Tinubu Vs Atiku: A Cautionary Tale Of Self-Destruction

 By Dan Onwukwe

Like a broken family whose members would  prefer to destroy their father’s inheritance rather than share it, shame has become a passé to the managers of the Presidential candidates of the All Progressives Congress and that of the Peoples Democratic Party, Bola Ahmed Tinubu and Atiku Abubakar. As the Feb 25 Presidential and National Assembly elections draw feverishly near, the desperation in the camps of these two presidential candidates seems to have reached a new low.

*Atiku and Tinubu 

With the many gaffes and seeming lack of tact by Tinubu on the campaign hustings, a sense of ennui has set in. His desperate efforts to be the next President of Nigeria appear to be bogging down. But he keeps blowing hot. As respected columnist Sonala Olumhense wrote in the SUNDAY PUNCH of January 29, if there’s one political party that ought not to be on the ballot in the February/March elections, it’s the ruling APC.  

At The Peter Obi Event In New York

 By Sonala Olumhense

As a Nigerian with considerable interest in public affairs, the Grand Ballroom of New York City’s Hilton Midtown Hotel, the venue of “Afro-Economics & Government Policy: A Conversation with Governor Peter Obi,” was my destination last Sunday.

*Obi

The engagement followed others in the United States, some of which had been mismanaged by local organisers who chose to charge a gate fee. Not New York, which was free to every registered attendee, thanks to the Columbia University’s Africa Business Club and Black Law Students Association.

The Hilton Grand Ballroom is a cavernous facility capable of accommodating 3,000 persons. For a city with nearly 700 hotels pre-COVID, Hilton bills the facility as the city’s largest ballroom.  At the height of the event, it was about two-thirds full.

Abati, Arise TV’s PR Show And Buhari’s Dementia

 By Farooq Kperogi 

That even the vaguest pretense to traditional watchdog journalism is in throes of death in Nigeria’s institutional news media was instantiated by the interview Arise TV’s crew had with Muhammadu Buhari last week. It was out and away a PR job that masqueraded as journalism.

*Buhari and the Arise TV Team
 

The questions were feeble, obvious follow-up prompts were ignored, the questioners were diffident, and the viewer is left scratching their head about what they had just watched. It was the journalistic equivalent of a bad circus. 

I am glad famous Punch columnist, Sonala Olumhense, clinically dissected the interview in his Sunday column and showed what a tragic professional theater the interview was. Even though I was initially inclined to comment on the poor quality of the conduct of the interview, I chose to cut the interviewers some slack because I thought managing to get reclusive and tight-lipped Buhari to talk after nearly six years of ignoring the domestic news media was praiseworthy. 

Chuks Iloegbunam At 70

 By Chido Nwkanma 

18 May 2021 is an important day in the household of the Iloegbunams as the one and only Baba Ndidi, the brand and the person, clocks 70 years. Chuks Iloegbunam is a general of the writing fraternity. He has served this nation well as a journalist, book editor, publisher and technocrat in government. 

*Chuks Iloegunam 

He stands out for his craft as a writer with a fearless voice that wields a powerful pen. Chuks Iloegbunam is a writer in the best traditions of that craft. His pen roars in honesty and fluidity. 

Mr Iloegbunam wrote memorable essays in The Guardian, where he turned to after service at The Punch. He was passionate both in his writing and in his defense of rights, the worker, and humanity.

He was at Longmans Nigeria Limited as Humanities Editor. He edited Sonala Olumhense, No Second Chance, and Femi Osofisan, Morountodun and Other Stories. 

Nigeria: President Buhari: Resign And Run Far Away!

By Sonala Olumhense

Finally, President Muhammadu Buhari has confirmed what has been known to many for nearly three years: he wants to remain in power for four more years. According to Mr. Buhari, this decision is owed not to his personal desire, but to popular clamour.  

*President Buhari 

It is always amusing when people who seek office, or want to cling to it, cite popular pressure.  The truth is that only Buhari’s circle of loyalists wants him back.  No Nigerian whose desire or interest is leadership rather than power, does. 

