What’s going on?  Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, the president and commander-in-chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces (dressed fully in an army general’s uniform on this page), has dispatched fighter jets to those places.  And the fighter jets have been doing what such planes do: dropping bombs, bazookas and grenades, turning them into balls of fire which have devastated the lands and bloodied the cities.

Truly, President Jonathan is angry and he is at war.  Will this onslaught rout the deadly Boko Haram sect and send them into the eternal sleep? We hope so. We pray so.  We pray for peace at the end of war. We make war in order to have peace. The chief purpose of a purposeful war is the enthronement of peace.   But do wars necessarily bring peace?  What happens the morning after this war?  Was the president right to have rolled out tanks of warfare?  Too many questions.  My candid opinion follows shortly.

As I write this column,  the newspapers and television are awash with news of fleeing citizens and political leaders from the theatre of conflict; hideouts of the Boko Haram insurgents have being  ravaged;  cities and towns locked in a 24-hour curfew; battle-ready soldiers in camouflage and assault rifles on the mission to flush out the bad guys who have been giving their fellow citizens sleepless nights as they engaged in festival of blood: bombing places of worship, public buildings; assaulting hapless women and kids, and generally enveloping the land in a cycle of fear.

There’s indeed the irony of war that is quite striking: when Boko Haram strikes, fear envelopes everywhere;  when soldiers strike at Boko Haram,  the nation is gripped in fear.  At the end,  as Poet J.P Clark rightly says, the casualties are not even the wounded and the dead,  but are most times far from the theatre of war.  In the fight to tackle Boko Haram, the casualties may not even be Boko Haram insurgents or the soldiers sent to quell the rebellion, but those who have nothing to do with the battle.

So far since the insanity began, innocent Nigerians have been bombed to death in the churches ;  travellers blown up in luxury buses; law enforcement officers ambushed and killed.  Truly, war does no one any good, especially the ordinary citizen who are unable to decipher the cause the insurgents fight.  Families whose hearts can never be mended even after peace hopefully returns.  Scars of this war will remain in our nation even when the drums of war become silent.  Such is the nonsense of war, any war.  In the words of American writer, Benjamin Franklin, “there never was a good war or bad peace.”

What am I driving at?  This conflict was avoidable.  Our leaders sowed seeds of war when they  left our nation to ruin; when  they  bred ill-mannered and ill-tempered citizens through neglect,  through looting of the resources that could have been used to adequately train, equip and engage them.   We are bountifully reaping the fruits of that neglect.  We have a restive youth population, often manipulated by the elite to achieve their selfish goals. Boko Haram, like I have stated several times in this column, is clearly a failure of leadership, in this case successive leadership at the centre, and of course,  the North.  The leaders there sowed the wind and they are reaping the whirlwind.  The North is not significantly poorer than many parts of the South, but can the leadership there honestly beat their chests that they have often ruled in the best interests of their people, especially the youths?  What educational opportunities have they created?  Where are the jobs for the jobless youths?  Where have the resources for development gone?  When the youths are idle, it becomes easy to infiltrate their minds and sow all kinds of ideas, including religious extremism, into them.  The consequences of criminal neglect, abject poverty,  asinine religious indoctrination and political manipulation possibly led to the birth and metamorphosis of  what is now known and called Boko Haram.

In other parts of the country, the situation is not much different.  The youths have become a standing army of political battles, because there is not much hope of meaningful engagement. This has to stop if our nation will ever enjoy lasting peace.   Even when Boko Haram ends,  there is no guarantee that another angry group would not emerge to threaten the rest of us and hold the nation by the jugular.

What Nigeria needs, in my humble opinion, is complete reorientation of the society, especially the youth. While the nation concentrates on building the dilapidated physical infrastructure, no thought is spared on the more critical issue of human infrastructure.  What’s the point in having well-paved roads and physically appealing environment when all around us are crooked minds,  dysfunctional youth population who hold to neither edifying values, principles nor regenerative morality?  Sadly, our leaders are neither concerned about generation next nor are they themselves good examples.

What Nigeria truly needs, even as it tackles terrorism, is  a new value system;  social and economic justice;  a humane society catering to the needs of the people, especially the downtrodden.   A country with a warped value system anchored on the  primitive side of exploitative tendencies masqueraded as capitalism has the propensity of breeding hydra-headed fringe groups.  Of course,  no system ever eliminates malcontents and the discontented from the society, even when economic and social rights are taken care of.  But a system that offers little or no redemptive features for a large army of its youth population is easily susceptible to combustion and is often a fertile recruitment ground for external extremist groups and terror organisations.

Back to the issue of the Emergency Rule and deployment of more troops in the North-East zone, the hotbed of Boko Haram.  Since last week, the debate on the propriety or otherwise of the emergency rule has been raging.  While some are hailing the move and believe it will restore peace to the trouble region, others especially the opposition view the action as highhanded and incapable of ending the terror attacks.

Where do I stand?  I stand on the side of those who support the Emergency Rule and deployment of troops to the Boko Haram territory. No group or group of persons should be allowed to continue to hold the rest of the country to ransome, whatever their grievances are. When a group continues to attack, maim and kill innocent citizens,  law enforcement officers, rebuffs amnesty offer, what a responsible government should do is to move in and protect the rights of the larger members of the society.  But in so doing, decency should be the watchword;  the soldiers must stick strictly to rules of engagement in such situations: no wanton killing of defenceless citizens, women and children.

Even though I am no fan of President Jonathan as regular readers of this column can testify, on this issue Mr President is right, very right, and the opposition, especially the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN is wrong, very wrong.  Like my brother and friend, Dele Momodu,  wrote in his column on Saturday, the opposition must have the courage to commend the president when he does some things right. You don’t criticise for the sake of criticism, otherwise you lose relevance and credibility in the eyes of discerning members of the public.  What would they have done were they in the president’s shoes? Standby and watch idly as terror groups continue to strike? The same people who call the president weak are the same people who call him highhanded when he sends troops to troubled spots.  Haba!

Even without recourse to the constitution,  an ‘emergency’ as defined by the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary means, “a sudden serious and dangerous event or situation which needs immediate action to deal with it.”  Are those criticising the Emergency Rule saying the Boko Haram issue has not become  serious enough to warrant a decisive action? When will enough be enough?

Will the military exercise bring an end to terrorism in the country? Not likely. No military action guarantees such infinite peace.  Iraq and Libya are still in endless turmoil even after the US-led forces trounced the leadership there; there is Afghanistan.  So, we can’t hope that all will be forever well after the Emergency Rule.  But even at that, the Emergency Rule was a necessary action, a devil’s alternative. Should the amnesty Committee be disbanded? Certainly no. Let those who lay down their arms and are prepared for amnesty go for it, while the war goes on for those who chose the path of war.

As Jonathan goes to war against Boko Haram,  he must extend his war to other rotten sectors of our country.  We need emergency in health,  education, petroleum,  social infrastructure and the economy, and of course, defence and security.  Is ‘General’  Ebele Jonathan listening?

He was one of the people you could bump into on the streets without a name or face recognition.  Even though a  sitting two-term senator, he has made no great mark or reputation in the Senate unlike his more famous colleagues who make the Senate tick  by their contributions in the plenary, on the floor of the Senate. But not anymore.  Thanks to his current spat with his more charismatic, more popular and  performing kinsman,  Chief Godswill Akpabio, the governor of Akwa Ibom State, Etok’s face now graces the newspapers, magazines and the electronic media.

Lucky man. What he couldn’t achieve in his two-term stint, he now enjoys courtesy of a fight with Akpabio.  Who says a political fight does not have its use? Distinguished Senator Etok shot into the limelight when he  made an undistinguished allegation against Gov. Akpabio.  He claimed that the latter wanted him dead over the senatorial seat which he currently occupies.  Akpabio  has indicated his interest to run for the Ikot Ekpene North-West Senatorial  district election in 2015.  Etok  claims that the governor’s proxies had been sending him text messages advising him to bury his third term senatorial ambition or be buried with it.

The governor, he also claimed, had mandated his ‘hit squad’ to take on the senator if he remained adamant to the admonition to quit the forthcoming race. Said Etok at the press conference:  “I want the governor to tell Nigerians and the international community if there is anything wrong in any man aspiring to contest for an office…Not only that,  the governor has now loosed (sic) his hit squad, including what I have on this phone, some text messages,  that if I don’t retract the statement that I will contest election, after seven days,  I will see what they will do.

