Clay Richie

I thought former Nigeria leader Goodluck Jonathan was writing his biography.  It turns out the former president has been busy writing revisionist history instead.

Since he was fired as the head of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission by President Muhammadu Buhari Dr. Sam Amadi has never seen anything good in the Buhari administration. Before now, he has been supporting corrupt people and other criminal elements who are on trial. That should not surprise the Nigerian people since he served in the most corrupt government in the history of Africa. But out of sheer mischief,  he has decided to twist the law by challenging the powers of President Buhari to set a panel of inquiry. Although it is common knowledge that every head of government has since 1960, set up panels of inquiry to investigate the conduct of public officers, civil disturbances, electoral violence and human rights abuse it has now suddenly become illegal and unconstitutional in the wild imagination of Dr. Amadi.

Since April 25, 2017, millions of Nigerians, international security and diplomatic monitors of Nigeria have been witnessing two contrasting images of the country of an estimated 170 million. One image is that of President Muhammadu Buhari. The other is the controversial profile of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the IPOB (Indigenous People of Biafra) movement. Ironically, Buhari's government detention and refusal to respect lawful orders of the courts for almost two years regarding the release or granting of bail escalated Kanu's profile, globally. It sharpened the contrast with implications.

President Muhammadu Buhari’s government is seriously challenged. That is the truth and nothing but the truth. We can choose to play the Ostrich and sink our heads deep in the sand but then our nakedness is obvious from the back. The impression I am getting is that the factionalisation, or is it the fractionalisation, of Aso Rock has become so deep that except something drastic is done now, the damage may last even beyond the life of this administration. In my young life, I have never seen a Nigerian government so openly divided against itself as this one. This is ironic because Buhari is assumed to be a strong leader, at least as a man with military background.

Undoubtedly, the last thing President Muhammadu Buhari wants to put up with now are blunders that will bring unnecessary attention to how well he should be performing in managing the country.

At 74 Muhammadu Buhari is the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces. He came to power in May 2015 after winning a landmark presidential poll of the same year. He was subsequently sworn into office on the 29th May. After three failed attempts to democratically capture power at the apex he finally made it to Aso Rock Villa through the opposition All Progressives Congress in a blaze of glory. Nigeria then needed desperately a change at the center and Nigerians wanted same given the rampaging uncontrollable corruption and the growing insurgency in the north-east spearheaded by Boko Haram. Millions of Nigerians felt that a Buhari presidency would stabilize the polity and win the war against both corruption and Boko Haram. Today, two years on, very few are disappointed with Buhari as he has done very well fighting the two monsters.

The extremely controversial employment exercise by the SSS is generating ripples in the country. A report by Premium Times (also published by Sahara Reporters) indicates that while Katsina state had 51 persons, all the southeast states had a combined total of 44 persons. Such preferential treatment is not new. The reinstatement of Major General Ahmadu Mohammed, who was implicated in the killings of over 600 civilians, is one recent example. General Mohammed was reportedly retired in 2014 for reasons unconnected to the killings, according to an Amnesty International report. He was surreptitiously brought back to the military in early 2016 during a period in which several officers had been dismissed, demoted or jailed for lesser offenses.

Fellow Nigerians, anyone familiar with CNN International would readily know the name and face of an unusually dramatic presenter, Richard Quest, widely known and acclaimed for his popular programme “Quest Means Business”. This journalist with a tinge of eccentricity has been in Nigeria all this week. If he is still in town and able to read this, let me say a big Nigerian welcome to him, before I move on to the meat of my epistle this week.

If, like me, you supported a change of government in 2015 and have been asking yourself why, then you should read the new book by leading columnist and Chairman of ThisDay Editorial Board, Olusegun Adeniyi. Adeniyi’s book, entitled, Against the Run of Play, is the most eloquent single contemporary repository of why former President Goodluck Jonathan had to go.

The Abuja disease is a peculiar affliction in Nigerian politics. It refers to the tendency of an actor with otherwise modest endowment or from humble station to transmute to a monstrous creature once he/she enters the nation's capital and begins to frequent the power circles.

The three key issues that constitute the topic of this presentation – Unity, Diversity and National Development – are among Nigeria’s greatest challenges. Unity has been a scarce commodity among our country’s diverse peoples and communities, as a consequence of the way and manner the country was put together by British colonial authorities and our collective failure as a people to create a true and viable nation out of the union. This has become a major source of disquiet, anxiety and frustration and a veritable obstacle to national development.

If the United Kingdom’s Foreign Minister, Boris Johnson, can describe the Leader of the Opposition Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, as a “mutton-headed old mugwump” and an “Islington herbivore” how on earth should we describe our very own President Muhammadu Buhari in Nigeria?