I am not necessarily saying Buhari will not win the re-election contest, but if he does, it will not be because he deserves it.  To begin with, voter turnout was high for him when he won in 2015, hope in full bloom.  

In 2019, betrayed Nigerian voters may revert to indifference.  Already, it is curious that mountains of voters’ cards are being ignored by their owners nationwide.  

The Unmasking Of Diezani Alison-Madueke

By Sonala Olumhense

His name: Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s President-Elect.  The man who, in one week, would take control of the Africa’s most bewildering country.  He was a much-feared man, with a certain reputation for character, a man who had fought for the presidency for years claiming he would rid Nigeria of corruption.

*Diezani Alison-Madueke

He was swiftly checked in, accompanied by just one person.  He took First Class Seat 3K.  

And then British Airways received another surprise VIP to the same flight: Diezani Alison-Madueke, Nigeria’s powerful Minister of Petroleum Resources, accompanied by two aides also in First Class.  She sat behind the President-Elect.

Reports said the Minister, her tenure down to seven days, had booked her flight only after discovering Mr. Buhari would be on it.  Widely-alleged to be the most corrupt Minister in a government of great corruption, she hoped to soften him up in conversation during the flight, commentators suggested.

The omens were not good for the outgoing Minister.  After taking office, Buhari on almost a daily basis promised hell on earth for every corrupt former official. 

Mrs. Alison-Madueke had reason to be afraid.  As Buhari prepared to take office, there were further pressures.  As it turned out, on that late May 2015 trip to the United Kingdom, Buhari was received at 10 Downing Street by Prime Minister David Cameron, who pledged “technical assistance” to the Buhari administration to combat terrorism and corruption.

And then there was the United States, also offering help,and President Barack Obama reportedly giving him details of extensive corruption within the Goodluck Jonathan government, including of a certain Minister who had looted up to $6billion.  

Buhari And The Challenges of Sainthood – A Rejoinder

By Remi Oyeyemi

I have just finished reading the powerful article by Sonala Olumhense with the heading “A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To Sainthood.”  Being one of those that I read their articles almost religiously (and I have been following him since his days in The Guardian), I am not unaware that he is a very fervent supporter of President Muhammadu Buhari. He really believes in him. The only thing is that he is not fundamentalist in his belief in the President.

*Buhari 

That he is not fundamentalist does not surprise me. This is because he embodies a mind that is thoroughly developed. A mind translucent in its broadness that it can conveniently encapsulate fervent belief about an idea or a person while simultaneously endowed with the clarity to be critical in a subtle manner; driving home his point forcefully with unequalled succulence.  He has a mind cocoon in intellect. With that kind of mind, dogmatism has nowhere to dodge.

Mr. Olumhense probably drank some Champagne when President Buhari won the last elections to celebrate. If he did, it was not undeserved. President Goodluck Jonathan drove Nigerians nuts for the better part of his tenure. So, to Mr. Olumhense, like millions of other Nigerians, the new President Buhari represents the beacon of new hope and advent of a new era. He was, it seems, a new opportunity to save Nigeria from herself and her peoples. 

Mr. Olumhense’s article in question put on the table series of unfulfilled promises on the part of President Buhari regarding certain actions he was going to take relating to the war on corruption.  He believes it was a “serious embarrassment” that President Buhari failed to release to the public the list of those who have looted our commonwealth, especially, the one given to him by the US government. The list was said to have included information about “names of many corrupt Nigerians, and the location of their stolen funds.” Mr. Olumhense had believed President Buhari’s “punchline” announcing “his deadline for the publication of that list of infamy: May 29.”

 Mr. Olumhense’s frustration flipped open as follows:

“The only problem is that the day arrived, and he made the anniversary speech without including that much-anticipated report.
 
“But such was the tension and the anticipation surrounding the expected announcement that everything in his speech had actually become secondary to it. The ensuing national outrage compelled the government to declare that the Ministry of Information would make the announcement four days later.
 
“Again, however, that date yielded no such report. As the world now knows, the ‘announcement’ finally arrived at the end of that week through the office of the Minister of Information. But while it was informative as to what has been recovered, the report identified none of the corrupt former officials involved.”
 
