in my backyard?

“But she spoke the truth.” That is the most common retort among the diehard fans and devotees of Mrs Kemi Badenoch — leader of the UK Conservative Party — who has been obsessed with saying nasty things about Nigeria since she made her way into the front row of British politics and started glowing under the klieg lights. She has said so many “truths” at a dizzying speed that I am slightly confused over what she intends to achieve. She said she left Nigeria in 1996 after “leftist policies” impoverished the middle class and caused “hyperinflation”.  She said Yoruba “have nothing in common with northern Nigeria”. She said lizards, rather than water, flow from Nigerian taps.

I intend to, hereunder, challenge some of her egregious claims. To be clear, she has every right to say anything with her mouth. If she experienced trauma in Nigeria, she is free to tell the whole world. Nobody has the right to silence her. But there is one right she doesn’t have: to tell lies, misrepresent the facts or fan ethnic hate in a delicately poised country like Nigeria. Nigerians have every right to tackle her mischief. Her defenders say those who disagree with her utterances are only defending bad governance in the land. Thankfully, Mrs Badenoch did not invent criticism of bad governance in Nigeria. Nigerians do that every day in the media and on the streets. I do it regularly on this page.

Of all the awful things she said, the most disturbing is her promotion of ethnic bigotry. This woman is dangerous. Listen to her: “I find it interesting that everybody defines me as being Nigerian. I identify less with the country than with the specific ethnicity [Yoruba]. That’s what I really am. I have nothing in common with the people from the north of the country, the Boko Haram where the Islamism is. Those were our ethnic enemies and yet you end up being lumped in with those people.” This really excited her Nigerian fan base. Her father, the late Prof Olufemi Adegoke, a Yoruba nationalist, held similar views and even campaigned for the utopian “confederalism” which no country practises.

“But she spoke the truth.” But what manner of “truth” is her claim that Yoruba and northern Nigeria “had nothing in common”? Yoruba started interacting with northerners through commerce as far back as the 1500s. Fact. For centuries, they traded in cattle, kola nuts, horses, yams, cowries, firearms and glass beads. According to historians, the ethnonym ‘Yoruba’ — which Mrs Badenoch says defines her — was coined by northerners. I know some people are trying to re-write this fact but they have to travel back in time to erase history. They can argue that Yoruba and northerners should never have been in the same country, but they are not allowed to cannibalise the facts of history.

I have a sense that Mrs Badenoch is only repeating what she was told at home or what she read on social media. I will encourage her to go beyond hearsay and read good books. I recommend ‘A History of the Yoruba People’, authored by Prof Adebanji Akintoye, a supporter of Sunday Igboho, the Yoruba Nation separatist. Her father once described Igboho as “brave” for his secessionist rhetoric. She can also read ‘The Yoruba: A New History’, authored by Dr Akinwumi Ogundiran, a history professor at the Northwestern University, the US. Mrs Badenoch will be sad to discover the history of Yoruba intercourse with northerners and how this influenced culture and the Yoruba language.

It is obvious that Mrs Badenoch does not even know that the ethnonym ‘Yoruba’ did not refer to her own ancestors before colonial rule. ‘Yoruba’ was the identity of the Oyo-speaking people in today’s Oyo state and parts of Osun and Kwara states. Not all the people who call themselves ‘Yoruba’ today were called ‘Yoruba’ before colonial rule. The example I always cite — because it is easily on record — is Nigeria’s first newspaper which was established in 1859. It was named ‘Iwe Irohin fun Awon Egba ati Yoruba’ (‘Newspaper for Egba and Yoruba’). As of 1859, Egba people were not identified as Yoruba. Today’s pan-Yoruba identity, like most ethnic identities around the world, evolved with time.

Lest I forget, Mrs Badenoch said northerners “were our ethnic enemies”. My recommended reading for her in this regard would be ‘War and Peace in Yorubaland 1793-1893’, written by the late Prof Adeagbo Akinjogbin. She will be shocked to read about the intra-Yoruba wars: the Owo War (1820-1827), the Ijaye War (1860-1865) and the Kiriji War (1877-1893). Indeed, we can argue that the advent of colonialism and the “Lord Lugard lumping” of 1914 helped bring peace to what later became known as Yorubaland. Mrs Badenoch obviously thinks there was a lovey-dovey Republic of Oduduwa before the colonial masters came and “lumped in” her people with Boko Haram. Fantasy.

“But she spoke the truth.” She classified a region of 19 states as “Boko Haram”. She does not know that the north has nearly 200 ethnic groups (and millions of non-terrorists). In Borno state, the heartland of Boko Haram, most of the terror victims are Muslims. Fact. In this age and with all her education, exposure and experience in a multi-racial and multi-cultural society like the UK, I wonder how she plans to preside over a country where the Scottish, Welsh, Irish, and English people are “lumped in” — to say nothing about the millions from ethnic and religious minorities. She acquired British citizenship by birth; maybe she needs a crash course on the complex history of the UK.

Born to Nigerian parents in a British hospital in 1980, she was named “Oluwakemi” (incidentally, one of my younger sisters answers that lovely name, which, roughly translated, means “the Lord pampers me” or “the Lord blesses me”). Baby Oluwakemi was thereafter brought to Lagos, Nigeria, where she lived the first sixteen years of her life and received her basic education. A couple of years after her birth, the Nigerian economy ran into a serious storm amid a global recession. Dwindling oil revenues and the inevitable forex crunch forced many Nigerian factories to close down or retrench workers. The Shehu Shagari administration rolled out a mini reform package nicknamed “austerity measures”.

As prices of goods and services soared and economic pains intensified, the military overthrew Shagari on December 31, 1983. Major Gen Muhammadu Buhari became the head of state. The economy still did not improve much, even though oil prices recovered — and Buhari was overthrown by Gen Ibrahim Babangida on August 27, 1985. Babangida went on to implement the structural adjustment programme (SAP) — a reform package backed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank. The objectives were to transit to market economy through privatisation, grow agriculture, promote local industry, ramp up exports and cut subsidies to reduce government debts.

“But she spoke the truth.” What truth? When Mrs Badenoch left Nigeria in 1996, Nigeria was neck-deep in its market transition. The second-tier foreign exchange market (SFEM) was introduced in 1986 to liberalise the forex market. The naira crashed from roughly N1/$ in 1986 to N22/$ in 1996 (N88/$ in the parallel market). With an economy tied to imports, inflation was inevitable. Was SAP a leftist policy? Is forex liberalisation a leftist policy? Is privatisation leftist? Are IMF and World Bank leftist institutions? What truth, exactly? Meanwhile, when she relocated, Nigeria was still reeling from the June 12 annulment crisis which had paralysed the country politically and economically.

