An interesting report by Sunday Trust on the eponymous moribund industrial complex. We have spent billions of dollars on the project .... billions.
We've got to make Ajaokuta work. Not as a political or patriotic statement, but as a sustainable commercial and industrial powerhouse.
At this point I suppose the Complex will probably never repay the billions (in US dollars) of government funds already spent in its genesis. Indeed, as the article notes, the Complex has billions (in Naira) of additional loans to repay to private-sector banks (which would or should have priority over the federal government in any repayment plan).
Nevertheless, at this point it would just be a depressing waste (in every conceivable way) if we don't get the Complex up and running as originally planned.
There is certainly a market, or should I say potential market for it. Nigeria, West Africa, Central Africa and the Rest Of Africa all suffer SEVERELY from the lack of basic infrastructure, which will require prodigious amounts of iron and steel to remedy.
Then again, the issues that have contributed to the continuing lack of infrastructure as late as the 21st century have also contributed to keeping Ajaokuta Steel Complex moribund.
It is sad.
Amalgamation Day in Lagos, 1914
18 April, 2010
14 April, 2010
Rule of Law and the power of video
A Borno State High Court has awarded =N=100 million (about US$670 thousand) in damages to the survivors of the late Alhaji Baba Fugu Mohammed, a 72-year-old citizen extra-judicially killed by the certain specific officers of the police because he was the father-in-law of the leader of Boko Haram.
The 72-year-old Alhaji Fugu Mohammed had voluntarily surrendered himself to the police after being told by his family that he was wanted by the police. Sometime afterward, while in police custody, Alhaji Mohammed was killed, his body dumped in a mass grave along with other extra-judicially executed suspects.
No charges were proffered against him. There was no arraignment, no trial. Nothing.
Apparently, he had given his son-in-law a house which was subsequently used as the headquarters of Boko Haram. For whatever reason, certain specific officers of the police thought this was reason enough to kill him.
Alhaji Mohammed's family told the Borno Hgh Court that their father and grandfather had given the house to his daughter's husband long before the formation of Boko Haram. Far from making a contribution to the group, the late Alhaji Mohammed just provided a home for his grandchildren and helped support a son-in-law whose poverty was probably a contributing factor to his later radicalization.
If the police had any information to the contrary, they should not have killed him. They should have kept him alive, taken him to court and presented whatever evidence they felt they had so all of us could rationally come to a conclusion as to what really happened. Only a court of law is constitutionally empowered to determine guilt or innocence.
I don't understand why our country is plagued by so much violence. It is not just the police killing people, but also people killing the police. I am critical of the police for their many extra-judicial killings, but I am just as opposed to the murder of police officers.
So much violence. So many families left in so much unnecessary pain.
The police have a thankless, low-paid job that brings them criticism, disdain and fear, and very little in the way of respect, financial security or protection from unchecked violence. But they can't keep randomly killing citizens who have NOT been convicted of any crime. It is too much and no one is safe.
For the sake of =N=20 at checkpoints, a three-year-old girl, as well as the drivers and passengers of commercial vehicles have been killed.
There are many reasons why the relatives of suspects don't come forward to help put their kinsmen in jail, or to help the security agencies preemptively stop their relatives from acts of violence. Among these reasons is the relatives' fear of what would happen to their relatives in police custody should they help the police catch them. Indeed, different district police commands have been known to detain the innocent relatives of suspects indefinitely, effectively holding them ransom until their relative turns himself or herself in, which rarely happens. Why would you want to go to the station to put yourself at risk of that?
A police force cannot be effective without the cooperation of the citizenry. In our particular case, the police can't really criticize people for essentially covering up for their relatives when the police are themselves frequently guilty of covering up (or attempting to cover up) the criminal actions of policemen. They denied that there were any extra-judicial killings in Maiduguri until exposed by pictures, video and the army's refusal to participate in the coverup.
This isn't helping.
The late Alhaji Mohammed's survivors have been awarded =N=100 million in damages. They owe the verdict to the power of video and the internet in the 21st Century.
