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OPINION: The Scandals In Abuja

Published

4 months ago

January 8, 2024

Editor

Some cabinet members went to Western Region premier, Samuel Ladoke Akintola, to complain about the corruption of one of their colleagues. They said the man was stealing their party’s funds and eating government money with reckless abandon. They said the gentleman’s impunity knew neither the fear of the law, nor of the party and the people. “He is even building two houses at the same time,” they rammed it in. Chief Akintola listened attentively to the complainants and their complaints. He then turned to the accused who was also seated right there.

“You heard that? They said you are building two houses at the same time; you are building one in Oyo; you are building another in Ibadan. You are the party’s treasurer; you are also in charge of the government’s finances. Can’t houses be built one after the other? (Ngbó, wón ní ò nkó’le méjì léèkan soso; ìkan l’Òyó, ìkan n’Bàdàn? Ìwo ni treasurer egbé; ìwo náà ni minister owó. Sé ilé ò seé kó ní’kòòkan ni?).» If that line of adjudication was strange to the complaint lodgers, Chief Akintola was still not done with them. He had some words for the accusers.

“Each of you is in charge of a ministry of government. If we flash a torch into your anus, won’t we see faeces?” He asked, looking straight into their eyes. They looked down. Then Akintola faced the leader of the accusers. “And you, but I know that you have just built a house in Ibadan for one of your mistresses (Ìwo, mo sebí o sèsè kó’lé fún àlè re kan n’Bàdàn ni). The accusers were shocked by their leader’s bent of justice. But they ought not to be shocked. The leader once said publicly that he was a master of equivocation. The premier didn’t release his guests without a warning to both sides to be sensitive to public sensibilities in their use of public funds.

Dr Omololu Olunloyo, a second republic governor of the old Oyo State, will be 89 years old this year. He once told me the significance of this year in his life but I am not permitted to say it – at least, not now. Where I come from, a man does not tell all he is told. Olunloyo also knows too much, perhaps that explains his ‹refusal’ to write his autobiography despite our prodding and pressure. But he told me stories, one of which is the Akintola story I just told above – although I have hidden the names of the accused and the accusers. I will tell yet another one from that former governor, especially now that the Federal Republic of Nigeria is enmeshed in an argument over whether or not it is permitted and legal in public service to officially move public money into private accounts.

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Olunloyo was very close to Akintola. He was also very close to Prime Minister Abubakar Tafawa Balewa. One day, Balewa drew Olunloyo aside and told him his story of helplessness: “Doctor Olunloyo, this country is a country of thieves. As I sit here, my appointees managing the central bank are stealing money. If I move my seat from here to the CBN, right under my nose and supervision there, they will still steal money. Look, I just caught a thief, but they said I can’t prosecute him because of where he comes from – unless I catch at least one thief each from the other regions.”

If Vulture claims that it is not today that the rains started beating him, you think he is lying. Please, believe Vulture. The two cases above occurred in the early 1960s – that was some sixty-something years ago. And it wasn’t only the political class that was implicated. Even the wretched of the earth believe in fish eating fish to get fat.

In 1952/1953, seven years before independence, there was a commission of inquiry into the administration of Lagos Town Council. The commission found that «in hospitals, nurses require a fee from every in-patient before the prescribed medicine is given, and even the ward servants must have their ‹dash’ before bringing the bed-pan; it is known to be rife in the Police Motor Traffic Unit, which has unrivalled opportunities on account of the common practice of overloading vehicles; pay clerks make a deduction from the wages of daily paid staff; produce examiners exact a fee from the produce buyer for every bag that is graded and sealed; domestic servants pay a proportion of their wages to the senior of them, besides often having paid a lump sum to buy the job.» Can you see the class of those implicated in those findings? Ordinary workers. Public and private sector workers still do it; politicians do it; they buy and sell positions. Indeed, our political situation has always been like eighteenth century England when «it was taken for granted that the purpose for going into parliament or holding any public office was to make or repair a man’s personal fortune» (R. M. Jackson, 1958, page 345).

