OPINION: ABUJA LEGISLATORS: PROFITEERS OF MISERIES OF POOR NIGERIANS…

 THEWILL_

Leaving Victims On The Shelves
Nigerians, rather than ask the usual question about which political system is better, allow me to ask which political system do we practice: Representative Democracy or Dumbocracy?
It’s been said that Democracy basically consists of two wolves and a sheep deciding on what to have for dinner. It’s also been said I believe by Bernard Shaw, that those in government who rob Peter to pay Paul, can always depend on the support of Paul.
We tend to think of mental hospitals as snake pits, hells of chaos and misery, squalor and brutality. As far as poor Nigerians are concerned, the largest mental hospital on earth is Nigeria full of different patients with different mental miseries. We, the people, the whole people, are locked in a death grapple and nothing our representatives offer, or are willing to offer, mitigates our troubles.
The primary function of legislatures is lawmaking. However, legislatures have more important responsibilities than lawmaking. John Stuart Mill the British philosopher and political economist in 1862 describes legislature in a representative democracy as the eyes, ears, and voice of the people. In other words, individual lawmaker’s duty is to represent the interests of their individual constituencies.
Strong legislatures with strong and caring legislators are essential to improving people’s quality of life. Our elected representatives are required to consult with Nigerians to give reality to their rights. This will ensure meaningful engagement on matters affecting people’s lives at local, state, and federal. But is this happening?
The Abuja legislators (and state lawmakers throughout the country) are guilty of political malpractice for their failure in building a capable, accountable, and responsive representative democracy that can address poverty, inequality, and provide public services. Representative Democracy means elected representation, public participation, rule of law, separation of powers, accountability, and legitimacy.
The constitution requires the representatives to uphold the constitution, develop law and provide oversight of service delivery to the public as well as facilitate public involvement in the legislative and oversight functions. The opposite is true in the case of Nigeria. In our representative democracy, the legislators in the National Assembly who are in possession of our wealth remain the great profiteers of miseries of poor Nigerians.
From politicians to profiteers, our National Assembly members see representation and see Naira signs. All their years in the National Assembly could best be described as an era of turmoil. They have abandoned the public sector and the vital services they should provide to their constituencies. Because of their corruption, incompetence, indifference, and apathy the public sector is dead. The legislators are wicked, exploitative, parasitic, and hence profoundly anti-poor.
They have built up great fortunes at home and abroad. They have increased their luxury. They have created the House of Have and the House of Want. Theirs is the House of Have while the exploited and excluded poor owns the House of Want. They have foisted on our people poverty of multiple evils: restricted job opportunities, crumbling education system, stultified home life and suppressed initiative, fragile family relationships which distorted personality development.
The legislators have failed to craft bills to solve these problems. No coordinated programs. No housing policy. No education policy. No job program. No social services program. No public safety policy. If there was any policy or program at all, it has been piecemeal and pygmy, fragmentary and spasmodic at best. Educational reforms have been sluggish and entangled in bureaucratic stalling. Family assistance is nil. You may ask: what happens to their oversight function? Well, it’s been deleted from their job description.
With all our God given resources, the cause and curse of poverty have no justification in Nigeria. As predators, the legislators are as cruel and blind as those who practiced cannibalism at the dawn of civilization when men eat each other for food. It is tragic that the legislators live in revolutionary times and fail to achieve the new attitudes and new mental outlooks that our situation demands. They have slept through a revolution that would have alter the course of our history.
Of what use are these dishonorable legislators? What have they done for their constituencies and the country lately? Many of them have never sponsored a bill that will benefit their constituencies. What else can they do apart from stealing and looting? What can they show for the eye popping constituency allowances earmarked for the people they claim to represent? How much money do they have to steal before they’ll respond to the cries of those who sent them to Abuja? How much allowances for trifling nonsense do they need to feed their insatiable greed? Shame on them!
The home of a drunkard tells the sad story of the evil wrought by the use of strong drink. Wretchedness and destitution reign, and often the wife and children suffer from abuse and hunger. Yes, the Abuja legislators are drunkards, and Nigeria is the home and the family where wretchedness and destitution reign. Take a look at the death centers called hospitals in their constituencies and in the country as whole. The buildings are old and murky without any renovation. The wards are crowded, nurses underpaid, the doctors struggling to meet pressures. Another attention-raising problem is the rarity of drugs and other essential medical supplies in these hospitals.
Since we sent them to Abuja 16 years ago, we cannot boast of treated water to drink, no good roads to travel on, no electricity, no professional police, no rule of law, no criminal justice system, no jobs, no industries, no security, no public transportation, no rail system, no postal services, no national air carrier, no social services for the elderly and the disabled. Nothing, absolutely nothing! Who and what the hell do they represent? Shame on them!
They have turned Nigeria into the most desolate land of impoverished people sitting on the street corners hustling, hawking, suffering and begging. Prostitutes, the homeless, and the destitute compete for crumbs and alms from passers by. These street dwellers serve as a lingering reminder of the wickedness and indifference of those who represent them in Abuja.
Destruction of our nation is created from tsunami of profiteering of the ruling class. Nigerians are hurting on the inside. They’re harming on the outside. The profiteers have turned the nation into emptiness and lack where tears, pleas, schemes, desperation and want are shed away like a filth, stenching, garment burned never won again… leaving their victims on the shelves to rot and die!
They have successfully cultivated and sustained the culture of ingrained acceptance of wrong doing. The constitution including our laws have been deformed by the piggish reps. Past scandals, scams, stealing, looting, bribery, corruption, and other heinous crimes are not investigated or resolved and no steps taken to prevent future occurrences.
All the legislators represent is corruption with their trade mark mantra “It’s our turn to eat” bound by oath with their colleagues not to betray their collective interests and to rob their own people. Robbing, raping, killing, leaving their victims – the poor – languishing on shelves… With these leeches in charge in Abuja, Nigerians fear what tomorrow may bring… Shame on them!
Nigerians, which political system do we practice: Representative Democracy or Dumbocracy?
Written by Bayo Oluwasanmi.
byolu@aol.com