Good day folks! It would always be a good day in Nigeria until the Federal Republic of Nigeria is rechristened; maybe- the Federal Republic of Corruption as one won’t be left to think otherwise and hope for a better day since the rate at which the menace is taking shape and breaking new grounds is endemic. The proselytizing effect of the menace is even more worrisome than the menace itself as Nigerians can’t live a day without breathing the air of Corruption. It is as conspicuous as an albino in a Ghanaian market. Like MTN, it is everywhere you go even in the most sacred place. The acts of corruption I saw during my incarceration in prison would be an account during another musing period.

Oluyemi Oluleke Osinbajo. I have followed this professor of law for nearly a decade, and I’ve admired him from a distance all the while. When he came up in discussions with friends back at the University of Ibadan, I’d defend him like my father – especially at a time when he was largely “unknown”.

I think one of the reasons the Muhammadu Buhari administration currently seems overwhelmed and isolated is because the honcho and those close to him bought the hype that he was the only man that could change Nigeria.

Against the background of what has been happening in recent weeks regarding the war against corruption, I am compelled to break my self-imposed censorship on the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under the chairmanship of Mr Ibrahim Magu. People close to me, and those in a few groups with whom I share online discussions, know why I don’t write on EFCC or Magu but I want to make the reason public today before I delve into the beef of my intervention.

Whoever said ugliness is only skin deep should take another look at Nigeria from the rooftop of Osborne Towers in Ikoyi. Even if you cannot see Flat 7B Dash-dash, I know you can see the ugly suburb in Kaduna where former NNPC Group Managing Director hid millions of dollars as his neighbors starved to death. The ugliness has replaced the electrons that should be moving between atoms to generate electricity in our cables. It has replaced the unity we used to enjoy in our diversity.

It was grim news again recently when the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) launched the 2016 Human Development Report.  On the table of Human Development Index Nigeria is ranked 152 out of 185 countries surveyed for the indicators of progress.  Relatively, Nigeria was even better rated in 2014 to be in the 151st position. The country is, of course, in the unenviable league of other poor African countries. Nothing illustrates the fact that Africa is being left behind in the global journey of development more than the ranking in which those in   the 170th to 185th position, the last, are all African countries. Norway is rated to have the highest human development index in the world while Burkina Faso has the lowest.

Nigeria, as it is presently set up, has no chance of thriving. The idea of certain countries today as “emerging economies” instead of “developing countries” as it was just years ago is proof of the fact that while political realities continue to define economic realities, the outlook of countries will first be defined by their economic realities before anything else.

On Wednesday, April 19, 2017 the Special Adviser on Media to the President issued a press statement announcing the suspension from office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mr. David Babachir Lawal and the Director of the Nigerian Intelligence Agency (NIA), Ambassador Ayo Oke on allegations of corrupt practices. The press statement reports that, “President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered an investigation into the allegations of violations of law and due process (emphasis is mine) made against the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, David Lawal, in the award of contracts under the Presidential Initiative on the North East, PINE”.

The United Nations’ call to “end malaria for good” resonates deeply with me – I have had malaria.  I am encouraged by the progress that has been made to eliminate this terrible disease.   The global mortality rate dropped by 47 per cent between 2000 and 2013 and the number of children killed by malaria has declined by two-thirds since 2000, with more than 6.8 million lives saved.  I was reminded however of the deadly toll this disease continues to take when I saw a public service announcement on DSTV stating that every thirty seconds a child in Africa dies from malaria.  Today, Global Anti-Malaria Day, is a time to reflect on what we have achieved and chart our way forward.

The news of the demise of Dipo Famakinwa swamped the social media. He was the Director General of the Development Agenda for Western Nigeria (DAWN) Commission. Famakinwa died last Friday at a Lagos hospital before he could be ferried abroad for better treatment. Since the news broke out, the outpouring of condolence on the social media flows around you like a river and you could easily abandon yourself to the current. It was a testimonial to his character, vision, work ethics, and love for people.

When last week, President Muhammadu Buhari decided to suspend the secretary to the government of the federation, Babachir Lawal, and the director general of the Nigeria Intelligence Agency, ambassador Ayo Oke in order to allow unfettered investigations of both public officers, the most striking immediate reaction was the SGF asking: who is the presidency? State house correspondents had accosted the then SGF as he left a meeting with the vice president. It is standard practice at the state house for correspondents to lay ambush. Babachir Lawal obviously did not know that he had been suspended from office.

