Nigeria’s Political Structures Of Corruption!

 By MC Asuzu

There have recently been discussions in this country concerning Nigerian politicians who have no political structures and those who had them, as the veritable determinants of those who will be able to win elections in Nigeria and otherwise. It was a very interesting discussion indeed. But what kept coming back to the mind of some of us who are incapable of any partisan political persuasions and/or memberships and participation is this: what structures are the people saying these things thinking of?

What does political structures by a single politician mean? Is it individual politicians or the group of people who wish to work together under specific political ideologies that develop such political structures? These organisational groups of people are simply called political parties, is it not? So, when politicians are talking of personal political structures (but not those of political parties), it becomes necessary to examine what these people may be having in mind and what it is that they themselves really have done in those regards.

Nigeria: A Change From Better To Worse?

By Dan Amor

Even as the River Niger surges still along its wonted path to its dalliance with the River Benue and the consequent emptying of the passionate union into the mazes of the Delta, and, thereafter, into the vast, swelling plenitude of the all-welcoming seas, it is Nigeria, our Nigeria. True, Lagos is still Lagos; Abuja is still Abuja. It is, indeed, injury time in a new country under a new democracy, our democracy! Yet, everywhere you look, things look pretty much as they always have been. Still, the sway of buffoonery and unintelligent greed; still the billowing gown arrogance of the supposedly powerful, the surface laughter of the crashing rivers celebrating the disquieting crisis of democracy, the riveting appearances of things. Splendid is the current! Yet, into the heart of the average Nigerian pop uninvited intimations that we live today in the cusp of a new age, a new country and a new democracy. 

*Buhari and Tinubu

Alas, it is a new era. But in the lull between the passions and exertions and excitations of our workaday world today, at these times when the body yields to repose and the mind nestles in shades of quietude, it hits you: it is the dawn of change! But, what manner of change is this? From better to worse?

As Wicked As The Nigerian State

By Dan Amor

Anyone living in Nigeria especially since the 2015 general elections and the subsequent emergence of General Muhammadu Buhari as President would have known that politically the nation is sitting on the keg of gun powder. There is a regime of palpable fear in the land as the political thermometer cannot easily be interpreted by analysts no matter how discerning they might be. The situation is compounded by an unnerving weight of mayhem that appears to have engulfed the entire geo-political space like a cankerworm. Rampaging Fulani herdsmen on killing spree have turned many states in the North West and North Central, and many parts of Southern Nigeria to killing fields thereby sentencing thousands of armless Nigerians to their early graves without a blink of an eyelid from the government.

*President Buhari 

In fact, the quality of democratic practice in the past two and a half years has been abysmal, with public functionaries at all levels of government consciously exploiting the weaknesses of the system to advance interests that run counter to the common good. Within the same administration, the Directorate of State Services and the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission are at daggers drawn just as the Ministry of Justice and the same EFCC do not see eye to eye. There is a huge disconnect in the security architecture of the country. Aside from Boko Haram and herdsmen insurgency, there are still pockets of mockery killings and kidnappings across the country. In spite of all this, the government does not care any hoot about the survival of the average Nigerian amidst the total collapse of social infrastructure across the country.

How APC Betrayed Buhari

By Joe Igbokwe

I was shocked to the marrows when I heard that some APC Senators asked the National Working Committee of the Party led by the National Chairman of the Party Chief Odigie Oyegun to prevail on President Buhari to drop all charges against Bukola Saraki at the Code of Conduct corruption trial before they stop sabotaging the presidency. Words failed me when it dawned on me that this potentially dangerous demand is coming from some APC Senators who are supposed to be the agents of change we promised Nigerians while seeking their mandate in 2015.

*Buhari, Tinubu and Saraki 

I reflected on the event of the past 24years from 1993 when we elected Chief MKO Abiola to bring hope to Nigerians and how he was crushed and decimated by demonic and satanic forces after five years struggle to defend and sustain the mandate. Time and space will not permit me to recall the quantum of energies expended to defend the mandate for five years, the wars, on the streets, the casualties including MKO Abiola and the late wife Kudirat Abiola, and many others, the damage to the national project, the devastation of our economy, the balkanization of the political entity called Nigeria, the alienation by the international community making Nigeria a pariah nation, and the ethnic division it visited on Nigeria.

