Babysitting France In Africa

 By Owei Lakemfa

France is a problem. In Africa, it is a man-child fighting hard to retain its feeding bottle. The United Kingdom-based Socialist Labour organised a virtual conference of Africans to discuss this and the current crises in Africa, with an emphasis on the Francophone countries. Co-ordinator Tokunbo Oke, in commenting on the theme, “The Niger Coup: Imperialism and the Crisis of Francophone Africa”, lamented that to discuss, the African people have to surmount the obstacles of various European languages as they are either Anglophone, Francophone, Iberiaphone, or Luxophone.

Ndongo Samba Sylla, a Senegalese development economist and co-author of the book Africa’s Last Colonial Currency: The CFA Franc, noted that the recent coups in West and Central Africa occurred in the same Francophone Zone and that they are all landlocked. He said the repeated coups in these countries show they have weak institutions and remain underdeveloped.

Gabonese Coup: The Fault Is Not In The Electorate

 By Owei Lakemfa

The scenario has various strands of familiarity. I mean the military coup of Wednesday, August 30, 2023 that removed Gabonese President Ali Bongo Ondimba. An elected African dictator in a well-fortified Presidential Palace finds his palace has become his prison. It is like the fish realising that the water it is swimming in is boiling.

The Praetorian Guards who swore an oath to defend him even if it means losing their lives, are the same arrow head of the coup. The coup leader is, of course, the Head of the Presidential Republican Guard who only yesterday saluted the President, and today, he is the Head of State with the President as his Prisoner-in-Chief.

Consumption To Production Is Mythical With Neglected Producers

 By Owei Lakemfa

It appears that Nigerians are fairly attuned to the new sing-song that the country needs to move from consumption to production. However, discussions at a conference on Wednesday, August 16, 2023 once again brought to the fore the belief in some government and employers circles that the wilful and conscious deprivation of workers constitutional and human rights would not affect production. In fact, in some cases, they believe that the abridgement of such rights is good for business and governance.

The setting was the 45th Anniversary of the Food, Beverage and Tobacco Senior Staff Association, FOBTOB, held in Lagos, and the immediate trigger was the paper: “Enforcing Workers’ Right In Nigeria” by Mr Andrew Egboh, Director in the Federal Ministry of Labour and Employment.

When The American Hawk Decides To Devour The Nigerien Chick

 By Owei Lakemfa

The threat of the mighty United States of America, USA, on Tuesday, August 7, 2023  to invade little Niger Republic is not for its love of democracy, Nigeriens or Africans. It is basically in the nature of hawks to circle the sky looking for prey, especially chicks. There were American and French troops in Niger before the coup because it is in the nature of black vultures, not only to target and kill small live animals, but also to have the patience to wait and devour carcases.

So, the July 26 military coup in Niger Republic is a pretext. The USA Acting Deputy Secretary, Victoria Nuland, in   threatening to invade Niger, declared in the usual American arrogant manner: “So we’ll be watching the situation, but we understand our legal responsibilities and I explained those very clearly to the guys (the new Nigerien  leaders) who were responsible for this and that it is not our desire to go there, but they may push us to that point, and we asked them to be prudent in that regard and to hear our offer to try to work with them to solve this diplomatically and return to constitutional order.”

Let Me Breathe, I Don’t Want To Die!

 By Owei Lakemfa

Two different but related cries ring in my head. “Let the Poor breathe” and “I don’t want to die.” The first is the cry across the country as the masses are being suffocated by inflation and over 90 million poor get hungrier.

*Dr. Vwaere Diaso

The second is the plaintive cry of young medical doctor, Vwaere Diaso, whose calling is to save lives. However, when her life was in danger with her limbs broken by an heartless system, her blood flowing from various parts and she knew her life was ebbing and she desperately needed help, her dying cry to her colleagues was: “I don’t want to die.”

Before Marching To Niamey, Let Us Pause

 By Owei Lakemfa

The new military rulers in Niger Republic, the country which marked independence day on Thursday, August 3, 2023 have a Sunday ultimatum from the Economic Community of West African States, ECOWAS. It is that they give up power and restore elected President Mohammed Bazoum to power or face serious measures, including possible invasion.

ECOWAS also imposed sanctions, including border closures, a no-fly zone and the freezing of Nigerien assets. The options seem to be that if former Presidential Guard head, General Abdourahamane Tchiani and his boys do not give up power by that day, ECOWAS would either add more sanctions and pressure, or invade Niger. The issues are, however, not as straight forward; there are many complications, including foreign interests.

President Tinubu: Set The Captives Free!

 By Owei Lakemfa

Violence was expected last Friday, July 28, 2023 when the Shia population in the country marked the Ashura Festival held worldwide by the Shiites. The prediction almost did not come to pass but for a last minute duel near the Wuse Market, Abuja when as usual, armed security men engaged the Shiites, and bullets flew.

