By Salisu Suleiman
Laurent Gbagbo, Cote d’Ivoire’s president for the past 10 years, should know better. He is a professor of history. When his predecessor in office Robert Guei rigged elections and attempted to prolong his stay in office, he ended up dead – shot, like a dog, on the streets of Abidjan.
Propelled by inordinate ambition, Gbagbo has chosen to forget that lesson. But it is not what happens to him that matters. The tragedy is that he has allowed his ambition to destroy the fragile peace that was beginning to emerge in Cote d’Ivoire.
The crisis in Cote d’Ivoire and possible return to armed conflict has useful lessons for Nigeria. The two countries have some similarities; both are multi-ethnic and multi-religious. Muslims, who make up about 38 percent of Cote d’Ivoire, are mostly from the north while Christians, who make up about 32 percent of the population, are mostly found in the south. Eleven percent of the population practice African religions while about 9 percent are free-thinkers.
Until the death of the country’s founding President, Félix Houphouët Boigny, Cote d’Ivoire was one of the most stable and prosperous African states and had one of the largest expatriate populations of any African country. This was to change when Boigny died. The then Prime Minister Alassane Ouattara could not become president, so the then Parliamentary Speaker Henri Konan Bedie succeeded Boigny. Bedie then masterminded constitutional amendments, which excluded large sections of the population from participating in the electoral process. Many were denied citizenship.
The political instability that followed led to the first ever military coup in Cote d’Ivoire, and eventually a brief civil war. A peace accord was eventually signed, paving the way for a new constitution and a more inclusive political and electoral process.
Laurent Gbagbo, who swore himself in as president last week despite losing the election, had postponed elections several times and managed to hang on to power for 10 years, using a mixture of guile and delay tactics. Having waited since 1994 to actualise his ambition, Mr. Alassane Ouattara, the acknowledged winner of the elections, also swore himself in as president. So we are confronted with a country with two presidents. The situation is very volatile, especially as the former rebels from the north still have control of their arms and virtually control half of the country.
So what are the lessons for Nigeria and the rest of Africa?
The most important message must be that there are no perfect democracies anywhere in the world. Even Western democracy, particularly the American presidential model, which is very often our reference point, has significant drawbacks. A critical factor in the democratic experience is the inclusion of as many citizens as possible in the electoral process. If, in the process, certain compromises like zoning or rotation of offices have to come in, it may be worth paying that price in the interest of peace and stability.
I am not an advocate of zoning, but If Ivoiriens had zoned the presidency to one region, the sharp ethnic and religious connotations in the aftermath of the elections would be less obvious. The contest between Olusegun Obasanjo and Olu Falae in 1999 is a case study. The same thing happened in 2007 when late president Umaru Musa Yar’Adua contested against Buhari and Atiku.
In the run up to next year’s presidential elections in Nigeria, the debate has assumed the discordant tunes of north/ south with a dangerous religious overcast. Every debate has been reduced to what the mother tongue of the president should be. At the moment, the undeclared battle between President Jonathan and former Vice President Atiku’s camps is degenerating to new lows. No prisoners are being taken. Every voice of reason is branded as being either ‘for us or against us’.
Today, every newspaper article or opinion piece is viewed as having been paid for by one camp or another. Responses by readers of articles published in various media are rabidly sectional. All voices of reason have been drowned by the north/ south divide. Few people have bothered to enquire about what the candidates have to offer. The overriding concern is: if he is from my zone, he should president (regardless of antecedents) and if he is from another zone, he cannot be president (regardless of merit).
Of course the concept of zoning only came about because of the ineptitude of successive governments and leaderships in Nigeria. But the lesson from Cote d’Ivoire must be clear: the personal ambitions of politicians should not accentuate ethnic and regional divisions in Nigeria’s political square.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Monday, November 29, 2010
NIGERIAN OZYMANDIAS
By
Eddy Aghanenu
Like a whirlwind, they came. Like the dangerous tsunamis, they flooded the land. Like the hurricane, they swept off the landscape. Like earthquakes, they left destruction in their paths. It was called mainstream politics.
Theirs was not to appeal. It was not to plead with the people. It was not to solicit for support or understanding. It was not to allow the rule of law take its course. Neither were there programmes for the people. The people were irrelevant. With or without the people, the apostles of mainstream politics were sure of acquiring power.
It was a conquering army on the move. It was a “do or die” affair. Theirs was to subdue, enslave, subjugate loot and enshrine a reign of terror in the land. They were antithetical to development. They de-flowered the innocence of the people. They left behind tears, sorrow and blood. The people became the victims.
In Ogun, Oyo, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Ekiti, Edo and Delta States, The Emperors reigned supreme. Like John Keats’ Ozymandias, they became tin gods. They were worshipped and their words became law. Nothing was too big to be sacrificed so that they can perpetually remain in power. People and resources were therefore sacrificed. The people were cowed but not forever.
They bestrode the land like colossus, trampling on the people and their resources. Because, they were bereft of ideas, looting and brute force became the order of governance.
They were already planning on how to continue their plunder in 2011 but not reckoning with the power of the people and rule of law.
Like the son of Ogun (the one that spits fire like Sango) once said: “the man died in all men who keep mute in the face of tyranny”. Thankfully, the man has not died in the life of the people. Led by the generalissimo, the Asiwaju, with such able lieutenants as the comrade orator of Edo, the Marxist in Ekiti State, the Iroko of Ondo, the technocrat in Lagos, the political engineer of Oshun State and the millions of foot soldiers, it was a matter of time before the emperors and their empires crumbled. The people confronted the devil. With the law and God on their side, victory was certain. Light will always triumph over darkness.
We expected an epic fight, a battle royal. It turned out to be an anticlimax. The wind has blown and we have seen the strength of their majesties. In fact, strength they have not. We thought they were giants not knowing they were mere paper tigers. It was a David and Goliath fight. A fling of stone and they were blown away. The wind of change has swept some of them off. There is liberation fever in the land. Delta State is next on the line. This wind of change will continue to 2011. Those emperors still remaining learn from the story of Ozymandias. If they do not know it, I crave the indulgence of the publisher to reproduce it below:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Eddy Aghanenu
Like a whirlwind, they came. Like the dangerous tsunamis, they flooded the land. Like the hurricane, they swept off the landscape. Like earthquakes, they left destruction in their paths. It was called mainstream politics.
Theirs was not to appeal. It was not to plead with the people. It was not to solicit for support or understanding. It was not to allow the rule of law take its course. Neither were there programmes for the people. The people were irrelevant. With or without the people, the apostles of mainstream politics were sure of acquiring power.
It was a conquering army on the move. It was a “do or die” affair. Theirs was to subdue, enslave, subjugate loot and enshrine a reign of terror in the land. They were antithetical to development. They de-flowered the innocence of the people. They left behind tears, sorrow and blood. The people became the victims.
In Ogun, Oyo, Ondo, Osun, Oyo, Ekiti, Edo and Delta States, The Emperors reigned supreme. Like John Keats’ Ozymandias, they became tin gods. They were worshipped and their words became law. Nothing was too big to be sacrificed so that they can perpetually remain in power. People and resources were therefore sacrificed. The people were cowed but not forever.
They bestrode the land like colossus, trampling on the people and their resources. Because, they were bereft of ideas, looting and brute force became the order of governance.
They were already planning on how to continue their plunder in 2011 but not reckoning with the power of the people and rule of law.
Like the son of Ogun (the one that spits fire like Sango) once said: “the man died in all men who keep mute in the face of tyranny”. Thankfully, the man has not died in the life of the people. Led by the generalissimo, the Asiwaju, with such able lieutenants as the comrade orator of Edo, the Marxist in Ekiti State, the Iroko of Ondo, the technocrat in Lagos, the political engineer of Oshun State and the millions of foot soldiers, it was a matter of time before the emperors and their empires crumbled. The people confronted the devil. With the law and God on their side, victory was certain. Light will always triumph over darkness.
We expected an epic fight, a battle royal. It turned out to be an anticlimax. The wind has blown and we have seen the strength of their majesties. In fact, strength they have not. We thought they were giants not knowing they were mere paper tigers. It was a David and Goliath fight. A fling of stone and they were blown away. The wind of change has swept some of them off. There is liberation fever in the land. Delta State is next on the line. This wind of change will continue to 2011. Those emperors still remaining learn from the story of Ozymandias. If they do not know it, I crave the indulgence of the publisher to reproduce it below:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Friday, November 26, 2010
FORENSIC FORCE: Unspoken and unemployed
By Salisu Suleiman
According to some reports, close to 80, 000 people stormed the National Stadium for the event. They were not there to watch the opening ceremony of the Olympic, or the All Africa Games. They were not there to watch the Super Eagles play a visiting team. They were not there for any Evangelical Crusade, and neither did Muslims decide to observe the Eid prayers at the stadium. They were there to write examinations to be shortlisted for employment by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA.
The 80,000 candidates were just at the Lagos centre alone. All over Nigeria’s major cities, similar scenes played out that day. In all, over half a million candidates applied for the few thousand job openings at the NDLEA. (The agency itself reportedly netted N750 million from the N1, 500 fees charged each applicant).
Scenes like these are by no means unusual. Reports also indicate that millions of people applied for a few thousand job openings at the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC; the Federal Road Safety Corps; Nigeria Immigration Service and others.
Nobody has the exact numbers of unemployed people in Nigeria. Last year, government accepted World Bank estimates that nearly 30 percent of Nigeria’s workforce is unemployed. Other observers believe the figures are higher. A recent study warns that Nigeria would have to create 24 million jobs in the next 10 years just to halve unemployment. Whatever the actual figures may be, unemployment is a major challenge confronting Nigeria.
While these scary statistics stare at us, government recently announced that the Niger Delta Coastal Road project would be constructed at the sum of N 1 trillion. Typically, there was no indication of the number of jobs the project would create. Yet, properly planned and executed, a project of this magnitude can create millions of direct and indirect jobs of all kinds in addition to more obvious benefits.
This single example is symptomatic of government approach to the challenge of job creation. Projects and programmes are embarked upon without indicating the specific number of jobs the project would create. How many jobs have been created in the real sector as a by-product of huge government spending? What strategies have been put in place to help mitigate the effects of unemployment in Nigeria? Do the unemployed have hope? Do we even have a current database of unemployed Nigerians?
Government must view unemployment in Nigeria from a national security perspective. Nigerians are generally hardworking and creative. If you follow a street hawker darting in and out of heavy traffic for a whole day in the hot sun, (often burdened with goods they are hawking), you will understand. But when people who are able and willing to work so hard just to get by find themselves unable to earn a living, then we are asking for trouble.
While not justifying the spate of armed robberies and kidnappings of recent, they are no doubt linked to unemployment. When university graduates, retired (and even serving) members of the security forces are forced into a life of crime, the level of sophistication and complexity is often beyond the capacity of the police and civil defense corps to handle.
So what is to be done?
There must be a census of unemployed people in Nigeria. From the exercise, a constantly updated base of unemployed Nigerians should be developed to introduce a basic ‘unemployment’ allowance. If all our ‘dishonourable honourables’ at the National Assembly can emerge as billionaires after each four-year term, then the treasury can find funds for this payment, which stops as soon as a person gets a job.
Responsibility for this payment should be shared among the federal, state and local governments. Compared to the billions spent every year on security (and much more looted), it is not asking for too much for government to give a token sum to every unemployed Nigerian. That way, a lot of petty theft and crime would be reduced and millions of lives would be touched. There would also be a positive impact on the economy, as most of the money would go directly to purchase goods and services.
The public sector cannot employ everyone in the country even if it had the resources. The private sector must be enabled to create employment and stimulate economic growth. Policies (and spending) at all levels must aim to stimulate the real sector, especially small and medium scale enterprises. Agriculture and industry are critical.
The warning lights are on: politics may dominate national discourse today, but the effects of unmitigated unemployment will destroy the polity.
According to some reports, close to 80, 000 people stormed the National Stadium for the event. They were not there to watch the opening ceremony of the Olympic, or the All Africa Games. They were not there to watch the Super Eagles play a visiting team. They were not there for any Evangelical Crusade, and neither did Muslims decide to observe the Eid prayers at the stadium. They were there to write examinations to be shortlisted for employment by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA.
The 80,000 candidates were just at the Lagos centre alone. All over Nigeria’s major cities, similar scenes played out that day. In all, over half a million candidates applied for the few thousand job openings at the NDLEA. (The agency itself reportedly netted N750 million from the N1, 500 fees charged each applicant).
Scenes like these are by no means unusual. Reports also indicate that millions of people applied for a few thousand job openings at the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC; the Federal Road Safety Corps; Nigeria Immigration Service and others.
Nobody has the exact numbers of unemployed people in Nigeria. Last year, government accepted World Bank estimates that nearly 30 percent of Nigeria’s workforce is unemployed. Other observers believe the figures are higher. A recent study warns that Nigeria would have to create 24 million jobs in the next 10 years just to halve unemployment. Whatever the actual figures may be, unemployment is a major challenge confronting Nigeria.
While these scary statistics stare at us, government recently announced that the Niger Delta Coastal Road project would be constructed at the sum of N 1 trillion. Typically, there was no indication of the number of jobs the project would create. Yet, properly planned and executed, a project of this magnitude can create millions of direct and indirect jobs of all kinds in addition to more obvious benefits.
This single example is symptomatic of government approach to the challenge of job creation. Projects and programmes are embarked upon without indicating the specific number of jobs the project would create. How many jobs have been created in the real sector as a by-product of huge government spending? What strategies have been put in place to help mitigate the effects of unemployment in Nigeria? Do the unemployed have hope? Do we even have a current database of unemployed Nigerians?
Government must view unemployment in Nigeria from a national security perspective. Nigerians are generally hardworking and creative. If you follow a street hawker darting in and out of heavy traffic for a whole day in the hot sun, (often burdened with goods they are hawking), you will understand. But when people who are able and willing to work so hard just to get by find themselves unable to earn a living, then we are asking for trouble.
While not justifying the spate of armed robberies and kidnappings of recent, they are no doubt linked to unemployment. When university graduates, retired (and even serving) members of the security forces are forced into a life of crime, the level of sophistication and complexity is often beyond the capacity of the police and civil defense corps to handle.
So what is to be done?
There must be a census of unemployed people in Nigeria. From the exercise, a constantly updated base of unemployed Nigerians should be developed to introduce a basic ‘unemployment’ allowance. If all our ‘dishonourable honourables’ at the National Assembly can emerge as billionaires after each four-year term, then the treasury can find funds for this payment, which stops as soon as a person gets a job.
Responsibility for this payment should be shared among the federal, state and local governments. Compared to the billions spent every year on security (and much more looted), it is not asking for too much for government to give a token sum to every unemployed Nigerian. That way, a lot of petty theft and crime would be reduced and millions of lives would be touched. There would also be a positive impact on the economy, as most of the money would go directly to purchase goods and services.
The public sector cannot employ everyone in the country even if it had the resources. The private sector must be enabled to create employment and stimulate economic growth. Policies (and spending) at all levels must aim to stimulate the real sector, especially small and medium scale enterprises. Agriculture and industry are critical.
The warning lights are on: politics may dominate national discourse today, but the effects of unmitigated unemployment will destroy the polity.
How Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan Perpetuates Fraud In Delta State
By Tony Ikelegbe
Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan has virtually littered every available space on road junctions/roundabouts, street corners with billboards and newspapers of supposedly completed projects around the state.
His government and DESOPADEC have spent over N500 million on advert placements in an attempt to broadcast the falsehood of these phantom projects to the unsuspecting public and the federal government. Over N1 billion has also been spent in bringing senior government officials to the state in an attempt to launder the image of the failing government. But, good things speak for themselves; the projects executed and completed in Lagos state speak volumes much louder than Uduaghan’s billboards. We believe these projects would have served us all better on land rather than in billboards, newspaper pages or CNN.
The budget is the fiscal instrument for implementation of government policies and projects and therefore the ultimate tool for assessment of the overall performance of any government. For the Uduaghan government, the yearly budgetary provision is regarded as a mere annual ritual, as it is just an avenue to allocate public funds to sectors after which they are diverted to phantom projects and/or completely spirited away.
The question now begging for answer is why are projects indicated in budgets and not implemented? Is it lack of funds? Obviously no. Why has Delta State been assuming a financial insolvency status when our Actual Receipts more than meet our Actual Expenditure? Where is the balance money going to?
Records obtained from the Federal Ministry of Finance and Delta State Ministry of Economic Planning shows revenue receipts and expenditure for the past 3 and half years as follows.
YEAR RECEIPTS BUDGETED EXP ACTUAL EXP. DIFF
Jan – Sept
2007 132,968,492,04 89,660,092,831 34,951,322,263 98,017,169,778
2008 155,137,500,694 232,810,646,314 92,051,405,662 63,086,095,032
2009 168,339,224,576 168,083,331,057 Not available
2010 (Jan-Jun) 114,939,466,431 217,176,003,604 Not available
Total monies received by Delta State government from Statutory Allocation, Oil derivation, IGR, VAT, etc. from January 2007 to June 2010 is over N571,384,683,742, one begins to wonder how these monies were spent and which beneficial projects it was used on. It is also most atrocious to note that Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan single handedly authorized the disbursement of over N114 billion been amount received since the beginning of this year as no cash budget has been done in the state as at August 2010 and no virement made.
It is apparent that Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan has hijacked the state’s resources presuming Deltans are docile and dim-witted citizens hence his obnoxious display of resentment for criticism. The monthly cash budgets for the allocation of resources to various sub heads for payments/disbursement has been cancelled by Dr. Uduaghan in Delta State. Hence, payment to contractors is not possible unless you are a “slave loyalist” or one of his mole contractors who represent him. The reason The Governor has given for non-payment of certified jobs done for the government for which he has claimed ownership of is that, He (Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan) does not want to empower his enemies. Is everybody in Delta state his enemy? If he does not pay for those contracts which formed basis for the past budgets, who does he expect to pay for them?
The highest level of insult the governor has thrown at Deltans is the “Anger Management Seminar” purportedly organized for Deltans – certainly the governor knows, we Deltans are very very angry with his total presentation of a government. A state where contractors are not paid after over 2 years of job completion, teachers’ promotion arrears and welfare have not been effected for the past 3 years. Jakpa/Ekpan road of less than 8km, 4 years running and is still under construction at snail speed but now being hurriedly done as election is drawing near. Yet the Governor has embarked on the dualisation of the 143kms Ughelli/Asaba road including several bridges were over 40% of total sums have been disbursed but not up to 10% of job completed. Obviously he will require 24 years for these elephant projects to be completed. So, why tie down needed funds that could have gone into meaningful township roads/drainage construction and economic projects into these white elephant projects? Definitely, these preferred projects are his drain pipe. As at today over N30billion has been paid out for these elephant projects, which will never be completed.
A whopping N14 billion naira was appropriated for street lights, and maintenance whereas the education and health sector is comatose – dilapidated infrastructure and shortage of staff. Doctors and medical workers are currently on strike for over 9 weeks in a state where we have a medical doctor as governor! Instead of managing the situation, the good Doctor has drawn a battle line with his colleagues.
Uduaghan is propagating poverty inducing policies so that come 2011 elections, Deltans will be all too vulnerable to accept stipends and evil political inducements so as not to revolt against his return. He has craftily paralyzed businesses in Delta state and enriched a very select few “slave leaders”. The end goal – no rivalry, no questions. But would it work? Not this time!
Budgeted sums approved by the state house of assembly for some selected projects from 2007 to 2010 are as follows.
