The issue of law and order is of very high public concern, not only to Nigerians but also to the international community wanting to do business in and with Nigeria. Since the return to democracy in 1999, crime has risen steadily, with the Nigeria Police Force seemingly unable to respond effectively. In many cases, police incompetence, misconduct and corruption have fuelled, rather than reduce crime and violence. The issue of crime since this new democratic dispensation entered the political agenda due to the rise in kidnappings in the Niger Delta, the assassination of political opponents as well as the annual tally of police brutality and indiscriminate killings. Reform of the Nigerian policing system is clearly badly needed, yet policies have remained timid, incongruous and insincere in this area.
The recent call by the Federal Government of Nigeria and the Inspector General of Police, Mike Okiro, to invite the British Police to reform the Nigeria Police has met with a lot of opposition and righteous indignation by many Nigerians, judging by what I have read in the newspapers. However, honest, sincere and articulate Nigerians should see this as a “welcome development which will take the Force to its anticipated standard”, as the IG himself posited and tried to explain. It is a step in the right direction, if only it is sincere, well-thought out, planned and implemented, and not just another way of pulling the wool over our eyes.
I have read people opposed to this move shouting “racism”, “re-colonisation”, “neo-colonialism”, “waste of our resources” and all kinds of other political words. If we are sincere with ourselves, to deny the involvement of colonisation in the history of Nigeria and its Police Force is to deny our history, and thereby deny our very existence as a country and as a people. History is there for the purpose of reference, and should not be denied or tampered with. That is a basic fact.
As one “Paul” wrote in The Vanguard, Thursday 29 November 2007, “Mr Okiro's statement is a testament to the pervading situation in Nigeria where the worst group of dullards occupies position of authority. ….. There are many capable Nigerians who if given the opportunity will lead the corrupt Nigerian Police into glory. (I will tend to agree with this, but not from within the current Police cadre) Okiro was appointed by a useless internal promotion process and not because he demonstrated any ability for doing the job. The right way for filling a position is by recruiting the best person for the job and that means those who will demonstrate their individual capability for getting the job done. …… I hope the British Police accept the responsibility to help. Most of the current force members will be re-interviewed and will be made to justify why they should retain their job. (Again, I am in agreement with this statement) …. and the way things are done in the UK is that everyone justifies why they should be employed even if the interview panel is composed of your relatives from the same parent. This and this reason alone is why UK and most western countries have made such progress and advancement.
I would say perhaps the way in which the IG sought to explain the reasons behind this move justified this opposition. In fact I do not expect him to be able to explain these things well to Nigerians in the first place, because he would be under constraint to speak the truth, as it may be.
Hear Mr Okiro, the Inspector General of Police, “The Nigeria Police was created by the British and therefore, inviting them for the purpose of assisting us in certain area of need should be likened to a son looking up to his father for help. The invitation of the British police should not generate any controversy. They were our colonial master. In fact, the Nigeria police was formed by the British government and like father and son, a son should look up to a father over an issue he feels he is not too experienced on. There is nothing wrong in inviting them. Nothing the Nigeria Police is going through now that the British police had not gone through. Is it crime, is it restructuring? Name them. The British Police went through restructuring in 1957 and the government sat and reformed the police. So it is not an issue.”
While there is some basis of facts in the statement, we the people know that the Nigeria Police Force, like many other Nigerian government institutions and departments, is a farce, not a force. The police in Nigeria are corrupt, but then, the society is also corrupt, I have written before. The men and women of the Nigeria Police Force are products of a corrupt society and system, so it follows that that they will be corrupt too. This is of course, not an excuse for them, but that is the fact. They have families; they have to survive in the harsh conditions of Nigeria, just like other Nigerians. They have to make do, and the only way they know, is “if you can’t beat them, join them”. They see politicians and other civil servants living beyond their means, embezzling money in the billions, sharing out perks and contracts between them, and they have to resort to roadblocks extortions, killing innocent civilians and running away from armed robbers who are better equipped than them. The men and women in the lower ranks see their “ogas” living well beyond their salaries, so naturally, they have to survive too on the highways.
The Nigeria Police Force is ill-trained, ill-equipped, ill-orientated, ill-paid, ill-motivated and not respected. These people work more than eight hours a day, standing on road blocks and just totting their out-dated weapons. Even the ones in the office never seem to leave for home at night. Are there set hours for them to work? Mind you, I still give them some respect. There have been many instances of uncommon bravery and honesty in a few patched. Recently, some courageous policemen were killed while battling armed robbers in various places in the country. What happened to the families they left behind? You ask me, if they will be well compensated for their irretrievable loss. Is there any kind of life insurance scheme or Government Grant or Compensation Scheme for policemen killed in the line of duty as in many Western countries? What exactly do policemen in Nigeria benefit from?
They are used by corrupt politicians to carry out nefarious activities, especially during electioneering. Their bosses pocket all the money. The 20 Naira collected on thousands of roadblocks around the country go very high up, if you don’t know. All monies collected on roadblocks must be accounted for, by some bosses up there in their corrupt headquarters.
Compatriots, it is time we faced up to the reality that a lot of things are not working in Nigeria, and needs external or divine intervention. To be frank, it is not a shame for one country to seek the assistance of another in several areas of governance. This is nothing new or something for countries to be ashamed of. There has been unilateral cooperation between countries of the world since time immemorial. Nigeria, as a country has sought it several times before and will continue to seek it. The United States, China, the old USSR and the UK, have sought help from each other and even from less developed nations to tackle one problem or the other. This is what is called International Cooperation, and it is something that happens everyday between countries.
Yes, it is an indictment of our police as a corrupt, ineffective, inefficient and totally useless law enforcement agency, and a shame on the officers, both serving and retired. It is an indictment of our Government too, but when we recognise our deficiencies and mistakes, that is only when we can correct them and move forward. These are precisely what the IG failed to address and get across to us. If he had admitted that his force are all these things, then people would understand where he was coming from and not lay into him like that. But Government officials are famous for speaking from the sides of their mouths, not articulate with stating the facts and are economical with the truth.
As it currently stands, it is not possible for the Nigeria Police Force to be reformed internally. This is because those who will be asked to reform it rose through the ranks – the ranks of corruption. They are or were part of the corrupt system, so they cannot reform it. They are devoid of ideas, they have vested interests, they are corrupt and morally bankrupt, they are too compromised and they are inept. So help has to come from outside. No Sir, we have been leaving it in their hands everytime, without any real change. Many Committees and task Forces and white and Green papers have been done internally on reforming the Police; what have heard about them. The best that some Inspector Generals have come up with is to change the uniforms. That is their idea of reforms; an exercise in futility and insincerity; a means of making money.
This outside help should also be qualified. What exactly are they coming to do? Is the help sought short or long term? What is our level of sincerity and desire to seek real and lasting help and desired reforms? How will the reforms be implemented, monitored and reviewed? Will the officers and men of the Police give them the cooperation desired and requested in order for the reforms to have real meaning and effect? Will our current corrupt officers not be afraid that a lot of skeletons will be exposed and thereby affect their jobs?
In carrying out the reforms, several corrupt and useless officers will have to go, and this will decimate the whole of the Force, since there will be many, if not the whole lot. Is this practicable or part of the intended reforms? Can the leopard change its spots? It is a Catch-22 situation, because after the reforms, the same corrupt, useless officers will still be left in the Force. Game on. Nothing has changed.
But we should give it a try. I think what needs to drummed into the heads of “Nigeria’s Finest” is that they need a completely new orientation. Their mode of training is outdated. Forget about their officers going abroad for training. This does not mean anything. Even if such officers want to adapt what they have learnt from abroad and translate it into action, the system will not let them. Another waste of resources.
The first thing should be their salary and compensation levels. Policemen and women must be well paid in order for them to perform effectively, efficiently and honestly. In fact, they must be paid higher than most other workers in the country. Then they will turn their backs on bribery and extortion. With the wealth of this country, it is amazing that policemen in this country are still not well-paid accordingly. It is a shame really. We are talking about security of life and property everyday, but the pay of the Police is still not being addressed. Yet, politicians are stealing billions of dollars.
Secondly, they must be trained and equipped properly. I don’t know what they teach them at the Police Colleges, but one thing I am sure about, is that they do not teach them that their profession is a noble one, and their remit is to protect and serve the Nigerian public. (Incidentally, I see this motto on their vehicles, and I could not help but laugh and see the sarcasm of it). Police work transcends a lot of things these days, and is highly technical and technology intensive. In a country where electricity is moribund, police work, and others like it, is severely hampered. For example, how many police stations in the country are linked by ordinary telephones, not to talk of computers? How many of the officers are computer-literate. I have seen inner city police stations lighted by lanterns. We have a long way to go and reforms are quite daunting, if you thing long and hard about the problems facing us.
Thirdly, we must have more police per head of population. We simply do not have enough to police the country.
Politicians also need to hands off the police, with the force being semi-independent. There is too much politics being played with the police by irresponsible and corrupt politicians, which has resulted in misery and death for the populace. Why, for example, should the Police be guarding people like Chief Adedibu or escorting him all over the place. Is he a government official? This is a waste of resources and smacks of political pandering and favouritism.
The name of the organisation should also change from Nigeria Police Force to Nigeria Police Service. The use of “Force” is outdated, politically incorrect and incompatible with modern definitions and norms. And actually, the Police are supposed to provide a service to the people, and should not be seen as an occupying force. This psychological change will also go down well with their customers – the Nigeria public.
Basically what I am saying is that we must invest in the security of life and property of the people of Nigeria, like we must invest in their education, health, food, water and other basic necessities of life. A contented Policeman is an efficient policeman.
David Bayley, in his book, Changing the Guard: Developing Democratic Police Abroad Oxford University Press, New York, 2005, posited that the assumption behind building democratic police forces is that "what the police do critically affects the character of government". The nature of policing in a country not only affects the lives of its citizens but also is an indicator of the character of the government. Furthermore, police actions have a profound effect on the vivacity of the political process. Subsequently, he presented four institutional reforms that he believes foreign assistance should promote in the police if the goal is a democratic government based on constitutionalism. These four reforms are as follows:
1. Police must be accountable to law rather than to government.
2. Police must protect human rights, especially those rights that are required for the sort of political activity that is the hallmark of democracy.
3. Police must be accountable to people outside the organization who are specifically designated and empowered to regulate police activity.
4. Police must give top operational priority to servicing the needs of individual citizens and private groups.
A police force that is democratically reformed supports democracy in two ways. First, a reformed police force is accountable to a diverse set of people, particularly individuals. Second, it enhances the legitimacy of government by demonstrating that the authority of the state will be used in the interests of the people. After all, the police typically act as the most visible representative of the government. Based on this, Bayley makes the insightful statement that the reform of police services would do more for the legitimacy of government than any other reform program - and the effects would immediately be felt. Reforming the police would be an exercise in futility if the rest of the system did not recognize their authority or work achieved. Furthermore, Bayley said, in post-conflict nations and failed states; there is often a perceived trade-off between providing security for the government and its citizens and undertaking institutional reform.
So this is not such a bad idea and should be given a chance.
Saturday, 29 December 2007
THE NIGERIA POLICE AND PUBLIC SAFETY
“The Nigeria Police Force is now a danger to public safety and security and the conduct of its personnel could be the cause of a major public health and mortality emergency on a national scale” – NOPRIN (2007)
The revelation of the content of the damning 19-page report by the Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN), which monitored over 400 police stations in 13 states of Nigeria, should come as no surprise to any Nigerian. It is a most welcome and eye-opening report which really further exposed the Nigeria Police Force as one of the most, if not the most, incompetent, inefficient, corrupt, brutal security organisation in the world. This report must be a real concern for the Nigerian public, because, God help us, if it is not you today, it might be a family member or friend tomorrow who will fall into the callous hands or trap of this organisation.
It is no exaggeration that, according to NOPRIN, that “the [police force] is now a danger to public safety and security and the conduct of its personnel could be the cause of a major public health and mortality emergency on a national scale”. In fact, the Nigeria Police Force no longer protects the Nigerian public, rather, the Nigerian public should be protected from the men and women of this outdated and corrupt force. And therein lies the problem, because who is going to protect the public? The government or ourselves? NOPRIN’s Coordinator said “President Yar’Adua’s commitment to the rule of law rings hollow as long as his administration takes no steps to bring an end to the epidemic of police killings and other abuses in Nigeria. What use is the rule of law if it cannot guarantee the right to life? A Police Force that kills this number of people cannot guarantee public safety.”
According to the report, “thousands of detainees are killed annually in encounters with the police; hundreds of detainees die outside police custody from injuries sustained during police torture; custodial conditions in police cells cause and spread infectious diseases; while a growing incidence of allegations of rape by police personnel raise the risk of trauma injuries to the victims as well as the spread of HIV-AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases”. (Are we surprised?) The report claimed that a “police officer attached to the Police in Ikeja, Lagos State, described their practice of raping professional sex workers, claiming that ‘this is one of the fringe benefits attached to night patrol’. (Perfect examples of man’s inhumanity to man, I dare say, and while armed robbers with superior firepower are busy carrying out raids on helpless public, our “finest” and “protectors are busily engaged in having fun raping sex workers. Not a bad fringe benefit or bush allowance, is it?). These crimes against Nigerians have been going on for decades, and from the look of it, will continue for a long time to come, because the people in power have never addressed the issue appropriately. All they do is change their uniforms, or arm them more to commit more crimes against their fellow Nigerians.
To be frank, I was surprised that we even have over 400 police stations in only 13 states. I thought there were less, so the fact that we this many, is a plus to either the force itself or to the government. Have you ever been to the website of the Nigeria Police Force? It is www.nigeriapolice.org. It is a shame on whoever decided that this is the website of a national police force worthy of the name. But then, there we have it.
I would assume that it was on the back of this report that the Inspector General of Police, Sir Mike Okiro, thought he should holler for help from the British Police. And damn right he should, but with appropriate action plans and the right approaches. However, when a security force’s boss decides to measure his force’s success by the number of people, called armed robbers, that they have killed within 3 months, saying that the Police had killed 785 suspected armed robbers in his first one hundred days in office, representing an average daily killing rate of nearly eight persons, you know the Nigerian public is not safe from the Nigeria Police. And he was promoted just a few days after making this statement. I do not mind if he can convince us that ALL the people he called armed robbers were actually armed robbers, but the problem is we all know a lot of this figure are not armed robbers, but people, mostly innocent civilians who either fell foul of the law, or were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Look at these statistics – and these are just the ones they decided to tell us – “One of Mr. Okiro’s predecessors, Tafa Balogun, announced in 2004 that the police killed 7,198 alleged “armed robbers” in encounters from 2000 to the end of February 2004, including 2,025 in 2002, and 3,100 in 2003. Mr. Balogun’s successor as Inspector-General of Police, Sunday Ehindero, however, claimed in July 2006 that the police killed only 2,402 during the same period”. This is a lot of killings done in the name of policing, Nigerian-style. My guess is that only half of those people killed were actual armed robbers.
I should know. Within the last 6 months, three acquaintances who happened to live abroad and were holidaying in Nigeria have been killed by Nigeria Police, who labelled them armed robbers. Then are the frequent raids by men and women of the force on area boys and the homeless, parading them in front of the TV (a breach of International Conventions) and then the next thing you hear, is that they were shot while trying to escape. These are men who had been beaten silly, or shot in the leg, who could not possible walk after their torture by the police brutes, not to talk of run.
The only solution to armed robbery, apparently, as far as the Nigeria Police Force is concerned, is to kill as many people, armed robbers or innocent people, as possible. This is quite obvious in the slogans written on their dilapidated and decrepit patrol cars. “Operation Fire for Fire”, and other idiotic slogans. One thing for sure, they are not exchanging the same fire as the real armed robbers are.
Please, let us recognise that there are many brilliant, well educated, brave, efficient and resourceful men and women in the Nigeria Police Force. I know many in these categories of fine officers, who have really taken the Police Force as a career and mean to do well for the public. I have heard of many officers who have been courageous in the line of fire with armed robbers. Some officers are very committed to police work and protecting the public, but they are too few, and therefore overwhelmed by the many bad ones.
There are so many causative issues and factors affecting the performance and psyche of our policemen and women, and one that I want to single out is the very environment or society in which they are forced to work in. The environment is corrupt, harsh and not conducive in whole or parts, and since they are a product of this environment, living and working in it, they are bound to reflect that environment, hence they are corrupt and brutal and have no respect for human life and endeavour. Their leaders, both political and organisational are corrupt, hence they find it difficult to operate as efficiently and humanely as one would expect in a normal conducive society. They are therefore not wholly to blame. They have to eat, pay their rents, send their children to school and generally exist like others, and because all these basic pleasantries of life are not provided to them, they have to resort to brutality, torture, corruption and blatant disregard for human life. This is not an excuse for their bestiality, but it should be recognised.
The Nigeria Police is the organisation that reflects Nigerian corruption the most, not only because of their public visibility, but because of their status in a civil society. At least the corrupt political leaders and civil servants can sit behind their office desks and steal billions of Naira in secret, (and most of them get away with it) not so the policeman. They can only steal in public by extorting money from the public on the highways and in their police stations. It is well known that some officers moonlight as armed robbers during the night. Some are in league with the armed robbers and drug barons, some even sell or lend guns to armed robbers. Tell me if such men will not kill anyone in sight, or to protect themselves from exposure.
