Editorial
Like Buhari, Tinubu has no business in Aso Rock
Nigerians knew that Bola Ahmed Tinubu, would be a bad President. What they probably did not know is that he would be this terribly bad or that it would be this fast, so soon after. Or put another way – a complete disaster, tapering towards a national fatality.
Yes! Fatality! That is the only correct reading of the fate of Nigeria if something does not happen soon and quickly too, apparently not to stop – for that would be too much to ask – but at least mitigate or slow down the galloping descent to the jagged rock down the precipice – the only bargain any right-thinking person might hope for at times like this.
It takes only an imbecile or a listless moron with the Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA), of a Mongolian idiot not to have recognised the signs, or noticed where the country would be headed with him at the driving wheel. Of course the last time I checked, no Nigerian shares the history of the Mongols. The devil in the room therefore is not that Nigerians lacked the knowledge or wisdom to do the right thing, but other myriads factors helped to bring him to power.
Yes! Let it be stated again that Tinubu was not the choice of Nigerians. That one is settled irrespective of what the judges at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal (PEPT) decide. No matter the bold face anyone puts up, the truth about who Nigerians chose to lead the country in 2023, is ensconced in the inner recesses of every heart. But it is what it is, as the saying goes in our hood.
Indeed, even if he were not showing the signs of clear incapacity, figuratively and in real terms, it would have been easier for the camel to enter through the eyes of the needle than for the All Progressives Congress (APC), his party, co-led with as the National Leader, to have produced another President after Muhammadu Buhari and the calamity he wrought on the country.
A little digression might help understand this position. In December, 2008, I had a sit-down with Nana Akufo-Addo, today’s President of Ghana, at his home in Accra. As then, candidate of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), the ruling entity in the country, he had just won the election on the first ballot, but missed being declared winner and would-be successor to John Kuffor, by the skin of the teeth. His votes were not enough to declare him President by a few hundred – mind you not thousands or millions – just a few hundred votes – that were denied him.
Of course, not under the watch of Kwado Afari-Gyan – I hear he is now late – Chairman of Electoral Commission of Ghana (ECG), would anyone be rewarded with half a vote not earned legitimately – government candidate or not – unlike his Nigerian opposites – Maurice Iwu, Attahiru Jega or the babanla of them all – the cyber-shutting, Mahmoud Yakubu, who has given the world the new meaning of the word, glitch.
So, I had asked my host his expectations regarding the inevitable recontest between him and the late Atta Mills, the candidate of the National Democratic Party (NDP). You know what he told me? He did not take me on a cruise inside the space coaster of political lies like the archetypical Nigerian in the mould of Adams Oshiomhole who changes colours like ogwomagana, but shot straight from the hips.
“I know that Ghanaians have become weary of voting one party. Our party has been in power for two terms and there might be that urge for a change. Besides there might be a coalition between the opposition and other parties. Those are my fears.”
Those were his exact words. He did not tell me how the people loved him and how they saw him as the next best thing in the world since the discovery of Ewa Agonyi and Agege bread. He told me the truth the way he knew if. Incidentally, I was still in Ghana to see his prediction come to pass, exactly the way he read it.
Atta Mills went ahead to win that election. Parenthetically, I was one of those invited to meet with the new President, years later, when he came to Nigeria to seek help at Synagogue Church of All Nations of the late Temitope Balogun (TB), Joshua for his ailing health issues. Unfortunately, I didn’t know that the late cleric was using us to “catch cruise” as it is said these days.
For try as we did using all the tricks in the book, my team and I were not allowed to meet with him. The only sign that he was actually in the building was the long black Mercedes Benz car with all the insignia of his high office, of course befitting an African President, inside the living quarters of the church. I had hoped to confront him with the Ghanaian experience and beg him on how he could help Nigeria transmit the Ghanaian model or get it to their level of election without tears, such as I witnessed in the one that produced him.
On a personal level, I would also have used the opportunity to confront him about how his aides gave me the short end of the stick, when they kept me waiting for hours in a futile attempt to get an exclusive from him, only for some white men and ladies wielding cameras, to be expressly ushered in straight with immediate effect and automatic alacrity, as Chief Eleiyimi of Oja, in Village Headmaster, would put it, while I was still waiting and hoping.