After killing Chief Abiola in July 7, 1998, the same satanic and demonic forces still bent on decimating Nigeria further decided to foist PDP and retired General Obasanjo on Nigerians. In sixteen years, from 1999 to 2015 the same forces wasted huge resources running into hundreds of billions of dollars earned in times of oil boom. The unconscionable looters and unrepentant thieves diverted and stashed away these huge resources into private pockets. These funds have been traced to private accounts both at home and abroad, traced to real estates both in Nigeria and abroad, and traced to farms and some buried underground. The rest is now history.

Nigeria: All Of A Sudden Nothing Is Working!

By Remi Oyeyemi

I have just finished reading the piece by Mr. Tunde Fagbenle with the above title. I could not resist writing this rejoinder because I found his view in the piece not just interesting but also annoying. I found it very interesting that he has come out to admit what the followers and the “water carriers” of President Muhammadu Buhari have been saying behind the doors because of shame and regret while they go from door to door defending series of indefensible in the public. 

I found it interesting that Mr. Fagbenle is balking at his ilk’s false propagation of Buhari’s sainthood “so soon.” They called him the “messiah” and the “savior” of Nigeria. It is interesting that Mr. Fageble is not willing to wait until at least one year anniversary of the tragic day when President Buhari’s second coming took off. It is interesting that he believed that he could take some of us for a ride – that he is just seeing the light - when this is not the case. He knows it, and those who have been reading his contributions know it too.
 
Mr. Fagbenle is a man of letters. He is by every means a tutored man. I do not know much about him except through his writings. His writings without any doubt convey a mind that is gifted with intellect, circumspection, and insight. He understands that two plus two must equal four in simple arithmetic. He also knows that when two plus two is not equal to four, then jibiti or 419 is involved. So, to come out with the article under reference that he is surprised by the incompetence and the concomitant collapse being manifested by President Buhari is an insult to those who have been reading him.
 
The truth is that Mr. Fagbenle is part of the group who sold the idea of Buhari as President hook, line, and sinker when in fact they knew he has not the intellectual wherewithal to captain the ship of Nigeria. They dressed him in deceptive drapes of adequacy, insisting that he is “the man for the job.” They knew that his trajectory did not justify the confidence with which he was being invested. They were aware that then candidate Buhari would not be able to do the job. When Mr. Fagbenle and his fellow travelers were supporting Buhari, they knew what they were doing, but they had different calculations. So far the calculations have not worked out.  

 
It is weird that someone of Mr. Fagbenle’s erudition, intellect and circumspection could not figure out that someone such as Buhari who could not produce his certificate for the West African Examination Council (WAEC) would be able to correct all the anomalies in Nigeria and save the country. It is weird that Mr. Fagebenle who is not young by any means could pretend not to know the history of Buhari during his first coming. If he did, it is weird that Mr. Fagbenle could ignore all the facts available and helped advance the falsehood of Buhari’s sainthood.

Jumbo Pay In Nigeria: The Final Solution

By Banji Ojewale

Far north of Nigeria, a state governor directs all public officials to withdraw their children from private schools and move them to government-owned ones. About the same time, the celibate daughter of a former Vice-President just sworn-in as a commissioner in one of the troubled north-eastern states forswears enormous wages and allowances waiting for her. Later, a pressure group somewhere in a state down south calls on the authorities to ban those in government from travelling abroad for medicare, whether for therapy or for checkup. Let them do it here in Nigeria. Much earlier the nation’s Spartan president and his equally abstemious deputy announce a cut in their pay.

*President and two of his ministers: Amaechi

 and Fashola 

It’s all in the air; the change aura suggesting times have changed. It’s a lean dawn when you can’t lean on government again. These are days that tell you a lean government is itself seeking where to lay its own lean and languid head.

Let us comfort and heal this land, battered and violated like a woman over the decades by so-called lovers who have only milked her dry out of her beauty.

A diet of half measures won’t deliver this broke and broken nation from the salivating and insatiable palate of these public office holders and their fellow carrion eaters.

Count Me Out Of 2019 Presidential Contest - Babangida

Excerpts from a press statement issued on Tuesday, November 10, 2015, by former military head of state, General Ibrahim Babangida 

I have heard whispers from different political arenas that one of the rationales for the rebranding of PDP was to prepare me for future elections in 2019. How ridiculous! God’s willing; by 2019 I will be 78 years old. If I called it quits in 2011, why would PDP contemplate fielding a 78 years old man in a presidential election in a country that parades very vibrant men and women of lesser age?

