By Reuben Abati

INTERNATIONAL organisations and other stakeholders commenting on the coup that took place in Niger on February 19 have been making the right diplomatic and politically correct noises. While all that familiar stuff about a military coup being an aberration and a major setback for the democratic process in Africa is acceptable, the truth is that this is a perfect case of good riddance to bad rubbish in Niger. Mamadou Tandja had become a nuisance, holding that poor nation and its people hostage for more than a year to pursue a selfish ambition that saw him getting an additional three years in office last November. Tandja’s two-term tenure of five years each expired in December but long before then, he came up with the idea of prolonging his tenure in office by another three years, obviously the first step towards life rule. Everyone who opposed him was hounded into silence or exile. He sacked the Constitutional Court.

Members of his Cabinet who dared to raise a voice were expelled too. The media was harrassed. Civil society activists were intimidated and blackmailed. Tandja put together a team of sycophants who shouted Tazarce: continuity. He suspended the Constitution, started ruling by decrees and issued arrest warrants for opposition leaders. The referendum that was held in August 2009 was a kangaroo exercise with a predictable outcome. Tandja had his way. But he underestimated the people. For a whole week leading up to the coup that took place on Friday, civil society protesters took to the streets in Niamey and elsewhere. When the military junta struck, there was dancing in the same streets. Tandja is said to be in a military facility and the coup plotters have announced that he is in good health. Whatever pains he may be going through is self-inflicted. He is the victim of his own greed.

One of the first assignments of the junta should be to put Tandja and his cohorts on trial. His self-perpetuation gambit was based on the funny script that his government had done so much for Nigeriens, and that he needed to consolidate the gains of his government’s economic reforms. A lie. What reforms? Tandja’s economic reform brought Chinese investors and more money into the pockets of crooks. Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world. For the ten years that Tandja reigned, that country’s development index travelled consistently Southwards. At 71, Mamadou Tandja had no fresh ideas, no new tricks that he could play to promote the people’s interests. He was acting out a bad script that had been authored before him in Nigeria, and it failed on stage, and even in those countries where the leaders became monarchs hoping to die in office, the ultimate outcome was one of shame. Remember Mobutu Sese Seko, Kamuzu Banda, Houphouet-Boigny, Idi Amin Dada: Africa ’s despots.

The more important value of what has happened in Niger lies in the strong message that it sends to African leaders, many of whom may be tempted to copy the Tandja experiment. The coup is not merely a military coup, it is a triumph of sorts for the Nigerien civil society. It produced in that regard an interesting paradox, with the leaders of the “revolution”, Col Djibril Adamou Harouna and Major Salou Djibo promising that they intend to ensure Niger becomes “an example of democracy and good governance.” The ousted Tandja rode on the back of the military to power in 1999; he has taken the same route out of power. His exit sends another message: that dictatorship creates the conditions for its own failure.

Following his decision to force himself on the people of Niger, both ECOWAS and the African Union suspended the country. The US and the EU withdrew aid. On Thursday, Nigeria, Niger ’s neighbour, and the regional power, quickly rushed a statement to the press condemning the coup. Former Nigerian Head of State, General Abdusalami Abubakar is the leader of a team to Niger holding talks with the coup makers. Where was Nigeria all this while? Tandja was able to flourish in part, because Nigeria looked the other way.

Now it is being speculated that the coup in Niger has a Nigerian element: not necessarily the fact that certain persons in the international community thought they heard Nigeria instead of Niger , with an immediate effect on oil prices, but that the coup is meant to test possible international reactions to a similar incident in Nigeria . Mischievous as this may sound, it should not be discountenanced, more so as there has been a copy-cat pattern to military interventions in West African politics. Besides, for more than two months, the Nigerian political leadership has been engaged in a death-wish. When politicians suspend the Constitution as Tandja did, and as the Nigerian leadership appears to be doing, they write a long letter to trouble. Political leaders should not seek to remain in power because it suits their animal instincts, they are required to respect the law, and not succumb to the temptation to bend or change it for selfish reasons.

Col Djibril Adamou Harouna told Nigeriens: “The army loves the people and will always stand by Niger .” The best way to demonstrate that love and commitment is for the junta to make its intervention brief. It should set about initiating fresh elections within the shortest possible time, and ensure that Niger returns quickly to the path of democratic governance. I recommend six months. It must live up to its assumed name: “Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy,” and turn its intervention into an opportunity for a new beginning. The long-term challenge however, will be to rescue that country from the claws of poverty, instability and insecurity.

In addition to the ECOWAS framework, Nigeria should see the urgent need to contribute to the task of bringing stability to our neighbour to the North, a country with which Nigeria shares not just a border but intertwined lives and cultures. Poor governance combined with elite greed poses the biggest threat to Africa ’s democratisation process in addition to ethnic/religious differences and mass illiteracy. As these transform into elements of state failure, more African states, from Guinea to Zimbabwe, to Kenya and Angola may implode. This is a terrible burden for a continent left behind by the development clock. The democratisation project in Africa is in as great a need for protection and promotion now as was the case two decades ago. Too many African states are pseudo-democracies, Nigeria inclusive; and although there has been considerable growth in civil society responsiveness and the role of international actors, altogether the conflicting spectacle of progress and failure invites much pessimism about now and the future.

