One of the greatest human traits, especially when confronted with unsavoury circumstances, is the irresistible desire to look back into the annuls of their history for comparisons – possibly, as a form of strength, comfort, direction, or guidance.

I am not exactly sure why we do it, but all I know is that, all of us – as human beings – are drawn to such comparisons, at some point in our lives – it is simply unavoidable.  How many times have we complained over the poor standards of today’s products and goods, as compared to those of yesteryear? …or, how today’s youth are so disrespectful and undisciplined, as opposed to past generations?

This is human nature at its best…or worst! However, there are times when the comparisons become a bit more tricky and complex, as the situations being compared both seem unenviable – as this may end up being reduced to a case of ‘the better evil’. One may have to compare two catastrophic situations that they had to endure, for instance, a traumatic and terrifying accident, and the death of a loved one.

Both these scenarios are horrific, but if one is faced with the death of a loved one, then the horrid accident – which, probably, left them terribly paralysed, and traumatized – would suddenly, not appear so bad afterall. This is the sinister and paradoxical predicament that the ever-suffering people of Zimbabwe find themselves in this day and age.

After braving decades of horrendous oppression and subjugation at the hands of the brutal Rhodesia government, the country’s majority would be excused for thinking that things could not possibly get any worse, and that independent Zimbabwe would usher in the well-deserved respite.

What else were they to expect after facing years and years of racially skewed political, economic, and social policies – having their land expropriated, denied equal access to quality education and health, awarded racially-prejudiced salaries, being restricted to certain residential areas, denied their right to vote, and basically treated as second class citizens in their own country?

The only sane recource for such injustices was the liberation struggle, which led to the country’s independence, and huge expectations for the majority to be finally freed from the overbearing shackles of oppression. Nonetheless, years down the ‘independence road’, that same majority could sense that their joy had been misplaced, and their ‘liberators’ were no better that their erstwhile enslavers.

The land of milk and honey that they had been promised, turned out to be nothing more than a land of ‘pee and pooh’, a sad country where the same brutal repression and oppression persisted, with lack of any meaningful source of livelihood, where university graduates were reduced to street vendors, and hospitals and schools degraded to dying places and rooms where our children were turned into zombies. As is the norm, as human nature dictates, when confronted with such dire circumstances, the people can not help, but look back into the past for comparisons.

This is obviously such a painful task, as it is a journey that can be very traumatic, since the only other situation most, especially older Zimbabweans, can relate to is with Rhodesia.  Again, it is akin to comparing a debilitating and traumatic accident, and the death of a loved one – but, it can not be avoided. Immediately after independence, Zimbabwe, led by then Prime Minister, and subsequently first executive president Robert Gabriel Mugabe – in a government that he was with current president Emmerson Dambudzo Mnangagwa, as security minister – embarked on a destructive policy of annihilating a whole tribe of the country’s population, by launching what observers regard as brazen ethnic cleansing of tens of thousands of mostly Ndebele-speakers of the Midlands and Matebeleland provinces.

When compared to Rhodesia, as much as there was systematic racial segregation, and a tribally-based ‘divide and rule’ tactic, there was hardly any ethnic cleansing of such a magnitude, outside of a war zone. In fact, the most notable acts of tribal violence in Rhodesia were at the instigation of Mugabe’s party ZANU, after its break away from ZAPU.

Any other deliberate mass killing of the people of this country during Rhodesia was during war time – however, the Mugabe and Mnangagwa dispensation’s decision to massacre people enmass was during ‘peace time’ – save for one of two isolates cases of insurgence, which could never be rightly termed as acts of war.

Another major comparison that Zimbabweans find themselves making is with economic prosperity, or lack of, especially during alleged or real sanctions.  After the Ian Douglas Smith Rhodesian regime decided on a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI), in 1965, the United Nations (UN), at the instigation of the colonial power Britain, imposed comprehensive economic sanctions on the country.

Vital products, trade, and services were cut off from and to Rhodesia, and it was virtually reduced to an island of isolation – its only friend, albeit, cautiously, was apartheid South Africa. As Rhodesia became more and more isolated, and blocked – especially, after the independence of its neighbours – it had to come up with innovative and ingenious ways to survive.

Although, it was very difficult, they managed to make record-breaking and impressive achievements – even by international standards – such as, the construction of a new railway line to South African ports, in order to avoid the now closed-off Mozambique.

Rhodesia continued to make magnificent inroads in massive domestic industrial and agricultural investments – in spite of, the UN sanctions – resulting in the country becoming a global leader in those areas. In 1979, Rhodesia had some of the biggest industries in the world, and was a leader in agricultural production.  As much as the country was also secluded in the areas of sport and culture, its continued global prowess was exhibited when, soon after independence, the women’s hockey team landed a gold medal at the 1980 Moscow Olympics.

However, in the Mugabe and Mnangagwa dispensation, amidst dubious sanctions – which at most, were nothing but targeted at certain individuals and regime-aligned companies – Zimbabwe become the laughing stock of the world, as it dismally failed at every corner.Zimbabwe became well-known for whining and whinging, being the cry-baby of the world – blaming its pathetic failures on flimsy sanctions.

Zimbabwe  could not even sustain the economy that it had inherited, resulting in massive company closures, with multitudes fleeing the country in search of sustenance, those still in employment not being paid their salaries. …let alone, winning any significant sporting accolades at any international grandstage – save for Kirstey Coventry, and the Black siblings, whose achievements had nothing to do with Zimbabwe’s sporting policies.

In fact, in Rhodesia, a Standard Six (possibly, the equivalent of today’s Grade 7), as could easily access tertiary education, for
instance, my mother who trained as a general nurse – however, the same could not be said for independent Zimbabwe. For someone to be enrolled in nursing school today, they would need at least 5 Ordinary Level passes – and even armed with that certificate, their acceptance is not guaranteed, leading to some despicable acts, as bribery.

By the way, the increase in enrollment qualifications had nothing to do with any sort of improvement in the quality of the training, as my mother – who still works today on locum tenens basis – is highly regarded over the younger Zimbabwean-trained nurses.

Soon after graduation, employment was readily available in Rhodesia, as even my mother was immediately scooped up by the then giant Rhodesia Iron and Steel Company (Risco), which paid her well and regularly – a company that the independent Zimbabwe regime destroyed after nationalizing it, and then running it into the ground through mismanagement and rampant corruption.

Rhodesia companies not only paid their workers on time every time, but also provided them with varied social amenities, such as sports clubs – which have since been turned into jungles under the Mugabe and Mnangagwa dispensation.  Zimbabwe can not even construct a high standard road and rail network – actually, in all my life, I have never witnessed the construction of
a railway line in this country.

