For Dele, Christmas day is coming fifteen days earlier on December 10th. His present ordeal represents a climax of the crucial role he has played in the political firmament of Nigeria. He will be rapturously celebrated on that day.

The first time I encountered him was as the lawyer who perfected the title of a land I bought twenty five years ago. I never knew he was far bigger than that occupation.

The first notion I have of him as a public intellectual was a message I received from him while I was at the University of Oxford in 2020.

He wanted my permission to use a column (I had written on the passage of the erstwhile chief of staff to President Mohammadu Buhari in his book) “Don’t die in their war”. I, of course, had no reservations whatsoever in granting his request.

When I returned to Nigeria and heard him speak on the cable TV network, I realised we have another giant in our vocation of public intellectualism. I sought him out and we became brothers. I subsequently recruited him for the role of spokesperson, Peter Obi presidential campaign.

The uniqueness of Dele does not merely lie in his intellectual flair. He shoots from the hips and takes no prisoners.

Chief Afe Babalola is my uncle from my mother’s side. In the thick of the violation of the Yoruba territories by rogue fulani militia, I got President Olusegun Obasanjo and Professor Wole Soyinka to sponsor a Yoruba political summit.

In our search for a credible Yoruba man of sufficient stature, we easily resolved on Chief Babalola as the convener.

Of all his outstanding attributes, the one I admired most is his unwavering commitment to constitutional reforms with the specific objective of the restoration of federalism.

Hardly a month passes without Babalola advocating for this Nigerian life saver (true federalism) in his regular public interventions.

He is one of Nigeria’s biggest role model in the legal profession, education, community development leader and as an investor.

As my father’s pupil in the senior standard school in the forties. He did so well in an English language test that my dad scored him eleven over ten.

Babalola once told me a tragic experience he would never forget (a first hand experience of how destitute Nigerians had become).

About ten illiterate petty traders came to seek his financial support in Ado-Ekiti. He asked them how much they needed to start off. They said ten thousand naira per person. He said he rushed to the restroom to cry. Ten thousand naira!!!

Dele constantly briefs me on his difficulties with Babalola. When we recently had a ceremony in honour of Professor Jide Osuntokun, we had lined up Chief Babalola as special guest of honour.

Dele expressed reluctance to attend, drawing my attention to the attack he was certain to receive from the legal luminary and potentially two others who were going to play significant roles.

The first inkling I heard of his plight was from Chief Ayo Adebanjo whom he was getting set to visit when the storm troopers struck and bundled him into their vehicle en route to Ado-Ekiti.

Predictably, the backlash came thick and fast and in torrents. It is a public relations disaster for my Uncle (Babalola), the Nigerian police force and the judiciary. Given our contemporary experience with these dysfunctional institutions, this is not the company Babalola should be in active connivance. This is not the resplendent image we have of him.

To the contrary, this is Dele’s finest hour as the nation rose as one to canonise him as the embodiment of resistance to all that is wrong with Nigeria in this season.

ASUE, COMPLIMENTS OF THE SEASON

“That day will forever be etched in our history as one of our darkest moments, marked by the brazen theft of our mandate and the shameful subversion of the will of the people”- Asue Ighodalo

 At a ceremony I attended a week ago, a side discussion ensued and centred on the recent Edo state governorship election and the experience of a mutual friend, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP governorship candidate, Asue Ighodalo.

 I have not seen Asue for a while. But for the participation of Olumide Akpata, governorship candidate of the Labour Party, LP, I would have volunteered to join his political campaign. For Nigeran politics to stand a chance of development these are the kind of enlightened people, with unimpeachable pedigree, we would have to recruit into the political system

Human beings are a creation of hope and so despite myself, I prayed that his venture would be the exception to the rule of political depravity that has ceased Nigeria’s jugular. So I cannot claim to be surprised at his predictable fate.

A mutual friend observed that Asue was not looking his robust and vibrant self, the last time he saw him. I suggested that this is attributable to the ‘culture shock’ experience he encountered at the election.

Asue is relatively new to the culture of defiant gangsterism that passes for politics in Nigeria.

It is difficult to estimate just how brazen and blatant the culture has become unless you are a direct witness.The standard playbook goes like this.

