January 2, 2001
It will not be out of place to say that, I write out of character in that readers may not find a reservoir of optimism in this piece.
It has not been written with any motive to convey a false optimism. It is rather driven by a patriotic passion to discuss our wrongs with candour and
modestly prescribe some steps forward.
Just as I set to write, a Christmas and New Year card from my father was brought in. One weighty statement it contains reads, "It is you I care for". I was moved to asked in soliloqy, who cares for the average Nigerian? Who cares about his shattered dreams and visions; his pains and penury.
My monologue confronted me with only one conclusion, our country needs to be governed by men with the heart of a father.
Perhaps one strange verdict Nigerians of every tribe and tongue are agreed upon is that, the government is failing the governed again. The promises and prospects which the democratic experiment once held in view for most have given way to depression and despair.
Some are even tempted to conclude that, it would have been better for us to have remained in the Egypt of militarism than the wilderness of democratisation without dividends.
Much as I align and identify with the frustrations evident in such expressions as I often witness during my weekly "surgery" for the constituents in my office, I do not share any sympathy for an advocacy that takes us back to the days of military misrule.
That we have not made much progress since May 29 1999 when the present democratic enterprise began is stating a self-evident truth. In fact the verdict contained in a May 1996 Report of the World Bank that, "Nigerian presents a paradox, the country is rich but the people are poor" is as true today as it was when
it was made in that military-controlled year.
That Nigeria had power-outages, fuel scarcity, unemployment, high crime profile, unmatched resume on corruption and de-industrialisation, is true of the military days as it is of the present dispensation. It would be mischievous to pretend these monsters do not exist in the land.
One can not pretend that the days of state wide and nation wide black-outs are clean gone while the economy still lies comatose as the needed energy to jump-start it is yet to be declared a "National Emergency" by the government.
Take for example the Egbin Thermal Power Station in Lagos, commissioned just in 1986 with an installed capacity of 1,320 megawatts. Despite the station's importance to the nation's economic nerve centre, Lagos, a number of some of its vital units are still lying dead cold in betrayal of
the great expectations inspired in investors when the contract for the rehabilitation of its STD 04, and 06 were awarded to Merubem Engineering of Japan since the second quarter of year 2000.
These units have a capacity to generate and supply 720 megawatts to the national grid while
STD 03 which had been contracted out for rehabilitation and completion within 120 days had the capacity to generate 660 megawatt totalling 1,320 megawatts in all.
Inspite of its prospects to help many of the Lagos-based industries come back to life the people have continued to listen to one story or another like bewildered spectators from officials in their desperate efforts to explain-away the unending delay and continued power outages.
It is sad to say that Nigeria still imports over 60% of its needed fuel for local consumption despite its high-flying profile as an oil-producing nation. The repeated assurances of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) that we would stop fuel importation by the end of year 2000 when the turn-around maintenance of the refineries would have been completed mean little to the people. Anyway, the year's end is here, the voice of the corporation's management is enveloped in silence.
I do not intend to delve into the nauseating "politricks" of how and to whom the contract was awarded and how many times the same contract for the turn-around-maintenance of the refineries have been awarded.
The fore-going is just to illustrate how the PDP-controlled administration has displayed crass unseriousness in tackling the problems affecting two vital sectors upon which the nation's economy squarely rest. While the problems bedevilling the energy sector have surrendered the fortunes of most industries and homes to a mafia of "generator merchants", that of incessant fuel scarcity has led to colossal loss of lives and properties.
Even as this piece is being written, Baruwa, an entire village near Ipaja, a Lagos surburb, still berths on a river of fuel from vandalised petroleum product pipelines by desperate citizens in search of the scarce product.
It is a monumental tragedy that the fuel queues that were a constant feature of the inglorious reign of the military are still the signposts of our national life. They are a source of national embarrassment and make nonsense of Mr. President's so-called "shuttle diplomacy".
