OTHERS' VIEWS
SUNDAY 1-DEC
Hearn confirms Joshua’s 2025 return date
https://reubenabati.com.ng/sports/hearn-confirms-joshua-s-2025-return-date
Why Nigeria Needs Tax Reform – Oyedele
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/why-nigeria-needs-tax-reform-oyedele
Okpebholo, APC Jittery Over Exposure Of Systemic Rigging In Edo, Lies To Cover Fraud – Obaseki
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/okpebholo-apc-jittery-over-exposure-of-systemic-rigging-in-edo-lies-to-cover-fraud-obaseki
CBN tells Nigerians to report cash withdrawal issues from December 1, banks to face penalties
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/cbn-tells-nigerians-to-report-cash-withdrawal-issues-from-december-1-banks-to-face-penalties
Local Government Autonomy….Concerns Mount Over Non-execution Of Supreme Court Ruling
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/local-government-autonomy-concerns-mount-over-non-execution-of-supreme-court-ruling
Tinubu Tax: North’s anger grows as youths attack Deputy Senate President
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/tinubu-tax-north-s-anger-grows-as-youths-attack-deputy-senate-president
OAuGF report reveals huge financial infractions in NNPCL, NUPRC, NMDPRA
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/oaugf-report-reveals-huge-financial-infractions-in-nnpcl-nuprc-nmdpra
Rivers: N27bn IGR behind Fubara, Wike rift, INEC now APC member – Adeyanju
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/rivers-n27bn-igr-behind-fubara-wike-rift-inec-now-apc-member-adeyanju
‘I Am Against Tax Reform Bills, It Gives Some States More Advantage’ – Ningi
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/i-am-against-tax-reform-bills-it-gives-some-states-more-advantage-ningi
[STATE HOUSE PRESS RELEASE] President Tinubu Congratulates New NUJ President And Executive Team
https://reubenabati.com.ng/news/state-house-press-release-president-tinubu-congratulates-new-nuj-president-and-executive-team
[PRESS RELEASE] President Tinubu Approves Funds for UNESCO Media and Information Literacy Institute in Nigeria
https://reubenabati.com.ng/news/press-release-president-tinubu-approves-funds-for-unesco-media-and-information-literacy-institute-in-nigeria
Trump threatens 100% tariff on BRICS countries over currency plans
https://reubenabati.com.ng/news/trump-threatens-100-tariff-on-brics-countries-over-currency-plans
‘From Secular To Sacred’ - Filmmaker, Mike Bamiloye Reflects On Transformation To Gospel Drama
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/from-secular-to-sacred-filmmaker-mike-bamiloye-reflects-on-transformation-to-gospel-drama
Darey Art Alade and wife Desola mark 18th wedding anniversary
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/dare-art-alade-s-wife-deola-celebrate-18th-wedding-anniversary
Sokoto NLC Suspends Planned Strike Over ₦70,000 Minimum Wage
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/sokoto-nlc-suspends-planned-strike-over-70-000-minimum-wage
Nigeria needs collaborative leaders for national progress - Peter Obi
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/nigeria-needs-collaborative-leaders-for-national-progress-peter-obi
How Tinubu’s fiery critics became spokespersons, loyalists
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/how-tinubu-s-fiery-critics-became-spokespersons-loyalists
2027: Atiku, Obi deny joint presidential bid after reunion
https://reubenabati.com.ng/feature/2027-atiku-obi-deny-joint-presidential-bid-after-reunion
Tax Reform Bill: Atiku Calls For Transparency, Inclusivity In Debate
https://reubenabati.com.ng/news/tax-reform-bill-atiku-calls-for-transparency-inclusivity-in-debate
Today is exactly 30 years after the June 12, 1993 presidential election which were annulled by the Ibrahim Babangida military regime.
On June 18, six days after the election, my media colleague and brother, Kayode Komolafe, came to my house with a copy of the full election results being uploaded by the electoral commission.
Businessman and friend of Babangida, Chief Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, had won the election with 58 per cent. Then, on June 23, 1993, Babangida announced the annulment of the election, claiming there had been vote-buying. The annulment of an election generally perceived to be the freest and fairest in the country’s history, set off six years of bloody resistance against continued military misrule.
A narrative gives a lot of credit to politicians for that glorious resistance which led to civil rule on May 29, 1999. This does not reflect the complete history of that struggle. There were actually three eras of that war corresponding to the regimes of Babangida, Shonekan and Abacha, and the political class was virtually absent in the first two.
The civil movement whose expression vibrated in the voice of towering lawyer, Alao Aka-Bashorun, was convinced that the military was merely deceiving the populace with a bogus transition programme. After a layer of presidential hopefuls had been swept away by military fiat, Abiola and Bashir Tofa were allowed to contest the June 12 election.
While Abiola and his group thought they could persuade the military to de-annul the election, the civil movement which had started off in 1990 as the National Consultative Forum, NCF, transformed into a broad national coalition of anti-military forces which included student, youth, professional, market, community and civil society organisations. It was renamed the Campaign for Democracy, CD. Its transition leadership passed from Aka-Bashorun to the medical doctor, Beko Ransome-Kuti.
The CD began mobilising for mass protests across the country to force the military out. But it had two challenges. The first was how to contain the murderous military and minimise the inevitable casualties. The second was how to persuade the political class that did not want to confront the military, not to side the regime. To overcome the second challenge, CD leaders, including Beko, Olisa Agbakoba, Frederick Fasehun, Femi Falana and I held meetings with Abiola to get a commitment that even if he would not support the nationwide protests, he should at least not denounce us.
The protests were overwhelming across the country. In Lagos where we hoped to get some 50,000 protesters, the streets were clogged with millions of people. The Babangida regime panicked and ordered its Army Chief, General Sani Abacha, to take back the streets by force. Abacha led a long military convoy into Lagos which opened fire on all human beings in sight beginning with youths who were playing football in Apakun/Toyota, Oshodi. That July 6, 1993, the Nigeria Medical Association compiled a figure of 118 corpses brought to the general hospitals in Lagos. They had gunshot wounds with most shot in the back which indicated they were running away when shot.
Despite these huge losses and the arrest of many, including Beko and Gani Fawenmi, we continued the protests. Tragically on the day of the massacres, Abiola denounced us in a public statement. He said his mandate was given without bloodshed so he did not want to reclaim it with bloodshed. Two weeks later, we asked Nigerians to sit at home, and the nation’s streets were deserted.
The continued defiance by the populace, forced the Babangida regime to hand over to a military contraption called the Interim National Government, ING, headed by Ernest Shonekan.
Its primary purpose was to organise new elections supervised by the compromised military. But Abiola said the June 12 election was like a derailed train; so until it was cleared, no other train could use the tracks. He turned to the CD to stop the new election process. Beko, Fasehun and I met Abiola’s representative, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu in his office. It was decided that I coordinated the disruption of the ING’s voters registration and review exercise which was necessary for the planned election. We succeeded in doing so across the country and the tottering ING which was later declared illegal by the courts, just needed a push to collapse. But Abiola disagreed with our plans to employ the mass to force the ING out and install him. The alternative he went for was a military coup by alleged pro-June 12 Generals like Oladipo Diya, Chris Ali and Abacha. We disagreed with the coup and after he met new Head of State, Abacha with Diya and Tinubu as witnesses, we met and warned him to stop his support for the new regime, including his agreement to provide it credible politicians as ministers. But he told us that Abacha was a dwarf, and to greet a dwarf, one had to bend down to his level. It was after it became clear that Abacha and his gang were not going to de-annul the June 12 election and swear him in as President in accordance with their understanding, that the politicians joined the struggle to oust the military from power. It was in that process the National Democratic Coalition, NADECO, coalesced. NADECO itself had origins in the meetings of the CD and old experienced politicians led by Chief Alfred Rewane with Chief Anthony Enahoro as Deputy. Others included Chiefs Ayo Adebanjo, Ajise and Cornelius Adebayo. After Rewane was murdered in his Ikeja GRA residence where we used to meet, Enahoro led an expanded group and we began meeting mainly in Abiola’s house with Alhaja Kudirat Abiola as hostess. Despite Abacha’s murder of Kudirat, and many like Enahoro, Dan Suleiman, Wole Soyinka and Tinubu forced into exile, the forces that would see the backs of the military had been born.
Let me on this day, pay tribute to two virtually unacknowledged heroes of the democratic struggles. Prince Ademola Adeniji- Adele who was crucial in keeping Abiola safe when the military dictatorship declared him wanted, better dead than alive; and who contributed funds to keep the streets alive for June 12. His undoing was that he later joined the Abacha transition programme. Then there was Chief Rasheed Abiodun Gbadamosi, economist, writer and an assumed apolitical industrialist who when the goons closed in on Abiola, and people were afraid to give him shelter, took the June 12 presidential election winner to his Victoria Island home. One night, when it appeared his home might be compromised, Gbadamosi got Abiola to climb the fence and shelter in the adjacent premises which he also owned.
My salute to these heroes and heroines and hundreds like Bagauda Kaltho who lost their lives in the struggle for democracy in Nigeria.
A few months ago, the State Security Service (SSS) levelled grave allegations of terrorism financing, money laundering, and other economic crimes against Mr. Godwin Emefiele, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). At the material time, the attempt by the SSS to arrest, investigate, and prosecute Mr. Emefiele was frustrated by the erstwhile Buhari administration.
However, following the suspension of Mr. Emefiele as the Governor of the CBN by President Bola Tinubu, the SSS quizzed him in Lagos and flew him to Abuja yesterday. According to media reports, the investigation of the suspect by the SSS has commenced. Even though the SSS which initially denied the arrest has since turned round to admit that Mr. Emefiele is in its custody.
In the case of Dr. Bukola SarakI v. Federal Republic of Nigeria (2018) 16 NWLR (pt. 1646) 433-434, the Supreme Court ruled that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission lacks the vires to investigate and prosecute the appellant for the breach of the provisions of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act. It was for that principal reason that Senator Saraki was freed by the apex court.
In line with the principle of law enunciated by the apex court in Saraki's case the SSS lacks the power to investigate and prosecute Mr. Emefiele in respect of allegations of money laundering and other economic crimes. Therefore, after investigating the alleged involvement of Mr. Emefiele in terrorism financing the SSS should transfer him to the EFCC for the purpose of investigating the allegations of money laundering and allied offences. Otherwise, the investigation of the case will be bungled by the SSS!
