Yemi Osinbajo As Argument

By Dan Amor

Against the backdrop of palpable apprehension in high places over public appreciation of the enduring leadership qualities of the Acting President Professor Yemi Osinbajo, it is necessary to pontificate on some critical underpinnings in the relationship between leadership and followership as a philosophic construct. The fact that President Muhammadu Buhari officially handed over the reins of governance to his deputy, as required by law, before proceeding to the United Kingdom on medical vacation on January 19, 2017, need not delay us here. It is obvious that the All Progressives Congress (APC) won the presidential election on a joint ticket of Buhari/Osinbajo, from campaign to inauguration. 

*Osinbajo 

This, also, need not delay us here.  But what has generated more heat than light in recent times is the concept of delivery and appreciation. Whereas Nigerians overwhelmingly believe that a messenger who delivers neatly and squarely must be roundly appreciated or commended for a job well done, a cabal which is jittery over the messenger's looming popularity and sturdy bulwark does not. That is the crux of the matter. Yet governance is a contract between the government and the governed. We give you our mandate to deliver our needs and security. If you deliver, we applaud you; if you don't, we murmur. 

So far, since he mounted the podium of leadership of Nigeria as Acting President, Prof. Osinbajo appears to be performing. From his body language, his utterances and his actions, the Ogun State-born professor of law is not prepared to hoodwink anybody. His rapprochement with the Niger Delta, the goose that lays the golden egg, is legendary. The oil-bearing region had experienced leaders or rulers who wielded the big stick thereby amplifying their restiveness. Abacha militarized the Niger Delta and murdered their agitators. Obasanjo spent over N200million daily for eight years to maintain the Joint Task Force in the region and ordered the extermination of Odi and Odioma communities in broad daylight pogroms. 

Yar'Adua it was who brandished the carrots because he recognized their anxieties. Buhari had mobilized troops to the region and talked tough with unpretentious swagger before the current intervention by Osinbajo. Whether or not he ordered the latter to do what he is doing, or whether Osinbajo's shuttle diplomacy in the Niger Delta is part of their party's manifesto, the truth is that the messenger deserves applause. It is not only that we should complain when our leaders are not leading welł; we must also show some appreciation when they are doing well enough.

Pitting Buhari Against Osinbajo

By Wale Sokunbi

The Presidency on Monday raised an alarm on what it believes to be a plot to cause a division between President Muhammadu Buhari and Acting President Yemi Osinbajo. The Special Adviser to the President on Political Affairs, Mr. Babafemi Ojudu, described the trending comparisons of Buhari and Osinbajo as the handiwork of those who do not wish the country well.  He also said it was a ploy by the opposition to cause unnecessary division between the two men who share a joint ticket.

*Osinbajo and Buhari 

He was quick to say that Osinbajo was only carrying out the economic policies of the government which the public was only now beginning to feel their impact. As he put it, “it is not a question of one person being better than the other.” Even Osinbajo’s visit to the Niger Delta, he said, is an initiative of the president, and the attempts to divide the two men can only rob Nigerians of the dividends of democracy.

The concerns of the Presidency over what appears a direct effort to pitch Buhari against Osinbajo are well placed. The gambit has apparently been seized by well known Buhari naysayers who have started praising Osinbajo to the high heavens for his modest and sincere efforts at governance, while painting Buhari as lacking in ability to solve the nation’s problems.

For those who have immersed themselves in this worrisome narrative, Buhari is a non-performer while Osinbajo is the magic wand that is gradually making a difference in governance and solving some of the nation’s problems, especially the nation’s forex woes, which has seen the naira appreciate from N520 to N420 to the dollar, while electricity supply is improving with the reducing militancy and bombing of oil pipelines in the Niger Delta area of the country.
Vice President Osinbajo has, undoubtedly, been playing his role well but that is no reason for tattling tattlers to seek to draw a wedge between him and his principal, Buhari. Those who cannot appreciate the wisdom of allowing Osinbajo to do his work as Acting President in peace, while Buhari attends to his health in London, will do well to reread the story of David and Goliath in I Samuel, chapters 17 and 18 , of the Holy Bible.

The young boy, David, killed the giant, Goliath, and King Saul was, indeed, happy to have such a young man who could help the nation get rid of the vaulting Goliath (economic recession and forex woes?) from his nation. The king, initially, harboured no evil at all against David.

Ojodu, Osinbajo And The Sleeping President

By Paul Onomuakpokpo  

Nigerians are legendarily associated with patience. But it is troubling when the distinction between this virtue and the propensity to brook the excesses of our political leaders is blurred. The danger of the conflation of this virtue and the vice of acquiescence is often signalled by our political leaders’ exploitation of our famed patience to turn public office to an opportunity for self-valourisation as manifested by regular heists in government.

