US duplicity in Iraq

 

In many ways, the United States’ misadventure in
Iraq and the conduct of some of its troops, continue to question the claim of many Americans to superior moral conduct. 

Perception of the US, under President George Bush’s watch, as a rogue state is increasing, and the duplicitous manner the administration is handling reported cases of gross human rights abuses by American soldiers in Iraq has not helped matters. 

An article in last week’s edition of The Economist¹ magazine indicated that many American soldiers who committed grievous crimes, including premeditated murder and rape, against innocent Iraqi civilians, are never given tough sentences. 

American Civil-liberties groups such as Human Rights First and Human Rights Watch even allege that only an insignificant fraction of such crimes has been adequately investigated. 

The US which is not only the aggressor but also illegally occupies
Iraq promulgated a law which gives its soldiers immunity from prosecution. Even where global outcry, like in the Abu Ghraib prison scandal, forces it into action, Americans always insist on carrying out the investigation on their own with little or no input from the Iraqi authorities. 

This level of arrogance is at the root of the inflamed passion in the
Middle East. 

For a country that claims to lay much stock on fundamental human rights, this double standards galls. What moral right does the Bush administration have to incarcerate suspected Taliban and al-Qaeda militants at

Guantanamo
Bay for more than five years while shielding American soldiers who have committed similar, or even more grievous, crimes against humanity from prosecution?

 

Nuhu Ribadu’s List Of Prejudice

Nuhu Ribadu, EFCC chairman 

Every well-meaning Nigerian, both at home and in the Diaspora, should be worried at the direction the country is headed. Once again, Nigeria is tottering on the brink of political crisis, the implications of which, nobody can fully predict.   In countries where the people matter, with only two months left before general election, the tempo of political activities would have peaked by now. The politicians ought to be criss-crossing the nooks and crannies of the country, selling their vision and their parties’ manifestoes to the electorate, pleading and hoping that the people buy into such programmes. But not in Nigeria! Here, barely sixty days to the polls, Nigerians hardly know the candidates, what they stand for and why they should entrust their destiny to them. Many political parties are yet to flag off their campaigns. In fact, many are yet to finally decide on their candidates.  Two months to the elections, party leaders are busy lining their pockets with filthy lucre from would-be candidates, selling tickets to highest bidders. And you ask: what was the need for the primary (s)elections? As the April polls approach, the party apparatchiks are busy submitting, this minute and withdrawing the next minute, lists of candidates to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). As they engage in this game of musical chairs, the names on the lists continue to change. Within 24 hours, an aspirant’s status could change from a candidate to defeated aspirant and again to candidate.  Again, the implication is that rather than going to the grassroots to canvass for votes, many aspirants have relocated to Abuja in their desperation to safeguard their tickets. At the end of the day, many of those who would fly the parties’ flags, if the elections hold, are not necessarily those produced by the parties’ internal democratic mechanism but those whose pockets are deep enough to assuage the greed of unconscionable party officials.  As if this distraction is not enough, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) finally threw the axiomatic spanner in the electoral works last week by releasing its so-called list of “investigated and indicted” politicians who are not worthy of holding public office. As expected, this latest EFCC gambit, an action which smacks of political mischief, is generating controversy. It will be interesting to see how the EFCC chairman, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu convinces Nigerians, who can easily see through the subterfuge, that his overriding goal in compiling this list is to further the ends of the fight against corruption. It will be sad if, rather than levy a resolute war on sleaze, those saddled with this historic responsibility resort to blackmail, fighting proxy wars on behalf of certain political interest groups. It will even be more so if in doing this, they disingenuously exploit the deep seated aversion which ordinary Nigerians have for graft and their simmering desire to rid their country of this asphyxiating malaise. It is in itself an act of corruption, in fact a more hideous genre, to feed on such a national phobia, knowing full well that even when barely disguised political vendetta is hoisted on the totem pole of anti-corruption, many people are wont to tread carefully in opposing it. By allowing the commission to be tied to the apron strings of the presidency contrary to the dictates of the EFCC Act, Ribadu will continue to commit this avoidable faux pas, which smacks of bad faith and hypocrisy. And by so doing, he would, sooner than later, erode the confidence of Nigerians in the only agency they can look up to in their desperate quest to retrieve the soul of their country from kleptomaniacs who steal out of compulsion. How do I mean? Even to the most undiscerning, it is obvious that the list could well have been compiled in Aso Rock and handed to the EFCC. 

First, the agency leaked the list to the media early last week; making it known that it was only then dispatching a copy to the presidency. The idea was to create the impression that the list was compiled independent of any external influence. Ribadu, in an accompanying letter said the list was to help guide the parties in their choice of candidates and therefore merely advisory. Yet, this list only came after the parties had concluded their primaries. Shouldn’t such a list aimed at helping the political parties make more credible choices come before the primary elections? Second, the presidency said it had no hand in compiling the list. Yet, on the same day, Wednesday, February 7, that the list was leaked to the media, the same presidency that denied fore-knowledge had already set up an administrative panel of enquiry, summoning 26 of those whose names are on the list, through the Nigerian Television Authority, to appear before it on Friday and Saturday, to defend allegations of corruption against them. A day later, 62 more names were included in the list of those invited to face the panel. When did the presidency study the list, which if Ribadu is to be believed, it only got on Wednesday; and when was the panel set up? Why would the EFCC send the list to the presidency rather than charge the accused to court, as required by the EFCC Act?  Third, the fact of the panel is an act of bad faith. Granted, the Federal Government has the power to set up a panel of enquiry pursuant to Section 103 of the 1999 Constitution. But is this panel investigative, in which case, it will only look into the veracity or otherwise of the allegations, or is it, in the manner of the Bayo Ojo-led panel, that purportedly indicted Vice President Atiku Abubakar, judicial? It is obvious that this panel was set up for the sole purpose of indicting those invited in a desperate bid to satisfy a constitutional precondition for barring a candidate from contesting election. Having been “investigated and indicted” by EFCC, what guarantee is there that the accused will get fair hearing from this panel, which constitution has the imprint of the same EFCC? That makes the anti-graft body the accuser, investigator, prosecutor and judge, all in one. That flies in the face of justice. EFCC has the powers to investigate and charge an accused to court. It has no power to indict, as that power falls only within the purview of courts and duly constituted tribunals. Fourth, Senator Ahmed Aruwa, the Kaduna State All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) gubernatorial candidate told his colleagues in the Senate on Thursday that he was never at any time invited by the Commission in connection with any investigation. Many of the so-called “investigated and indicted” politicians whose names are on that list have equally cried out. How could a man be investigated and indicted for serious crimes without being given a fair hearing? What offences did they commit and when, how and where were the offences committed? Nigerians need to know. After all, these are supposed to be crimes committed against Nigerians and the Nigerian state and not against the person of Ribadu. As much as Nigerians want corrupt officials to be sanctioned, they don’t want to be turned into a lynch mob, corralled into baying for the blood of people who at best are mere suspects.  Here, Ribadu cannot claim to be constrained by the constitution because many of those involved do not enjoy any constitutional immunity from investigation and prosecution. He could even arrest most of them if he so wished. So, why didn’t he do that? Why is he “charging” his quarries to a presidential panel of enquiry rather than the courts after unilaterally investigating and indicting them? Why the seeming haste to sacrifice fairness and justice on the alter of political expediency? The most plausible explanation is the impression so brazenly created that the driving force behind this so called war on corruption is vendetta, not justice. After all, Ribadu cannot say in good conscience that the courts have not been sympathetic to the anti-corruption cause because such a claim will not be borne out by the facts. EFCC has secured many historic convictions via the courts? It flies in the face of justice to deny people indicted of corruption an opportunity to defend themselves in court. Beyond the issue of bad faith is Ribadu’s duplicity as this list of “investigated and indicted” politicians would show. Granted, it will be difficult for one book to contain the names of all the corrupt people in
Nigeria, because that book could well be a multi- million page book. Yet, no credit is done either to Ribadu’s integrity or the credibility of EFCC when certain names are conspicuously missing from the list. For instance, is it not curious that the name of Chief Adebayo Alao-Akala, deputy governor of Oyo
State and PDP gubernatorial candidate is missing from the list? Yet, here was a man who Ribadu, ten days ago, publicly declared unfit to be a leader on account of gross misdemeanour. When did Ribadu realise that Alao-Akala is a saint after all? Is it not curious that in Anambra, those whose names are on the list, from the state House of Assembly, are the very lawmakers who opposed the purported impeachment of Governor Peter Obi? Could Ribadu tell Nigerians what crime Dr. Olanrewaju Tejuosho, ANPP senatorial candidate in Ogun Central, a man who is not a public official, committ other than having the audacity to challenge Nigeria’s reigning “first daughter” to a political duel?  It will be a grave error on our part to indulge Ribadu, no-matter how altruistic he may claim to be, by giving him the God-like powers of sitting in the comfort of his office and determining all alone, with no provable evidence other than his hunch, which Nigerian is corrupt, and therefore not fit to hold public office, in this politically charged atmosphere. Only angels could be entrusted with such responsibility without fear of possible abuse and they (angels) are not known to dwell among men, at least, not in the EFCC office. Ribadu should appreciate that waging this all-important anti-corruption war from the platform of prejudice is to defeat its essence.  Nigerians have for long come to the inevitable conclusion that corruption is a malignant cancer blighting the soul of the country; it is a spectre which has haunted them endlessly and which they have agreed must be exorcised from our body-politic if we are to reclaim our country. But using the war on corruption to serve political ends will not only be a disservice, it will ultimately boomerang.                  

