Opinion

OPINION: Asari Dokubo In Aso Rock Villa

Published

1 year ago

June 19, 2023

Editor

By Lasisi Olagunju

In 1948, Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, thought of the best way to protect his country’s security information from invasive media toxins. He summed his strategy up in one short sentence: “Take the thief and make him guard.” But a thief would remain a thief even if he is made the chief hunter. A maxim of the Yoruba drives this home: Twenty years after you’ve made the palm wine tapper king, he still won’t stop casting furtive glances at the neck of the palm tree (Bi ó lé l’ógún ọdún táa ti fi ad’ẹ́mu j’ọba, kò ní yé ọrùn ọ̀pẹ ẹ́ wò). There is an Italian Island called Sicily; it gave the world the term ‘mafia’ to describe its homegrown group of outlaws who sold protection and competed violently with the law. Increasingly failing states exhibit this tragedy of falling into the hands of mafia dons. That point appears to be where Nigeria is today. Mafia gunmen are on parade –and are in charge, almost officially.

I watched Niger Delta chief militant, Asari Dokubo, addressing the press inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on Friday after his meeting with President Bola Tinubu. He exuded the very awe of power as he waxed lyrical boasting brazenly of his efficiency as a protection entrepreneur. The man sat with absolute confidence; directly behind him was Nigeria’s national Coat of Arms, the solemn symbol of the authority of the government and of the sovereignty of the Nigerian State. Only the president, and, maybe, the vice president are statutorily allowed that privilege in that complex. But the militant enjoyed it on Friday and nothing happened. That is what you do when you think you have the king behind you. Everyone and everything, including the law, rose to meet this big man at our seat of government.

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Dokubo spoke not like a sovereign but as the sovereign. He sells security and the Nigerian Armed Forces are his competitors. At the press conference, the man maximally used the hallowed grounds of the State House to advertise his business and do a very negative review of the ‘enemy’ and their operations. He attacked the Nigerian Armed Forces using the very visible platform of their Commander-in-Chief. He said our forces and their men were felons who would rather steal than protect what they were employed to guard. Then he adroitly advertised his protection business and rammed its ‘efficiency’ down the throat of a terrorized nation. The big man from the creeks announced that he was in charge of security from our Federal Capital, Abuja to one, two, three, four, five, six states of the country. Nigeria has 36 states. Dokubo said he is in charge of six. He looked foolish Nigeria in the eyes, raised his voice and sensationally attempted a destruction of his competitors, our soldiers: “There is a full-scale war going on,” he announced while declaring that “the blackmail of the Nigerian state by the Nigerian military is shameful. They said they do not have enough armament and people listen to this false narrative. They are lying. They are liars. I repeat, they are liars because I am a participant. I am a participant in this war. I fight on the side of the government of the Nigerian state in Plateau, Niger, Anambra, Imo, Abia and Rivers. And in Abuja today, you are travelling to Kaduna on this road. It is not the army that makes it possible for you to travel to Abuja or travel to Kaduna, and vice versa. It is my men, employed by the government of the Nigerian state, stationed in Niger. Today, you travel to Baga, you go to Shiroro, you go to Wase. We have lost so many men and in all these engagements, we don’t even have one percent of the armament deployed by the Nigerian military; one percent, and we have had resounding success. So, this blackmail must end. They have enough resources to fight. Instead of fighting, they are busy stealing…” That was excellent mafia marketing unfurled, but I think it was reckless and unfortunate – especially given where those words were said and who said them. If Fox has disproportionately big eye balls, should that fact be heard from the mouth of the village Hen? It is true that there are bad eggs everywhere, including among our soldiers, but the armed forces are the very last twines holding together the Nigerian contraption. The day we allow their humiliation by entrepreneurs of violence and unwashed street gangs, we will all be in trouble.