Who knows, I could even have been invited to Ghana on a pleasure trip as compensation in addition to the apologies for my troubles, including nearly missing my flight back to Nigeria. But, I never got the chance, no thanks to Joshua and his tricky ways.
Of course, there is no chance of that anymore, here on earth, except, perhaps in heaven. The man has since died and ironically, Akufo-Addo is now President, some years after that interesting encounter in Accra. Nonetheless, that singular event with the Ghanaian President then, remains instructive till date – people get weary of voting one party and make changes for the sake of it.
So, that the APC was destined for its political Waterloo, even on this singular factor, was known to the goat and the hen. Indeed if any miracle could have sprung them from the depth of political morass, the genie would have come from the magic lamp of Yemi Osinbajo, then Vice President who ought to be the party’s talisman and not Tinubu.
But he has gotten there anyways, by his simple political technique of snatching it, grabbing it and running with it, one that he perfected in the uncanny relay race agreement he struck with Buhari. So now what? The answer is what you are seeing today. The worst Nigerians have feared is unfolding already. The Tinubu phenomenon, Yinka Odumakin, his once close ally warned long time ago, is unravelling before everyone’s eyes.
Imagine just how one thoughtless, rash, impulsive quip – subsidy is gone – has set off a domino effect – a chain reaction that has cascaded throughout the country, leaving in its stride a flood of pain, anguish, hunger and death. Imagine the supine, banal and vapid solution that has been offered to contain it when the horse has already bolted from the stable.
Worse still, indications are that there are many more of such faux pass where that came from, as evidence of groping in the dark, has become the major imprimatur of the last three months. Like handing over the job of piloting a plane to a cobbler, nobody seems to know what to do.
As flood from the dike began to drown everything in sight from that singular move, the first step was the wackiest proposal that he would release N8,000 to the “poorest of poor Nigerians.” No data, no clear idea of the target is. Just empty words that would neither scratch the surface of the problem, assuming the money really got to anyone in the first place, nor make the littlest impact.
Now, it became obvious that the completely asinine move would fall flat on its face, another one banger, has just been released. We’re being told of how, this time, N180billion would be released as a panacea. Guess what the money would be used for! Five trailers of rice for each of the 36 states of the federation, N5billion for them to procure 100,000 bags of rice and other palliatives.
Now, ask where this rice would come from? Does Nigeria have the capacity to produce a quarter of the quantity of rice needed for this project? In the end, it would be a fresh chase for foreign exchange as the states take a recourse to importation, again, assuming that the governors would not pocket the money.
Now, has anyone heard Tinubu, or any of his officials speak strongly about corruption? Has anyone heard him proffer solutions on how the oil thieves in the Niger Delta could be stopped and oil production upped to such a level that Nigeria would meet its quota at the international oil market?
No! Never! But who is not aware that Nigeria is emphatically the only oil producing country in the world that is not benefitting from the ongoing war in Ukraine? Have you heard him, in all the discussions going on about subsidy and or lack of it, talk about the restoration of the four refineries in Nigeria? Again, who is not aware that Nigeria is the only oil producing nation in the whole wide world without a functional refinery?
Certainly, those are no-go areas. Why? That is where the vested interests operate – those responsible for the calamity that has befallen Nigeria today – the actual devils in the room. Solve the corruption in the two critical areas of the economy and half of the problems is gone.
Ask many of the billionaires in Nigeria today their sources of sudden wealth and the ready answer would be – oil and gas? Doing what? You would meet a brick wall. But you need not be told that in there lies the metaphor for mindless pillaging of the national economy. When someone tells you that crude oil is not a piece of sweet or biscuit that you could steal from a shelf, the question is why would it persist for a second with the right government in place?
Why is it impossible to ascertain and peg the amount of petrol consumed in Nigeria today, which is the real issue behind the entire subsidy debate? But no attempt would ever be made in producing an answer. Would it surprise anyone to learn that these vested interests, the economic leeches, mostly from the Western countries, who have found collaboration with their willing Nigerian enablers were the ones that shut down the server of the INEC server – the glitch, Yakubu spoke about?
Of course, not! Because, a good election and credible result would have produced a different outcome. It means a good leader would emerge, which would ultimately be the end of their vice grip on the soft underbelly of Nigeria’s massive wealth. Bad business!