TOTAL SUM APPROPRIATED
2007 TO 2010 STATUS
1 Warri Industrial Park 3,650,000,000 Paper Work
2 Agricultural Youth Development programme 2,100,000,000 Money Disbursed to Loyalist
3 Independent Power Project 25,000,000,000 Site not known
4 Establishment of Gas utilisation scheme 1,100,000,000 No clear direction
5 Installation & Reactivation of street lights in the state 16,666,971,759 Running with the states blood
6 LED Display boards/Electronics decorations round the state 3,550,000,000 Located along busy roads
7 Jakpa/Gbokoda Road 200,000,000 Slow pace of work
8 Sapele/Abigborodo Road 3,950,000,000 No visible work
9 Asaba Airstrip 22,200,000,000 Still under construction with completion date shifted thrice now.
10 Expansion of Osubi Runway 4,502,158,208 No work done
11 Construction of Effurun/Eku road 4,900,000,000 No work done
12 Construction of Ughelli/Asaba dual carriage way 24,000,000,000 %6 completion & Fed Road
13 Construction & Equipping of Specialist Hospital, Oghara 7,700,000,000 completed
14 Construction of Governors Office (New govt house, Asaba) 6,550,000,000 Work Given urgent attention
15 Naval logistics Corps, Oghara 1,160,000,000 Fed.project.
16 Maintenace of govt. house/landscaping 420,000,000 Urgent attention given
17 Beautification and landscaping of Effurun roundabout 290,000,000 Urgent attention given
18 Warri/Effurun Water Supply scheme 4,348,181,053 No drop of water after over 4years
19 Faculty of Engineering (DELSU, Oleh Campus) 1,100,000,000 Snail speed
20. Civic/Event Centre 3,700,000,000 Urgently completed
21. 1.5km Maryam Babangida Way without drainage but with streetlight 500,000,000 Urgently completed without drainages
Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan has virtually littered every available space on road junctions/roundabouts, street corners with billboards and newspapers of supposedly completed projects around the state.
His government and DESOPADEC have spent over N500 million on advert placements in an attempt to broadcast the falsehood of these phantom projects to the unsuspecting public and the federal government. Over N1 billion has also been spent in bringing senior government officials to the state in an attempt to launder the image of the failing government. But, good things speak for themselves; the projects executed and completed in Lagos state speak volumes much louder than Uduaghan’s billboards. We believe these projects would have served us all better on land rather than in billboards, newspaper pages or CNN.
The budget is the fiscal instrument for implementation of government policies and projects and therefore the ultimate tool for assessment of the overall performance of any government. For the Uduaghan government, the yearly budgetary provision is regarded as a mere annual ritual, as it is just an avenue to allocate public funds to sectors after which they are diverted to phantom projects and/or completely spirited away.
The question now begging for answer is why are projects indicated in budgets and not implemented? Is it lack of funds? Obviously no. Why has Delta State been assuming a financial insolvency status when our Actual Receipts more than meet our Actual Expenditure? Where is the balance money going to?
Records obtained from the Federal Ministry of Finance and Delta State Ministry of Economic Planning shows revenue receipts and expenditure for the past 3 and half years as follows.
YEAR RECEIPTS BUDGETED EXP ACTUAL EXP. DIFF
Jan – Sept
2007 132,968,492,04 89,660,092,831 34,951,322,263 98,017,169,778
2008 155,137,500,694 232,810,646,314 92,051,405,662 63,086,095,032
2009 168,339,224,576 168,083,331,057 Not available
2010 (Jan-Jun) 114,939,466,431 217,176,003,604 Not available
Total monies received by Delta State government from Statutory Allocation, Oil derivation, IGR, VAT, etc. from January 2007 to June 2010 is over N571,384,683,742, one begins to wonder how these monies were spent and which beneficial projects it was used on. It is also most atrocious to note that Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan single handedly authorized the disbursement of over N114 billion been amount received since the beginning of this year as no cash budget has been done in the state as at August 2010 and no virement made.
It is apparent that Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan has hijacked the state’s resources presuming Deltans are docile and dim-witted citizens hence his obnoxious display of resentment for criticism. The monthly cash budgets for the allocation of resources to various sub heads for payments/disbursement has been cancelled by Dr. Uduaghan in Delta State. Hence, payment to contractors is not possible unless you are a “slave loyalist” or one of his mole contractors who represent him. The reason The Governor has given for non-payment of certified jobs done for the government for which he has claimed ownership of is that, He (Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan) does not want to empower his enemies. Is everybody in Delta state his enemy? If he does not pay for those contracts which formed basis for the past budgets, who does he expect to pay for them?
The highest level of insult the governor has thrown at Deltans is the “Anger Management Seminar” purportedly organized for Deltans – certainly the governor knows, we Deltans are very very angry with his total presentation of a government. A state where contractors are not paid after over 2 years of job completion, teachers’ promotion arrears and welfare have not been effected for the past 3 years. Jakpa/Ekpan road of less than 8km, 4 years running and is still under construction at snail speed but now being hurriedly done as election is drawing near. Yet the Governor has embarked on the dualisation of the 143kms Ughelli/Asaba road including several bridges were over 40% of total sums have been disbursed but not up to 10% of job completed. Obviously he will require 24 years for these elephant projects to be completed. So, why tie down needed funds that could have gone into meaningful township roads/drainage construction and economic projects into these white elephant projects? Definitely, these preferred projects are his drain pipe. As at today over N30billion has been paid out for these elephant projects, which will never be completed.
A whopping N14 billion naira was appropriated for street lights, and maintenance whereas the education and health sector is comatose – dilapidated infrastructure and shortage of staff. Doctors and medical workers are currently on strike for over 9 weeks in a state where we have a medical doctor as governor! Instead of managing the situation, the good Doctor has drawn a battle line with his colleagues.
Uduaghan is propagating poverty inducing policies so that come 2011 elections, Deltans will be all too vulnerable to accept stipends and evil political inducements so as not to revolt against his return. He has craftily paralyzed businesses in Delta state and enriched a very select few “slave leaders”. The end goal – no rivalry, no questions. But would it work? Not this time!
Budgeted sums approved by the state house of assembly for some selected projects from 2007 to 2010 are as follows.
TOTAL SUM APPROPRIATED
2007 TO 2010 STATUS
1 Warri Industrial Park 3,650,000,000 Paper Work
2 Agricultural Youth Development programme 2,100,000,000 Money Disbursed to Loyalist
3 Independent Power Project 25,000,000,000 Site not known
4 Establishment of Gas utilisation scheme 1,100,000,000 No clear direction
5 Installation & Reactivation of street lights in the state 16,666,971,759 Running with the states blood
6 LED Display boards/Electronics decorations round the state 3,550,000,000 Located along busy roads
7 Jakpa/Gbokoda Road 200,000,000 Slow pace of work
8 Sapele/Abigborodo Road 3,950,000,000 No visible work
9 Asaba Airstrip 22,200,000,000 Still under construction with completion date shifted thrice now.
10 Expansion of Osubi Runway 4,502,158,208 No work done
11 Construction of Effurun/Eku road 4,900,000,000 No work done
12 Construction of Ughelli/Asaba dual carriage way 24,000,000,000 %6 completion & Fed Road
13 Construction & Equipping of Specialist Hospital, Oghara 7,700,000,000 completed
14 Construction of Governors Office (New govt house, Asaba) 6,550,000,000 Work Given urgent attention
15 Naval logistics Corps, Oghara 1,160,000,000 Fed.project.
16 Maintenace of govt. house/landscaping 420,000,000 Urgent attention given
17 Beautification and landscaping of Effurun roundabout 290,000,000 Urgent attention given
18 Warri/Effurun Water Supply scheme 4,348,181,053 No drop of water after over 4years
19 Faculty of Engineering (DELSU, Oleh Campus) 1,100,000,000 Snail speed
20. Civic/Event Centre 3,700,000,000 Urgently completed
21. 1.5km Maryam Babangida Way without drainage but with streetlight 500,000,000 Urgently completed without drainages
Remembering Demas Akpore
By SUNNY AWHEFEADA
ON 26 December 2008, people of goodwill shall gather in Ughelli for a memorial lecture in honour of Chief Demas Akpore, one time Deputy Governor of the Old Bendel State (1979-1982), the greatest Orogun son in modern time, and one of the most selfless Nigerians that ever lived. He rose through dints of hard work to overcome daunting existential obstacles to write his name, and that of the entire Orogun in the chronicle of humanity. He gave the greatest legacy any man could give to another when he personally built Orogun Grammar School in 1966. The height of his public record came when he became the first Deputy Governor of Bendel State in 1979.
One of my earliest childhood book encounters that is yet to be lost to the vagaries of memory was the one I had of the Late Chief Demas Onoliobakpovwa Akpore, then His Excellency and Deputy Governor. That encounter took place on the pages of my primary five social studies text book. The year was 1982. Chief Demas Akpore dominated the consciousness of children of my generation in the early eighties. He was a much talked about personality in positive and superlative terms. He was to some of us a symbol of hope and regeneration albeit undefined in our then callow minds. My next symbolic encounter with Chief Akpore was again on the illuminating pages of a book entitled The Good Student written by the educationist per excellence Edwin Oruma in 1984, my first year in secondary school. The book was made a compulsory read for my generation of students. In a chapter entitled “The Dignity of Labour†the author cited the example of Chief Demas Akpore who together with a handful of pioneer students built what is now Orogun Grammar School, Orogun in 1966. Chief Akpore and his team with matchets, spades, wheelbarrows, cleared the forest, dug and laid foundations, erected blocks and did everything including mortgaging his future finances to build the school for his people. Chief Demas Onoliobakpovwa Akpore was born in April 1928 in Warri. A descendant of redoubtable Orogun ancestry, the young Demas attended the Christ Missionary School in Warri for his elementary education. When the prestigious Government College Ughelli was founded in 1945, Demas was among the pioneering students, and it is on record that he was the third student to enroll. His potentials as an academic wizard and a great leader of men blossomed at Government College. After Ughelli he proceeded to the then University College Ibadan to study the then doyen of all disciplines, Classics. His decade at Ibadan also saw Bola Ige, Gamaliel Onosode, Iyalla Joseph Iyalla, Christopher Okigbo, among other cerebral geniuses reading Classics. Demas, we were told, was non pareil. He wrote and spoke Latin as if it was the language of his forebears.
Having deconstructed Graecoromen Scholarship at Ibadan, Demas sailed across seven seas to the Western world in search of more knowledge. He berthed at the University of British Columbia to study for a Master of Arts degree in Classics. He graduated with Distinction in 1958! Demas returned home to render selfless service to his fatherland just getting ready to get sovereignty from British rule.
On his return to Nigeria he became the Principal of United College of Commerce in Warri. His most historic moment in the annals of education was soon to follow. In 1966, enraptured by the dignity of labour he single-handedly founded Orogun Grammar School. He was inspired by a mission which was to bring education to his retarded people. That mission was powered by a vision which held that only through education can a people be fully emancipated. When in the early 1970s, his alma mater Government College Ughelli was in dire straits, it was Chief Demas Akpore that was beckoned at to restore the school to the path of greatness. Thus in 1972 he became the first old boy to be Principal of the school. He was a disciplinarian, exemplary teacher, great sportsman and motivator of people. He took the college to the peak of glory.
By 1978 when partisan politics was given the nod, Chief Akpore pitched his tent with the progressive Unity Party of Nigeria, led by the sage Papa Obafemi Awolowo. However, this was not Akpore’s first foray into politics. He was indeed a nationalist who distinguished himself in the Zikist Movement. He had in the First Republic attained political visibility when he played the enfant terrible and neutralized the unholy alliance between the NCNC and NPC. He emerged from the Schism a hero and eventually championed the formation of the Midwest Democratic Front (MDF). Chief Akpore was an intellectual and philosopher in politics. He was cultured beyond his time. In league with Ambrose Alli, Bola Ige, Michael Ajasin, Bisi Onobanjo, Lateef Jakande, under the patriarchal tutelage of Papa Awolowo, Akpore used his erudition, energy and will power to expand the frontiers of progressive ideals. But, the Nigerian turf could be traitorous to good men, and soon some of Chief Akporeâ party men started scheming to undo him. He resigned his post as Deputy Governor in 1982.
Chief Akpore credentials bestrode Africa. He was a consummate Pan-Africanist who was at home with Jomo Kenyatta (after whom he named his first son), Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, Leopold Sedar Senghor, Sekou Toure, and other flag bearers of African Liberation.
He was a great family man. Together with his wife Mrs Grace Akpore, they bore six children, Stella, Jomo, Boye, Kevwe, Enaite and Newman. Boye went the way of Bola Ige, A.k. Dikibo, Harry Marshall among other victims of politically motivated killing. Chief Akpore was a great musician, deft with the use of both hands.
•Awhefeada wrote from Delta State beration. Chief Akpore involvement in Pan-Africanism went beyond contact with the proponents of the concept. He read so much about Pan Africanism, and also wrote several tours de force.
Unlike many of his contemporaries Chief Akpore was incorruptible. The story was told of a Lebanese contractor who offered to build him a mansion in Lagos or Warri or any place of his choice. Chief Akpore politely refused. He had only two houses, his country bungalow in Orogun and a storey building built through mortgage loan in Warri! He was a decent man, too decent and too ideal for his Nigeria. When the military regime arrested and jailed thieving politicians in 1984, Chief Akpore was apologized to for being invited for interrogation after investigations revealed that he was as clean as a whistle.
ON 26 December 2008, people of goodwill shall gather in Ughelli for a memorial lecture in honour of Chief Demas Akpore, one time Deputy Governor of the Old Bendel State (1979-1982), the greatest Orogun son in modern time, and one of the most selfless Nigerians that ever lived. He rose through dints of hard work to overcome daunting existential obstacles to write his name, and that of the entire Orogun in the chronicle of humanity. He gave the greatest legacy any man could give to another when he personally built Orogun Grammar School in 1966. The height of his public record came when he became the first Deputy Governor of Bendel State in 1979.
One of my earliest childhood book encounters that is yet to be lost to the vagaries of memory was the one I had of the Late Chief Demas Onoliobakpovwa Akpore, then His Excellency and Deputy Governor. That encounter took place on the pages of my primary five social studies text book. The year was 1982. Chief Demas Akpore dominated the consciousness of children of my generation in the early eighties. He was a much talked about personality in positive and superlative terms. He was to some of us a symbol of hope and regeneration albeit undefined in our then callow minds. My next symbolic encounter with Chief Akpore was again on the illuminating pages of a book entitled The Good Student written by the educationist per excellence Edwin Oruma in 1984, my first year in secondary school. The book was made a compulsory read for my generation of students. In a chapter entitled “The Dignity of Labour†the author cited the example of Chief Demas Akpore who together with a handful of pioneer students built what is now Orogun Grammar School, Orogun in 1966. Chief Akpore and his team with matchets, spades, wheelbarrows, cleared the forest, dug and laid foundations, erected blocks and did everything including mortgaging his future finances to build the school for his people. Chief Demas Onoliobakpovwa Akpore was born in April 1928 in Warri. A descendant of redoubtable Orogun ancestry, the young Demas attended the Christ Missionary School in Warri for his elementary education. When the prestigious Government College Ughelli was founded in 1945, Demas was among the pioneering students, and it is on record that he was the third student to enroll. His potentials as an academic wizard and a great leader of men blossomed at Government College. After Ughelli he proceeded to the then University College Ibadan to study the then doyen of all disciplines, Classics. His decade at Ibadan also saw Bola Ige, Gamaliel Onosode, Iyalla Joseph Iyalla, Christopher Okigbo, among other cerebral geniuses reading Classics. Demas, we were told, was non pareil. He wrote and spoke Latin as if it was the language of his forebears.
Having deconstructed Graecoromen Scholarship at Ibadan, Demas sailed across seven seas to the Western world in search of more knowledge. He berthed at the University of British Columbia to study for a Master of Arts degree in Classics. He graduated with Distinction in 1958! Demas returned home to render selfless service to his fatherland just getting ready to get sovereignty from British rule.
On his return to Nigeria he became the Principal of United College of Commerce in Warri. His most historic moment in the annals of education was soon to follow. In 1966, enraptured by the dignity of labour he single-handedly founded Orogun Grammar School. He was inspired by a mission which was to bring education to his retarded people. That mission was powered by a vision which held that only through education can a people be fully emancipated. When in the early 1970s, his alma mater Government College Ughelli was in dire straits, it was Chief Demas Akpore that was beckoned at to restore the school to the path of greatness. Thus in 1972 he became the first old boy to be Principal of the school. He was a disciplinarian, exemplary teacher, great sportsman and motivator of people. He took the college to the peak of glory.
By 1978 when partisan politics was given the nod, Chief Akpore pitched his tent with the progressive Unity Party of Nigeria, led by the sage Papa Obafemi Awolowo. However, this was not Akpore’s first foray into politics. He was indeed a nationalist who distinguished himself in the Zikist Movement. He had in the First Republic attained political visibility when he played the enfant terrible and neutralized the unholy alliance between the NCNC and NPC. He emerged from the Schism a hero and eventually championed the formation of the Midwest Democratic Front (MDF). Chief Akpore was an intellectual and philosopher in politics. He was cultured beyond his time. In league with Ambrose Alli, Bola Ige, Michael Ajasin, Bisi Onobanjo, Lateef Jakande, under the patriarchal tutelage of Papa Awolowo, Akpore used his erudition, energy and will power to expand the frontiers of progressive ideals. But, the Nigerian turf could be traitorous to good men, and soon some of Chief Akporeâ party men started scheming to undo him. He resigned his post as Deputy Governor in 1982.
Chief Akpore credentials bestrode Africa. He was a consummate Pan-Africanist who was at home with Jomo Kenyatta (after whom he named his first son), Osagyefo Kwame Nkrumah, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, Leopold Sedar Senghor, Sekou Toure, and other flag bearers of African Liberation.
He was a great family man. Together with his wife Mrs Grace Akpore, they bore six children, Stella, Jomo, Boye, Kevwe, Enaite and Newman. Boye went the way of Bola Ige, A.k. Dikibo, Harry Marshall among other victims of politically motivated killing. Chief Akpore was a great musician, deft with the use of both hands.
•Awhefeada wrote from Delta State beration. Chief Akpore involvement in Pan-Africanism went beyond contact with the proponents of the concept. He read so much about Pan Africanism, and also wrote several tours de force.
Unlike many of his contemporaries Chief Akpore was incorruptible. The story was told of a Lebanese contractor who offered to build him a mansion in Lagos or Warri or any place of his choice. Chief Akpore politely refused. He had only two houses, his country bungalow in Orogun and a storey building built through mortgage loan in Warri! He was a decent man, too decent and too ideal for his Nigeria. When the military regime arrested and jailed thieving politicians in 1984, Chief Akpore was apologized to for being invited for interrogation after investigations revealed that he was as clean as a whistle.
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
IBB: A Dictator And The Burden Of History
By OLUSOLA FABIYI
The suave former minister of information, Chief Alex Akinyele, is neither a pastor nor an Imam but he seems to have knowledge of the Holy Bible and Quran, if the way he spoke at the presidential declaration of former military dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida (rtd) in Abuja on September 15 was anything to go by. Akinyele, who served during the inglorious reign of Babangida, appealed to Nigerians to cultivate the habit of forgiveness, without which, he said, it would be difficult to nurture friendship. This apart, he also said both the Holy Bible and the Holy Quran lay emphasis on clemency.
However, the Ondo State born chief refused to state the issues that his former boss needed to be forgiven of. He also did not tell his audience if the man he was speaking on his behalf had agreed that he had in anyway committed any sin either against Nigeria or Nigerians that necessitated his asking for forgiveness on his behalf.