Her brother’s experience with the Nigerian police (“they stole his shoes and wristwatch”) is something Nigerians can relate with. After all, our youths held the #EndSARS protests against police atrocities in 2020. Definitely, the British police, which she praised, are better trained, better resourced and far more professional than ours. No argument. But in the year up to March 31, 2024, nearly 600 police officers were sacked in England and Wales for sexual offences, possession of child exploitation material, dishonesty and discriminatory behaviour. There is the famous case of David Carrick, a police officer who raped 48 women while on duty. Yes, she spoke the truth. Selective truth.

She talks exactly like those clout-chasers who think belittling Nigeria abroad is a ticket to glory. Responding to Vice-President Kashim Shettima’s caution over her unprovoked attacks, her aide said it is not her job to do PR for Nigeria. Fair enough. Her job is to urinate on Nigeria everywhere she goes. But think about it. President Barack Obama’s father was from Kenya. Rishi Sunak, ex-UK prime minister, has Indian roots. Humza Yousaf, ex-Scotland first minister, and Sadiq Khan, mayor of London, have Pakistani origin. Despite similar “truths” about their ancestral countries, they never open their mouths, like our dear Mrs Badenoch, to savage their roots. Emotional intelligence.

Now, my final words to Mrs Badenoch: grow up. You have already made history as the first black to lead the Tories. That is monumental. Work hard to become the next prime minister. Make history again. That is all you care about. But by outing yourself as an ethnic bigot, you are hurting yourself, not Nigeria. Denigrating us will not win your party more parliamentary seats. You behave like someone with a complex — like those slaves who felt privileged to supervise fellow slaves and often treated them with more disdain than the slave masters themselves. By the way, Mrs Badenoch, there is a Yoruba noun for those who point to their family house with the left hand. Go and find out.

AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…

STAMPEDE SEASON

As many as 35 children were crushed to death in Ibadan, Oyo state, on Wednesday at a carnival. Three days later, several people died in stampedes in Anambra and Abuja induced by distribution of foodstuffs. These things happen all the time. In February 2024, seven people died while scrambling for subsidised rice being sold by Customs in Lagos. People blame it on economic hardship but how good are we when it comes to crowd management — hunger or no hunger? What are the protocols? Who enforces them? Who gets punished when things go south? Most importantly, what lessons do we learn from these recurring tragedies? We wail, probe, threaten, move on, rinse, repeat. Painful.

LAWLESS LAWMAKERS

You think the obstacle to Nigeria’s progress is the 1999 constitution? How do you explain the recent decision of the Edo state house of assembly to suspend all the 18 council chairpersons and their deputies? The house said it was acting on a petition by Governor Monday Okpebholo alleging misappropriation of funds. However, the Supreme Court — the highest court in the land — determined not so long ago that the local governments have financial and administrative autonomy. There is no constitutional provision for the dissolution or suspension of councils by the executive or legislature. And just five months after the landmark pronouncement, this happened. Dangerous.

BEST MAN LOOKMAN

The story of Ademola Lookman, the Nigerian international who has just been crowned CAF Men’s Player of the Year, is straight from the book of grass to grace. I started following his career in 2017 when he was at Everton in the English Premier League. Several years of being loaned out or shipped from one midtable club to the other made it look like he was not destined for the top. He finally found his mojo when he moved to Atalanta of Italy in 2022 and also got called up to the Super Eagles, despite having been born in England and having played for their youth teams. He has now turned mediocrity to excellence. At 27, his best may just be coming. Better late than never. Inspiring.

NO COMMENT

One person will steal public funds running into billions of naira and get a slap on the wrist. Another will steal groundnuts and people will shout “catch am catch am, thief thief thief” and stone him to death. One Segun Olowookere is on death row for stealing a chicken and eggs in 2010 when he was a teenager. The problem here is the archaic law. If you rob with a pen (not even with a gun), it is classified as armed robbery and punishable by death. If you steal billions without being armed, it is punishable by imprisonment. Aren’t these laws archaic? They need to be reviewed to reflect proportionality. How can someone get the death penalty for stealing chicken and eggs? Wonderful.

The Nigerian Human Rights Community (NHRC) says those compelling Wole Soyinka, the Nobel laureate, and Femi Falana, a senior advocate of Nigeria (SAN), to lead a protest against economic hardship lack a sense of history.

In a statement issued on Sunday by Taiwo Adeleke and Digifa Werenipre, NHRC’s officials, the group expressed concerns about “persistent accusations” that the duo have been silent in the face of the economic downturn.

The NHRC said Soyinka and Falana have, for decades, been at the forefront of activism demanding good governance.

The group asked youths to emulate Omoyele Sowore, convener of the #RevolutionNow movement, by fighting for justice and equity.

“We wish to remind these people, mostly young people, that their actions constitute a drawback to the rich heritage of democratic struggle the two figures represent in the history of Nigeria,” the statement reads.

“We urge younger ones to learn from Mr Omoyele Sowore and emulate his sterling contributions to democracy and justice for over 30 years of his life.”

The NHRC said while it is time for Soyinka to rest, Falana has continued his advocacy by taking up pro bono cases, with some against the current administration.

The group challenged the critics to be bold enough to lead the protest they seek, rather than condemn “older people who have risked their lives countless times” in the struggle for a greater country.

“Some of them believe the word activism makes sense only when speaking in support of Obidients indicating their narrow mindset about what it means to change a country for the better,” the group said.

“We are seeing a generation of lousy, lazy and completely ignorant youths whose basic agenda is to destroy Nigerian heroes thereby serving the interests of the government and the ruling class who oppress Nigerians.

“When Soyinka and Falana were younger, they did not look up to the older generation to liberate them. They rather discovered the mission of their own generation and fulfilled it.

“We challenge you to take the bull by the horns and provide alternative leadership for change instead of taking up the professional duty of running down those that have established milestones in the struggle for a better Nigeria.”