The twin brother is what has been playing out as the obscene and vulgar display of opulence and luxury you have seen so far. In less than 100 days, you must have noticed the notorious convoys of both the President and those of the leadership of the National Assembly. Tinubu and Godswill Akpabio, Senate President seem to be in competition of who would have the longest and most wasteful motorcades in Nigeria. Even Tajudeen Abbas, Speaker of the House of Representatives, and other principal officers of the House, have also joined in the lewd game.
You have heard about how the National Assembly carved out N110billion from the N819.5billion for themselves – N70billion for “to support the working conditions of members” with another N40bllion to purchase Sports Utility Vehicles (SUVs) for them. This was at the same time, 12 million so-called poorest of the poor Nigerians were to be given N8,000 monthly as palliatives.
In other words, while each of the 469 members would go home with at least N228.7million in just one instance, 12 million others would get N24,000 in six months. What could be more guttering? That is what Tinubu and his team call palliatives. But for Nigerians who shouted blue murder, that parlous offering would have passed. Now, what has it been replaced with? Imagine five trailer-loads of rice standing at Agege Market? How far would that go for the residents, not to talk about the entire Lagos?
Yet, that is what a thinking government, is proposing as its magic wand to take hunger off the people. Of course even the imbecile would know what would happen to the N5billion the state governments would be given. In the end, even the poor old woman in the village that was supposed to get the N8,000 would be lucky to get a quarter of that.
The next stage of the flogging is actually doing press-up somewhere within the Aso Rock Villa precinct. The so-called palliatives are just to lullaby you for now, because the petitions at the PEPT are still waiting. Nobody would probably talk about that soon. Wait for the heist of February 25 to be certified. Then you will discover that the words of the biblical Rehoboam to burden the people further is not just for the Israelites.
Yes! While Buhari’s burden was to flog Nigerians with whips, Tinubu is actually coming with snakes and scorpions. For one, nobody with the mindset to appoint 48 ministers, populated by known economic brigands including former governors whose record was to lay heavy yokes on their people, would do less.
How could he? With the crowd in Abuja, where each member of the cabal has already fixing a pipe and taken a vantage position to start milking the commonwealth? And for all these, the common binding factor is captured in one word – Greed. Uncontrollable desire to acquire more and more of what they never need.
For instance, check the garages of the NASS members who are angling for new SUVs. You would find that there are so many cars that are under cover and have not been driven for years. Yet, their desire is to add more. What else could anyone call it? Yet again, the picture pales to insignificance to what would happen in the executive branch. Else, what would make a Senator abandon the job of representing his people where it matters most after an intense electoral process to take up a ministerial position? Imagine a US senator leaving the job of a congressman to take up an appointment in a cabinet.
Yes! If indeed Tinubu is thinking about how to pull Nigeria out of the economic and social nadir, where Buhari plunged it in his disastrous eight years, would he be thinking of leading Nigeria to a war in Niger? Certainly not! Don’t forget that Nigeria currently wears the unenviable crown of the poverty capital of the world.
Yet in that war under the guise of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), Nigeria would be providing close to 80 per cent, if not more of the resources needed in that war which could run into hundreds of billions of naira if not trillions, if the ECOMOG experience of former military President, Ibrahim Babangida is the template to go by.
More regrettable, on a closer look is that the war itself has little or nothing to do with the main motive for it, which is to restore democracy in Niger, where a military junta recently sacked Muhamed Bazoum, elected in 2021. Instead, it has more of a proxy war for the West – US and France, believed to be pulling the string from Washington and Paris for the reason of their own obvious interests.
To fix Nigeria does not need any special sophistication. The solution is clear like the image on a bright wall. One – fix corruption. Plug all the loopholes from where the huge resources of Nigeria escape. The revenue husbandry therefrom would generate a pool of funds capable of leading to a new burst of economic energy similar to picture of decades ago when Nigeria was a huge construction site with chimneys from the various factories, busy emitting smokes.
Two – fix greed. What is wrong if a Nigerian government official owns one car? Those who watched the welcome party for Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala on her first day in office would probably have been taken aback when she arrived in one simple sedan – not even an SUV instead of a convoy. Did it take anything away from her high office?