The caucus of the status quo candidate (invariably the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC) will prevail on the INEC to declare victory for the candidate no matter the contrary outcome. Shoot first before asking questions.

Knowing fully well its a futile gesture, the practice of Nigerian democracy would now invite the victim to follow the mockery of seeking justice at the temple of a state captured compromised judiciary.

There the fate of the INEC declared losers will be sealed with the imprimatur of the Nigerian judiciary. And all righteousness would have been fulfilled having gone through all the constitutionally required procedure. 

Then the outcome will be rationalised by such idle speculations and gossip that the election couldn’t have gone any other way, because Asue’s principal, Governor Godwin Obaseki has offended the divine king of Benin.

To the question, why would a man of Asue’s pedigree make frivolous allegations on the election, referencing it as “one of our darkest moments, marked by the brazen theft of our mandate and the shameful subversion of the will of the people”.

If we are agreed that Atedo Peterside is a credible third party, then he could not be reasonably expected to associate himself with a bogus claim of that magnitude. Yet here is:

“Ever since the election in Osun, where INEC came out with credible result sheets on IREV, it is as if something has changed right from the presidential election, they went rogue. I hope that I will be held accountable,”said Peterside

For personal and Party records purposes. I will not dissuade Ighodalo from going to court. Whatever the veracity of the claims, the Nigerian Supreme court is guaranteed to come down on the side of the party with the biggest machete. It has become a vicious cycle.

In the belief of our host, we might as well abandon the field to the APC and withdraw from participation in further elections altogether, if the role designed for our participation is lending legitimacy to the premeditated charade.

As noted by the American based Council on Foreign Relations, CFR, “The problems for champions of democracy run deep. The very meaning of the term has been called into question for too many populations who have experienced plenty of elections, but little in the way of real political choice or accountability.. when democracy is understood as a label applied to governments that simply stage elections, or a fig leaf that conceals corruption and repression, it is easy to devalue democracy”.

The perspective of President Olusegun Obasanjo is “Let me go back to the beginning where we got it wrong—the western liberal democracy, that is what the Europeans have. When you look at the western liberal democracy, it is a product of their history, a product of their culture, a product of their way of life”

“I have looked into most African languages, western democracy has what they call loyal opposition. What is opposition in African languages? Enemy. Western democracies called oppositions “loyal” because the oppositions are loyal to the monarchy. That’s where their loyal democracy began. They used to have monarchies”.

He believes that the notion of liberal democracy is alien to Africa and it is not consistent with the spirit of African communalism hence its contextual failure in the continent.

What I think the former President meant to articulate as the bane of post colonial African states is the absence of autochthony, (in which regard, it is the totality of the colonial transition that has failed) of which the bastardisation of democracy is an epiphenomenon.

The concept of autochthony is the Greek word translated ‘as springing from the land. It usually means the assertion of not just the concept of autonomy, but also the concept that the constitution derives from their own native traditions’.

Peter Ekeh illustrates “Take the Japanese, the Taiwanese, The Indian and the Chinese. They have evolve with their culture and tradition intact. They evolved, wearing their own clothes, speaking their own language, teaching every subject up to university level, on their own language, keeping their values, their gods, their own religion…

“They have all come out better for it. Their economy, education, health, orientation, better than that of the Blackman and in some cases, better than the whiteman’s”.

The biggest political challenge Tinubu confronted was the Buhari legacy of divisive and primitive nepotism bordering on apartheid rule. If this is the case, why does he want to travel the same road?. To become a Yoruba hero the way his predecessor remains the Hausa-Fulani folk hero?

That would be a wrong lesson to learn from the precedence of the Afenifere choice of Olu Falae over the late Chief Ajibola Ige as the AD candidate in the 1999 presidential election.

Professor Bolaji Akinyemi deems it ironic, that Afenifere college of electors, actually predicated the choice on the logic that Ige was the personification of Yoruba irredentist politics which may be a disability in the context of national elections.

Coincidentally the President was a member of that college and I have not seen a divergence from this position by Yoruba intelligentsia. 

One major takeaway from the ongoing controversy over the tax reform bills is that Nigeria’s democracy is maturing. Although the debates initially evoked ethnic and regional emotions, the contestations have gradually moved towards discussing facts and figures, which should be central to the issues ab initio.