Confusion over Senate’s clearance of service chiefs

•Senate will perform its functions –Saraki •Genesis of the crisis •Why Buhari sacked service chiefs

Written by: 

Taiwo Adisa

A tweet from the Twitter handle of the Senate president, Dr Bukola Saraki, on Tuesday, stirred up controversy over whether or not the Senate needs to confirm the newly appointed service chiefs appointed by President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday
The Senate president had, early on Tuesday, tweeted that Buhari did not need to send the list of service chiefs to the Senate for confirmation, adding that only the ministers would be confirmed by the Senate.
But a barrage of issues were raised on Twitter against the Senate President following that tweet, a situation that led him to an amendment of the earlier position.
The office of the Senate President, in a statement later in Tuesday, said the Senate would be ready to screen the service chiefs anytime they were presented to the Senate.
Why Buhari sacked service chiefs
INDICATIONS emerged in Abuja, on Tuesday, that President Muhammadu Buhari’s forthcoming trip to the United States (US) for extensive bilateral, security, economic and financial discussions with President Barrack Obama and the need to answer certain questions about the terrorism challenges, as well as Nigeria’s military capability to tackle the menace conclusively necessitated the sack of the service chiefs.
Informed security sources disclosed to the Nigerian Tribune that the Buhari-led administration got wind of the fact that the Obama-led administration would want to know why, after so much money was devoted to the war on insurgency, including foreign contributions, the Boko Haram terrorists were still holding sway.
The source said definitely, the US would ask President Buhari why the military commanders (sacked service chiefs) were still in place, since after several months of being in control and getting huge financial support from the Jonathan-led administration, Boko Haram is still biting hard.
“They will present Buhari with the figures and ask how this huge amount of money was spent, and for what purposes? This is because America will tell President Buhari pointblank that we have a package to assist you to conquer this menace but it will be on the grounds that you have a new team with thinking faculty, a team that is tested and will spare no effort in ending the Boko Haram mayhem,” the source stated.
It further disclosed that President Buhari would now be able to tell Obama that “I have a new team in place. The team is trusted, with integrity, and primed to actualise my mission of ending Boko Haram insurgency.”
According to, the source, “Buhari will be in a better position to tell the US that he has set machinery in motion to investigate how the huge amount of money so far released to fight insurgency was spent and why, after such releases to the security agencies, many of the equipment promised to deal with Boko Haram are nowhere to be seen.”

“The attention of the Media Office of the Senate President has been drawn to a story making the rounds to the effect that the Senate  does not need to screen or confirm the new service chiefs appointed by President Muhammadu Buhari.
“However, we want to make it abundantly clear that based on inquiries made to the Senate President, Dr Abubakar Bukola Saraki, on whether or not the Senate was consulted before the appointment of new service chiefs was announced, he had, in response, tweeted that the appointment of service chiefs is the exclusive function of the president as stipulated by the constitution.
“Let it be known that his comment is now being misinterpreted to say the Senate will neither screen nor confirm the new service chiefs. This is far from the truth.
“For the avoidance of doubt, Saraki has said his comment is without prejudice to extant laws and court pronouncements on the issue and, therefore, that the Senate will do the needful when the list of the new service chiefs is sent to it by Mr President,” the statement read.
Saraki, in a new tweet on Tuesday, said: “This is to clarify the earlier position which was not up to date and does not represent the position of the Senate President on  the issue of screening of the newly appointed service chiefs. The Senate will perform its constitutional duty when it receives communication from the President on the appointments.”