While many Nigerians had actually in clear terms enumerated many ways in which Babangida had sinned against his fellow Nigerians and his country, the gap-toothed general had consistently refused to budge. He also brazenly resisted that he needed forgiveness. Perhaps, if his presidential ambition has made him forget the past so soon, the African Democratic Initiates, in serial advertorials in major newspapers, has brought to fore, the issues that Babangida, who is aspiring to be president on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, and the likes of Akinyele, need to ponder on.
Referring to IBB, as he is commonly called by his admirers and foes alike, the ADI said, “This man stood against the will of the entire Nigerian nation when he annulled the victory of Chief Moshood Abiola at the June 12, 1993 presidential election.
“This man refused to prove his innocence over the assassination of Dele Giwa and other alleged human rights abuses at the Justice Oputa Panel.
“This man detained Major-General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and other political leaders because they opposed the fraud of the so-called transition programme that shifted the hand-over date from 1990 to 1991, then 1992 and later 1993.”
Nevertheless, as requested by Akinyele, the organisation urged Nigerians to “let us forgive him;” but also asked, “must we forget?” Perhaps, it is in this spirit that many Nigerians are now voicing their opinion, with many wondering what Babangida, who had ruled this country with iron hand, forgot in the Presidential Villa, which he occupied before he was forced out by Nigerians in 1993.
A group, Akwa Ibom Interest Group, described IBB’s presidential ambition as insult to Nigerians. The group, through its leader, Mr. Sylanus Ukpong, said that it was even surprising that Babangida could muster enough courage to still think of running for the presidency when he did not believe in democracy in the first place.
Ukpong said after annulling the June 12, 1993 presidential election, which had been described as the freest and fairest in the interest of Nigeria, Babangida did not have any moral right to ask for Nigerians’ vote. The group said, “When Ibrahim Babangida’s interest to contest the 2011 presidential election in Nigeria became a major political issue in the media, most Nigerians were still in a state of denials because it was difficult to accept the ugly possibility that the former military dictator could dare Nigerians once again, 17 years after annulling the June 12, 1993 presidential election that was considered to be the best in the history of Nigeria’s attempt at democracy.
“Today, Babangida has officially declared that he is running for president in 2011. By that, he has urinated on the graves of late Chief Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, the nation’s unforgettable icon of democratic struggle who died while fighting to claim the people’s mandate freely given to him on June 12 and hundreds of Nigerians who died in the same course. Today, Babangida has spat on the faces of Nigerians, his message to Nigerians is clear: ‘I can rule this nation again, with or without your consent’.
“We had thought, albeit wrongly, that the former military president would succumb to the numerous voices of wisdom that has cautioned him against seeking election into the office of the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We consider his declaration as another big insult on our collective psyche and our fledging democracy.
“We totally condemn Ibrahim Babangida’s declaration to contest 2011 presidential election in Nigeria. We call on all Nigerians at home and abroad to voice out their protest against Babangida’s insensitivity against Nigeria and Nigerians. Let the ghost of June 12, we invoke, begin to hunt down Babangida and anyone who line out behind him.”
Also, a governorship candidate on the platform of All Nigerian People’s Party in Lagos State, Chief Yomi Tokoya, described Babangida as a threat to free, fair and credible election in 2011. He, therefore, called on Nigerians to ignore those campaigning for him that he has experience to lead the nation once again. While describing his campaigners as “sycophants, praise singers” who he said were all out to deceive unsuspecting Nigerians, Tokoya promised he would soon release a book on why the former military president must not be allowed to lead the nation again.
The book, he said, is co-published and co-sponsored by the Movement for Free and Credible Elections in Nigeria and Save Nigeria Campaign Organisation. He called on Babangida to either withdraw from the presidential race or be prepared to be disgraced.
He said the major objective of the book was to mobilise Nigerians “nation-wide and world-wide to put pressure on Babangida to withdraw honourably now from the presidential race or be disgraced Insha Allah, if he refuses to withdraw.”
Tokoya added that a survey carried out before the book was written indicated that majority of Nigerians were of the opinion that Babangida did not have the moral right to want to lead the country now.
Tokoya said, “Many patriotic, progressive and revolutionary Nigerians interviewed for the opinion poll, asserted that Babangida has no moral right to contest the presidential election in 2011 for many reasons. They responded that most of the varied, complex and intricate social, economic and political problems confronting contemporary Nigeria, were created, accentuated and multiplied by unpatriotic and bad leaders like Babangida.
“We wish to advise patriotic, progressive and revolutionary Nigerians to ignore the current and massive propaganda in the mass media and on the Internet, that Babangida has experience, vision, wisdom, courage to build a new Nigeria. We wish to say categorically that the propagandists, sycophants, praise singers and spin doctors of Babangida are pathological liars, deceitful, crooked, craft and unpatriotic people, who are trying to deceive Nigerians to cast their precious votes for Babangida, an unrepentant kleptomaniac, habitual pretender, everlasting reactionary.
“We hereby reiterate that Babangida is a threat to free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria in 2011. We are determined to save Nigeria and Nigerians from Babangida and his few unpatriotic, reactionary, greedy and selfish supporters.”
With the stiff opposition coming from all angles, a human rights activist, Mr. Amitolu Shittu said it would be better for Babangida to drop his presidential ambition. He said Babangida remained the most unpopular leader in the history of the country, adding that the former leader’s advisers had failed to tell him the truth about Nigerians’ aversion to him.
The activist said Babangida would not contemplate contesting the 2011 presidential election if he had a true assessment of the public perception of his antecedents and that his reign as a military ruler would haunt Nigeria for a long time.
The suave former minister of information, Chief Alex Akinyele, is neither a pastor nor an Imam but he seems to have knowledge of the Holy Bible and Quran, if the way he spoke at the presidential declaration of former military dictator, Gen. Ibrahim Babangida (rtd) in Abuja on September 15 was anything to go by. Akinyele, who served during the inglorious reign of Babangida, appealed to Nigerians to cultivate the habit of forgiveness, without which, he said, it would be difficult to nurture friendship. This apart, he also said both the Holy Bible and the Holy Quran lay emphasis on clemency.
However, the Ondo State born chief refused to state the issues that his former boss needed to be forgiven of. He also did not tell his audience if the man he was speaking on his behalf had agreed that he had in anyway committed any sin either against Nigeria or Nigerians that necessitated his asking for forgiveness on his behalf.
While many Nigerians had actually in clear terms enumerated many ways in which Babangida had sinned against his fellow Nigerians and his country, the gap-toothed general had consistently refused to budge. He also brazenly resisted that he needed forgiveness. Perhaps, if his presidential ambition has made him forget the past so soon, the African Democratic Initiates, in serial advertorials in major newspapers, has brought to fore, the issues that Babangida, who is aspiring to be president on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party, and the likes of Akinyele, need to ponder on.
Referring to IBB, as he is commonly called by his admirers and foes alike, the ADI said, “This man stood against the will of the entire Nigerian nation when he annulled the victory of Chief Moshood Abiola at the June 12, 1993 presidential election.
“This man refused to prove his innocence over the assassination of Dele Giwa and other alleged human rights abuses at the Justice Oputa Panel.
“This man detained Major-General Shehu Musa Yar’Adua and other political leaders because they opposed the fraud of the so-called transition programme that shifted the hand-over date from 1990 to 1991, then 1992 and later 1993.”
Nevertheless, as requested by Akinyele, the organisation urged Nigerians to “let us forgive him;” but also asked, “must we forget?” Perhaps, it is in this spirit that many Nigerians are now voicing their opinion, with many wondering what Babangida, who had ruled this country with iron hand, forgot in the Presidential Villa, which he occupied before he was forced out by Nigerians in 1993.
A group, Akwa Ibom Interest Group, described IBB’s presidential ambition as insult to Nigerians. The group, through its leader, Mr. Sylanus Ukpong, said that it was even surprising that Babangida could muster enough courage to still think of running for the presidency when he did not believe in democracy in the first place.
Ukpong said after annulling the June 12, 1993 presidential election, which had been described as the freest and fairest in the interest of Nigeria, Babangida did not have any moral right to ask for Nigerians’ vote. The group said, “When Ibrahim Babangida’s interest to contest the 2011 presidential election in Nigeria became a major political issue in the media, most Nigerians were still in a state of denials because it was difficult to accept the ugly possibility that the former military dictator could dare Nigerians once again, 17 years after annulling the June 12, 1993 presidential election that was considered to be the best in the history of Nigeria’s attempt at democracy.
“Today, Babangida has officially declared that he is running for president in 2011. By that, he has urinated on the graves of late Chief Moshood Kashimawo Abiola, the nation’s unforgettable icon of democratic struggle who died while fighting to claim the people’s mandate freely given to him on June 12 and hundreds of Nigerians who died in the same course. Today, Babangida has spat on the faces of Nigerians, his message to Nigerians is clear: ‘I can rule this nation again, with or without your consent’.
“We had thought, albeit wrongly, that the former military president would succumb to the numerous voices of wisdom that has cautioned him against seeking election into the office of the president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. We consider his declaration as another big insult on our collective psyche and our fledging democracy.
“We totally condemn Ibrahim Babangida’s declaration to contest 2011 presidential election in Nigeria. We call on all Nigerians at home and abroad to voice out their protest against Babangida’s insensitivity against Nigeria and Nigerians. Let the ghost of June 12, we invoke, begin to hunt down Babangida and anyone who line out behind him.”
Also, a governorship candidate on the platform of All Nigerian People’s Party in Lagos State, Chief Yomi Tokoya, described Babangida as a threat to free, fair and credible election in 2011. He, therefore, called on Nigerians to ignore those campaigning for him that he has experience to lead the nation once again. While describing his campaigners as “sycophants, praise singers” who he said were all out to deceive unsuspecting Nigerians, Tokoya promised he would soon release a book on why the former military president must not be allowed to lead the nation again.
The book, he said, is co-published and co-sponsored by the Movement for Free and Credible Elections in Nigeria and Save Nigeria Campaign Organisation. He called on Babangida to either withdraw from the presidential race or be prepared to be disgraced.
He said the major objective of the book was to mobilise Nigerians “nation-wide and world-wide to put pressure on Babangida to withdraw honourably now from the presidential race or be disgraced Insha Allah, if he refuses to withdraw.”
Tokoya added that a survey carried out before the book was written indicated that majority of Nigerians were of the opinion that Babangida did not have the moral right to want to lead the country now.
Tokoya said, “Many patriotic, progressive and revolutionary Nigerians interviewed for the opinion poll, asserted that Babangida has no moral right to contest the presidential election in 2011 for many reasons. They responded that most of the varied, complex and intricate social, economic and political problems confronting contemporary Nigeria, were created, accentuated and multiplied by unpatriotic and bad leaders like Babangida.
“We wish to advise patriotic, progressive and revolutionary Nigerians to ignore the current and massive propaganda in the mass media and on the Internet, that Babangida has experience, vision, wisdom, courage to build a new Nigeria. We wish to say categorically that the propagandists, sycophants, praise singers and spin doctors of Babangida are pathological liars, deceitful, crooked, craft and unpatriotic people, who are trying to deceive Nigerians to cast their precious votes for Babangida, an unrepentant kleptomaniac, habitual pretender, everlasting reactionary.
“We hereby reiterate that Babangida is a threat to free, fair and credible elections in Nigeria in 2011. We are determined to save Nigeria and Nigerians from Babangida and his few unpatriotic, reactionary, greedy and selfish supporters.”
With the stiff opposition coming from all angles, a human rights activist, Mr. Amitolu Shittu said it would be better for Babangida to drop his presidential ambition. He said Babangida remained the most unpopular leader in the history of the country, adding that the former leader’s advisers had failed to tell him the truth about Nigerians’ aversion to him.
The activist said Babangida would not contemplate contesting the 2011 presidential election if he had a true assessment of the public perception of his antecedents and that his reign as a military ruler would haunt Nigeria for a long time.
Friday, November 19, 2010
FIRST LADY LAWLESSNESS
It was with shock that one read about the military like vituperations of the First Lady, Dame Patience Jonathan during her recent visit to Rivers State. In this twenty first century and in our nascent democracy, the First Lady forgot that she has no constitutional role in the nation’s constitution. By acting as a Headmistress or Militant Commander, she has shown what she will do if her husband wins election next year.
This First Lady intoxication and lawlessness is not limited to the federal level but even to wives of governors. It is high time they knew that no office was assigned to them in the constitution. Whatever they are doing is illegal.
By berating Governor Rotimi Amaechi, Dame Patience Jonathan has shown that she regards governors as part of Aso Rock Staff that can dance to her whims and caprices. Unfortunately, the governors bend over to lick the shoes of the first lady because of 2011.
Dame Patience Jonathan should be reminded that she needs patience and tact in her relationships and utterances. She should also remember that she has to account for whatever fund that might have been donated to her pet project. This applies to other state first ladies. Law enforcement agencies should scrutinize the funding and expenditure of the pet projects of various first ladies.
Finally, Dame Patience Jonathan should also be reminded that her actions will positively or negatively affect her husband’s chances during next year’s election. Many where skeptical of her considering the controversies that surrounded her when she was the first lady in Bayelsa State. She is proving the skeptics right.
This First Lady intoxication and lawlessness is not limited to the federal level but even to wives of governors. It is high time they knew that no office was assigned to them in the constitution. Whatever they are doing is illegal.
By berating Governor Rotimi Amaechi, Dame Patience Jonathan has shown that she regards governors as part of Aso Rock Staff that can dance to her whims and caprices. Unfortunately, the governors bend over to lick the shoes of the first lady because of 2011.
Dame Patience Jonathan should be reminded that she needs patience and tact in her relationships and utterances. She should also remember that she has to account for whatever fund that might have been donated to her pet project. This applies to other state first ladies. Law enforcement agencies should scrutinize the funding and expenditure of the pet projects of various first ladies.
Finally, Dame Patience Jonathan should also be reminded that her actions will positively or negatively affect her husband’s chances during next year’s election. Many where skeptical of her considering the controversies that surrounded her when she was the first lady in Bayelsa State. She is proving the skeptics right.
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
What Does IBB Want Again?
by Adewale T. Akande
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"This is 2010 and not 1985. Nigeria has a pool of men who are blessed with leadership qualities and who can stand the acid test of honour and integrity. I believe that very soon a true servant of people and a genuine lover of humanity will emerge as our President. God bless the good people of Nigeria."
“The future will have no pity for those men who possessing the exceptional privilege of being able to speak words of truth to their oppressors, have taken refuge in an attitude of passivity, of mute indifference, and sometimes of cold complicity” so said Frantz Fanon. Edmund Burke in support of Fanon said “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” We have integrity when what people see is the same as who we say we are.
It is a matter of common sense that the values we hold and remain true to, are intertwined with the well-being of ourselves as both individuals and as communities. I pray that most of our ancestors will not turn in their graves for our iniquities and curse our nation with venom. According to a proverbial saying, “When you are down, the only way out is up” Nigeria will never be down again. Nigerians will never eat their vomits again despite ravaging poverty.
The recent declaration of the former military leader, General Babangida at the Eagle Square in Abuja of his intention to contest the 2011 Presidency, should not be seen as a surprise to all Nigerians. I think, we should no longer be surprised as to what a man can do. Man is the only animal that eats when he is not hungry and the only creature that drinks when he is not thirsty. Babangida first attempt after stepping aside was on the 8th of November 2006, when he picked a nomination from the Peoples Democratic Party Headquarters in Abuja. He was later shown the way out. Firstly, as a citizen of Nigeria who has not been found guilty of any criminal offence by the court of the land, he is eligible to contest in any national election. He is definitely exercising his political right. Even, late General Sanni Abacha would have done the same thing by now had it not been “a coup from heaven” that took his life. The whole world is watching the recycling of our past leaders and administrators with disgust.
Secondly, we should not be surprised about his declaration as we are living in one of the most corrupted nations of the world. The corruption that has robbed Nigeria children of a better future. The corruption which he himself institutionalised-“the kick-backs and “ten-percentages”. Is IBB exposing himself to ridicule or he wants people following him to have their own share? Do you think that this can happen in a developed and civilized world? His families and kins-men should have called him to order and ask him what does he want in the office again ! He was there for eight years and he had no solutions to any of all the problems that brought this country into crisis in his declaration speech; “Today, the reality of our present circumstances is that our country is in a crisis. We cry over the economy; and we agonise our state of our educational system as well as organized crime. Our infrastructure has collapsed and we continue to live with epileptic supply of electricity. We bicker over the never-ending issue of subsidy”.
Twenty-five years ago, General Babangida in the last four lines of October 1, 1985 independence speech .He said; “I assure you that this administration is determined to face the challenges squarely. The time for action is NOW. We count on your understanding, cooperation and support. Let us all work together for brighter future under the banner of ECONOMIC RECONSTRUCTION, SOCIAL JUSTICE AND SELF-RELIANCE”. By the time he stepped aside on August 27 1993, the Africa’s leading oil producer, one of the potentially richest nations in the world, the land of food basket was in ruin, crumbling on its knees and at the brink of disintegration. Who is know fooling who? According to one of the greatest American statesmen, Abraham Lincoln; “You can fool some of the people some of the time; you can fool all the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time”.
Moreover, we should not be surprised that this is happening in a country where over 70 percent of Nigerians live below poverty level. Poverty is the condition of being poor, need, indigence and lack of means of sustenance. This is as a result of lack of consistency and effective implementations of government policies to the letter. The traces of poverty is seen everywhere, even it manifests itself on our so called rich men. Poverty leads to corruption, disruption of the family relations and social life, causes rising crime rate such as the new trend of kidnappings, sophisticated armed-robbery, advance fee fraud (419) internet scams among other vices. In this situation, people are very desperate to survive by all means. You can see what happened in Minna just less than twenty four hours after IBB declared to contest for Presidency in Abuja; hundreds of youth, including women mobilised to attend the Abuja declaration stormed the Government House in Minna to register their grievances over non-payment of promised allowances (five thousand naira each) for attending the event. This is a kind of dirty money and stage-managed politics that they want to bring back to Nigeria.
Meanwhile, as a result of the plague of crisis over the last five decades, most of Nigerians seem now to be suffering from selective amnesia. Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu rightly put it in his book “Because I am Involved” as “…we conveniently forget certain unpleasant facts about our journey through life as a polity”. Selective amnesia happens when a person can recall only small parts of events that took pace in a defined period of time. The IBB-years (1985 and 1993) trapped Nigeria into ruinous military reign, stinking corruption , deepening poverty, economic decline and ethnic rivalry. We cannot estimate many innocent life lost and properties destroyed as an aftermath of June 12 election annulment demonstrations. Lets take a clue from immortal words of George Santayara; “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
The strength of a nation lies in discipline. IBB betrayed the Nigeria Oath of allegiance, the army core values, and the entire people for his over ambition. Discipline is one of the most important core values of the Army. It is “to maintain the highest standard so that others can rely on you”. IBB has committed iniquities with the greatest opportunity he had to rule the most populous black nation in the world for eight good years. What has he forgotten in the office that he wants to go back and pick ? Either his Campaign Co-ordinator, who is now soiling his name and reputation that took him many years to build or his son, Muhammed Babangida, a leader in this generation of young polo players would have gotten more votes than him if at all he is able to scale through PDP primaries.
How could somebody who failed to turn the country around for better in eight years (with military power) can now turn the country round in four years?. He refused to exercise the will of Nigerians by annulling the most adjudged free and fair election, in which he would have made history for himself even if late MKO Abiola will be overthrown by Abacha in few days as done to the Interim government. Obasanjo handed power to an elected President and had another opportunity to rule the country again. As Yoruba adage says “The king whose reign is characterised by peace, history will record it. Also the king whose tenure is fraught with chaos (poverty), history will not fail to record it”. Tell IBB and his cronies that their game is up. If IBB wants to help the masses, he should first embark on building public libraries in all State capitals. After all, 42 billion naira was wasted on his endless transition programme. They should give other people a chance. This is 2010 and not 1985. Nigeria has a pool of men who are blessed with leadership qualities and who can stand the acid test of honour and integrity. I believe that very soon a true servant of people and a genuine lover of humanity will emerge as our President. God bless the good people of Nigeria.