I will either be dead to stop me or alive to retract the statement.” To demonstrate the seriousness with which he took the alleged threat to his life,  Etok forwarded the text of his widely publicised press conference, to the presidency, leadership of the National Assembly and various security agencies, including the State Security Service,  SSS, the police, among others. Coming from a whole federal  lawmaker and given the often volatile nature of the politics played in this clime, the security agencies soon swung to action to unravel the veracity or otherwise of Senator Etok’s weighty claims.  In no time, the security agencies found out that Etok’s allegations were unfounded.

Nobody wanted him dead.  Not Gov. Akpabio.  Not anyone.  The senator had been crying wolf when none existed. Parading a young man, Adeola Olaore, a.k.a. General Africa,  before the media,  what was uncovered was the smart, but devious moves to fleece the senator by selling a dummy of an alleged assassination plot to him.  The criminally minded young man had simply fooled Senator Etok.  How could he have fallen for such cheap trick?  If someone as high up as Akpabio wanted him dead, would the young man not be better paid than a senator?

Why would he not carry out the assignment and be better  remunerated? The confession of Gen. Africa simply put paid to the lies concocted by the senator to elicit sympathy from the public, of a powerless man being oppressed and arm-twisted  by a powerful, ruthless governor who is hell-bent on snatching his senatorial seat. Now that it has emerged that no one was plotting to snuff life out of him, the senator has simply clammed up.  Not a word.  Not an apology to all of us, ordinary Nigerians,  who had been led to almost believing that there had actually being an attempt to silence him. There are two major reasons I have decided to comment on the Akpabio/Etok  altercation.

First, an issue of threat to life is a serious one which should concern all, given the orgy of bloodletting which has enveloped our nation.  Secondly, as 2015 gravy train is on the fast lane, issues like this will crop up: allegations of assassination by opposing politicians.  What should be condemned  is the frivolous ploy of mischievous politicians seeking to garner mileage by making their seemingly more powerful opponents look like blood-thirsty  killers.  Politics of blackmail and wolf-crying should never have a place in our political atmosphere. Back to the Akpabio/Etok issue.

The point must be made clear that both men have  legitimate rights to contest the Ikot Ekpene Senatorial district election.  It is not the exclusive preserve of Etok,  that because he had been a two-time senator, he should be given automatic third term ticket. That decision lies with the electorate.  And because he had  been a two-term governor does not preclude Akpabio from the race or give him a free ride to the Senate.  He, too, still has the duty of convincing the electorate that he would give a more quality representation in the Senate than the man he virtually went on his knees, pleading passionately with the party leaders to allow a second term in 2011.

Politics is a game of persuasion.  You persuade the electorate to give you their trust and mandate.  You tell them why you are the better candidate;  how you will impart their lives when elected.  In over six years in the saddle, Akpabio is generally acknowledged to have transformed  Akwa Ibom State.  It is not unexpected that a senatorial election would be a piece of cake for him.  Etok had thought that Akpabio would not be vying for the Senate after his second term as governor.  With Akpabio  firmly in the race, it is natural for  Etok to have  sleepless night.

But calling someone a killer just because your seat is threatened is giving politics a reputation far worse than it has been in our land.  Let the battle for the 2015 race begin.  But decently.  That is all we ask, and that can’t be too much expectation.

“Olaitan has been killed,” the distraught voice from Benin announced.  In between sleep and alertness, I mumbled in confusion: “Which Olaitan? Killed by who, for what?”  All the questions rang out at the same time in a staccato.

Of course, there was only one Olaitan Oyerinde in Edo Government House. A  comrade in the true  sense of the word. A loyal, dependable, friend and ally of the activist-governor, Comrade Adams  Oshiomhole. As Principal Private Secretary and Special Adviser on Special Duties to the governor, you would be correct to describe him as the comrade-governor’s ‘hard disc’.

To say he was brilliant, hardworking, articulate, amiable, humble, fair-minded but firm, is to reaffirm the obvious. Now, he’s dead. At just 44!  Cut down when his flower was only beginning to bloom. Why, on earth, would anyone kill a defenceless man in such gruesome circumstance before his wife and kids?

“Wild animals never kill for sport,” writes the English historian, James Frande, “Man is the only creature known, to whom torture and death of his fellow creature is amusing in itself.”  Meaning: when a man kills his fellow human, he betrays sentiments the lower creatures often find embarrassing and difficult to understand.

According to media reports, quoting eyewitness account, four gun toting men hiding under the cover of darkness sneaked in on the young man while he was at home sleeping, after an apparently tough day at work.  Moments later, shots rang out.  They allegedly fired him on his head, chest, abdomen and leg. He instantly slid into eternal sleep.

For whatever reason or motive, Olaitan certainly didn’t deserve his gruesome death. He was a man of peace whose only motivation for joining the political process was the desire to see good governance and enthronement of a system that guaranteed the good life for the vast majority of the toiling masses of our people.

That must have been the reason he adopted the famous quote of Karl Max:  “Philosophers  have tried to interpret the world. What is important is to change it, “ as his personal motto. That also must have been the reason he left his NLC job in Abuja to join his mentor, boss and friend in  Benin where he served as one of his most trusted and reliable aides for almost four years before his tragic end.

I had always known  Olaitan,  but got closer to him at the very beginning of the plan to ‘draft’ the then president of the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC, who was rounding off his tenure, into the Edo gubernatorial race. As his special assistant, Olaitan was always around whenever you went to see Comrade Adams at his office in Abuja. He would hold a small note book jotting down salient points. He would offer incisive view points on issues. He understood his principal’s every mood, thought process, glances, words (spoken or unspoken).

He was fiercely loyal and believed absolutely in the person of Comrade Oshiomhole. I remember very well the day we all sat in the comrade’s expansive office trying to tinker with the speech he would make to herald his entry into the political arena. It was a long session and we were trying to think out programmes that would excite the Edo electorate. What would immediately hit the people. That was when we came up with Edo YES!  Comrade Adams liked the rhythm and rhyme of EDO YES! I can still picture  Olaitan’s shy, boyish smile when that acronym for Edo Youth Empowerment Scheme popped out.

To him was assigned the job of knocking out the final speech of the aspiring governor after the brain storming session had ended. Needless to say he was equal to the task.

Even during those early days of conceptualization of the programmes and policies of aspirant and later, candidate Oshiomhole, you couldn’t fail to notice the dedication and zealous faith of Olaitan. He never believed the battle won’t be won. Like a confident fighter, he thought victory was achievable. He worked hard for that victory, saw that victory and was there all through the legal and political hurdles to reclaim the mandate.

When Oshiomhole became governor on November 11, 2008 and appointed me Special Adviser, Public Affairs and Strategy (basically in charge of his media), Olaitan was one of the first persons who called to congratulate me. Few days later, he was in Benin City to take up appointment as one of the two advisers in the Governor’s office, where he functioned as speech writer, private secretary, clearing house of the governor ‘s official and personal issues, as well as the governor’s trusted confidante.

Till his demise. When Gov. Oshiomhole wept profusely, declaring: “They have killed my son,” he surely meant every word of it. Those who knocked him out certainly hit the governor where it hurt the most.

The late Olaitan would remain in my memory as an honest and hardworking gentleman who had no room in his heart for cant and chicanery. Even when I quit the government after barely a year, he called to find out what precipitated my action. He was reassured when I told him I bore no one hatred or malice.

He always found it easy to relate with me whenever the government had something to do with The Sun. The last time we spoke was in connection with the redemption of a financial pledge the governor made to the lady who resisted the bribe offered her during the elections in Oyo state. At The Sun Man of the Year Award held February 25, 2012, an overwhelmed Oshiomhole had promised a cash gift to the courageous woman who resisted the lure of the filthy gold and stuck to a good name and conscience.

After the ceremony, it was Olaitan’s lot to follow up and see that the money got to the woman. He called me to furnish him with her details: account, name etc. The woman promptly got her money. Thanks to Olaitan who waded through the government bureaucracy. Other notable newsmen like Segun Adeniyi and Azu Ishiekwene, also have testimony to  Olaitan’s honesty and humility. Now, he’s gone. Cut down. Just like that.