I have no intention whatsoever to run for any office again in Nigeria. I will consistently pray to Almighty Allah to grant me good health and sound mind to watch my dearest beloved country grow from strength to strength during my lifetime and beyond…

I wish to make some clarifications concerning the invitation extended to me on the scheduled PDP Rebranding Conference slated for Thursday, 12 November, 2015, aimed at repositioning the party after its poor outing at the last elections. While I welcome the invitation to the event as a mark of respect as one of the founding fathers, I want to be excused on the grounds that I have long bid bye to partisan politics.

Four years ago at an elaborate event at the Transcorp Hilton Hotels Abuja, I announced my retirement from partisan politics after my failed attempt to contest for President and having attained the gracious age of 70, in a society where life expectancy stands at a ridiculous 47 years. In appreciating what Allah has done for me in life, seeing me through many challenges, stabilizing me during periods of tribulations, and safeguarding me through the thick and thin of political risks, I did state at that event that Journalists would not push me around again.

Nigeria: APC Rode On Monumental Lies To Power

Press Statement 

N5,000 Stipend: APC Senators Acting Party Script’ – PDP……Says APC’s Hidden Ideology Is Lying

Metuh, PDP's spokesman 

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says Wednesday’s rejection by APC senators of the N5,000 monthly stipend, which they promised Nigerians during the electioneering, underscores the monumental hypocrisy of their party in getting to power by means of deceit and false promises to Nigerians.

PDP National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh in a statement on Thursday said that the development is a clear confirmation of the fact that the APC is a party of hypocrites, who never had the intentions of honouring any of their campaign promises.

“The PDP declares that it is absolutely obvious to all that the APC came to power riding on monumental lies and deceit in making promises they had no intentions to keep. All they wanted was to get into power and they achieved this with their lying tongues.

“Indeed, the unanimity displayed by the APC senators in rejecting the promised N5, 000 monthly welfare package, especially coming after their party and the Presidency had made futile efforts to distance themselves from it, further stresses the duplicitous spirit of the APC and its reprehensible insensitivity to the feelings and aspirations of Nigerians, especially the unsuspecting youths, women and the indigent, who they shamelessly swindled with false promises.

In Search Of Nigeria’s “Credible” Politicians

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

If you are in Nigeria and you have not done this before, try and do it right away. Just open a Nigerian newspaper near you. Go through its pages to find out how many people were described in that particular edition as “credible” politicians or “honest and selfless” Nigerians. You would be shocked to see the number of people that recklessly allowed themselves to be associated with such superb qualities even when they are fully aware that by what most people know about their character and vile history, it might even be considered a generous compliment to dress them up in the very opposites of those terms.

*Leaders of the PDP and the APC meet before 

the 2015 elections in Nigeria 

Indeed, these are some of the words and phrases that have been so callously and horribly subjected to the worst kinds of abuses in Nigeria with hardly anyone making any attempt to intervene. I won’t in the least, therefore, be surprised if I wake up tomorrow to hear that decent people in this country (or even outside the country) have begun to protest and resist any attempt to associate them with those terms any more.

In these parts, we appear to be such exceptional experts in the effective devaluation of all that ought to inspire awe and noble feelings. I can confidently predict that there are now some Nigerians who would, for instance, feel greatly insulted should their dogs be nominated for our country’s “National Honours.” Especially, since the Obasanjo regime, the “National Honours List” in this country has sadly distinguished itself by the ease with which people who ought to be in jail star prominently in it.

And as you look at the haggard or even dilapidated and grossly impoverished nature of a country with a long list of “illustrious” and “honest” sons and daughters annually honoured for their “selfless” and “invaluable” services to their fatherland, you cannot help wondering how indeed their so-called “immense contributions to the growth and progress of the their country” were not able to leave some bit of positive impact on the same country and its people.   Why is a country with such a long and intimidating list of “patriotic achievers” and “nation builders” still one of the most backward in the world despite being endowed with enviably abundant natural resources?

Many Nigerians, especially, politicians, do not care about the credibility of their pronouncements before they open their mouths to drop them, especially, before mammoth crowds. It is in Nigeria that a very tall man would not have the slightest hint of restraint telling everyone how incredibly short he is (because of the rich gains such a gross misrepresentation would attract to him at that time) without bothering about the evidence before everybody’s eyes which brutally contradicts what he is saying. We live in a country where consequences hardly follow actions, so, people everywhere flaunt their ability to behave anyhow and make wild claims with utmost impunity.