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"This is 2010 and not 1985. Nigeria has a pool of men who are blessed with leadership qualities and who can stand the acid test of honour and integrity. I believe that very soon a true servant of people and a genuine lover of humanity will emerge as our President. God bless the good people of Nigeria."
“The future will have no pity for those men who possessing the exceptional privilege of being able to speak words of truth to their oppressors, have taken refuge in an attitude of passivity, of mute indifference, and sometimes of cold complicity” so said Frantz Fanon. Edmund Burke in support of Fanon said “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing” We have integrity when what people see is the same as who we say we are.
It is a matter of common sense that the values we hold and remain true to, are intertwined with the well-being of ourselves as both individuals and as communities. I pray that most of our ancestors will not turn in their graves for our iniquities and curse our nation with venom. According to a proverbial saying, “When you are down, the only way out is up” Nigeria will never be down again. Nigerians will never eat their vomits again despite ravaging poverty.
The recent declaration of the former military leader, General Babangida at the Eagle Square in Abuja of his intention to contest the 2011 Presidency, should not be seen as a surprise to all Nigerians. I think, we should no longer be surprised as to what a man can do. Man is the only animal that eats when he is not hungry and the only creature that drinks when he is not thirsty. Babangida first attempt after stepping aside was on the 8th of November 2006, when he picked a nomination from the Peoples Democratic Party Headquarters in Abuja. He was later shown the way out. Firstly, as a citizen of Nigeria who has not been found guilty of any criminal offence by the court of the land, he is eligible to contest in any national election. He is definitely exercising his political right. Even, late General Sanni Abacha would have done the same thing by now had it not been “a coup from heaven” that took his life. The whole world is watching the recycling of our past leaders and administrators with disgust.
Secondly, we should not be surprised about his declaration as we are living in one of the most corrupted nations of the world. The corruption that has robbed Nigeria children of a better future. The corruption which he himself institutionalised-“the kick-backs and “ten-percentages”. Is IBB exposing himself to ridicule or he wants people following him to have their own share? Do you think that this can happen in a developed and civilized world? His families and kins-men should have called him to order and ask him what does he want in the office again ! He was there for eight years and he had no solutions to any of all the problems that brought this country into crisis in his declaration speech; “Today, the reality of our present circumstances is that our country is in a crisis. We cry over the economy; and we agonise our state of our educational system as well as organized crime. Our infrastructure has collapsed and we continue to live with epileptic supply of electricity. We bicker over the never-ending issue of subsidy”.
Twenty-five years ago, General Babangida in the last four lines of October 1, 1985 independence speech .He said; “I assure you that this administration is determined to face the challenges squarely. The time for action is NOW. We count on your understanding, cooperation and support. Let us all work together for brighter future under the banner of ECONOMIC RECONSTRUCTION, SOCIAL JUSTICE AND SELF-RELIANCE”. By the time he stepped aside on August 27 1993, the Africa’s leading oil producer, one of the potentially richest nations in the world, the land of food basket was in ruin, crumbling on its knees and at the brink of disintegration. Who is know fooling who? According to one of the greatest American statesmen, Abraham Lincoln; “You can fool some of the people some of the time; you can fool all the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time”.
Moreover, we should not be surprised that this is happening in a country where over 70 percent of Nigerians live below poverty level. Poverty is the condition of being poor, need, indigence and lack of means of sustenance. This is as a result of lack of consistency and effective implementations of government policies to the letter. The traces of poverty is seen everywhere, even it manifests itself on our so called rich men. Poverty leads to corruption, disruption of the family relations and social life, causes rising crime rate such as the new trend of kidnappings, sophisticated armed-robbery, advance fee fraud (419) internet scams among other vices. In this situation, people are very desperate to survive by all means. You can see what happened in Minna just less than twenty four hours after IBB declared to contest for Presidency in Abuja; hundreds of youth, including women mobilised to attend the Abuja declaration stormed the Government House in Minna to register their grievances over non-payment of promised allowances (five thousand naira each) for attending the event. This is a kind of dirty money and stage-managed politics that they want to bring back to Nigeria.
Meanwhile, as a result of the plague of crisis over the last five decades, most of Nigerians seem now to be suffering from selective amnesia. Chief Odumegwu Ojukwu rightly put it in his book “Because I am Involved” as “…we conveniently forget certain unpleasant facts about our journey through life as a polity”. Selective amnesia happens when a person can recall only small parts of events that took pace in a defined period of time. The IBB-years (1985 and 1993) trapped Nigeria into ruinous military reign, stinking corruption , deepening poverty, economic decline and ethnic rivalry. We cannot estimate many innocent life lost and properties destroyed as an aftermath of June 12 election annulment demonstrations. Lets take a clue from immortal words of George Santayara; “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”.
The strength of a nation lies in discipline. IBB betrayed the Nigeria Oath of allegiance, the army core values, and the entire people for his over ambition. Discipline is one of the most important core values of the Army. It is “to maintain the highest standard so that others can rely on you”. IBB has committed iniquities with the greatest opportunity he had to rule the most populous black nation in the world for eight good years. What has he forgotten in the office that he wants to go back and pick ? Either his Campaign Co-ordinator, who is now soiling his name and reputation that took him many years to build or his son, Muhammed Babangida, a leader in this generation of young polo players would have gotten more votes than him if at all he is able to scale through PDP primaries.
How could somebody who failed to turn the country around for better in eight years (with military power) can now turn the country round in four years?. He refused to exercise the will of Nigerians by annulling the most adjudged free and fair election, in which he would have made history for himself even if late MKO Abiola will be overthrown by Abacha in few days as done to the Interim government. Obasanjo handed power to an elected President and had another opportunity to rule the country again. As Yoruba adage says “The king whose reign is characterised by peace, history will record it. Also the king whose tenure is fraught with chaos (poverty), history will not fail to record it”. Tell IBB and his cronies that their game is up. If IBB wants to help the masses, he should first embark on building public libraries in all State capitals. After all, 42 billion naira was wasted on his endless transition programme. They should give other people a chance. This is 2010 and not 1985. Nigeria has a pool of men who are blessed with leadership qualities and who can stand the acid test of honour and integrity. I believe that very soon a true servant of people and a genuine lover of humanity will emerge as our President. God bless the good people of Nigeria.
The Evil Candidate: General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida
by Naiwu Osahon
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(Apart from Obasanjo, Babangida is the greatest evil ever to befall any country in the world)-All that Babangida, (nicknamed IBB), has to show for his over eight years in power in Nigeria, is private colossal wealth, and the edification of corruption in our body politics. Yes, he is richer than many African governments and can buy who ever he wants, but he ruined our lives to reach there. The book, The Sink, by Jeffrey Robinson, an American writer, says it all about Babangida. “Of the $120 billion siphoned out of the Nigerian treasury into offshore accounts by dishonest politicians, $20 billion is allegedly traceable to IBB directly as president from 1985 to 1993.” The World Bank and other international sources of information put his total loot from the Nigerian treasury at over $35 billion.
He is now threatening to use a fraction of his loot to return to power and a figure of N400 billion has been mentioned by his cronies as his campaign chest. We ought to be worrying now about how to survive this viper’s poisoned food. We are desperately hungry but if we eat, we die immediately. If we don’t, we die slowly from hunger anyway, terrorized by the viper’s fang. We are trapped. We can’t get up to look elsewhere for food or do anything else. The evil genius has hijacked our destiny.
Fortunately, there are still principled, conscientious and patriotic Nigerians, determined that if they must die, it must not be without a fight. Babangida would not return to rule over one Nigeria. If he does, lovers of Nigeria would, at least, make Nigeria ungovernable for him, failing which, they would emigrate. I would definitely renounce my citizenship of Nigeria if nothing else.
The Yoruba have a proverb about: ‘a person about to be roasted, who rubs his body with fat and goes to stand by a raging fire.’ This must have influenced the following remarks on IBB by our popular human rights lawyer/activist, Mr. Femi Falana: “I am not quite sure that Nigerians can stop him from exposing himself to ridicule. He has been lucky that he is not in jail now. His coming out to contest will provide an opportunity for Nigerians to deal with him squarely and confront him with the annulment of June 12 election, the murder of Dele Giwa, the Ejigbo tragic plane crash, the destruction of our values as a people, corruption, and massive violation of human rights.”
M. D. Yusufu, a former Inspector General of police said in Karl Maiers book, This House has fallen, that: “Babangida went all out to corrupt society. Abacha was intimidating people with fear. With him gone now you can recover. But this corruption remains and it is very corrosive to society.”
Professor Akin Oyebode of the University of Lagos law department describes IBB’s attempt to return to power “as a colossal assault on the national psyche. At the end of the debate on the IMF conditionalities, he clamped on SAP, which was more draconian than the IMF conditionalities. Because he has a 50-bedroom house at Minna, he thinks the world is his oyster. He latches on the popular yearnings to launder his image. He has dirty rotten underwear that he wants to clean so that people will give him a new improved IBB. IBB is a bad statement to the whole world that at the end of the day we again brought Babangida to the scene. I don’t want my children to live under Babangida. I won’t live under Babangida.”
If all he could deliver, as a young man was to loot our treasury dry, what is he bringing to the table now? He does not even have the basic education or the intelligence. To be an expert at maneuvering a people and their treasury does not demonstrate intelligence as much as lack of moral fiber and self-discipline. Babangida is an empty barrel midget, robed in threatening vulgar giant frippery of evil exploits.
He lacks respect for democracy and worth of human life. He killed Dele Giwa. He closed down Ogun state radio; Concord, Guardian, Punch and Sketch newspapers; Newswatch and News magazines, during his time. He treated with contempt the Justice Chukwudifu Oputa led Human Rights Violation Investigation Commission (HRVIC), when summoned to answer charges on the murder of Dele Giwa. He also rushed to the court to prevent the implementation of the report of the Commission as it affected him.
Perhaps he wants to come back to rule so that he can retire with the biggest loot in history? But according to the book: The Sink, and International anti-corruption agencies reports, he has achieved that status already so why does he not want to leave us alone?
Speaking obliquely a few months ago in Babangidaspeak, he threatened that when he would speak on the June 12 annulment issue, Nigeria would shake to her foundations. In an interview in late May, 2004, on Channels TV, Babangida spoke on the June 12 issue, and no feathers were ruffled. Instead, Babangida admitted toothy smile and all, that he made a mistake but that he did it in the interest of Nigeria.
That was the same argument Mariam Abacha used when asked about her husband’s loot stashed away in his foreign accounts. She said her husband was saving the money for Nigeria. On hindsight, we got some of the money back didn’t we? That is more than can be said about Babangida’s loot and the political turmoil he plunged Nigeria into since his selfish, irresponsible, June 12 annulment.
On why Babangida ignored all pleas not to kill Mamman Vasta, the master dribbler said that Vasta’s death was a painful decision for him, but that he had no choice in the matter, because he was following military rules, and he did it in the national interest. But Vasta, his fellow infantry soldier and childhood friend, was hurriedly killed and his body dumped in a mass grave on the night of the announcement of his sentence, (i.e. early morning of 5th March 1986), to prevent last minute pleas for reprieve. Acid was poured on the bodies, including Vasta’s and burnt, so one must ask, was the rush to kill Vasta and burn his carcass sanctioned too by the military laws? The whole thing smacks of envy, apart from being hideous and barbaric. Babangida used the phantom coup allegation to remove or marginalize the Middle Belt military top brass in his government.
Babangida said that he brought Obasanjo back to power to stabilize the polity. What he was not telling, was the apparent deal between the two of them not to probe each other in power. Otherwise, why would Obasanjo ignore the bigger rogues to vigorously pursue the return of Abacha’s loot of a mere US$5 billion relatively?
Babangida on the Channels‘TV interview said he wants to return to power to correct Nigerian problems because he has been there before.
The man has no shame. Our most critical problem as a people is the rampant and systematic looting of our treasury by our successive leaders. Babangida was no exception, and he is being accused of the biggest loot of all, so, is he now saying that he wants to voluntarily refund whatever he is being accused of diverting from our coffers while in power? I have written personally to him before to do this, and he did not answer. He does not have to return to power to help Nigeria pay off her staggering foreign debt.
In a country of over 140 million people, what makes Babangida think he alone deserves to rule for perhaps seventeen or more years? What is he bringing to the table now if he never had it in the first place? Don’t we deserve better than our past illiterate leaders who could not differentiate between the national and their private purses?
Of all the Nigerian military dictators, Babangida was the most desperate for power, and for attempting to hold on to it for life, apart from being the most flamboyant, cunning, callous, ruthless and deadly, about how they went about achieving their goals. Babangida grew on Nigeria slowly and quietly, with a deceptive toothy smile.
Babangida first came into serious political reckoning with Buhari’s misleading coup of December 31st 1983. In reality, power was seized for the opportunity to destroy documents relating to the NNPC’s missing USA$2.8 billion oil money, and punish all those involved in the unraveling of the scam. Politicians and critics, including Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, notorious for clamouring for the exposure of the oil money rogue Minister of an earlier military epoch, were locked up without trial.
After consigning the vexatious matters that brought him to power to administrative oblivion with the help of Shinkafi, his Secret Service guru, Buhari announced his readiness to quit office. Idiagbon, as Buhari’s lieutenant, naturally insisted on taking over as head of state from his apparently prematurely retiring boss. Babangida, who was Chief of Army Staff at the time and a member of the Supreme Military Council, insisted it was his turn to rule because he had been involved in virtually every military coup. The quarrel split the Supreme Military Council members almost equally behind the two principal combatants.
Akilu had just returned from a military training in India at the time and Babangida recommended him for appointment as the head of the Secret Service. Idiagbon by-passed Akilu and slighted Babangida by not consulting with him to confirm the new head of the Secret Service from the army.
Gloria Okon was arrested at the Murtala Mohammed Airport trying to smuggle cocaine out of the country. Gloria claimed to be a courier for the family of one of the two high ranking military officers deeply involved in the Supreme Military Council’s palaver. Gloria was quickly smuggled out of the country and a carcass burnt beyond recognition of a human body, was left in her prison room to deceive the authorities. As Gloria’s drama was playing out, Abiola brought a large consignment of banned newsprint into the country, forcing Idiagbon to insist on the arrest of Chief M.K.O Abiola.
All sorts of calamitous events kept rolling out at the time, including the arrest of one Ikuomola for trying to smuggle a large consignment of cocaine out of the country. He indicted a son of one of the Dantatas and they were both tried and sentenced to death. The Dantata family mounted pressure on the Supreme Military Council to commute the sentence to life. The issue heightened the division among the Supreme Military Council members, with the Gloria Okon’s high ranking military benefactor, siding with the Dantatas naturally.
Idiagbon insisted that if poor people found with cocaine could be punished with death sentence, why should the rich and affluent be spared? Idiagbon also wanted the lawyer, (a Rivers state chap who had received some four million naira as legal fees on the case at the time), to be shot along with the drug barons for benefiting from the evil.
The schism between Idiagbon and Babangida totally paralyzed the Supreme Military Council and it could no longer function. Idiagbon forced compulsory leave on Babangida, under close surveillance with tapped telephone lines and all. Chief M.K.O Abiola saw the opportunity to save his neck from the newsprint saga by teaming up with his friend, Babangida, and he provided the seed money for a coup.
Through the facilities of Abiola and the Dantatas, Yar Adua was brought into the picture to help influence the Saudi Arabian monarch to extend a special invitation to Idiagbon as a guest of the monarch, to perform the 1985 Lesser Hajj in Mecca. Idiagbon felt greatly honoured by the invitation and took with him to Mecca, most of his supporters on the splintered Supreme Military Council, including Mamman Vasta.
With Idiagbon (who was the head of the Buhari’s regime in every sense of the word, and was very popular because of his transparent honesty, patriotism, and discipline), out of the way, Buhari (who was ready to vacate office anyway), was picked up like a helpless chicken at Doddan Barracks, and dumped in jail. Idiagbon, against the coupists’ advice, returned home a people’s hero, although locked up for several months too by Babangida.
The day after Babangida’s coup, I attacked it on the front page of the Sunday Punch newspaper, as a ploy by the (IMF and the World Bank) to marginalize the naira and destroy our economy, and Babangida was described as a snake by nature and a stooge of the West. The Editor of the Sunday Punch and his deputy at the time, Ayo Osintolu, and Bob Opone, respectively, were suspended from their jobs. Ayo for six months and Bob for three. I was unemployed as usual at the time, so, Babangida was handicapped about how to deal with me immediately. I heard later that I was blacklisted for all future government contracts and positions, even though my secondary school classmate Rear Admiral Aikhomu (rtd) eventually became Babangida’s deputy in office. I never tried to find out.
Because of my reputation as someone you could persuade with superior argument but impossible to bribe out of his conviction, my best friend who was like a twin brother to me at the time, Com. Wole Bucknor (rtd), was detailed to plead with me to drop any further development of the IBB matter. Their strategy was to admit to me that my observations were absolutely correct but that Babangida meant well for Nigeria. With Babangida’s antecedence, it was difficult for my friend to persuade me, but Nigerian newspapers in general at that early stage of the regime, were a little scared to publish and be damned.
Luckily, it did not take too long for Babangida to begin to reveal his secret agenda. He had removed Idiagbon/Buhari from power to douse the heated allegation at the time about illegal drug links and to help the IMF/World Bank ruin the naira and open up the Nigerian market as dumping ground for American and European junk and decadence. The marginalization of the naira suited Babangida’s Machiavellian streak to blunt prospects of mass protests with abject poverty, hunger, and basic survival pre-occupations. For example, the terroristic power of massive foreign exchange loot in a private hand, is limitless as a tool for forcing pauperized populace to acquiesce to the self-perpetuation antics of a potential despot.
Babangida’s first pronouncement in power was to shock the nation by adopting the civilian title of president. He did this because of a secret personal ambition kept to himself, to transit into life president in the mould of Presidents Nasir of Egypt and Eyadema of Togo, and also because of his agreement to make Chief Abiola his Vice President for collaborating over their 1985 coup. Abacha kicked against Abiola becoming Vice President because he was eyeing Babangida’s seat in a possible future coup of his own and wanted to remain the defacto next in command, in military terms, for eventual easy take over excuse.
Babangida promised Yar Adua a short-lived military transition after which he would hand over power to Yar Adua. That was why Yar Adua kept boasting during the early stages of Babangida’s regime, that no force on earth could stop him becoming the next president of Nigeria. This prompted Obasanjo’s statement at the time that Yar Adua must have forgotten something at the state house.
Babangida was so single minded, self-centered, and power-drunk, he single-handedly forced OIC membership on Nigeria without respect for our supposed religious secularity. He used every means imaginable to assert his power. Spiritual, criminal, everything was fair in his ruthless power game. The gods of the Marabouts became privileged guests at Aso Rock, lacing it with severe witchcraft, which was later vigorously sustained by Abacha.
If the physical failed, the metaphysical was handy in the human blood bath for power. Blood was the language in the cultish game for total control. Fear gripped the land. Who was going to be the next victim? Life was scary and worthless. I bet, corridor of power social acolytes of the time like the Arisekolas, Adedibus and the Akinyeles, could write blood-cuddling masterpieces on the mysteries of the season. Assassinations were rampant, sophisticated and comprehensive, incorporating bombings and dare-devil forages. Media houses were burnt or closed down, and critics of government were murdered, incarcerated or hounded into exile. Plane loads of promising young army officers lost their lives in questionable circumstances. Others appeared to have been sacrificed in distant land civil wars.