If You See The Saudi King…

THE six-man delegation appointed by the Executive Council of the Federation is travelling today to Saudi Arabia to do two things: visit the sick Nigerian President whose ill-health held the entire country hostage for more than 70 days before the National Assembly organised a “civilian coup”, and then thank the Saudi King for his hospitality. Shopping, disappearing to take care of personal issues, staying back to pursue family interests- all of this is not part of the trip and we are hoping that all six men will return before the next meeting of the Executive Council on Wednesday with useful information.

It has been reported that one Nigerian, Mrs Turai Yar’Adua, who also happens to be the first wife of the President, is the one who determines who sees the President or not. Too many fruitless trips have been made to Saudi Arabia by government officials with all the emissaries unable to see the President because Madam Turai says no. We can give her the benefit of the doubt: the President is probably being hidden from visitors on doctors’ advice. But doctors also ought to recognise extra-ordinary situations. If leprosy is not one of the cocktail of ailments that they are treating, they should allow the six-man delegation from Nigeria ’s Federal Cabinet to see our President. They are coming to the hospital as “the eyes and ears” of all Nigerians. They don’t have to say a word to him; they can just wave and nod, and observe carefully. Nigeria today stands at a crossroads: not too many countries have been so affected by Presidential ill-health.

The King of Saudi Arabia has been identified repeatedly in the last 72 hours as the good host who is picking up President Yar’Adua’s bills. Some reports suggest that President Yar’çdua is no longer in a hospital but in a special facility provided by the Saudi King. The Saudi Arabian authorities must clear the air at once: to reassure Nigerians that in purporting to act as Yar’Adua’s keeper, they have no intentions of violating Nigeria ’s sovereignty. For it is this country’s sovereignty that is being compromised if the head of another sovereign nation is allowed to keep our President as a willing medical hostage, without allowing access to him.

The six men going to Saudi Arabia have all obtained their visas. Given the importance of the trip to Nigerians, and we hope the Saudi Embassy in Nigeria is awake to its duties, this can be taken as sign that the Saudi King has been duly informed, diplomatic protocols have been sorted out and the six envoys will get a chance to deliver their message. Anything short of that will amount to an unfriendly act. My fear though is that a low-ranking officer may be assigned to attend to the “nosey” folks from Nigeria ! Should that happen, and an insult posted to Nigeria’s 140 million people, the Jonathan administration should immediately invite the Nigerian Ambassador to Saudi Arabia and the Saudi Arabian Ambassador to Nigeria for very serious discussions.

King Abdullah recently hosted the US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton to a buffet lunch, showing that when he wants to play the diplomatic game, he sure knows how to do it. If the Federal Government delegation succeeds in having an audience with the King, they shouldn’t be more interested in bowing and scraping, they should tell him Nigeria’s immediate future hangs in the balance, because its President is stranded in Saudi Arabia and the people have no information about him. The Nigerian team, comprising five Ministers and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation should not return empty-handed.

Tiger Woods’ Apology

SO Tiger Woods has now apologised, publicly and properly for being “irresponsible” and “selfish”: kudos to his media handlers who want him back in the good books of all conservative elements who think his infidelity is worse than the original sin. But they want more than that: they want the withdrawn endorsements and goodwill back. Fine. I think Tiger Woods has paid enough penance. This hand-wringing over sexual dalliances, in addition to sex addiction therapy, strikes all the necessary moral notes, but can we go back to golf before Tiger Woods begins to imagine himself an eternal victim? No one is asking all the ladies who “stole” him from his wife to offer any apologies. If guilt is to be shared they are just as guilty.

By apologising, Tiger Woods has reassured everyone who invested faith and energy in his talents and success that he is aware and appreciative of the burden he bears as role model and public figure. A strong sense of his humility and humanism is well-conveyed. It is a necessary lesson for all public figures about the moral compass that defines their role-playing, a compass that is beyond their control.

Postponing Tiger’s return to competitive golf extends his saga needlessly. He is a champion on the golf course: that is the best place to work all of this out. Tiger Woods’ mother probably has the best perspective. Shortly after her son’s press conference, she told reporters: “Sometimes think there is double standard. He didn’t do anything illegal. He didn’t kill anybody. But he try to improve himself. He try to go to therapy and help. He change that and making better. When he do all this thing, he will come out stronger and better person…I am so proud to be his mother, period.” Momma is right.

by Reuben Abati

Nigeria has a new ‘acting’ president courtesy of the action taken by the National Assembly to resolve the terrible impasse into which President Umaru Yar’Adua had thrown the entire country by refusing to transmit a letter to the National Assembly in line with Section 145 of the Constitution. There is no doubting the fact that ‘expediency and pragmatism’ informed the decision but in passing the resolution by both Chambers of the National Assembly, the rule of law was jettisoned; the action it must be said had absolutely nothing to do with the law.

