The Restructuring Nigeria Needs

By Arthur Agwuncaha Nwankwo

It is indeed interesting to see so many Nigerians today talking about restructuring the Nigerian state. This is heart warning on account of the fact that today we have come to appreciate restructuring as a necessity for Nigeria’s continued existence. This is a crusade I began almost two decades ago; a crusade that has taken me to prison and back.

*Dr. Nwankwo

In the course of this crusade, I have had my younger brother brutally murdered in cold blood by agents of the state; I have had my residence turned inside-out by security agents brooding over my massive library like maggots rummaging the remains of decaying carcass. I have been cursed and discussed; scandalized and analysed. The leeches of the Nigerian state are mad; and I am happy. The struggle rages on and that’s just the way I love it. My happiness is that my crusade has put Nigeria on notice and today we are all talking about it.

Even though it is a welcome development that we have been caught by the bug of restructuring, I am afraid not so many of us understand the true essence of restructuring. I say this because in recent times I have heard people talk about merging of states as a form of restructuring. I am afraid this is not restructuring by any stretch of the imagination.
The question is: What type of restructuring does Nigeria need? For the avoidance of doubt, Nigeria needs both structural and fiscal restructuring. Structurally, Nigeria must constitutionally define the federating units.

 For now there are six geo-political zones in the country. These geo-political zones should be constituted into the federating units with equal constitutional rights. The states as presently existing make up the zones. 
Each zone will have its own constitution, which must not be in conflict with the federal constitution. The federating units should be in-charge of the zones and LGS. The States’ Houses of Assembly will remain as they are but there will be Regional Houses of Assembly that will function as the highest legislative organ of the region. 

The Avengers As Nemesis Of A Nation’s Hubris

By Alade Rotimi-John  

These are testy times for the Nigerian nation state. She is variously buffeted on all sides by the scourge of insurgency in her North-East geo-political zone, the murderous ogre of Fulani herdsmen in the north–central axis and in the southern states of Enugu, Ekiti, Oyo and Delta, the brimming militancy in the South-South exemplifying itself in incessant bombings of oil and gas pipelines in the Niger Delta, the revamped agitation for self-determination by restive youths in the South-East, an all-time low crude oil price, the irritable upsurge in price level, the plummeting exchange value of the national currency, unbridled unemployment and the abysmal failure or non-functioning of public infrastructure e.g. electricity, etc.

Of all Nigeria’s contemporary difficulties, however, the Boko Haram attempt to take control of the country by force to foist on her its own brand of rabid or unconventional Islamism and the Niger Delta militancy directed at the nation’s economic jugular have understandably taken the centre stage. Both militant agitations must be understood as natural human responses to a perceived unfair or unjust political or social order even as they are a stark reflection of how remiss successive administrations have been regarding the requirement to resolve the contradictions inherent in the Nigerian pastiche. Only half-hearted attempts have been made to interrogate the Nigerian national question.

The socio-economic injustice in the Niger Delta finds unrefreshing or disturbing parallel in the criminal neglect of the fortunes of children and young persons in many parts of Northern Nigeria. Generally, the Nigerian state manifests smug indifference to the plight of her people even as the people are consequently provoked to question the legitimacy or appropriateness of those who have been put in authority over them to resolve the crisis of the status of their stake-holding.

Self-help is resorted to as government marshals state security and military resources to combat the “audacity” of the aggrieved people. For instance, the hubris or overweening pride of the state often displayed by her power wielders defines the response of the state to the people’s protestation of the environmental degradation or ecological scandal that is the plight of the residents of the Niger Delta. Troops are promptly mobilised and deployed just to put out or “crush” any protest. 

The people may be quietened but the rumbles remain loud. The Adaka Boro and Ken Saro-Wiwa memorabilia fore-shadowing today’s restive agitations in the Niger Delta region offer a ruminative opportunity for the present occupiers of state offices. The impending battle in Oporoza is the a la carte or regular response of government: make no distinction between the culpable and the innocent, the young or aged; lump all together for violent punishment or mauling as they have not been able to restrain their children or wards from becoming threats to the national economy. Afterall, “All have sinned…”

Nigeria: Re-Structuring Again?

By Oshineye Victor Oshisada  

Lately, the call for the country’s re-structuring is unbridled. The clamour for it rents the air as if without it , the country shall go asunder. The issue is over-dramatised to the point of nausea, and to such degree that every Tom , Dick and Harry is climbing on the bandwagon of the agitation for re-structuring whether or not they understand re-structuring, its processes and implications.