All the major sporting facilities, except two or three, were constructed under Rhodesian rule – most of which are now laying in
ruin. As much as Rhodesia was under UN devastating sanctions, hospitals and schools, even in those segregated Black areas were well-stocked with the most essential medication, equipment, textbooks, and all the necessary stationary.

In stark contrast to the Mugabe and Mnangagwa dispensation, whereby, even the most vulnerable in our society, such as the elderly, poor,and disabled, are still required to purchase expensive medication from private pharmacies – as government health institutions lack the very basics. As the two presidents of  Zimbabwe, Mugabe and Mnangagwa – the latter having always being in government since independence in 1980, and being an integral part of the decision making – should equally be held
responsible and answerable for the divisions, atrocities, and meltdown that Zimbabwe has been subjected to.

Thus,  Mugabe and Mnangagwa can never be separated as the two men are the most responsible for the chaos and demise of Zimbabwe – and, for the latter to attempt to dissociate himself from that dispensation is futile and deceptive.

The two walked together, agreed together, destroyed together, and no coup d’etat, or any other shenanigans can ever manage to pull wool over the eyes of Zimbabweans.

*Tendai Ruben Mbofana is a social justice activist, writer, author, and speaker. He is the Programmes Director with the Zimbabwe Network for Social Justice (ZimJustice).

The Zimbabwean

In late 1978, or early 1979, Chief Obafemi Awolowo, one of Nigeria’s frontline political leaders and the leader of the newly-proclaimed Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), came to Calabar in continuation of his presidential campaign tour. The ban on political activities imposed after the military coup of January 15, 1966 had been lifted four months earlier and Chief Awolowo had announced the formation of the party the same day the ban was lifted.

Through the agency of Odia Ofeimun, Awolowo’s private secretary, two young members of the Calabar Group of Socialists (CGS) – Bassey Ekpo Bassey and myself – met the visiting presidential candidate of UPN as he was having his dinner (of bread and Lucozade drink) late at night, at about 1.00 am.

After the pleasantries, we told Chief Awolowo that we liked his party’s four cardinal programmes (free education at all levels NOW; integrated rural development; free medical care; and full employment of all labours) and would like to campaign for him freely, that is, without compensation – but would not like to be card-carrying members of his party. After appreciating our choice, Chief Awolowo insisted that we should formally and openly join the party. We thanked him for granting us audience, withdrew from his presence and left the venue as quietly – or rather, as secretly – as we came.

My review of this story – and indeed the rest of this piece – will be built around four questions: Why did we make this trip? Why was it secret, or rather, doubly secret? What was our feeling about Awolowo’s response to our request? And what do I feel about the event now, more than 39 years later?

To answer these questions we may have to move 17 months back from December 1978, that is, back to July 1977. Between the end of that month and the beginning of the following month, August, 1977, Nigerian socialists held a conference at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. That conference, with the name All-Nigeria Socialist Conference, is a landmark in the history of the Nigerian Left. All shades of radical consciousness – from social democracy to Bakuninist anarchism – were present. The list of invited participants became useless, because the majority were uninvited. Fela Anikulapo Kuti came with the full contingent of his band and dancers. They insisted on sitting on the floor! At the end of the four-day riotous conference, a particular decision came out as a consensus: Whenever General Obasanjo and his military gang lifted the ban on open political activities socialists should form a single party to confront the exploiters and oppressors.

With the benefit of hindsight it may now be seen that such a single party-accommodating all Leftwing tendencies - could only be a “mass” socialist party, near to social democracy, and not a “cadre” or “vanguard” socialist party. But this was not spelt out at the conference, nor could the difference have been appreciated by most of the participants who were just angry, but politically progressive young Nigerians. I am now convinced that older comrades like Eskor Toyo, S. G. Ikoku, Ola Oni, Ikenna Nzimiro, Tunyi Otegbeye, Wahab Goodluck, Dapo Fatogun, Baba Omojola, etc, must have known that major differences would emerge at the point of execution of this landmark decision. And so it happened!

By the time Bassey and I met Chief Awolowo in Calabar 17 months later, not less than five Left parties had emerged – each claiming to a realization of the Zaria decision. But that was not all.

Leftists who went into the two leading progressive mainstream parties: the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN) and the People’s Redemption Party (PRP) claimed to have gone there to realize the Zaria Conference mandate. Even comrades who went into the leading conservative parties – the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), the Nigerian People’s Party (NPP) and the Great Nigeria People’s Party (GNPP) - claimed to be the legitimate heirs of the Zaria Consensus since they went there to take over the parties and transform them! The comrades who were “left behind”, that is, those that did not form or had not formed parties or had formed parties and quickly came out – seeing that it was a joke – were very angry.

This last group included Bassey and I. And we were angrier because General Obasanjo had just dismissed us and some other Leftists from our jobs over “Ali must go” protests. We did not accept that we should just go and “siddon look” as vampires and predators were preparing to take over power from the military after 13 years. We looked at the situation and decided to meet with Chief Obafemi Awolowo. This answers the first of the four questions: Why did we make the trip to meet with Chief Awolowo?

Now to the second question: Why was the trip secret and doubly secret? It was secret because we did not want the meeting to be known to the public, since we did not have sufficient time to consider the implications and consequences. And the trip was doubly secret because it was not approved either by the Nigerian Left in general or the Calabar Group of Socialists in particular. On the face of it, the trip, whether “successful” or not, would have been considered by the two entities not only as undisciplined, but also as dangerously “voluntaristic” and “adventuristic”, if not “counter- revolutionary”. We were, however, ready to justify it on highly revolutionary grounds before the Left – had it leaked. But the trip was unsuccessful and did not leak. The matter was therefore buried.

The third question: What was our immediate reaction to Chief Awolowo’s response? We were, of course, very disappointed. But later, over beer and cigarettes, we rationalized that, perhaps, we were lucky! I thought of the possible reactions of Comrades Bene, BJ and Eskor Toyo in particular.

The answer to the fourth and final question – what I now think of the 1978 visit to Chief Awolowo – is the “meat” of this piece. That answer is this: The thing that Bassey and I did that night in Calabar should be taken as a prototype of what the Left should openly begin to do now. But it should be done collectively (as against individually) and consciously and deliberately (as against idealistically and romantically). It should not be a “free gift” like what Bassey and I offered 40 years ago. It should rather be a hard political bargain of mutual benefits.