Then comes the use of the policemen and women by politicians and people in government. It is again well known that several politicians, including several State Governors, and possibly the Obasanjo Administration, used ex-IG Tafa Balogun’s Nigeria Police Force, to ensure their re-elections in 2003. That explained part of the massive loot that Balogun was eventually caught with. Even, ex-IG Ehindero can not absolve himself of his culpability in rigging the last election in 2007, with the aid of his men and women.
I once met a young police officer in Ibadan, who could not have been more than 22 years of age. We met under an altercating situation, but afterwards I advised him to get another job. He agreed with me, but told me he’s lucky to have this job in the meantime.
I never cease to wonder what they teach them in the Police Colleges. Or could it be that they teach them the right things, but out there on the street, they abandon all the good things they were taught and revert back true to type and just swing along with the environment, considering all members of the public as their enemies? Do they teach them courses in civics, governance, security, effective policing, humanities, political sciences, civil rights, human rights, ethics, etc?
Again, you have to be sympathetic to their sorry state. In my previous article about the invitation extended by IG Mike Okiro, to the British Police, I said that the “Nigeria Police Force is ill-trained, ill-equipped, ill-orientated, ill-paid, ill-motivated and not respected. These people work more than eight hours a day, standing on road blocks and just totting their out-dated weapons. Even the ones in the office never seem to leave for home at night. Are there set hours for them to work? Mind you, I still give them some respect. There have been many instances of uncommon bravery and honesty in a few patches. Recently, some courageous policemen were killed while battling armed robbers in various places in the country. What happened to the families they left behind? You ask me, if they will be well compensated for their irretrievable loss. Is there any kind of life insurance scheme or Government Grant or Compensation Scheme for policemen killed in the line of duty as in many Western countries? What exactly do policemen in Nigeria benefit from?”
What next then? How do we reform this organisation? Who will do the reforming? Should we split the force into national and regional/state police forces? What will be the political implications of such split? How do we save the public from the Nigeria Police Force? Again, I have written that “As it currently stands, it is not possible for the Nigeria Police Force to be reformed internally. This is because those who will be asked to reform it rose through the ranks – the ranks of corruption. They are or were part of the corrupt system, so they cannot reform it. They are devoid of ideas, they have vested interests, they are corrupt and morally bankrupt, they are too compromised and they are inept. We have been leaving it in their hands everytime, without any real change. Many Committees and Task Forces and White and Green papers have been done internally on reforming the Police; what have we heard about them. The best that some Inspector Generals have come up with is to change the uniforms. That is their idea of reforms; an exercise in futility and insincerity; a means of making money”.
Unfortunately, if our society as a whole does not change fundamentally, any attempt to reform any or all of our various governing departments or functions will be an exercise in futility. It is not only the police that are corrupt, the whole society is. Therefore, the society must change before anything else can change. Our attitude, our morality, our commitment, etc must change. We all know this is not easy. It might not even be in our lifetime. Who knows? But we have to work towards it. We do not have a choice, if we want to survive as a people and leave a lasting legacy to our children and grandchildren, which they will be proud of and which will make life easier (and safer)for them.
The revelation of the content of the damning 19-page report by the Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN), which monitored over 400 police stations in 13 states of Nigeria, should come as no surprise to any Nigerian. It is a most welcome and eye-opening report which really further exposed the Nigeria Police Force as one of the most, if not the most, incompetent, inefficient, corrupt, brutal security organisation in the world. This report must be a real concern for the Nigerian public, because, God help us, if it is not you today, it might be a family member or friend tomorrow who will fall into the callous hands or trap of this organisation.
It is no exaggeration that, according to NOPRIN, that “the [police force] is now a danger to public safety and security and the conduct of its personnel could be the cause of a major public health and mortality emergency on a national scale”. In fact, the Nigeria Police Force no longer protects the Nigerian public, rather, the Nigerian public should be protected from the men and women of this outdated and corrupt force. And therein lies the problem, because who is going to protect the public? The government or ourselves? NOPRIN’s Coordinator said “President Yar’Adua’s commitment to the rule of law rings hollow as long as his administration takes no steps to bring an end to the epidemic of police killings and other abuses in Nigeria. What use is the rule of law if it cannot guarantee the right to life? A Police Force that kills this number of people cannot guarantee public safety.”
According to the report, “thousands of detainees are killed annually in encounters with the police; hundreds of detainees die outside police custody from injuries sustained during police torture; custodial conditions in police cells cause and spread infectious diseases; while a growing incidence of allegations of rape by police personnel raise the risk of trauma injuries to the victims as well as the spread of HIV-AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases”. (Are we surprised?) The report claimed that a “police officer attached to the Police in Ikeja, Lagos State, described their practice of raping professional sex workers, claiming that ‘this is one of the fringe benefits attached to night patrol’. (Perfect examples of man’s inhumanity to man, I dare say, and while armed robbers with superior firepower are busy carrying out raids on helpless public, our “finest” and “protectors are busily engaged in having fun raping sex workers. Not a bad fringe benefit or bush allowance, is it?). These crimes against Nigerians have been going on for decades, and from the look of it, will continue for a long time to come, because the people in power have never addressed the issue appropriately. All they do is change their uniforms, or arm them more to commit more crimes against their fellow Nigerians.
To be frank, I was surprised that we even have over 400 police stations in only 13 states. I thought there were less, so the fact that we this many, is a plus to either the force itself or to the government. Have you ever been to the website of the Nigeria Police Force? It is www.nigeriapolice.org. It is a shame on whoever decided that this is the website of a national police force worthy of the name. But then, there we have it.
I would assume that it was on the back of this report that the Inspector General of Police, Sir Mike Okiro, thought he should holler for help from the British Police. And damn right he should, but with appropriate action plans and the right approaches. However, when a security force’s boss decides to measure his force’s success by the number of people, called armed robbers, that they have killed within 3 months, saying that the Police had killed 785 suspected armed robbers in his first one hundred days in office, representing an average daily killing rate of nearly eight persons, you know the Nigerian public is not safe from the Nigeria Police. And he was promoted just a few days after making this statement. I do not mind if he can convince us that ALL the people he called armed robbers were actually armed robbers, but the problem is we all know a lot of this figure are not armed robbers, but people, mostly innocent civilians who either fell foul of the law, or were at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Look at these statistics – and these are just the ones they decided to tell us – “One of Mr. Okiro’s predecessors, Tafa Balogun, announced in 2004 that the police killed 7,198 alleged “armed robbers” in encounters from 2000 to the end of February 2004, including 2,025 in 2002, and 3,100 in 2003. Mr. Balogun’s successor as Inspector-General of Police, Sunday Ehindero, however, claimed in July 2006 that the police killed only 2,402 during the same period”. This is a lot of killings done in the name of policing, Nigerian-style. My guess is that only half of those people killed were actual armed robbers.
I should know. Within the last 6 months, three acquaintances who happened to live abroad and were holidaying in Nigeria have been killed by Nigeria Police, who labelled them armed robbers. Then are the frequent raids by men and women of the force on area boys and the homeless, parading them in front of the TV (a breach of International Conventions) and then the next thing you hear, is that they were shot while trying to escape. These are men who had been beaten silly, or shot in the leg, who could not possible walk after their torture by the police brutes, not to talk of run.
The only solution to armed robbery, apparently, as far as the Nigeria Police Force is concerned, is to kill as many people, armed robbers or innocent people, as possible. This is quite obvious in the slogans written on their dilapidated and decrepit patrol cars. “Operation Fire for Fire”, and other idiotic slogans. One thing for sure, they are not exchanging the same fire as the real armed robbers are.
Please, let us recognise that there are many brilliant, well educated, brave, efficient and resourceful men and women in the Nigeria Police Force. I know many in these categories of fine officers, who have really taken the Police Force as a career and mean to do well for the public. I have heard of many officers who have been courageous in the line of fire with armed robbers. Some officers are very committed to police work and protecting the public, but they are too few, and therefore overwhelmed by the many bad ones.
There are so many causative issues and factors affecting the performance and psyche of our policemen and women, and one that I want to single out is the very environment or society in which they are forced to work in. The environment is corrupt, harsh and not conducive in whole or parts, and since they are a product of this environment, living and working in it, they are bound to reflect that environment, hence they are corrupt and brutal and have no respect for human life and endeavour. Their leaders, both political and organisational are corrupt, hence they find it difficult to operate as efficiently and humanely as one would expect in a normal conducive society. They are therefore not wholly to blame. They have to eat, pay their rents, send their children to school and generally exist like others, and because all these basic pleasantries of life are not provided to them, they have to resort to brutality, torture, corruption and blatant disregard for human life. This is not an excuse for their bestiality, but it should be recognised.
The Nigeria Police is the organisation that reflects Nigerian corruption the most, not only because of their public visibility, but because of their status in a civil society. At least the corrupt political leaders and civil servants can sit behind their office desks and steal billions of Naira in secret, (and most of them get away with it) not so the policeman. They can only steal in public by extorting money from the public on the highways and in their police stations. It is well known that some officers moonlight as armed robbers during the night. Some are in league with the armed robbers and drug barons, some even sell or lend guns to armed robbers. Tell me if such men will not kill anyone in sight, or to protect themselves from exposure.
Then comes the use of the policemen and women by politicians and people in government. It is again well known that several politicians, including several State Governors, and possibly the Obasanjo Administration, used ex-IG Tafa Balogun’s Nigeria Police Force, to ensure their re-elections in 2003. That explained part of the massive loot that Balogun was eventually caught with. Even, ex-IG Ehindero can not absolve himself of his culpability in rigging the last election in 2007, with the aid of his men and women.
I once met a young police officer in Ibadan, who could not have been more than 22 years of age. We met under an altercating situation, but afterwards I advised him to get another job. He agreed with me, but told me he’s lucky to have this job in the meantime.
I never cease to wonder what they teach them in the Police Colleges. Or could it be that they teach them the right things, but out there on the street, they abandon all the good things they were taught and revert back true to type and just swing along with the environment, considering all members of the public as their enemies? Do they teach them courses in civics, governance, security, effective policing, humanities, political sciences, civil rights, human rights, ethics, etc?
Again, you have to be sympathetic to their sorry state. In my previous article about the invitation extended by IG Mike Okiro, to the British Police, I said that the “Nigeria Police Force is ill-trained, ill-equipped, ill-orientated, ill-paid, ill-motivated and not respected. These people work more than eight hours a day, standing on road blocks and just totting their out-dated weapons. Even the ones in the office never seem to leave for home at night. Are there set hours for them to work? Mind you, I still give them some respect. There have been many instances of uncommon bravery and honesty in a few patches. Recently, some courageous policemen were killed while battling armed robbers in various places in the country. What happened to the families they left behind? You ask me, if they will be well compensated for their irretrievable loss. Is there any kind of life insurance scheme or Government Grant or Compensation Scheme for policemen killed in the line of duty as in many Western countries? What exactly do policemen in Nigeria benefit from?”
What next then? How do we reform this organisation? Who will do the reforming? Should we split the force into national and regional/state police forces? What will be the political implications of such split? How do we save the public from the Nigeria Police Force? Again, I have written that “As it currently stands, it is not possible for the Nigeria Police Force to be reformed internally. This is because those who will be asked to reform it rose through the ranks – the ranks of corruption. They are or were part of the corrupt system, so they cannot reform it. They are devoid of ideas, they have vested interests, they are corrupt and morally bankrupt, they are too compromised and they are inept. We have been leaving it in their hands everytime, without any real change. Many Committees and Task Forces and White and Green papers have been done internally on reforming the Police; what have we heard about them. The best that some Inspector Generals have come up with is to change the uniforms. That is their idea of reforms; an exercise in futility and insincerity; a means of making money”.
Unfortunately, if our society as a whole does not change fundamentally, any attempt to reform any or all of our various governing departments or functions will be an exercise in futility. It is not only the police that are corrupt, the whole society is. Therefore, the society must change before anything else can change. Our attitude, our morality, our commitment, etc must change. We all know this is not easy. It might not even be in our lifetime. Who knows? But we have to work towards it. We do not have a choice, if we want to survive as a people and leave a lasting legacy to our children and grandchildren, which they will be proud of and which will make life easier (and safer)for them.
PERSONAL REFLECTIONS ON OUR POLITICAL ORIENTATION
Dear Reader, before you think or say “Oh my God, not another essay about Nigerian corruption from this guy”, please bear with me. First, the issue of corruption in my country has been a passion with me since childhood. Secondly, this is not another article about the consequences of corruption in Nigeria, but to narrate some personal political experiences. So please forgive me.
When I consented to coordinate the plans for the presidential ambition of a particular Presidential hopeful between 2004 and 2006 in the United Kingdom, I went into this project with the utmost of clean minds; I supported our candidate because I sincerely believed (and still believes) that this man could move Nigeria forward. He worked really hard – from 2004 to 2006, touring all over the country, conferring and consulting with traditional rulers, political heavyweights, religious and business leaders, the grassroots, etc. Our organisation in the UK and counterparts in the US consisted of professionals and academicians, who worked very hard for this man; I personally wrote not less than four policy papers on various departments and areas of governance and our organisation also wrote several papers, which he passed on to his “working groups” to incorporate into his manifesto. In fact, my original organisation’s forte was our Policy and Strategic Directorate, headed by a Nigerian Professor of Economics teaching in one of the Universities in the UK. The candidate really appreciated that Directorate. Those were the days, I will say. I was proud of what we had achieved, and many thanks go to several sincere and positive people, whose names I will not mention now.
And to cap it all, our original group never asked for, nor received, a single penny or kobo from our candidate, (or any other candidate for that matter) contrary to what a detractor recently slanderously alleged. We spent our own money throughout the three years without asking for any compensation. Many other organisations abroad purportedly supporting and promoting other Presidential hopefuls were shamelessly collecting money from these politicians. Of course, some people called us fools; never did it occur to many Nigerians that some people could do this without getting paid for it. We did it for Nigeria and because we believed in the capabilities and abilities of the candidate. We are proud today, because we can still hold our collective heads high.
So why am I recounting this? During the course of our support, inevitably, you will find a lot of political opportunists crawling out of the woodwork. This was exactly what happened. The moment some people realised that this man had a very good chance at becoming the next president of Nigeria, all kinds of organisations stated springing up, especially in the UK, purportedly supporting our candidate. They thought there was money in it. Some went all the way to Nigeria to see the candidate, and to the candidate’s credit, he would tell them he already has an organisation in the UK, and they should contact that organisation and try to join us. Invariably, these political jobbers never did; instead, they formed their own organisations, and pretended to forge ahead on their own.
Things came to a head, when the candidate himself decided that all organisations supporting his presidential ambition should be merged under one umbrella, as he did not want splinter groups all doing different things for the same purpose. Inevitably, these people were not too pleased about this, because that means they have to merge with my group, being the first in the UK (and in fact, outside of Nigeria). However, what they decided to do was to combine forces, enter the original group and then try to hijack the organisation. For over one year, this was the battle we were fighting. They wanted the top positions, etc. They tried to force me to give up the chairmanship of the combined group, but they failed when the Candidate himself insisted that I should be the Coordinator, contrary again to what one TV journalist wrote recently, that I fought tooth and nail to be the Coordinator. Ironically, throughout all these three years, we never had any problems of political bitterness with our candidate’s political opponents and their supporting groups either in the UK or elsewhere in the world. Some of them are even close friends and acquaintances who we meet regularly to drink together and joke with each other. The problems came from within, from mischievous opportunists bent on disrupting the organisational structure to achieve their own selfish aims and objectives.
The political party in the UK, to which the Candidate belonged, was even culpable in this farce. The UK branches of the party devised many devious ways to take control of the group, using these political jobbers. Incidentally, most of us in the original group did not even belong to this political party, or any other Nigerian political party, irrespective of the fact that the person we were supporting belonged to a particular party. What we believed in, was Nigeria. It does not matter to us what political party our man belonged to, as long as he delivers when he gets there. We were not looking to get positions or appointments, power, money or contracts. If these do come our way as a way of compensating us for our troubles and support, we may accept them in order to serve Nigeria and not to serve even the candidate himself or ourselves.
Thus began an internecine war of attrition. I was maligned. I was even nearly assaulted one evening at one of our meetings. Several unprintable things were said about me. They mounted a campaign of calumny and false information about me, saying I had taken money from the Candidate and I did not want to share it with the group. In fact, in their little minds, they actually thought I had been given millions of Naira to run the campaign, and I was holding tight to the money. This was what was spread around. Of course, members of our original group, who knew better and who were men of sincerity of purpose knew where these political jobbers were coming from. On the long run, we prevailed, but after a lot of damage had been done. The organisation’s main purpose of finding constructive ways of working to ensure that the Candidate himself is well prepared for office, should he get there, was derailed by these internal conflicts which arose out of personal greed and ambition. Up till now, some of these people never forgave me for seemingly thwarting their efforts to be leaders of the combined group. But there we have it; we can’t win them all, can we?
Some of them boasted of being seasoned politicians who previously worked hard to get this governor or the other in office, having raised thousands of pounds for them, and later got compensated by their principal. Some of them wanted all members to pay huge sums of money to support the candidate, promising them contracts or positions. Whoever gave them this authority or assurance that this will be so still remains a mystery to me today, because I know the candidate never did promise anything of the like. When you ask for up to £2000 from a member, you must promise him or her something in return. How do you guarantee these returns? If the candidate loses, what happens to the £2000 you have collected? If the candidate wins, how can you guarantee that the person from whom you have collected money will be compensated adequately or at all?
Maybe I am simpleminded, but I was aghast at these political chicaneries and devious scheming. These were Nigerians who have been living abroad for very long periods, in developed countries with highly honed political machineries where everything works; one should have at least expected that having lived abroad so long, our political orientation will change for the better; one will expect some modicum of finesse in the way we play politics and governance so that we can transfer what we have learnt here to Nigeria to make it a better place to live.