If it is examined critically, it shall be discovered that the agitation for re-structuring is from disgruntled elements; those whose political horizon is bleak and their influence, not to mention affluence, is progressively ebbing. For an example, if a person like Atiku Abubakar, with 954 votes compared with Muhammadu Buhari’s score of 3,430 votes in the 2015 APC primary election, was successful to be the sitting President today, would he be calling for re-structuring? Definitely not. Therefore, the callers for re-structuring are not sincere.

None of the callers for re-structuring except Chief Emeka Anyaoku who once suggested that the country should be collapsed to six geo-political zones has explained what they really want. This is physical re-structure and not power re-structure. In my piece on March 2, 2016, titled “Of Buhari’s Critics, Counsellors”. I opposed this, because I doubted if any of the existing states could be prepared to surrender its hard-earned autonomy. 

In the past 53 years, states were created. In 1960, there were three regions – West, East and North ; in 1963 , Midwest was created ; in 1967 , it increased to 12 states ; 1976 produced 19 states ;1987 witnessed 21 states ; in 1991 , it increased to 30 states ;1996 ,36 states ,with the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja , meaning that seven times , the country was re- structured . Therefore, if someone suggests the collapse of 36 states to six, it is to put back the hand of the clock. The reasons for the creations were to enhance holistic competitions and bring governance to the door of the people. A collapse has the opposite effect of suppressing competition and governance.

Buhari: Before This Hope Turns Into Hopelessness

By Martin-Hassan E. Eze

At a time like this that Nigerians are hungry and angry, saying ‘I am sorry’ may be the best escape route that some of us who championed the sai Buhari crusade and were his ardent supporters in his ANPP and CPC days in the political wilderness of failed political ambition can offer to Nigerians who wish to drag us into the shooting range or send us to Golgotha after the magical wand of the Daura sheriff had failed to perform the needed magic after one year in office.

*Tinubu and Buhari 

Wallahi, I actually believed the APC and Buhari will herald a paradigm shift from the messy stories of the past. I was also convinced that before a year in office, the APC led FG could have proven to majority of my Ibo brothers who seem not to approve of Buhari and the other 12 million Nigerians that rejected him at the last presidential polls that he was a better candidate than GEJ- the incompetent shoeless fisher man from Otuoke and the ‘boo’ of Biafrans. But, some of us are beginning to lose our voices in shame if not regret.

These days I don't worship at my Cathedral where I am a popular face and even sneak in and out of some streets like Nicodemus to avoid confronting citizens who will insist I explain why Buhari has denied every single phantom promise he made during the campaigns or have done exactly the opposite of what he said he will do as if I share the same sitting room with the old man. Biko kwa, I don't know Aso villa and I am not in any way related to Lai Mohammed the megaphone of APC and the FG.

My greatest disappointment with the APC and her greatest undoing is(was) her inability to properly manage her success and adorn the party with a nationalist babariga bearing in mind the ethnic and religious division that greeted the election. I was expecting to see Buhari at the Saint Theresa’s Cathedral in Nsukka sharing smiles and handshake with Most Rt Prof Godfrey Onah, the Catholic Bishop of Nsukka or drinking Sapele water with our Ijaw and Urobo brothers in Effurun. The APC and PMB lost the game the moment they failed to realise that after election, partisanship and party politics is sent to the morgue as governance and nation-building take the centre stage. I actually wept when the President started exhibiting the same sectional mentality that robbed him of a nation-wide support that Abiola enjoyed in 1993 in his political appointments. I was expecting a system of appointment that will be so wazobian in nature that all haters and bigots currently dominating and polluting the social space will be relieved of their jobs but the old man just disappointed me. The winner take all school of thought was not what a New Nigeria we were expecting from Buhari needed judging from the religious, ethnic and regional tension the last Presidential election generated. Extending an olive branch to some sections of the country that don’t love his face was a political master stroke and common sense that could have scored some goals for national unity and integration but Buhari and his handlers have so far proven that sense is not common as some of us think.

Saraki: What Do Buhari’s Men Really Want?

By Jude Ndukwe 

Since Senator Bukola Saraki emerged president of the Senate on June 9, 2015, the Senate has been forced to carry out their legislative functions in an atmosphere of suppressed tension as managed by the current leadership of the upper chamber. But for the equanimity with which the senate president and his team have handled the political persecution visited on them by the executive and the cabal within the ruling party, the nation by now would have been in irreversible chaos.

*Buhari and Saraki

It is very rare in democracies like ours for the ruling and opposition parties in a legislative chamber to strike a harmonious chord to the extent that beyond election of their leaders, they both work together to ensure a smooth running of not only the senate but also the national assembly and the nation in general. They also have ensured that the usual rift that characterised the relationship between the executive and legislature has been reduced significantly if not removed entirely.