It’s great that after much dillydallying President Buhari has finally summoned the intestinal and testicular fortitude to “suspend” “cash-and-carry” SGF Babachir David Lawal of “grass-cutting” infamy.

Last week our country lost another set of citizens, and as usual, they were needless deaths. That’s why I think their deaths should be classified as murders with perpetrators consequently brought to book giving a fitting closure to their senseless exits.

Next week, perhaps at the Federal Executive Council meeting, President Muhammadu Buhari will receive the report of a three-man panel headed by Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo he asked to investigate two top officials. His credibility flagging, President Buhari set up the panel last week to examine allegations concerning Babachir Lawal, the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), in the award of contracts under the Presidential Initiative on the North East (PINE).

In recent times, there has been a growing interest in the understanding of the concept of national security and role of the Office of the National Security Adviser in Nigeria in the context. President Muhammadu Buhari’s appointment of Major-Gen Monguno (Ph.D.), a retired military officer as the new National Security Adviser, has renewed the question as to what really constitutes National Security? What is the role of the NSA? What should be the appropriate background and credentials of a competent man or woman that would really discharge the functions of that office creditably?   What the best examples we can draw from?

They almost spoilt our Easter fun with the thriller of Osborne Towers in Ikoyi, Lagos. In these hard times when most Nigerians have barely something to eat – no one talks of “square” meals anymore – a gang of thieves had hidden almost N15billion ($50million) in one flat in an edifice built with stolen money also. The primary suspect claimed the money was for some “covert operations” approved by former President Jonathan.

The news going round that the current meningitis scourge affecting some parts of Nigeria is the result of the sins of Nigerians is absolute rubbish! Meningitis is caused by bacteria not sin. If sin caused meningitis, most of us politicians will get it, but it is the poor who suffer it most.

President Buhari on Wednesday the 19th set up a three-man panel led by Vice president Yemi Osinbajo to investigate the $43 million-plus Ikoyi NIA boss-linked stash and SGF Babachir’s grass cutting and related PINE northeast terror victims’ scandal.

The time has come, I propose, for the expression — “Sanusi stirs controversy” — to be officially classified as a cliché. It would appear each time Alhaji Muhammad Sanusi II, the emir of Kano, talks, there must be an outbreak of controversy. Whenever he discusses economics or politics, passions are always inflamed, opinion is sharply divided and a free-for-all often ensues . You can accuse Sanusi of many things, but you can never accuse him of not speaking his mind — and brutally. You may say he is being honest, direct and radical. You may also say he is being hypocritical and out to gain attention by shedding crocodile tears. Pick your choice — it’s a free world.

Since last week, the National Intelligence Agency (NIA), the foreign intelligence arm of our nation’s intelligence network, has been in the news for the most annoying, baffling and wrong reasons. The shocking discovery of $43m( about N13bn) by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFFC) in a plush Osborne Ikoyi flat, allegedly hidden by the NIA for reported covert operations, going the admission of the now suspended Director-General of the agency, Ambassador Ayo Oke, raises several questions which a very serious government should not gloss over and sweep under the carpet.

It was a notion that gained traction in the wake of the interregnum created after the tortuous push back of the Nigerian military to the barracks in 1998 and the return of civil rule to our polity effective May 29th, 1999. To be sure, the Nigeria political powers, expressed in the sovereignty of our country laid practically on the proverbial streets of Nigeria when the critical mass within the constituencies that struggled for the return of democracy instituted no succession plans to consolidate on the gains of the struggle. This was true regardless of the fact that Nigerians at all material times remained the authentic repositories of our sovereignty pursuant to S.14(2)(a) of the 1999 Constitution from whom government through the organic law derive all its powers and authority.

Fellow Nigerians, let me start this epistle by congratulating the Ministry of Transport especially the Aviation Department of that Ministry for completing the overhaul of the runway of Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport in Abuja ahead of schedule, even if it was only by one day. It is indeed remarkable that the work was accomplished on time as promised. It demonstrates that given the requisite resolve and determination Nigerians can do things right. In the past, the job would have become moribund like the endless renovations embarked upon at many of our airports in the days of razzmatazz by PDP.

The Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, is now leading the long awaited quest to find the soul of the North. He is willing to risk the throne to get there. But will he succeed? Will the factors that stopped reformers before him stop him?

Like a typical Shakespearean comedy, the great dollar find in Lagos penultimate Thursday following a whistleblower’s tip-off seems to have inadvertently bequeathed to the public space a slew of memorable jokes – some quite libelous.

Sarkin Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, is in the eye of the storm and it seems the only way he can overcome it is to remain controversial. I was at an event in Lagos in October where he was also present as special guest. In an extempore speech, he said he had decided to stay out of the headlines, especially after government officials responded with a sledgehammer to his criticism of the Central Bank’s monetary policy.

