Clay Richie

It is certainly a misnomer to describe Nigeria’s 19-year old experiment in liberal democracy as “nascent.” By now, at least signs of political development ought to be so noticeable that any politician or commentator who still talks of a “nascent democracy” could be said to be making a slip of the tongue.

From the judgement of a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos which orders President Muhammadu Buhari to “urgently instruct security and anti-corruption agencies to forward to him reports of their investigations into allegations of padding and stealing of some N481 billion from the 2016 budget by some principal officers of the National Assembly” to damaging allegations by both former Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala and former Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Chairman, Prof. Attahiru Jega, the spotlight is now on our federal lawmakers who are being perceived as no more than cheap bribe-takers.

The State social order is founded on ideals of Freedom, Equality and Justice. In furtherance of the social order…the sanctity of the human person shall be recognised, and human dignity shall be maintained and enhanced; governmental actions shall be humane. – Chapter II, The Nigerian Constitution

SINCE 2009, Nigerian security agencies− Nigerian Army, State Security Services and the Police have been fighting insurgencies in the country.  Yet the war against insurgency in Nigeria seems unending. The security agencies are still garnering experiences in fighting insurgencies, because nothing had prepared them for unconventional war such as insurgency.

Since 2015 Nigeria and the African continent as a whole has witnessed a diversion from the norm in the political space. It was clearly witnessed in the 2015 general elections in Nigeria where for the first time an incumbent president lost to the major opposition, another instance was in Gambia where Yahaya Jammeh was defeated by Adama Barrow after 22 years in power and finally late last year in the gold coast where the then Incumbent John Mahama was defeated by NPP’s Nana Akufo-Addo.

IT'S exactly three years today since the self-confessed grand patron of the terrorist Fulani herders organization — Muhammadu Buhari took office — as Nigerian president. His presidency at the time was mainly prated on three prong: security, anti corruption, and jobs created. Nigerians, except a motley of Aso Rock bootlickers, a few law makers and pockets of poster governors know that Buhari's government is a disaster.

Politicians are connoisseurs at dribbling the credulous and naïve masses as the Portugal born soccer star, Cristiano Ronaldo. And the truth is, in Nigeria today, there is no opposition party! The two major political parties in Nigeria are the same within the context of ideology. And when they make it look like they are fighting themselves, the goal is to divide the inexperienced masses along idiotic and foolish line. Also, what is painful is that most Nigerians—both educated and illiterate ones—always fall into their ancient political trap.

The race for the presidency is shaping up. In the right-place-right-time theory of politics, the moment matters. It’s scary to visualize the return of the political prostitutes and the prodigals in 2019. To be sure, there will be events that will try our souls between now and then.

My Dear Nigerians Today marks the 19th year of our nascent democracy and the 3rd anniversary of this administration. I am thankful to Almighty God for bringing us thus far.  This administration came at a time that Nigerians needed Change, the Change we promised and the Change we continue to deliver. We have faced a lot of challenges on this journey and Nigerians have stood by us in achieving the three cardinal points of this administration namely; Security, Corruption and the Economy.

Tuesday, May 29, marks three years of the Muhammadu Buhari government. The major question that should be on the lips of all Nigerians is, ‘Am I better off than I was before this government assumed office?” No matter the intensity of campaigns for next year’s elections, that’s the only issue that should be up for determination as President Buhari seeks our mandate again. After all, an incumbent runs on his record in office.

Of recent, there has been a lot of talk about the problems facing Nigeria’s youth especially the issue of drug addiction and fraudulent behaviour. These two vices have led to a ban on the production of codeine in Nigeria and a clamp down on club going youths, because the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, in its wisdom, has determined that clubs are a favourite hang out of youths with a tendency for internet fraud (why they think that, I do not know).

On Tuesday, May 29, 2018, the Buhari/Osinbajo led government will clock three years in office. With elections less than a year ahead, this period of people-oriented governance has been a great success. The administration has fared very well in various policy fronts. There is a long list of achievements to flaunt.

