Nigeria: Script For A Final Looting Spree

 By Ochereome Nnanna

The Good Book says “by their fruits ye shall know them”. When you dress a person in borrowed robes just to show off, William Shakespeare (Macbeth Act 5, Scene 2) says it will be “(hanging) loose about him like a giant’s robe upon a dwarfish thief”. Before 2003, the Finance portfolio of the Nigerian economy had always been handled by men. After his frivolous first term, former President Olusegun Obasanjo decided to get serious in his second. Nigeria had a debt overhang of $32bn owed to the Paris Club alone.

*Buhari 

Obasanjo saw that his global gallivanting and begging for debt forgiveness was not cutting ice. He needed to do more than merely advertise his “beautiful” mug on the streets of Western capitals.

Buhari’s Unholy Romance With Niger Republic

 By Ochereome Nnanna

President Muhammadu Buhari’s romance with Niger Republic has become an affront to the national interest of Nigeria. When he was sworn-in as an elected president in 2015, he went to Mamadou Issoufou’s presidential palace in Niamey, Niger Republic, to celebrate. They gave him the reception of a conquering Fulani warlord: a white horse and sword. 

         *President Buhari with Mahamadou Issoufou 

of Niger Republic 

I found that curious. How can a Nigerian leader celebrate his electoral victory in a foreign country and not Daura, his supposed hometown in Nigeria? The answer has since been provided through Buhari’s policy actions in the past five plus years. We have since learnt that Buhari is a first-generation Nigerian whose father, Ardo Adamu Buhari, a duck seller, had migrated from Niger, settled in Nigeria and married a Nigerian woman, Zulaihat. 

The Real Enemies Of Nigeria

By Ochereome Nnanna

Last week Wednesday, the President of the Senate, Dr. Bukola Saraki, was forced, on behalf of his colleagues, to pronounce the Inspector-General of Police, Alhaji Ibrahim Idris as an “enemy of our democracy.” 

He declared him a persona non-grata and unfit to hold public office both within and outside Nigeria. This was after Idris refused on three occasions to honour the lawmakers’ summonses to answer critical questions bordering on the nation’s security challenges and the treatment the Police meted to one of their colleagues, Senator Dino Melaye.

*President Buhari 

 As often pointed out in this column, the National Assembly is not about the specific individuals elected into it or occupying its high offices at any given time. It is about an institution that represents the people of Nigeria who elected them to be in government on their behalf. They are there to make laws, supervise the ways the funds of the federation are spent, perform oversight functions on the ways the government is implementing the budget and the laws of the country and act as effective checks to ensure the Executive does not drag us back to dictatorship and impunity. 

President Buhari’s Queer Blandishment Of A Kleptocrat

By Ochereome Nnanna

 President Muhammadu Buhari gave hints of how his supporters will enter the upcoming electioneering fray when he met his Buhari support groups in the Presidential Villa on Tuesday last week: it’s going to be a gale of lies all the way. I am not referring to his allegation of $16 dollars spent on power projects “without power”. Figures that have been bandied down the years – from $3billion to $6 billion to $10 billion to $16 billion.

*President Buhari 

This reminds us of how former Central Bank of Nigeria Governor (now the Emir of Kano) Mallam Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, had in February 2014 bandied figures as the amount “diverted” by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, instead of being remitted to the Federation Account. He started with $20 billion, brought it down to $10 billion and readjusted it to $12 billion. That is Nigeria for you. Others use figures to inform and educate. We use ours to confuse and promote falsehood. 

Army Should Produce Nnamdi Kanu

By Ochereome Nnanna

The excesses of the leader of the proscribed Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, needed to be put in check, no doubt. But I think the Army totally mismanaged it and put those who signed his sureties at risk. In April this year, Justice Binta Murtala Nyako of the Abuja High Court brought relief to the tensed atmosphere wrought by the continued illegal detention of Kanu and granted him bail on rather draconian conditions.