Signs of trouble emerged two weeks ago when 19 Northern governors and their top traditional rulers rose from a meeting, raising objections to one of the four bills because it was against the region’s interest. Somehow, they managed to convince the other 17 governors from the South to block the bills at the National Economic Council presided over by Vice-President Kashim Shettima.

The Council, which comprised the 36 state governors, Ministers of Finance and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Budget and Economic Planning, and Federal Capital Territory, and the governor of the Central Bank, resolved to advise the President to pause the legislative process on the bills pending further consultations with relevant stakeholders. Of course, the Presidency initially rejected the advice, saying those opposed to the bills should engage with the legislative process to make their case.

Not a few people felt that the Presidency’s initial reaction was impolitic, given the governors’ influence on federal legislators, many of whom derived their positions from the benevolence of the state executives. It was not long before it became apparent that a hard time awaited the bills at the federal legislature, where they were headed for approval.

Despite passing the second reading in the Senate, the bills ran into a brick wall in the House of Representatives, which had to suspend their consideration to avoid being killed. Even the Senate has paused further consideration pending the outcome of negotiations by its 10-man committee, which was set up to consult with stakeholders over the bills’ grey areas.

However, it is important to note that only two clauses in one of the bills, the Nigeria Tax Administration Bill 2024, have attracted controversy, which threatens to endanger the remaining bills: the Nigeria Tax Bill 2024, the Nigeria Revenue Service Establishment Bill 2024, and the Joint Board Revenue Service Bill.  The culprits are Sections 77 and 12 (12), which seek to increase the Value Added Tax from 7.5% to 10% in 2025 and 15% in 2030. They also seek to adjust the sharing formula by increasing the derivation criteria from 20% to  

  60%. Besides, there are complaints about attribution.

The Northern governors felt that these clauses would further impoverish their region and tilt the advantage in favour of a few states in the South, particularly Lagos, Ogun and Rivers, which host the headquarters of most of the VAT-paying companies. Interestingly, Lagos and Rivers have argued that they would lose 80% of their earnings, contrary to the North’s claim. Significantly, the debate has been engaging, shifting from emotional to rational arguments as stakeholders are challenged to state and defend their cases.

It is noteworthy that despite the complaints of the Northern governors, many people from the region have supported the bills, contending that they would challenge them to be more creative and productive. Some even argue that the governors’ position was baseless because the North stands to gain more from the overall intent of the bills.

Ironically, the bills aimed at fixing the economy to engender shared prosperity for all citizens have become enmeshed in steep controversy. Many analysts have argued that they contained more beneficial provisions to increase the country’s revenue base and move it closer to fiscal federalism. For instance, S77 of NTAB seeks to reduce the federal government’s share of VAT revenue to 10% while increasing the state and local governments’ share to 55% and 35%, effectively putting 90% in the pockets of the subnational governments.   

In addition, the bills seek to reduce the tax burden on the poor and low-income earners while enhancing the environment for businesses to thrive. Subsequently, low-income earners will be exempt from paying income tax. This tax exemption would benefit about 90% of government and private sector workers. To cushion the poor, there will be 0% VAT on over 600 food items, education, health, electricity generation and distribution, and fuel. As for businesses, over 60 taxes have been collapsed into about 11. So, there is something in the bills for everyone. Yet, they have now been threatened by the ongoing bickering.

It remains to be understood how the product of an over 100-member committee, including 40 students, government officials, private sector players, and trade union organisations from the country’s six regions, has become so controversial that it has even been accused of lack of widespread consultation.

The good news is that all the warlords realised the need to approach the table for intelligible conversations that would engender trade-offs. This is commendable and shows that the nation understands that democracy is about dialogue to resolve issues of common interest. The Tayo-Oyedele-led Presidential Committee on Revenue and Fiscal Reforms should be commended for owning the bills and stepping forward to engage. Its chairman, Tayo Oyedele, a professor and tax expert, deserves special commendation for his calmness and articulate responses to stakeholders’ queries. It is reassuring that he has left no one in doubt that his committee’s proposals are not resistant to informed review.  

