AS WAS WITH BALARABE MUSA, SO IT SHOULD BE WITH TANKO AL-MAKURA

The recent threat by the Nassarawa State House of Assembly to impeach the state governor, Tanko Al-Makura of the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) reminds one of the maxim that “the more things change, the more they remain the same”.  Reading the story took me back to the second republic politics of old Kaduna State when a National Party of Nigeria (NPN) dominated House of Assembly fought a war of attrition with the Peoples Redemption (PRP) governor of the state.  The then NPN swept the country like a gale picking states at will particularly the northern states but could not win the mother lode – the old Kaduna state.  It was a shocker for the NPN and its candidate, Lawal Kaita, who to all intents and purposes was just waiting to be crowned.  While the NPN swept almost all the seats in the legislature, it performed woefully losing the gubernatorial seat to a little known accountant – Balarabe Musa.  This was unacceptable to the NPN and so began the ‘war’, which led to Balarabe’s impeachment.  The people of the state were the worst for it because in the two years that Mallam Balarabe Musa lasted, he was not allowed to perform optimally with distractions coming from the House of Assembly.  Be as it may, the PRP government was able to establish some industries like the Kachia Ginger factory and the Ikara Food Processing Company.

We can only guess what the state lost by the antics of the NPN, but from the little that was delivered by Mallam Bala, we can hazard a guess as to the unquantifiable loss the state experienced with his impeachment.  Balarabe Musa operated without commissioners for the duration of his stay in office but many people still revere him for his performance and he still remains a reference point for good governance.  The shenanigans taking place in Nassarawa state since the ascension of Al-Makura to the governor’s office reminds one of how the NPN scuttled people’s dreams because of the selfishness of the party and its members in 1981.  In the run-up to the 2011 general elections, Tanko Al-Makura a founding member of the PDP decamped to the newly registered CPC to actualise his ambition of leading Nassarawa Sate as governor, which he couldn’t realise in the PDP.  In a scene reminiscent of Kaduna in 1979, the PDP won almost all the elections held in 2011 and then lost the governorship to the CPC and Al-Makura.  The PDP holds Al-Makura responsible for its loss in Nassarawa State.

From the day Al-Makura was sworn to the present moment, the governor has not known peace from his legislators who are supposed to be his partners in carrying the state forward.  He has been jumping from one booby trap to the other.  The legislators once boycotted their legislative functions for the ridiculous reason that the governor refused to furnish their chamber – a contract awarded by the erstwhile governor when most of them were in the legislature.  But the recent threat to impeach the governor within seven days beat all else.  How does a fight between two ethnic groups constitute an impeachable offence beats my imagination.  Much as I try to see reason and logic in the threat, I couldn’t find any.  Nigeria has been practically on fire since Goodluck Jonathan became president but I cannot remember anyone threatening him with impeachment.

Ethnic and religious violence has been the hallmark of elite rivalry and has been destroying the country and tearing the nation apart and any right thinking Nigerian is trying to find solutions to these senseless killings and destructions going on.  To try to trivialise such a grave issue is tantamount to irresponsibility.  The PDP like politicising issues that they believe will advance its cause even if lives may be lost.  This attitude is exactly why you have pockets of clashes all over the country.  Authorities concerned are not interested in addressing critical questions but rather try to gain political points from such.  The recent misadventure by the group called Ombatse in Nassarawa state that led to the lost of lives of innocent Nigerians, some ordinary travellers, should under normal, rational circumstances elicit condemnation by the State House of Assembly and a call on the authorities (state and federal) to arrest and prosecute the leaders of the group.  But no.  The PDP see the disturbance of a way of issuing threats and may be finally get rid of Al-Makura, whose only offence seems the bruising of PDP’s dirty nose in the dirt.

The legislators accused the governor of lacking “competence to response to emergencies, and has shown complete disdain for the courtesy of extending relief to thousands, including women and their children, as well as the elderly, often displaced by the fast spreading violence”.  I hope federal legislators from Borno and Yobe states are listening and will take a cue from the Nassarawa State legislators.  The people of the two states (Borno and Yobe) should ask their representatives on why they are yet to issue impeachment threats against the president.  Goodluck Jonathan has not for once visited these hapless people to even show empathy, much less extend “relief”.  While he is not busy to attend the 40^th pastoral anniversary of Ayo Oritsejafor, he is always busy to visit Borno and Yobe despite the unparalleled lost of lives and destruction of economic activities in the two states under his watch.

Al-Makura was also accused by the majority leader in the House, Godiya Akwasiki, of “failing to comply with previous House resolutions to act on the raging violence and has folded his hands to watch while the people were daily being killed”.  May be I don’t get the meaning of this allegation, but are they talking about the president or Nassarawa State governor?

The NPN held the people Kaduna State to ransom and denied them the chance to be led by a bonafide welfarist.  Now it appears it is the turn of Nassarawa State and its people to be treated to the fascist’s treatment by the offshoot of the NPN.  I see the fascism that drove Balarabe Musa out of office in 1981 at play in Nassarawa State in 2012.  But if the state legislators should be foolhardy to go ahead with their threat, National Assembly members should be on notice to kick out Goodluck for the fact that while Nigeria is on fire he is playing modern day Nero – drinking expensive wine in place of Nero’s fiddle.

If the PDP as an institution wants to play this type of brinkmanship, why don’t they start with the presidency?  At least they are in control of the National Assembly.  To selectively single out Al-Makura for such a threat smacks of arrogance and bad bele.  This should be unacceptable to Nigerians wherever they may be.  We should not allow dictatorship creep in on us wearing the garb of law and order.  Granted that Al-Makura must, as the chief security officer of the state, ensure the prevalence of peace, harmony and peaceful co-existence amongst and between the disparate people of the state.  But this must be applicable to the federal government that controls all security agencies.