The offer to the other side could begin like this: “Although our destinations are not the same, it appears we can pass through the same routes for a considerable distance. Let us then move together and hope that before we get to the “parting of ways” we would have convinced you or you would have convinced us or a mutually – acceptable third destination would have appeared. But in the meantime the masses would have achieved irreversible successes and victories.”

Finally, this bargain, which may result in an alliance, should not exhaust the strategy or programme of the Left. There should be ancillary and “fall back” positions – just as the other side will have theirs.

This conclusion brings us to the 2019 general elections. The alliance talks implicitly proposed here for the Nigerian Left could be with small political parties/groups or large political parties/groups or small/large political parties/groups which satisfy some obvious conditions – in terms of programmes, antecedents and public image of leaderships - provided, of course, that at least one of the allying entities is registered and that they are not all paupers or juveniles.

Let it not be like the alliance of 20 parties in Kenya in the early 1980s which President Arap Moi ridiculed as an alliance of 20 monkies against a lion!

There are lots to be read into the recent report by the Fiscal Responsibility Commission on the debt profile of various state governments in 2016. According to the Punch of March 20 2018, which reported extensively on the report, the debt profiles of about 18 states exceeded their gross and net revenues by more than 200 per cent. The paper quoted the FRC as saying that the debt may have increased by 2017 since “there was no effort by the states to clear them”. It also quoted the FRC as saying that the development was contrary to the guidelines of the Debt Management Office on debt sustainability, which recommends that the debt status of each state should not exceed 50 per cent of the statutory revenue in the previous 12 months.  “In the light of the DMO’s guidelines on the Debt Management Framework, specifically, sections 222 to 273 of the Investment and Securities Act, 2007 pertaining to debt sustainability, according to the guidelines, the debt to income ratio of states should not exceed 50 per cent of the statutory revenue for the preceding 12 months,” the FRC was quoted as saying.

Analysis of the FRC report (which was based on the debt profile of the states as of December 31, 2016) showed that most of the states of the federation flouted the regulation as they exceeded their debt to revenue ratio by more than 100 per cent. According to the report, the worst offenders were Lagos (670.42 per cent), Osun (539.25 per cent), Cross River (486.49 per cent), Plateau (342.01 per cent), Oyo (339.56 per cent), Ekiti (339.34 per cent), Ogun (329.47 per cent), Kaduna (297.26 per cent) and Imo (292.82 per cent). Others were Edo (270.8 per cent), Adamawa (261.96 per cent), Delta (259.63 per cent), Bauchi (250.75 per cent), Nasarawa (250.36 per cent), Kogi (221.92 per cent), Enugu (207.49 per cent), Zamfara (204.91 per cent), and Kano (202.61 per cent).

The report found that the only states whose debts did not exceed the recommended 50 per cent ratio by more than 100 per cent were Anambra, Borno, Jigawa, Kebbi, Sokoto, Yobe and the Federal Capital Territory.

Several extrapolations could be made from the above set of frightening figures:

One, the amount of revenue accruing to a state has no relationship with its debt profile.  For instance Lagos State which has the highest debt to gross revenue ratio of 670.42 per cent (and  debt to net revenue of 930.96 per cent),   is one of the highest receivers of  funds from the Federation Account. It has also one of the best internally generated revenue profiles (thanks in part to the location of prime businesses there). In September 2017 for instance, it received from the Federation Account N8.8bn, compared to say Borno and Anambra which received less than half of what it got from the Federation Account alone during the period and yet stayed within the recommended 50 per cent to revenue ratio. Remarkably none of the top receivers of funds from the Federation Account - Akwa Ibom, Delta, Rivers, Bayelsa, Kano and Kaduna States - made it in the ‘honours’ list.

In fact the states whose debt did not exceed the recommended 50 per cent ratio by more than 100 per cent according to FRC received the following sums in September 2017 from the Federation Account (I am using a random month and year for which data on what was received by all the states are available): Anambra (N4.3bn), Borno (N4.9bn), Jigawa, (N4.67) Kebbi (N4.26), Sokoto (N4.1bn), Yobe (N4.15bn). In contrast, the top receivers of funds, which did not make the ‘honours’ list received the following sums during the period: Delta (N14.2), Akwa Ibom (N12.94bn), Rivers (N12.45bn), Kano (N6.8bn) and Kaduna (N5.4bn). In the same vein, Osun, which is the poorest state in the country in terms of sums received from the Federation Account, (it got only N1.6bn during the period) was not listed among the states with the highest debt to gross revenue ratios. One of the conclusions from this would be the wise words of Benjamin Franklin, one of the founding fathers of the USA: “Money never made a man happy yet, nor will it. The more a man has, the more he wants. Instead of filling a vacuum, it makes one.”

Two,  a survey published in May 2017 by BudGIT, (a civic organisation founded in 2011 to simplify the budget and matters of public spending for citizens), found that most states, including some top receivers of funds from the Federation Account and many heavily indebted states, owed workers arrears in salary and pension payments.

Among the States which it found were not owing salaries were Anambra, Borno, Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Kaduna, Kano, Kebbi, Lagos, Plateau, Sokoto and Yobe.  Remarkably while rich Delta State and Bayelsa States owed upwards of six months salaries, Yobe, Kebbi and Anambra which receive less than half of what they get from the Federation Account did not owe any salary arrears.  The above raises the question of whether revenues accruing to states are good indicators of the viability of states. It will seem from the above that the capacity for governance and managing resources may be better indicators of state viability than the quantum of money that flows to states. 

Three, while oil money controlled by the federal government has made it the central site of the intra elite struggles for power and privileges, a commensurate attention is not paid at what happens at the state levels. In fact while the country’s democracy is in a transition mode at the federal level, it appears to be suffering from arrested development at the state levels. Just consider these: In Imo state, which was found by BudGIT to owe primary school teachers two months arrears of salary and pensioners 24 months arrears in May 2017, the government strangely found enough resources to build statutes of personalities that caught his fancy, including that of Jacob Xuma, former President of South Africa, who is now facing corruption charges in his country. The same Governor gave the ministerial slot for his state to his father-in-law and is now pushing for his son in-law to succeed him. In Kaduna state, an otherwise smart governor had to pull down a house belonging to his political opponent. In virtually all the States, the Governors behave like monarchs rather than elected executives that are accountable to the electorate.  Is there any State in the country where the State House of Assembly is not a rubber stamp of the Governor? Is it possible for a State Governor to lose a court case in the State’s High Court? Can the party of a state Governor lose Local Government elections in the State? Compared to what is happening at the state level, the federal government seems to be doing well. 