I have read the very tepid responses from the army and the navy. They both denied being thieves. One said their accuser should name names; another took a politically safe lane and merely listed its achievements in curtailing crude oil theft. The replies were not as they would be if the accuser were an ordinary foul-mouthed lout. But this one was a presidential guest who had just enjoyed a photo op with the Commander-in-Chief. I pity the village hunters; they did not know how to say it that the village head’s mother was a witch. The sky is indeed falling and the world is ending. If you were the one who said what the militant said, I am very sure your ankles and knee caps would be in some soldiers’ play plate now. But our Generals heard the iron man from the creeks very clearly and turned the discourse to a farcical rendition of Fela’s “you be thief, a no be thief.” Khaki has become leather finally!

We had always thought that it was only our oil pipelines that were put under the care of Nigeria’s surplus mafia guns. But Dokubo has revealed an extension of the frontiers of the privatization of our nation’s security. I read the army’s response; I read the navy’s too; I did not see any word shooting down Dokubo’s claim that he is the commander of the forces that have brought peace and security to critical parts of northern and southern Nigeria. He said, and he was emphatic, that it was not our armed forces that are keeping Nigeria safe, especially in the northern corridor: “It is not the army that makes it possible for you to travel to Abuja or travel to Kaduna, and vice versa. It is my men…” That is what he said, right in the Villa with the Coat of Arms solidly behind him as his star witness. I think that was huge, and gross, and embarrassing! Is it true that Asari Dokubo is in charge of our security? All our security forces should come clean on this issue which I think is even more important than the tug of war over who does per-second stealing of barrels of Nigeria’s crude oil. A private citizen declared in our State House that he was the reason why Nigerians travel in peace from our federal capital to the capital of northern Nigeria and the government and its forces are keeping mum. If Dokubo’s claim is true, then what it says is that our case is worse than we thought. It means the government has ceded our sovereignty to bands of men with errant guns. It means the country has moved from fragility to failure.

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How did that man find the knob of the presidential door? Is he the landlord’s son? I have always known that the child of the house does not knock before entering the house. Dokubo boasted that the president was “a father-figure” to him and that he had enjoyed with our new leader filial embrace and hugs for more than thirty years. I heard that too and felt that it was not funny. Where was this fellow 30 years ago and what were his acts of engagement with the Nigerian state at the turn of this century? His life is an open book; he has never hidden anything, including his ways and beliefs. His swagger suggests he is an insider in this new government. I congratulate him. No one in government is uncomfortable because the elephant is leaving the forest for the city. Ordinarily, the farm owner should have no problem slapping any intruder who abuses his ridges. A planter is looking on, looking away while his farm becomes footpath for delinquent dogs and errant goats. Something is not right; some things are wrong somewhere. President Bola Tinubu’s minders should tell him that a king does not receive every visitor that comes knocking at the palace door. They should also tell him that not every guest he receives at the Villa should henceforth address the press in the State House. The Asari that I saw there on Friday had no regard for the institutions of the Nigerian state. He spoke as a competitor for state power and control, almost as a parallel Commander-in-Chief with his own army “stationed in Niger.” Tinubu as a Yoruba proper should have no problem recollecting what untrimmed Iroko collects from town and king when it matures.

Foxes and hawks are not just fast and cunning; they are bold. But those are not the only two things they have in common. Both are lethal predatory beings. They exist to prey on hens and their chicks. The farmer who entrusts his poultry to their care does so to his sorrow. We can learn from them and their ways. The state, its peace and security take a bow where gangs are the law. John Dickie, in his ‘Cosa Nostra: The Definitive History of the Sicilian Mafia’ (2004) describes the situation with chilly poignancy: “Mafiosi…were entrepreneurs in violence, specialists who had developed what today would be called the most sophisticated business model in the marketplace. Under the leadership of their bosses, mafia bands ‘invested’ violence in various commercial spheres in order to extort protection money and guarantee monopolies…In the violence industry, the mafia boss…acts as capitalist, impresario and manager. He unifies the management of the crimes committed…, he regulates the way labour and duties are divided out, and controls discipline amongst the workers…It is the mafia boss’s job to judge from circumstances whether the acts of violence should be suspended for a while, or multiplied and made fiercer. He has to adapt to market conditions to choose which operations to carry out, which people to exploit, which form of violence to use…”