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Above, you read about people buying public and private jobs in 1952/1953 Lagos. You would think 60 years of independence should be long enough for a people’s redemption to occur. But jobs are still being purchased in Nigeria of 2024. If anything has changed in our story over the last six decades, it is that the acorn of misdeeds of the past has grown to become an oak. The oak is that behemoth no one wraps their arms around to climb. The oak is igi osè in my part of the world. If you are Yoruba, you should be familiar with this incantation: Wón d’òyì k’ápá, apá ò k’ápá; wón d’òyì k’ósè apá ò k’ósè…). That is what corruption has become. The law is helpless before the powerful because no sane person looks into a deep well and jumps into it. It is our major gain in sixty years of flag independence. Our country is fully vaccinated against all virtues. Follow the variegated stories around Emefiele. Instead of retail stealing in the central bank, the CBN itself has been stolen – what we have there is ‹kòròfo ìsáná› – a matchbox without matchsticks. Follow other recent scandals in Abuja. Instead of government ministers being content with stealing their ministries’ money «to build two houses simultaneously,» they are stealing the ministries. Yet, nothing happens to the plunderers because they are like human eyes – they come with divine immunity from intrusive fingers – Àánú ojú kìí jé kí wón t’owó b’ojú. They are also like rattle snakes –Ìbèrù ejò kìí jé kí wón te ejò mó’lè. Another incantation!

You saw a document that surfaced some days ago signed by the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs and Poverty Alleviation, Dr Betta Edu. In that memo, Edu directed the Accountant General of the Federation to transfer the sum of N585,198,500.00 into a private account belonging to one Oniyelu Bridget. There was a national uproar. If you were part of the outrage, it means you no get job. Did you not see that the minister did not disown the document? With her full chest, she owned it and declared what she did as legal. She also did not forget to blame the leakage and the outrage on her enemies. She called them desperate persons implicated in an earlier scandal of N44.8bn in the National Social Investment Programme Agency (NSIPA). She said they wanted to «stain her integrity because she alerted the government on the ongoing N44.8 Billion fraud in NSIPA…» She was referring to the scandal that has led to the suspension of the National Coordinator and chief executive of the NSIPA, Mrs Halima Shehu, by President Bola Tinubu. There are reports that Halima moved that amount (N44.8 Billion) into some unusual accounts. We do not have the details. And, we have not heard her own defence direct from her mouth. But her own people plead her innocence; they are accusing her enemies of being behind her ordeal.

Then the Accountant General of the Federation (AGF), Dr Oluwatoyin Madein, weighed in on Saturday. She said although her office received the said request from Edu, it ignored it. She said she did not make the payment as instructed because the procedure was wrong.

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The engine of Nigeria’s bureaucracy has broken down. The Yoruba would say if the short one is not wise, what about the tall one? Were civil servants in Edu’s ministry who presumably drafted the memo for her to sign not aware of the existence of the laws guiding the processing, movement and use of public funds? There is Nigeria’s Financial Regulations 2009. Its Chapter Seven, Section 713 states that “personal money shall in no circumstances be paid into a government bank account, nor shall any public money be paid into a private account.» If the civil servants didn’t know the law, you would think the person signing that half-a-billion naira memo would pause and check. Was there not a retreat shortly after the ministers were appointed? What were they taught at those opulent sessions?

Things are happening. We only know what our husbands allow us to know or what ‹accidentally’ leaks like the N44.8 billion suspension and the N585 million memo. The present Federal Government with its three branches is particularly audacious in doing the unthinkable. The unthinkable is what you calmly do when you know you’ve conquered the world.

We can dismiss all these and say they do not matter, that after all, no money is lost (yet). But that deadly, slithering being called snake has a way of climbing its way to the top of the raffia palm. Ninety-two-year-old British political scientist, Colin Leys, in 1965 wrote on the consequences of corruption, impunity and sleaze on the future of Africa. Writing in his ‹What is the Problem about Corruption?’ Leys argued that «If the top political elite of a country consumes its time and energy in trying to get rich by corrupt means, it is not likely that the (country’s) development plans will be fulfilled.» His prediction reeked of doom. About that time, Ronald Wraith and Edgar Simpkins published their book, ‹Corruption in Developing Countries’ (1963). They looked into practices in African countries, including Nigeria. They said they saw a «jungle of nepotism and temptation… a dangerous and tragic situation.» They described the landscape as «the scarlet thread of bribery and corruption.» They witnessed malfeasance flourishing «as luxuriantly as the bush and weeds which it so much resembles.» They saw the toxins of corruption «taking the goodness from the soil and suffocating the growth of plants which have been carefully and expensively bred and tended.» I suggest you read that metaphor of gloom again. If nothing fruitful grows today, it is because the earth was scorched yesterday.