A Country And Its Strange Citizens

Nigeria’s Vice President Atiku Abubakar

Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), asked a question that has concentrated the minds of many, particularly people outside our shores, for too long.

Speaking during a seminar organised by the University of Ibadan chapter of the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), Ribadu wondered aloud why in the face of the wanton rape of our patrimony by unconscionable men and women who call themselves leaders, Nigerians are not angry.

No doubt, it was a deeply pained Ribadu that asked his audience why they chose to remain the “happiest” people in the world in the face of their contrived grim situation. “Why can’t we be angry?” he asked them. Knowing Nigerians well, rather than mope and feel very unhappy and full of pity for themselves at that point, most must have giggled hysterically.

But Ribadu was not done yet. “Where is the outrage among our compatriots who are so easily pricked to revolt in instances of ethnic and religious challenge…where is the revolt from the elite, the academics and the professionals who are engines of social growth in any community?” Of course, he got a standing ovation for his speech.

But Ribadu could well have saved his breath. Nigerians are a special breed of people. They have the incomprehensible and bizarre capacity of being happy in the worst of circumstances. A Nigerian could even applaud a man, contemptuous enough of him, to rape his mother in his presence.

Ribadu was wondering why any human being with any sense of self would perceive Chiefs Lamidi Adedibu and Bayo Alao-Akala as leaders.

In any decent society, Adedibu would by now be spending his thuggish life in jail. But not in
Nigeria! Here, he is applauded, even by those at the highest reaches of government, as the issue in Oyo, if not Yoruba, politics. And you wonder what calibre of human beings populate this country.

You can hardly see any other people than can endure the humiliation, degradation, deprivations, squalor and ruin that our so-called leaders visit on us everyday. Rarely can you see any leadership elsewhere, treat its citizens with so much contempt, scorn and condescension without having a revolt on their hands.

Revolt does not necessarily have to be violent. But there comes a time in the life of a people when they cannot but protest against the attitude of their leaders towards them. Why are Nigerians not revolted by the salacious confessions of the two highest ranking public office holders in the country?

Early last month, many Britons were up in arms against the Communities Secretary, Ms Ruth Kelly, who decided to send her son to a £15,000-a-year specialist private prep school in Oxfordshire to help with his learning difficulties. Her nine-year-old son is suffering from dyslexia, a slight disorder of the brain that causes difficulty in reading and spelling. Before taking on her current job in May 2006, she was the Education Secretary for 17 months.

Ms Kelly’s three other children still attend a state school in Tower Hamlets, east London. The outrage over her decision to put her son with “substantial learning difficulties” in a private school forced her to issue a public statement explaining that she took the decision based on “professional advice – which the local authority accepts” and that the boy will only be in the school for two years “before he begins at a state secondary school.”

But the people were not impressed. Their anger was not assuaged by her plea. To them, the minister’s conduct was hypocritical. While conceding her the right to offer her child the best, which includes placing him in a school that will be able to meet his particular needs, their angst border on the fact that not all Britons can afford to send their dyslexic children to a £15,000 private school. They argue that it is the responsibility of the government to strengthen the capacity of public schools to handle such cases by increasing funding for special-needs provision within the state sector.

Here in the UK, Prime Minister Tony Blair’s children are enrolled in the same public schools attended by the children of the Nigerian immigrant who is working as a factory labourer.

Presently, the anger of the British people is boiling over because of the cash-for-peerages scandal. Penultimate Friday, the police interviewed Tony Blair for 45 minutes. That was the second time he would be quizzed over the matter. Lord Levy, Labour Party’s chief fundraiser had already been arrested and questioned on suspicion of perverting the course of justice. The people are scandalised that their government was selling “national honours,” which ought to be conferred on merit, to the highest bidders.

Recently, Washington DC erupted in anger as Americans vented their spleen on their president over the Iraqi war. All over the world, people revolt against their governments when they err. But not in
Nigeria! You would hardly hear a whimper no matter how horrendous a government policy is.

Britons are angry that a former Education Minister sent her educationally-challenged son to a private school rather than ensuring that the government provides the same facilities in public schools where the children of both the poor and the rich would have equal access. And you ask: Why are Nigerians not angry that their leaders destroyed public schools only to establish private universities and secondary schools where only the children of the rich can acquire decent education?

Why are Nigerians not angry that their leaders send their children to the best private and public schools in Europe and America, with public funds, to acquire the best of education while own children are left at the mercy of demoralised teachers, dilapidated infrastructure and cultists?

Why are Nigerians not angry that the Lords of the manor are busy equipping their children with the right skills through decent education, acquired at public expense, while ensuring that their own children end up as ‘drawers of water and hewers of wood?’

Why are Nigerians not gnashing their teeth at their so-called leaders who are happy leaving the Nigerian hospitals the way they met them eight years ago – mere consulting clinics or even worse, while they travel abroad for the treatment of the commonest of ailments?

Almost every Nigerian leader who has died in the past decade died either in a South African, Saudi Arabian, European or American hospital. They proudly announce when they are going for their regular medical check-ups abroad. Yet, hospitals at home cannot boast of the commonest of drugs and the people are not complaining.

Why are Nigerians not fuming that the private businesses of their leaders, which they run from public office, are flourishing while theirs are dying everyday due to harsh economic environment?

While are Nigerians not beside themselves with rage that their leaders can raise N2 billion “loan” from the banks, using nothing other than their offices as collateral when they cannot get from the same banks a paltry N20,000 to finance their small-scale businesses?

Ribadu alleged that a governor bought four aircraft for his personal use. Nigerian leaders no longer travel in commercial aircraft. Those who have not bought their own planes now charter jets to move about in the country and even to travel abroad. The aircraft in the presidential fleet is enough to resuscitate the moribund Nigeria Airways. Our leaders now fly from one part of the country to the other in jumbo jets. When they land at the nearest airport, they hop into waiting helicopters to complete the journey to their villages. Yet, in this same country, poverty walks on all fours. Minimum wage a month remains N7,500, equivalent of £30.

Why are Nigerians not fuming that those who are enjoying these luxuries at their expense have not been considerate enough even to build good roads for them?

