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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TOBACCO: The Ruthless Killer Next Door

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

Today, as I allow my mind to endure the oppressive thought that tobacco still remains the ruthless killer next door, what then shall we call its producers and distributors? The answer can only be simple and straightforward: They are people who prosper at the expense of other people’s lives. They make their billions by ruining other people’s health, and eventually terminating their lives. They should therefore not complain if anyone refers to them as proud, happy, licensed murderers.

Packs of Killer Poison

How these people are able to deaden their conscience to go on prospering and sustaining their own lives by producing and marketing a scientifically confirmed poison whose only benefit is its ability to cruelly terminate the lives of their fellow human beings beats me hollow? Tobacco never adds even the tiniest value to life; it only destroys it completely. Without mercy. This is a fact nobody has even attempted to deny.

The Nigerian president should put the concern for the lives of many Nigerians above his often whispered personal tastes and habits and take another look at the massive freedom granted by his predecessor to tobacco companies to fill Nigeria with their neatly wrapped and attractively packaged killer poison called cigarettes. If he cannot immediately ban the production of cigarettes in Nigeria, he should, at least, put in place stricter regulations that would ensure that tobacco manufacturing would automatically become a very unprofitable venture in Nigeria. 

I call on Nigerians with lively conscience and genuine friends of Nigeria, to join this clearly winnable battle, to flush these heartless fellows out of Nigeria. The question I have always asked cigarette producers is: can they boldly come out in the open and assure me that the commodity they manufacture and distribute to hapless individuals cannot be rightly classified as poison? Again, they should tell me one single benefit the human body derives from smoking cigarettes. Has it not been convincingly proved everywhere, and publicly admitted even by tobacco producers, that tobacco is a merciless killer, an unrelenting cannibal that devours a man when his life is sweetest to him?  If then tobacco is a proven killer, can’t those who manufacture and circulate it in society be classified as murderers? Hasn’t even our own Federal Ministry of Health been shouting and warning us with passion, sense of urgency and alarm that TOBACCO SMOKERS ARE LIABLE TO DIE YOUNG?

What the Health Ministry here is saying is very simple: Anyone offering you a cigarette is only wishing you an untimely death. In fact, he is just saying to you: May you die young! That is exactly what tobacco companies, including the government that issued them the license to transact their deadly trade in Nigeria are wickedly wishing their Nigerian victims! Yes, tobacco companies manufacture products that make people to die young. How wicked and heartless could they be!

Before now, these tobacco companies would erect fresh, beautiful billboards, and fill several pages of newspapers and magazines with glossy adverts. Unfortunately, that option is no longer available to them, because of the ban on outdoor advertising of their lethal products. I am glad that those pleasant pictures of vivacious achievers smiling home with glittering laurels just because they were hooked to particular brands of cigarette which used to adorn glossy billboards and magazine pages, and which had proved irresistible baits to several people, especially youths, have now vanished from the public domain.

As a youth, the elegant, gallant, athletic rodeo man whose image marketed the 555 brand of cigarette was my best idea of a handsome, hard-working winner. My friends and I admired him, carried his photographs about, and yearned to smoke 555 in order to grow up and become energetic and vivacious like him. One wonders how many youths that have been terminally impaired because they went beyond mere fantasies or obsession with their cigarette heroes and became chain-smokers and irredeemable addicts. Managers of tobacco adverts are so adept in this grand art of monumental deception that their victims never suspect any harm until they have willingly placed their heads on the slaughter slab. Indeed, only very few are able to look beyond the meretricious pictures and the pernicious pomp of cigarette promotional stunt and see the blood-curdling pictures of piecemeally ruined lungs and other sensitive organs, murky, chimney-like breath tracts and heart region, the looming merciless and spine-chilling fangs of an all devouring cancer, tuberculosis, sundry lung and heart diseases, and their associate unyielding killers.

Smokers Are Burning Their Lungs!!!! (pix: pulse2)

I want to challenge tobacco companies to come out and tell Nigerians that tobacco, the product they manufacture and circulate in Nigeria, is no more the resilient, implacable and silent killer, the lethal poison and heartless cannibal that seeks accommodation in the midst of hapless humanity with the sole intention of effecting their eventual decimation. I want to hear that cigarettes are no longer generous distributors of devouring cancer, tuberculosis, sundry terminal lung and heart disease, etc.