THE NORTH’S WRETCHED OF THE EARTH

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Whenever you think northern Nigeria has reached its nadir in the area of insecurity, we touch a new low.  With the killing of Major General Mamman Shuwa, war time General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the first Division, the situation was pushed a notch lower.  The late Shuwa was the most invisible among his peers throughout his retirement years and many people believed he died a long time ago.  His low profile life after retirement belies his larger than life stature of the folklores surrounding him while we were growing up.   Shuwa was an enigma to many people but that was the way he chose to live his life.  May his soul rest in peace.

The north has been under siege, so to say, since the middle of 2010.  The first salvo was fired in the Eagle Square during the Independence Day celebration of that year and since then the region has not known peace.  Almost every part of the region has experienced one crisis or the other; lives have been needlessly wasted and economies, both public and private, destroyed.  The level of infrastructural damage in a region with already atrophied infrastructure is mind-boggling.  This is happening to a region noted for its high level of poverty and illiteracy, high poverty level, low economic and commercial activities and dangerous rise in immorality and indolence.  The area is therefore home to the largest concentration of beggars found anywhere in the world.  These factors and bad governance by a leadership that is increasingly isolating itself from the people may largely be responsible for the insecurity situation.

Much as one may try to make excuses for our leadership (particularly the northern governors and other political leaders of the region) one is forced to admit leadership failure at all the strata of governance in the north.  The northern region has never had it so rough and I dare say no region has ever had it this tough without any fear of contradiction.  Gone were the days when parents were either forced or enticed to send their wards to school; gone also were the days when there was competition among parents as to who has the highest number of wards in the school, or the number of university graduates per household; gone also were the days when service to the community and nation supersedes personal aggrandisement.  Today the competition may be on who has the least number of students in school or which mallam has the largest body of almajirai.  Our streets are littered with street urchins, some barely out of their diapers – non-among them has a chance in hell of seeing the four walls of classroom.

My generation and the generation before enjoyed the best governments have to offer is now denying these poor souls the chance to even hope for a decent life.  We, the inheritors, are guilty of the perilous state of our communities.  We foolishly think being well off personally is tantamount to living in peace and to hell with the other guy.  Living behind high fences topped by electric or razor fence gives us a false sense of security.  We forget that those boys – those that we turned into hewers and drawers of water – venture into our houses, some to our innermost sanctums, to spy on us and see first hand how our over-pampered, children live while they scavenge our thrash cans for remnants of junk foods bought for our kids to or from school.  We invite them into our lives to come and wash for kids, sweep our houses and remove the garbage from our houses.  They see us living a life that they can only envy; yet we wonder how they become beasts without compassion.  We turned them in these beasts, wittingly or unwittingly.

We steal the money meant to educate them and send our kids abroad only for them to come back (or brought back) as graduates of drug addiction.  We pilfer the monies meant for the purchase of drugs and equipment for public hospitals to afford us the opportunity of travelling abroad for the merest ailment only for us to be brought back in caskets or strange ailments that our doctors lack the expertise or equipment to take care of.  We siphon the monies meant for the provision of potable drinking water to build boreholes in our houses.  We pinch monies for the provision of electricity and buy generators so our kids won’t miss Scooby Doo, The Simpsons, Ben10 and such other cartoons that only encourage immorality.  We are comfortable stealing funds meant to construct roads for the use of the poor and buy planes to pollute the atmosphere and air they breathe.  How did we come to this heartless century?  We that are noted for compassion are today guilty of lack of empathy.

We were given free education by our past leaders and now that we have taken up the leadership mantle have failed our younger ones and generations yet unborn.  We pretend not to know the causes of the mayhem unleashed on us by those whom we neglected and treat like dirt.  The hopelessness, their poverty and the way we throw our ill-gotten wealth at their faces are some of the things that make them behave irrationally.  We have taken away their future and that of their children, yet we think they are unreasonable.  Have we ever paused to think our roles in the creation of the monster that is now threatening to consume us?  Have we been fair to those who made it possible for us to be the successes that we belief we are today?  How did we come to this sorry pass? 

We have created a nation where injustice appears to have taken permanent residence.  Different folks are treated differently and this therefore, engender lost of faith in the country.  While pickpockets and small-time criminals are punished, armed robbers are rewarded with the country’s highest honours, appointments and contracts.  I can easily empathise with a boy who grew up on the streets, through no fault of his, when he becomes a killer for hire.  I am not justifying such behaviour but where you have a country that doesn’t care about your well-being and a president who “doesn’t give a damn” about you and your feelings, what do you expect to get?  The streets are harsh and unforgiving.

The spate of killings and property destruction sweeping across the north is a serious indictment on the leadership of the region.  They appear to be going round in circles with no clear vision as to how to bring an end to this madness.  Unfortunately they are part of the problem.  The poverty level of the region can be directly attributable to their selfish style of leadership.  For their visionless leadership style, today the economy of the north is prostate, the result is what see – unemployment spawning poverty, which breeds discontent that translate into anarchy.  While our cities and villages are burning, we pretend to find solutions in posh hotels, drinking coffee and exchanging banters while reading our mails on our Ipads, Iphones, BlackBerry and Samsung Smartphones.  Each of these gadgets is enough to send a kid to school.

The north is fast turning into a concentration of illiterates; drug addicts, morons and this invariably make people angry and suicidal.  Suicidal because they don’t have anything in life and nothing to protect.  Their lives become hopeless so therefore not worth living.  If such be their lot, why do you think they should spare you.  Shuwa is gone through the bullets fired by either an amateur or a trained killer.  His visibility, service to his community and the fact he lived all his live in the midst of the down trodden, couldn’t save him from them at the end.  Are we living the life Shuwa led?  Are we truly one with the people just like the late General?  Have we really tried to interrogate ourselves on why the region, known for its peaceful coexistence has suddenly turned to violence, where human life isn’t valued more than a dog’s?