Four, what the different ethnic and regional factions of the political class demand from the federal government, they often negate when it comes to their own states. For instance, while we all extol the unwritten power rotation agreement between the Northern and Southern parts of the country, will it be a crime for the politicians to respect the same principle in their states? Will it for instance be a crime for a power rotation arrangement in Benue, Kaduna, Taraba and several other states in the country so that all the key constituents of a State will have a good opportunity of producing the Governor of the State? Several states in the country need restructuring, not just the federal government.

The hullabaloo over Senators’ N13.5m monthly ‘running cost’

The recent revelation by Senator Shehu Sani (Kaduna Central) that each Senator receives the whopping sum of N13.5m as running cost - on top of N700,000 monthly consolidated salary and allowances  -  has led to justified anger in the land. I join in condemnation of bogus payments. But I will like also to put a caveat: several comparisons of what the Senators earn with what their counterparts earn in Europe, USA and elsewhere earn,  miss the context.  The truth is that the electorate in Nigeria (and virtually all parts of Africa) are manifestly different from their European and American counterparts. For instance while the constituents of a Nigerian Senator expect him or her to attend funerals, naming ceremonies and launchings of all hues and to be among the highest donors in such events, there are no such expectations on their American and European counterparts. Nigerian Senators, like political office holders,  are also expected to become cash cows and to donate handsomely wherever they go and their presence is acknowledged including in churches and mosques.

This is not a justification for any jumbo pay when most Nigerians are just trying to scrape by but to give a sense of proportion to the conversation.

Again, it is important for us to compare like-for-like. So if we are justifiably angry at what Senators take home every month, we must also know how much top members of the executive and the judiciary take home - in consolidated monthly salary and monthly ‘running cost’.  

Following public outcry over provisions of the 2018 Land Use Charge (LUC) in Lagos State, Governor Akinwunmi Ambode last week announced a downward review of the charges. While it is good that the government would respond to public opinion and make concessions, there are also those who argue that the state needs to address several other concerns which may necessitate repealing the law in its entirety. Incidentally, I foresaw this problem about 17 years ago but it would appear that the current administration in the state has refused to learn any lessons from the past.

In December 2001 when the law was first promulgated, my column on this page was titled “Tinubu Can’t Be Serious”. Then, like now, it was as if the people don’t matter, even though Governor Bola Tinubu eventually had to listen to voices of reason before reaching a compromise with critical stakeholders. I am reproducing that particular piece to remind Ambode of how the problem started, before I draw my conclusion.

===============================================================
About four weeks ago, three Lagos State Commissioners (Rauf Aregbesola, Oladele Alake and Olawale Edun) visited our Apapa office and they wasted no time before telling us their mission. First, the Information and Strategy Commissioner, Alake, went into a laborious explanation on how Lagos has become a mega city and the problems associated with over population. He was supported by his Works counterpart, Aregbesola before Edun, the Finance Commissioner, brought in one ‘Oyinbo’ consultant to give us a lecture with a projector.

Since none of the editors owns any property in Lagos, the visiting commissioners knew we would not be much problem. Even at that, many of us were actually receptive to the idea because members of the elite in Nigeria do not like paying taxes. So if the property owner class would be taxed to develop the state, it was not a bad move. The snag though is that in enacting such a law, the people should be adequately informed while the levies should be reasonable. Unfortunately, that is not what has transpired on this matter.

In a letter dated 10th September 2001, addressed to many landlords in Victoria Island, outrageous amounts of money were charged. A copy of one of such letters sent to a property owner on Oyin Jolayemi Street (who shared it with me in confidence) reads: “Notice is hereby given in respect of the land and buildings situated at the following location… The land and buildings have been assessed in accordance with the Land Use Charges Law, 2001 and have been found to have an assessed value as noted below: N180, 981, 000. 00. The Land and buildings are being used for commercial purposes and are therefore subject to Land Use Charges of 2.50% of the assessed value. The following Land Use Charges are payable: Land Use Charges set for the year 2001—N4, 524, 525.00.”

As if the letter was written by one of those lawyers who worked under the late General Sani Abacha, it continued: “The Lagos State Land Use Charges Law, 2001 provides for penalties for delayed payment and these are fully enforceable (and will be enforced) under the law. The amount, including the penalties which will be payable in the event of payment delayed after the 15-day grace period following the due date above, is as follows: For payment between Oct. 25, 2001 and Nov. 9, 2001—N5, 655, 656. 25; For payment made between Nov. 10, 2001 and Dec 2001—N6, 786, 787.50; For payment made between Dec 10, 2001 and Jan. 8, 2002—N9, 049, 050.00.”

Now the clincher: “If payment in accordance with the foregoing is not received on or before Jan., 8, 2002, the property to which this notice relates shall be liable to receivership by the State or its appointed agent until all outstanding taxes, payments, penalties and administrative charges are paid under the law.”

While I commend Tinubu’s efforts in developing Lagos and one cannot fault his revenue generation drive, his latest decision makes no sense and he cannot win the support of the people on a patently flawed process. One, a ‘law’ that was just passed is now given retroactive powers as if we are under military regime. Two, even if a property is worth N181 million must a landlord pay N4.5 million in a year as charges when the rent on the property might just be only slightly above that? Three, is it sensible to base an annual assessment for the purpose of administering charges on the value rather than on the rent accruable on a property? Four, do the property owners not deserve to be consulted before this arbitrary law was enacted?

Even as a lay man in economic matters, I am fully aware that one of the cardinal principles of taxation is that it must be reasonable. Why is it that the authorities in Lagos want residents to pay some ridiculous annual charges that would further hike the already high rent on property in the state? Besides, when the Lagos State Government started this property assessment campaign, what they told us at the time was that it would only be for planning and not for taxes; does it mean they were deceiving the people?

It would appear that a common feature of governance in Lagos now is arbitrary regime of levies—from the council to the state. But Edun and his men in the Lagos State Finance Ministry had better put on their thinking caps and come up with a more realistic formula on their new ‘law’ otherwise Lagos property owners might be compelled to simply ignore them. Then we will see how many houses they will put under receivership in a democratic government. Even Abacha, as brutal as he was, would find it impossible implementing the ‘law’ Tinubu now wants to foist on Lagos property owners…

ENDNOTE:
The foregoing, as I said, was written 17 years ago and it is unfortunate that Ambode would follow the same old route of ‘shoot first, ask questions later’ that engendered a serious friction in the past. Besides, feigning ignorance on the fact that these same charges have been reviewed three times since 2001, as prescribed in the law, is, to put it mildly, rather shameful. If the governor had consulted widely, as he ought to, especially on a sensitive issue such as this, he would not run into the kind of problem he has now found himself.

