Africa’s Chance To Lead Next Digital Revolution

By Gordon Graylish

One interesting theme took centre stage during panel discussions at the recently concluded World Economic Forum on Africa in Rwanda; that what the continent needs as much as roads, dams, power plants (although there is still more development required) is a way to embrace technology and infuse digital transformation in all sectors.

It was interesting because when questions such as “how can we diversify our economies” and “how can we improve efficiency” or “how do we prepare our young generations to have jobs” were asked, the answer from a lot of different players including politicians, think tanks, investment organisations and the private sector was the same; embrace the “3rd industrial revolution”; the digital transformation revolution.

With a 350-million strong middle and upper class currently expected to jump to 430 million by 2020, in a 1.3 billion continent by that time, the private and public sector strongly concurred that technology will have a significant impact in modernising African governments in effect creating what I call the next-generation governments.

It’s encouraging that this revolution is already being stirred in small offices and houses across Africa that have wholly embraced mobile communications. Thanks to Kenya’s pioneering M-Pesa, Africa is leading the mobile money revolution and this has already had a noticeable impact on the continent in expanding financial inclusivity.

But mobile technology alone is not enough. The next logical step should be to harness technology for industrialisation, agriculture and social transformation. The world is entering one of the most exciting eras of technology.  Everyday objects are becoming part of an integrated system of smart devices that are changing the way we live. Opportunities are endless in smart energy power grids, smart cities, smart agriculture, building secure government services and developing a vibrant globally competitive technology industry. These opportunities have the ability to fuel GDP, create new jobs, and boost economies.

This Is Our Continent, Not Yours! – President Museveni

SPIEGEL speaks with Yoweri Museveni, who has ruled Uganda for three decades, about the West's role in fostering African Islamist terror, his opposition to the International Criminal Court and whether he is himself abusing his power.

Interview Conducted by Susanne Koelbl and Jan Puhl

*President Museveni and his wife, Janet

SPIEGEL: Mr. President, as a young politician you castigated autocratic African leaders who ruled for their entire lives. When you came to power, you changed the constitution so you could stay in office longer. It has been 30 years now. When will you leave?

Museveni: My critics always forget to mention that I was democratically elected, the others were not. Everyone in Uganda can challenge me, everyone can vote, the elections are free. Not many countries have achieved what we did. One third of the seats in parliament are reserved for women, five seats for youth, five for workers, five for the disabled and 10 for the army. How many democracies with such a record do you know?

SPIEGEL: So far, the political party system has yet to succeed in Uganda. Your only serious challenger, Kizza Besigye, has been arrested repeatedly. International observers certified the recent election as unfair, and on one day during the election campaign, you were on television for 12 hours while your opponent was only on for four minutes. Is this democracy?

Museveni: Our laws and institutions are excellent, but the population is not yet ready. They must develop their views and need to be provided with the right information. We now also have private broadcasters and many are very critical of me, hostile even, yet they operate freely.

SPIEGEL: Aren't you afraid of an African rebellion similar to the Arab Spring? Uganda's rapidly growing population is young, globally connected and its biggest problem is the lack of jobs and the feeling of not being able to breach the old leadership structures.

Museveni: Our population is growing rapidly because of our good health policy. When I came into office, there were 14 million Ugandans, today there are 38 million, despite the catastrophe of AIDS, which we have also tackled. The Ugandans know and appreciate this, especially the elderly. This makes it very unlikely that Uganda will face a chaotic scenario similar to that in Syria or other places. Incidentally, doctors, scientists, engineers and nurses are highly sought after and find jobs immediately.

SPIEGEL: Last year, 1.3 million refugees came to Germany, mainly from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, but also from Africa. Many believe this is only the beginning of an exodus to Europe. What do you suggest to stop this wave of migrants?

Museveni: Mistakes were made. But I would prefer to talk about these issues in detail with your political leaders.

SPIEGEL: Is this in reference to the wars in the Middle East or the uprisings in Libya and Tunisia?

Museveni: When the problems in Libya started, the African Union set up a committee to address the situation. We urgently advised the Europeans not to intervene. You have done so anyway. Now we are seeing absolute chaos there.

CLICK ON THIS LINK TO READ THE WHOLE INTERVIEW

Time To Review Nigeria

Alabi Williams

When some concerned intelligence quarters in the U.S advised that 2015 could be ominous for Nigeria, not many people took the concern to heart. Some even jeered at the peep as another meddlesomeness of the West. There was sufficient time between when the alert was issued way back in 2006 and 2015 for some reasonable measures to be put in place to shame the doomsayers, assuming that was all there was to it. There were also no signs that the matter was handed to local intelligence units to interrogate. In the absence of a concerted official position on the prediction, individual politicians swore to high heavens that Nigeria had come too far to disintegrate. Private citizens, as usual, launched into prayers to ward off the forecast from hell, and to possibly return it to those who sent it.