The bottom line has to be the overall interest of Nigerians groaning under the weight of the prevailing economic hardship brought about by decades of mismanagement of the nation’s resources. President Bola Tinubu now has the mandate and responsibility to reverse this. As part of discharging that responsibility, he set up the Oyedele Committee to put the nation’s fiscal framework in shape for the revival of the economy. Now that the job is almost done, the President must take personal responsibility to engage and negotiate the grey areas for a fruitful outcome.

Adebiyi is the media aide to the Minister of Budget and Economic Planning, Senator Abubakar Bagudu  

After tempestuous agitations from Northern Nigeria, which appears to be more concerned with the sharing of revenue from Value Added Tax, the House of Representatives suspended deliberations on President Bola Tinubu’s four tax bills.

Nigeria’s tax administrators, who do not seem to recognise that Value Added Tax is different from Sales Tax, are confusing everyone, including the media (and the legislators, who may not have read the tax documents).

Just gauge the decibel of cacophony that legislators are making over the allocation of VAT proceeds without corresponding light! They don’t even realise that Value Added Tax is not charged on foodstuffs, pharmaceuticals, and educational materials.

The explanations about the sharing of Value Added Tax proceeds between the three tiers of government and among the states, by Taiwo Oyedele, Chairman of the Presidential Tax Reform Committee, are disingenuous, to say the least.

Surprisingly, neither the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Nigeria nor the Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria tries to clarify the position, so that Nigerians do not suffer another round of ill-conceived public policy.

The current Value Added Tax Act allocates 15, 50, and 35 per cent of collection to the federal, state, and local governments, respectively. And 20 per cent of the 50 per cent allocated to all states goes to where the Value Added Tax is generated, 30 per cent is shared according to population, and the balance of 50 per cent is distributed equally among the states.

Northern Nigeria is worried that the new tax bills allocate 10, 55, and 35 per cent to the federal, state, and local governments, respectively. It also raises the allocation of states where the revenue is generated from 20 to 60 per cent—with the argument that more should accrue to states where wealth is created or income is earned.

The state where production takes place absorbs environmental costs of air and water pollution, stress on its roads, educational and health facilities, and infrastructure and should therefore be compensated accordingly.

As expected, Northern Nigeria, led by the Northern Governors’ Forum, swiftly rejected the new proposals and used their majority in the National Economic Council to demand a review from the president, who, however, rejected their request.

Senator Ali Ndume, obviously smarting from his removal as Chief Whip of the Senate, introduced his usual histrionics and theatrics, threatening to leave the All Progressives Congress over this Value Added Tax matter. It should be the private affair of himself and the APC whether he remains or vacates the All Progressives Congress.

When he begins to ask whether Nigerians who earn less than N800,000 per annum will be exempted from paying Personal Income Tax, one begins to wonder if he knows the difference between Personal Income Tax and Value Added Tax! No one knows what he meant by, “giving somebody something with the right hand and taking it back with the left hand.”

It will be a matter for regret if Senator Ndume is just finding out that the poor Nigerian consumers have been indirectly paying Value Added Tax from its inception in 1994. He appears to be prepared to muddy the waters just to advance petty regional interests.

By the way, if those professionals that he suggests are the teachers of the current tax czars of Nigeria gave him the wrong argument that he is bandying about, it would amount to what the Yoruba describe as “a monkey carrying a monkey atop a palm tree!” They must be suspect professionals.

Former Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, added his voice with a subtle blackmail: “We are aware that the Lagos young men are working so hard to impose taxes and take away our taxes from Kano and this part of the country to Lagos. Today, as we have seen, even the telephones that we… register here in Kano, efforts are there to take all the taxes to Lagos.”

Mr. Oyedele should find the time to explain to Governor Kwankwaso that Value Added Tax accrued from sales invoices issued for fabrics manufactured and sold in the sundry textile factories based in Kano will not be attributed to Lagos, even if they were sold to Lagos, for instance.

Section 145(1) of the new tax bill provides: “For the purpose of… this Act, a taxable supply should be deemed to have taken place at the time an invoice or receipt is issued by the supplier… or payment is due to, or received by the supplier in respect of the supply…”

The Northern political establishment should stop the emotional blackmail that has yielded neither Northern Nigeria, its poor citizens, nor the Nigerian economy any good. The North must come to terms with reality and allow Nigeria to move forward.