In many ways, there is an underlying subterfuge and insincerity in the repeated use of ‘law’ to legitimize extortion as taxation in many states across the country today and Lagos is becoming the most notorious in this regard. Yet, hiding under law to foist on the people unpopular policies is counter-productive. In history, some of the greatest outrages against humanity have been committed under ‘laws’ passed by manipulated parliaments. But history is also replete with empires that crumbled under the weight of their own contradictions.

While I remain an admirer of the Lagos model of political succession that has engendered a measure of incremental development and I endorse taxation as a public policy, I am also aware that the arrogance of power that made the defunct National Republic Convention (NRC) to defeat the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in the dramatic 4th December 1991 gubernatorial election in Lagos State may not be too far away, if care is not taken. The glaring abuse of the legislative process (with names of private companies even being written into laws) in a revenue-generating gambit that fails to take into account the prevailing economic situation in the country can only lead to one inevitable conclusion: Hubris!

Of Police and Dapchi

In what has become a familiar trick, the Inspector-General of Police, Mr Ibrahim Idris, on Monday ordered the withdrawal of all his officers and men attached to private individuals and companies. Not surprisingly, the directive was received with derision by most Nigerians who remembered that practically all his predecessors made similar pronouncement to no effect. Sadly, that in itself speaks to the rot in the police, a law enforcement institution that cannot enforce its own order!

While some ‘Nollywood Senators’ would want to retain their undue privileges, I subscribe to the idea that, in the light of the frequent invasion, by Boko Haram, of schools in the North-east to carry away female students, those policemen should be deployed to provide security. But my main concern is that Nigerian VIPs would not release the police personnel serving them, most of who have become embedded in their politics and businesses, while IGP Idris who is huffing and puffing in the media will do nothing.

It is noteworthy that on 21 August 2015, it was announced that President Muhammadu Buhari had directed the then Inspector General of Police, Mr Sunday Arase to withdraw the over 130, 000 police personnel attached to unauthorized persons and VIPs in the country so they could be deployed to confront the serious security challenges afflicting the nation. Four days later, Chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC), Sir Mike Okiro, (himself a retired IGP) said a team had been constituted to enforce the presidential directive. “The monitoring team will have the powers to stop VIPs on the highways, airports etc, for confirmation of their status and that of the policemen attached to them” said Okiro who warned that “any erring VIP or policeman caught in such unauthorized beat, will be prosecuted”. He also said most memorably, “We cannot afford to have more than half of the population of the police in private hands.”

Three years down the line, Okiro is still singing from the same hymn book as he again lamented last month: “We cannot afford to have more than half of the population of the police in private hands”. Even a parrot cannot do better, although Okiro also explained by way of excuse: “We could not sustain the enforcement of the order on the withdrawal of policemen attached to unqualified persons in the country because of lack of fund.”

At an interactive session with Police Inspectors and other rank and file personnel selected from commands nationwide at the Force Headquarters in Abuja on 21 May 2015, then IGP, Solomon Arase spoke to the abuse of police personnel by the VIPs to which many of them are attached. “Those of you who are posted to VIPs, on no account should you carry their bags and on no account should you act as domestic servants to them. Your uniform must be respected. Anybody who wants to hire a domestic help should not use our policemen who are sent to protect them as domestic help” Arase warned but the misconduct continues without anybody ever brought to book.

In the light of the current precarious security situation in the country, it is no longer tenable that our policemen are only good at carrying handbags for spouses and concubines of ‘Big Men’ while our children are left at the mercy of sundry criminal cartels on their school campuses. Therefore, Idris must understand that it is not only his credibility that is on the line but also that of the president whose name he is invoking on the latest directive. To borrow the words of Okiro, “we cannot afford to have more than half the population of the police in private hands.”

The Amber Light is On…2

That brinksmanship is the name of the game in Nigeria today can be glimpsed from the giant billboards that now dot strategic places in Abuja with banner headlines: ‘Red Alert’. For those who pay attention, the message, targeted at the National Assembly by one Aminu Balel Kurfi (Dan Arewa), proclaims: “Frustrating the President will no longer be tolerated by the masses.”

Although the main concern of the Dan Arewa do-gooder is the delay in the passage of the 2018 budget, the underlying tension between the lawmakers and the presidency over the order of election and the orgy of killings which many politicians, across ethnic and religious divides, are capitalising upon, compound the situation as we inch gradually to another crucial general election. When you add into the mix a growing capacity of Boko Haram to cart away (and later return some) innocent school girls almost unchallenged, you get the picture of a nation under siege.

Meanwhile, as I said, squabbles over the Electoral Act are nothing new, only that we have never witnessed this sort of desperation and long-drawn power struggle. For instance, on 6th December 2001, then President Olusegun Obasanjo wrote the National Assembly, declining assent to the Electoral Bill sent to him the previous day because “…for the stability of the polity and the survival of our nascent democracy, it is imperative that only serious and creditable political parties should be allowed to participate in general elections…”

Following my intervention on this page at that period, I got a mail from Mr Sam Omatseye, the current Chairman of the editorial board of The Nation newspaper who was then a university lecturer in the United States. Reading Omatseye’s mail again yesterday, I find it amazing how not much has changed and I leave readers with his words: “I just read your column on the Electoral Act, which indicates that the political brew is beginning to take on the taste of old. Not that it didn’t before, only that its flavour lay hidden in synthetic garnishes. The frail ends are beginning to show but what I see is a sore that has encroached upon the bone. The marrow is next, and when that happens we may be faced with a Bosnia-like scenario of independent warlords. I am worried because what seems to hold the nation together is not law. Nigeria has never had respect for law, but for symbols, whether they represented absolute power or flattered an ethnic sentiment, or promised an illusory dawn. As Henry David Thoreau himself wrote, ‘The law never made anyone a whit more just’…”

NOTE: This series shall be long. Just look out for the continuation.

The authorities must do more to turn the fortunes around

The depressing state of education in the country was again highlighted last week when only 18 per cent of the candidates that sat for the West African Senior School Certificate Examination (WASSCE) obtained marks that could get them admission into some of the reasonable universities. According to Olu Adenipekun, head of the National Office of West African Examinations Council (WAEC), 8,113 candidates representing 71.75 per cent obtained credits and above in two subjects in the recently released results. Some 6,375 candidates, representing 56.38 per cent obtained credits and above in three subjects, while 2,010 candidates representing 17.78 per cent obtained credits and above in six subjects. Performance in the key subjects of English and mathematics was down by eight per cent, compared with 26.01 per cent in 2017.