The vaccine that will cure our political elite of greed has not been made. Lanrewaju Adepoju, a Yoruba performing poet who died recently, looked at a situation like this in the 1980s and declared that nothing overwhelmed a babaláwo more than being confronted with a bad case that permitted no remedial ritual. The Nigerian situation is pretty much like a terminal illness – or worse, like a carcass being mobbed by a pack of wolves and a wake of vultures. Everyone tears at it, exacting their share. And the predators are very bold and daring. Socialists and Marxists will blame this tragedy on the greed of capitalism and its lack of shame. English trade unionist, Thomas Dunning (1799-1873), quoted by Karl Marx in his three-volume work ‹Capital’ said «With adequate profit, capital is very bold. A certain 10 percent will ensure its employment anywhere; 20 percent certain will produce eagerness; 50 percent, positive audacity; 100 percent will make it ready to trample on all human laws; 300 percent, and there is not a crime at which it will scruple, nor a risk it will not run, even to the chance of its owner being hanged. If turbulence and strife will bring a profit, it will freely encourage both…” Just sit back and, like Akintola, take a long look at the accused and the accusers in the current scandal in Abuja. Look at the entire business architecture of government. Corruption is the only business that yields returns here. In 60 years plus, the Nigerian state has established itself as a crime scene. We all know that things can’t continue like this without the world coming to an end. But the questions are: Where is the face of the saviour? And who really is clean?

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Minimum Wage: Why We May Not Accept N100,000 – Organised Labour

Published

4 hours ago

May 20, 2024

Editor

The organised labour has told the government to perish any idea of offering N100,000 as the new minimum wage.

The labour has also told the government to be serious with the negotiations on the issue of workers wages, insisting that it used the lowest minimum in arriving at the N615,000 as new minimum wage.

Recall that the organised labour comprising the Nigeria Labour Congress, NLC and the Trade Union Congress of Nigeria, TUC, pulled out of the negotiation meeting last week Wednesday when the government offered N48,000 as the new minimum wage.

However, Chairman of the Tripartite Committee on the National Minimum wage, Alhaji Bukar Goni in a letter to the organized labour for a meeting tomorrow indicated interest that the government will shift ground and asked the organised labour to also shift ground.

Speaking to Vanguard in Abuja, the NLC Head of Information and Public Affairs, Benson Upah, said that the organised labour would honour the invitation tomorrow but he advised the government to be serious.

He said, “Our expectations are that the government should be serious this time around. We expect them to take more seriously the issue of wages of workers.”

On whether labour would accept N100,000 as being insinuated, he said, “Well, it will not be fair and these are the reasons. The first reason is that when we demanded for N615,000, we broke that down. In fact, we used the barest minimum.

“For instance we put accommodation for N40,000, we also use for feeding N500, tell me where you are going to get food for N500 with a family of six. As I said, we used barest estimate but beyond that, government hiked electricity tariff by two hundred and fifty percent after we made our demand and that has introduced new cost and expenses. So if government is serious, it should not be thinking about a hundred thousand naira.

“You know that when you create poor citizens, you create a poorer county.” On his part, a member of the NLC delegation on the Tripartite Committee, Prof Theophilus Ndubuaku, said it would not be kind of the government to offer N100,000.

He said, “I don’t think one hundred thousand naira is a kind of thing we want because it’s far below expectation, we will accept something that can at least keep somebody alive. I don’t think a hundred thousand naira will keep a worker alive in this country a man with a family of six because our computation is based on the size of family.

“So, if they come up with that kind of amount, I don’t think we will appreciate it. In the private sector even artisans are not taking one hundred thousand a month. Whatever we accept we will look what is the income, what are they collecting, what is available to government because if government is collecting one trillion naira, we cannot ask them to pay two trillion.

“We are responsible people but the same government should know that people are suffering they will have to agree with us that there is crisis, that something needs to be done to create wealth, that something needs to be done for Nigeria to be a producing country and not a consuming nation.

“Something needs to be done to reduce the cost of governance. We are supposed to be partners in governance, after all we are the labourers.”