Even in times when distractions are absent, it is enough an arduous task to lead a senate peopled by high ranking Nigerians who come to the senate with the delicate complexities that precariously hold our nation together, not because they are cryonic or parochial, but because they all represent peoples with divergent identities, peculiar needs and expectations, not to talk of when the leadership of the senate has been hit with needless and relentless distractions of persecution engineered by those self-acclaimed godfathers and members of the cabal not only in the presidency but also in the ruling APC.

With Buhari’s style of governance, a lot of people who had their eyes on Nigeria’s till were disappointed. It is difficult reaching the till for self-gratification or reward for working hard for the party. However, the ingenuous ones among them who have always been ingenuous in doing what they know how to do best have since fashioned a new way of unfairly getting a share of our national cake.

Dangerous Expansion Of Militancy

By Wale Sokunbi

The expanding theatres of militancy in the country are fast becoming a threat to the unity and continuing peaceful existence of Nigeria. Reports emanating from different parts of the country in recent weeks indicate the need for prompt action to stem a slide into anarchy.

Beyond the snake of the insurgency in the North-East, which the President Muhammadu Buhari administration has only scorched, and not killed, the trickles of militancy undermining the national economy with the blowing up oil pipelines in the Niger Delta states are fast becoming a deluge.

From the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), which is fast taking on the toga of a reverend gentleman when compared with the ongoing bombing campaigns of the more virulent group, the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA), the militancy in that part of the country is growing in geometrical proportions. Nigeria now has to contend with more and more new militant groups such as the Niger Delta Red Squad, which appears to be operating from the Ohaji Egbema axis of Imo State and is threatening to blow up the Imo State Government House and the State secretariat; ground oil companies and destroy all government assets in the state. The group has already claimed responsibility for the blowing up of two Shell oil pipelines in the state.

Even beyond the Niger Delta, some communities around Ikorodu,   Lagos State, identified as Igbolomu, Elepete and Ishawo, were invaded by unidentified militants who killed no fewer than 30 persons at the weekend. The invaders are suspected to be pipeline vandals who are moving westwards and were protesting the killing of two of their members by security agents. Some reports said the communities were attacked because some local residents were suspected to have disclosed the location of the militants to the police.

A Few Heartless Men

By Simbo Olorunfemi  

There is a reason why the rule of law, as opposed to rule of men, is fundamental to the entrenchment of all-round development of a nation. Should men be given the impression that they can get away with infractions and breach of the law, their hearts swell with impunity, they become heartless. They live by their own rules. They take on wings to do as they like. They assume that rules exist to be broken and other men are lesser mortals before them. They become gods. Six years back, I was in some other part of the world to supervise the production of a print job.

One of these days, the General Manager of the company asked if I was familiar with a particular Nigerian and I responded in the affirmative. Who does not know him? On our way out of the factory, he made a detour towards the warehouse and pointed in a particular direction. Seated there were cartons of goods ready for shipping, being held back. He told me that job had been commissioned by this Nigerian several months back, but because he had refused or neglected to make the outstanding payment of $10,000, the company was holding on to the goods. My host asked: “Why are Nigerians like that?” The same man, he said, had called him when he came into town.

He flew into that country in a private jet. He lodged in the penthouse of one of the most expensive hotels in town, but rather than pay the $10,000, he pushed it off the table. Rather, he dwelt more on dropping names of the President, state governors, ministers, and all sorts of irrelevant side talks. Rather than pay the outstanding, he takes on the outlandish, promising some future business, on the strength of connections with the high and mighty. A man will not meet his present obligations, but has no scruples in living large at the expense of tomorrow.

Nigeria: Federal Republic Of Inequality?

By Magnus Onyibe

The Federal Republic of Nigeria, FGN is the country we all call our own. Our country comprises of about 250 tribes or ethnic nationalities with the main ones being Hausa/Fulani,Yoruba, lgbo, Kanuri, ljaw, Nupe, Calabari, Tiv, Ijebu, lgara, Urhobo, Jukun, ldoma, fufulde, Ika Ibibio, Edo etc. In the inaugural speech of President Muhammadu Buhari on May 29, 2015, he was famously quoted as saying  ”l belong to everyone , l belong to no one”.

*Buhari with former Vice President Ekwueme 

That very welcoming and reassuring remark, which resonated very well with most Nigerians, became a quotable quote that featured in myriads of comments in the mainstream and online media, just as it also became a talking head in torrents of radio and television shows. The reason the quote was significant is quite simple. In the run up to the 2015 general elections, campaign rhetorics vaunting ethnic and regional sentiments were so rife that Nigeria became too polarised in such manner that the Hausa/Fulani in the northern parts of Nigeria were stacked behind, ex-military head of state, Muhammadu Buhari, who is from the Hausa/Fulani  stock, while the lgbos, ljaws and other minority tribes in the South east and South south part of Nigeria, queued up behind the then incumbent president, GoodLuck Jonathan, who is ljaw, and one of their own.