Evidently, Mr. Olumhense was in despair about the inability of President Buhari to keep his promises made on the war against corruption in several fora.  Assessing the aftermath of that debacle, Mr. Olumhense ruefully commented as follows:
 
“In effect, it means the corrupt elements have won another round, leaving corruption in control, while the government lost a wonderful opportunity it may never regain.”
 
Then he opined correctly as follows:
 
“Perhaps most of all, the events of that week left President Buhari‘s credibility in a fog, and his road to political  sainthood  as broken as a federal Nigerian highway.”

The reason for this level of disappointment on the part of Mr. Olumhense is that he had put more stock in the hyping of Mohammadu Buhari in the days leading to the last presidential elections. His omission in properly interrogating the know-how and qualifications of Buhari in those heady electioneering days made him unwittingly gullible to the propaganda of a possible “Saint Buhari.”
 
Without any doubt, Mr. Olumhense is still holding on to some straws of hope that somehow, someday, someway, President Buhari would change from who he really is and fight this corruption war the way he (Olumhense) has been made to buy hook, line and sinker – without favour or fear. This is an impossibility because President Buhari is innately nepotic. He flits, fibs and feints. He cannot change. Even, if he tries, he won’t be able to change. He is like a leopard that nature has rendered congenitally unable to change his spots.

Abacha Loot: Saved, Spent Or Stolen?

By Sonala Olumhense

Former Nigeria leader Olusegun Obasanjo has explained what became of the funds recovered from Nigeria’s best advertised kleptocrat, General Sani Abacha.

Calling the court of law and Nigerians who want to know what he did with the money he recovered, “stupid,” he dignified his critics with some wisdom last week.

“I don’t keep account,” he said.  “All Abacha loots were (sic) sent to Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and every bit of it was reported to Minister of Finance…If they want to know what happened to the money, they should call CBN governor or call the Minister of Finance!”

*Gen Sani Abacha

To begin with, here is a general timeline of the Abacha loot story:

·         May 29, 1999: Obasanjo takes office.

·         July 1999: Nigeria begins civil proceedings in London against Mohammed Abacha, Abubakar Bagudu and companies owned by them, in connection with a debt buy-back transaction in which they had made an illicit profit of about 500 million DEM. Freezing and disclosure orders having been obtained, $420 million in assets are identified and frozen, and Nigeria demonstrates to the courts that Mohammed Abacha had failed to disclose over $1.1m in assets in Switzerland and Luxembourg.

·         Mid-September 1999: Obasanjo hires Italian lawyer Enrico Monfini to pursue assets stolen by Sani Abacha and his family. Pursuit begins from a Nigeria police investigation which showed that between 1994 and 1998, Abacha and his sons had looted the CBN of about $2 billion and transferred the money abroad.

·         30 September 1999: Monfrini lodges with Switzerland a request for interim freezing orders. Granted within two weeks, this paves the way for the lodging of a formal request for mutual assistance by Nigeria on 20 December 1999. It is discovered that all of the bank accounts identified in the request have been closed, and their assets transferred to such places as Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, the UK and Jersey.

·         November 1999: Nigeria, deploying a parallel strategy with the Attorney General of Geneva of a criminal complaint for fraud, money laundering and participation in a criminal organisation, requests to be admitted in the proceedings as a party suing for damages. This is granted, leading to a blanket freezing order in which the names of the suspects, their aliases and their companies are sent to all Swiss banks.

·         Within days, many accounts with assets of over $700m, are frozen in Switzerland as banks report and dutifully monitor suspicious accounts, including the receiving and paying accounts.

·         On the basis of the criminal proceedings in Geneva, Nigeria lodges requests for mutual assistance with Luxembourg, UK, Liechtenstein and Jersey, and within months, an additional $1.3 billion are frozen in those jurisdictions.

Chinua Achebe, 37 Other Nigerian Writers Speak On The State Of The Nation

We are troubled by the turn of events in Nigeria, and hereby call on President Goodluck Jonathan and the rest of the country’s political leadership to take immediate steps to tackle the state of lawlessness in certain parts of the nation and address the trepidation and rage that has reached dangerous levels within the Nigerian populace.