 I have heard tobacco companies pay huge taxes to government, award scholarships to indigent students and embark upon several projects to better the lot of the common man in several communities. But how many people have their lethal product sent to their early graves? How many widows, widowers and orphans are they producing with alarming rapidity?  How many people have been lured to calamity and painful death with their tantalizing and deceptive adverts? How many cancer TB lung disease patients do they produce in a year? How many among their hapless employees are gradually ruined daily because of the insidious fumes they inhale during production of cigarettes? It is so saddening that while in several countries of the world, tobacco companies and their owners are being isolated and choked with harsh laws, they have been allowed to invade Nigeria and other African countries with their filthy billions because we have incompetent and insensitive governments that have no qualms welcoming urbane, but ruthless killers in the name of "foreign investors."


A Poison-Manufacturing Giant


I will never be tired of referring to an interesting development in the United States on June 7, 2001 where a Los Angeles Superior Court slapped an unprecedented $3 billion in damages on Phillip Morris, another giant tobacco company, in response to a suit by a tobacco casualty, Richard Boeken, who had developed incurable cancer of the brain and lungs after smoking two packs of Marlboro cigarettes every day for 40 years. This should serve as eye opener to Africans that with several class suits from victims of tobacco, these evil merchants of death can be forced out of the continent. According to the New York Post editorial of June 9, 2001, 56-year-old Boeken who began smoking as a teenager in 1957 claimed that "he continued smoking because … he believed claims by tobacco companies that smoking was safe." He told reporters in a post-trial interview: “I didn't believe they would lie about the facts that they were putting out on television and radio."


Now, that is exactly the issue. Tobacco companies deploy beautifully packaged lies to lure people into taking their fatally poisoned wraps called cigarettes. Their billboards do not present cancer patients treading the cold, dark, lonely path to a most painful, slow death, which is where tobacco happily leads victims. Every society has a responsibility to defend its unwary and the ignorant, and Nigeria and the rest of Africa cannot be an exception. The argument that smokers ought to be dissuaded from smoking by the hardly visible warnings they put out on their packets, and that people are merely being allowed to exercise their right and freedom to make choices, is akin to endorsing suicide as a lawful expression of freedom? Why allow a killer-poison to circulate among humans in the first place? Do we all have the same capacity to discern and resist the allurement of this clear and present danger called cigarettes?



Cigarette Manufacturers Want You To Die Young!!!!

It is widely known that many tobacco producers are non-smokers because they know too well how deadly their products are! In court and in several enquiries, tobacco producers have admitted that their product contains very harmful substances. So why should the government not protect its citizens against it? Tobacco is a killer. So are its manufacturers. Nigerians should rise with one voice and unified strength and resist this cannibal in our midst. The battle is winnable.

scruples2006@yahoo.com
www.ugochukwu.wordpress.com

Yar’Adua, Please, Fix Lagos-Shagamu-Benin Expressway

(First Published June 19, 2007)

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye 

The Lagos-Shagamu-Benin Expressway is in a very horrible state. Although it has deteriorated quite beyond what anyone could have imagined was possible in a country ruled by human beings, no one can recall any meaningful attempt made in the past few years to halt its progressive decay. Indeed, the unmissed, out-gone regime of Gen Olusegun Obasanjo was unable to conceal the fact that the rehabilitation of that road was not part of its priorities.

It instead found more pleasure and fulfillment in erecting several signposts bearing the scary photograph of Gen Obasanjo and the shameless lie that it was rehabilitating the road. In addition, the irremediably corrupt and inept regime also awarded mouthwatering contracts to one or more of its cronies to build some brightly painted bungalows at several points along the road, as offices or observation posts for its clearly phantom road maintenance agency workers who were supposed to be rehabilitating the road. Well, those fine buildings are not entirely useless now. They provide comfortable shelter for criminals, lizards, snakes and other wild animals.   