No! My erstwhile political colleagues were playing politics the way Nigerians have been playing it for decades. Western politics, development and thinking have not rubbed off on them at all. All they wanted was money, position, power and fat, juicy contracts. All they wanted was a slice of the national cake. No intention to change Nigeria for the better; nothing about contributing to ways to eradicate poverty and corruption; nothing about trying to change the political orientation and culture of our people. They were going to contribute more to the problems of Nigeria instead of finding the solutions.
Some of them had been following failed governors and other politicians of disrepute, getting what little they can get from them. They thought they will get the same from this candidate.
It was later that I learnt that the various UK branches of the political party had actually formed within itself, several groups, each focused on and supporting all the presidential hopefuls belonging to that same party, waiting for the time – the Primaries – when only one will be selected by the party to run for the Presidency, then they will dissolve the losing groups and transfer all their support to the winner. Very nice little game, supporting all of them and making money from all of them. But the party caught all of them napping, bringing in a previously unknown person at the last minute, and throwing everybody into confusion.
And guess what? The moment this happened, new organisations immediately sprung up in the UK, and their machineries went into overdrive for the selected candidate, almost overnight. Phew! Unbelievable, but true. Man must chop, and why not?
So, why am I bringing this about? The reason is to demystify that myth that all Nigerians in Diaspora, or at least, let us put it this way, all Nigerians who have travelled and lived abroad for a considerable period of time, are capable of bringing positive change in the political orientation and governance of our country. This is far from being the truth, a fallacy. The facts remains that you can take a man out of the bush, but not necessarily take the bush out of him. Some people pass through universities but do not allow the university to pass through them. The same analogy goes for many of our people who have supposedly lived, worked and learned abroad in developed countries. We know how they do things in the US, the UK, Europe etc. We know how these countries work and make things work for themselves. We see them on a daily basis, and in fact, most Nigerians living abroad contribute immensely to these other countries’ development and progress. But let us return home to Nigeria to change things, or try to influence getting the right things done in our country from abroad, and we resort back to what we have always been. We quickly jettison what we have learnt from these countries without a second thought. We revert back to indiscipline; moral corruption, tribalism, religious fanaticism and raw and murderous politics. Why, some of my erstwhile colleagues were even ardent supporters of notorious political godfathers and corrupt governors in Nigeria. Need we say more?
I might even write a book on this personal experience one day, God sparing our lives.
And you think we – both living in and living outside - are all intent on seeing change in Nigeria? Not on your life.
When I consented to coordinate the plans for the presidential ambition of a particular Presidential hopeful between 2004 and 2006 in the United Kingdom, I went into this project with the utmost of clean minds; I supported our candidate because I sincerely believed (and still believes) that this man could move Nigeria forward. He worked really hard – from 2004 to 2006, touring all over the country, conferring and consulting with traditional rulers, political heavyweights, religious and business leaders, the grassroots, etc. Our organisation in the UK and counterparts in the US consisted of professionals and academicians, who worked very hard for this man; I personally wrote not less than four policy papers on various departments and areas of governance and our organisation also wrote several papers, which he passed on to his “working groups” to incorporate into his manifesto. In fact, my original organisation’s forte was our Policy and Strategic Directorate, headed by a Nigerian Professor of Economics teaching in one of the Universities in the UK. The candidate really appreciated that Directorate. Those were the days, I will say. I was proud of what we had achieved, and many thanks go to several sincere and positive people, whose names I will not mention now.
And to cap it all, our original group never asked for, nor received, a single penny or kobo from our candidate, (or any other candidate for that matter) contrary to what a detractor recently slanderously alleged. We spent our own money throughout the three years without asking for any compensation. Many other organisations abroad purportedly supporting and promoting other Presidential hopefuls were shamelessly collecting money from these politicians. Of course, some people called us fools; never did it occur to many Nigerians that some people could do this without getting paid for it. We did it for Nigeria and because we believed in the capabilities and abilities of the candidate. We are proud today, because we can still hold our collective heads high.
So why am I recounting this? During the course of our support, inevitably, you will find a lot of political opportunists crawling out of the woodwork. This was exactly what happened. The moment some people realised that this man had a very good chance at becoming the next president of Nigeria, all kinds of organisations stated springing up, especially in the UK, purportedly supporting our candidate. They thought there was money in it. Some went all the way to Nigeria to see the candidate, and to the candidate’s credit, he would tell them he already has an organisation in the UK, and they should contact that organisation and try to join us. Invariably, these political jobbers never did; instead, they formed their own organisations, and pretended to forge ahead on their own.
Things came to a head, when the candidate himself decided that all organisations supporting his presidential ambition should be merged under one umbrella, as he did not want splinter groups all doing different things for the same purpose. Inevitably, these people were not too pleased about this, because that means they have to merge with my group, being the first in the UK (and in fact, outside of Nigeria). However, what they decided to do was to combine forces, enter the original group and then try to hijack the organisation. For over one year, this was the battle we were fighting. They wanted the top positions, etc. They tried to force me to give up the chairmanship of the combined group, but they failed when the Candidate himself insisted that I should be the Coordinator, contrary again to what one TV journalist wrote recently, that I fought tooth and nail to be the Coordinator. Ironically, throughout all these three years, we never had any problems of political bitterness with our candidate’s political opponents and their supporting groups either in the UK or elsewhere in the world. Some of them are even close friends and acquaintances who we meet regularly to drink together and joke with each other. The problems came from within, from mischievous opportunists bent on disrupting the organisational structure to achieve their own selfish aims and objectives.
The political party in the UK, to which the Candidate belonged, was even culpable in this farce. The UK branches of the party devised many devious ways to take control of the group, using these political jobbers. Incidentally, most of us in the original group did not even belong to this political party, or any other Nigerian political party, irrespective of the fact that the person we were supporting belonged to a particular party. What we believed in, was Nigeria. It does not matter to us what political party our man belonged to, as long as he delivers when he gets there. We were not looking to get positions or appointments, power, money or contracts. If these do come our way as a way of compensating us for our troubles and support, we may accept them in order to serve Nigeria and not to serve even the candidate himself or ourselves.
Thus began an internecine war of attrition. I was maligned. I was even nearly assaulted one evening at one of our meetings. Several unprintable things were said about me. They mounted a campaign of calumny and false information about me, saying I had taken money from the Candidate and I did not want to share it with the group. In fact, in their little minds, they actually thought I had been given millions of Naira to run the campaign, and I was holding tight to the money. This was what was spread around. Of course, members of our original group, who knew better and who were men of sincerity of purpose knew where these political jobbers were coming from. On the long run, we prevailed, but after a lot of damage had been done. The organisation’s main purpose of finding constructive ways of working to ensure that the Candidate himself is well prepared for office, should he get there, was derailed by these internal conflicts which arose out of personal greed and ambition. Up till now, some of these people never forgave me for seemingly thwarting their efforts to be leaders of the combined group. But there we have it; we can’t win them all, can we?
Some of them boasted of being seasoned politicians who previously worked hard to get this governor or the other in office, having raised thousands of pounds for them, and later got compensated by their principal. Some of them wanted all members to pay huge sums of money to support the candidate, promising them contracts or positions. Whoever gave them this authority or assurance that this will be so still remains a mystery to me today, because I know the candidate never did promise anything of the like. When you ask for up to £2000 from a member, you must promise him or her something in return. How do you guarantee these returns? If the candidate loses, what happens to the £2000 you have collected? If the candidate wins, how can you guarantee that the person from whom you have collected money will be compensated adequately or at all?
Maybe I am simpleminded, but I was aghast at these political chicaneries and devious scheming. These were Nigerians who have been living abroad for very long periods, in developed countries with highly honed political machineries where everything works; one should have at least expected that having lived abroad so long, our political orientation will change for the better; one will expect some modicum of finesse in the way we play politics and governance so that we can transfer what we have learnt here to Nigeria to make it a better place to live.
No! My erstwhile political colleagues were playing politics the way Nigerians have been playing it for decades. Western politics, development and thinking have not rubbed off on them at all. All they wanted was money, position, power and fat, juicy contracts. All they wanted was a slice of the national cake. No intention to change Nigeria for the better; nothing about contributing to ways to eradicate poverty and corruption; nothing about trying to change the political orientation and culture of our people. They were going to contribute more to the problems of Nigeria instead of finding the solutions.
Some of them had been following failed governors and other politicians of disrepute, getting what little they can get from them. They thought they will get the same from this candidate.
It was later that I learnt that the various UK branches of the political party had actually formed within itself, several groups, each focused on and supporting all the presidential hopefuls belonging to that same party, waiting for the time – the Primaries – when only one will be selected by the party to run for the Presidency, then they will dissolve the losing groups and transfer all their support to the winner. Very nice little game, supporting all of them and making money from all of them. But the party caught all of them napping, bringing in a previously unknown person at the last minute, and throwing everybody into confusion.
And guess what? The moment this happened, new organisations immediately sprung up in the UK, and their machineries went into overdrive for the selected candidate, almost overnight. Phew! Unbelievable, but true. Man must chop, and why not?
So, why am I bringing this about? The reason is to demystify that myth that all Nigerians in Diaspora, or at least, let us put it this way, all Nigerians who have travelled and lived abroad for a considerable period of time, are capable of bringing positive change in the political orientation and governance of our country. This is far from being the truth, a fallacy. The facts remains that you can take a man out of the bush, but not necessarily take the bush out of him. Some people pass through universities but do not allow the university to pass through them. The same analogy goes for many of our people who have supposedly lived, worked and learned abroad in developed countries. We know how they do things in the US, the UK, Europe etc. We know how these countries work and make things work for themselves. We see them on a daily basis, and in fact, most Nigerians living abroad contribute immensely to these other countries’ development and progress. But let us return home to Nigeria to change things, or try to influence getting the right things done in our country from abroad, and we resort back to what we have always been. We quickly jettison what we have learnt from these countries without a second thought. We revert back to indiscipline; moral corruption, tribalism, religious fanaticism and raw and murderous politics. Why, some of my erstwhile colleagues were even ardent supporters of notorious political godfathers and corrupt governors in Nigeria. Need we say more?
I might even write a book on this personal experience one day, God sparing our lives.
And you think we – both living in and living outside - are all intent on seeing change in Nigeria? Not on your life.
ONLY THE PEOPLE MUST SAVE NIGERIA
“There is a tide in the affairs of men, which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.” – William Shakespeare.
One of my grandfathers worked in various capacities with the old WNDC (Western Nigeria Development Corporation) as a Farm Manager for many decades. During his working life, he traversed the whole of the whole Western Region and parts of the old Mid-West, before his retirement in the late 60s at the mandatory age of 65. After his retirement, he lived only on his pension (that was when Nigeria was still regularly paying the pension of its retired workers regularly and without fail), supported by the monthly contributions of his children and grandchildren. Till he died, he had only one house, left to him by his father. He never built his own house. In fact by the time he retired, he was still driving his Peugeot 403, and when that eventually acted up on him, he was left taking public transport. Yet, this was a man who managed 1000-acre-plus rubber, oil palm and cocoa plantations all over the old Western and Mid-Western Regions. By the time he retired, he only had a few pounds in his account. He died respected and with dignity. Nobody, and I say nobody in this world, could ever accuse him of being corrupt. God rest his soul.
Same with my father. A disciplinarian, who founded a school, in collaboration with the current Olubadan of Ibadan, and other community leaders in their village. Then he was transferred all over the old Western Region, and then Western State, to remote places, before eventually retiring as a Grade 1 Principal. All the houses he built were from loans which he made sure he paid back before his death, leaving his children debt-free. The school he founded attracted students from all over Nigeria. I still remember students from respected and popular families from Borno, Kano, Enugu, Benin, Warri, Port Harcourt and Minna who passed through his school. When he died, most of these now important Nigerians were at his funeral to pay their respects. Nobody ever accused him of corruption, despite the power and authority he wielded as a Principal in the 60s and 70s, when school principals were a law unto themselves.
I am, as a human being and a Nigerian, proud of these men, and many other unsung heroes of our times. Such people seem to be rare these days, but believe me, No, they are not. There are millions of them in Nigeria today, but they are overshadowed and overwhelmed by the corrupt, vociferous few, whose only intent is grabbing all they could whilst they are alive and thereby, through their selfish and deliberate actions condemn their people to poverty, misery, agony and certain death. And this in a land of infinite opportunities and wealth. And I am also proud to be their offspring and to have inherited their senses and character of dignity, the ability to distinguish between good and bad, as well as their Nigerian-ness and dedication to duty and responsibilities.
I recounted all these, (and I am sure thousands, if not millions of other Nigerians will also recollect thousands of such people of credibility and honesty) because of the state of our country today as a result of our fallen morals and civic degradation that have inevitably led to such unbelievable and massive incidents of corruption. Everyday, on the pages of newspapers, we are inundated with yet another scandal. In fact, I don’t believe these are scandals anymore, since Nigerians do not seem to be scandalised by these report. And why should they? We all know what has been happening anyway. It is only the Governments that seem to be unaware of all these things happening right inside their house. The whole world knows, Nigerians themselves know that all our public officials are corrupt. In fact we know how corrupt they are.
It is not rocket science to figure out that an ex-Governor with £20 million in asset and bank account is a thief, who robbed the people of his state and Nigeria blind. It is definitely not rocket science to be able to deduce that an ex-Governor who has a private jet is a damn greedy thief. Or a minister who was allocated oil block, or a local government chairman who has built 20 houses within four years. Or the massive corruption that has been going on for years in the Nigeria Football Association, or the Customs Service, or every other government department for that matter. The mind-numbing and massive corruption witnessed in the last eight years (Obasanjo’s administration) is incomparable to any in the history of Nigeria. Even, Shagari’s inept and wasteful administration, and Abacha’s oppressive one, was nothing compared to what happened between 1999 and 2007. Even, our own “Maradona’s” administration pales to insignificance, judging from what we have had so far. It is now that we are getting the full extent of this massive fraud and conspiracy perpetrated by our erstwhile Excellencies and Ministers. Everyday, the shit keeps hitting the fan. Who could ever think that people like Cornelius Adebayo and Jubril Aminu will be smeared, despite the fact that we know they are not exactly first class examples of uprightness anyway? Yet, there we have it. It is the Adebayos and the Aminus and the Olanrewajus exposed today, others will be exposed tomorrow, by God’s Grace. It should be a learning outcome for current and would-be political office holders and discourage them from dipping their hands in the treasury or accepting back-hander, but would it? If I embarked on naming names of prospective exposures, I will not finish this article. That is a fact. We know them all. It is all of them. Nobody is clean, and they all did it deliberately, to the detriment of the Nigerian people, so they should not expect any sympathy from us. We can only pray that President Yar’Adua’s promises that they will be probed and investigated and dealt with accordingly will be properly and conscientiously carried out. But I have my doubts.
Yes, we have been writing about and exposing corruption to no end. What Nigerians have been asking are: What are the practical solutions? How do we rid Nigeria of all these thieves? Can we ever be successful in tackling corruption?
Honestly, dear compatriots, I get sick of having to write about corruption in our country, as I am sure you are tired of reading about it too, not only from me, but from others. Many sincere and erudite Nigerians have proposed radical and seemingly practical solutions in numerous treatises and write-ups. What I’d rather be writing about are what we can do in practical terms to fight it to a standstill in our country. But we still need to acknowledge and bring it to the fore. We should recognise and admit to our problems, and as far as I am concerned, Corruption is our major problem for now. It has drained the life out of the country, and the end does not appear to be in sight. All our political leaders got into government through fraud and trickery, so what do we expect them to do when they see an opportunity to loot? It is like putting a chicken in a silo full of corn. It will gorge itself. So, the preventative measure is to discourage them and not let them get there in the first place.
We can talk about and proffer many solutions till we are blue in the face; we can have as many anti-corruption agents and agencies as we like; we can hold millions of conferences and seminars on tackling corruption; we can even take up guns, but the reality is that the most important and effective solution to corruption lies in the power of the people, ourselves, Nigerians. If we, the people of Nigeria do not condone it and take a zero tolerance stance and action on it, that is when thieving officials will be rid of their kleptomaniac tendencies. It is when the people of Nigeria rise up as one, irrespective of tribal and religious differences, against corruption, that we will start making and seeing a difference.
It seems to me logical and sensible that it is the people who should, must, take this battle forward. The Government (all tiers of government and their civil services and all their other arms) can not tackle it, simply because it is the Government that is corrupt. The people in this case are the victims of government or official corruption. The people consists of organisations, individuals and the masses; all suffering as a result of Government insensitiveness. It is the government that must be tackled on corruption. They can not effectively tackle corruption because they are the cause and the root of it. You can not expect a thief to tackle a thief.
You see, compatriots, in an ideal democracy, power is derived from the people. Despite the many flaws and abuses of democracy, it is the people that should call the tune. The more we continue to let people like the Adedibus, the Ubas, the Aminus, the Dariyes, the Nyames, the Alamieyeiseghas, the Iboris, the Odilis and their sorts, and irresponsible and murderous political parties, ride roughshod over us, the more we lose that power, and the more we decline as a functional and vibrant democracy. We will continue to suffer the consequences and the murderous grips of these corrupt and vicious elite will never be loosened.
The problem is, the environment in Nigeria is very conducive to enhance corruption. Remove the machineries and the people that feed it from the root, and what we will have is a progressive country that will be one of the best place to live in the world. Mind you, corruption can not be totally eradicated in any country in the world; the aim should always be to reduce it to a manageable level, which will have an infinitesimal impact on our economic, social and cultural well-being.