A similar thing happened with the Miss Uzoma Okere case. Without the power of tiny phones to capture video and upload them to the web, she would have been just another Nigerian citizen brutalized by enlisted soldiers acting on the orders of a commissioned officer. But with the video having gone worldwide, there was nowhere for the Navy (or the judicial system) to hide. Miss Okere was awarded a judgment against the Navy, and =N=100 million in damages. The Navy is appealing the Uzoma Okere judgment, insisting the =N=100 million award is excessive.
There is far too much violence in Nigeria. Violence against uniformed officials of state, and violence by uniformed officials of state. We have so much to do before we can say we live in a safe, secure, stable environment. Reform, restructuring and transformation can't wait another day. Alas, I fear we will have to endure much more violence ahead. It makes me sad.
The 72-year-old Alhaji Fugu Mohammed had voluntarily surrendered himself to the police after being told by his family that he was wanted by the police. Sometime afterward, while in police custody, Alhaji Mohammed was killed, his body dumped in a mass grave along with other extra-judicially executed suspects.
No charges were proffered against him. There was no arraignment, no trial. Nothing.
Apparently, he had given his son-in-law a house which was subsequently used as the headquarters of Boko Haram. For whatever reason, certain specific officers of the police thought this was reason enough to kill him.
Alhaji Mohammed's family told the Borno Hgh Court that their father and grandfather had given the house to his daughter's husband long before the formation of Boko Haram. Far from making a contribution to the group, the late Alhaji Mohammed just provided a home for his grandchildren and helped support a son-in-law whose poverty was probably a contributing factor to his later radicalization.
If the police had any information to the contrary, they should not have killed him. They should have kept him alive, taken him to court and presented whatever evidence they felt they had so all of us could rationally come to a conclusion as to what really happened. Only a court of law is constitutionally empowered to determine guilt or innocence.
I don't understand why our country is plagued by so much violence. It is not just the police killing people, but also people killing the police. I am critical of the police for their many extra-judicial killings, but I am just as opposed to the murder of police officers.
So much violence. So many families left in so much unnecessary pain.
The police have a thankless, low-paid job that brings them criticism, disdain and fear, and very little in the way of respect, financial security or protection from unchecked violence. But they can't keep randomly killing citizens who have NOT been convicted of any crime. It is too much and no one is safe.
For the sake of =N=20 at checkpoints, a three-year-old girl, as well as the drivers and passengers of commercial vehicles have been killed.
There are many reasons why the relatives of suspects don't come forward to help put their kinsmen in jail, or to help the security agencies preemptively stop their relatives from acts of violence. Among these reasons is the relatives' fear of what would happen to their relatives in police custody should they help the police catch them. Indeed, different district police commands have been known to detain the innocent relatives of suspects indefinitely, effectively holding them ransom until their relative turns himself or herself in, which rarely happens. Why would you want to go to the station to put yourself at risk of that?
A police force cannot be effective without the cooperation of the citizenry. In our particular case, the police can't really criticize people for essentially covering up for their relatives when the police are themselves frequently guilty of covering up (or attempting to cover up) the criminal actions of policemen. They denied that there were any extra-judicial killings in Maiduguri until exposed by pictures, video and the army's refusal to participate in the coverup.
This isn't helping.
The late Alhaji Mohammed's survivors have been awarded =N=100 million in damages. They owe the verdict to the power of video and the internet in the 21st Century.
A similar thing happened with the Miss Uzoma Okere case. Without the power of tiny phones to capture video and upload them to the web, she would have been just another Nigerian citizen brutalized by enlisted soldiers acting on the orders of a commissioned officer. But with the video having gone worldwide, there was nowhere for the Navy (or the judicial system) to hide. Miss Okere was awarded a judgment against the Navy, and =N=100 million in damages. The Navy is appealing the Uzoma Okere judgment, insisting the =N=100 million award is excessive.
There is far too much violence in Nigeria. Violence against uniformed officials of state, and violence by uniformed officials of state. We have so much to do before we can say we live in a safe, secure, stable environment. Reform, restructuring and transformation can't wait another day. Alas, I fear we will have to endure much more violence ahead. It makes me sad.
