Nigeria: Corruption And Politics Of ‘Winner Takes All’

 By Jerome-Mario Utomi

This piece primarily stemmed from a recent Nigeria-focused conversation with a Delta state born but Florida, United States of America (USA) based practicing Lawyer who studied in England, Finland, Sweden, and Norway among others. 

Aside from using the opportunity provided by the conversation to explain how today politics in Nigeria is not tailored to the development of the country, but to the individual players and their various interests, the Legal luminary highlighted the corruption challenge in the country with a sustainable strategy to arrest the monster. He deeply advanced approaches to sanitizing the nation’s political space in ways that will not only change the economic and public leadership narrative in the country but pave the way for well informed, self-contained and quietly influential Nigerians to participate in politics while bringing coordinated development in the country. 

Tinubu’s Foreign Policy: Driving Nigeria In A 4D Wagon

 By Owei Lakemfa

Ambassador  Yusuf Maitama Tuggar, the Honourable  Minister of Foreign Affairs, stepped out on Thursday December 21, 2023 to explain to  Nigerians the four-dimensional space built by the Tinubu administration for the country’s foreign policy. Tuggar, 56, a player in the oil and gas industry had in the last six years, been Nigeria’s Ambassador to  Germany.

*Tinubu

This opportunity  of  a wide audience including the diplomatic community, intellectuals, active and retired public servants   to examine  the new policy, was provided by the ever thoughtful and visionary Association of Retired Career Ambassadors of Nigeria, ARCAN. 

The ARCAN, led by Ambassador John Kayode Shinkaiye,   one of the country’s greats in African diplomacy, asked me to chair the occasion which had the succinct theme:   ‘The Foreign Policy Agenda under Tinubu Administration.’

CBN: Cash Scarcity Is Here To Stay For A While

 By Dele Sobowale

“Cash Scarcity: People are hoarding bank notes – CBN.” VANGUARD, December 14, 2023.

Governor Cardoso and his new team at the top of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, can be forgiven if the current cash scarcity being experienced has caught them by surprise.

They were not in office in March, when it was predicted on these pages that another round of cash scarcity was inevitable; after the one induced by the CBN then. Before going into the reasons why we are not free of this problem yet, permit me to make one observation; which will be helpful to the current CBN Management.  Statements such as “people are hoarding cash” are more emotional than technical or professional; and they seldom solve the problem.

Wike And Fubara: Tinubu’s Sham Agreement

 By Ugoji Egbujo

The agreement between a pimp and a prostitute ought not to be written. Because if the pimp and prostitute still have any trace of honour left in them, they wouldn’t want the transaction made legible for their grandchildren to read. However, when shame has fled and taboos have become doormats, a pimp can demand a written document.

*Tinubu and Wike 

And when they have a contractual dispute, a bishop might step in to ask the prostitute to sleep with more clients to satisfy the covenant. If reminded of the sinfulness of fornication and trade in flesh, the bishop might say that he did it in the interest of peace and to safeguard trade customs. Peace and custom are laudable virtues but when shallow peace is purchased at the cost of normalization of evil, society is imperiled. 

A Court For Kangaroos

 By Chidi Odinkalu

“Because judges are part of government, acting on our behalf, we are entitled to require them to abandon their priesthood and to present their activities for assessment by laymen.” David Pannick, KC, Judges, p. 17 (1987)

The Guardian’s obituary on Bernard Levin, the celebrated Times columnist who died in 2004 after a long battle with Alzheimer’s disease, described him as “a passionate and eclectic journalist with a legendary capacity for work, whose career made him a host of friends – and enemies.” Among these enemies, few were as determined as the legal profession.

David Pannick, KC, recalls that Mr. Levin’s settled view was that “the legal profession had an infinite capacity for deluding itself.” He had good reason. When Rayner Goddard retired as Lord Chief Justice in 1958, Bernard Levin’s evisceration of his judicial record inspired “a clandestine meeting at which the higher judiciary considered whether the uppity columnist might be done for criminal libel.” The idea was eventually dropped. 