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Year 2015 has come and gone and the house has not fallen, even though we did not do anything special to reinforce its structures. Glory be to God. But how long can the house continue to stand when there are no deliberate efforts to prolong its lifespan, except to hope and pray? But citizens continue to do a lot of other things to hewn at its foundations and the leadership refusing to hearken to calls to retool for enhanced cohesion and greater performance.

Until three weeks ago, the most disturbing news item was that of herdsmen who prowled communities of Benue, Enugu, Oyo, Delta and everywhere, unleashing terror on armless victims and setting their homes ablaze. Skirmishes between herdsmen and farmers had gone on for decades, but such were settled with sticks, and perhaps bows and arrows. Herdsmen used to carry local guns for hunting animals. In those days, herdsmen travel for kilometers in search of grazing lands and they did not seek to drive local farmers away to inherit their lands. If there were skirmishes, they were isolated and were within the capacity of community leaders to manage.

But as if to hasten the U.S prediction on disintegration, even if not within the 2015 timeline, herdsmen of recent years leave no one in doubt about their notion of a country. They want to operate like doctors with borders, roaming without inhibitions of law and space, trampling on territories and annexing vast swathes, even ancestral lands. They went to Plateau and left behind desolation and deaths. Then they went with temerity to Kaduna, south of the state and inflicted collateral damage on the local population. Then they went to Nasarawa, where prevailing internecine suspicions among local tribes aided their exploits. Then they crossed into Benue, Kogi, Ondo, and Oyo and were unhindered, even though they made front pages when they visited chief Olu Falae. It was in Enugu, and of recent Ekiti that their accomplishments received more than the usual feeble condemnations of the past.

Remembering MKO Abiola And June 12

By Reuben Abati

This day, June 12 will always be remembered by those who have defied the culture of silence and conspiracy against a significant moment in Nigerian history, to remind us of how today, 23 years ago, the battle against the exit of the military from power was fought at the ballot by a determined Nigerian people. It is indeed sad that apart from the South West states of Oyo, Ogun, Lagos and Osun which have Chief Moshood Kashimawo Olawale (MKO) Abioladoggedly continued to celebrate the hero, and later martyr of that battle, , there has been studied indifference to the June 12 phenomenon by the Federal Government and remarkably, the rest of Nigeria.

*MKO Abiola 

This is sadder still because MKO Abiola was not an ethnic champion: he was a man of pan-Nigerian vision and ambition, who went into politics to give the people hope, to unite them and lead them out of poverty. His campaign manifesto was instructively titled “Hope 93- Farewell to Poverty: How to make Nigeria a better place for all.”

When Nigerians voted in the presidential election of June 12, 1993, they chose the Muslim-Muslim ticket of MKO Abiola and Baba Gana Kingibe under the platform of the Social Democratic Party (SDP). MKO Abiola not only defeated the Presidential candidate of the National Republican Convention (NRC), Bashir Tofa in his home state of Kano, he also defeated him “fairly and squarely” with “58.4% of the popular vote and a majority in 20 out of 30 states and the FCT.” That election was adjudged to be free and fair, and peaceful. But the Ibrahim Babangida-led military government had been playing games with the transition-to-civilian rule, and so it chose not to announce the final results of the election, and later on June 23, 1993, the Presidential election was annulled.

This was a coup against the Nigerian people, and an act of brazen injustice, but June 12 will go down in history as the birthday of the revolution that swept the Nigerian military back to the barracks. The media began to refer to MKO Abiola as “the man widely believed to have won the June 12, 1993 election”, or perhaps, “the undeclared winner” but those who played key roles at the time, including Humphrey Nwosu, the chief electoral umpire, have since confessed that “their hands were tied”, and that indeed MKO Abiola won the election. General Ibrahim Babangida, then Head of State, has not been able to live down that error of judgement. It was the final error that also consumed his government, forcing him to “step aside”, and as it turned out “step away”. He left behind an Interim National Government (ING) led by Chief Ernest Shonekan who was handpicked for the assignment, but the ING contrivance only survived for 83 days; in November 1993, General Sani Abacha, who was in the ING as Minister of Defence, seized power. It was obvious that the military never wanted to relinquish power.

Restructure Nigeria Or Fracture Her

By Tola Adeniyi  

 I start this column today with a heavy heart and great pity for both Nigeria and those armed to the teeth to bring her down. In the past couple of weeks I wrote about the thirteen threats to Ni­geria’s survival and the need for the Federal Government to bend a little to stop Nigeria from break­ing up.

But the threat last Monday by the latest Militants in the Ni­ger Delta to collapse Nigeria with their missiles [apparently purchased with the humongous amount dashed to them under the Amnesty Project] has warranted a second look at the whole develop­ing scenario.

I am compelled to issue a warn­ing here. Even if the Militants believe they have the strongest army in the world, they should do a rethink. One can only boast about the outbreak of a war; no one can categorically predict its end. The Militants should sheath their swords and call for dialogue instead of threatening to destroy Nigeria without giving a thought to the credible possibility of also getting themselves and the region they claim to be fighting for burnt in the inferno.