11 April, 2010
Babangida declares, Atiku's back in PDP, Pat Utomi throws a party
A couple of weeks ago, I noted on the blog thatAtiku Abubakar was mulling a return to the Peoples Democratic Party. His intent (and the intent of the Big Men in the PDP who are inviting him back) is to take up the presidential nomination for the 2011 Presidential "polls" (if you can call them polls) in place of President Umaru Yar'Adua who will definitely not be running.
This being Nigeria, and the rotation system being what it is, the 2011-2015 presidential term will be held by a candidate from north of the Niger-Benue line. The vice-president will come from from "below" the southern borders of Kwara, Kogi, Benue and Taraba.
The Big Men of the PDP are not interested in a General Mohammedu Buhari (rtd) presidency, or in resurrecting the political career of General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd), which leaves the PDP with the option of either selecting a sitting or former state governor (and if they pick one from the horde, the rest will rebel) or selecting former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, a man whom many of them owe political favours (never mind that they sold him out under when Obasanjo used Ribadu to blackmail and threaten Atiku backers).
The PDP presidential candidate is guaranteed to "win" next year's presidential election. It isn't really an election ... and Nigeria isn't really democratic. So, it is not really surprising that Atiku did in fact return to the PDP, as also noted on the blog. After all of Obasanjo's "do or die" politics of 2007, it looks like he only delyaed Atiku's presidential ambitions by four years. Basically the former vice-president is the odds-on favourite to replace Acting President Jonathan Goodluck after next year's formalities.
But wait one minute ....
Former diarchy regime leader and Head of State General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd) has thrown his hat into the ring, saying to newsmen at the airport in Asaba, "On the speculation by Nigerians of my 2011 presidential ambition I must say “the speculation is correct”."
Babangida intends to contest for the presidency on the PDP platform, which means Atiku Abubakar might not get a free ride to the PDP presidential nomination. We will see which of the two men has the more influential concentric networks of patron-client relationships. In fact, the contest between these men for the PDP nomination will probably be more important in determining the future of the Nigerian presidency than the so-called "elections" .... or even the supposed electoral reforms.
How many constitutions and "electoral reforms" have we been through since 1960? Look, I love football, but I am not good enough to be a professional football player. If you put me in a 4-4-2 formation, I will not be good enough to be a professional footballer. If you put me in a 3-5-2 formation, I will not be good enough to be a professional footballer. If you put me in 4-5-1, 4-3-3, 3-4-3, 4-2-3-1, 4-3-2-1 .... it does not matter what formation you use, I will still not be good enough to be a professional footballer.
Nigeria's problem is not the combination of words in a piece of paper called "constitution", nor is our problem the presence or absence of open ballot, secret ballot or option A-4, nor does changing the name from FEDECO to NEC to NECON to INEC address in any way our core problem.
There is a fundamental, practical truth and reality about the practice of politics in Nigeria ... and until we address that fundamental truth, everything else is just window-dressing.
Speaking of which, Pat Utomi one of the founders of the Lagos Business School (which has since metamorphosed into the Pan-African University), and a 2007 Presidential candidate on the platform of the African Democratic Congress, has announced the formation of the Social Democratic Movement Party. Utomi says the party "will be an entrepreneurial party focused on market economy", which isn't surprising considering he co-founded the Lagos Business School and is a classic economic liberal ... but interestingly, Olawale Okunniyi, secretary of the Harmonisation Team for the Mega Party project, says the SDMP will be built around support from organized labour, as well as alliances with various "opposition" political parties and factions (most of which are, frankly, anti-labour if the actual past practices -- as opposed to empty rhetoric -- of the leaders of these "opposition" parties is anything to go by).
If that seems to be a contradiction, note that the Social Democratic Movement Party is supposed to to be the culmination of years of efforts by opposition parties and by the "Conference of Nigerian Political Parties", to create what they call a "Mega Party" to compete with the dominant Peoples Democratic Party.