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There are other scholars. One of them is emeritus Professor Anton Blok, Dutch cultural anthropologist and author of ‘The Mafia of a Sicilian Village, 1860-1960: A Study of Violent Peasant Entrepreneurs’ (1974). He presents, in that book, a vivid description of a Sicily where the state failed to monopolise the use and control of physical violence and estate owners turned to “armed men and field guards” for protection, and insecurity and lawlessness reigned. Russian Professor of Sociology, Vadim Volkov, is yet another scholar on the violence industry created and nursed by non-state actors. He published a seminal work with the title: ‘Violent Entrepreneurs: The Use of Force in the Making of Russian Capitalism’ (2016). A reviewer said the author “entered” the shady world of what he called “violent entrepreneurship”,… explored the economic uses of violence and coercion in Russia in the 1990s where violence played “a crucial role in creating the institutions of a new market economy,” where “competition among so-called violence-managing agencies—criminal groups, private security services, private protection companies, and informal protective agencies associated with the state” reigned. Some of the groups, Volkov notes, “wore state uniforms and others did not, but all of their members spoke and acted essentially the same and were engaged in the same activities: intimidation, protection, information gathering, dispute management, contract enforcement, and taxation. Each group controlled the same resource—organized violence.”

Are our armed forces working? Yes. Are they doing enough? They can improve on their performance, especially now that they have a new Commander-in-Chief with the swag of knowledge. The last three weeks have been epochal. We have watched Tinubu putting his feet where angels fear to tread: Deregulation of petrol supply and sales; deregulation of foreign exchange supply and sales. Deregulation of education and its funding? That one is still coy; the head of its ogre peeks inside the president’s breast pocket. But the man has taken those unforgettable steps and has moved on to other things in an ‘I dey kampe’ manner. The people are not complaining, at least loudly. An Ibadan person told me five days ago that he once asked General Ibrahim Babangida where he got the guts to put Nigerians through his many experiments and experimentations. IBB, the person said, submitted that Nigerians were a very resilient people. There is no situation you throw at them that they will not adapt to. Unlike the goat that fights back when it hits the wall, there is always a space for Nigerians to shift to beyond the wall. We have seen that fact come to play with the N500/per-litre petrol and the hike in the price of everything. The rugged chassis of the Nigerian has absorbed the shock and he is moving on, even if with sputtering bouts. Nigerians have taken more and they are likely to take even more but handing over their lives to street gangs and creepy creatures should not be part of the bargain.

Ruling a state should not be a Captain Flint kind of voyage. Who is Captain Flint? Explore the fictional universe of Robert Louis Stevenson to refresh who that character is. Should the Oluode (chief hunter) be found sharing his apron with his dogs? May it never happen! That is why I counsel that the president can, and should, appreciate his backers and enforcers without allowing them turn his presidency to another Black Sails series. The times are hard but the wind is behind the sails of the new president. Whatever he does with his voyage is his to choose. If he likes, let him bring pirates on board his ship. Àgunlá, àguntètè. We will write the story when the buccaneers do their thing. But Nigerians are battle-weary; they deserve peace and good life, at least for once. That is why we will not keep quiet in the face of an insidious capture of our state by mafia dons.

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Hardship In 2024: A Time Like No Other![OPINION]

Published

6 days ago

July 2, 2024

Editor

Icon-James Tam

Nigerians are known for their sense of resilience, endurance and hard work, especially in challenging times. Like years gone, 2024 has also given face to this fact.

Since President Bola Ahmed Tinubu took office on May 29, 2023, and announced the removal of fuel subsidies, prices of essential goods have skyrocketed across the country.

Even our education system has been affected, with tertiary institutions increasing tuition fees by 100%. I withheld judgment on the daily struggles of Nigerians until after the president’s first year in office.

To my surprise, President Tinubu’s first tenure came to completion with his stumble at Eagle Square, followed by an explanation that, as a Yoruba man, he(Dobale)was paying homage, not falling. Unfortunately, this past year has been incredibly difficult for Nigerians, with the benefits of subsidy removal nowhere to be seen in terms of human or infrastructure development.

Eight out of every ten persons suffer from malnutrition, a fact painfully evident during my recent visit to my hometown Arogbo in Ese-odo Local government Area of Ondo state. The promises of renewed hope after the turbulent governance of former President Muhammad Buhari seem increasingly distant.

