CONSENSUS: A SAD RETURN TO ETHNIC POLITICS
A sad day it was on the 22nd of November, 2010, when Mallam Adamu Ciroma and 8 others against wise counsel and all entreaties and appeal to the better angels of their nature endorsed a Northern consensus candidate to vie for the presidential ticket of the PDP against the incumbent President, Dr. Jonathan Ebele Goodluck of the minority Ijaw stock of the South - South region supposedly to maintain a nebulous power rotation or zoning within the ruling PDP which delusionally refers to itself as the largest political party in Africa.
Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the man so endorsed has accepted the challenge and the three other major contestants, General Ibrahim Babangida, General Aliyu Gusau and Abubakar Bukola Saraki have since congratulated and pledged to work with him. On the other hand, Presidential spokesperson, Ima Niboro has welcomed the choice of the Nine ‘wisemen’ boasting that the choice of Atiku Abubakar has further cleared the coast for his principal to coast to victory at the PDP presidential primaries. Dr. Balarabe Musa believes that Atiku’s choice is an opportunity for the opposition parties to dislodge the PDP from power as he reckons General Ibrahim Babangida would have being a more formidable choice even more so than President Jonathan Ebele Goodluck.
For whatever it is worth, the 2011 elections will come and go and we will still be here but the implications and the resonance of what Mallam Adamu Ciroma and his cohorts have done will live with us for decades. I pray they will live many more years to be haunted by the inevitable ethnic backlash that will follow this endorsement every general election year. IBB is obviously already worried; he has cautioned that the aspirants from the North should not be seen as candidates of the North, but as national aspirants. He said the position of the North on zoning had been misconstrued. Pray how else are we to see candidates who insisted that a Northerner must emerge president and who willingly submitted themselves to the Ciroma group for possible selection as the Northern consensus candidate? Atiku Abubakar is a Northern candidate pure and simple.
The sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Sa’aad Abubakar, Emir of Kano, Alhaji Ado Bayero, Alhaji Maitama Sule, Generals Yakubu Gowon, Theophilus Danjuma and Domkat Bali and many other influential Northerners endorsed Atiku’s candidature as reported in the Guardian of Tuesday, November 23, 2010. If it is about Nigeria, these experienced men sure could have counseled other subtle ways of achieving the same purpose without such an open endorsement that will surely divide Nigerians more than it will unite them.
Wise counsel suggests that the Jonathan Ebele Goodluck presidency is a tide of history that we should all do well to live with. The conventional wisdom should be that there is nothing any one can do about it considering the humble man’s trajectory to power but not so with these rapacious and perfidious political elites and their collaborators who must be relevant at all cost. These same men have held power for 38 years of Nigeria’s political independence and did nothing for their people yet they will in the name of these same people demand power rotation at all cost in 2011 when a Southern minority was having a shot at power for the first time in Nigeria’s political history, something that may not happen again in One hundred years and yet these people will not see it as an opportunity to heal the nation and foster a sense of belonging, enthrone equity and justice and engender a sense of joint ownership of the Nigerian project amongst the minority ethnic groups.
Now the damage is done. How shall we counsel the Ibo man in 2015 if he insists on a Consensus Eastern candidate? How about our brothers to the West of the Niger river who will sooner than later insist on a Yoruba president and a very clear and present danger, how do you explain these to the South - South, the region which believes that without its vast oil wealth, there will be no Nigeria. It is no longer whether Atiku wins the Presidency or not. It is that from now on, every one will be justified to insist on ethnocentricity and resort to ethnic jingoism whenever and wherever the question of political office rears its head in Nigeria.
But for one or two persons amongst the ‘Nine wisemen’, and the four candidates, they have between them held all the most important offices with enormous opportunity to make Nigeria but they did not. Their arrowhead, Mallam Adamu Ciroma was Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, three times Minister of Industries, Agriculture and Finance. He was a powerful chieftain of the NPN and infact a former Presidential aspirant of that era that brought Nigeria to its knees. He is also a founding member of the PDP, a party that is destroying Nigeria today. Another prominent member of that panel is three times Minister of Establishment, Minister of State for Education and Minister of Labour, Alhaji Bello Kirfi. Chief Audu Ogbeh was a former Minister of Communications and he was National Chairman of the PDP. Major General David Jemibewon was Military Governor of Western State, First Governor of Old Oyo State and Minister of Police Affairs. He was also a founding member of the PDP. Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the Turakin Adamawa, rose to be Customs boss, he was elected Governor of Adamawa State and He was Vice President of Nigeria for Eight years. No one will forget the unspeakable shame the then Vice President and President Olusegun Obasanjo brought Nigeria in a war of attrition where accusations of corruption and counter corruption were bandied around to the chagrin of utterly disconsolate Nigerians. He was also a founding member of the PDP. General Aliyu Gusau has been National Security Adviser now for as long as anyone can remember. How secure is our nation today? He was also a founding member of the PDP. Everything has been said and written about General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida who is fondly called IBB and he has been accused of everything and anything under the sun. He has been accused of elevating corruption to a statecraft. He has been accused of murder and above all he annulled an election that could have set Nigeria free and flying again in 1993. The agitations that followed the annulment of the June 12, 1993 Presidential elections brought Nigeria to the edge of the precipice and the albatross of that misadventure remains wrapped around IBB’s neck like an albatross. A Gordian knot from which he will never be able to extricate himself even if he had two lifetimes.
These men without fail failed our country. These men should hide their heads in shame for the role they played in the destruction of Nigeria. They should worry that a country they midwifed turned out this awry and leave us to sort out the mess with new ideas. There is no magic wand they have now to exorcise the evil with Nigeria that was not available to them all along – since Nigeria’s political independence these men and their ilk have held sway. These men by their antecedents cannot be trusted to lead us right or choose leaders for us.
Turaki is meanwhile prancing about the place, talking to a people whose flirtations with dementia are well known. His predilection to sound the gong of zoning from the rooftop deceives no one. So there was no zoning when he held Olusegun Obasanjo to ransom in 2003 on the eve of the Presidentail primaries of the PDP. He could well have been President or swing the support Alex Ekwueme’s way and this much he agreed were two of the three options available to him until the last minute when Obasanjo went to him cap in hand begging at the time. If Obasanjo had died in 2001, Atiku wants us to believe he would have respected any nebulous zoning or power rotation concept eh… Let the former Vice President tell that story to the marines!!!
I am bitterly disappointed because by this consensus candidate thing, we have again introduced another dangerous dimension to our politicking and one that is not easily reversed at that all in the name of ‘self interest’ is the name of the game. Just when you think it can not possibly get worse than this, it actually does get worse in Nigeria.
Resignedly, we wait with berthed breath and see where this all leads us in 2011 and beyond.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law Firm of Fountain Court Partners.
Friday, December 3, 2010
Wednesday, October 20, 2010
LUCKY DUBE: RETHINKING NIGERIA’S FOREIGN POLICY
LUCKY DUBE: RETHINKING NIGERIA’S FOREIGN POLICY
Nigeria has severally avowed that Africa is the centre piece of its foreign policy. Simply put, it means that Nigeria in the conduct of its foreign policy and pursuit of her international interests will seek the peace, security and well being of all African countries and its peoples. In time past, Nigeria’s foreign policy was robust and the country was respected around the world as it put the interest of Africa first in world affairs. If America has earned the sobriquet, “Uncle Sam” on account of her leadership role in world politics, Nigeria’s was “big brother Africa” on account of her penchant for putting Africa first. For Nigeria, charity seemed to begin abroad. Nigeria’s role at the United Nations, especially in peace keeping efforts in Africa and around the world is well acknowledged.
In Nigeria, all nationalities (black and white) are well at home and thriving in several ways. Take for example, the case of Nigerien immigrants in Lagos who freely go about their business soliciting alms from Nigerians who freely give as well. Nigeria committed men and resources well worth over 50 million dollars to fight apartheid in South Africa until that evil system crumbled in 1994 with that rainbow nation’s first multi racial elections ushering in democracy and Nelson Mandela as President of the country. Nigeria was the moving force that secured peace in Liberia and Sierra Leone, committing monumental resources to both struggles. Nigeria’s effort and achievement in peace winning and peace keeping across the globe is no mean feat. Compare these two instances with the complete mess Belgium, France and the UN made of Rwanda in 1994.
I have recounted these instances in light of the recent revelation that the killers of the reggae music maestro and icon, Lucky Dube mistook him for a Nigerian. If he were, why will they kill any one because he is Nigerian? South Africa did not dismantle apartheid only to replace it with Xenophobia which has come to the fore in recent times. Will the miscreants go after an American in that manner just like that? The South African Government has a lot of explanation and apology to make to Nigeria if this is indeed true. Black South Africa gained political independence and since 1994, their Government has done little to gain them economic advancement and lift the majority of the black population with poor education from poverty as all most of them ever knew was the struggle. Now crime has skyrocketed and instead of seeking answers to this and sundry social cultural issues plaguing the black majority, the ANC, in the manner of many popular parties that won independence for many of Africa’s countries is derailing on account of leadership tussle between former President Thabo Mbeki, who has left the party and his erstwhile Deputy, Jacob Zuma who has corruption charges wrapped around his neck like an albatross.
The understandable anger of the South African people should be directed towards their Government and not innocent Nigerians, many of who work and contribute to the advancement of the former apartheid enclave. I have no sympathy for the South African Government. I only feel for the family of Lucky Dube and the man himself, who was Africa’s biggest musical export. His death was particularly cruel. It is ironical that a man who preached peace, advocated non violence and the common humanity of mankind was claimed by violence in a senseless manner. Perhaps the South African government will now appreciate the enormity of the economic problem and crime in South Africa and set about combating it now it has claimed one of theirs and Africa’s best.
This Lucky Dube incident I do hope will in the coming months elicit debates among Nigeria’s many public commentators. But there is one question I want them to avert their minds to as the significance of the Lucky Dube incident which is not an isolated case must not be lost on us. They must ask themselves and Nigerians why we are hated and despised around the world despite our best efforts in the committee of nations. The other day I heard our otherwise respected information Minister talking of Re branding Nigeria. What is she re branding? Was there ever a brand? Are there no lessons for her to learn from history? What became of the last vain attempt to launder the image of Nigeria? What did they call it? “The heart of Africa campaign.”
Well if those who should know do not know what the problem is with our country, I will tell them. The problem with Nigeria is that we have mismanaged everything imaginable so badly that we do not even know how to start righting them. But it is obvious where to start if we will. Our “little brothers” do not respect us because of the kind of Leadership we have had overtime. If our leaders will run Nigeria right then there is no image to launder. The consultancy fee for these intangibles at times are mind boggling and simply unjustifiable by the results. Apart from the consequences of the misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, no one is attacking Americans. Hostility towards French men and Britons inside Europe is virtually unheard of. These people put their people first and their leaders are committed to their welfare. Whenever and wherever they suffer wrongs, their Governments will protect and get redress for them and the rest of the world takes note. Can we say the same of our country? Nigeria with its potentials should be king in Africa and well respected across the globe. But what do we get. Nothing.
No one respects a country whose leaders willfully undermine the will of the people, plunder their common patrimony/commonwealth, deliberately bungle elections and in the most hypocritical and wicked manner imaginable turn around to ask the people to learn from Ghana. It is fast turning out that the perfidy of many Nigerian leaders and politicians know no bounds.
There is so much wrong with Nigeria and her foreign policy. In the aftermath of the war in Iraq, American companies are involved in re building Iraq; America has continued to secure the gulf because of its strategic and vast oil interests, America’s huge industrial military complex supplied the armaments in America’s war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. What strategic advantage has Nigeria ever secured from playing big brother? After 1994, we could not reap anything from our support for the freedom of South Africa and the dismantling of apartheid there. Infact apart from the fact of liberating fellow blacks from the shackles of apartheid, all our efforts in South Africa went down the drain in one fall sweep – politically and economically. In 1995, Nelson Mandela, the man who benefited most from Nigeria and Nigerian’s large heartedness mobilized the rest of the world to suspend Nigeria from the Commonwealth of Nations and thus began the pariah status from which we are yet to fully recover. Without holding brief for the Late Head of State, General Sanni Abacha, probity demands Nelson Mandela should have been more circumspect in canvassing for sanctions against Nigeria at least in retrospection for the big brother Nigeria has been and besides, General Sanni Abacha did not at the time approximate to the Nigerian state.
With the dismantling of apartheid and the opening of a new market vista, it was expected that Nigerian businesses will invade South Africa. What did we see instead? The South African’s actually invaded us. The biggest telecommunications company in Nigeria today is a South African company, one of the biggest banks in Nigeria is now controlled by South African’s. I am unaware of any African country today where Nigerian businesses and businessmen hold sway in strategic sectors of the economy. Liberia and Sierra Leone is now being rebuilt. Who is doing the rebuilding? What percentage of the contracts has been awarded to Nigerian businesses? Again, as with the experience of South Africa, Nigeria and Nigerian’s gain nothing for their monumental sacrifice in winning peace for our two West African neighbours. These are the things we are talking about when we say that Nigeria should rethink and overhaul its foreign policy thrust. This naiveté charitable thinking must give way to a pragmatic and self edifying foreign policy. Whatever sentiment informed the choice of Africa as the centre piece of Nigeria’s foreign policy is no longer as valid as it was in the 1970’s.
In 1975, when the late Head of State, General Ramat Murtala Mohammed made the inspiring “Africa Has Come of Age” speech at the Meeting of the Heads of Governments of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) one could see the need for Africa to bond together in light of its then recent colonial history and the unsure footedness of the newly independent states in a continually fractious world between the East communist philosophy and the West’s capitalism. If anything, the countries of Africa are now rife to take advantage of their individual identity in a continent wide political union or each African country in the absence of that, especially Nigeria must make itself and its people the centre piece of its foreign policy. It is only after the internal contradictions and problems which in Nigeria’s case has threatened to consume us has been brought to a manageable proportion that we can again stick out our neck either for a continent wide Government or for pretensions of being any one’s big brother. Who needs a big brother who cannot take care of even himself? Another way, with a big brother like Nigeria, bullies will have a field day.
It is never too late to do the right thing though as Martin Luther King Jr. reminded Americans in 1963, One Hundred years after Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation freeing slaves, that though the negro remained in bondage everywhere, the time was propitious to start the process of the final emancipation of America’s black people even if it is starting One Hundred years late. Nigeria and her leaders must start doing the right thing from this moment onwards and the right thing is to refocus and retool Nigeria’s foreign policy. The welfare of Nigeria’s people should become the centre piece of her foreign policy while at the same time accommodating the best interests of the African continent but when it comes to any areas of conflict between the interest of Nigeria and that of Africa that of Nigeria should take precedence.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a partner in the Lagos law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
Nigeria has severally avowed that Africa is the centre piece of its foreign policy. Simply put, it means that Nigeria in the conduct of its foreign policy and pursuit of her international interests will seek the peace, security and well being of all African countries and its peoples. In time past, Nigeria’s foreign policy was robust and the country was respected around the world as it put the interest of Africa first in world affairs. If America has earned the sobriquet, “Uncle Sam” on account of her leadership role in world politics, Nigeria’s was “big brother Africa” on account of her penchant for putting Africa first. For Nigeria, charity seemed to begin abroad. Nigeria’s role at the United Nations, especially in peace keeping efforts in Africa and around the world is well acknowledged.
In Nigeria, all nationalities (black and white) are well at home and thriving in several ways. Take for example, the case of Nigerien immigrants in Lagos who freely go about their business soliciting alms from Nigerians who freely give as well. Nigeria committed men and resources well worth over 50 million dollars to fight apartheid in South Africa until that evil system crumbled in 1994 with that rainbow nation’s first multi racial elections ushering in democracy and Nelson Mandela as President of the country. Nigeria was the moving force that secured peace in Liberia and Sierra Leone, committing monumental resources to both struggles. Nigeria’s effort and achievement in peace winning and peace keeping across the globe is no mean feat. Compare these two instances with the complete mess Belgium, France and the UN made of Rwanda in 1994.
I have recounted these instances in light of the recent revelation that the killers of the reggae music maestro and icon, Lucky Dube mistook him for a Nigerian. If he were, why will they kill any one because he is Nigerian? South Africa did not dismantle apartheid only to replace it with Xenophobia which has come to the fore in recent times. Will the miscreants go after an American in that manner just like that? The South African Government has a lot of explanation and apology to make to Nigeria if this is indeed true. Black South Africa gained political independence and since 1994, their Government has done little to gain them economic advancement and lift the majority of the black population with poor education from poverty as all most of them ever knew was the struggle. Now crime has skyrocketed and instead of seeking answers to this and sundry social cultural issues plaguing the black majority, the ANC, in the manner of many popular parties that won independence for many of Africa’s countries is derailing on account of leadership tussle between former President Thabo Mbeki, who has left the party and his erstwhile Deputy, Jacob Zuma who has corruption charges wrapped around his neck like an albatross.
The understandable anger of the South African people should be directed towards their Government and not innocent Nigerians, many of who work and contribute to the advancement of the former apartheid enclave. I have no sympathy for the South African Government. I only feel for the family of Lucky Dube and the man himself, who was Africa’s biggest musical export. His death was particularly cruel. It is ironical that a man who preached peace, advocated non violence and the common humanity of mankind was claimed by violence in a senseless manner. Perhaps the South African government will now appreciate the enormity of the economic problem and crime in South Africa and set about combating it now it has claimed one of theirs and Africa’s best.
This Lucky Dube incident I do hope will in the coming months elicit debates among Nigeria’s many public commentators. But there is one question I want them to avert their minds to as the significance of the Lucky Dube incident which is not an isolated case must not be lost on us. They must ask themselves and Nigerians why we are hated and despised around the world despite our best efforts in the committee of nations. The other day I heard our otherwise respected information Minister talking of Re branding Nigeria. What is she re branding? Was there ever a brand? Are there no lessons for her to learn from history? What became of the last vain attempt to launder the image of Nigeria? What did they call it? “The heart of Africa campaign.”
Well if those who should know do not know what the problem is with our country, I will tell them. The problem with Nigeria is that we have mismanaged everything imaginable so badly that we do not even know how to start righting them. But it is obvious where to start if we will. Our “little brothers” do not respect us because of the kind of Leadership we have had overtime. If our leaders will run Nigeria right then there is no image to launder. The consultancy fee for these intangibles at times are mind boggling and simply unjustifiable by the results. Apart from the consequences of the misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan, no one is attacking Americans. Hostility towards French men and Britons inside Europe is virtually unheard of. These people put their people first and their leaders are committed to their welfare. Whenever and wherever they suffer wrongs, their Governments will protect and get redress for them and the rest of the world takes note. Can we say the same of our country? Nigeria with its potentials should be king in Africa and well respected across the globe. But what do we get. Nothing.
No one respects a country whose leaders willfully undermine the will of the people, plunder their common patrimony/commonwealth, deliberately bungle elections and in the most hypocritical and wicked manner imaginable turn around to ask the people to learn from Ghana. It is fast turning out that the perfidy of many Nigerian leaders and politicians know no bounds.