*Osinbajo

Our leaders strive to over-stretch this patience. They do not expect us to interrogate their excesses. So, whenever the citizens occasionally lose their patience, show signs of alertness and query why their government has become their affliction, our leaders fume with rage.

Just on Monday, the presidency demonstrated this. It was furious that the citizens could be aware of the fact that the President Muhammadu Buhari administration has become an ogre rather than a means of succour as it ought to be. Bristling with rage, the Special Adviser to the President on Political Affairs, Babafemi Ojodu, wondered why Nigerians dared to review the now almost two years of the administration of Buhari and declare that it has been a period of an unspeakable ordeal. The presidency, as articulated by Ojodu, did not expect the citizens to know that they have been suffering. The presidency is enraged that the citizens have realised that it is possible for a president to make a difference despite the recession, the crash of the price of oil and the so-much lampooned looting of the common patrimony by the previous government.

The presidency was reacting to a people who have been subjected to so much suffering and depression in the past 20 months and more and who now saw a reason to be hopeful in Osinbajo and they expressed this. Does this require the flagellation of the citizens by the presidency? If the presidency really felt that it must correct some wrong impressions, it should simply have said that Osinbajo is executing the agenda of Buhari and stopped there. But Ojodu committed the same blunder that he accused the citizens of – launching into a campaign of a Manichean categorisation of Buhari and Osinbajo.

But if Osinbajo is only executing the agenda of Buhari as Ojodu would like us to believe, why did Buhari fail to execute this agenda in the past 20 months while he was in charge? What the citizens can see is that Osinbajo has some ideas of governance he is pursuing that were not known to them until now.

Osinbajo And The Demand Of Leadership

By Rotimi Fasan

It’s been more than one month now since Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, assumed the status of Acting President. Even when this is not the first time he would be holding forth for the president, it is the first time he would be doing it for this long. Except in an actual state of incapacitation it is doubtful if anyone could envisage a situation like this when the president would be away from office for over a month without being declared ill or incapacitated.

*Osinbajo 

But by embarking on a medical vacation which has been indefinitely extended on the advice , Nigerians have been told, of his British doctors President Buhari has afforded his deputy an opportunity to demonstrate what he could do if given the chance. Before now, Osinbajo had operated in the shadows of President Muhammadu Buhari. This is the way things should be as the presidential system of government is a monarchy of sorts that does not leave room for two heads.

The Vice president in such a system is a ceremonial leader who can only operate at the behest of the president and to the extent the president permits. Which thus makes the office of the vice president that of a sinecure. The vice president performs delegated duties, only such responsibilities assigned him or her by the president. But President Buhari is not a stranger to such a system of delegated responsibility. As a military head of state he had a deputy, Tunde Idiagbon, that many Nigerians thought had as much power as the head of state.

This was in a dictatorship that had no room for democratic niceties and in which the word of the leader was itself the law. Yet Idiagbon functioned apparently with the full support of Buhari. Although others with a revisionist mindset have had cause to read things differently but that Buhari gave Idiagbon a wide latitude within which he shared the power of the leader with him was a sign of self-confidence. The same self-confidence, even if unintended, appears to be at work now. Ag Pres Osinbajo Osinbajo has never looked the part of the over-ambitious; he appeared content to operate from behind Buhari where he belongs constitutionally.

But the dramatic manner in which the president’s medical vacation of ten days has now been extended indefinitely has thrust him into the limelight in a way he may not personally relish. For it is turning out that some Nigerians are already making invidious comparisons between his mode of leadership and that of his principal.

While President Buhari Is Away

By Sunny Ikhioya

There is a need for us to understand the context under which the country is being run presently. Only a fool will have a death wish for Mr. President because it will benefit the country more for President Buhari to stay alive, otherwise, the consequences will be too grievous to imagine. But, we tend to over dramatise basic issues, so, things that are supposed to be normal in every society becomes complex here.

 

*Buhari 

The more open and transparent a leader is to the people, the less controversial his actions and inaction are to them. Sickness is normal to man. That the President is sick should not be a big deal to the citizens. That there is so much cover up is what boggles the mind. Even in his present condition, the intrigues and scheming are ongoing amongst politicians, the ruling party, The All Progressive Party, APC, is  not exempted.