Femi Falana SAN
In November 2017, it emerged that the suspended governor of Nigeria’s central bank, Godwin Emefiele, had significant interests in an off-shore company registered in Bermuda, which held an account with UBS in London. UBS is a multinational investment bank and financial services company with its headquarters in Basel and Zurich in Switzerland.
Disclosures released by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) in the Paradise Papers revealed that Emefiele owned 49% of Oviation Asset Management since 2009 and was a director in the company from January 2013.
According to The Guardian newspaper in London: “Oviation was part of a structure that imported two jets via the Isle of Man. The latest purchase, a $50 million Gulfstream G550, arrived in November 2015. It replaced a $33 million Gulfstream G450, imported in 2013”. 15 months before the import of the second Gulfstream, in June 2014, Mr. Emefiele became governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). In this capacity, he also chaired the board of the Nigerian Security Printing and Minting PLC, which is responsible for printing Nigeria’s currency.
Section 9 of the CBN Act of 2007 requires both the governor of the central bank and his deputies that they “shall devote the whole of their time to the service of the bank and, while holding office, shall not engage in any full or part-time employment or vocation, whether remunerated or not, except such charitable causes as may be determined by the board and which do not conflict with or conflict with their full-time duties”.
This prohibition places three constraints on the CBN governor: one substantive, another procedural, and a third ethical. Substantively, it bars him from moonlighting in any other job or vocation, whether or not remunerated. Procedurally, he needs the approval of the board of the CBN before taking on any role outside the bank. Implied in this is an obligation of full and honest disclosure on the part of the CBN governor. As an (additional) ethical standard, the act precludes the CBN governor from putting himself in a position that conflicts with his full-time duties.
As the head of a public corporation (which the CBN is), Emefiele, as CBN governor, is also subject to the Code of Conduct for senior public officers contained in the 5th Schedule of the Nigerian constitution, which imposes on him standards of conduct with reference to asset disclosure, acceptance of gifts and donations, and holding of overseas interests.
For Emefiele, these standards were ornaments of convenience. Three years into his office as the CBN governor, his interests in Oviation were still intact. Contacted by The Guardian for an explanation in November 2017, Emefiele claimed that he “gave instructions for his shares to be handed back” to his former employer, a Nigerian bank, in 2014. For a central banker, this claim showed either a tendency for the cavalier or a habit of casuistry.
On or about May 4, 2022, Emefiele was a guest of President Muhammadu Buhari in the presidency. The following day, some characters claiming to be armed Niger Delta militants endorsed Emefiele for the presidential ticket of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) promising to lay down their arms if the party were to hand the ticket to him.
Two days later, on May 6, 2022, it emerged that one Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN) and two other shadowy organisations had purchased for Emefiele forms to run for the presidency on the ticket of the APC. On the same day, Reuters reported that “news of Emefiele’s presidential bid sent the Naira close to a record low”.
Reacting to these developments, Ondo state governor, himself a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Rotimi Akeredolu, put the issue pointedly: “It is difficult to imagine that a person who occupies the exalted and sensitive office of the governor of the CBN will be this brazen in actualising his ambition”.
The following day, May 7, Emefiele claimed that he was waiting for “God’s divine intervention” which he hoped to receive “in the next few days”. His political organisation, called #Meffy2023, was launched three months earlier in February 2022 by The True Green Alliance (TGA), an organisation that, bizarrely, “promotes caring for the earth and sustainable living practices throughout the societies and governments of southern Africa”. Nigeria is in West Africa.
Emefiele was nothing if not consistent in his convenient attitude to rules. As CBN governor, he maintained a ruinous regime of multiple exchange rates, sustaining a deliberate scheme of arbitrage that oiled both insider abuse and cronyism.
From taking over the management of the National Theatre (despite pending litigation) to making himself a willing instrument for the persecution of #EndSARS protesters, Emefiele got the CBN involved in schemes and scams that almost assuredly violate Section 34 of the CBN Act. Premium Times in a February 21, 2021, editorial feared that his tenure at the CBN will be remembered for having wilfully “shredded” the guardrails in the CBN Act.
In a country where consequences follow malfeasance, Emefiele should have been unemployed and in prison. In Nigeria, he longed for the presidency.
The question of Emefiele’s presidential project was, even more, of a legal issue. Two of his predecessors proceeded him into elective politics. Clement Isong, the second governor of the CBN from 1967 to 1975 became the first elected governor of old Cross River state in October 1979. Chukwuma Soludo, who was CBN governor from 2004 to 2009, is currently serving as the governor of Anambra state, having been elected on November 6, 2021. Both Dr. Isong and Professor Soludo, however, ran for office after the expiration of their terms.
But section 9 of the CBN Act makes it quite clear that the CBN governor just cannot choose to run for elective office while still holding on to office. He could, of course, have chosen to resign in order to pursue his ambition. For this, though, section 11(3) of the CBN Act required him to give “at least three months’ notice in writing to the president of his intention to do so”.
Emefiele did neither. Instead, he used the time and money of the central bank to set up a partisan bid for the presidency. As with his holding in an offshore company despite being prohibited from doing so, Emefiele wished this prohibition away as yet another inconsequential encounter with an inconvenient guardrail.
In pursuit of his presidential project, Emefiele did not encounter any guardrails that he was not willing to destroy. When citizens objected to his pursuing the presidency from the office of the CBN governor, Emefiele procured a fly-by-night order from the High Court of Delta State in Kwale to see them off. In December 2022, the Federal High Court in Abuja issued two orders, one declining the application of security agencies to question Emefiele; the other restraining anyone from touching him.
As with the launch of his presidential ambition in February 2022 and the purchase of his presidential forms in May, Emefiele managed to find another faceless NGO to be his Mother Theresa. The plaintiff in the latter case was “Incorporated Trustees of Forum for Accountability and Good Leadership”, registered in May 2018. The case took only five working days; they filed on Monday, December 19, 2022, and had a 22-page judgment on December 29! When the same courts encountered a suit seeking accountability by Emefiele, they ruled that citizens did not have standing to question him.
Emefiele has always been relaxed about having his fate decided by Nigerian judges, a tribe with whom he has had many favorable encounters. While he was the boss of The Mint, he could issue enough notes to buy any number of court orders he fancied. Now that he is no longer there, he can still afford the most expensive lawyers in the land and can get courts who will give him orders to send him on medical tourism whenever he wants. But if at any point he were to suffer a bloody nose, I’ll not cry for him because that will be just dessert for a man who clearly believes everything can be bought and sold.
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.. This article updates an earlier version which appeared in May 2022 under the title “#Meffy2023: A Joke Taken Too Far”
In the last couple of years, nothing has elicited as much consensus among Nigerians as to remove our famous fuel subsidy. It was officially scheduled to go by June 30, 2023, that is, exactly one month after the inauguration of a new administration.
A few people might have imagined that because of the huge implications of fuel subsidy removal, its implementation might stretch a little later than the end of June 2023. It was also obvious that except a well-thought-out modality for handling the subject was first put in place, the confusion that would follow a half-baked procedure would be too much to contain.
Consequently, no one expected that the removal could be fast-forwarded through the instrumentality of a short sentence until it was suddenly done some 30 days ahead of schedule. The simultaneous clumsy communication of ‘subsidy is gone’ and that it is not with immediate effect while a circular on increase in prices was already in the public domain disorganized all and sundry.
In Nigeria, fuel subsidy removal could rear many contentious issues. First, of the many subsidies in different sectors of the country; is it the one on fuel that is the most problematic? Second, Nigeria is a poor country, will fuel subsidy removal halt the nation’s poverty?
Third, will the removal of fuel subsidy bring to an end, oil theft which has remained a major challenge to Nigeria’s economic growth? If these questions are appropriately interrogated, our fixation on fuel subsidy removal may pro- duce a moderated perspective that would enable us to observe that as negative as fuel subsidy has become, many people especially the poor are convinced that it is not necessarily the first and the most urgent to go. One obvious reason why it has been difficult to convince such people about the desirability of fuel subsidy removal is that statements on the subject by successive governments had been largely sincere.
Indeed, messages on fuel subsidy removal had been allowed to create a stereo-type of new singers who are permanently singing an old chorus. It has always been a cat and rat game between government and the organized labour in which government was always reneging on virtually all its promises on palliatives and in- vestments on infrastructure. In 2004 for example, it was agreed that every state would receive a grant of N100million from the federal government, to which each state was to add N200 million to flood all our cities with buses. It didn’t happen despite the aggressiveness of the labour leaders of those days who usual- ly shunned court orders stopping them from strikes. As a result, government assurances were never believed. In view of this trust deficit, it was difficult to convince the average Nige- rian that the removal of subsidy was not ‘a 419’ arrangement. The situation of lack of faith in government has not changed notwithstanding that there is hardly any option now that there is no budget to fund subsidy.
In addition, Nigerians seem to believe that the much-talked-about fuel subsidy does not really exist more so as the supposed recipients have always remained anonymous thereby reverberating the public perception that the subsidy narrative was a scam. There is in fact the story that apart from the version of officials of the foreign oil companies, Nigerians do not really know how much oil is produced and how much is lifted daily in their country. It is generally believed that after several years of oil business, oil monitoring equipment and allied facilities in the country were not and are still not controlled by Nigerians. So, why should people trust government?
Another reason why many people particularly the masses will still be hard to persuade that fuel subsidy, perhaps the only privilege of the masses should go is the failure of the proponents of the diagnosis to lead by example. Nothing in Nige- ria’s reported economic challenges shows that our leaders are denying themselves any of their own humungous privileges. The big man still maintains at public expense, a visibly unrealistic retinue of vehicles in his convoy. How is his previous budget able to cover the new reality of huge cost of fuelling official cars? We are hearing nothing about a cut in office entertainment, and other flamboyant expenditures like foreign trips. The Mur- tala/Obasanjo military government acted differently in the 70s by limiting their own official cars to Peugeot 504 to prepare everyone for pruning down official expenditures dictated by the challenges of their time.
Today’s top office holders in Nigeria especially federal legislators still earn millions of naira (they always deny) along with allowances attached to every item such as newspaper allowance that is higher than the salary of a Director in the public service. A typical former state governor earns at retirement, remuneration higher than he got while in office. Yet, many states al- ways claimed they didn’t have enough resources to pay the scanty minimum wage of the poor.