*Tinubu

No, it is not as if the Shiites are bounded to violence, but the security services, including the armed forces, seem to have locked it in their brains that the Shiites will always be violent, so a counter-force must be on ground. It is like a cat and mouse game and the mouse cannot plead innocence even if the facts on ground supports its claim. Even if the Shiite processions are peaceful, the security services assume they have a duty to disperse them because the latter would not have taken permission from the police.

The Coup In Niger And The Moncada Barracks Attack

By Owei Lakemfa

Exactly 70 years separate the July 26, 1953 suicidal attack on Moncada Barracks by Cuban youths who wanted to remove the military from power, and this Wednesday’s coup in Niger Republic which removed elected President Mohamed Bazoum and restored military rule. The coup plotters, styling themselves as the National Council for the Safeguarding of the Country, said in a speech by Air Force Colonel Major Amadou Abdramane that their treasonable move “is as a result of the continuing degradation of the security situation, the bad economic and social governance”.

Indeed, Niger, like many other African countries, is a paradox. It is one of the poorest countries in the world with 41 per cent of its 20 million people living on less than a dollar. It depends a lot on aid. Nigeria under former President Muhammadu Buhari in 2022 provided it with N1.4 billion worth of vehicles to run government and also took loans to build railway from Nigeria into Maradi in Niger Republic.

A Thief Is Not A Thief If He Is Powerful

 By Owei Lakemfa

Four female students of the Zamfara State College of Arts and Science, abducted by bandits six months ago, may know their fate this week. Their abductors have given the parents of the young ladies, one week within which to pay N12 million ransom or the victims will be married off. This may be an euphemism for selling the young women into sexual slavery.

What to do about these soulless bandits who maim, rape, murder, loot and visit arson on many states, especially Zamfara, Sokoto, Katsina and Niger, is no straight forward matter.

There are vested interests. For instance, with the new service chiefs vowing to destroy these bandits who in the last eight years have murdered about 65, 000 Nigerians, there are urgent petitions and campaigns that the might of the military should not be used against them.

We’re Beasts Not Humans: Italy’s New Law Of The Sea

 By Owei Lakemfa

Italy, the beautiful south-central European country that juts into the Mediterranean Sea and embraces the Alps, giving mountainous hugs to Switzerland and France, is one of the earliest human civilizations. So civilized that its animals are protected in the country’s constitution and have fundamental rights such as the right of a dog to be walked out in the streets, at least thrice weekly. Animals kept for farming purposes have the right to food, water, satisfactory environmental conditions and right to free movement.

If animals can be so well regarded how much more humans? However, that is the basic issue. While the Italian state treats its citizens with dignity, it has laws on migrants headed for its shores that states clearly that their lives are not only worth less than that of a dog or rabbit, but that they do not even have a right to life.

African Peacemakers: Rescuing Europeans From Mutual

 By Owei Lakemfa

Seven African leaders stunned the world on June 16 and 17, 2023 when they went on a peace mission to warring Ukraine and Russia. The reaction from many in the West was that of contempt; how is it the place of lowly Africa to intervene in a war of Europeans? In fact, Poland tried to scuttle the mission by detaining for 30 hours the aircraft carrying the protection unit of President Cyril Ramaphosa, leader of the delegation.

*Ramaphosa and Putin 

Its claim was that the security men carried “dangerous goods”(weapons). Did they expect them to carry candies? The protocol all over the world is for the paper work for the weapons to be submitted; but Poland declined. Eventually, the aircraft which also had a dozen journalists on board, could not join Ramaphosa as Hungary barred it from using its airspace. These are clear indications that some Europeans countries do not want peace.

Nigeria: Using Torchlight In Broad Daylight

 By Owei Lakemfa

There is a country called Nigeria. For three decades, its coffers were daily looted in the guise of fuel subsidy. The looters are known by name and some are known faces. The companies they use in looting are registered and have addresses. Rather than bring the criminals to book, government decided to remove the subsidy.

Thus, the people are forced to pay astronomical prices for fuel, while the subsidy looters keep their loot and are free to forage for other things to loot. This is the truth. There is also the lie; that fuel subsidy has now been removed. The truth is that it is impossible to remove fuel subsidy no matter how much the people are visited with high fuel prices.

The Homosexuality Of Cultural Imperialism

 By Owei Lakemfa

I made acquaintance with a lady, Yeye Akilimali Funua Olade, about 1990. A few months later, my wife and I visited her in Ila Oragun where she was running a rural library, the African Heritage Research Library. She was an American who had studied at Fisk University from 1963 -1965, earned a Bachelor’s degree in African- American/Black Studies from the San Francisco State University, and a Master of Library Science from the University of California.

So what was she doing in such rustic circumstances? She said she had three children, including two girls and all around the American communities she lived, aggressive forces of lesbianism were on the rise. So, with the agreement of her African American husband, Ayantuga Olade, she fled the United States. Unfortunately, the forces she ran away from in North America, four decades ago, are on the move in her adopted continent, Africa in the guise of campaigning for workers and human rights.

Nigeria Tripped In 2015, Then Stumbled For Eight Years

 By Owei Lakemfa

Today, Nigeria stands ragged and worn out on the global highway. Should it look back at the last eight years and try to make sense of the rough road it had been dragged through? Or simply pick itself up and face the future?

