Buhari administration’s many odious scandals

Less than three years in office, the Muhammadu Buhari All Progressives Congress-led administration is already drowning in a sea of corruption scandals. The many “…GATES” of this government threaten to sweep it off its feet – and they keep growing by the day! Its spin doctors are getting exasperated and confused and are fast running out of ideas.

Unfortunately, rather than take the bull by the horn, they are busy drawing the wool over our eyes, papering over the cracks, and sweeping humongous corruption cases under carpets which are already bursting at the seams. This was exactly the same perilous path travelled by ex-President Goodluck Jonathan when the Stella Oduahs (of the bullet proof car saga); Deziani Allison-Madueke (who spent billions of public funds on chartered flight), Abba Moro (who conducted a murderous Immigrations job interview) and many others all got away with blue murder, as it were. There were sacred cows in the Jonathan administration that did as they pleased and got away unscathed. Nigerians thought that was not good enough; voted Jonathan out of office; and installed Buhari, a one-time military dictator who had promised to fight corruption. Borrowing a leaf from his antecedents, Nigerians believed him. In fact, the masses deified and elevated him to the pedestal of a demigod, hence the chant “Sai Baba”

But, alas! Two years down the road, Buhari has been demystified. The corruption scandals oozing out of his government today rival those under Jonathan. Buhari already has his own Oduahs, Dezianis, and Moros – and many more many times over! Yet, this is an administration that rode into power on the crest of an anti-corruption mantra and which continues to parrot its commitment to same. While it is quick to arrest and try opposition figures and party contrarians accused of corruption, it has been lethargic, clay-footed, hypocritical, double-faced, and dubious in applying the same medicine to its own party members and other loyalists. Senator Shehu Sani of the same APC best described this unsavoury state of events with his deodorant (for Buhari loyalists) and insecticides (for Buhari enemies) analogy.

The list of the corruption scandals encircling this administration is mind-boggling. Virtually every powerful person in this government has been fingered and this is not just (political) mud-slinging by opponents but real and factual allegations made by people who, ordinarily, should be the ones defending and protecting this government. A few examples: The allegation, twice made, that the EFCC boss is not fit for office, and which has twice denied him Senate confirmation, was made by the State Security services (DSS); the same EFCC has now blown the lid on Mainagate, which has engulfed the same DSS, the Federal Attorney-General and Minister of Justice; Minister of the Interior, Federal Civil Service Commission; Head of Service of the Federation; and even President Buhari himself if leaked photographs and memos on this corruption scandal are anything to go by. Friendly fires, you may say! Aisha Buhari, the president’s wife, was the first to blow the whistle on the corruption walloping the Presidential Initiative on the North-East (PINE) before the grass-cutting scandal that just consumed SGF Babachir Lawal broke. A daughter of the president, Zahra, supported by the same First Lady, also recently blew the whistle on the Aso Rock clinic situated within the State House under Buhari’s very nose, which they alleged has drawn billions of Naira in budgetary allocations since Buhari came into office with nothing to show for it.

We should not forget that both Hon. Jubril of the padded budget fame, who blew the whistle on Speaker Yakubu Dogara and Senator Misau, who blew the whistle on the Inspector-General of Police, are both from the ruling APC. In making his defence, the IGP reportedly released damning information that the First Lady demanded and got two SUVs from him. Et tu Aisha? This is not to talk of the Dubai properties’ allegation concerning the Army chief and Minister of the Interior as well as the bribery allegation said to connect a GSM company with the Chief of Staff. If we say the odious revelations from Rivers and Ekiti states concerning two ex-governors now serving Ministers are political because an opposition party now controls the two states, how about that from Lagos where both former and sitting governor belong in the same ruling party? What do we make of the “ownerless” monies that the EFCC said it has picked up all over the country?

The sack of SGF Lawal and the NIA DG is too little, too late. It is a ruse if, truly, the new SGF, Boss Mustapha, is Lawal’s first cousin. That must be one aspect of the “soft landing” that was long rumoured to be in the offing for the disgraced SGF. Another is that he walks about freely, not invited or charged by the EFCC even though a panel constituted by the president himself and headed by the VP who was ably assisted by two top-ranking Ministers found him guilty. What anti-corruption war are we still talking about? That is not fair to Olisa Metuh, Femi Fani-Kayode, Bala Mohammed and others standing trial for corruption. How many of Lawal’s properties have they seized as they have done Patience Jonathan’s?  The sack of Lawal and the NIA DG is a subterfuge and a scantily-concealed attempt to divert our attention from the much more serious Maina-gate and the SUV allegations threatening to consume the President and First Lady respectively.