Nigeria was faced with a desperate situation; desperate tactics were adopted to save the situation from descending into sheer anarchy, what with some misguided elements in society already mouthing the nonsense that such times called for military intervention. What was done on Tuesday was not a resolution per se, it was a revolution: it was a case of the National Assembly, conniving with the Vice President, the Governors and a vocal section of the civil society, to do what seemed expedient. Nigeria needed to be saved from drifting, from the rush of uncertainties, it needed to be rescued from the hands of a cabal that had taken hold of it – but at what cost?

Establishing a constitution-driven society requires that both chambers either use the case of expediency to change the law or execute same through observance of the constitution. We cannot fumble and wobble our way out of the constitutional quagmire we have found ourselves through the irresponsibility of those taking care of a sick president, who from all accounts, was in no state or faculty to take the necessary steps as provided for by the constitution at the time of leaving office.

Nigerians have embraced the situation and found it acceptable because it serves our purpose; because it seems to be the only way to check the intrigues of those who were misinterpreting the law and making the presidency seem more important than the country itself.

While we look the other way and ask those who are protesting that violating the Constitution to save a desperate situation will create more problems in the long run, we should do a prompt reality check. It is as follows: the development in the National Assembly on Tuesday came about as a result of our collective helplessness. President Yar’Adua and his aides had continued to insist that he is well and capable of running Nigeria from anywhere in the world. Meanwhile, the man has allegedly been in a Jeddah hospital since November 23. Nigerians do not know the exact truth about his state of health. He and his family and megaphones have held the country to ransom and have now been beaten at their own game.

This however should not be the end of the story. We cannot proceed without resolving what happened or is happening to our president. The logjam from which we think we have extricated ourselves may be further extended and the Constitutional crisis that we think we have side-stepped may be blown full scale in due course. It is better in matters such as this, therefore, to insist on first principles. The National Assembly had to act ultra vires by interpreting the Constitution to suit its purpose. The word transmit in Section 145 suddenly was stretched to cover the BBC interview by President Umaru Yar’çdua. To all intents and purposes, that BBC interview belongs to the BBC.

It is not the property of the Nigerian government, not an official communication; it was not in any way directed to the National Assembly. To resolve this impasse by relying on the BBC is to submit our sovereignty to a foreign media – How did the BBC secure such an interview when the Nigerian Security Service, National Assembly, Federal Executive Council, Secretary to the Federal Government and indeed key staff members of the kitchen cabinet and the presidency could not gain access to him?

The appropriate thing for the National Assembly to do should have been to insist on the President sending a letter to the National Assembly asking to go on vacation to attend to his health. What then was the purpose of the meeting with Senator Muhammad Abba Ajji, “the presidential letter courier” last week? Where is the letter he promised? There were reports that David Edevbie, the President’s Principal Private Secretary had travelled to Saudi Arabia to bring the letter, the same way he took the Appropriation Act to Saudi Arabia for presidential signature. At what point between last week and Tuesday this week, did it become impossible to get the President’s signature or thumb print, therefore compelling the National Assembly to suspend the Constitution and act expediently?

No man can be more important than the country. Not even the President. By refusing to obey the Constitution, the President has committed a major breach. He has by his inability to sign a letter, confirmed his incapacitation. Why didn’t the National Assembly insist on the Federal Executive Council acting as directed in Section 144 of the Constitution? What has been proven now is that it is alright in certain situations for the Constitution to be subjected to the force of circumstances. Nigeria has never had the experience of a President going AWOL. It became a testy situation because of the failure of the professional political elite to behave properly. The National Assembly has not yet resolved the Yar’çdua issue.

On this debate rests the unresolved issue of a signed Appropriation bill. To accept that the president was in no way able to sign a letter confirming his leave of absence is to raise a fundamental and grave issue bothering on possible forgery and outright criminal deception carried out and executed by the presidency.

However, clearing the mess that had been created and strengthening public confidence in the rule of law should be Dr. Goodluck Jonathan’s first assignment in his new posting. This would mean his addressing the issue of President Umaru Yar’Adua’s ill health. As Acting President, albeit the product of a democratic coup, willed into reality by overwhelming public consensus, he must direct a delegation immediately to go to Saudi Arabia to establish the true location of the missing President, his true circumstances, his true state of health, the bills that he has incurred.

There are reports that the President’s family prevents people from seeing him. They cannot do that. They must be told that the Nigerian President belongs to the Nigerian people. We should have a right of access to him and the right to pry into his private life. Acting President Goodluck Jonathan must give appropriate orders for full and detailed information about President Yar’Adua. Our national security is at stake. Besides, who is picking up the huge bills that the president must have chalked up in the last 79 days? If it is the Nigerian taxpayer’s money that is being spent, then the people’s right to know must be protected.