Now, I feel very highly insulted each time I see a public officer, say a Nigerian governor, who virtually everyone seems to agree deserves to head straight to jail once he leaves office due to his mindless plunder of the country’s resources, come out (before an election) to tell the world with sickening brazenness how his party would wage a successful war against corruption if elected into power! By allowing himself the revolting recklessness of uttering such an outstanding blasphemy, the person is only calling all of us fools who are incapable of using our brains. And the mere fact that this same odious fellow would automatically be rewarded with very ecstatic ovations from supposedly rational human beings who constitute his audience and who would also go ahead to give him their votes is one reason most people easily conclude that something is very horribly and disastrously wrong with Nigeria, and that we live in one of the most unserious societies on earth.  

In Nigeria, anybody can suddenly become an “esteemed” and “respected “anti-corruption” crusader. Even if you have a very horrible criminal past, it would not matter. Somebody once boasted to me that the only way to effect lasting, positive change in Nigeria is to become a public officer, acquire boundless wealth by looting the treasury pale, and then with your enormous loot, seek to sanitize the system. Moreover, Nigerians are always interested in the present. The same Nigerians who had called you horrible names while you were busy criminally accumulating humongous wealth would start hailing you once you start attacking the incumbent regime. Soon, you will be crowned an “eminent statesman” or even the “conscience of the nation,” celebrated by all.

Even the foreign media which will not tolerate such hideousness in their own land will join their local counterparts to decorate you. And if the current government attempts to investigate the organized banditry you effectively supervised during your tenure, you would just call a press conference and grant lengthy interviews to allege that they are persecuting you because you are exposing their corrupt acts and then promise Nigerians that you would not be deterred by any acts aimed at intimidating you into silence! I can assure you that if you act “wisely,” you would get eager influential defenders in the media, among opinion moulders and even from some of your “more liberal comrades” in the human rights community.   

You can also always rely on our media to never attempt to remember your past, but to continue to emphasize how you are the hope of the country. They will readily help our nice and easily forgiving and forgetting populace to quickly consign your past to the bin and embrace your new “Mr. Clean” image.         

Former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), late Alao Aka-Bashorun, one of the country’s most principled activists and legal luminaries, once said that if a gang of armed robbers rose in Nigeria and seized power that he knew some of his colleagues who would fall over themselves to “serve” in that regime and blame patriotism for their abominable choice. Aka-Bashorun made this statement during the heyday of military rule when coups and counter-coups were the country’s worst afflictions, and military adventurists, largely motivated by selfish interests, did not seek the mandate of the people to rule them, but just seized power and imposed themselves on all of us.

Politicians As Nigeria’s Biggest Headache

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Now, let’s face it. Despite all the empty (and, often, very exasperating) noise about being driven by patriotism and “desire to serve my people” that usually saturates the atmosphere at each election season, a careful, conscientious search on the political terrain can only yield about less than one percent (and one is being really generous here) of aspirants motivated solely by genuine desire to improve the lives of the citizenry and make society a better place.

            Buhari, President Jonathan and the Chairman
            of PDP and APC

For the majority, the sole incentive is the golden opportunity politics offers to gain access to government coffers and cart away as much free money as one could grab before one’s tenure elapses. This is just the raw, plain truth. Indeed, it is a simple case of organized banditry and every politician in Nigeria knows that we know this.

There is, however, a very insignificant few who, although also inspired by the same primitive craving for the very unfairly lucrative political jobs, are content to just go home every month with only their usually jumbo salaries and allowances. Although, they do not find the very outrageously inflated pay packets they have allocated to themselves in the midst of widespread poverty very obscene, they are, however, able to recoil from the mad, free and fair looting that has become the distinguishing feature of political office in Nigeria. The brazenness with which the looting is perpetrated and the most revolting manner its prodigious proceeds are often flaunted before everyone underline the unmistakable impression that shameless stealing has received an official endorsement as part and parcel of governance, a kind of official culture.

What makes the matter even more egregious is that these callous looters are always able to use some tiny crumbs or the usually very reliable intoxicants, namely, ethnicity and religion, to get the same shortchanged and impoverished citizenry to rise in their defense each time there are attempts to pry into their hideous activities in office. It is only in Nigeria that this kind of thing makes sense – that someone among the populace would want to fight and even die for an unrepentant enemy of the people who has so wickedly exploited, dehumanized and grossly diminished him!

Nigeria, Kill Corruption Before It Kills You!