The genesis of the violence surrounding us can be located in our governments abandoning education, making it unaffordable to the poor.  This led to the burgeoning in the number of street kids – their training ground being the streets and their teachers the criminals roaming the streets looking for gullible, innocent youths.   Thus we unwittingly created an army of killers, rapists and sundry criminals.  We created mindless, hopeless youth that will look you in the eye and shoot you dead without blinking their eyes.  We assumed in our usual fashion that we could use them as cannon fodders and scallywags during elections and discard at the end of their assignments.  To have total control over them, we introduce to hallucinogenic drugs but forgot to learn how to wean them from it.  They now take all manner of assignments to enable them satiate their thirst for the drugs.

These then are those that could kill without any emotion.  These are our legacy to the north that our parents inherited from the likes of Sardauna, Tafawa Balewa and Mahmud Ribadu.  While our first generation leaders bred first class scholars, civil servants and military officers, we have proudly procreated the demons that are consuming us.  To insult them the more, we conceived the Almajiri schools, more to give out contracts to the ‘boys’ than to cater for their education.  Why don’t we use the money so voted for these segregated schools to incorporate them into those schools where the kids of our domestic helps go to – the public schools.

We either rethink our ungodly, thieving ways or be prepared to be consumed by the hatred we are brewing in the bellies of these poor souls.

TARABA: THE HEAT IN SUNTAI’S ABSENCE- JOURNALISTS AT IT AGAIN

Our journalists and political jobbers are at it again.  In 2010 when the late President Umaru ‘Yar Adua was on his dying bed in Saudi Arabia, the vultures began circling and so much unwanted acrimony was generated which we are yet to overcome as a nation.  Danbaba Danfulani Suntai, Taraba State governor had an accident in a plane he was flying himself and his condition is still unknown.  We all pray for his recovery soonest.  But the signals emanating from the state portends danger for all the citizens of the state and all those who love the state.  I see some people trying to recreate what happened during the dying days of the ‘Yar Adua presidency.  The alleged sacking of the Deputy Governor by thugs said to be sponsored by a sitting Senator while security men attached to the Deputy Governor averted their gaze, says much about what to expect in the near future.  While the Deputy Governor was issuing press statements with a view to dousing the tension generated by the accident and its aftermath, I read a feature in the Daily Trust of November 1^st, 2012 by its Taraba State Correspondents Messrs. Andrew Agbese & Terkula Igidi with the above caption.  I felt scandalised.  Despite what transpired in the run-up to Jonathan taking over from ‘Yar Adua and the attendant friction it created in our society, some people are still ready to take us down that road again.

The feature was nothing but a subtle way of turning one segment of the society against the other.  Otherwise, what is the use of amending the said section 190 of the Constitution, which they copiously quoted?  I thought the section was amended to take care of such eventualities and prevent the recurrence of the unnecessary situation that arose in the ‘Yar Adua case.  If I understand the quoted section of the Constitution very well, the question of which Senatorial Zone or which religion one professes doesn’t arise.  A Deputy Governor / Vice President is picked precisely for what the duo of Agbese and Igidi are now trying to use to ‘disqualify’ Alhaji Umar Garba, the Taraba State Deputy Governor.  When those calling for Goodluck Jonathan to take over were in their elements, nobody brought up the issue of his faith or Zone and when ‘Yar Adua’s handlers resisted the move, the Senate passed what it called the “doctrine of necessity”, something alien to our laws.  We all accepted the Senate’s wisdom.  For the duo to imply that Patrick Yakowa was opposed because of his faith in Kaduna is a blatant lie with a mischievous intent.  He was the Deputy Governor and there wasn’t any ambiguity in our Constitution as who shall take over once there is a vacancy in the Government House so long as the tenure the Governor and his Deputy for which they were elected has not expired. 

No one opposed the take-over by both Goodluck Jonathan and Patrick Yakowa at the time the conditions of vacancies emerged in their respective political spheres.  As far as I am concerned, Jonathan and his group created a panicky scenario where northern politicians, depicted as desperately attempting to cling to power by all means, fair or foul, were trying to deny him his right to “ascend” the throne.  My take then was that it was indecent for us to be fighting over ephemeral things like the presidency while the holder of that office was lying prostrate before His maker, waiting for Him to do as He decreed.  It was disrespectful to his family and friends that we could be so heartless as to start “sharing” his inheritance while he was still alive and kicking.  But I know that every living soul must taste death.  Do we have guarantees that Danbaba will not outlive Alhaji Garba Umar or any of his plethora of loyalists who wanted to be identified as those who protected the realm in the emperor’s absence? 

If it were alright for both Jonathan and Yakowa to succeed their bosses when vacancies existed, then equity demands that Alhaji Umar shall also take-over – it is just a matter of time.  Endangering hatred between and among the disparate ethnic groups in the state will not help anyone bar the merchants of hate.  The writers’ resort to this underhand way of giving credence to those who want section 190 of the Constitution be interpreted to reflect their narrow prisms and horizons, makes them more guilty than the purported thugs who invaded the government house while the security operatives deployed to protect the Deputy Governor looked the other way.  Sub-section (2) of section 190 clearly spells what ought to happen in the case of Taraba State.  The section states unequivocally that “In the event that the governor is unable to transmit the written declaration mentioned in sub-section (1)  of this section within 21 days, the House of Assembly shall, by a resolution made by a simple majority of the vote of the House, mandate the Deputy Governor to perform the functions of the Governor as Acting Governor, until the Governor transmits a letter to the Speaker that he is now available to resume his functions as a Governor.  So said the Nigerian Constitution and concurred by our duo.

As things stand today, Alhaji Umar Garba is the Deputy Governor of Taraba, and until such a time as he is impeached, he remains the Deputy Governor.   We will wait and see if Danbaba may stay beyond the stipulated 21 days or not outside the state.  We will also not relent in our prayers for his recovery.  Morbid as it may sound, I had been looking forward to such a scenario where a principal is indisposed for one reason or the other and a deputy may be compelled to act.  It may appear we have not learnt any lesson from the ‘Yar Adu’a case.  For (un)biased journalists to take such a route portends so much danger for the populace – but more dangerous is for such a paper as the Daily Trust to publish such without minding its ramifications. 