If statistical estimation of Nigeria’s population of 60% youth is anything to go by, then a very few percentage of Nigerian youth, in their multiple of millions, witnessed the reign of terror of General Sani Abacha, Nigeria’s Head of State between 1994 and 1998. Thus, when President Muhammadu Buhari, last Tuesday, canonized the late General as one unfairly demonized, the import of that eulogy may be totally lost on more than half of Nigerians. Speaking while receiving a delegation of Buhari Support Organization (BSO) which held at the Presidential Villa, Buhari literally said he didn’t care what opinion the whole world may have about Abacha but that the late General was worthy of societal role of honour. “No matter what opinion you have about Abacha, I agreed to work with him and the roads we did from PTF exist from here to Port Harcourt, to Onitsha, to Benin and so on,” he had said.

As a schoolboy, I loved to compete in the 400-metre race. You had to run full circle on the field, unlike the 100m or 200m race where athletes with stamina weren’t given the chance to prove their prowess. In those days – some 40 years ago –my admiration usually went to long-distance runners whom we called “milers” or “marathoners”. They usually competed only in the 1.5km and 5km races; but, during inter-house sport competitions, some also participated in the 400m race if their house didn’t have good candidates.

So how can we have a much better Nigeria, a country we can proudly call our own? The debate continues. The dominant line of discourse has been that of “restructuring Nigeria” and there are certainly different shades of the argument. I was fascinated by the communiqué of Ohanaeze Ndigbo at the end of the South-East Summit on the Restructuring of Nigeria in Awka, Anambra state, last week. The socio-cultural group put a number of proposals on the table which, going by the mood of the participants, can be considered unanimous. The proposals are not completely new, just that most are now attaining consensus among the leading lights of the restructuring campaign.

WITHOUT the use of bayonets, gun shots and hand-propelled rocket grenade thrown from the discordant opposing political parties, President Muhammadu Buhari blightly submitted his hermit government has caved in to the rampaging terrorist Fulani herders. President Buhari sang Nunc Dimittis of his government and Nigerian state failure that smacks off mental barrenness, polical turmoil and a sense of horror. Robert D. Caplan painted gore picture of the tragedy that befalls Nigeria earlier in his book titled: "The Coming Anarchy", that will be prosecuted on the premise of political disorder, civil strife and self-defense in the absence of patriotic standing army. 

Fellow Nigerians, it is now four weeks that I have been educating and entertaining you about my 30 eventful years as a journalist and businessman in Lagos. My supersonic and meteoric journey was seemingly cut short by the three years I was forced to spend in exile, during the draconian government of General Sani Abacha. I ended my epistle to you last week at the point I arrived Accra, Ghana, in the evening of July 25, 1995. Let me say it loud and clear, I fell instantly in love with Ghana. By the time I woke up the following morning, I had to do two things; find my way around Accra to locate and meet the few friends I had on ground and link up with my amazing friends in England who were already meeting, planning and raising funds for me to fly out of Accra to London. I remain eternally indebted to so many people, most of them much younger. They stood by me like the Rock of Gibraltar.

Ordinarily I wouldn’t bother reacting to what has been trending in the social media for the past few days, but for certain factors, which have continued to point to the reality that to combat some vested interests in Nigeria, requires far more than applying the available legal and administrative frameworks. The impunity that is employed in impoverishing the public also comes handy in trying to shield the culprits from facing the law.

I would like to preface this piece with the following four declarations: One: My dominant interest in Election 2019 is the strengthening of the Nigerian Left in the country’s electoral and non-electoral politics. That is the only real change that can take place and that Nigerian masses deserve. Two: By the Left I mean the aggregate of socialism and popular democracy. This historical-ideological-political tendency is both anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist in orientation and logic. Three: Nigerian Leftism in the present historical epoch goes beyond being a “weapon of criticism.” It is also a programme of liberation. Four: The effectiveness of Left political interventions depends, to a large extent, on Leftists’ understanding of what is actually happening. This is an elementary service the Left owes itself. None of these my declarations is new. They are only being pulled together for this piece.