Of course, the narrative is not only irrational, it is wicked to argue that a rise in the prices of petroleum products which would necessarily raise the cost of transportation should be tolerated in the interest of the nation. Certainly, for charity to begin at home, it makes more sense to first remove the numerous privileges of our leaders. If government is pretending to be unaware of such subsidies of the rich that should be removed without hesitation, they should listen to the irrepressible Femi Falana who the other day listed 21 of such elite subsidies.
The point being made is that at this juncture of Nigeria’s development, the mismanagement of our re- sources has brought us to a level where subsidies that can crumble the nation must go. One of such subsidies is the one on fuel; so, it is time for it to go. But the subsidies of the rich must not be retained because it is only that group that benefits from them unlike the one on fuel which benefits all.
Bearing in mind that many poor citizens may not survive an end to subsidy, visible and tangible efforts ought to be made to assist the poor to withstand the resultant harsh realities. The old narrative of merely politicizing the subject must end. In this regard, different segments in society have roles to play which some are already commendably performing.
A few examples would suffice here. First, in the face of the uproar over the removal of fuel subsidy, a group of bus drivers at a meeting in Lagos quickly resolved to ensure that passengers would not witness astronomical increases in bus fares in their areas of operations. Second, the University of Jos, immediately approved the deployment of shuttle buses to transport staff and students to and from the University campuses. Third, two state governments, Kwara and Edo decided to reduce workdays for the workforce in their states to lessen the impact of the subsidy re- moval on their earnings. While ensuring that reduced hours of work do not adversely affect productivity, the federal government should emulate these gestures and improve the welfare of workers by deploying the gains of the fuel subsidy removal policy to investment in infrastructure and mass transportation to show that the aim of removing the subsidy was not to hurt workers and citizens. Government must bend backward to convince the people that the policy would better position her to ensure greater development of society.
To this end, public communication organs such as the National Orientation Agency should be equipped to sensitize the public on the gains of fuel subsidy removal. For instance, one of the hidden truths of the removal is that it is the best way of cutting off the invisible cartels that corrupt the system to siphon public funds into private pockets.
History has shown that it is such massive public enlightenment programmes that persuasively convert citizens into advocates of zero fuel subsidy for huge development of society. The only monster that remains to be tackled headlong is oil theft. The reality is that the mere fact that our oil would no long- er be cheap as before would not on its own stop oil theft. If that issue is not ad- dressed, greedy citizens with the collusion of law enforcement agencies could still quite often have a free day.
On several occasions, I had cautioned then Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria GODWIN EMEFIELE at the peak of his glory when he started seeing himself as a politician and even attempted a misadventure by clandestinely making a Presidential bid. I knew he was heading to Golgotha. Now, as I envisaged, the cookies have crumbled.
Unlike those gloating over his tragic fall from grace, I will urge that he must not be treated like a victim of political vendetta. His rights must be fully respected and guaranteed under the Laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. On this special day of the 30th anniversary of June 12, no attempt should be made to install a civilian dictatorship in our beloved country. EMEFIELE has served his country in good and bad times. Like all mortals, he must have displayed his foibles and egocentricities at some point but that cannot be enough reason to treat him summarily like a certified criminal when he's not been tried...
He should not be humiliated ahead of any intended probe or trial...
Media
With just three days to the inauguration of the 10th National Assembly, Vice President Kashim Shettima has stated that President Bola Tinubu and the NWC of APC are in support of the emergence of Senator Godswill Akpabio as the next Senate President in order to engender diversity, unity and stability of the polity. Speaking at a dinner organized by the Stability Group, the campaign platform of Senator Akpabio, Saturday evening at Transcorp Hilton in Abuja, the VP stated that by zoning the Senate Presidency to the South-South zone, the party wanted to ensure that the top echelon of the government of the federation was diverse and inclusive, without compromising competence and capacity. ‘’Senator Akpabio is very competent and he has the capacity to lead the 10th National Assembly. At the same time, he is from a very important zone and he is also a man of Christian faith. So, in line with the Constitution of our country, and in conformity with the plurality of our union, the party and in deed, the President, thought it fit to support him’’, the VP said, emphasizing that these were the same sentiments he expressed earlier in the day at the valedictory session of the 9th Senate.
The dinner was organized in appreciation of all the senators who have shown support for Senator Akpabio and Senator Jibrin Barau. The two have been endorsed by President Tinubu as the next Senate President and Deputy Senate President. The Vice President, who was the special guest of honour at the dinner, said that since the President and the Vice President are Muslims, APC is careful not to present itself as a one-religion party, and that is why the party is supporting Akpabio. At a personal level, Senator Shettima noted that he had taken steps to promote diversity. ‘’My CSO is an Igbo man who had worked with me when I was governor. He has been a dedicated and loyal officer, even in the heat of the Boko Haram attacks in Borno’’, the VP said, adding that his ADC is a Northern Christian. Senator Shettima also announced, to the pleasant surprise of the guests at the dinner, that he had been campaigning privately for Akpabio and Barau and that he was leaving the dinner early to visit with some senators who are yet to register their support.
Other dignitaries at the dinner were Senator-elect Adams Oshiomhole; Senator-elect Dave Umahi; Senator Jibrin Barau and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume. In his brief remarks, Oshiomhole, who is the Vice Chairman of the Stability Group, said the essence of politics is to promote collective interest, and that the Akpabio-Barau candidacy signifies the need for diversity of the government and stability of the federation. Engr Dave Umahi, the Chairman of the Group, said the three Senators from Ebonyi and most of the senators from the South East are in support of Akpabio and Barau. He reiterated the point that Akpabio has the capacity, competence and energy to lead the National Assembly. He noted that the dinner was organized to appreciate the over 67 senators who have written down and signed their names as supporters of Akpabio and Barau. Umahi thanked the party and the government for supporting the Akpabio-Barau ticket and promised that the duo will work to stabilize the country. ‘’Nigeria is a multi-ethnic and multi-religious country, and so the character of our government must reflect this diversity’’, said Umahi.
The Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, in his own remarks said that even before he was appointed SGF, he had already identified with the ambition of Akpabio to be Senate President. He noted that his experience in the executive and legislative branches of government (he was governor for 8 years and senator for 12 years) has made him to appreciate the need to build a virile country where every part belongs.
Senator Akpabio himself was full of thanks to the party, the President, Vice President and all his colleagues for their support. He said that he is sure of the support of 80 senators when the vote is taken on Tuesday.
Human life is sacred. That is why society sets boundaries. That’s also why, no matter how great a hunter is, he cannot compare himself to the government, the ultimate hunter, which exercises the power of life and death on behalf of the people.
For centuries, humanity has wrestled with the question: at what stage can the life of a fellow human being be terminated? The question has always been resolved in favour of a system of checks and balances where every angle of the matter in question is rigorously considered. That was the understanding of earthlings like us until ‘outer space’ societies like the USA invented the right to execute a fellow citizen privately under the guise of self-defence.
In Florida, it is called the Stand Your Ground law.
How many dirges shall we chant for our 35-year-old daughter, Ajike AJ Shantrell Owens, the African American mother of four shot through a closed front door by her white neighbour while she was trying to recover an iPad taken from her child in front of their home in a housing complex, in Ocala, Florida, USA? AJ was killed in the presence of her 9-year-old son by her 58-year-old female neighbour who had complained several times about Owens’ children playing outdoors and had allegedly been hurling racial abuses at them. Neighbours say that the white woman had a history of harassing children.
Will this end up as just another statistic?
One distraught commentator says Christians of the evangelical hue are now being called upon to speak up whether the God they serve excludes black people from his reassurance in the Psalms which they quote with relish:
“For it was you who formed my inward parts; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; that I know very well. My frame was not hidden from you, when I was being made in secret, intricately woven in the depths of the earth. Your eyes beheld my unformed substance. In your book were written all the days that were formed for me, when none of them as yet existed. “(Ps. 39:13-16)
It took the whole of four days and massive outcry from the public for the authorities to arrest the killer, 58-year-old Susan Louise Lorincz. Protesters chanted, “No justice, no peace”. They carried signs saying: “Say her name Ajike Owens” and “It’s about us.”
As usual in America, the NRA gun lobby see nothing wrong in what Susan Lorincz has done. Although many of them describe themselves as Christians, they serve a white god who discriminates among his creatures. Their racist attitude is a carryover from the slavery days. Conservative whites felt they needed to be protected against their former slaves and therefore campaigned for the enactment of laws that permitted shooting under the guise of self defence. They owned the gun industry anyway; the more guns sold the better the business.
The Stand Your Ground Law has no greater defender than the NRA and conservative politicians.
The Florida Stand Your Ground Law is based on the “castle doctrine.” The idea is that an individual who is legally occupying a place—their home or car, for instance—has the right to use force if faced by an intruder or a threat in order to protect themselves. It’s an old idea that has been around for over 2000 years. When the early settlers crossed the Atlantic, they brought the idea with them.
In Florida, the Stand Your Ground law was enacted in 2005. State legislators felt that Florida’s self-defense laws weren’t doing enough to shield citizens who shoot others in self defence from prosecution. The law aims to protect individuals who discharge a firearm or otherwise harm another individual in their attempt to protect themselves when they believe they are under threat. Under the law, there is no duty to retreat.
Before the law was enacted, when a person was under threat and even afraid for their life, they had to take reasonable measures to remove themselves from the situation. This is called a “duty to retreat.” If the threat didn’t abate after that, then they could use force if necessary to protect themselves. It is claimed by protagonists that, by removing the duty to retreat, the Florida Stand Your Ground law would make it easier for Florida residents to protect themselves and their families. More than 30 states have now joined Florida in enacting their own version of Stand Your Ground law.
Some knowledgeable people had spoken out against the law even when it was in its formative stage. “It turns 250 years of jurisprudence on its head,” said Andrew Warren, a Florida State attorney. “The preliminary hearing already gave this additional protection to defendants claiming ‘stand your ground.’ Now we’re going several steps past that. It’s going to be much harder. There will be cases where the state cannot make the initial burden.”
The law has been linked to increases in homicide and violent behaviour. Notably, it has negatively impacted the ability to successfully prosecute cases in Florida. In 2012, a Tampa Bay Times investigation revealed that almost 70 percent of defendants who invoked the statute went free. A law professor at the University of Miami, Mary Anne Franks, described the law as “essentially stacking the deck repeatedly in favour of people shooting other people”.