This Monday, August 21, 2023, 45 ministers would be taking charge of Nigeria as Tinubu’s foot-soldiers. Do they look like those that would keep their fingers off the public till as to save up money to build the financial power bank needed to reignite the economy? Do their pasts suggest those who could drive in one car to their offices and in the streets? How many of them have you seen mixing up with people and engaging with them? Elsewhere, do you not see leaders riding bicycles to their offices or taking trains? Does the governor of California, whose economy is 10 times bigger than Nigeria drive to office in a convoy?
So, if you thought that for one moment that the Tinubu men would give Nigeria the leeway for climbing out of the hole it has found itself over the recent years, you would be in for a long thing, as it is said. It would be worse if you thought that Tinubu really cares. The President capable of any magic is the one with the propensity to shed weight and give his government a haircut. Is Tinubu prepared to do that? The answer is out there already.
Soon, you would discover that just like Buhari, whose capacity, mindset and calling ought not have taken him beyond the position of Emir of Daura, Tinubu with all his claims of a thinker and a doer, does not have any business being at the Villa as President of Nigeria. And that is putting it mildly.
In the early hours of Monday, January 26, 2026, Charles Chukwuma Soludo, stormed Onitsha Main Market, reputed to be the biggest enclave for trading and other commercial activities in West Africa, on what he called on-the-spot assessment.
It was a military-style display, reminiscent of the Muhammadu Buhari-Tunde Idiagbon, best-forgotten taskforce days, when soldiers, without warning swooped on markets, broke into their owner’s shops and practically sold available goods to the public at giveaway prices – many their cronies, in the guise of forcing their Essential Commodities policy.
In like manner there and then, the governor ordered the immediate closure of the market after accusing the traders of harbouring criminal intents and engaging in economic sabotage that costs the state a whopping N8billion in lost revenues. To boot, he even warned not only to close the market on a permanent basis, but if need be, even bulldoze it to the ground, should the traders remained recalcitrant in their decision.
Hear him: “Each Monday, we’ll come and inspect. If people are not in their respective shops, it will be shut down again. If you like I don’t mind shutting down this Main Market for the remainder of this year. If you don’t like it, go elsewhere and trade, but if you’re here, we’re not going to allow this plain economic sabotage. Also, we suspect whoever closes their shops to have some criminal intents.”
From the outset, we must state that what the world saw in that spontaneous encounter and subsequent days as the issues therein remained on the front burner, has little place in democracy, neither does it reflect sound, people-oriented leadership under the ethos of what has now been accepted across the globe as the best form of government.
Now, the last time we checked, Soludo is neither a military General nor even a soldier, but a highly-decorated academic, whose influence in the knowledge industry spans beyond education institutions, government – he was formally Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) – to international reckoning – consulting for some of the highest global bodies, including the United Nations.
Now, how does this selfsame global icon, reduce himself to a local dictator, dishing out orders as in regimental commands rather than employing that power of persuasion, which distinguishes brainpower – the emblematic factor of his training from raw strength of dictators in the gun business?
How does it fit? Do concepts like immediate effect and automatic alacrity form part of the recommendations Soludo makes to those global institutions he consulted for? Certainly no! So, why introduce them as his own governance template? That is the confusing, if not the disturbing part.
Is it not becoming clearer now? Is this military-style tendency not finding expression in the audacity captured in that ghoulish spectacle last year, where one Jennifer Elohor Edema, the young lady serving Nigeria under the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) scheme, was stripped down to her birthday suit by some youths, visibly inebriated on influences of some brain-damaging substances, who were working for Soludo’s government?
By the way, when last did anyone hear anything about those criminals, outside the initial apparent crocodile tears at government places in Awka? Has anyone heard of any form of punishment? Have they been arraigned in court? If yes, what is the state of the trial?
In the instant case, we particularly detest the governor’s attempt to feign ignorance of the issues behind the conduct of the traders or his efforts to bury them under the veneer of righteous anger. To so do is deceitful, arrogant, if not self-serving – elements that seem to have, so unfortunately, formed part of the governance structure in Anambra State, as in most other states across the country, including the central government.
The issue here, if Soludo needs be reminded, is about the fate of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), currently serving life sentence at a facility in Sokoto, to where he was sent by Justice James Omotoso of the Federal High Court, Abuja.
Of course, the governor was right in claiming that the dangerous security situation in the state has changed for the better and that Anambra is no longer the killing field it was until recently. Obviously, the blood-thirsty terrorists responsible for the carnages witnessed in the state, including those ostensibly aimed at enforcement of the sit at home orders, seem to be on holiday and from the look of things are no longer returning.