Genesis of the crisis
Lagos lawyer, Festus Keyamo, had ignited the fire when he instituted a suit against the appointment of service chiefs by the immediate past president, Goodluck Jonathan.
The lawyer had said that his suit was to stop the Federal Government from continuing the practice where service chiefs were appointed without Senate confirmation under President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Keyamo secured a ruling in 2013, forcing the government  in 2013 to send the list of service chiefs to the Senate. For the first time in  the history of the nation’s democracy, service chiefs were confirmed by the Senate under the Jonathan-led administration.
Though Keyamo had relied on Section 218 of the 1999 Constitution and Armed Forces Act to back his claims before the Federal High Court, the constitution did not expressly require the president to send the list of service chiefs to the Senate for confirmation.
It was gathered that though former President Jonathan had announced while making the appointment of the last set of service chiefs that he would send the list for confirmation by the Senate, the government ran into trouble when it was to write the letter to seek the confirmation, as there was no clear section of the constitution to back up the action.
The government, thereafter, jettisoned the idea and asked the service chiefs to continue their work, but the ruling in favour of Keyamo’s suit at the Federal High Court changed the procedure, thus forcing the government to send the list of service chiefs to the Senate for the first time.

How the Senate will screen the service chiefs
Party ranking senator told the Nigerian Tribune that the Senate, during the last exercise, sent the service chiefs to its Committee on Defence for screening at a closed session, while the report would be made available to the Senate in plenary.
He stated that in view of the current scenario where committees were not yet formed, the Senate would adopt one of the two options, either to constitute themselves into a committee of the whole and screen them in closed session or appoint an ad hoc committee, which would then report to the Senate in plenary.

NASS crisis: Why Buhari shut out Saraki, Dogara from Villa

 by: 

Taiwo Adisa

DECISION of President Muhammadu Buhari to pander to the wishes of some powerful members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the battle over the seats of National Assembly may have informed his decision to shut out Senate President Bukola Saraki and Speaker of the House of Representatives, Honourable Yakubu Dogara, from the Presidential Villa.
Nigerian Tribune gathered that the president had actually refused to create avenue for Saraki and Dogara to visit him at the Presidential Villa since they emerged on June 9.
Sources said that while the president announced he had accepted the emergence of the two presiding officers, he, on the other hand refused to host either of the duo at Aso Rock.
It was gathered that before the last National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting of the APC, Buhari had consistently told the duo of Saraki and Dogara to ensure they settle their problems with the party before they would visit the Villa.
It was gathered that the two presiding officers have, however,  remained baffled that even after the NEC of  APC approved of the election of Saraki and Dogara, the Presidency had continued to keep the number three and number four citizens all along.
“The duo of Saraki and Dogara felt that they had scored a major victory following the ratification of their election by the NEC. After the meeting, it was understood that the two presiding officers made immediate efforts to visit the president; again and again their attempts have been rebuffed. This time, there have been no excuses,” a source in the know told the Nigerian Tribune.
It was gathered that the persistent refusal of the president to see the Senate President and the Speaker was partly responsible for the decision of the National Assembly leaders to  adjourn  on June 25 till July 21.
Besides, a source said the leadership of the APC was also responsible for the delay in the president meeting the Senate President and Speaker, saying the party was yet to perfect its legislative agenda.
“It is going to be  too obvious  if the National Assembly is in session and nothing is being heard from the president. I suspect that there is a deliberate strategy to delay the resolution of the crisis so that inactivity at the Villa will not show clearly,” the source said.
It was gathered that some influential party leaders were fuelling the crisis from behind, so as to allow the president settle down.
“There is a deliberate strategy to keep the lawmakers busy, while the party sorts out its legislative agenda and the government properly settles down,” another source said.
A source also said that it was confounding to see that Buhari, who had repeatedly said he can work with anybody and would  be neutral in the election of National Assembly principal officers, had refused to meet the leadership that emerged more than one month after.
The source, however, said that while the APC had  kept blaming  Saraki and Dogara for the incident of June 9, the party should be blamed for failing to give clear directives on the zoning of the elective offices in the National Assembly.
“The president’s failure to work with National Assembly is actually slowing down activities of government. Working with the National Assembly will enable him to get work off the ground. It is also certain that working with the National Assembly would reduce the incidence of costly errors, now being seen in governance,” a source said.
Another source  stated on Monday: “The APC leaders’ decision to send a list of officers to the National Assembly leadership is abnormal and negates legislative tradition. If this had been allowed, it would have been a bad precedent. The APC would also have set a bad precedent of conducting party business on the floor of the House. The floor is for national business, not a place to conduct party affairs.
“Buhari, by not working with the National Assembly, is slowing down activities of government. Working with the National Assembly will enable him to get work off the ground.
“He has told the world that elections of principal officers of the National Assembly is constitutional, so he should call stakeholders in the party and the National Assembly to a private meeting, where a new course that would enable the APC to deliver on electoral promises will be charted.”
 It was learnt that some leaders of the APC might also be orchestrating the crisis so as to prevent the Assembly from questioning steps being taken in the early days.
“Whatever they do now would be interpreted as playing  politics and that would continue until the President invites Saraki and Dogara over,” another source said.