Why is it that Nigerians don’t get angry when they see men and women with whom they were living in squalid ‘face-me-I-face-you,’ riding in the same molue bus with 44 sitting and 77 standing, and eating at the same buka only yesterday suddenly become multi-millionaires who can afford to send their children to Europe and ride the best cars simply because they are now in government?

Why is it that Nigerians cannot get angry when they go out on Election Day to vote for those they want to be their leaders, only for other people to be announced winners at the end of the day?

What stops indigenes of Oyo State from venting their spleen on Adedibu and his co-travellers on the boulevard of infamy? What stops them from staging a massive protest in Ibadan, vowing never to get off the streets unless and until the police arrest Adedibu over his illegal possession of six Independent National Electoral Commission’s Direct Data Capture machines.

What stops Anambra indigenes from marching to the state House of Assembly and sacking the thugs pretending to be lawmakers? What stops indigenes of Oyo from sacking the ruffians who have turned the hallowed lawmaking chambers into marijuana smoking complex?

Why can’t Nigerians protest unless someone rents them for the purpose of scoring cheap political points against their enemies?

Of course, many will point at the brutal character of the Nigerian state and sadistic tendency of those in power who will not hesitate in unleashing violence on citizens who dare protest. But that is defeatist. How many people can the police kill when the righteous anger of the people boil over.

Nigerians have themselves to blame for the impunity of those in power. In any other clime other than ours, the anger of the people would have by now left so many so-called leaders swinging in the wind. In
Nigeria, we would rather pray for them to live long. They kill, maim and rig themselves into power and insult us with the mumbo-jumbo that power comes from God and we ululate.

And to imagine that these same people that cannot raise a finger of protest in the face of impudent heist of their patrimony will not think twice before pouncing on each other, killing and maiming themselves, in an orgy of religious cum ethnic warfare. Ours is indeed a strange county, populated by strange people.

          

      

General Muhammadu Buhari

2007: Again, We Have Lost It 

Many a time, you would hear some Nigerians, those who claim to wear epaulettes of patriotism, take umbrage at some others who genuinely agonise over the country’s inability to make any appreciable progress on the democratic front. To them, it is nonsensical to expect Nigeria to be up and running democratically because the country itself is only but a tot, yet to be weaned on the tenets of democracy.

It does not bother such people that Nigeria is 46. If you dare cite example with an event in the US, they will pillory you, arguing that America became independent in late 18^th century and has practised democracy for over two centuries.  But those who use age to rationalise our insalubrious political conduct forget that in the same western hemisphere, there is also a country called Haiti, the world’s first black-led republic which became independent in 1804; the first Caribbean state to achieve independence. Today, Haiti remains the poorest nation in the Americas without a scintilla of democratic culture.  

Again, our self-acclaimed patriots would situate Haiti’s difficulties in its tortuous history. They forget that until 1775 when war broke out between the British and the American colonists, leading to the 1776 declaration of independence by the colonists and eventual recognition of US independence by
Britain in 1783, the former was a colony of the latter.  Right here in Africa, Liberia which was founded in 1821 as a haven for freed American slaves became independent in 1847 and adopted a US-style constitution. It was never an official US colony or a colony of any other country. Yet, until last year, Liberia remained a hell on earth, while Ghana, a country poised to celebrate her golden jubilee this year has become an exemplar of a thriving democratic country. I have given these examples just to buttress the point that age has little or nothing to do with a country’s ability to grapple with the intricacies of democracy. What counts is the sincerity of purpose and vision of the leadership. The people on the other hand must be eternally vigilant. Therefore, that Nigeria is being nourished on an exiguous democratic diet has less to do with the fact that it got its independence from Britain 46 years ago. But it has everything to do with the treachery and perfidy of leadership, and the docility of the followers. Democracy is a game of benchmarks. There must be minimum levels of expectations by us, from those who aspire to rule. Positions of leadership should not be an all-comers affair. A man who aspires to lead must evince certain qualities. And the people must imbue in the process of leadership selection a certain level of authority. The process of selecting the leaders of a country should be a very serious one. It should not be reduced to a circus. That is what makes the difference between America and Haiti, Ghana and Liberia, Benin Republic and Nigeria; countries with discernible democratic ethos and those that have repudiated same

This difference explains why, almost two years to America’s presidential election, the entire country has become electrified by the mere act of aspirants taking the putative steps of setting up exploratory committees, which is no more than the declaration of their intention to explore further their intention of aspiring for America’s presidency in 2008.

In the US, both the aspirants and the citizenry know what the issues are. They appreciate the problems facing America. They are desirous of solving those problems and that will form the kernel of the campaigns from the primary to the general election. The candidates must, in very explicit manner, tell the people where they stand on those issues and what answers they would bring to bear on the myriad of problems confronting America today.

The debate has started in earnest. The people are scrutinising rigorously not only the private lives of those who have taken the tentative step of making their aspirations known, they are querying their antecedents. Thus Hillary Rodham Clinton, the New York senator who voted, authorising George Bush to wage what Chinua Achebe would call a ‘war of blame’ in Iraq but who in recent times is chanting the anti-war mantra is being asked to explain the difference between ‘authorisation’ and ‘declaration’ of war.

Two years before the election and only with her declaration of intention, Americans are reminding her of the scandals that buffeted the administrations of her husband in which she was very visible and played roles far weightier than those of a first lady, right from the little state of Arkansas to the White House. But here in Nigeria, two months to the general election, those who call themselves frontrunners are unable to articulate the reason why they want to be president. Yet, the issues are straightforward. It is self-evident that Nigeria is in a deep hole. Forty-six years after independence, Nigeria’s socio-economic status remains dire. The country occupies the unenviable status as one of the 20 counties in the world with the lowest Human Development Index (HDI) in the ranking of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). Standard of living is one of the lowest in the world; same as life expectancy. The country’s infrastructural backbone has broken down completely and corruption remains rife. Security of lives and properly has become a mirage, while unemployment has hit the roof. Per capita income embarrassingly remains one of the lowest in the world. A low intensity war is being waged in the creeks by Niger Delta militants against the Nigerian state. So, the least the candidates are expected to do by now is to come up with unambiguous, well thought-out policies that would address these problems and by so doing signal the beginning of the long and difficult climb out of the very deep hole our leaders have dug.

But what have we seen so far? The candidates are saying it is too much of an expectation. PDP presidential candidate wants our votes because he supports the present administration’s reforms programme. Whatever it is! Most of those in the opposition want our votes because they are opposed to the programme. Why? We don’t know. None of them seems to have an original idea how to pull
Nigeria out of this hole. And you would expect the people to be scandalised. No! They have constituted themselves into an orchestra, clapping and cheering, obviously beside themselves with joy.

Thus, on Wednesday, January 25, Umaru Yara’Adua, PDP flag bearer was in Anambra to meet with the people. At the palace of the traditional ruler of Awka, Obi Gibson Nwosu, he told Anambrarians why he wants to be their president. Hear him: “My party and myself, we are seeking to reunite because our party and our president are doing great reforms that seek to transform completely our great nation so that we join other developed nations of the world to become a developed industrial nation and we are going to make sure that we leave in peace under democratic rule, in harmony with one another, in prosperity. This is the vision of our president and the Peoples Democratic Party and this is what is going to be my vision and those of my colleagues when we form the government in May 2007 by the grace of God.” How inane can a speech be?

 Then on Saturday, the party formally flagged off its campaign at the Tafawa Balewa Square in Lagos. Again, hear Yara’Adua: “We will do everything within our power to realise the PDP dream. We are sincere, honest and determined to ensure that Nigeria achieves greatness. On this, there is no going back. I want to call on all Nigerians wherever they are to choose the path of PDP, to choose the path of greatness, to choose the path of progress.”  