Asked to give reason why labour may not accept one hundred thousand, he said, “If we see that that hundred thousand is affordable, if we see that they can afford more, we will reject it. They have to tell us why they cannot pay N615,000, the onus is on them to tell us why, then we will sit down and say okay you don’t have the money but we will also know why you don’t have the money because Nigeria is a country that is naturally endowed but something is wrong, how do you make sure you get the money so that when we come again in two years time, you won’t tell us the same story?

“What are you doing to create wealth, how are you going to partner with us to create wealth instead of being wasteful, how are you going to partner with us to reduce cost of governance. If a father comes home and says the only money he has is one thousand naira and you know that the father is not wasting the money, you will manage but if it is when the father comes and he is eating food bought from the fast food joint and it cost N10,000 and he gives one thousand to the entire family to go and look for food and cook for themselves, he may be beaten up, the family may refuse it.

“The letter they wrote to us they said that both parties should shift ground, that means they will shift ground and they are expecting us to shift ground but the question is, what ground are they shifting, are they going to shift ground by two naira or two thousand naira to make it N50,000 or are they going to shift ground by N62,000 to make it N100,000 or by N150,000 or N200,000 to make it N300,000 plus.

“The point here is, this thing we are doing is not rocket science, the government should sit down and calculate how much it will cost, what is a befitting wage for an average Nigeria? They should breakdown what they are giving us because even in salaries, you break everything down. So when you break it down, they will tell us whether they are going to put one thousand naira per month for transport and two thousand naira per month for food.

“That N48,000 they are offering, they should have broken it down so if there are certain things they don’t want to make provision for, for instance health, if they say if any worker is sick they person should go and die or they don’t want to make provision for food, let them just put standard things.

“The problem here is that, you asked someone to tighten his belt, you said there is no money but you removed subsidy. Since they removed subsidy, FAAC has been collecting almost three times of what they were collecting before subsidy. That money you are collecting, what are you doing with it?

“You now said you want to build coastal highway when the existing roads to the same location are not passable, you are budgeting trillions of naira, you want to build Lagos-Sokoto brand new Highway, you want to put billions for hajj subsidy, you bought 200 vehicles for Customs and this is somebody that is complaining that naira is having issues but you now want to spend hundreds billions to import Toyota cars for Customs, why can’t you buy made-in Nigeria vehicles?

“This whole thing doesn’t make any meaning, we don’t even understand it. They are behaving as if they have money but they don’t know what to do with it like General Yakubu Gowon said in the 70s. You bought 200 Toyota Jeeps for Customs, it means you really do have the money but you don’t know what to do with it. But one thing you don’t want to do with the money is to feed Nigerians, feed your workers, make your workers comfortable.

“And as you can see, they are not even giving anybody hope. There is no programme for agriculture, government is not declaring emergency on power, food security, transportation.

“So what we are expecting is that, if they tell us they cannot pay N625,000, they should tell us why they cannot pay, this is negotiation. If we have told them to pay N615,000, what we expect government to calculate how many workers that are expected to receive this minimum wage.

“We did our research, you now say each state has this workforce, this is what they are now getting as revenue forget the fact that some of them are not doing anything to increase their IGR. Whatever they are getting now from the money coming from the federal revenue account, the federal government should say, this is the number of workers that we have, this is how much that you are asking, at the end of the day, this is how much we are expected to spend as salary and this is how much we have.

“So, NLC please look at it, we don’t want to spend this percent on salary, we will then sit down and ask, if you don’t want to spend it on salary, you want to spend it by importing vehicles for Customs when you have locally manufactured vehicles that won’t cost capital flight.”

He, however said that if the government comes out with something”relevant “, the organised labour will shift ground as asked.

“We must discuss with them that the figure presented is realistic and based on facts and statistics as the organised labour has done,” he said.

He said, “For provision of food for one person, we put N500 but there is a survey carried out by the National Bureau for Statistics covering all parts of the country, NBS is the custodian of statistics and it came out with that in today Nigeria, the average you can spend for a meal is N900.

“But we went low, we took the minimum. Their average is N900 but we took the minimum of N500, that is you cannot go below the N500. So you can see how realistic we are. So we will insist that government breakdown every item. Food, hospital, accommodation, transportation etc.