[MUST READ] Why Nnamdi Kanu’s Biafra Project Must Be Stopped - By Joe Igbokwe.

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Last week, I saw the photo of a group of people who gave the impression that they are receiving military training somewhere in Igboland. This afternoon, I saw another photograph on Facebook, with some youths bearing guns and Nnamdi Kanu standing with them. I may not know where these pictures are coming from and what they are planning to do, but this is the time to speak out and I urge anybody who is somebody, and who understands where we are coming from to stand up now to be counted. Woe betides a nation whose leaders are children. If we elders do not speak against this evil, posterity will never forgive us. Let us speak out and if these children do not hear us, then it should be on record that we spoke.

Ever since former President Jonathan lost the presidential elections on March 28, 2015, which some of us knew he could never win based on the facts that we had access to and the statistics available, a majority of Igbo people have been unhappy and angry. They have been cursing and abusing the president and APC leaders, wishing that President Buhari never existed and APC was never formed. Many of them have been so frustrated after the elections that they are now looking for ways to get back to the APC-controlled federal government.
Now, one Nnamdi Kanu who has been dreaming about the State of Biafra has provided a space for them to vent their anger. Some of them have joined this small boy to begin to wish for the State of Biafra. Suddenly the so-called Radio Biafra has created a momentum for them. On Facebook, I have watched with keen interest what these guys dish out on daily basis in the name of fighting for Biafra. They tell blatant lies; they create havoc; they make terrible noise; they abuse other Nigerians; and they preach unimaginable propaganda and hate that, at once, puts Igboland in potential danger. I have been waiting for the South-East Governors to speak up but they have maintained a deafening silence that suggests complicity. I have also waited for our elders to call this small boy to order but nothing has happened.
With the so-called Radio Biafra, this boy, whose age I do not know, has unleashed an unimaginable trailer-load of lies and potentially dangerous propaganda that has put the Igbo nation in danger. It is now 45 years after the Nigeria-Biafra Civil War and I think that Igbos must rise up to stop this small boy who never saw the 1967-1970 Civil War and who may not know the implications of what he is doing. He has never consulted anybody to seek their opinion. He has been speaking to the gullible and not too educated people in Igboland, and very soon these uneducated people will take a dangerous decision that may decimate and destroy Igboland. Soon our people will start complaining that they were not consulted. To be fore-warned is to be fore-armed.
Can someone tell Nnamdi Kanu that wars may be fought for 50 years, and should people die in order to achieve Biafra? The war may even consume Nnamdi and all the members of his family and millions of others without achieving its purpose. We have been so inter-married, interwoven, intertwined, inter-related that the idea of separation should not be encouraged.
Last week, I saw the photo of a group of people who gave the impression that they are receiving military training somewhere in Igboland. This afternoon, I saw another photograph on Facebook, with some youths bearing guns and Nnamdi Kanu standing with them. I may not know where these pictures are coming from and what they are planning to do, but this is the time to speak out and I urge anybody who is somebody, and who understands where we are coming from to stand up now to be counted. Woe betides a nation whose leaders are children. If we elders do not speak against this evil, posterity will never forgive us. Let us speak out and if these children do not hear us, then it should be on record that we spoke. About a month ago, the barrage of lies and uncontrolled propaganda Radio Biafra dished out everyday drew the attention of the National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC), which asked Nigerians to stop listening to this useless radio station.
Now here are compelling reasons why the Igbo must remain in Nigeria in their own interest:
(1) The Igbo fought a war of self-determination between 1967 and 1970 and lost about one million people. This should be taken as a huge price for the unity of this country. Having paid this monumental supreme price, I think Igbo should work for the unity of this country on the basis of social justice, equity and fair play;
(2) Nigeria has three major ethnic groups: Hausa/Fulani, Yoruba and Igbo. The Hausa/Fulani Empire has Hausa people stretching all through the Sahel to the Sudan. They are mostly muslims and they have contacts with the Arab world. The Yoruba nation has Togo, Benin Republic, and Sierra Leone, even up to Brazil and Cuba to run to where their kinsmen are. The Igbo nation has no other place in the world where the Igbo language is spoken. Therefore the people must see Nigeria as where they belong and work for its survival;
(3) Nigeria provides a big space for Igbo to spread their tentacles, explore, excel and blossom. The South-East is too small for this highly mobile and dynamic people to thrive;