The Ejigbo military Hercules crash that killed an elite corp. of army captains and majors returning to their Jaji training base, is a typical example of the terrible human carnage visited upon us at the time by a desperate tyrant bent on holding on to power indefinitely at all costs. The plane was doctored and it crashed a few seconds after take-off from the Murtala Mohammed airport. No rescue attempt was ordered or made until 24 hours after the crash and even then, the inadequate facilities of a private company, (Julius Berger), were relied upon. Forty-eight hours after the crash, a warm body was still found suggesting that some lives could have been saved if rescue operations had commenced minutes after the crash.
Apart from the needless assassinations of possible opponents and rivals for power, there were totally senseless ones too, such as the death of Murtala Mohammed’s first son immediately after visiting the seat of power. It was generously reported in the press at the time. The allegation was that during the friendly, private visit, the young man was asked if he would be prepared to do a job. The young chap said he could not say until he was told what the job was. When told that he was to help facilitate the elimination of Chief Abiola, the young man said he couldn’t because Abiola was like a father to him. The host then quickly dismissed the suggestion as if it had been a joke and asked how the young man travelled to the state house. “By private car,” the young man said. “You are going about without security?” the host asked, pretending to look alarmed, and detailed some security officers to escort the young man to his Minna destination. The body of the young man was later that day found in his car on the route between the seat of power and Minna.
Bongos Ikwe’s son by a girl friend, who later married Oga, also lost his life in suspicious circumstances. Bongos, in press interviews at the time, denied knowing his son’s mother who, in fact, is the junior sister of Bongos’ best friend and music partner on an RKTV programme in the early 60s. Despite denials, Bongos’ most popular recorded song ‘O Mariana’ could not conceal the anguish of the jilted lover.
Perhaps the most stupid, irresponsible and callous murder of them all was that of Dele Giwa. The death was a classic example of desperate, high-handed, dirty and mean, under-the-carpet cover-up state terrorism.
Dele Giwa‘s problem was that he stumbled on some documents about Gloria Okon in London and after interviewing her, threatened to publish the story while allegedly letting it be known that he could be persuaded to withdraw publication with a cash bribe of US$21m plus N200m. Alternatively, he was ready to settle for the position of Information Minister, which Tony Mommoh was occupying at the time. Dele Giwa’s blackmail unfortunately misfired unlike an earlier one involving Mr. Lawson, the founder of the Nigerian Grail Movement who was alleged to have been arrested and locked up in London for money laundering problems. Mudashiru, the military governor of Lagos state at the time of Lawson’s travails, was alleged to have stopped the publication of Lawson’s story by bribing Giwa with the land and C of O of the Newswatch plaza.
Dr. T.C. Nwosu, the renowned Nigerian author, and I, came out in defense of Mamman Vasta, (when he was arrested for coup plotting), in a joint statement published as a news item at the time, in the Nigerian Guardian newspaper. We said it was a lie to accuse Vasta of trying to stage a coup to take the IMF conditionalities. This was the first time anyone, (civilian or military), would come out openly to defend an alleged coup plotter in Nigeria, and Vasta who was our friend and colleague in the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), took our support to heart, and arranged for some documents on his kangaroo trial for coup plotting to be smuggled out to us.
One of the documents we received was on Gloria Okon. We could not use the information in Nigeria at the time because no newspaper would dare publish it, so I arranged for Ejike Nwankwo, my bosom friend, to take the documents to his senior brother, Chief Arthur Nwankwo, who was in political exile in London at the time. The idea was for Arthur Nwankwo to have the Gloria Okon’s story published in the Manchester Guardian, but Arthur decided to delay publication until he could use the immunity of the Nigerian Senate, which he was aspiring to join in Babangida’s best time as a member, to make the story public.
Senior members of the Ministry of Information, and of the Daily Times at the time, and a director of Newswatch, were not totally ignorant about what was going on in Babangida’s government. In fact, Abacha at a point, asked the boss of the Ministry of Information to frame up Dele Giwa. The boss being a principled and die-hard journalist, argued that it was difficult to frame up journalists.
Babangida’s boys went ahead to frame up Giwa anyway. Three days before they killed Dele Giwa, Col. A. K. Togun, the deputy Director of Babangida’s State Security Service (the SSS), invited Giwa to his office and accused him of involvement in the importation of arms while linking Giwa with other persons alleged to be trying to stage a socialist revolution in Nigeria. At the meeting, agreement was reached, and Babangida, through his emissaries, promised to meet Giwa’s terms. Two days before Giwa’s murder, Akilu allegedly phoned Giwa’s home to ask for direction because Babangida’s ADC “has something for him, an invitation or something.”
Dele Giwa allegedly invited the overseas editor of Newswatch at the time to be around. Obviously, Giwa took the president’s promise more seriously than his colleagues at the Newswatch. This was why, when Giwa received the parcel and confirmed that it was from the President, his guest’s first reaction was to dash off to take cover in the toilet adjacent to the room where Giwa opened the parcel bomb. The guest escaped death by the whiskers and blasted eardrums. Tagum, when asked by Airport Correspondents on October 27, 1986, about Giwa’s bombing inadvertently confirmed the blackmail reason for Giwa’s death when he said: “We came to a real agreement and one person cannot just come out and blackmail us. I am an expert on blackmail. If a motorcycle man suddenly dashed in front of a car and the driver kills the motorcycle man, another motorcycle man who was there would not say the motorcycle man who dashed in front of the car was wrong. He would say the driver killed him, not that he killed himself”
An Arab terrorist, who was recruited to collaborate with a University of Ibadan chemistry don especially for the task, produced the bomb. The terrorist is alleged to have gone with Major Buba Marwa, Ogbeha and Gwazo, in a Peugeot station wagon car with fake license plate numbers, to deliver the bomb at Dele’s home. On arrival, they were told that Dele was not in, so they laid ambush near-by to watch movements in and out of Giwa’s premises.
As soon as Giwa was spotted entering his house, the allegation continues, the Arab terrorist offered to go and deliver the bomb, but his colleagues in crime stopped him on the grounds that a white man would look too suspicious for the job. Marwa, accompanied by Ogbeha, are alleged to have delivered the bomb to Dele’s son at the door, after which the crime team drove off to Mafoluku where they burned their delivery car. The same day, the Arab terrorist was flown out of Lagos, first to Kano, and eventually out of the country.
Major Buba Marwa was at the time rewarded with the rank of Lt. Col. and posted to the Nigerian Embassy in Washington, USA, as the new Military Attaché. His rise in the Army was extremely rapid and as Col. retuned home to be Governor of Lagos State. Armed robbers welcomed him to his new office with the kind of daredevilry never before experienced in Nigeria. Violence begets violence they say. The armed robbers raided from Mile two to Ikeja, even as he was passing by. Marwa panicked, so Babangida pumped unusual resources into Marwa’s coffers to ensure his success, which is the genesis of his tramping around as an achiever today. His private life does not suggest that he suffered in fool’s paradise.
Marwa, Ogbeha, and Gwazo, have since denied their alleged involvement in Dele Giwa’s murder. Marwa, who now owns an airline and, therefore, knows that it takes less than eight hours to fly across the Atlantic to Nigeria, argued that he was studying in the USA at the time. The implication of this, of course, was that it was impossible to take a few days off his studies.
Marwa, who rose to fame through IBB’s benevolence, is considered in military circles as one of the IBB boys, made up principally of the trusted cronies of the retired dictator. Accused of laundering money for IBB, Marwa again relied on the puerile argument that he was the Borno state governor in 1990, as if state governors are too busy governing diligently to travel out of Nigeria for a day or two, or even a week, on private businesses.
In December, 2005, when Marwa was detained for a couple of weeks by the EFCC, for laundering money for Abacha, he allegedly admitted that he had no choice in the matter as a military officer. He was only doing his duty. Of course, doing illegal duties loyally often goes with silencing, mouth-watering pecks, if nothing else.
In the area of managing the national economy, Babangida bestowed his adroitness and moral degeneracy. His economy was dominated by male-wives, particularly in the banking and oil sectors. Women often brag about the efficacy of ‘bottom’ power. Feminine men sometimes flaunt it too as their passport to economic liberation. Between them and the suddenly very lucrative 419 business of the time, industry was complete. IBB’s chiefs, allegedly colluded with 419 criminals to create the over-night semi-illiterate money-bags without class or shame, (including the 150 members of the National Assembly, that in 2005 sent IBB a birthday card), and who together now form the bulk of his supporters and campaigners, to return him to power.
Babangida (sapped) or totally wiped the middle class out of existence with the destruction of the naira, which he did by fiat in 1985, when he down graded the naira exchange rate from about N2 to N18 to the dollar. By the time he was forced out of office in 1993, the naira was exchanging at N60 to the dollar. Society was now reduced to two social classes of either the very poor or the rich rogues.
Babangida first concentrated on pulverizing his military base by tinkering with the 1985 Decree 17, to give himself sole authority to fire his military chiefs, including the chief of general staff; chairman, joint chiefs of staff; service chiefs, and the inspector general of police. General Domkat Bali said at the time: “Babangida must have known what he was aiming at if you now take those powers of the President as civilian, and you now put them on any army officer who then sits with other army officers, in the name of Supreme Military Council, SMC, who are useless to him, whom he can change tomorrow, that means that name is not Supreme at all.”
Bali was provoked to leave the government when he was demoted from the position of Minister of Defence to that of Internal Affairs. Ukiwe, a senior naval officer, who was IBB’s deputy, was forced to retire even before Bali did, for demonstrating patriotic zeal in defense of team spirit, over our IOC membership saga.
Gideon Orkar’s failed coup of April 22, 1990, provided Babangida with the opportunity to further purge the military. With total control over the military, IBB was ready to pursue his President-for-life agenda, (starting) by dismissing his S. J. Cookie’s Political Bureau programme for the return to civil rule by 1990.
For over eight years, Babangida kept shifting his handing over date and juggling his transition programme by arbitrarily banning and unbanning politicians, particularly the known opponents of military rule. He spent N40 billion on his endless transition programme, and bribed all and sundry, including the NLC with N50 million, NUJ with N20 million, PMAN with N30 million, and so on, to try to silence them. He attempted to compromise some vocal critics by settling them, and those he could not recruit, he sacked where possible, or detained, or killed, or hounded into exile.
Less than two years into his rule in 1987, IBB announced that he was planning to bequeath a lasting legacy of civil rule, through a gradual learning political process. Four years into his regime in 1989, he lifted for the first time his ban on partisan politics, and set up two political parastatals. One was called the Social Democratic Party (SDP), and the other was the National Republican Convention (NRC).
The handing over date to civilian government was postponed once again from late 1990 to the 1st of October 1992. He allowed elections to be held into the local governments in 1990, and in 1991, Babangida instigated intra party squabbles to find excuse to ban 12 of the candidates participating in the governorship elections. Candidates replacing the disqualified ones had barely one week to campaign.
Elections into the State Assemblies miraculously held without too much acrimony, followed shortly afterwards by elections into the National Assembly. In all the elections, known individuals strongly against Babangida or the military in power were sidelined, banned, or hounded into exile, prominent among whom were Ibrahim Tahir of the NPN, Sam Mbakwe, Chris Okolie, Wahab Dosumu, Ebenezer Babatope, etc.
Allegation of massive rigging was invoked on 17 November, 1992, to ban Adamu Ciroma and Shehu Musa Yar Adua, who had emerged from party primaries as presidential candidates for the NRC and the SDP respectively, and 21 other presidential aspirants, (including Chief Arthur Nzeribe, Chief Olu Falae, Alhaji Lateef Jakande and Alhaji Umar Shinkafi), from participating in the scheduled August 1992 presidential election, and all other future elections. The trick was that Babangida was gradually narrowing the field of potential presidential materials to himself. Remember that Babangida had promised Yar Adua the Presidency when Yar Adua helped to actualize the 1985 coup that brought Babangida to power. The ban did not go down well with the political elite in general, and particularly with Yar Adua who had assumed he would take over leadership from Babangida.
With the ban, Babangida once again postponed his handing over date from October 1st 1992, to Dec 5, 1992. Soon after, Babangida mandated the National Electoral Commission (NEC), to conduct the presidential primaries of the political parties, and he again fixed a new date of January 3, 1993, for the handing over of the reigns of power to a civilian government. Bribery, thuggery, rigging, ethnic cleavages, etc., ruined the NEC supervised political parties’ presidential primaries, resulting in the dissolution of party executives, who were replaced by Sole Administrators, and National Coordinators. Handing over date was once again postponed to August 27, 1993.
Baba Gana Kingibe, who was the SDP chairman before the dissolution of the party executives, and was then supposed to be managing the affairs of Yar Adua, was alleged to have received Babangida’s backing and financial support to aspire as presidential candidate obviously to cause confusion in Yar Adua’s political camp. Kingibe pasted his campaign posters all over the place, causing bad blood between himself and Yar Adua, which spilled into the Jos SDP convention of 1993.
In the meantime, Babangida was busy creating anarchy in the ranks of the politicians by introducing his modified open ballot system, and insisting that presidential aspirants go through tedious ward, local government, and state congresses. This eventually produced two presidential aspirants for each of the states, plus two for the FCT, and the unwieldy 62 presidential aspirants had to go through further elimination processes, at various national congresses, before the Jos (SDP), and Port-Harcourt (NRC), conventions of 1993.
Several irregularities were observed at the party conventions and a lot of money changed hands.
Alhaji Bashir Tofa for the NRC, and Bashorun M.K.O Abiola for the SDP, emerged as the presidential flag bearers. Babangida who was unhappy that progress was being made in the presidential election process was further pissed-off when his nominee, Pascal Bafyau, the ex-NLC president, as Abiola’s running mate, (to spy on and undermine Abiola), was rejected by Abiola. Abiola also upset Yar Adua’s calculations, by not accepting Abubakir Atiku as his running mate, and choosing Baba Gana Kingibe instead.
Of course, the emergence at last of promising presidential candidates for both parties was not a very palatable option for Abacha too who was still nursing the dream to succeed Babangida although pretending to be on the side of Babangida. Abacha misled Babangida to think of him as a possible ally, so the scene was set for Babangida to feel that if he annulled the election, he would have the support of Abacha, Yar Adua and other perceived, powerful enemies of Abiola, including a leading traditional ruler in the South-West.
Babangida, in his determination to scuttle the presidential election at all cost, promulgated Decree 13, forbidding the presidential flag bearers of the two political parties from doing anything whatsoever that would influence members of the public to vote for them at the election scheduled for June 12 1993. Then Babangida empowered NEC to disqualify any of the candidates at will, and as a (final) fall back strategy, to scuttle our democratic dream, he set up his Association for Better Nigeria (ABN) party, using Senator Arthur Nzeribe as proxy.
On June 10, 1993, at the unholy hour of 9.30 pm, late Justice Ikpeme, who was appointed a few days earlier and hurriedly transferred from Lagos to Abuja, granted a court order to the ABN, restraining the NEC Chairman Humphrey Nwosu, from conducting the Presidential election on June 12, 1993.
The Director of the United States Information Service (USIS) in Nigeria at the time, Mr. O’Brien, warned that the US government would not be happy if the June 12 election was cancelled. Babangida panicked, and although he declared O’Brien persona non grata and ordered him out of the country in his personal interest, Babangida allowed Nwosu to go ahead with the election.
The election was adjudged by the international and local observers monitoring it and by the two political parties involved, as the fairest and freest in the history of Nigeria. By the evening of June 14 1993, more than 50% of the election results had been authenticated and released by NEC, showing that SDP’s Moshood Abiola had swept the polls.
To everyone’s surprise, Babangida suddenly ordered NEC not to release any more results. On June 23, 1993, Babangida gave an unsigned statement to Nduka Irabor, his press secretary, announcing the cancellation of the presidential election on the radio. The unsigned statement was a strategy to allow Babangida to deny its authenticity, should Nigeria begin to boil over the announcement. Nigerians had become too hungry and docile to react.
Babangida annulled the June12 election entirely on his own, based on his selfish, personal agenda to rule indefinitely. Before annulling the election, he rallied the connivance and support of some critical Emirs and a leading Yoruba traditional ruler known to be antagonistic to Abiola’s political ambition, and the signatures of a bunch of political and military apologists (or jobbers), tagged the G-34, on a document entitled ‘Peace Pact,’ in endorsement of his annulment of the June 12, 1993, elections.
The G-34 comprised of the following members of the military junta and leaders of the two political parties, the SDP and the NRC: Admiral Augustus Aikhomu, Chief Earnest Shonekan who eventually headed Babangida’s contraption called the Interim National Government (ING), General Shehu Musa Yar’ardua, Alhaji Sule Lamido, Alhaji Adamu Ciroma, Amb. Dele Cole, Chief Tony Anenih, Chief Jim Nwobodo, Brig-Gen David A. B Mark, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, Alhaji Olusola Saraki, Chief Dapo Sarumi, Chief Joseph Toba, Chief Bola Afonja, Dr. Hammed Kusamotu, Dr. Okechukwu Odunze, Prof. Eyo Ita, Y. Anka, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, Chief Tom Ikimi, Barrister Joe Nwodo (who signed with reservations), Dr. Bawa Salka, Alhaji Abba Murtala Mohammed, Alhaji Abdulrahman Okene, Lt. Gen Joshua Dongoyaro, Lt. Gen Aliyu Mohammed Gusau, Brig-Gen John Shagaya, Brig-Gen Anthony Ukpo, Halilu A. Maina, Alhaji Bawa Salka, Mr. Amos Idakula, Mr. Theo Nikire, Alhaji A. Ramalan, Alhaji A. Mohammed. Many of these traitors are still making decisions for Nigeria today.
Babangida’s military constituency, by and large, was against the annulment. Abacha saw his opportunity to act, and with the backing of the armed forces of Nigeria, warned Babangida that he would be entirely on his own after the August 27, 1993, handing over date. Babangida in fear, concocted and swore in an illegal arrangement he called the Interim National Government, ING, to take over office from August 27, 1993. After swearing in his ING on August 26, 1993, Babangida who was supposed to be pulled out of the army in the military tradition, played all sorts of pranks to delay the event from 11.am to 1.00pm and then to 3.00pm, when the Nigerian army removed Babangida’s guards from the Eagle Square to warn him that his time was up.
There is this strong allegation among the rank and file of the armed forces, and members of the defense correspondence of our newspapers attached to the seat of power, that Babangida arranged, in the last couple of weeks before leaving office, for several armoured vehicle loads of newly printed naira notes to be delivered daily to his new Minna palatial abode obviously with the connivance of Abacha, perhaps as his mentor’s retirement benefit.
Abacha and Babangida had several serious financial problems with Abiola but one of them takes the cake. It was over some foreign war booty amounting to US$215m. It is alleged that Babangida had asked Abiola to help launder it when Babangida was in office but Abiola was not interested.
Babangida allegedly side-stepped Abiola and eventually prevailed upon a member of Abiola’s family in the custom of family friendship, to rescue the situation. Then the person suddenly died. It is further alleged that Abiola was asked to return the money and he truthfully and honestly said he knew noting about it and even if there was such a thing, he had no authority over the matter. Then he was asked to pressurize the children of the deceased to play ball.
Abiola refused, arguing that he had no legal or moral right to do so. The kids of the deceased wanted Abiola released but Abiola was too principled to succumb to blackmail so the powers that be decided early after his arrest, that he would die in detention for declaring himself president.