There is so much wrong with Nigeria and her foreign policy. In the aftermath of the war in Iraq, American companies are involved in re building Iraq; America has continued to secure the gulf because of its strategic and vast oil interests, America’s huge industrial military complex supplied the armaments in America’s war efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. What strategic advantage has Nigeria ever secured from playing big brother? After 1994, we could not reap anything from our support for the freedom of South Africa and the dismantling of apartheid there. Infact apart from the fact of liberating fellow blacks from the shackles of apartheid, all our efforts in South Africa went down the drain in one fall sweep – politically and economically. In 1995, Nelson Mandela, the man who benefited most from Nigeria and Nigerian’s large heartedness mobilized the rest of the world to suspend Nigeria from the Commonwealth of Nations and thus began the pariah status from which we are yet to fully recover. Without holding brief for the Late Head of State, General Sanni Abacha, probity demands Nelson Mandela should have been more circumspect in canvassing for sanctions against Nigeria at least in retrospection for the big brother Nigeria has been and besides, General Sanni Abacha did not at the time approximate to the Nigerian state.
With the dismantling of apartheid and the opening of a new market vista, it was expected that Nigerian businesses will invade South Africa. What did we see instead? The South African’s actually invaded us. The biggest telecommunications company in Nigeria today is a South African company, one of the biggest banks in Nigeria is now controlled by South African’s. I am unaware of any African country today where Nigerian businesses and businessmen hold sway in strategic sectors of the economy. Liberia and Sierra Leone is now being rebuilt. Who is doing the rebuilding? What percentage of the contracts has been awarded to Nigerian businesses? Again, as with the experience of South Africa, Nigeria and Nigerian’s gain nothing for their monumental sacrifice in winning peace for our two West African neighbours. These are the things we are talking about when we say that Nigeria should rethink and overhaul its foreign policy thrust. This naiveté charitable thinking must give way to a pragmatic and self edifying foreign policy. Whatever sentiment informed the choice of Africa as the centre piece of Nigeria’s foreign policy is no longer as valid as it was in the 1970’s.
In 1975, when the late Head of State, General Ramat Murtala Mohammed made the inspiring “Africa Has Come of Age” speech at the Meeting of the Heads of Governments of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) one could see the need for Africa to bond together in light of its then recent colonial history and the unsure footedness of the newly independent states in a continually fractious world between the East communist philosophy and the West’s capitalism. If anything, the countries of Africa are now rife to take advantage of their individual identity in a continent wide political union or each African country in the absence of that, especially Nigeria must make itself and its people the centre piece of its foreign policy. It is only after the internal contradictions and problems which in Nigeria’s case has threatened to consume us has been brought to a manageable proportion that we can again stick out our neck either for a continent wide Government or for pretensions of being any one’s big brother. Who needs a big brother who cannot take care of even himself? Another way, with a big brother like Nigeria, bullies will have a field day.
It is never too late to do the right thing though as Martin Luther King Jr. reminded Americans in 1963, One Hundred years after Abraham Lincoln signed the proclamation freeing slaves, that though the negro remained in bondage everywhere, the time was propitious to start the process of the final emancipation of America’s black people even if it is starting One Hundred years late. Nigeria and her leaders must start doing the right thing from this moment onwards and the right thing is to refocus and retool Nigeria’s foreign policy. The welfare of Nigeria’s people should become the centre piece of her foreign policy while at the same time accommodating the best interests of the African continent but when it comes to any areas of conflict between the interest of Nigeria and that of Africa that of Nigeria should take precedence.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a partner in the Lagos law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
Monday, October 11, 2010
CHINUA ACHEBE: TIME TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE EMERITUS NOBEL LAUREATE
CHINUA ACHEBE: TIME TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE EMERITUS NOBEL LAUREATE
What is it with the Nobel Prize in literature? Why has not Professor Chinua Achebe won the prize?
Chinua Achebe, renowned writer and author of the 1958 classic novel, Things Fall Apart, A Man of the People, Anthills of the Savannah, Arrow of God, Home and Exile and many more has sold over 20 million copies (Things Fall Apart alone has sold over 10 Million copies) and translated into several languages has won yet another prize; the 300, 000. 00 U.S Dollars Dorothy and Lillian Gish prize thus joining the esteemed list of Bob Dylan, Arthur Miller, Robert Redford and a select few who have won the prize which is one of the largest and most prestigious awards in the arts. Chinua Achebe is currently Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University in Providence, R.I, United States of America.
Achebe, whose incisive writings and critical thinking examines the impact of colonialism on African culture and politics in the pre and post colonial world has won several other awards and he won the Man Booker International Prize (2007) which recognizes a life time of work, sponsored by the Man Group and established in 2005 to complement the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize rewards one writer's overall achievement in literature and their significant influence on writers and readers worldwide. The award is therefore a recognition of the writer's body of work, rather than any one title.
Achebe's novels focus on the traditions of Igbo society, the effect of Christian influences, the clash of values during and after the colonial era and he has also written about the missed opportunities and squandering of the continent’s high hopes at independence. He has variously been described and held in high esteem by the literary world. When in 1987, he released his fifth novel, Anthills of the Savannah, about a military coup in the fictional West African nation of Kagan, the Financial Times hailed him thus, “in a powerful fusion of myth, legend and modern styles, Achebe has written a book which is wise, exciting and essential, a powerful antidote to the cynical commentators from 'overseas' who see nothing ever new out of Africa”. The magazine, West African, also wrote that the book which was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize of that year deserved to win the prize, and that Achebe was “a writer who has long deserved the recognition that has already been accorded him by his sales figures”.
In June 2007, Achebe was awarded the Man Booker International Prize. The judging panel included U.S critic Elaine Showalter who said he "illuminated the path for writers around the world seeking new words and forms for new realities and societies"; and South African writer and Nobel Laureate Nadine Gordimer who said Achebe has achieved "what one of his characters brilliantly defines as the writer’s purpose: 'a new-found utterance' for the capture of life’s complexity". Now in 2010, Achebe has been awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize “awarded to a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life” in the words of one of the creators of the trust, Lillian Gish.
According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and I copiously quote “Achebe has been called "the father of modern African writing", and many books and essays have been written about his work over the past fifty years. In 1992 he became the first living author to be represented in the Everyman’s Library collection published by Alfred A. Knopf. His 60th birthday was celebrated at the University of Nigeria by "an international Who's Who in African Literature". One observer noted: "Nothing like it had ever happened before in African literature anywhere on the continent".
Many writers of succeeding generations view his work as having paved the way for their efforts. In 1982 he was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Kent. At the ceremony, Professor Robert Gibson said that the Nigerian author "is now revered as Master by the younger generation of African writers and it is to him they regularly turn for counsel and inspiration." Even outside of Africa, his impact resonates strongly in literary circles. Novelist Margaret Atwood called him "a magical writer – one of the greatest of the twentieth century". Poet Maya Angelou lauded Things Fall Apart as a book wherein "all readers meet their brothers, sisters, parents and friends and themselves along Nigerian roads". Nelson Mandela, recalling his time as a political prisoner, once referred to Achebe as a writer "in whose company the prison walls fell down."
Of his extra-ordinary classic – Things Fall Apart, Time magazine wrote, “a novel of great power that turns the world upside down”. Time magazine also acknowledged the book as one of the best 100 English language novels written between 1923 and date. Things Fall Apart, is thus in good company, and ranks with other seminal works of our time, like Gone with the Wind, The Great Gatsby, The Sun Also Rises, The Grapes of Wrath, The Blind Assassin, To Kill a Mockingbird, Catch-22, An American Tragedy and Blood Meridian.
Achebe is the recipient of over 30 honorary degrees from universities in England, Scotland, Canada, South Africa, Nigeria and the United States, including Dartmouth College, Harvard, and Brown University. He has been awarded the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, an Honorary Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Nigerian National Order of Merit (Nigeria's highest honour for academic work), and the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. Professor Chinua Achebe, received The Medal of Honor for Literature from the National Arts Club in New York City in 2007. The Medal of Honor for Literature, one of America’s most prestigious and distinctive literature honors is given for a body of work of literary excellence. Achebe will become the 39th recipient of the medal since it was instituted in 1968. It is noteworthy, that Achebe is also the first black African and second black writer to receive this honor.
How come such a man has not received the Nobel? In 2006, when the Nobel Prize for Literature went to Turkey’s novelist Mr. Orhan Pamuk, it was widely believed that the other four (though unconfirmed) nominees were a Nigerian, an American, a Syrian and a Peruvian and if this would-have-been Nigerian laureate was Achebe as many have since then speculated we will never know until fifty years hence when in keeping with tradition, the 2006 runner-up status is made public. For me personally and I take umbrage (not without good cause though) with the academy in Stockholm, why no Nigerian has won the Nobel prize in any field of human endeavour in the intervening 24 years since Professor Wole Soyinka in 1986 beats me silly. There is nothing left for Chinua Achebe to do to deserve the recognition. Some have argued that the literary prize is too Eurocentric and they may not be far from the truth, the 2009 Nobel prize for literature as an example was awarded to Roman born German poet and novelist, Herta Muller with the Swedish academy describing Muller as a writer “who, with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, depicts the landscape of the dispossessed”. Though she is relatively unknown, she has been celebrated as one of Germany’s best writers in a long while. American’s it was reported were shocked at the choice of Muller. If American’s were shocked at the choice of Muller because no American has won the prize in a couple of years then Africans ought to be enraged. In its 110 years old history, only five Africans have won the Nobel prize for literature despite the obvious glut of iconic literary talents on the continent – Wole Soyinka of Nigeria in 1986, Naguib Mahfouz of Egypt in 1988, Nadine Gordimer of South Africa in 1991, J.M Coetzee of South Africa in 2003 and Iranian/Zimbabwean/British Doris Lessing in 2007 and more outrageous is that Chinua Achebe is much more distinguished than these writers. Achebe even bested Doris Lessing to win the Man Booker International Prize in 2007.
It is a testimony to the impeccable character of the man who has also been described with such superlatives as “the most translated writer of African heritage”; “one of the great intellectuals and ethical figures of our time”; “one of the 1, 000 makers of the 21st Century responsible for defining a modern African literature that was truly African” that when Wole Soyinka won in 1986, he joined the rest of the world in celebrating the first African Nobel laureate in literature. He lauded Wole Soyinka’s works and remarked that he was “most eminently deserving of any prize”. On this vexatious issue he told Quality Weekly in 1988; “My position is that the Nobel Prize is important. But it is a European prize. It's not an African prize. Literature is not a heavyweight championship. Nigerians may think, you know, this man has been knocked out. It's nothing to do with that”. See how this man has bore and still bear it all with equanimity and good grace uncommon in these times and age.
Achebe’s biographer Ezenwa-Ohaeto suggests a possible reason why the Stockholm academy continues to shun Achebe: Achebe once refused to attend a Conference on African literature in Stockholm, Sweden. With his characteristic humility he explained that he “consider(ed) it (in) appropriate for African writers to assemble in Europe in 1986 to discuss the future of their literature. Ezenwa-Ohaeto implies that in all likelihood the act was perceived as a snub by the Nobel committee, who assumed that this refusal was an indicator that Achebe would refuse the Prize itself if awarded.
Again, Achebe had in 1975, at the Chancellor lecture at Amherst, Massachusetts criticized Joseph Conrad, the tradition of racism in the west and pointed out that racism was the core of Conrad’s critical book “The Heart of Darkness”, asserting that the book more than any other work displays that “Western desire – one might indeed say the need – in Western psychology to set up Africa as a foil to Europe, as a place of negations at once remote and vaguely familiar, in comparison with which Europe’s own state of spiritual grace will be manifest”. To Achebe, “Heart of Darkness projects the image of Africa as “the other world,” the antithesis of Europe and therefore of civilization, a place where man’s vaunted intelligence and refinement are finally mocked by triumphant bestiality”.
Now Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” is considered in the West as one of the great works of art produced by any man and is about the best read book in the English Departments of European and American Universities. Apart from emphatically denying that this book is a great work of art, Achebe even had the “temerity” to criticize another one considered great in the West, Albert Schweitzer, a 1952 Nobel Peace Prize winner who Achebe described as an “extraordinary missionary who sacrificed brilliant careers in music and theology in Europe for a life of service to African’s” but who could not ultimately accept the equality of the African as he gleefully quotes “the African is indeed my brother but my junior brother” and he went on to build substandard hospitals appropriate to the need of junior brothers. Westerners were scandalized and many appalled that Achebe could criticize a man honoured in the West for his service to mankind and advocacy of Western liberalism. The West never forgave him and Stockholm took note.
Perceptibly, it does seem that literary reasons are no longer the sole consideration for awarding the Nobel in literature any more. Turkey’s Orhan Pamuk won in 2006 because “in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native land has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing cultures”. Austria’s Elfriede Jelenik in 2004 for revealing “the absurdity of society’s clichés and their subjugating power”. In 2010, Peruvian, Mario Vargas Llosa has won for “his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual’s resistance, revolt and defeat”. This all smacks of Political correctness. No longer will anyone win the approval of Stockholm again if he simply “in a wide cultural perspective and with poetic overtones fashions the drama of existence” without more.
Ike Okonta writing in the Thisday of October, 29, 2006 came as close to the truth as anyone who has written on the subject before when he wrote “the reading world, including the Nobel Committee, know this fact: Chinualumogu Achebe is not only the greatest writer to come out of Africa, he is also, perhaps, the one writer in the world today who, through his work, single-handedly changed the way in which one people, their history and culture are perceived by another. After the publication of Things Fall Apart in 1958, the myth of a dark Africa, peopled by savages, without history and so without a story, a myth assiduously cultivated and peddled by European explorers and mercenary soldiers of the Frederick Lugard variety, was smashed forever. The guardians of the Western literary cannon in Oxford and Stockholm and Harvard have not forgiven Chinua Achebe for this ‘heresy’. He is widely seen as an ‘uppity nigger’ who does not know his place, who does not accord white ‘Massa’ sufficient respect. Above all Achebe is considered the cultural equivalent of Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Patrice Lumumba, great African’s who made it clear from the outset that their life’s mission was to rid the continent of the armed robbers and rapists that had held her down for five centuries. It is significant that all three were removed from power by the West, and in the case of Cabral and Lumumba, murdered in cold blood by agents of Western imperialism. Had Achebe’s terrain been politics, there is no doubt in my mind that he too would have gone the way of the others, felled by a bullet fired from London or Washington. ‘Heretics’, those that challenge the status quo, are meant to burn at the stakes, after all. Is it likely that the Nobel Committee, which in truth is merely the cultural arm of a rapine project intent on gobbling up all that is non-Western, will reward Chinua Achebe for insisting so powerfully and so brilliantly in his novels, essays, and poems that Africa was not one long night of savagery before Europe came calling in the fifteenth century?”
But does Chinua Achebe really need the Nobel Prize to validate his pre eminence in African literature? As the ‘Eagle on the tallest Iroko?’ Many think not and Obi Wakama captured it in good sense when he wrote in 2002, “frankly, I think that Achebe does not need the Nobel Prize. The Nobel Prize will merely dignify itself if it is awarded to Chinua Achebe. Everyone recognizes that he is among the greatest writers living on earth today. The real significance of Achebe was captured by that announcement in London two years ago in 2000, when he, Wole Soyinka and Derek Walcott were invited to a special program. The announcement read: ‘Two Nobel Laureates and a Legend’. There is no greater honour”.
The continued disregard for Achebe by Stockolm has truly not diminished him a bit. Achebe would win the Nobel either in life or in death but unfortunately the prize is not awarded posthumously and Achebe will be 80 years in November 2010. Simply, if Achebe does not win the Nobel price anytime soon, then he will never win it. This will not diminish him in our eyes but it will sure diminish him in the eyes of the next generation of literary connoisseurs who may never have the good fortune to know and understand what we know now. But then Achebe will loom large even in death and his place in African literature will never be discountenanced. More than any other African writer I know, see how Africa remains the focus of this great man’s thoughts? In 2007 when he won the Man Booker International Prize, Achebe reacted thus: “It was 50 years ago this year that I began writing my first novel, Things Fall Apart. It is wonderful to hear that my peers have looked at the body of work I have put together in the last 50 years and judged it deserving of this important recognition. I am grateful.” In essence African literature has flourished for 50 years, critically galvanized by Achebe’s monumental work, Things Fall Apart. Three years on in 2010, he said about the Gish Prize "When I was a boy, growing up in Nigeria, becoming a novelist was a far-away dream, now it is a reality for many African writers, not just myself. The Gish Prize recognizes the long journey my fellow colleagues and I have taken, and I am proud and grateful for that." Quintessential Achebe on the difficult road less travelled he took in 1957 and the thousand African writers who will be joint heirs to the throne. Ngugi wa Thiong’o for example, another one who should be a Nobel laureate one day if Stockholm does the right thing.
So in the innermost recesses of the minds and in the heart of African’s and 20 million readers across the globe, Achebe is the unacknowledged Nobel laureate and to the Nobel Committee they have assigned the task of carrying the burden of their snub of a literary giant, more eminent than scores of men in their honours list and who in their hearts they acknowledge a legend and a Nobel laureate several times over.
All therefore hail Africa’s emeritus Nobel laureate, Professor Chinua Achebe!!!
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law Firm of Fountain Court Partners.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA
FOUNTAIN COURT PARTNERS
36B, OGUDU ROAD
OJOTA
LAGOS.
08052066172.
What is it with the Nobel Prize in literature? Why has not Professor Chinua Achebe won the prize?
Chinua Achebe, renowned writer and author of the 1958 classic novel, Things Fall Apart, A Man of the People, Anthills of the Savannah, Arrow of God, Home and Exile and many more has sold over 20 million copies (Things Fall Apart alone has sold over 10 Million copies) and translated into several languages has won yet another prize; the 300, 000. 00 U.S Dollars Dorothy and Lillian Gish prize thus joining the esteemed list of Bob Dylan, Arthur Miller, Robert Redford and a select few who have won the prize which is one of the largest and most prestigious awards in the arts. Chinua Achebe is currently Professor of Africana Studies at Brown University in Providence, R.I, United States of America.
Achebe, whose incisive writings and critical thinking examines the impact of colonialism on African culture and politics in the pre and post colonial world has won several other awards and he won the Man Booker International Prize (2007) which recognizes a life time of work, sponsored by the Man Group and established in 2005 to complement the Man Booker Prize, the Man Booker International Prize rewards one writer's overall achievement in literature and their significant influence on writers and readers worldwide. The award is therefore a recognition of the writer's body of work, rather than any one title.
Achebe's novels focus on the traditions of Igbo society, the effect of Christian influences, the clash of values during and after the colonial era and he has also written about the missed opportunities and squandering of the continent’s high hopes at independence. He has variously been described and held in high esteem by the literary world. When in 1987, he released his fifth novel, Anthills of the Savannah, about a military coup in the fictional West African nation of Kagan, the Financial Times hailed him thus, “in a powerful fusion of myth, legend and modern styles, Achebe has written a book which is wise, exciting and essential, a powerful antidote to the cynical commentators from 'overseas' who see nothing ever new out of Africa”. The magazine, West African, also wrote that the book which was a finalist for the Man Booker Prize of that year deserved to win the prize, and that Achebe was “a writer who has long deserved the recognition that has already been accorded him by his sales figures”.
In June 2007, Achebe was awarded the Man Booker International Prize. The judging panel included U.S critic Elaine Showalter who said he "illuminated the path for writers around the world seeking new words and forms for new realities and societies"; and South African writer and Nobel Laureate Nadine Gordimer who said Achebe has achieved "what one of his characters brilliantly defines as the writer’s purpose: 'a new-found utterance' for the capture of life’s complexity". Now in 2010, Achebe has been awarded The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize “awarded to a man or woman who has made an outstanding contribution to the beauty of the world and to mankind’s enjoyment and understanding of life” in the words of one of the creators of the trust, Lillian Gish.