The cold blooded murder of AJ brought to national recollection the 2012 murder of Trayvon Martin in Miami at the hands of a zealous neighbourhood watchman. The killing ignited a national outcry on issues of race and justice, inspiring social activism that paved the way for the Black Lives Matter movement.
Trayvon Benjamin Martin was a 17-year-old African-American from Miami Gardens, Florida. He was fatally shot in Sanford, Florida, by George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old Hispanic American. Martin had accompanied his father to visit his father’s fiancée at her townhouse in Sanford. On the evening of February 26, Martin was walking back to the fiancée’s house from a nearby convenience store when Zimmerman, a member of the community watch, reported him to the Sanford Police as suspicious. An altercation ensued and Zimmerman fatally shot Martin in the chest.
Zimmerman was injured during the altercation. He said he shot Martin in self-defense. The police said there was no evidence to refute his claim of self-defense, and Florida’s stand-your-ground law prohibited them from arresting or charging him. After national media focused on the incident, Zimmerman was eventually charged and tried, but a jury acquitted him of second-degree murder and manslaughter in July 2013.
Rallies, marches, and protests were held across the United States to protest Martin’s murder. An online petition calling for a full investigation and prosecution of Zimmerman garnered 2.2 million signatures. The media coverage surrounding Martin’s death became the first story of 2012 to be featured more than the presidential race, which was underway at the time. A national debate about racial profiling and stand-your-ground laws ensued. The governor of Florida appointed a task force to examine the state’s self-defense laws. The name Trayvon was tweeted more than two million times in the 30 days following the shooting. He was buried in Dade-Memorial Park (North), in Miami. A memorial was dedicated to him at the Goldsboro Westside Historical Museum, a Black history museum in Sanford, in July 2013.
Trayvon’s death cast national scrutiny on Florida’s controversial “stand your ground” self-defense law which has since become more robust and expanded by Republican lawmakers with support from gun rights advocates who argue that it makes the streets safer and over the objections of critics who say it only encourages “shoot first” vigilantism.
Many of us Africans viewing the American tragedy from thousands of miles away tend to agree with Democratic lawmakers and gun control activists who have spoken out against the Stand Your Ground Law (understandably because our children are the usual victims). The lives of African Americans shouldn’t be reduced to two-a-cent.
“Shoot-first laws”, argues Shannon Watts, the founder of a gun-control advocacy group, “aren’t about standing your ground when threatened.” In her view, “They are about making murder legal, empowering people with racist or vigilante views to shoot first and ask questions later.” In terms of homicide rate per state, Florida with 2,087 deaths (9.7, per 100k) ranks number 19 in the US.
I pray for you, America. May the Nigerian-American, Ajike AJ Shantrell Owens, find peace in paradise where the colour of her skin will not make her legit game in the cross hairs of a racist’s target shooting.
There will be an election for our bi-cameral National Assembly leadership on Tuesday, June 13, 2023. The two critical positions that seek to alter the balance of power in Nigeria are number three and four positions according to the National Order of Precedence – the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives. The President of the Senate is number three citizen because he will lawfully be the Chairman of the Joint Session of the National Assembly while the Speaker, number four citizen, will be the Deputy Chairman of the Joint Session of the National Assembly. So, who ever heads the Senate as its president is the presiding officer of the Legislature in Nigeria. And instead of building inter-party consensus on how to get the best chairman and deputy chairman of the joint session of the 10th Assembly, at the moment, Nigerian political leaders and the members-elect have to deal with an ancient grudge inherent in our ticklish national question. Where the president of the Senate and Speaker of the house come from have become the issue.
As I was saying here the other day, the president’s controversial Muslim-Muslim Ticket has hauled into the fray the same national question the federal character provision in the 1999 constitution is supposed to deal with. In other words, if the core North’s (north-west) candidate sails through for the senate president and speakership, the first five citizens of Nigeria would be Muslims since the first two (president and VP) and the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) are Muslims, in this regard. And that will be deplored by a section of the faithful in the country just as it will be celebrated by another section that will regard the development as a conquest as a former governor from the same North West has been heard to have noted in a trending video evidence.
Ordinarily, that shouldn’t have been a subject of commentary for this kind of column in a significant country. We should be celebrating the dividends of an unbroken 24 years of democracy and democratisation and the change it has brought to Africa’s most populous nation and hope of the black race. Here we are, debating why particular sections of the country should produce even nincompoops as presiding officers of the National Assembly that will shape the destiny of Africa’s most significant country.
Anyway, today is another opportunity to join the groundswell of opinions to remind all members-elect and all the stakeholders who are involved in politicking and jostling for the National Assembly positions that federal characterisation of positions isn’t an excuse for recourse to election and selection of mediocrities and scoundrels for our National Assembly. Yes, it is our, not their National Assembly. Enough is enough, the world has been waiting for Nigeria to make democracy deliver development for its people. Indeed, the black people of the world have been waiting for Nigeria to allow democracy to blossom for the country to be a source of pride and confidence. The people of Nigeria have been waiting for Nigerian politicians and political leaders to nurture democracy and its processes to deliver some common good. And so because the Legislature is doubtless, the most important institution that can set the tone for processes that will trigger development through reform agenda to fight corruption, check executive and even judicial excesses and rascality, manage waste in the economy, according to our constitution, that body should not be led by mere men, who are just prominent but not significant in the country. Yes, Rick Warren, an iconic author and cleric, I have often quoted here says some people can be prominent but not significant just as some people can be significant without being prominent in the polity.
On October 17, 2021, I wrote here in an article titled, ‘2023: Let Good Aspirants Prepare For National Assembly.’ I had then noted the expediency of getting most of the presidential aspirants to leave the presidential race for National Assembly where they could also serve the country significantly. Here is an excerpt from the article:
‘…This power-to-the-people law (electoral law) has enabled me to call on all the good people who would like to contest presidential election to look before they leap this time. This is the executive summary of my submission here: let most of the presidential aspirants including governors, ministers, professionals and technocrats who think they are capable of serving Nigeria consider their strategy and platforms for the service of their country that is at the moment in a state of anomie. I would like all the powerful faces being listed by even the media not to be carried away by the prominence they freely get or procure from the media. They should consider first the feasibility and risks of their campaigns. Can those who have the resources or war chest to campaign mobilise enough votes to be president? They should note that oratory nurtured by intellectual power alone cannot give you presidential tickets on the platforms that can win presidential elections here. Let’s not speak in tongues to good people here:
Why can’t Professors Pat Utomi, Kingsley Moghalu, HRH Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, Malam Nasir el-Rufai, Mr. Peter Obi, Mr. Femi Falana, Fela Durotoye, Babagana Kingibe, Mr. Omoyele Sowore, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, Professor Attahiru Jega, Abdullahi Ganduje, Dr. Kayode Fayemi, Pastor Tunde Bakare, Pastor Ituah Ighodalo, Dr. Doyin Okupe, Col. Abubakar Dangiwa Umar (rtd); Ibrahim Dankwabo, Chief Nyesom Wike, Abubakar Malami, Babatunde Fashola, and a host of other aspirants get set to be in National Assembly?
I think we should not lose these prominent people to the vagaries of presidential election aspiration alone. After all, only one of them will be elected president. Why can’t we take advantage of the new electoral law to serve Nigeria at the powerhouse of democracy? I mean here that the National Assembly is the most critical arm of government. It is the most significant training ground for leadership – just like president Joe Biden. Look at the significant impact of just one Senator from Abia State, Enyinnaya Abaribe whose legislative artistry exposed the shenanigan and peccadillo of the Senators who either voted against electronic transmission of results provisions or were deliberately absent when the vote was taken. The former deputy governor of Abia State has been one-man squad from the time he was elected to the Senate. If we have at least 40 strong voices such as Abaribe’s at the 109-member Senate, there would have been more robust legislative service and representation at the Senate. In the same vein, if we have even 50 hardworking, resourceful and research-oriented members of the 360-member House of Representatives, there would have been better service delivery even at the executive arm. The National Assembly has enormous powers to check executive excesses, fight corruption, curtail senseless borrowing for consumption if their membership foundation is strong and if they can elect their leaders freely at the inauguration of their session. Look at what the leadership of the current session of our bicameral legislature is delivering. Where in the world would presiding officers of the National Assembly proclaim to the people who elected them that they would accept without question whatever the president brings to them because they would be good for the nation?
My suggestion that most of our significant politicians and leaders who would like to serve the nation should begin from the National Assembly should not be seen an attempt to cast aspersion on their stature and knowledge power. The parliament is a citadel of representative democracy where policies through laws are made to serve common good. It is a place where appropriations or budgetary details are constructed in the language and data of development plans. If any democracy is on the brink as a result of executive excesses or mediocrity, the representatives of the people can rise up to the occasion to call the tyrannical executives to order. The U.S Congress saved their country from threat of tyranny in a bi-partisan mode early this year.
That is why most learned constitutional scholars agree that legislative power is, “the distinctive mark of a country’s sovereignty and the index of its status as an independent state…” And so if significant citizens begin to announce their readiness to get elected to the National Assembly, that will have a positive bandwagon effect as even skilled younger people with some political skills and ambition will begin to follow such footsteps and aspire to serve at State Assemblies and even Local Governments. Why should we continue to allow charlatans and never-do-wells to be in the National and State Assemblies where the majesty of democracy is supposed to be celebrated? Let’s, therefore, call on all who would like to serve the country in any capacity to begin to renew their minds: that you don’t have to be president or governor to serve your country. You can also serve significantly from your State or National Assembly…’ As I have also noted here before in another treatise on ‘Deconstructing our chaotic National Assembly,’ our 469 National Assembly members hardly care a hoot about their image before the people.
They would like to be addressed as Honourable Members and Distinguished Senators. They hardly reflect on the weight of their responsibility to the more than 200 million people they represent. From the way they carry on and speak, they don’t research on the needs of their constituents who perceive and call them ‘legislooters’ and lap dogs to the executive arm of government. They don’t know the implications of their tag as the First Estate of the Realm. They don’t believe that members of the public they serve have the right to know how much they earn. They have worked out a strange remuneration package that the economy of the country can’t cope with. They are the most comfortable yet they receive ‘hardship allowances.’ What is worse, in their cocoon, the representatives of the people in Abuja hardly know that the people they represent know that they are not serious about the state of the nation at any time.
This is a reflection of poor leadership recruitment processes at the National Assembly at all times. This is a time to tell our representatives and leaders in Abuja and 36 state capitals that we the people are quite desperate to see development in our country. In our country, where we still grapple with basic needs, we continue to celebrate mediocrity and frivolities of our leaders.