[TheCable]

The unnamed woman had just given birth to a baby five days before. Her body was still wet as Yoruba say of mothers who newly underwent the pangs of labour and delivery. Pains must still be ricocheting round her navel. Ex-Queen of the Ooni of Ife, Prophetess Naomi Silekunola, and an Ibadan-based broadcaster, Oriyomi Hamzat, had promised her and her baby free food. This was done in a blast of publicity inviting her kid and 4999 other children to a funfair. The event was slated for Islamic High School, Bashorun, a suburb of Ibadan. The organizers said it would be an unprecedented funfair of freebies never given before. Hamzat’s Agidigbo Radio, based in the capital of Oyo State, is undoubtedly the darling of the common people. It is top of the radar, traffic-wise. Hamzat popularized the medium as one that tends to the needs of the common people and discusses issues agitating their minds.

Scholars have posited that everyday matters woven round the existence of the ordinary man are sex, cheap sex, poverty, food, crime, alcohol, divorce, gambling and sexual violence. Matters that are queer, uncommon and mind-boggling, which cannot be divorced from those everyday issues, are given pride of place on Agidigbo radio. Listeners gravitate towards the radio in their multiple of thousands. It is on Agidigbo you would hear stories of a less than 20-year old lady whose pregnancy is being contested by two artisan boys. Salacious details that evoke laughter and tears ooze out of the radio. Hamzat himself, renowned for the phrase, “E bá wa gbé’nu sí mic” – kindly draw closer to the microphone – popularized that phrase. It acquired a life of its own, becoming synonymous with someone being under public scrutiny. Or one enmeshed in petty misdemeanor. It is no wonder that in the Nigerian Broadcasting Service (NBS) rating, Agidigbo is No 1 in Oyo State. So, it should be common sense that if you advertize a funfair that would give N5000 – about $3 USD – to hewers of woods and drawers of water, in this T-Pain economy of Bola Tinubu, you would get more than you bargained for. Senegalese author, Ousmane Sembène, whose 1960-written book, entitled God’s Bits of Woods, discusses the fate of these underprivileged people in details.

The unnamed woman heard or was told about the alliance by Queen Naomi and Hamzat to provide succor for her new born baby. Not minding her “wet body”, she strapped her fragile new born baby to her back and headed for Bashorun. By 5am, the venue was already bursting at its seams with persons. Did some wicked people land Queen Naomi and Hamzat in trouble spiritually? This is a question being asked in some quarters.

If Hamzat and Olori Silekunola emerge from their current travails unscathed, they may learn to seek our Mothers’s faces in subsequent ventures. It is said that such gathering of a large crowd involving women and children are sacred and must be looked at from the lens of teleology. In his “Òṣòròmọ̀nìgà: Representations of witchcraft in Yoruba films,” (Nordic Journal of African Studies – Vol 30 No 2, 2021) Olusegun Soetan of the African Studies Department, Pennsylvania State University, venerates the place and value of witchcraftcy which he called àjẹ́ism. Òṣòròmọ̀nìgà, said the scholar, is one of the many cognomens of witches in Ifá divination systems and praise poetry. According to him, “among the many supernatural phenomena in Africa is witchcraft. (It) is both cultural and sacred, and its practices suggest that specific individuals have supernatural powers that enable them to bend physical and cosmic laws.” Known as àjẹ́ in the Yoruba society, Igbo call it amoosu while, in the Maka tradition of Cameroon, it is known as gris-gris.

Dauda Epo-Akara, a notable traditional musician, chanting the cognomen of  witches, once said that if a cook who is preparing to pound yam fails to factor the Aje into its preparation, the pounded yam would lose its taste due to a myriad pf tiny un-pounded yam specks called “kókó” that will dot it. In the same vein, said Epo Akara, any cook preparing a meal of àmàla who fails to factor the Mothers into its preparation will have the àmàlà’s otherwise solid morsel become as watery as pap. Ulli Beier however disclaimed this widely held notion of Àjé as inaccurate. In a 1958 piece, he said Àjé “represents rather the mystic powers of womanhood in their more dangerous destructive aspect.” Perhaps, in concert with Queen Silekunola’s Ifè palace enemies and Hamzat’s traducers in and out of the microphone, the Mothers ganged-up to do the duo in last Wednesday. After all, Chief Ebenezer Obey, the Juju music great, once sang that those who pound evil for their fellow beings advertize no physical pestle, nor mortar – “agún’bàjé ò l’ódó”.

Sorry, I digressed. By the time the unnamed mother newly-delivered of a baby arrived Bashorun, it was brimming with a never-seen-before gathering of people. Her baby later became one of the 35 people trampled to death in the scramble for food. The baby returned to its maker without being given the traditional seven-day name. The BBC, in its report of the tragedy, said the 35 children “died in a crush after thousands turned up on the promise of free food.” According to it, some people slept overnight at the school gate so as not to miss the chance to be among the first 5000 to access the free food. Many attempted to force their way through, some parents attempted to scale the fence and some mothers threw their children inside the fence while they climbed the walls.

So, this past week, Ibadan wept. Everyone, even anyone, who was as unfeeling as to be capable of eating the barbecued bony and fleshless heads of a vulture and tortoise, must have wept with Ibadan. The agony reverberated throughout the rusty-roof city. Mothers wept uncontrollably. Tears became an infection, afflicting, at supersonic speed, eyes of anyone who heard of the tragedy. But the deed had been done. Thirty five lifeless bodies of the glory of Nigeria’s tomorrow lay in a heap. Someone showed me their gory photo. It reminds me of Palestinians’ bodies killed in airstrikes by Israel laid in a heap, waiting for the Salat al-Janazah prayer for the dead. Or hairs-peeled, disemboweled goats laid in heaps on an abattoir table by butchers.  It was as if the trampled-to-death children of Ibadan were asleep. You couldn’t see death on their faces, except that life had escaped their nostrils. Mothers rolled on the dusty floor of Islamic High School’s football field where death chose to conduct its dawn raid. A few minutes after the raid; after the bodies had been taken to freeze inside the mortuary, Death’s mementoes lay on the football field. They had been abandoned in panic in the melee and now served as reminder of the human loss. They ranged from children’s sandals, torn books and cracked school desks. And gallons of tears that the greedy and unfeeling earth swallowed. Death must have sat somewhere treating himself to huge gourds of palmwine.

The lamentable deaths of children in Ibadan have since been enveloped by politics and doublespeak. Yes, there was acute negligence on the part of the organizers of the children’s funfair event. From tissues of information available, not only didn’t they seek government’s permission, safety measures were cavalierly or nil-observed. Their defence that they expected 5000 children but at conservative estimate, between 7500 and 10,000 children and parents attended, was wonky.

