Nigeria

I agree with Reuben Abati: It is Time to Stone Those in Power

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By Adeola Aderounmu

In 2009 Reuben Abati recommended that it will soon be time to start stoning the economists in the corridor of power in Abuja. In 2011 I strongly recommend that everyone in the corridor of power and all those who are called stakeholders who have supported the removal of the subsidy on oil and oil products should be stoned.

Goodluck Jonathan has pinned the reactions of Nigerians to the proposed removal of subsidy on those who want to throw him out of office. I say that he fired the first rounds of shots on his legs. If this will mark the beginning of the end for his insensitive regime, let the occupation starts.

I want to ask the same questions that Reuben Abati asked in 2009: How? Where is this subsidy that government talks about? How was it disbursed?

Reuben Abati wrote in that headline that Nigerians will soon be trekking. Sadly enough Nigerians have actually been trekking before 2009. I remembered trekking from festac town to CMUL during the 2001/2002 fuel scarcity. I had obligations that couldn’t wait.

In 2011 Nigerians are not only willing to trek, they appear ready to march down the Jonathan government that has come to be characterized by weakness in all its ramifications.

From one generation to another, the Nigerian government presents a constant image of a permanent aggregation of dubious elements. In my personal opinion I have concluded that no amount of additional suggestions or written essays can solve Nigeria’s problems.

Are there problems facing Nigerians that the solutions have not been proffered here in the Nigerian Village Square or elsewhere where Nigerians display their intellectual capabilities? Do we have problems in Nigeria that we have no discussed about openly? What has happened to their implementations?

I believe so much in the solution proffered by Reuben Abati. Even so because when it is carried out it will consume people like him. I like such solutions that will not spare the hypocrites, the pretenders, the sycophant and the famously corrupt people in government, many of whom have recently been rewarded by meaningless national awards over several years.

I can’t imagine how people receive national awards in one of the most corrupt countries in the world. How does it feel to receive national awards in a country with one of the highest child and maternal mortalities in Africa? How does it feel to receive awards in a country where electricity is almost absent? How does it feel to receive national awards in a country where public education is almost grounded?

If Nigerians obey Abati’s call by simply rising up and stoning the people in the corridor of power, I am convinced that the revolution we long sought will start. It might be ultimate the clean-up we have waited from since 1960.
It is sad how things have turned out for the ordinary Nigerians. On a poverty wage of USD 113/ month, a Nigerian is expected to pay his rent, bills, and sundries. There is no greater miracle on planet earth than a Nigerian living on N18 000 per month.

In a country where more than 20% of the population is unemployed, I have found it hard to find a greater tragedy against the back drop of the immense natural resources and potential human resources.

If there is any country in Africa where the government should be giving relief packages to her citizens after 50 years of misrule and leadership failure, that country is Nigeria.

In a twist of test of resiliency the ordinary masses will be insulted further. For failing the build or maintain functional refineries, for failing to fight or curb systemic corruption, for failing to deliver on the so-called dividends of democracy, the insensitive Nigerian government now headed by Goodluck Jonathan will make Nigerians suffer even more.

Rather than relief package the economic team of Goodluck Jonathan, his executive council and the so-called stakeholders will deliver loads of additional burden onto Nigeria.

The arguments are hinged on the famous textbook concepts rather than the realities on the ground. There are no arguments that the Jonathan government has put forward that is different from what Obasanjo and late Yar Adua proposed. In all the previous partial or total removal of subsidies that have been used to increase the pump price of petroleum products, there has never been a corresponding increase in the quality of lives of the Nigerian people.

There is absolutely no reason to believe or trust the Jonathan government. It represents the PDP government that has held sway since 1999. The PDP is the largest aggregation of corrupt people in Africa. Under the PDP the quality of life has declined sharply at the same time that the cost of it has continued to increase unhindered.

This, as Jonathan feared in his recent utterances that the opposition wants to bring down his government, must be the last test of resiliency for Nigerians. Any attempt to increase the burden of Nigerians should be met with the highest possible resistance. The opposition that I see is the over 90m Nigerians living below the poverty level.

The argument that the state governors are in support of the removal of fuel subsidy does not hold water. Which governors? We know they want more money from the 52% that the federal government has been looting for several years because they are all the same birds. Why should what the governor wants be a benchmark for what the people want?

Why do the extremely rich but corrupt people in the corridor of power think that they know what is good for the suffering masses? When will the voices of the people start to matter democratically, if truly we are under a democracy?

I think it is sad and disappointing that Jonathan think that only the people in the middle class who have 4-5 jeeps will be affected by the subsidy removal. A lot of middle class Nigerians are even still struggling to maintain their statuses and to continue to pursue a happy life.