But this rather vacuous speech begs obvious questions. What is this so-called PDP dream that Yara’Adua wants to realise and for which he wants Nigerians to elect him president? What steps will he take to realise this dream assuming there is a dream? Why must Nigerians buy into this dream? The implication is that either the man hasn’t any idea what he wants to do to turn around the damning fortunes of the country or lacks the ability to articulate these ideas and communicate same in an intelligible manner to the people, or both. Sincerity and honesty of a leader, important as they are, do not on their own necessarily guaranty a nation’s greatness. Such virtues can only compliment the vision of the leader. A leader must have an idea of what the problems of his country are, what the people want and what is expected of him and articulate distinct, comprehensible, coherent and lucid policies to tackle those problems so as to meet the people’s expectations. If Yara’Adua has any, he is yet to tell Nigerians what they are. It is not enough for a man aspiring for the highest office in a country, a man asking 140 million people to put their destiny in his hands to hide under the policies of his party and say nothing of how he intends to pilot the affairs of the state. When the political chips are down, the president who is the Commander-in-Chief takes the decisions and not the party.   

But, he is not alone. Of the motley crowd that call themselves presidential candidates, only one or two have an idea of what the issues are and how to address them. Unfortunately, they are the very people that have been written off as not having what it takes to win elections in Nigeria.  The implication of all these is that again, we may have lost it. Many Nigerians had hoped that 2007 would present a very good opportunity for us to get it right. As the elections draw closer, that hope has become forlorn despite the flatulent boasts to the contrary in some quarters. We have an infinite capacity to prove our worst detractors right always. At every turn in the nation’s tortuous democratic peregrination, we keep making the same tragic mistakes that diminished us in the past. Even when we pretend to be making an effort at using our chequered history as a compass to navigate out of turbulent political storm, which the delicate art of nation building induces, such effort is at best perfunctory.                       

UN Job: Did Obasanjo Block Okonjo-Iweala? 

A Vietnamese friend drew my attention to the story last week. A politically discerning lady and a journalist with over ten years experience, we struck a relationship in our very first week in
Cardiff. Since then, discussion of international politics has become our pastime.

 

When the new UN Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki-Moon indicated his intention to appoint a woman from one of the developing countries, preferably Africa, as his deputy and the name of
Nigeria’s Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala started buzzing in diplomatic circles, she sought to know who the woman is. I told her that she was our immediate past Finance and Foreign Affairs Minister, a Harvard-trained economist and former senior staff of the World Bank.

 

I assured her that if Okonjo-Iweala’s name had been mentioned, then the job may well be hers. “Is she that good?” she asked. “Yes,” I answered without hesitation. “Ngozi is a genius. A damn hard worker and very intelligent woman, she turned around the macro-economic policies of the government and
Nigeria is the better for it. She is one of the best Finance Ministers any country could have,” I said, despite my reservations over some of the policies she foisted on the country all in the name of reforms.

 

You can then imagine my embarrassment when, last Wednesday, the lady confronted me with the question of why
Nigeria’s president blocked Okonjo-Iweala’s appointment at the UN. I dismissed the allegation immediately telling her that the Secretary-General for reasons best known to him preferred the Tanzanian Foreign Minister Asha-Rose Migiro to Ngozi and that the decision had nothing to do with the president of my country. She insisted that Ki-moon preferred Okonjo-Iweala but went for the Tanzanian because President Obasanjo could not give the requisite endorsement. Seeing my incredulity, she referred me to the story published by an Australian newspaper on the internet which Thisday newspaper eventually published last Friday. 

I am inclined to believing Mrs. Remi Oyo, the President’s media aide who dismissed the report as nothing but a tissue of lie. It would be unimaginable to believe otherwise; that a country’s president, out of spite, would prevent a citizen from bringing home the honour and rare privilege of being the world’s number two civil servant.

 

 Unfortunately, Obasanjo’s reputation for vindictiveness would make many believe the worst of him. The former minister bruised his huge, imperial sense-of-self by literarily walking out on him when she resigned. For a man so used to not only seeing ministers fidget before him but also fawn and massage his ego, Okonjo-Iweala’s audacity may have been recorded as a crime that must be punished.

 

It will be disastrous if the president saw her UN job bid as pay back time, an opportunity to extract his vengeful pound of flesh as it is being insinuated in diplomatic circles. Like I said earlier, it is unthinkable that any president would deny his country such an opportunity even if his worst enemy were to be the primary beneficiary. But with President Olusegun Obasanjo, no act, no matter how unseemly is unbecoming. Therefore, it is not enough that he has denied the allegation; the National Assembly should through its Foreign Affairs committees investigate the circumstances that led to Okonjo-Iweala’s failure at the UN. And if it is true that the president had any hand in it, then he has crossed the Rubicon and must be sanctioned.             

 

      

 

Peter Obi

‘Lawmakers’ As Thugs 

By Ikechukwu Amaechiikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.comhttp://www.amadikwa.wordpress.com  

Once again, the political mood in the beleaguered state of Anambra is febrile. It hasn’t been any better since 1999 though. But last week, the vile characters who call themselves lawmakers in the state House of Assembly raised the din of the contrived political crisis a notch higher. And by so doing, they finally left no one in doubt that they are nothing other than ruffians. And Anambrarians must be highly mortified that these pig-ignorant people claim to be making laws on their behalf for the good governance of the state.

 

But for how long will the people allow this impunity and brazen arrogance of power to go unchallenged, given that the reprehensible conduct of a few, continues to make the state and its indigenes plumb the depths of ignominy, almost in perpetuity?

 

Last Friday, the Mike Balonwu-led faction of the House proved beyond doubt that decorum and even legality are beyond their ken. That was the day they proved themselves to be no more than political thugs. To show how unruly they are and their scant regard for civilised conduct, the pro-impeachment lawmakers physically went to the Anambra State Government House to stop the governor from performing her constitutional duties.

 

The drama started on Wednesday. The National Judicial Council (NJC) wrote the

Anambra
State governor reaffirming the suspension of the disgraced Chief Judge, Chuka Okoli, and urged her to appoint an acting Chief Judge in his stead.

 

Justice Okoli was axed over his blameful role in the illegal impeachment of the de facto and de jure governor of the state, Mr. Peter Obi. He was not alone. The same punishment was meted out to his counterparts in other states that had similar cases. In fact, the Chief Judge of

Plateau
State who was equally suspended has since been replaced. It is a measure of the inexorable descent of Anambra into the chasm of hooliganism that while the other Chief Judges took their fate calmly, Okoli, goaded by his godfathers, challenged the NJC to a brawl.

 

Even when the NJC bared its fangs and declared him a persona-non-grata, the lawmakers thought they could save the job of their lickspittle Chief Judge, thus setting the stage for last Friday’s show of shame. They pooh-poohed the Council, claiming it usurped the powers of the state legislature by suspending Okoli. Having thus pontificated, they ordered him to ignore the suspension.

 

But this time around, they didn’t reckon with the determination of Governor Virgy Etiaba to get it right, even if this once, in a state blighted by political banditry. When they realised their game of deceit was up, they resorted to filibustering.  On Friday morning, they rushed out a resolution urging the governor and the Judicial Service Commission to retire Justice Umegbolu Nri-Ezedi, the man who by virtue of his being next in hierarchy to Okoli, should be the acting Chief Judge, “without further delay.”

 

Is it not laughable that this bunch of lawbreakers only realised that Justice Nri-Ezedi was 72 years and therefore should have retired from service, on the day he was to be sworn in as acting Chief Judge? Yet, despite their claim of having the evidence to prove their allegation, they could not even avail themselves with the document at their sitting. How could a people who hold such lofty office descend so low as to resorting to barefaced lies?