*Nnamdi Kanu

Apart from being barred from granting interviews, addressing rallies and being in a group of more than ten people at any time, he was required to procure three sureties for the sum of N100 million each, one of whom must be a Jewish religious leader (Kanu being a self-acclaimed adherent of the Jewish religion).

Contrary to expectations, the sureties stepped forward. One of them was a notable politician, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, who represents Abia South Senatorial Zone which covers Aba, the hotbed of the Biafran agitation and the wellspring of Igbo nationalism.

Apart from possible political opportunism, I understood Abaribe’s readiness to accept the risky challenge of standing surety for Kanu. He must have felt duty-bound to obey his constituents’ wishes. I think Abaribe was also convinced Kanu would not jump bail. Yes indeed, Kanu violated all the conditions attached to his bail, except the one that concerned Abaribe and the other sureties: jumping bail.

Nigerian Army Must Re-Brand Itself

By Ochereome Nnanna

If the current Nigerian leadership still has any conscience, it must be shocked and sobered by the reaction of the people of the South East over the unfounded “Army vaccine” rumour that took place last week.

It was a conclusive proof that due to the prevailing unsavoury atmosphere foisted by the regime on major national institutions, a section of the Nigerian populace no longer sees the Nigerian Army as their own. They are now feared and despised, rightly or wrongly, such that even when they are involved in noble activities in the interest of the common man, they are suspected.

Following the outbreak of the monkey pox virus epidemic, the story, manufactured from devil knows where, made the rounds in the theatre of Operation Python Dance, that some individuals dressed in army uniform had invaded schools in Imo and Abia States forcibly administering vaccines to spread the monkey pox diseases within the Igbo population. Unfortunately, people believed this story, even though no one had any evidence to that effect.

Nigeria: Our Intractable Northern Burdens

By Ochereome Nnanna

 What happened at the Senate on Wednesday, 26th July 2017 infuriated those who have been clamouring for restructuring and true federalism.  But, it elated two other segments of the Nigerian society which, funny enough, see each other as sworn enemies:

(a) those who want to maintain the status quo,

(b) the separatists.

Those who want to maintain the status quo got what they wanted when the Senate voted 48 to 46 to throw out the proposal for the devolution of powers to the states. It required 72 votes to alter the constitution, subject to the verdict of Members of the House of Representatives. The separatists also rejoiced because, having lost faith in the possibility of restructuring and devolution of powers, they want complete separation from Nigeria to establish their own sovereign republic where they can swim or sink based on their abilities.

The separatists know that the failure of the vote for restructuring and devolution of powers will vindicate their position. It will win them more converts in the East and nudge more groups outside the East to also seek self determination. I would have been surprised if the vote had turned out differently. Just before that day when the Senate had to vote electronically to avoid controversy as to where majority of their members stood, Arewa Youth Forum, AYF) responded to the move towards restructuring by issuing death threats. 

Nigeria: Living With Two Presidents

By Ochereome Nnanna

Section 145 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999, (As Amended) has this to say about the power of the Vice President in the absence of the President:

“Whenever the President transmits to the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives a written declaration that he is proceeding on vacation or that he is otherwise unable to discharge the functions of his office, until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary such functions shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President”. 

*President Buhari and VP Osinbajo

Because of the cynical nature of Nigerian politics which is sadly rooted in religion, ethnicity, sectionalism and familial interests (factors that corrupt and debilitate our constitutional democracy), a constitutional enactment as precise and self-explanatory as the Section 145 is still made to seem hard to grapple with.

President Muhammadu Buhari, who has done very well in respecting the Constitution by transmitting such letters to the leaders of the National Assembly on each of the two occasions he went abroad to tend to his health problems, however, introduced confusion into the issue when he said Vice President Osinbajo would “coordinate” the activities of government in his absence. The President was heavily criticised for this strange definition of the status of the Acting President, though it hardly matters since it is the Constitution, not the President that defines roles played by everyone in our democracy.