The dynamics of the Nigerian economy certainly reveals that the masses are the end-receivers of failed policies. When the subsidy is removed there is no doubt that the cost of transportation that is already exorbitant will increase further and the prices of dietary and other consumable products will follow the same curve.

We cannot live in denial and allow those who are shielded from the reality of everyday existence since they got to the corrupt corridor of power speak for us any longer. Reuben Abati and the other advisers cannot speak for the masses. Nigeria has not improved since this administration started wasting our time. Policies or parameters that neither put food on the table nor increase the quality/standard of living are abstract and worthless.

The practical situation in Nigeria today is worse and even more deplorable compared to 2004. Someone, an ordinary Nigerian who knows where the shoes hurt, wrote today that Nigerians should be ready to turn sand to food. In all sincerity he was not joking and he didn’t think we should laugh about his comment. People are suffering.
Nigerians need relief packages and they should be brought forward now.

If this virtual subsidy on oil products is removed and Nigerians remain resilient, it means our collective “suffering and smiling” will continue. It also means that People Deceiving People Party and the team of political and economic looters who are blind to the reality of a daily Nigerian life have succeeded again. Our glory is not yet come and that is so sad and disheartening.

aderounmu@gmail.com

Nigeria: Before the Strike Over Poverty Wage

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Adeola Aderounmu

Warning strike actions will start across Nigeria on July 20 2011 over the non-implementation of the minimum wage of N18 000. I call this wage poverty wage anyway.

The state governments are saying that they cannot pay the amount as they don’t have that kind of economic resources.

Before the 2011 presidential elections even the NLC went to show support for the election of Jonathan. When Jonathan told them that he had approved N18 000 as their minimum poverty wage, they did not ask him how it will be implemented. They had a stupid meeting with Jonathan I would say. They were too myopic at that time.

The thing is: they can strike forever. The money that the state will use for the payment of the minimum wage is with Jonathan and the federal government.

More than 50% of Nigeria’s wealth is concentrated at the federal level, yet it was Jonathan who signed the minimum wage without initiating processes that will reduce the amount of money at the centre.

Jonathan and NLC are dreamers, I guess.

What is the federal government of Nigeria doing with more than 50% of Nigeria’s wealth?

I know.

Jonathan, his lazy ministers, his idle assistants and the jokers in the National Assembly and House of Representatives are sharing the money daily. These funny crooks who called themselves politicians are taking home more than 25% of the country’s wealth.

The rest of us, more than 160m can go to hell with the remaining 75% that is used to service re-current expenditures.
N18 000?

What can that buy? Still the state government cannot afford to pay it!

Can Jonathan and David Mark live on N18 000? Funny people.

I heard that Italy has a big debt. Do you know how much it is? 1.2 billion euros.

In Nigeria only Dimeji Bankole stole more than that as the speaker of the House of Assembly. This means that he can even pay off the debt of another country including Italy.

Nigerian politicians have no clues. They are interested in looting and they continue to succeed. The people praise them for their ill-gotten wealth and this encourage more and more people to go into politics just to steal.

The minimum wage should not be a problem. If states were formed based on their viability, then N18 000 should not be a problem. But states were created in Nigeria so that they could receive stipends from the oil sales. That is a tragedy on its own. A group of people sit idle all month, wait for money from the federal government and then share or loot the money as the case may be.

The local governments wait upon the state government for the same reason.

So in Nigeria’s politics, it is about money sharing.

They do nothing to promote the state of infrastructure or to develop the service and manufacturing industry. The economy is almost mono-economy surviving mainly on the sales of crude oil. We even import finished oil products. What a country..!

Nigeria needs to be restructured. More than ever before I want the re-emergence of regional governments where the regions would have more control over their resources and economic development.

All the powers concentrated at the centre should be decentralized and all the money going to the federal government that is not doing anything and that is also very far from the people should be taken away and given the regions.

But these things won’t work if corruption remains a way of life. Almost all Nigerian politicians are thieves. So it has been difficult to have both reforms and positive changes.

That makes the struggle for the minimum wage a minor struggle because the system is wrong and bad. It is very annoying actually.

NLC has not used its powers in the right way. It should actually be initiating a revolution that will sweep all these looters into jail or exile.

Nigeria and some countries in West Africa need their own revolutions.

Otherwise these looting, stealing, corruption, laziness in government and the diseases and poverty that continue to spread like wild fire will remain forever in West/ sub-Saharan Africa.