(4) The world pays attention to Nigeria today because of our size and population. If Nigeria splits into smaller countries the world will pack their bag and baggage and leave. Population and size make a nation a destination;
(5) Assuming we manage to get a State of Biafra, which state in the South-East will produce its first President? When Enugu State was created, the late governor C.C Onoh sacked all the civil servants and teachers from Anambra State. Recently, former governor Orji of Abia State sacked workers from Imo, Anambra, Ebonyi and Enugu States. Now, how can we manage Biafra with this attitude?
(6) The Igbo control 60 to 70 percent of all the imports in Nigeria, and other Nigerians, Yoruba, Hausa/Fulani, Ijaw, Efik, Birom, Tiv, Idoma etc. provide the huge market for Igbo’s mobile and big time traders;
(7) Monumental inter-marriages between Igbos and Yorubas and other ethnic groups have thrived for close to 70 years now, and we cannot just dismiss all these with a wave of the hand;
(8) Igbos own huge and massive investments in property in Lagos and Abuja, and other state capitals in Nigeria. Now are you going to wish all these away?;
(9) Other Nigerian cities have provided safe haven for Igbos, as places to run to cool off whenever self-inflicted crisis arise or other problems. When kidnapping became a way of life in the South-East, our people moved to other parts of Nigeria to settle. Now, where will the Igbo go when confronted with these problems in Biafra?;
(10) How can Igbos thrive without their Lagos and Abuja or Port-Harcourt? What happens to all their connections and relationships in these places?
Can someone tell Nnamdi Kanu that wars may be fought for 50 years, and should people die in order to achieve Biafra? The war may even consume Nnamdi and all the members of his family and millions of others without achieving its purpose. We have been so inter-married, interwoven, intertwined, inter-related that the idea of separation should not be encouraged. I do not want to lose my friends from the other parts of Nigeria for anything.
When a writer is silent he is lying. A story that must be told never forgives silence. The only thing necessary for evil to triumph in any society is for good men to do nothing.
I can go on, and on, but there is no need to continue to do so. We must be strong enough to stop this world’s old problem of looking down on people who are different from us. This is a problem with Nigeria. Nigeria’s diversity is a big plus for all of us to excel. United we stand, divided we fall. I confess that Igbos have not played better politics in Nigeria since 1970 and that has been our bane. Anytime we want to change bad leadership in the country, Igbos as a block would resist this. It happened in 1993 and we lost everything. In 2015, Igbos were at it again, but the forces of history prevailed. Igbos can do better than this.
If the truth must prevail, Nigeria has not been fair to Igbos since the end of civil war. They tell us that there is no victor and no vanquished but in actions and deeds the victors are still celebrating and enjoying the spoils of the war, while the defeated are still languishing in abject neglect.
Now we must collectively stop this small boy called Nnamdi Kanu who is still sucking his mother’s breast before he endangers the whole of Igboland and plunges us into a civil war once again. When a writer is silent he is lying. A story that must be told never forgives silence. The only thing necessary for evil to triumph in any society is for good men to do nothing.
We have found solace in all these because we have found out that those who are still oppressing the Igbos in Nigeria are not better. We also take solace in the findings of the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council that all acts of indignity against human persons, against human society debase the perpetrators more than the victims. It is not that the offended cannot forgive but have the offenders repented?
However, I want Nigerian leaders to show leadership by carrying all Nigerians along in distributing power and resources. If there is no justice, there will be no peace. If there is no peace there will be no progress. Let justice prevail. Let us be fair to all concerned. If the truth must prevail, Nigeria has not been fair to Igbos since the end of civil war. They tell us that there is no victor and no vanquished but in actions and deeds the victors are still celebrating and enjoying the spoils of the war, while the defeated are still languishing in abject neglect. For instance, of all the six zones in Nigeria, only the South-East zone has five states.
President Buhari must address this injustice.
We have found solace in all these because we have found out that those who are still oppressing the Igbos in Nigeria are not better. We also take solace in the findings of the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council that all acts of indignity against human persons, against human society debase the perpetrators more than the victims. It is not that the offended cannot forgive but have the offenders repented? This injustice must stop now for the sake of unity of this country. I wrote Igbos: 25 Years After Biafra in 1995 thinking that the book would prick the conscience of other Nigerians but they have not paid any attention to it. It has been business as usual. Now, President Buhari must address this injustice. Case rested!