Chinua Achebe

Nigeria is witnessing a new escalation of sectarian violence, culminating in explosions that have killed or seriously wounded scores of people at churches and other centers of worship and local businesses.

As a people who lost two million citizens in a civil war, Nigerians must bring an urgent sense of history to the gloomy events. The country’s leadership should not view the incessant attacks as mere temporary misfortune with which the citizenry must learn to live; they are precursors to events that could destabilize the entire country.

We applaud President Jonathan’s declaration of a state of emergency in certain local government areas in four states. However, we have seen little indication that the country’s security and law enforcement agents are up to the task of protecting the lives and property of citizens in all parts of Nigeria.



Okey Ndibe

Clearly, the sophistication and deadly impact of the terrorist attacks suggest an agenda to create widespread fear and, possibly, to foment anarchy or war. President Jonathan has no greater duty than to ensure that Nigerians are safe wherever they live or visit within the country. He should demonstrate his recognition of that solemn duty, in our view, by doing the following:

(a) Outline both short and long term plans to comprehensively address the scourge of terror,

(b) Appoint competent and committed officials to head the various security agencies, and

(c) Serve as an agent to heal the many divisions plaguing Nigeria, and persuade all well-meaning people to enlist in the fight against festering violence.



Tess Onwueme

President Jonathan’s decision to remove fuel subsidies in the country at this time was ill-advised. Coming at the advent of the New Year, and barely a week after the gruesome Christmas Day attacks on worshippers, the policy has forced many Nigerian citizens to perceive his leadership as one that is both insensitive and possibly contemptuous of the mood of its people.

We stand with the Nigerian people who are protesting the removal of oil subsidy which has placed an unbearable economic weight on their lives. This action has clearly imposed an untenable and unfair burden on those segments of Nigerians who are already impoverished - subsisting on less than $2 a day. We call on President Jonathan to immediately change course. By reverting to the old prices of petroleum products, President Jonathan can work to diffuse tension in the country and exemplify the true servant leader who not only serves but also listens to his people. To insist on having his way, and to deploy state security and legal apparati to crush growing popular uprisings is to stamp on a highly valued tenet of democracy – the right to peaceful assembly – and to inadvertently promote greater violence in the country.



Isidore Okpewho

President Jonathan’s administration has made a persuasive case that a few highly connected Nigerians have corruptly profited from fuel subsidy. The government should swiftly bring to justice those corrupt profiteers as well as the bureaucrats who aid and abet their unconscionable parasitic activities and economic sabotage.

We acknowledge President Jonathan’s recent announcement of 25% cut in the basic salaries of political office holders.

But we believe that the move merely scratches the indefensible bloated salaries and allowances paid to Nigerian political officials. The president should also champion significant cuts in the huge cost of running the various tiers of government and the luxuries that have become the signature of those who ought to protect the commonwealth, serve the people, and not exploit them.



Besides, the culture of corruption and impunity in official quarters constitutes a grave threat to national security and to the country’s effort to establish a democratic culture and meaningful economic development.

Nigeria needs a return to relative calm to enable its people, and the Jonathan administration in particular, to focus on the task of combating the incubus of corruption, poverty and home-grown terrorism.

Signed by:
Chinua Achebe,  Okey Ndibe, Nduka Otiono, Helon Habila, Akin Adesokan, Pius Adesanmi, Tess Onwueme, Obiora Udechukwu, Yinka Tella,  Richard Ali, Chiji Akoma, Paul Ugor, Tolu Ogunlesi, Samantha Iwowo, Idowu Ohioze, Offiong Bassey, Chido Onumah, Bunmi Aborisade, Omolade Adunbi, Mahmud Obeamata, Mahmud Aminu, Nasr Kura, Gimba Kakanda, Obioma Nnaemeka, Sonala Olumhense, Ikhide Ikheola, Isidore Okpewho, E.C. Osondu, Ogaga Ifowodo, Mike Nwosu, Herbert Ekwe Ekwe, Chimalum Nwankwo, Uzor Maxim Uzoatu, Ebenezer Obadare, Ahmed Maiwada, Madina Shehu, Hussein Abdu, Auwal Musa Rafsanjani