For the information of Agbese and Igidi, Muslim political leaders promoted Yakowa’s candidature in the main and he wasn’t “opposed” to step up to the governor’s office – it was just a matter of taking over and appointing another deputy governor.  Same applied to the presidency when ‘Yar Adu’a died.  If the “odds do not favour a Muslim becoming a governor in Taraba State”, in this case, we have to resort to the Constitution and wait till election time and reject a ‘Muslim’ candidate.  But as it was with Jonathan, so it should be with Alhaji Garba Umar.  This does not mean I have written off Danbaba, God forbid.

OUR DIVIDED & COLLAPSING COUNTRY

This generation of Nigerians may as well be the last set of Nigerians if the record of Goodluck Jonathan’s leadership quality and style is anything to go by. A leadership steeped in ethnic assertiveness and abrasiveness with a ‘to hell with you’ attitude towards anyone outside the creeks of the Niger Delta.  A style of leadership based on provincialism, peopled by militants (ex or not), old men once indicted by a reformist government now desperately trying to reinvent themselves because ‘their son’ is in the saddle and pseudo-intellectuals like Atedo Peterside, who got the best opportunities Nigeria had to offer.  Goodluck’s government is fuelled by exploiting the fault lines in our body politics – regional, religious and ethnic – and this is why I belief, if allowed to continue, will bring the end of the country as we know it today.  I say this with all sense of responsibility.

The manifestations of this dangerous style of leadership reared its ugly head right from when Goodluck was Vice President and was desperate to shove aside the then sick ‘Yar Adu’a.  Goodluck had to rely on whipping sentiments to make his case and thus began the ascension of ethnicity in national discourse. Dinosaurs like Edwin Clark were resurrected from the dead to make a case for one of “their own”.  The north was blackmailed (of course with the connivance of some northern Quislings) into feeling guilty and the national assembly concocted a so-called ‘doctrine of necessity’, a contraption alien to the Constitution, just to please a segment of the country.  The rest, as the say is history.  Goodluck’s campaign last year was a defining moment for the country because at a point in time we were threatened with Armageddon should in case Goodluck was not elected.  The threat was given by no less a person than the minister of Information, Labaran Maku.  Rather than this dangerous brinkmanship diminishing, it is escalating and subtly adopted as state policy.  With the likes of Asari Dokubo, a confessed killer, joining the fray, I am afraid we are beginning to see the makings of the end of Nigeria as it exist today.

The most recent brinkmanship by Goodluck’s people is the recent declaration of autonomy by the Ogoni people, the unending insults and blame game on northern leaders by Clark, the passage of a law by the Bayelsa State legislature on state anthem, flag and coat of arms, the declaration of independence by the people of Bakassi and the incoherent threats by Dokubo of starving the north by denying them access to the ports to ‘import’ food and bringing out the guns.  The common denominator for these acts – south – south.  What is of interest to me is the lack of reaction from the federal government with the minister of information telling Nigerians that government isn’t aware of the declaration of autonomy by the Ogoni people led by Goodluck Jonathan’s namesake – Goodluck Diigbo.  That is the height of insult to poor struggling Nigerians.  It took the SSS (the secret police) less than forty-eight hours to “invite” Pastor Tunde Bakare for delivering a sermon on ‘How to Change Government Peacefully’.  May be because Pastor Bakare is not from the south – south.  The seditious nature of the actions of Diigbo and the Bakassi people was not viewed as serious as that of a harmless Pastor’s homily.  Is the federal government sending the wrong signal to Nigerians? Are we therefore to infer that while some get away with murder, others won’t?

The government of Goodluck Jonathan will go down in history as the government that polarised Nigeria the most.  The acrimony of his ascension was based on the fact some people decided to build his case purely on his ethno-religious identity.  His campaign put more emphasises on this same ethno-religious hue than on any tangible programme or manifesto and his government seem to be stoking the embers for the continuation of this same dangerous trend.  I am not optimistic that Nigeria will survive this bluster if the president continues to tow this path.  But be as it may, if the country breaks up in the foreseeable future, are northern governors and northerners prepared to face a future without ‘federal allocation’?  Are we truly building structures and infrastructures meant to endanger economic growth and prosperity?  Where are those northerners running from pillar to post just a year ago telling us that Goodluck is the best thing to happen to Nigeria?

While states in the south are involved in one economic programme or the other, our governors are busy buying up estates in Dubai, South Africa and Europe.  Or building new government houses that does not have any economic impact on the populace.  It is okay for Clark or Dokubo to insult us as long as the oilfields in their backyards can continue to fund our consumerism.  Our insatiable thirst for corruption has made us shameless and undignified.  Genuflecting before Dokubo or Tompolo is now the fad.

While Goodluck Jonathan belief it is okay to “allocate” to Dokubo, Tompolo, Ateke Tom and Boyloaf $40million per annum to “guard” pipelines, our governors are retching up issues that the presidency believed are “settled” while some are going round with a begging bowl asking the deaf to give them more.  How did we come to this sorry pass? Where are those so-called leaders who always claim to be working for our interests?  Am yet to hear anyone condemn the “allocations” to these militants who can cause their underlings to drive all the way to Abuja without fear of molestation by security personnel.  While all northern cities are turned into barracks, with gun totting soldiers at every corner, bringing to a halt most businesses, militants can have unfettered access to the nations capital, driving from the creeks in convoys.  Our leaders, those at the front row of Goodluck’s campaign train, are nowhere to be found now that the chips are down.  The poor are left to their devices and this is what we are reaping in the form of unmitigated violence.