Did anyone take special notice of the fact that the same day Goodluck Jonathan was declared Acting President by the National Assembly, the first official visitors he received were the American Ambassador and a special envoy from President Barack Obama. They were in Abuja, waiting. Ambassador Johnnie Carson brought a special message from President Barack Obama and Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton. He also met with some stakeholders, including Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ojo Maduekwe, and note this: former President Ibrahim Babangida! Who are the other stakeholders that the Americans met? Carson talked publicly about Nigerians upholding the Constitution but it is not difficult to establish where America’s interest in the matter lies. Two weeks earlier, Mrs Hillary Clinton and EU leaders had signed a statement expressing concern about the uncertainty in Nigeria. They warned that Nigeria is too strategic in the West African region to be allowed to disintegrate. Imagine 150 million people spilling into our neighbouring countries as refugees. It would be worse than Haiti and Somalia combined. America and the rest of the international cannot afford such risk.

Then, there is the crude oil factor. With MEND declaring that it would not do business with Goodluck Jonathan because he lacks authority, the relative peace that had been achieved in the Niger Delta faced the real threat of derailment. MEND had put the oil multinationals on notice that the next round of offensive will be an all-out war. That won’t be in America’s interest either. With Goodluck Jonathan now acting President, the thunder has been taken out of MEND’s sail. In the end, the Tuesday revolution was not merely about Nigeria’s interest, there were external interests actively involved.

America has always showed up at interesting times in the life of this nation. Recall that the day MKO Abiola died, the Americans were in town. The day Goodluck Jonathan was declared Acting President, the Americans were again in town, standing by as events unfolded. Jonathan did not help matters when he addressed the nation looking as if he was at a funeral. He looked too glum for a man who had just been made Acting President! Did the Americans apply, as they say, subtle pressure? If this had been a better-managed country, we wouldn’t have needed the Americans and other external interests to push us.

Acting President Goodluck Jonathan may have no more than a week or two months in office, since the Senate has made it clear that President Yar’çdua will assume his position, the moment he returns to the country. It is worth stating however that President Yar’çdua must not return to the country like a thief in the night. The National Assembly and the Executive Council of the Federation are not likely to impeach him, but if he must take over, there must be clear and compelling evidence that he is healthy enough to do so.

As far as the Nigerian people are concerned, Goodluck Jonathan should be allowed to finish the remaining 18 months of the Yar’çdua Presidency. For more than two years, the country has been in a lull. The people want real dynamism. They are hoping that Jonathan will be able to provide it. He has on his shoulders a historic responsibility. He tried to show a little swagger on Wednesday by redeploying the controversial Michael Aondoakaa who as Attorney General and Minister of Justice acquired a notorious reputation for bending the law to serve narrow interests.

That wasn’t good enough. Jonathan should have dissolved the entire cabinet and announce new Ministers immediately. Nigerians need a new beginning. A Federal cabinet of position-seekers cannot provide the needed momentum. He also must set to work immediately. There are files that have been awaiting Presidential signature since October including due retirements in the Armed Forces that have not been authorised. There are vacancies in INEC that have not been filled. Professor Maurice Iwu’s tenure as INEC Chairman will end in June, he should be asked to proceed on terminal leave, and another man appointed quickly to start studying the terrain ahead of the 2011 elections. What is Jonathan still waiting for?

While engaged in house-cleaning, the ‘Acting’ President should also take time out to tour the country. That shouldn’t take more than three weeks, off and on. Anyone who wants to rule Nigeria must make an effort to know this country. We have had too many people running Nigeria who know near to absolutely nothing about the country or the people.

In a country where history is treated shabbily, this should not be surprising. But Nigeria now needs more than good luck to move forward. We must put an end to the tradition of people jumping from their villages, or the army barracks to Presidential office. By reading a few history books and moving round the country to see things for himself, Jonathan should be able to get a crash induction into life Nigeriana.

Electoral Reform: He is in a position to do something about that too, more so as he is not likely to be a candidate in the 2011 Presidential election. Resource control: the people of the Niger Delta have always asked for this; through Jonathan as Acting President, they are now in charge of Nigerian resources, but will Jonathan be bold enough to take consequential steps to address the Niger Delta question? In addition to everything else, let him engage the services of a wardrobe director, and learn how to smile!

By Reuben Abati

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s prayer at the Annual Trust Awards that God should punish him if indeed he deliberately chose as his successor a sick man so he would not be able to perform and possibly outshine him, has drawn quite a number of Amens from the public with the outrightly cynical insisting that God is already inflicting punishment on the former President. The reference to God often drives up sentiments among Nigerians and in an overtly religious society such as ours, every appeal to God is intended to have a special effect. It is a psychological fact that pastors rely on so well, and which Obasanjo often deploys in seasons of doubt. It is possible to be emotional in responding to his latest intrusion into the public space. But more benefit could be derived from looking at the facts of the case, and why Obasanjo has chosen now to speak up on the subject of the President’s ill-health, and what message(s) he could possibly be sending across to the public and certain stakeholders. Obasanjo not only ditched President Yar’çdua publicly, he also advised him to resign if his health has failed him. The wily OBJ talked about the path of honour and the path of morality.