The SDMP is supposed to be the Mega Party, but in recent months, as the consolidation process approached completion ... the major planks of the proposed party began splitting away. For one thing, many opposition figures have moved to join or rejoin the PDP, including Atiku Abubakar, previously a supporter of the Mega Party project (Atiku desperately wants to be president by any means necessary, and when he couldn't beat the Big Men of the PDP, he was all for a Mega Party; now that the Big Men of the PDP want to make him their candidate, Atiku has ditched the Mega Party).
General Mohammedu Buhari was another name mentioned in connection with the Mega Party, but no one every explained how they were going to persuade Buhari or Atiku to step down for the other man. Not known for wasting time with such ajasco dancing, Buhari decided to pursue his continuing presidential ambitions on the platform of the Congress for Progressive Change, having realized that his previous party, the All Nigerian Peoples Party, has become the PDP's Division Two feeder team. Most anyone who is anyone in the ANPP is only there because they couldn't get a nomination in the PDP, and (like Atiku) will join or rejoin the PDP in due course of time (or will stay in the ANPP and run PDP-esque state governments). Buhari has thus cut himself free from the Mega Party project.
Then you have Bola Ahmed Tinubu's sole proprietorship, the Action Congress, which was supposed to be the nucleus around which the Mega Party would be built. But Tinubu is pursuing a separate, Lagos-and-Southwest-focused agenda to turn his Action Congress into the new Action Group (the First Republic ethno-regionalist party built by the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo). In fact, to paraphrase another giant figure from First Republic politics, Tinubu would rather be the capo-da-tutti-capi of Lagos State than be President of Nigeria (an office he more or less has no chance of ever occupying). Oddly enough, Atiku Abubakar was the Action Congress' 2007 presidential candidate, and he has left the AC to rejoin PDP (which says a lot about a lot of things, both related to Atiku and related to the AC).
The Action Congress and the Congress for Progressive Change both refused to merge into the proposed Mega Party, and even Balarabe Musa of the CNPP says he will work with the SDMP while maintaining his leadership of the Peoples Redemption Party, another sole proprietorship, albeit one pretending to continue the legacy of the late Mallam Aminu Kano.
Beyond all of this pointless politicking, the only thing that Social Democrtic Movement Party members will have in common is their shared desire to replace the Peoples Democratic Party as the dominant group of allied Big Men. There is no ideological similarity or compatibility, no commonality of thought, desire or approach .... nothing at all binding these people other than their weakness in the face of the PDP. It is not surprising that they cannot come to agreement on anything of substance, because they respective worldviews and (more importantly) their respective ambitions are contradictory.
Recall I said earlier in this blog post that the All Nigerian Peoples Party (and for that matter the Progressive Peoples Alliance as well) consist of people who could not win (more like buy, extort or "negotiate") nominations and candidacies in the PDP. In Nigeria, nobody accepts the reality of losing an intra-party primary (or rig-ary) to choose candidates, and I suppose you can't really blame them because most of the primaries are in fact rig-aries and the losing candidates do not perceive themselves to have really lost per se. So what happens is people who can't get a PDP nomination either create a brand new sole proprietorship political party, that exists for no reason other than to facilitate their candidacy (i.e. giving themselves a 110% guarantee that they will be the candidate) or they join an existing micro-party which exists to rent out candidacies to aspiring candidates, or (because certain smaller parties like the idea of having structures in every state, even if their party is thin on members and resources) they take over their state's branch of a small party (as Andy Uba did when he paradoxically ran as candidate for Anambra Governor under the Labour Party banner).
The so-called Mega Party Movement that (supposedly) gave rise to the Social Democratic Movement Party is comprised of too many people who want to be president at all costs ... people who would withdraw from the "movement" the moment they either believed it would not endorse them as "consensus" presidential candidate (i.e. candidate by acclamation and negotiated agreement, without need for primary) or that their chances to be president would be better elsewhere (e.g. Atiku Abubakar).
Pat Utomi, the "Pro-tem National Chairman" of the SDLM already has a website up for his 2011 Presidential campaign (really a continuation of his 2007 campaign). For the record, Utomi is one of the more thoughtful Nigerian politicians (though, like the rest of them, he tends to speak in generalities with nothing specific you can analyze to see if it is possible, probable, unlikely or flat out wrong), but even Utomi is not immune to the "briefcase party" phenomenon; his candidature on the platform of the African Democratic Congress had nothing to do with the ideology (if it has any) of the ADC, and everything to do with the ADC's willingness to make him their "consensus" presidential candidate.