The Gulf war oil windfall is Babangida’s often-referenced loot. Abacha set up a panel headed by the highly respected economist, Pius Okigbo, in October, 1994, to reorganize the CBN. Okigbo’s panel discovered that $12.2 billion of the $12.4 billion accruable from the Gulf War excess crude oil sales was frittered away or unaccounted for, through nebulous or phantom projects that could not be traced. Only $206 million was left in the account. According to Okigbo, “disbursements were clandestinely undertaken while the country was openly reeling with crushing external debt overhead. These represent, no matter the initial justification for creating the account, a gross abuse of public trust. ”
When Obasanjo in 2001, decided to look quietly into the missing NNPC’s US$12.2 billion Gulf war oil windfall linked to Babangida, it was found that the documents pertaining to the fraud had disappeared from the volts of the Central Bank. The brilliant, highly respected economist, Pius Okigbo who handled the investigations into the scam had private copies. Before he could deliver, he insisted on travelling to London against strong, wise, private, counsel, and he was wasted. Other members of the Okigbo panel had copies of the report anyway and were still alive.
Government miraculously found the CBN documents when it suited it, and aspects of the documents concerning IBB, were published during the threat by members of the House of Representatives to impeach President Obasanjo in July, 2005, because of speculations that IBB was one of the Northern elites fanning the plot.
Babangida was ruthless in the way he amassed his colossal wealth. First is the illegal self-allocation of free oil, sold on the spot market. Then he initiated the corrupt culture of maintaining a huge monthly security vote virtually as personal pocket money. Rather than repair our refineries, let alone to work at maximum capacity, IBB built private refineries in Cote d’Ivoire and the Republic of Benin, where he took our crude to refine and sell back to us as fuel.
John Fashanu, in a private investigation published in African Confidential early in Obasanjo’s current regime, discovered an alleged $6 billion debt buy-back scam by IBB between 1988 and 1993. Another $14.4 billion disappeared into off shore accounts as currency stabilization and debt buy-back scheme that actually cost $2.5 billion. One of the front-companies used, Growth Management, based in London, bought the debt for 10 cents per dollar and resold to the government at 45 cents to steal 35 cents per dollar. Fashanu was trying to recover about $17 billion for the Nigerian government only for the CBN to say they had no records of the deals. The records are out there abroad but cleaned out at home to conceal the (theft) deals.
The Wolfsberg Principles, an initiative of 11 banks and institutions across the world to fight serious international financial crimes, traced another $3 billion of our stolen money to Babangida’s accounts abroad, and $4.3 billion to Abacha’s.
Although Babangida used mostly fictitious names for his numerous accounts abroad, EFCC could zero in on some of the accounts by following up on the dusts raised early in 2003 over the financing of a leading Nigerian telecommunications project in which Babangida is alleged to own 75% shares. Mohammed fronts for his father on the authentic board of the company. Those claiming to have borrowed from foreign banks in the heat of the EFCC’s revelations at the time have not identified the collateral or sortie used. Documents on the loan supposed to have been granted on 9 February, 2001, was dated 28 August, 2006. The original ‘loan’ letter has not been presented. Apparently, Paribas Bank, based in Paris, was managing a slush fund from which investments in excess of US$400 million was made to buy into Alcatel, (the telecommunications’ partner technical partners), Bouygues Telecoms, Peugeot and Total finaelf.
Alcatel and Parabel National of France were worried at the time that their invoices for the telecom project were being inflated to launder funds by the supposed private owners of the sources of funds and that private cheques were being issued to finance the staggering project without recourse to borrowing from banks. They suspected illegal laundering of funds and threatened to withdraw collaboration on the project while alerting Interpol to investigate the sources of the private cheques being issued to finance the project.
IBB could not participate in Obasanjo’s 2003, inauguration ceremonies, because he was allegedly out of the country sorting out the Interpol queries on the Alcatel’s slush account alert, at the time. Even now, the telecoms’ financing details through Siemens etc, could be investigated by the EFCC tracing ghost cheques to issuing private sources of funds and their local and international banks to unravel possible laundering of funds.
Luscious contracts for the construction of Abuja were awarded to front-companies of his and his cronies, including Julius Berger and Arab Contractors that between them virtually single-handedly handled the construction of the new Federal Capital. The security danger of foreign companies solely constructing a country’s capital and having assess to its structural secrets, including possible Presidential underground escape routes and military arsenal volts, is mind boggling to say the least, but that is an issue for another day.
The largest, most prestigious housing estate in Alexandra, Egypt’s leading holiday resort town, is alleged to belong to Babangida. Even Egyptians cannot afford his rent, which is alleged to be in dollars. All his tenants are rich foreigners and the staff of multi-national companies operating in Alexandra. The estate is alleged to have its own airport, which Babangida uses when he visits.
Babangida is alleged to own several other housing estates around the world, including houses on Bishop Avenue in London. He uses his London houses, it is alleged, as guest houses or gifts for people on his compromise list. He is considered generous with gifts of cars with their boots stuffed with naira notes when he wants some jobs done.
Perhaps you would want to join me to play the prude accountant, generous with figures. Let’s pretend that Babangida was a General throughout his service years in the Nigerian army. Again let’s assume he spent 30 years in the army and was paid N100,000 monthly (actually, salaries of Generals were less than N10,000 a month until recently) and he saved every kobo of his salary. He would be worth about N35,000,000 plus interest in the bank today. But Babangida’s 50 bedroom palatial abode in Minna is alleged to be conservatively worth billions of naira and he does not owe any bank on it.
In 2003, he threw a wedding party for his first daughter, which numbed the nation. Some 28 governors were in attendance, and in June 2004, he treated us to another dream-like political carnival during his son’s wedding. No one dared to ask where the money came from to set up such a palatial abode or scandalous and intimidating wedding carnivals in our jungle of abject poverty and hunger. Nigerians reveled in the lavish show of shame, hoodwinked by the audacity, the sumptuous food, the ambience, the vulgarity….. At least we saw our fellow Nigerians (albeit a handful of them), living it up on the money that could have guaranteed millions of Nigerians, active, regular employment indefinitely.
Almost all the principal characters involved in leadership tussles with Babangida since 1985, Abiola, Yar Adua, Idiagbon and even Abacha, have all died through induced cardiac arrest, lethal injection, poisoned food, gassed telephone handset, etc, etc, and my fear is whether Nigeria would survive the Godfather himself? Babangida usurped eight years and eight months of the thirty-three years of military misrule and still wants to come back to finish us off properly. If he was honest with himself, he ought to be ashamed for the economic, political and social mess he has turned Nigeria into. Babangida should be heading for Kirikiri not Aso Rock.
* NAIWU OSAHON Hon. Khu Mkuu (Leader) World Pan-African Movement); Ameer Spiritual (Spiritual Prince) of the African race; MSc. (Salford); Dip.M.S; G.I.P.M; Dip.I.A (Liv.); D. Inst. M; G. Inst. M; G.I.W.M; A.M.N.I.M. Poet, Author of the magnum opus: ‘The end of knowledge’. One of the world’s leading authors of children’s books; Awarded; key to the city of Memphis, Tennessee, USA; Honourary Councilmanship, Memphis City Council; Honourary Citizenship, County of Shelby; Honourary Commissionership, County of Shelby, Tennessee; and a silver shield trophy by Morehouse College, USA, for activities to unite and uplift the African race.
Naiwu Osahon renowned author, philosopher of science, mystique, leader of the world Pan-African Movement.
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(Apart from Obasanjo, Babangida is the greatest evil ever to befall any country in the world)-All that Babangida, (nicknamed IBB), has to show for his over eight years in power in Nigeria, is private colossal wealth, and the edification of corruption in our body politics. Yes, he is richer than many African governments and can buy who ever he wants, but he ruined our lives to reach there. The book, The Sink, by Jeffrey Robinson, an American writer, says it all about Babangida. “Of the $120 billion siphoned out of the Nigerian treasury into offshore accounts by dishonest politicians, $20 billion is allegedly traceable to IBB directly as president from 1985 to 1993.” The World Bank and other international sources of information put his total loot from the Nigerian treasury at over $35 billion.
He is now threatening to use a fraction of his loot to return to power and a figure of N400 billion has been mentioned by his cronies as his campaign chest. We ought to be worrying now about how to survive this viper’s poisoned food. We are desperately hungry but if we eat, we die immediately. If we don’t, we die slowly from hunger anyway, terrorized by the viper’s fang. We are trapped. We can’t get up to look elsewhere for food or do anything else. The evil genius has hijacked our destiny.
Fortunately, there are still principled, conscientious and patriotic Nigerians, determined that if they must die, it must not be without a fight. Babangida would not return to rule over one Nigeria. If he does, lovers of Nigeria would, at least, make Nigeria ungovernable for him, failing which, they would emigrate. I would definitely renounce my citizenship of Nigeria if nothing else.
The Yoruba have a proverb about: ‘a person about to be roasted, who rubs his body with fat and goes to stand by a raging fire.’ This must have influenced the following remarks on IBB by our popular human rights lawyer/activist, Mr. Femi Falana: “I am not quite sure that Nigerians can stop him from exposing himself to ridicule. He has been lucky that he is not in jail now. His coming out to contest will provide an opportunity for Nigerians to deal with him squarely and confront him with the annulment of June 12 election, the murder of Dele Giwa, the Ejigbo tragic plane crash, the destruction of our values as a people, corruption, and massive violation of human rights.”
M. D. Yusufu, a former Inspector General of police said in Karl Maiers book, This House has fallen, that: “Babangida went all out to corrupt society. Abacha was intimidating people with fear. With him gone now you can recover. But this corruption remains and it is very corrosive to society.”
Professor Akin Oyebode of the University of Lagos law department describes IBB’s attempt to return to power “as a colossal assault on the national psyche. At the end of the debate on the IMF conditionalities, he clamped on SAP, which was more draconian than the IMF conditionalities. Because he has a 50-bedroom house at Minna, he thinks the world is his oyster. He latches on the popular yearnings to launder his image. He has dirty rotten underwear that he wants to clean so that people will give him a new improved IBB. IBB is a bad statement to the whole world that at the end of the day we again brought Babangida to the scene. I don’t want my children to live under Babangida. I won’t live under Babangida.”
If all he could deliver, as a young man was to loot our treasury dry, what is he bringing to the table now? He does not even have the basic education or the intelligence. To be an expert at maneuvering a people and their treasury does not demonstrate intelligence as much as lack of moral fiber and self-discipline. Babangida is an empty barrel midget, robed in threatening vulgar giant frippery of evil exploits.
He lacks respect for democracy and worth of human life. He killed Dele Giwa. He closed down Ogun state radio; Concord, Guardian, Punch and Sketch newspapers; Newswatch and News magazines, during his time. He treated with contempt the Justice Chukwudifu Oputa led Human Rights Violation Investigation Commission (HRVIC), when summoned to answer charges on the murder of Dele Giwa. He also rushed to the court to prevent the implementation of the report of the Commission as it affected him.
Perhaps he wants to come back to rule so that he can retire with the biggest loot in history? But according to the book: The Sink, and International anti-corruption agencies reports, he has achieved that status already so why does he not want to leave us alone?
Speaking obliquely a few months ago in Babangidaspeak, he threatened that when he would speak on the June 12 annulment issue, Nigeria would shake to her foundations. In an interview in late May, 2004, on Channels TV, Babangida spoke on the June 12 issue, and no feathers were ruffled. Instead, Babangida admitted toothy smile and all, that he made a mistake but that he did it in the interest of Nigeria.
That was the same argument Mariam Abacha used when asked about her husband’s loot stashed away in his foreign accounts. She said her husband was saving the money for Nigeria. On hindsight, we got some of the money back didn’t we? That is more than can be said about Babangida’s loot and the political turmoil he plunged Nigeria into since his selfish, irresponsible, June 12 annulment.
On why Babangida ignored all pleas not to kill Mamman Vasta, the master dribbler said that Vasta’s death was a painful decision for him, but that he had no choice in the matter, because he was following military rules, and he did it in the national interest. But Vasta, his fellow infantry soldier and childhood friend, was hurriedly killed and his body dumped in a mass grave on the night of the announcement of his sentence, (i.e. early morning of 5th March 1986), to prevent last minute pleas for reprieve. Acid was poured on the bodies, including Vasta’s and burnt, so one must ask, was the rush to kill Vasta and burn his carcass sanctioned too by the military laws? The whole thing smacks of envy, apart from being hideous and barbaric. Babangida used the phantom coup allegation to remove or marginalize the Middle Belt military top brass in his government.
Babangida said that he brought Obasanjo back to power to stabilize the polity. What he was not telling, was the apparent deal between the two of them not to probe each other in power. Otherwise, why would Obasanjo ignore the bigger rogues to vigorously pursue the return of Abacha’s loot of a mere US$5 billion relatively?
Babangida on the Channels‘TV interview said he wants to return to power to correct Nigerian problems because he has been there before.
The man has no shame. Our most critical problem as a people is the rampant and systematic looting of our treasury by our successive leaders. Babangida was no exception, and he is being accused of the biggest loot of all, so, is he now saying that he wants to voluntarily refund whatever he is being accused of diverting from our coffers while in power? I have written personally to him before to do this, and he did not answer. He does not have to return to power to help Nigeria pay off her staggering foreign debt.
In a country of over 140 million people, what makes Babangida think he alone deserves to rule for perhaps seventeen or more years? What is he bringing to the table now if he never had it in the first place? Don’t we deserve better than our past illiterate leaders who could not differentiate between the national and their private purses?
Of all the Nigerian military dictators, Babangida was the most desperate for power, and for attempting to hold on to it for life, apart from being the most flamboyant, cunning, callous, ruthless and deadly, about how they went about achieving their goals. Babangida grew on Nigeria slowly and quietly, with a deceptive toothy smile.
Babangida first came into serious political reckoning with Buhari’s misleading coup of December 31st 1983. In reality, power was seized for the opportunity to destroy documents relating to the NNPC’s missing USA$2.8 billion oil money, and punish all those involved in the unraveling of the scam. Politicians and critics, including Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, notorious for clamouring for the exposure of the oil money rogue Minister of an earlier military epoch, were locked up without trial.
After consigning the vexatious matters that brought him to power to administrative oblivion with the help of Shinkafi, his Secret Service guru, Buhari announced his readiness to quit office. Idiagbon, as Buhari’s lieutenant, naturally insisted on taking over as head of state from his apparently prematurely retiring boss. Babangida, who was Chief of Army Staff at the time and a member of the Supreme Military Council, insisted it was his turn to rule because he had been involved in virtually every military coup. The quarrel split the Supreme Military Council members almost equally behind the two principal combatants.
Akilu had just returned from a military training in India at the time and Babangida recommended him for appointment as the head of the Secret Service. Idiagbon by-passed Akilu and slighted Babangida by not consulting with him to confirm the new head of the Secret Service from the army.
Gloria Okon was arrested at the Murtala Mohammed Airport trying to smuggle cocaine out of the country. Gloria claimed to be a courier for the family of one of the two high ranking military officers deeply involved in the Supreme Military Council’s palaver. Gloria was quickly smuggled out of the country and a carcass burnt beyond recognition of a human body, was left in her prison room to deceive the authorities. As Gloria’s drama was playing out, Abiola brought a large consignment of banned newsprint into the country, forcing Idiagbon to insist on the arrest of Chief M.K.O Abiola.
All sorts of calamitous events kept rolling out at the time, including the arrest of one Ikuomola for trying to smuggle a large consignment of cocaine out of the country. He indicted a son of one of the Dantatas and they were both tried and sentenced to death. The Dantata family mounted pressure on the Supreme Military Council to commute the sentence to life. The issue heightened the division among the Supreme Military Council members, with the Gloria Okon’s high ranking military benefactor, siding with the Dantatas naturally.
Idiagbon insisted that if poor people found with cocaine could be punished with death sentence, why should the rich and affluent be spared? Idiagbon also wanted the lawyer, (a Rivers state chap who had received some four million naira as legal fees on the case at the time), to be shot along with the drug barons for benefiting from the evil.
The schism between Idiagbon and Babangida totally paralyzed the Supreme Military Council and it could no longer function. Idiagbon forced compulsory leave on Babangida, under close surveillance with tapped telephone lines and all. Chief M.K.O Abiola saw the opportunity to save his neck from the newsprint saga by teaming up with his friend, Babangida, and he provided the seed money for a coup.
Through the facilities of Abiola and the Dantatas, Yar Adua was brought into the picture to help influence the Saudi Arabian monarch to extend a special invitation to Idiagbon as a guest of the monarch, to perform the 1985 Lesser Hajj in Mecca. Idiagbon felt greatly honoured by the invitation and took with him to Mecca, most of his supporters on the splintered Supreme Military Council, including Mamman Vasta.
With Idiagbon (who was the head of the Buhari’s regime in every sense of the word, and was very popular because of his transparent honesty, patriotism, and discipline), out of the way, Buhari (who was ready to vacate office anyway), was picked up like a helpless chicken at Doddan Barracks, and dumped in jail. Idiagbon, against the coupists’ advice, returned home a people’s hero, although locked up for several months too by Babangida.
The day after Babangida’s coup, I attacked it on the front page of the Sunday Punch newspaper, as a ploy by the (IMF and the World Bank) to marginalize the naira and destroy our economy, and Babangida was described as a snake by nature and a stooge of the West. The Editor of the Sunday Punch and his deputy at the time, Ayo Osintolu, and Bob Opone, respectively, were suspended from their jobs. Ayo for six months and Bob for three. I was unemployed as usual at the time, so, Babangida was handicapped about how to deal with me immediately. I heard later that I was blacklisted for all future government contracts and positions, even though my secondary school classmate Rear Admiral Aikhomu (rtd) eventually became Babangida’s deputy in office. I never tried to find out.
Because of my reputation as someone you could persuade with superior argument but impossible to bribe out of his conviction, my best friend who was like a twin brother to me at the time, Com. Wole Bucknor (rtd), was detailed to plead with me to drop any further development of the IBB matter. Their strategy was to admit to me that my observations were absolutely correct but that Babangida meant well for Nigeria. With Babangida’s antecedence, it was difficult for my friend to persuade me, but Nigerian newspapers in general at that early stage of the regime, were a little scared to publish and be damned.
Luckily, it did not take too long for Babangida to begin to reveal his secret agenda. He had removed Idiagbon/Buhari from power to douse the heated allegation at the time about illegal drug links and to help the IMF/World Bank ruin the naira and open up the Nigerian market as dumping ground for American and European junk and decadence. The marginalization of the naira suited Babangida’s Machiavellian streak to blunt prospects of mass protests with abject poverty, hunger, and basic survival pre-occupations. For example, the terroristic power of massive foreign exchange loot in a private hand, is limitless as a tool for forcing pauperized populace to acquiesce to the self-perpetuation antics of a potential despot.
Babangida’s first pronouncement in power was to shock the nation by adopting the civilian title of president. He did this because of a secret personal ambition kept to himself, to transit into life president in the mould of Presidents Nasir of Egypt and Eyadema of Togo, and also because of his agreement to make Chief Abiola his Vice President for collaborating over their 1985 coup. Abacha kicked against Abiola becoming Vice President because he was eyeing Babangida’s seat in a possible future coup of his own and wanted to remain the defacto next in command, in military terms, for eventual easy take over excuse.
Babangida promised Yar Adua a short-lived military transition after which he would hand over power to Yar Adua. That was why Yar Adua kept boasting during the early stages of Babangida’s regime, that no force on earth could stop him becoming the next president of Nigeria. This prompted Obasanjo’s statement at the time that Yar Adua must have forgotten something at the state house.