In Yar’çdua’s case both are obviously currently conflicted. The Obasanjo that spoke at the Daily Trust event tried to project himself as a patriot who is more interested in national progress. Now that we know where Obasanjo stands in this matter, when next Professor Wole Soyinka, Pastor Tunde Bakare, Femi Falana and others want to embark on another “Enough is Enough. To Save Nigeria” street march, they should remember to invite him along! But is Obasanjo now one of the progressives? Or he is merely playing to the gallery? Or he is trying to absolve himself of blame? Some of his friends have praised him for lending his voice to the calls for Yar’Adua’s resignation.

There is nothing original in him position though. He is waking up to the truth, more than two years late. Is this not the same Obasanjo who only a fortnight ago pointedly refused to comment on the President’s health? If it was not safe for him to pass a comment then, why is it now safe for him to do so? Or was he waiting for the right platform? Telling Yar’çdua to get out at an event in his own backyard, seems a clever way of loading a statement with appropriate weight. Or could it be that Obasanjo already knows something that is not yet public knowledge and which puts him in a safe position to fulminate? For a man who has been to jail and back, simply because he was critical of a sitting Head of State, and who himself does not suffer fools gladly when he wielded power, Obasanjo must be sure that it is only safe to step on a dead cobra’s tail. So what are we dealing with? Opportunism? An attempt at self-ingratiation? Rather than applause, Obasanjo’s statement, arguably his most poignant public statement, since he left office in May 2007 should invite more questions. President Yar’çdua’s ill-health has set an invidious power game in motion and OBJ is trying to get on top of it. But not so fast, sir.

According to the former President, at the time he decided to support President Yar’çdua’s candidacy, he was looking for three qualities: intellectual capacity, integrity and broad-mindedness. In 2007, Candidate Yar’çdua was not the only man in the PDP Presidential race who could boast of these three qualities. That was a fact. Another fact: Obasanjo and his agents had made up their mind that it was Yar’çdua that they wanted. He even told Nigerians at the time that he knew those who would not succeed him. One by one, those who showed interest in the race were arm-twisted, or frightened, out of it. Long before the PDP Presidential primaries, it was common knowledge that both the PDP Presidential ticket and the Presidency had been willed by the man in power to the then Governor of Katsina state.

Yar’çdua was a reluctant candidate, the most reluctant of all the candidates. Obasanjo also wanted Yar’çdua in order to spite Abubakar Atiku, his Vice President with whom he had serious problems. Atiku is a product of the General Shehu Yar’çdua political dynasty, and the leader of the late General’s wing of the PDP; the once powerful People’s Democratic Movement (PDM). In 2002/3, Atiku had made the mistake of boasting that it was he and the PDM machinery that he inherited that brought Obasanjo to power. At the PDP Presidential primaries in 2003, Atiku and his PDM supporters almost humiliated Obasanjo. He was forced to eat the humble pie. What better way to divide and demolish the PDM in 2007, than to hand over power to the junior brother of the founder of the PDM? Handing over power to Yar’çdua was a cold-hearted, Machiavellian move on Obasanjo’s part. With due respect, it had nothing to do with all that rhetoric about intellectual capacity, integrity and broad-mindedness. How much of these three, now presented by OBJ as if they are divine imperatives, did we get from the eight years of the Obasanjo administration?

To all intents and purposes, former President Obasanjo wanted Umaru Yar’çdua as president because that was what would serve his own political interests then. Eye-witnesses to that campaign process will recall that it was President Obasanjo that did most of the campaigning. At several rallies, the man who wanted to be President was not allowed to speak. Obasanjo did all the talking, and subsequently, he would raise Yar’Adua’s hand. At a point, there were comments about the need for Obasanjo to allow the PDP candidate to speak to Nigerians. The first time we heard of the seven-point agenda was on inauguration day! Yar’çdua became President without Nigerians really knowing him. Now, Obasanjo says don’t blame me. He gave me a medical record which said he was in good shape. Obasanjo was Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces. A Presidential aspirant gave him a sheet of paper certifying himself fit and he Obasanjo did not deem it necessary to entertain doubts!

The subtext of the Obasanjo comment is that Nigerians not he, made President Yar’çdua president. Nigeria ’s big men are very good at revising history. In the light of available evidence, it seems to me that even if OBJ had full knowledge of the risk factors in making a man who had had a kidney transplant President, he would still have chosen Yar’Adua. If the man was so fit, why was Obasanjo the one selling him to Nigerians, instead of allowing him to do more of the talking? So grateful was the Yar’çdua family after the Presidential elections and the inauguration of Yar’çdua as President that three women from the Yar’çdua household including the brand new President’s mother, and his late brother’s wife went to Ota specially to thank Obasanjo. They did not issue a statement thanking Nigerians. They went to Ota! And now, Obasanjo ditches the same Yar’Adua.