Alive, Comrade Olaitan seemed to have imbibed the immortal words of the Spanish theologian who founded the Society of Jesus, St. Ignatius Loyola, who defined labour thus: “to give and not count the cost; to fight and not to heed the wounds; to toil and not to seek for rest; to labour and not to ask for any reward, save that of knowing that we do thy will.”

Adieu, Comrade Olaitan. Goodbye, goodnight. And may Almighty God comfort your family, loved ones, friends, colleagues and those you left behind, consoled that you live in the hearts of many.  And to live in the hearts of those you leave behind is not to die!

Postscript: This column was first published May 7, 2012. One year after, his killers remain at large; investigations mired in needless controversy.  As activists led by Comrade Femi Falana, SAN, gather in Benin today for his first anniversary lecture, one question will resonate at the Idia College hall: where are Olaitan’s killers?  Many will also demand to know who are the persons obstructing the cause of justice?  Some points remain incontrovertible in the Olaitan issue.  He didn’t die of natural causes; he wasn’t sick, he didn’t die in his sleep.  He died in a pool of his blood, after being brutally shot.

His killers were not ghosts, but human beings. It is the responsibility of the police and the security agencies to fish out those bad guys and bring them to justice.  So long as they remain at large, so long will the Police continue to face a barrage of criticisms and lampoon.

We owe the dead and the living the duty to see the criminals get justice for their unjust and wicked action against a young man who abhorred violence in any form; a man for whom, like the Nobel Laureate,  Prof. Wole Soyinka, justice was the first condition of humanity.?

Just like Odi and Zaki Biam,  Banga has joined the list of Nigerian communities despoiled  by their nation’s soldiers on an alleged revenge mission. A community of folks turned into refugees in their own country on account of their displacement in the wake of the invasion of their land by security forces on a search of the deadly Boko Haram sect, the terror group that has become the nation’s worst nightmare since it arrived here without a departure date in 2010.

The gory pictures of the dead and the injured assail the eyes, turning them misty. Pictures of displaced natives; forlorn-looking kids strapped to the backs of their distraught mothers;  men  with the visage of defeat and resignation, tears in their heart, blood everywhere around them.  There are conflicting reports of the number of the actual dead,  and houses ravaged by soldiers’  bombs, bazookas and other weapons of war.  Some say over 185 people lost their lives to the days of rage, while over 100 buildings and other valuables were reduced to rubble,  with  countless others injured. But the Senator representing Borno North  where Baga falls,  Maina Maaji, claims 228 persons were brutally murdered, with 4000 houses destroyed.  He talks about defenceless civilians, men, women and children targeted in the offensive raid on the community.

The military, on their part, claim that the villagers were willing accomplices, shielding Boko Haram insurgents who launched attacks that killed a soldier.  In the reprisal attack, the community had to bear the brunt of shielding insurgents.  Interpretation: the Baga people, if we x-ray the statement from the military high command, should blame themselves for the tragedy that befell their community, not soldiers on a legal and legitimate battle to rout the stubborn sect.  In between that are calls for a probe of the Baga incident which has since being dubbed by the media as a ‘massacre’ and ‘genocide’ against a defenceless people.  The outcry has not only assumed a national dimension, it has resonated on the global scene.

For this columnist, the Baga incident is indeed a shame and an embarrassment to our nation.  It also, in a way,  confirms the confusing and conflicting strategy of the Jonathan government in tackling the Boko Haram insurgency.  Let me explain the point I am getting at.  Over a decade after the Odi and Zaki Biam episodes, where soldiers  attempted to avenge the killing of policemen and soldiers on a security assignment,  and in the process wiped out whole communities,  our security agencies don’t seem to have learnt much on how to go about such delicate assignments as dictated by the Geneva international convention on war, which ruled out the killing of women, children and defenceless civilians from any form of attack or violence in a war environment.

Before and after Odi and Zaki Biam, what we have heard are stories of security apparatchik deploying men,  arming them to the teeth,  on the ready to crush and actually crushing  rebellion, without much consideration for civilian casualties.  The ‘might is right’ syndrome appears to be still pervasive in the nation’s security community as we have seen in the Baga altercation. Of course, might is right, but not against defenceless citizens whom the soldiers and other security agencies are paid, in the first instance, to protect and defend against external aggressors and whenever their security is threatened.

We can argue that the soldiers might have acted under provocation; there may also have been a sense of desperation to deal fatal blow to the seemingly ubiquitous Boko Haram sect, but nothing excuses the death of a single, defenceless Nigerian in the chase of the evil sect.  No excuse is good enough to rationalise the death of any Nigerian, be it that of a soldier or a civilian, who has not been convicted of a crime against his country or fellow citizen.  In a democracy, the rights of the citizen to liberty and right to life is fully enshrined and guaranteed under the 1999 constitution.

The second point this columnist seeks to make is the apparent confusion and conflicting signals to the military and security agencies as regards the strategy and rule of engagement on the Boko Haram challenge by the government.  In a string of policy inconsistencies and double-speak, the military high command may find it difficult understanding what actually is the government position on Boko Haram.  For now, it is unclear if there is a cease fire or not.  There should be a clear directive to the military: to continue their military operations or call it off;  to use fire power to wipe out  Boko Haram or declare a cease fire and allow for dialogue, in the spirit of the proposed amnesty for the sect.  The government can’t be blowing hot and cold at the same time.  A government that has announced its intention to declare amnesty and has even gone ahead to inaugurate a committee, cannot at the same time be seen to be supporting a full or partial arms conflict with the enemy group.

There is also this other issue worth examining:  the point made by the Joint Military Task Forces,  that Baga community and elders were shielding  Boko Haram members and had provided them a base to launch attacks at the JTF.  This is a very weighty allegation.  If that is true, it is certainly not right.  If we want peace, we should neither encourage war nor provide ammunition for any group in its fight against the state.  Under the war without boundaries declared by Boko Haram, so many hapless citizens have lost their lives, many  are still grieving and will remain inconsolable for the rest of their lives;  the police and the armed forces have lost gallant officers and men.  In our search for peace and peaceful resolution of the Boko Haram debacle, it goes without saying that all hands must be on deck: young, old, elderly, Muslim, Christian, pagan, atheist, and what have you.  But then, in my humble view, even if the community was guilty of the offence of providing a resting nest for Boko Haram, wiping out a quarter, half or whatever number of a community for whatever reason can never be justified or justifiable.  Two wrongs remain wrong.

On a last note, the Northern leaders must move very swiftly to find solution to the security challenge confronting the region.  There have been too much talk, now is the time for action. Now is the time to call the guys throwing bombs and grenades, and causing mayhem all over the region to order. Now is the time to summon an emergency meeting of the emirs and other traditional rulers in the region to identify the bad eggs in their communities and bring them to the table of discussion and negotiation, and if they won’t turn a new leaf, turn them over to the law. Now is the time to take advantage of the Jonathan administration’s offer of amnesty  and tell those opposed to peace in the region to embrace it or face the wrath of the community and the law of justice.  Truth be told,  if the region is on the boil, it is clearly a failure of leadership  (in the region). No less.  It is not every time we blame others for our woes. We also must look inwards, and take a slice of the knocks.  If we all are determined and honest about the grave issue at hand,  I am hopeful that all hope is not lost as we seek to navigate out of the Boko Haram quagmire.  Our nation is bleeding.  We need a balm of healing.  Neither pretence, hypocrisy nor buck-passing is the solution we seek.  This I believe.

The great surprise, said the erudite scholar,  was that Nigeria still remained intact despite all the prevailing factors which could trigger a blow up.  No one, he argued, could say for certain how long the nation’s elasticity could stretch before it snaps. Before we lose it, he counselled, the nation’s leaders have to urgently tackle the many challenges bedevilling the beleaguered country. He went on to list the factors which were prevalent in the Arab countries before the people’s revolt, which he said were also highly present with us.

In Egypt and Tunisia, rising unemployment, joblessness and its attendant economic crunch had hit an all-time high before the youths took to the streets in protests. In Nigeria, said the prof, we are witnessing a worse scenario,  with thousands of our employable graduates,  unemployed.  It is so bad now that graduates are applying for jobs as cleaners, drivers, office assistants etc. when they do exist.  The unlucky ones are pounding the streets and pavements, clutching certificates and wearing hopeless faces as a bleak future beckons menacingly.