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

It has since become common knowledge which enjoys widespread acceptance that any day Nigeria is able to make up its mind to end its obscene and ruinous romance with the stubborn monster called “Corruption”, this country will automatically witness the kind of prosperity no one had thought was possible in these parts. Just imagine the amount of public funds reportedly (and un-reportedly) being stolen and squandered daily under various guises by too many public officers and their accomplices, and the great transformation that would happen to public infrastructure and the lives of the citizenry if this organized banditry can at least be reduced by fifty percent!  

 A Victim Of Corruption (pix by Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye) 

Now, is this monster divorceable? Of course, yes. But are there any signs that anyone in the corridors of power is genuinely interested in ending the strong grip it maintains on the very soul of this country? That is the problem. It is sheer foolishness to expect many of them to willingly block the very hole from which great goodies also flow to them just because some other persons are also benefiting from there. No, you can neither fight corruption with soiled hands nor retain monopoly of it! It spreads like cancer. And the whole thing appears now to have been so horribly compounded by the emergence and successful empowerment of a very formidable class whose sustenance and longevity solely depend on its ability to continue sustaining the culture of corruption and bleeding the country pale.

Who Needs Patricia Etteh’s House?

 By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye 
Not long after the N628 million contract scandal involving the leadership of the House of Representatives exploded in the face of Nigerians, Vanguard newspaper (August 29, 2007) carried an interview with Dino Melaye, the Chairman of the House Committee on Information and National Orientation. Mr. Melaye who has unduly advertised himself as one of the loudest supporters of the House Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Bunmi Etteh, in her current travails, had, in the course of the interview, startled Nigerians with a very loaded and overly distasteful statement that spoke volumes about the quality of minds that “make laws” for Nigerians at the nation’s Lower Legislative House.

Said Melaye: “This woman [Etteh] told us, on the floor of the House, that she’s got two boobs. That the old [House Members] can suck one while the new would suck one. Honestly speaking, we are sucking. We are enjoying the sucking. We are doing that right now.”

A Meal From A Dustbin In Lagos

Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

It was a very beautiful evening in Lagos. I had parked the car in front of my wife’s office, and was inside the car waiting for her to get her bag from her office so we could go home together.

And then, I saw the man as he passed, looking very hungry, haggard and harassed. It was quite clear that he was not mad. At least, not yet. What was easy to notice was that he was greatly traumatized by the impossible conditions under which he struggled each day to exist in this impossible place called Nigeria, a country so richly endowed, but where life for the majority has become hellish. 

Victim Of Corruption And Failed Leadership

Recent studies have shown that due to boundless plundering of the public treasury flourishing in Nigeria, about 99% of the country’s resources are in the hands of just 1% of the population, and more than 85 per cent of Nigerians live below poverty level.

Well, suddenly, the man’s hungry eyes caught the dustbin outside the office complex, a few meters away from where my car was packed. He appeared so elated at his clearly delicious find. His face creased into an awful gesture, which he probably meant to be a smile.

Then, with a quickened pace, he made for the dustbin, and began to desperately rummage in it, among its decayed, putrid, stinking contents. He seemed afraid that someone might come out to drive him away before he was through. His diligence, meticulousness, and sense of urgency would have been very infectious were it not that were deployed on the clearly diseased contents of a refuse bin.

An idea occurred to me immediately. Nigerians ought to share this heart-rending image with me, to see one of their own reduced to such a sorry spectacle in a country that was overwhelmingly prospering from crude oil exports. Perhaps, a few would weep and think deeply about the unbearable condition that years of abysmal misrulership have reduced many Nigerians.  

President Goodluck Jonathan Of Nigeria And Other

 African Heads  Of State: What Are They Doing

About Widespread Poverty

Yes, my camera was at the backseat, I remembered. I quickly reached for it, and with a greater part of me hidden behind the windshield, I took two shots of him while he was still busy searching and collecting some items triumphantly.  Then my third shot caught him as he made to move away with his booty. 

And within a few minutes, he went down the street and was gone.  Perhaps, very fulfilled that for that day, he would not, like countless other impoverished Nigerians, go to bed (Did I say bed? Could he afford one?) on an empty stomach.

That man, too, is a Nigerian, with flesh and red blood running in his veins, like you and I. Like President Goodluck Jonathan, whose daily campaign expenses, as Professor Pat Utomi has told us, and which no one in the Presidency has convincingly denied, exceeds a hundred million naira daily!

     Just Enough For One Evening

Yes, that scavenger is a human being just like our distinguished Senators whose annual allowances have been put at $1,500,000 (You can convert that to naira and see what it amounts to!) Yes, the man is a human being like Olusegun Aremu Obasanjo (the man that loves to be called founder/father of Modern Nigeria – whatever that means) whose multi-million dollar farm is flourishing somewhere at Otta in Ogun State. 