The recent uproar amongst some elites in the northern geopolitical zones of Nigeria following the remarks made by the Emir of Kano, His Highness Muhammadu Sanusi II, missed or deliberately ignored a central message that many States in the northern geopolitical zones of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are failing or have already failed to meet the basic, legitimate aspirations or expectations of their citizens.

Why the cover-up? What is Aso Rock hiding from Nigerians? Who is the Buhari administration seeking to protect? And why is this Presidency exhibiting the traits of a confused administration that has a scandal on its hands but is looking for a way to cover up its shame and embarrassment? I’m talking about the $43m, £27,000 and N23 million discovered and recovered by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) at the luxurious 16 Osborne Road, Ikoyi building on April 12 and the very disappointing manner the federal government has handled the matter so far.

For Omoyele Sowore, Bamidele Ademola-Olateju, Bayo Omisore, Moses Ochonu, Dapo Rotifa, Rudolf Ogoo Okonkwo, Yommi Oni, Yomi Okusanya Scott, Jesse Bay, Peter Oshun, Obinna Aligwekwe, Olutoyin Adeyinka Eweje, Ayo Turton, Inibehe Effiong, Gimba Kakanda, Abdul Mahmud, and so many valiant warriors in your shoes within and without Fatherland.

For a government that thrives in propaganda, it is just as well that the operatives of the Muhammadu Buhari administration did not understand the significance of what happened on Tuesday at the Abuja International Airport. If they did, they would have moved beyond just regaling us with their cemetery tales.

In these times of challenge in the electric power sector, it is apt to present some facts to the general public in order to appreciate the nature of the challenge in the sector.

The Economic Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) has Wednesday announced that it uncovered foreign currencies and naira notes that worth about N15 billion at a four-bedroom apartment in Ikoyi, Lagos. The funds have been reported to be proceeds of unlawful activity while investigations are said to be ongoing. As laudable as this development is, it is rather very depressing that the owner of the huge money is yet to be named or identified.

Our nation is now a big theatre where farcical actions and events take place at a pulsating pace. And keeping up with the tempo of the outlandish dramas that have grotesquely assailed our sensibilities has not been easy. The totality of the bizarre storyline centers on the recoveries by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) of monies believed to be part of our looted commonwealth by some former and, possibly, serving government officials.

The administration led by President Muhammadu Buhari was subject to a very slow start; it took the president about five months to appoint his ministers, took seven months to present first budget, 16 months to shift grounds on the naira and two years to show the Nigerian people an articulate economic plan.

Nigerians are horrified, and rightly so, for what passes for corruption in today's Nigeria. It's important to keep the horror of our corrupt nation up front, to keep highlighting the lies and stealing that have become the trade mark of our politicians.

I have just returned from Abuja travelling through the Kaduna airport. As we disembarked from the aircraft and moved towards the arrival section, I could hear an announcement being made. The diction of the announcer was clear. She didn’t sound like those On-Air-Personalities (OAP, they are called) who speak as if they have hot water on their tongues. Airport continuity announcers in Nigeria tend to imitate these OAPs.

The #BringBackOurGirls movement invited the Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi II, to give its Inaugural Chibok Girls’ Lecture on 14 April 2017. The event coincided with the third-year commemoration of the kidnapping of the Chibok girls. Key leaders of the #BBOG movement such as former Minister of Education, Obiageli Ezekwesili, Aisha Yesufu and the entire #BBOG family have consistently maintained that the fight for the Chibok girls is “the fight for the soul of Nigeria”. Therefore, it was particularly apt to have SLS speak on the issue of the Chibok girls and more generally, the social conditions of women and young girls in northern Nigeria.

The idea of Nigerian youths in politics and governance has been advanced by several youths and youth groups in recent times. In 2014, I led a group of young Nigerian professionals under the banner of Rethink Nigeria to present a document on this issue to the then National Conference.

My favourite Buharist is Maiwada Sanusi. We’ve never met in person but I like him. He sends me occasional private messages on Facebook extolling Buhari and declaring his undying adulation for the president. He tells me to temper my “Buhari bashing,” as he calls it, with an acknowledgement of what he argues are mitigating alibis. He never tires of telling me that Jonathan and his people stole the country into recession. He once told me to advise my friends, Farooq Kperogi and Okey Ndibe, to stop their “Buhari bashing” because it would not have any effect on Buhari diehards like him. He pleads with me to be objective and to assess Buhari sympathetically. I like Maiwada. I always look forward to reading from him. We have forged a strange bond despite our disagreement. Here is the latest message he sent to me.