Bad Spot At Ore: Along Lagos-Shagamu-Benin Expressway( Pix: NVS)                                                                 

I was on Lagos-Shagamu-Benin Expressway last week and my experience was most traumatic. Even though we took off quite early, about 8.am, from Lagos, with a very sound, new vehicle, I was only able to get to my destination in the East by about 8.00pm. Yet, this was a journey that should, ordinarily, not have taken more than six-to-seven hours or even less!

The traffic hold-up, which I understand is an everyday trauma for regular users of that road, can hold somebody at a spot for several  hours. Because of the very deep holes that adorn the road, big vehicles are always spoiling, being stuck or falling down on the road, thereby rendering the lane involved impassable. Motorists would now be left with the option of using the other equally bad lane. And because of the usually heavy traffic on the road, the hold-up witnessed daily on that road is an experience not even a demonized mind can wish for his worst enemy.  

The reputation of this road as the bloodthirstiest slaughter-slab in the nation has since been firmly established. The accident scenes one encounters each time one uses the road are so many, that they can cause even the warmest blood to congeal. It is so benumbing. It is so frightening. What a shame! 

Last week, somebody showed us a village footpath through which we avoided most of the traffic jam. We had to pay some very unruly young men (and even women) who had mounted roadblocks on those footpaths to collect tolls from the strangers who had turned their once serene village into a busy thoroughfare. The behaviour of the young men made some of the travelers to begin to entertain fears about their lives. Indeed, if somebody had not shown us that village route, maybe, judging from the kind of traffic jam I saw, we would have been trapped there till past midnight.

 The other day, some people returning to Lagos spent a whole two days on that road, because, both lanes were blocked by big trucks who had either spoilt while trying to crawl past the deep holes on the road or fallen down. Man-hours were wasted in an already prostrate economy. Lives were cut short as people developed hypertension, just because they decided to make a journey in a country somebody claims to be ruling.  

These days, those who are trapped in those terrible hold-ups have become easy preys to daredevil armed robbers/rapists, who descend on them once night falls.

 So how long would this madness, this hell-on-earth, continue?  How long will Nigerians continue to witness avoidable bloodshed on this road? When will users of this road stop developing High BP and Hypertension, because they are trapped in a horrible hold up all day long, punished by the implacable sun, and tormented by the fear of what may befall them once night time comes? 

Considering the importance of Lagos-Shagamu-Benin Expressway, as the only link between the West and the East, and several parts of the South-South, and the volume of daily business transactions that take place between these two zones, President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, must show right now that he wants to fix the road without any further delay. The matter is too urgent. It just cannot wait. Yar’Adau should in fact declare his State of Emergency on the road, award the contracts for its rehabilitation to several construction companies, and let Nigerians know which company is responsible for any part of the road. 

As we approach the so-called “ember-months”, the volume of traffic on that road is bound to almost triple. What then would the situation be like?

Many people from the East and the South-South will use this road during the Christmas and New Year period. On no account should Yar’Adua allow Nigerians to taste the kind of hell they experienced on this road last December and January. I would remember that during that period, my family and I spent nearly twelve hours on that road before we could even get to Asaba, and were involved in accident when it was pitch dark, from which God delivered us, even though my car was badly damaged.  Many other people were not as “lucky”. Many have worse tales to share, while many more are not even alive today to tell their stories of woe. Mr. Yar’Adua must intervene immediately and halt the daily bloodshed that is going on that road. The deaths being recorded on that road daily have almost surpassed what is being experienced at some warfronts. 

I would suggest that Mr. Yar’Adua, if he truly means to be a man of the people, should take a trip on this road urgently to have a feel of the daily trauma human beings with blood in their veins like him experience everyday. That is what patriotic leaders do in every properly run nation. Unfortunately, during his notorious reign, Gen Olusegun Obasanjo tried as much as possible to avoid any contact with the bad Nigerians roads. He would alight from his Presidential Jet and step into a waiting helicopter to either go to his farm or any other place.

I just hope Mr. Yar’Adua has not allowed Obasanjo to pass this most atrocious habit over to him. Only recently, when he came to Lagos, Yar’Adua was reportedly flown from the airport to Dodan Barracks in a helicopter, thus, robbing himself of a good opportunity for a direct acquaintance with the horrific federal roads in Lagos.