How long can these guys hold out before something snaps inside? The professor also listed a greedy and corrupt elite as precursor to a people’s revolt in countries where it had happened.  Is our situation any different?  Are we not in a country of a powerful, corrupt few?  Is corruption not walking on all fours in this country?  Are the many poor and dispossessed not witnessing the display of ostentatious and obscene wealth by leaders and those who have found themselves in government?  Are they happy about it?

Will they continue to fold their hands in resignation as things move from bad to worse? How much pain can the afflicted bear before he shakes off his shackles?    Despite the pretensions and hypocritical denials to the contrary, our government and  nation sit on a stench of corruption with funds needed to tackle infrastructural decay largely disappearing into private pockets. A recent US report, according to yesterday’s  Nigeria’s THISDAY newspapers,  reveals a thriving  corruption industry.  The damning report says no sector is spared the odium of the corruption spectre ravaging our dear nation.  “Massive, widespread, and pervasive corruption affected all levels of government and the security forces,” the report stated.

Even the hallowed chambers of justice, the judiciary, was similarly indicted for lack of transparency and graft in the dispensation of justice.  It also chronicled the rot in the petroleum industry and the inability of the government to decisively tackle it because its hands were tied;  relations, family, friends and cronies with link to ‘ogas at the top’ were those allegedly behind the fraudulent oil deals.  Truly, the US 2012 Country Reports as it affects Nigeria is a document that rankles;  a truth denied only by a nation without a sense of shame.

We ought to accept the findings in good faith and then move towards finding solutions to the issues raised.  However, no one should be surprised by a government statement dismissing the report as some ‘piece of hogwash, a smear campaign designed to denigrate our wonderful and performing president by envious detractors.’  In our country, every criticism, no matter how well-meaning, is often the handiwork of evil detractors on a pull him down endeavour! Now, the question is: for how long will this nonsense continue?  Are those leading the country not seeing the big sign on the wall? Are they doing something about it, before we lose it; before things get really out of hand? If our economy , according to the World Bank, has grown by 8%, should we not be witnessing an exponential growth in jobs and more jobs?

Are we seeing the jobs?  Where are the jobs? The brilliant professor also talked about tribalism and the ethnic cleavages  as a demon countries desirous of staying together must avoid.  He said they were twin evils that had polarised many countries as they went down. He talked about Somalia,  Malawi,  Ethiopia, Sudan, Zaire, as countries that had tasted the bitter pills of the damage tribalism and ethnicity could do.  What do we find now?  We are gradually regressing to the Pre-Lugardian era.  In 2015, the tribal card is bound to rear its ugly head.  We must do something to produce a Nigerian president, not an Ijaw, Hausa/Fulani, Igbo or Yoruba president.

That would prove disastrous for our country. If after 100 years of our marriage (forced or otherwise) and 53 years after political independence, we still find it difficult to produce one good leader irrespective of tribe or ethnic origin, who will lead us to the land of our dreams and possibilities, then we still have a long way to go.  We must be obviously deceiving ourselves that in brotherhood we stand.  This must be strange brotherhood, a brotherhood of deceit. Finally, the professor was sure that if we didn’t  quickly tame the monster of religious bigotry we would find it difficult, if not impossible, talking about one nation, one destiny, one people.

Nations, he submitted, may survive civil war, but no nation ever survives religious war.  His message: let religious leaders tame their tongues and call their followers to order. Let God fight His own battles.  No man is strong enough to fight God’s war. It is only an illusion of grandeur to attempt to be God’s defender.  I agree. Postscript:  We are a federation of the angry. That was my concluding remark last week.

I also called for a National Conference, where all Nigerians, representatives of ethnic nationalities, religious, social, political groups, would sit to trash out on the table of love and brotherhood what our grievances are, and reach an understanding of how we intend to live in peace and harmony with one another; how we intend to make our union work.  Things are still not right.  Trust is missing; love is faraway. Greed and blind ambition for personal aggrandisement is everywhere.   We must talk the talk, before it is too late. Is anyone afraid of a talk?

A recent US report, according to yesterday’s  Nigeria’s THISDAY newspapers,  reveals a thriving  corruption industry.  The damning report says no sector is spared the odium of the corruption spectre ravaging our dear nation.  “Massive, widespread, and pervasive corruption affected all levels of government and the security forces,” the report stated.  Even the hallowed chambers of justice, the judiciary, was similarly indicted for lack of transparency and graft in the dispensation of justice.

It also chronicled the rot in the petroleum industry and the inability of the government to decisively tackle it because its hands were tied;  relations, family, friends and cronies with link to ‘ogas at the top’ were those allegedly behind the fraudulent oil deals.  Truly, the US 2012 Country Reports as it affects Nigeria is a document that rankles;  a truth denied only by a nation without a sense of shame.  We ought to accept the findings in good faith and then move towards finding solutions to the issues raised.

However, no one should be surprised by a government statement dismissing the report as some ‘piece of hogwash, a smear campaign designed to denigrate our wonderful and performing president by envious detractors.’  In our country, every criticism, no matter how well-meaning, is often the handiwork of evil detractors on a pull him down endeavour! Now, the question is: for how long will this nonsense continue?  Are those leading the country not seeing the big sign on the wall? Are they doing something about it, before we lose it; before things get really out of hand?

If our economy , according to the World Bank, has grown by 8%, should we not be witnessing an exponential growth in jobs and more jobs?  Are we seeing the jobs?  Where are the jobs? The brilliant professor also talked about tribalism and the ethnic cleavages  as a demon countries desirous of staying together must avoid.  He said they were twin evils that had polarised many countries as they went down.

He talked about Somalia,  Malawi,  Ethiopia, Sudan, Zaire, as countries that had tasted the bitter pills of the damage tribalism and ethnicity could do.  What do we find now?  We are gradually regressing to the Pre-Lugardian era.  In 2015, the tribal card is bound to rear its ugly head.  We must do something to produce a Nigerian president, not an Ijaw, Hausa/Fulani, Igbo or Yoruba president. That would prove disastrous for our country.

If after 100 years of our marriage (forced or otherwise) and 53 years after political independence, we still find it difficult to produce one good leader irrespective of tribe or ethnic origin, who will lead us to the land of our dreams and possibilities, then we still have a long way to go.  We must be obviously deceiving ourselves that in brotherhood we stand.  This must be strange brotherhood, a brotherhood of deceit. Finally, the professor was sure that if we didn’t  quickly tame the monster of religious bigotry we would find it difficult, if not impossible, talking about one nation, one destiny, one people.

Nations, he submitted, may survive civil war, but no nation ever survives religious war.  His message: let religious leaders tame their tongues and call their followers to order. Let God fight His own battles.  No man is strong enough to fight God’s war. It is only an illusion of grandeur to attempt to be God’s defender.  I agree. Postscript:  We are a federation of the angry. That was my concluding remark last week.

I also called for a National Conference, where all Nigerians, representatives of ethnic nationalities, religious, social, political groups, would sit to trash out on the table of love and brotherhood what our grievances are, and reach an understanding of how we intend to live in peace and harmony with one another; how we intend to make our union work.  Things are still not right.  Trust is missing; love is faraway. Greed and blind ambition for personal aggrandisement is everywhere.   We must talk the talk, before it is too late. Is anyone afraid of a talk?

…Hon. Emeka Ihedioha rises to the challenge

Leadership is everything.  In nation-building, in governance,  in legislative business, in all spheres of life.  Indeed, our nation is where it is today essentially because of its leadership deficit.  But some Nigerians who have found themselves in leadership positions are doing what they can to prove that when opportunities arise, they could give a good account of themselves;  that all hope is not lost as far as the leadership question is concerned. So, as we condemn tunnel-vision leaders, we must equally commend those who have demonstrated admirable leadership in national assignments as a way of encouraging others.

One of such men is Rt.Hon.Emeka Ihedioha, the deputy speaker of Nigeria’s House of Representatives, and chairman of the House Constitution Review Committee which last Thursday submitted its report. When he was made to chair this all-important Committee, not many Nigerians thought Ihedioha and his men would discharge their duties  to the satisfaction of majority of Nigerians, given the contentious nature of issues involved in the exercise, including  states’ creation.  They thought it would end up as a failed exercise reflecting the jaundiced views of members of the Committee and powerful, vested interests.