This is the second regime in which our President had to be taken out of the country for an extended stay out of power. When the case of the late President Umaru Yar’Adua took place late in November 2009 he did not transmit any letter as Buhari does. By February 2010, murmurs over a power vacuum became cacophonous and Yar’ Adua’s handlers caused the British Broadcasting Corporation to air an “interview” he granted to show he was not incapacitated.

Magu's Rejection: I Stand With The Senate (II)

By Ochereome Nnanna

Having examined the retired Colonel Hameed Ali versus the Senate saga, let us take a look on another contentious issue: the Ibrahim Magu screening controversy.

President Buhari and Sen Pres Saraki 

So many people have said their minds on this matter, which is their constitutional right. There are those who blame the Senate for the long-drawn impasse and difficulty in getting Ibrahim Mustapha Magu confirmed as the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. Some have alleged that in rejecting Magu’s candidacy, the Senate constitutes itself into a “parallel government”. Others say they want to “collect the power” from President Muhammadu Buhari and frustrate him from implementing the “change” he promised Nigerians.

The one I found most interesting was the submission of Chief Robert Clark, a respected lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, with usually sound perspectives on legal and current affairs. He appeared on Channels TV and was all over the place, lamenting that the Senate’s treatment of Magu was “a slap on the face of the President; a slap on the faces of Nigerians”.

The impression being given by all these shades of opinion is that the Presidency has played its own part neatly only to be messed up by the Senate. Another impression is that the Federal Government is all about President Muhammadu Buhari, the Presidency he commands and the Cabinet he has at his disposal. In other words, the Executive Branch alone is the Government. On both counts I beg to disagree. First of all, let us track the facts of this story.

Following the sack of Ibrahim Lamorde as the EFCC Chairman, Magu, another police officer, was nominated as his successor in acting capacity. One would have expected that President Buhari, cognisant of the sensitive nature of the EFCC Chairman’s duties, would immediately send Magu’s name to Senate for confirmation. Instead, Buhari delayed this issue between 9th November 2015 and 14th July 2016, when his Deputy, Professor Yemi Osinbajo as Acting President, submitted Magu’s name to the Senate for confirmation when the President was away on his foreign medicals.

Olusegun Obasanjo At ‘80′

By Ochereome Nnanna

I have only encountered President Olusegun Obasanjo twice. The first time was in 2001 when his Media Adviser, the late great journalist, Mr. Tunji Oseni, invited me to Aso Villa for the Presidential Media Chat series. The second event was quite dramatic. I visited a friend, Osita Chidoka, in his office in August 2007.

 

*Obasanjo 

He had just been appointed Corps Marshall of the Federal Roads Safety Commission, FRSC. At lunch time, he asked me to accompany  him to see “someone” at the Hilton, Abuja. When we arrived at the hotel, I became suspicious when we rode the elevator to the topmost floor and Chidoka led me to the end of a hallway with two coated security guards on duty.

It was then that I knew we were seeing a VVIP. After signing us in, Chidoka stood aside as a bespectacled elderly man still wearing shabby bedclothes (at 2.00pm) came out. Everyone in the room stood reverently. He bantered with Chidoka and I took a closer look. It was former President Obasanjo!

Chidoka introduced me: “Baba, this is Ochereome Nnanna of Vanguard…” Obasanjo, who was already about to shake my hands, quickly withdrew it as if I had turned into a cobra. He gave me a hostile stare and walked away. I whispered to Chidoka that I would wait for him downstairs.

All this drama apart, the lesson I took away from the encounter was that, contrary to Obasanjo’s pretensions that he does not read Nigerian newspapers, he does. His reaction to me just proved it. I have never hidden my disdain for the recycling of the military generals who fought the civil war as elected “civilian” presidents.

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.

A Peep Into Osinbajo’s Presidency

By Ochereome Nnanna

Within these twenty months of  the regime of President Muhammadu Buhari, we have been privileged to see two “faces” of his presidency. The first face is the General Muhammadu Buhari character of it, while the second is the Professor Yemi Osinbajo coloration. These two faces are dramatically different.