Indeed, our dustbin man is not less  human than our State Governors, ministers and Super Special Advisers and Assistants, Local Government Chairmen, many of whom are now incredibly wealthy after just a few years of “self-less service to the nation.”

Now, if this hapless Nigerian ever heard that sometime ago, specifically under the tenure of a certain lady called Patricia Etteh, as Speaker of the House of Representatives, that a house was renovated in Abuja with the “paltry sum” of N628 million, he didn’t show it.

Nigeria's Former Heads Of State: Ibrahim Babangida,

Olusegun Obasanjo And Muhammadu Buhari 

If he had heard that some $16 billion dollars that were sunk in the power sector only succeeded in generating uninterrupted darkness, he never betrayed. He was just content to invade the dustbins, to fill his stomach with its putrid contents, until life, his life, reaches a T-junction, where, his candle would be cruelly extinguished by the violent wind of the unspeakable callousness of Nigerian leaders.

By the way, is Mallam Umaru Dikko reading this? Then he should rejoice that his prediction had come true, for Nigerians are now feeding from dustbins. Where are our rulers and former rulers? They should rejoice because that proud scavenger out there is a living evidence that their many years of altruistic, selfless leadership in Nigeria had yielded far greater dividends than we had imagined.

 That is the reality of present day Nigeria. And make no mistakes about it, there are several others like that man, who would never have anything to eat today, until they are able to find a dustbin rich enough to yield them a meal.

His condition is like that because those who are supposed to take care of him are out there in Abuja and other points of power engaging in unspeakable profligacy, with the commonwealth, from which they have carefully insulated him. While he dies slowly, and miserably – a victim of boundless greed and callousness among the ruling elite. 

Indeed, everyone appears to accept this very glaring truth that any day Nigeria is able to make up its mind to end its obscene and ruinous romance with the stubborn monster called “Corruption”, this country will automatically witness the kind of prosperity no one had thought was possible in these parts.

 Just imagine the amount of public funds reportedly (and un-reportedly) being stolen and squandered daily under various guises by too many public officers and their accomplices, and the great transformation that would happen to public infrastructure and the lives of the citizenry if this organized banditry can at least be reduced by fifty percent! 

Can Nigeria ever drag itself out of the muddy waters? Can we ever destroy a monster we have all clearly identified and agreed constitutes our worst undoing? Let’s hope that post-May 29, 2011 will usher in some fresh air.

Hope did I say? No! What I actually mean is that Nigerians can strongly desire that change, insist on getting it and never give up until it materializes. It is quite possible, if not very easy.

==========
scruples2006@yahoo.com

How I Joined The Nigerian Ruling (Eating) Class!

  [A Rejoinder To The Article: "How I Became A Prominent Lady"]

Dear Ugochukwu,

I thoroughly enjoyed myself reading the piece you published last week, captioned, “How I Became A Prominent Lady,” written by one of the  greatest and most patriotic   daughters of our great nation, a highly placed and well-respected lady who, incidentally, is a very close associate, my very good friend and fellow distinguished member of the nation’s political and ruling elite.

Even though you withheld her name (that was very thoughtful of you), I know her very well, and I can confidently tell you that she is a thoroughly groomed and well polished lady, totally above board, whose every action is motivated by an unfathomable sacrificial love for her country.

 

 I am thoroughly overwhelmed by her disarming humility which made her to stoop so low to tell Nigerians without blushing the various ‘sacrifices’ and ‘prices’ she had to pay on her way to join us in the Ruling Class from where she believes she would be able to serve her fatherland very well.  And on this, I can testify that she has acquitted herself very well.

 An example of her lack of vanity could be seen in the fact that despite our endless prodding and even harassment, she has bluntly refused purchase more than one house in London or another in the United States or even Dubai , even when some of us had offered to buy them for her. She is such a unique lady that naturally attracts kindness, and knows how to appreciate kind gestures too.

She is well loved among us, because she mixes very well, is always very cheerful and vivacious, has an exceptionally generous heart; and that is why she is excelling with incredible speed.  Eternally loyal, she could have dumped the Chief (on whose back she rode to fame and prominence) for a long time now without any fear of repercussions since she now has many other even more powerful political heavyweights around her, but her heart of gold would not let her hurt even a fly.  