They didn’t believe that the masses or their representatives and groups would ever have a chance to partake in the exercise.  Hon. Ihedioha and his team proved us wrong.  Here is how he did it: he turned the whole exercise into a quasi-referendum, making the voice of the people matter.  He organised town hall sessions across the country’s geo-political zones, where all spheres of interests were accommodated: the civil society, town unions, professional groups, the students, intellectual community, etc,. all had their day to share their views on the proposed new constitution.

The people’s public sessions,  I am told, held across 360 constituencies in the two years the committee lasted;  receiving over 200 memoranda from various interest groups and members of the public.  Such transparency in the Committee’s assignment made it virtually impossible to manipulate the process.  Thanks to Ihedioha’s leadership.   When he presented the report last Thursday, Ihedioha was naturally full of smiles, even as he admitted he and his team couldn’t lay claim to have done a perfect work, being human.

However, he had given the job his best shot. He said: “This process may not be perfect, but I dare say, that it is the first time in the history of this country that Nigerians at the grassroots have been made part of the Constitution Review Process in a practical and transparent manner. We promised Nigerians that we shall be transparent and accountable. Indeed we made a commitment to do things differently in our Legislative Agenda, unveiled at the beginning of the 7th House of Representatives.

This public presentation is a fulfillment of this commitment and promise. We have responded as best as we can within the limits of the constitutional and legal framework to the demands of Nigerians for greater voice and involvement in the constitution amendment process.”  With young, visionary men like Ihedioha, there is yet  hope that all hope is not lost. Congrats, Hon. Deputy Speaker!

Looking like ex-convicts who had just been released from jail, they tramped the city in search of food and shelter. In their tattered state, one of the young men suddenly turned to his friends and asked: “Guys, what happened to us? How did we get here? How did we become what we are?” It was certainly a dumb question. It was also a question that popped up in a fleeting moment of self-realisation; what happens the day after a drunken party or hangover.

What happened to the merry-go-lucky delinquent young men is simple: they blew their lives away. How they got to the pitiable situation they found themselves was that, they took their inherited wealth for granted and lived as if there was no tomorrow. They sowed the wind, and reaped the whirlwind. What they sowed was what they reaped. Law of nature, no less. It is possible they were warned by family members and elders of their communities on their wayward living, but they turned deaf ears. They were told to take it easy, but they scoffed at the persons offering advice as ‘old school’ who didn’t understand modernity or current happenings.

So they lived large, only to turn small. Nigeria is like that group of directionless young men who turned wealth to waste, instead of the other way round. We got the black gold, but turned it to waste; we got wealth, which we have blown like the prodigal young men. Those who found themselves in leadership positions neglected duty to community and country, and we soon began to breed worms and maggots all over.

Truly and painfully, who could have predicted that a nation so prodigiously blessed with every good thing on earth, human and material, would turn this way: a giant with the feet of a dwarf? Wobbling slowly, unsurely. Unsteadily. Greatly troubled and traumatized by myriad problems, not the least insecurity. How come nations we got independence almost at the same period left us far behind, in their steady march to progress? Look at India, a nation we once derided; Brazil, Ghana, Indonesia, Singapore, South Africa, to mention a few.

How come we are still battling to get to 4000 megawatts of electricity, when power is no longer an issue in other countries? How come we are producing the 21st set of unemployed graduates, a country that is the 6th largest oil-producing nation on earth? How come we haven’t got our transportation right:air, road, rail and waterways? How come our army of the unemployed keeps lengthening, while our industrial capacity keeps reducing?

How come budgets are running into trillions, while the ordinary Nigerian is still battling the basic necessities of life: water, food, shelter, clothing, health care, amongst others? I don’t know about you, but all around me, what confronts me are faces of frustration, faces of the unemployed, faces of hopelessness awaiting hope in a leadership that seems totally confused as to where the nation should be heading. All around me, I see motion without movement.

I hear the egg heads speaking long grammar and economic jargons that produce no tangible results or garri for the hungry man’s stomach. How did we get here, to borrow the words of the distraught young men? The answer stares us in the face: leadership delinquency. We could have been a great nation, not a permanently developing nation or potentially great country, if those who happened on leadership had been more proactive; If those who took over from the independence leaders hadn’t turned vultures devouring our common wealth.

Where are the groundnut pyramids that once dotted the Northern skyline? Where are the textile factories? What happened to the once-flourishing cocoa industry in the West and the palm kernel production in the East? What about the agricultural prowess of the old Mid-West and the East? Gone! Drained, like the prodigal youngsters who blew their inherited wealth. Even our black gold, our oil, has been so mercilessly bled that many are wondering if we wouldn’t have been better off if God hadn’t deposited the precious liquid in our soil.

Don’t let’s get angry or depressed talking about the billions of dollars that have been stolen from our oil resource. The several probe panels on the rot in this sector are eloquent testimonies that we have been sundry gang- raped by those we had entrusted to oversee our most prized resource. Na wa. It is not only in the economy that things have abysmally plunged. How did we get to the level where death has become this cheap? Death on the roads.Death through armed robbery attack.Death in the hands of assassins.Death by Boko Haram.

Death, death everywhere. Indeed, never has life become this cheap and demeaned as we have seen in recent times. Never has the Nigerian felt so insecure as we witness daily. From the North to South; East to West, roadcarnages have become truly frequent and frightening. In the last four weeks alone, according to official statistics, over three hundred Nigerians have had their lives brutally abridged on the road.

Add to that, the number of Nigerians who die daily in the hands of gun men, assassins and through other gruesome attacks, you get the picture that Thomas Hobbes could have been talking about our country when he described life as ‘short, brutish and nasty.’ The disturbing part of this ugly scenario is that we have a government that is either unable to do something about the spectre of deaths in the land or has adopted an approach that is patently too slow. For example, road carnages could be reduced if we had motorable roads and enough logistics provided for the road marshals to properly police the highways, provide enlightenment to road users and have the capacity to deal with errant road users.

Of course, the rot didn’t start with the Jonathan government, but what’s wrong if solutions began with it? Over the years, hefty sums are budgeted for road construction, maintenance and rehabilitation. Paradoxically, the heftier the fund, the more deplorable the roads get. Don’t ask me what happened to the money! In the area of security, we know that not much has changed. The police itself is unable to protect its men and officers, not to talk of it offering protection to the larger members of the society. Don’t get me wrong.

Within the limit of their ability, resources, manpower and what have you, they are putting up a good fight, but the fight isn’t good enough to guarantee a good night rest for majority of Nigerians. When a whole commissioner of police is gunned down on the streets of Enugu and no one has been brought to justice yet, that paints a picture of how pathetic the situation is. If a serving commissioner is so brutally brought down and the high command hasn’t turned Nigeria’s criminal gang upside down to get the killers, we can’t expect much miracle from the same police as far as protection of lives and property is concerned.

The killing of Kwara Police boss, Asadu, in Enugu, should count as the most embarrassing incident for the police in recent times. If IGP Abubakar Mohammed can’t get the killers of his commissioner, he has no business sitting pretty in office and assuring Nigerians that the police he commands is equal to the task of protecting Nigerians. No one is ever going to take him serious. Of course, the police has in its crime diary a litany of unresolved murders: Comrade OlaitanOyerinde, Funso Williams, Bola Ige, Harry Marshal, Otunba Dina, amongst others.

If government can’t guarantee food, shelter and other basic things of life, it ought to be able to protect the life of its citizens, which the constitution says is the primary purpose for the existence of government. This brings us to the raging issue of Boko Haram and the controversy generated by a proposed amnesty for the militant Islamist sect. The first question to ask is: how did we get to the situation where a group of citizens would hold the government and the generality of Nigerians to a standstill? Simple: we got to this sorry pass because we brought a rotten wood home and ants have infested everywhere, as novelist Chinua Achebe would say.

Our leaders sowed the wrong seeds; the wrong values; the wrong culture, preached the wrong verses, and we are simply harvesting the results of bad leadership. When leaders enrich themselves and pauperise their peoples, when they devalue lives, when they fail to do what is right before God and man, what the nation harvests are violence and blood. We are paying the price for the mismanagement of our country at all strata.