So, if the governor says security or insecurity of the traders is no longer the big issue, he has a foundation to so state. At least for the first time in recent years, Christmas was celebrated in the entire Igboland with the usual fanfare under the robust atmosphere devoid of fear. That alone gives credence to the extent of these changes.
But that is not the end of the story. Kanu’s fresh ordeal seems to have introduced a new chapter to the entire saga. Now, the current sit-at-home option appears no longer out of fear of being attacked or killed, but the willingness of the traders to donate every Monday, in solidarity with the IPOB leader. This was evident in the Tuesday demonstration, where the message of the traders who thronged the streets of Onitsha, was clearly delivered with renditions like – Nnamdi Kanu is another saviour.
Therefore, Soludo, must be a complete novice or pathologically naïve to claim he is not aware of this new sentiment. But he is neither of the two. There is no way the governor would not have been seized of the compelling emotions around him.
So, for him to put up that show on Monday, is nothing but a gambit tailored towards gaslighting the public. His feigned anger against the traders for not opening their shops is as manipulative as it is deceitful, just as argument thereto regarding the economy implications is as puerile as it is spurious.
It is demonstrative of lack of emotional intelligence, as it showcases the absence of the required synergy between the government and the people, a phenomenon that has become characteristic in the South East in recent years, where a huge gulf and trust deficit exist between the people and those who lead them.
It is indeed laughable when South East governors, including Soludo, lay claims to the current calm in Igboland, when on the contrary, many of them are accused of being collaborators, either as active agents of being complicit through their conspiracy of silence.
Who does not know that the late President Muhammadu Buhari, was the vector that transported that killer disease to Igboland? Dan Nwanyanwu, National Chairman of the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP), has remained relentless in establishing this fact most pungently in the past and even quite recently.
Soludo, in his chest-beating mode, gives the impression that he somehow sprung a genie out of the magic lamp to create a sudden miracle that turned the parlous security situation around. No! It was the death of Buhari that ended the blitzkrieg in the South East. Simplicita!
Where was this genie when during the Buhari days, when the Aguata Local Government headquarters, where he comes from was razed to the ground or when a swathe of Ihiala and adjoining areas in the state became a hunting ground for the rampaging terrorists, codenamed Unknown Gunmen.
He was only content in the open and shut attitude of dismissing the carnage they wrought as the handiwork of Kanu’s Eastern Security Network (ESN), even when the group swore on their father’s grave that they were not involved.
Indeed, if there is ever going to be anything good in the government of President Bola Tinubu, it is the fact that he is not as hungry for the blood of the Igbo man as Buhari, who never hid the fact of his desire to continue the civil war against Ndigbo, more than 50 years after.
Had Tinubu, who upped the ante in the marginalisation of Ndigbo in many ways, escalated this penchant by toeing the line as part of his continuation of the Buhari legacy, which he promised Nigerians, he might have renewed the military contract Asari Dokubo claimed to have with Buhari.
Yes, though he never revealed details of the so-called contract, its nature could be gleaned from the manner the people were dying wotowotowoto, as the Niger Delta warlord, himself gloated about some years back.
He even backed his gloating up in that viral video, with a display of an AK-47, boasting how he would use the weapon to cure Ndigbo their “madness.” Is it not surprising that in all his public comments, neither Soludo nor his South East colleagues ever mentioned this obvious threat to his people.
So, nobody is deceived by the governor acting like Idi Amin of Uganda, who went berserk because he could not get more money printed from his central bank. Nobody is moved by his threat to even bulldoze that market. He is only being clever by half, if not acting a script.
It does not remove the fact that he and his colleagues suddenly went mute, then and now and remained tongue-tied at a historic moment when Ndigbo are battling to extricate themselves from the soggy, foggy, belly of the whale, like the biblical Jonah, as they are in Nigeria today. It does not belittle the fact that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is a metaphor for that horrible situation.
It is even worse that Soludo, arguably the most intellectually-gifted governor in Nigeria today, would be introducing some ethnic, sectional or indigene-based sentiments into the matter by trumpeting that those pursing the sit at home drive are not from Anambra. What a shame!