Nowhere in the world has any militant group waging a war of self determination or seces­sion succeeded in destroying the whole country. PKK in Turkey and Tamil Tigers in Sri-Lanka are ready examples. Tamil Tigers campaign lasted for over 40 years and in the end they had to settle for dialogue. PKK is still at it and Turkey is still waxing stronger by the day.

Nigeria survived without oil in the 50s and 60s and prosecuted a gruesome, albeit needless war without oil and without bor­rowing a Kobo from the outside world. Nigeria can call the bluff of the oil producing region and operate on Zero oil revenue. She will fall on her knees but sooner or later will gather her senses and bounce back!

Having said this, I think it is high time the Federal Government began the process of quick and in­evitable restructuring of the polity. Whoever or whatever group that is standing against restructur­ing does not wish this bleeding country well. It is gratifying that the likes of Atiku Abubakar have joined the chorus of what people have been clamouring for in the last 60 years. The ferocious cam­paigns of JS Tarka, JS Olawoyin and Adaka Boro were all inspired by the burning desire to have Ni­geria restructured.

The Menace of Cattle Herders in Nigeria

By Leonard Karshima Shilgba

There has been a rash of proposals to resolve the menace of cattle herders’ invasion of Nigerian farmlands, who are killing unarmed Nigerians (children, women and men) and burning down or destroying houses and property, where understandably, no feeds or grasses exist for their cattle. All of these are happening on the victims’ ancestral lands, which the Nigerian constitution recognizes, even as according to Section 25(1) of the Constitution, a Nigerian by birth is so recognized only if either of his parents or grandparents “belongs or belonged to a community indigenous to Nigeria.”

In all the proposals available to me, I see none that provides for the farmers, who need even more parcels of land for their crop-farming activities than the cattle herders do. Whether they are proposals for “grazing reserves across Nigeria” or “Ranching”, for which the Federal Government seems prepared to invest public money for private business (I am yet to be provided evidence that the cattle herders are  herding government animals), I see no provision of a compensatory nature for Nigerian farmers and people, who have fallen victim to the recurring impunities of cattle herders that seem to be ever strengthened by some conviction of protection from certain quarters.

I wish to remind here that whatever proposals that the federal government may eventually adopt should be in agreement with the Constitution, otherwise they will fuel more crises and provoke anarchy in the land. Even the weak, when they face injustice, or perceive injustice that threatens their existence, will fight back in a deadly manner; for, after all, they believe they only have all to lose if they do nothing. But fighting back, they may have some to save.

 Let me cite a germane section of Nigeria’s Constitution: Section 42 (1) [Right to freedom from discrimination]:

A citizen of Nigeria of a particular community, ethnic group, place of origin, sex, religion or political opinion shall not, by reason only that he is such a person-

(a)    be subjected either expressly by, or in the practical application of, any law in force in Nigeria or any executive or administrative action of the government, to disabilities or restrictions to which citizens of Nigeria of other communities, ethnic groups, places of origin, sex, religions or political opinions are not made subject; or

(b)   be accorded either expressly by, or in the practical application of, any law in force in Nigeria or any executive or administrative action, any privilege or advantage that is not accorded to citizens of Nigeria of other communities, ethnic groups, places of origin, sex, religions or political opinions.

A close examination of the above Section shows that the constitution frowns at both discriminatory restrictions (and imposed disabilities) and discriminatory privileges or advantages. In view of this, I frame three questions for public determination:

1.       If the federal government chooses as a solution, to expend public money and expropriate lands from the natives across Nigeria, and hand over those to cattle herders for grazing, would that not amount to discriminatory restriction (of the natives, who will lose ownership of their ancestral lands) and discriminatory offer of privilege and advantage (to the cattle herders), who would then, like the Biblical Levites, live in government-protected “cities of refuge” across Nigeria? 

Before They Mislead President Buhari

By Dele Momodu 

Fellow Nigerians, let me say categorically and emphatically that our dear beloved country is dangerously haemorrhaging again and this perfidious drift must be halted urgently before we all end up in perdition. Anyone telling President Muhammadu Buhari that all is well or that his government is moving in the right direction is either lying or pretending like a rattlesnake. And there are many scorpions around ready to mislead every government and move on effortlessly when things fall apart. For sure President Buhari possesses the ability to move this country in the right direction and lead us to where we want to be but right now it is not happening and the soul of the people palpitates! I’ve been on several television and radio interviews in the past one week and the commonest question is on the performance of our President. The general perception is that the change mantra seems not to be working and the world is worried because of the importance of Nigeria in the comity of nations.