Painfully, those who have lost their lives had nothing to do with it. From groups that said they were fighting for economic and political justice like MOSOP, MASSOB, OPC and MEND, we now have a Boko Haram fighting a totally intriguing and bloody battle garbed in a fight for religious justice, and we all are the worse for it.

Beyond the call, acceptance or otherwise of amnesty, the way out, I would think, is for government to urgently convoke a national conference of the Nigerian people to discuss our nationality and nationhood questions. With a heavy dose of mutual distrust, suspicion, ethnic and religious gulf, we can’t continue to play the ostrich by pretending all is well with us. This, indeed, is a troubled federation of the angry. Quick-fixes only assuage the anger. Temporarily.

The citizen contributes his quota to his nation’s development and gives nothing short of his best so his nation can be greater in the comity of nations,  while his nation provides him and other citizens the necessities of life and other requirements that make life worth its while. What Kennedy’s statement didn’t quite explain are: what happens when the citizen has given his best and his nation still fails him in fulfilling its own part of the contractual obligation? When his nation fails to provide security for the generality of the citizenry?

When unemployment index is at an all time high? When the economy isn’t growing in proportion to the growing poverty in the country?  When there are socio-political upheavals? When frustration rules the land? Professor  Chinua Achebe, the celebrated African novelist, seems to have one simple answer to the above posers: reject any honour by a nation that fails to live up to the expectations of its citizenry!  And that’s what he did with the award of the Commander of the Federal Republic, CFR, Nigeria’s third highest honour,  just as he did seven years ago when the Obasanjo administration gave him the same award.

By so doing, the respected literary icon, a global intellectual,  once more proved that he remains the undisputed conscience of our nation,  the voice of the voiceless and one that the people can rely on to champion its cause at critical moments.  Achebe proves that as a conscientious objector, he is the moral voice  protesting the malfeasance of the powerful who have continued to subjugate and dehumanise the powerless and the helpless in a nation that should have no business with poverty, hunger and underdevelopment given its human and natural endowments.

In rejecting the award in 2004, Achebe had lamented the plight of the people  and the inability of the government to provide economic succour for them. He was uncomfortable with the insecurity in the land and the gradual diminishing of the human essence in Africa’s largest nation.  He was also nauseated by  the brigandage in his Anambra home state which witnessed the harassment of then Gov. Chris Ngige by powerful citizens with links to the Obasanjo administration. When the award came this second time around, he didn’t have to think twice in similarly rejecting it because,  “the reasons for rejecting the offer when it was first made have not been addressed let alone solved.

It is inappropriate to offer it again to me.  I must, therefore, regretfully  decline the offer again.” Before Achebe,  Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila, the  opposition Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, minority leader in the House of Representatives, had declined his award, citing the proliferation of the award list with men of questionable integrity and people who can’t be said to have merited the honours. But Achebe’s rejection, given his international stature, takes the icing on the cake.  It sends home the message that the authorities need to take a critical look at the list of awardees before making it public.

It needs to disabuse the minds of Nigerians that the awards are not just ‘a dash’ to friends of government, contractors, sycophants and hangers on.  The integrity of the awards is even more important than the award.     In 1986, the Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, had rejected his CFR in protest against the execution of General Mamman Vatsa by the Babangida administration despite assurances from the regime that it would not do so following  the passionate plea of the troika, Soyinka, Achebe and Professor John Pepper Clark. Professor Tam  David-West, the eminent virologist and social critic, had last year also rejected his Commander of the Order of the Nigeria, CON, because he felt insulted by the category he was grouped, given his patriotic contributions to the nation as petroleum minister.

This is not to say there are no persons in this year’s list that deserve their honour. We have distinguished Nigerians who should be celebrated given their superlative contributions to nation building; those who are doing us proud in the discharge of their duties as government officials, in the private sector and their areas of calling.  But the inclusion of few bad eggs pollutes the many good apples in the list. And that constitutes the tragedy of a supposedly laudable endeavour.

Back to Kennedy’s  call on Americans to ask what they can do for America rather than what America will do for them. Were Americans  lacking in patriotism at the time of Kennedy’s call? Americans, we all know, have always loved America; proud Americans would do anything for their country because their country would do almost everything for its citizens, especially in their moments of travails no matter how far flung the places they are. So, why did Kennedy make that clarion call? May be he was asking for more patriotism that would sustain America’s economic and political  pre-eminence  in national and global affairs.

It was the era of American renaissance, the rebirth of America with a young, brilliant leader, JFK, ready to challenge Americans to the next level, a greater America for Americans. Kennedy was the forerunner to today’s President Barrack Hussein Obama. Both men love words and with powerful words Kennedy[in his days] and Obama today moved their people to positive action.  But, we don’t need to debate why Major-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari told Nigerians after he sacked the Shagari government: “This generation of Nigerians and indeed future generations have no other country but Nigeria.

We must stay here and salvage it together.”  Nigeria was swiftly on the brink of collapse,  its citizens hungry and dispirited. Buhari needed to imbue in the citizenry a sense of purpose and patriotism, so he reached for words that could stir our souls. And it worked like magic. Queues replaced chaos at bus stops; order and probity was beginning to return to our public institutions, while many were afraid to dip their itchy fingers in the collective till, because they knew the consequences of running foul of the 11th commandment[thou shall not be caught].

Buhari’s undoing, it would appear, was the regime’s alienation from the grassroots. It failed to carry them along, relying largely on coercion rather than persuasion However, even though Kennedy and Buhari didn’t quite expatiate on the reward of citizens who identify the critical needs and do something for their countries, the logical expectation is that citizens who have done their countries proud ought to be recognised, honoured and garlanded by their leaders.

That’s why in the United States and the United Kingdom, and indeed, many of the developed countries, to be singled out for award is the ultimate honour, something to roll out the drums for, something to brag about before your children and children’s children, something to cherish till death. But not here.  National honours and awards have for long been reduced to a comic bazaar where both the honourable and dishonourable share the same podium.

Achebe’s rejection of his award seeks to interrogate the propriety of engaging in the frivolity of  awards in a nation that is evidently not working when all indices are considered.

Yes, the people of Europe beheaded their kings and queens and hung their heads in Public Square for all to see. And that brought the end of monarchical dictatorship. It brought the end of reckless leadership and insensitivity to the plight of the people. All these happened because leaders of those times took things for granted and the people said no.

And today, the people of Europe and America are better for it. The Italian and American mafia are not known to interfere in government affairs. They run their own illegal business activities. But in Nigeria our own mafia have hijacked government business and institution and are dictating the pace of things. Whereas the mafia in other climes are having a running battle with government, we are celebrating them in Nigeria. We have given them all sorts of elegant name, from statesmen to important personalities.

The government is making them more powerful by extending patronage to them. Perhaps what we have in Nigeria are occult societies who are into fetish practices and empower their members with juicy contracts and positions. So if you want to enjoy the privileges and protection of the group, you join. That is why we don’t have a mafia godfather in the likeness of the late Italian/American Al Capone, who can be regarded as the head of crime family in Nigeria. Our mafia are not organized.

They are simply occult criminals scrambling for the soul of Nigeria. Why they look so powerful is because our state institutions are weak. When you have weak institutions of state and a weak leadership, even a cripple and a dunce can have his way with such a government. Every Nigerian government seeks for her survival first and in the process a lot of compromises are allowed which leaves the people more confused and deprived. Those we regard as powerful presidents or heads of state are actually local champions who choose the battle they can fight, while pretending they are building an enduring nation.

That is why the legacies of former presidents are rubbished by their successors immediately they assume office. But today, whether out of sheer wickedness or plain ignorance, the elites of today’s Nigeria are still going about the business of governance with the mindset to plunder, loot and acquire all the resources which will better the lives of the people. Pastors have spoken from the pulpit. Intellectuals have written dozens of proposals on good governance.

Philosophers and statesman have given advice on what to do and how to govern, but it seems subsequent governments in Nigeria are adamant and heading to perdition. When God deposited crude oil and gas beneath the Nigerian soil he had a reason. It was not the making of anybody or any group. Nobody lobbied God for it. God had a purpose for Nigeria. That was why he deposited the oil for us. God knew Nigeria will be the hope of the black race.