According to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and I copiously quote “Achebe has been called "the father of modern African writing", and many books and essays have been written about his work over the past fifty years. In 1992 he became the first living author to be represented in the Everyman’s Library collection published by Alfred A. Knopf. His 60th birthday was celebrated at the University of Nigeria by "an international Who's Who in African Literature". One observer noted: "Nothing like it had ever happened before in African literature anywhere on the continent".
Many writers of succeeding generations view his work as having paved the way for their efforts. In 1982 he was awarded an honorary degree from the University of Kent. At the ceremony, Professor Robert Gibson said that the Nigerian author "is now revered as Master by the younger generation of African writers and it is to him they regularly turn for counsel and inspiration." Even outside of Africa, his impact resonates strongly in literary circles. Novelist Margaret Atwood called him "a magical writer – one of the greatest of the twentieth century". Poet Maya Angelou lauded Things Fall Apart as a book wherein "all readers meet their brothers, sisters, parents and friends and themselves along Nigerian roads". Nelson Mandela, recalling his time as a political prisoner, once referred to Achebe as a writer "in whose company the prison walls fell down."
Of his extra-ordinary classic – Things Fall Apart, Time magazine wrote, “a novel of great power that turns the world upside down”. Time magazine also acknowledged the book as one of the best 100 English language novels written between 1923 and date. Things Fall Apart, is thus in good company, and ranks with other seminal works of our time, like Gone with the Wind, The Great Gatsby, The Sun Also Rises, The Grapes of Wrath, The Blind Assassin, To Kill a Mockingbird, Catch-22, An American Tragedy and Blood Meridian.
Achebe is the recipient of over 30 honorary degrees from universities in England, Scotland, Canada, South Africa, Nigeria and the United States, including Dartmouth College, Harvard, and Brown University. He has been awarded the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, an Honorary Fellowship of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Nigerian National Order of Merit (Nigeria's highest honour for academic work), and the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade. Professor Chinua Achebe, received The Medal of Honor for Literature from the National Arts Club in New York City in 2007. The Medal of Honor for Literature, one of America’s most prestigious and distinctive literature honors is given for a body of work of literary excellence. Achebe will become the 39th recipient of the medal since it was instituted in 1968. It is noteworthy, that Achebe is also the first black African and second black writer to receive this honor.
How come such a man has not received the Nobel? In 2006, when the Nobel Prize for Literature went to Turkey’s novelist Mr. Orhan Pamuk, it was widely believed that the other four (though unconfirmed) nominees were a Nigerian, an American, a Syrian and a Peruvian and if this would-have-been Nigerian laureate was Achebe as many have since then speculated we will never know until fifty years hence when in keeping with tradition, the 2006 runner-up status is made public. For me personally and I take umbrage (not without good cause though) with the academy in Stockholm, why no Nigerian has won the Nobel prize in any field of human endeavour in the intervening 24 years since Professor Wole Soyinka in 1986 beats me silly. There is nothing left for Chinua Achebe to do to deserve the recognition. Some have argued that the literary prize is too Eurocentric and they may not be far from the truth, the 2009 Nobel prize for literature as an example was awarded to Roman born German poet and novelist, Herta Muller with the Swedish academy describing Muller as a writer “who, with the concentration of poetry and the frankness of prose, depicts the landscape of the dispossessed”. Though she is relatively unknown, she has been celebrated as one of Germany’s best writers in a long while. American’s it was reported were shocked at the choice of Muller. If American’s were shocked at the choice of Muller because no American has won the prize in a couple of years then Africans ought to be enraged. In its 110 years old history, only five Africans have won the Nobel prize for literature despite the obvious glut of iconic literary talents on the continent – Wole Soyinka of Nigeria in 1986, Naguib Mahfouz of Egypt in 1988, Nadine Gordimer of South Africa in 1991, J.M Coetzee of South Africa in 2003 and Iranian/Zimbabwean/British Doris Lessing in 2007 and more outrageous is that Chinua Achebe is much more distinguished than these writers. Achebe even bested Doris Lessing to win the Man Booker International Prize in 2007.
It is a testimony to the impeccable character of the man who has also been described with such superlatives as “the most translated writer of African heritage”; “one of the great intellectuals and ethical figures of our time”; “one of the 1, 000 makers of the 21st Century responsible for defining a modern African literature that was truly African” that when Wole Soyinka won in 1986, he joined the rest of the world in celebrating the first African Nobel laureate in literature. He lauded Wole Soyinka’s works and remarked that he was “most eminently deserving of any prize”. On this vexatious issue he told Quality Weekly in 1988; “My position is that the Nobel Prize is important. But it is a European prize. It's not an African prize. Literature is not a heavyweight championship. Nigerians may think, you know, this man has been knocked out. It's nothing to do with that”. See how this man has bore and still bear it all with equanimity and good grace uncommon in these times and age.
Achebe’s biographer Ezenwa-Ohaeto suggests a possible reason why the Stockholm academy continues to shun Achebe: Achebe once refused to attend a Conference on African literature in Stockholm, Sweden. With his characteristic humility he explained that he “consider(ed) it (in) appropriate for African writers to assemble in Europe in 1986 to discuss the future of their literature. Ezenwa-Ohaeto implies that in all likelihood the act was perceived as a snub by the Nobel committee, who assumed that this refusal was an indicator that Achebe would refuse the Prize itself if awarded.
Again, Achebe had in 1975, at the Chancellor lecture at Amherst, Massachusetts criticized Joseph Conrad, the tradition of racism in the west and pointed out that racism was the core of Conrad’s critical book “The Heart of Darkness”, asserting that the book more than any other work displays that “Western desire – one might indeed say the need – in Western psychology to set up Africa as a foil to Europe, as a place of negations at once remote and vaguely familiar, in comparison with which Europe’s own state of spiritual grace will be manifest”. To Achebe, “Heart of Darkness projects the image of Africa as “the other world,” the antithesis of Europe and therefore of civilization, a place where man’s vaunted intelligence and refinement are finally mocked by triumphant bestiality”.
Now Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness” is considered in the West as one of the great works of art produced by any man and is about the best read book in the English Departments of European and American Universities. Apart from emphatically denying that this book is a great work of art, Achebe even had the “temerity” to criticize another one considered great in the West, Albert Schweitzer, a 1952 Nobel Peace Prize winner who Achebe described as an “extraordinary missionary who sacrificed brilliant careers in music and theology in Europe for a life of service to African’s” but who could not ultimately accept the equality of the African as he gleefully quotes “the African is indeed my brother but my junior brother” and he went on to build substandard hospitals appropriate to the need of junior brothers. Westerners were scandalized and many appalled that Achebe could criticize a man honoured in the West for his service to mankind and advocacy of Western liberalism. The West never forgave him and Stockholm took note.
Perceptibly, it does seem that literary reasons are no longer the sole consideration for awarding the Nobel in literature any more. Turkey’s Orhan Pamuk won in 2006 because “in the quest for the melancholic soul of his native land has discovered new symbols for the clash and interlacing cultures”. Austria’s Elfriede Jelenik in 2004 for revealing “the absurdity of society’s clichés and their subjugating power”. In 2010, Peruvian, Mario Vargas Llosa has won for “his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual’s resistance, revolt and defeat”. This all smacks of Political correctness. No longer will anyone win the approval of Stockholm again if he simply “in a wide cultural perspective and with poetic overtones fashions the drama of existence” without more.
Ike Okonta writing in the Thisday of October, 29, 2006 came as close to the truth as anyone who has written on the subject before when he wrote “the reading world, including the Nobel Committee, know this fact: Chinualumogu Achebe is not only the greatest writer to come out of Africa, he is also, perhaps, the one writer in the world today who, through his work, single-handedly changed the way in which one people, their history and culture are perceived by another. After the publication of Things Fall Apart in 1958, the myth of a dark Africa, peopled by savages, without history and so without a story, a myth assiduously cultivated and peddled by European explorers and mercenary soldiers of the Frederick Lugard variety, was smashed forever. The guardians of the Western literary cannon in Oxford and Stockholm and Harvard have not forgiven Chinua Achebe for this ‘heresy’. He is widely seen as an ‘uppity nigger’ who does not know his place, who does not accord white ‘Massa’ sufficient respect. Above all Achebe is considered the cultural equivalent of Kwame Nkrumah, Amilcar Cabral and Patrice Lumumba, great African’s who made it clear from the outset that their life’s mission was to rid the continent of the armed robbers and rapists that had held her down for five centuries. It is significant that all three were removed from power by the West, and in the case of Cabral and Lumumba, murdered in cold blood by agents of Western imperialism. Had Achebe’s terrain been politics, there is no doubt in my mind that he too would have gone the way of the others, felled by a bullet fired from London or Washington. ‘Heretics’, those that challenge the status quo, are meant to burn at the stakes, after all. Is it likely that the Nobel Committee, which in truth is merely the cultural arm of a rapine project intent on gobbling up all that is non-Western, will reward Chinua Achebe for insisting so powerfully and so brilliantly in his novels, essays, and poems that Africa was not one long night of savagery before Europe came calling in the fifteenth century?”
But does Chinua Achebe really need the Nobel Prize to validate his pre eminence in African literature? As the ‘Eagle on the tallest Iroko?’ Many think not and Obi Wakama captured it in good sense when he wrote in 2002, “frankly, I think that Achebe does not need the Nobel Prize. The Nobel Prize will merely dignify itself if it is awarded to Chinua Achebe. Everyone recognizes that he is among the greatest writers living on earth today. The real significance of Achebe was captured by that announcement in London two years ago in 2000, when he, Wole Soyinka and Derek Walcott were invited to a special program. The announcement read: ‘Two Nobel Laureates and a Legend’. There is no greater honour”.
The continued disregard for Achebe by Stockolm has truly not diminished him a bit. Achebe would win the Nobel either in life or in death but unfortunately the prize is not awarded posthumously and Achebe will be 80 years in November 2010. Simply, if Achebe does not win the Nobel price anytime soon, then he will never win it. This will not diminish him in our eyes but it will sure diminish him in the eyes of the next generation of literary connoisseurs who may never have the good fortune to know and understand what we know now. But then Achebe will loom large even in death and his place in African literature will never be discountenanced. More than any other African writer I know, see how Africa remains the focus of this great man’s thoughts? In 2007 when he won the Man Booker International Prize, Achebe reacted thus: “It was 50 years ago this year that I began writing my first novel, Things Fall Apart. It is wonderful to hear that my peers have looked at the body of work I have put together in the last 50 years and judged it deserving of this important recognition. I am grateful.” In essence African literature has flourished for 50 years, critically galvanized by Achebe’s monumental work, Things Fall Apart. Three years on in 2010, he said about the Gish Prize "When I was a boy, growing up in Nigeria, becoming a novelist was a far-away dream, now it is a reality for many African writers, not just myself. The Gish Prize recognizes the long journey my fellow colleagues and I have taken, and I am proud and grateful for that." Quintessential Achebe on the difficult road less travelled he took in 1957 and the thousand African writers who will be joint heirs to the throne. Ngugi wa Thiong’o for example, another one who should be a Nobel laureate one day if Stockholm does the right thing.
So in the innermost recesses of the minds and in the heart of African’s and 20 million readers across the globe, Achebe is the unacknowledged Nobel laureate and to the Nobel Committee they have assigned the task of carrying the burden of their snub of a literary giant, more eminent than scores of men in their honours list and who in their hearts they acknowledge a legend and a Nobel laureate several times over.
All therefore hail Africa’s emeritus Nobel laureate, Professor Chinua Achebe!!!
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law Firm of Fountain Court Partners.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA
FOUNTAIN COURT PARTNERS
36B, OGUDU ROAD
OJOTA
LAGOS.
08052066172.
Friday, September 24, 2010
2011 GUBERNATORIAL ELECTIONS: IMPERATIVE FOR THE UNITY OF EBIRA PEOPLE
This brilliant piece on the need for unity, equity and fair play in the Governance of Kogi State was contributed by Mr. Omoiza Balogun, an Igarra man and consummate media practitioner who lives in Abuja and is passionate about the good of this country.
2011 GUBERNATORIAL ELECTIONS: IMPERATIVE FOR THE UNITY OF EBIRA PEOPLE
Query: are the Igalas preventing other tribes from clinching the number one seat in the State? This will be the central focus of this write up with a pointer at the Ebira people.
Created on the 27th of August 1991, Kogi State is undoubtedly one of the most heterogeneous states in the country. The State is mostly dominated by the Okuns (Yorubas) of the Western Senatorial District, the Ebiras of the Central Senatorial District and the Igalas of the Eastern Senatorial District. The State is also home to other tribes like the Bassa Komos, Bassa Nges, Kakandas, Kupas, Ogori-Magongos, Nupes, Oworos, Gwaris etc. Added to these differences, the State is blessed with a large deposit of human and natural resources; that if well harnessed the over dependence on oil will be a thing of the past as internally generated revenue is sure to rise to hitherto unimaginable levels.
At the national level people from the state have also distinguished themselves as a force worth reckoning with. The State has produced top politicians, academicians, businessmen/women, captains of industry, armed services top brass who have contributed in no small measure to the development of the present democratic dispensation in the country. However in recent times the State has witnessed a lot of distrust in its polity that was further projected by the recent visit to the state of President Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan to commission some projects executed under the present administration of Alhaji Ibrahim Idris. Prior to the visit, those in opposition (both within and outside the ruling party) rose to condemn the State Governor for not carrying them along in the running of the State affairs. They complained of deep and chronic marginalization by the Igalas (note that the Governor and his predecessor in office are both of Igala extraction) who always seem to be in charge of running the affairs of the state since the State was created in 1991.
This complaint may not be unconnected with the alleged Igala boast that in the event no one is left in Igalaland to lead the state, they (the Igalas) will make their dog Governor; rather than allow any other tribe especially the Ebiras to control the sharing formula of the states goodie-goodie. Thus, as the sound of the drums of political participation begin to emit again from all angles, those conversant with power-play fear that the Igalas might again be plotting to continue their hold on the ticket, thus the widespread call that they (the Igalas) should fictionalize the alleged boast by allowing other tribes to occupy the number one seat in the state.
The Ebira people are undoubtedly one of the dominant tribes in the state, thus if number alone is the determining factor in winning elections, then the Ebiras have nothing to worry about. What the Ebiras need right now is unity which will either make or mar any candidate from Ebiraland that is interested in occupying the number one position in the state. The Ebiras should first put their house in order before they slug it out with any other contestant from the other districts. It is no longer a secret that the disunity among the Ebira people has cost them this precious opportunity in the past. Now the march is on again, observers like me anticipate that the Ebiras will unite as one and support a candidate who has the interest of the Ebiras at heart. Ordinarily it should be a thing of joy that a fellow tribesman is seating at the helm of affairs especially the exulted position of a Sate Governor, but the bad blood politics amongst the Ebira people will not allow this and it is very disheartening to say the least.
The disunity among the Ebira people is an age long thing and it has not in any way brought about any development; rather violent clashes has characterized almost every socio-political gathering of the Ebira people. This disunity is usually fuelled by works of local artists and musicians who are supposed to use their music to point out social decadence and call for measures that will attract development to Ebiraland. They have in time past used the power of their music to further fuel the disunity among the Ebira people.
However, recent trends show that the younger artists have found a new voice and instead of being subjective in their works; they have chosen to use the power of their lyrics to reach out to the Ebira people. So the Igalas are not in any way preventing anybody, especially the Ebiras from producing the state Governor rather it is the Ebiras who are the architect of their own problems.
The dog-eat-dog politics of the Ebira people is a sad story to tell. During the 2007 gubernatorial elections for instance, the whole Ebiraland was turned into an orgy of senseless violence as a result of the two prominent contestants who also happen to be brothers, Prince Abubakar Audu of the ANPP and Alhaji Ibrahim Idris of the PDP who are both Igalas. Lives and properties worth millions of naira were lost in Okeneland the capital of Ebiraland. While in places like Idah the story was different, there they witnessed relative peace with little or no clash in the whole Igalaland. So tell me what manner of brother will rather fight/kill his own brother for the interest of an outsider?
Just as the clamour for zoning or power shift at the national level has been vehemently introduced into the nation’s political vocabulary, so also is the trend fast creeping into other levels of Government as well as political representation. But the question will remain thus: is zoning the issue or is good, tested and trusted leadership the ‘koko’? This should be the central focus of the Ebira people. Since the Ebiras have also joined in clamouring for zoning, well-meaning Ebiras should as a matter of urgency rise up to the task of unifying the hitherto different factions in Ebiraland as well as the PDP in the State. Thus, using the opportunity to reach out to other stakeholders from other tribes, so as to gather support for an Ebira candidate to emerge as the next Governor of Kogi State come 2011. For now the support seems to be favouring the PDP especially with the recent developmental efforts of the State Governor.
The sitting deputy Governor, Mr. Philip Salawu, an Ebira man has indicated interest to run and in most quarters he has been fingered as a favorite to win the PDP’s ticket. That he is the sitting deputy is no reason why he seems to be commanding so much favour, Mr. Salawu has displayed loyalty and good leadership potentials and he has being a good follower; he stood by the governor through thick and thin. Therefore it is only reasonable for the Governor to in-turn give his deputy this much needed support especially for power to shift to other parts of the State for the first time since its creation. The Governor is known to be an advocate of peace, a man who believes in dialogue in resolving issues; he has stated in many fora that every Kogite has equal stake in the affairs of the State. But will Salawu’s kinsmen allow him? Or would they rather give their support to another tribe just to satisfy their ego that they have hurt a man who they would see as coming from the other divide of the tribe. Only time will tell and trust that history as usual will be a keen recorder of events as they unfold.
Balogun Omoiza is a senior staff in WarHouse Communications Limited a media outfit with headquarters in Abuja. He can be reached on 08034522903.
djomeiza01@yahoo.com
BALOGUN OMOIZA
WARHOUSE COMMUNICATIONS LIMITED
SUITE 12B LANDMARK PLAZA
NO. 1, YESDERAM STREET, OFF IBB WAY, MAITAMA
ABUJA.
2011 GUBERNATORIAL ELECTIONS: IMPERATIVE FOR THE UNITY OF EBIRA PEOPLE
Query: are the Igalas preventing other tribes from clinching the number one seat in the State? This will be the central focus of this write up with a pointer at the Ebira people.
Created on the 27th of August 1991, Kogi State is undoubtedly one of the most heterogeneous states in the country. The State is mostly dominated by the Okuns (Yorubas) of the Western Senatorial District, the Ebiras of the Central Senatorial District and the Igalas of the Eastern Senatorial District. The State is also home to other tribes like the Bassa Komos, Bassa Nges, Kakandas, Kupas, Ogori-Magongos, Nupes, Oworos, Gwaris etc. Added to these differences, the State is blessed with a large deposit of human and natural resources; that if well harnessed the over dependence on oil will be a thing of the past as internally generated revenue is sure to rise to hitherto unimaginable levels.
At the national level people from the state have also distinguished themselves as a force worth reckoning with. The State has produced top politicians, academicians, businessmen/women, captains of industry, armed services top brass who have contributed in no small measure to the development of the present democratic dispensation in the country. However in recent times the State has witnessed a lot of distrust in its polity that was further projected by the recent visit to the state of President Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan to commission some projects executed under the present administration of Alhaji Ibrahim Idris. Prior to the visit, those in opposition (both within and outside the ruling party) rose to condemn the State Governor for not carrying them along in the running of the State affairs. They complained of deep and chronic marginalization by the Igalas (note that the Governor and his predecessor in office are both of Igala extraction) who always seem to be in charge of running the affairs of the state since the State was created in 1991.