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OPINION: Nigeria Nor Be Kenya

Published

7 days ago

July 2, 2024

Editor

Nigeria Nor Be Kenya

By Suyi Ayodele

“Kabiyesi, the message which I bring you today is the message of all the women who have left their stalls, their homes and children, their farms, and petty affairs to come and visit you today. They are the suffering crowd who are gathered on your front lawn… they are all the womanhood of Egba, and they have come to say – Enough is Enough” (Soyinka 1981, 208).

There is a trending trailer of a film titled “Funmilayo Ransome Kuti”. I have not watched the film, but I know the event that gave birth to the epochal event which forms the core of the plot. It was the Abeokuta Women’s Revolt of 1946. It was caused by the colonial government’s resolve to tax Abeokuta women. Wole Soyinka (WS), whose aunt, Funmilayo Ransome Kuti, and mum, Grace Eniola Soyinka, led the action, captures it well in his memoir, Aké: The Years of Childhood. The quote above explains the central theme of the ‘war’. I remembered it as I watched the Kenya young people’s action last week.

A friend and I discussed the Kenya riots. He was wondering why nobody appears to be bothered about the shenanigans going on in our government circle, especially in the last year. He concluded that Nigerians have become laid-back. I disagreed with him. I have a different theory about why nobody appears to be talking to protest the recent economic policies of the government that have impoverished the masses. In explaining my theory to him, I adopted the street lingo, Nigeria nor be Kenya, an adaptation of the 2020 political slogan of the Edo State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

The then National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu, through a video, directed Edo people to vote for the APC governorship candidate, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu, against the incumbent governor and PDP candidate, Godwin Obaseki. In reaction to that directive, the PDP coined the lingo, Edo nor be Lagos, meaning Edo is not Lagos, where Tinubu dictates who will be the governor. The people went ahead to demonstrate that they would not be directed by any godfather as they ensured that the APC candidate, who had earlier been the PDP candidate in the 2016 governorship election, Ize-Iyamu, lost 13 out of the 18 local government areas of the state. The margin of defeat was such that the votes the PDP got in Oredo Local Government Area alone cancelled out the APC votes in the five local governments it won in Edo North Senatorial District!

I told my friend that Nigeria nor be Kenya because there has never been any organic protest in Nigeria since the beginning of this present democratic dispensation in 1999. While the Kenya riots over the now rescinded Financial Bill were spontaneous, organic and impulsive, all the demonstrations we have had in Nigeria since 1999 have been politically motivated, sponsored and orchestrated to achieve just one aim – to put the kingmaker on the throne. For the three days or so that the Kenyan youths were on the streets, there was no room for social razzmatazz. I have not seen any video of the youths partying; of any comedian reeling out jokes and musicians dishing out hot vibes to the protesting youths. The Kenyan boys and girls were focused. They knew what they wanted and went straight for it. They mapped out their targets and went straight for them. Everyone in the Kenyan government, who is related, or perceived to be connected to the obnoxious Financial Bill either scampered to safety or was caught in the crossfire.

From Monday to Wednesday last week, Kenya was on fire. Kenyans, mainly young men and women in their mid-30s and below, trooped out in large numbers to protest the insensitivity of the government of President William Ruto. Ruto proposed a bill termed Financial Bill 2024 to Kenya’s National Assembly. The summary of the proposed Bill was increased taxes to be paid by Kenyans. The young folks in that East African country, known as Gen-Zs, would not have any of that. They came out forcefully. The protest, spontaneous as it was, was well coordinated. All the three arms of government in Kenya collected, what in our street parlance, is known as wotowoto! I hate violence. My sanguinary disposition is low, if non-existent. Ironically, I nonetheless found the treatment meted to some government officials funny, though not totally amusing. Kenyans are lucky lots. Ordinary bill led to a three-day demonstration. I saw the video clips of the riots. Nigeria came to my mind. How will it happen that Nigerians will go on demonstration because of a mere bill?