Everyone is trying to take advantage of the situation. So, when you attempt to point out the flaws in this administration, people attribute it to supporting corruption. Sonala Olumhese’s  column of Sunday February 19 2017 titled “As Ibori Stirs Buhari’s Tea” opined that the presidency have up to nine media advisers and assistants, working “to react to all media content critical to the President and attack/demonise/smear the people critical of the President”.

We have stretched the debate for so long that focus is lost. From what have been happening these past weeks, it is safe to conclude that President Buhari is being shielded from the true situation of things in the country, it is either that, or, he is ignoring the truth, which I doubt. Why am I in all of these rigmarole? One has noticed that there is a subtle change going on in the attitude to governance these past few weeks; not that of arrogance or fear, but, a positive change that is.

The type or kind that the people have been waiting for these past two years, which  has eluded them. Things appear to be working, albeit positively. If the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP,  failed us in the past, it does not guarantee a repeat by the APC and this is what those sympathetic to the cause of this government have failed to realise. The people wanted positive change.

Buhari And Conspiracy Theories: Mahmud Jega Is Right

By Moses Ochonu

I study Northern Nigeria for a living. I am a Lugardian Northerner. I grew up in and schooled in Northern Nigeria. I know that conspiracy theories have a high resonance in the region. I know that implausible and sometimes ridiculous alternative explanations and alternative facts circulate in the region to devastating effect.

*Buhari 

Conspiracy theories led to non-Muslim fellow Nigerians being killed in Kano shortly after the beginning of the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001. The ignorant interpretation of cosmic and climatic events as recompense for sin by some Muslim clerics led to Christians being attacked in Maiduguri when there was a solar eclipse--years before Boko Haram emerged.

Conspiracy theories and outright fabrication about insults and plots against Islam got Gideon Akuluka and Grace Usha beheaded in Kano and Gombe respectively. I know several northerners who are Truthers, believers in the theory that the 9/11 attacks were the work of the US government and/or Jews. I have seen posts written by Northern Nigerians on my Facebook timeline alleging that jews and/or Americans created ISIS to destroy Islam. Such posts garner many likes from Northern Nigerians.

Until Buhari's election, there was a cottage industry of conspiracy theories about Boko Haram being the work of the CIA or of being a plot by then President Jonathan to destabilize the North. Former Governor Murtala Nyako of Adamawa State even went to Washington DC to spout this nonsensical theory, lending executive credence to a previously fringy contemplation. Some Northern Nigerians alleged that the US and French governments were supplying weapons to Boko Haram to destroy Islamic solidarity and pit Muslims against one another.

One interlocutor even told me that his village people had seen some Baturai (white people) among the terrorists, insinuating that that was proof of Western backing for Boko Haram. The abiding power of this particular conspiracy theory is the reason that when stories circulated in the wake of the capture of Camp Zairo in Sambisa about a "white man" being among the captured insurgents" the stories was a particularly enduring sensation in Northern Nigeria. In fact, Northern Nigerians dug up and widely circulated photos of the moment Cameroonian soldiers rescued a German hostage released by Boko Haram several years ago. The fake photo gave the story even more resonance in Northern Nigerian social media circles. The story found a primed audience in Northern Nigerians because it confirmed what many already believed. Its spread was aided by the existence of confirmatory bias in the region.

Mismanaging Mr. President’s Wellbeing

By Oseloka H. Obaze  

Analyzing Nigeria is arduous if you seek to speak truth to power. Many Nigerians, mostly the leaders and elite make speeches unceasingly. Such conventional speeches tend to be largely rhetorical. And together, the analysts, the religious, the political leaders and the disenfranchised populace have all become “miserable comforters” of a nation in distress. As asked in the Holy Book:  “Will your long winded speeches never end?”

*Buhari 

Nigeria remains the classical outlier nation state. Thus in resignation many Nigerians have thrown in the towel. Some have fled, finding refuge and succour in foreign lands. Yet, many remain, having no option; and some remain to capitalise on the leadership and general disorder in the commonwealth. The latter seek to foster legality from illegalities with the intent to benefit from it.

But there remains one constant. Like Fela Anikulakpo Kuti averred presciently, the state of the nation is nothing but “Confusion” as “Everything Scatter.” As another contemporary musician, Eedris Abdulkareem put it: everything in Nigeria is “Jaga Jaga.” And this brings me to how those charged with minding President Muhammadu Buhari are managing his wellbeing or as some say, his health issues. 