The Burden Of Emerging Infectious Diseases

 By Ogodo Audu

Nigerians were shocked when the World Health Organisation (WHO) recently officially declared a fresh outbreak of corona virus disease in Benue State, revealing a total of 25 newly confirmed cases. It, as usual, stressed the importance of vaccination, emphasising that the virus remains prevalent. This has happened despite the millions that had been vaccinated in that state and confirmed immune in the heat of the COVID-19 virus infection years back.

It is the outbreaks of all sorts of infectious diseases in the country that brought the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) to Nigeria; it is the largest biomedical research facility administered by the U.S. Department of Defence (DOD). The WRAIR centre for military infectious disease research combines scientific expertise with product development to prevent a range of diseases of strategic importance to the U.S. military and the world.

Tribute To Comrade Joe Ajaero, NLC President, At 59

 By Denja Yaqub

When some leaders of The Guardian newspapers branch of the Nigeria Union of Journalists led by Gbolahan Gbadamosi, now a lawyer based in the United States of America were sacked by the management of the flagship of Nigeria’s newspaper industry sometime in the year 2000, they filed a complaint at the headquarters of Nigeria Labour Congress, then fully located in Yaba, Lagos under the leadership of Comrade Adams Aliyu Oshiomhole.

*Ajaero 

After attempts to resolve the issues through dialogue to ultimately reinstate the union leaders failed, NLC decided to massively picket the premises of the newspaper firm. Journalists from all the major print and electronic news media were effectively mobilized to cover the picket.

The Place Of Food In Nigerian Politics

 By Tony Afejuku

The essay you are about to read is culled from my Nigerian Tribune column In & Out of Monday, February 4, 2013. Its import is still as relevant now as it was then, although our current experience is readily and particularly worse than any calamitous calamity can be. Indeed, what we noticed then is nothing compared with what we have and observe today.

Our new Senate President, for instance, confirmed this last week with his gluttonous display of his extravagant gluttony on the occasion of his long-stomach birthday celebrations. The nicely nice brevity of the essay says so much in a few words about the longish-ness and long-ness of the monstrously monstrous politicians of protruding throats and bellies of bellies of bad belle bellies crushing the land and landscape from everywhere to everywhere.

Rivers Crises: A Challenge To Nation-Building

 By Obasi Igwe

Peace happily returned to Rivers, Ijaw nationalists having precipitately weighed-in for Fubara, turning party affairs ethnic, and leaving Wike with barely feeble support. Rivers State is a contrivance emphasising power over harmonious development, another expression of a flawed Nigerian structure awaiting statesmanly healing, hopefully under a modern democratic secular state of equal laws and equal applications built on civilised Common Law principles in an organically restructured true federalism. 

*Fubara and Wike 

Never force strange bedfellows into marriage merely to spite another. Rivers disproportionate volatility is not from multi-ethnicity, but due to a malign doctrine of Igbo landlocking undergirding it, whereof Igbo communities, nicknamed “Igboids,” are decoupled from their hinterland kith and kin; Bonny, Opobo, parceled to Ijaw trusteeship; leaving Andoni, Ogoni, askant. Negative contradictions of sharing booties of machination are behind Rivers problems, and until resolved the “fire next time” could be unimaginable.

‘Agbero’, Transport Unions And Public Order

 By Adesegun Ogundeji

Popularly referred to as  Agbero, operators of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) and Road Transport Employers of Nigeria (RTEAN), are major actors in the transportation sector of Lagos State, and indeed other States across the country.

To some,  Agberos are into legitimate undertakings, while others simply see them as interlopers who compound the State’s transportation challenges. However, irrespective of contrary opinions, in the real sense of it,  Agbero,  by its original concept, is doing a legitimate business. Shocked? No doubt, I am sure a lot will be surprised to hear this, but don’t crucify me yet.

When Ndigbo Celebrated Their Own

 By Ikechukwu Amaechi

As Nigeria’s political elites continue to fool around in Rivers State pretending to be preferring solution to self-inflicted political wound, it is refreshing to see groups celebrating excellence, merit and competence in a country where mediocrity and absolute lack of character have become the keys that unlock high public offices.