It is most unfortunate that the party process seems to have collapsed completely. We must be candid to admit that the parties are largely impotent and unable to mobilise or sensitise the Nigerian people todays the cause of re-inventing governance. It is the bitter truth that even the ruling party offers no hope to the Nigerian people because of its prebandal engagement and constant in-fighting characteristic of a kindergarten class.
I do not know how a party without program, purpose, policy and well-thought-out manifesto can lead Nigerian out of the woods. As a ruling party, it is obvious the PDP has made a prodigious waste of its goodwill and the opportunity offered. It is unheard-off in modern democratic experiment for a party with an absolute majority to have elevated in-fighting to a national art without taking the advantage of its absolute supremacy to make an impact on the lives of the people.
Ask an average Nigerian if the PDP-controlled government has made any impact on his life, his answer would be a speedy, NO.
A way out is for the political class to work in concert with the civil society organisations to refuse and resist party registration in any form or shape. We must say NEVER AGAIN to "guided democracy" of any guise or disguise.
Our Constitution must be ammended to allow for independent candidates. We have a long way to go. Radical but new choices must be made and fresh challenges set and confronted. We do not have a dearth of the needed brains to take us from the precipice. Neither do we need to recycle spent forces who have nothing good to offer in leadership positions.
A new generational battle to free the democratic space of re-cycled spent forces must begin in earnest. One that would ultimately give us a new national leadership with a President that is not above 50's but with a heart of a father and mind-set to work.
The above is an option before the Nigerian people. An option that must not be abandoned because of the familiar but infamous refrain of "NO VACANCY" being trumpeted about by hirelings within and outside the PDP today.
Let me refresh their short memory that not too long ago, the "No Vacancy" refrain was the order of the day to perpetuate Abacha in power against the wish of the Nigerian people.
Let those who are playing "God" now remember Abacha. They must understand that there is a season for everything and a time for every purpose. Their time is gone. The nation needs a new life and a new leadership.
Is it not even strange that when at all we choose to follow global trends we often do so late? As we move into year 2001 we are still helplessly watching the game as to know who wins the contest for GSM licences when the technology itself has become out-dated by reason of the speed of development in information technology globally. Those who rule us today don't even know how to send or read E-mails on their own! And yet we talk of development and advancement in 2001 and beyond.
There are sad commentaries on our sense of preparedness everywhere. It is laughable that government estimate in the year 2001 budget to prepare our sports men for the next Olympics is just 1 million naira when other countries in the developing nations' club have set aside huge sums of money for the same purpose. It speaks of unseriousness to say the least.
But when it is four (4) weeks to the Olympics, government will then release N600 million, and what happens we all know.
With the smooth and early passage of the year 2001, one must of need still make some urgent prescriptions in view of the daily-growing disenchantment of the people with the government. For once, President Olusegun Obasanjo has a golden opportunity to make an impact on the lives of the people significantly without any excuses. One must say that the early passage of the appropriation bill is only one aspect of the whole story.
Strict adherence and the courage to implement the budget is what the Obasanjo administration direly needs. History will forgive the President and his team if after implementing the budget faithfully, they still did not make the desired impact. But they will be damned if Nigerians are told again that only 20% of the budget allocation was adhered to like the President himself has acknowledged with the year 2000 budget.
The Obasanjo team needs the gut to keep the year 2001 budget aim in sight. What I reckon
Nigerians need is not another national stadium but a national salvation from poverty. The World Bank estimate that 7 out of every 10 Nigerian is poor is not an account to coffee over.
The allocation in this year's budget should also be regarded as the final interventionist steps of the Federal Government in such vital sectors as the energy and housing sectors. I do not know what business the federal government has building houses that could be better planned and built by states in due cognisance of certain internal factors.
The Federal Ministry of Works must immediately be abolished while the Federal government should only retain a Federal Highway Maintenancy Agency.
Also the earlier the monopoly of NEPA is broken, (indeed we ought to disband NEPA now) the better for the economy as private investors in the energy sector have proved their mettle worldwide. The Nigerian government can find an example in South Africa where a single private power generating firm in Johannesburg generates as much as 8,000 megawatts of electricity.