Sixty-two years after independence, our elected leaders are still building classrooms, providing school chairs, boreholes, school uniforms and commission them with fanfare.
History shows us that tumultuous times bring change, but we have heard for too long that our change variant is a gradual process. Even as we wait for the dividends, we can interrogate some of the institutions that are designed by law to help the change process. Certainly, one institution that actually symbolises functional democracy is the legislature. That is why the election of National Assembly leaders in Abuja on Tuesday, June 13, 2023 should not be sold to bigots and sycophants who will condone executive inertia, laziness, and recklessness again. Doubtless, the leadership of the National and State Assemblies should be strong enough to protect the power, independence and relevance of that remarkable institution of democracy.
O Godwin, with your cheap green tie, fading suit and wry smile you poked your greedy, grubby little fingers into Nigeria’s eye
O Godwin, where are your backers, protectors and soldiers today? You enjoyed the ride and thought it would last forever. Yet now its all over.
The hunter has become the hunted and the tormentor has become the tormented.
The troubler of Nigeria is now the troubled and the source of our collective pain and tears will himself feel pain and shed tears.
How great and mighty is our God and how faithful He is to His promise and to His word.
O Godwin, with your cheap green tie, fading suit and wry smile you poked your greedy, grubby little fingers into Nigeria’s eye.
Like a drunken sailor and feckless dullard you boasted of your strength and wielded power with impunity as if there were no tomorrow.
Now reality has hit you in the face and you stand shamed, bowed, bloodied and naked before the world. You caused the death of many. You made men and women take their own lives.
You caused mothers and fathers to regret having their children. You caused Nigerians to strip themselves naked in public places and rant, rave and lament about their suffering and hardship.
You caused women to weep for their men and men to weep for their women. You caused millions to lose their self-esteem, self-respect and dignity and to sell their souls to Satan to make ends meet.
You brought a great and mighty nation to its knees and turned 220 million proud, hardworking and noble people into powerless, pitiful and grovelling paupers and beggars.
You caused law-abiding, loving and dutiful youths to turn into violent arsonists, terrorists and subversives out of despair, anger and frustration.
You caused men and women to burn down banks and public buildings and you caused Nigerians to lose their life’s savings, beg for bread and walk the streets penniless with no more than 200 naira in their pockets and to their names.
O Godwin, son of Emefiele, like Lucifer Son of the Dawn, you have finally fallen.
Like your father Beelzebub, you have been thrown out of heaven and now comes your judgement.
Misery, suffering, torment, tragedy, prison, the sulphur pits of Gehena and the raging fires of hell await you for the great evil that you wrought against our nation and our people.
You turned a resilient, hardworking and enterprising people into one of hopelessness, despair and desperation.
You turned a nation of achievers and giants into a country of fickle, feckless and hungry dwarfs.
You turned a courageous, resilient and loving people who have excelled in every field of human endeavour and in every part of the civilised world to a nation of never do wells and failures with no self-respect and no dignity.
You caused men and women to curse God and pray for their own death out of disgrace and despair. You caused millions to question their faith and the very existence of God as a consequence of their misery and suffering.
You made us the laughing stock of the world. You castrated Nigeria, wounded our souls, maimed and subverted our democracy, undermined our security, humiliated and disgraced our leaders, taunted and mocked our incoming President and sent many innocent souls to an early grave.
You shattered many dreams, broke many hearts and caused many to perish and die before their time. Protected by corrupt and evil men and goaded on by a power-obsessed cabal of sick, sadistic and evil monsters and tyrants, you thought you owned Nigeria and even had the nerve to attempt to run for the Presidency.
You thought our nation was for sale and you believed that satan ruled in the affairs of men.
Yet millions prayed for your downfall and removal. Millions more are praying for your detention, investigation, incarceration and bitter end.
Never has a man been more hated in our entire history as the hateful, merciless, callous, wicked, treasonous and treacherous tyrant and traitor that goes by your name.
You believed that money was greater than God and you thought that your repugnant and villanous reign would never end.
O Godwin, I have never wished a man ill in my entire life but in your case I make an exception.
May your pathway be filled with sharp thorns, the horrors of the night and pain and may the Angel of the Lord pursue you along a dark and slippery path.
May your story and end be a graphic example and instructive reminder to the evil and wicked that man is nothing before God, that earthly power is ephemeral and transient, that all power belongs to the Living God and that the Lord alone rules in the affairs of men and forges the destiny of nations.
* Fani-Kayode is a former Minister of Aviation and public affairs analyst.
On Tuesday, June 6, 2023, the Senate concurred with the House of Reps in taking the extremely backsliding step of passing the Bill for the Establishment of Police Pension Board. Senate President Ahmad Lawan would later boast that President Muhammadu Buhari signed more than 100 bills in four years. He waved that in our face as if it was a contender for Guinness World Record. That usually happens when you take quantity for quality and do not understand the harmful impact of some of your actions on national economic health. By exempting the police from the contributory pension scheme (CPS), the lawmakers have continued in the path of taking us to the next level of fiscal crisis.
It did not start with the Police Pension Board. A few hours to Buhari’s departure from the Presidential Villa, he had signed one of Lawan’s “100 bills” — the National Assembly Service Pensions Board (Establishment) Bill — into law. The law also exempts the employees of the National Assembly from the contributory pension scheme. Essentially, the National Assembly has kick-started the death of the revolutionary pension reform launched by President Olusegun Obasanjo in 2004. If we stand by and fold our arms, the outcome will be more devastating than the pension crisis that Nigerian retirees lived with for decades before the reform by Obasanjo. We are heading for the abyss.
That Nigeria has a serious leadership problem is known all over the world, but it seems we are moving from one low to another in many aspects. At least, if you cannot improve upon an idea, don’t destroy it. If you cannot make pension reform better, don’t make it worse. When Nigeria ran the defined benefit scheme (DBS) — which placed the entire pension responsibility on the government — it worked until we ran into a prolonged revenue crisis that meant budgets could no longer be funded. Retirees saw hell before their death. The introduction of the contributory system spread the burden of pension across board and ended the era of waiting for insufficient budgetary releases.
The amazing thing about Nigeria, for me, is how we try to fix what is not broken. When public pensions were the sole responsibility of the government, we were left in arrears of about N2.5 trillion as at 2004, by some estimates. Retired public servants were frustrated. Some regretted ever serving their country. You would not blame them. The truth, however, was that Nigeria had a revenue problem and it always so happened that pension payment was never a main concern. With a revenue crisis, some items would always fall off the priority list. Unfortunately, pension was often one of such items for us. The liabilities predictably accumulated and the retirees were dehumanised.
With the 2004 pension reform, however, the story has changed. Both the employee and the employer are required, under the CPS, to save towards pension. The savings are invested and they yield decent returns. In essence, pension is now reliant on actual savings and payment of retirement benefits is no longer at the mercy of budgets. Only the retirees coming from under the old defined benefit system are still tied to budgetary provisions, but there is a sunset clause which will kick in with the payment of the last employee on that scheme. A transition phase, managed by the Pension Transitional Arrangement Directorate (PTAD), was put in place to cater for this category of retirees.
What has happened over the last two decades, therefore, is that the pension industry has moved from negative to positive. Pension assets are now well over N15 trillion. The industry has become a major subsector of the economy, funding public infrastructural projects via government securities, and this is to say nothing about the number of fund administrators, custodians and employees that now operate there, or the impact of the regular payments of different benefits to millions of contributors. We are enjoying stability and predictability under the contributory scheme, although retirees under the old defined scheme cannot say the same thing because of the revenue crisis.
It is fair to say that the harm to the pension reform did not start under Buhari. The first major misstep was excluding the armed forces and the intelligence agencies when the Pension Reform Act, 2004, was re-enacted in 2014. The excuse for the exclusion was that because of the nature of their job, their identities needed to be protected. This makes perfect sense. You cannot have the sensitive information of the operatives of the National Intelligence Agency (NIA) and the Department of State Services (DSS) stored with a private Pension Fund Administrator (PFA). The best way out was to allow them to have their own PFAs and remain under CPC but they were returned to the defined scheme.
This suggested that the issue was not just about protecting the identities of the operatives but principally to revive the troubled but “juicier” old scheme. The CPS is seen as yielding low returns (which could be true but I will come to this shortly). The defined scheme does not require contributions from the employees, most of whom will retire with full benefits. That, in my opinion, has led to the frenzied campaign to exit the contributory scheme. With the exclusion of the military and intelligence agencies granted in principle by Jonathan even before the PRA 2004 was re-enacted in 2014, the police force too began to agitate for exit, claiming to also have “special circumstances”.
As a form of compromise, Jonathan approved that the police should have their own PFA but still operating the contributory scheme — which was what he should have done for the military and intelligence agencies in the first place. The police agitation did not stop. The next move was that they came out clearly saying they must exit the contributory scheme and return to the defined system. All kinds of bills were sponsored thereafter, but they all failed because the case was weak. In July 2012, Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, who was then the secretary to the government of the federation (SGF), had to write to Mr MD Abubakar, then inspector general of police (IGP), to perish the thought.
Mr Boss Mustapha, who has just left as the SGF, also wrote to the current IGP, Mr Usman Baba, in July 2022 when the latest round of lobbying started, maintaining that police would continue under the CPS. He reminded Adamu that the White Paper on the report of the Presidential Committee on Restructuring and Rationalization of Federal Government Parastatals, Commissions and Agencies (the Oronsaye Committee) had barred Federal Government retirees from opting out of the CPS. Nonetheless, the lobbying intensified at the National Assembly, culminating in the passage of the Police Pension Board Bill on June 6. The House of Reps had quietly passed it before the Senate.
Under Buhari, the retired heads of the service and permanent secretaries had also, through presidential fiat, opted out of the CPS. Mr Abubakar Malami, as attorney-general, countered a previous legal advice from his office which had said an exemption was illegal. Anybody familiar with government workings knows how easy it is to get the legal advice that would favour you. It is one of the several malaises injuring Nigeria and pushing us into endless judicial liabilities all over the world. But I digress. Common sense dictates that we should not disrupt a system that is yielding so many positive results, but if we really had common sense, Nigeria would not be like this in the first place.