Bola Tinubu, who is trying to make himself the "president" of the Southwest, covets the independent identity of the Action Congress because it would be more difficult to convince voters in the Southwestern states that his party is the successor of the AG, UPN and AD if his party is actually "national" in orientation as the "Mega Party" is meant to be.
[The media often talk about ex-Governor of Sokoto State, Attahiru Baffarawa, as though he were one of the big names on the Mega Party sheet .... but to be honest, he and his sole proprietorship party, the Democratic Peoples Party DPP, are barely relevant in Sokoto, much less anywhere else.]
All things considered, the People's Democratic Party look set to "engineer" an official win for themselves next year, with little in the way of formal or informal opposition.
The "Social Democratic Movement Party" is neither a party, nor a "movement".
EDIT 11-04-10: The Guardian reports former Governor (1999-2007) of Cross River State, Donald Duke, will announce that he will be a candidate for next year's presidential "election. The Guardian did not provide any quote or confirmation from Duke himself (or from anyone with an iota of crediblity to speak for Duke), so I suspect this is just a bit of sensationalism from a newspaper that is usually one of the more reliable and the least driven to sensationalistic-but-wholly-without-evidence stories (and on this note I must say that for a moment there I thought NEXT was going to revolutionize the Nigerian media industry .... but then they too started publishing unproven, sensationalistic headlines). Besides, why in heck would a Nigerian presidential candidate launch his campaign in a five-city tour of the USA? That makes no sense at all, particularly from a candidate who, if our elections were truly free and fair, would realize that his biggest challenge was his lack of any kind of profile (or more importantly, any kind of political machine) in the majority of Nigerian states.
This being Nigeria, and the rotation system being what it is, the 2011-2015 presidential term will be held by a candidate from north of the Niger-Benue line. The vice-president will come from from "below" the southern borders of Kwara, Kogi, Benue and Taraba.
The Big Men of the PDP are not interested in a General Mohammedu Buhari (rtd) presidency, or in resurrecting the political career of General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd), which leaves the PDP with the option of either selecting a sitting or former state governor (and if they pick one from the horde, the rest will rebel) or selecting former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, a man whom many of them owe political favours (never mind that they sold him out under when Obasanjo used Ribadu to blackmail and threaten Atiku backers).
The PDP presidential candidate is guaranteed to "win" next year's presidential election. It isn't really an election ... and Nigeria isn't really democratic. So, it is not really surprising that Atiku did in fact return to the PDP, as also noted on the blog. After all of Obasanjo's "do or die" politics of 2007, it looks like he only delyaed Atiku's presidential ambitions by four years. Basically the former vice-president is the odds-on favourite to replace Acting President Jonathan Goodluck after next year's formalities.
But wait one minute ....
Former diarchy regime leader and Head of State General Ibrahim Babangida (rtd) has thrown his hat into the ring, saying to newsmen at the airport in Asaba, "On the speculation by Nigerians of my 2011 presidential ambition I must say “the speculation is correct”."
Babangida intends to contest for the presidency on the PDP platform, which means Atiku Abubakar might not get a free ride to the PDP presidential nomination. We will see which of the two men has the more influential concentric networks of patron-client relationships. In fact, the contest between these men for the PDP nomination will probably be more important in determining the future of the Nigerian presidency than the so-called "elections" .... or even the supposed electoral reforms.
How many constitutions and "electoral reforms" have we been through since 1960? Look, I love football, but I am not good enough to be a professional football player. If you put me in a 4-4-2 formation, I will not be good enough to be a professional footballer. If you put me in a 3-5-2 formation, I will not be good enough to be a professional footballer. If you put me in 4-5-1, 4-3-3, 3-4-3, 4-2-3-1, 4-3-2-1 .... it does not matter what formation you use, I will still not be good enough to be a professional footballer.