Who cares? Instead of such obtuse, infantile, if not asinine suggestion, would it not be more apposite for him to conduct a census in the entire Anambra, Aguata, his local government, Isuofia, his community and even the Soludo family to determine the number of Igbo people that are happy with the fate of not only Kanu, but Ndigbo in the hands of his friends in high authority today?
We hear that the traders have caved in. So, by Monday, expectedly, they would return to their shops – though definitely against their will. Soludo, would have scored another point and proven himself a strong man. But is it not a crab that makes itself king in shallow waters? Times shall tell!
The systematic bastardisation of Nigeria and its degraded worth in the eyes of the global community seem to have reached to its inglorious height in recent months. How damning!
Each day, the largest country of black people on earth seems to be gliding uncontrollably down the slippery slope of infamy where countries which hitherto stand in awe and trepidation, now practically spit at its global image.
Only recently, Burkina Faso, one of the smallest countries on the West African sub-region – a country with total worth far less than Lagos got Abuja crawling on its knees to Ouagadougou to plead for the release of a military aircraft flying the Nigerian flag.
Yes! It took a whole 10 days for the Nigerian Air Force C-130 and 11 soldiers on board to breathe the air of freedom once again, after they were detained in the hunger-ravaged African country for making an emergency landing – a routine aviation procedure that is ironed out in a matter of hours with nothing more than a mere explanation required.
But in this case, it took a special delegation of top Nigerian officials to move to the country with apology letter in hand to beg for the freedom of the detained men and plane from the Burkinabe authorities, whose personnel, openly walked on air to stamp their importance. Compatriots, this is your country – the giant of Africa.
Last year, it took a cough at the Oval Office Washington for Aso Rock Villa to catch cold and harass itself into a frenzy in search for way out of the decade-old issue of mass slaughtering of Nigerians by terrorists in addition to other forms of high crimes that have seized the country over the years.
Yet, even with all the frantic, frenetic and impulsive thrashing around, including a unilateral declaration of State of Emergency on security, what has come out of it?
It took the same United States, to make a decisive statement with the Christmas day bombing of a supposed hideout in Sokoto, said to have decimated scores of terrorist, who had assembled to plot how to wreak another havoc across the country as has become traditional during the yuletide season over the recent years.
But were these disgraceful outings limited to domestic affairs, it would have been more tolerable. But, unfortunately, it is not.
Internationally too, the tiger has also lost its tigritude. The same Nigeria that virtually stood shoulder to shoulder, gazing eyeball to eyeball as it confronted powerful western nations in a singular bid to end apartheid in South Africa – yes, the same Nigeria that took it upon itself to end the mass slaughtering in Liberia and Sierra Leone, is today cowering in its cocoon over issues it ought to have taken the lead in presenting the African perspective.
Last year, it was South Africa that roared like a lion by confronting Israel over the blitzkrieg in Gaza – going as far as taking the country to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) at The Hague, The Netherlands.
Today, it is Ghana that is taking charge at the world stage, with its voice echoing beyond the seas and wildernesses over the US action in Venezuela where its special forces arrested Nicolas Maduro – that country’s President on Saturday.
“Ghana expresses strong reservations against unilateral use of force and strongly deplores such acts that violate the Charter of the United Nations and international law, as well as the sovereignty, territorial integrity, and political independence of States.
“The Ghanaian Government is keenly following the situation in Venezuela with great concern, and notes that such assaults on international law, attempts at the occupation of foreign territories and apparent external control of oil resources have extremely adverse implications on international stability and the global order.
“Ghana also notes with deep concern statements by US President, Donald Trump, that the US will “run” Venezuela “until such time as we can do a safe, proper and judicious transition” and that US large oil companies will be asked to “go in.”
“These declarations are reminiscent of the colonial and imperialist era. They set a dangerous precedent for the global order. Such colonial ambitions should have no place in the post-Second World War era.
“To allow this is to put the international community at great risk and undermine the sovereignty of every country. Ghana, therefore, re-affirms its commitment to the principle of self-determination and holds the firm view that only the Venezuelan people should freely determine their political and democratic future.
“Ghana calls for immediate de-escalation and the release of President Maduro and his wife. The Government of Ghana shall maintain and defend its long-held principled position against invasion, occupation, colonialism, apartheid, disregard for sovereignty and all forms of violation of international law.”