 

*Buhari and Osinbajo

Let us look at them briefly. Muhammadu Buhari, being the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic of Nigeria is the man majority of the Nigerian electorate gave their votes to as the flag bearer of the All Progressives Congress, APC. Many Nigerians saw him as an experienced leader; a man of integrity who would fight corruption and secure the nation from Boko Haram and other security threats, thereby, giving the sluggish economy the impetus to jumpstart itself back to buoyancy.

At least, that was the logic his promoters from the Asiwaju Ahmed Tinubu presented before Nigerians. He looked very tailor-made to deliver the “change” the party promised Nigerians. Some of us had our reservations because we had seen the other side of him which did not recommend him as the person to lead the country at this juncture of her march to nationhood.

But when he assumed the mantle of power, Buhari started confirming our fears about him, rather than justifying the confidence of his supporters and other unbiased onlookers. He was slow and sloppy in putting his government together, very much unlike the experienced leader whom we all expected to swing into action immediately after being sworn-in. It took him six months to put together his Federal Executive Council, unlike the new American President, Donald J. Trump, whose cabinet was already in place as he started work.

Up till today, Buhari has not fully constituted his government. One of the most perplexing of Buhari’s failings when it comes to the appointment of people to crucial positions is the Chief Justice of Nigeria, (CJN) saga. When the former CJN, Mahmud Mohammed retired in November last year, the National Judicial Council, NJC, recommended Hon. Justice Walter Nkanu Onnoghen to Buhari for onward transmission to the Senate for confirmation.

Rather than doing so, Buhari swore Onnoghen in as Acting CJN. It was a queer move which the President, up till today when he is away on medical tourism abroad, has refused to explain his motive for it. He left us all guessing. Some of us guessed, against the background of his ethnic and sectional predilections in loading up the commanding points of the Federal Government with Northern Muslims, that Buhari did not want a Southerner as CJN.

Perhaps, he was waiting for three months to elapse, hoping that Onnoghen would retire and the NJC would cave in and nominate the next in line, Justice Tanko Mohammed from Bauchi. That would effectively put the leadership of the Legislative, Executive and Judiciary back in Northern Muslim hands in line with Buhari’s preferred, nepotism-fed governing template which is against the demands of the constitution that top positions in government must be shared to reflect the Federal Character and give all sections a sense of belonging.

Buhari’s Python Christmas Gift To Ndigbo

By Ochereome Nnanna

The Christmas season is here. In no other part of the country is the Yuletide celebrated as much as it is in the South East and South-South (the heart of Nigeria’s Christendom). It is a time when a chunk of the Igbo Diaspora returns home for the annual communal and family reunions.

Even though it has long been predicted that this year’s Christmas is going to be hard on all Nigerians because of the economic recession (depression, some economists now say), something special is in the offing. President Muhammadu Buhari, through the Nigerian Army, has a special Christmas gift for the people of the South East: a military operation code-named: “Operation Python Dance”.

According to a statement signed by Colonel Sagir Musa, the Deputy Director, Army Public Relations, 82 Division of the Nigerian Army, Enugu, this operation has already started on 27th November to end on 27th December, 2016.

According to Musa: “the prevalent security issues such as armed robbery, kidnapping, abduction, herdsmen-farmers clashes, communal clashes and violent secessionist attacks among others will be targeted”.

The statement went on: “Above all, an elaborate Civil-Military Cooperation (CIMIC) Line of Operation has been planned during the Exercise. Interestingly, Nigerian Army Corps and Services would conduct activities such as medical outreach, repairs of roads, schools and other infrastructure across the South East Region”.