Nigeria's problem is not the combination of words in a piece of paper called "constitution", nor is our problem the presence or absence of open ballot, secret ballot or option A-4, nor does changing the name from FEDECO to NEC to NECON to INEC address in any way our core problem.
There is a fundamental, practical truth and reality about the practice of politics in Nigeria ... and until we address that fundamental truth, everything else is just window-dressing.
Speaking of which, Pat Utomi one of the founders of the Lagos Business School (which has since metamorphosed into the Pan-African University), and a 2007 Presidential candidate on the platform of the African Democratic Congress, has announced the formation of the Social Democratic Movement Party. Utomi says the party "will be an entrepreneurial party focused on market economy", which isn't surprising considering he co-founded the Lagos Business School and is a classic economic liberal ... but interestingly, Olawale Okunniyi, secretary of the Harmonisation Team for the Mega Party project, says the SDMP will be built around support from organized labour, as well as alliances with various "opposition" political parties and factions (most of which are, frankly, anti-labour if the actual past practices -- as opposed to empty rhetoric -- of the leaders of these "opposition" parties is anything to go by).
If that seems to be a contradiction, note that the Social Democratic Movement Party is supposed to to be the culmination of years of efforts by opposition parties and by the "Conference of Nigerian Political Parties", to create what they call a "Mega Party" to compete with the dominant Peoples Democratic Party.
The SDMP is supposed to be the Mega Party, but in recent months, as the consolidation process approached completion ... the major planks of the proposed party began splitting away. For one thing, many opposition figures have moved to join or rejoin the PDP, including Atiku Abubakar, previously a supporter of the Mega Party project (Atiku desperately wants to be president by any means necessary, and when he couldn't beat the Big Men of the PDP, he was all for a Mega Party; now that the Big Men of the PDP want to make him their candidate, Atiku has ditched the Mega Party).
General Mohammedu Buhari was another name mentioned in connection with the Mega Party, but no one every explained how they were going to persuade Buhari or Atiku to step down for the other man. Not known for wasting time with such ajasco dancing, Buhari decided to pursue his continuing presidential ambitions on the platform of the Congress for Progressive Change, having realized that his previous party, the All Nigerian Peoples Party, has become the PDP's Division Two feeder team. Most anyone who is anyone in the ANPP is only there because they couldn't get a nomination in the PDP, and (like Atiku) will join or rejoin the PDP in due course of time (or will stay in the ANPP and run PDP-esque state governments). Buhari has thus cut himself free from the Mega Party project.
Then you have Bola Ahmed Tinubu's sole proprietorship, the Action Congress, which was supposed to be the nucleus around which the Mega Party would be built. But Tinubu is pursuing a separate, Lagos-and-Southwest-focused agenda to turn his Action Congress into the new Action Group (the First Republic ethno-regionalist party built by the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo). In fact, to paraphrase another giant figure from First Republic politics, Tinubu would rather be the capo-da-tutti-capi of Lagos State than be President of Nigeria (an office he more or less has no chance of ever occupying). Oddly enough, Atiku Abubakar was the Action Congress' 2007 presidential candidate, and he has left the AC to rejoin PDP (which says a lot about a lot of things, both related to Atiku and related to the AC).
The Action Congress and the Congress for Progressive Change both refused to merge into the proposed Mega Party, and even Balarabe Musa of the CNPP says he will work with the SDMP while maintaining his leadership of the Peoples Redemption Party, another sole proprietorship, albeit one pretending to continue the legacy of the late Mallam Aminu Kano.
Beyond all of this pointless politicking, the only thing that Social Democrtic Movement Party members will have in common is their shared desire to replace the Peoples Democratic Party as the dominant group of allied Big Men. There is no ideological similarity or compatibility, no commonality of thought, desire or approach .... nothing at all binding these people other than their weakness in the face of the PDP. It is not surprising that they cannot come to agreement on anything of substance, because they respective worldviews and (more importantly) their respective ambitions are contradictory.