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scruples2006@yahoo.com
www.ugochukwu.wordpress.com
June 19, 2007

Yar’Adua, Give Nigerians Prepaid Metres!

(Published on Wednesday, May 28, 2008, a day before Nigeria’s ‘Democracy Day’ and President Yar’Adua’s one year anniversary)

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye

By this time tomorrow (May 29, 2008) President Umar Musa Yar’Adua would be one year in office. As usual, he may call for “low-key, sombre celebrations” and “sober reflections” which would not be extended to the obscene gaiety, excessive mirth, hugging, necking and backslapping amidst endless flow of champagne and sumptuous delicacies, in short, the bacchanalian revel that would take place in the name of State Banquet later in the day.

He would also record a speech in which he would appeal to us to make further sacrifices and exercise more patience to allow the great seeds of growth, development and incredible plenty which he has been carefully sowing and watering for the past one year (and which he may continue to sow and water till he leaves office) to germinate, grow and spread unimaginable prosperity all over the nation. He would probably spice the speech up with a long list of the phantom achievements he had recorded since he was sworn in and grab the headlines by announcing some really ambitious and big projects he would undertake between tomorrow and the “second quarter of next year.”  Needless to add that he may well forget the whole thing before Sunday afternoon. 

 

President  Yar’Adua: Floored By the ‘Energy Challenge'?

If he is able tomorrow, he may also attend a parade at the Eagle Square, give a short address, or send his irritatingly dull deputy to stand in for him, while he stays at home to rest and conserve some strength for the State Banquet, where Turai, his wife (and she that must be obeyed), cannot wait to star without moderation. Indeed, not even the Servant Leader himself can deny her this day!

It is unlikely, too, that the contractors, hangers-on and jobless fellows whose eyes are fixed on the next cabinet reshuffle would heed his call to observe tomorrow as a day of sober reflection. No doubt, newspaper pages would be dominated by full-page colour adverts extolling his “sterling virtues  and great vision,” and the “unprecedented achievements of this great son of Africa who has just under one year taken Nigeria to great heights” – the same words they had deployed to seduce Gen Olusegun Obasanjo into his present grief.

(By the way, when last did anyone witness where Obasanjo was referred to as the Founder and/or Father of Modern Nigeria? The last I heard was Founder and Father of Modern Corruption!)

But if Yar’Adua would take my advice, he should ask everybody to stay at home tomorrow and excuse himself from any grand design by unconscionable fellows in and around government to celebrate failure. I mean abysmal and all-round failure!

He should also be man enough to stand up to his restless, limelight-crazy wife and tell her that any State Banquet tomorrow evening would constitute an obscene provocation to long-suffering Nigerians. What exactly would Yar’Adua be celebrating? Does he need anyone to tell him that his one year in office has been one woeful story of overwhelming failure? Sometimes I am tempted to feel that this country would have even fared better if this government (or any other one like it) was not in place. At least, the country would have moved faster on the path of development without the crushing burden this burden  constituted.

Last Saturday evening, I entered a filling station to buy fuel and the crowd I saw there almost scared me. It was when I looked closely that I saw containers of different sizes in the hands of the people. Oh, all those people had come to purchase fuel for the countless generators they use to generate power for themselves in a failed state like Nigeria. As I looked at this large crowd and it occurred to me that many of them may even be storing the fuel under their beds, I shuddered. No doubt, it is only God’s mercy that has prevented the whole of Lagos from going up in flames before now.

Take a trip today to the various areas in Lagos, especially, where people are crammed into small apartments like the face-me-I-face-you type of accommodation, where whole families and dependants are piled into stuffy rooms, and observe the room occupants showing off their generators and the fuel they had stored. At night when all these machines begin to roar, emitting killer fumes into the already airless, stuffy enclosures, what emerges is a most horrible situation where a failed and heartless government has cruelly driven its hapless citizens into organizing their own bitter deaths with generators purchased with monies they had probably starved themselves to save.