Babangida was so single minded, self-centered, and power-drunk, he single-handedly forced OIC membership on Nigeria without respect for our supposed religious secularity. He used every means imaginable to assert his power. Spiritual, criminal, everything was fair in his ruthless power game. The gods of the Marabouts became privileged guests at Aso Rock, lacing it with severe witchcraft, which was later vigorously sustained by Abacha.
If the physical failed, the metaphysical was handy in the human blood bath for power. Blood was the language in the cultish game for total control. Fear gripped the land. Who was going to be the next victim? Life was scary and worthless. I bet, corridor of power social acolytes of the time like the Arisekolas, Adedibus and the Akinyeles, could write blood-cuddling masterpieces on the mysteries of the season. Assassinations were rampant, sophisticated and comprehensive, incorporating bombings and dare-devil forages. Media houses were burnt or closed down, and critics of government were murdered, incarcerated or hounded into exile. Plane loads of promising young army officers lost their lives in questionable circumstances. Others appeared to have been sacrificed in distant land civil wars.
The Ejigbo military Hercules crash that killed an elite corp. of army captains and majors returning to their Jaji training base, is a typical example of the terrible human carnage visited upon us at the time by a desperate tyrant bent on holding on to power indefinitely at all costs. The plane was doctored and it crashed a few seconds after take-off from the Murtala Mohammed airport. No rescue attempt was ordered or made until 24 hours after the crash and even then, the inadequate facilities of a private company, (Julius Berger), were relied upon. Forty-eight hours after the crash, a warm body was still found suggesting that some lives could have been saved if rescue operations had commenced minutes after the crash.
Apart from the needless assassinations of possible opponents and rivals for power, there were totally senseless ones too, such as the death of Murtala Mohammed’s first son immediately after visiting the seat of power. It was generously reported in the press at the time. The allegation was that during the friendly, private visit, the young man was asked if he would be prepared to do a job. The young chap said he could not say until he was told what the job was. When told that he was to help facilitate the elimination of Chief Abiola, the young man said he couldn’t because Abiola was like a father to him. The host then quickly dismissed the suggestion as if it had been a joke and asked how the young man travelled to the state house. “By private car,” the young man said. “You are going about without security?” the host asked, pretending to look alarmed, and detailed some security officers to escort the young man to his Minna destination. The body of the young man was later that day found in his car on the route between the seat of power and Minna.
Bongos Ikwe’s son by a girl friend, who later married Oga, also lost his life in suspicious circumstances. Bongos, in press interviews at the time, denied knowing his son’s mother who, in fact, is the junior sister of Bongos’ best friend and music partner on an RKTV programme in the early 60s. Despite denials, Bongos’ most popular recorded song ‘O Mariana’ could not conceal the anguish of the jilted lover.
Perhaps the most stupid, irresponsible and callous murder of them all was that of Dele Giwa. The death was a classic example of desperate, high-handed, dirty and mean, under-the-carpet cover-up state terrorism.
Dele Giwa‘s problem was that he stumbled on some documents about Gloria Okon in London and after interviewing her, threatened to publish the story while allegedly letting it be known that he could be persuaded to withdraw publication with a cash bribe of US$21m plus N200m. Alternatively, he was ready to settle for the position of Information Minister, which Tony Mommoh was occupying at the time. Dele Giwa’s blackmail unfortunately misfired unlike an earlier one involving Mr. Lawson, the founder of the Nigerian Grail Movement who was alleged to have been arrested and locked up in London for money laundering problems. Mudashiru, the military governor of Lagos state at the time of Lawson’s travails, was alleged to have stopped the publication of Lawson’s story by bribing Giwa with the land and C of O of the Newswatch plaza.
Dr. T.C. Nwosu, the renowned Nigerian author, and I, came out in defense of Mamman Vasta, (when he was arrested for coup plotting), in a joint statement published as a news item at the time, in the Nigerian Guardian newspaper. We said it was a lie to accuse Vasta of trying to stage a coup to take the IMF conditionalities. This was the first time anyone, (civilian or military), would come out openly to defend an alleged coup plotter in Nigeria, and Vasta who was our friend and colleague in the Association of Nigerian Authors (ANA), took our support to heart, and arranged for some documents on his kangaroo trial for coup plotting to be smuggled out to us.
One of the documents we received was on Gloria Okon. We could not use the information in Nigeria at the time because no newspaper would dare publish it, so I arranged for Ejike Nwankwo, my bosom friend, to take the documents to his senior brother, Chief Arthur Nwankwo, who was in political exile in London at the time. The idea was for Arthur Nwankwo to have the Gloria Okon’s story published in the Manchester Guardian, but Arthur decided to delay publication until he could use the immunity of the Nigerian Senate, which he was aspiring to join in Babangida’s best time as a member, to make the story public.
Senior members of the Ministry of Information, and of the Daily Times at the time, and a director of Newswatch, were not totally ignorant about what was going on in Babangida’s government. In fact, Abacha at a point, asked the boss of the Ministry of Information to frame up Dele Giwa. The boss being a principled and die-hard journalist, argued that it was difficult to frame up journalists.
Babangida’s boys went ahead to frame up Giwa anyway. Three days before they killed Dele Giwa, Col. A. K. Togun, the deputy Director of Babangida’s State Security Service (the SSS), invited Giwa to his office and accused him of involvement in the importation of arms while linking Giwa with other persons alleged to be trying to stage a socialist revolution in Nigeria. At the meeting, agreement was reached, and Babangida, through his emissaries, promised to meet Giwa’s terms. Two days before Giwa’s murder, Akilu allegedly phoned Giwa’s home to ask for direction because Babangida’s ADC “has something for him, an invitation or something.”
Dele Giwa allegedly invited the overseas editor of Newswatch at the time to be around. Obviously, Giwa took the president’s promise more seriously than his colleagues at the Newswatch. This was why, when Giwa received the parcel and confirmed that it was from the President, his guest’s first reaction was to dash off to take cover in the toilet adjacent to the room where Giwa opened the parcel bomb. The guest escaped death by the whiskers and blasted eardrums. Tagum, when asked by Airport Correspondents on October 27, 1986, about Giwa’s bombing inadvertently confirmed the blackmail reason for Giwa’s death when he said: “We came to a real agreement and one person cannot just come out and blackmail us. I am an expert on blackmail. If a motorcycle man suddenly dashed in front of a car and the driver kills the motorcycle man, another motorcycle man who was there would not say the motorcycle man who dashed in front of the car was wrong. He would say the driver killed him, not that he killed himself”
An Arab terrorist, who was recruited to collaborate with a University of Ibadan chemistry don especially for the task, produced the bomb. The terrorist is alleged to have gone with Major Buba Marwa, Ogbeha and Gwazo, in a Peugeot station wagon car with fake license plate numbers, to deliver the bomb at Dele’s home. On arrival, they were told that Dele was not in, so they laid ambush near-by to watch movements in and out of Giwa’s premises.
As soon as Giwa was spotted entering his house, the allegation continues, the Arab terrorist offered to go and deliver the bomb, but his colleagues in crime stopped him on the grounds that a white man would look too suspicious for the job. Marwa, accompanied by Ogbeha, are alleged to have delivered the bomb to Dele’s son at the door, after which the crime team drove off to Mafoluku where they burned their delivery car. The same day, the Arab terrorist was flown out of Lagos, first to Kano, and eventually out of the country.
Major Buba Marwa was at the time rewarded with the rank of Lt. Col. and posted to the Nigerian Embassy in Washington, USA, as the new Military Attaché. His rise in the Army was extremely rapid and as Col. retuned home to be Governor of Lagos State. Armed robbers welcomed him to his new office with the kind of daredevilry never before experienced in Nigeria. Violence begets violence they say. The armed robbers raided from Mile two to Ikeja, even as he was passing by. Marwa panicked, so Babangida pumped unusual resources into Marwa’s coffers to ensure his success, which is the genesis of his tramping around as an achiever today. His private life does not suggest that he suffered in fool’s paradise.
Marwa, Ogbeha, and Gwazo, have since denied their alleged involvement in Dele Giwa’s murder. Marwa, who now owns an airline and, therefore, knows that it takes less than eight hours to fly across the Atlantic to Nigeria, argued that he was studying in the USA at the time. The implication of this, of course, was that it was impossible to take a few days off his studies.
Marwa, who rose to fame through IBB’s benevolence, is considered in military circles as one of the IBB boys, made up principally of the trusted cronies of the retired dictator. Accused of laundering money for IBB, Marwa again relied on the puerile argument that he was the Borno state governor in 1990, as if state governors are too busy governing diligently to travel out of Nigeria for a day or two, or even a week, on private businesses.
In December, 2005, when Marwa was detained for a couple of weeks by the EFCC, for laundering money for Abacha, he allegedly admitted that he had no choice in the matter as a military officer. He was only doing his duty. Of course, doing illegal duties loyally often goes with silencing, mouth-watering pecks, if nothing else.
In the area of managing the national economy, Babangida bestowed his adroitness and moral degeneracy. His economy was dominated by male-wives, particularly in the banking and oil sectors. Women often brag about the efficacy of ‘bottom’ power. Feminine men sometimes flaunt it too as their passport to economic liberation. Between them and the suddenly very lucrative 419 business of the time, industry was complete. IBB’s chiefs, allegedly colluded with 419 criminals to create the over-night semi-illiterate money-bags without class or shame, (including the 150 members of the National Assembly, that in 2005 sent IBB a birthday card), and who together now form the bulk of his supporters and campaigners, to return him to power.
Babangida (sapped) or totally wiped the middle class out of existence with the destruction of the naira, which he did by fiat in 1985, when he down graded the naira exchange rate from about N2 to N18 to the dollar. By the time he was forced out of office in 1993, the naira was exchanging at N60 to the dollar. Society was now reduced to two social classes of either the very poor or the rich rogues.
Babangida first concentrated on pulverizing his military base by tinkering with the 1985 Decree 17, to give himself sole authority to fire his military chiefs, including the chief of general staff; chairman, joint chiefs of staff; service chiefs, and the inspector general of police. General Domkat Bali said at the time: “Babangida must have known what he was aiming at if you now take those powers of the President as civilian, and you now put them on any army officer who then sits with other army officers, in the name of Supreme Military Council, SMC, who are useless to him, whom he can change tomorrow, that means that name is not Supreme at all.”
Bali was provoked to leave the government when he was demoted from the position of Minister of Defence to that of Internal Affairs. Ukiwe, a senior naval officer, who was IBB’s deputy, was forced to retire even before Bali did, for demonstrating patriotic zeal in defense of team spirit, over our IOC membership saga.
Gideon Orkar’s failed coup of April 22, 1990, provided Babangida with the opportunity to further purge the military. With total control over the military, IBB was ready to pursue his President-for-life agenda, (starting) by dismissing his S. J. Cookie’s Political Bureau programme for the return to civil rule by 1990.
For over eight years, Babangida kept shifting his handing over date and juggling his transition programme by arbitrarily banning and unbanning politicians, particularly the known opponents of military rule. He spent N40 billion on his endless transition programme, and bribed all and sundry, including the NLC with N50 million, NUJ with N20 million, PMAN with N30 million, and so on, to try to silence them. He attempted to compromise some vocal critics by settling them, and those he could not recruit, he sacked where possible, or detained, or killed, or hounded into exile.
Less than two years into his rule in 1987, IBB announced that he was planning to bequeath a lasting legacy of civil rule, through a gradual learning political process. Four years into his regime in 1989, he lifted for the first time his ban on partisan politics, and set up two political parastatals. One was called the Social Democratic Party (SDP), and the other was the National Republican Convention (NRC).
The handing over date to civilian government was postponed once again from late 1990 to the 1st of October 1992. He allowed elections to be held into the local governments in 1990, and in 1991, Babangida instigated intra party squabbles to find excuse to ban 12 of the candidates participating in the governorship elections. Candidates replacing the disqualified ones had barely one week to campaign.
Elections into the State Assemblies miraculously held without too much acrimony, followed shortly afterwards by elections into the National Assembly. In all the elections, known individuals strongly against Babangida or the military in power were sidelined, banned, or hounded into exile, prominent among whom were Ibrahim Tahir of the NPN, Sam Mbakwe, Chris Okolie, Wahab Dosumu, Ebenezer Babatope, etc.
Allegation of massive rigging was invoked on 17 November, 1992, to ban Adamu Ciroma and Shehu Musa Yar Adua, who had emerged from party primaries as presidential candidates for the NRC and the SDP respectively, and 21 other presidential aspirants, (including Chief Arthur Nzeribe, Chief Olu Falae, Alhaji Lateef Jakande and Alhaji Umar Shinkafi), from participating in the scheduled August 1992 presidential election, and all other future elections. The trick was that Babangida was gradually narrowing the field of potential presidential materials to himself. Remember that Babangida had promised Yar Adua the Presidency when Yar Adua helped to actualize the 1985 coup that brought Babangida to power. The ban did not go down well with the political elite in general, and particularly with Yar Adua who had assumed he would take over leadership from Babangida.
With the ban, Babangida once again postponed his handing over date from October 1st 1992, to Dec 5, 1992. Soon after, Babangida mandated the National Electoral Commission (NEC), to conduct the presidential primaries of the political parties, and he again fixed a new date of January 3, 1993, for the handing over of the reigns of power to a civilian government. Bribery, thuggery, rigging, ethnic cleavages, etc., ruined the NEC supervised political parties’ presidential primaries, resulting in the dissolution of party executives, who were replaced by Sole Administrators, and National Coordinators. Handing over date was once again postponed to August 27, 1993.
Baba Gana Kingibe, who was the SDP chairman before the dissolution of the party executives, and was then supposed to be managing the affairs of Yar Adua, was alleged to have received Babangida’s backing and financial support to aspire as presidential candidate obviously to cause confusion in Yar Adua’s political camp. Kingibe pasted his campaign posters all over the place, causing bad blood between himself and Yar Adua, which spilled into the Jos SDP convention of 1993.
In the meantime, Babangida was busy creating anarchy in the ranks of the politicians by introducing his modified open ballot system, and insisting that presidential aspirants go through tedious ward, local government, and state congresses. This eventually produced two presidential aspirants for each of the states, plus two for the FCT, and the unwieldy 62 presidential aspirants had to go through further elimination processes, at various national congresses, before the Jos (SDP), and Port-Harcourt (NRC), conventions of 1993.
Several irregularities were observed at the party conventions and a lot of money changed hands.
Alhaji Bashir Tofa for the NRC, and Bashorun M.K.O Abiola for the SDP, emerged as the presidential flag bearers. Babangida who was unhappy that progress was being made in the presidential election process was further pissed-off when his nominee, Pascal Bafyau, the ex-NLC president, as Abiola’s running mate, (to spy on and undermine Abiola), was rejected by Abiola. Abiola also upset Yar Adua’s calculations, by not accepting Abubakir Atiku as his running mate, and choosing Baba Gana Kingibe instead.
Of course, the emergence at last of promising presidential candidates for both parties was not a very palatable option for Abacha too who was still nursing the dream to succeed Babangida although pretending to be on the side of Babangida. Abacha misled Babangida to think of him as a possible ally, so the scene was set for Babangida to feel that if he annulled the election, he would have the support of Abacha, Yar Adua and other perceived, powerful enemies of Abiola, including a leading traditional ruler in the South-West.
Babangida, in his determination to scuttle the presidential election at all cost, promulgated Decree 13, forbidding the presidential flag bearers of the two political parties from doing anything whatsoever that would influence members of the public to vote for them at the election scheduled for June 12 1993. Then Babangida empowered NEC to disqualify any of the candidates at will, and as a (final) fall back strategy, to scuttle our democratic dream, he set up his Association for Better Nigeria (ABN) party, using Senator Arthur Nzeribe as proxy.
On June 10, 1993, at the unholy hour of 9.30 pm, late Justice Ikpeme, who was appointed a few days earlier and hurriedly transferred from Lagos to Abuja, granted a court order to the ABN, restraining the NEC Chairman Humphrey Nwosu, from conducting the Presidential election on June 12, 1993.
The Director of the United States Information Service (USIS) in Nigeria at the time, Mr. O’Brien, warned that the US government would not be happy if the June 12 election was cancelled. Babangida panicked, and although he declared O’Brien persona non grata and ordered him out of the country in his personal interest, Babangida allowed Nwosu to go ahead with the election.
The election was adjudged by the international and local observers monitoring it and by the two political parties involved, as the fairest and freest in the history of Nigeria. By the evening of June 14 1993, more than 50% of the election results had been authenticated and released by NEC, showing that SDP’s Moshood Abiola had swept the polls.
To everyone’s surprise, Babangida suddenly ordered NEC not to release any more results. On June 23, 1993, Babangida gave an unsigned statement to Nduka Irabor, his press secretary, announcing the cancellation of the presidential election on the radio. The unsigned statement was a strategy to allow Babangida to deny its authenticity, should Nigeria begin to boil over the announcement. Nigerians had become too hungry and docile to react.
Babangida annulled the June12 election entirely on his own, based on his selfish, personal agenda to rule indefinitely. Before annulling the election, he rallied the connivance and support of some critical Emirs and a leading Yoruba traditional ruler known to be antagonistic to Abiola’s political ambition, and the signatures of a bunch of political and military apologists (or jobbers), tagged the G-34, on a document entitled ‘Peace Pact,’ in endorsement of his annulment of the June 12, 1993, elections.
The G-34 comprised of the following members of the military junta and leaders of the two political parties, the SDP and the NRC: Admiral Augustus Aikhomu, Chief Earnest Shonekan who eventually headed Babangida’s contraption called the Interim National Government (ING), General Shehu Musa Yar’ardua, Alhaji Sule Lamido, Alhaji Adamu Ciroma, Amb. Dele Cole, Chief Tony Anenih, Chief Jim Nwobodo, Brig-Gen David A. B Mark, Alhaji Abubakar Rimi, Alhaji Olusola Saraki, Chief Dapo Sarumi, Chief Joseph Toba, Chief Bola Afonja, Dr. Hammed Kusamotu, Dr. Okechukwu Odunze, Prof. Eyo Ita, Y. Anka, Alhaji Bashir Dalhatu, Chief Tom Ikimi, Barrister Joe Nwodo (who signed with reservations), Dr. Bawa Salka, Alhaji Abba Murtala Mohammed, Alhaji Abdulrahman Okene, Lt. Gen Joshua Dongoyaro, Lt. Gen Aliyu Mohammed Gusau, Brig-Gen John Shagaya, Brig-Gen Anthony Ukpo, Halilu A. Maina, Alhaji Bawa Salka, Mr. Amos Idakula, Mr. Theo Nikire, Alhaji A. Ramalan, Alhaji A. Mohammed. Many of these traitors are still making decisions for Nigeria today.
Babangida’s military constituency, by and large, was against the annulment. Abacha saw his opportunity to act, and with the backing of the armed forces of Nigeria, warned Babangida that he would be entirely on his own after the August 27, 1993, handing over date. Babangida in fear, concocted and swore in an illegal arrangement he called the Interim National Government, ING, to take over office from August 27, 1993. After swearing in his ING on August 26, 1993, Babangida who was supposed to be pulled out of the army in the military tradition, played all sorts of pranks to delay the event from 11.am to 1.00pm and then to 3.00pm, when the Nigerian army removed Babangida’s guards from the Eagle Square to warn him that his time was up.
There is this strong allegation among the rank and file of the armed forces, and members of the defense correspondence of our newspapers attached to the seat of power, that Babangida arranged, in the last couple of weeks before leaving office, for several armoured vehicle loads of newly printed naira notes to be delivered daily to his new Minna palatial abode obviously with the connivance of Abacha, perhaps as his mentor’s retirement benefit.