The Yorubas in the South west, who having had a shot at the presidency from 1999 to 2007,when ex-army General, Olusegun Obasanjo transited from prison to presidency, became the bride to be wooed by both the political forces from the north and south south parts of Nigeria. In the end, the Yorubas aligned with the north through acceptance of the Vice President slot which the acclaimed leader of the Yorubas, Bola Tinubu, former governor of Lagos state, conceded to a man of impeccable character, an evangelical pastor,his long time ally and former attorney general of Lagos state, Yemi Osinbajo.

Prior to his success at the 2015 polls, President Buhari had tried and failed to successfully clinch the presidency in 2003, 2007 and 2011 but on each of those occasions that he lost, Buhari swept the votes in the core northern states like, Katsina, Kebbi, Zamfara , Sokoto, etc, sometimes garnering about 12 million votes. Even with Yoruba’s vote in the kitty, Buhari still needed the votes from the South east and South south to fulfill the constitutional requirements that votes must be garnered from all parts of Nigeria for a candidate to be deemed to have won. This is to ensure that a situation whereby a particular candidate from an ethnic group with superior numerical strength, does not ride into the presidency relying only on votes from his Kith and kin.

That’s how Rotimi Amaechi, former governor of Rivers state, the heart  of South south, now minister of transport and Rochas Okorocha, incumbent governor of Imo state, the ground zero of lgbo land, became the game changers. With their support, substantial votes  in Rivers and lmo states were brought into Buhari’s kitty that already had the Hausa/Fulani and Yoruba votes and the rest, as they say is history. Politics is a game of strategy and democracy is also about numbers of people that politicians are able to swing to their side, which justifies the political dictum,majority carries the vote.

In 2015, Buhari reached out and built bridges across many deserts and rainforests into Yoruba land as well as crossed many bridges and rivers into lgbo and lkwere/Calabari mangroves and creeks and he reaped the  reward of the hard work by becoming Nigeria’s number one citizen. Now, it’s pay back time. In politics, as in business, settling lOUs is usually a very testy experience. In what many thought was a Freudian slip like the one famously made by British prime minister, David Cameroon about Nigeria being a fantastical corrupt country, in the wake of the anti corruption summit in London recently, president Buhari during an interactive session with some Nigerians and Americans, on the sideline of his visit to the USA, stated that he cannot be expected to treat the 95% who voted for him in the north equally with the less than 5% who voted in the south.

As expected in a multicultural multiethnic and multi-religious society, the comment got twisted and dissected with all manners of bias on online media platforms. Unsurprisingly, many members of the elite commentariat also took Mr. President up on the remark from the optics of the numerous ethnic and other primordial sentiments, and l thought the high level of condemnation would challenge Mr. president to offer some clarifications but that was not the case. With the public hue and cry about appointments so far made into executive positions, it would appear that Mr. President is sticking to his guns-literarily-to reward mainly voters from his home base by skewing appointments in their favour.

Is INEC About To Unleash Anarchy In Abia?

Following the June 27, 2016, ruling of the Federal High Court, Abuja, which sacked Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu as the Governor of Abia State, Okezie approached the Court of Appeal to contest the judgment. But earlier today, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) issued a Certificate of Return to Mr. Uche Ogah to be sworn in as Abia Governor despite the motion for a stay of execution pending before the Appeals Court.

*Mr. Ogah receiving his Certificate
of Return at the INEC Headquarters Abuja

Analysts believe that this is an invitation to anarchy. Reports say that Mr. Ugah is on his way to Umuahia to "claim his mandate" while the  sitting governor, following established precedents, is still holding forte as Abia Governor. It will be a case of two governors in Abia State and recipe for crisis.

Observers are worried that INEC, by its action, is about to unleash crisis in Abia State in which the casualty will, as usual, be the ordinary people who will be drawn into it by blind loyalty. 

Is President Buhari A Sectional Leader?

By Jide Ojo

The composition of the Government of the Federation or any of its agencies and the conduct of its affairs shall be carried out in such a manner as to effect the federal character of Nigeria and the need to promote national unity, and also command national loyalty, thereby ensuring that there shall be no predominance of persons from a few states or from a few ethnic or other sectional groups in that Government or in any of its agencies”

– Section 14 (3) of 1999 Constitution of Nigeria, as amended.