 First, President Buhari is not a private citizen. While he is entitled to some privacy, Nigerians who elected him have the right to know of his wellbeing and the state of his health. He is the CEO of corporate Nigeria, and his wellbeing affects our stocks and holdings. Nigerians are not interested in his minders including the Acting President Yemi Osinbajo and media advisers telling us that the president is “fit”, “alright” and “that there is no cause for alarm.” The president did the right thing in devolving power to his deputy. That is constitutional. But Nigerians behold a Deja vu moment. If they are doubtful they have good reasons. Nigeria needs to hear directly from her leader, President Buhari, in accordance with the oath of office he took.

 My friend, Femi Adesina, the Special Adviser on Media has characterised the present reality as “imperfect” but conditioned on “exigencies of the moment.”

He is doing his best in an awkward circumstance. Well, we recall the uncertainties and unpleasantness that led to the “doctrine of necessity” and do not want to revisit that episode under any pretext. Perhaps, Mr. Adesina should have a chat with his professional colleague, Segun Adeniyi on this and related matters.  Nigerians don’t want to be fooled. If President Buhari could speak to President Donald Trump, he can speak to Nigerians. The facilities exist.

The Scourge Of South Africa’s Ingratitude

By Ayo Oyoze Baje  

The recurring ugly decimal of premeditated brutalisation of Nigerians, by South Africans in their country has become a handshake beyond the elbow, calling for a vicious wrestling combat. That, in itself is a most unfortunate development. What with Nigeria’s famed Big Brother role in the African continental politics and economy? What about spearheading the struggle to free the country from the iron-grip of the blood-letting and asphyxiating Apartheid policy that claimed some 21,000 innocent lives, going by statistics from International Human Rights Organisation (IHRO)?

*Jacob Zuma and Muhammadu Buhari

It therefore, smirks of gross ingratitude, quite antithetical to the African Union Charter and the much-cherished African traditional ethos of hospitality that Nigerians should be at the receiving end of the transferred aggression of the same South Africans! According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Mr. Ikechukwu Anyene, President, Nigeria Union, in a telephone call from Pretoria confirmed attacks on members and looting of Nigerian-owned businesses in Pretoria West on Saturday.

In his words: “As we speak, five buildings with Nigerian businesses, including a church have been looted and burned by South Africans. One of the buildings is a mechanic garage with 28 cars under repairs, with other vital documents, were burned during the attack. The attack in Pretoria West is purely xenophobic and criminal because they loot the shops and homes before burning them. Also, the pastor of the church was wounded and is in the hospital receiving treatment.” He said that the union had reported the incident to the Nigeria mission and South African police. 

What Do Niger Deltans Want?

By Hope Eghagha 

In the wake of the Acting President’s recent media-advertised visits to the Niger Delta, a highly-placed Nigerian posed a question to me as a suffering indigene of the exploited and oppressed zone of the Nigerian State: What do Niger Deltans want? Put differently, the question could be: What should the Nigerian State do for the Niger Delta? The question popped up in exasperation, I suppose. To ask this question some 60 odd years after the Oloibiri discovery shows we haven’t come to terms with the tragic circumstances of the Niger Delta.

If we want to play on words, these questions could be posed in different ways. The first proposition is that what the people want is different from what they have been given. Another flip is that they have been given enough and should just shut up and get on with life. It could also mean that citizens from other parts of the country genuinely want to know what people of the region want. Whatever meaning we give to the question, the plight of the Niger Delta is a sore point in the history of our country.

The question got me thinking though. Is it true that the corridors of power do not know what is good for the region? Have Deltans articulated their wants in the Nigerian polity? What about the tonnes of literature that led to the creation of the NDDC, and the Ministry of Niger Delta Affairs dating from the 1950s? If the Niger Delta had a son of theirs for five full years in charge of the Nigerian Presidency, do we still as Niger Deltans have the right to complain? In other words, if in five years a Nigerian President of Niger Delta extraction could not chart the course to national transformation, who else can? If past governors of the states in the region did not use funds allocated to them judiciously, how are we sure that resource control would yield anything different? 

I will summarise my submission with an anecdote: Communities which live in abject poverty in spite of billions of dollars that have been sucked from their soil and which still hold billions of dollars in gas reserves are in dire straits. Simply put, the Niger Delta needs a transformation of the environment and infrastructure of the land that has given so much wealth to the Nigerian federation. Either by design or default, we have not been able to achieve this. This is sad, tragic and alarming.

Meeting A Man Who Fed Biafrans

By Okey Ndibe

One of the fortunes of my frequent travels is that I meet fascinating people at different locations, even when I have no inkling of the possibility of such encounters. In stops in such cities as Los Angeles, Abuja, San Francisco, Johannesburg, London, Washington, DC, Houston and Austin, Texas, I have met classmates from my elementary, secondary school and college days, childhood playmates, former students of mine, elders who knew my parents before they were married, those who knew me as a snotty nosed, impish child, and folks with whom I had communicated for years, by email or telephony.