That was Accra’s bold and fearless response to the Venezuelan saga. Now where is Nigeria? Where is President Bola Tinubu? Mum is the word. The last we heard from our President was via an image of him having lunch with Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda in Paris. No single word uttered – just a picture!
Even that has also run into its own controversy as the image is now being disputed, because experts are convinced that it is AI-generated. How bad could it get! How deep could a country sink into the morass of infamy! How terrible!
But need anyone look far to ascertain the reason for this parlous situation and progressive dip into the bottomless pit of hopelessness. Of course, not! The answer is very apparent.
It is all about legitimacy and integrity of the leadership of the individual countries. John Dramani Mahama, could stand anywhere on the world stage today to declare that the mandate he holds as President derives from the people of Ghana. Cyril Ramaphosa could also swear in like manner that he enjoys the mandate of South Africans.
Could Tinubu honestly make the same claims today? That is the difference. When Sam Amadi, Harvard-trained lawyer, captured the Nigerian variant of strategy for election victory as the ability to bribe the institutions – INEC, judiciary and security authorities, rather than constituency mapping and messaging to convince the people – this is the result.
When Chidi Odinkalu, a professor of law, states categorically that Tinubu did not need the votes of Nigerians but corrupt INEC and the judiciary, to be President, the consequence is illegitimacy, lack of credibility and a country limbo.
The African Democratic Congress (ADC), was even more emphatic when it linked Tinubu’s silence to the fear of being served the Maduro treatment based on the evidently fraudulent 2023 presidential election that brought him to power, the consequences he has been battling with till date.
Bolaji Abdullahi, its spokesman, recalled how the government of the ousted President was widely condemned as illegitimate and deeply flawed by nine governments across Latin America, the European Union, and international democratic institutions.
Stressing how political opponents were barred from contesting, peaceful protests met with violence, and state institutions weaponised against the very citizens, he pointed to the celebration that followed Maduro’s fate to underscore his argument, stating: “When citizens pour into the streets in celebration, it reveals more than approval of an intervention; it exposes the bankruptcy of the regime that has been upended.”
Back home, he was no less so: “Let’s be clear: the Nigerian government’s choice of silence at this moment has nothing to do with neutrality. Instead, it reveals a government that lacks confidence simply because it lacks integrity. In Nigeria, in Venezuela, and across the world, democracy must mean more than ballots and electoralism. It must translate to freedom, fairness, and a happier life for the citizens.
“In this context, the ADC believes that the situation in Venezuela is a cautionary tale to all dictators, including the supposedly elected ones, and election riggers everywhere. The world is watching, and contrived mandates will no longer find a place to hide.”
How would anyone dispute this position? The naysayer must give a credible reason for the rapid Nigeria’s current drift to a one-party state, despite the evidential failures of the All Progressives Congress (APC) on all fronts of developments since coming to power in 2015.
Why, for instance are all the 36 governors of Nigeria struggling for space in the All Progressives Congress (APC) and declaring open support for Tinubu, even when the President has posted the most disastrous if not the worst outing in Nigerian history, if they were not being corralled to do so.
Why would a Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) arrogate to himself the power of life and death and insist that Siminalayi Fubara, his successor as Rivers State Governor must be divested of his free choice to contest for re-election as part of a strange “agreement?”
The real story is that Nigeria is no different from Venezuela under Maduro. That a repeat of the 2023 fraudulent presidential election will not only continue to produce a lame-duck President that will either be a puppet a weakling, or a disgrace rolled into one. That will be the real TRAGEDY!
Nigerians, nay, the world woke up on Monday morning to the shocking news of yet again, the abduction of students in the country – this time at the Government Girls Comprehensive Secondary School, Maga, Kebbi State.
The incident has now added to the long list of a phenomenon, which started on the night of April 14, 2014 with the kidnap of the students of the Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, an episode now popularly known as the Chibok Girls saga.
When an uproar reverberated across the globe following the Chibok incident, with world leaders weighing in on the matter, including Michelle Obama, former US first lady, who took it personally by joining the campaign to free the young girls, it was an instant response to the gory picture that hovered in the firmament over the fate of of such young lasses, many still in their puberty stage in the hands of such dangerous criminals.
Who would have thought that the development would soon become a constant feature that would continue to smear the nation’s landscape, especially with the exit of then President Goodluck Jonathan, who had suffered the butt of national and international ridicule, as the incident was attributed to him with the derisive term – cluelessness – was eventually tossed out of office as a result?