President Buhari and Dele Momodu

I hope our President will get to see this piece, read it and ruminate on the points I will raise. The Buhari government has lost a substantial equity in just one year as I will try to explain in the next few paragraphs. It must be noted that Nigerians were happy with the election that ushered in President Buhari. Even those who did not vote for him accepted him with unusual equanimity. Those we expected to fight and throw tantrums simply vamoosed into their bunkers. The expectations were high then but I doubt if enough effort was put into seizing the momentum and translating it into a mass movement that would have stood the test of time. It is not too late to reclaim the moment.

The faith Nigerians had in the abilities and incorruptibility of Buhari is mighty enough to move mountains. But unfortunately, I think the government took many things for granted once it took over the reins of power. The government mistakenly believed that the support of the people was like several blank cheques which it could cash at any point in time. The general impatience of Nigerians and their desire for progressive action were never put into consideration. I remember writing two memos to our President in quick successions, when I realised that Nigerians were getting restless and restive, one of which was the desperate memo that earned me an invitation to the Presidential Villa for which I am so honoured and proud.

Still the government did not respond appropriately to the yearnings of the populace. The major problem is that the priorities of Buhari were never palpable to the general public as everything seemed to operate in utmost secrecy. This is probably a relic of the military days when surprise and spontaneity achieved more. However, democracy is an open book and it has become even more so since the internet turned the world into a global information minefield. I’m sure it was assumed that the people would never doubt or query the sincerity of a messiah. So there was no need to provide any real information about the activities of government. That was the first fallacy.

The second fallacy is that people would give the President plenty of time to unfold his change agenda. One year on, it is obvious that this has not been the case. President Buhari should have moved faster once the people started grumbling about the apparent sluggishness of his administration. The selection of his cabinet was annoyingly slow and by the time it eventually came it had evaporated into a deja vu. There was no element of surprise to elicit major excitement. In fact, most people wondered why it took so long to assemble his present team most of whom he could have picked in two weeks or even before he was sworn in. The demystification of Buhari became manifest from that moment not because the team he picked is not worthy or creditable but because the interminable delay in making the choices cost the nation dearly.

Buhari With Idiagbon

By Farouk Martins Aresa

President Buhari’s one-year anniversary has been anything but glorious. It has been pitiful compared to his last time around. It is a different era, yet Buhari has done what most Northern rulers do best. When he loaded his personal staff with Northerners, some of us defended him based on the fact that he was overthrown in a palace coup. He has gone further by reserving most of the strategic positions for Northerners as if Southerners and Federal character do not exist.

*Buhari 

Late Idiagbon might have taken more heat than he deserved during the first coming of Buhari as military dictator. They ruled by fiat, regardless of what others thought. Idiagbon and the Supreme Military Council then had more input in order to gratify Buhari’s power base. Eventually, they confirmed his fears and overthrew him and Idiagbon. In this case, we realize that Osinbajo is in a civilian democracy. A Vice-President is used as the President deems fit.

Idiagbon was in a way more powerful than Osibanjo as the military dispensation gave them the clout to carry out War Against Indiscipline (WAI). Most of the people that voted for Buhari this time around wanted some grip on the national purse that was looted beyond reason with so much impunity. This gave Buhari an edge over the former President Jonathan. As far as those that voted for him are concerned, he has somehow lived up to it but below expectation.

Some of us would want him to go further. While we do realize constrains of democracy, the rule of law and due process, there are ways of confronting a killer disease if the life of the country is at stake. The same way western countries confront terrorism before it devours their cultural or normal way of life. They created task forces, detentions and outside jurisdictions.

Buhari could have gone as far as Obasanjo did with the atmosphere of accountability and the fear of consequences for the type of impunity we saw in the last Administration of President Jonathan. Ribadu was forceful, visible and acted as a deterrent for corruption under Obasanjo. He even claimed he used OBJ to investigate his friends and challenged anyone to point to any head of state that gave an investigating officer so much leverage and power.

Buhari and the Biafran Challenge

By Tunde Rahman

Last Tuesday, President Muhammadu Buhari met with South-east leaders, majorly from his the All Progressive Congress, at the Aso Rock Presidential Villa in Abuja. The meeting came a day after the country celebrated yet another May 29 Democracy Day.

*Buhari

But it was also a day after the bloody Biafran protests in the South-east cities and Asaba in the South-south, which left in its wake death and destruction. Over 50 pro-Biafran protesters were reportedly killed across South-east states and in Asaba, the Delta State capital.

According to newspaper reports, two policemen also lost their lives in the protests. One of the policemen was said to have been thrown into River Niger. The South-east leaders met with Buhari under the aegis of South-east Group for Change and the 18-man delegation was led by former Senate President Ken Nnamani. After the meeting, the delegation declined to speak with State House Correspondents, but asked by the newshounds whether Biafra came up for discussion at the talks, Nnamani reportedly said, “No, no, not now”. If we believe the former Senate President that the issue of Biafra did not come up for discussion at that meeting, then it was just a matter of time for a presidential meeting on Biafra to be arranged because the Biafran issue has become a thorny issue for the South-east and for Nigeria.