Good luck with your useless misinformed strike NLC. When you are ready, you will revolt once and for all.

The Day I Was Arrested At Frankfurt Airport

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Adeola Aderounmu

I’d wanted to tell this story since December 2010 when I was arrested by the German Police at Frankfurt Airport.

Sonala’s article stating MMA as a metaphor of a Non-Governing Governance gave me the needed impetus.

I have a butterfly knife that I love so much that I always carry it with me. It serves as a utility tool. Last December I took it with me to Nigeria. Somehow it ended up in my backpack where I also have the basic things that my children need.

We left Nigeria on Dec. 28 after celebrating Christmas in Lagos.

We went through rigorous checks at MMA. They turned everything inside out and we even went through the scanners and all their cancer-inducing machines.

You can imagine my shock when I was stopped at Frankfurt the next morning and ordered to step aside. The police were called immediately and I was interrogated and made to give a written statement.

They found my butterfly knife in my bag. They have a functional scanner there in Frankfurt. Or maybe they are not looking at just the human physiology like our brethren back at MMA.

They told me that I could be required in the court of law and a notification will be sent to me about that. I have waited since December 2010 but it appears the case was not pursued further. Hopefully this essay will not stir it up again.

The officers took my knife and wanted to retain it as an exhibit. I guessed they will throw it away. I told them that I really cherished the knife and that it meant something to me. They were a bit surprised but respected my views.

They said I can only retain the knife on one condition. I have to go out of the waiting hall and check in at Lufthansa’s desk. To save my knife it became necessary for me to check in at a point of transit. I took one of our baggage with me, put the knife inside and checked it in.

Even though I had the status of a “potential terrorist” I was still allowed to exercise my rights and to choose what I wanted to do with my knife.

We had luck that there was ample time to our connecting flight. I was still able to fly with my family. They were waiting for me at another point but they could see me. The arrest was something I had to sort out alone since I was the one carrying the bag.

If a butterfly knife on the side pocket of a backpack cannot be detected at MMA, I could only imagine the possibility of a terrorist being able to blow up the entire airport in these days of micro- and nano-technologies.

I remembered one day in 2002 when my things were taken from me at MMA. I was not given any choice at all. They just “obtained” me like that. They took my things and I left Nigeria with such a sad experience. The story is the same today. When I leave Nigeria these days I travel light.

There are several sad things about MMA that Sonala didn’t mention. I trust that he wanted to save Nigeria from some serious embarrassment.
MMA should actually have been converted to a local airport altogether. On developmental scale, MMA is on the same level as Iyana Ipaja because Oshodi is far better these days.

There is nothing about MMA that fits into international standard. I was embarrassed that my family first’s visit to Nigeria took them through this point of entry. There was nothing to explain because they have read many of my essays.

The traffic in Lagos almost made us cry and the work rate of NEPA not only made us deaf temporarily, it also ensured that my kids found a special toy in Nigeria-the torchlight. How they loved it!

I have also wondered about the crowd at the airport. Is it possible to divert the crowd to Onikan, Adamasingba or National stadium so they can provide the spectatorship that our football games are longing for?

I was afraid I could be mishandle by the thousands of uniform men at MMA and that was the reason I didn’t take any picture at all. Too many angry faces looking for preys!

It is as if all the security men in Lagos are based at MMA. The variant of uniforms will make a good thesis for a post-graduate student.
Someone should take the offer so that the rest of us can understand why thousands of uniformed people are stationed at an overcrowded point like MMA. Is that the meaning of double wahala?

There are so many waste materials, big and small, different forms and shapes, electrical and others littering all the premises of the airport. The interior of the airport is too stuffy, hot, disorganized and haphazard. It pains the eyes.

It took more than 2½ hours for us to retrieve our luggage when we arrived that fateful evening that eventually turned to night at MMA. I had to tell my cousin to take my wife and children home while I waited for the remaining luggage. My brother in law it was who kept record of the time. I’m happy he didn’t faint in the waiting process.

There was one funny but sad situation also that same night.
One of our luggages was not on the major conveyor belt. We were told it could have been sent to the small or extra conveyor belt. Bu alas!
They can’t find the guy who has the key to the conveyor. It was a sort of crazy-looking conveyor that led directly from the outside to the inside and it is used for transporting wheel chairs and sorts into the main waiting hall. After a long wait, they found the guy with the key.

When we got back to our base in Europe my brother in-law politely told me that it has taken just 20 minutes since we arrived and we are already driving home. What was I supposed to say?

He didn’t have to tell me about the absence of crowd or uniformed people. He didn’t have to say the rest. I’ve been living with it for nearly a decade.