He knew Nigeria will be an important nation in the comity of nations. He gave us the oil to develop our infrastructures and live a better life like other nations. He knows Nigeria will not command any respect before the world, if she has nothing and the people are living a miserable life. God blessed Nigeria with good weather and abundant natural resources. But these blessings have entered our head and we have taken things for granted, like the 14th century Europe and American imperial monarchies.

Meanwhile, God is watching. He must be wondering the type of Business Managers we have in the name of Nigerian politicians. Whose proclivity and predilection to plunder is legendary and notorious. Pray, how can any sane government wake up and just give oil blocks to people- just because one is in support of that government – whether the government is doing well or not. In a community of a thousand people, government will select one man and give him oil blocks, so that the rest of 999 will depend on him and queue behind on any social, political or economic issues. Where is equality and justice in that? Where is federal character in a situation where Northerners own 83% of oil blocks in Nigeria?

The defence of the allegation in an online new media is as belated as it is empty. How can you say that because some of the oil blocks has dried up, therefore it does not exist? Who exploited the oil blocks until it dried up? Where did the money go to if not to live imperial and unproductive lifestyle? I am particular about the mafia elite in the North, because when you compute the resources that has flowed to that region since independence, it is not commensurate with the level of human and infrastructural development.

They are not wealth creators, but wealth consumers. It is not about grabbing power and acquiring wealth. It is about attitudinal and cultural change. After all many Arab countries are governed by Islamic and theocratic laws, yet there is little peace and development there- in spite of the resources they have.

Sincerely speaking, if the impact of the 83% oil blocks by northern elite is being felt in improved infrastructures, building of small scale industries which will create jobs, or improved lifestyle of the average Northerner, then I won’t border with this rejoinder, neither will I demonize Northern elite. But even a blind man can see that poverty is so pervasive in the North, to the extent that an average Northern youth is a danger to himself and his environment.

When you add 83% oil blocks and 38 years of Nigerian leadership in the hands of the North, you begin to wonder why begging and poverty is seemingly a profession in the North. You begin to wonder why leaders don’t spare a thought for their people. Why leaders are so heartless and selfish. I expect the true leaders of the North, social engineers, philosophers and intellectuals to begin a campaign of wealth redistribution.

They should tell their imperial over Lords that feudalism and slavery in the North, is a time bomb waiting to explode. No matter how Northern youths are brain washed and deceived, one day they will come to their senses and ask their leaders questions. Northern elite are claiming that Boko Haram is caused by poverty. Whereas they are sitting on oil wealth that could have lifted their people out of poverty, the leaders are misdirecting their anger to imaginary enemies in the South.

The Northern elite should wake up to the reality that we are in 21st century which cannot accommodate 14th century ideas. •Darlington Agomuo, Public Affairs Analyst (08022905726) Oil! Oil!! Oil!!! Since 1958. I beg, it is high time we changed topic. We couldn’t even discover the oil in the first place. What plans do we have for our children who may not live on oil? This is madness. I mean absolute madness.

So, apart from oil, Nigeria cannot do any other thing? Funny characters that call themselves leaders! – Ekekwe True federalism, the way out Let all encourage true fiscal federalism in the country. Every part of the country has one profitable resource or the other. The country will be richer and better for it if we would go back to proper derivation principles and the states are allowed to control the resources with

Where is the custodian of the African literary idioms and proverbs? Who will deploy powerful imagery, depicting an African culture and civilisation, soiled by the men, who spoke through their nostrils, professing love but stealthily stealing and destroying the African essence?     When an iroko suddenly falls, what happens is predictable:  The earth quakes, there are rumbles in the sky; dumbstruck mortals struggle to find the right words to describe what happened. Tears don’t flow from the eyes but depths of the heart.

Words freeze in the reality of unfathomable sequence of the extraordinary life and times of the iroko we mourn and celebrate at the same time. A willing suspense of disbelief grips grieving humanity:  Is it true? Can the iroko, in all its ruggedness and majesty, truly yield to the force of nature? Oh, iroko, king of the forest, what mystery thou truly are. In life, the king; and in transition, also king.  The news of iroko’s passage is as weighty as its physical presence. Truly astonishing!   What do you say or write about a man who wrote his magnum opus, Things Fall Apart, when he was in his early 20s?

And went on to craft other literary masterpieces that became global bestsellers: No Longer At Ease; Arrow of God; A Man of The People; Beware, Soul Brother (anthology of poems) ; The Trouble with Nigeria;  There Was A Country (his most recent and last work), among a long list of others. What tribute can any man pay to the man, who, from the beginning, not only had the word but the word was with him? The word of prose; elegant prose, prose that hit your marrow like an arrow.

No word adequately captures the man’s essence. Like an elephant, everyone has been trying to tell the Achebe story from the perspective that strikes him,  what part of the literary statesman he feels. Whatever his portraiture, no doubt, Professor Chinua Achebe was a literary phenomenon, a gift to Nigeria, Africa and the world. He was an intellectual giant, Africanist and humanist, all rolled into one. As an intellectual, he deployed his intellect to try and explain the cultural puzzle the African found himself in the face of a rampaging colonial power, masquerading its economic and political interests as missionary sojourn.

His works dwell extensively on the consequences of that unsolicited visitation by the white man: loss of culture, values and other virtues that once stood the Africans out. But he was no bigot or blind enthusiast of the African way of life. He was as unsparing of colonialism as he was of neo-colonialism.  Through works like Arrow of God; The Trouble with Nigeria, amongst others, he deprecated ego and dictatorial leadership in the African setting. His humanist philosophy was a crusade for the egalitarian society.

A man of few words, Achebe was a man of many works, great literary works. When news came of his passage, his works (some like Things Fall Apart spanning over 50 years), sprang to the memory. We remember characters like Okonkwo and his indolent father, Unoka; we remember the derailing chief priest in Arrow of God. We confront hubris and the conflict between man and his society as a microcosm of the conflicts in the larger society.

In The Trouble with Nigeria, Achebe places our retrogression as a nation on leadership; leadership driven by tribalism. Tribalism, submits the prose craftsman, is the major bane of our country; the reason we seem to be making progress in reverse order. I agree.  Tribalism, ethnicity, corruption are all siblings of the same parent called indiscipline.   If leadership is right, the nation can’t go wrong. We have been struggling with leadership ever since the colonialist handed over power to Nigerians. Achebe was no theorist or someone afraid to call a spade by its name.

Wearing a calm exterior and generally soft spoken, the writer had moments of direct intervention in critical issues, affecting his nation. When the Ibrahim Babangida administration in 1986, sentenced the poet-minister of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, General Mamman Vatsa, to death over alleged coup plotting, he, alongside his literary comrades (Profs. J.P Clark and Wole Soyinka) pleaded passionately against it. The plea fell on deaf ears; Vatsa, alongside others, was executed. Same for the three men killed during the Muhammadu Buhari regime over alleged cocaine trafficking.

The writer was also in the news for rejecting a national honour, the Commander of the Federal Republic, CFR,  from the Olusegun Obasanjo administration in 2004. His reason? His beloved native Anambra State was in turmoil.  The Ubas were in a deadly fight with the then Gov. Chris Ngige; public property had been set ablaze while the rattled governor was allegedly kidnapped and forced to resign. Achebe didn’t see himself, accepting an award from a central government he believed was either shielding the aggressors or lacking the moral force to check them.

He was also appalled by the poverty, ravaging Africa’s most populous nation. When the Goodluck Jonathan government offered the CFR again in 2010, the writer was peeved and said so: “The reasons for rejecting the offer when it was first made have not been addressed, let alone solved. It is inappropriate to offer it again to me. I must, therefore, regretfully, decline the offer again,” he wrote Jonathan.   Achebe was, this time, referring to the economic distress his countrymen and women are still experiencing.

Two years later, the iconoclastic writer hugged the global limelight with one of his yet most controversial works, There Was A Country, his personal recollection of the Nigerian civil war. It is Achebe’s view that the war was simply a genocide against his Igbo kinsmen. Envious of their economic and political heads up in the Nigerian nation, the war, Achebe submitted, in the emotive narrative, was a carefully programmed action to dislocate them from the nation. The writer faced a fusillade of attacks from other sections of the country.  Undaunted, Achebe stood his grounds. He had discharged the burden of his conviction. He had spoken what he felt in his heart. Others were free to interpret his motive and his work.