Here, our leaders rape us serially. We don’t groan, irrespective of the bad bed on which we are raped, or the size of the instrument used in defiling us. Nigerians are used to different sizes of punishment from the various husbands that have been taking advantage of our ‘innocence’. Our husbands, especially those we have had between 2015 and date, would never bother to send any bill to our National Assembly before taking any action. They act first and inform our pliable legislators of the actions taken. How many Nigerians can recall the number of taxes we pay in this country? What about our budgets; how many do we run in one fiscal year? Nigeria is a cruise; a country of anything goes. Our resilience is like that of the proverbial woman under a man with a big phallus. She can only moan and thank her God that she survived while waiting in trepidation for when her assailant will be in the mood again. What a terrible situation!

Are Nigerians naturally complacent? I answer in the negative. History abounds about how our forebears fought oppression in the past. The Yoruba race, for instance, instituted traditional checks and balances in its political structures. Once an Oba veered off the acceptable norms and codes, the people, through their chiefs, presented the “calabash” to such a monarch. Many Yoruba Obas of yore were forced to “open the calabash”, an euphemism for suicide, because they did not rule well. The Alake of Egbaland, Oba Oba Ladapo Samuel Ademola, who was suspected to be in support of the 1946 women tax had, Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti and her fellow women under the aegis of Abeokuta Women’s Union (AWU), to contend with. At the end of the Abeokuta Women’s Revolt, Alake was chased out of his palace and town. The Egba Native Authority was expanded to include more women. That was 78 years ago!

The same thing happened earlier in Aba in 1929 when, in November of that year, women in the Bende District of Umuahia and other locations in the present-day South-East, kicked against the tyranny of the colonial government-imposed Warrant Chiefs and their exploitative tax regimes. That protest led to the abolition of the Warrant Chief system in a region that is patently acephalous. The event also marked the beginning of women’s participation in politics in that zone. Those women of Igbo extraction remained heroines to date. They are pointers to the fact that Nigerians are not complacent by nature. However, the nature of the politics we adopted after the fall of the Second Republic in 1983 has changed a lot of things. We have greatly commercialised our politics and it is now a cash-and-carry venture! Again, sad!

The Kenyan incident cannot be compared to what we had in 2020 as #EndSARS! While the first two days of the 2020 youth protest police brutality could be seen and said to be organic, the subsequent days were characterised by politicking. I keep asking: who footed the bills incurred during the protests? I am talking here about the stage, the lighting, sound engineering, refreshments and artists’ appearances. Nobody should tell me about any mass funding, or the love of the “participating artists” for the Nigerian youths. I know enough of showbiz and organisation to know that what went into the #EndSARS was millions of naira. That, however, would never justify the brutality the Nigerian State visited on the armless youths, especially at the Lekki toll Gate axis of the protest. If not now, it shall surely come that posterity will ask for the blood of the poor citizens felled by the armed men sent by the State to disperse the youths.

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What about the January 2012 protest codenamed, #OccupyNigeria? Was that also spontaneous? Was it in any way a natural reaction of the people to the removal of subsidy by President Goodluck Jonathan? During his inauguration on May 29, 2023, President Tinubu, unceremoniously, announced that “subsidy is gone”. Immediately, everything that hitherto made life comfortable for Nigerians took flight. Life has been unbearable ever since. Yet, nobody has been on the streets in protest. Why? Is there any difference between what Jonathan announced in January 2012 and what Tinubu announced on May 29, 2023? Why then did Nigerians troop out in 2012 but have remained indoors since 2023.

The answer is simple. Those behind the January 2012 #OccupyNigeria protest are either in power today or have their friends in power. The 2012 anti-subsidy removal protest remains one of the most organised civilian coups against a sitting government. Everybody involved in the planning and execution of that 2012 event had one agenda, to wit: remove Jonathan at all costs. Nothing more. At Ojota, Lagos, the epicentre of the #OccupyNigeria protest were politicians, ‘human rights activists’, ‘philanthropists’ and ‘public-spirited’ individuals. If the late iconoclast, Fela Anikulapo Kuti, were to be alive, he would have “put them together” as political carpetbaggers and profiteers! Check the list of the leaders of the protest and you will see that those who are not in today’s government have friends in it!