This attitude of the leadership is, in my view, what makes the Boko Haram tick.  The spate of terrorism has nothing to do with religion or ethnicity but rather a product of ‘use and dump’ insolence of our political class.  These boys are denied education and therefore denied any future.  With no stake in a polity they believe they had a hand in making, they turn to violence in order to vent their bottled up anger.  They lay waste whatever they survey indiscriminately.  This monster has to be tackled by our governors and other leaders of the region even if the federal government is lukewarm about tackling it.  If we fail, then we should be prepared for the long-term effect of this madness.

While Goodluck is pampering his kindred (the militants), our governors believe they can wish Boko Haram away. Getting angry at Clark, Goodluck or any of the lot seems to be a misplacement of anger.  Our anger should be directed at our leaders to make them realise the folly of their ways.  We do not want more allocation from the federal government.  All we want is a conducive economic environment from our leadership.  

We now have a Nigeria of haves and have nots, south-south and the rest of us.  And this is dangerous because the have nots are in the northern part of the country.  I hope we won’t be last set people to hold a Nigerian passport.  But if that is going to be for the best, so be it.

COL. DASUKI & THE PREVAILING SECURITY SITUATION

The recent tinkering of the leadership personnel of the Defence establishment by President Jonathan even it be cosmetic, appear to wake up some people from a self-imposed slumber.  For whatever it is worth, the visits by the new National Security Adviser (NSA) Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) to the theatres of war have shown those bearing the brunt of the terrorists that some people still care about their plight.  The president failed to visit both Borno and Yobe states, the centres of the Boko Haram carnage giving as an excuse the lack of functionality of the Maiduguri Airport (the shame of it) for his non visit but his erstwhile NSA, Owoye Azazi couldn’t even glorify the people by giving an excuse, no matter how laughable.  The people are really appreciative of the NSA’s visit to empathise with them on the siege they have been under in the past two years.

But the visit alone cannot solve the people’s problems and they are waiting for the NSA to start acting.  Thankfully Col. Dasuki informed Nigerians that he has obtained the phone numbers of those to be contacted for dialogue on how to bring an end to the state of insecurity facing the country, particularly the north.  Col. Sambo has clearly shown his intentions of dealing with the macabre dance of those attempting to bring the north in particularly to its knees, by hitting the ground running.  But as far as I can see there are those who want to ensure that he failed woefully in his attempt.  The renewed and sustained attacks on northern cities is indicative of the desire of the merchants of death to make a statement – of particular interest is the attacks on Police formations in Sokoto state, the home state of the NSA. 

Islam clearly prohibits fighting (war) during certain months, the Ramadan inclusive, so it is clear to all discerning and objective minds that those carrying out these attacks are either not Muslims or do not understand their religion very well.  My gut feeling tells me they are fifth columnists with the intention of giving Islam a bad name and in the process achieve two things – both very dangerous to the corporate existence of the country.  One, to create a religious divide between Christians and Muslims particularly in the north; and two, two cripple economic activities in the region.  They appear to be succeeding on both fronts.  Before the madness in Sokoto, there was the massacre in Plateau state, which ultimately led to the death of a Senator and a member of the state legislature.  This came almost immediately after the visit of the new NSA to the state.  All these things appear funny to me and doesn’t have any linkage to religion nor could be simplistically explained as a reaction by northerners who are bitter for losing power to the south.  Truth be told, if the government and its functionaries are ready to get to the bottom of the madness, all they have to do is fall back on what one of its own began and was truncated midway.

When Major General Mungonu, erstwhile Chief of Defence Intelligence (CDI), beamed his searchlight on “Boko Haram” he came close to discovering those behind the killers and before you say ‘Goodluck’ he was removed from office.  But before he was removed, he made startling progress that points to certain politicians from his home state as being the men behind the masks.  Of particular interest was the immediate past governor, Ali Modu Sherriff.  Mungono was threatened to discontinue his line of investigation or be removed, or worse still, lose his Commission.  All these were made public in the run-up to his removal.  Sponsored media articles against him appeared with regularity in newspapers and the threat finally came to pass.  Mungonu’s investigation pointed directly to the former governor but in a bizarre move that can only happen in Nigeria, Mungonu was removed as CDI and Sherriff was appointed Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP).  While the General was sent to the cooler, Sherriff is on the way to rehabilitating his battered image.

After Mungonu’s ouster, the spate of attacks heightened with the attendant loss of lives and property because the tell-tale clues he was pursuing were deliberately allowed to fizzle out by redirecting the energies of the intelligence agencies to phantom suspects who couldn’t be allowed to see the four walls of a court room.  To compound the deliberate bungling, we have the State Security Service (SSS) and the Police working at cross-purpose on the same case.  The two agencies always parade different suspects on a particular case, or one service contradicting the other as in the case of the Radio House bomber.  Nigerians came to be cynical about the sincerity of the security and intelligence services and had the distinct impression that somebody, somewhere is lying to protect some people.

A lot of arrests have been made with each suspect branded as the ‘mastermind’, yet non of theses ‘masterminds’ was taken to the courts for prosecution much less conviction.  Are Nigerians then to believe that the government is not interested in getting to the bottom of this “boko haram” issue?  What happens to people like Ali Tishaku, a SSS operative embedded in to the boko haram hierarchy that was to be denied by his employers after ‘coming in from the cold’ with a report that was not in conformity with the current thinking in the SSS?  He had to go to the court to get his freedom from an employer he served diligently.  Where is he and what happened to his report?

With Col. Sambo as the NSA, we believe he will first of all bring to an end this inter-agency rivalry and pursue the real culprits and bring them to court for all Nigerians to see.  The likes of Munguno and Tishaku may be of immense help to the NSA’s cause of bringing to an end the mayhem and destructions in the country given their past participation in curbing the madness.  After all, Lamorde was once kicked out of the EFCC, but recognising his knowledge of the Commission, he was brought back to head the place.