The argument of the police, and other agencies who are trying to exit or have exited the contributory scheme, is that pension accumulation is low under the CPS. They say what they get as lump sum payment when they retire is not juicy enough and the subsequent annuity or programmed withdrawals are pittance. Also, they would rather not contribute one kobo towards their own pension. Rather, the employer should take full responsibility. Ironically, I have no argument against this. I myself would like to get a good pension when I retire. That is rational choice. Why should any normal human being prefer N100,000 to N150,000 except “village people” are on her case?
However, the law already takes care of all these concerns and complaints. Employers are allowed to contribute 100 percent on behalf of their employees. Also, employers are not restricted on how much they can pay as “lump sum” for gratuity when their employees retire. It is an open cheque. The National Pension Commission (PenCom), which regulates the pension industry, has said this a million times. Retirees can get lump sums and active workers can get some benefits too. So, what problem is the National Assembly trying to solve? Approving all these exits and piling up more liabilities on a government with already strained finances and a fiscal blackhole is not smart, anyway we look at it.
If we were a country where common sense had any impact on policy making, someone in the National Assembly would have asked: how much will this new bill add to public expenditure? Where will the money come from? Nigeria currently has a debt of N77 trillion. We are using almost all our revenue to service debts and this is likely to get worse down the line. The last thing is to add to the debts without thinking of the revenue. Yet, we are creating new agencies every day and making new laws that will worsen things. Where the money will come from is nobody’s business. We are never tired of creating problems for the present and future generations. That is how we are wired.
My conclusion is that if the police and National Assembly staff, or other public servants, want improved pensions, there is no need to pull out of the CPS. The law allows their employers to scale up their own contributions and to also provide sizeable gratuity as lump sum payments. This will still be cheaper on the public treasury. But when public agencies know that exiting the CPS is easy if they can play the right game with the lawmakers, it is just a matter of time for them to sponsor bills to be exempted too. I, therefore, appeal to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to work out a compromise in the interest of all stakeholders. This is one of the biggest and most consequential reforms in the last 24 years. We must protect it. Undermining pension reform will hurt everyone: if not now, then later.
AND FOUR OTHER THINGS…
JUNE 12 MEMORIES
Where were you on June 12, 1993? I was in Ogbomoso for my NYSC. Actually, I was spending the weekend with my cousins in nearby Ilorin. I could not vote in the presidential poll, which 30th anniversary is tomorrow, since I was registered in Lagos. I initially supported Alhaji Bashir Tofa, candidate of the National Republican Convention (NRC), because the Social Democratic Party (SDP) fielded a Muslim-Muslim ticket. After watching his TV debate with Bashorun MKO Abiola, the SDP candidate, I felt like an idiot. The gap was clear, sentiments apart. I switched my support to Abiola instantly. My friend, Mallam Lanre Issa-Onilu, made fun of me. Abiola won. Election was annulled. And Nigeria went into a crippling six-year crisis full of sorrow, tears and blood. Reminiscences.
REMOVAL PALAVER
The removal of petrol subsidy by President Bola Tinubu appears to be fait accompli, at least judging by the way the unions have reacted so far. They have shelved proposed strikes and seem to be in a mood for jaw jaw. I’m aware there are those opposing the policy purely for political reasons, but it seems the arguments for and against the removal of the subsidy have become so familiar that they have become jaded. We’ve been saying the same things for 40 years, so there is hardly anything new to say. The major difference today is that we just cannot afford the bill. We have a debt of N77 trillion. If we were awash with money, we could debate whether or not to subsidise petrol. Simple.
NORTHERN SWEEPSTAKES
Left to some northern politicians, the next senate president and speaker will be Muslims and northerners. That means the top five in the nation’s hierarchy will be an all-Muslim affair. I do not know how some politicians think, but the last thing on their minds appears to be national cohesion and promotion of diversity in our multi-cultural society. They care about personal or group benefits above the overall peace and unity that we badly need in Nigeria. As far as they are concerned, Nigeria can go to blazes — as long they can achieve their personal goals and ambitions. Sadly, if trouble starts, we will all suffer the consequences as we have seen in the last eight years. Selfish.
EMEFIELE’S EXIT
I had just finished writing my article for the week when news broke that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu had suspended Mr Godwin Emefiele as the CBN governor. Let’s be honest: it was always going to happen. It was just a matter of when. Minus the political differences between Tinubu and Emefiele, every new president would always want a new CBN governor because of the need to align ideas. There is still a debate on if a president should be able to suspend a CBN governor since the bank is supposed to be politically insulated. I won’t be surprised if there are fresh legal challenges after Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi abandoned the case over his suspension in 2014. Watching.
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Summarizing my expectation from President Tinubu’s administration simply implies me adopting the quote of Dwight D. Elsenhower which states “We believe that our truly urgent need is to make our nation secure, our economy strong and our dollar sound (In this case our Naira).” He further placed emphasis on the fact that “For every American, this matter of the sound dollar is crucial. Without a sound dollar, every American family would face a renewal of inflation, an ever-increasing cost of living, the withering away of savings and life insurance policies.”
It is therefore in the light of the above that my scope of primary expectations hinges around the followings:
i. Tackling Insecurity
ii. Economic Development
iii. Fostering and upholding of the promised Unity in the Country.
E.R. Stettinius, Jr. said “Happiness has many roots, but none more important than security”. Every rich man with a treasure in his house builds high fences and barricades to guard his treasures, so does every poor man have a door in front of his house in a bid to guard the little he can afford, all these are testaments to how important issues of Security is to everyone both rich and poor.
Hence, a vital reason why Insecurity has to be curbed by President Tinubu with utmost priority.
Kudus on the foremost to the President for the meeting held with all Service Chiefs and Heads of security agencies led by Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Lucky Irabor on 1st June, 2023 concerning measures to strengthen the Nation’s Security. However, Nigerians are anxious and awaiting the positive effect of same as writings on the walls without implementations amounts to nullity. In effect, alongside the promises of the President of a topnotch secured Nigeria in his manifesto, officials involved right from the Commander-In- Chief of the Federation till the least security personnel are to safeguard the provisions of Chapter II and particularly Section 33 of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).
All regions of the State should receive adequate security attentions and lives of each and every citizen should matter and count in this present administration as against the former.
In a nutshell, the meeting held and administrations achievement should not only produce a Nigeria secured from oil theft but rather a Nigeria with zero Kidnappings, bombings, terrorism attacks, killings and on the whole, an unsafe Nigeria as the latter should be prioritized than the former in considering equity, good conscience and morality.
In view of the above it is also expected that the President review the nation security architecture and relieve the Service Chiefs of their commission to pave way for new ones, the choice of the National Security Adviser should be a season, intelligence and diplomatic Chief with the ability to coordinate the Nation security teams as well as to liaise with diplomatic community effectively.
David Cameron said “The economy is the start and end of everything. Nigeria can’t have successful education reform or any other reform if we don’t have a strong economy.” At this point in the country, a wholistic economic policy is to be adopted by the President combing through all sectors and running safe of the lane of myopic stream of profit orientation or revenue generation for the country.
It should principally be noted that a single sector at this point cannot for instance employ the millions of populations existing in the country.
In essence, beyond oil production and availability, what next? A million and one promises have been made in several interviews, manifesto and even during the speech of the President on how a better economy would be enhanced during his administration some of which includes the removal of subsidy on oil, adoption of a unified exchange rate, premium investments in the agricultural sector amidst several other outlooks and scopes.
I would however on the whole admonish the President to include in his spectrum measures of Improving Productivity in the country. i.e., graduating Nigeria from a consumption Nation to a Producing Nation. In doing this, several other measures are necessary beginning from improved legislations and establishment of several other statues, acts and laws that would enhance infrastructural developments with which ease in productions would thereupon exist. Note that with the oil sector, our nation already has a huge foreign inflow and in this transition to a producing nation, where standard products are made (proponent to laws existing and bodies created to supervise their quality), existing markets are not just at hand but several further others in flows would as well be enhanced and the economy through purchase of our productions in large numbers grow uncurbed.
I would as well use this medium to commend the President on the bold move of subsidy removal to curb further exploitations by suppliers of petroleum who in their wisdom created pseudo scarcity, hoarding the fuel on the President’s announcement of his intent to remove the subsidy on PMS at his inauguration speech.
However, the approach had its faults as the President ought to have done due diligence by creating several Palliatives that should have alleviated the resultant hardship of same on the citizens.
For instance, His Excellency before this move should have made available alternative transportation systems with lesser cost for ease of movement of people as well as agricultural produce from one state to another (the railway option or waterway options could have been put in place), in-depth checks and balances could have been done to allegations raised of several individuals benefiting from the subsidy and depriving the nation of the benefits of removal of same as this checks would curb embezzlement of the proceeds of this act and would allow the focus of the administration in boosting the growth of the economy actualized and finally, issues of restructuring our Local Refineries either by the government or privatizing same to private individuals to restructure them and create a competitive market when it comes to the refining of our oil within the Nation.
Moreover it expected that paying direct subsidy to some citizen should commenced in earnest in form of PMS Allowances for workers and PMS Benefits to others, after all some leaders received as much as Newspapers, Furniture, Wardrobe, Vehicle, Hazard etc allowances.
Finally, and Conclusively, Yoshihide Suga said “A strong economy is the source of National strength”. In Essence, once we have our economy thriving, it rubs off on our National Strength. I therefore admonish His Excellency to not forget and implement the fostering, upholding and fortification of the Unity of our country as a whole. This cannot be downplayed by the present administration as it is sacrosanct to the development of the Nation as a whole and futuristically.
I on this note commend His Excellency on his current appointment of Chief Femi Gbajabiamila, a season lawyer and the highest ranking parliamentarian as Chief of Staff, George Akume as Secretary to the Government of the Federation and Senator Ibrahim Hadejia as his deputy as this is a clear testament of not just zoning of offices to foster the country’s unity and involvement of all regions but also possess at the backend choice with topnotch competence and selection of able and capable hands from various regions who are geniuses in the offices they are appointed to manage.
The act of the President upholding the Country’s unity and getting it to a better state preserves the labours of our heroes past, curbs it from being in vain and on the whole helps the Nation to attain great lofty heights as stated in the second stanza of the Country’s anthem and with a resultant effect to build a nation where peace and justice prevails.
Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu has walked into a minefield with which he is very familiar. He had his own mines in the field, of course. They had been well laid out for over two decades, and with verifiable results. Many of his former opponents are either flat on their backs, are nursing injuries, or are queued up behind him in diligent subservience. Some of his co-contestants who are in court have the right to the line of action they have chosen. They must, however, abide by whatever decision the courts come up with. But the forgoing is not really our concern here today at all.