While the #OccupyNigeria protest lasted, a one-time Nollywood actor, Desmond Eliot, for instance, asked: “Why does our president need six private jets? Why should our public officials keep their salaries when Obama slashed his? Why should we believe the government when it says the subsidy gain will be properly invested? Bad leadership and corruption must stop.” Three years later, Eliot was rewarded with one of the Surulere seats in the Lagos State House of Assembly, a position he has retained for the third term. Today, President Tinubu is asking for two additional jets for the presidency; corruption has spread its tentacles everywhere, but Eliot is as silent as the water in a clay pot. Corruption has assumed a life of its own, yet the Eliots of this world are deaf and blind to that!

What about Abike Dabiri-Erewa and Lauretta Onochie who were regarded as the ‘Amazons’ of the protests during the Jonathan government? After they found themselves in the succeeding governments, what has become of them? Are Nigerians better now than they were during the Jonathan era? Where are the likes of Banky W, El Dee, Kate Henshaw, Omoni Oboli, Bimbo Akintola, Ufoma Ejenobor and Ronke Oshodi-Oke in today’s Nigeria? Should I also mention the deafening silence of our dear Nobel Laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka (WS)? Or why the people’s lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN), has reduced his interventions to mere academic exercises of lectures, speeches, symposia and television screens? One person argued that it is wrong for Nigerians to expect someone like WS to lead a protest in his old age, and I asked: at what age should one accommodate bad governance and State insensitivity to the plight of the masses? If not on the streets, what about incisive statements from the stable of the world-renowned scholar? Our elders say: kìí d’àgbà kí á má lá obè, eegun eran nìkan ni a leè fó mó (old age cannot prevent one from liking soup; it only stops the aged from breaking meat bones)!

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Nigerians will also recall the 2014 ‘Salvation Rally’, organised by the leadership of the APC to “draw global attention to the deliberate hijack of the Nigeria police and other security agencies by the ruling PDP.” At that rally was Rotimi Amaechi, who, as a PDP governor of oil-rich Rivers State, joined forces with the opposition against Jonathan. General Muhammadu Buhari, then APC presidential aspirant, was at that rally. So also, were Chiefs John Odigie-Oyegun, late Ogbonnaya Onu and a host of others. All these personalities became the beneficiaries of the government that took over from Jonathan in 2015. Buhari became president, Amaechi a minister, and Oyegun as APC National Chairman.

Many Nigerians who applauded the ‘Salvation Rally’ as a bold attempt at correcting the “bad policies” of the Jonathan administration, realised too late that those behind the rally had just one common goal: to take over the government. Femi Gbajabiamila, who was then the Minority Leader of the House of Representatives, said that the rally was to end impunity. Today, Gbajabiamila is the Chief of Staff to President Tinubu. Can we ask him to define “impunity” for us in simple terms, bearing in mind the shenanigans that have been the hallmark of the government in which he serves as the head of the president’s domestic staff?

At the Abuja ‘Salvation Rally’, Chief Oyegun said the ‘protesters’ wanted to end “the raging insurgency that is daily killing and maiming our compatriots. An end to the impunity that permeates the Jonathan administration. An end to the massive corruption that has left our compatriots impoverished in the midst of plenty. An unambiguous effort to ensure that 2015 elections will be free and fair.” Where is the Benin Chief today? Can we ask if the “killings and maiming” have stopped, or if “impunity” has ended, and if our electoral system now is better than what we had in 2015?

The difference between Nigerians and the Kenyans who went on a rampage last week is clear. The history of our ‘fight’ for independence in Nigeria cannot be compared to what was obtainable in Kenya. While our ‘freedom fighters’ were busy drinking cups of tea, the Kenyans were in the bush with their Mau Mau agitation. A Nairobi University professor of Business and Management Sciences, XN Iraki (Waithaka N Iraki), said that the Gen-Zs that led the riots are below 35 years old and constitute 80% of the Kenyan population.