Last week, I put out a notice on Facebook and Twitter that I was spending a month in Pittsburgh, PA, to give several workshops and lectures as well as present my memoir, Never Look an American in the Eye: Flying Turtles, Colonial Ghosts, and the Making of a Nigerian American. I received a note from Ndaeyo Uko, once one of Nigeria’s wittiest and most popular columnists, who is now an academic in Australia. Ndaeyo, who was a star writer at The Guardian and Daily Times, now holds a PhD. For his dissertation, he researched the daredevil motley of adventurers and philanthropists, who discounted unimaginable risks to ferry food and, in some cases, arms, into Biafra during Nigeria’s ruinous thirty-month civil war.

Ndaeyo’s message was simple: I was not to miss the opportunity, before leaving Pittsburgh, of meeting David Koren, an American, who was part of that team of expatriates – Americans, the British, and Europeans – who, at grave risks to life and limb, undertook the perilous missions to fly-smuggle relief into Biafra. He explained that he had flown from Australia to Pittsburgh to interview Mr. Koren – and had found his recollections memorable.

Via email, Ndaeyo introduced me to the rescue activist. Mr. Koren and I then spoke over the phone. I told him I was a child of the Biafran War, and directed him to a link to my piece titled “My Biafran Eyes,” a series of vignettes based on my childhood recollections. On reading my essay, he responded, “I read ‘My Biafran Eyes.’ It was a touching story.”

Last Saturday, Mr. Koren (accompanied by his wife, Kay) and I met at a bookstore run by the City of Asylum, the organisation that arranged for my monthlong fellowship in Pittsburgh. It was an emotional experience, for both of us.

1967, A Metaphor For Military Slaughter

By Ochereome Nnanna

The international human rights outfit, Amnesty International (AI), has engaged the Nigerian military authorities in a war of wits, accusations and counter-accusations since our armed forces embraced a full-scale campaign to overcome the Boko Haram Islamist threat in Northern Nigeria.

The first sign of tension emerged shortly after former President Goodluck Jonathan, in January 2014, signed the bill outlawing homosexuality (especially gay marriage) in Nigeria. Most Western countries and local and international organisations (such as civil society groups which they fund) propagating their mostly alien and unacceptable values in the Third World suddenly became hostile to Nigeria, particularly the Jonathan regime.

They directly and indirectly added their voices to the growing anti-Jonathan opposition, especially those based in the North which were perceived as using the Boko Haram terrorists as a political tool to oust Jonathan and grab political power. AI, which had harshly criticised the anti-gay law, descended heavily on the Nigerian Army. AI was no longer interested in the horrendous activities of Boko Haram, which were sacking villages and communities, slaughtering people like animals and carting away women whom they dehumanised just as they liked.

These did not matter to AI. Instead, AI beamed its activities on the so-called human rights of Boko Haram fighters killed or captured during operations. Many Nigerians saw AI’s slur campaign against the Nigerian Armed Forces as ill-motivated, hostile and malicious, perhaps due to the anti-gay law. It seemed to meld with the strange reluctance of the President Barack Obama regime to recognise Boko Haram as a foreign terrorist outfit, which also manifested in its refusal to sell arms to Nigeria to prosecute the war on terror.

Obama’s America and its non-state sidekick, the AI, seemed unwilling to even help Nigeria in coping with our explosive humanitarian crisis concerning the internally-displaced persons. Rather, their own headache was the “human rights” of terrorists and the demonisation of our military. Following the change of government on May 29th 2015, and the assumption of power by retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari, the mindset and combat reflexes of our armed forces underwent a sudden psychedelic shift.

Tinubu And The Paths Once Travelled

By Debo Adesina

As All Progressives Congress (APC) governments at all levels in many places, not all, strike a pitiable or pitiful sight, it is impossible not to be overwhelmed by emotions.

So much goodwill, so much hope, so much disappointment and, now, so much anger! All within two years!

*Bola Tinubu

But blame the people first.

The climate in which the party thrived ahead of the 2015 elections was only genuinely ripe for deceit and empty promises by any candidate who could successfully inflame emotions, escape rigorous scrutiny even as he basked in ignorance of or poor preparation for the enormity of the task ahead.

Having been short-changed by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, for 16 years and particularly the Goodluck Jonathan-led brigandage, the people had every cause to abandon reason and hold on to emotions, such fertile breeding ground for gullibility.