*President Buhari with new IGP Tukur

Love him or hate him, President Muhammadu Buhari is a man of destiny. The trajectory of his life’s odyssey clearly points to that. Mr. President has held different public offices from his youth to old age. He has been a military governor, petroleum minister, chairman of the Petroleum Trust Fund, Head of State and now an elected President of the most populous country in Africa.

Many will vouch for the President as an honest man hence the appellation of “Mai Gasikiya” which means one who always says the truth in Hausa language. He is seen as an austere man who lives a Spartan life despite having held many privileged positions. However, many others have also alleged that the President is a religious bigot and a provincial leader. In trying to puncture the accusation of bigotry, for the four times he ran for presidential office, he always chose a Christian running mate and twice even chose clerics – Pastor Tunde Bakare in 2011 and Pastor Yemi Osinbajo in 2015. However, The President has yet to fully dismiss the allegations that he is a provincial leader.

On his assumption of office, all the major appointments President Buhari made were from the north with the exception of, perhaps, his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, and the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Dr Ibe Kachikwu. At the time Dr. Ogbonnaya Onu was touted as being likely to be made the Secretary to the Federal Government, the President decided to pick Babachir David Lawal from Adamawa State. The President’s Chief of Staff is also from the North. Now, news making the rounds shows that a chunk of the national security and defence sector is dominated not only by people of northern extraction but also Muslims. Let’s take a count: The National Security Adviser; Chief of Army Staff; Chief of Air Staff; Comptroller General of Customs; Comptroller General of Immigration; Comptroller General of Prisons; the Director General of the Department of State Services; the Commandant-General of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, and now the Acting Inspector General of Police appointed last week.

How Buhari Is Harming The North And Nigeria

By Azuka Onwuka
With last week’s appointment of Mr Ibrahim Idris as the Acting Inspector-General of Police (bypassing 30 of his seniors), President Muhammadu Buhari further made the headship of virtually all the military-cum-defence agencies and related agencies which wear uniform a Northern affair.

*Buhari and Emir Sanusi of Kano

Records show the following:
Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai – North;
Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar – North;
Acting Inspector General of Police, Mr Ibrahim Idris – North;
Minister of Defence, Brig Gen (retd) Mansur Dan Ali – North;
National Security Adviser, Major Gen (retd.) Babagana Munguno – North;
Chairman, Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Mr Ibrahim  Magu – North;
Director-General, Department of State Services, Mr Lawal Daura – North;
Comptroller-General of Nigeria Customs Service, Col Hameed Ali (retd.) – North;
Comptroller-General, Nigerian Immigration Service, Mr Kure Abeshi – North;
Controller-General, Nigerian Prisons Service, Alhaji Ja’afaru Ahmed – North;
Commandant-General, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, Mr Abdullahi Muhammadu – North;
Director-General of the National Youth Service Corps, Brig Gen Sule Kazaure – North;
Comptroller-General of the Federal Fire Service , Mr Garba Anebi – North.
If it is recalled that the Minister of Interior, Lt. Gen. Abdulrahman Damazzau (retd.), under whose ministry are Prisons Service, Immigration Service, Fire Service and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, is also from the North, then the Ministry of the Interior with its agencies is virtually controlled by the North in clear breach of the Federal Character policy enshrined in the constitution.

Furthermore, even though it was not Buhari that did it, yet for the first time in the history of Nigeria, all the three arms of government are headed by Northerners:  
Executive, President Muhammadu Buhari;
Legisture, Dr Bukola Saraki;
Judiciary, Justice Mahmud Mohammed.
In addition, the two arms of the legislature are headed by Northerners: Dr Bukola Saraki, Senate President, and Mr Yakubu Dogara, Speaker, House of Representatives.

Renegotiating The Nigerian Project

By Dan Amor

​A two hundred and thirty-six page book written by Dr. Amanze Obi, literary scholar, critic and journalist, who until recently was chairman of the Editorial Board of the Sun Group of Newspapers and published in 2013, is an engrossing tapestry of the Nigerian condition. Drawing afflatus from history, politics, philosophy, culture and every day experience, Delicate Distress: An Interpreter’s Account of the Nigerian Dilemma, navigates the beleaguered contours of a nation, interrogates her chequered post colonial heritage and protean existential predicaments defined by recrudescent, fratricidal debacles, military misadventure, institutionalized corruption and prostrate economies as well as a loud poverty, disease, willful inexplicable deaths, amnesia, and gleeful self negation. 

As a renowned editorialist and distinguished newspaper columnist, Obi, in this book, harmonizes a robust stalking style with a penetrating apocalyptic deconstruction of Nigeria as a failing state. It is written with a fresh, pulsating, stark and chillingly unsentimental prose style.