The Biafran issue had become knotty again since Indian-trained lawyer, Ralph Uwazuruike, around 1999 or so, established the Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) with the aim, as the name suggests, of securing the resurgence of the defunct State of Biafra. Based on the group’s activities, including hoisting Biafran flags at different locations in the South-east, the government accused MASSOB of violence and Uwazuruike was arrested in 2005 and detained on treason charges. That year, MASSOB had re-introduced the old Biafran currency into circulation. Uwazuruike was later released in 2007 but the secessionist activities of the group, however, did not stop. For instance in 2009, MASSOB launched ‘Biafran International Passport’ in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the group.

But around May 2014, the Biafran agitation took a new dimension with a new leader for the struggle: the British-Nigerian Nnamdi Kanu who spoke of his readiness to fight all the way. He said Nigeria would seize to exist by December 2015. Speaking at a gathering of members of defunct Biafra, including scores of its aged war veterans on May 30, 2014, Kanu vowed that he would not rest until the Biafran Republic is realised. The event held at Ngwo, Enugu State, was the maiden commemoration of Biafran Day, in remembrance of the events of 1967 when the late Igbo leader, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, declared the Republic of Biafra. Kanu who was also the Director of the outlawed Radio Biafra used the occasion to unveil a multi- million naira cenotaph in memory of Biafra fallen heroes killed during the civil war. He alleged that despite the declaration of the “No Victor, No Vanquished” after the Nigeria/Biafra civil war in 1970, successive governments in the country had continued to deliberately marginalise and make life unbearable for the Igbo nation and its people. He said it was unfortunate and painful that 47 years after the civil war, the reasons for which the war was fought were still evident in Nigeria. Kanu has been slammed with treason charges and remains in detention at present.

Multi-Partism As A Philosophic Construct

By Amor Amor

Like an inscrutable nightmare, the pon­derous mystery of the Nigerian national question, which is ultimately the nation’s enduring essence, is still at issue. Jolted by the scandalous and shocking dis­play of the obvious limitations of the human evolution, the unacceptable index of human misery in their country, and willed by the current spate of pain being inflicted on them by a stone-hearted old soldier and his quislings, Nigerians have been singing discordant tunes about the state of their forced union. This has further been exacerbated by disarm­ing pockets of inter and intra-communal clashes, ethnic cleansing by Fulani herdsmen, student unrest, rampaging madness of ethic militias and sectarian fanaticism in some parts of the country. There­fore, the matter for regret and agitation is that a supposedly giant of Africa has suddenly become the world’s most viable junkyard due to the evil mach­inations of a fraudulent ruling class and the feudal forces still bent on keeping the country in a perpetual state of medieval servitude.

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Yet, the most disturbing irony of the Nigerian con­dition is that a multi-party democratic system made up of over fifty registered politi­cal parties enthroned by the civil society and the media with the support of a few pro­gressive politicians such as the late legal luminary, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, the great Yoruba leader, Chief Abraham Ade­sanya, Chief Ndubisi Kanu, Alhaji Balarabe Musa and a host of others, is gradually be­ing turned to a one-party state by a gang of confused politi­cians and discredited soldiers who call themselves “progres­sives”. After a keenly contested presidential election in which emotions rose to fever-pitch, a lot of unprintable and dam­aging words thrown into the bargain from all sides of the divides, rather than sue for a genuine reconciliation of all the contending forces, presi­dent Muhammadu Buhari and his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) started by criminalizing the opposition led by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which was hither­to the ruling party. Rather than show magnanimity in victory as genuine progressives would do, extend the olive branch to the defeated, resuscitate and rejig the Inter-party Advisory Office and promote peaceful co-existence amongst the vari­ous political parties, ethnic na­tionalities, religious and other interest groups, the APC-led federal government did the op­posite.

Soon after its inauguration, the APC government, like a bull in a China’s shop, started embarking on the aggressive promotion of belligerence, acrimony and rancour; crimi­nalization, demonization, de­humanization, and demolition of the major opposition party, the PDP. While decimating their prime enemy, the APC was trying to lionize and can­onize its members in messianic emblems at the detriment of other politicians. The APC, in its smugness, self assurance and we-know-it-all bravura, is bliss­fully unaware of the fact it won the election not only for them­selves but for all Nigerians. The ruling party is sadly engrossed in the envenomisation, intimi­dation and balkanisation of the PDP, organized Labour, the intelligentsia and the critical elite that it has forgotten how to govern this complex nation. By trying to rubbish the sustained achievements of the PDP which succeeded in rebuilding almost all the broken segments of the national economy for sixteen unbroken years after sixteen consecutive years (1983-1999) of military gangsterism, rapac­ity and greed, the APC has, unknown to itself, committed political harakiri before all dis­cerning Nigerians and the in­ternational community which rated the country under former president Goodluck Jonathan as easily the biggest economy in Africa and one of the fasted growing economies in the world.