Recall I said earlier in this blog post that the All Nigerian Peoples Party (and for that matter the Progressive Peoples Alliance as well) consist of people who could not win (more like buy, extort or "negotiate") nominations and candidacies in the PDP. In Nigeria, nobody accepts the reality of losing an intra-party primary (or rig-ary) to choose candidates, and I suppose you can't really blame them because most of the primaries are in fact rig-aries and the losing candidates do not perceive themselves to have really lost per se. So what happens is people who can't get a PDP nomination either create a brand new sole proprietorship political party, that exists for no reason other than to facilitate their candidacy (i.e. giving themselves a 110% guarantee that they will be the candidate) or they join an existing micro-party which exists to rent out candidacies to aspiring candidates, or (because certain smaller parties like the idea of having structures in every state, even if their party is thin on members and resources) they take over their state's branch of a small party (as Andy Uba did when he paradoxically ran as candidate for Anambra Governor under the Labour Party banner).
The so-called Mega Party Movement that (supposedly) gave rise to the Social Democratic Movement Party is comprised of too many people who want to be president at all costs ... people who would withdraw from the "movement" the moment they either believed it would not endorse them as "consensus" presidential candidate (i.e. candidate by acclamation and negotiated agreement, without need for primary) or that their chances to be president would be better elsewhere (e.g. Atiku Abubakar).
Pat Utomi, the "Pro-tem National Chairman" of the SDLM already has a website up for his 2011 Presidential campaign (really a continuation of his 2007 campaign). For the record, Utomi is one of the more thoughtful Nigerian politicians (though, like the rest of them, he tends to speak in generalities with nothing specific you can analyze to see if it is possible, probable, unlikely or flat out wrong), but even Utomi is not immune to the "briefcase party" phenomenon; his candidature on the platform of the African Democratic Congress had nothing to do with the ideology (if it has any) of the ADC, and everything to do with the ADC's willingness to make him their "consensus" presidential candidate.
Bola Tinubu, who is trying to make himself the "president" of the Southwest, covets the independent identity of the Action Congress because it would be more difficult to convince voters in the Southwestern states that his party is the successor of the AG, UPN and AD if his party is actually "national" in orientation as the "Mega Party" is meant to be.
[The media often talk about ex-Governor of Sokoto State, Attahiru Baffarawa, as though he were one of the big names on the Mega Party sheet .... but to be honest, he and his sole proprietorship party, the Democratic Peoples Party DPP, are barely relevant in Sokoto, much less anywhere else.]
All things considered, the People's Democratic Party look set to "engineer" an official win for themselves next year, with little in the way of formal or informal opposition.
The "Social Democratic Movement Party" is neither a party, nor a "movement".
EDIT 11-04-10: The Guardian reports former Governor (1999-2007) of Cross River State, Donald Duke, will announce that he will be a candidate for next year's presidential "election. The Guardian did not provide any quote or confirmation from Duke himself (or from anyone with an iota of crediblity to speak for Duke), so I suspect this is just a bit of sensationalism from a newspaper that is usually one of the more reliable and the least driven to sensationalistic-but-wholly-without-evidence stories (and on this note I must say that for a moment there I thought NEXT was going to revolutionize the Nigerian media industry .... but then they too started publishing unproven, sensationalistic headlines). Besides, why in heck would a Nigerian presidential candidate launch his campaign in a five-city tour of the USA? That makes no sense at all, particularly from a candidate who, if our elections were truly free and fair, would realize that his biggest challenge was his lack of any kind of profile (or more importantly, any kind of political machine) in the majority of Nigerian states.
08 April, 2010
Atiku returns to the PDP
He is baaaaack.
Atiku Abubakar returns to the PDP to be annointed the PDP presidential candidate for the second four years of the Northern swing of the North/South rotational pendulum.
Can't say I am surprised. This isn't even a passable dog bite man story. It is more like a "the sun rose this morning and will set tonight" story.
Yawn.
Atiku Abubakar returns to the PDP to be annointed the PDP presidential candidate for the second four years of the Northern swing of the North/South rotational pendulum.
Can't say I am surprised. This isn't even a passable dog bite man story. It is more like a "the sun rose this morning and will set tonight" story.
Yawn.
05 April, 2010
Bank deposits decrease
A brief but interesting article from Vanguard.