The level of security at MMA is appalling. The long wait and long queues are surely pretenses that someone or some people are working hard. It’s all nonsense. The things that take you 5 minutes at other airports around the world can take you several hours at MMA. If you have a heart disease or you are hypertensive you should either avoid MMA or take loads of medication with you.

The sad stories about MMA are inexhaustible.

I was also frustrated that I have to fill some forms as I entered Nigeria even though it state clearly on the top that it is for foreigners. And every time I gave the form back there was something I didn’t do right. I was turning brain-dead on the queues and I can’t believe that officer expected me to write my full address on that form. Who knows there the forms are heading?

As far as MMA is concerned it is a serious embarrassment to Nigeria. To call MMA a disaster or a disgrace is an understatement. It is not organized at all. No one should hope for a terror attack at that airport, the fatalities and consequences would be devastating. Let’s not imagine it. MMA is the worst airport I have been to. It is what you get when you have a Non-Governing Governance.

Two True Stories From Pakistan

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Adeola Aderounmu

There was once a liberal governor in Pakistan in the state of Punjab.

He wanted peace to reign in his domain and he wanted to promote the spirit of tolerance. He wanted to promote the right of children and women. He did his best.

One day a woman was sentenced to death, charged with speaking blasphemy against the holy prophet of Islam. But before she would be killed the governor decided to do a private investigation into the allegation and the judicial process.

He discovered that the woman was falsely accused. She is a Christian and one of the 2% of the followers of Christ who are scattered among 180m people.

The governor went on air to make a statement that he has found out that the woman was falsely accused and that the case against her may be dropped.

In addition he also said that he will be looking into either adjusting the law that allows people to be sentenced to death for blasphemy or have it removed altogether.

In the midst of this religious imbroglio the governor made a visit outside of his territory. He went to Islamabad. Then as he was about to enter his car to return to his hotel room he was shot 29 times by one of his personal security aides. He died.

The man who shot him was charged to court. As the trial was about to begin, thousands of Pakistani made their way to the court yard to praise the murderer. They throw roses and beautiful flowers at him.

They praised him for killing the governor of Punjab. Many of them mentioned that they would have done the same if they had the opportunity to kill anyone speaking blasphemy against Islam and its prophets.

There was also a young girl who was not born a Christian. Somehow she met with the Christian faith, became a Christian and decided to attend a bible college. She was very shy but studious and for two years she studied the scriptures and became versed.

One day she travelled back to her roots to help people who have been displaced by flood. As she helped them she spoke about The Christ.

People asked her many questions and she provided answers to all of their questions.

Some men did not like what the young woman was up to so they threatened her. They would kill her if she continues to spread the word about Christ.

She called her bible teacher who told her to leave the zone and report back to the district where she has attended bible school. She obeyed.

However as she rode on the back seat of a bicycle to the train station, unknown to her, an ambush has been laid. She was shot at; she sustained injuries on her legs but was lucky to have escaped the murder attempt.

In pain she got to Lahore and was treated. She is alive to tell the story.

She didn’t want her bible teacher to visit the remote place in the south of Pakistan where she has worked as a volunteer and shot. The man of God wanted to make a police report and to see if they can start a judicial process to seek justice.

In the words of the young woman “I have forgiven those who tried to kill me because they don’t know what they are doing”.

These stories touch my heart and they remind me of the recurrent killings in parts of Nigeria especially in the Northern Province. Some of the religious and or tribal killings do not make the news. When they do, they are no longer headlines. In short they have become part of our existence.

We now accept that it is “ok” that innocent people be murdered in certain parts of Nigeria. Life has become meaningless and lawlessness is now an acceptable pattern to us. Or how many perpetrators have been arrested in Jos, Bauchi and Borno?

Just to let sleeping dogs lie, I try to refrain from discussing or writing about religious matters either in Nigeria or elsewhere. It’s too sensitive. People get stirred up when religion is debated or reported in a certain way. It’s puzzling because of rigid opinions.

Yet it is so unbelievable how evil has spread in the minds of people representing all the religious groups around the world.

Around 1992/93 I wrote an essay for an English course at the University of Lagos. It was titled Religion and Morality. I argued that religion from a moral point of view has helped to shape the world. That argument probably belongs to the dustbin now.

No doubts I can now add that religion has also changed the world order forever. Intolerance based on religion (along with social injustice) has come to stay as a parameter that has ensured that the world is totally unsafe for all.

Religion has ensured that peace is elusive to humanity.

Acknowledgement
I wrote down these stories after listening to a preacher from Pakistan. The stories are real.