 

Re:

I am Most Rev. Felix Femi Ajakaye, Bishop of the Catholic Diocese of Ekiti. I am writing to greet and thank you especially for your sincere and purposeful presentation of your thoughts, ON THE LORD’s Day in the Sunday Tribune every Sunday. I was thrilled with your unbiased write-up of Sunday, 29 October, 2017: “What’s in a name: Ilesa Grammar School or Ilesa Government High School?”

In our dear country Nigeria, there are Nigerians who like names and titles more than selfless service and genuine and meaningful productivity. This is why most of our State Governors cherish being addressed as EXECUTIVE governor. A State Governor is either addressed as Governor or Chief Executive. Many Local Government chairmen also prefer to be addressed as EXECUTIVE chairman. All these people love fantasies at the expense of realities.

What is the essence of mega schools, mega hospitals, mega towns, mega cities, etc, without concrete plan for maintenance? Notably, we tend to lack maintenance culture in Nigeria, a country where there is the promotion of culture of waste and the blame-game. Honestly, we need disciplined minds with courage and sincerity of purpose to be at the helm of affairs in our country.

Indiscipline is the number ONE problem in Nigeria while corruption is the FIRST born. With discipline, we can achieve a lot. This has to start from the family, which is the bedrock of the society. We cannot continue to moan over our mourning. Enough is enough!

Thanks immensely for using your God-given talents and gifts positively and concretely. Kindly keep up the good work with the good spirit.

 

Bishop Felix Femi Ajakaye.

…………………………………………

In the epic play, Romeo and Juliet, Williams Shakespeare popularised the saying, “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet”

I was at Ilesa on Tuesday, October 24, 2017 as part of the entourage of the state governor to commission the newly-built (like others in its genre) Ilesa Government High School. The crowd was a spectacle. The coaster bus which the governor rode in, accompanied by members of the state executive council and others, was literally mobbed such that he had to alight into the cheering crowd and hop into an open-roof SUV to acknowledge the unending cheers of the people.

It was indeed a triumphant entry into Ilesa. Market women and men, indigenes and visitors from near and far, school children, especially those from the school itself, lined up the road leading to the school from hundreds of meters away, waving national and state flags, not to talk of the traditional and cultural teams that welcomed the governor and his entourage at the entry point of the town. All this pointed to one thing: the real people whom the governor had at the back of his mind in building the educational edifice appreciated him.

Who are the naysayers concerning the name-change from Ilesa Grammar School to Ilesa Government High School? A certain cohorts who, in their characteristic gathering in elitist postures, claim to own the school just because they were opportune to attend, like hundreds of thousands of past students, the high profile Ilesa Grammar School at one time or the other.

And who truly owns a public school? Just as the descriptive term goes, it is the public. And who are the public? The public are the people in the generality of a defined geographical or social/political space. And in this case, the entire Ijesa people, the tax-paying masses of the people who have been shortchanged over time by previous governments education-wise; the present and past students and, lastly, the government which acts as the custodian of the collective will of the people.

Where does the Old Students’ Association come in? Whose interests are they representing and who appointed them owners of this school? Which law or constitution gave them the power to lord it over others, including the government of the day? And where were they during the decadent days of our educational system? What major contributions have they made in concrete terms to give them this unusual audacity to lord it over a constituted authority, even when the olive branch was extended to them by invitation to the ceremony?

They lay claim to intellectualism yet fail to recognize the age-old saying that change is the only constant thing in life; name-change does not in any way affect an institution’s rich cultural and other heritage?

This same school, Ilesa Grammar School, was once Ijesa High School. Have they asked themselves why it was changed to the name they are ferociously clinging to today? Why should Ilesa Grammar School be different from others in its category like the Osogbo Government High School; Wole Soyinka Government High School; Adventist Government High School; Ataoja Government High School; and Oduduwa Government High School and others which have their names slightly altered to reflect the realities of the day?

What baffles one is that these opposition group in the gab of Old Students have not really sat back to discuss the deep intellectual reasoning behind a government high school as well as the deep philosophy behind it.  They refused to give kudos where necessary but would rather feed on the mundane. Most surprising is that this needless opposition is coming from unexpected quarters.

– Ayo Akinola