“We don’t want anyone to come and say that the NLC and the TUC presented arbitrary figure.”
VANGUARD

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BREAKING: CBN Withdraws Circular On Cyber Security Levy

Published

5 hours ago

May 19, 2024

Editor

The Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN has withdrawn the circular directing banks and other financial institutions to implement the 0.5 per cent cyber security levy.

The withdrawal of the circular was announced via a statement signed by Haruna Mustafa, Director, Financial Policy and Regulation, Department and Chibuzo Efobi, Director, Payment System Management Department.

The circular stated: “The Central Bank of Nigeria circular dated May 6, 2024 (Ref. PSMD/DIR/PUB/LAB/017/004) on the above subject refers. ‘

“Further to this, please be advised that the above referenced circular is hereby withdrawn.”

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JUST IN: Tinubu Appoints Spokesperson, Ngelale, As Special Envoy On Climate Action

Published

7 hours ago

May 19, 2024

Editor

President Bola Tinubu has appointed his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Mr. Ajuri Ngelale, as Nigeria’s Special Presidential Envoy on Climate Action.

This was as he established a 25-person committee to oversee the country’s green economic initiatives.

“Ngelale will serve in this role as part of a larger Presidential Committee, to be chaired by the President,” the office of the secretary to the government of the federation revealed in a statement signed Sunday by its Director of Information and Public Relations, Segun Imohiosen.

“Ngelale will retain his role as the Official Spokesperson of the President and Special Adviser to the President on Media & Publicity while serving on the committee,” it added.

The statement is titled, ‘President Tinubu establishes a committee to oversee green economic initiatives, appoints Chief Ajuri Ngelale as special envoy on climate action.’

Imohsien said the Presidential Committee on Climate Action and Green Economic Solutions will “coordinate and oversee all policies and programmes on climate action and green economic development.”

“This is to remove the constraints to coordination, foster a whole-of-government approach to climate-action programmes, provide an efficient governance architecture, and ensure that all relevant institutions in the sector are plugged into the President’s vision and are collectively implementing the Renewed Hope Agenda on climate action,” it further explained.

The new committee which has the President as its Chairman also includes the Minister of Environment, Mr. Balarabe Lawal as its Vice-Chairman, and Mr. Ajuri Ngelale as its Secretary/Special Presidential Envoy.

Members are the CEOs of, InfraCorp, Mr. Lazarus Angbazo; National Council on Climate Change, Mr. Salisu Dahiru; Infrastructure Council Regulatory Commission, Mr. Michael Ohiani, Nigeria Investment Promotion Council, Mrs. Aisha Rimi and National Social Investment Fund, Mr. Aminu Umar-Sadiq.

The committee also consists of the CEOs of the National Agency for the Great Green Wall, Mr Yusuf Maina-Bukar, Energy Commission of Nigeria, Mr Abdullahi Mustapha; Rural Electrification Agency, Abba Aliyu; CreditCorp, Uzoma Nwagba, the National Agency for Science and Engineering Infrastructure, Khalil Halilu Member, Solid Minerals Development Fund, Fatima Shinkafi; CBN Deputy Governor (Deputy Governor, Corporate Services Directorate) Mr Bala Bello; UN SE4ALL, Lolade Abiola; Member and an Adviser to the NCCC Adviser, Teni Majekodunmi.

Others are representatives of the Federal Ministries of FCT, Finance, Industry, Trade & Investment, Water Resources, and Agriculture & Food Security.

The committee also consists of representatives from the Federal Inland Revenue Service and the Nigeria Customs Service.

The OSGF outlined eight objectives of the Presidential Committee. They are to:

“Identify, develop, and implement innovative non-oil & non-gas climate action initiatives.

“Coordinate all activities of relevant federal institutions towards the attainment of all agreed climate action and green economic objectives and non-oil/non-gas ambitions of the federal government.

“Collaborate with all relevant government, subnational governments, non-government, and civil society entities towards the attainment of the climate action objectives and ambitions of the federal government.

“Collaborate with national governments and multilateral institutions towards the attainment of the climate action objectives and carbon market ambitions of the federal government.

“Monitor, evaluate, and guide the progress of all climate action and renewable energy projects and activities of the federal government.

“Track and guide the implementation of initiatives and developments conducted by the Energy Transition Working Group.

“Supervise the work of the Presidential Steering Committee on Project Evergreen and

“Prepare a half-yearly green ambitions update, covering all associated climate action achievements of the federal government.”