Before we examine the meaning and implications of this exercise, let us reflect briefly on the army’s current operational engagements nationwide, particularly the language in which they are coded. This will offer insight into the psychological mindset of our nation’s elite fighting forces: the Nigerian Army. Have you noticed that the motto of our Army is written in Arabic, then translated into English as: “Victory is from God alone”? I keep wondering how and when Arabic became part of our official lingua franca, such that it is boldly used to write the motto of an Army that supposedly belongs to all Nigerians. I thought English was our sole, official language? For that matter, how did Arabic get mixed up with our national currency, the Naira? What was the rationale for it, and when did we sit down to agree to do it? Could it have been inserted there with the impunity of some vested interests which has been growing wild of late?

Dele Cole’s Nonexistent ‘Igbo’ Slaves

By Ochereome Nnanna

On  Tuesday, 30th August 2016, at exactly 10.41am, I received a text from an unidentified frequent sender of messages to my platforms whenever he reads topics that agitate his mind, whether written by me or others.

He wrote: “Greetings. How can Dr. Patrick Dele Cole, in today’s Vanguard Newspaper…assert that the Igbo were slaves of the Ijaw? If, for the purpose of argument, one or two Igbo men were captured, held as slaves, or were sold into slavery in those days, how does that translate to the Igbo (an entire ethnic nationality) becoming slaves to the Ijaw…?”

Dele Cole’s article was entitled: “Nigerians And Their Origin”. He was displaying his rich knowledge of how people, not just in Nigeria but also in different parts of the world, acquired their current ethno-racial identities; how some powerful conquerors like the Jihadist Fulani, “dropped” their language and adopted those of their majority subjects, the Hausa, in order get assimilated and rule over them effectively.

Cole, at the tail end of his very interesting tapestry of sampling, however, made a conclusion I found both curious and contradictory compared to his earlier conclusion about the “Igbo” and “Ijaw” (I am putting these words in inverted commas for a reason that will be explained shortly). According to Cole: “Who are the Hausa-Fulani? The French of Normandy conquered England in 1066 and adopted their language. They were not known as French-English but English…Thus in the North of Nigeria they (Fulani) should be known as Hausa”.

Before I go on, let me correct Cole. The Fulani never dropped their language. Though they adopted the Hausa and other languages in areas they conquered (such as Nupe in Bida and Yoruba in Ilorin) they still maintained their Fulbe language and identity. In fact, former Governor Sule Lamido of Jigawa State, a Fulani royal who hails from Bamaina in Birnin Kudu Local Government of the state, told me he did not “learn” Hausa until he went to school.

I Reject President Buhari’s ‘One Nigeria’

By Ochereome Nnanna

We are now concentrating on the militants to know how many they are, especially in terms of groupings, leadership and to plead with them to try and give Nigeria a chance.

“I assure them that the saying by Gen. Yakubu Gowon that ‘to keep Nigeria one is a task that must be done’ still stands. In those days we never thought of oil all we were concerned about was one Nigeria. “So please pass this message to the militants, that one Nigeria is not negotiable and they had better accept it. The Nigerian Constitution is clear as to what they should get and I assure them, there will be justice.” – President Muhammadu Buhari, to some residents of Abuja who paid him Sallah homage recently.

*Buhari 

President Buhari President Buhari’s off-the-cuff statement above provides an opportunity for us to pick the mindsets of Nigerians on what they really mean by the concept of “One Nigeria”. It is obvious that “One Nigeria” does not have a single meaning for all of us; going by the way we carry on, especially when we find ourselves in positions of power as Buhari currently does.

Let me describe my own idea of One Nigeria. It is a crossbreed between the Zikist and Awoist visions of the unity of Nigeria. Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe, the father of African Nationalism and foremost exponent of Nigeria’s independence, believed in a Nigeria where all citizens would share one vision and national aspiration, irrespective of their tribes, tongues, regions, religions, majority or minority status. That is the kind of nationalism practised in Ghana, a country whose foremost independence proponent and Pan-Africanist, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, was inspired by the Great Zik.