Among others, President Bola Tinubu, according to his media chief, “expressed sadness over the tragic incident” as usual, “extended his condolences” and cried that “this is a deeply painful moment for the entire nation.” He said he was “determined to prevent similar tragedies” and “uncover the truth behind this tragedy as “It is imperative to determine whether negligence or deliberate actions were involved” because “Our children’s safety and well-being remain paramount” and “No event should ever compromise their safety or take precedence over their lives.” Bla bla bla.

But, as my people say, until the lion kills the Chief Hunter, the war between hunters and the crew in the wild cannot end; nor can the dance come to a halt until the donkey farts. If Tinubu does not focus on bettering the lives of Nigerians but chooses, at the drop of a hat, to jump on a vacuous globetrotting and aimless junketing in the name of seeking non-existent investors, more Nigerians will come to grief. Shorn of politics and hypocritical talk, let us tell Tinubu to his face that he is vicariously liable for the death of the Ibadan 35 kids. His accomplices are those glib-talking aides and party buffs who deodorize the pains of Nigerians in the last 19 months, decorating sufferings in beautifully sounding reform epithets.

As I have said ceaselessly, while the Tinubu government claims the president is on a reform binge, he has succeeded in killing multiple of hundreds of our countrymen and sent hundreds others into the streets. Ravaged by depression, they whisper to space as they occupy a world of their own. Thousands die for inability to procure drugs for simple ailments. Many families and homes are embroiled in social crises as a result of a huge emasculation of their husbands, breadwinners’ manhood. Wives are lured into prostitution due to their husbands’ economic dis-masculinity. Children meet their waterloo in the process of augmenting their parents’ meager daily breads. Yes, reforms, all over the world, are painful exercises but Tinubu’s isn’t merely painful, it is cruel and bears the visor of Dracula. Yet, the reformists wallop in ostentation, mindless and Satanic corruption and flaunt their loots in our faces.

The dusts of trampled bodies in Ibadan had hardly settled than Nigeria witnessed similar stampedes this weekend. They happened during food distributions, leading to the deaths of at least 30 people on Saturday. While 20 people reportedly got killed in Okija, Ihiala Local Government Area of Anambra state, ten others died at the Holy Trinity Catholic Church, Maitama area of Abuja. Handled by individual and private institutions at both venues, the food distributions suddenly went awry when hungry would-be beneficiaries began to trample on one another. In March of this year, a similar stampede happened in Bauchi State which claimed the lives of an eight-year old girl and six other people. Like the Ibadan tragedy, the victims, alongside others, had stormed the house of a businessman who invited residents to collect N5,000. In October of this year, 153 people got burnt to ashes while they were scooping fuel from an overturned fuel tanker which exploded. The tanker had been coming from Kano State and heading towards Nguru when it overturned. Granted that Nigerians are used to a life of freebies no matter the risks that ensconce those freebies, Nigeria’s grueling economic realities have quadrupled the number of Nigerians who would take risk without considering its downsides. No sermonization of fair play, decency or normalcy can penetrate the deaf ears of the hungry.

Thus, when Tinubu and his minders try to push the blame of last Wednesday’s tragedy in Ibadan and the ones in Abuja and Anambra State to “crowd control breakdown” and vowing to avert similar tragedies, they look at the ailment and not its root cause. There will be many of such tragedies to come unless Tinubu stands up from his fanny and administers Nigeria like a committed leader.

In the midst of this, all Tinubu’s APC is bothered about is winning elections. While the bodies of the 35 dead were in the morgue in Ibadan, on a visit to the party’s National Working Committee in Abuja, Minister of Power, Adebayo Adelabu, called on the National Chairman Abdullahi Ganduje, to replicate the party’s recent electoral banditry in Edo and Ondo States as blueprint to reclaim Oyo State. Ganduje himself, like a skunk-drunk sailor, had said his party would create chaos in Osun and Oyo states to snatch and run with the states. Trust politicians, they think not about lives but the next election.

If Tinubu needed to hear – and per chance is bothered – these calamities, in the words of Bob Marley, are becoming a natural mystic that is associated with excruciating hunger and suffering. Both were brought on hapless Nigerians by the Tinubu government. “Many more will have to suffer; many more will have to die,” Marley warned. You can shawl the abdication of responsibility by the government in beautifully-sounding reform language. The truth is, figuratively speaking, this government’s inhuman reform gambling, which my people call “èyí je, èyí ò je,” is the culprit. It was what served the 35 innocent Nigerian kids in Ibadan, as well as the countrymen who died in stampede in Abuja and Okija, as Christmas season meal to be devoured by the incisors of the rapacious Death.

I wish you a merry and prosperous Christmas, longsuffering people of Nigeria, in the midst of this parlous season.

There are occasions when a writer sets out to write one thing but ends up writing something else. For me, this is one of such occasions! I have had many in the past, though! This time around, I set out to write on Kemi Badenoch’s differentiation between her being a Nigerian and her Yoruba ancestry. And the title I quickly scribbled down was “Which is higher: Ethnic identity or  Nigerian nationality?” The ruling All Progressives Congress chieftain and CEO of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, started it all when she disclosed that the newly-elected UK Conservative Party leader, Mrs. Kemi Badenoch, snubbed her when she made efforts to congratulate and identify with her on the landmark achievement of being the first black person (and, ostensibly, Nigerian) to be so elected. The floodgate of reactions that followed was varied: Some scolded Abike while others lambasted Kemi. In response, Badenoch justified her action, saying she was not ready to do Nigeria’s PR; meaning, she did not want Nigeria to piggyback on her to white-wash its stained linen of a “fantastically corrupt” country, as a former British Prime Minister, David Cameron, had described her right to the face of former President Muhammadu Buhari, who was too dumb-founded and subdued to fight back.

Nigeria, being a country of one scandal, one week, everyone thought the matter had died down – thanks to the Dele Farotimi versus Chief Afe Babalola tango – until the vice-president, Kashim Shettima, chose to stir the hornets’ nest again as he lambasted the British Leader of Opposition for “denigrating” her Nigerian identity, sarcastically advising her to renounce her Nigerian name, Kemi!  At that point, the tango became high profile! It also became more interesting! But it was a most unwise thing for Shettima to have done! The spat from the Nigerian side should have been left at the lower level of Abike Dabiri. Jumping into the fray diminishes the person and office of the country’s Number Two citizen. Did Shettima consider the dignity of his office? Again, the question of what level of training in diplomatic etiquette our leaders get comes to the fore. One such diplomatic gaffe that has refused to go away but appears to have snowballed into the splintering of the ECOWAS (and the collateral damage of the Lukarawa terrorist threat in Nigeria itself), was the hasty and scantily-considered decision taken on the coup leaders of Niger Republic. Don’t we have seasoned professional diplomats anymore? Or is it that our leaders don’t listen to robust and informed advice?