 

As we talk now, the leaders of our great party in her geo-political zone have pencilled her down as the next deputy governor of her state, a move we at the national level have readily endorsed because of her profound integrity, moral soundness and our great trust in her ability to deliver with unrivalled speed. I was present recently when she launched her NGO to promote moral uprightness, honesty and hard work in youths.

 She is equally a very regular face at youth forums and ethical revival conferences where she draws from her wealth of experience and exceptional personal example to admonish her hearers on the dangers of cheating, waywardness and corner-cutting. She is indeed a role model, and it is good that many people, especially the young people now look up to her for direction and mentoring.

Please, permit me to follow her excellent example and also share my own success story before another lady beats me to it again, because, we have among  us many other successful ladies, whose ‘prices’ and ‘sacrifices’  on their way to the top would even greatly diminish my friend’s own. While at the University, which, by the way, I had entered with results obtained through very fraudulent means, academic work held no attraction for me.

 

I wanted to make money fast and live big. As I saw on television and newspapers these mostly thirty-something olds and early or mid-forty emergency billionaires who I was so certain I was more intelligent and more hardworking than, brazenly seizing the limelight, flaunting their opulence and throwing their weight about in a way that seemed to ask the poor to simply get lost, murderous thoughts welled up in me against anyone trying to disturb me with foolish questions about why I skipped classes or shunned my books.

 

Soon, I had to leave campus in search of something meaningful to do with my life before others left me behind in the lonely pit of grinding poverty. Fortunately, one day, a friend told me at the joint where we usually congregated to smoke weeds that an aide to a top and very powerful political figure was hiring ‘strongmen’ in preparation for the forthcoming elections.

 

 I immediately jumped at the offer. That singular move was to usher me into an exciting, easy life of limitless opportunities and cheap pleasures that I never imagined could just suddenly come my way. My ‘oga’ later came to know me more closely and to appreciate my special abilities and talents. I had a perfect understanding of my job, and never failed to deliver. I tried hard to suppress the fire of greed raging in me, and accounted for every kobo given to me. Although I was such a ruthless person, I was not foolish and so knew quite well that if I must attain my targeted height in politics, I must school myself to keep my greed in serious check.

  The Logo Of PDP --Nigeria's Ruling Party

Fortunately, I always delivered on all fronts with efficiency and precision, and equally acquitted myself well when in the business of ‘arranging’  very beautiful girls from the neighbouring Universities each time my ‘oga’ hosted dignitaries for top political meetings. Oh, there were always so much to eat, drink and enjoy, but I never forgot myself and what I was aiming at. My eyes were on the top, and any price was worth paying to get there.

 

My stars began to shine brilliantly when my ‘oga’ lifted me from the scummy pond of violent and murderous existence where I had wreaked tremendous terror as one of his most effective and ruthless thugs and promoted me to his personal aide, which enabled me to follow him to very important political meetings, where I met many other very highly placed Nigerians, many of whom also began to like me as time went on. Although, I could be such a ruthless and implacably destructive beast when any occasion required my exhibition of that aspect of me, I have this very warm, amiable and overly harmless personality that easily earns me the unreserved affection of many people.

 

Soon my ‘oga’ began to test me with money, several times, but each time, I surprised him by not falling. Unlike my colleagues who always allowed their greed to make them lose his confidence, I already knew I needed to keep mine on leash in order to win the undying trust of one those who decided the direction, future and how the resources of this incredibly rich nation were shared. Already, I had arranged a degree certificate for myself and managed to let it enter ‘oga’s ears that I was a graduate.

Before long, he began to trust me with bigger money, some of which I took abroad to deposit for him in designated accounts. I always resisted every temptation to run away or tamper with even the smallest part of them. My oga wanted to appoint me into the ministerial position allotted to him, but later changed his mind, and instead registered a company and appointed me its Managing Director/Chief Executive. And soon countless juicy contracts I never even knew when and how they were applied for began to pour in, and although we rarely executed any, we were usually paid in full upfront.

 

And because I had learnt early to keep my greed in check, I shared out the percentages as instructed, and paid them in the various bank accounts I was given, before taking the percentage allotted to me. And because we were so reliable and efficient, and did our business without any risks to our clients’ good names and political lives, business boomed amazingly. I became very rich as the company prospered. Soon, I began to hobnob with the high mighty from the president to governors, lawmakers, ministers, diplomats and fellow business magnates.