Was he then by that work an ethnic champion? No, sir. He was, to me, a humanist first and foremost; always concerned about the human condition. If he appeared to bemoan the plight of his kinsmen, that would neither cast him in that light nor be justifiable reason to pillory the writer.  In any case, the book, he explained, was his personal recollection of events of the civil war and how they affected his people. Those who disagree with him can also write their books, detailing their own perceptions.

Achebe from all ramifications was a great Nigerian, who loved his country but was not blinded by that love not to point out its failings. He did so, most courageously.  He will continue to do so, because he is not dead. Great writers don’t die. Achebe has only transited from this life to another life.  So be it with Africa’s greatest novelist of this century!

…To Louis Odion @ 40

Life, they say, begins at 40. This is partially true. Life begins the day one is born, when one begins to face the vicissitudes of life. So it is with Louis Odion, the Edo State Commissioner for Information, who clocks 40 today. He has had to struggle his way to the top from the day he was born. A vibrant, young man, who is also intellectually imbued, Louis is a living testimony that hard work has its rewards; that commitment and fidelity to one’s craft pays at the end of the day.

That with God, all things are possible. From a lowly paid secretarial/reportorial staff at the defunct Concord newspapers, Louis acquired university education and subsequently rose to the deputy editorship position of The Sunday Concord; deputy editor, Thisday  and eventually, Managing Director of National Life, after editing The Sunday Sun for five years, before berthing in Edo State as commissioner.  For many, it is difficult to believe that Louis is just 40, given his meteoric rise in journalism and strings of successes in life.

As he celebrates today (he told me last week it would be low key), this is wishing him good health, long life, more prosperity and the best life has to offer, convinced that there are certainly better days ahead.  To our friend and brother, happy birthday!!

We see him as the calm-looking, gentle-speaking man; the good luck man, the man who seems to have the hand of God in every of his affairs but who can say if his famed good luck will rub off on us and bring good fortune to our beleaguered country? Who can say if this man with the shy smile and a bowler hat is the man who will lead us to the land of our dreams? Answer: no one. No man is God.

No man can predict the future. Forget those futurists trying to play God. No man at the end of the day is God. No man lives forever. Only God is eternal. Man lives and then dies. Even Methuselah, officially the oldest man that ever lived, died.

Man invents, but God is the super inventor. God is ‘inventor’ of the inventor. God is the One who makes one man great and the other, ordinary. God is the One who makes one man vice-president and withdraws his boss for him to emerge president. A man who never dreamt he will be governor, became deputy governor and later, governor after his master got entangled in some act and ran foul of the 11th commandment: thou shall not be caught.

A man, who beat more formidable vice-presidential aspirants in 2007 and was hustled on to the No. 2 seat, got elevated to the No. 1 position, just like that, after his second boss lost the race of life to a deadly illness. What other proof do you need to believe that God makes presidents? Effortlessly. Goodluck Jonathan is, indeed, a living testimony to this truism. But even though God makes presidents, presidents define their presidency.

Men who find themselves in the presidency define for themselves and their nations, the kind of presidents they want to be. Men make great presidency. Great men. Visionary men. Men of ideas. Men of courage. Men of tomorrow, living today. In Nigeria, we haven’t been lacking in men of vision and courage. But the trouble is that they weren’t allowed to stay long. Murtala Mohammed and Muhammadu Buhari for example.

Murtala had barely six months; Buhari was in power for 20months. We have also had men who ruled and ruined us. They stayed longer in power.

You know them, don’t you? Now, what’s confounding is: how come the bad guys stayed longer in power, while the good men are shoved into the long night? How come, we, the people, have the elasticity to accommodate the bad rulers, while we do little or nothing when our beloved leaders are disallowed from building our nation? And how come God allows bad rulers rule for so long and allows a second opportunity for some, while others dream of another opportunity after a wasted chance?

We can’t question God, but we can ask questions, can’t we? But, how come that in our over 50 years of nationhood, we have mostly been ruled by lousy fellows who placed self above nation? We have had men who, were we to be in saner climes, wouldn’t qualify to be local government chairmen or councillors, presiding over our affairs and becoming super-billionaires at the expiration of their tenures.

We have had men who left us poorer than they met us. Living us still battling with food, water, shelter, roads, electricity and other problems that define us as a permanently developing nation and shamelessly undeveloped. Majority of our people, over 60percent, live on 65cents a day while a few people and their cronies feed fat on our resources. We live in a nation of greedy elite and their collaborators, while a change of guards occasioned by a new administration is an avenue for a new cabal to ‘come and chop.’

How can a nation hope to make progress that way? We can’t be serious. We can’t keep doing the wrong things and hope that with our prayers, God will help us develop our nation and wipe our misery. Didn’t they say work is prayer in action?

We must begin with our new beginning, which the Jonathan presidency offers us, to do things right. Shun cronyism, tribalism, nepotism and other negative ‘isms’ that constitute a hindrance to our march to greatness. But, honestly, my fear is that a president we don’t know is governing us. We don’t know his vision. The ideals that drive his vision. His road map to a greater Nigeria.

We have none of his words on marble. No inspirational address that galvanises us to action, to the urgent tasks of nation building. Are we in for a go-slow administration? Well, we watch. We wait. Time, say the sages, unveils even the darkest of secrets.

Time makes men saints and turn saints to villains. Time heals all wounds, and reopens new ones. Time differentiates true leaders from posturing fellows. Time, oh time. Just a little time and we will soon know the man whose news dominates the airwaves and whose face graces cover pages of the print media. Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, the 4th democratically elected president of Nigeria, may well turn out to be the nation’s most enigmatic man to ever lead Africa’s most populous nation.

The man in whose tenure we may witness a lot of shockers. Don’t ask me what I mean. Time will tell. President Jonathan was barely few days in office after the election of 2011 when I wrote the above piece. I was dead sure we were in for a shocker from his administration.

Call it prophetic journalism, if you like. Now, Jonathan shocks all of us every now and then. He shocks us with his words, with his actions.

He shocks us with his curious dance steps. One example will suffice in this piece. The presidential pardon granted his former boss, the former governor of Bayelsa State, Chief DSP Alamieyesegha, alongside others. Many Nigerians know the story too well. While he presided over the oil-rich Ijaw nation, Alams was the lord of the Manor, who was dubbed the Governor-General by his army of supporters and hangers-on.

Wealthy and swashbuckling, Alams was arrested in the United Kingdom on money laundering charges, repatriated home to face corruption charges. He was found guilty and convicted, after he entered a plea bargain with the anti-graft agency, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC. Alams was impeached and succeeded by Jonathan. Jonathan becomes president years later and grants Alams state pardon.

His aides argue that there is nothing wrong in the gesture, while opponents of the president believe the action comes as a deadly blow to the anti-corruption war or whatever is left of it. The United States government is no less alarmed by Alams’ pardon. Speaking through its Nigerian embassy, the US believes the presidential pardon will worsen the nation’s fight against graft. Where do I stand? I stand on the side of public morality.

I don’t believe it is the right thing to do at this point in time. I am not begrudging the president’s decision to create a soft-landing for his former boss and mentor. Many in President Jonathan’s shoes will do the same for an old pal who gave him his first break in public office.

Also, who in Alams’ shoes would not pressurise his powerful friend for this great favour? But then, it still is an insensitive action to take at a time Nigerians are angry and lamenting the monumental corruption ravaging our land? This is cronyism and favouritism at the highest quarters. Forget the other names padded with Alamiesegha’s. The pardon was all for the former governor.

The others were just beneficiaries of the gesture. The question that will continually haunt this administration will be: if Alams deserves state pardon, what about others facing graft charges? If it is argued that Alams’ case was political persecution, it can also be argued that there are many others who got railroaded to court by the EFCC because they fell out with the then emperor, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo.

What then makes Alams’ case special? This is the cross that President Jonathan would sadly have to carry for the rest of his administration.

I don’t believe this is all about 2015 and Alams’ expected role. It was simply repaying an old debt to the Governor-General. But the cost of the pardon would alarm the president at the end of the day.