Badenoch’s response to Shettima was more dangerous and damaging than the one she offered Abike Dabiri. She minced no words as she emphasized her preference for her Yoruba ancestry, adding, to boot, that she had no affinity with what she described as a North whacked by Islamism and Boko Haram ideology!  Mrs. Badenoch’s full names are Olukemi Olufunto Badenoch (nee Adegoke). She bears no “English” name. She is proudly and unapologetically Yoruba. She has no “Nigerian name” to renounce, if I may add. There are no Nigerian names, anyway, but there are English, Arabic, Yoruba, Igbo, Efik, Ijaw, Tiv, Igala, Hausa, etc names. Are there even Nigerians in the real sense of the word? I doubt if there are! What we have are people pretending, ape-ing and/or hoping to be one! But there are Fulani, Hausa, Tiv, Idoma, Igb.o, Yoruba, Ijaw, etc. – all cohabiting in the space or geographical expression called Nigeria – so named by the British colonialists.

In Libya in 1989 on the ticket of Pascal Bafyau’s NLC for the Organization of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) conference, we met the leader of the Benin Republic delegation who was delighted to hear that we were “Yoruba from Nigeria” Immediately, the language barrier between him and those of us who were Yoruba evaporated. Benin Republic, colonized by the French, speaks French while Nigeria, colonized by the British, speaks English. The moment he asked us if we understood “Anago”, which is what the Yoruba in the French-speaking West African countries call Yoruba, and we replied in the affirmative, we began to flow in the Yoruba language! He was Yoruba from Benin Republic while we were Yoruba from Nigeria. All across the West Coast where there is a large population of Yoruba (Anago) people, that is how it! In Europe as well, I met people who never stepped a foot into Nigeria but who described themselves as “Yoruba from Cuba or Brazil or Jamaica, etc.” If you think Yoruba are the only “Nigerians” with this tribal mentality or ethnic consciousness, you are wrong! It spreads across! That was why Buhari as military Head of State voted for a fellow Fulani man from another country at an international forum while snubbing his own fellow Nigerian vying for the same position! There is no Nigerian in the real sense of the word! It remains, at best, a wish; a desire for those who savor it. Efforts, if any, to mesh the various ethnic groups that inhabit the space called Nigeria into a nation have all ended in calamitous failure.

Taking a cue from Buhari – and why not? – it will be unrealistic of Shettima to expect the average Yoruba person, proud of his or her Yoruba ancestry, just like Olukemi Olutoyin Badenoch (nee Adegoke) is proud of hers, to file behind the VP in his snide remarks about this illustrious daughter of Yoruba land. Take note that she is our daughter! And we shall make our stand with her in our millions!

Now to the point that I originally set out to make! When they think they have got rid – or been rid – of one Yoruba gadfly or “irritant” or the other and that Nigeria can now heave a sigh of relief, another pops up and rears its “ugly” head! Why have the Yoruba been “the main issue (not only) in Nigerian politics” (to quote the military dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida’s definition of Awo) but also the benchmark against whom every detractor and competitor measure their performance? Herbert Macaulay, a Yoruba man, was the doyen of the nationalist struggle. Obafemi Awolowo was the poster boy of the First Republic. The most radical Nigerian woman in history was Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti. The name that struck most fear in friends and foes alike during the Nigerian Civil War (1967 – 70) was “Black Scorpion” Benjamin Adekunle. The most patriotic, most selfless, and most self-sacrificing Nigerian military officer ever was Francis Adekunle Fajuyi, who chose to die with his boss, the then Head of State, JTU Aguiyi-Ironsi. The first black Nobel Laureate (in Literature), Prof. Wole Soyinka, is Yoruba!

Now, when we come to the theatre of the radicals and “hot-heads”, the Yoruba also lead, beginning, again, with the same Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, who led the Egba women to chase the Alake of Egbaland out of the palace. What of her son, the irrepressible Fela Anikulapo-Kuti? Or his younger brother, Beko? Alao Aka-Bashorun was the first radical NBA president. What of Tunji Braithwaite and Kanmi Ishola-Osobu who followed in his footsteps? We can mention Tai Solarin. What of the stormy petrel himself, Chief Gani Fawehinmi? We can mention a string of NADECO leaders who fought the military to a standstill – Adekunle Ajasin, Abraham Adesanya, among others! With the death of Gani enters Femi Falana!

The only free and fair elections accepted as such by everyone was won by MKO Abiola, a Yoruba man. When Fulani herdsmen ran riot all over the country, the only governor daring enough to look them and President Buhari straight in the face was Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State. Where angels feared to tread; what Goodluck Jonathan and Buhari ran away from is what Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is tackling with uncommon courage and confidence. Now, the man who has volunteered that his head be used to crack the coconut of the malfeasance that we all know has enveloped the Nigerian state in its entirety is Yoruba. The Yoruba stood up like one man and fought for the actualization of June 12. As if the raging Dele Farotimi tsunami was not enough, the Kemi Badenoch hurricane joined the fray!

What is in the DNA of the Yoruba that makes them selfless warriors for the common good, regardless of whose ox is gored and not minding the danger to self? Is it in the water that their ancestors drank and which has been passed on from generations unto generations? Nigeria is not likely to know peace until the gods of the Yoruba are appeased!

FEEDBACK

Well said! You hit the nail right on spot! The forceful arraignment of Dele Farotimi further proves the content of his book to be VERY TRUE. It is a shame that the Judiciary and Government establishments have reduced themselves to be in chains to the powerful. It, thus, further shows that the accused in that book had always twisted the judiciary to his favor. I now see, why some children inherit the enemies and curses of their ancestors even when they themselves are innocent! – Akhidilano.

One thing Tinubu is getting right is the appointment of Taiwo and Zach on tax issues. His tax reform is so daring and good to see that it is ruffling the feathers of the members of the ‘entitled enterprise of Nigeria’. Those two men understand the assignment and are knowledgeable.