 

Billions of naira were always easily laundered through us without any hassles or incidents that could embarrass our esteemed clients, and we were always prompt to neatly deposit such funds into any accounts supplied by our clients in any part of the world. I have eventually  achieved my ambition of joining the ruling class, and boy, life up there is    just pleasantly exciting and really good!  Although, I am not holding any public office, I am, no doubt, part of the decision-making process since I am a generous financier and prominent member of our great party.

 

 The secret of my success, if I must restate that, was my commendable ability to continue resisting the temptation to tamper with my ‘oga’s money even when a lot of it was always with me and around me. Indeed, I was quite aware that he never bothered to even find out how much each ‘Ghana-Must-Go’ sack contained, or how much had been removed from a particular bag and how much remained, but I kept my cool. Well, if I must tell you also, highly influential and respected political stalwarts like my oga have no time to count money. Moreover, its uninterrupted flow into their houses, offices and bank accounts was always guaranteed, so why bother?

 

 Although, I wanted so much to be rich, I also desperately wanted to also secure the distinguished membership of the ruling elite, where I can help decide the direction and future of this country. And if I must achieve this, I knew it quite early enough that I required much patience, restraint and loyalty to one of the key custodians and sharers of the very sweet, richly garnished National Cake.

 

I was relieved when my ‘oga’ eventually shelved the idea of having me fill the ministerial slot allocated to him and instead established the flourishing company which I now manage for him. Although with such a highly influential personality of repute like my ‘oga’ behind me, all the Senate would have simply done if I had appeared for screening would be to simply ask me ‘Take A Bow!’ and move on, but I did not want the overwhelming searchlight such an event would most likely beam on my past. Moreover, I don’t trust you, journalists, Ugochukwu. One of you might come up with the crazy idea that I was a University dropout and so could not have earned the degree I was parading, or that I had unresolved cases with the police. So, I was glad to be spared that kind of exposure.

 Well, all I can say now is that I am doing incredibly very well. Although I have become very rich beyond my wildest imagination, with properties in countless choice spots in Nigeria and abroad and shares in blue chip companies around the world, I still have refused to do anything to make my ‘oga’ feel I have grown some wings and was now capable of being my own master. I have been very careful. His numerous women (mostly married), especially among the top echelon of our great party devour me daily with undisguised lustful attention, but I have refrained from letting them come between me and my very kind godfather. No, how can I be that stupid when countless women, including top actresses and models are throwing themselves at me?

 

Former Senator Iyabo Anisulowo was right after all!

 

Well, right now, I can confidently tell you that I am now and fully and perfectly established as a distinguished member of the ruling class and a stalwart of our great party. I sponsor candidates into high public offices and have continued to reap, in season and out of season, the juicy fruits of my endeavour. I have also taken practical steps to polish my personality and give myself an urbane, intellectual image. Recently, I got a backstreet (some say unaccredited) college in the United States to package an honorary doctoral degree for me at an impressive ceremony attended by highly placed Nigerians.

 

Do not be misled into thinking we are indifferent to corruption. In fact, my ‘oga’ was one of those who first mooted the idea of setting up very vibrant anti-corruption bodies in Nigeria to cleanse the country of corrupt elements. I can confidently tell you that it was his idea that they borrowed and set up what we have today as the EFCC and ICPC. And to his further credit, he has never failed to seize any forum available to him to denounce corruption and urge the anti-graft agencies to root out the monster that has ensured Nigeria is kept 100 years behind civilisation. All we want from Nigerians is patience; they should give us more time to deliver the democracy dividends. We are on course. We sincerely mean well for this country.

 

Who Cares About The Powerless Majority? More Than 80%
Of Nigerians Live  Below Poverty Level...

Ugochukwu, I am always amused each time you describe us in your column as a ‘Criminal Class.’ Apart from the fact this betrays your total ignorance of how government business is managed at this level in this country, I also think you are being very unfair to a body of distinguished, credible Nigerians with very impeccable records of invaluable services to their fatherland who spend sleepless nights thinking of how to move this great country forward and usher in an era of prosperity and massive development.

 

Well, next week, I will be presenting a paper (written for me by a retired professor who is on my payroll) at a high profile seminar in Abuja on anti-corruption and good governance, and I have already despatched an invitation to you. Be our guest and discover for yourself how determined we are to battle this monster of corruption to the ground. Surely, with Nigeria in our hands, the masses of this country would have cause to smile very soon.

 

Thanks for this opportunity to tell my success story despite your obvious unreserved disdain and fierce contempt for us.

We will eventually prove to you and several others that we mean well for this country.

 

Chief (Dr.) …… (Name Withheld)

Abuja, Nigeria

 

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