The timing of his latest politics is suspicious but his outburst is understandable. The Atiku threat no longer exists. The PDM is in disarray. Atiku who wanted to replace Obasanjo and in the process became an issue in Nigerian Presidential politics has since gone to Obasanjo’s home to pay homage. All the other candidates, North and South in the PDP who wanted to be President have been driven into their shells, with some of them still battling with the EFCC yoke that was slung around their necks. But Yar’Adua on whose behalf all that effort was made has shown no gratitude to former President Obasanjo. The Yar’Adua government began at the centre with a systematic assault on the Obasanjo legacy. Obasanjo and his spin-doctors used to boast that the dividends of democracy that Nigerians wanted so badly would fructify in the fullness of time on the altar of sustainability.

If they thought Yar’çdua would sustain Obasanjo’s reform agenda and programmes, they made a mistake. These were the first set of pillars that the new government pulled down. Many Obasanjo boys who had worked tirelessly on the Yar’çdua-must-be-President agenda suddenly found themselves being treated as persona non grata. They have been chased out of government, into exile, or into EFCC detention centres. Under Obasanjo, there was something that assumed a political shape called Corporate Nigeria, the jet-riding set that donated money to political causes and strolled into the Presidential Villa at will. They owned the biggest businesses in town and they didn’t hide the fact of their closeness to the President. More than two years later, the Yar’çdua government has successfully castrated this group.

The 24-hour gate passes to Presidential Villa that they used to brandish have been withdrawn! Some of them have lost their banks and are now struggling to stay out of jail. Even those who thought they knew Yar’Adua ( “he was my senior in secondary school”; “I know him”) have all been shocked: if they thought they would prosper politically under him, the man gave them poisoned gifts. Obasanjo himself has not been spared. Yar’çdua and his team have not treated him as the Godfather of the administration. His position as Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the PDP has been rendered almost useless. He has been turned into a laughing stock in the company of those he once said would never be President. Ordinary Nigerians may regard President Yar’çdua as a weak leader because of his illness, but his power-politics has been very strong and he may have made great strides in that direction that could affect Nigeria in more fundamental ways than we may realise. But Obasanjo is smart. He is choosing his own time to strike back. But why strike a man when he is weak? Whatever may be Obasanjo’s shortcomings, his voice still carries weight in Nigerian politics. By coming out against Yar’Adua, he will be setting off a chain of reactions that should be closely watched. What will be the Katsina response to the bomb from Ota? And why has Obasanjo suddenly become freshly voluble at the time when Vice President Goodluck Jonathan is said to be taking charge gradually at the Presidency?

It is a game of musical chairs, not yet an end game. Two or three newspapers have suggested that President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua may show up in Nigeria next week, looking healthy and strong enough to carry on. Should that happen, it will be not necessarily a miracle, but a political masterstroke. Some people may have to leave town. For there could be serious reprisals from the Yar’çdua end which may not have demonstrated a capacity to keep promises, but remarkable adroitness in teaching ambitious men and women bitter lessons about the game of power. Even if the man does not return next week, with INEC poised to announce the time-table for the 2011 elections in March, the professional political class will see the need to engage in further mischief.

By Reuben Abati

“HALLELUYAH oh. Somebody shout halle-lu-yah o. Ha-le-ha-le-hale… I praise the Lord o…ha-le. “Somebody, e yin oluwa logo hale…”

“What’s the matter with you?”: You don drink?”

“Yes o. I am drunk with joy. Halle-hale-halle…, “halleluyah, halle…”

“I have been telling you. Take it easy with the bottle. What a man eats is his path to the grave”.

“Hey. Professor. Spare me the lecture. I am not drunk. I am just happy that our missing President has been found. Lost and found President Yar’Adua. Halle lu yah o”.

“The missing President”.

“For over 50 days this country was without a President but now, we have found him. He is alive… He is ali-ve… Yar-Adua is – ali-ve-. A a-men I say: He is – a li-ve. Yar’Adua is ali-ve. Oh, oh, oh, he is alive. A a-men”.

“I am not as enthusiastic as you are”

“A nation that prays, stays together. Obviously, God has answered our prayers… It is good to pray”.

“Are you sure?”

“Oh yes. What do you mean I am sure? The President spoke on BBC. He told Nigerians that he is alive and well, and that as soon as his doctors say he is fit enough, he will return home. In the meantime, he wished the Super Eagles well in the Nations Cup in Angola”.

“He is well. After 50 days! And he doesn’t think he should talk to us through a Nigerian medium. He had to choose the BBC. We have been praying for him and Nigeria, and then, he finds his voice, he thinks the BBC is the best platform. What contempt!”