This complaint may not be unconnected with the alleged Igala boast that in the event no one is left in Igalaland to lead the state, they (the Igalas) will make their dog Governor; rather than allow any other tribe especially the Ebiras to control the sharing formula of the states goodie-goodie. Thus, as the sound of the drums of political participation begin to emit again from all angles, those conversant with power-play fear that the Igalas might again be plotting to continue their hold on the ticket, thus the widespread call that they (the Igalas) should fictionalize the alleged boast by allowing other tribes to occupy the number one seat in the state.
The Ebira people are undoubtedly one of the dominant tribes in the state, thus if number alone is the determining factor in winning elections, then the Ebiras have nothing to worry about. What the Ebiras need right now is unity which will either make or mar any candidate from Ebiraland that is interested in occupying the number one position in the state. The Ebiras should first put their house in order before they slug it out with any other contestant from the other districts. It is no longer a secret that the disunity among the Ebira people has cost them this precious opportunity in the past. Now the march is on again, observers like me anticipate that the Ebiras will unite as one and support a candidate who has the interest of the Ebiras at heart. Ordinarily it should be a thing of joy that a fellow tribesman is seating at the helm of affairs especially the exulted position of a Sate Governor, but the bad blood politics amongst the Ebira people will not allow this and it is very disheartening to say the least.
The disunity among the Ebira people is an age long thing and it has not in any way brought about any development; rather violent clashes has characterized almost every socio-political gathering of the Ebira people. This disunity is usually fuelled by works of local artists and musicians who are supposed to use their music to point out social decadence and call for measures that will attract development to Ebiraland. They have in time past used the power of their music to further fuel the disunity among the Ebira people.
However, recent trends show that the younger artists have found a new voice and instead of being subjective in their works; they have chosen to use the power of their lyrics to reach out to the Ebira people. So the Igalas are not in any way preventing anybody, especially the Ebiras from producing the state Governor rather it is the Ebiras who are the architect of their own problems.
The dog-eat-dog politics of the Ebira people is a sad story to tell. During the 2007 gubernatorial elections for instance, the whole Ebiraland was turned into an orgy of senseless violence as a result of the two prominent contestants who also happen to be brothers, Prince Abubakar Audu of the ANPP and Alhaji Ibrahim Idris of the PDP who are both Igalas. Lives and properties worth millions of naira were lost in Okeneland the capital of Ebiraland. While in places like Idah the story was different, there they witnessed relative peace with little or no clash in the whole Igalaland. So tell me what manner of brother will rather fight/kill his own brother for the interest of an outsider?
Just as the clamour for zoning or power shift at the national level has been vehemently introduced into the nation’s political vocabulary, so also is the trend fast creeping into other levels of Government as well as political representation. But the question will remain thus: is zoning the issue or is good, tested and trusted leadership the ‘koko’? This should be the central focus of the Ebira people. Since the Ebiras have also joined in clamouring for zoning, well-meaning Ebiras should as a matter of urgency rise up to the task of unifying the hitherto different factions in Ebiraland as well as the PDP in the State. Thus, using the opportunity to reach out to other stakeholders from other tribes, so as to gather support for an Ebira candidate to emerge as the next Governor of Kogi State come 2011. For now the support seems to be favouring the PDP especially with the recent developmental efforts of the State Governor.
The sitting deputy Governor, Mr. Philip Salawu, an Ebira man has indicated interest to run and in most quarters he has been fingered as a favorite to win the PDP’s ticket. That he is the sitting deputy is no reason why he seems to be commanding so much favour, Mr. Salawu has displayed loyalty and good leadership potentials and he has being a good follower; he stood by the governor through thick and thin. Therefore it is only reasonable for the Governor to in-turn give his deputy this much needed support especially for power to shift to other parts of the State for the first time since its creation. The Governor is known to be an advocate of peace, a man who believes in dialogue in resolving issues; he has stated in many fora that every Kogite has equal stake in the affairs of the State. But will Salawu’s kinsmen allow him? Or would they rather give their support to another tribe just to satisfy their ego that they have hurt a man who they would see as coming from the other divide of the tribe. Only time will tell and trust that history as usual will be a keen recorder of events as they unfold.
Balogun Omoiza is a senior staff in WarHouse Communications Limited a media outfit with headquarters in Abuja. He can be reached on 08034522903.
djomeiza01@yahoo.com
BALOGUN OMOIZA
WARHOUSE COMMUNICATIONS LIMITED
SUITE 12B LANDMARK PLAZA
NO. 1, YESDERAM STREET, OFF IBB WAY, MAITAMA
ABUJA.
Wednesday, August 4, 2010
RE: HELLO, HYPHENATED - LAWYERS
RE: HELLO, HYPHENATED - LAWYERS
I read with a pinch of salt a piece in the Thisday of June 1st 2010 written by erudite and respected Professor Bolaji Akinyemi where he expressed doubts over the practical utility of legal associations such as the Catholic Lawyers Association, Lagos Diocese, Association of Muslim Lawyers and an Association of Women or Female Lawyers by which I take the professor to mean the International Federation of Women Lawyers.
Professor even questioned the rationale for the existence of such associations and quizzically questioned why further sub groups of lawyers will not spring up in the circumstances. Such bodies the professor alluded to already even exist in one form or the other. I may agree with the professor that within the legal profession no alienation afflicts any sub group of lawyers if the great chasm that already exists between junior lawyers and their much prosperous seniors is not alienation enough. The glaring alienation in this regard is such that about the richest professional in this country is a lawyer and the poorest one is probably also a lawyer but the Catholic Lawyers Association professor wrote about has not complained of any alienation or marginalization though.
What then is the rationale for the existence of the association and many of its ilk. I dare suggest to the leading scholar that the starting point of this enquiry is the Constitution of the body. A perusal of the Constitution of the National Association of Catholic Lawyers (Lagos Archdiocese) shows no pretentions to protecting any primordial self interest or self preservation. Our nations generic law even guarantees every one the right to associate as they deem fit. The Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria, saddled with the moral burden of leading the church and pastoring the estimated 39 Million member strong Catholic faithful in Nigeria though statistics may be unreliable facilitated the birth of the association in 2001 and the clear commission to Catholic lawyers, leading lights in the legal profession and in society was ‘go help the poor, save the heathen and propagate your faith and the gospel of Christ in the work place’.
The relevant portion of the commission which was specifically set down in the Constitution of the Association adopted on the 11th of September, 2005 reads thus: to promote intellectual, social and spiritual interest of members; to take up the many legal and constitutional challenges facing the country and to engage in corporate actions that have substantial and positive bearings on the moral, spiritual and social development of Nigeria or any of the constituent parts as may from time to time arise or be spelt out by the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria or the Archbishop of Lagos; to place our expertise and professional experience at the disposal of Nigerians and the Catholic church on its mission of evangelization and spread of the social teachings of the Church; to promote the spiritual growth of members of the association and help them live out the gospel values, which should be reflected in their lives and work; to strive to learn from one another with humility things that are of benefit to mankind; to encourage and contribute to charity and other welfare funds for the benefit of the needy.
And further to speak with one voice through resolutions passed at our general meetings or through the National body on: the many contentious matters of law and constitutional processes and development in the country; the challenges posed to good governance and the sustenance of democratic principles for the endurance of the Nigerian state; the need to preserve lives, human dignity and oppose any form of the practice of abortion; the need for dialogue in resolving all forms of conflicts among the diverse people of Nigeria; the need to preserve and promote the freedom of expression for all Nigerians and the practice and adherence to the rule of law and due process through the courts; the need for the church to run and maintain its own schools and ensure that moral and religious teachings are given pride of place in the school curriculum; to ensure that no member of the church, clergy, religious and or the laity are ill-treated in any part of the country, and to rise up in support where such is the case; the call by the church for transparency and accountability in government and the fight against corruption in all facets of Nigerian society; on the need to strengthen the police and provide them with adequate welfare, equipment, regular training and retraining to make them effective in the discharge of their obligations and duties to the country and all citizens; to provide legal aid to prisoners and other persons in need.
So by no stretch of imagination can a people oriented association of this nature be thought unnecessary or blamed for fragmenting an already incoherent and fractious nation. Invariably, we are enhanced by these configurations.
Associations of lawyers who have further specialized in one area of the law or the other already abounds but suppose the Catholic church as an institution which abhor abortion and many of the faithful are pro-lifers seeks to enforce laws against abortion or opposes gay rights will it call on Muslim lawyers or Maritime lawyers to ventilate its grievances? Professors damn good lawyer may not even share the sentiments and ethics of the Catholic faith, how much more its core values so the hyphenated-lawyer comes damned good for the purposes of the Church.
The Catholic Church helps millions of people everyday of the week, every week of the month, and every month of the year. People who are not Catholics even. The Catholic Church is the biggest charity and NGO in the World, its Schools are the toast of local communities, and its hospitals bring quality affordable healthcare to the needy without discrimination as to religion or denomination and the Church continues to reach the heathen. According to Sam Miller, a prominent Cleveland businessman (Jewish, not Catholic), the Catholic Church educates 2.6 million students everyday, at a cost to the Church of 10 billion dollars, and a savings on the other hand to the American tax payer of 18 billion dollars. Needless to say that Catholic education at this time stands head and shoulders above every other form of education that we have in this country. And the cost is approximately 30% less.
He further wrote that the Cleveland School system boast of an average graduation rate of 36% and the burden of the other 64% who did not make it is borne by the tax payer whilst Catholic schools graduate 89% and the Catholic students go on to graduate studies at the rate of 92%, and all at a cost to the Church. To the rest of the American’s it is free, but it costs Catholics at least 30% less to educate students compared to the costs that the public education system pays out for education that cannot compare.
The Catholic Church has 230 colleges and universities in the United States alone with an enrollment of 700, 000 students. The Catholic Church has a non profit hospital system of 637 hospitals which accounts for hospital treatment of 1 out of every 5 people not just Catholics in the United States today. The Church clothes and feeds and houses the indigent 1 of 5 indigents in the United States whether Catholic, Protestant, Jew or a Moslem, at a cost to the Church of 2.3 billion dollars a year.
The Catholic Church has over One Billion adherents the world over, 64 Million members in the United States and is the largest non – governmental agency in that country. It has 20, 000 churches in the United States and every year they raise approximately 10 billion dollars to help support these agencies.
In this country, though there is a criminal and dire dearth of statistics, empirically Catholic schools abound that have contributed immensely and still are doing so to the cause of development and nation building – St. Gregory College, Ikoyi, Christ the King College, Ijebu Ode and Onitsha, Queen of the Rosary Secondary School, Gboko, Onitsha, Nsukka and Abuja, Loyola Jesuit College, Abuja, Loyola College, Ibadan, St. Patrick College, Asaba and Ibadan, St. Theresa’s Catholic Secondary School, Ibadan, St. Francis Secondary School, Idimu and Oshogbo, Mary Mount College, Agbor, College of Immaculate Conception, Enugu and Catholic Institute of West Africa, Port Harcourt are several outstanding ones amongst many that readily come to mind.
The mosaic painted above is a prototype of what the Church does all over the World. The good deeds and works of charity the Church carries on in Nigeria today are clearly evident. Who will help promote and sustain these good deeds if there are no professionals and bodies who believe in the cause of the Church and the good the Church does in Society? Not only lawyers but a professional body of all Catholic faithfuls in all fields of endeavour who subscribe to, believe in and live for the cause of the Church. Now who will go for the Catholic Church? Professor well knows the Nigerian Bar Association will not. The Maritime Lawyers Association, The Pension Lawyers Association of Nigeria or any professional body for that matter as qua professional body gives no hoot about the cause of the Church. So the hyphenated-lawyer still comes damned good for the cause of the Church.
Most professional bodies not organized on the basis of ethnicity are already trans-cultural and well suited to nation building. American’s make associations out of everything – many thriving associations in America grew out of birthday parties, christening ceremonies, dinners, sports meets and from every conceivable activity where humans interact and it has not bred any chaos and the American people are no less united. These groupings promote specific causes and their societies and local communities are the better for it. The challenge if there is any is to address our minds to how to harness the energy and the good in all these associations for the common good, the good of society. If the Catholic Lawyers Association makes one lawyer a better lawyer and Catholic, if the Muslim Lawyers Association makes one Muslim a better lawyer and Muslim, then bring it on as it can only mean the good of Society and the coherence of the Nigerian state; far better building blocks for the task of nation – building than professor cares to admit.
In a polity where everything and anything has been reduced to politics, I can understand the erudite professor’s apprehension and no one is not worried. I have canvassed elsewhere that the creation of more Local Governments will not solve the problem of our local communities; I have also written that the so called zoning of positions in our national life only entrenches mediocrity and a ploy for the same power mongers who have being around and about since independence in 1960 to subjugate the rest of us perpetually. That Nigeria has developed an unenviable reputation of a country where concepts are turned upside down and applied beyond recognizable logic as Professor wrote is also not in dispute but by no stretch of imagination can it be supposed that the proliferation of religious-based organizations can cause the backlash professor so canonized in his piece.
But the way forward really is already guaranteed in the constitution – the right of association and it must be protected and unfettered. Not as Professor concluded tongue in cheek though that he has no objection to the Igbobi College Old Boys Lawyers Association even after he had counseled refrain from what he called pointless escapades. All be it why not? Bring it on; even Okesa or Isare Lawyers Association, Ilesa.
By the way Professor was also once in Government.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
FOUNTAIN COURT PARTNERS
No. 36B, Ogudu Road
Ojota
Lagos.
08052066172
Kingjaja_j@yahoo.com or obaoni@yahoo.co.uk
I read with a pinch of salt a piece in the Thisday of June 1st 2010 written by erudite and respected Professor Bolaji Akinyemi where he expressed doubts over the practical utility of legal associations such as the Catholic Lawyers Association, Lagos Diocese, Association of Muslim Lawyers and an Association of Women or Female Lawyers by which I take the professor to mean the International Federation of Women Lawyers.
Professor even questioned the rationale for the existence of such associations and quizzically questioned why further sub groups of lawyers will not spring up in the circumstances. Such bodies the professor alluded to already even exist in one form or the other. I may agree with the professor that within the legal profession no alienation afflicts any sub group of lawyers if the great chasm that already exists between junior lawyers and their much prosperous seniors is not alienation enough. The glaring alienation in this regard is such that about the richest professional in this country is a lawyer and the poorest one is probably also a lawyer but the Catholic Lawyers Association professor wrote about has not complained of any alienation or marginalization though.
What then is the rationale for the existence of the association and many of its ilk. I dare suggest to the leading scholar that the starting point of this enquiry is the Constitution of the body. A perusal of the Constitution of the National Association of Catholic Lawyers (Lagos Archdiocese) shows no pretentions to protecting any primordial self interest or self preservation. Our nations generic law even guarantees every one the right to associate as they deem fit. The Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria, saddled with the moral burden of leading the church and pastoring the estimated 39 Million member strong Catholic faithful in Nigeria though statistics may be unreliable facilitated the birth of the association in 2001 and the clear commission to Catholic lawyers, leading lights in the legal profession and in society was ‘go help the poor, save the heathen and propagate your faith and the gospel of Christ in the work place’.
The relevant portion of the commission which was specifically set down in the Constitution of the Association adopted on the 11th of September, 2005 reads thus: to promote intellectual, social and spiritual interest of members; to take up the many legal and constitutional challenges facing the country and to engage in corporate actions that have substantial and positive bearings on the moral, spiritual and social development of Nigeria or any of the constituent parts as may from time to time arise or be spelt out by the Catholic Bishops Conference of Nigeria or the Archbishop of Lagos; to place our expertise and professional experience at the disposal of Nigerians and the Catholic church on its mission of evangelization and spread of the social teachings of the Church; to promote the spiritual growth of members of the association and help them live out the gospel values, which should be reflected in their lives and work; to strive to learn from one another with humility things that are of benefit to mankind; to encourage and contribute to charity and other welfare funds for the benefit of the needy.
And further to speak with one voice through resolutions passed at our general meetings or through the National body on: the many contentious matters of law and constitutional processes and development in the country; the challenges posed to good governance and the sustenance of democratic principles for the endurance of the Nigerian state; the need to preserve lives, human dignity and oppose any form of the practice of abortion; the need for dialogue in resolving all forms of conflicts among the diverse people of Nigeria; the need to preserve and promote the freedom of expression for all Nigerians and the practice and adherence to the rule of law and due process through the courts; the need for the church to run and maintain its own schools and ensure that moral and religious teachings are given pride of place in the school curriculum; to ensure that no member of the church, clergy, religious and or the laity are ill-treated in any part of the country, and to rise up in support where such is the case; the call by the church for transparency and accountability in government and the fight against corruption in all facets of Nigerian society; on the need to strengthen the police and provide them with adequate welfare, equipment, regular training and retraining to make them effective in the discharge of their obligations and duties to the country and all citizens; to provide legal aid to prisoners and other persons in need.
So by no stretch of imagination can a people oriented association of this nature be thought unnecessary or blamed for fragmenting an already incoherent and fractious nation. Invariably, we are enhanced by these configurations.
Associations of lawyers who have further specialized in one area of the law or the other already abounds but suppose the Catholic church as an institution which abhor abortion and many of the faithful are pro-lifers seeks to enforce laws against abortion or opposes gay rights will it call on Muslim lawyers or Maritime lawyers to ventilate its grievances? Professors damn good lawyer may not even share the sentiments and ethics of the Catholic faith, how much more its core values so the hyphenated-lawyer comes damned good for the purposes of the Church.
The Catholic Church helps millions of people everyday of the week, every week of the month, and every month of the year. People who are not Catholics even. The Catholic Church is the biggest charity and NGO in the World, its Schools are the toast of local communities, and its hospitals bring quality affordable healthcare to the needy without discrimination as to religion or denomination and the Church continues to reach the heathen. According to Sam Miller, a prominent Cleveland businessman (Jewish, not Catholic), the Catholic Church educates 2.6 million students everyday, at a cost to the Church of 10 billion dollars, and a savings on the other hand to the American tax payer of 18 billion dollars. Needless to say that Catholic education at this time stands head and shoulders above every other form of education that we have in this country. And the cost is approximately 30% less.
He further wrote that the Cleveland School system boast of an average graduation rate of 36% and the burden of the other 64% who did not make it is borne by the tax payer whilst Catholic schools graduate 89% and the Catholic students go on to graduate studies at the rate of 92%, and all at a cost to the Church. To the rest of the American’s it is free, but it costs Catholics at least 30% less to educate students compared to the costs that the public education system pays out for education that cannot compare.
The Catholic Church has 230 colleges and universities in the United States alone with an enrollment of 700, 000 students. The Catholic Church has a non profit hospital system of 637 hospitals which accounts for hospital treatment of 1 out of every 5 people not just Catholics in the United States today. The Church clothes and feeds and houses the indigent 1 of 5 indigents in the United States whether Catholic, Protestant, Jew or a Moslem, at a cost to the Church of 2.3 billion dollars a year.
The Catholic Church has over One Billion adherents the world over, 64 Million members in the United States and is the largest non – governmental agency in that country. It has 20, 000 churches in the United States and every year they raise approximately 10 billion dollars to help support these agencies.