 

The resolution, no doubt was a shot across the bow to Etiaba. But unfortunately for them, it didn’t cut an ice with her. Desperate characters that they are, they resorted to thuggery, invading, literarily speaking, the executive council chambers where guests and top government functionaries were already seated to witness the swearing-in and stalling the event for six hours. They only lifted their siege when Etiaba left for

Abia
State. But they were beaten to their own game as the governor came back and hurriedly swore in the acting Chief Judge.

 

The action of the lawmakers which in every sense material is tantamount to taking the governor hostage and preventing her from carrying out her constitutional responsibilities poignantly illustrates how low they are prepared to descend not only in pursuit of their self-centred and lucre-induced agenda but also inordinate quest for power without responsibility. It equally shows how far off we all are, eight years after, from enthroning sustainable democratic culture.

 

Granted, Section 271, sub-section (1) of the 1999 Constitution confers on the House the powers to confirm the appointment of a Chief Judge as made by the governor on the recommendation of the NJC, yet, sub-section (4) states unequivocally: “If the office of Chief Judge of a state is vacant or if the person holding the office is for any reason unable to perform the functions of the office, then until a person has been appointed to and has assumed the functions of that office, or until the person holding the office has resumed those functions, the governor of the state shall appoint the most senior judge of the High Court to perform those functions.” By heeding the advice of the NJC, Etiaba acted within the powers of her office. So, why the puerile flexing of political muscles as exhibited by the lawmakers?

 

This latest act of impunity should raise a number of questions in the minds of Anambrarians as the general election approaches. Why would Balonwu and his co-travellers on the boulevard of infamy physically attempt stopping the governor from carrying out her lawful duties? Is it part of their lawmaking responsibilities? What manner of desperation would inform such ignoble conduct? What is in this desperation for the people who they claim to represent?

 

While it would be uncharitable to single out Anambra for chastisement since what is happening in the state is only but a reflection of the burgeoning national culture of lawlessness, scant regard for rule of law and utter contempt for judicial pronouncements, which are the unenviable legacies of the impetuous Obasanjo presidency, Anambra’s case is peculiar. The inexplicable docility of the majority in the face of insulting impudence of a tiny minority is what stokes the smouldering embers of political gangsterism in the state.  Sooner than later, Anambrarians will realise that they won’t have the luxury of blaming Obasanjo for their political woes in perpetuity. Those who have made the state the butt of all national jokes are known. It is true that Obasanjo, their godfather remains the President and Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces until after the elections and may not have any qualms manipulating the polls in their favour.

 

But they can only succeed if the people acquiesce. That is why the April elections should matter to every Anambrarian, as indeed every Nigerian.

Kano
State performed the feat in 2003. Anambra could, and in fact should, do same in 2007.

In Praise Of President Olusegun Obasanjo 

By 1kechukwu Amaechi ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com, http://www.amadikwa.wordpress.com  

They came from all parts of Igboland, some in crutches, others in wheel chairs; most, if not all, of them wizened. But even in their perceptible frailties, it was easy to notice the unmistakable glint in their eyes.

These are men who finally kissed hope goodbye 37 years ago. Victims of a fratricidal war, the declaration and prosecution of which they had no control over, they became, to borrow a cliché, sacrificial lambs at the end of the bloody strife; punished for “crimes” if any, they share only vicarious liability. They are part of the 1033 former police officers from the five Southeast states of Imo, Abia, Ebonyi, Enugu and Anambra who had converged at the Enugu Campus of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka to receive cheques for their pension in fulfilment of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s promise six years ago.

Their sad story started almost four decades ago when the General Yakubu Gowon-led Federal Military Government dismissed “Biafran officers” from the Nigerian Police through Decree 46 of August 15, 1970. Their offence? They found themselves on the wrong side of the war. Truth be told, many of these officers had little or no say in the fate that befell them, being as it were, victims of a grim circumstance way beyond their control. Some may not even have believed in the philosophy that gave impetus to the war, whatever its merits were at the material time.

The termination of their appointments was part of a two-legged scotched earth policy aimed at crippling “Biafrans” financially; a plot hatched and clinically executed by the same people who saw starvation as a legitimate weapon of war and enforced a regime of food blockade against the East while the war lasted.

The first leg was the policy which reduced the wealth of every Igbo, no-matter how rich to only £20 after the war, thereby brazenly and unconscionably appropriating the riches of a people whose financial standing had already been dealt a devastating blow by the war. Sacking South easterners, who survived the hostilities with no homes, no money and no businesses to fall back on, from their places of work, was the final attempt to escalate their financial misery. And, come to think of it, these policies came on the heels of the 1971 Indigenous Enterprises Promotion Decree.

President Obasanjo promised to correct this long standing injustice in May 2000, during the first anniversary of his administration. To start with, he converted their dismissal to retirement and announced that the Federal Government would pay their entitlements in full. In July 2006, he approved the release of about N75 billion for the payment of outstanding arrears of pensions, including those of Biafran policemen, thereby putting some spine behind his words. In February last year, the government issued the policemen with retirement letters through the Police Pensions Board, which qualified them for pensions.

The gathering of these old men, brazenly purloined for years by the Nigerian state, at the Enugu Campus of the UNN, was to collect their cheques. Those from Cross River, Rivers, Akwa-Ibom and Delta, which at the time constituted the now defunct Eastern Region, converged in Port Harcourt for the same purpose. While those who are still alive were issued cheques in their own names, those who have died would have their cheques issued in the names of their next-of-kin. And most importantly, this is only the first phase of the exercise, which has been declared a continuous one.

Coming from Obasanjo whose heart, many would swear, does not overflow with the milk of kindness, and whose policies in government lack human face, this act which is an exemplar in magnanimity, is indeed a tectonic shift in policy and a loud disclaimer to the pretence of sundry regimes, military and civilian, that have held sway in the country since the end of the civil war. While the fulsome praises heaped on him by Mr. Charles Machie national chairman, Association of Retired War Affected Police Officers (AWAPO), may sound rather hyperbolic, this rare act of magnanimity should be commended by all and sundry. At the end of the day, the money is not the issue and some of the beneficiaries could as well do without it but the symbolism of the act matters.

There is no arguing the fact that in seeing through this six-year promise, the president has exhibited tremendous political will, knowing that some forces bent on perpetuating the injustices of the civil war would rather prefer that the status quo remained. These reactionary forces have ensured in 37 years and through seven regimes including the Murtala/Obasanjo government of the late 1970s that issues such as the benefits of former Nigerian officers trapped in the Biafran enclave during the war remained taboo.

Even when AWAPO, the umbrella organisation for the retired officers formally petitioned General Abdulsalami Abubakar in 1998, as the then military head of state, over their plight, he conveniently ignored them.

Yet, General Gowon had not only declared at the end of the war in January 1970 that there was “no victor, no vanquished,” but also embarked on the project of reconciliation, reconstruction and rehabilitation. Is it not disingenuous that the same regime embarked on an orchestrated campaign of persecution, as evidenced in the sack of the police officers? How could someone claim to be rehabilitating a people, and yet formulate policies aimed at persecuting them?

Will this gesture by President Obasanjo in the twilight of his eight-year administration bring a permanent closure to issues of marginalisation, if not outright persecution of South easterners in Nigeria? No! But it is a significant step. What the president has proved with this singular act is that with political will, issues that tend to constantly remind us of our bitter past and fuel separatist sentiments can be confronted frontally and dealt with appropriately.

Unfortunately, such issues still abound. That the Igbo are being made to pay a heavy price for having the guts to challenge the injustices that have become even more manifest in today’s Nigeria at the time they did is evident for all to see. Till date, the infrastructures in the Southeast, particularly the roads, which the war destroyed, remain in scandalous state. Construction of a second bridge across River Niger, as socially, economically and politically imperative as it is, remains sacrificed on the alter of post-war prejudice. The glass-ceiling placed on the career of military officers of Igbo extraction remains 37 years after the war and the constant pacification of Igbo towns and villages in the name of fighting an unarmed group – Movement for the Actualisation of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) – has become a pastime.