Laws and rules are for the guidance of the wise and for disobedience by fools, so they say. Constitutions fall into this category too. We must not be fooled by the phrase now being uttered by these same thieving elites - “rule of law”. They cannot be flouting the rule of law and expect us to judge them by the rule of law. They simply can’t eat their cake and have it. We must make the country hot for them. They must not be allowed to walk the streets of Nigeria defiantly and arrogantly. We must use our votes to ensure they are put out to pasture, if they are already in there, or ensure that their sorts, always waiting in the wings do not get there. And for those who are there, we must demand accountability and good governance. This includes public officials and civil servants, because, believe me, politicians can only rob us with the connivance and cooperation of the civil servants.
It is going to be difficult but not impossible or unachievable in out time. It is difficult because of the orientation of our people. For example, when ex-Governor Ibori seemed to have won his battle to keep his ill-gotten assets in the UK, a whole Bishop presided over a “Thanksgiving Service” for him, together with his cousin, the incumbent Governor of Delta State, and the whole Delta State Executive Council. It is very laughable and sad. What and who are they thanking? God?. For letting him rob his people and get away with it? Shame on that Man of God. You see why we should not be too fanatical about religion? And when DSP Alams was released from prison, where he rightly belonged, the whole Ijaw Nation gave him a hero’s welcome for robbing them blind. He then had a well-publicised wedding for his daughter attended by the mighty and famous all across Nigeria. Probably only his Nemesis, ex-President Obasanjo and Nuhu Ribadu were persona non grata at the event.
And the ex-chicken-governor of Ekiti State? His posters are now appearing all over the state praising him, and wanting him back as Governor to resume what? Even the recent arrest of Chief Adedibu did not prevent his supporters and hangers-on from bringing drums and songs to welcome him back to Ibadan on his return from the Inspector General’s interrogation and court charges. Even whole communities tend to ignore the evidence and ignoble behaviour of their sons and daughters, and hide behind tribal and righteous indignation, saying, “He/she is our own, let him do it, we don’t mind” (“Omo wa ni, e je o se”, in Yoruba). Yes, we must all have our supporters, who will stick by us in times of trouble and good times, but this tells us how difficult the fight against corruption by the people themselves will be. But, no matter whose ox is gored, it must be fought from the perspective of the people.
There must come a moment when Nigeria, as a country, reaches a point when we have to know that things have to change, and change fundamentally and radically. As a nation, we seemed to have reached that point in 1999, after the institutionalised corruption of Babangida and the murderous dictatorship of Abacha. A democratic government was elected on the assumption and expectation that root and branch reform will be introduced, from which no institution of the state emerged unscathed, and thereby the energies of Nigerians will be liberated once again, after the inept Second Republic of Shagari. That process has by and large been successful, but corruption that had been so much hidden fervently by its perpetrators and worshippers, is threatening to derail us. Of course, it has always been a threat in Nigeria, but one way or the other; we have lived with it and pretended that it does not affect us. Really? It always had, but we have always had heads stuck in the ground like ostriches, not caring as long as we can eat three square meals a day, and indulge in our other pastimes.
But there is hope. At least the perpetrators are being exposed now and some of them actually being prosecuted while some Western countries, which never used to care before, and used to benefit directly and indirectly, are now seemingly helping us fight our own war. It is a start, from Obasanjo’s EFCC and ICPC to the UK’s Metropolitan Police.
Believe it or not, it was “people power”, and nothing else, that made Madam Speaker Etteh resign eventually after she and her ignoble backers held out for a long time trying to call the bluff of Nigerians. She eventually committed the equivalent of a political hara-kiri, after she and her god-fathers sensed the mood of the people. Good riddance. There are many more to come. I can imagine Ibori, Odili, Lucky Boy Igbinedion, and all the rest of them running helter-skelter trying to prevent probes and investigations and having nightmares and sleepless nights. And so should they be. They have murdered sleep (and a lot of their people), so they must not sleep.
The Lord have Mercy on us.
One of my grandfathers worked in various capacities with the old WNDC (Western Nigeria Development Corporation) as a Farm Manager for many decades. During his working life, he traversed the whole of the whole Western Region and parts of the old Mid-West, before his retirement in the late 60s at the mandatory age of 65. After his retirement, he lived only on his pension (that was when Nigeria was still regularly paying the pension of its retired workers regularly and without fail), supported by the monthly contributions of his children and grandchildren. Till he died, he had only one house, left to him by his father. He never built his own house. In fact by the time he retired, he was still driving his Peugeot 403, and when that eventually acted up on him, he was left taking public transport. Yet, this was a man who managed 1000-acre-plus rubber, oil palm and cocoa plantations all over the old Western and Mid-Western Regions. By the time he retired, he only had a few pounds in his account. He died respected and with dignity. Nobody, and I say nobody in this world, could ever accuse him of being corrupt. God rest his soul.
Same with my father. A disciplinarian, who founded a school, in collaboration with the current Olubadan of Ibadan, and other community leaders in their village. Then he was transferred all over the old Western Region, and then Western State, to remote places, before eventually retiring as a Grade 1 Principal. All the houses he built were from loans which he made sure he paid back before his death, leaving his children debt-free. The school he founded attracted students from all over Nigeria. I still remember students from respected and popular families from Borno, Kano, Enugu, Benin, Warri, Port Harcourt and Minna who passed through his school. When he died, most of these now important Nigerians were at his funeral to pay their respects. Nobody ever accused him of corruption, despite the power and authority he wielded as a Principal in the 60s and 70s, when school principals were a law unto themselves.
I am, as a human being and a Nigerian, proud of these men, and many other unsung heroes of our times. Such people seem to be rare these days, but believe me, No, they are not. There are millions of them in Nigeria today, but they are overshadowed and overwhelmed by the corrupt, vociferous few, whose only intent is grabbing all they could whilst they are alive and thereby, through their selfish and deliberate actions condemn their people to poverty, misery, agony and certain death. And this in a land of infinite opportunities and wealth. And I am also proud to be their offspring and to have inherited their senses and character of dignity, the ability to distinguish between good and bad, as well as their Nigerian-ness and dedication to duty and responsibilities.
I recounted all these, (and I am sure thousands, if not millions of other Nigerians will also recollect thousands of such people of credibility and honesty) because of the state of our country today as a result of our fallen morals and civic degradation that have inevitably led to such unbelievable and massive incidents of corruption. Everyday, on the pages of newspapers, we are inundated with yet another scandal. In fact, I don’t believe these are scandals anymore, since Nigerians do not seem to be scandalised by these report. And why should they? We all know what has been happening anyway. It is only the Governments that seem to be unaware of all these things happening right inside their house. The whole world knows, Nigerians themselves know that all our public officials are corrupt. In fact we know how corrupt they are.
It is not rocket science to figure out that an ex-Governor with £20 million in asset and bank account is a thief, who robbed the people of his state and Nigeria blind. It is definitely not rocket science to be able to deduce that an ex-Governor who has a private jet is a damn greedy thief. Or a minister who was allocated oil block, or a local government chairman who has built 20 houses within four years. Or the massive corruption that has been going on for years in the Nigeria Football Association, or the Customs Service, or every other government department for that matter. The mind-numbing and massive corruption witnessed in the last eight years (Obasanjo’s administration) is incomparable to any in the history of Nigeria. Even, Shagari’s inept and wasteful administration, and Abacha’s oppressive one, was nothing compared to what happened between 1999 and 2007. Even, our own “Maradona’s” administration pales to insignificance, judging from what we have had so far. It is now that we are getting the full extent of this massive fraud and conspiracy perpetrated by our erstwhile Excellencies and Ministers. Everyday, the shit keeps hitting the fan. Who could ever think that people like Cornelius Adebayo and Jubril Aminu will be smeared, despite the fact that we know they are not exactly first class examples of uprightness anyway? Yet, there we have it. It is the Adebayos and the Aminus and the Olanrewajus exposed today, others will be exposed tomorrow, by God’s Grace. It should be a learning outcome for current and would-be political office holders and discourage them from dipping their hands in the treasury or accepting back-hander, but would it? If I embarked on naming names of prospective exposures, I will not finish this article. That is a fact. We know them all. It is all of them. Nobody is clean, and they all did it deliberately, to the detriment of the Nigerian people, so they should not expect any sympathy from us. We can only pray that President Yar’Adua’s promises that they will be probed and investigated and dealt with accordingly will be properly and conscientiously carried out. But I have my doubts.
Yes, we have been writing about and exposing corruption to no end. What Nigerians have been asking are: What are the practical solutions? How do we rid Nigeria of all these thieves? Can we ever be successful in tackling corruption?
Honestly, dear compatriots, I get sick of having to write about corruption in our country, as I am sure you are tired of reading about it too, not only from me, but from others. Many sincere and erudite Nigerians have proposed radical and seemingly practical solutions in numerous treatises and write-ups. What I’d rather be writing about are what we can do in practical terms to fight it to a standstill in our country. But we still need to acknowledge and bring it to the fore. We should recognise and admit to our problems, and as far as I am concerned, Corruption is our major problem for now. It has drained the life out of the country, and the end does not appear to be in sight. All our political leaders got into government through fraud and trickery, so what do we expect them to do when they see an opportunity to loot? It is like putting a chicken in a silo full of corn. It will gorge itself. So, the preventative measure is to discourage them and not let them get there in the first place.
We can talk about and proffer many solutions till we are blue in the face; we can have as many anti-corruption agents and agencies as we like; we can hold millions of conferences and seminars on tackling corruption; we can even take up guns, but the reality is that the most important and effective solution to corruption lies in the power of the people, ourselves, Nigerians. If we, the people of Nigeria do not condone it and take a zero tolerance stance and action on it, that is when thieving officials will be rid of their kleptomaniac tendencies. It is when the people of Nigeria rise up as one, irrespective of tribal and religious differences, against corruption, that we will start making and seeing a difference.
It seems to me logical and sensible that it is the people who should, must, take this battle forward. The Government (all tiers of government and their civil services and all their other arms) can not tackle it, simply because it is the Government that is corrupt. The people in this case are the victims of government or official corruption. The people consists of organisations, individuals and the masses; all suffering as a result of Government insensitiveness. It is the government that must be tackled on corruption. They can not effectively tackle corruption because they are the cause and the root of it. You can not expect a thief to tackle a thief.
You see, compatriots, in an ideal democracy, power is derived from the people. Despite the many flaws and abuses of democracy, it is the people that should call the tune. The more we continue to let people like the Adedibus, the Ubas, the Aminus, the Dariyes, the Nyames, the Alamieyeiseghas, the Iboris, the Odilis and their sorts, and irresponsible and murderous political parties, ride roughshod over us, the more we lose that power, and the more we decline as a functional and vibrant democracy. We will continue to suffer the consequences and the murderous grips of these corrupt and vicious elite will never be loosened.
The problem is, the environment in Nigeria is very conducive to enhance corruption. Remove the machineries and the people that feed it from the root, and what we will have is a progressive country that will be one of the best place to live in the world. Mind you, corruption can not be totally eradicated in any country in the world; the aim should always be to reduce it to a manageable level, which will have an infinitesimal impact on our economic, social and cultural well-being.
Laws and rules are for the guidance of the wise and for disobedience by fools, so they say. Constitutions fall into this category too. We must not be fooled by the phrase now being uttered by these same thieving elites - “rule of law”. They cannot be flouting the rule of law and expect us to judge them by the rule of law. They simply can’t eat their cake and have it. We must make the country hot for them. They must not be allowed to walk the streets of Nigeria defiantly and arrogantly. We must use our votes to ensure they are put out to pasture, if they are already in there, or ensure that their sorts, always waiting in the wings do not get there. And for those who are there, we must demand accountability and good governance. This includes public officials and civil servants, because, believe me, politicians can only rob us with the connivance and cooperation of the civil servants.
It is going to be difficult but not impossible or unachievable in out time. It is difficult because of the orientation of our people. For example, when ex-Governor Ibori seemed to have won his battle to keep his ill-gotten assets in the UK, a whole Bishop presided over a “Thanksgiving Service” for him, together with his cousin, the incumbent Governor of Delta State, and the whole Delta State Executive Council. It is very laughable and sad. What and who are they thanking? God?. For letting him rob his people and get away with it? Shame on that Man of God. You see why we should not be too fanatical about religion? And when DSP Alams was released from prison, where he rightly belonged, the whole Ijaw Nation gave him a hero’s welcome for robbing them blind. He then had a well-publicised wedding for his daughter attended by the mighty and famous all across Nigeria. Probably only his Nemesis, ex-President Obasanjo and Nuhu Ribadu were persona non grata at the event.
And the ex-chicken-governor of Ekiti State? His posters are now appearing all over the state praising him, and wanting him back as Governor to resume what? Even the recent arrest of Chief Adedibu did not prevent his supporters and hangers-on from bringing drums and songs to welcome him back to Ibadan on his return from the Inspector General’s interrogation and court charges. Even whole communities tend to ignore the evidence and ignoble behaviour of their sons and daughters, and hide behind tribal and righteous indignation, saying, “He/she is our own, let him do it, we don’t mind” (“Omo wa ni, e je o se”, in Yoruba). Yes, we must all have our supporters, who will stick by us in times of trouble and good times, but this tells us how difficult the fight against corruption by the people themselves will be. But, no matter whose ox is gored, it must be fought from the perspective of the people.
There must come a moment when Nigeria, as a country, reaches a point when we have to know that things have to change, and change fundamentally and radically. As a nation, we seemed to have reached that point in 1999, after the institutionalised corruption of Babangida and the murderous dictatorship of Abacha. A democratic government was elected on the assumption and expectation that root and branch reform will be introduced, from which no institution of the state emerged unscathed, and thereby the energies of Nigerians will be liberated once again, after the inept Second Republic of Shagari. That process has by and large been successful, but corruption that had been so much hidden fervently by its perpetrators and worshippers, is threatening to derail us. Of course, it has always been a threat in Nigeria, but one way or the other; we have lived with it and pretended that it does not affect us. Really? It always had, but we have always had heads stuck in the ground like ostriches, not caring as long as we can eat three square meals a day, and indulge in our other pastimes.
But there is hope. At least the perpetrators are being exposed now and some of them actually being prosecuted while some Western countries, which never used to care before, and used to benefit directly and indirectly, are now seemingly helping us fight our own war. It is a start, from Obasanjo’s EFCC and ICPC to the UK’s Metropolitan Police.
Believe it or not, it was “people power”, and nothing else, that made Madam Speaker Etteh resign eventually after she and her ignoble backers held out for a long time trying to call the bluff of Nigerians. She eventually committed the equivalent of a political hara-kiri, after she and her god-fathers sensed the mood of the people. Good riddance. There are many more to come. I can imagine Ibori, Odili, Lucky Boy Igbinedion, and all the rest of them running helter-skelter trying to prevent probes and investigations and having nightmares and sleepless nights. And so should they be. They have murdered sleep (and a lot of their people), so they must not sleep.
The Lord have Mercy on us.
Sunday, 4 November 2007
WHY OYO STATE IS NOT WORKING AND CANNOT WORK
Akintokunbo A Adejumo
London, UK
akinadejum@aol.com
"Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable." - Frantz Fanon
"Nobody, no matter how highly placed; and no institution, no matter what it considers the rightness of its cause, will be considered a sacred cow or above the law in the bid to rid Nigeria of corrupt practices," - President Umaru Yar’Adua
I have always restrained myself from commenting publicly on the events in Oyo State, which happens to be my state, because of several reasons. One, I do not want thugs harassing my family or harassing me anytime I go to Nigeria to spend my leave, because these people we are dealing with are vicious, murderous people. Secondly, in most cases, I am too sad and disillusioned to bring myself to write anything about the state. This latter is borne by my belief that it is not always a good thing to write negative things about events, people or situations everytime. We should always look to write positive things, if we can. However, Nigeria’s political and moral situations as a whole has always been that of bringing out the pessimism and negativity in most of her people, such that we find it very difficult to celebrate achievement and excellence in all spheres of human activities in our country.
It is really a pity. We are often accused of being a difficult people to please. Yes, that is right, the reason being that at this stage in our nationhood and development (or underdevelopment, take your choice) Nigerian people expect a lot much more from their leaders, taking into consideration our wealth and human resources. Therein lies the problem – a dearth of good, sincere and committed leadership.
Talking of Oyo State, what now motivated and galvanised me to write about events in this sad excuse for a state government was the nice piece of editorial written by the Sun News Publishing “Let Oyo State work” (Thursday, October 4, 2007) and that by The Guardian “Between Alao-Akala And Civil Servants In Oyo State” (Saturday, October 6, 2007). If only the renegade government of Oyo State and its backers and other selfish interests could read these and digest them and act on these and several other advice that have been proffered over the past 8 years.
The problems of Oyo State are the problems of Nigeria. In fact, a lot of Nigeria’s problems are reflected in the problems of Oyo State, if the truth be said, and those problems started a long time ago. And Oyo State is not unique. Nigeria has several problems, which means all the 36 states of Nigeria are conjoined in those same problems, however each state have local problems specific to them. Oyo State is by no means different.
It is not necessary here to delve into history, or else, this narrative might turn into a full blown book. Suffice it to say that the specific current problems of Oyo State, in my opinion, really began when the old Oyo State, comprising the current state and Osun State was split into two. This was further manifested when Governor Lamidi Adesina took over the reins of government of Oyo State, as it is today in 1999. To say that Lam Ade’s administration was a disaster is putting it really mildly. In fact, we are being kind to him for saying that. It was a monumental catastrophe. I will not go further than that in his case.