Abacha and Babangida had several serious financial problems with Abiola but one of them takes the cake. It was over some foreign war booty amounting to US$215m. It is alleged that Babangida had asked Abiola to help launder it when Babangida was in office but Abiola was not interested.
Babangida allegedly side-stepped Abiola and eventually prevailed upon a member of Abiola’s family in the custom of family friendship, to rescue the situation. Then the person suddenly died. It is further alleged that Abiola was asked to return the money and he truthfully and honestly said he knew noting about it and even if there was such a thing, he had no authority over the matter. Then he was asked to pressurize the children of the deceased to play ball.
Abiola refused, arguing that he had no legal or moral right to do so. The kids of the deceased wanted Abiola released but Abiola was too principled to succumb to blackmail so the powers that be decided early after his arrest, that he would die in detention for declaring himself president.
The Gulf war oil windfall is Babangida’s often-referenced loot. Abacha set up a panel headed by the highly respected economist, Pius Okigbo, in October, 1994, to reorganize the CBN. Okigbo’s panel discovered that $12.2 billion of the $12.4 billion accruable from the Gulf War excess crude oil sales was frittered away or unaccounted for, through nebulous or phantom projects that could not be traced. Only $206 million was left in the account. According to Okigbo, “disbursements were clandestinely undertaken while the country was openly reeling with crushing external debt overhead. These represent, no matter the initial justification for creating the account, a gross abuse of public trust. ”
When Obasanjo in 2001, decided to look quietly into the missing NNPC’s US$12.2 billion Gulf war oil windfall linked to Babangida, it was found that the documents pertaining to the fraud had disappeared from the volts of the Central Bank. The brilliant, highly respected economist, Pius Okigbo who handled the investigations into the scam had private copies. Before he could deliver, he insisted on travelling to London against strong, wise, private, counsel, and he was wasted. Other members of the Okigbo panel had copies of the report anyway and were still alive.
Government miraculously found the CBN documents when it suited it, and aspects of the documents concerning IBB, were published during the threat by members of the House of Representatives to impeach President Obasanjo in July, 2005, because of speculations that IBB was one of the Northern elites fanning the plot.
Babangida was ruthless in the way he amassed his colossal wealth. First is the illegal self-allocation of free oil, sold on the spot market. Then he initiated the corrupt culture of maintaining a huge monthly security vote virtually as personal pocket money. Rather than repair our refineries, let alone to work at maximum capacity, IBB built private refineries in Cote d’Ivoire and the Republic of Benin, where he took our crude to refine and sell back to us as fuel.
John Fashanu, in a private investigation published in African Confidential early in Obasanjo’s current regime, discovered an alleged $6 billion debt buy-back scam by IBB between 1988 and 1993. Another $14.4 billion disappeared into off shore accounts as currency stabilization and debt buy-back scheme that actually cost $2.5 billion. One of the front-companies used, Growth Management, based in London, bought the debt for 10 cents per dollar and resold to the government at 45 cents to steal 35 cents per dollar. Fashanu was trying to recover about $17 billion for the Nigerian government only for the CBN to say they had no records of the deals. The records are out there abroad but cleaned out at home to conceal the (theft) deals.
The Wolfsberg Principles, an initiative of 11 banks and institutions across the world to fight serious international financial crimes, traced another $3 billion of our stolen money to Babangida’s accounts abroad, and $4.3 billion to Abacha’s.
Although Babangida used mostly fictitious names for his numerous accounts abroad, EFCC could zero in on some of the accounts by following up on the dusts raised early in 2003 over the financing of a leading Nigerian telecommunications project in which Babangida is alleged to own 75% shares. Mohammed fronts for his father on the authentic board of the company. Those claiming to have borrowed from foreign banks in the heat of the EFCC’s revelations at the time have not identified the collateral or sortie used. Documents on the loan supposed to have been granted on 9 February, 2001, was dated 28 August, 2006. The original ‘loan’ letter has not been presented. Apparently, Paribas Bank, based in Paris, was managing a slush fund from which investments in excess of US$400 million was made to buy into Alcatel, (the telecommunications’ partner technical partners), Bouygues Telecoms, Peugeot and Total finaelf.
Alcatel and Parabel National of France were worried at the time that their invoices for the telecom project were being inflated to launder funds by the supposed private owners of the sources of funds and that private cheques were being issued to finance the staggering project without recourse to borrowing from banks. They suspected illegal laundering of funds and threatened to withdraw collaboration on the project while alerting Interpol to investigate the sources of the private cheques being issued to finance the project.
IBB could not participate in Obasanjo’s 2003, inauguration ceremonies, because he was allegedly out of the country sorting out the Interpol queries on the Alcatel’s slush account alert, at the time. Even now, the telecoms’ financing details through Siemens etc, could be investigated by the EFCC tracing ghost cheques to issuing private sources of funds and their local and international banks to unravel possible laundering of funds.
Luscious contracts for the construction of Abuja were awarded to front-companies of his and his cronies, including Julius Berger and Arab Contractors that between them virtually single-handedly handled the construction of the new Federal Capital. The security danger of foreign companies solely constructing a country’s capital and having assess to its structural secrets, including possible Presidential underground escape routes and military arsenal volts, is mind boggling to say the least, but that is an issue for another day.
The largest, most prestigious housing estate in Alexandra, Egypt’s leading holiday resort town, is alleged to belong to Babangida. Even Egyptians cannot afford his rent, which is alleged to be in dollars. All his tenants are rich foreigners and the staff of multi-national companies operating in Alexandra. The estate is alleged to have its own airport, which Babangida uses when he visits.
Babangida is alleged to own several other housing estates around the world, including houses on Bishop Avenue in London. He uses his London houses, it is alleged, as guest houses or gifts for people on his compromise list. He is considered generous with gifts of cars with their boots stuffed with naira notes when he wants some jobs done.
Perhaps you would want to join me to play the prude accountant, generous with figures. Let’s pretend that Babangida was a General throughout his service years in the Nigerian army. Again let’s assume he spent 30 years in the army and was paid N100,000 monthly (actually, salaries of Generals were less than N10,000 a month until recently) and he saved every kobo of his salary. He would be worth about N35,000,000 plus interest in the bank today. But Babangida’s 50 bedroom palatial abode in Minna is alleged to be conservatively worth billions of naira and he does not owe any bank on it.
In 2003, he threw a wedding party for his first daughter, which numbed the nation. Some 28 governors were in attendance, and in June 2004, he treated us to another dream-like political carnival during his son’s wedding. No one dared to ask where the money came from to set up such a palatial abode or scandalous and intimidating wedding carnivals in our jungle of abject poverty and hunger. Nigerians reveled in the lavish show of shame, hoodwinked by the audacity, the sumptuous food, the ambience, the vulgarity….. At least we saw our fellow Nigerians (albeit a handful of them), living it up on the money that could have guaranteed millions of Nigerians, active, regular employment indefinitely.
Almost all the principal characters involved in leadership tussles with Babangida since 1985, Abiola, Yar Adua, Idiagbon and even Abacha, have all died through induced cardiac arrest, lethal injection, poisoned food, gassed telephone handset, etc, etc, and my fear is whether Nigeria would survive the Godfather himself? Babangida usurped eight years and eight months of the thirty-three years of military misrule and still wants to come back to finish us off properly. If he was honest with himself, he ought to be ashamed for the economic, political and social mess he has turned Nigeria into. Babangida should be heading for Kirikiri not Aso Rock.
* NAIWU OSAHON Hon. Khu Mkuu (Leader) World Pan-African Movement); Ameer Spiritual (Spiritual Prince) of the African race; MSc. (Salford); Dip.M.S; G.I.P.M; Dip.I.A (Liv.); D. Inst. M; G. Inst. M; G.I.W.M; A.M.N.I.M. Poet, Author of the magnum opus: ‘The end of knowledge’. One of the world’s leading authors of children’s books; Awarded; key to the city of Memphis, Tennessee, USA; Honourary Councilmanship, Memphis City Council; Honourary Citizenship, County of Shelby; Honourary Commissionership, County of Shelby, Tennessee; and a silver shield trophy by Morehouse College, USA, for activities to unite and uplift the African race.
Naiwu Osahon renowned author, philosopher of science, mystique, leader of the world Pan-African Movement.
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Friday, September 17, 2010
RENTED CROWD
By
Eddy Aghanenu
The campaigns are here again. Everywhere is buzzing. The unemployed and the poor masses are becoming useful once again in the hands of desperate politicians. The rented crowd is here again.
If you are probably from another planet and does not know anything about rented crowd, then the best place to learn about it is Nigeria. During elections, politicians in order to prove that they are popular, rent crowd for their campaigns. At the end of the day, terms such as ‘mammoth crowd’, ‘massive crowd’ are used to describe such gatherings. Due to the economic situation, the masses are rented for peanuts. They are faced with a lot of hazards – long trips on very bad roads, venue to sleep, feeding and lack of medical care. In most cases, politicians do fulfill their own side of the bargain. The contract amount are sometimes not paid.
An example is the recent ‘mammoth crowd’ that attended Ibrahim Babangida’s recent declaration for the presidency in Eagle Square, Abuja. According to The Nation of Friday, 17th September, 2010, the crowd rented from Minna in Niger State have not been paid their allowance of N5,000 per person. Ironically, Minna is the home town of Ibrahim Babaginda.
According to Yau Ibrahim, the spokesperson of the commercial crowd, they promised an allowance of N5,000 for the trip. The money was supposed to be paid before the trip. Unfortunately, this was not done. They were assured that they will be paid on the way. This was not to be. Finally, they were told that the money would be paid at the venue. It was an unfulfilled promise.
The commercial crowd has now besieged the Government House, Minna, for their money.
Expect more of such stories as the campaign progresses. This is what you get when politics is turned to ‘a do or die’ affair.
Eddy Aghanenu
The campaigns are here again. Everywhere is buzzing. The unemployed and the poor masses are becoming useful once again in the hands of desperate politicians. The rented crowd is here again.
If you are probably from another planet and does not know anything about rented crowd, then the best place to learn about it is Nigeria. During elections, politicians in order to prove that they are popular, rent crowd for their campaigns. At the end of the day, terms such as ‘mammoth crowd’, ‘massive crowd’ are used to describe such gatherings. Due to the economic situation, the masses are rented for peanuts. They are faced with a lot of hazards – long trips on very bad roads, venue to sleep, feeding and lack of medical care. In most cases, politicians do fulfill their own side of the bargain. The contract amount are sometimes not paid.
An example is the recent ‘mammoth crowd’ that attended Ibrahim Babangida’s recent declaration for the presidency in Eagle Square, Abuja. According to The Nation of Friday, 17th September, 2010, the crowd rented from Minna in Niger State have not been paid their allowance of N5,000 per person. Ironically, Minna is the home town of Ibrahim Babaginda.
According to Yau Ibrahim, the spokesperson of the commercial crowd, they promised an allowance of N5,000 for the trip. The money was supposed to be paid before the trip. Unfortunately, this was not done. They were assured that they will be paid on the way. This was not to be. Finally, they were told that the money would be paid at the venue. It was an unfulfilled promise.
The commercial crowd has now besieged the Government House, Minna, for their money.
Expect more of such stories as the campaign progresses. This is what you get when politics is turned to ‘a do or die’ affair.
Wednesday, September 8, 2010
MINORITY WINS THE VOTE
By
Eddy Aghanenu
The macabre dance can never cease in Nigeria. The political drama is getting more interesting by the day. The political intrigues are getting hotter with the passing of each day
Everyday brings in new definition of democracy. New concepts of democracy are emerging every day. Take the recent happenings in Ogun State. It is the state of the exponent of ‘do or die’ politics, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. It is also the state of the Speaker of House of Representative, Dimeji Bankole.
It is in this state that the unusual took place. In the early hours of Monday, 6th September, 2010, eight members of the state House of Assembly broke into the hallowed chambers with a borrowed mace and ‘impeached’ the Speaker and suspended fourteen others. Not done yet, in a matter of minutes, some controversial financial bills sent to the House by the Executive, were hurriedly passed. The bills were previously rejected by the House of Assembly. You can say it is the hand of Esau but the voice of Jacob.
The minority has won, but it is a pyrrhic victory. It is only in Nigeria that this can happen. This is what the nation gets when political representatives are selected and not elected. The drama of the absurd is still on. Governance has gone to sleep and the people are irrelevant in this show of shame.
Eddy Aghanenu
The macabre dance can never cease in Nigeria. The political drama is getting more interesting by the day. The political intrigues are getting hotter with the passing of each day
Everyday brings in new definition of democracy. New concepts of democracy are emerging every day. Take the recent happenings in Ogun State. It is the state of the exponent of ‘do or die’ politics, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. It is also the state of the Speaker of House of Representative, Dimeji Bankole.
It is in this state that the unusual took place. In the early hours of Monday, 6th September, 2010, eight members of the state House of Assembly broke into the hallowed chambers with a borrowed mace and ‘impeached’ the Speaker and suspended fourteen others. Not done yet, in a matter of minutes, some controversial financial bills sent to the House by the Executive, were hurriedly passed. The bills were previously rejected by the House of Assembly. You can say it is the hand of Esau but the voice of Jacob.
The minority has won, but it is a pyrrhic victory. It is only in Nigeria that this can happen. This is what the nation gets when political representatives are selected and not elected. The drama of the absurd is still on. Governance has gone to sleep and the people are irrelevant in this show of shame.
Friday, September 3, 2010
Nigeria At Fifty
By
Eddy Aghanenu
The country will be fifty by October this year. What have we got to show in our fifty years of nationhood? It is a litany of woes, failed opportunities
What will the Government be celebrating come October 1st. Is it the strides we have made in economic, social and political spheres or the non realization of the dreams of our founding fathers? A quick reflection of the past fifty years has shown that Nigeria and Nigerians have not enoyed the fruits of independence.
Within the period, there has been a bloody civil war that claimed millions of lives. Within the same period, the military hijacked power from the people for a period of over thirty years. All democratic structures were destroyed and corruption was elevated to new heights.
Today, Nigeria, rich in human and material resources, is one of the poorest countries in the world. With the advent of the new democratic dispensation, one would have expected some positive changes. Rather than doing that, the government is maintaining the status quo and not much has changed.
Today, Nigeria is regarded as one of the most corrupt countries in world. The looters of the nation’s treasury are walking freely in the streets and flaunting their ill gotten wealth, yet the nation is seeking to go borrowing.
Today, the health sector is in a state of collapse. Medical facilities are not available. Where they are available, they are beyond the reach of the common man. The result is an increase in child mortality rate. The average life span is on the decrease. Health workers are constantly on strike. Fake and expired drugs are now openly sold in the markets and commercial vehicles.
Today, the education sector has collapsed. Educational infrastructure is non existent. The high rate of failure in external examinations for high school students is alarming. A student ends up spending five to six years for a four year course. Tertiary institutions now produce half baked graduates.
Today, in the name of globalization, Nigeria has become a dumping ground for junk and fake products from the West and Asia. Our industries are closing down daily and moving to neighboring countries where conditions are more favorable. Rather than develop our agricultural sector, we go about importing rice from all over the world. The government is selling all her investments to the same looters of our economy in the name of privatization Unemployment rate is one of the highest in the world. The value of the naira is not worth the paper it is printed on. It is ironic that a country that produces over two million barrels of crude oil per day continues to import refined products.
Today, electricity supply is epileptic in spite of the billions of dollars meant to revive the energy sector. Potable water for the citizenry is non-existent. Shelter for all will continue to be a dream
Today, Today, the security situation is getting worse. In order to protect themselves, Nigerians have to barricade themselves in their self made prisons. People have lost confidence in the police force. From Tivland to Ijawland, there are extra judicial killings as calls on the army in time of crises. Elective positions are for the highest bidder. Political assassinations are on the rise.
Today, children have become bread winners as unemployed parents have decided to engage their children in commercial activities. Child labor is no longer news. The only means for survival for some of our young girls is to resort to prostitution in foreign lands in this AIDS infested world. Slavery is back. Brain drain has become a problem as our best materials go outside our shores to seek greener pastures.
Today, our environment has been degraded. From Sokoto to Bayelsa in the Niger Delta, the story is the same. Desert encroachment is no longer a threat but a reality. The sea eats our lands. Our water and farmlands are daily being destroyed by mining and industrial giants.
In short, there is nothing to cheer in our fifty years of independence. It is not yet uhuru. The federal, state and local governments must direct their energies towards improving the lives of the people, ensure justice and equity. Until this is done, Nigeria will continue to wallow in disease, hunger, ignorance, unemployment and international capitalist conspiracy.
Eddy Aghanenu
The country will be fifty by October this year. What have we got to show in our fifty years of nationhood? It is a litany of woes, failed opportunities
What will the Government be celebrating come October 1st. Is it the strides we have made in economic, social and political spheres or the non realization of the dreams of our founding fathers? A quick reflection of the past fifty years has shown that Nigeria and Nigerians have not enoyed the fruits of independence.
Within the period, there has been a bloody civil war that claimed millions of lives. Within the same period, the military hijacked power from the people for a period of over thirty years. All democratic structures were destroyed and corruption was elevated to new heights.
Today, Nigeria, rich in human and material resources, is one of the poorest countries in the world. With the advent of the new democratic dispensation, one would have expected some positive changes. Rather than doing that, the government is maintaining the status quo and not much has changed.
Today, Nigeria is regarded as one of the most corrupt countries in world. The looters of the nation’s treasury are walking freely in the streets and flaunting their ill gotten wealth, yet the nation is seeking to go borrowing.
Today, the health sector is in a state of collapse. Medical facilities are not available. Where they are available, they are beyond the reach of the common man. The result is an increase in child mortality rate. The average life span is on the decrease. Health workers are constantly on strike. Fake and expired drugs are now openly sold in the markets and commercial vehicles.
Today, the education sector has collapsed. Educational infrastructure is non existent. The high rate of failure in external examinations for high school students is alarming. A student ends up spending five to six years for a four year course. Tertiary institutions now produce half baked graduates.
Today, in the name of globalization, Nigeria has become a dumping ground for junk and fake products from the West and Asia. Our industries are closing down daily and moving to neighboring countries where conditions are more favorable. Rather than develop our agricultural sector, we go about importing rice from all over the world. The government is selling all her investments to the same looters of our economy in the name of privatization Unemployment rate is one of the highest in the world. The value of the naira is not worth the paper it is printed on. It is ironic that a country that produces over two million barrels of crude oil per day continues to import refined products.
Today, electricity supply is epileptic in spite of the billions of dollars meant to revive the energy sector. Potable water for the citizenry is non-existent. Shelter for all will continue to be a dream
Today, Today, the security situation is getting worse. In order to protect themselves, Nigerians have to barricade themselves in their self made prisons. People have lost confidence in the police force. From Tivland to Ijawland, there are extra judicial killings as calls on the army in time of crises. Elective positions are for the highest bidder. Political assassinations are on the rise.
Today, children have become bread winners as unemployed parents have decided to engage their children in commercial activities. Child labor is no longer news. The only means for survival for some of our young girls is to resort to prostitution in foreign lands in this AIDS infested world. Slavery is back. Brain drain has become a problem as our best materials go outside our shores to seek greener pastures.
Today, our environment has been degraded. From Sokoto to Bayelsa in the Niger Delta, the story is the same. Desert encroachment is no longer a threat but a reality. The sea eats our lands. Our water and farmlands are daily being destroyed by mining and industrial giants.
In short, there is nothing to cheer in our fifty years of independence. It is not yet uhuru. The federal, state and local governments must direct their energies towards improving the lives of the people, ensure justice and equity. Until this is done, Nigeria will continue to wallow in disease, hunger, ignorance, unemployment and international capitalist conspiracy.
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