THE NORTH UNDER SIEGE

Let me begin this piece by extending my heartfelt sympathies to all those who lost their lives in the killing spree going on in the north in the past two years.  Those who lost people near and dear to them must have gone through traumatic experiences while trying to understand the madness sweeping across the region.  Human life in the north is today ten a dime.  With governments at all levels folding their arms and pretending helplessness while killers are cutting short lives and visiting anguish on innocent people.  The impunity with which murderers operate knowing that nobody will arrest them and bring them to justice makes it more painful to those who lose their loved ones.  I pray God should give them the fortitude to bear their irreplaceable loses

The frequency of these killings escalated, incidentally, with the ascension of Goodluck Jonathan to the presidency of the country equally as well the impunity of the killers increased directly to the longevity of Goodluck in the Aso Villa.  The north has become a basket case, no matter how one look at the situation – politically, economically, socially or otherwise.  By now, I want to believe the intention of those oiling the killing machine ought to be clear to anyone interested in knowing.  It is my personal opinion that their intention is twofold – first, the complete destruction of all commercial activities in the region and second, to engender religious crisis in the region.  The first was achieved by ensuring that places like Jos, Maiduguri and Kano, hitherto major commercial hubs in the region are down and out.  People go to these places only if it is absolutely necessary.  What remains for them is the second objective, which is the spawning of religious crisis in the north.  After killing thousands in Jos, Maiduguri, Yola, Bauchi, Kano and Gombe without achieving their aim, they have resorted to bombing churches on Sundays when the churches are full to capacity with worshippers.  The reactions to the bombings in Zaria and Tirkana in Kaduna appear to have fulfilled the objectives of these unscrupulous people.

With the killings going on in Kaduna, those that want the north on bended knees will be patting each other on the back that they have finally found the North’s soft spot and may continually hit its underbelly until such a time the religious conflagration spreads throughout the region.  With all the contrived attacks on worship places, non achieved what Kaduna did and may even have surpassed the expectations of the perpetrators.  With the destruction of Jos, Maiduguri, Kano and Kaduna the north has effectively being brought to its knees.  For those jubilating, this is a culmination of a project began well before the country achieved flag independence.  What politicians of the first and second republics failed to accomplish in a lifetime of trying despite their best efforts, was achieved in thirteen years.  This is a made possible by compromising greedy, visionless and focusless politicians from the region whose main interest is the accumulation of wealth and continued relevance or lack of it not minding whose underwear they wash.

Almost half a century after the murders of Balewa, Sardauna and those crops of selfless politicians, who were on their way to positioning the region into one of the biggest regional economic powers within the country, their heirs have turned the region into the biggest colony of beggars the whole world over.  Northern politicians in this dispensation have become shameless and uncaring and are completely disconnected with the people that they do not care the number of bodies that litter our streets as long as they will be appointed into any government even it is headed by the devil himself. 

Northern Nigeria is gradually descending into chaos and may very well turn into another Somalia, God forbid. There is no certainty of seeing a whole day out for anyone except those who go around with a convoy of fierce looking, gun wielding security men who shoot first and ask after.  A region that was known as the economic power house of the nation all over the world is today without a single industry that employs up to two hundred people full time.  Successive governors of the region neglected two critical sectors in the area – agriculture and education.  And the two happen to be the drivers of development.  But the prize for the criminal neglect, thievery and selfishness goes to the current crop of governors who operate as if the section dealing with conscience in their brains has been removed.  Their policies succeeded in spawning the current state of insecurity that we find ourselves in today.   Kids that are supposed to be in school are on the street while their age mates, the kids of the high and mighty, pass them by on their way to or from school.  These kids may well turn out to be our undoing not any religious differences.

We have seen the federal government through the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Niger Delta Ministry and the Amnesty Programme office, have been sending their kids abroad for training in skills acquisition.  Why can’t our governors start such a programme locally in order to take these unfortunate kids off our streets, which in my opinion, will minimise the menace of wanton killings and destructions of properties that we are daily confronted with.  The heirs to the first and second republic politicians in the region are only interested in the education of their kids and the amassing of wealth that may either take them to jail or die without utilising.  While the north is burning, they have continuously kept a deafening silence.

To my Christian brethren in the north, I would like to say let’s start using our heads rather than our hearts.  It is becoming apparent that somebody somewhere is bent on making sure Muslims and Christians in the north are continuously at each others throats while whatever agenda they have is gradually and successfully unfolded & implemented.  In none of the cities that have experienced violence has the governments (states and federal) shown any sense of responsibility by quickly nipping potential troubles in the bud.  They always sit back and watch while Christians and Muslims kill each other.  If we are sincere and set aside sentiments, how many of those arrested are ever taken to court?  What becomes of them after the arrests?  And if I may ask, how many of those arrested with explosives or guns are Muslims?  Why is it only mutilated bodies are labelled as boko haram but those arrested in the act of burning churches are either hypnotised, have issues with their churches or madmen?  We should be demanding for answers from our governors not killing each other.

Creating killer colonies like Gonin Gora or Riyom will only exacerbate our distrust for each other rather than solve any problem.  They do not advance the cause of either of the religions nor should any religion be in completion with the other.  They are rather injuries to all not just Muslims and us.  The reaction of the residents of Gonin Gora is directly responsible for the bloodletting in Kaduna and this has been going on since 2000 with no government ready to do anything about it.  Whenever they struck, the Abuja – Kaduna highway is effectively closed to all.  Also the curfew imposed on the people of Kaduna is on everybody not just Muslims.  So we all bear the brunt with all its economic and social consequences.  And where is your president?  Off to the Brazilian beaches with a retinue of one hundred and sixteen hangers-on.

We are being systematically destroyed by the twin evils of religion and ethnicity.  They destroyed our unity and communality, something the region was known for and envied, discourage our interaction and steal our peace by creating a siege mentality and sowing hatred amongst us.  We then unwittingly fall into the traps set for us by our elites for their benefits that come at the expense of the rest of us.  It is my hope that we can, collectively as northerners, overcome our primordial sentiments for the collective good of the region.  As the Yorubas will say, Arewa, Ronu.