In this country, though there is a criminal and dire dearth of statistics, empirically Catholic schools abound that have contributed immensely and still are doing so to the cause of development and nation building – St. Gregory College, Ikoyi, Christ the King College, Ijebu Ode and Onitsha, Queen of the Rosary Secondary School, Gboko, Onitsha, Nsukka and Abuja, Loyola Jesuit College, Abuja, Loyola College, Ibadan, St. Patrick College, Asaba and Ibadan, St. Theresa’s Catholic Secondary School, Ibadan, St. Francis Secondary School, Idimu and Oshogbo, Mary Mount College, Agbor, College of Immaculate Conception, Enugu and Catholic Institute of West Africa, Port Harcourt are several outstanding ones amongst many that readily come to mind.
The mosaic painted above is a prototype of what the Church does all over the World. The good deeds and works of charity the Church carries on in Nigeria today are clearly evident. Who will help promote and sustain these good deeds if there are no professionals and bodies who believe in the cause of the Church and the good the Church does in Society? Not only lawyers but a professional body of all Catholic faithfuls in all fields of endeavour who subscribe to, believe in and live for the cause of the Church. Now who will go for the Catholic Church? Professor well knows the Nigerian Bar Association will not. The Maritime Lawyers Association, The Pension Lawyers Association of Nigeria or any professional body for that matter as qua professional body gives no hoot about the cause of the Church. So the hyphenated-lawyer still comes damned good for the cause of the Church.
Most professional bodies not organized on the basis of ethnicity are already trans-cultural and well suited to nation building. American’s make associations out of everything – many thriving associations in America grew out of birthday parties, christening ceremonies, dinners, sports meets and from every conceivable activity where humans interact and it has not bred any chaos and the American people are no less united. These groupings promote specific causes and their societies and local communities are the better for it. The challenge if there is any is to address our minds to how to harness the energy and the good in all these associations for the common good, the good of society. If the Catholic Lawyers Association makes one lawyer a better lawyer and Catholic, if the Muslim Lawyers Association makes one Muslim a better lawyer and Muslim, then bring it on as it can only mean the good of Society and the coherence of the Nigerian state; far better building blocks for the task of nation – building than professor cares to admit.
In a polity where everything and anything has been reduced to politics, I can understand the erudite professor’s apprehension and no one is not worried. I have canvassed elsewhere that the creation of more Local Governments will not solve the problem of our local communities; I have also written that the so called zoning of positions in our national life only entrenches mediocrity and a ploy for the same power mongers who have being around and about since independence in 1960 to subjugate the rest of us perpetually. That Nigeria has developed an unenviable reputation of a country where concepts are turned upside down and applied beyond recognizable logic as Professor wrote is also not in dispute but by no stretch of imagination can it be supposed that the proliferation of religious-based organizations can cause the backlash professor so canonized in his piece.
But the way forward really is already guaranteed in the constitution – the right of association and it must be protected and unfettered. Not as Professor concluded tongue in cheek though that he has no objection to the Igbobi College Old Boys Lawyers Association even after he had counseled refrain from what he called pointless escapades. All be it why not? Bring it on; even Okesa or Isare Lawyers Association, Ilesa.
By the way Professor was also once in Government.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
FOUNTAIN COURT PARTNERS
No. 36B, Ogudu Road
Ojota
Lagos.
08052066172
Kingjaja_j@yahoo.com or obaoni@yahoo.co.uk
Friday, July 16, 2010
EDO NORTH SENATORIAL DISTRICT: THE IMPERATIVES FOR THE AKOKO - EDO PEOPLE
EDO NORTH SENATORIAL DISTRICT: THE IMPERATIVES FOR THE AKOKO - EDO PEOPLE
INTRODUCTION
POLITICS, ECONOMICS AND LAW
A great political publicist defined politics as the authoritative allocation of values and another defined it as who gets what, when and how. Yet another defined it as war without guns and the great Franklin Delano Roosevelt let it known that nothing ever happens in politics by chance or accident and that if it happens you can be sure it was programmed to be so.
From the above exposition, it should become apparent that there is something to be gained from participation in politics. If this is the case, it therefore means that whoever occupies the position of power or authority in any political system has enormous influence to peddle as he is the arrow head dispensing political favour as he wills.
Another important factor which cannot be discountenanced is the economic factor. So long as political decisions and actions affect the economic wellbeing of persons, so long will the fierce struggle for political power and sometimes domination continue.
The third important concept in the equation is the law. The law zeroes in to bring some order and set minimum rules of engagement in the struggle and competition for political and economic power even though some commentators have been circumspect and suspicious of the role law plays in society.
KARL MARX & THE ROLE OF LAW IN SOCIETY
One of the best known exponents of this skepticism is Karl Marx and his thinking runs through the entire gamut of communist philosophy. He famously defined law as a super structure upon an economic base. By this, Marx meant and sought to show how the law is a powerful tool in the hands of the bourgeois (that is the owners of capital) to perpetually put down the proletariat (that is the poor majority who are suppliers of labour) and to maintain their strangle – hold on the means of production in order to maintain the class society so they can forever keep their privileges.
Marx envisaged a time when the proletariat (labour) will overthrow the bourgeoisie (capital) in the industrial complex of developed Europe, abolishing class, establishing a society organized on a classless basis and by the dictatorship of the proletariat an eternal fair and equitable order of “from every man according to his ability and to every man according to his needs” will be established. Ironically though, it was in Russia, the European industrial back waters of the time that any semblance of communism was eventually established after the Bolsheviks outwitted the Mensheviks in what is today known as ‘Red October’ in 1917. The Great Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, the intellectual powerhouse of the revolution unfortunately died early in 1924 before intellectual Communism had opportunity to take root and his right hand man, Leon Trotsky was driven into exile and subsequently assassinated in Mexico by a Soviet state agent. The coast was clear as Joseph Stalin, one of the most powerful and murderous dictators in history unleashed a reign of terror and bloody putsches on the Russian people for over two decades.
THE FALL OF COMMUNISM AND THE RISE OF CAPITALISM
The end of the second world war and the emergence of two super powers and the consequent cold war and the arms race that ensued, the cry of oppressed people’s of the world and the internal contradictions and decay within the Soviet Empire itself eventually led to the demise of Communism and the Soviet State in 1990 when the Berlin wall fell. The Soviet Union at the height of its powers sprawled over most of Eastern Europe and with the mammoth red army behind it; it seemed that its relentless march across frontiers could not be halted. A real scepter of what Sir Winston Churchill first saw at the end of World War II and captured succinctly thus: “from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an ‘iron curtain’ has descended across the continent” stared the rest of the free world in the face.
But eventually, with Mikhail Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika adopted in the 1980s, Communism died and it is capitalism that lives on. Capitalism has endured; Communism never really took root and with the demise of the old Soviet Union in 1990 and the overthrow of communist vestiges and outposts around the world Communism as we know it at least has ceased to exist.
THOUGHTS ON NIGERIAN AND AMERICAN POLITICS
Capitalism, American style supposedly thrives best in a democratic atmosphere. Nigeria in the run up to the second republic in 1979 fashioned and adopted an American Executive type Presidency and has continued to operate such a Constitution in the present political dispensation and our economy and market is supposedly organized on the laissez faire American model Capitalism.
In Nigeria, the Executive President, State Governor, Local Council Chairman occupies a very powerful office and is a very powerful and influential person that is. Perceptibly, a Nigerian President is more powerful than the President of the United States of America. Witness the imperial Presidency of General Olusegun Obasanjo, his ‘can do and undo’ attitude, the unspeakable Constitutional breaches ho got away with. Any American President who tried what “baba Iyabo” got away with here would long be history. It will be blue murder.
Elected officials in Nigeria are very powerful; they hold the purse strings and have enormous influence to peddle. If politics is the authoritative allocation of values and if it determines who gets what, when and how, then we ought to be interested in who controls the levers of power, holds the purse strings and peddle influence in our local communities which in the peculiar circumstances of Nigeria is enormous.
Away from the urban centres, Nigeria’s local communities are desperately underdeveloped and as they say, see the poverty in some of these places and die. I have carefully avoided to say anything ever since the raging debate on the suitability of the candidates who are angling to represent my local community (Edo North Senatorial District) in the senate or otherwise but not anymore bearing in mind what I have earlier observed. I have seen all the comments for and against the candidates on the revolutionary social networking site, face book, the new fad in town and at other forums and I am hugely disappointed that no one is considering the real issues.
Yes, I mean those for and against the leading candidates. Every one seems to be fixated with the ideal when we should go the way of practicability. No one will deny that one of the corner stones of any serious polity is fairness and equity. Politics every where in the world is an expensive venture. The cost of running Governments – a democratic one at that is enormous and many have questioned the utility of such governments in poor countries.
The United States of America is a prime example of this culture. At the last campaigns that brought President Barack Obama to power for example, both candidates of the dominant parties (the GOP and the Democrats) raised tens of millions of dollars to fund the campaign and the elections. Without funds no one can come close to the Presidency of the United States. Nigeria is therefore no exception. Those who tell you otherwise are either ignorant or are outright mischievous. They should tell you there are institutions called Political Action Committees (PACs) of diverse interests who raise money to support candidates for various causes. The problem we have in this part of the world is that we usually do not have well entrenched institutions to do most of these things that are done abroad properly and legitimately. What is Lobbying for example? Money does change hands, in a legitimate manner albeit though; but in our part of the world we know it only as corruption because we have not found an ethical and acceptable way to do it within the rules with transparency. For example Donors are required to disclose to the necessary authorities how much they are donating. Candidates likewise disclose money raised and received from donors and appropriate taxes are paid on the sums. Certain donors and sums are prohibited. Some entities, e.g. Companies cannot donate to political causes unless they have PACs. This no doubt is meant to curb the corruptive influence of big businesses but just what do you have here?
During the run up to the 2003 General Elections, all manner of businesses and businessmen under the amorphous umbrella of Corporate Nigeria unabashedly raised billions of Naira for the electoral conquest of the then incumbent President, General Olusegun Obasanjo in violent disregard of Section 38 (2) of the Companies and Allied Matters Act. For clarity of purpose, the section provides under Corporate powers and capacity and I copiously quote “a company shall not have or exercise power either directly or indirectly to make a donation or gift of any of its property or funds to a political party or political association, or for any political purpose; and if any company, in breach of this subsection makes any donation or gift of its property to a political party or political association, or for any political purpose, the officers in default and any member who voted for the breach shall jointly and severally be liable to refund to the company the sum or value of the donation or gift and in addition, the company and every such officer or member shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a fine equal to the amount or value of the donation or gift”.
We did not hear that any one tried to enforce this law, the monies were not accounted for, no taxes were paid and we all have since carried on as if nothing was amiss.
Nigerian politics replete with cronyism is such that if the so called power brokers and ‘godfathers’ do not sanction a candidate, nine times out of ten, the candidate is doomed to fail. If you will call the bluff of the ‘godfathers’, you must either have other powerful backers or you have very deep pockets. Definitely it is not right, volumes have been written on this point but unfortunately that is where we are. Ignoring these variables amounts to burying our heads in the sands the proverbial way of the ostrich.
ISSUES IN EDO, EDO - NORTH AND AKOKO – EDO LGA POLITICS
Now to the real issues to which I earlier alluded in this piece.
The issues as I see them are these: No Akoko - Edo person nay Igarra has ever been senator in the history of the senatorial district and that is serious; conservatively you need at least the sum of Three Hundred Million Naira to get to the Senate unfortunately again; the hard work begins after you are elected senator; you need men of influence and power to get things done for your constituency at whatever level how much more the senate in a country where the already scarce resources are surreptitiously deployed to build personal empires and fiefdoms; the only thing constant in life is change and men do change for good or for worse; Victor Hugo wrote "a man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labour and there is an invisible labour"; no privileged class ever lets power go on a platter; it must be wrestled from their grip; Akoko - Edo is the oldest Local Government Area in Nigeria today; other local divisions in the old Midwest State are now 2 - 3 Local Government Areas.
Akoko – Edo Local Government Area was one of the original divisions created in the old Midwest State for administrative convenience in 1963. It is disheartening that all other divisions have since metamorphosed into two or three Local Government Areas, even the State has since become two, with the Deltans taking their fate in their own hands when history beckoned in 1992 and today they have the “big heart” where their dreams and aspirations in the old Bendel State find expression, while Akoko – Edo remains one.
Akoko – Edo has only undergone change once, when in 1967 the Midwest became Bendel State it was re christened Akoko – Edo Local Government Area from the earlier nomenclature (Akoko – Edo Local Division) with which it was known. Apart from this Akoko – Edo remains the only Local Government Area in the federation that has remained pristine since independence. The consequence of this is that Akoko – Edo has been much marginalized. A clear example of this marginalization is this Senatorial seat issue.
The mosaic I will paint now is a model of what has happened to the Akoko – Edo people in every facet of their existence in a State and Nation they call their own.
The senatorial district is a tripod-like structure, made up of Akoko-Edo, Etsako and Owan Local Government Areas. The Constitution has made the three components heirs to the Edo North senatorial seat. The seemingly lacklustre performance of the present senator from Edo North, Hon. Yisa Braimoh, from Owan East LGA, who is perceived more as a bench warmer, appears to have thrown the doors wide open for other interested stakeholders particularly candidates from the ruling Action Congress in the state as it does not appear on the face of it and there is nothing on the ground to suggest that Senator Yisa Braimoh of the Peoples Democratic Party can muster a second win.
Historically, the battle for the Senatorial seat has always been a straight fight between the contending forces from the three Etsako LGAs and the two Owan LGAs, leaving out the third leg of the tripod, Akoko Edo LGA from the race. The Edo North people who are also referred to as the Afenmai people comprise of Owan (2 LGAs), Akoko Edo (1 LGA) and Etsako (3 LGAs). Please note that in 1963, you only had Owan Division, Etsako Division and Akoko – Edo Division. How the Etsako people and the Owan people now have 3 and 2 LGAs respectively while Akoko - Edo remains one big entity beats one silly.
Before now, at the advent of Executive type Presidency in Nigeria, in the second republic, in the 1979 general elections to be precise, Senator John Umolu from Agenebode, now Etsako East LGA was elected the Senator to represent the district. In 1983, Senator (Mrs.) Franca Afegbua from Etsako East LGA occupied the office all be it for a short while.
During the aborted third republic; before General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida threw away the opportunity to be the Charles de Gaulle of modern Nigeria by annulling what was generally acclaimed the freest and fairest elections in Nigeria’s political history, Senator Albert Legogie from Etsako East LGA represented the Edo North people in the senate until 1993. In the days of the dark goggled General, Sanni Abacha, Senator Remi Agbowu from Owan East LGA was elected to represent the senatorial district. At the return of democratic rule in 1999, Senator Victor Oyoifo from Etsako West LGA was elected to represent the district and he served out two terms which ended in 2007, before the Owan people took their turn again in 2007. In all these Akoko – Edo which is the third leg, the third arm of the tripod if you like has been ignored with ignominy/disdain.
More compelling facts and nearer home even; On March 19, 1964 when the then Midwest State House of Assembly was inaugurated, Hon. P.K. Tabiowo, an Urhobo man was Speaker until 1966 when the Military led by Kaduna Nzeogwu struck. Hon. Benson Anthony Alegbe from Owan East was Speaker of the old Bendel State House of Assembly from 1979 to 1983. Hon. Louis Ijeoma took over and was Speaker from October to December, 1983 before the second republic administration of President Shehu Shagari was truncated and consigned to the dustbin of history by the then fiery military junta led by the draconian laws loving General Muhammadu Buhari (Rtd). In the course of the aborted third republic, Hon. Matthew Egbadon from Esan Central was Speaker from January 1992 to August 1993 and when he was removed Hon. Joe Ekpenkhio from Etsako Central was sworn in (in his stead) meanwhile Reverend Peter Obadan, also from Owan East, was Deputy Governor of Edo State at the relevant time.
In the same vein, at the return of democratic governance in 1999, Hon. Thomas Okosun another Esan man was elected Speaker in October 1999 and when he was impeached in February 2000, Hon. Matthew Egbadon in what was his second coming was elected Speaker of the House. In the year 2003, after the elections of that year, Hon. Friday Itulah from Esan North East, who is now a member of the Federal House of Representatives, was elected Speaker but after a short while, he was impeached and Hon. David Iyoha from Esan Central emerged Speaker in October, 2003. In the year 2007, Zakawanu Garuba of Etsako West Constituency was elected Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly until recently when crisis erupted in the house between the contending forces of the evenly matched Peoples Democratic Party and the Action Congress in what many saw as a fight for supremacy between the incumbent Governor elected on the platform of the Action Congress and the ‘eternal godfather’ of Edo politics and a King pin of the Peoples Democratic Party. Hon. Bright Omokhodion from Esan West Constituency, elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party but who defected to the Action Congress in the heat of the crisis has since emerged Speaker of the House though the crisis lingers.
Hmmm, how instructive, what manner of marginalization? Is it not Criminal neglect to discover that in this impressive long list of Speakers, Akoko Edo LGA with two Constituencies has never produced any? It is simply unfathomable. What has the Akoko – Edo people done to the rest of Nigeria? Though some say it is a self inflicted injury and they have questioned the quality of representatives sent to the Assembly by the Akoko – Edo people in recent years. Even at that, nothing justifies this kind of neglect. Our Comrade Governor must hear this, the elders of Edo state must hear this and we will take our legitimate case to the Federal Government and all well meaning Nigerians.
Stretching it further, George Agbazika Innih from Agenebode, Etsako East LGA was at a time the Military Governor of the old Bendel State, Admiral Mike Okhai Akhigbe (Rtd) from Fugar, Etsako Central LGA was in recent memory Chief of General Staff and effectively second in command to the then Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar (Rtd). Today, the highest ranking member of the President Jonathan Goodluck kitchen cabinet from Edo State is Chief Mike Oghiadome, the Chief of Staff to the President, who was also Deputy Governor of Edo state from 1999 to 2007; he is also from Etsako Central LGA.
The Governorship of the State? Do not even go there. How will a People who have never produced a Deputy Governor, A Speaker of the State House of Assembly and A Senator ever hope to produce the Governor of such a State. Infact other than George Agbazika Innih, who was a Military Governor, the whole of Edo North is only now producing a Governor in the person of the incumbent Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole. You can now see why it is a no go area for the Akoko – Edo people.
Twenty men have governed the State in its chequered history. Seven of these twenty men are relevant to our present discourse. Jereton Mariere, a Deltan was the first Governor at the inauguration of the old Midwest State from February 1964 to January 1966. Lt. Colonel David Ejoor, another Deltan, became Administrator of the State at the onset of Military rule in Nigeria from January 1966 to August 1967. Brigadier General Samuel Ogbemudia from Uhunmwonde LGA, who is still active in contemporary Nigerian politics succeeded him and was Military Administrator and later Governor from September 1967 to July 1975. For the Brigadier General history came full circle again when as Dr. Samuel Ogbemudia he was elected Governor of the old Bendel State from October 1983 to December 1983 in the fading moments of the ill fated second republic. Colonel George Agbazika Innih from Etsako East succeeded Ogbemudia as Military Governor from July 1975 to March 1976. At the onset of the second republic, Professor Ambrose Folorunsho Alli from Esan West was elected the first Executive Governor of the old Bendel State from October 1979 to October 1983. John E. K. Odigie Oyegun from Uhunmwonde LGA again was Governor of the new Edo State from January 1992 to November 1993. As democracy returned to our shores in 1999, Chief Lucky Igbinedion from Oredo LGA was elected Executive Governor of the State from May 1999 to May 2007. Professor Osarheimen Osunbor of the Peoples Democratic Party from Esan West yet again was purportedly elected Governor from May 2007 before his pyrrhic election victory was overturned by the Court of Appeal sitting in Benin on November 12, 2008 and in the process declared Comrade Adams Oshiomhole from Etsako West of the Action Congress validly elected as Governor of Edo State as he scored more of the lawful votes cast at the April 14 2007 Gubernatorial elections.