*Buhari 

The misfortune of the last eight years that was the Buhari regime was foretold. No, not by a fortune teller who might have degrees of in-exactitude. But by the exactitude of lived history. A history that opened the book of remembrance reminding us that this taciturn general who was being propped up on stilts of profane propaganda, wrapped in the borrowed robes of a democrat and falsely presented as an unmatched fighter against corruption, is the same man who for 20 months from 1984 subjected the country to terrors of military misrule.

National Assembly Sovereignty: Joke Taken Too Far

 By Owei Lakemfa

As an undergraduate in Great Ife, the Obafemi Awolowo University, I was a member of the Students Representative Council, the parliament. Whenever we met, the generality of the student body surrounded the venue to observe. The idea was that the parliament represented the students, so they have a right not only to observe, but also influence it. In a far limited sense, that is what is called the gallery; except that while the gallery can be cleared, same does not apply to the parliament.

The idea that parliamentarians are autonomous and should not be influenced either in picking their officers or legislating, was ridiculous.

My Democracy Is Not Your Democracy!

 By Owei Lakemfa

We were gathered. Some intellectuals, social activists, journalists, serving and retired diplomats. The primary issue was democracy. Is it universal and is there just a single, or multiple roads to democracy? Is the British democracy which calls itself the Mother of Parliaments, superior to the American version; is the latter better than the Australian or the Chinese? Is Russian democracy superior to the Ukrainian?

It was Thursday, April 27, 2023 and the venue was the Cuban Embassy on Diplomatic Drive, Abuja. The out-going Cuban Ambassador Clara Pulido Escandell was presenting the report of the  April 19, 2023 general elections in her country and explaining Cuban democracy within the context of  democracy in the modern world.

Elections As Crime Scenes: Decriminalising The Electoral Process

 By Owei Lakemfa

Twice did I hear Aisha Dahiru, alias Binani, of the All Progressives Party, APC, declared the winner of the Adamawa State gubernatorial elections and the first female to be elected governor in the country. Twice did this turn out to be a hoax – a sick joke played on Nigerians. The first time was the product of propaganda; the diet on which Nigeria is run.

After the March 18, 2023, elections, it was announced on some media outlets the next day that Binani had won the elections. Many, including Great Britain, fell for the hoax. The British High Commissioner in Nigeria, Catriona Laing, took to her verified Twitter handle, screaming: “Great news! Huge congratulations to Aisha Binani! I hope you will be a trailblazer for other elected female governors.”

Nigeria: A Nation That Lost Its Way

 By Owei Lakemfa

As an aspirant in 2022, the President of the Nigeria Bar Association, NBA, Yakubu Chonoko Maikyau, made a pilgrimage to Keffi, Nasarawa State. He needed the blessings of one of the most consummate and influential law professors the country has ever produced: Onje Gye-Wado. The latter from 1999, was for four years, Deputy Governor of Nasarawa State. He was also former Law Dean of the Nasarawa State University, and Dean, Faculty of Law, Birmingham University.

He agreed to support Maikyau provided he agrees to use his NBA Presidency to fight for a better country because he believes that lawyers should be the engine of change in society. This was no mere rhetoric because Gye-Wado not only passionately believes it, but lives it. He was one of the enthusiasts of the legendary former NBA President, Alao Aka-Bashorun who built the pro-people foundations of the association and made the NBA a body even military dictators had to contend with.

A Nation Where Everyone Is Oppressed

 By Owei Lakemfa

Nigerians have the next 70 days to survive a regime that has chastised them with whips and is promising to further chastise them with scorpions. Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. Zainab Ahmed, last week not only renewed the Buhari regime’s threat to increase Nigerians heavy burden by piling far higher fuel prices, but also told the incoming administration to immediately raise the Value Added Tax from 7.5 per cent to 10 per cent.

While depleting all available resources and adding heavy local and foreign debts to the bargain, the regime seems determined to drain whatever finances are available. So, rather than wind down and start producing handover notes, it wants to conduct a census that promises to be controversial. But more importantly, the census will be used to legally take out N869 billion or $1.88 billion from our national coffers. It is like a retirement package.

They Sell The Needy For A Pair Of Shoes

 By Owei Lakemfa

I woke up at the weekend to a letter by Professor Ibrahim Adamu Yakasai of the Bayero University, Kano. He had on March 25, 2023 performed a civic duty as the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, Returning Officer for the Tudun Wada/Doguwa House of Representative elections.

He had announced with his professorial authority that Ado Doguwa of the All Progressives Congress, APC, polled 39,732 votes to defeat his closest rival, Yushau Salisu Abdullahi, of the New Nigeria People’s Party, NNPP, who polled 34,798 votes. Now, in his letter, he makes a different declaration: that the previous verdict he declared was false, but that he had to do so because his life and those of other electoral staff were endangered. He said the collation area was under siege and he was “completely traumatised, hopeless and confused”.