The latest wrinkle is the result of the 2006 population census, already endorsed by the National Council of State, which effectively made the Igbo one of the least populated ethnic nationalities in Nigeria. In a country where population is solely used for the sharing of national wealth rather than planning and developmental purposes, it goes without saying that the result has dire consequences for the Igbo nation.

But sometimes, the Igbo have themselves to blame for their woes in Nigeria by their inexplicable naivety.  It is instructive that while the Yoruba that were allocated the second highest number are vehemently protesting the result of the census, there is no whimper from the Southeast. Governor Bola Tinubu of Lagos State publicly repudiated the census figures but the five Southeast governors who are members of the Council of State endorsed them with relish. Yet, at 13.72 million, the population of Kano (9.38 million) and Jigawa (4.34 million), two North western states that used to be one, almost equals the population of the entire Southeast put at 16.4 million. This same census figures has been rejected by the Major-General Adeyinka Adebayo-led Yoruba Council of Elders as “totally unacceptable.” What is Ohanaeze Ndigbo’s position on this matter that has grave consequences for the people it purports to lead? Your guess is good as mine.

While the country’s leaders over the years have found it convenient to play the ostrich with the very important project of national reconciliation by failing to enthrone equity in the conduct of national affairs, the issues that gave birth to Biafra continue to fester. In fact, they are at the core of the insurgency in the Niger Delta which is threatening the very foundation of the Nigerian state.

Nigerian leaders have over the years totally gone off the deep end with nobody to call them to sanity. Many of them would bristle at the mere mention of this fact, but it goes without saying that for so long, we have been ruled by men without character and vision. But as we move towards the elections, part of the responsibility of the electorate is to make hay out of the process by identifying and electing those leaders who will have the courage of their conviction to enthrone justice and equity in the land by ensuring a permanent closure to those ever-present wrinkles, which seek to divide rather than unite us as a people, like Obasanjo has done with this rather uncharacteristic show of generosity of spirit.

  Magazines in the blogosphere world 

In the past decade, personal publishing has dramatically changed the way journalism is practiced, thus raising question on the future of magazines in an era of digital revolution. 

The pictures were as grisly as they were enthralling. Moments after the execution of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein on December 30, 2006, the graphic details were in the public domain. Interestingly, the ‘New Media’ beat the ‘Mainstream Media’ to what arguably was the biggest story of 2006. 

Just like in the September 7, 2005 terrorist attack in
London when eyewitness camera phone photos became a major part in the media’s coverage of the bombings, an amateur video shot using a camera phone was the major source of news on Saddam’s execution. The amateur video containing low-quality footage of the entire hanging was also notable for the fact that, unlike the official footage, it included sound: witnesses could be heard taunting Saddam.[1] 

With increasing number of young people, those Rupert Murdock, a media mogul, calls “digital natives” pitching their news tent in the blogosphere world, questions have arisen as to the future of magazines.  

Ever since Tim Berners-Lee, a computer scientist at the Cern particle physics laboratory in
Switzerland, invented the World Wide Web in 1989, journalism has undergone radical transformation. At the heart of this change is the unconventional media or what Dan Gillmor of the San Jose Mercury News, calls the “We Media.” The blog, a digital newswire, facilitated by the proliferation of the internet, low production and distribution costs, ease of use and really simple syndication (RSS), is the engine that drives this new and powerful push-pull publishing concept.[2] 

In the past decade since this phenomenon gained currency, the question has been consistently asked; why blogging?  The attraction of personal publishing lies in its ability to change the power structures in journalism, giving yesterday’s readers the option of being today’s journalists and tomorrow’s preferred news aggregators.[3] Teenage kids, Murdoch noted in a speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, on April 13, 2005, “Want news on demand, continuously updated. They want a point of view about not just what happened, but why it happened…they want to be able to use the information in a larger community.”[4]   

Blogging merges this democratisation of the media with speed of news delivery. “The central virtue of blogging, I’ve decided, is that in the proverbial agora, or online marketplace of ideas, bloggers are like Socrates on speed,”[5] writes Chris Mooney, the 2005 winner of the Scientific America’s Science and Technology Web award. The result is that today blogs number well over 30 million worldwide, promoted by the often-free blogging service providers like Blogger and WordPress. An estimated 75,000 new blogs are created everyday, an average of one new blog a second.[6]  

Unarguably, the “We Media” comes with enormous capabilities which seem to give it an edge over the mainstream media, particularly the print version. The blogosphere, “can do lots of things better than we can currently do – including fragmentation and connectivity and community. It is wonderfully enabling, intoxicatingly democratic and exhilaratingly anarchic,” says Alan Rusbridger.[7] Traditional printing compared to personal publishing remains an expensive process. As Shel
Israel, author of the book Naked Conversations puts it: “In the information age, the newspaper has become a cumbersome and inefficient distribution mechanism. If you want fast delivery of news, paper is a stage coach competing with jet planes.”[8]   

Is personal publishing about to consign magazines to the garbage bin of history? Robin Sloan and Matt Thompson think so.  “The year is 2014, and people have access to a breadth and depth of information unimaginable in an earlier age. Everyone contributes in some way. Everyone takes part to create a living, breathing mediascape. However, the press, as you knew it, has ceased to exist. Twentieth century news organisations are an afterthought, a lonely remnant of a not too distant past,”[9] the two
California bloggers proclaim.  

But many industry pundits disagree. While acknowledging the challenges posed by blogosphere, the preponderant opinion is that strong symbiotic relationships have evolved between blogging and journalism, with the former acting as both a check on journalistic inaccuracy and source of opinion on which journalists increasingly rely.[10]  

Personal publishing carries its own baggage, which remain the strength of the print media. Unlike blogging, traditional print media is still the custodian of the core values of journalism – accuracy, objectivity, reliability and pursuit of truth. Consumers of journalism don’t seem to be in a hurry to sacrifice these values on the alter of speed. “There are snakes in this new media ‘Garden of Eden,” writes Patrick Baltatzis. “Rumours seem to have a natural habitat in the blog world, as well as ranting and personal opinions. The issues of trust and reliability are difficult.”[11]  

Realising however the challenges posed by the new era, magazines are changing the ways they had hitherto approached journalism. Not only have they gone online, establishing their own websites, many in a bid to cultivate new audiences have resorted to blogging some beats or sections that ordinarily would have run in print, thereby, using fewer resources and maximising the use of journalists. 

They do this by either encouraging their staff to blog or hiring the services of professional bloggers. Going online has also enabled them to streamline their operations, changing the way they write and edit stories and interacting more with the audience. Besides, in 2005, Bill Gates predicted that the Internet would attract $30 billion in advertising revenue annually within the next five years.[12] Realising that their traditional revenue sources are increasingly being eroded as advertising increasingly migrates to the internet, magazines have also gone online in order to put their hand in the online advertising pie. 