The immediate but strategic de-monopolisation of power generation is a sine-qua non for the much desired economic revival of the nation.
The Federal Government must stop playing politics with peoples life. Let Lagos Enron project start now!
On the soaring crime rate in the country, the government would do better by setting a machinery for the establishment of state police structures that will be funded and controlled by the states. All the federal government needs to retain is a thoroughly restructured Federal
Investigation and Intelligence Bureau (FIIB) which will be an equivalent of the FBI of the United States.
To brand State Governors as Chief Security Officers of their states without an enabling constitutional power for actual effective control is to pay a lip service to the security of
lives and properties of the people. President Obasanjo must know that one of the causes of the misdirected anger of the populace on the state governors stem from their helplessness to decisively deal with the menace of hoodlums and armed criminals in the states.
The success stories of the exploits of the Bakassi Boys and the OPC in Abia, Imo, Enugu, Lagos, Ogun etc are pointers to the desirability of a state police structure. I totally agree with the need for some kind of mechanism for the control andsupervision of the state police structures so that they do not become weapons of political vendetta.
Our indecisiveness is costly. I have lost friends and patriots who were some of the best brains the Banking, Insurance, Telecommunications and Architectural sectors could boast of
such as the late Al Hassan, Tunji Ogunkanmi, Shuaibu and Layi Balogun. These monumental human wastes can be avoided if we act fast and decisively too.
The only alternative to the option of a state police is to have a national legislation to allow every sane Nigerian to carry gun in line with the constitutionally guaranteed rights of citizens to self-defence. I was privileged to know that in a particular state, for example, the total number of sub-machine guns available to the state police command is about half what "Shina-Rambo" would take out for a single robbery operation.
A constitutional empowerment for citizens to carry arms would at least engender some kind of "balance of terror" to deter criminals in their acts. It is unfortunate that after 40 years of our independence, Nigerian is perhaps the only country where an armed robbery operation would go on for 2 hours without any disturbance by the security forces.
The present administration would be remembered for some time to come if it succeed in restoring the confidence of the ordinary man in the judiciary through respect for the rule of law.
Appointment of radical and courageous democrats to the bench will help strengthen not only the judiciary but also the entire democratic fabric. Allied to this is the urgent need for
the demystification of wealth in the land and a gap-bridging effort at the wide lacuna between the rich and poor.
The need to promote the economic rights of the people has became an imperative. While we celebrate the value now placed on civil rights as part of the perks of democracy, it must be borne in mind that civil rights without economic rights will breed anarchy and open-up criminal predatory instincts in man in a state of deprivation.
Conflict resolution is an area the government must do what ought to be done. It is becoming rather sickening to hear of Judicial Commissions and Panels of Inquiries into ethnic and religious disturbances. What the administration needs to do is to immediately convene a Sovereign National Conference. The mere fact that some ethnic platforms are beginning to see a need to meet across boundaries and barriers is a pointer to the fact that, the conference is just an idea whose time has come.
The various national questions today require answers more than ever before.
The beginning may have been rough, the days ahead offer President Obasanjo yet another opportunity to right the wrongs of the past and lead Nigerian to place of pride in the comity of nations. I see a restiveness in the people and one that can only be stemmed with good governance evidenced with concrete dividends of democracy.
The questions on the lips of Nigerians will only find answers in massive reduction in unemployment when there is an aggressive re-industrialisation project, accessibility of the common men to clean drinkable water, health-care facilities, education etc.
For the National Assembly, in the discharge of its oversight functions, monitoring the implementation of the budget against the backdrop of the indices for measuring the reduction of the level of poverty must be the acceptable minimum in the year 2001. If the year in view offers hope to the despairing people, then we should be seen to be succeeding.
If not, may God grant us the boldness to acknowledge our failure and make amend speedily by re-ordering our priorities aright.
I wish you the very best in this new year and millenium.
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