What followed a monumental catastrophe was another cataclysm in the form of the PDP government of Governor Rashid Ladoja. In fairness to this mild-mannered gentleman, he might have had good intentions, but the way he got into power haunted him and proved the cause of his downfall. You see, if you want to dine with the devil, you must have a very long spoon. Ladoja obviously is oblivious of this adage and other wise sayings. He bought his way into power, using the dubious power and influence of Chief Adedibu, and he found out to his great cost, that he could not tame the tiger. He had opened a Pandora’s Box. His plight again demonstrates the fact that power must be derived from the people, not through god-fathers, electoral corruptions and other trickeries to get into power. The people must really and truly vote for you and want you as their leader, otherwise, forget it. This is a lesson all our political leaders in Nigeria are yet to learn but must learn and realise.
Rashid Ladoja just was not allowed to govern and he also, foolishly and naively, did not give himself any chance as he was all the time embroiled in a personal war of attrition and wits with his godfather. Although this is very arguable, the people of Oyo State, and indeed Nigeria, may never know what kind of governance Ladoja would have run, had he been allowed to serve his 4 years in full and in peace. It is a pity really, because he himself will not be judged kindly. The only sympathy people like me have for him is the illegal manner he was removed from office, not his performance as a governor.
Enter the greatest opportunist Alao-Akala. And utter chaos besieged Oyo State, actually in Ibadan, because in reality, other parts of the state were relatively peaceful. It is only that bedrock of Nigerian politics that erupted. I don’t think God and history will ever judge Alao-Akala and Adedibu well. And for that matter, all the so-called elders and monarchs of Oyo State, ex-president Obasanjo, the so-called Ibadan elders and elites. They are all culpable in this shameful and murderous farce.
On the face of it, it would seem like the Ibadans do not want anybody else to rule Oyo State. Well, this would seem to be the case judging from the posture and utterances of the so-called Ibadan elites, but then, who are they really? Their opinions nowadays are not worth anything. They buried their heads in the sand when they should be seen to be taking up the charge on behalf of the people of Ibadan and Oyo State. In fact, some of them were openly or discreetly going to pay obeisance to the Molete Thug-father and rubbing shoulders with him. One of them even was planning to make his son the Deputy Governor when and if Ladoja was removed; therefore he had to cuddle up to Chief Adedibu. It is a shame really.
The issue had nothing to do with a non-Ibadan indigene ruling the state, but the qualities of the Non-Ibadan indigene. Unfortunately for the non-Ibadans, it had to come in the form of a disgraced, corrupt, former policeman who was said to be indicted by the Nigeria Police Force and then unceremoniously sacked. During the eleven months, that he ruled the state, after he had helped impeached his boss, he looted the treasury in connivance with his political godfather, who ironically, was also the political godfather of his former boss. And shameless and power-hungry as he is, even when the courts declared that he should vacate the seat for his boss, the man did not even have the decency to resign, despite all the humiliations that accompanied his removal as governor and the way his boss started treating him. There must be something in government and power that these Nigerian politicians cannot just give up – money, of course, or rather, the opportunity to steal money, lots and lots of it.
A little bit of digression here. We tend to think that elites and elders can do something to solve Nigeria’s problems. This is a very big NO, for the following reasons:
These decrepit and morally bankrupt elders and elites were the causes of our problems in the first place, so they cannot, and do not have any solutions to offer. They also want to keep the status quo because of their selfish interests. They are very selfish, and they do not really care for the common Nigerian
The elders and elites have lost the respect of the larger community and are not trusted. They are mostly discredited and compromised persons, including most of the monarchs in the Southern part of Nigeria.
The world has changed its attitude to community leaders in general. Because these community leaders, including these elders and elites, have failed the community they are supposed to lead or serve, the community has lost confidence in them; however these lepers still crave one kind of relevance or the other, and thus still prefer to refer to themselves as elites or elders.
While I support the saying that “we cannot have elders in place and let the head of a newborn baby be malformed”, the problem is that we have had these elders overlooking, and indeed contributing to the malformation of newborn babies heads a million times since our independence. In fact as Yorubas will say, they are “Agba-iya’s” translated as “Useless old persons”
This is exactly what has been happening in Oyo State and Ibadan. The elders have either been cowardly in the face of truth, or they have been deliberately quiet because of selfish interests.
Take Chief Richard Akinjide, a man who is noted worldwide for his legal and judicial brilliance, a man who entered Nigerian politics, according to himself, at the age of 27, and held many political positions culminating in the position of Attorney General and Minister of Justice; a man of incomparable brilliance and vast experience in governance, law and the constitution, and an Ibadan man. You ask me, what has been this man’s contribution to the development of Ibadan, his hometown, and to Oyo State all his life? What specifically have been his roles in solving the current political and constitutional mayhem and problems facing Oyo State and Ibadan? What has he really done to uplift Ibadan except that Ibadans take pride in referring to him as a “son of the soil” to highlight achievements of Ibadan sons and daughters? I can’t point to a single thing, but please correct me if I am wrong. We still remember his historic calculations of 12 two thirds in 1979.
Yes, Obasanjo failed the Oyo State, Yorubas and Nigerians woefully. However people like Chief Richard Akinjide (we like to think of him as an important and foremost Ibadan man) are the real culprits in Yorubaland and are never to be trusted. Throughout the eight years of Obasanjo in Aso Rock, I never heard or read where Uncle Richard ever criticised Obasanjo. The Chief was indeed one of those people who formed the Yoruba Council of Elders to counter Afenifere's opposition to Obasanjo. He is now criticising Obasanjo saying the government is 'the worst ever in Nigeria'. He has conveniently forgotten that his government of Shehu Shagari from 1979 to 1983 spent 36 billion dollars left by the same Obasanjo and plunged Nigeria into a further debt of $30 billion, and which it was the same Obasanjo that cleared this debt on his second return.
While I concur that there were very serious faults and flaws with Obasanjo’s 8 year administration, I do not believe Chief Akinjide is in any way, yes anyway, qualified to pass judgement on Obasanjo, in his 9-page interview with the Sun Newspapers, for the simple reasons that when Obasanjo was President, Chief Akinjide never said a word against Obasanjo’s excesses. Secondly, Akinjide was no better than Obasanjo, in fact I rate Obasanjo much higher than him; thirdly, I have very serious doubts about Chief Akinjide’s timing of his criticism, and lastly Chief Akinjide was among those who formed the Yoruba Council of Elders to counter Afenifere's opposition to Obasanjo; so the man is double-speaking. Such men should not be taken seriously, as they are speaking from the sides of their mouth.
No Ibadan Chief, with all due respect to your age and other reputations, your time is over. You have not contributed anything significantly either to Ibadan, Oyo State or Nigeria to withstand the test of time. Sir, please leave quietly so as not to disturb the neighbours.
In this instance, Chief Akinjide is not the only one culpable. I can mention hundreds of so called Ibadan and Oyo State elites and elders. Where are the Chief Arisekolas and other rich elites, the numerous professors, the Oyo State Council of Obas, etc?
To add insult to injury, at a time, Raji Rasaki, former Military Governors of both Lagos and Ogun States was in the frame for running for the Governorship of Oyo State, because he had aligned himself with Chief Adedibu. After he lost out in this race, he was again touted as a potential Minister in Yar’Adua’s government. You can see that this has really descended into a farce and a joke. With all due respect again, what could this man of straw offer to the people of Oyo State? Is it by building “girders”? What were his achievements in Lagos and Ogun States except make money for himself and his then military heads of state?
I have no doubt that there are lots of credible personalities in Oyo State who could restore peace; development and progress to Oyo State, but the current crop of opportunists are not it. And those who can will never be given a chance unless something really drastic happens for the better. I personally do not care which area of Oyo State that person comes from – Ogbomosho, Ibadan, Oyo, Ibarapa, Shaki, Iseyin or wherever – what we need are honest, sincere man or woman. But we are not going to get that for a while, mark my words.
The current government of Alao-Akala is a gross aberration and a curse to Oyo State as a whole, not only Ibadan. It cannot work because it is so much compromised. The foundation has been built on sands. The man is grossly incompetent, corrupt and comes laden with a dearth of ideas. I do not know how his acolytes can ever sell him to the public. For him, you cannot sow maize and hope to harvest yams. The moment he was a party to his former boss’s removal, and started prostrating to Chief Adedibu, that was when he lost any credibility and respect he had, if he ever had one.
From all that has been happening since he became Governor over 3 months ago, it is glaring that he can never be a good governor or governs well. The man has been bumbling from one controversy to the other. He was sacking and replacing Chief Judges at will; devoting much energy and time to trying to undo what his predecessor had put in place, etc. ; the Electoral Tribunal is still examining his credentials and the way he got into power. The civil service and the people of Oyo State have clearly shown him that they do not want him in the Governor’s Office. A Governor who thinks the solution to a civil strike is to sack the whole of his civil service clearly does not have any idea about governance and the rule of law. But then, not many people are surprised by this inane and insane act. Many people have lost their lives as a result of what he brought upon the people of Oyo State, by his stubbornness to remain in office by all means. Can you imagine the cost to the people – schools closed, hospitals closed, civil service closed, no new developments and implementation of electoral promises? Nothing has worked in Oyo State even before he became governor, and nothing will work as long as he remains governor. Obviously, Mr Alao-Akala has not heard of the saying “Ilo ya, Onibode Apomu” (It is time to go, the Gatekeeper of Apomu)
The Sun Editorial again concluded that “Alao-Akala’s handling of episodes of trouble in the state since he came to power has been less than admirable. He carries on as if his government is backed by a decree. And unfortunately, for him to have a force like Adedibu, giving him inspiration and impetus, a different result is hardly expected....... Alao-Akala has proved his incapability to manage Oyo State”. And continued “Also we wish to appeal to the Nigerian authorities and everyone for that matter who could rein on Alhaji Adedibu to let the state be”.
The Sun newspaper editorial asked about the House of Assembly and I nearly died with laughter. “We are worried, however, by the silence of the state’s House of Assembly” the Editorial queried. Well, herein lies the question. House of Assembly indeed, more like House of Thugs. What can you expect from this dishonourable members, most of whom not only rigged themselves into the house but are also mostly in the pocket of the Governor or Chief Adedibu? Half of them are being challenged in the various electoral tribunals and the other half are in fear of their lives. No, I am not in the slightest doubt that the Oyo State House of Assembly can or will do anything. They are also part of the problem. Even the Federal Legislators and Senators from Oyo State do not have any solution or say in this. One of the Senators is even Adedibu’s son.
And for those elites and elders again, including Obasanjo (everybody sees Obasanjo’s hands in the problems of Oyo State), you are the cause of all these palaver in Oyo State. You allowed it to happen, and you must take responsibility for everything that happened, including the loss of lives and properties and the lack of progress in the state. It is time you admitted it, and stop laying blames elsewhere. You cannot resolve it because you are part and parcel of it, so please withdraw. You have shown yourselves incapable of any decency and selflessness. You have demonstrated that you do not love your people and you lack the wisdom and the capacity to behave like true leaders and elders who can move the state forward.
Please, dear compatriots, read “VIOLENCE", by Dr Festus Iyayi, a lecturer in Business Administration at the University of Benin. If you read that 'open-reality' novel, you will glean the solution to the problem of corruption and misrule in Nigeria. The practice of politics, democracy and capitalism in Nigeria is very, very crude and primitive. It is simply red-blood politics, democracy and capitalism which is fuelled and sustained by violence orchestrated by our ruling elite. To change this, we MUST move away from theory and embrace praxis. Period! Otherwise, we are in for a continuing vicious circle of these shameless practices. I believe in praxis especially the one with a revolutionary bent.
Ever since we wholeheartedly embraced democracy in 1999, these problems have been replicated in one state or the other – Anambra, Ekiti, Oyo, Plateau. And we will have more. In others, they have very strong Governors and weak deputies. The latter are more or less domesticated properly and just follow their Governors, grabbing and satisfied at the crumbs passed on to them by their bosses.
So we see why Oyo State cannot work and will not work in the foreseeable future. If Alao-Akala and Adedibu are out of the calculations, we stand a chance. If the elites and elders are out of the equation, we might have a chance. It is quite possible that if the entire above mentioned are put in a room and a nuclear bomb is set off, Oyo State might have a chance to express itself as one of the leading states in Nigeria.
What do you say we try this last option? It will surely work.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. A graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985), he also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigerians in America, Nigeria Village Square, etc.
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
London, UK
akinadejum@aol.com
"Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent change inevitable." - Frantz Fanon
"Nobody, no matter how highly placed; and no institution, no matter what it considers the rightness of its cause, will be considered a sacred cow or above the law in the bid to rid Nigeria of corrupt practices," - President Umaru Yar’Adua
I have always restrained myself from commenting publicly on the events in Oyo State, which happens to be my state, because of several reasons. One, I do not want thugs harassing my family or harassing me anytime I go to Nigeria to spend my leave, because these people we are dealing with are vicious, murderous people. Secondly, in most cases, I am too sad and disillusioned to bring myself to write anything about the state. This latter is borne by my belief that it is not always a good thing to write negative things about events, people or situations everytime. We should always look to write positive things, if we can. However, Nigeria’s political and moral situations as a whole has always been that of bringing out the pessimism and negativity in most of her people, such that we find it very difficult to celebrate achievement and excellence in all spheres of human activities in our country.
It is really a pity. We are often accused of being a difficult people to please. Yes, that is right, the reason being that at this stage in our nationhood and development (or underdevelopment, take your choice) Nigerian people expect a lot much more from their leaders, taking into consideration our wealth and human resources. Therein lies the problem – a dearth of good, sincere and committed leadership.
Talking of Oyo State, what now motivated and galvanised me to write about events in this sad excuse for a state government was the nice piece of editorial written by the Sun News Publishing “Let Oyo State work” (Thursday, October 4, 2007) and that by The Guardian “Between Alao-Akala And Civil Servants In Oyo State” (Saturday, October 6, 2007). If only the renegade government of Oyo State and its backers and other selfish interests could read these and digest them and act on these and several other advice that have been proffered over the past 8 years.
The problems of Oyo State are the problems of Nigeria. In fact, a lot of Nigeria’s problems are reflected in the problems of Oyo State, if the truth be said, and those problems started a long time ago. And Oyo State is not unique. Nigeria has several problems, which means all the 36 states of Nigeria are conjoined in those same problems, however each state have local problems specific to them. Oyo State is by no means different.
It is not necessary here to delve into history, or else, this narrative might turn into a full blown book. Suffice it to say that the specific current problems of Oyo State, in my opinion, really began when the old Oyo State, comprising the current state and Osun State was split into two. This was further manifested when Governor Lamidi Adesina took over the reins of government of Oyo State, as it is today in 1999. To say that Lam Ade’s administration was a disaster is putting it really mildly. In fact, we are being kind to him for saying that. It was a monumental catastrophe. I will not go further than that in his case.
What followed a monumental catastrophe was another cataclysm in the form of the PDP government of Governor Rashid Ladoja. In fairness to this mild-mannered gentleman, he might have had good intentions, but the way he got into power haunted him and proved the cause of his downfall. You see, if you want to dine with the devil, you must have a very long spoon. Ladoja obviously is oblivious of this adage and other wise sayings. He bought his way into power, using the dubious power and influence of Chief Adedibu, and he found out to his great cost, that he could not tame the tiger. He had opened a Pandora’s Box. His plight again demonstrates the fact that power must be derived from the people, not through god-fathers, electoral corruptions and other trickeries to get into power. The people must really and truly vote for you and want you as their leader, otherwise, forget it. This is a lesson all our political leaders in Nigeria are yet to learn but must learn and realise.
Rashid Ladoja just was not allowed to govern and he also, foolishly and naively, did not give himself any chance as he was all the time embroiled in a personal war of attrition and wits with his godfather. Although this is very arguable, the people of Oyo State, and indeed Nigeria, may never know what kind of governance Ladoja would have run, had he been allowed to serve his 4 years in full and in peace. It is a pity really, because he himself will not be judged kindly. The only sympathy people like me have for him is the illegal manner he was removed from office, not his performance as a governor.
Enter the greatest opportunist Alao-Akala. And utter chaos besieged Oyo State, actually in Ibadan, because in reality, other parts of the state were relatively peaceful. It is only that bedrock of Nigerian politics that erupted. I don’t think God and history will ever judge Alao-Akala and Adedibu well. And for that matter, all the so-called elders and monarchs of Oyo State, ex-president Obasanjo, the so-called Ibadan elders and elites. They are all culpable in this shameful and murderous farce.
On the face of it, it would seem like the Ibadans do not want anybody else to rule Oyo State. Well, this would seem to be the case judging from the posture and utterances of the so-called Ibadan elites, but then, who are they really? Their opinions nowadays are not worth anything. They buried their heads in the sand when they should be seen to be taking up the charge on behalf of the people of Ibadan and Oyo State. In fact, some of them were openly or discreetly going to pay obeisance to the Molete Thug-father and rubbing shoulders with him. One of them even was planning to make his son the Deputy Governor when and if Ladoja was removed; therefore he had to cuddle up to Chief Adedibu. It is a shame really.