From Left: Aka Ikenga President, Agbalanze Chike Madueke, AFRINVEST CEO, Dr Ike Chioke, (Awardee) and Agunze Chib Ikokwu, former President of Aka Ikenga (pix: Daily Independent).

That was exactly what Aka Ikenga did on Sunday, December 17 when members held the 2023 end of the year get-together which has been the tradition since the think-tank organisation of Igbo intelligentsia and professionals who are committed to the vision of an egalitarian Nigerian society based on the rule of law, equity and fairness for all Nigerians, debuted in 1989.

Anarchies In Rivers, Ondo: No Individual Must Be Greater Than The State

 By Olu Fasan

I have strong affinities with the two states currently embroiled in political crises in Nigeria. One, Ondo, is my state of origin. The other, Rivers, is where I did my national youth service decades ago and for which I have undiminished affection. Sadly, while the citizens of both states are decent people, their political leaders are charlatans. They abuse public office and political power, acting with impunity as if they’re greater than the state and the people. 

*Wike and Akeredolu 

Yet, the rule of the game works differently. In a democracy, a few are elected to govern in the best interests of the people. But politicians in Rivers and Ondo states and, indeed, across Nigeria control power and use it in deleterious ways. They rule over the people, not for the people. Unfortunately, Bola Tinubu, Nigeria’s president, is complicit in the elevation of selfish individual interests above the common good in both states.

Nigeria’s Wasteful And Insensitive Leaders

 By Dan Onwukwe

Very so often, news about Nigeria and its leaders, is profoundly concerning. Worrisome.  Whenever Tinubu presidency is over, I suggest that it should be taught as history lesson in schools – on how not to govern a country on the basis of propaganda and tapestry of lies. Governance is a serious, honest, human enterprise. It should not be the opposite.  Amid a blizzard of shocking revelations of bizarre profligacy in less than seven months in power, it shows some clear,  but disturbing issues about power and leadership in Nigeria. First, nothing that happens to a country that is not like their leaders. 

*Mrs Oluremi Tinubu, Akpabio, Mrs Akpabio and others during Akpabio 61st birthday celebrations 

Secondly,  power is like a bikini:  it reveals more than it can hide. In other words, what leaders do when they are trying to get power is not necessarily what they do after they have it. This is Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress revealed. It’s an unravelling story that will perhaps get worse with the passage of time. This is a government of contradiction. 

Nigeria: Time To Clean Up The Budget Process

 By Tunde Bamise

It is budget season again for Nigeria. In November, President Bola Tinubu assented to the 2023 Supplementary Budget, and, a few weeks later, presented the 2024 Appropriation Bill to the National Assembly. Naturally, this has been followed by a lot of debate and conversation about the details of the budget.

President Tinubu, in his presentation speech to the National Assembly, described it as “Our Budget of Renewed Hope; a budget which will go further than ever before in cementing macro-economic stability, reducing the deficit, increasing capital spending and allocation to reflect the eight priority areas of this Administration.”

Time Ticks For Nigerian Ruling Elite

 By Suyi Ayodele 

I take a bet. The judgement of God and of the people is nigh! Check your neighbourhood. For weeks, and in some cases, months, there is no electricity. But in your houses, you run your generator. Neighbours come around to charge their phones, rechargeable lamps and what have you in your compound. How do you tell them that you are not part of the oppressors? What about water? As early as 5 am, neighbours are already on the queue in front of your house to fetch water. They don't have the boldness to knock on your gate to wake you up. They know that they are at your mercy, and so, they wait until you wake up to turn on the tap for them. Many of these people grew up with functional water corporations and dams in their towns and villages.