Where will all these ultimately leave magazines in the 21^st century? Only time will tell. But as Rusbridger, noted: “The newspaper of the future may or may not look like a newspaper – it could be printed on paper, on a screen or exist in electronic ink on a sheet of plastic. But it will behave like a newspaper.”[13] Ditto for magazines!                                                                                                                                                                                                               (981 words) Bibliography 

 

Baltatzis, P., Is Blogging Innovating Journalism? Innovation Journalism, Vol.3 No.4, May 29, 2006 

Bauder, D., Saddam execution images shown on TV, Web, International Business Times, January 2, 2007 http://www.ibtimes.com/articles/20070102/Saddam-web-tv-htm 

Hammersley, B., Media: New Media: Time to blog on, The Guardian, May 20, 2002 

Israel, S., Merging Newspapers and Blogshttp://redcouch.typepad.com, March 9, 2006  

Mooney, C., How blogging changed journalism – almosthttp://www.Post-Gazette.com, February 2, 2003 

Naughton, J., What’s the secret of blogging? It’s personal, Guardian Unlimited, July 23, 2006 

Paulman, K., Do you trust blogs? The Spokesman Review, March 9, 2006 http://www.spokesmanreview.com 

Rusbridger, A., Is it all over for bloggers?http://www.MediaGuardian.co.uk, June 12, 2006 

Silver, J., It’s the thought that counts, The Guardian, March 6 2006 

Sloan, R., and Thompson, M., Media: Its 2014 – We’re all journalists now, The Observer, June 26, 2005 

---

[1] International Business Times,  02-01-2007

[2]Innovation Journalism, Vol. 3 No. 4, 29-05-2006

[3] Ibid

[4] www.MediaGuardian.co.uk, 14-04-2005

[5] www.Post-Gazette.com, 02-02-2003

[6] Sunday Guardian, 03-07-2006

[7] www.MediaGuardian.co.uk, 12-06-2006

[8] http://redcouch.typad.com

[9] The Observer, 26-06-2005

[10] Guardian Unlimited, 23-07-2006

[11] Op. Cit.

[12] http://www.MediaGuardian.co.uk, 14-04-2005

[13] Op Cit

How Lawless Can A People Get? 

By Ikechukwu Amaechi 

 

If I were President Olusegun Obasanjo, I would be nursing a very deep sense of unease now; I would be clearly worried over some of the emerging trends in the country.
Nigeria is gradually but inexorably becoming a very lawless state and this is frightening. If I were him, I would be concerned about my legacy, the type of society I would bequeath not only to this generation but those yet unborn. I am saying this because Nigeria under Obasanjo’s watch is gradually proving to be no better than a country like
Somalia. And anybody who thinks this is an exaggeration should simply pause and listen to some of the comments coming out of Ibadan, Oyo State capital in the wake of the Supreme Court judgement on the Governor Rasheed Ladoja impeachment case. 

I couldn’t believe it myself that some of these statements are being made in a country that lays claim to being governed by the rule of law. It doesn’t matter if the threats being made by Alao Akala and Lamidi Adedibu are nothing but empty braggadocio and grandstanding of people worsted in the court of law. That these threats are being made at all and openly with impunity is the issue. And in any case, why would Adedibu’s threats be taken lightly? Hasn’t the man a track record of delivering on his threats? 

No-matter the political battle Obasanjo claims to be fighting; no-matter the political score(s) he is striving to settle, the fact that he is allowing
Nigeria to slip into a lawless jungle is the most atrocious legacy any leader could aspire to leave behind. Not even General Sani Abacha, with all his malevolence descended to that level. Obasanjo is behaving as if there is no life after 2007. How short can human memory be? 

If a report in The Guardian newspaper of Friday, December 8 concerning Adedibu’s utterances shortly after the Supreme Court verdict is anything to go by, then there is every reason for all of us to be worried. According to the newspaper, Adedibu holding court at his ‘

Molete
Republic’ and surrounded by his hordes of thugs boasted that Governor Ladoja can never return to the Agodi Government House. Said he: “I have predicted what may happen and I said if the Supreme Court still confirms the declarative judgement, it is not helpful to Ladoja….Akala is not a party to the suit, so no order of the apex court is binding on him. Ladoja cannot come because the law is not on his side. The court must issue an order to the police and no such order has been made by the court. 

“It is not the court that installed Akala or Ladoja, it is the people and the wish of the people is that they don’t want Ladoja again and they put Akala there. So, how can the court upturn the wish of the people? Ladoja can never come to rule

Oyo
State. If he is still interested in becoming governor, let him go to another political party to test his popularity. As far as we are concerned, he cannot come back here to upstage Akala.” How cheeky can someone get?  

Imagine Adedidu, not only interpreting Supreme Court judgement but also literarily sitting in judgement over the Justices of Nigeria’s apex court, some of the best legal minds in the world, questioning their competence and authority. 

I know that some people will ask; why blame Obasanjo for statements made by Adedibu? I will resist the urge of saying that both are two sides of the same coin though that is indeed what they are. But the fact remains that Obasanjo is the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the man on whose table the bulk stops. He is the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces. Moreover, Obasanjo has in the past seven and half years wielded absolute power in
Nigeria and does not fight shy of using same. So, if any individual or group of people are threatening the peace of the country or a part of if, it behoves the man whose responsibility it is to act to do so. Obasanjo has for long shirked from this sacred responsibility unless in situations where his very selfish and narrow political interests are at stake. 

The fact that the president welcomed the Supreme Court verdict and directed the police and other security agencies to immediately implement it does not distance him from Adedibu’s premeditated comments. If anything, it even makes his case worse. That Adedibu is making this audacious statement even after the president supposedly made an unequivocal commitment to the restoration of Ladoja to his position smacks of a sinister plot. In the first place, Adedibu is a faithful student of Obasanjo who has in the past shown unbelievable contempt for court judgements even those given by the Supreme Court as the
Lagos case typifies. 

So, the speed with which the presidency accepted this verdict is quite uncharacteristic. It can only be compared to the speed with which Obasanjo accepted the defeat of his third term project in the National Assembly. We are all living witnesses to what he has done since then over the same matter which he claimed was dead and buried. So could it be that while Obasanjo is making a public show of his acceptance of the Supreme Court ruling in the Ladoja case, he is at the same time prodding Adedibu to reject the verdict and precipitate a violent and bloody crisis so as to have the excuse to declare a state of emergency and deny Ladoja the fruits of his almost one-year legal battle? 

If that is not the new game plan, then Obasanjo must act fast to rein in Adedibu because his Molete declaration is a very serious challenge to the president’s authority. If the president of Nigeria is saying that the ruling of the highest court in the land must be obeyed without any delay and has in fact ordered his security chiefs to act immediately and an ordinary citizen is sitting down in the comforts of his living room to give counter orders, then the president should not only be worried, but should act fast to redeem the vanishing glory and prestige of his office. But why wouldn’t Adedibu disparage the judiciary when the president and federal government agencies including the EFCC are leading the dangerous campaign to discredit the judiciary?  

When Akala’s reaction to the judgement is thrown into the mix, then the augury becomes starker. My people have a saying that when a bird is dancing in the middle of the road, the drummer is always somewhere in the evil bush. While rejecting the November 1 judgement of the Court of Appeal, Akala said he would quit office if the Supreme Court nullifies Ladoja’s impeachment. Now that the Supreme Court has done just that, Akala has brazenly gone back on his words. 

Not only did he go on air through his SSG, Chief Olayiwola Olakojo to urge the people to disregard the Supreme Court judgement, he actually caused Olakojo and Diran Odeyemi, his media adviser to address a press conference pooh-poohing the judiciary and warning Ladoja of the futility of any attempt to reclaim his mandate. 

“Ladoja should not make that mistake. He dare not make such mistake. The Yoruba have a saying that there cannot be two kings in a town. Akala is still the governor of this state and not Ladoja and he will continue to be governor after 2007…. Ladoja has not been reinstated, he dare not come to the office to say that he wants to resume. We will not allow it,” Olakojo said. 

In every society governed by law, the judiciary is the last hope of the common man. The courts are sacred institutions and members of the Bench must be respected. Ridiculing the judiciary and making the pronouncements of law courts not worth more than the papers on which they are written is the first step to anarchy. 