Houses for all who had no shelter. Money for those who were out of jobs, for widows and the disadvantaged. Abundant life for the weak and vulnerable, the APC promised it all.

But what could compel disbelief more than the promises the party made then? What should have set the alarm ringing that Nigeria was in for a fantasy ride into fallacy than the promise of millions of jobs in a year? Should the promissory note on which the idea of social security-like payments to the poor was written not have been trashed by a discerning people? What could be less convincing than the avowal of true federalism in the manifesto of a party whose leading lights shunned the finest attempts yet at beginning the journey as represented by the 2014 National Conference?

Under normal circumstances, such promises as APC made would have been subjected to the most rigorous interrogation by the media and the people. But such was the incompetence of the then government and the odium of its ways that the more unbelievable the alternative was, the greater its appeal.

More importantly, that alternative had a political master gladiator as its leading salesman.

Bola Ahmed Tinubu had long established himself as a smart political tactician and grand strategist long before he teamed up with Muhammadu Buhari for the 2015 presidential election. He ran a good shop in Lagos, laid a good foundation for its development and entrenched a succession scheme that has worked very well so far. He perfected the art of surrounding himself with the best and the brightest and had constantly expanded the pool of talents from which he has always picked the most suitable for any assignment.

Before President Buhari Returns Home

By Dele Momodu

Fellow Nigerians, something major is happening in our dear beloved country and it is very positive. Every disappointment they say is a blessing. While we are very sad that our President, Muhammadu Buhari, has not been feeling too well for some time now and needs treatment and recuperation abroad, I now believe that God wants him to also have some time for sober and deep reflection. Someone asked me about two weeks ago, on Twitter if I have given up on the Buhari government? My answer was an emphatic NO! And the reason I gave was simple and straight-forward enough: I believe in miracles. 

 

*Buhari and Osinbajo

What has happened in Nigeria in the past few weeks, even days, can only be a testimony to that miracle I prophesised. When President Buhari left Nigeria he formally wrote to the Senate putting his Vice-President in charge as Acting President until he returns. That singular act which is merely a repetition of what was done during previous extended personal visits abroad by the President is salutary as it is stellar and itself heralded the transformation in this government that we are witnessing. It seems to me that President Buhari knew that his government needed some change in direction, some fillip, and in his infinite wisdom chose a subtle way to initiate that change without seeming to jettison his kitchen cabinet. 

When I flew out of Lagos to Johannesburg last Monday, February 20, 2017, a US dollar was selling for about 520 naira in the omnipotent black market. As at Thursday, it was selling at around 475 Naira. By yesterday, Friday 24 February 2017 the Naira was exchanging at about 460 Naira to the Dollar.  What a difference a week makes.  This remarkable resurgence of the Naira is coming on the heels of new policies and directives that the CBN has been mandated to put in place by the rejuvenated economic team that the Acting President is the driving force.

Not just that, I received a report from Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi that the Acting President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo, paid an unscheduled visit to the Murtala Muhammed International Airport on Thursday, February 23, 2016, and caught the airport officials napping. My joy knew no bounds. Only last Saturday, I had complained bitterly about that unfortunate airport on this very page. 

In the past seven years, I must have written countless times about that that gory airport. It was one of the reasons I disliked President Jonathan’s government because it had done a wishy-washy renovation of the place and was celebrating it as if we can now compete with some of the best airports in Africa (note that I did not mention Dubai, Europe or America). I took pictures of dead escalators, comatose elevators, jet bridges in blatant darkness, leaking roofs, cranky conveyor belts, flooded and stinking toilets, murky basements, potential structural deficiencies from a disused underground car park and generally an airport in various stages of disrepair, dilapidation and decay. We did what we could to alert our leaders to the monumental disgrace at that airport. 

The Hypocrisy Of President Buhari And El-Rufai, His Mini Me

By Reno Omokri

 With President Muhammadu Buhari's lawyer's ₦500,000 'gift' to Justice Adeniyi Ademola while the certificate case was being tried before that judge and with the Secretary to the Government of the Federation's Grasscuttergate scandal, can we all stop pretending and accept that the anti corruption war is dead?

*President Buhari and Gov El-Rufai

I believe I now know the reason why God allowed President Buhari to come back to power. It was to expose him for who he really is. Not a saint, but a hypocrite!

A hypocrite of the highest order. A so called anti corruption crusader who writes letters to cover his corrupt Secretary to the Government of the Federation and whose lawyer gives gifts to a justice that is being tried for collecting gifts from others. Do as I say, not as I do!