In order to escape the unbearable heat and choking darkness their government and its licensed Agent of Darkness, NEPA/PHCN, have heartlessly plunged them into, they end up creating deadly gas chambers where they enact mass suicides daily. We have regularly heard of whole families being found dead in the morning after an all-night inhalation of generator fumes. For those resilient ones still on their feet, what is left of their sensitive organs by the lethal fumes they abundantly inhale every night are being progressively ruined by the ear-splitting din produced by the countless generators. No wonder cases of hypertension and nervous breakdowns are also on the increase in Nigeria.     

 

Turai Yar’Adua, (Right): Power Behind The Throne?

My view is that as these people whose only offence is that they were born Nigerians develop lung cancer and deadly heart and respiratory diseases and die painful in their obscure corners due to lack of medicare (while their president hops across to Germany from time to time to treat catarrh (common cold) and allergic reactions, their blood would certainly be required at the hands of those who claim to be ruling this richly endowed nation.

 Night time in this nation has simply turned into several harrowing hours of unbearable torments. In the fairly moderate accommodation I occupy with my family, we usually abandon our rooms every night to cram ourselves into the parlour and my already jam-packed study, because the ear-splitting noise from my neighbour’s generator in the next compound is simply destructive. As the monster starts roaring (and this continues till morning), not even the wall demarcating the two compounds can mitigate its damage. I have this feeling that if I try any day to protest, the man might pour on me all the pent up anger he had reserved for Yar’Adua and, of course, Obasanjo who for his own selfish reasons foisted on us a man who neither wanted to be president nor have any clear idea how to get this nation on its feet.

For two months now, NEPA/PHCN has left my neighbourhood in total darkness. We used to complain about irregular power supply. Now, total darkness has enveloped the whole place.  Apart from the two or so brief moments I was informed power was supplied, it has been darkness all the way for more than two months now. In the previous months they had managed to flash some flicker of light. Yet despite all these, the huge bills keeps coming. This is nothing but heartless extortion and daylight robbery, actively supported by the Federal Government under Mr. Umar Yar’Adua.

A friend who recently secured his prepaid metre was so excited to discover that it was only two hundred naira that he had consumed in a whole month. Before now, his monthly bill never came below five thousand naira despite the uninterrupted darkness that engulfed him! What an unarmed robbery! The other day, officials of NEPA/PHCN invaded a widow’s house threatening to disconnect her from their Darkness Supply because she was “not paying her bills.” The woman’s protestations that she was using the prepaid metre only annoyed them further. They hate to hear that anyone is using a prepaid metre because it effectively checks their extortion!

So, how long will Yar’Adua allow this robbery to continue? How long will Nigerians continue to pay for services not rendered to them?  Why are the irremediably corrupt sadists at NEPA/PHCN frustrating attempts by Nigerians to get prepaid metres?  

Now, if NEPA/PHCN chooses to supply only darkness, they should let every Nigerian have a prepaid metre so that no one would be compelled again to pay for energy not supplied. It is cruel to force people to pay these bills after they had generated power for themselves at very huge costs and great risks to their health.

If President Yar’Adua wishes to distance himself from this heartless, official robbery, he should tomorrow (May 29, 2008) announce a date when everybody in Nigeria must, without fail, be issued a prepaid metre. If this measure would dry up the revenue base of NEPA/PHCN and cause it to fold up, so be it. Nigerians are better off without such an agency that produces only pain, torments, sorrow, heart-ache and death.  

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 scruples2006@yahoo.com

www.ugochukwu.wordpress.com

    +234-802-883-3853

Will Obasanjo Explode President Yar’Adua’s Anti-Graft Balloon?

(First published April 2, 2008)

By Ugochukwu Ejinkeonye  
If you were carrying out an employment exercise in your company, and one of the job seekers  showed up with a letter of  recommendation duly written and signed by Mr. Nuhu Ribadu, the former Chair of the Economic And Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), would that impress you? 

 Well, the strength and credibility of any   recommendation should flow from the performance of the person earlier recommended by the same person. For instance, Mr. Ribadu had told the nation that he had deployed the full force of his prodigious intellect, experience and thoroughness to carefully examine the eight-year nightmare prosecuted by Gen Olusegun Obasanjo but could not detect the slightest hint of corruption in all that the man did while in office!  