One thing I love about this Tinubu is the fact that he is not afraid of taking bold decisions. This country needs decisive actions; not people who are interested in playing to the gallery. Out-of-school children are ravaging your region, no solution! Underage marriage is a menace, no solution! Polio looks more likely to emerge from your region again, no solution! Tinubu’s stubbornness is what looks like the cure to most of the systemic and structural defects of this country. That groups of vested interests are complaining about the tax reform bills is sufficient enough reason to pass the bills and let them cry even more! When Tinubu finishes with tax reform, he should move to other reforms. – Olusegun S. Adeniyi.

I commend your stand on the inalienable rights of offenders to be treated humanely and with respect under the same law that accords a different standard to those in the upper deck. This article will go far from my window to all stakeholders. I have nothing more to urge as I align myself to all the salient issues presented by you and I owe you a loud ovation! – Music speaks.

Your opinion always speaks volumes to the authorities!  Whether they will get the message and do the needful is another thing entirely! But posterity will judge. The issue of Yaya Bello readily comes to mind. He was so let loose that he was beckoning on people on his way to court because he was not put in chains. I can even see a woman embracing him in court and taking photographs with him! This is the level to which our nation has deteriorated and denigrated! The society is corrupt and the judiciary has joined the fray. What a calamity! – Aderemi Ajadi Desalu.

Quite early in the life of the Nigerian state, in the 1970s, General Yakubu Gowon (Rtd.), the then military Head of State, gleefully declared that the problem with Nigeria was not a lack of the financial muscle to fund capital projects and meet other obligations of his administration, but how to appropriate the humongous resources derived from crude oil to benefit the citizens.

The discovery and subsequent exploration and production of crude oil suddenly cast a spell on a country with an unrivalled agrarian prowess that made it the envy of others in the comity of nations. Nigeria bade a calamitous farewell to her legendary groundnut pyramids in the north and abandoned the sprawling cocoa and rubber plantations in the south.

The unprecedented fortune that came with the discovery of the “black gold” overwhelmed managers of the Nigerian economy to the extent that they jilted the old bride (agriculture) that opened the doors of financial prosperity at independence.

The military administration of General Olusegun Obasanjo (Rtd.), in its determination to maximise the economic gains of Nigeria’s vast crude oil and gas endowment, established the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) on April 1, 1977, as a state-owned oil company with the statutory mandate to embark on exploration activities, refining, petrochemicals, product transportation, and marketing. At its inception, the NNPC was managed with vigour and foresight to effectively harness the vast economic potentials of oil and gas in the global economy, resulting in the building of oil refineries in Port Harcourt, Warri and Kaduna between 1978 and 1989.

The NNPC successfully ran the refineries to ensure energy sufficiency to strengthen the economy. Unfortunately, the state-owned oil corporation began to backslide when it came under the siege of the monster called corruption that assailed all sectors of the Nigerian economy with time. The refineries soon went aground as a result of poor management and the NNPC, the largest asset holder in the oil and gas industry, began to falter in its remittances to the national treasury.

To illustrate the administrative lethargy and managerial inertia that became the lot of the NNPC, it would be worthwhile to recall some of its statutory infractions about financial misappropriations over the years. When the Federal Government hired KPMG to audit its account in 2011, it was discovered that the NNPC could not account for about N28.5bn on subsidy-related claims. In March 2016, the Auditor-General of the Federation alleged that the corporation failed to remit around $16bn to the federation account. Earlier in 2014, Emir Lamido Sanusi, former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), raised an alarm that a whopping $20bn was missing in the treasury of the NNPC.

Suffice it to say that the ordinary people have been at the receiving end of decadence in the NNPC that has left the Nigerian economy in dire straits. Owing to the comatose state of the refineries the country has, for many years, witnessed scarcity of refined petroleum products that the hoi polloi can hardly afford.

Consequently, small and medium enterprises that serve as the engine room of the economy have been forced to close up shop. Moreover, endemic corruption and inefficiency in the petroleum industry, prior to the enactment of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) , had provided huge disincentives for foreign investments.

The declining fortunes of Nigerians, due to gross mismanagement in the NNPC, is clearly a breach of social contract between the government and the people. This scenario has significantly eroded generalised trust in the NNPC and the Federal Government over the years. Consequently, there has been an avalanche of protests against operations of the NNPC and the management of the petroleum industry. In fairness to those disparaging the NNPC, they are only exercising their right to freedom of expression which is a vital tool to keep governments and their agencies under check.

However, there is enough evidence to suggest that a few disgruntled elements who are still roaring themselves hoarse in the present dispensation, particularly those calling for the head of Mr. Mele Kyari, Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), are acting from a hangover spell.

The naysayers have adamantly refused to accept the fact that it is no longer business as usual in the NNPC, which has undergone significant reforms to live up to its obligations to the Nigerian state and its people. These doubting Thomases are only victims of circumstance whose condition can be likened to plight of hypochondriacs. In medicine, hypochondria, also called health anxiety disorder, is a state of obsession with the idea of having a serious medical condition that does not exist. Hypochondriacs exaggerate symptoms and severity of a suspected illness without supporting evidence and grope in all directions for solutions in their helpless state of phantasmagoria.

In the realm of cultural psychology, hypochondriacs are constantly weighed down by paranoia and panic attack, and resort to compulsive behaviours that are evident in damaged self-respect, negative attacks on leaders, fault-finding tendencies, fierce criticism, and a pessimistic outlook on life generally.

Caroline Crampton, writer and podcaster, in her latest book entitled “A Body Made of Glass: A Cultural History of Hypochondria”, admits that she was once under the numbing influence of hypochondria when she confesses to having harboured fears that a cured cancer disease for which she had been diagnosed at age 17 would return. Crampton goes further to chronicle other notable intellectuals like Elizabeth Browning, Phillip Larkin, Tennessee Williams et al who fretfully battled against unfounded fears about personal health, safety and security in their lifetime.

Given the distressed state of the Nigerian economy, occasioned by hyperinflation, it is not out of place to find a high prevalence of stress-induced hypochondria in the country. Fortunately, the available treatment for this ailment, as doctors have prescribed, includes therapy and counselling. Therefore, it would be helpful to highlight the laudable achievements of the new NNPC under the supervision of Kyari to convince the naysayers that light has come at the end of the tunnel.

On June 20 2019, Mr. Mele Kolo Kyari was appointed the 19th Group Managing Director (GMD) of the NNPC. His appointment coincided with a period of comprehensive reforms in the petroleum industry. On assumption of office, Kyari launched a policy of Transparency, Accountability, Performance and Excellence (TAPE) to retool the operations of the corporation. To this end, he opened the books of NNPC to the public for proper scrutiny.