Asiwaju and the NASS Crisis.

Chief Bisi Akande, former governor of Osun State and ex-interim national chairman of the now ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), is hardly your typical politician who is easily given to demagoguery. As anyone familiar with the key role he played in how the APC evolved into the eventual nemesis of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) - the self-styled biggest party in Africa which misruled us for the past 16 years - would testify, the elderly chief was a great voice of wisdom for restraint and the politics of give and take, all the way back to the genesis of party before 2011.
Late last month, however, the chief gave in to the strong temptation to be your typical politician when he issued a statement in which he described the raging National Assembly leadership crisis which has divided the APC right down the middle as a conspiracy of the North against the Yoruba.
“Most Northern elite, the Nigerian oil subsidy barons and other business cartels who never liked Buhari’s anti-corruption political stance,” the chief said in his statement, “are quickly backing up the rebellion against the APC with strong support...A large section of the South-West sees the rebellion as a conspiracy of the North against the Yoruba.” With due respect to the highly esteemed chief, nothing could be further from the truth.
The frustration behind the chief’s statement is understandable. The political sleight of hand Dr Bukola Saraki, incidentally himself a Yoruba, used to become Senate President on June 9, whereby 51 senators of APC out of 69 were denied their rights to choose their leader, is a cause for great anger, especially given the gratuitous concession of the deputy Senate presidency to the PDP. Saraki is, of course from the North, even if a Yoruba minority in the region. But it should be obvious to even a political illiterate that the man did it for himself, not for the region; in making his bid he neither sought for nor obtained anyone’s mandate.
As with Saraki so also it is with Honourable Yakubu Dogara as Speaker, even though there is a difference in his circumstance; in his own case, no members were deprived of their rights to vote even though, like Saraki, he submitted himself for election and emerged victorious in defiance of his party’s wish.
Akande’s opposition to Saraki and Dogara clearly derives from the great anger of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu at the apparently successful defiance of the party by Saraki and Dogara. Without doubt the Asiwaju is today the most pre-eminent Yoruba politician since the beginning of the current Republic in 1999, bar possibly President Olusegun Obasanjo.
And just like the failure of General Muhammadu Buhari to seal the deal for an alliance as leader of Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) with Tinubu as leader of Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) back in 2011 doomed his presidential bid to failure that year, their handshake last year was probably, more than any other factor, responsible for the general’s success this time around. So Tinubu is entitled more than most top shots of APC to call its shots.
This status, however, does not entitle him to think, as many believe he does, that he is the conscience of the party any more than other chieftains are entitled. In other words, his insistence on party supremacy in the choice of the National Assembly’s APC leadership, though seemingly in the interest of party discipline and cohesion, is hardly as selfless as he and his acolytes would like the world to believe. Tinubu, many believe with good reason, has insisted on party supremacy only because it serves his interest of having Honourable Femi Gbajabiamila, former minority leader and his crony, as the Speaker, instead of Dogara.
In principle, party supremacy is necessary for discipline and cohesion. However, any party which insists on handing down orders from above all the time in the name of party supremacy without first gauging the true feelings of its rank and file, as is clearly the case in the current APC crisis, only courts precisely the indiscipline and chaos it seeks to avoid by invoking the mantra of party supremacy.
As for Tinubu’s entitlement to call APC’s shots, surely he must be aware that there are widespread concerns even among some of his acolytes that, having singlehandedly nominated both the interim and the elected party chairmen and the vice president, he has called more than enough of the party’s shots even as arguably its greatest architect. That this concern is not exclusively Northern can be seen from a full page news item in The Nation of June 14 as reported by one of its managing editors and ace investigative reporter, Yusuf Alli.
The story, entitled “How oil barons, others hijacked Senate, House elections” spoke about how an anti-Tinubu cabal met at various times in Port Harcourt, Lagos, Abeokuta, Abuja and Ilishan to plan how to “decimate APC national leader, Asiwaju Tinubu.” The plotters, according to the story, included four serving governors and seven ex-governors, two of each from Asiwaju’s South-West backyard.
The story also claimed an “influential emir” was also involved. The emir, according to the story, had unsuccessfully pleaded with Asiwaju to intercede with President Buhari in the cases of some oil barons who have been fearful of the president’s commitment to investigate the oil subsidy scam. The story did not identify the oil barons but chances are they came from all sections of the country.
What all this means is that the crisis of the National leadership election is not, as Chief Akande claims, any Northern conspiracy against the Yoruba.  Neither Saraki nor Dogara, it bears repeating, sought for or obtained the region’s mandate to do what they did. And, to the extent that there is any conspiracy to clip Asiwaju’s wings, most likely the co-conspirators come not from one section of the country alone but from all over.
Besides, it is instructive that much of the public gloating about Asiwaju’s current predicament has come, not from the North, but from his own backyard. Predictably, leading the gloating is Chief Bode George, the Lagos-born PDP chieftain who has blamed Tinubu for his jailing years back on corruption charges as chairman of the Nigerian Ports Authority. Asiwaju’s political influence, George said with apparent glee, first in THE PUNCH (June 10) “is coming to sunset” and then added in the July 6th edition of the same newspaper that Tinubu and his group “have now been given political circumcision.”
Quick on his heels was Dr Frederick Fasehun, co-founder of the militant Odu’a People’s Congress. Fasehun said in a two-page advert in The Guardian of July 5 that the National Assembly leadership crisis had nothing to do with the Yoruba but instead was “the demystification of Goliath.” As such, he said, Akande’s call on the Yoruba to see it as a slight on their nationhood “should be ignored.”  
Not left behind was the voluble Mr Femi Olukayode, nee Fani-Kayode, spokesman of President Goodluck Jonathan’s campaign organisation, who, among other nasty things, said on his official Facebook page on July 9 that the crisis was “the destruction and demystification of Bola Tinubu and his Yoruba loyalists by his erstwhile northern allies in the APC.”
The Asiwaju should not bother himself about all those gloating over his predicament. In politics, no one, not even the most sagacious politician, can win all the time. He may have lost the battle for the leadership of the National Assembly but winning the war of stemming the rot of 16 years of PDP’s misrule is far more important. And this war can still be won in spite of the new National Assembly leadership should it constitute itself into an obstacle against Buhari’s declared war on corruption and of restitution.
Therefore the Asiwaju, as a key APC chieftain, should never regret the key role he played in the emergence of his party as PDP’s nemesis simply because he has lost one, albeit an important, battle, among the many he has fought to bring hope of a new dawn to Nigeria.