But, for the past few weeks now, Nigerians have witnessed with utter disbelief and deep pain horrifying details of the worst form of heartless plunder this nation had ever witnessed, perpetrated with utmost impunity and even fanfare, under the direct supervision of the same man Nuhu Ribadu had told us was above board.  

About $16 billion was callously squandered under the pretext of fixing the nation’s problematic power sector, plunging the country and   its hapless citizens deeper into thicker and more suffocating darkness.  As sordid revelations ooze from the House of Representatives Probe into the management of the power sector under the Obasanjo regime, where, for instance, it was revealed that a contract worth about N88 billion was verbally awarded, Nigerians are shocked that human beings with hearts and blood running in their veins are capable of such prehistoric greed and cruelty.

While Nigerians groaned under the punishing effect of the protracted energy crises in the country, the very resources meant for the alleviation of their harrowing pain was being primitively plundered.  

 In a decent country, Mr. Liyel Imoke would have since resigned as Governor of Cross River State with shame and haste, while awaiting his well-earned trail alongside his big uncle, Obasanjo. But, this is Nigeria, where something called Immunity Clause exists to provide very formidable protection for unrepentant enemies of the people from the just consequences of their hideous actions in office. 

                                                                                                                                Late President Yar’Adua 

Only last week, former Finance Minster, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, told the House Committee probing the mindless brigandage that flourished in the power sector that it was Mr. Imoke and Obasanjo  that concocted the “Due Process Waiver” that enabled them bypass all statutory roadblocks to prosecute their unparalleled clean out of the public treasury to build phantom power plants.  

In 1999 when Obasanjo became president, total power generation within the national grid stood at 2,400 Mega Watts. But by the time he was leaving office in 2007 (and till date), the whole thing had come down to 2,100 MW, despite the billions of dollars said to have been poured into the obviously phantom efforts to give Nigerians stable power supply.  

To sensible Nigerians, that is hardly surprising. Among the companies awarded juicy contracts, and paid jumbo mobilisation fees, which in some cases were as high as 70 percent of the whole contract value, thirty-three (which got N6.2 billion contracts) were not registered at the Corporate Affairs Commission, which means that they were non-existent companies! Even when identifiable companies got contracts and were fully mobilized, several of them vanished into thin air or managed to show some form of presence at the project site. 

 The only believable reason those in charge of the whole obscene profligacy had refused to bother themselves with whether those contracts were executed or not may be that, perhaps, those “companies” were either theirs or belonged to their cronies and agents.

                                                                         
                                                                                 Former EFCC Boss, Nuhu Ribadu            
          
According to Daily Independent editorial of March 27, 2008, “Energo Limited, a company in which a former military head of state is Chairman, [was paid] over N13 billion … without any job done to date … Obasanjo, according to disclosures by the Revenue Mobilisation Allocation and Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), even commissioned an empty site in Odukpani, Cross River State, as a power station last year.  Top managers of PHCN [also awarded] contracts worth US$142 million to non-existent firms. PHCN was shown to have paid out various sums – N2.1 billion, 2.1million Euros and 1.1billion Yen — for hydropower projects whose existence is unknown to chief executives of the stations.”

According to the Minster for Energy (Power), Mrs. Fatimah Ibrahim, $13.3 billion was squandered in the power sector, under very close, direct supervision of Imoke and Obasanjo with nothing on ground to show for the huge expenditure.

Certainly, this is enough to put these fellows behind bars for the rest of their lives, if President Umar Musa Yar’Adua is serious about all the noise he makes about rule of law and due process.  Well, how Yar’Adua responds to this challenge will help define the image of his administration in the days ahead.

Last week, former Health Minister, Prof Adenike Grange, was sacked or forced to resign, or both, for refusing to heed the Presidential directive to return to the treasury the unspent fund from the allocation to her ministry. The amount involved is N300 million naira, which the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) accused her, her deputy, Gabriel Aduku, and 14 senior civil servants of the ministry of attempting to embezzle.    