The issue had nothing to do with a non-Ibadan indigene ruling the state, but the qualities of the Non-Ibadan indigene. Unfortunately for the non-Ibadans, it had to come in the form of a disgraced, corrupt, former policeman who was said to be indicted by the Nigeria Police Force and then unceremoniously sacked. During the eleven months, that he ruled the state, after he had helped impeached his boss, he looted the treasury in connivance with his political godfather, who ironically, was also the political godfather of his former boss. And shameless and power-hungry as he is, even when the courts declared that he should vacate the seat for his boss, the man did not even have the decency to resign, despite all the humiliations that accompanied his removal as governor and the way his boss started treating him. There must be something in government and power that these Nigerian politicians cannot just give up – money, of course, or rather, the opportunity to steal money, lots and lots of it.
A little bit of digression here. We tend to think that elites and elders can do something to solve Nigeria’s problems. This is a very big NO, for the following reasons:
These decrepit and morally bankrupt elders and elites were the causes of our problems in the first place, so they cannot, and do not have any solutions to offer. They also want to keep the status quo because of their selfish interests. They are very selfish, and they do not really care for the common Nigerian
The elders and elites have lost the respect of the larger community and are not trusted. They are mostly discredited and compromised persons, including most of the monarchs in the Southern part of Nigeria.
The world has changed its attitude to community leaders in general. Because these community leaders, including these elders and elites, have failed the community they are supposed to lead or serve, the community has lost confidence in them; however these lepers still crave one kind of relevance or the other, and thus still prefer to refer to themselves as elites or elders.
While I support the saying that “we cannot have elders in place and let the head of a newborn baby be malformed”, the problem is that we have had these elders overlooking, and indeed contributing to the malformation of newborn babies heads a million times since our independence. In fact as Yorubas will say, they are “Agba-iya’s” translated as “Useless old persons”
This is exactly what has been happening in Oyo State and Ibadan. The elders have either been cowardly in the face of truth, or they have been deliberately quiet because of selfish interests.
Take Chief Richard Akinjide, a man who is noted worldwide for his legal and judicial brilliance, a man who entered Nigerian politics, according to himself, at the age of 27, and held many political positions culminating in the position of Attorney General and Minister of Justice; a man of incomparable brilliance and vast experience in governance, law and the constitution, and an Ibadan man. You ask me, what has been this man’s contribution to the development of Ibadan, his hometown, and to Oyo State all his life? What specifically have been his roles in solving the current political and constitutional mayhem and problems facing Oyo State and Ibadan? What has he really done to uplift Ibadan except that Ibadans take pride in referring to him as a “son of the soil” to highlight achievements of Ibadan sons and daughters? I can’t point to a single thing, but please correct me if I am wrong. We still remember his historic calculations of 12 two thirds in 1979.
Yes, Obasanjo failed the Oyo State, Yorubas and Nigerians woefully. However people like Chief Richard Akinjide (we like to think of him as an important and foremost Ibadan man) are the real culprits in Yorubaland and are never to be trusted. Throughout the eight years of Obasanjo in Aso Rock, I never heard or read where Uncle Richard ever criticised Obasanjo. The Chief was indeed one of those people who formed the Yoruba Council of Elders to counter Afenifere's opposition to Obasanjo. He is now criticising Obasanjo saying the government is 'the worst ever in Nigeria'. He has conveniently forgotten that his government of Shehu Shagari from 1979 to 1983 spent 36 billion dollars left by the same Obasanjo and plunged Nigeria into a further debt of $30 billion, and which it was the same Obasanjo that cleared this debt on his second return.
While I concur that there were very serious faults and flaws with Obasanjo’s 8 year administration, I do not believe Chief Akinjide is in any way, yes anyway, qualified to pass judgement on Obasanjo, in his 9-page interview with the Sun Newspapers, for the simple reasons that when Obasanjo was President, Chief Akinjide never said a word against Obasanjo’s excesses. Secondly, Akinjide was no better than Obasanjo, in fact I rate Obasanjo much higher than him; thirdly, I have very serious doubts about Chief Akinjide’s timing of his criticism, and lastly Chief Akinjide was among those who formed the Yoruba Council of Elders to counter Afenifere's opposition to Obasanjo; so the man is double-speaking. Such men should not be taken seriously, as they are speaking from the sides of their mouth.
No Ibadan Chief, with all due respect to your age and other reputations, your time is over. You have not contributed anything significantly either to Ibadan, Oyo State or Nigeria to withstand the test of time. Sir, please leave quietly so as not to disturb the neighbours.
In this instance, Chief Akinjide is not the only one culpable. I can mention hundreds of so called Ibadan and Oyo State elites and elders. Where are the Chief Arisekolas and other rich elites, the numerous professors, the Oyo State Council of Obas, etc?
To add insult to injury, at a time, Raji Rasaki, former Military Governors of both Lagos and Ogun States was in the frame for running for the Governorship of Oyo State, because he had aligned himself with Chief Adedibu. After he lost out in this race, he was again touted as a potential Minister in Yar’Adua’s government. You can see that this has really descended into a farce and a joke. With all due respect again, what could this man of straw offer to the people of Oyo State? Is it by building “girders”? What were his achievements in Lagos and Ogun States except make money for himself and his then military heads of state?
I have no doubt that there are lots of credible personalities in Oyo State who could restore peace; development and progress to Oyo State, but the current crop of opportunists are not it. And those who can will never be given a chance unless something really drastic happens for the better. I personally do not care which area of Oyo State that person comes from – Ogbomosho, Ibadan, Oyo, Ibarapa, Shaki, Iseyin or wherever – what we need are honest, sincere man or woman. But we are not going to get that for a while, mark my words.
The current government of Alao-Akala is a gross aberration and a curse to Oyo State as a whole, not only Ibadan. It cannot work because it is so much compromised. The foundation has been built on sands. The man is grossly incompetent, corrupt and comes laden with a dearth of ideas. I do not know how his acolytes can ever sell him to the public. For him, you cannot sow maize and hope to harvest yams. The moment he was a party to his former boss’s removal, and started prostrating to Chief Adedibu, that was when he lost any credibility and respect he had, if he ever had one.
From all that has been happening since he became Governor over 3 months ago, it is glaring that he can never be a good governor or governs well. The man has been bumbling from one controversy to the other. He was sacking and replacing Chief Judges at will; devoting much energy and time to trying to undo what his predecessor had put in place, etc. ; the Electoral Tribunal is still examining his credentials and the way he got into power. The civil service and the people of Oyo State have clearly shown him that they do not want him in the Governor’s Office. A Governor who thinks the solution to a civil strike is to sack the whole of his civil service clearly does not have any idea about governance and the rule of law. But then, not many people are surprised by this inane and insane act. Many people have lost their lives as a result of what he brought upon the people of Oyo State, by his stubbornness to remain in office by all means. Can you imagine the cost to the people – schools closed, hospitals closed, civil service closed, no new developments and implementation of electoral promises? Nothing has worked in Oyo State even before he became governor, and nothing will work as long as he remains governor. Obviously, Mr Alao-Akala has not heard of the saying “Ilo ya, Onibode Apomu” (It is time to go, the Gatekeeper of Apomu)
The Sun Editorial again concluded that “Alao-Akala’s handling of episodes of trouble in the state since he came to power has been less than admirable. He carries on as if his government is backed by a decree. And unfortunately, for him to have a force like Adedibu, giving him inspiration and impetus, a different result is hardly expected....... Alao-Akala has proved his incapability to manage Oyo State”. And continued “Also we wish to appeal to the Nigerian authorities and everyone for that matter who could rein on Alhaji Adedibu to let the state be”.
The Sun newspaper editorial asked about the House of Assembly and I nearly died with laughter. “We are worried, however, by the silence of the state’s House of Assembly” the Editorial queried. Well, herein lies the question. House of Assembly indeed, more like House of Thugs. What can you expect from this dishonourable members, most of whom not only rigged themselves into the house but are also mostly in the pocket of the Governor or Chief Adedibu? Half of them are being challenged in the various electoral tribunals and the other half are in fear of their lives. No, I am not in the slightest doubt that the Oyo State House of Assembly can or will do anything. They are also part of the problem. Even the Federal Legislators and Senators from Oyo State do not have any solution or say in this. One of the Senators is even Adedibu’s son.
And for those elites and elders again, including Obasanjo (everybody sees Obasanjo’s hands in the problems of Oyo State), you are the cause of all these palaver in Oyo State. You allowed it to happen, and you must take responsibility for everything that happened, including the loss of lives and properties and the lack of progress in the state. It is time you admitted it, and stop laying blames elsewhere. You cannot resolve it because you are part and parcel of it, so please withdraw. You have shown yourselves incapable of any decency and selflessness. You have demonstrated that you do not love your people and you lack the wisdom and the capacity to behave like true leaders and elders who can move the state forward.
Please, dear compatriots, read “VIOLENCE", by Dr Festus Iyayi, a lecturer in Business Administration at the University of Benin. If you read that 'open-reality' novel, you will glean the solution to the problem of corruption and misrule in Nigeria. The practice of politics, democracy and capitalism in Nigeria is very, very crude and primitive. It is simply red-blood politics, democracy and capitalism which is fuelled and sustained by violence orchestrated by our ruling elite. To change this, we MUST move away from theory and embrace praxis. Period! Otherwise, we are in for a continuing vicious circle of these shameless practices. I believe in praxis especially the one with a revolutionary bent.
Ever since we wholeheartedly embraced democracy in 1999, these problems have been replicated in one state or the other – Anambra, Ekiti, Oyo, Plateau. And we will have more. In others, they have very strong Governors and weak deputies. The latter are more or less domesticated properly and just follow their Governors, grabbing and satisfied at the crumbs passed on to them by their bosses.
So we see why Oyo State cannot work and will not work in the foreseeable future. If Alao-Akala and Adedibu are out of the calculations, we stand a chance. If the elites and elders are out of the equation, we might have a chance. It is quite possible that if the entire above mentioned are put in a room and a nuclear bomb is set off, Oyo State might have a chance to express itself as one of the leading states in Nigeria.
What do you say we try this last option? It will surely work.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. A graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985), he also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigerians in America, Nigeria Village Square, etc.
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
THE BANANA SKINS CALLED IBORI, ETTEH AND ODILI
THE BANANA SKINS CALLED IBORI, ETTEH AND ODILI
Akintokunbo A Adejumo
London, UK
akinadejum@aol.com
This author has always said it and will continue to say it: The Rule of Law cannot work yet in Nigeria for the simple reason that our half-hearted anti-corruption war cannot be sustained by the rule of law when there is no “obeisance of the law in the first place. This fear seems to be confirmed by recent events that are increasingly indicating that the Yar'Adua government is not exactly forthright about its anti-graft campaign. This is further compounded by the actions, or inactions of the relevant authorities who are expected to carry out this fight. Externally, the UK Director of Public Prosecution publicly saying that the Federal government of Nigeria is deliberately frustrating the efforts of the UK Government to investigate Ibori’s alleged £35 million assets in the UK and elsewhere. Now the chicken are coming home to roost, but is it too early to say or pass judgement? The problem is not so much that the government is winning the war against corruption, but the impression that the war itself is not being fought with especially sincerity of purpose, the right tools and resources or seriousness. Certain people in and out of government seem determined to maintain the status quo and are actively subverting the course of justice.
And what do we have now? After being allowed to breathe some fresh air and given time to consolidate under the guise of “the Rule of Law”, now comes former Governor of Taraba State, Reverend Jolly Nyame who told the Federal Government that the money he allegedly stole does not belong to the Federal Government but to Taraba State Government. He stated that the Federal Government has no right to accuse him of stealing any money since the state government has not declared any money missing. According to him, “since the entire money alleged to have been misappropriated belongs to the Taraba State Government, the Federal Government of Nigeria (the complainant) has no locus standi to prosecute me and this fact has thus deprived this FCT High court of trying me.” Please remember that he had earlier admitted embezzling state funds. Somebody please tell me how much Taraba State contributes to the Federal coffers? As far as I know, all state allocations come from the Federal Government, hence all monies belong to the people of Nigeria. It is wonderful how these corrupt people come up with all these defences.
Then comes the mother of all confirmation, albeit by a state government: the news recently that the Government of Delta State had filed, and been granted an ex-parte Injunction in a Federal High Court in Benin, shielding former Delta State governor, Chief James Onanefe Ibori, from arrest and investigation by the Federal Government and all its agents -The Attorney General, the EFCC, etc
This curious ruling is to frustrate efforts of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice to obtain documents relating to Ibori's operations and activities while in office as governor.
More curious, interesting and intriguing is that it was the Government of Delta State who initiated this application on behalf of its ex-Governor and some others who were in his government and prohibits the Federal Government and its agents from arresting or detaining any current or erstwhile public or political office holders in Delta State government from May 1999 to June 2007 including but not limited to the following: Chief James Ibori, Chief Benjamin Elue, Mr. Ede Oghoro and Mr. Charles Israyel in consequence of the alleged investigation touching on the accounts, contracts, etc of the State Government. This is a wide ranging order, in that it not only protects the ex-governor and his people while in government, it also protects current office holders. The reason why the current Delta State government should stick their neck out so far for Ibori is something we all know, of course, but this is a blatant and arrogant display of nepotism, attempted suppression and frustration of justice, law and order and outright display of corruption.
Of course, this is not the first time ex-Governors (whether or not they are under investigation for corruption) will take out such injunctions. Plateau’s Dariye tried it, Abia’s Kalu tried it and more recently, Odili of Rivers State was granted an order preventing him from arrest by the anti-graft agency to face prosecution over alleged misconduct while in office. And they were somewhat successful because they were clever enough to apply for such injunctions in their home states, where they had lots of influence in everything. Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC), Nuhu Ribadu, confirmed this by alleging that some judges in the country collude with looters in the sharing of proceeds of financial crimes and thereby resort to granting indiscriminate ex-parte injunctions against the anti- graft agency.
All these left and right injunctions, under the much misused and maligned Rule of Law came about following growing insinuations that President Musa Yar'Adua was part of the ploy to shield Ibori from trial by a London court, although the President denied the allegation saying: "As far as I am concerned, nobody, no matter how highly placed, and no institution, no matter what it considers the rightness of its cause, will be considered a sacred cow or above the law in the bid to rid Nigeria of corrupt practices." The President has of course made certain pronouncements on this case, even directing the AGF to “fully cooperate with the UK authorities, but this is after the fact, and our President seems to be always reacting after the damage has been done. This does not instil confidence in Nigerians or the world about the government’s stated determination to continue the fight against graft and corruption in every form. It seems to us they are speaking from the sides of their mouths.
We will see, Mr President, we will see. Let us see the action; we have heard enough of words. Without necessarily being too harsh on the President, all the steps his government had taken so far in ensuring justice for Nigerians and ensuring that all these ex-governors and their cohorts do not escape justice, had all fallen flat and not measured up to the expectations of the people. It just does not look good. The war against corruption is simply not being fought the right and efficient way. Every day, as thing move from bad to worse, a lot of us are beginning to doubt the sincerity of purpose, the modus operandi and tactics of the Federal Government. What else can we believe? The EFCC is being muzzled, or at best, lost its tempo; the nation’s Attorney General’s actions so far are sending out the wrong signals; an ex-Governor who has accumulated $35 (or is it £35) million during 8 years of ruling his state is said not to be under investigation (courtesy, AGF’s letter to Ibori’s London solicitors); injunctions not to arrest or investigate are flying left, right and centre; most of these corrupt ex-governors have the ear of the President; the Honourable Speaker of the House of Representatives is embroiled in a massive scandal; and other corruption scandals surfacing everyday.
One undeniable fact is that Yar ‘Adua’s government is burdened enough with credibility problems as a result of the underhand way it came in via a very flawed election. It should do nothing to compound them. From all indications so far, with its seemingly errant officials, it is doing its best to self-destruct and implode. President Yar'Adua had 'chance meetings' with Ibori in New York. This is most unfortunate. The President should not be seen to be having “chance meetings” with Ibori, despite the fact that Ibori played a prominent role in his (s)election and spent billions of Naira in this exercise. The President should not touch such people with a long pole. Ibori should be a pariah, not only to Aso Rock, but also to the people of Nigeria. Under the present circumstance, it is indeed a big deal and the timing was inapt.
Is this government up to the Herculean task of tackling this Aegean stable called corruption? You tell me. Why are we relying on the British Government, for example, to establish money laundering charges against Ibori? Should not the Nigerian Government first initiate an investigation into misuse and mismanagement of public funds, embezzlement, stealing and financial misconduct, etc against these people in Nigeria and then come up with the results of their investigation which could then be used to prosecute them on Nigerian soil and then passed to the British authorities to help them with their own investigations? Then, Ibori will have 2 separate cases to defend, one in Nigeria, where he is a national, and the second in the UK.
Funny enough, Ibori has not denied amassing such massive wealth, neither has he explained how he came about it. All he has been saying is that the UK authorities do not have any case and cannot freeze his assets. Yar Adua’s Government is sitting on a keg of gunpowder, because when the Ibori shit hits the fan, it is going to spread. And God knows, I won’t be there. And this seems precisely what our current Government and PDP (and even former President Obasanjo’s administration) are trying desperately to avoid. You see, the man Ibori is becoming one helluva headache for all of them. He is becoming a real problem for Yar ‘Adua and his government. All the atrocities he has committed are not without the knowledge and even the blessing of the party and government. They know, we know, and only a fool does not know it in Nigeria. And this is why I proffer that the “Honourable” ex-Governor is a real banana skin, and a lot of people are going to slip on it, assuming ours is a normal country, or if the government itself is sincere about its commitment to fighting corruption.
The first two ex-governors who must be fully investigated and prosecuted are Ibori and Odili. But can they? Does this government have the heart, the courage, the willingness, the sincerity to face these two dinosaurs, these embodiment of corruption? From the look of things, I doubt it. The government and all its enforcement authorities are even having difficulty dealing with “petty” crooks like Dariye, Turaki, Nnamani and Kalu (if you can really call them petty thieves).