Onitsha Massacre And The Shame Of A Nation

By Lawrence Chinedu Nwobu

Buhari would probably go down in history as the worst violator of human rights and by consequence the most undemocratic president ever to walk the shores of this blighted land. It is ironic that one day after the regime celebrated democracy day and its one year anniversary on the 29^th of May with much pomp, pageantry and fanfare, feeding the public with fanciful tales of its commitment to democracy, the rule of law and much propaganda on what it claims to have achieved in one year;   the next day being the 30^th of May heralded an unprovoked bloodbath as the infamous Nigerian army treaded the familiar path of killing more than 50 IPOB and MASSOB adherents who were peacefully marking the 49^th anniversary of the declaration of Biafra.

The most fundamental attributes of democracy are the freedoms of expression, association and dissent. Democracy in effect gives citizens the largest unrestricted space to air their views no matter how unpalatable—to assemble for what they believe in and above all to express dissent through peaceful means. In nations where democracy is practiced as it should, citizens express themselves freely and organise frequent public protests to register dissent. In none of these countries are citizens arrested or killed for expressing their opinion or for organising public protests. In rare occasions where possibly because of violence the security services deem it necessary to terminate such protests; civil means such as tear gas and water cannons are employed to disperse protesters.  It is thus paradoxical that one day after celebrating democracy day, the army is unleashed to kill peaceful  protesters who are exercising the most fundamental right that democracy affords them.

More so when as has been reported, IPOB and MASSOB had actually written the Anambra state commissioner of police, formally notifying him of their upcoming rally, for which the police should ordinarily have provided security while they carried out their peaceful rally as is done in true democracies. How can an administration celebrate the virtues of democracy and at the same time kill unarmed peaceful protesters? Is their own definition of democracy different? How come the same administration that has refused to act and infact maintained a studied silence while Fulani herdsmen slaughter people across the middle belt and South is ever so quick to kill peaceful IPOB/MASSOB protesters? By these contradictions Buhari has again demonstrated his deliberate refusal to align with democratic tenets.  After decades of struggling to have democratic governance and 17 years in a supposed democracy, these blatant suppression of rights and extra judicial executions  only serves to indicate that Nigeria has returned to full blown despotism.

Thoughts On New Minimum Wage

By Oye Eribake   

A wage is monetary compensation or remuneration paid by an employer to an employee in exchange for work done. Payment may be calculated as a fixed amount for each task completed or at an hourly or daily rate, or based on an easily measured quantity of work done. On the contrary, salary is a fixed regular payment made by an employer, often monthly, for professional or office work done as opposed to manual work.

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The term “minimum wage” implies minimum legislated remuneration of an employee whether in public or private sector. In Nigeria, we find that the organised private sector (OPS) is usually just guided by the minimum wage because their compensation packages reward employees fairly adequately and in excess of the minimum wage. On the other hand, the public and informal private sectors regard it like the doctor’s life-saving prescription i.e. not to be varied. Some would rather go below it if they know that they can get away with it. That is why many states shout on roof tops that they cannot afford Federal Government determined minimum wage. The extravagant life styles of the governors, however, belie such assertions.

Like it or not, fresh negotiations must start soon given the current harsh economic realities; a higher minimum wage is inevitable. It is only Federal Government that has the constitutional responsibility to legislate it; of course that does not mean that the state governors do not have a say. The National Economic Council will drive the process culminating in enactment of an act by the NASS.

One would like to see a situation where the economic well-being of the states is taken into adequate consideration alongside the welfare of their workers in determining the new minimum wage. We have states that are agrarian while some are commercial/metropolitan just as some are rich in mineral resources especially oil and gas. The proverbial saying that all fingers are not equal sums it up! Were the state governments to behave like the organised private sector, the South-South and Lagos states should have been rewarding their unskilled workforce more than agrarian states like Benue.

Power: Interrogating The Gaps In Fashola’s Roadmap

By Calixthus Okoruwa  

The minister with responsibility for Nigeria’s pivotal power sector, Mr. Babatunde Fashola has recently released what he calls “a roadmap for change” in the sector. It is commendable that his effort in this arena will be underscored by planning and more so that he has chosen to share this plan with the public. This conveys a sense of mission.

*Fashola 

Fashola’s roadmap is not different in any material way from the August 2010 “Roadmap for Power Sector Reform” the robust roadmap that was developed by the previous government. Incidentally, despite the lofty agenda of that apparently painstakingly-crafted plan, six years later, Nigeria still totters on circa 5000MW of power-generating and -transmission capacity respectively.

While such factors as corruption and insincerity of purpose can be listed among the causes of the failure of that otherwise meticulous plan, there is no doubt that hordes of genuine problems many of which hallmark the famed difficulty of doing business in Nigeria are also contributors. One of the most instructive but least recognised of these problems, in my view, has been citizen disinterest, arising from an inability or unwillingness of government to carry citizens along on its implementation journey. Not unexpectedly, therefore, initial public excitement soon gave way first to apathy and thereafter, sheer derision. If Fashola’s roadmap is not to go the way of its predecessor, it is pertinent that it is ardently confronted and interrogated by the average citizen.