The issues facing the federal republic of Nigeria today go far beyond some of the questionable expectations of many of the critics, observers and admirers of Bola Tinubu, Atiku Atiku and Peter Obi. A nation with a fundamentally disoriented political, economic, political and traditional leadership elite cannot become Eldorado in a hurry. The decades-long convoluted conspiracies within, and around, this confederacy is responsible for the Nigeria we have today. So, let’s get real. The dominant interests are not about to turn in their retirement papers. The renewed struggle for the soul of Nigeria will either lead to a rebirth, or a strangulation.
The point made on this page some seven years ago, under the title “Nigeria: Beyond Buhari and Jonathan”, still stands today, namely: “It is not right that a nation should be undergirded by untruth. It is also not right that a nation should be under a political economy of decay and corruption, warehoused and propagated by a business and political elite that lives in denial. When old lies are told afresh by those who know they are lying, a time comes when even the liars themselves won’t be sure whether they are lying anymore. Reason? Others would be repeating the same lies with great aplomb everywhere”.
None of the actors in our crisis-ridden political environment is solely responsible for our present national problems. The PDP, the APC, and several other combinations of political and economic forces put together, bear responsibility for everything that is wrong with Nigeria today. We are seeing the products of generations of leaders and followers who were nurtured on a diet of impunity, inattention to service delivery, consumption and arbitrary use of state power.
Tinubu, like all previous leaders before him, belongs to that tradition; but in a way that must be properly understood in order to avoid confusion. He is an inheritor as well as a patient and calculating investor in the Nigeria of today. He has demonstrated a great capacity for outwitting, outmaneuvering and outsmarting most of his adversaries in the power game. He is good at paying for political services and his peculiar approach to managing the political environment, shorn of strong concerns about morality, has been one of his strengths. And that is part of the problem at the moment.
Asiwaju Tinubu is now managing a nation that has moved from the lofty concept of “citizenship” in the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s to the less inclusive notion of “indigeneship”. As observed in the aforementioned article: “We have been building a mansion on quicksand and with pillars of straw. The soil, quicksand as it is, is further infested with two species of ants, called presumption and nepotism. These ants, which feed exclusively on straw, have been nibbling away for decades. They have left us with a hollow and painted frame that conceals a lie. This lie has been on parade for decades. It is described as an architectural masterpiece by casual observers. An architectural masterpiece that is not designed to withstand the wind”?
The article continued: “Now that we have brought up children who have seen shielded criminality as leadership, we have a nation wherein hiding under the instruments of state to violate natural justice, equity and good conscience makes you not guilty of any crime. Look at Nigeria today, … The dominant motifs are (1) skewed values, (2) a flawed national psyche and (3) an aberrant leadership recruitment process. These motifs have given us several national ‘leadership pseudopodia’, or “false feet”.
Just as happens with Amoeba, the jelly-like microorganism that pops out part of its shapeless body in any direction it wants to move, Nigeria’s leadership pseudopodia (or new regimes with insular notions about nation building) usually spring new agenda, new national ideals and new aspirations on everyone without warning and without consultation. They have since replaced National Development Plans with limited regime goals, and often without plans or strategy. And it all vanishes without trace with the demise of each regime”.
The Kaduna Nzeogwu coup détat of January 15, 1966, for instance, was a very important step in the misdirection of the Nigerian state. That coup saw a junior officer issuing instructions to his superiors from a radio station. “It saw an officer peremptorily informing the nation (by mere announcement about ‘Extraordinary Orders’) that all local administration in the country was now under the ‘local military commander’, who would mete out any punishment he ‘deemed appropriate’ to anyone who disobeyed him”. How? Where on earth, and why?
That unfortunate incident put the concepts of right and wrong in the hands of individuals of, sometimes questionable antecedents, for the first time in Nigeria. It violated Service Discipline, and set new paradigms for the collapse of esprit de corps in the armed forces. It also created a dilemma in diplomatic circles, for which even Ambassador Jolaosho’s experience as a diplomat did not prepare him when the Germans asked: “Why did your people kill your prime Minister, instead of voting him out of office”?
But the damage was far more more fundamental, because it “…side-tracked the existing crop of leaders and their ‘replacement generation’. A generation groomed along ideological lines in leadership recruitment stagnated for 12 years, until 1979. The trio of Zik, Awo and Aminu Kano, who would since given way to the likes of Tafawa Balewa, Michael Okpara, Bola Ige and others before 1979, turned up as presidential candidates, because of the 1966 coup. This created the backlog of two generations of leaders that we are still unable to deal with today. The average age of party youth leaders, the National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) and the Nigerian Youth Movement (NYM) says it all”.
Did that first murder of 1966 not lay the foundation for subsequent murders and abominations? Did it not set the tone for the eventual replacement of professional military service and responsible national leadership with personal and ethnocentric desires, misuse of office, political illiteracy and petulant idealism and exuberance? Has this murk not produced many “Excellencies” and filled our post-1966 nationhood with sporadic and spasmodic declarations of new national goals, new federating units and much more? Have we not been “moving forward” in the wrong direction as a nation; sometimes at the whims of persons without deep personal maturity, a grand vision, real wisdom or even enlightened patriotism?
Does the Armed Forces Remembrance Day we celebrate every 15th January not affronts us all? It bears repetition to say here gain, as said seven years ago, that: “That date bespeaks impropriety and is inappropriate for accolades”. We need not have the date of the cheerful murder of some of our fellow countrymen as a day of celebration. Nigeria has a catalogue of prematurely retired military officers and a long list of frustrated and unfulfilled professionals because of the events of 1966. Many who joined the armed forces as military professionals have since been replaced others who joined in the years of military regimes – as a short cut to wealth.
Should we be celebrating Armed Forces Remembrance Day on the day families of some of Nigeria’s greatest leaders are in mourning? Tinubu should ask, as I asked seven years ago, whether “…we do not have several military exploits, including the final triumph of ECOMOG, or the day Buhari rallied the Nigerian military to route Chadian incursion during the Shagari Presidency, to make our Armed Forces Remembrance Day. That will save us from holding up a day that blights our collective dignity as decent people to salute the gallantry of our armed forces”.
A day that reminds us that a civil war ended in Nigeria with the complete economic disenfranchisement of a section of the country need not be so cheerfully projected. The South East was arguably not really rehabilitated, reconstructed and reconciled to the rest of the country after the civil war. It is open to question whether, even now, it has been reintegrated. As a Lagos lawmaker called, last week, for land revocations, to ensure land allocation to only indigenes, we should ask ourselves why a place where the late Chief Adeniran Ogunsanya and others protected properties of Igbos in Lagos while the civil war lasted and returned same to the owners after the war should be so poised today.
Is Nigeria really going anywhere if, after 52 years, the same Igbos who lost their belongings in another part of the country as “abandoned property” to their fellow countrymen, are to face the same fate once again? To whom were they they allegedly reconciled after the war, and even now?
Tinubu, Atiku and Obi should look around them and ask the following questions: (1) It it true that our 23 years old democracy has produced leaders with sudden stupendous wealth, amidst grinding mass poverty? (2) Is it true that their wealth has impacted less than 15 persons? (3) Is it true that their local communities, members of their religious congregations, most of their friends, some members of their extended families who knew how poor they were a few years earlier only chuckle and regard them as lucky thieves? (4) Is it true that many priests, traditional rulers and other supposed custodians of public conscience who should ask questions are on their payroll?
Truth is: the nation is reeling piteously. A criticism of Tinubu does not automatically translate into an endorsement of Obi or Atiku; and vice versa. Hunger, banditry, skyrocketing prices and much more are here. We need the following to move forward: Truth, competent leaders, the right sense of responsibility, propriety in public office, service delivery and inclusivity in policy making and resource allocation. Yes, beyond Tinubu, Atiku and Peter Obi.
I shall pass through this world but once. Any good therefore that I can do or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it, for I shall not pass this way again. – Stephen Grellet
Some days ago when I watched, on social media, a post of the immediate past vice-president, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, and his wife alighting from an aircraft with just two or three persons around them, and the caption said that was the VP returning home after eight years as the country’s Number Two citizen, I was aghast; in fact, gutted! Not that I was a fan of the ex-VP anyway and for no personal reason. My mind quickly raced to the tumultuous welcome that was accorded Osinbajo’s boss, the immediate past president, retired Major-General Muhammadu Buhari, on his own return to his own people in Daura, Katsina State.
But then, and thank goodness, it turned out, according to another social media report, that the embarrassing report of Osinbajo’s lonely home-coming, like a chicken beaten silly by the rain, was not just a hoax but also the handiwork of some “bad belle” people intent on casting the ex-VP in very bad light. Osinbajo, like Buhari, we were told, was also very warmly received by his own people on his own home-coming. For both Buhari and Osinbajo, that is how it should be. No leader is through and through good and none is through and true bad or evil. The saying of the elders is that no matter how bad a person might be – let the whole, wide world forsake him – there will still be someone who will stick with him through thick and thin. Who that person will be is what no one can tell.
Everyone in positions of authority makes some smile even as they cause many to weep and gnash their teeth; they make some rich even as they cause many to sink deeper into the miry clay of poverty. There is no denying the fact that the administration of Buhari and Osinbajo sowed tears and sorrow everywhere but they must also have put smiles on the face of a few. Under them, Nigeria became the poverty capital of the world but the other side of the coin is that many became stinking rich under them without as much as lifting a finger. The humongous corruption enterprise supervised and condoned by their government mortally wounded the country but made some emergency billionaires and trillionaires. That is why it is called different strokes for different folks. I am certain you know too well that crowds are rented here. So, the crowds welcoming anybody home could have been rented. I am sure you know the same Buhari has been booed and stoned in many parts of the North during his presidency and, after it, Miyetti Allah, whose Grand Patron he is said to be and whose excesses he condoned, has denounced him as the worst thing to have ever happen to them! So much about home-coming!