Things were already bad enough until the President's spokesman released his statement trying to justify the 'gift'! 

When Femi Adesina, President Muhammadu Buhari's spokesman, says PMB's lawyers ₦500,000 payment to Justice Ademola was a 'gift' not a bribe he must think that Nigerians are on the bottom of the ladder in the rational thinking food chain!

So if I take a bribe and call it a 'gift', according to Femi Adesina, it automatically transforms from corruption to 'gift'? So President Buhari believes in the Transformation Agenda after all! Who would have thought so! 

So why can President Buhari's lawyer give gifts but Andrew Yakubu cannot accept 'gift'? The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission should just release everybody they are trying because they took 'gifts' not bribe. After all, President Buhari and his lawyer have shown us the way!

The Justice Ademola that is currently being tried is accused of taking bribes because people gave him gifts. So why were their gifts proceeds of corruption and Lawyer Awodein's (Buhari's lawyer) a proceed of friendship?

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, a bribe is defined thus:

Buhari Is Not Coming Back!

By Toyin Dawodu

There is a saying in Yoruba Land: “Orun a re mabo.”

Translation: No one comes back from the dead.

Buhari may not be dead, but he might as well be – too sick to rule, too greedy to leave.

*Buhari 

Do I wish Buhari dead? Hell no! I wish him well. But as the president of Nigeria, he needs to either serve in his full capacity as president, or immediately resign. There is no third option here, at least not one that benefits Nigerians.

For weeks, Buhari’s administration has been reporting that he is healthy, that he is simply on an extended trip to London for medical tests. He has been away for weeks, and his administration is unwilling or unable to tell Nigerians if or when their president will return, according to the LA Times.

So, what we know for sure is even if Buhari is not sick - which is improbable, considering his appearance of late - and he is just more comfortable spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on his current medical tour instead of getting these “medical tests” done at the State House Clinic Abuja, the fact remains he so  preoccupied with his health that he is unable to lead his country. And Nigeria does not seem to have another leader poised to take his place.

I agree with Okey Ndibe that Buhari should step down.

$2.5 Million Set For President Mugabe’s 93rd Birthday Bash

*Flanked by family and friends, Mugabe
cuts his 92nd Birthday Cake

The ruling party of Zimbabwe is reportedly looking to spend some $2.5 million on President Robert Mugabe’s 93rd birthday celebration on February 21, a media report said on Wednesday.

“Each of the ten provinces is expected to [participate in raising the] $2.5 million for the ceremony.

“They expect to raise it through provincial structures, individuals, private companies, parastatals and local authorities,” Zanu PF party officials said.

However, opposition parties have attacked Mugabe for wasting money on extravagant revelry while “93% of Zimbabweans are wallowing in poverty caused by his incompetence and misrule”, NewZimbabwe.com reported.

APC: Govt Of Liars, By Liars And For Liars

By Dr. Arthur Agwuncha Nwankwo
Recently, a senior official of the Buhari administration came out on national television to tell us that Nigeria is now the second largest producer of rice in the world. This is the most ridiculous claim I have heard in the last couple of years.

 

*Dr. Nwankwo

I know that the Buhari administration, even those that can be numbered among his kitchen cabinet, is full of clowns and morons bereft of intellect; but honestly I didn’t know that somebody can be this naïve and crass to come and tell us that Nigeria is a world class producer of rice.

Why do people lie so brazenly? Does he think that he is talking to kindergartens? I do not understand why this government has made lying an article of faith and governance. How can anybody in his right senses make such useless claim?

How and where did he get the statistics? If his claim is true why is a bag of local rice still going for between N18000 to N20000? If this claim were true why would the UN only a few days ago, include Nigeria among famine-threatened countries in Africa alongside Sudan and Somalia?

I know that Nigeria is not famous for statistical records. This is a country that does not know its population; the number of unemployed graduates; the number of the poor; does not even know the number of secondary schools in the country or anything for that matter.

Yet this is a country that wants to pay monthly stipends of N5000 to every unemployed graduate and the poor. As a matter of fact, I have come to the conclusion that APC is a fraud. Democracy is said to be government of the people, by the people and for the people.

But strangely, the APC government has become “government of liars and thieves, by liars and thieves and for liars and thieves”. I want you to understand that this type of APC government is the perfect setting that creates deep-seated social resentment and which also leads to the inevitable death of nations.