The matter has really come to a head when likeable Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno State begins to argue that when Nigerians who earn less than N800,000 annually Personal Income Tax states revenue will reduce. He omitted the increase to the tax rate of high-net-worth taxpayers.

Why is Mr. Oyedele failing to explain to the legislators and governors that while Value Added Tax, paid throughout the supply chain, is paid by distributors to manufacturers, who then remit to the tax collection agencies, and that Sales Tax is paid by consumers at the point of sale to retailers, who remit to the tax collection agencies?

The textile retailer in Lagos pays Value Added Tax to the textile distributor, who remits the Value Added Tax to the Kano-based manufacturer, Da Viva Textile Mills, or the importer, who forwards the same to the Federal Inland Revenue Service as a Kano State sale.

By this logic, the Value Added Tax will be recognised as revenue derived from Kano State for the purpose of remittance to the Federation Account. For emphasis, the Value Added Tax  that is paid in Lagos State travels through the supply chain to FIRS in Kano State as a tax-deductible payment, with its separate ledger, of course.

But unlike Value Added Tax, Sales Tax, paid by the consumer to the retailer in Lagos, does not travel through the supply chain. It is remitted directly to Lagos Inland Revenue Service or a Local Government Authority. For instance, customers are required to pay some kind of Sales Tax to Ijebu-Ode Local Government for ram bought at Imowo Market in Ijebu-Ode.

Maybe the conversation should be that Value Added Tax should still be collected by the Federal Government and distributed according to an agreed allocation regime, while states charge and retain 100 per cent of Sales Tax. This should motivate states to rev up their economies.

Dr. Sani Abdullahi Shinkafi, who thinks that Northern Governors are whining “because how the money will be shared is based on performance and your contribution,” suggests that “most of these states (governors) are lazy; most of them (he says) are not ready to develop their states to (be able to) generate (internal) revenue,” and insists that “that is why they are complaining.”

Senator Seriake Dickson, representing Bayelsa State West Senatorial District, recalls that when the Petroleum Industry Act ignored the 10 per cent preferred by petroleum-producing communities and granted them only three per cent the heavens did not fall.

Northern Nigerian leaders, like Governor Zulum and Senators Aminu Tambuwal and Abdul Ningi, should stop issuing threats whenever there are plans to straighten things out for everyone. As former Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon says, “The North must ensure that its actions are in the best interest of Nigeria.”

After many years of guarding oil pipeline installations, the Nigerian Army finally made its first high-profile arrest. It turned out to be a journalist! Investigative journalist and founder of the Foundation for Investigative Journalism, Fisayo Soyombo became the face of the Army’s eventual success in apprehending oil thieves. Of course, they regularly announce arrests of some faceless and nameless people. Hardly anyone bothers to follow up on their prosecution. We have all been Nigerian long enough to know that some crimes persist in the country, not simply because the criminals are resilient but because the ring of perpetration is so institutionalised that it should be considered an extension of the civil service. That is essentially the story of oil bunkering in Nigeria.

We were all here in 2019 when Rivers governor Nyesom Wike accused the Nigerian Army of running illegal bunkering in Rivers State. He did not insinuate; Wike specifically accused the general officer commanding the Army’s 6 Division in Port Harcourt, Jamil Sarham, of using soldiers to steal and sell petroleum products in the region. In a country that takes itself seriously, that sort of accusation would neither be flippantly made nor lightly received. However, this is Nigeria. The only thing guaranteed to happen is nothing.

Wike did not say anything anyone did not already know. By the time you reach the end of organised crime in Nigeria, you will discover it is an appendage of the administrative state. Oil theft is run by legitimate state actors. When the government says it is looking for oil thieves, what they are searching for are the unemployed youths who carve out their own spaces outside of the massive extra-legal operations that the government has created for itself.

When finally released from detention, Soyombo granted an interview on AriseTV where he noted that the sensitive information he shared with the officers somehow ended up with the oil thieves. By leaking details of the information he gave them, they ensured they jeopardised the rest of his investigations. Still, congratulations! Even with that outcome, one can argue that the investigation succeeded in a way that would not have been so well-illustrated if you had published it in the most poetic language a poet could have mustered. If anyone was ever in doubt that the state and the so-called oil thieves are in cahoots, here is irrefutable proof.