Whatever may be the excuse, the result reflects the long-standing decay in the education sector across the country. Indeed, the sharp academic decline over the years could be attributed largely to the utter neglect of the learning environment. Most schools lack the basic educational infrastructure. This is also true of staffing. Unfortunately, the sorry conditions are all-pervading, across the states. From Kaduna to Benin City, Kebbi to Sapele, the facilities in most schools have either collapsed or decrepit, while the quality of the education being offered is suspect .There are today, classrooms without teachers, or where there are, many can hardly differentiate between blue and black.

Thus, as we have said severally in this space, our post-primary schools need complete overhaul. Government would need to place emphasis on the quality of teachers and teaching as an irreducible minimum. The conditions of service for teachers must be enhanced if the story must change in the education sector. There is need for education policies that would promote teachers’ capacity to meet the needs of the society. Moreover, the relevant stakeholders have to bear in mind that the mass failure in WASSCE which has become an annual fare is also partly the embarrassing outcome of decades of academic fraud spanning all preceding levels of the education system.

Indeed, as we also noted in a recent editorial, the crisis in our educational sector is so total and frightening that nothing short of a well thought-out strategy will do for any meaningful change to occur. It is not a mere declaration of “a state of emergency” across the state in April as Adamu Adamu, the Minister of Education declared recently: “We hope that once this is done our educational sector will improve,” he said. It is more than that. The learning environment, quality of teachers, academic outcomes and the capacity of monitoring institutions are critical to the success of the sector.

On the whole, we need short, medium and long terms plan with clear objectives and measurable timelines to reform the entire educational system. We must fashion out ways by which the federal, states and local governments and stakeholders from the private sector would come together to save secondary education in Nigeria.

Thisday

While attempting to stowaway through some vessels plying the country’s coastal waters, nine Nigerian citizens and a Nigerien were recently apprehended by the Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS). Their hope of securing the so-called “better life” in Europe was therefore dashed. According to media reports, they had been variously assisted into the vessels by some fishermen who ferried them in local boats before getting them aboard the ships which they erroneously presumed to be Europe-bound, not knowing that they were restricted to the West African coastal waters.

Popoola said he and his fellow co-travellers thought that the vessels in which they were apprehended were Europe-bound and that it was better to live as a fugitive in Europe or any other country for that matter than to despair and die in their country which had failed to offer any hope for its teeming unemployed youths. Their desperation has apparently overtaken their sense of safety. Too poor to undertake a legitimate trip, they ironically threw away all fears of death in order to survive and perhaps prevail in extreme circumstances. And even if the steps taken by these obviously misguided youths are faulted for their lack of depth, it is uncharitable not to consider their logic. There would be no desperation to leave Nigeria if life was conducive for Nigerians.

At the sudden firing of the former US Secretary of State, Tex Tillerson, by President Donald Trump (DJT), I had made the following remarks: It couldn’t have been imagined a couple of years ago that a US president would fire his Secretary of State, and on Twitter, while the latter was away on a foreign trip! This detracts greatly from the image and reputation of the US as a stable, ordered, and orderly democracy, where governance is organized in a most systematic manner.

By the way, instability is not just about an incessant and unpredictable change in, and of government – which once characterized Africa. As a conceptual category, it is also about the fact of rapid turnover in personnel of government, the type the Trump White House has come to represent. What we are confronted with in all of this, is the new USA that is fast losing its much-acclaimed exceptionalism, of course with grave implications for not just Americans, but indeed the entire world.

He is an unrepentant populist who will pander to any idea that will earn him some form of applause, no matter from what source, or how despicable such ideas are. He was there for the white supremacists in Charlottesville. He supported Roy More for the Alabama Senate seat. Soon after the man lost the election, Trump claimed he never quite wanted him anyway. He worked against the Democratic candidate,  Mr Conor Lamb, in Philadelphia, only to begin to patronize the man as soon as he won the election. This was to the chagrin of his own party, the GOP, whose candidate had just narrowly lost. Trump made a commitment to stand up to the National Rifle Association (NRA) soon after the Parkland shooting, only for him to enunciate a position on gun ‘control’ a few days later that the same NRA found too good to be true.

Trump has demonstrated time and time again that he has very little respect for Africans and other peoples of colour. That is the reality; and there is no basis for any denial on our part, no matter how soothing that may sound and feel.

It is also a fact of the moment that Africa has receded considerably in strategic relevance to the West, especially the US, in the past couple of decades. To assume DJT would go all out in pursuit of a position he feels is worthy and beneficial to Nigerians, therefore, is to miss the point. You take such a step only on behalf of people you respect, not people whose countries you’ll rather see as ‘shithole.’  I am afraid, we have started making the same mistake about DJT as many made on Barack Obama.

When Obama was elected, the whole place (in Africa) was agog as people erroneously assumed he was going to specially benefit Africa because he was supposed to be a black man, of Kenyan origin to boot. We forgot that the guy is as white as he is black. By the way, methinks it is a part of the racist narrative to refer to any white person with a drop of black blood in their vein as black; and not white – assuming whiteness is the preferred category. Anyway, it didn’t take too long for us to realize that Obama was not going to be in any way a benefactor of Africa. That is why in much of the black community in the US today, Bill Clinton remains the first and last ‘black president.’

Now talking specifically about what Obama supposedly did against ‘us’ in 2015, I really fail to recognise any. What did Obama do against Goodluck Jonathan that has not been done against Nicholas Maduro? Why has the moustached one in Caracas not handed over Venezuela to the US by reason of that? I do not think we should lay the failure of Jonathan to assert himself and hold his ground when it mattered, at the doorstep of Obama. Our man simply wasn’t available.

He practically went on vacation, and could not exercise the high office he occupied. Pray, what type of president would leave his presidential palace to attend a meeting called by an American Secretary of State in the US embassy located in his country? In diplomacy, that is tantamount to complete abdication!

I reiterate again that diplomacy is as much a game of substance as it is of symbolism. It was evident that DJT had wanted Tillerson out since the ‘moron’-president incident. He also needed to fire the Secretary in a most disrespectful manner, to sweeten up the revenge. That he chose to do it while the guy was visiting Africa is emblematic of the little regard the US president has for the continent.

He wouldn’t have sacked the man while he was crisscrossing Europe or Asia-Pacific. For God’s sake, firing Tillerson has nothing to do with whatever the former Secretary said or did not say, did or failed to do in Africa, including Nigeria. There is no point in deluding ourselves that he was dropped because he was warm towards PMB. Waiting on DJT to help us advance the frontier of the restructuring battle may mean that we would wait in vain.

It is perhaps only when the White House sees that Nigeria has started imploding that it may be obliged to do something, and mind you, not necessarily for us, but to save us from ourselves, and avert yet another immigrant crisis for the West.