And it reminds me of Lenrie Peters’ poem, Homecoming: “…Too strange the sudden change/Oft the times we buried when we left/The times before we had properly arranged/The memories that we kept…” After having “paced the world”, Lenrie Peters longed to return to his old home and was nostalgic when he eventually did but I am not sure Osinbajo longed to return to his after an eight-year sojourn in the inner sanctuary of power and privileges at the Presidential villa in Abuja; otherwise, he would not have wanted to stay on and become president! Well, it can be argued that no rational human being gets so close to the seat of power like Osinbajo did who would not be tempted to want the seat for himself. It is human. It is legitimate. It is a reasonable expectation, especially if we think it achievable. The urge to go for it, as they say, is most likely to be fired the more if we believe we have something to offer and if we see lack of capacity in our principal. If we try to fill in the gap but are rudely put in check, we may be convinced to make an effort to step into his shoes and make a difference. This played out in the case of Osinbajo and his principal, Buhari. The VP’s talents and capacity were left to rot. He was humiliated. His advice, offered behind closed doors, I suppose, might have been ignored. He might have been a mere traveller in the corridors of power while all that the outside world saw was the razzmatazz of power around him. Like the proverbial chicken which labours and sweats but its feathers would not let anyone notice, Osinbajo might have laboured silently without anyone seeing his efforts. Yet, he might have meant well. We saw flickers of that on the few occasions he was allowed to step in as acting president before the door was slammed in his face for no reason other than that he showed promise. He thereafter accepted his lot with equanimity and philosophical calmness, as they say. But looking back now, does he rue dragging the APC presidential ticket with his erstwhile boss and benefactor (?), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu?
In all of these, was Osinbajo bold, timid, treacherous or diplomatic? Was he compromised and shackled by one thing or the other? Is he satisfied with his contributions as VP and convinced of the decisions he took? We waited and longed for him to stir. We sighed and moaned when he did not. We cried and yelled. We berated and lambasted him but he remained unmoved, even stoic; he ignored us like he himself was ignored. It was as if he, too, was disdainful of us. There must be things Osinbajo knew that we did not. I only hope that it was not the demons of the Presidential villa that one-time presidential spokesperson, Dr. Reuben Abati, has spoken ceaselessly about that stole Osinbajo’s mojo. Thank God now that he is out of the villa, Osinbajo can recover. His memoirs will surely make an interesting read. I am sure you know they get wiser once they get out of that villa. They enter it sane; lose their senses, sensibilities and sensitivities while there. They regain it and become normal human beings and begin to see things and talk like reasonable human beings, like you and me, once they step out of the place. This happens not only to presidents and vice presidents; it happens also to presidential spin doctors. It happened to Reuben Abati himself! Our brother, Femi Adesina, just got released from the same stranglehold!
Now is the time for Osinbajo and others like him to take a good rest, which they deserve, having exited the lion’s den in one piece, and take time to rue missed opportunities. What will they do differently given the same opportunity again? They may not have another opportunity but it is important for others, especially those coming behind, to learn from their experience. That is one way society is nurtured. If you find anyone who says he will do the same thing all over again if given another opportunity, know that you have just found a fool! Nothing is so perfect that it cannot be improved upon if one is given the opportunity. Make your best better. No one knows this better than a writer. If you read a piece you wrote a million times over, you will always have an improvement to make on it.
My checklist for Osinbajo includes the following: As a professor of Law, he is a member of the academia; so, when the Academic Staff Union of Universities was on strike for eight months, what role did Osinbajo play? What advice did he give the government in which he was the Number Two, for whatever it is worth, and what support did he give to his colleagues in academia? How did he feel about the turn of events? Did he feel let down by the government of which he was a part or did he feel disappointment in his colleagues? Now with the benefit of hindsight, how does Osinbajo feel about that unfortunate ASUU/FG saga? Will anyone say that Osinbajo abandoned that constituency of his? As a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Osinbajo’s ought to be a strong voice on legal matters in the Muhammadu Buhari administration but Abubakar Malami, Buhari’s Federal Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, appeared as the man that held sway. The Buhari administration picked cherries when it came to court judgments to obey and which to spurn. That government violated the fundamental human rights of Nigerians at will. Did Osinbajo’s stomach turn at each turn? As a senior pastor in the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Osinbajo was deemed to have represented Christians in the Buhari administration but at no time in the history of this country were Christians so victimised, murdered, butchered, driven out of their homes, churches torched, pastors kidnapped and slaughtered, etc than under the Buhari administration. To make matters worse, Boko Haram, the bandits, and Miyetti Allah unleashed mayhem and top government officials defended and backed them! Who heard a whimper from Osinbajo? Did he speak out but we did not hear it? What were Osinbajo’s feelings for his fellow Christians? Looking back now at those sordid events, does he think he could have acted differently? Osinbajo and Buhari left Leah Sharibu with Boko Haram; they also left office without bringing the killers of Deborah Samuel to book: When Osinbajo looks back now, how does he feel about these events? Could he have acted differently or did he put in his level best?
I can go on and on! Osinbajo is Yoruba but what did his vice-presidency attract to Yoruba land? We saw the avalanche of projects that Buhari – or Buhari’s body language – attracted to his home state of Katsina; even the East had the second Niger Bridge completed under Buhari. The Lagos/Ibadan expressway is still ongoing since 1999 or whatever; the Sagamu/Ikorodu road along the Lafarge Cement axis is a death trap; the Lagos/Abeokuta road is hell on earth. Can anyone point at one project that the South-west benefitted from Osinbajo’s tenure as VP? Yet, it is to the same South-west that Osinbajo returned after his time out as VP! True, then, is the saying “Ile l’abo simi oko”! Home is home, sweet home! The late Cote d’Ivoire president, Felix Houphouet-Boigny, said “home is where, when you go there; they take you in” So the Southwest has no choice but to take in Osinbajo, just like it took in former President Olusegiun Obasanjo, both of whom – ironically from the same section of the South-west – gave their people the short end of the stick. Maybe we need to ask Dr. Reuben Abati whether some demons were also at work here!
The fate of Nigeria's decaying democracy is staring at us.
Nobody can escape the numerous holes disfiguring it while all kind of anxious questions it is throwing also to our feet. Because history is back with a vengeance. Asking: what have you done so far since the Nigerian nation teetered on the brink of its demise when it fell flat on her face thirty-years ago.
On this day, on a fateful June 12, in 1993, while all Nigerians, across all geographies and her Diaspora, were bracing for the advent of a great, sunny day, on our long-battered land, heralding the maturing of a new, strong, democratic culture, a brutal curtain, an iron curtain, fell on us with the annulment of the very transparent presidential election held that year.
We had thought, naively, that "militics", the military version of civilian rule that long was in charge of the destiny of the leading African country would deliver on its promise -a peaceful transition to power from them to a new, civilian, leadership brought about by what was one of the most competitive polls in recent history!
Observers from around the world, voters, the media, academics and the ordinary citizenry had come to the conclusion that Moshood Abiola, the media and industrial magnate turned politician, had roundly defeated his rival, Bashir Tofa, in a two men's race hailed throughout the nation as fair and just.
When the military regime of General Ibrahim Badamassi Babangida declared null and void the election, the whole country was literally in turmoil. Its image dented. The world looking down at Nigeria as the sick nation of an Africa that was already going South. And no wonder that Babangida was welcomed to the Economic community of West African States (Ecowas) Summit, held a few days later, in Cotonou, Benin Republic, was humiliating for the most populous and wealthy of all member States making-up the 15 nations community...I witnessed it all in my then capacity as Ecowas's communication Director.
The blow was terrible. Since then, Nigeria has been fighting to restore its lost democratic credentials. To be true, progresses have been recorded, as testified by the end of formal Khaki, military, rule even though, dressed in Agbadas, two of its leading representatives, namely Generals Olusegun Obasanjo and Muhammadu Buhari, occupied the highest seat of the land, as Presidents, during the past thirty-years along other civilian rulers.
The road has been rocked with all sorts of hurdles but being the ever-resilient nation, one must observe that Nigeria has come a long way from the brink. And despite its still lingering democratic shortcomings, it is justified to salute Nigeria's recovery -at least in words and papers- in its embrace of democracy, rule of law, freedom of expression and opinion, media pluralism and trade unions voices...
That more and more citizens are feeling the need to get involved and speak-up provide further comfort, regardless of the many travails it is still facing, including with the lack of acknowledgement thus far that nothing can be achieved to entrench democracy therein as long as the citizen is not a the center of its deployment, the fact is that we no longer live in a time of vertical, authoritarian, leadership.
Let us be blunt: Nigeria could, and must, have fared better, especially on the economic and social fronts in light of the fact that democracy without justice and shared-prosperity is an empty shell.
What missed further, and has been strikingly highlighted, is the failure of its institutions to meet their promise to roll-out a credible supervision of the democratic proposition for such a great country.
Witness only the utter treason by the Independent Electoral National Commission (Inec), including the various blunders it covered, considering that the elections it organized in March, this year, were, to cast them mildly, catastrophic, without electronic transmission of the results nor an uncontested overall outcome, the courts being up till now reviewing the complaints of key political, aggrieved, figures of the process..
June 12 being celebrated as democracy day reminds us that much is yet to be done to take us to the holy grail. One of the key deliverables that must be met, as soon as possible, is the emergence of a powerful, ethical, with character, competence and capacity, credibility, class of new leaders poised to transforming politics as we know it until now as a dirty and fraudulent, corrupt, project to the great loss of Nigeria and other African nations.
In the midst of this darkness still clogging its societal prospects, let us not be pessimistic. Lighting up a candle is the urgent action to maintain hope in the spirit of what mobilized the Nigerian people following the June 12 disaster when all Nigerians coalesced with a motto: Never again...
Out of that chaos started off the current, soul-searching and pragmatic, evidence-based, attempts at democracy consolidation. We got a long way to go but, like a Chinese proverb posits, the "the longest journey begins with a first step". That is where one should heed the calls following an in-depth academic and empirical research by Doctor Obiageli Ezekwesili, the former Nigerian Minister of Education and World Bank Africa Vice-President, the new FixPolitics Movement, started off in Nigeria, now reaching my own Senegal, before being deployed on a Panafrican level, comes in not just as a response to Nigeria's democratic deficits but to the whole of Africa's...
The future is not of doom and gloom despite the hard times we are in. It is bright. For, in democracy, we trust, and yes, while the whole continent of Africa is watching, Nigeria has no other option but to put on track its democratic ambitions. We can do that...
Adama Gaye, a Senegalese Author and media practitioner, former Director of Communication of Ecowas, coined the concept Nigeria, Democracy Day, in many international newspapers, on May 29, 1999, as he acted as the media Adviser for the Transition to civilian rule in Nigeria. Gaye is the Convener of FixPolitics Senegal.