But if there is something Soyombo’s series of explosive investigations has repeatedly proven, it is also that Nigeria does not take itself too seriously. Those serious enough about Nigeria and even demonstrating it by putting their lives on the line end up appearing to be doing too much. For instance, during his AriseTV interview, Soyombo mentioned his earlier investigation that revealed a child trafficking ring in the country and how the same state officials who should act have stonewalled him. I remember reading the publication open-mouthed, genuinely shocked that the process of giving a child out to adopters in the country was that lax. In a society where the earth has eyes, the jaw-dropping revelations should have led to reforms in the child adoption industry. Nigeria slacks in many areas, but you would be forgiven if you took it for granted that we would at least protect the most vulnerable among us. For nothing to happen, you realise that Nigeria cares for none of its children.

Then, in 2019, he investigated the corruption of the Nigerian Prison Service. He also put himself on the line for that fact-finding mission. One would think that the Nigerian government would at least meet him halfway, but for where? What eventually woke them up to the sordid reality of the NPS was Bobrisky. Yes, Bobrisky did that for us. Before you knew it, the interior minister, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, had announced an investigation. The National Assembly set up a fact-finding panel and even invited a social media rabble-rouser to testify before them. Then you wonder why the sudden seriousness. The knowledge they needed to act was available in the public sphere all along, but they were only aroused to their duties when the matter had to do with sex.

Come to think of it, maybe that is how the outcome of investigative journalism should be published in Nigeria. Perhaps that was what was missing all along! Attach sex to reports of investigation in any form, and the relevant agencies will be tempted to pay attention. Who knows, sex might finally motivate state officials to take decisive action over the rotten state of another bureaucracy where Soyombo has conducted a series of investigations: the Nigerian Customs Service. He has investigated the agency and published a series of reports, but the silence from the same administration that was awakened during the Bobrisky saga can wake even the dead.

The good book says we will know the truth, and the truth will free us, but Nigeria defies that hope. We know the truth, and even the truth knows us back, but we are not yet free. We have been compromised on every front by leaders who cannot bring themselves to even feign any interest in social progress. Under their watch, virtually every decadent institution is allowed to progressively decay. The lesser their structural integrity, the more pliable—and better readied—they are for the machinations of these tyrannical leaders. Their disinterest in arresting the rot means it keeps spreading, eating into every organ, every nerve, every cell, every bit of the society.

What is eating up our society from the inside is gnawing at the brains now, God help us! In several directions you look, nothing seems to be taken seriously. Here is a recent and unfunny example: The Nigerian Presidential Compressed Natural Gas Initiative employed the services of some comedians and singers (one, the musician Innocent Idibia, popularly called TuFace; two, Waris Olayinka Akinwande, the social media jokester popularly called Ola of Lagos; three, musician Dauda Kahutu Rarara, and comedian Bright Okpocha, whom everyone knows as Basket Mouth) on a fact-finding trip to India to learn about Compressed Natural Gas and convince Nigerians at home that it was safe for use. One wonders, if the FG is serious about swaying people towards CNG, why hire comedians and singers? Whatever happened to actual experts?

Imagine that you are an engineer with years of training in this area. You have been honing your skills (maybe even up to PhD level), waiting for the day you will be called to serve society with the knowledge. Then you wake up one day and learn that those called to the serious assignment are the amusers. Imagine the betrayal you will feel when you realise that you wasted time taking Nigeria too seriously. Please note that this is not an argument against entertainers as people who can also positively influence their society. There are countless examples of comedians playing the role of a society’s intellectuals, but expertise is expertise. If we have sincere questions about what CNG would mean for the life expectancy of vehicles that would need to be retrofitted, are comedians the right people to ask?

When it eventually dawns on you that Nigeria is not a serious country, it hits so hard that being struck by thunder would have been gentler. You realise that you have been investing your passion in a country that is not passionate enough about itself; you embarked on a redemption quest for a country that is just not ready. When the rage that seizes you finally subsides, you experience a calm within. That is the moment you come to full Nigerian maturity. And you know that because when they start another round of noise over one thing, one thing in the Nigerian streets, you just enter your own house and close the door.