To the legion crises and catastrophe-in-the-making that the incumbency of President Mohammadu Buhari is bequeathing to Nigeria must now be added the alarming penchant for rank dishonesty. Under a self-inflicted pressure for a disintegrative quest for reelection, Nigeria has become captive to a steady stream of tragicomedy display of the unraveling of the Nigerian presidency as a credible and believable institution. At the latest outing where he was receiving a campaign organization led by a serving public servant, the comptroller General of the customs, no less (when is the turn of the director general of the state security services? the inspector general of police? and perhaps the central bank governor?) here was what President Buhari said

Backtracking a little, a few days back, the Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria jumped on a plane and travelled to Benue State to identify with those who were mourning, but the president was on the inside of the state’s house—being busy with some state matters—like entertaining his support group. Each time I hear from PMB’s mouth or I hear from a revered citizen of Nigeria that Mr. President loves Nigeria and Nigerians and I look at what he does sometimes, I always find it hard as diamond to believe that he truly loves those he was voted into office to serve.

Why are elections, which should be the celebration of democracy, war in Nigeria? In societies where people are in tune with the ethos of democracy, elections are the brightest moments in the lives of the citizenry.

There is hardly any fairly educated person that’s not familiar with the wisecrack ‘He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day’. The fight that former president Olusegun Obasanjo was spoiling for via a nasty letter in January, through which he unbraided President Muhammadu Buhari for performing abysmally low in office and daring to propose himself for re-election next year, seems to have been accepted by PMB a couple of months after he was taunted.

At the invitation of Dr Tunji Olaopa, I was at the Ibadan School of Government and Public Policy (ISGPP) last Thursday for what turned out a most interesting conversation on elections in Nigeria as critical stakeholders interrogate my book, ‘Against The Run of Play: How an incumbent president was defeated in Nigeria’. The ISGPP’s monthly book reading series to which I was invited is an innovative platform for community engagement on issues of governance, democracy and development and draws participants from the huge population of intellectuals within and around the city of Ibadan.

As is customary, today, we shall be making a detour from the usual to dissect just two of the slew of words that has lately crept treacherously into national conversation since our last enumeration. The mission is to provide context and content, so that the uninitiated may better understand. Transmission: Goodluck Jonathan gave us “transformation” even though it turned out the real agenda was to democratize the looting of the nation’s exchequer. Perhaps owing to his own ritual taciturnity, President Muhammadu Buhari has hardly made a pretense to any such fanciful sloganeering.

Dear Mallam Garba Shehu, They say if your father is a garlic and your mother an onion, you can’t smell good. Defending President Buhari’s performance is practically impossible and no, it’s not because he has assembled unarguably the worst media team ever seen, it is because he has set an unprecedented low for governance in Nigeria. That is a fact we all see for our ourselves. There couldn’t be a better person to highlight the flaws of the opposition and to also reveal the positives (no matter how little) managed by the Buhari administration other candidates would have to build on or surpass in our quest for quality leadership. This was why I settled down to read your article with an open mind.

In the Yoruba culture, adults are rarely wrong. Of course, this does not say they are not wrong many times, it just means that when they are wrong, it is not in the place of a child to say it. It gets even more interesting: when adults fart in Yorubaland, a proper child or omoluabi, as we call it, is expected to say “eku idita” or “ara agba fere”. This is just some form of congratulating the adult on the success of his or her air pollution.

When disaster strikes close home, it speaks eloquently. I never took the Joint Health Sector Unions (JOHESU) – what a name – serious until a neighbour got entangled and nearly lost her three-year-old son. Sometimes, journalists forget that statistics are not just mere figures but could be human beings as well and until you’re involved in something, one might not appreciate the trauma those concerned go through in such harrowing circumstances.

“Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organised conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe”. Frederick Douglass (1818-1895)

Just take the phrase: “impending” in the title above with a pinch of salt. I use the word because in politics as in life, things happen – as seemingly absolute situations become redeemable and what originally appears impossible could be the catalyst for fresh opportunities. Otherwise, the truth is that the ruling Nigerian political party, the All Progressives Congress is already imploding, it has in fact imploded; the party is in the throes of a debilitating illness. The implosion began almost as soon as the party assumed power in 2015. The APC emerged as a special purpose vehicle – composed almost entirely from second hand, used groups from the CPC, the ACN, APGA, ANPP, and a break away faction of the PDP, known as new PDP (nPDP) – even if there was nothing new about it, with the sole objective of taking power from the then ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and the then incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan.

Comic relief in the midst of speech tragedy swept through Nigeria last week following the leaking of a video clip in which Police Inspector General Ibrahim Idris had trouble reading his speech at an official function in Kano. The IG got stuck with the word “transmission,” repeated it many times and was unable to proceed despite the intervention of an aide who rushed in to help. The police have not flatly denied that the video was real, which is just as well because reporters were there.

Top opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members have been granting press interviews and addressing zonal political rallies talking about “CHANGING THE CHANGE” in next year’s general elections, without defining what exactly that means. As the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) gears up to celebrate the completion of three years of the Buhari government in the centre on May 29th, Nigerians need to be reminded of what the reversal of the achievements of this administration will amount to.

This is not a drill. If you are keeping questionable images and videos on your phone, you may want to think twice. A Nigerian man has just been deported from the US after immigration officials randomly stopped him at the airport and searched his phone. They found gory images and hate messages that people normally send around by WhatsApp under the umbrella of “forwarded as received”. He explained that his phone is set to automatically download received files, and that he was not the sender of the offensive messages. They wouldn’t care. They returned him to Nigeria by the next flight. More Nigerians might have experienced something similar since President Donald Trump came to office.

Were Ehiogie West Idahosa not a familiar name, one would have been tempted to dismiss the graffiti credited to him recently in the media as composed by a stark illiterate at a pepper-soup joint at the popular Agbado market in Benin City. Aside the farrago of illogicalities, seeking to ethnicize the circumstances that forced Chief John Odigie-Oyegun’s fall as APC chair is, to put it mildly, descent to the sewer of crude revisionism.

I disagree with those claiming that President Muhammadu Buhari can’t be second-guessed. Put plainly, I don’t share the sentiment that Mr President can’t be predicted. And here is why.

Since the advent of the first military coup on January 15, 1966, Nigeria had gone through several coups and counter-coups carried out by military officials until the return to democratic rule on May 29, 1999. During this period, Nigerians faced and were confronted with draconian policies and laws mostly issued through decrees under repressive military regimes. Democratic ideals were rolled back and stifled, leading to gross abuse fundamental human rights, dissolution of the parliament, curtailment of press freedom, subjugation of trade unions and civil society organizations, abolition of political parties and pressure groups, power centralization, absolute rule as well as the removal of power checks and balances.

A successful and peaceful change of the government of the day is one of the indices that a democratizing society is successfully transiting to a mature democracy. This is why it was a major milestone for the country’s democracy that Jonathan and the ruling PDP lost the 2015 election to usher the second coming of Muhammadu Buhari.  In this sense, if Buhari loses the 2019 election and accepts defeat, it will be another major milestone for our democracy project.

On 24th March 2012, Chief Rochas Okorocha, then less than a year in office as Imo State Governor, was in Kosovo where he signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for an independent power plant, an agro processing plant and several other industries that he promised would be established in his state. There were neither feasibility studies nor any clear ideas as to where the money to finance these projects would come from but those sorts of things never really worry the ebullient governor.

Ordinarily it would have been better to ignore the statement credited to a group that called itself the Buhari Media Organisation (BMO), a metamorph of the 2015 Buhari Media Support Group (BMSG) but for the expressed ignorance of the Buhari Administration masquerading as BMO.

The face-off between the Senate and the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Idris, over the insistence of the former that the latter appears personally before it in connection with the seeming inhumane treatment being meted out by the Police to Senator Dino Melaye, and the state of insecurity and killings in parts of the country, seems to be gaining traction by the day.