Also starring in the slimy scandal is Obasanjo’s first daughter, Dr. Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello, who is the Chairman, Senate Committee on Health.  It may appear uncharitable to view Prof Grange’s sack or resignation, given its timing, as aimed at diverting significant attention from the earth-shaking revelations rolling out from the Public Hearing on the Power Sector which has provoked widespread demand for the immediate arrest and trial of Obasanjo and all those who had joined hands with him to enact the unprecedented corruption. But then, the whole thing reeks of just that! 

                                                            
                                                                          Former President Obasanjo

On Monday (March 31, 2008), General Jeremiah Useni, the unrepentant alter ego of the late ruthless dictator, Gen Sani Abacha, was quoted as saying that the boundless brigandage that flourished in the power sector has made whatever Abacha was accused of looting to appear like “a child’s play.” He even expressed doubt that the once famous Abacha Loot recovered from several sources were deployed to execute any venture that would benefit the Nigerian people, because, according to him, there was “no bill [that] went to the National Assembly to approve its expenditure.” In other words, Abacha’s may have been looted by those who recovered it!  

Also, on the same Monday, the papers reported that Prof Grange may be charged to court this week. Now, if we consider that what Grange and Co were accused of “attempting to embezzle” was mere “change” when compared with the $16 or $13 billion that was siphoned off thought phantom power projects, we will then begin to ask ourselves whether, under Yar’Adua, different rules apply to different people? 

 Now, some ex-Governors are, justifiably, being dragged about by the EFCC for allegedly stealing N1 billion or N2 billion or even less. If these ex-Governors or Mrs. Grange and Co are found guilty, they should be hastened off to jail, to isolate them from the assembly decent beings, because they have proved themselves to be unrepentant enemies of Nigeria.

But should the alleged bigger thieves be spared? 

 Nigerians and the rest of world are watching to see what President Yar’Adua would do with the fellows who awarded N88 billion contract by mere word of mouth. They would want to know what would be done to the man who gave out juicy contracts to 33 non-existent companies, and commissioned empty lands as power plants, to cover up the squandered fund.

Yes, they would want to know whether the fellow who had bled his country pale to become one of the richest billionaires in Africa is, in the thinking of Yar’Adua, above the laws of the land, and deserves to be celebrated, while the poor clerk somewhere who was driven by hunger to mismanage N5, 000 is sent to jail.  

It must be clear to Yar’Adua that injustice and double standards, especially of this magnitude, can only create fertile grounds for defiance, rebellion and anarchy.
Already, a former Governor standing trial for corrupt enrichment is threatening to make the country ungovernable if big thieves are left to move about undisturbed while mere pickpockets are haunted and harassed with extreme zeal.  

Yar’Adua must be wary of allowing seeds of destabilisation germinate in the country just because of his determination not to “embarrass” some fellows whose only contribution to their fatherland is the ruin and stagnation they had brought to it by their conscious unethical acts.  

By the way, where was Saint Ribadu when the nation was being gang-raped with such unparalleled violence? To what extent did the National Assembly under Ken Nnamani and his brother Aminu Bello Masari exercise its oversight functions when this insane plundering was flourishing?

Well, former Vice-President, Atiku Abubakar can gloat today, but would this brazen prodigality have been exposed if Obasanjo had not parted ways with, and handed over to him as he had expected?   Now, we have seen the stench in the power sector, but when will the long-awaited probe of the NNPC commence? 

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scruples2006@yahoo.com
April 2, 2008

I Wanted to Unmask Charles Taylor in My Film, Says, Sam Kargbo, Producer of 'Blood Diamonds'

Lawyer, law teacher, social commentator and film maker, Sam Kargbo is many things to many people. Although a regular TV guest on many topical issues and a newspaper columnist,  Kargbo carries about his life with utmost modesty. He loves his beautiful wife from Akwa Ibom State and adores his mentors with a passion. He is the maker of Blood Diamonds, arguably one of the highest budget films in Nollywood, the Nigerian Home Video Industry. Yet, he insists film making is just an avenue for him to pass his message across to a target audience. In this interview with UGOCHUKWU EJINKEONYE (February 2005), he talks about his involvement in film making and the bold efforts of private investors that have taken the good image of Nigeria across continents.

Excerpts:

Sam Kargbo on Channels TV

Most people are familiar with Sam Kargbo the lawyer, not the script writer and film producer, at what point did this other side of you come up?