 *Tinubu and Shettima

We are already in the festive period. How many Nigerians have what to eat during this season? How many can afford a bag of rice? How many will be able to buy clothes for their children and wards? How many are already calculating the school fees for the second term which begins by the first week of January 2024? When you consider these, you will realise that there is no time to postpone fixing Nigeria. The elite just have to fix Nigeria now or Nigerians will fix them, and permanently too. The masses are like the sheep. Those are the most gentle of all animals. But they have the most poisonous teeth ever! You can read me again. Sheep have teeth. Just pray they don't bite you with them. There is no anti-rabies vaccine that can cure that. 

Akpabio’s Uncommon Birthday Celebration

 By Ugoji Egbujo

Akpabio celebrated his birthday in a stadium. That must be a sign of his stature. The economic situation didn’t deter him. He gathered his people in tens of thousands to eat and drink. The people are poor but their leaders are rich on their behalf.

*Akpabio

A two-term governor, former minister and now senate president. It can’t get larger. Ordinarily, one government or the other would pick up the bill in recognition of his services to the nation. After all, such a political Iroko must have paid his dues. As Flavor, the musician, would say, “How much is money”? 

Solving National Leadership Problem In Nigeria

 By Chiedu Okoye

Nigeria, a multi-ethnic country, is a nation of nations with more than 250 ethnic and linguistic groups making up its geographical space and colonial contraption. It has not become an organic whole. The sad fact is that our past political leaders have failed to engender true peace and unity in Nigeria. The centrifugal forces of ethnicity and religion are tearing the nation apart.

*Buhari and Tinubu

Our past national leaders, both politicians and military rulers, could not harness our abundant natural resources such as limestone, tin-ore, bauxite, crude oil, and others, to leapfrog Nigeria to the acme of economic and technological advancement. Instead, the nation is trapped in the morass of national underdevelopment. Nigeria has been outpaced by less-endowed countries in the areas of economic and technological development. Think about Malaysia, Singapore, and Japan.

An Itinerant Jurist, An Unfinished Honeymoon And A Judicial Transaction

 By Chidi Odinkalu

Supreme Courts are places where lawyers and judges regularly encounter one another. On 17 November 2023, one of such encounters occurred, not in the regular halls of Nigeria’s Supreme Court in Abuja but in its Mosque.

There, Abdulaziz Waziri, a Justice of Appeal wedded Zaynab Bashir, a Judge of Nigeria’s National Industrial Court. The wedding reception followed thereafter at a well-appointed venue in up-market Maitama, in Abuja.

Justice Waziri has been nothing if not busy this season. For his duty station in this election petition appeal season, Justice Waziri was stationed in Jos, Plateau State, where the Justices of Appeal, in the state from which the President of the Court of Appeal hails, have been busy re-writing the results of the elections, taking seats from one party and generously handing them to another party on the bases of jurisprudence that can most charitably be described as extraordinarily specious. 

Tinubu, Appoint Diplomats, Not Politicians To Run Our Missions

 By Owei Lakemfa

The culture in Nigeria is that after Presidential Elections, politicians, hangers-on, propagandists, relatives and a rainbow of persons gather like ants over sugar. Primarily, the gathering is to partake of the honey which is how they see the emergent government.

*Tinubu 

In fact, for many, elections are the best investment they can make, and they need to quickly recoup the funds invested. The Tinubu administration has so far, exhibited the symptoms of that national disease.

Who Will Tell The Chief Justice?

By Chidi Odinkalu

Nigeria’s Supreme Court held a special session on 27 November 2023 to formally usher in a new legal year. It provides an occasion for a retrospective on the performance of Nigeria’s judiciary by its leaders in a season of unprecedented levels of public angst over the political weaponisation of judges and a set piece moment to compare notes on the dysfunctions that afflict the judicial system. The outcome was interesting to the point of anti-climactic.

*CJN Olukayode Ariwoola

On that occasion, the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Olukayode Ariwoola, also administered the oath on 57 new entrants into the coven of Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN). One of the new SANs was born in 1981. Two years later, in 1983, his dad, a lawyer, began proceedings against Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) Ltd, a multinational company in the hydrocarbons sector, in Warri. At the time, Warri was part of Bendel State, which was created by the military a mere seven years earlier in 1976.