Professor Mimiko is a former vice chancellor

Senator Saidu Umar Kumo represented Gombe Central in the fourth senate on the platform of the defunct All Peoples Party (APP). He was also National Secretary of the defunct All Nigeria Peoples Congress (ANPP) before his appointment as a Special Adviser to the late President Umaru Yar’Adua in 2007.

He explains why he thinks Atiku Abubakar remains the best option for the PDP in next year’s presidential contest.

There was outrage across the country following recent abduction of about 110 girls from Government Girls Technical School Dapchi in Yobe State as well as the attack on Kalabalge in Borno State where UN workers were reportedly killed. Do you see this latest Boko Haram attacks as confirmation that the insurgents still pose a threat contrary to initial claims by government?

In the first place, the insurgency in the north-eastern part of the country is something new entirely. We have never experienced it before. This is the first time this thing is happening in Nigeria. At the beginning of the insurgency, leaders in the country took it for granted. Later it developed to become what it is today. It is now a serious challenge to the entire nation, both to those in authority and the governed. Unfortunately, when the Chibok issue came up, after all the effort and up to this moment, some Nigerians thought we have learnt a lesson and taken security measures in all our schools. But the Dapchi issue has embarrassed the country, embarrassed its leaders because nobody expected that at this time, there will be a re-occurrence of students abduction.

This Dapchi issue has drawn the country back. Even the international community has been taken aback because they had expected our leaders to be on top of the situation by providing adequate security in schools in the trouble states. We cannot continue to blame the military always. The military cannot be everywhere at every time. What about other security operatives who are supposed to compliment the efforts of the military, the military are expected to recover areas from the insurgents and move on. Other security agencies are expected to take over and maintain law and order. Had it been there were some policemen or even mobile policemen stationed in various schools, they would have alerted the military for support or even rescue. Unfortunately, that did not happen.

The Nigerian government never told anyone that they have finished with Boko Haram completely; they merely crippled them as they are no longer a threat as before. They cannot say they have stamped them out completely because it’s not an easy task stamping insurgency out. The Boko Haram do not have peculiar identity, they enter the society and mingle easily. It takes time for security agencies to identify them. It will take a time before it ends completely.

As 2019 general election approaches, there is agitation for the presidential candidate of the PDP to come from the north- east geopolitical zone. Do you think this is possible?

 Yes, it is. By God’s grace, we are going to realise it. We are working very hard to make sure the party gives us the opportunity. Of course, some other contestants from other parts of the country are free to show interest but time is coming when we will appeal to them to consider us. Moreover, the person we want is the Wazirin Adamawa, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar. By the Grace of God, he will emerge. However, we have to work together with our colleagues from other parts of the north and other parts of the country.  The position has not been micro-zoned to any part of the north. It’s still for the entire north. But we hope to either micro-zone it to the north-east or we would appeal to others to slow down and allow someone from the area to emerge.

Recently you opened the north- east zone Atiku Abubakar Solidarity Office. What makes you think that Atiku could be the best choice for the PDP?

I opened up the zonal solidarity office for Atiku Abubakar to mobilise support for his presidential ambition, which we are part of. I’m telling you, Atiku is long overdue in the PDP to become its presidential candidate and be elected as president. Nigeria of today needs someone like Atiku; there are many challenges that we require someone like him to step into the leadership to bring about an all inclusive administration with focus. He is going to be the right choice for Nigerians. But first, we want him to be the choice of the PDP, when the PDP choose him to become its presidential candidate, then we can sell him to Nigerians.

Talking about presidential aspirants from the north- east, in 2015, you were Director General, Ibrahim Hassan Dankwambo campaign organisation. There is indication that he too is gunning for the PDP presidential ticket. Why are you angling for Atiku to pick the ticket?

 I really don’t know that Dankwambo is angling for the presidential ticket. Because he never discussed the issue with me, he never discussed with someone that came to discuss with me, he never sent someone to inform me. My party leadership never called me to say Gombe governor is angling for the PDP presidential ticket. Nobody told me until this moment. I’m not the one to push him and say, ‘come out and contest for this position.’ If he is nursing such ambition, maybe he told those that matter. Maybe they are aware, maybe he didn’t come to our level. But already there is another person that saw us and considers us important in this project and we are for him.  That doesn’t mean he cannot gun for the ticket, he must work for it. But for me, I have made my position clear; everybody knows I’m for Atiku in the north- east and Nigeria.

In the north- east, only Gombe and Taraba States belong to the PDP. Do you see this as a challenge to Atiku’s presidential ambition?

Recently, the lingering crisis within the PDP took a turn for the worst with the defection of some founding members of the party like Profs Jerry Gana and Adeniran to the Social Democratic Party (SDP). Do you see this as a challenge to the chances of the PDP in the 2019 presidential election?

 When parties lose election, particularly big parties, like the PDP that was in power for 16 years, what people don’t understand is that, if care is not taken, the party will go into disarray. People are yet to know what it meant to be in the opposition, how the opposition suffers. They don’t know how to build an opposition. They expected the thinking to be rowdy. Although, we know the convention has come and gone, with all that happened, at least, we want to put it behind us. As family members of the party, there should be deliberate effort to pacify people but that is what is lacking today or it’s not as we expected. That’s the reason some of them are moving away. Today, in the political terrain of Nigeria, there are only two good platforms, either the PDP or APC. All the rest are weak, they cannot carry the burden of promoting contestants. I also moved out but I came back because some people prevailed on me. We need to prevail on them to come back. They left out of annoyance not because they sincerely prefer life outside the PDP. We need to include leaders of the party, supporters and stalwarts of the party to prevail on them to come back to the party, not only them, but to open our doors for others to come in. It’s unfortunate this is happening at this material time. We all knew what happened during the convention, which resulted in this crisis. Whether we like it or not, this is a challenge to us, which points the way to build and bring up an opposition party. There is nothing PDP can do today to deny the fact that we are in the opposition. We have to behave like the opposition and not to carry on as if we are still in power. We should stop thinking as if we are still in power. Nobody owns this party; PDP belongs to all Nigerians and board members of the PDP. It’s sad; we cannot afford to lose a member not to mention those with influences. I believe the party leadership would look into it and see how we can reunite ourselves as one family.

Coming back home, Gombe State since its creation in 1996 has evolved into a model for others to emulate. However, it’s obvious there are still challenges facing the people. What can you say are these challenges and how do you think they can be surmounted?