He wrote: “Several economic factors have come together, creating the perfect storm for these mass protests. First, young Kenyans have endured hard economic times brought on by COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine. Tensions were already evident in the run-up to Kenya’s 2022 presidential elections, with complaints over rising national debt and the cost of living. At the time, President William Ruto’s alliance read the signs correctly and tapped into the discontent. As a presidential candidate, Ruto promised to lower the cost of living if he won the elections. He also promised the downtrodden, popularised as “hustlers”, better jobs. And they voted for him in droves. But in two years the economy did not grow as fast as expected. And the hustlers’ patience ran out. They have seen no transformation in their economic lives. This is despite the economy achieving a growth rate of 4.9% in 2022, edging up to 5.6% in 2023. This growth was not enough to deal with the economic backlogs. Hence, the popular question I have been asked as an economist is: if the economy is growing, where is the money?”

The same promises Ruto made to Kenyans are what Tinubu promised Nigerians. Kenyans took to the streets because they have never had the misfortune of having selfish politicians lead them in protests whenever government policies fail. But, here in Nigeria, political merchants have been the ones organising ‘protests’ on behalf of the people. Now, the ‘protesters’ of yesterday are in power; the people are helpless. Permit this last forecast: a day is coming when the Nigerian people shall take their destiny into their own hands. A day when they will chase the political merchants away and act on behalf of themselves. When that day comes, no fortress shall be impenetrable; not even the Aso of all Rock(s) Villa. That day, the monkey go go market and he no go return! May my generation witness that glorious day.

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OPINION: Let Kenyans Enjoy Their Kenya

Published

1 week ago

July 1, 2024

Editor

By Lasisi Olagunju

Hugh Gaitskell became Britain’s Minister of Fuel and Power on October 7, 1947. Soon after taking that office, because there was an energy crisis, the minister told his countrymen and women to save fuel by reducing the number of baths they took. Gaitskell said: “personally, I have never had a great many baths myself, and I can assure those who are in the habit of having a great many that it does not make a great difference to their health if they have less.”

Winston Churchill, who had by then become the opposition leader, heard him and said no wonder the government smelt so badly. He replied Gaitskell on 28 October, 1947: “When ministers of the Crown speak like this on behalf of His Majesty’s government, the Prime Minister and his friends have no need to wonder why they are getting increasingly into bad odour.”

Nigeria is an unwashed country. It stinks. It needs deliverance but won’t get it. The fire we have on our mountain is uncontrollable and unquenchable. At least, it is not the type you kill with thunder claps of anger. Some people demolished their own Wall of Jericho with noise. In case you believe that story and think you can replicate it here, you are wrong. What Kenyans did on their streets and achieved in one day last week, you can not have here. We have enough shock-absorbers and fissions to take all shocks and frustrate all enemies of frustration.

You’ve lately been reading of unbelievable in-your-face sad acts of our democratic government. You’ve heard rumours of expenditures that you would pray were not true. You’ve been watching circus shows on a new minimum wage for public and private sector workers.

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You watched the Kenyan parliament with its President William Ruto thoroughly whipped by their angry children. You wonder why our own king and his lawmakers are not as worried about all this as they are concerned about the purchase of new presidential jets. You’ve also been hearing sermons calling for more sacrifices from you, the people. You’ve wondered why it must be you who must always tighten your belt while the pilot eats to explosion.

You are hearing rumours of four budgets in one country by one government in one year. The government wants to operate, in 2024, the 2023 main and the 2023 supplementary budgets plus the 2024 budget while preparing another supplementary budget. You don’t understand? The government wants to eat yesterday’s pounded yam with today’s in addition to a supplementary one in preparation. It won’t matter that some projects and their votes are duplicated in the various budgets. They must appear in all the budgets because they are tagged ongoing. Money here (2024), funding there (2023) make the smart wealthier.

Why are people quiet? What should they say and what will their talking amount to? Felix Adler (1851-1933) was a German-American professor of political and social ethics. In an address to the Society for Ethical Culture of New York on Sunday, 6 February, 1898, Adler spoke on what he called “the wisdom of mute lips”. In the speech entitled ‘The Moral Value of Silence’, he counseled that “reticence should be observed when the likelihood is wanting that what is said will have its due effect.” Those of us who write the ‘rubbish’ we write daily or weekly know that no one who should care really cares. We know that regime-backers’ passion for power or belly won’t let them accept the truth just as the regime won’t. But we also know that truth, even in silence, has its own unique way of asserting its supremacy no matter how long the night lasts.