This culminated in the publication of the 2018/2019 audited financial statement of the state-owned petroleum corporation and its subsidiaries registered under the Companies and Allied Matters Act of 1990 to enhance transparency in joint venture finances, the first of its kind in over 40 years of its existence. Under the dynamic and able leadership of Mr. Kyari, the NNPC enlisted with the global Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI).

Implementation of the TAPE policy led to a drastic reduction in the corporation’s loss profile in a period of two years, from N803bn in 2018 to N1.7bn in 2019. In 2020, former President Muhammadu Buhari announced that, for the first time in its history, the NNPC was able to declare a profit of N287bn after tax deductions in that financial year. In April 2022, the NNPC paid $3.68bn out of a total $4.689bn cash call debt to five joint venture partners.

It is a known fact that all efforts to revive Nigeria’s ailing refineries from 1999 to 2015 proved abortive. On April 6, 2021, Kyari led the NNPC to sign a $1.5 billion Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contract with Technimont SPA to rehabilitate the Port Harcourt refinery. Construction work commenced on May 6, 2021, and witnessed a slight delay in its completion date.

Through the sheer commitment of the new NNPC led by Kyari and the able supervision of the petroleum ministry, the revamped Port Harcourt refinery that had been shut since 2019 was opened on November 26, 2024. The reopening of the Port Harcourt refinery marks a new dawn in the operations of the NNPC and the petroleum ministry, as most Nigerians have acknowledged. In the words of Mr Peter Obi: “I wish to congratulate the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) for fulfilling the long-standing promise of revamping the old Port Harcourt refinery. The refinery which comes on stream today boasts an installed production capacity of 60,000 barrels of crude per day. Approximately 200 trucks are expected to load products daily from the refinery. Nigerians await the corresponding impact on pump prices and the overall economy.”

The revival of the Port Harcourt refinery bolsters public confidence in the government’s assurance about the resuscitation of other moribund refineries that will be fixed to commence production in no distant time. When they all become operational, as anticipated, Nigerians will begin to appreciate the “Renewed Hope” economic blueprint of President Bola Tinubu, as petroleum products scarcity and what is generally considered an unreasonably high cost of energy will gradually become a thing of the past. In addition to making petroleum products available and affordable to Nigerians, the NNPCL now has the mandate to implement a renewable energy initiative and other projects that are at various stages of completion, all of which will not be expatiated upon here, for lack of space.

The NNPCL which played a critical role in the enactment of the PIA, currently one of the most important pieces of legislation in the country, was able to attain greater achievements, which seemed impossible, under the leadership of Kyari. Until his previous appointment in 2019, the GCEO of NNPCL was Group General Manager of the crude oil marketing division of the defunct NNPC, an assignment which he carried out diligently with a vast knowledge of crude oil marketing, oil and gas trading, and petroleum economics.

At the time, he became the helmsman of what is now Nigeria’s state-owned oil company, Mr. Kyari had over 32 years of experience after traversing the entire value chain of the petroleum industry.

From the foregoing, it is evident that the recent querulous protests and media attacks launched against the NNPCL and Mr. Kyari are unfounded and launched out of ignorance or sheer malevolence. Contrary to the claims of Kyari’s traducers, it has been nearly five years of growth and recovery in the NNPCL which has been repositioned on a positive trajectory, after many years of administrative and managerial inefficiency.

Dr. Amieyeofori, Journalist and Conflict Scholar, writes from Abuja.

AHEAD 2027 general elections, 78 associations have submitted applications to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) seeking to be registered as political parties.

A senior management staff of the commission, who pleaded not to be named, revealed this to Sunday Tribune in Abuja.

The source, who declined to give the identities of the associations, declared that relevant departments within the commission are already sieving the applications to determine those that meet up the commission’s requirements for eligibility for registration as political parties.

“It is after that rigorous examination of their applications that the commission would select the ones that meet up its template for registration,” the source said.

Sunday Tribune checks revealed that the requirements that the applicants must fulfill include national spread; an existing National Executive Committee of the association that reflects the Federal Character principle; the constitution and manifesto of the association must align with the fundamental objectives and directive principle of state policy, as enshrined in the Constitution.

The name, acronym, symbol and motto of the association seeking to transform to a political party must not be toxic as to offend provisions of the Constitution and the Electoral Act.

According to the INEC Guidelines and Provisions for Political Parties, some of the claims to be verified by its relevant departments ahead of an association registration as party are: “The commission, in verifying the claims of an association, shall, among other things, ascertain whether: The National Executive Committee of the association reflects the Federal Character Principle which requires that members of the National Executive Committee must come from at least 24 states of the federation and the Federal Capital Territory.

“The constitution and manifesto of the association comply with the provisions of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), the Electoral Act 2022 and these Regulations and Guidelines.

“The name, acronym, motto, or symbol does not offend the provision of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), the Electoral Act 2022 and these Regulations and Guidelines.

“The constitution and manifesto of the association conform to the Fundamental Objectives and Directive Principle of State Policy as contained in Chapter Il of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).”

The regulation further stated that “Where, at any stage of the registration process, it is discovered that the same set of persons submitted more than one application, or that any aspect of the submission is false, such an application shall be invalidated.”

Checks by Sunday Tribune revealed that 19 political parties are currently operating in the country.

The number swelled from 18 to 19 in July last year, when INEC had to reverse itself on the deregistration of the Youth Party, in compliance with judgement of the Supreme Court.

With the growing internal dissension within the dominant opposition parties, multiple sources revealed that gladiators within the dominant political parties have since opened discussions to form a formidable coalition against the ruling All Progressives Congress in forthcoming general elections.

One of the options is to coalesce under a political party, outside the three dominant opposition parties which are now heavily fractured.

[Tribune]

The feud between elder statesman, Chief Afe Babalola and civil right activist, Mr. Dele Farotimi, is perhaps the most significant discourse that postcolonial Nigerian state has thrown up for the moment, one in a class of those grand defining disputations that sure will gather dust which will take some time to abate. And it is one case that is fraught with all sorts of legal, jurisprudential, moral and political traps and complexities that speak to more than the trivial interventions—leveraged around the David and Goliath motif—that are attending the matter. Those who have been able to go beyond the surface of the case will agree that it goes to the very foundation and founding of the Nigerian society, and the fundamental objective of crafting a good and just society for Nigerians. That the issue revolves around the dispensation of justice immediately alerts us to the deep insinuation about the idea of social justice itself, and how the conception of fairness could be written into the very fabric of the Nigerian society.