 Even without expressly stating it, Fashola may have tactically reduced Nigeria’s power target over the next five years by half. While the original roadmap set a target of 40000MW by 2020, Fashola has cut this to 20000MW, stating that the Transmission Company of Nigeria, “TCN, has expressed a desire” to increase transmission in a stepwise manner from today’s 5000MW through to 20000MW over the next five years.

Ken Nnamani And Co’s Beggarly Villa Trip

By Ochereome Nnanna

I would not have commented on the recent appearance by a group of political adventurers in Aso Villa if not for the fact that they were described as “Igbo leaders” in some sections of the media. If they had simply gone as All Progressives Congress (APC) members from the South East visiting the President and leader of their party for whatever purposes, it would have passed as a non-event (though I have not seen APC leaders from other geopolitical zones going similarly cap-in-hand for special attention of President Muhammadu Buhari).

They called their gathering South East Group for Change (SEGC), probably a name they coined just for the Aso Rock trip, as nothing of such had been heard before now. Led by Mr. Ken Nnamani, a former Senate President, some of the known names included Mr. Osita Izunaso, a former one-term senator; Mr. Ernest Ndukwe, a two-term Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Mr. Chris Akomas, a former Deputy Governor of Abia State and Chief George Moghalu.

Apart from Moghalu, the rest were in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) when the going was good. They owed the high public offices attached to their names to the PDP, and now that the APC has become the new party with the “knife and yam”, they have trooped over there to reap where they did not sow. They are political opportunists, and it shocks many of Nnamani’s former admirers that he has degenerated to this level after once seeming a strong presidential possibility from Igboland.

Of this lot, only Moghalu is a genuine, thoroughbred APC leader. From 1999, Moghalu has been in the movement that eventually transmogrified into the APC – from the All People’s Party (APP) to the All Nigerian People’s Party (ANPP) to the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) to the APC. He is a true party man; a genuine politician who stuck with the former opposition party through sun, rain, storms and high winds until it finally became the ruling party.

Buhari told us that the reason he violated the constitutional principle of federal character in the appointment of his inner government, was that he distributed positions to those who toiled and suffered with him over the years as a reward for their loyalty. I wonder how Moghalu could not qualify for appointment since he had been one of Buhari’s faithful point men in the South East since 2003 when he first ran for president. He was in that movement long before Dr. Chris Ngige decamped from the PDP. Even though no communiqué or media statement was issued after that visit (Buhari, knowing them for the opportunists they were, probably had nothing tangible to tell them), I read a most annoying analysis credited to an unnamed member of the group.

Sexual Harassment ‎Bill: A Step In The Right Direction

By Cynthia Ferdinand

 The history of sexual harassment dates back to the pre-colonial era when women were accorded little or no rights whatsoever – they were often married out against their wish, sacrificed as virgins or married to deities where they became ready sexual preys to the chief priests or custodians of such deities.

(pix: nature)

While these repressive and degrading habits have abated following the introduction of Western education, it is unfortunate that the inhuman practice has not only crept into our citadels of learning but has continued to assume worrisome proportions to the consternation of parents and education authorities in the country alike. The effects of incessant sexual harassment of female students in higher institutions cannot be over-emphasized as it has continued to militate against the attainment of the educational vision and objectives of many a female folk in the country.

There have been overwhelming narratives on sexual harassment by victims such that researchers of international repute have described Nigerian tertiary institutions as sex colonies were rape and other forms of coerced copulation and sexual intimacy are practiced without sanctions. To many young Nigerians, especially female students in tertiary institutions, sexual harassment is something of a norm.

United Nations (UN) reports state that “one out of three women experience sexual harassment in their lifetime”. According to the European Union Commission recommendation: “There are also adverse consequences arising from sexual harassment for employers. In general terms, sexual harassment is an obstacle to the proper integration of women into the labour market.” It is further regrettable that over the years, aside provisions against rape and other untoward sexual behaviours in both the Criminal and Penal Codes, there have been no clear cut and effective legislation aimed at checkmating or eliminating this abhorrent practice from our institutions of higher learning.

 As a consequence, it is today difficult to explicitly articulate what constitutes sexual harassment and what sanctions there are to deter male predators. Another factor that has helped sustained this barbaric tendency, is the seeming societal indifference to the plight of victims due to discrepancies in views as to what actually constitute sexual harassment against the opposite sex.

Be that as it may, no matter the view we want to give to the menace of sexual harassment, its cumulative, demoralizing and harmful effect cannot be glossed over. It is unarguable that many academic careers of female students have been disrupted and frustrated and led inexorably to depression, ostracism, mental anguish and loss of self esteem on the part of victims of sexual harassment.