YES TO SOVEREIGN NATIONAL CONFERENCE

The recurring call for the convening of a national conference – sovereign or otherwise – is more and more sounding like a broken record.  But to me, the call is sounding more like a bargain or blackmail tool, which some people use from time to time to help them achieve certain objectives.  This is very okay with me because it shows a sense of purpose on the part of those using this particular tool for gaining advantage in every national discourse so far.  What riles me is the perception of some of us that the convocation of the conference will be to our disadvantage.  I cannot fathom what informs this line of reasoning by, particularly the political class of the north.  The call for the convocation of the conference has been on since after the Beninoise convoked their own and booted out Matthew Kerekou.  This also coincided with Babangida’s annulment of the June 1992 election, which some ethnic bigots fortuitously interpreted to mean that a section of the country is against the presidency by a Yoruba man.  So for all intents and purposes, those calling for a Sovereign National Conference are simply copycats and also merely ethnic champions masquerading as nationalists.

In the years between 1992 to date, there have been at least two national conferences that readily come to mind.  The one convoked by the late General Sani Abacha in 1995 – 96 that succeeded in fractionalising the country further into six geo-political zones by adopting the Ekwueme model and the one called by Obasanjo in 2004 – 2005 to specifically amend the constitution to make way for his ambition to rule Nigeria for as long as he lives.  These are the two that readily come to my mind and from where I am sitting none addressed the myriad problems we are faced with as a nation.  Rather, the Abacha conference succeeded in breaking up the north into three “zones” – a project began in the 1960s and a lifelong ambition for some.  Though they have succeeded in splitting the north, the region’s politicians helped in no small measure in bringing this reality to fruition by either being complicit or docile in some instances.  Today, northern Nigeria is the most fractured of the entire pre-military foray into politics in 1966.  This fractionalisation, sadly, is not only physical but also mental.

The call this time may not be unconnected with the ill-advised call for the revision of the revenue allocation formula by some northern politicians, particularly our governors.  In all the previous conferences, the north got the short end of the stick due to our self-imposed roles of guardians of the sanctity of the unity of Nigeria.  But we always come out bruised literally and metaphorically.  The region is perceived by outsiders as weak and a burden to the rest of the country due to the way it has been projected by our politicians in the last thirty years or so.  Flowing from leadership failure at all levels in the north, we are more fractured today than at any point in history.  The region is racked with crisis that is destroying what remains of its commercial activities; our governors and other leaders care less what happens in critical sectors like education, health and agriculture; our youth are ill-equipped to face the challenges of present day world because since they are not “ex-militants” government doesn’t care whether they go to school or not; and our elders are all busy playing the ostrich while the region is gradually sinking into pre-historic times with mini-wars raging all across the region.  If these problems are not enough to call for a conference, then I shall be damned! 

I am all for a national conference (sovereign or not) for all the “ethnic nationalities” to come together and chart a way for either our continued existence as a country or for the breakup of Nigeria into 250 or more countries.  But before then, I would like to call on the conveners to carry out a census of the “ethnic nationalities” with a view to determining who is what so that ALL should be represented.  This is to avoid a problem where all northerners can be lumped into a convenient contraption called ‘Hausa. Fulani’.  This will raise more questions than provide answers.  Beginning from my state, Adamawa State, I know a Yofo man will never allow himself to be represented by a Yandang or Gengle or Sate nor a Chamba Leko be represented by a Chamba Ganye.  In the Numan Federation alone, the Bachamas are distinct from the Mbulas, the Battas, Lungudas, Kanakurus and the Kwas.  The Mumuye of Tola has nothing in common with the Chamba of the area.  The Fulanis have the Wuitis, the Kesus, the Ba’en and the Mbororos.  The Veres of Fufore don’t see eye to eye with their Batta neighbours.  In Karim Lamido local government of neighbouring Taraba State, you have twenty-seven distinct “ethnic nationalities”.  This is the local government that the late Deputy Inspector General Police, John Haruna came from.

I am pointing out these “nationalities” to educate some of us on the diversity of the “nationalities” that make up Nigeria because as I write this piece, I am already all set for the conference and I would not like to be part of any talk shop regarding the future of Nigeria that one single “nationality” will be excluded from.  We have seen how every subset of a tribe call itself a “race”, a “nation” and a “kingdom” in the last thirteen or so years.  Therefore, to give every local potente his dues, I suggest that every subset be represented at the conference table.  The hunger that drives the rise in ethnic assertiveness must be satiated for we, the poor to have peace of mind otherwise the demon unleashed by politicians who are comfortable in being ethnic chauvinists than truly community or national leaders will devour us all.  The fad now is that whoever fails to make an impact on a larger platform retreats to his ‘laager’ for relevance.

Northern politicians, community and business leaders screaming for an increase in the allocation of federally generated revenue will do well for the region to get cracking on how to prepare for the inevitable national conference.  They must also prepare an economic blueprint for the region because we will very soon be weaned from suckling the crude oil tit that we, as we are being told to our face, contributed nothing in its production, transportation, refining or even retailing.  I am thinking of going into the processing of cow products (being a mbororo, you know).  I am looking for partners to start the processing of things like fresh milk & yoghurt, kpomo and transportation of frozen meat because my agenda does not include interstate transportation of live animals.

Such a conference may be the only way to awaken us from our oil-induced stupor to rediscover our dignity and revive our economy and other institutions of the region inherited from those founding fathers of the north long gone to the beyond but still remain our reference point.  If nineteen governors cannot manage the New Nigerian Newspapers, NNDC, Arewa Textiles and various BCGs scattered all over the north, then it is time to sit and consider turning over the region to our traditional rulers, whom the British used during the days of indirect rule.  Those were the days when the north was feared and respected by all.  Not now when a suspected armed robber turned “militant” will be rewarded with a $103million contract for insulting the collective people of a whole region.