​Divided into five unequal parts, Delicate Distress is truly a delicate intermeshing of the congealed monumental tragedies and other emerging contemporary realities in the Nigerian historical continuum which have conspired to drive the country to the precincts of a yawning precipice. In refracting these prismatic realities, the essayist generously benefits from variegated trajectories that have yielded a heaving intellectual harvest. Obi impressively combines lyrical lightsomeness and rhythmic richness with abiding patriotism and perspicacity of cultural thought and insight. The result is a bold and visceral gnawing at a nation’s soul and psychology and the rankling of the weeping sores of a mortally wounded nation at odds with itself.  

Amanze Obi’s reservoir of literary resources and reportorial experience has interlaced all the essays in this collection.

​Part One: Tales Unpleasant, which begins with a critical introduction, distills the hydra-headed Nigerian society with such precarious equilibrium that facilitates the paradox of happiness in a shrinking federalism. It circulates the anti-intellectual politics that heralds the perils of disunity and the challenge of constitution-making in a country in which inequity has been elevated to state policy. 

Part two: North-South Divide, appraises an elusive rapprochement that has failed to balance the regional agenda between East and North but rather aggravates regional war even at the Confab. In gloating and fretting over oil, Northern leaders who misruled Nigeria for 39 years out of her 53 years of post independence experience have succeeded in creating a dangerous class of youth in the North who agitate amidst excruciating poverty. While remaining divided by the advocacy for state police, Northern governors and their Southern counterparts are still swimming in the illusion of politics of number.

Nobody Needs Grazing Reserves Now

By Rotimi Fasan

There was in this past weekend at least one reported incident of a ghastly nature between Fulani herdsmen and hunters. This happened in Koh village in Adamawa State. Five lives including that of one hunter and five herdsmen were lost in that encounter. This would be the latest in a long series of bloody encounters between cattle herders who have since replaced their prodding staff and concealed daggers with the more modern and effective assault rifle.

While clashes between farmers and herdsmen have a long history in different parts of the north, there has been an exponential increase in such clashes in different parts of the country, mostly outside the north, in the last one and half years. As always in these recent cases the herdsmen have been the main aggressors for the simple reason that they’ve been responsible for leading their animals into other peoples’ properties, practically turning such persons’ means of livelihood into grazing fields. But like the herdsmen, farmers are in their line of business to make money. Beyond leading their cattle into farmlands herdsmen or people who pretend to tend cattle have been known to engage in wanton acts of criminality.

They are involved in armed robbery, raping and abduction of women and children in isolated communities. But the one aspect of the activities of these herdsmen that have been most controversial is their readiness to place their rights as diary farmers over and above the rights of food and cash crop farmers. For them, their activities seem to say, their cattle is worth more than human life to say nothing of anybody’s farm. They would kill at the least provocation just in order to assert their right to graze their cattle. And with assault rifles now part of their paraphernalia of business, their criminal tendencies go unchecked.

They’ve decimated families and sacked villages from places as far-flung apart as Benue and Adamawa to Ekiti. From Oyo, Plateau, Enugu to Ebonyi, it’s been a harvest of deaths and destruction. Yet, the response from the authorities has been one of accommodation if not outright appeasement. Rather than taking a firm hold of the issue and tackling it headlong, state and federal authorities have tended to be weak-kneed in terms of what they ought to do. But this ought not to be so. The number of lives that have been lost to clashes between herdsmen and farmers or members of other communities ought to make our civil authorities ashamed. They’ve practically abdicated their responsibilities as Nigerians saw recently with the Agatu and Nimbo massacres. People are now contemplating self help in the face of the irresponsible abdication by municipal, state and federal authorities.

Gen Buratai: The Dubai Landlord And His Magic Of 'Personal Savings'

By Emmanuel Uchenna Ugwu

Thanks to a recent revelation that exposed the two mansions he procured in Dubai while serving as the Director of Procurement at the Defense Headquarters, the character of Lt. General Tukur Yusuf Buratai, the present Chief of Army Staff of Nigeria, has become fuller and rounder.

Before now, Buratai was a single story persona. He was definitively profiled as the civilian-hating author of the massacre and mass burial of 347 Shiites in Zaria. Now he has revealed that he is more than a waster of blood: He is also an extraordinary saver of treasure!

*Gen Buratai being decorated by President
 Buhari and VP Osinbajo 

By way of defense, Buratai chalked up his ownership of 120 million naira houses in Dubai to his capacity for thrift. He said he grew his widow’s mite. He saved and saved and saved his salaries…until he had enough foreign exchange to make himself a double landlord in the United Arab Emirates!

Taken at face value, this is an inspiring tale. It’s a powerful object lesson in parsimony. It teaches that all things are possible to an everyday person if he can define a goal for himself, tame his appetite, and practices the discipline of delayed gratification.