Again an impressive cast of former Governors of the State and yet again the Akoko – Edo’s are conspicuous by their absence.
So our cause is just. It will take sheer insensitivity and monumental wickedness for any one to say that our cause is false. All men of good will recognize that something must be done about the privations the Akoko – Edo people have suffered for so long.
Fairness and equity demands that an Akoko – Edo person must be senator now. The Etsako and Owan people have had more than their fair share of the largesse of office.
That Akoko-Edo is a complementary part of the tripod is not disputed by anyone. That we have been much maligned and marginalized is also not in issue. That as a result of this marginalization, development has eluded the LGA is crystal clear for all to see.
THE WAY FORWARD FOR THE AKOKO –EDO PEOPLE
Now to the possible solutions I now turn my attention.
On the basis of equity, justice and fair play, an Akoko - Edo person must be senator now.
If that is true then this senator with all sense of fairness and responsibility must be an Igarra person. Even in the LGA, the Igarra people have always held the short end of the stick. In recent memory, between 1999 and now, Dr. Tunde Lakoju, who incidentally is also a Commissioner in the present administration of the Comrade Governor and Colonel Tunde Akogun (Rtd) who currently represents the Akoko – Edo people in the House of Representatives have been elected to the House of Representatives. Chief Paul Kehinde Udofe was also Commissioner in the Administration of Chief Lucky Igbinedion. The Late Chief Samson Ekhabafe before his unfortunate demise was Commissioner in 1983, He was Attorney General in the administration of Chief Lucky Igbinedion, He was again Commissioner for Water Resources in the administration of Professor Oserhiemen Osunbor and was factional Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party in Edo State. My point is by now obvious. Telling you none of these men hails from Igarra and that in all that time no Igarra man has been elected or appointed to any of these posts will be merely begging the question. So our next senator must be an Igarra person.
Politics is not cheap. As earlier noted, the cost of successfully campaigning and winning elections, the cost of running democratic Governments is enormous. In the absence of proper institutions as we have in saner climes, then anyone who will run for a senatorial seat has to be well heeled or have powerful backers. Conservatively, to successfully run a senate race, you at least need Three Hundred Million Naira. Now will anyone tell me if they know any Igarra man who has three hundred million naira or is willing to spend such a mind boggling sum to get to the senate? We know those who have marginalised us and they have enormous resources. If we agree on an ideal Igarra candidate and we are to raise funds for him, does anyone sincerely believe that the Igarra people can raise fifty million naira for such a project? So left for us and those who will perpetually subjugate us, without any Igarra man of means who is personally interested we will perpetually be marginalised. These people do not care about us so we must find a way to get the senatorial slot first however imperfect. We can always return home to sort out issues of concern. Let the man who can go, go for us.
At the senate, a senator must be able to work across party lines and divide. He must be able to call on the external influence of men of power and means if he will be able to attract meaningful projects to his constituency. Tell me who will be able to do this as Igarra is today? There is visible and invisible labour and as the bible tells us that which is unseen is more important than that which we can see. Has anyone heard of the ongoing Constituency delimitation/delineation stuff? Who is making sure it is done to the advantage of the Akoko – Edo people? If we get this sorted out properly, it will solve 75% of our political problems. We should not concern ourselves with what we will eat alone. Why worry if someone gives you a job or not when with God and smart work, everything is possible. Let us concern ourselves with what will benefit all. What will outlast all. The common good.
I know and I am sure and I severally contemplate it in the innermost recesses of my heart. If Akoko – Edo always had a man of means and power who was interested enough, Akoko – Edo would not have remained a single LGA till date. Does anyone remember the circumstances that led to the creation of Etsako Central LGA and how Fugar became a Local Government headquarters? That is what you get when you have a man of means and power at the top who is interested enough.
I am pragmatic enough to see, comprehend, accept and agree that mistakes have been made in the past and on the part of all but if we continue to see the negatives, then we will miss the positives, we are saying that men cannot change. People do change and we must see what today is and stop living in the past - whatever anyone has done in the past is past. What is past is past; never go back, not for excuses and certainly not for justification. But if we insist on stoning others for their past lives, I will simply say as Christ did in his time "let he who is without sin be the first to cast a stone". The question now really is what are you doing for Akoko – Edo and Igarra today?
As I canvassed elsewhere, in whatever we say or do, we must know that we have only one place to call home, whatever heights we attain in life, we can never, ever divest ourselves from Akoko – Edo nay Igarra. Let these words of Martin Luther King Jnr. be a constant reminder of what you owe yourself, others and Igarra as an Igarra man, “every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment; life’s most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others?” And for Akoko – Edo and Igarra permit me to add if we shall come through these dark years of privation together.
And I end this treatise as I did elsewhere by asking you to call to mind the immortal words of Frantz Fanon thus, “every generation must discover its mission which it either fulfills or betrays”. We have and you have discovered yours, it is Akoko –Edo, it is Igarra, we must fulfill it.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
FOUNTAIN COURT PARTNERS
No. 36B, Ogudu Road
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08052066172Kingjaja_j@yahoo.com or obaoni@yahoo.co.uk
INTRODUCTION
POLITICS, ECONOMICS AND LAW
A great political publicist defined politics as the authoritative allocation of values and another defined it as who gets what, when and how. Yet another defined it as war without guns and the great Franklin Delano Roosevelt let it known that nothing ever happens in politics by chance or accident and that if it happens you can be sure it was programmed to be so.
From the above exposition, it should become apparent that there is something to be gained from participation in politics. If this is the case, it therefore means that whoever occupies the position of power or authority in any political system has enormous influence to peddle as he is the arrow head dispensing political favour as he wills.
Another important factor which cannot be discountenanced is the economic factor. So long as political decisions and actions affect the economic wellbeing of persons, so long will the fierce struggle for political power and sometimes domination continue.
The third important concept in the equation is the law. The law zeroes in to bring some order and set minimum rules of engagement in the struggle and competition for political and economic power even though some commentators have been circumspect and suspicious of the role law plays in society.
KARL MARX & THE ROLE OF LAW IN SOCIETY
One of the best known exponents of this skepticism is Karl Marx and his thinking runs through the entire gamut of communist philosophy. He famously defined law as a super structure upon an economic base. By this, Marx meant and sought to show how the law is a powerful tool in the hands of the bourgeois (that is the owners of capital) to perpetually put down the proletariat (that is the poor majority who are suppliers of labour) and to maintain their strangle – hold on the means of production in order to maintain the class society so they can forever keep their privileges.
Marx envisaged a time when the proletariat (labour) will overthrow the bourgeoisie (capital) in the industrial complex of developed Europe, abolishing class, establishing a society organized on a classless basis and by the dictatorship of the proletariat an eternal fair and equitable order of “from every man according to his ability and to every man according to his needs” will be established. Ironically though, it was in Russia, the European industrial back waters of the time that any semblance of communism was eventually established after the Bolsheviks outwitted the Mensheviks in what is today known as ‘Red October’ in 1917. The Great Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, the intellectual powerhouse of the revolution unfortunately died early in 1924 before intellectual Communism had opportunity to take root and his right hand man, Leon Trotsky was driven into exile and subsequently assassinated in Mexico by a Soviet state agent. The coast was clear as Joseph Stalin, one of the most powerful and murderous dictators in history unleashed a reign of terror and bloody putsches on the Russian people for over two decades.
THE FALL OF COMMUNISM AND THE RISE OF CAPITALISM
The end of the second world war and the emergence of two super powers and the consequent cold war and the arms race that ensued, the cry of oppressed people’s of the world and the internal contradictions and decay within the Soviet Empire itself eventually led to the demise of Communism and the Soviet State in 1990 when the Berlin wall fell. The Soviet Union at the height of its powers sprawled over most of Eastern Europe and with the mammoth red army behind it; it seemed that its relentless march across frontiers could not be halted. A real scepter of what Sir Winston Churchill first saw at the end of World War II and captured succinctly thus: “from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an ‘iron curtain’ has descended across the continent” stared the rest of the free world in the face.
But eventually, with Mikhail Gorbachev’s glasnost and perestroika adopted in the 1980s, Communism died and it is capitalism that lives on. Capitalism has endured; Communism never really took root and with the demise of the old Soviet Union in 1990 and the overthrow of communist vestiges and outposts around the world Communism as we know it at least has ceased to exist.
THOUGHTS ON NIGERIAN AND AMERICAN POLITICS
Capitalism, American style supposedly thrives best in a democratic atmosphere. Nigeria in the run up to the second republic in 1979 fashioned and adopted an American Executive type Presidency and has continued to operate such a Constitution in the present political dispensation and our economy and market is supposedly organized on the laissez faire American model Capitalism.
In Nigeria, the Executive President, State Governor, Local Council Chairman occupies a very powerful office and is a very powerful and influential person that is. Perceptibly, a Nigerian President is more powerful than the President of the United States of America. Witness the imperial Presidency of General Olusegun Obasanjo, his ‘can do and undo’ attitude, the unspeakable Constitutional breaches ho got away with. Any American President who tried what “baba Iyabo” got away with here would long be history. It will be blue murder.
Elected officials in Nigeria are very powerful; they hold the purse strings and have enormous influence to peddle. If politics is the authoritative allocation of values and if it determines who gets what, when and how, then we ought to be interested in who controls the levers of power, holds the purse strings and peddle influence in our local communities which in the peculiar circumstances of Nigeria is enormous.
Away from the urban centres, Nigeria’s local communities are desperately underdeveloped and as they say, see the poverty in some of these places and die. I have carefully avoided to say anything ever since the raging debate on the suitability of the candidates who are angling to represent my local community (Edo North Senatorial District) in the senate or otherwise but not anymore bearing in mind what I have earlier observed. I have seen all the comments for and against the candidates on the revolutionary social networking site, face book, the new fad in town and at other forums and I am hugely disappointed that no one is considering the real issues.
Yes, I mean those for and against the leading candidates. Every one seems to be fixated with the ideal when we should go the way of practicability. No one will deny that one of the corner stones of any serious polity is fairness and equity. Politics every where in the world is an expensive venture. The cost of running Governments – a democratic one at that is enormous and many have questioned the utility of such governments in poor countries.
The United States of America is a prime example of this culture. At the last campaigns that brought President Barack Obama to power for example, both candidates of the dominant parties (the GOP and the Democrats) raised tens of millions of dollars to fund the campaign and the elections. Without funds no one can come close to the Presidency of the United States. Nigeria is therefore no exception. Those who tell you otherwise are either ignorant or are outright mischievous. They should tell you there are institutions called Political Action Committees (PACs) of diverse interests who raise money to support candidates for various causes. The problem we have in this part of the world is that we usually do not have well entrenched institutions to do most of these things that are done abroad properly and legitimately. What is Lobbying for example? Money does change hands, in a legitimate manner albeit though; but in our part of the world we know it only as corruption because we have not found an ethical and acceptable way to do it within the rules with transparency. For example Donors are required to disclose to the necessary authorities how much they are donating. Candidates likewise disclose money raised and received from donors and appropriate taxes are paid on the sums. Certain donors and sums are prohibited. Some entities, e.g. Companies cannot donate to political causes unless they have PACs. This no doubt is meant to curb the corruptive influence of big businesses but just what do you have here?
During the run up to the 2003 General Elections, all manner of businesses and businessmen under the amorphous umbrella of Corporate Nigeria unabashedly raised billions of Naira for the electoral conquest of the then incumbent President, General Olusegun Obasanjo in violent disregard of Section 38 (2) of the Companies and Allied Matters Act. For clarity of purpose, the section provides under Corporate powers and capacity and I copiously quote “a company shall not have or exercise power either directly or indirectly to make a donation or gift of any of its property or funds to a political party or political association, or for any political purpose; and if any company, in breach of this subsection makes any donation or gift of its property to a political party or political association, or for any political purpose, the officers in default and any member who voted for the breach shall jointly and severally be liable to refund to the company the sum or value of the donation or gift and in addition, the company and every such officer or member shall be guilty of an offence and liable to a fine equal to the amount or value of the donation or gift”.
We did not hear that any one tried to enforce this law, the monies were not accounted for, no taxes were paid and we all have since carried on as if nothing was amiss.
Nigerian politics replete with cronyism is such that if the so called power brokers and ‘godfathers’ do not sanction a candidate, nine times out of ten, the candidate is doomed to fail. If you will call the bluff of the ‘godfathers’, you must either have other powerful backers or you have very deep pockets. Definitely it is not right, volumes have been written on this point but unfortunately that is where we are. Ignoring these variables amounts to burying our heads in the sands the proverbial way of the ostrich.
ISSUES IN EDO, EDO - NORTH AND AKOKO – EDO LGA POLITICS
Now to the real issues to which I earlier alluded in this piece.
The issues as I see them are these: No Akoko - Edo person nay Igarra has ever been senator in the history of the senatorial district and that is serious; conservatively you need at least the sum of Three Hundred Million Naira to get to the Senate unfortunately again; the hard work begins after you are elected senator; you need men of influence and power to get things done for your constituency at whatever level how much more the senate in a country where the already scarce resources are surreptitiously deployed to build personal empires and fiefdoms; the only thing constant in life is change and men do change for good or for worse; Victor Hugo wrote "a man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is a visible labour and there is an invisible labour"; no privileged class ever lets power go on a platter; it must be wrestled from their grip; Akoko - Edo is the oldest Local Government Area in Nigeria today; other local divisions in the old Midwest State are now 2 - 3 Local Government Areas.
Akoko – Edo Local Government Area was one of the original divisions created in the old Midwest State for administrative convenience in 1963. It is disheartening that all other divisions have since metamorphosed into two or three Local Government Areas, even the State has since become two, with the Deltans taking their fate in their own hands when history beckoned in 1992 and today they have the “big heart” where their dreams and aspirations in the old Bendel State find expression, while Akoko – Edo remains one.
Akoko – Edo has only undergone change once, when in 1967 the Midwest became Bendel State it was re christened Akoko – Edo Local Government Area from the earlier nomenclature (Akoko – Edo Local Division) with which it was known. Apart from this Akoko – Edo remains the only Local Government Area in the federation that has remained pristine since independence. The consequence of this is that Akoko – Edo has been much marginalized. A clear example of this marginalization is this Senatorial seat issue.
The mosaic I will paint now is a model of what has happened to the Akoko – Edo people in every facet of their existence in a State and Nation they call their own.
The senatorial district is a tripod-like structure, made up of Akoko-Edo, Etsako and Owan Local Government Areas. The Constitution has made the three components heirs to the Edo North senatorial seat. The seemingly lacklustre performance of the present senator from Edo North, Hon. Yisa Braimoh, from Owan East LGA, who is perceived more as a bench warmer, appears to have thrown the doors wide open for other interested stakeholders particularly candidates from the ruling Action Congress in the state as it does not appear on the face of it and there is nothing on the ground to suggest that Senator Yisa Braimoh of the Peoples Democratic Party can muster a second win.
Historically, the battle for the Senatorial seat has always been a straight fight between the contending forces from the three Etsako LGAs and the two Owan LGAs, leaving out the third leg of the tripod, Akoko Edo LGA from the race. The Edo North people who are also referred to as the Afenmai people comprise of Owan (2 LGAs), Akoko Edo (1 LGA) and Etsako (3 LGAs). Please note that in 1963, you only had Owan Division, Etsako Division and Akoko – Edo Division. How the Etsako people and the Owan people now have 3 and 2 LGAs respectively while Akoko - Edo remains one big entity beats one silly.
Before now, at the advent of Executive type Presidency in Nigeria, in the second republic, in the 1979 general elections to be precise, Senator John Umolu from Agenebode, now Etsako East LGA was elected the Senator to represent the district. In 1983, Senator (Mrs.) Franca Afegbua from Etsako East LGA occupied the office all be it for a short while.
During the aborted third republic; before General Ibrahim Badamosi Babangida threw away the opportunity to be the Charles de Gaulle of modern Nigeria by annulling what was generally acclaimed the freest and fairest elections in Nigeria’s political history, Senator Albert Legogie from Etsako East LGA represented the Edo North people in the senate until 1993. In the days of the dark goggled General, Sanni Abacha, Senator Remi Agbowu from Owan East LGA was elected to represent the senatorial district. At the return of democratic rule in 1999, Senator Victor Oyoifo from Etsako West LGA was elected to represent the district and he served out two terms which ended in 2007, before the Owan people took their turn again in 2007. In all these Akoko – Edo which is the third leg, the third arm of the tripod if you like has been ignored with ignominy/disdain.
More compelling facts and nearer home even; On March 19, 1964 when the then Midwest State House of Assembly was inaugurated, Hon. P.K. Tabiowo, an Urhobo man was Speaker until 1966 when the Military led by Kaduna Nzeogwu struck. Hon. Benson Anthony Alegbe from Owan East was Speaker of the old Bendel State House of Assembly from 1979 to 1983. Hon. Louis Ijeoma took over and was Speaker from October to December, 1983 before the second republic administration of President Shehu Shagari was truncated and consigned to the dustbin of history by the then fiery military junta led by the draconian laws loving General Muhammadu Buhari (Rtd). In the course of the aborted third republic, Hon. Matthew Egbadon from Esan Central was Speaker from January 1992 to August 1993 and when he was removed Hon. Joe Ekpenkhio from Etsako Central was sworn in (in his stead) meanwhile Reverend Peter Obadan, also from Owan East, was Deputy Governor of Edo State at the relevant time.
In the same vein, at the return of democratic governance in 1999, Hon. Thomas Okosun another Esan man was elected Speaker in October 1999 and when he was impeached in February 2000, Hon. Matthew Egbadon in what was his second coming was elected Speaker of the House. In the year 2003, after the elections of that year, Hon. Friday Itulah from Esan North East, who is now a member of the Federal House of Representatives, was elected Speaker but after a short while, he was impeached and Hon. David Iyoha from Esan Central emerged Speaker in October, 2003. In the year 2007, Zakawanu Garuba of Etsako West Constituency was elected Speaker of the Edo State House of Assembly until recently when crisis erupted in the house between the contending forces of the evenly matched Peoples Democratic Party and the Action Congress in what many saw as a fight for supremacy between the incumbent Governor elected on the platform of the Action Congress and the ‘eternal godfather’ of Edo politics and a King pin of the Peoples Democratic Party. Hon. Bright Omokhodion from Esan West Constituency, elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party but who defected to the Action Congress in the heat of the crisis has since emerged Speaker of the House though the crisis lingers.
Hmmm, how instructive, what manner of marginalization? Is it not Criminal neglect to discover that in this impressive long list of Speakers, Akoko Edo LGA with two Constituencies has never produced any? It is simply unfathomable. What has the Akoko – Edo people done to the rest of Nigeria? Though some say it is a self inflicted injury and they have questioned the quality of representatives sent to the Assembly by the Akoko – Edo people in recent years. Even at that, nothing justifies this kind of neglect. Our Comrade Governor must hear this, the elders of Edo state must hear this and we will take our legitimate case to the Federal Government and all well meaning Nigerians.