I'm not going to comment on it. It isn't really subject matter for a "commentary". It is more an issue of keeping up with the changing economic trends.
I kind of wish there was a publication I could rely on not just for current facts, but also for analysis of long-term trends and credible projections. I have always liked Business Day , and for a time I thought they would be the ones to take financial/economic reporting in Nigeria to the next level. They are still a good source (and excellent source actually), but we are missing so much.
Oops. A bit of commentary slipped out, didn't it?
I'm not going to comment on it. It isn't really subject matter for a "commentary". It is more an issue of keeping up with the changing economic trends.
I kind of wish there was a publication I could rely on not just for current facts, but also for analysis of long-term trends and credible projections. I have always liked Business Day , and for a time I thought they would be the ones to take financial/economic reporting in Nigeria to the next level. They are still a good source (and excellent source actually), but we are missing so much.
Oops. A bit of commentary slipped out, didn't it?
04 April, 2010
The bloat continues
More evidence of the effect of excessive numbers of political office-holders.
In the northeast, Borno State, one of the poorest states in the federal republic, is spending =N=400 million (US$2.7 million) to build two new houses for the speaker and deputy-speaker of the State Assembly (that is about US$1.35 million per house). The state will also spend =N=250 million (US$1.7 million) buying new cars for Emirs in the state. I am 100%, nay, 110% supportive of sustaining our traditional/cultural institutions, but we need to rationalize and consolidate here as much as anywhere else. Bear in mind, Borno State Governor Ali Modu Sheriff (as noted on this blog) has actually INCREASED the number of emirates by creating newer, "fake" emirates to award political associates (and apparently his father) with emir titles.
And in the southwest, Ondo State has appropriated =N=866 million (US$5.8 million) to address the backlog in payments of "entitlements" to former political office-holders (from the 1999-2007 period) at the local government area level in the state. These former office-holders will draw these "entitlements" for the rest of their lives, as will current LGA office-holders and future LGA office-holders. There are 774 atomized LGAs in Nigeria (where no more than 72 districts are necessary) generating a large turnover of officials entitled to suck resources from the public treasury in perpetuity.
Speaking of local government areas, the recently-held 2010 LGA council elections in Bayelsa (home to Governor Timipre "98% of the vote" Sylva) were accompanied by the murders of 6 people in Ekeremor LGA. The state police command claim it was a clash of two rival cults that had nothing to do with politics, but apparently (this being the Fourth Republic) there is bad blood between Timpre Sylva and his deputy who hails from Ekeremor. Democracy in action? God spare us.
In the northeast, Borno State, one of the poorest states in the federal republic, is spending =N=400 million (US$2.7 million) to build two new houses for the speaker and deputy-speaker of the State Assembly (that is about US$1.35 million per house). The state will also spend =N=250 million (US$1.7 million) buying new cars for Emirs in the state. I am 100%, nay, 110% supportive of sustaining our traditional/cultural institutions, but we need to rationalize and consolidate here as much as anywhere else. Bear in mind, Borno State Governor Ali Modu Sheriff (as noted on this blog) has actually INCREASED the number of emirates by creating newer, "fake" emirates to award political associates (and apparently his father) with emir titles.
And in the southwest, Ondo State has appropriated =N=866 million (US$5.8 million) to address the backlog in payments of "entitlements" to former political office-holders (from the 1999-2007 period) at the local government area level in the state. These former office-holders will draw these "entitlements" for the rest of their lives, as will current LGA office-holders and future LGA office-holders. There are 774 atomized LGAs in Nigeria (where no more than 72 districts are necessary) generating a large turnover of officials entitled to suck resources from the public treasury in perpetuity.
Speaking of local government areas, the recently-held 2010 LGA council elections in Bayelsa (home to Governor Timipre "98% of the vote" Sylva) were accompanied by the murders of 6 people in Ekeremor LGA. The state police command claim it was a clash of two rival cults that had nothing to do with politics, but apparently (this being the Fourth Republic) there is bad blood between Timpre Sylva and his deputy who hails from Ekeremor. Democracy in action? God spare us.
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