Except that the tale is intrinsically false. It is not a testimony of prudence - by any stretch of the imagination.

Buratai’s narrative is a reconstruction of the reality of a theft meant to extricate the thief from his anti-social deed. His widow's mite saving is a patent lie. It is an incredible truth told by a desperate robber who is less eager to expiate his crime than he is to justify his possession of the stolen goods. 

Buratai told an incongruous legend. The cost of his two Dubai mansions is not a sum of the savings of the unspent fraction of his soldier's salary. He couldn’t have possibly bought the houses that are significantly above his earning with his wages. He procured the house some other way he is not proud to divulge.

Thankfully, he didn’t parrot a variation of Diezani Allison-Madueke's claim that her stupefying 18 million dollar Abuja mansion was a product of "the blessings of God." He avoided the profanity of ascribing his dubious acquisition to the handiwork of an invisible Being who can neither be queried nor arrested. He told the less obnoxious untruth of describing his two Dubai houses as stuff that materialized out of his cumulative "personal savings."

To be fair, though, a strict reading of his theory of "personal savings" acquits Buratai of lying. This is because he did not state that the "personal savings" were part of his legitimate wages. He merely implied it. He cued the reader of the text of his response to to infer a proposition he couldn’t bring himself to assert. He suggested just enough to make you adopt the import of the subtle conclusion he made by hoarding his disclosure behind a thin veneer of escapist denial!

That said, Buratai effectively confessed to perpetration of fraud, stealing and money laundering when he confirmed that he purchased properties he couldn't ordinarily afford. He bore witness against himself by admitting ownership of houses that are worth more than his means. He unwittingly accused himself  of furtively bridging the irreconcilable difference between the worth of those properties and his wages.  

And it’s easy to figure how this general managed to buy houses that were above his level of income without a bank loan. His resume indicates he had the ‘good luck’ of being the Director of Procurement, Defense Headquarters a while ago. That period coincided with the ascendance of Boko Haram and the ritualized humiliation of the Nigerian Army in the North East.

Fayose And Nigeria’s Immunity Scandal

By Okey Ndibe

Governor Peter Ayodele Fayose of Ekiti State has a solid claim to the title of politician par excellence of Nigeria’s Fourth Republic. In many ways, the man symbolises the idiosyncrasies, texture and other pathological characteristics of the high-priced, frustrating experiment that goes by the name of democracy in Nigeria.

*Gov Fayose 

His storied political career has involved a controversy over his academic credentials. It is ironic that questions were – perhaps –  are raised about the educational training of a man who presides over Ekiti State – a state with one of the highest PhD degrees per capita in Nigeria. During his short-lived first stint as governor – from 2003 to 2006 – Mr. Fayose was accused of several crimes, including massive theft of public resources and ordering a murder. He left office in disgrace, impeached by a state legislature that was under pressure from then President Olusegun Obasanjo. The US government once had cause to revoke visas issued to him and members of his immediate family. He is as brash as they come, a bolekaja brand of politician, who takes no prisoners.

At a public function in Osun State in 2014, Mr. Fayose traded insults with his nemesis, Mr. Obasanjo. He had ignored the former president while greeting other “dignitaries.” Not one to recoil from making a spectacle of himself, Mr. Obasanjo demanded to be greeted. “I won’t greet you. You are bad person! I don’t greet bad people!” exclaimed Mr. Fayose.

“You are a bastard,” an irate Obasanjo railed.
“You are a father of bastards!” Mr. Fayose countered. And he wasn’t done yet. He threw a few more verbal punches at Mr. Obasanjo, accusing him of wrecking the PDP in the southwest.

In 2014, Mr. Fayose signaled a desire to return to the office from which he was ignominiously sacked in 2006. As he sought the PDP’s governorship ticket, some political pundits thought it was a long shot. After he secured the ticket, the consensus among political talking heads was that he would not be competitive against then Governor Kayode Fayemi, an articulate PhD owner. Shunning the incumbent governor’s air of sophistication and emphasis on matters of policy, Candidate Fayose refined a pragmatic political message calculated to resonate with the voters’ gullets. He dismissed his opponent’s accent on developing infrastructure in the state. What the people needed above all, he insisted, was “stomach infrastructure.” He had introduced an ingenious new term into Nigeria’s political lexicon.

I confess to being among those who gave Mr. Fayose little chance of winning the governorship. His rustic, charming gift for words would carry him only so far, but certainly far short of the gubernatorial goal. I reckoned, as some others did, that the man’s past would doom his quest.

Will New IGP, Idris, Be Up To Scratch?