On the contrary, it turned out that Muhammadu Buhari, his successor, posted a worse outing, despite his record as a General of the Nigerian Army and former Military Head of State, who during his times as the latter, was known as a no-nonsense leader.
Indeed, while Jonathan was clueless, Buhari practically dozed, slept or actually slumbered on the same issue. Under him, the situation assumed an almost epidemic proportion – from Dapchi Girls, which saw the abduction of 110 students from the Girls’ Science and Technical College (GGSTC), Dapchi in Bulabulin, Bursari Local Government area of Yobe State, on February 19, 2018, to the 279 female students of Government Girls Science Secondary School, a boarding school in Jangebe, Zamfara State on February 26, 2021, which came few months after about 300 students of Government Science Secondary School, Kankara, Katsina State, on December 11, 2020.
During this period, Kaduna suffered some of the worst hits. First, 150 students of the Bethel Baptist High School, in 2021 and then the 2024 edition, when about 285 students were taken from their school in Kuriga, in Chikun Local Government Area.
These are just some of the incidents that quickly come to mind. There are many other cases of similar nature before this latest addition in Maga, where 25 girls were picked up and herded into the bush like cattle.
Now this was the situation under which President Bola Tinubu, had actually packed his bag preparatory to boarding his much-fancied executive jet en-route South Africa and Angola for the 20th G20 Summit of leaders in South Africa and thereafter proceed to Luanda to attend the Seventh African Union-European Union (AU-EU) Summit.
Indications coming from the Villa, in Abuja, appear confusing, as it suggests “postponement” rather than outright “cancellation,” going by the statement of Bayo Onanuga, the President’s main spokesman, on Thursday.
Onanuga, wrote: “Disturbed by the security breaches in Kebbi State and Monday’s attack by bandits against worshippers at Christ Apostolic Church, Eruku, President Tinubu decided to suspend his departure.
“He now awaits reports from Vice President Kashim Shettima, who paid a sympathy visit to Kebbi on his behalf, as well as reports from the police and the Department of State Services regarding the attack in Kwara.”
Anyone could bet and be sure that the trip was paused substantially due to the general outcry in the country over the move and that even now, the pull similar to the bee to the nectar remains too strong that he might actually step on the plane before the events end.
Pray! What is his role and of what benefit would he willingly stain the floor of these events with the blood of his countrymen with which his feet are currently smeared?
Pray! With which face would the President be sitting among these leaders, considering the situation in his country, which is practically on intense inferno currently? How would he handle the stolen glances? Knowing the world of diplomacy where much are ensconced in those deep stares and benign but deceptive smiles, those sympathies he would receive could obviously be more pretended than genuine and he would become the butt of private jokes and conversations thereafter.
Remember the heat that attended the discovery of a headless body floating on the Thames River in the UK in 2001 and how life nearly came to a halt in the country as a result.
Now imagine Kier Starmer the current Prime Minister stepping into British Airways en-route the same South Africa or even United Nations summit without resolving the issue of a stolen pet-dog or assuaging the feeling of that little blue-eyed girl ruing over her loss, let alone one young British school girl being kidnapped and in the hands of mindless criminals. Just imagine it!
Did the US not deploy all its intelligence and military might in a multi-million-dollar operation just to rescue one of its citizens the terrorists currently tormenting Nigeria were too inebriated in their madness to abduct.
Now, consider a Donald Trump, even in his extreme eccentric nature, mounting Air Force One and jetting out to France, China or Saudi Arabia to sign some trillion-dollar military hardware contracts capable of jolting the US economy to a 50-year-record high, while one American Marine is in captivity, let alone some 20 students of a college in Alabama. Would the heat generated therefrom not be enough to power a spacecraft?
Why must Nigeria be different? Is the life of a Nigerian worth less than that of a dog in Britain? Does Tinubu consider the life of the school girl in Dapchi, Kaduna or Maga less valuable than that of her counterpart in Chicago? If no, why not stay back and prove it?
We must say so, unequivocally! Nothing – economically, socially, politically, globally – is more important than the rescue of these 25 young girls. Whether postponed or paused Tinubu must not be found anywhere near that aircraft. In fact, he must not leave Nigeria until those girls are rescued! Nothing could be more serious, nothing more valuable!
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