In Ghana, tribe, region and religion are no impediments to national unity. That is why the longest-ruling head of state, John Jerry Rawlings (a minority), was able to seize power and sanitise Ghana. He laid a solid foundation for today’s success story. Contrast this with Nigeria, where an earlier attempt by Chukwuma Kaduna Nzeogwu and his colleagues ended up being given an ethno-religious and regional toga. It resulted in a civil war at the end of which Nigeria became a colonial booty of Arewa (the Muslim North). The Awoist version of One Nigeria recognised the differences between the various groups and sought to establish a structure in which all these groups could live within their geopolitical enclaves and aspire competitively for the greatness of a united nation. Nobody’s ethnic, religious or cultural hang-ups would slow down the progress of others who do not share these hang-ups, and yet all would belong equally and equitably to one nation in spite of their complex diversity. This arrangement is often described as “true federalism”.

So, in this Nigeria of my dreams, those who want to practice Islamic Sharia in their home zone can go ahead. Those who want to cut off the hands of their thieves and overpopulate their home zones with illiterate citizens will not be an impediment to my section which wants to exercise population control, give good education to the young people and offer them a modern, civilised lifestyle comparable to the best in the world. You use what you produce to cater for your people but pay rents to the Federal Government to maintain the common services that bind us together as people of One Nigeria. But you do not use your landmass and population to parasite upon and terrorise others and suck their resources dry in the name of “One Nigeria” which, you insist, is “non-negotiable”.

Ken Nnamani And Co’s Beggarly Villa Trip

By Ochereome Nnanna

I would not have commented on the recent appearance by a group of political adventurers in Aso Villa if not for the fact that they were described as “Igbo leaders” in some sections of the media. If they had simply gone as All Progressives Congress (APC) members from the South East visiting the President and leader of their party for whatever purposes, it would have passed as a non-event (though I have not seen APC leaders from other geopolitical zones going similarly cap-in-hand for special attention of President Muhammadu Buhari).

They called their gathering South East Group for Change (SEGC), probably a name they coined just for the Aso Rock trip, as nothing of such had been heard before now. Led by Mr. Ken Nnamani, a former Senate President, some of the known names included Mr. Osita Izunaso, a former one-term senator; Mr. Ernest Ndukwe, a two-term Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Mr. Chris Akomas, a former Deputy Governor of Abia State and Chief George Moghalu.

Apart from Moghalu, the rest were in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) when the going was good. They owed the high public offices attached to their names to the PDP, and now that the APC has become the new party with the “knife and yam”, they have trooped over there to reap where they did not sow. They are political opportunists, and it shocks many of Nnamani’s former admirers that he has degenerated to this level after once seeming a strong presidential possibility from Igboland.

Of this lot, only Moghalu is a genuine, thoroughbred APC leader. From 1999, Moghalu has been in the movement that eventually transmogrified into the APC – from the All People’s Party (APP) to the All Nigerian People’s Party (ANPP) to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to the APC. He is a true party man; a genuine politician who stuck with the former opposition party through sun, rain, storms and high winds until it finally became the ruling party.

Buhari told us that the reason he violated the constitutional principle of federal character in the appointment of his inner government, was that he distributed positions to those who toiled and suffered with him over the years as a reward for their loyalty. I wonder how Moghalu could not qualify for appointment since he had been one of Buhari’s faithful point men in the South East since 2003 when he first ran for president. He was in that movement long before Dr. Chris Ngige decamped from the PDP. Even though no communiqué or media statement was issued after that visit (Buhari, knowing them for the opportunists they were, probably had nothing tangible to tell them), I read a most annoying analysis credited to an unnamed member of the group.

Atiku Should Define ‘Restructuring’

By Ochereome Nnanna

After one year of silence, Vice President Atiku Abubakar seized the opportunity of a book launch in Abuja last week to break his silence. He reviewed the state of the nation under President Muhammadu Buhari, which is what pretty much everyone else has done in the past one week. Of all that he said, I was intrigued by his call for a “restructuring” of the federation and the shade he threw at the leadership of Buhari, when he observed: “we also have a leadership that is not prepared to learn from the past and the leadership that is not prepared to lead”. Of this snide on Buhari, observers have already determined that it was Atiku’s first step towards a 2019 challenge for the presidency.