“A man is ill. He recovers. It doesn’t matter which platform he speaks from. I think we should be happy that the President is alive and that he has been found”.

“Of all things, he had to talk about the Super Eagles and the Nations Cup. Useless Super Eagles and Coach Amodu who if I have my way should be sent to Cabinda. The President didn’t apologise to Nigerians. He didn’t wish us a happy New Year. He didn’t say something to inspire us. In fact, I don’t believe it was him that spoke. I dare say the BBC must be embarrassed conducting such a shoddy interview”.

“Shoddy?”

“Yes. Shoddy. The local media would have done a better job. At least, the reporter could have asked one or two intelligent questions. The BBC using its platform to conduct what was obviously a stage-managed interview does little credit to its own reputation?”

“Hey man. Dogs should not eat dogs. Don’t get carried away.”

“Let us tell the truth and let the devil be ashamed.”

“I see you have been listening to Lagbaja. I know where that line is coming from”.

“You know I don’t even believe that it was President Yar’Adua that spoke to the BBC. The BBC should be careful not to be seen to be part of a conspiracy of deceit. Besides, the President spoke in Hausa language. I object to that Hausa bit. He is President of Nigeria, not President of the Hausa-Fulani”.

“Oh come on. When a man is ill, and he recovers, I don’t care what language comes out of his mouth. In any case, the man also spoke in English”.

“All of this is political”.

“You are a doubting Thomas”.

“Yes. I am. To convince us that the President is alive and well, let his spin doctors put him on NTA Television. With a 3-D scan of the President”.

“Channels, please. Or AIT. I don’t trust NTA”.

“After 50 days of absence, if the President is well enough, we expect him to show up on national television and address all Nigerians. And I don’t expect him to talk about the Super Eagles in Angola. There are more important issues. Is he handing over to his Vice President, for example? Will Goodluck Jonathan now be in charge? Or the country will remain without a leader?”

“The court has settled that, I think”

“The court has not settled anything. If you are talking about the Federal High Court ruling which says the Vice President can take over, I am sorry, it looks like that judgement merely states a principle. It is not executorial. There are no clear-out orders”.

“The Attorney-General of the Federation says there are. The Vice President can now sign anything and act as President”.

“Only in a delegated capacity. The President has not delegated anything to him, so, we are still in the clouds”.

“But a man of courage will hold on to that same ruling and act courageously. The ruling is in one sense about the character of the Vice President. Will he seize the day? Will he step up to the big moment. He has a chance now to stand up. This is all that he needs”.

“You are asking Vice President Goodluck Jonathan to become a suicide bomber? Is that what you are saying?”

“You are speaking in tongues. I don’t get it. I am saying there is a court ruling which offers both Jonathan and all Nigerians a window of opportunity”.

“And I am saying the court ruling has only worsened the situation. Judges should be careful what they say at moments like this”.

“Don’t blame the Judge. The law is a social modulator. The court has ruled. Will Jonathan step forward?”

“My own take is that nothing is that straight-forward in Nigerian politics. Vice President Jonathan will not like to be seen to be ambitious. You know the man is a lucky Deputy. Any man wey the man deputise, something must do am. Alami go jail. Yar’Adua go hospital.”

“That’s mumbo-jumbo. No be Jonathan fault. The matter is simple. Let the President return home. We get hospital for Nigeria too.”

“On doctor’s advice?”

“No. We can no longer wait for that. You know some newspapers have been insisting that the man is clinically dead”.

“But a man that is clinically dead cannot speak Hausa and English on BBC”.

“Suppose it was an actor that spoke…”

“No. It was Yar’Adua”.

“Fine. Let him appear on NTA, then”.

“All of this is just so tiresome. The whole world is laughing at us. How can the President of Nigeria be a missing President?”

“Nothing ever works in Nigeria”.

“At least we now know where our President is. In Haiti, their President is homeless. He now sleeps on the streets. We should thank God here. Now that the President has spoken, naturally every government official would wish to go to Saudi Arabia to greet him. Traditional rulers too”.

“No. That should be discouraged. Whoever wants to see the President should await his arrival. Nobody should turn the President’s ill-health into an opportunity to make quick bucks”.

“Too late. I understand members of the House of Representatives are already on their way to Saudi Arabia. Seven of them. They have all collected their tickets”.

“Jonathan should stop them”.

“The lawmakers claim they are performing their oversight function. They need to go to Saudi Arabia to oversee the President”.

“They shouldn’t bother. The President himself should come home. When Saudi Princes fall sick, they go to America for medical treatment. What is our President doing in Saudi Arabia?”

“No. You are wrong. Why is our President not in a Nigerian hospital. That is the question?”

“He should answer that question himself. And not through BBC. It has to be a Nigerian channel. And in English not Hausa”.

“May be you have a point. English is Nigeria’s official language, not Hausa. The crisis has just begun.”

“Don’t misunderstand me though. I am not saying that this is a North-South debacle. No. That is not my view, I just want the President back home, if that is possible. And I ask: who will come home first- Yar’Adua or the Super Eagles?”