It was October 2013; I remember this month with so much pain in my heart. My family had just lost one of our finest — perhaps the finest of us, to the cold hands of death, aided by the failing Nigerian medical system. She was my aunt, who doubled as a mother. She was clearly the best caretaker I had as a young boy. After her death,  all we had was a festival of tears.

The degree of political intrigues ahead of the 2019 general elections is rising on daily basis. It has compounded the myriad of problems confronting Nigeria to the extent that except the political class soft-pedaled and play according to rules patriotically and in civility, in the national interest, the cataclysm, which was predicted in 2015, may just be around the corner. The contention for political office by largely people who seem to have no other business is adversely affecting the polity and the economy.

First things first, and lest one is accused of plagiarism, this headline belongs to our dear senators or ‘distinguished senators’ as they love to call themselves. The phrase was the way they described the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, who again failed last week to appear before the senate after he was summoned.

Each Governor was reportedly asked by the ruling APC party to bring N250 million ahead of the party’s National Convention. When the public protested, recently, the party disclaimed the news even if it added that it was the responsibility of members to pay outstanding dues. The APC needs N6 billion for its pre-election Convention. In the just concluded Ekiti Governorship primaries, an APC Gubernatorial aspirant who claimed he spent N100 million, got just 11 votes! I wonder how much the eventual winner spent. This story and similar ones, underscore the politics of campaign finance, the threat it poses to electoral integrity and outcomes, the enforceability of electoral laws, and the freedom of the people to choose.

No president is unbeatable. Ask the Malaysians who recently elected Mahathir Mohamad, a 92-year-old former prime minister who had teamed up in an unlikely alliance with his political opponents, some of whom he had jailed. So many factors seemed to be loaded against Grandpa Mohamad, not least of which was his advanced age. He was on overtime as the life expectancy in his country is 74.9 years.

My Governor, My Governor, Yes, that is your signature appellation. You remain my Governor despite everything. This is the reason writing this letter is a hard task for me. I believed in you and firmly approve the good work you have been doing in Imo State for these past seven years. I subscribe fully to your political roadmap, which saw you ride high and above the short-sighted, purblind and blighted political myopism of your enemies and political foes who were not endowed with your foresight. It is this same foresight that made you break away from the Lilliputian enclave and enclosed shell our people ply their political trade and join other progressives to form the All Progressives Congress which vanquished the existing octopoidal order and inflicted unbearable pain on the shortsighted politicians of easy virtue who never saw what you and few other Igbo saw at that time.

When crocodiles eat their own eggs, let frogs run and run. Because of the 2019 elections, an intra-class war is currently raging among a special breed of Nigerians. I call their exclusive enclave the Generals Club.  These are a lucky set of army officers who either staged the counter-coup of July 1966 or benefitted from it. That was a coup that forever changed the fortune of Nigeria and its inhabitants. The young officers came, seized and squeezed Nigeria into their suffocating cubicle. They came and became our permanent landlords. They built all the good things; they also enthroned all the bad things. Today’s loud demands for restructuring is a rejection of these gentlemen’s conundrum.

Suddenly, the entire country known as Nigeria seems to have been engulfed by violence. Herdsmen violence more than other type of violence. Although there has been times when living in Nigeria was considered highly risky in some parts, but it has never been this brutish at the same time all over the country. The 1960s was an inglorious period in the annals of Nigerian history.

If politics were medicine, the current Nigeria government would be facing malpractice suits that include murder and premeditated murder.  And while hypocrisy is not a crime under the nation’s laws, it is an issue in her politics, as the All Progressives Congress, the parent party of the government, demonstrated in prospecting for leadership in 2015. 

Asked by journalists to list his achievements, a governor proudly said: “Mr Bigg’s has opened an outlet in the state capital under my administration.” The reporters could hardly stifle their chuckle. Another governor told a group of editors that “peace obtained and maintained” was his biggest achievement, pointing to an award plaque given to him by an association of crime reporters whom he called “security experts”. These days, many governors would list payment of salary arrears as one of their biggest feats, and I am still seeing politicians celebrate the provision of well water, construction of wooden bridges and distribution of transistor radios.