 

*Atiku

This may well be so because we all know about Atiku’s insatiable appetite for presidential contests, of which he has made five record bids in 1993, 2003, 2007, 2011 and 2015. Atiku’s former boss, ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, was the first to caper a similar political double shuffle some weeks ago when he described Buhari as a leader who is good in military matters (such as the fight against Boko Haram) but incompetent in economic and diplomatic areas. He gave the impression that after Buhari defeats Boko Haram another leader would be found (obviously the self-installed tin god of Nigerian politics, Obasanjo himself) to solve our economic problems. It is obvious that the mesmerism of Buhari is beginning to thaw as we steam towards the starting blocks of the next political transition, and it is going to be hot inside the All Progressives Congress, APC where, I am firmly convinced, Buhari will make a bid for a second term.

Atiku will definitely feature prominently in it, barring any earth-shaking circumstances. I am surprised that Atiku described himself as a “long term campaigner” for restructuring. Honestly, I have never come across that notion before. What is known to most Nigerians is that Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been a long term campaigner for true federalism and restructuring. For some quaint reasons, he has gone mute on this since the APC seized the reins of the Federal Government a year ago. It is on record that the APC had it as one of its long-winded litany of campaign promises. The party and the Federal Government it produced have backed out of many of these promises, but it’s not yet on record that the promise to establish true federalism is one of those.

Yet not a single word has been breathed of it either by Buhari, the APC or even its chief protagonist, Tinubu. If Buhari meant to implement this policy, I am sure he would have said so in his maiden broadcast on May 29th 2015. He would have seized the opportunity of his May 29th 2016 to spell out the pillars of the programme, with timetable attached. But of course, we have seen that Buhari’s fabled body language is not pointing towards any bloody restructuring of the federation. 

Buhari’s Archaic Approach To Niger Delta Problems

By Ochereome Nnanna

 Two Nigerians from Katsina State have been Presidents of Nigeria in the past ten years. The first was Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, who assumed power on May 29th 2007. He was an academic from a Fulani elite family. The core of his government comprised mainly Northerners because unlike his late elder brother, Major General Shehu Yar’Adua, he never really had much opportunity to interact with the wider Nigerian society before he joined politics. He was imposed as President on the nation by – you know who – former President Olusegun Obasanjo, his immediate predecessor in those days when the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) did just as it liked without any challenge from any quarters.

*Buhari 

Having finished his eight years as the Governor of Katsina State, Yar’Adua had wanted to go back to the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria, teach Chemistry pro bono and look after his failing health. Next, Obasanjo went to the creeks of the Niger Delta and dragged in another gentleman who had already won the PDP ticket for Governor of Bayelsa State, Dr. Goodluck Ebele “Azikiwe” Jonathan. I remember that day in November 2006 when Obasanjo paraded Yar’Adua and Jonathan on television as the Police usually parade crime suspects. Jonathan in particular looked like a school boy on a forced errand.

The president-to-be never knew his Vice-president-to-be apart from the fact that they sometimes met as governors. When eventually they were elected into office, the militancy in the Niger Delta was at its peak. Many analysts had argued that Obasanjo was forced to bring Jonathan into the presidential pairing as a peace offering to the Ijaw militants and their loud and troublesome “father”, Chief Edwin Clark, in place of the more fancied and popular Dr. Peter Odili, the Rivers State governor. That Obasanjo bowed to the Clark/Ijaw faction of the South-South People’s Assembly (SSPA) rather than the more broad-based pro-Odili faction led by Ambassador Matthew Mbu/Raymond Dokpesi, was seen as an application of common sense. Obasanjo must have realised that ignoring the demands of Clark and his Ijaw militant tribesmen would keep the economic livewire of the nation in the Niger Delta at great risk.