But we can take heart in the words of the Holy Books that said definitively that the sinner shall never go unpunished.
The Guardian, in its editorial of 16th October 2007 stated that “because corruption is aggressively destructive in both intent and method, it must be matched with no less ferocity if we are to curb it, and the starting point should be a review of observable structural problems. And we can do this fully within the ambit of the rule of law. One example: Sections 11 and 12 Part 1 of the Fifth Schedule of the extant constitution requires public officers to submit to the Code of Conduct Bureau a written declaration of their assets both on coming into office and at the end of each term of office. Penalty for a breach of the stipulations of the Code of Conduct is clearly spelt out in the relevant sections. In effect, there exists a law, and a structure - the Code of Conduct Bureau and the Code of Conduct Tribunal - that, if alive to their constitutional duties, can do much to bring to book, thieving governors and other miscreants in high places. There is also a need to make assets declaration public through Constitutional amendment.”
The editorial went on “Because the law is foundational to government and its processes, it is critical that a president and his chief law officer must be in complete agreement on matters of both principle and policy. We regret to say that, much as President Yar'Adua may be saying all the right things on the matter of corruption, his attorney-general does not appear to operate in tune with the expressed sentiments of his boss. A well-meaning AGF should, notwithstanding his constitutional powers and authority - or indeed because of it - be eager to collaborate with, even strengthen the EFCC, ICPC and indeed any other body that can help fight corruption in the land. Not so the incumbent. Put starkly, Mr. Michael Aondoakaa has so far proved himself unable to work in tandem with the very strong anti-corruption sentiments of the Nigerian people, and the global public. This country cannot afford a chief law officer whose motive is in the least questionable; who discharges his duty in a manner not manifestly in "public interest, the interest of justice and the need to prevent the abuse of legal process". As things stand now, the president may wish to consider a fresh hand for this important office and assignment.”
This is a very strong and truthful indictment of this man of straw who was given the lofty position of AGF and Minister for Justice. He is culpable for this mess and should take full responsibility. In the Ibori case, was the AGF acting for and on behalf of Nigeria or was he acting for and behalf of Ibori? Within 3 months of his being in position, he has been courting controversy and he has taken all the wrong steps and actions, especially with regards to the anti-graft war, thinking he can get away with pulling the wool over the eyes of Nigerians, because he thinks he knows the law more than everybody. He has not only shown himself to be a legal charlatan and unworthy of his position, he has also shown that he is helping corruption and not combating it. Thus he has single-handedly cast doubt on this government’s anti-graft war, if it is a war at all. And he and Ibori might well be the banana skin on which Yar‘Adua may slip. There is only one thing remaining for him to do, and he should do it as soon as possible.
If Aondoakaa can accomplish all these controversy within three months, only God knows how much damage this man could do in four years to the anti-graft war, and also other matters of law and justice, and therefore to Yar’Adua’s Presidency. The man is fast becoming a liability and it seems only the people in the corridors of power do not realise this. Those who have been very critical of him have even been accused of tribalism. But then, this is our vocation in Nigeria everytime things are going against us. We tend to see conspiracies in every nook and corner – Speaker Patricia Etteh is also seeing plots and conspiracies. Interested selfish parties leave leprosy untreated and instead start treating for ringworm.
Another banana skin is the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Patricia Etteh. She is an accident waiting to happen to this Government, if it has not happened already. Why this hairdresser, who should not have been elevated to such high and respected position as No 4 citizen of Nigeria in the first place, is hanging on to power is something that confounds all reasonable Nigerians. However, knowing the Nigerian mentality of sitting tight because of the benefits, I am not surprised at her stance. It is however very disgraceful. Obviously, the majority of her peers and Nigerians do not want her, so how can she continue to enjoy the confidence, the trust and respect of Nigerians if she stays in power? Her position is now untenable, but apparently, only she and her God-father backers do not see this fact. She obviously has an ace up her sleeve, but the rest of us can’t see this ace. She must be right while the majority of Nigerians are wrong.
Already the first casualty of this shameful debacle has been claimed in the death of Representative, Honourable Aminu Safana, member from Katsina State, The lawmaker, who until his death was one of the supporters of the Speaker, slumped amid the scuffle between the two opposing groups in the House, complaining of exhaustion and was immediately rushed to the National Hospital, Abuja, he died in the hospital. (May his soul rest in peace). Yet the Speaker is still refusing to resign.
Yet another can of worms waiting to be opened is the ex-Governor of Rivers State, Dr Peter Odili. I cannot not recount all the misdeeds against him here, suffice it to say that when his Pandora ’s Box is opened, this Government might find itself in very deep trouble, as will the former President Olusegun Obasanjo. A lot of people in the past administration are said to be heavily implicated in the monumental fraud that went in Rivers State for eight solid years under Odili, that “kind and gentle doctor”. Yes, the man sure knows how to “doctor” accounts. Right now, the “Best Governor of Obasanjo’s Administration” is taking out applications for injunctions to prevent investigations into his eight years of gross mismanagement and monumental corruption in Rivers State where he is alleged to have bilked the poor people of his state of billions of petro-dollars, engaged in nefarious activities that has led to Port Harcourt being in the sad state and situation it is today.
On our Independence Day, 1st October, the Government of Yar’Adua told us we are making progress; well if this is how we are making the progress, then God help us.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. He is a graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985). He also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigeriansinamerica.com, Nigerianvillagesquare.com, Gamji.com, etc
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
Akintokunbo A Adejumo
London, UK
akinadejum@aol.com
This author has always said it and will continue to say it: The Rule of Law cannot work yet in Nigeria for the simple reason that our half-hearted anti-corruption war cannot be sustained by the rule of law when there is no “obeisance of the law in the first place. This fear seems to be confirmed by recent events that are increasingly indicating that the Yar'Adua government is not exactly forthright about its anti-graft campaign. This is further compounded by the actions, or inactions of the relevant authorities who are expected to carry out this fight. Externally, the UK Director of Public Prosecution publicly saying that the Federal government of Nigeria is deliberately frustrating the efforts of the UK Government to investigate Ibori’s alleged £35 million assets in the UK and elsewhere. Now the chicken are coming home to roost, but is it too early to say or pass judgement? The problem is not so much that the government is winning the war against corruption, but the impression that the war itself is not being fought with especially sincerity of purpose, the right tools and resources or seriousness. Certain people in and out of government seem determined to maintain the status quo and are actively subverting the course of justice.
And what do we have now? After being allowed to breathe some fresh air and given time to consolidate under the guise of “the Rule of Law”, now comes former Governor of Taraba State, Reverend Jolly Nyame who told the Federal Government that the money he allegedly stole does not belong to the Federal Government but to Taraba State Government. He stated that the Federal Government has no right to accuse him of stealing any money since the state government has not declared any money missing. According to him, “since the entire money alleged to have been misappropriated belongs to the Taraba State Government, the Federal Government of Nigeria (the complainant) has no locus standi to prosecute me and this fact has thus deprived this FCT High court of trying me.” Please remember that he had earlier admitted embezzling state funds. Somebody please tell me how much Taraba State contributes to the Federal coffers? As far as I know, all state allocations come from the Federal Government, hence all monies belong to the people of Nigeria. It is wonderful how these corrupt people come up with all these defences.
Then comes the mother of all confirmation, albeit by a state government: the news recently that the Government of Delta State had filed, and been granted an ex-parte Injunction in a Federal High Court in Benin, shielding former Delta State governor, Chief James Onanefe Ibori, from arrest and investigation by the Federal Government and all its agents -The Attorney General, the EFCC, etc
This curious ruling is to frustrate efforts of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice to obtain documents relating to Ibori's operations and activities while in office as governor.
More curious, interesting and intriguing is that it was the Government of Delta State who initiated this application on behalf of its ex-Governor and some others who were in his government and prohibits the Federal Government and its agents from arresting or detaining any current or erstwhile public or political office holders in Delta State government from May 1999 to June 2007 including but not limited to the following: Chief James Ibori, Chief Benjamin Elue, Mr. Ede Oghoro and Mr. Charles Israyel in consequence of the alleged investigation touching on the accounts, contracts, etc of the State Government. This is a wide ranging order, in that it not only protects the ex-governor and his people while in government, it also protects current office holders. The reason why the current Delta State government should stick their neck out so far for Ibori is something we all know, of course, but this is a blatant and arrogant display of nepotism, attempted suppression and frustration of justice, law and order and outright display of corruption.
Of course, this is not the first time ex-Governors (whether or not they are under investigation for corruption) will take out such injunctions. Plateau’s Dariye tried it, Abia’s Kalu tried it and more recently, Odili of Rivers State was granted an order preventing him from arrest by the anti-graft agency to face prosecution over alleged misconduct while in office. And they were somewhat successful because they were clever enough to apply for such injunctions in their home states, where they had lots of influence in everything. Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC), Nuhu Ribadu, confirmed this by alleging that some judges in the country collude with looters in the sharing of proceeds of financial crimes and thereby resort to granting indiscriminate ex-parte injunctions against the anti- graft agency.
All these left and right injunctions, under the much misused and maligned Rule of Law came about following growing insinuations that President Musa Yar'Adua was part of the ploy to shield Ibori from trial by a London court, although the President denied the allegation saying: "As far as I am concerned, nobody, no matter how highly placed, and no institution, no matter what it considers the rightness of its cause, will be considered a sacred cow or above the law in the bid to rid Nigeria of corrupt practices." The President has of course made certain pronouncements on this case, even directing the AGF to “fully cooperate with the UK authorities, but this is after the fact, and our President seems to be always reacting after the damage has been done. This does not instil confidence in Nigerians or the world about the government’s stated determination to continue the fight against graft and corruption in every form. It seems to us they are speaking from the sides of their mouths.
We will see, Mr President, we will see. Let us see the action; we have heard enough of words. Without necessarily being too harsh on the President, all the steps his government had taken so far in ensuring justice for Nigerians and ensuring that all these ex-governors and their cohorts do not escape justice, had all fallen flat and not measured up to the expectations of the people. It just does not look good. The war against corruption is simply not being fought the right and efficient way. Every day, as thing move from bad to worse, a lot of us are beginning to doubt the sincerity of purpose, the modus operandi and tactics of the Federal Government. What else can we believe? The EFCC is being muzzled, or at best, lost its tempo; the nation’s Attorney General’s actions so far are sending out the wrong signals; an ex-Governor who has accumulated $35 (or is it £35) million during 8 years of ruling his state is said not to be under investigation (courtesy, AGF’s letter to Ibori’s London solicitors); injunctions not to arrest or investigate are flying left, right and centre; most of these corrupt ex-governors have the ear of the President; the Honourable Speaker of the House of Representatives is embroiled in a massive scandal; and other corruption scandals surfacing everyday.
One undeniable fact is that Yar ‘Adua’s government is burdened enough with credibility problems as a result of the underhand way it came in via a very flawed election. It should do nothing to compound them. From all indications so far, with its seemingly errant officials, it is doing its best to self-destruct and implode. President Yar'Adua had 'chance meetings' with Ibori in New York. This is most unfortunate. The President should not be seen to be having “chance meetings” with Ibori, despite the fact that Ibori played a prominent role in his (s)election and spent billions of Naira in this exercise. The President should not touch such people with a long pole. Ibori should be a pariah, not only to Aso Rock, but also to the people of Nigeria. Under the present circumstance, it is indeed a big deal and the timing was inapt.
Is this government up to the Herculean task of tackling this Aegean stable called corruption? You tell me. Why are we relying on the British Government, for example, to establish money laundering charges against Ibori? Should not the Nigerian Government first initiate an investigation into misuse and mismanagement of public funds, embezzlement, stealing and financial misconduct, etc against these people in Nigeria and then come up with the results of their investigation which could then be used to prosecute them on Nigerian soil and then passed to the British authorities to help them with their own investigations? Then, Ibori will have 2 separate cases to defend, one in Nigeria, where he is a national, and the second in the UK.
Funny enough, Ibori has not denied amassing such massive wealth, neither has he explained how he came about it. All he has been saying is that the UK authorities do not have any case and cannot freeze his assets. Yar Adua’s Government is sitting on a keg of gunpowder, because when the Ibori shit hits the fan, it is going to spread. And God knows, I won’t be there. And this seems precisely what our current Government and PDP (and even former President Obasanjo’s administration) are trying desperately to avoid. You see, the man Ibori is becoming one helluva headache for all of them. He is becoming a real problem for Yar ‘Adua and his government. All the atrocities he has committed are not without the knowledge and even the blessing of the party and government. They know, we know, and only a fool does not know it in Nigeria. And this is why I proffer that the “Honourable” ex-Governor is a real banana skin, and a lot of people are going to slip on it, assuming ours is a normal country, or if the government itself is sincere about its commitment to fighting corruption.
The first two ex-governors who must be fully investigated and prosecuted are Ibori and Odili. But can they? Does this government have the heart, the courage, the willingness, the sincerity to face these two dinosaurs, these embodiment of corruption? From the look of things, I doubt it. The government and all its enforcement authorities are even having difficulty dealing with “petty” crooks like Dariye, Turaki, Nnamani and Kalu (if you can really call them petty thieves).
But we can take heart in the words of the Holy Books that said definitively that the sinner shall never go unpunished.
The Guardian, in its editorial of 16th October 2007 stated that “because corruption is aggressively destructive in both intent and method, it must be matched with no less ferocity if we are to curb it, and the starting point should be a review of observable structural problems. And we can do this fully within the ambit of the rule of law. One example: Sections 11 and 12 Part 1 of the Fifth Schedule of the extant constitution requires public officers to submit to the Code of Conduct Bureau a written declaration of their assets both on coming into office and at the end of each term of office. Penalty for a breach of the stipulations of the Code of Conduct is clearly spelt out in the relevant sections. In effect, there exists a law, and a structure - the Code of Conduct Bureau and the Code of Conduct Tribunal - that, if alive to their constitutional duties, can do much to bring to book, thieving governors and other miscreants in high places. There is also a need to make assets declaration public through Constitutional amendment.”
The editorial went on “Because the law is foundational to government and its processes, it is critical that a president and his chief law officer must be in complete agreement on matters of both principle and policy. We regret to say that, much as President Yar'Adua may be saying all the right things on the matter of corruption, his attorney-general does not appear to operate in tune with the expressed sentiments of his boss. A well-meaning AGF should, notwithstanding his constitutional powers and authority - or indeed because of it - be eager to collaborate with, even strengthen the EFCC, ICPC and indeed any other body that can help fight corruption in the land. Not so the incumbent. Put starkly, Mr. Michael Aondoakaa has so far proved himself unable to work in tandem with the very strong anti-corruption sentiments of the Nigerian people, and the global public. This country cannot afford a chief law officer whose motive is in the least questionable; who discharges his duty in a manner not manifestly in "public interest, the interest of justice and the need to prevent the abuse of legal process". As things stand now, the president may wish to consider a fresh hand for this important office and assignment.”
This is a very strong and truthful indictment of this man of straw who was given the lofty position of AGF and Minister for Justice. He is culpable for this mess and should take full responsibility. In the Ibori case, was the AGF acting for and on behalf of Nigeria or was he acting for and behalf of Ibori? Within 3 months of his being in position, he has been courting controversy and he has taken all the wrong steps and actions, especially with regards to the anti-graft war, thinking he can get away with pulling the wool over the eyes of Nigerians, because he thinks he knows the law more than everybody. He has not only shown himself to be a legal charlatan and unworthy of his position, he has also shown that he is helping corruption and not combating it. Thus he has single-handedly cast doubt on this government’s anti-graft war, if it is a war at all. And he and Ibori might well be the banana skin on which Yar‘Adua may slip. There is only one thing remaining for him to do, and he should do it as soon as possible.
If Aondoakaa can accomplish all these controversy within three months, only God knows how much damage this man could do in four years to the anti-graft war, and also other matters of law and justice, and therefore to Yar’Adua’s Presidency. The man is fast becoming a liability and it seems only the people in the corridors of power do not realise this. Those who have been very critical of him have even been accused of tribalism. But then, this is our vocation in Nigeria everytime things are going against us. We tend to see conspiracies in every nook and corner – Speaker Patricia Etteh is also seeing plots and conspiracies. Interested selfish parties leave leprosy untreated and instead start treating for ringworm.
Another banana skin is the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Patricia Etteh. She is an accident waiting to happen to this Government, if it has not happened already. Why this hairdresser, who should not have been elevated to such high and respected position as No 4 citizen of Nigeria in the first place, is hanging on to power is something that confounds all reasonable Nigerians. However, knowing the Nigerian mentality of sitting tight because of the benefits, I am not surprised at her stance. It is however very disgraceful. Obviously, the majority of her peers and Nigerians do not want her, so how can she continue to enjoy the confidence, the trust and respect of Nigerians if she stays in power? Her position is now untenable, but apparently, only she and her God-father backers do not see this fact. She obviously has an ace up her sleeve, but the rest of us can’t see this ace. She must be right while the majority of Nigerians are wrong.
Already the first casualty of this shameful debacle has been claimed in the death of Representative, Honourable Aminu Safana, member from Katsina State, The lawmaker, who until his death was one of the supporters of the Speaker, slumped amid the scuffle between the two opposing groups in the House, complaining of exhaustion and was immediately rushed to the National Hospital, Abuja, he died in the hospital. (May his soul rest in peace). Yet the Speaker is still refusing to resign.