By Oguwike Nwachuku

At a brief ceremony at Louis Edet House (otherwise called Force Headquarters) in Abuja on Wednesday, June 22, out-gone Inspector General of Police (IGP), Solomon Arase, handed over to his successor, Ibrahim Kpotum Idris. President Muhammadu Buhari, in exercising his right under Section 215 of the Constitution, named Idris IGP in acting capacity a day earlier, June 21. He becomes the 19th IGP.

*President Buhari and New IGP Idris 

A statement issued by Buhari’s media aide, Femi Adesina, said Idris was born on January 15, 1959; hails from Kutigi, Lavum in Niger State; and enlisted in the police in 1984, after graduating from Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria with a Bachelor’s degree in agriculture.

He also holds a degree in law from the University of Maiduguri (UNIMAID).

“Idris, who was in charge of Operations at the Force Headquarters before his appointment as acting Inspector General of Police, will act in that capacity pending his confirmation,” Adesina said.

Handing over to him, Arase said Idris “is going to serve in an acting capacity until the Police Council confirms him. I want to seize this opportunity to thank Nigerians for the cooperation given me while I served as Inspector General of Police. By extension, I want to also appeal to you to give the same support that you gave to me to my successor. He is a younger man, so I am sure he will be abreast with contemporary policing issues.”

According to Paragraph (a) of Section 215, “An inspector general of police who, subject to Section 216 (2) of this Constitution shall be appointed by the president on the advice of the Nigeria Police Council from among serving members of the Nigeria Police Force.”

Section 171 of the Constitution empowers the president to appoint the secretary to the government of the federation; head of the civil service of the federation; ambassador, high commissioner or other principal representative of Nigeria abroad (subject to confirmation by the Senate); permanent secretary in any ministry or head of any extra–ministerial department of the government, and any office on the personal staff of the president.

But Section 216 (2) says, “Before making any appointment to the office of the inspector general of police or removing him from office the president shall consult the Nigeria Police Council.”
By the appointment of Idris, Buhari has proved his critics right once more that he is determined to appoint into certain offices those who catch his fancy so long as they are from the Northern part of the country.

Buhari and the Consolidation of Democratic Dictatorship in Nigeria

By Arthur Nwankwo

Emperor Nero’s emergence as Roman Emperor in AD 54 was greeted with wild jubilation and expectation especially among the plebeians, aristocrats and subalterns. Interestingly, he came on the scene at a point the Roman Empire was burdened by gross internal decay and corruption. Regrettably, rather than address the obvious challenges confronting the Roman Empire, Nero pandered to the absurd by trying to hunt down and silence every perceived opposition against his administration. 

*Dr. Nwankwo

His childhood was moulded by freed slaves— a barber and dancer, before Seneca was recalled from exile to be his tutor. Despite the over-bearing attitude of Agrippina, his mother, Nero grew up a complex character— one who showed little interest in understanding his surrounding; though he tended to pitch his lot with the masses. His tragic family situation, his definitely over-powering mother coupled with what was perhaps a weak character eventually produced a highly unstable Nero. He was an addict to jesting and tended to secrecy. In the course of time his character showed darker sides and unleashed the beast in Nero. His dark sides would manifest in his many crimes like committing thousands of murders including his mother, and abuse of people’s fundamental human rights and practice of sodomy. 

Prior to his emergence, Nero was noted for his limited understanding of social forces that produced his emperorship and this lack of understanding in turn produced a veritable outcome— gross suspicion of the senators and even the praetors. His lame approach to the problems of the empire would re-instigate the several agitations by various segments of the in places like Venice, and Florence.

Patriotic Roman senators and nobles voiced their concern and wondered why Nero should be fiddling while Rome was on fire. Petronius, who Nero had earlier regarded as his “arbiter of elegance” would eventually call Nero “the incendiary of Roman Empire”. Blinded by a rage to eliminate his real and perceived enemies, Nero would go down in history as the monster and evil emperor who fed his people to lions in the Roman coliseum. Though, Nero was condemned by God and by Man, history is generous with instances of the re-incarnation of many Neros in several climes and circumstances.

Over the years, Nigeria has had its own fair share of maximum rulers in the mould of Nero. First was Muhammadu Buhari in 1983, and Sani Abacha in 1995. And today Nigeria is witnessing the re-emergence of another Nero in the mould of Muhammadu Buhari. 

I do not intend to waste my time reflecting on Buhari’s many failures in the past twelve months of his presidency. Failure is part of Buhari’s track record. That he has failed is not surprising to me. If the reverse had been the case, then I would be surprised. However, what is rather nauseating is Buhari’s brazen audacity to entrench democratic dictatorship in Nigeria; and even the warped and mundane rationalization of such criminality by apologists of the Buhari presidency.