The disruptions would never stop, and the economy would continue to suffer. When Yar’Adua assumed power, he came under pressure by hawks from his native Northern Nigeria to “crush” the Niger Delta militants. He actually mobilised the Nigerian troops towards that effect, but as an intelligent, wise and commonsensical leader he also listened to the argument of Niger Delta campaigners who were very rampant in the media, especially television. These included Dr. Chris Ekiyor; my sister, Ann Kio Briggs, Dr. Oronto Douglas, Comrade Joseph Evah, Dr. Ledum Mitee, Dokubo Asari and a host of others.

Most of them advised that rather than launching a full-scale military campaign to “crush” the militants as the Federal Government had already started doing when it attacked Gbaramatu Kingdom in Delta State in search of the Movement for the Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND) leader, Government Ekpemupolo (alias Tompolo), an offer of amnesty for voluntary disarmament of the militants should first be tried. Yar’ Adua sent his Vice President, Jonathan, to the creeks to discuss with his kinsmen. Eventually, by August 2009, the militants accepted the offer of amnesty and surrendered their arms. Thus, began the post-amnesty programmes, which saw the “repentant” militants being given education and training on various trades in Nigeria and abroad. The big boys or “ex-generals” got hefty contracts and became visible and loud in Abuja hotels and the Aso Villa, especially during the reign of Jonathan as President. In fact, the biggest ex-militant, Tompolo, was awarded multi-billion naira contracts to safeguard the network of oil pipelines in the Niger Delta and he also became a major player in the maritime industry. There was absolute quiet in the Niger Delta.

Fuel Price Hike: Buhari Must Apologise

By Ochereome Nnanna

 PRESIDENT  Muhammadu Buhari owes us apologies for the latest hike from N86.50k to N145 of the official pump price for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) announced on Thursday last week by his Deputy Minister of Petroleum, Dr. Emmanuel Kachikwu.

First, he must apologise to Nigerians, on behalf of himself, his political party, the All Progressives Congress, APC, his foremost apologist, Professor Tam David-West, Labour and the hired “civil society” groups who truncated the deregulation of the downstream sector of the petroleum industry in January 2012. Second, he must also apologise to his predecessor, ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, who lost his post-electoral “honeymoon” period early in 2012 when he stuck out his neck in an attempt to lay to rest, once and for all, the bogey of fuel scarcity and its attendant high cost and human suffering which have trailed the nation for nearly thirty years.

After maligning the Otuoke-born lecturer, he went back to implement a policy that Jonathan would have carried out four years ago if not for irresponsible and unpatriotic opposition. Whenever the deregulation of this sector is contemplated, people always say the timing is wrong without telling us when the timing will ever be right. Certainly, the timing for this steep hike is wrong. It comes so soon after the equally steep hike in the cost of electricity tariffs which the Federal Government through its Power, Works and Housing Minister, Babatunde Fashola, openly approves of.

It comes at a time when thousands of people are losing their jobs and most employers cannot pay the salaries of their workers because of the parlous economic situation brought about by low oil prices, the crash in the value of the naira and the inability of the Buhari administration to tackle them. To top it all, Labour is priming for a new national minimum wage of between N56,000 to N90,000. Now that the official price of petrol has been nearly doubled, who knows the amount that Labour will now ask for? If ever there was a right time for the deregulation of the downstream sector, the year 2012 was it. We had just emerged unscathed from the worldwide economic meltdown of 2008/2009. By 2012 our Brent crude was selling for $114.26 per barrel, a trend that was generally sustained until toward the end of 2014 when the tide of transitional political was in full swing.

Unlike now when economic activities are low, poverty rate is higher than ever and most investors have fled, there was money in the system then. The economy was even becoming increasingly “dollarised” as a result of oil-fed liquidity in the system. In fact, it was shortly after this that a review of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product terms showed that Nigeria had emerged as the largest economy in Africa and the continent’s number one investors’ destination. Nigeria could have weathered the shock of deregulation much more easily than now. But the opposition would have none of it. Labour unions went on strike.