Yet another can of worms waiting to be opened is the ex-Governor of Rivers State, Dr Peter Odili. I cannot not recount all the misdeeds against him here, suffice it to say that when his Pandora ’s Box is opened, this Government might find itself in very deep trouble, as will the former President Olusegun Obasanjo. A lot of people in the past administration are said to be heavily implicated in the monumental fraud that went in Rivers State for eight solid years under Odili, that “kind and gentle doctor”. Yes, the man sure knows how to “doctor” accounts. Right now, the “Best Governor of Obasanjo’s Administration” is taking out applications for injunctions to prevent investigations into his eight years of gross mismanagement and monumental corruption in Rivers State where he is alleged to have bilked the poor people of his state of billions of petro-dollars, engaged in nefarious activities that has led to Port Harcourt being in the sad state and situation it is today.
On our Independence Day, 1st October, the Government of Yar’Adua told us we are making progress; well if this is how we are making the progress, then God help us.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. He is a graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985). He also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigeriansinamerica.com, Nigerianvillagesquare.com, Gamji.com, etc
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
Sunday, 7 October 2007
RE: OJO MADUEKWE’S “CITIZENSHIP DIPLOMACY”
“The way to get on in the world is to be neither more nor less wise, neither better nor worse than your neighbours”. - William Hazlitt
“Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always at its best”. - Max Beerbohm
Nigeria’s new Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chief Ojo Maduekwe, who spoke recently at a book presentation by former Minister of Education, Professor Tunde Adeniran, in Abuja, announced a “retaliatory” foreign policy, warning that any country that presents Nigeria as corrupt without showcasing the intellect of Nigerians would be declared a “hostile nation”. He further said that it is geared towards “protecting” the image and integrity of Nigeria and retaliates against countries who are hostile and who brand Nigeria as “corrupt”.
While Chief Ojo Maduekwe’s statement is very commendable, we should look beyond mere rhetoric, as all our leaders and representatives have been posturing over the decades. The problem is that most of them do not mean what they say, and neither do they practice what they preach, not only to their fellow Nigerians, but also to the world in general. In most cases, our rulers come up with great ideas and words to that effect and espouse seemingly noble causes that will make the country’s image, and indeed, the lives of their people better, but end up not doing anything at all. Of course, Nigerians are used to this, but it is our sincere hope that this will not the same way as things have been going since independence.
On the face of it, I quite agree with Maduekwe’s new diplomatic policy – that is, encouraging other countries to promote the positive aspects of Nigeria and Nigerians and not just the negative and derogatory. We are also in agreement that for every single 419 fraudster and corrupt instance, there are hundreds of Nigerians all over the world who should be recognised positively for the positive image they portray of Nigeria and Nigerians. There is no doubt about this.
However, charity begins at home, so they say and should apply. What the Honourable Minister, and the rest of the Nigerian Government should be applying their energy and efforts to, is contributing to this new image by exorcising the devil in their own midst. The fact remains that corruption is still endemic in Nigeria. We still have the cases of the corrupt ex-governors pending and from the antics of our own Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Michael Aondoakaa, SAN, flexing a lot of unnecessary, misplaced and misinformed muscles with the EFCC (This man is definitely compromised and an interested party with another ex-governor’s EFCC case, and should be made to declare his interests) in the Orji Kalu case, it seems they are bent on quashing the case, and letting Kalu go scot-free - and there is a real concern for us about this development. This does not bode well for Nigeria or for the stance of Maduekwe and the government he represents.
Another instance is the shenanigan of the Speaker of the House, Patricia Etteh, a former hair-dresser, who has proved to us that what a Nigerian man can do in terms of corruption, a Nigerian woman can surely do better. Her silence has been deafening on this issue of the house renovation contract scam. If the Number 4 citizen of Nigeria can be involved in such a mess, what is the point of asking the world to have a positive image of Nigeria, and threatening brimstone and fire on those countries that do not?
With several corrupt former Governors still parading themselves imperiously on the streets of Abuja, still on the beck and call of the President, and appear seemingly untouchable, it will be hard to convince the world that we are still waging this war against corruption in government in earnest and with sincerity of purpose. And this renders Ojo Maduekwe’s utterances useless, and unfortunately irrelevant.
Chief Maduekwe explained further: “Our foreign policy has come of age and the age of innocence is over. We remain proud of our track record right from Tafawa Balewa up till now. The country that has the largest black nation in the world could not have done otherwise. A world where every six black man is a Nigerian could not have done otherwise, or where every four Africans is a Nigerian could not have done otherwise. We should ask ourselves some hard questions: to what extents has our foreign policy benefited Nigerians? To what extent has our foreign policy put food on our tables? In other words, where is the citizen in our foreign policy?”
The man is somehow asking the right questions and making the right noises, however, it is unfortunate that he is talking about “track records”. This is arrant nonsense and double speaks. There is no track record to be proud of. Successive Nigerian governments have nothing to be proud of in terms of promoting positive image of Nigeria or tackling corruption. Our foreign policies over the years have been inconsistent or even non-existent as far as putting food on the tables of Nigerians or looking after the interests of Nigerians all over the world. In fact, whatever little policy they have made has only been made to benefit those in government, and not the Nigerian masses.
How helpful have Nigerian foreign missions all over the world been towards Nigerians living abroad, for instance? There are too many instances of neglect to be mentioned, but it is all the same sad stories. Nigerian diplomats have never taken care of either our image or the Nigerians living abroad. In fact, coming to think of it, in generality, how helpful have Nigerian governments been to even Nigerians living in Nigeria not to talk of the ones abroad? Are we going to showcase poverty, sufferings, high mortality, lack of basic healthcare, moribund education, lack of electricity, water, good roads, etc, that our leaders have visited upon us for several decades as a result of their greed, corrupt behaviour and selfishness? How sincere are Maduekwe’s words, no matter how commendable? Are we right to say “We have heard this before?”
We are very high and famous on good intentions, but low on implementations. The former Education Minister, Tunde Adeniran himself, presenting a book; what was his achievement as the education minister during Obasanjo’s administration? What positive changes did he bring about in the education sector during his tenure that warrants him writing a book?
Despite all these, we are glad to know that at least a Nigerian Government is starting to take note and make moves to address the problems of Nigeria’s negative global image. It has long been overdue, but as mentioned above, we cannot embark on such moves without putting our own house in order. It might well turn out to be an exercise in futility. It is generally acknowledged that the Obasanjo Administration spent a lot of money, time and effort on redeeming the image of Nigeria by being the first Nigerian government in recent memory to actually try to tackle corruption, albeit patently unsuccessful and selective, laden with political vindictiveness and without much respect and reference to the rule of law and constitutionality. Also the immediate past administration went on a publicity and charm offensive to persuade the world that Nigeria is not all about corruption. This must be commended, but we are all aware that we have a lot more to do. Not rhetoric and posturing or muscle-flexing against an already, wrongly or rightly, biased world.
So in a way, I agree with the words of Ojo Maduekwe, to the effect that it is an obvious fact that Nigerians are perceived in several ways, - in a negative light - more often than not. However, there is an urgent need to do a lot more, rather than wait for that 'someone' or 'the government' or 'the society' to heal the wounds that we all carry around - our cultural identity as “Nigerian”.
All over the world, it is a known fact that one out of every black person is a Nigerian and every four African is a Nigerian. Our duties towards redeeming the image of the black race is beyond what lip-service can do. A little bit from each and everyone of us counts. Standing out of the crowd for something good, can, and will surely make a difference. We have to start a sharing of responsibilities, positive values and accomplishments, a projection in the positive light - of our heroes past and present and the accomplishments and the potentials of our fatherland. It is time for a positive change. Nigeria, and indeed Nigerians deserve a positive image. We cannot continue to move around the world as a people with the millstone of negative publicity, image and bad reputation or disrepute hanging around our necks everytime.
As our Foreign Minister himself posited, Nigeria carries enormous burden to be the symbol of the success of the black nation and there could never be a black success story, “unless it is a Nigeria success story.”
Yes, Nigeria may, can and should adopt a “Citizenship Diplomacy” approach to the whole world, but we must back this up with the sincerity of purpose and approach to all our problems at home. It is not good enough to know that after almost fifty years as a nation, and blessed with the kind of resources – human and material – that we have, our people are still wallowing in abject poverty and desperation, while our leaders are looting the treasuries all over the country, and living unimaginable expensive lifestyles and spiriting the loot out of Nigeria and depositing it in the countries we are trying to force this citizenship diplomacy on.
In a country where a convicted ex-governor can return to his home state and be given a hero’s welcome, where the same convict has the ear of the President of the country as to what to be done with the Niger Delta problem as a “consultant” and who threw a multi-million Naira, well-attended party to entertain important guests on his daughter’s wedding, it does not bode well for, nor confer any legitimacy or sincerity on Maduekwe’s and the Government of Nigeria’s position on citizenship diplomacy. It is sending out the wrong signals from this government to the world that they want to impress. The government of Nigeria cannot also not eat its cake and have it and must know that it cannot continue to pull the wool over a lot of Nigerian eyes anymore. The people of Nigeria can see through the charade and falsehood and double-speak.
More action, less rhetoric.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. A graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985), he also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigerians in America, Nigerian Nigeria Village Square, etc.
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
“Only mediocrity can be trusted to be always at its best”. - Max Beerbohm
Nigeria’s new Minister of Foreign Affairs, Chief Ojo Maduekwe, who spoke recently at a book presentation by former Minister of Education, Professor Tunde Adeniran, in Abuja, announced a “retaliatory” foreign policy, warning that any country that presents Nigeria as corrupt without showcasing the intellect of Nigerians would be declared a “hostile nation”. He further said that it is geared towards “protecting” the image and integrity of Nigeria and retaliates against countries who are hostile and who brand Nigeria as “corrupt”.
While Chief Ojo Maduekwe’s statement is very commendable, we should look beyond mere rhetoric, as all our leaders and representatives have been posturing over the decades. The problem is that most of them do not mean what they say, and neither do they practice what they preach, not only to their fellow Nigerians, but also to the world in general. In most cases, our rulers come up with great ideas and words to that effect and espouse seemingly noble causes that will make the country’s image, and indeed, the lives of their people better, but end up not doing anything at all. Of course, Nigerians are used to this, but it is our sincere hope that this will not the same way as things have been going since independence.
On the face of it, I quite agree with Maduekwe’s new diplomatic policy – that is, encouraging other countries to promote the positive aspects of Nigeria and Nigerians and not just the negative and derogatory. We are also in agreement that for every single 419 fraudster and corrupt instance, there are hundreds of Nigerians all over the world who should be recognised positively for the positive image they portray of Nigeria and Nigerians. There is no doubt about this.
However, charity begins at home, so they say and should apply. What the Honourable Minister, and the rest of the Nigerian Government should be applying their energy and efforts to, is contributing to this new image by exorcising the devil in their own midst. The fact remains that corruption is still endemic in Nigeria. We still have the cases of the corrupt ex-governors pending and from the antics of our own Attorney-General and Minister for Justice, Michael Aondoakaa, SAN, flexing a lot of unnecessary, misplaced and misinformed muscles with the EFCC (This man is definitely compromised and an interested party with another ex-governor’s EFCC case, and should be made to declare his interests) in the Orji Kalu case, it seems they are bent on quashing the case, and letting Kalu go scot-free - and there is a real concern for us about this development. This does not bode well for Nigeria or for the stance of Maduekwe and the government he represents.
Another instance is the shenanigan of the Speaker of the House, Patricia Etteh, a former hair-dresser, who has proved to us that what a Nigerian man can do in terms of corruption, a Nigerian woman can surely do better. Her silence has been deafening on this issue of the house renovation contract scam. If the Number 4 citizen of Nigeria can be involved in such a mess, what is the point of asking the world to have a positive image of Nigeria, and threatening brimstone and fire on those countries that do not?
With several corrupt former Governors still parading themselves imperiously on the streets of Abuja, still on the beck and call of the President, and appear seemingly untouchable, it will be hard to convince the world that we are still waging this war against corruption in government in earnest and with sincerity of purpose. And this renders Ojo Maduekwe’s utterances useless, and unfortunately irrelevant.
Chief Maduekwe explained further: “Our foreign policy has come of age and the age of innocence is over. We remain proud of our track record right from Tafawa Balewa up till now. The country that has the largest black nation in the world could not have done otherwise. A world where every six black man is a Nigerian could not have done otherwise, or where every four Africans is a Nigerian could not have done otherwise. We should ask ourselves some hard questions: to what extents has our foreign policy benefited Nigerians? To what extent has our foreign policy put food on our tables? In other words, where is the citizen in our foreign policy?”
The man is somehow asking the right questions and making the right noises, however, it is unfortunate that he is talking about “track records”. This is arrant nonsense and double speaks. There is no track record to be proud of. Successive Nigerian governments have nothing to be proud of in terms of promoting positive image of Nigeria or tackling corruption. Our foreign policies over the years have been inconsistent or even non-existent as far as putting food on the tables of Nigerians or looking after the interests of Nigerians all over the world. In fact, whatever little policy they have made has only been made to benefit those in government, and not the Nigerian masses.
How helpful have Nigerian foreign missions all over the world been towards Nigerians living abroad, for instance? There are too many instances of neglect to be mentioned, but it is all the same sad stories. Nigerian diplomats have never taken care of either our image or the Nigerians living abroad. In fact, coming to think of it, in generality, how helpful have Nigerian governments been to even Nigerians living in Nigeria not to talk of the ones abroad? Are we going to showcase poverty, sufferings, high mortality, lack of basic healthcare, moribund education, lack of electricity, water, good roads, etc, that our leaders have visited upon us for several decades as a result of their greed, corrupt behaviour and selfishness? How sincere are Maduekwe’s words, no matter how commendable? Are we right to say “We have heard this before?”
We are very high and famous on good intentions, but low on implementations. The former Education Minister, Tunde Adeniran himself, presenting a book; what was his achievement as the education minister during Obasanjo’s administration? What positive changes did he bring about in the education sector during his tenure that warrants him writing a book?
Despite all these, we are glad to know that at least a Nigerian Government is starting to take note and make moves to address the problems of Nigeria’s negative global image. It has long been overdue, but as mentioned above, we cannot embark on such moves without putting our own house in order. It might well turn out to be an exercise in futility. It is generally acknowledged that the Obasanjo Administration spent a lot of money, time and effort on redeeming the image of Nigeria by being the first Nigerian government in recent memory to actually try to tackle corruption, albeit patently unsuccessful and selective, laden with political vindictiveness and without much respect and reference to the rule of law and constitutionality. Also the immediate past administration went on a publicity and charm offensive to persuade the world that Nigeria is not all about corruption. This must be commended, but we are all aware that we have a lot more to do. Not rhetoric and posturing or muscle-flexing against an already, wrongly or rightly, biased world.
So in a way, I agree with the words of Ojo Maduekwe, to the effect that it is an obvious fact that Nigerians are perceived in several ways, - in a negative light - more often than not. However, there is an urgent need to do a lot more, rather than wait for that 'someone' or 'the government' or 'the society' to heal the wounds that we all carry around - our cultural identity as “Nigerian”.
All over the world, it is a known fact that one out of every black person is a Nigerian and every four African is a Nigerian. Our duties towards redeeming the image of the black race is beyond what lip-service can do. A little bit from each and everyone of us counts. Standing out of the crowd for something good, can, and will surely make a difference. We have to start a sharing of responsibilities, positive values and accomplishments, a projection in the positive light - of our heroes past and present and the accomplishments and the potentials of our fatherland. It is time for a positive change. Nigeria, and indeed Nigerians deserve a positive image. We cannot continue to move around the world as a people with the millstone of negative publicity, image and bad reputation or disrepute hanging around our necks everytime.
As our Foreign Minister himself posited, Nigeria carries enormous burden to be the symbol of the success of the black nation and there could never be a black success story, “unless it is a Nigeria success story.”
Yes, Nigeria may, can and should adopt a “Citizenship Diplomacy” approach to the whole world, but we must back this up with the sincerity of purpose and approach to all our problems at home. It is not good enough to know that after almost fifty years as a nation, and blessed with the kind of resources – human and material – that we have, our people are still wallowing in abject poverty and desperation, while our leaders are looting the treasuries all over the country, and living unimaginable expensive lifestyles and spiriting the loot out of Nigeria and depositing it in the countries we are trying to force this citizenship diplomacy on.
In a country where a convicted ex-governor can return to his home state and be given a hero’s welcome, where the same convict has the ear of the President of the country as to what to be done with the Niger Delta problem as a “consultant” and who threw a multi-million Naira, well-attended party to entertain important guests on his daughter’s wedding, it does not bode well for, nor confer any legitimacy or sincerity on Maduekwe’s and the Government of Nigeria’s position on citizenship diplomacy. It is sending out the wrong signals from this government to the world that they want to impress. The government of Nigeria cannot also not eat its cake and have it and must know that it cannot continue to pull the wool over a lot of Nigerian eyes anymore. The people of Nigeria can see through the charade and falsehood and double-speak.
More action, less rhetoric.
Akintokunbo Adejumo, a social and political commentator on Nigerian issues, lives and works in London, UK. A graduate of the University of Ibadan, Nigeria (1979) and University of Manitoba, Canada (1985), he also writes on topical issues for newspapers and internet media including Nigeriaworld.com, Nigeria Today Online, Nigerians in America, Nigerian Nigeria Village Square, etc.
He is also the Coordinator of CHAMPIONS FOR NIGERIA, an organisation devoted to celebrating genuine progress, excellence, commitment, selfless and unalloyed service to Nigeria and the people of Nigeria.
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