And yet, the complexity of the case is what makes it a case that is too critical for a public servant like me to dabble in. (Un)fortunately, my intellectual maturation, my political science education and my professional endeavor in institutional reform advocacy have prepared me to intervene in this critical matter. I have always been involved with Nigeria, and with reflective thoughts about how to reconstitute her greatness. Three learning encounters with three world-historic icons configured my passion for wanting to see that Nigeria becomes a state we all can be proud of. The first came from my reading of Plato’s Republic. There is a reason that the entire treatise commenced with the question, what is justice? Justice was a fundamental issue in the decline of the ancient Athenian democracy that allowed Socrates to be judicially murdered. The second learning derived from Wole Soyinka’s dense prison memoir, The Man Died. And like most who have read it, Soyinka was troubled by the idea of justice: “For me, justice is the first condition of humanity.” By the time I would be coming to Thomas More’s Utopia, I was already apprised of the connections between my political science education, my professional endeavor as a public servant, and the key elements of institutional reform as a cogent framework for transforming Nigeria.

From Plato to Soyinka, we have a trajectory of political reflection that takes justice seriously as the basis for organizing a just society. This is part of the intellectual frameworks for my undergraduate and graduate studies at the Department of Political Science, University of Ibadan. In one of those explosive seminar classes that played some fundamental role in my intellectual maturation in the graduate school, I had proposed an argument through a seminar paper titled: “Is a revolution an option to fix Nigeria?” The topic was meant to titillate the collective yearning for revolution that would serve as the ultimate mechanism for social change that will flush off all traces of corruption and degeneration in postcolonial Nigeria. Revolutions seem to possess some allure for the masses because they constitute a framework of justice that the constitutional justice mechanism might not be able to handle.

However, as Wole Soyinka, Thomas More, Martin Luther and even Galileo Galilei would realize, the need for radicalism is balanced by the force of establishment orthodoxy. The Nigerian predicament has, as a fundamental foundation, lot to do with the connection between governance failure and injustice in terms of the persistent and protracted class strife between the haves and the have-nots, between the rich and the poor, indeed, in the final analysis between the government and the governed. And in the case between Afe Babalola and Dele Farotimi, the issues boil down to the administration of justice and the entire edifices and institutions of social justice and the rule of law in Nigeria. And so, in outlining the key issues involved in the matter, we must be careful enough to read between the lines and the noises of analysts who are eager to queue behind their favored protagonists.

First things first. Let us remove the surface debris. Indeed, and in this case, the debris points us in the direction to look for the rot within the matter. First, there is the matter of civil defamation and its legal ramifications. And second, there is the issue of the legal and moral protocols involved in dealing with the pursuit of redress by someone who knows and understands the law. Barrister Farotimi has a legal right to seek redress in court. Chief Babalola has a legal right to defend his reputation in court. In raising the specter of legal prosecution against defamation, I see Chief Babalola as being at the forefront of gatekeeping the legal establishment in terms of what is and is not permissible or possible under the law and its conservative tenets. If you are hurt or an injustice has been done to your person, then the best place to seek redress is not the court of public opinion but the constitutional legal establishment. Unfortunately for him, Barrister Farotimi’s book, Nigeria and Its Criminal Justice System, impugned the entire legal and judicial establishment up to its apex institution, the Nigerian Supreme Court. However, does radicalism preclude moral decency? A book could be written and allegations made without the complement of atrocious language. Or maybe the rot in the judicial system, and the need for a revolution preclude any niceties, especially with those who are allegedly at the forefront of perpetuating and protecting the rot. But then, how to prove what we all considered to be the norm in terms of legal prosecution of judicial corruption remains a hanging question?       

No matter how we look at what we are calling the surface debris, we are redirected deeper and deeper into what lies beneath the surface. The ultimate question is that between Chief Afe Babalola and Barrister Dele Farotimi, what we are asked to contend with is the state of the Nigerian judiciary and the corrupt impediment of social justice, especially for an average Nigerian. What Barrister Dele Farotimi said about the Nigeria judicial system is not new. We are all familiar with the rot within the system. Indeed, this is not the first time an alarm would be raised about what we are all familiar with. Indeed, as far back as 1999, The News magazine carried a most unsalutary headline, “Crooks on the Bench: An Expose on the Rot in the Judiciary.” The magazine headlined the names of 47 judges indicted for judicial corruption. What is new is that Dele Farotimi dared to go so far as to mention specific names, and to confront the big players in the legal establishment. And he did this in a most scurrilous manner targeted at getting maximum traction and attention. It is as if Mr Farotimi, through the public sphere, is throwing the gauntlet to every Nigerian and challenging us on our collective responsibility to clean the Augean stable.

If Barrister Farotimi cannot prove his allegations in court, it would not mean that his charges are false. It might only imply that the system which is supposed to guarantee justice has become too corruptly dense to achieve its mandate. But there is also the chance that since the entire judicial system cannot be tarred so broadly with the same brush, Farotimi’s allegation might receive a dispassionate hearing that might deliver justice as we expect it. This might be a tall expectation. Nigeria’s postcolonial predicament has inevitable consequences on the capacity of the judicial system to facilitate the delivery of justice. And this failure also complicates the capacity of the Nigerian state to deliver on its social contract to Nigerians. This is what makes the Babalola-Farotimi case too complex to be decided either in the constitutional court or the court of public opinion. The burdens of postcolonial disruptions that the Nigerian judicial system carries are enormous: judicial corruption, miscarriage of judgments, executive lawlessness, delayed trial due to insufficient infrastructure, financial dependence on the executive arm of government

To outline the fundamental challenges of the judicial system in Nigeria this way is not to give in to cynicism and a deterministic mindset that we might be caught in a vice that is inescapable. It is simply to say that the ongoing uproar between the two dramatis personae demonstrates that the court has been given a chance to reflect on the role that (in)justice plays in the fundamental understanding of the Nigerian postcolonial predicament and the capacity of a democratic system to correct itself. When Chief Afe Babalola and Barrister Dele Farotimi are given their day in court, we will have no choice but to trust that same judicial system to deliver unbiased judgment no matter our misgivings about how objective and untainted that judgment could be. This is just a way of saying that though our judicial system is not perfect; it is still the best that we have.

The last words on this reflection on the connection between the ongoing feud between Babalola and Farotimi and Nigeria’s postcolonial predicament must be given to Haile Sellasie, former emperor of Ethiopia: “Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most; that has made it possible for evil to triumph.”