*Dr. Nwankwo, an eminent intellectual, author and publisher shared these thoughts on his facebook page

Fashola: How Not To Work

By Emeka Nnaka

It was like a shuttle in a projectile – let’s call it the BRF projectile. Of course, BRF being Babatunde Raji Fashola, the three-in-one federal minister in charge of Power, Works and Housing. He has been on a blitzing visit of major road projects across the country. Starting a few weeks back with on-going roads in the southeast zone of Nigeria, his last run was across seven states of the Niger Delta – in three days.

*Fashola in Benue State (pix: Guardian)

As one of the reporters in the shuttle, my verdict is: how not to work. Imagine starting a trip by road from Calabar to Uyo, then Aba to Yenegoa, Port Harcourt to Sapele and then Benin City – in just three days!

On paper, it may look easy and straight-forward, but out there on the poorly kept and dangerous Nigerian roads, it surely is an excruciating way to carry out a task. Of course, there are modern digital mapping devices that can locate projects even in the most remote outposts and highlight them with real life high definition. But understandably, such facilities are not available to the ministry right now but that must be the way forward. 

The first call of the inspection was the over 200 kilometres Calabar – Akampa – Ikom – Ogoja – Ugep – Katsina-Ala highway. A long-winding, seemingly interminable and indeed treacherous road. After travelling for about two-hours of twisting and turning and side-tracking endless streaming of heavy-duty trucks, it turned out that one of them had upended ahead before the project site. BRF had to make a U-turn, missing the first target.

This road which connects about four states and leads up to Makurdi in Benue State is as strategic as highways go. It is a single-carriage road, which is bad enough; but it is dilapidated and derelict in many sections. When the rains come, according to Cross Rivers State deputy governor, many sections are flooded impassable.

The contractor, Messrs Sermatech that had abandoned site for over two years for lack of payment is back at work. He was mandated to commence remediation work quickly before the rains. Important too is that hundreds of people are back to work once again: goods and service will move and zonal economy will flourish.

From the Akwa Ibom axis, the Ikot-Ekpene-Aba Road has suffered total collapse at Umuakpo. The Minister had to do a detour through bush paths and remote village tracks to re-enter the highway. This road that connects two very important towns of Ikot-Ekpene in Akwa Ibom State and Aba in Abia State was also awarded but unfunded. The contractor abandoned site. They are back now.

On the Aba-Port Harcourt section of the now notorious Enugu-Port Harcourt highway, BRF and his team did on foot, a very long stretch of the project under-going massive renewal and expansion on foot. It has numerous on-site workers and as we learnt, is generating hundreds of auxiliary jobs in material supplies, food and drinks vending.

Shifting Narratives Over Buhari’s Health

By Robert Obioha

Since President Buhari left Nigeria for London on medical leave, over a month ago, Nigerians have been fed with differing and sometimes conflicting statements over the health status of the number one citizen. And because Buhari’s media handlers dish uncoordinated tales, which most Nigerians now take with a pinch of salt, the rumour mills are agog with scary tales, especially the uncontrolled social media, which the All Progressives Congress (APC) used to its advantage to come to power in 2015.

*Buhari 

The hapless citizens, after waiting anxiously for Buhari’s return, which has no fixed date, have tended to believe information emanating from the rumour mills. They no longer believe their government and its numerous spokespersons because their chaotic tales sound like fiction to majority of Nigerians. Rumour thrives in an atmosphere where facts are hoarded; where there is attempt to misinform the people; and where truth is deliberately hidden or utterly distorted. This is basically the corner the APC government has literally boxed itself now.

When the president failed to return after the expiration of the 10-day’ vacation, Nigerians were told that he needs to do more medical tests as advised by his doctors. While this drama was still unfolding, the presidency insisted that the first citizen is ‘hale and hearty’, a phrase that is fast losing its intended meaning in Nigeria’s peculiar case. They even said that the president was not in any London hospital, that is to say that he was not hospitalized but having a good rest at Nigeria’s House in London.

When the president reportedly transmitted another letter to the National Assembly asking for more time for another round of medical tests without stating exactly when his leave will be over, the anxiety over his health status heightened and Nigerians started asking questions which Aso Villa handlers were unable to provide credible responses. Perhaps, they do not have adequate information on the president’s illness or they are just hoarding it from Nigerians or saying what they are asked to tell worried Nigerians.

Nigerians are more worried not because a president cannot be sick or seek for better medical treatment abroad considering our comatose healthcare system; they are worried because they have travelled this ugly path before when former president Umaru Yar’Adua was sick and the details were hidden from Nigerians. Incidentally, Buhari hails from the same Katsina State with Yar’Adua, although from Daura axis. During the Yar’Adua episode, those in information apparatus of APC now then demanded for a daily update on Yar’Adua’s illness, which is legitimate.