Nigeria: Change For The Worse, Litany Of Failures

By Fem Aribasala

When Buhari seized power, Nigeria’s GDP was $444. When he was overthrown in 1985, Nigeria’s GDP had dropped dramatically to $344. When Buhari seized power, one dollar exchanged for 0.724 naira. But by the time he was overthrown, one dollar exchanged for 0.894 naira; a 23% devaluation in barely two years. It was not surprising, therefore, that there was wild jubilation throughout the length and breadth of Nigeria when Buhari was overthrown.

*Buhari 

Litany Of Failure

History is now repeating itself in Nigeria. Since electing Buhari as president one year ago, Nigeria’s GDP has plummeted, with the economy suffering a negative growth in the first quarter of 2016; the worst in 25 years. Prices have skyrocketed. Investors have packed their bags and left Nigeria. Job losses and lay-offs have increased geometrically. Petrol stations have surreptitiously doubled their prices. Nigeria is now on the cusp of a recession.

Buhari was handed over $30 billion in foreign reserves by the Jonathan administration. He inherited over $2.5 billion in the Sovereign Wealth Fund; $1.4 billion in the ECA; and $4.65 billion in back taxes from NLNG. But virtually all of this has been squandered in one year of gross incompetence.

The president took the illegal and ill-advised step of providing N713 billion as bailout for insolvent state governments, without the approval of the national assembly, only to discover that those monies were squandered and not even used as intended to pay salary arrears. He squandered billions of dollars defending doggedly an unrealistic official value of the naira, only to finally admit defeat after the damage had been done.

Billions of dollars were mopped up by corrupt officials and shrewd middlemen who obtained dollars at the official N200 to $1 rate, only to sell this for huge profit at the N380 to $1 black market rate.

Babatunde Fashola boasted while in opposition that: “A serious government will fix the power problem in six months.” Now in office as Minister of Power for over six months, power blackouts have been unprecedented under his watch condemning the Buhari administration by his own words as a most unserious government.

Change For Worse

Goodluck Jonathan warned Nigerians about the bankruptcy of Buhari and the APC. His words have now become prophetic. He said in the heat of the 2015 election campaign: “The choice before Nigerians in the coming election is simple. It is a choice between going forward and backward, between the new ways and old ways, between freedom and repression, between a record of visible achievements and beneficial reforms and desperate power seekers with empty promises.”

After 365 days of a disastrous Buhari presidency, only diehard Buharimaniacs can deny that Jonathan’s warning has not come true. Propaganda has an expiration date, and it must now be abundantly clear that the expiration date for the hot air of Buhari’s government has long passed. Many of those like Dele Sobowale, Oby Ezekwesili and Wole Soyinka, who sang the praises of Buhari during the 2015 election, are already having a buyer’s remorse. Most Nigerians now realise they have been sold a fake bill of goods by Buhari and the APC.

Jonathan’s Bill Of Rights Or Failures?

By Paul Onomuakpokpo

It remains a puzzle of governance in Africa why those we entrust with leadership do not creditably acquit themselves like their counterparts in some nations of the world.  Before our politicians get power, we are enthralled by their resonant visions of an equitable society that would be an all-powerful response to the mockery that the black man would irremediably chafe under the affliction of  inept leadership. But once they are in office, they often fail to translate such grand dreams into reality.  After they leave office, they regain the trajectory of articulating how a great society should be run.

*Jonathan 

This is the problem of a nation whose leaders do not really prepare for leadership. They are imposed on the citizens by themselves, others or circumstances. It is only when they are thrown up by circumstances or other people or they bulldoze their way into power that they start to learn about what they should do while in office. Of course, this is in the rare case of when they learn at all. Most times, our leaders do not bother to learn about the real issues for which they are in office.

Rather, once they get to office, they become not only enamoured of it, they are pre-occupied with how to sustain themselves in their position to the detriment of good governance. This is when they think of the next election and how they would return to their offices.  It is when they would globe-trot, marry more wives and take more chieftaincy titles. It is because our leaders only remember the right things they should have done only after leaving office that the country would remain undeveloped or even retrogress.

But the real tragedy is that such leaders do not behave in a manner that shows that they regret frittering away some opportunities to do great things for their country. For instance, ever since former President Olusegun Obasanjo left office, he has been  behaving as though he were the only Nigerian alive who  could proffer solutions to the  seemingly intractable problems of the nation. It is in the same mould that former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has caught the limelight by canvassing the restructuring of the country as the solution to its myriad of problems. If they had used the opportunities they had to do what they are talking about now, they would not need to push them into public consciousness now.

Ever since he left office, former President Goodluck Jonathan has been silent. Even when it seemed he would react to the persistent  insinuations of his complicity in the corruption charges hanging over many of his aides, he has avoided being embroiled in them. But he broke his silence on Monday when he spoke in London. Indeed, Jonathan’s speech brims with stellar ideas about how to run a society that is underpinned by a clearly defined bill of rights. Jonathan wants such a bill of rights to be similar to the British Magna Carta established some 800 years ago, and  the one introduced by America’s Founding Fathers.