Most worrisome is his concluding statement: “It is one thing for the court to give judgement; it is another thing to enforce it. So I urge you journalists not to publish that Ladoja has been reinstated as governor.” Even the state’s Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General, Mr Michael Lana had the effrontery to insult the Justices, calling their judgement “mere academic exercise” and “wild goose chase.” And instead of ordering the immediate arrest of these men, Obasanjo is busy meeting with Adedibu and Akala in Ota. Since I read these statements, I have not stopped wondering. It is only the president that can cause this judgement to be enforced since the police and other agents of state coercion are solely answerable to him. Could it be that the Adedibus of Oyo State know what many of us don’t know? Could such privileged information be the reason behind their swank?  I have a hunch that these agents of darkness are still up to some mischief in

Oyo
State. They are yet to play their joker. After all, was it not the PDP secretary, Chief Ojo Maduekwe, who said while announcing the intention of his party last Friday to take a look at the judgement that: “In this business, it is not over until it is over.” Could that have been a Freudian slip? If a case is not over after the Supreme Court has given a ruling, when then will it be over? If the president refuses to call his Ibadan attack dogs to order and their utterances and actions lead to violence, then he should be held responsible for any life lost in the event of any crisis.  

But if he is the one goading them, my simple advice is that he should remember that history has a way of repeating itself. In 1993, rather than siding the cause of justice by supporting Chief MKO Abiola, winner of the June 12 presidential election, he signed a pact with evil, by helping to set up the illegal Ernest Shonekan-led interim government, all in a bid to spite his kinsman. For that act of transgression, he nearly paid with his life when the evil tree he helped to plant bore the iniquitous and malevolent fruit called Abacha. Sadly he is at it again.

2007 And The Illusion Of Free And Fair Polls 

By Ikechukwu Amaechi 

President Olusegun Obasanjo has promised Nigerians and indeed the international community for the umpteenth time that his administration would ensure that a free and fair election is held in 2007. Apart from being
Nigeria’s president since May 29, 1999, he is presently the defacto – that is, to all intents and purposes and in reality – leader of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). 

But the president is not the only one who is staking his “huge reputation” on the freeness and fairness of the conduct of the forthcoming polls. Professor Maurice Iwu had told everybody who cared to listen that he would conduct a free and fair election that would make the June 12, 1993 presidential election, won by late Chief MKO Abiola and annulled by General Ibrahim Babangida look like an exercise carried out by pupils in the kindergarten. Iwu is the chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the electoral umpire. He would like to be remembered as the man who broke the jinx of elections in
Nigeria, thereby giving multiparty liberal democracy a chance to flourish. 

Mallam Nuhu Ribadu has assured that the ultimate measure of his success in office would be the extent to which he ensures that evil and corrupt men are chased out of the corridors of power, never to come back again. He has sworn that the era of fraudulent men using their ill-gotten wealth to buy the votes of the hapless masses and wangle themselves to power is gone for good. Mallam Ribadu is the chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). He would like to be remembered as the man who put corruption on the leash and gave Nigerians a new lease of life.  

The success or otherwise of the 2007 elections depends to a very large extent on what the trio do with their good offices. I would believe also that they have every reason to ensure that the elections become huge success. If for nothing else, they would be engraving their names on stone as the men who did what was hitherto thought impossible in
Nigeria – superintending the conduct of free and fair elections. Interestingly, they have all vowed out of their own volition, without any prompting by the Nigerian people, to make the supreme sacrifice if need be so that
Nigeria will have a new beginning. 

Apart from the president, I have had a one-on-one with both Iwu and Ribadu and I came out each time with the impression that the axiomatic Daniel had come to judgement. They were passionate and convincing. They came across as men on a mission to reverse the ill-fortune of
Nigeria on matters of election. Both swore that it would no longer be “business as usual” in
Nigeria. I think it was Professor Iwu who coined the rather enticing phrase of “business unusual” in pointing out the way forward. 

To succeed in this noble mission of bequeathing Nigerians the legacy of free and fair elections that would ensure that the choices of the people as expressed through the ballot box not only remain sacrosanct but also that those with the mandate of the people actually take over the reins of power from those currently holding it, the trio, through their good offices must individually and collectively ensure that the old ways of doing things are put on a leash. 

Unfortunately, six months to May 29, 2007, the day these men ought to look back with pride and thump their chest for a job well done and mission accomplished, things are changing for the worse. If nothing is done and urgently too to halt this drift, 2007 would go down in the annals of elections in
Nigeria as the worst. 

My reasons for this assertion are two-legged. First, INEC has bungled the most elementary of all the processes that culminate in a free and fair election, which is registration of voters. It is not enough to inveigle us with the idea of electronic registration of voters because at the end of the day, the bottom-line remains that Nigerians want to be registered so as to exercise their right of franchise. Whether the registration is done manually or electronically is not much of a concern to them.  As it is now, INEC has done such a poor job of what I consider its most fundamental task in the chain of activities that will ultimately lead to a free and fair election, effectively dispelling the illusion that it could grapple with the ultimate task. Not even Dr Abel Guobadia, Iwu’s predecessor in office could have fared so badly. 

Secondly, if the outcome of the two congresses so far held by the PDP for the purpose of nominating candidates for next year’s general elections is anything to go by, there is nothing to show that Ribadu can or indeed has the capacity to rein in and stop money bags whose sources of wealth are questionable from hijacking the process. Evil men are still in control. Money is still everything. The people still have no say in choosing who flies the flag of their party in the elections. Nothing has changed and rather than “business unusual,” it is still business as usual. The dramatis personae are even more brazen now and it is still the same old cabal at work and Ribadu knows them. 

Then we come to the PDP itself, the only party that has flagged off its congresses. Again, nothing has changed. What has happened so far is a replay of the 2003 primaries that culminated in what Obasanjo recently called the Ayo Fayose Mistake. The culture of imposition of candidates on the party is still rife. The essence of primary elections is to give party members the chance to elect those that would contest the general elections on the platform of the party. This is not a privilege but a right. But as expected, PDP, the self-acclaimed largest party in
Africa has denied its members this right. Instead, the people have been served a cocktail of brigandage, killings and maiming.  

In

Rivers
State where Dr Peter Odili was declared winner with almost 100 percent of the people casting their ballot for him in 2003 even before INEC officials came back from the creeks with the results of the true verdict of the people, at least eight Nigerians were reportedly killed. In almost all the states, there was violence. In

Anambra
State, the Chuma Nzeribes are still at work. Results of congresses are still being written inside the bedroom of the most violent and powerful of the politicians. The culture of manufacturing several lists of candidates and substituting the names of winners with those of losers even after the general elections have been held has rear its ugly head again. The ward congress produced parallel results’ sheets. In fact, the exercise in five states – Delta, Bayelsa, Benue, Imo and Cross River – were cancelled outright while four local governments each were cancelled in Lagos, Kogi, Kaduna and Oyo. Out there, it is a jungle where might is right and how “successful” one is as a politician is not only a direct reflection of how brutal and nasty he is but also his ability to do the unthinkable. 

Congresses by their very nature are not supposed to be complex exercises, but they signpost the democratic temperament of a political party. It would be the height of illusion to expect a political party that cannot guarantee its internal democracy to quietly hitch a ride on the national democratic coaster without precipitating an accident. 

As I write, almost 20 people have collected PDP presidential nomination form. As the congresses progress to culminate in the national convention in December where the party will elect its presidential flag bearer, these manipulations would continue. The orgy of violence is bound to exacerbate; the killings would continue and the party members would have anything but the right to candidates of their choice. Yet, Obasanjo is telling those who care to listen that he is poised to give Nigerians a free and fair election in 2007. 

Now, through primaries, a party selects its best materials, which it would then present to the electorate during the general election for endorsement. Primaries afford the party the opportunity to put its best foot forward. A party that bungles its primaries can only expect to win the elections through fraud, which is what PDP has planned to do. 

It would be too much of an expectation; in fact, it would be foolhardy for anyone to hope that a political party that revels in rigging its own primaries would compete fairly with other political parties at the general elections. 

The most interesting thing though is that the president, INEC and EFCC chairmen, all of who have a role to play in straightening out the PDP bad boys are feigning ignorance of what is happening. Yet, they are promising a free and fair election in 2007. What an illusion.