DailyTrust

EXCLUSIVE: How Dambazau lost out in NSA race

 

One man who was 99.99% certain of being appointed national security adviser (NSA) by President Muhammadu Buhari was Abdulrahman Bello Dambazau — until two weeks ago when his stock began to fall.
Dambazau, who was removed as chief of army staff and then retired as a lieutenant general in 2010 by former President Goodluck Jonathan, was one person whose appointment was thought to be a mere formality.
He was, in other words, the NSA-in-waiting and he was already behaving like one.
But Buhari surprisingly appointed Babagana Monguno, a retired major general, as NSA in the much-awaited shake-up of his security cabinet on Monday.
Presidential sources told TheCable that the case against Dambazau started building up a few weeks ago as Buhari began to finalise his list for the key security appointments.
One of the sources said: “Buhari initially wanted Ibrahim Coomassie, former inspector general of police, as NSA, but so much argument was made about Coomassie’s age. He is just 69, but it seems those who made that argument carried the day.

Dambazau (centre) toured the presidential villa with Buhari and Jonathan in May

“That is how Dambazau moved to the top of the list as the favourite. However, several issues came up in the process of taking a final decision. One, Buhari does not want any officer who has held positions that exposed them to a lot of money. As it were, he wanted ‘innocent’ military officers to spearhead his security agenda. If you look at the new appointments, most of the security chiefs have never held what we call ‘plum’ positions in Nigeria.
“Buhari wants to re-professionalise the military. Those who have had questions asked about their past stewardship eventually fell down the list. He liked Dambazau a lot but he could not dismiss the case against him.”
Also, his tenure in the army was reviewed and some of the facts that emerged did not do him any favours.
“The Boko Haram insurgency budded under his watch as army chief, with Gen. Sarki Mukhtar as NSA. The No. 1 security priority of Buhari is to tackle Boko Haram. Dambazau’s CV was not glittering in that aspect. It was going to be a questionable appointment,” the source added.
Another presidential source said Buhari would still accommodate the retired general from Kano, who was the first chief of army staff to hold a PhD when former President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua appointed him in 2009.

Dambazau, sitting to Buhari’s right, praying at the state house mosque in June 2015

“The fact that Dambazau did not get the NSA position does not mean he has been blacklisted by Buhari. He is still highly regarded. But you cannot question the choice of Gen. Babagana Monguno as the NSA. He comes highly recommended and he has an enviable record. He is upright.
“He was unfairly retired because Jonathan wanted to make Gen. Kenneth Minimah army chief. So Minimah’s mates and seniors had to go. It was not as if Monguno did anything wrong or was found wanting,” the source added.
Dambazau’s failure to get the NSA slot was all the more shocking because he seemed primed to play the role right from the campaign days.
He was the head of the security committee of the APC campaign organisation, and was always around Buhari in the days leading to the May 29 inauguration as well as after the president assumed office.
Dambazau toured Aso Rock together with Buhari in the last days of Jonathan, and appeared prominently in all the pictures.