Stretching it further, George Agbazika Innih from Agenebode, Etsako East LGA was at a time the Military Governor of the old Bendel State, Admiral Mike Okhai Akhigbe (Rtd) from Fugar, Etsako Central LGA was in recent memory Chief of General Staff and effectively second in command to the then Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar (Rtd). Today, the highest ranking member of the President Jonathan Goodluck kitchen cabinet from Edo State is Chief Mike Oghiadome, the Chief of Staff to the President, who was also Deputy Governor of Edo state from 1999 to 2007; he is also from Etsako Central LGA.
The Governorship of the State? Do not even go there. How will a People who have never produced a Deputy Governor, A Speaker of the State House of Assembly and A Senator ever hope to produce the Governor of such a State. Infact other than George Agbazika Innih, who was a Military Governor, the whole of Edo North is only now producing a Governor in the person of the incumbent Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole. You can now see why it is a no go area for the Akoko – Edo people.
Twenty men have governed the State in its chequered history. Seven of these twenty men are relevant to our present discourse. Jereton Mariere, a Deltan was the first Governor at the inauguration of the old Midwest State from February 1964 to January 1966. Lt. Colonel David Ejoor, another Deltan, became Administrator of the State at the onset of Military rule in Nigeria from January 1966 to August 1967. Brigadier General Samuel Ogbemudia from Uhunmwonde LGA, who is still active in contemporary Nigerian politics succeeded him and was Military Administrator and later Governor from September 1967 to July 1975. For the Brigadier General history came full circle again when as Dr. Samuel Ogbemudia he was elected Governor of the old Bendel State from October 1983 to December 1983 in the fading moments of the ill fated second republic. Colonel George Agbazika Innih from Etsako East succeeded Ogbemudia as Military Governor from July 1975 to March 1976. At the onset of the second republic, Professor Ambrose Folorunsho Alli from Esan West was elected the first Executive Governor of the old Bendel State from October 1979 to October 1983. John E. K. Odigie Oyegun from Uhunmwonde LGA again was Governor of the new Edo State from January 1992 to November 1993. As democracy returned to our shores in 1999, Chief Lucky Igbinedion from Oredo LGA was elected Executive Governor of the State from May 1999 to May 2007. Professor Osarheimen Osunbor of the Peoples Democratic Party from Esan West yet again was purportedly elected Governor from May 2007 before his pyrrhic election victory was overturned by the Court of Appeal sitting in Benin on November 12, 2008 and in the process declared Comrade Adams Oshiomhole from Etsako West of the Action Congress validly elected as Governor of Edo State as he scored more of the lawful votes cast at the April 14 2007 Gubernatorial elections.
Again an impressive cast of former Governors of the State and yet again the Akoko – Edo’s are conspicuous by their absence.
So our cause is just. It will take sheer insensitivity and monumental wickedness for any one to say that our cause is false. All men of good will recognize that something must be done about the privations the Akoko – Edo people have suffered for so long.
Fairness and equity demands that an Akoko – Edo person must be senator now. The Etsako and Owan people have had more than their fair share of the largesse of office.
That Akoko-Edo is a complementary part of the tripod is not disputed by anyone. That we have been much maligned and marginalized is also not in issue. That as a result of this marginalization, development has eluded the LGA is crystal clear for all to see.
THE WAY FORWARD FOR THE AKOKO –EDO PEOPLE
Now to the possible solutions I now turn my attention.
On the basis of equity, justice and fair play, an Akoko - Edo person must be senator now.
If that is true then this senator with all sense of fairness and responsibility must be an Igarra person. Even in the LGA, the Igarra people have always held the short end of the stick. In recent memory, between 1999 and now, Dr. Tunde Lakoju, who incidentally is also a Commissioner in the present administration of the Comrade Governor and Colonel Tunde Akogun (Rtd) who currently represents the Akoko – Edo people in the House of Representatives have been elected to the House of Representatives. Chief Paul Kehinde Udofe was also Commissioner in the Administration of Chief Lucky Igbinedion. The Late Chief Samson Ekhabafe before his unfortunate demise was Commissioner in 1983, He was Attorney General in the administration of Chief Lucky Igbinedion, He was again Commissioner for Water Resources in the administration of Professor Oserhiemen Osunbor and was factional Chairman of the People’s Democratic Party in Edo State. My point is by now obvious. Telling you none of these men hails from Igarra and that in all that time no Igarra man has been elected or appointed to any of these posts will be merely begging the question. So our next senator must be an Igarra person.
Politics is not cheap. As earlier noted, the cost of successfully campaigning and winning elections, the cost of running democratic Governments is enormous. In the absence of proper institutions as we have in saner climes, then anyone who will run for a senatorial seat has to be well heeled or have powerful backers. Conservatively, to successfully run a senate race, you at least need Three Hundred Million Naira. Now will anyone tell me if they know any Igarra man who has three hundred million naira or is willing to spend such a mind boggling sum to get to the senate? We know those who have marginalised us and they have enormous resources. If we agree on an ideal Igarra candidate and we are to raise funds for him, does anyone sincerely believe that the Igarra people can raise fifty million naira for such a project? So left for us and those who will perpetually subjugate us, without any Igarra man of means who is personally interested we will perpetually be marginalised. These people do not care about us so we must find a way to get the senatorial slot first however imperfect. We can always return home to sort out issues of concern. Let the man who can go, go for us.
At the senate, a senator must be able to work across party lines and divide. He must be able to call on the external influence of men of power and means if he will be able to attract meaningful projects to his constituency. Tell me who will be able to do this as Igarra is today? There is visible and invisible labour and as the bible tells us that which is unseen is more important than that which we can see. Has anyone heard of the ongoing Constituency delimitation/delineation stuff? Who is making sure it is done to the advantage of the Akoko – Edo people? If we get this sorted out properly, it will solve 75% of our political problems. We should not concern ourselves with what we will eat alone. Why worry if someone gives you a job or not when with God and smart work, everything is possible. Let us concern ourselves with what will benefit all. What will outlast all. The common good.
I know and I am sure and I severally contemplate it in the innermost recesses of my heart. If Akoko – Edo always had a man of means and power who was interested enough, Akoko – Edo would not have remained a single LGA till date. Does anyone remember the circumstances that led to the creation of Etsako Central LGA and how Fugar became a Local Government headquarters? That is what you get when you have a man of means and power at the top who is interested enough.
I am pragmatic enough to see, comprehend, accept and agree that mistakes have been made in the past and on the part of all but if we continue to see the negatives, then we will miss the positives, we are saying that men cannot change. People do change and we must see what today is and stop living in the past - whatever anyone has done in the past is past. What is past is past; never go back, not for excuses and certainly not for justification. But if we insist on stoning others for their past lives, I will simply say as Christ did in his time "let he who is without sin be the first to cast a stone". The question now really is what are you doing for Akoko – Edo and Igarra today?
As I canvassed elsewhere, in whatever we say or do, we must know that we have only one place to call home, whatever heights we attain in life, we can never, ever divest ourselves from Akoko – Edo nay Igarra. Let these words of Martin Luther King Jnr. be a constant reminder of what you owe yourself, others and Igarra as an Igarra man, “every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment; life’s most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others?” And for Akoko – Edo and Igarra permit me to add if we shall come through these dark years of privation together.
And I end this treatise as I did elsewhere by asking you to call to mind the immortal words of Frantz Fanon thus, “every generation must discover its mission which it either fulfills or betrays”. We have and you have discovered yours, it is Akoko –Edo, it is Igarra, we must fulfill it.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law firm of Fountain Court Partners.
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Thursday, March 25, 2010
NIGERIA: THIS FOREIGN COACH THING
NIGERIA: THIS FOREIGN COACH THING
There is a stage you get to in life and you refuse to be deceived any longer. The world knows us and we know the world. However much we try to hide our shame we will never succeed. Our sins are as red as crimson; they will not become as white as snow because a country that seeks peace without justice is as hypocritical as a country can be. It is folly and an exercise in futility. Why will we continue to mouth vision 2020 when everything and every one who knows their onions have indicated that the vision is unattainable? What makes it more sickening is that those telling us it is achievable know it is not and are doing nothing to speed up the process of development. If there are some who still lend their ears and time to the shenanigans and deceit of these people then I am not one of them. No one will ever sell me a dummy in this country again. Does it take forever to build or repair refineries? Why on earth will any serious country be unable to add a single megawatt to its electricity needs in ten years? Yet the country has the economic pretensions of being one of the biggest 20 by 2020.
We wanted the Super Eagles of Nigeria to perform wonders at the just concluded nation’s cup in Angola. They did not and they are being vilified front, back, left, right and centre and their unfortunate coach, Amodu Shuaibu has been sacked or did they say redeployed? Nonsense. These boys do not owe us anything. A Country that has a non performing President or is even without one? A country with unaccountable Ministers? A country where Governors do nothing other than to fiddle and twiddle? A country where Lawmakers pass no bill? A country where the Attorney General is the Chief lawbreaker? A country that Citizens do nothing to make? What is anyone’s justification in condemning the boys? What has anyone of these critics done to make Nigeria? How have these critics made their own personal lives a success and a model for others to copy? Spare us this nonsense and let us get on with the job of making Nigeria.
To start with the coach thing, I think one of the chief culprits destroying Nigerian football are these clueless nitwits who call themselves football analysts on television, radio and sometimes the print media. The same analyst who told you yesterday that you do not need a foreign coach will shamelessly eat his words and vociferously call for one today. Statistics they say do not lie but in football you can use correct statistics to make anything look good or bad. For example, until his recent injury set back, only Thierry Henry (before he left for Barcelona) scored more premier league goals than Yakubu Aiyegbeni. And that in a league with the likes of Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Fernando Torres to mention a few truly class acts of the European game. Now juxtapose this with the perennial pedestrian in Nigerian colours and tell me what that tells you.
No one will argue that Thijs Libregts is a bad coach. We all know what he did with the Dutch national team. Berti Vogts, a coach that took Germany to the European Championship runner up spot in 1992 and the title in 1996 is by no stretch of imagination a bad coach. Brazilian Alberto Torres turned his back on us when we thought we had a done deal. The ‘white witch doctor’ Phillippe Troussier was not a bad coach either. He proved it at Korea/Japan 2002 with the Japanese national team. In the same vein, I dare say that the much vilified Amodu Shuaibu is not a bad coach. Festus Adegboye Onigbinde was one of the most technically astute coaches in his time. Former Green Eagles captain Christian Chukwu was not bad either. Stephen Okechukwu Keshi proved that indigenous coaches can go the whole hog. He did it with Togo and is doing it with Mali. Ex international, Samson Siasia is about the best Youth coach in the world. He did it at the Under 23 World Youth Championship in the Netherlands and at the last Olympics in Beijing, China, though he lost both final matches to Argentina.
Thijs Libregts did not suddenly become a bad coach as soon as he put pen to paper with the NFF. Berti Vogts cannot become bad as soon as he berthed on our shores. Far from it. Perhaps as Peter Drucker wrote in Corporate Governance when institutions continue to fail perhaps it is time to focus on the institutions themselves and not the men who run these institutions. What is in the Nigerian make up and constitution that suddenly turns eagles into chickens? Why do proven world beaters fail here? Bora Milutinovic is a classic example at the 1998 World cup with Nigeria. After credible spells as coach of Mexico, a team he took to the Quarter finals of the 1986 World cup in Mexico, lowly Costa Rica which he took over Four months before Italia ’90 and miraculously led them to the second round, the United States where he led the modest hosts to a narrow loss in the second round of the 1994 World cup to eventual Champions – Brazil, he led Nigeria to the Mundial in France after the unjust removal of the ‘white witch doctor’, denying him the right to lead the team to the World cup finals in his native France. After two unconvincing wins against Spain and Bulgaria, the team fell apart as they were pummeled three goals to one by Paraguay and got a hiding with Denmark drubbing the team four goals to one in a match the Eagles were widely expected to win. The team left France in tatters and Bora Milutinovic never returned to our shores.
In Nigeria, I dare suggest we modify Peter Drucker’s thesis. We do have weak institutions and focus must truly be directed at these institutions but we must also question the sanity of the men who run these institutions in this country. Or did not our FA Chairman sign a contract that allowed Berti Vogts to live in Germany and yet coach Nigeria? We hear though unconfirmed that Glenn Hoddle wanted less than half of the Kings ransom Lars Lagerback will earn in five months and yet he did not get the job. These people are clowns. How much did the FA pay Amodu for this same job? Where on earth does a coach earn N 50, 000,000.00 (Fifty Million Naira) per month? Only in Nigeria you will say. And if this is also true, what manner of FA will employ a coach because he seems familiar with the names of the national team players? How dumb can the men who run our institutions be? Should not these people realise that all the Swede needs do to get the information with which he dazzled the FA was to look up the internet even for a minute? I am so ashamed of my country men. Though not that I support looking up to the Nile to solve our football problems, it is even an insult that in the 21st Century, Nigeria will look to the land of the Pharaohs for a coach for our National team, but if part of the reason Hassan Shehata was not considered good enough for the Eagles was that he failed to qualify for the World cup with Egypt then what makes Lagerback’s failure to do same with his native Sweden more tolerable? Why did the NFF prevaricated so much in sacking Amodu if he was going to get the boot anyway? The immense opportunity the Nations cup in Angola would have afforded the new man at the helm to prepare for South Africa 2010 was therefore lost. Why does the NFF pay about the most attractive match bonuses across the globe at competitions and yet get nothing done? The players remain unmotivated usually. Why does Nigeria lose semi final matches only to win the third place match? Why has Nigeria lost so many competition finals – 1984, 1988, 1990, and 2000 to use the Nations cup as a parameter?
We still delude ourselves in football in the same manner we delude ourselves as ‘giant of Africa’ in the world committee. After Egypt with six wins now, the most successful sides in nations cup history are Ghana and Cameroun with four wins apiece. Nigeria has only won the competition on two occasions on home soil in 1980 and in Tunis in 1994. Cameroun defeated Nigeria in the 1984, 1988 and 2000 finals to win her first three titles. The 1988 and 2000 finals were particularly painful and leave a sour taste in the mouth. Nigeria had no business losing those two finals if our football administrators were any astute in the discharge of their duties. So in what stupid sense do we still consider ourselves a powerhouse in African football? Even the politics of the game in Africa passes us by. How many times has Nigeria pulled her weight at CAF? Does what we feel or think cut ice with Issa Hayatou? It took close to four decades for Enyimba FC of Aba to finally earn us a little respect in Club football when the team won the African Champions League in 2003 and repeated the feat a year later. Two wins till date. Contrast this with the many wins of two Egyptian clubs – Zamalek and Al Ahly. Even Orlando Pirates since won it for South Africa which was a pariah in world football until the 1990’s before we mustered our first win. When last was a Nigerian footballer in CAF’s top three yet a Nigerian company gleefully bankrolls the Multi million dollar awards every year. Oh how the rest of the football community must be having a jolly laughter at our expense!!!
To get back to the foreign coach thing, without questioning the desirability or otherwise of a Foreign coach for the Super Eagles, it is worthy of note however that Foreign coaches have not proven any more successful than their indigenous counterparts across the continent. Save for the 1996 Olympic Gold medal in football which we won with the Dutch understudy of Clemence Westerhof, Johannes Bonfrere, all other age grade competition medals have been won with indigenous coaches. Our female national team, the best in Africa has never been tutored by a foreign coach. The Brazilian, Otto Gloria won the nations cup for us in 1980, the ‘Dutchgerian’, Clemence Westerhof with no pedigree whatsoever when he arrived our shores in 1989 led Nigeria to glory in 1994 and to our first ever world cup but no one will deny that in 1980 things were not this bad and that you could not question the commitment of the Christian Chukwu skippered Green Eagles. But then that was before big money and European football destroyed the African game. Neither will anyone deny that the 1994 team can and has been described as the Golden team of Nigerian football and the coach then had the ears and eyes of those that mattered at Aso rock. And does anyone remember how Westerhof treated us the morning after? Abandoning Nigeria and the team in the United States after the painful loss to Italy, he elected to fly home straight to his native Netherlands even though we gave him a platform on which to build his career and pedigree.
No indigenous coach has won the nations cup with Nigeria but they have nonetheless had successful stints with the National team. Adegboye Onigbinde lost the final of the Nations cup in 1984 to a massively experienced Camerounean team led by such great players as Theophile Abega, Roger Milla, Thomas Nkono and Joseph Antoine-Bell. In the year 2002, when Amodu Shuaibu was first unjustly removed after qualifying us for the World cup and with little time to prepare, Adegboye Onigbinde again did creditably well with the team playing some good football on the way to losing narrowly to Argentina and Sweden. The team drew their last match against England. Infact I still consider that team unlucky not to qualify from the tough group and that speaks volume of the character the coach and his wards exhibited at that world cup especially considering that the Argies did not eventually qualify from that group too. Along the line, he defeated an Ireland team tutored at the time by Berti Vogts two goals to one in an international friendly preparatory to the World cup.
The much vilified Amodu Shuaibu did something great with BCC Lions of Gboko in the 1990’s winning both domestic and continental honours before joining the National team set up. In 2002 in Mali, he narrowly lost the semi finals to a Senegalese team that went all the way to the final of that year’s competition and further still to achieve fame at that year’s World cup by defeating defending Champions France and eventually reaching the Quarterfinals with Frenchman, Bruno Metsu. They had two years earlier almost eliminated Nigeria in Lagos in the Quarter final of the 2000 Nations cup until Julius Aghahowa came to the rescue. That team was tutored by Johannes Bonfrere. The same Amodu led and qualified Nigeria for the 2002 world cup but was unjustly shown the exit door after Mali, 2002 because some influential group of people in the FA did not like his face and style. The German, Berti Vogts, with a wonderful contract that will make Amodu green with envy played boring football all his days at the helm of affairs, he did not take Nigeria to any world cup and presided over a woeful nations cup performance at Ghana 2008, Nigeria’s worst outing in 26 years and he was reluctantly sacked by the FA. Now history has come full circle, Amodu has again been sacked unjustly. That is the thanks he gets for leading Nigeria to the 2010 world cup ticket against all odds. And all because he had a rough patch to the Quarter final of Angola 2010 and came unstuck against a youthful Ghanaian side just when his team was starting to play some decent football and the improvement could only have peaked from then on. And I also remember that on November 16, 1994, this man led the Super Eagles against England at Wembly Stadium where the Eagles played what for me remains their best match ever although they still were beaten by a David Platt headed goal. But hell, if you are the NFF, you do not consider these variables.
Christian Chukwu led the Super Eagles to a Bronze medal at the 2004 edition of the Nations cup losing the semi final to the hosts and eventual winners, Tunisia on penalties after extra time. Another Ex international Augustine Eguavoen again led us to the bronze medal two years later in 2006 after a narrow semi final loss to a questionable Didier Drogba lone goal and only failed to qualify for the 2006 World cup by the narrowest of margins having tied with Angola on points only for Angola to nick it on the head to head rule. It is easy to delude ourselves that Nigeria should be winning the nations cup for fun but anyone who has followed the game for a considerable length of time will tell you why these things are not necessarily as they seem. I know cynics may say as the Legendary Bob Paisley, the man who built Liverpool, England’s most successful club into the force they became in the modern game that ‘first place is everything and second place is nothing’, but it still cannot be emphatically said that foreign coaches have necessarily fared better than the indigenous ones simply because no indigenous coach has led Nigeria to first place and the coveted diadem at the Nations cup, Africa’s premier showpiece competition.