IN OIL THEY TRUST

It is now becoming crystal clear to me why and at what price northern leaders, temporal and spiritual, sold out the North to the likes of Asari Dokubo, Ateke Tom, Tompolo and the rest.  The recent calls by our political elites led by Babangida Aliyu, Niger State governor, for an increment in their “share” of the federal revenue allocation, gave us a window to what it is all about.  Their price is nothing more than their continued stay in office to resume funding their voraciousness from the oil proceeds dispensed from Abuja.  Their commodity for sale?  The collective present and future of the region, its people and its economy.

While the average northerner is struggling to survive one day at a time and therefore doesn’t have the time or inclination to find out what happens to what is already ‘allocated’ to his state, our governors are finding it difficult maintaining their lifestyles, with their “share” of the oil money that is becoming more outrageous by the day.  While over 95% of northerners cannot afford to eat three times a day, or send their kids to school, or even take their pregnant wives to the hospital for safe delivery, Babangida Aliyu went to town with a begging bowl ostensibly on behalf of northerners to beg for an increment in their monthly ‘stipend’, which a friend called “irresponsibility allowance” for our governors.  I have been wondering how any such increment will impact on the lives of the people of the north, who have seen the deterioration of infrastructures in the region in the past thirteen years – schools, hospitals, roads, manufacturing concerns and agricultural activities.  In the same vein, Dubai, England and Germany have stealthily entered the everyday lexicon of the poor, because on a daily basis he is told his chief executive is in one of the countries visiting either as a medical tourist or on vacation.

Watching the Yoruba elites unfold what they called Developmental Agenda for Western Nigeria (DAWN) made me wish I had such focused leaders as our “rulers”.  The people of the old western region, despite their unmatched educational, infrastructural and developmental levels are still determined enough, committed enough and honest enough to think of a collective developmental agenda for their people without a thought as to whether the federal government will increase or decrease states’ share from the federation account, or even think that the oil wells may very soon dry or any force majeure.  Lagos State at a point in time during the Obasanjo presidency went for more than two years without its allocation for local governments.  We did not see Tinubu, the then Lagos State governor grovelling before Obasanjo or wailing for the release of what was rightfully theirs.  Yet northern leaders are begging Ali Baba (as in Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves) to increase their own share of the ‘loot’.  I am yet to read anywhere of a governor in the north unfolding plans on how to improve his state’s Internally Generated Revenue (IGR). 

When countries like Vietnam, South Africa, Thailand, Taiwan and even Japan with smaller land mass and population than the north, are tilling their soil and maximising their human potentials to become economic powers, our leadership is making an issue out of revenue allocation.  Why should the allocation to northern states be increased?  What moral or fiduciary justification do Babangida Aliyu and his colleagues have to call for such a sacrilege?  Is he trying to turn every northerner into a servant because he is one?  We are already almajiris and parasites but to add servitude to the legion of our negatives will be too much for anyone to bear. 

My advice to Babangida Aliyu and those who clamour for more money to fund their consumerism is to put their acts together by exploring and exploiting the resources found in their respective domains, rather than looking down south for succour.  They should, for instance, come out with an agricultural blueprint that will take the north to at least back to the 1960s.  Our present crop of leadership has succeeded in taking us into the 12th century and it appears that they are proud of their achievement.  They have spawned Boko Haram and turned its violence into a franchise.  I have always maintained that the Boko Haram is an offshoot of political thuggery created and nurtured by our leaders.  Such groups like the ECOMOG in Borno of Ali Sheriff and the Kalare of Goje’s Gombe can easily be turned into killer squads.  With no education or jobs and therefore nothing to live for, they could be available to any would be mischief-maker.  To people like this, whose hands are soiled with the blood of innocent political opponents, it is better to commit suicide than to remain hopeless.  With their principal employers now out of government houses, no “work” is readily available.

While the northern political leadership see nothing wrong in begging an increasingly recalcitrant Niger Delta militants for scraps, and while falling head over heels in trying to outdo each other in eulogising Ojukwu, a man directly responsible for the massacre of over a million souls and vicariously responsible for the total wipe-out of post-independence northern political and military leadership, the atrophied infrastructure of the north is bombed out of existence.  Do they really care about how the families of the Balewas, Sardaunas, Akintolas, Ogundipes, Maimalaris, Pams, Largemas et al, may be feeling.  While they were busy rewriting history by helping turn a rebel into a statesman, has it occurred to them that it is the same money they are complaining as being inadequate that will, if properly applied, turn the north into an economic Eldorado.

Our leaders are very comfortable importing rice from distant lands like Brazil and Thailand while our land lies fallow.  Let us not even talk about mineral resources.  Let us just assume we are not going to dig further than is necessary to plant a seed.  The north is blessed with vast arable land, with a rainfall of about 1000mm per annum, which is just right for farming, many rivers, lakes and streams and a population looking for what to do.  What are we doing with these God given resources? Nothing!  This crime is on a par with genocide, as far as I am concerned.  I am strongly of the opinion that resources should be controlled 100% by inhabitants of where the resources are located.  Northern governments and northerners should be denied access to any revenue accruing from oil sales so that we may be forced to look inwards. 

The South Africans extracted fuel from coal during the apartheid regime when sanctions were imposed on the country.  It is a proven fact that the north is literally awash with coal but since the advent of the ill-fated Lagos state/ ENRON IPP project up to this moment, no single northern state deemed it necessary to generate its independent power supply and, therefore, our economy is at the mercy of PHCN.  While most industries in the south can rely on gas as an alternative power supply, nothern industries had to fold up for lack of power.

Mr Jonathan, please if you can do us a favour – the northern lumpen, that is – STOP THE MONTHLY FEDERAL MONTHLY ALLOCATIONS.