Dambazua (first right) was on Buhari’s team to the AU summit in South Africa in June, along with Governors Samuel Ortom (Benue) and Ibikunle Amosu (Ogun)

He also travelled with Buhari to the G7 summit in Bavaria, Germany, on June 7 — before travelling with him to Johannesburg, South Africa, for the 25th African Union summit.
TheCable understands that he played a major role in the security arrangements for Buhari, including the appointment of Muhammed Lawal Abubakar, a lieutenant colonel, as ADC to the president.
Dambazau also prayed regularly with Buhari at the state house mosque.

Buhari: How I chose new Service Chiefs

President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday explained how he settled for his choice of service chiefs, few hours after he appointed new heads for the nation’s armed forces.
Mr. Buhari had on Monday afternoon appointed new Service Chiefs and a National Security Adviser, after sacking their predecessors.
The president appointed Major-General Abayomi Gabriel Olonishakin as Chief of Defence Staff; Major-General T.Y. Buratai as Chief of Army Staff; Rear Admiral Ibok-Ete Ekwe Ibas as Chief of Naval Staff; and Air Vice Marshal Sadique Abubakar as Chief of Air Staff.
He also appointed Air Vice Marshal Monday Riku Morgan as Chief of Defence Intelligence; and Retired Major-General Babagana Monguno as National Security Adviser.
Addressing the new military chiefs shortly after their appointments, Mr. Buhari said he considered merit and track records in tapping them for their new assignments.
“All of you, including the National Security Adviser, were chosen on merit,” the President said.
“Your records gave you the job.
“Save for the new Chief of Army Staff whom I briefly met at his Command at the Multi-National Joint Task Force, in Chad, I don’t know any of you.
“Your records recommended you.”
The president therefore charged the new military chiefs to help him rebuild the reputation of the Armed Forces and the nation.
The President also called on them to show utmost commitment to their new duties.
Mr. Buhari assured them that their nominations would be sent to the National Assembly for confirmation.
“Legally, you are in acting capacity until the National Assembly accepts you,” the President said.
“It is only then that you will take the oath of office. Thereafter, we will sit down and talk in more detail.”
President Buhari appointed Major-General Munguno National Security Adviser against speculations that former Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Lt. General Abdulrahman Dambazau, would most likely get the job.
Presidency insiders however did not express surprise with the decision, saying President Buhari had long indicated preference to appointing a retired military officer with intelligence background, against Mr Dambazau, who was a military police.
Aside Mr. Dambazau’s perceived lack of experience in secret service, sources said the former army chief may have lost the plum position owing to a barrage of petitions against him.
PREMIUM TIMES learnt that President Buhari was alerted to Mr. Dambazau’s alleged involvement in the scandal concerning the renovation/upgrading of 44 Army Reference Hospital, Kaduna, when he was chief of army staff.
The petitioners reportedly claimed that the project, meant to upgrade the hospital to a world class reference centre for the military, allegedly gulped billions of naira under Mr. Dambazau without commensurate result.
Mr. Dambazzau could not be reached for comment Monday night. His known telephone number was switched off the several times PREMIUM TIMES called.
A presidency official however said the former army chief might be compensated with another appointment.
Mr. Buhari’s appointment of the new service chiefs came 48 hours after PREMIUM TIMES exclusively reported that the President’s slow approach to governance was affecting the prosecution of the war against the extremist Boko Haram sect in the north east of Nigeria.
Officials in the administration and some retired security and military experts had told PREMIUM TIMES that the decision by the president to allow uncertainty surround the tenures of the service chiefs and the National Security Adviser he inherited from the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan, was greatly affecting the war.
“Service Chiefs are currently sitting at the edge of their seats; there is a regime of uncertainty because it was clear to them and everyone that they would not be part of the new administration, as such, they presently do not go the extra mile,” one official said.
Officials at the Defence Headquarters had also told this paper that there was no long term commitment on the part of the now sacked Service Chiefs and other top commanders, owing largely to the uncertainty regarding their tenure.
“All the Service Chiefs have cleared their desks including the NSA, and each day, they expect to receive the news of their sack, in that case, how do you expect someone to be in the right frame to prosecute a war as complex as the one against Boko Haram who use civilian targets as shield,” one official had said.
He added that the Service Chiefs were hardly taking any long term decision on the war and security matters.