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So, let Kenyans of last week enjoy their Kenya of today. It is not our challenge. Our street is silent and withdrawn because it cannot believe that today has truly manifested itself in worse details than the horrible past. People who should be afraid of the people’s silence are not. They are happy that those who suffer suffer their deprivations in the quietude of their holes. You remember that city, Ègbin (the filthy) with its peculiar inhabitants, in D.O. Fagunwa’s Ogboju Ode ninu Igbo Irunmole. We can locate it in today’s Nigeria. The government has made itself smell so badly that no one wants to contest the soup pot with it. Its operatives can have everything – and they enjoy having everything. The filth and the ugliness of their character have won for them permanent residency in our vaults. It didn’t start today.

You must have come across an old August 11, 1956 newspaper story with the headline ‘Nigerian MPs’ pay.’ The story reads: “Chief (S.L.) Akintola, the official leader of the Opposition in the House of Representatives, described as a scandalous waste of public money a government motion providing for advances of £800 to each member of the House, except Ministers and Parliamentary Secretaries, to enable them to buy cars. The motion also provides for a consolidated travelling allowance of £140 a year for each member. The present salary of a member is £800 a year. Denouncing these measures, Chief Akintola said that the financial benefits accruing to members were unduly generous for their part-time service, compared with the whole-time members of the British House of Commons who were paid only £1,000 a year. He said many members had earned less than £300 a year before they became members of the House of Representatives.”

You see that? In 1956 (four years before independence) full-time British lawmakers were paid £1,000 a year. During that same period, part-time Nigerian lawmakers were paid £800 a year. Chief Akintola was lucky. If he says of our Senators or Reps today what he said in 1956, he would be suspended indefinitely from his legislative duties.

Wise people always know that anything that can fester will eventually get rotten. And, it actually got worse for Nigeria immediately after independence. The second republic perfected whatever heist was inadequately staged in the first republic. Dafe Otobo, Professor of Industrial Relations, in his ‘The Political Clash in the Aftermath of the 1981 Nigerian General Strike’ (1982), tells the story: “Typically, the more disadvantaged in society are requested to make sacrifices in difficult times: the legislators and bureaucrats jettisoned all previous (minimum wage) agreements in the name of ‘austerity measures’ after they themselves had stoutly opposed a cut in their pay and allowances! In fact the federal government’s 1981 approved estimates have confirmed that legislators collected a total of 15.1 million naira as remuneration and allowances for their aides for the year; 450 members of the House of Representatives received 13,673,700 naira or 30,386 each; and the 95 senators collected 1,462,240 or 15,392 each. Added to these sums were ‘constituency allowances’ which amounted to eight million naira (18,652 for each senator as against 13,840 for each representative), and then a vaguely titled ‘consolidated allowance’ which enabled each senator to collect another 5,000 naira and 3,000 for each representative. All this amounted to the tidy sum of 24,925,000 naira, apart from the 1.2 million naira spent by all the legislators on foreign travels when only N656,250 was actually approved for the purpose.” Note that one dollar officially exchanged for 61 kobo in 1981.

“What cannot be cured must be endured” is a phrase in Robert Burton’s 1621 book, ‘The Anatomy of Melancholy’. Burton says Melancholy is that feeling which “goes and comes upon every small occasion of sorrow, need, sickness, trouble, fear, grief, passion, or perturbation of the mind, any manner of care, discontent, or thought, which causes anguish, dullness, heaviness and vexation of spirit…” As negative as its character is, Burton says the melancholy of the world he lived had “grown to a habit” and so “will hardly be removed.” I recommend continued endurance to our millennials and their Gen Z cousins. They should read our history and calm down. Nigeria’s bald-headed vulture has been in the rains since it was created. They should stop dreaming about its salvation. The rain won’t stop.

The author, Dr. Lasisi Olagunju is the Saturday Editor of Nigerian Tribune, and a columnist in the same newspaper. This article was first published by the paper (Nigerian Tribune). It is published here with his permission.