Gombe is supposed to be a model and is still is to some states created at the same time with us and even some older states. By God’s Grace, Gombe is today ahead of even some older states. As of today, no matter what you do, there are still some issues of development. No matter what, particularly in terms of infrastructure, you cannot get it all, you have to start and finish some and start initiating some.  Don’t forget, we had only three administrations on our own. The first was under Hashidu, which was not given the chance because he ruled for only four years. Since it was the first civilian administration, it came with its peculiar challenges. Hashidu could not perform because of the prevailing situation. Secondly, Goje came and tried his best. He started to put up some of the things we have today. Then Dankwambo came and he did very well in terms of infrastructure.

Nevertheless, he cannot have it all as there are funding challenges. What the state used to get has gone down. He had to slow down to do mostly those projects that he deemed necessary. In that respect, I don’t have quarrelled with that, Gombe has gone somewhere and we want whoever is coming to build on that. This second tenure, the pace of development has slowed down possibly because of the shortfall in revenue. Things changed and you can see how the prices of everything skyrocketed. All these are part of the challenges. We believe he will be able to do something before the end of his tenure and it’s our hope that whoever is elected will come to build on it.

Sun

The recent disclosure by the Director General of the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO),  Jose Graziano da Silva, that African countries should create 12 million new jobs annually over the next 20 years to confront and halt ravaging unemployment on the continent, is a wake-up call on African governments.

African countries must heed to the advice of the FAO boss because unemployment, especially youth unemployment, remains a ticking time bomb, which may explode anytime with dire consequences. We are worried that successive governments in Africa are rather paying lip service to the unemployment problem instead of confronting it decisively.

Although unemployment challenge differs from country to country in Africa, its magnitude is high throughout the continent. While unemployment was hardly a problem in Libya under the late Muammar Gaddafi, the situation is not the same now that the country is suffering from instability. Most North African countries have less unemployment.

But, the unemployment situation elsewhere on the continent is dire. Nigeria, the most populous country in Africa, has the most unemployment challenge.  The Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS) recently put the number of the unemployed as at Q3 2017 at 15.99 million and the underemployed at 18 million. The youth constitute about 40 per cent of the unemployed population 

As a direct response to this challenge, millions of these youths brave the risk of voluntary enslavement in other countries in their search for greener pastures. Some of them travel through the risky Mediterranean Sea on their way to Europe.  Some have died in the process.

There is hardly any justification for the grave unemployment situation on the continent. Government in Africa must create more jobs for the unemployed, especially in rural areas. The growing army of unemployed people in Africa must be gainfully engaged for the continent to develop.  Africa cannot develop when those that constitute the active population are not working.

We agree that creating 12 million jobs over the next 20 years, which would translate to 240 million jobs, is a good starting point. African countries can even go beyond this estimation.

African governments must use agriculture to create more jobs and develop the continent. Agriculture remains the continent’s best route to full and gainful youth employment. But, to attain the laudable goal, a lot of attention and resources must be committed to rural and integrated infrastructural development and transformation.

Farm settlements, complete with modern and enough infrastructure support were established in well-targeted parts of the country. Agriculture provided adequate employment for the rural populace and largely addressed the problem of unemployment.

After groping in the dark for nearly two decades, state assemblies have acquiesced to the clamour for their autonomy. They are set to liberate themselves from being appendages of the governors, a move that will place their funding in the first line charge. Epileptic funding of the assemblies has been used by the Executive arm of government in many states to turn them like a dice.

However, the new lease of life will only come into effect after the ongoing Second Amendment to the 1999 Constitution by the National Assembly must have been consummated. This is a welcome development. Curiously, state lawmakers had jettisoned the proposal when it was first made by the Seventh National Assembly, following pressure from the governors, who wanted to keep them under their perpetual control.

It was not by accident that the founding fathers of democracy created the executive, legislative and the judicial arms of government, with well defined responsibilities, and each acting as a check on the other. This pristine arrangement is fundamental in a democracy. Where the legislature’s autonomy is eroded or lacking, what exists is anything but democracy.

Regrettably, such has been the lot of most states in Nigeria since 1999. Most governors have subjugated their state assemblies or, worse still, the assemblies have become willing tools in their hands, thereby betraying the trust of the people they purport to represent. As a result, many governors behave like emperors, embezzle and misappropriate public funds and defy all measures to make them accountable.

But in a democracy, the assemblies exist to make laws for good governance. Their major work, however, lies in oversight in the ministries, departments and agencies to ensure that value for money in public expenditure is religiously observed. But this has not been so. As evidence shows, they are mere rubber stamps of the executive.

However, it is hoped that their expected independence should translate into radical change in governance or service-delivery. Absence of this is responsible for about 15 ex-governors standing trial for hundreds of billions of naira allegedly looted while they were in office, majority of them since 2007. A survey by this newspaper in 2011 showed that only Rivers, Imo, Lagos and Oyo states included their security votes (funds) in the budget. The budgeted security votes ranged from N2.5 billion to N7.5 billion.

Incredibly, governors of 32 other states dipped their hands in the treasury and spent as they liked. Whether budgeted or not, the expenditure is never accounted for. This is alien to the 1999 Constitution. Security vote is a conduit for siphoning public funds and this should be stopped by the state lawmakers. That Rabiu Kwankwaso claimed he never collected any fund under this guise when he was in charge as governor of Kano State provides proof of its dubiety. He was once quoted as saying, “Security vote anywhere is stealing. I don’t believe in it….” What makes the expenditure more questionable is that robbery, kidnapping, cultism and unwarranted killings of innocent people are hardly tamed, despite the humungous amount appropriated as security vote. Evidently, they are on the ascendancy.

Lawmakers’ ignorance of their role in a democracy and indolence have deviously served not a few governors’ interests, as seen in the misappropriation of the N1.9 trillion bailout of the Federal Government to states to assist them clear the salary arrears of their workers. However, it is heartwarming that one of the legislatures in the Southern part of the country has recently found its voice to demand from the governor how he spent the Paris Club debt refund, as it considers the 2018 Appropriation Bill. Unfortunately, the refund has become a slush fund, rather than one to be budgeted and accounted for.

Elected representatives who are responsive and beholden to the constitution cannot pander to the recklessness of any state chief executive or be blind to his stewardship. The World Bank’s advice on this suffices. The parliament, being in control, it argued, would be “incomplete as long as government continued to enjoy wide discretion in spending public revenue.”

Power, as John Acton, the University of Cambridge historian, famously stated, “tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” These immortal words should guide each state assembly in stemming the incongruity of a governor acting like a bull in a china shop. Governors should be compelled to be transparent and accountable to the people. A state legislature that is delinquent in forcing this through has definitely lost its legitimacy.

Punch