Again, I say enough of these trumped up technical astuteness of the foreign coaches. At the Nations cup final in 1994, Zambia drew first blood before Nigeria replied with a brace from Emmanuel Amunike and as the second half wore on, the Copper bullets as the team later became known led by the mercurial Kalusha Bwalya played like a team demon possessed. They threatened to overrun the Super Eagles at some point and towards the end of proceedings a fierce strike from Kalusha Bwalya cannoned off the Crossbar with the Goalkeeper well beaten. Imagine if that had gone in. All the good work by Westerhof at that competition could easily have been undone at that point. At the final whistle the relief etched on the faces of the players, the technical crew and the fans watching on television back home was obvious and there for all to see.
At the 1994 world cup in the United States, Nigeria came within two minutes of achieving the nearly impossible with the same Westerhof when the Super Eagles traded tackles with Italy in the second round. Nigeria took a first half lead ironically by another Emmanuel Amunike strike from a corner kick and defended that up until the 88th minute of that eventful encounter but just when the team should have bedded down and see out the last two minutes of the match, one of the players carelessly lost the ball in Midfield, the ball made its way upfield and found the incomparable Roberto Baggio who coolly slotted past the despairing arms of Peter Rufai. A questionable penalty in extra time when Austine Eguavoen needlessly clattered into Antonio Benarrivo was again converted by Roberto Baggio to send the Eagles out of a tournament which final they could well have reached. This was a match wherein the Eagles outplayed, outmaneuvered, outfought and outthought the feared Azzuri. A match where the legend of Austine (Jay Jay) Okocha was born. A match in which Gianfranco Zola was sent off in the 75th minute to hand the Eagles a massive advantage. Yet the Eagles lost the match. In the course of that match Westerhof took off Daniel Amokachie and brought on Mutiu Adepoju in the 35th minute and he replaced Emmanuel Amunike with Thompson Oliha in the 57th minute when we already had Sunday Oliseh and Jay Jay Okocha in midfield and just when we needed to hit the Italians on the break as they were pressing for an equalizer with a man down. Westerhof had Victor Ikpeba, Samson Siasia and Efan Ekoku on the bench. Any two of the lot would have been genius as we will keep our attacking impetus and there was no way Italy was going to come back into it. But as they say all that is history now and a moot point but I shudder to think of the unprintable things we would have heard if an indigenous coach was at the helm of affairs. So much for the technical superiority of the foreign coaches then.
In 1998, Bora Milutinovic was brought in a few months to the start of the World cup and for all we were told about his competence, only a sublime strike from Sunday Oliseh separated us and Spain in the first match. We squeezed past Bulgaria in the second but that was the end of the tournament for Nigeria. We were comprehensively beaten by Paraguay in the last group match but then we had done enough to qualify for the second round. At a time any coach that was half as good as Bora was touted to be would have warned his players to stay focused on the match against Denmark; his wards were already dreaming Brazil. All that is history now too as we well know what happened. A disastrous match for the Eagles. Four goals to one it ended in favour of the Danes. Bora left us and the world has since moved on. Something tells me and I have the nagging fear that the story of Lars Lagerback and the 2010 world cup may not be any different from that of Bora Milutinovic and the 1998 world cup.
Finally these mercenary tacticians, because that is what they really are, have nothing to lose. They come here, get a great contract, they are not monitored and whether they do well or not their perquisites of office are guaranteed (I hear they now lodge a copy of their executed contracts with the world football governing body, FIFA) and there is no sanction mechanism should they fail. In short they have the best of both worlds and when the misadventure ends we are usually left to lick our wounds until the vicious cycle repeats itself again. But what I know is this, as long as we will not run our country properly so long will we continue to suffer in the hands of those who know not how to run football.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law Firm of Fountain Court Partners.
There is a stage you get to in life and you refuse to be deceived any longer. The world knows us and we know the world. However much we try to hide our shame we will never succeed. Our sins are as red as crimson; they will not become as white as snow because a country that seeks peace without justice is as hypocritical as a country can be. It is folly and an exercise in futility. Why will we continue to mouth vision 2020 when everything and every one who knows their onions have indicated that the vision is unattainable? What makes it more sickening is that those telling us it is achievable know it is not and are doing nothing to speed up the process of development. If there are some who still lend their ears and time to the shenanigans and deceit of these people then I am not one of them. No one will ever sell me a dummy in this country again. Does it take forever to build or repair refineries? Why on earth will any serious country be unable to add a single megawatt to its electricity needs in ten years? Yet the country has the economic pretensions of being one of the biggest 20 by 2020.
We wanted the Super Eagles of Nigeria to perform wonders at the just concluded nation’s cup in Angola. They did not and they are being vilified front, back, left, right and centre and their unfortunate coach, Amodu Shuaibu has been sacked or did they say redeployed? Nonsense. These boys do not owe us anything. A Country that has a non performing President or is even without one? A country with unaccountable Ministers? A country where Governors do nothing other than to fiddle and twiddle? A country where Lawmakers pass no bill? A country where the Attorney General is the Chief lawbreaker? A country that Citizens do nothing to make? What is anyone’s justification in condemning the boys? What has anyone of these critics done to make Nigeria? How have these critics made their own personal lives a success and a model for others to copy? Spare us this nonsense and let us get on with the job of making Nigeria.
To start with the coach thing, I think one of the chief culprits destroying Nigerian football are these clueless nitwits who call themselves football analysts on television, radio and sometimes the print media. The same analyst who told you yesterday that you do not need a foreign coach will shamelessly eat his words and vociferously call for one today. Statistics they say do not lie but in football you can use correct statistics to make anything look good or bad. For example, until his recent injury set back, only Thierry Henry (before he left for Barcelona) scored more premier league goals than Yakubu Aiyegbeni. And that in a league with the likes of Wayne Rooney, Didier Drogba, Fernando Torres to mention a few truly class acts of the European game. Now juxtapose this with the perennial pedestrian in Nigerian colours and tell me what that tells you.
No one will argue that Thijs Libregts is a bad coach. We all know what he did with the Dutch national team. Berti Vogts, a coach that took Germany to the European Championship runner up spot in 1992 and the title in 1996 is by no stretch of imagination a bad coach. Brazilian Alberto Torres turned his back on us when we thought we had a done deal. The ‘white witch doctor’ Phillippe Troussier was not a bad coach either. He proved it at Korea/Japan 2002 with the Japanese national team. In the same vein, I dare say that the much vilified Amodu Shuaibu is not a bad coach. Festus Adegboye Onigbinde was one of the most technically astute coaches in his time. Former Green Eagles captain Christian Chukwu was not bad either. Stephen Okechukwu Keshi proved that indigenous coaches can go the whole hog. He did it with Togo and is doing it with Mali. Ex international, Samson Siasia is about the best Youth coach in the world. He did it at the Under 23 World Youth Championship in the Netherlands and at the last Olympics in Beijing, China, though he lost both final matches to Argentina.
Thijs Libregts did not suddenly become a bad coach as soon as he put pen to paper with the NFF. Berti Vogts cannot become bad as soon as he berthed on our shores. Far from it. Perhaps as Peter Drucker wrote in Corporate Governance when institutions continue to fail perhaps it is time to focus on the institutions themselves and not the men who run these institutions. What is in the Nigerian make up and constitution that suddenly turns eagles into chickens? Why do proven world beaters fail here? Bora Milutinovic is a classic example at the 1998 World cup with Nigeria. After credible spells as coach of Mexico, a team he took to the Quarter finals of the 1986 World cup in Mexico, lowly Costa Rica which he took over Four months before Italia ’90 and miraculously led them to the second round, the United States where he led the modest hosts to a narrow loss in the second round of the 1994 World cup to eventual Champions – Brazil, he led Nigeria to the Mundial in France after the unjust removal of the ‘white witch doctor’, denying him the right to lead the team to the World cup finals in his native France. After two unconvincing wins against Spain and Bulgaria, the team fell apart as they were pummeled three goals to one by Paraguay and got a hiding with Denmark drubbing the team four goals to one in a match the Eagles were widely expected to win. The team left France in tatters and Bora Milutinovic never returned to our shores.
In Nigeria, I dare suggest we modify Peter Drucker’s thesis. We do have weak institutions and focus must truly be directed at these institutions but we must also question the sanity of the men who run these institutions in this country. Or did not our FA Chairman sign a contract that allowed Berti Vogts to live in Germany and yet coach Nigeria? We hear though unconfirmed that Glenn Hoddle wanted less than half of the Kings ransom Lars Lagerback will earn in five months and yet he did not get the job. These people are clowns. How much did the FA pay Amodu for this same job? Where on earth does a coach earn N 50, 000,000.00 (Fifty Million Naira) per month? Only in Nigeria you will say. And if this is also true, what manner of FA will employ a coach because he seems familiar with the names of the national team players? How dumb can the men who run our institutions be? Should not these people realise that all the Swede needs do to get the information with which he dazzled the FA was to look up the internet even for a minute? I am so ashamed of my country men. Though not that I support looking up to the Nile to solve our football problems, it is even an insult that in the 21st Century, Nigeria will look to the land of the Pharaohs for a coach for our National team, but if part of the reason Hassan Shehata was not considered good enough for the Eagles was that he failed to qualify for the World cup with Egypt then what makes Lagerback’s failure to do same with his native Sweden more tolerable? Why did the NFF prevaricated so much in sacking Amodu if he was going to get the boot anyway? The immense opportunity the Nations cup in Angola would have afforded the new man at the helm to prepare for South Africa 2010 was therefore lost. Why does the NFF pay about the most attractive match bonuses across the globe at competitions and yet get nothing done? The players remain unmotivated usually. Why does Nigeria lose semi final matches only to win the third place match? Why has Nigeria lost so many competition finals – 1984, 1988, 1990, and 2000 to use the Nations cup as a parameter?
We still delude ourselves in football in the same manner we delude ourselves as ‘giant of Africa’ in the world committee. After Egypt with six wins now, the most successful sides in nations cup history are Ghana and Cameroun with four wins apiece. Nigeria has only won the competition on two occasions on home soil in 1980 and in Tunis in 1994. Cameroun defeated Nigeria in the 1984, 1988 and 2000 finals to win her first three titles. The 1988 and 2000 finals were particularly painful and leave a sour taste in the mouth. Nigeria had no business losing those two finals if our football administrators were any astute in the discharge of their duties. So in what stupid sense do we still consider ourselves a powerhouse in African football? Even the politics of the game in Africa passes us by. How many times has Nigeria pulled her weight at CAF? Does what we feel or think cut ice with Issa Hayatou? It took close to four decades for Enyimba FC of Aba to finally earn us a little respect in Club football when the team won the African Champions League in 2003 and repeated the feat a year later. Two wins till date. Contrast this with the many wins of two Egyptian clubs – Zamalek and Al Ahly. Even Orlando Pirates since won it for South Africa which was a pariah in world football until the 1990’s before we mustered our first win. When last was a Nigerian footballer in CAF’s top three yet a Nigerian company gleefully bankrolls the Multi million dollar awards every year. Oh how the rest of the football community must be having a jolly laughter at our expense!!!
To get back to the foreign coach thing, without questioning the desirability or otherwise of a Foreign coach for the Super Eagles, it is worthy of note however that Foreign coaches have not proven any more successful than their indigenous counterparts across the continent. Save for the 1996 Olympic Gold medal in football which we won with the Dutch understudy of Clemence Westerhof, Johannes Bonfrere, all other age grade competition medals have been won with indigenous coaches. Our female national team, the best in Africa has never been tutored by a foreign coach. The Brazilian, Otto Gloria won the nations cup for us in 1980, the ‘Dutchgerian’, Clemence Westerhof with no pedigree whatsoever when he arrived our shores in 1989 led Nigeria to glory in 1994 and to our first ever world cup but no one will deny that in 1980 things were not this bad and that you could not question the commitment of the Christian Chukwu skippered Green Eagles. But then that was before big money and European football destroyed the African game. Neither will anyone deny that the 1994 team can and has been described as the Golden team of Nigerian football and the coach then had the ears and eyes of those that mattered at Aso rock. And does anyone remember how Westerhof treated us the morning after? Abandoning Nigeria and the team in the United States after the painful loss to Italy, he elected to fly home straight to his native Netherlands even though we gave him a platform on which to build his career and pedigree.
No indigenous coach has won the nations cup with Nigeria but they have nonetheless had successful stints with the National team. Adegboye Onigbinde lost the final of the Nations cup in 1984 to a massively experienced Camerounean team led by such great players as Theophile Abega, Roger Milla, Thomas Nkono and Joseph Antoine-Bell. In the year 2002, when Amodu Shuaibu was first unjustly removed after qualifying us for the World cup and with little time to prepare, Adegboye Onigbinde again did creditably well with the team playing some good football on the way to losing narrowly to Argentina and Sweden. The team drew their last match against England. Infact I still consider that team unlucky not to qualify from the tough group and that speaks volume of the character the coach and his wards exhibited at that world cup especially considering that the Argies did not eventually qualify from that group too. Along the line, he defeated an Ireland team tutored at the time by Berti Vogts two goals to one in an international friendly preparatory to the World cup.
The much vilified Amodu Shuaibu did something great with BCC Lions of Gboko in the 1990’s winning both domestic and continental honours before joining the National team set up. In 2002 in Mali, he narrowly lost the semi finals to a Senegalese team that went all the way to the final of that year’s competition and further still to achieve fame at that year’s World cup by defeating defending Champions France and eventually reaching the Quarterfinals with Frenchman, Bruno Metsu. They had two years earlier almost eliminated Nigeria in Lagos in the Quarter final of the 2000 Nations cup until Julius Aghahowa came to the rescue. That team was tutored by Johannes Bonfrere. The same Amodu led and qualified Nigeria for the 2002 world cup but was unjustly shown the exit door after Mali, 2002 because some influential group of people in the FA did not like his face and style. The German, Berti Vogts, with a wonderful contract that will make Amodu green with envy played boring football all his days at the helm of affairs, he did not take Nigeria to any world cup and presided over a woeful nations cup performance at Ghana 2008, Nigeria’s worst outing in 26 years and he was reluctantly sacked by the FA. Now history has come full circle, Amodu has again been sacked unjustly. That is the thanks he gets for leading Nigeria to the 2010 world cup ticket against all odds. And all because he had a rough patch to the Quarter final of Angola 2010 and came unstuck against a youthful Ghanaian side just when his team was starting to play some decent football and the improvement could only have peaked from then on. And I also remember that on November 16, 1994, this man led the Super Eagles against England at Wembly Stadium where the Eagles played what for me remains their best match ever although they still were beaten by a David Platt headed goal. But hell, if you are the NFF, you do not consider these variables.
Christian Chukwu led the Super Eagles to a Bronze medal at the 2004 edition of the Nations cup losing the semi final to the hosts and eventual winners, Tunisia on penalties after extra time. Another Ex international Augustine Eguavoen again led us to the bronze medal two years later in 2006 after a narrow semi final loss to a questionable Didier Drogba lone goal and only failed to qualify for the 2006 World cup by the narrowest of margins having tied with Angola on points only for Angola to nick it on the head to head rule. It is easy to delude ourselves that Nigeria should be winning the nations cup for fun but anyone who has followed the game for a considerable length of time will tell you why these things are not necessarily as they seem. I know cynics may say as the Legendary Bob Paisley, the man who built Liverpool, England’s most successful club into the force they became in the modern game that ‘first place is everything and second place is nothing’, but it still cannot be emphatically said that foreign coaches have necessarily fared better than the indigenous ones simply because no indigenous coach has led Nigeria to first place and the coveted diadem at the Nations cup, Africa’s premier showpiece competition.
Again, I say enough of these trumped up technical astuteness of the foreign coaches. At the Nations cup final in 1994, Zambia drew first blood before Nigeria replied with a brace from Emmanuel Amunike and as the second half wore on, the Copper bullets as the team later became known led by the mercurial Kalusha Bwalya played like a team demon possessed. They threatened to overrun the Super Eagles at some point and towards the end of proceedings a fierce strike from Kalusha Bwalya cannoned off the Crossbar with the Goalkeeper well beaten. Imagine if that had gone in. All the good work by Westerhof at that competition could easily have been undone at that point. At the final whistle the relief etched on the faces of the players, the technical crew and the fans watching on television back home was obvious and there for all to see.
At the 1994 world cup in the United States, Nigeria came within two minutes of achieving the nearly impossible with the same Westerhof when the Super Eagles traded tackles with Italy in the second round. Nigeria took a first half lead ironically by another Emmanuel Amunike strike from a corner kick and defended that up until the 88th minute of that eventful encounter but just when the team should have bedded down and see out the last two minutes of the match, one of the players carelessly lost the ball in Midfield, the ball made its way upfield and found the incomparable Roberto Baggio who coolly slotted past the despairing arms of Peter Rufai. A questionable penalty in extra time when Austine Eguavoen needlessly clattered into Antonio Benarrivo was again converted by Roberto Baggio to send the Eagles out of a tournament which final they could well have reached. This was a match wherein the Eagles outplayed, outmaneuvered, outfought and outthought the feared Azzuri. A match where the legend of Austine (Jay Jay) Okocha was born. A match in which Gianfranco Zola was sent off in the 75th minute to hand the Eagles a massive advantage. Yet the Eagles lost the match. In the course of that match Westerhof took off Daniel Amokachie and brought on Mutiu Adepoju in the 35th minute and he replaced Emmanuel Amunike with Thompson Oliha in the 57th minute when we already had Sunday Oliseh and Jay Jay Okocha in midfield and just when we needed to hit the Italians on the break as they were pressing for an equalizer with a man down. Westerhof had Victor Ikpeba, Samson Siasia and Efan Ekoku on the bench. Any two of the lot would have been genius as we will keep our attacking impetus and there was no way Italy was going to come back into it. But as they say all that is history now and a moot point but I shudder to think of the unprintable things we would have heard if an indigenous coach was at the helm of affairs. So much for the technical superiority of the foreign coaches then.
In 1998, Bora Milutinovic was brought in a few months to the start of the World cup and for all we were told about his competence, only a sublime strike from Sunday Oliseh separated us and Spain in the first match. We squeezed past Bulgaria in the second but that was the end of the tournament for Nigeria. We were comprehensively beaten by Paraguay in the last group match but then we had done enough to qualify for the second round. At a time any coach that was half as good as Bora was touted to be would have warned his players to stay focused on the match against Denmark; his wards were already dreaming Brazil. All that is history now too as we well know what happened. A disastrous match for the Eagles. Four goals to one it ended in favour of the Danes. Bora left us and the world has since moved on. Something tells me and I have the nagging fear that the story of Lars Lagerback and the 2010 world cup may not be any different from that of Bora Milutinovic and the 1998 world cup.
Finally these mercenary tacticians, because that is what they really are, have nothing to lose. They come here, get a great contract, they are not monitored and whether they do well or not their perquisites of office are guaranteed (I hear they now lodge a copy of their executed contracts with the world football governing body, FIFA) and there is no sanction mechanism should they fail. In short they have the best of both worlds and when the misadventure ends we are usually left to lick our wounds until the vicious cycle repeats itself again. But what I know is this, as long as we will not run our country properly so long will we continue to suffer in the hands of those who know not how to run football.
STEPHEN O. OBAJAJA is a Partner at the Lagos Law Firm of Fountain Court Partners.
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