“It is even more than that. If the country continues to drift, what do you think will happen? I am praying for Goodluck Jonathan”

“What?”

“Where do you think all this will lead to?”

“A greater future for Nigeria. I can see God’s hand in it all”.

“No. I don’t see God’s hands. I see failure of leadership. I see selfishness. That is what I see”.

“You probably have a point. Today is January 15″.

“No. No. No. Don’t go that way”.

“What way?”

“What I think you are thinking”.

“I am not even thinking. I am just saying that the only way forward is forward”.

“Better”.

“You should be careful. These are difficult times. Watch what you say. You could step on the wrong toes.”

“Okay I wish the President quick recovery, and all the people that drove the rabbit out of the hole, American Chronicle, London Telegraph and their local conspirators a happy 2010.”

“That your mouth will get you into trouble soon.”

“Wetin I talk now?”

By Reuben Abati

Nigerians were not favourite air travellers before the Christmas Day Flight 253 bomb scare incident involving our 23-year old compatriot Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab: the rest of the world looked upon Nigerians as potential crooks (even if there are more crooks in Italy and Russia). We were accused of being too noisy and aggressive (one Nigerian got chased off a British airways flight and was promptly banned for life from all BA flights: this caused so much furore). Part of our profile is the label of being the biggest load carriers in the world. On nearly every route, Nigerians tend to have more luggage than other travellers (British Airways has had to create a special luggage re-pack area for Nigerians at Heathrow’s Terminal Five, the only nationals that have been given that curious distinction).

Nigerians were also regarded as potential drug couriers or illegal immigrants: the country’s green passport received detailed attention, to be sure that the passport belonged to the man or woman holding it! Visas originating from Nigeria were screened more than averagely. As a Nigerian flight arrived at an international airport, sniffer dogs were directed to check out the Nigerians. Since Nigerians like to travel with foodstuff, many of them ended up with their ogbono seeds, processed melon, fish, kilishi being sent to the laboratory for proper examination to detect possible traces of cocaine. Others could be handpicked and asked to use the toilet by force. Not even our national icons are spared such humiliation. Before December 25, 2009, Nigerians loved to protest that the humiliation that they received at local embassies issuing visas and at international ports was most undeserved. Young visa officers at the embassies treated Nigerian applicants like vermin. We didn’t like that at all.

Now, the Mutallab effect seems to be shutting us all up. The shame is collectively shared. The collateral damage is resulting in embarrassment and self-doubt. After December 25, 2009, this was a foreseeable development. Our apprehension was further confirmed by the Sunday December 27 incident involving another Nigerian who again was travelling from Amsterdam to the United States. The Nigerian passenger, suffering from incontinence had reportedly stayed a bit longer in the lavatory. Two days earlier, his compatriot whose suicide-bombing attempt had failed had also spent a little time in the lavatory. Both are black men. Other passengers therefore jumped to a convenient conclusion (here is another suicide bomber from Nigeria!). The poor man was treated as if he was another terrorist trying to finish off what his compatriot had bungled on Christmas day. Mutallab may go to jail for attempted suicide-bombing etc., but all Nigerians travelling internationally would henceforth also pay a price, for we have all been adjudged guilty by association.

A cousin who is home on Christmas Holiday couldn’t have expressed the dilemma better when he pointed out 72 hours to his departure that he would also be travelling through Amsterdam.

“Mutalllab travelled through my route. I don’t want to imagine what would happen when I get to Amsterdam,” he had said.

“They will search you from head to toe, that is all.”

“No. It is not that simple. They will do it in a way that you’d feel you have been pronounced guilty by association. Every Nigerian will now be treated like a Mutallab; as if there is a Mutallab in all of us. ”

“You don’t have to worry. As long as you don’t go to the toilet too often, or appear too motionless, nobody will treat you like a suspect.”

“Are you saying Nigerians are now banned from using the lavatory on international flights? I can’t believe that”

“I have not said that. But don’t go into the toilet and start grunting the way many of you do, or spend more time than necessary as if you are busy mixing substances.”

“But why is Ghana not being criticised? The young man travelled through Accra. Why is Holland not being asked to talk about the security at Amsterdam Schiphol International? Why is the focus on Nigeria?

“Simple. It was your man that tried to blow up an aircraft with explosives.”

Since December 25, 2009, there have been reports of airports across the world beefing up their security systems with three dimensional (3D) image scanners. Again, this is causing so much concern among Nigerians. One other fellow, also based in diaspora, had observed that airport authorities need to provide more information about how the 3D scanners work.

“I mean they can’t just go and give somebody cancer because they are looking for explosives. I understand that scanning the entire human anatomy, with electro-magnetic waves could have implications for health. I travel a lot. So does it mean that at every airport, I’ll be exposed to a full scan.”

“Looks like.”

“And I can bet we Nigerians will be targeted specially. We should speak up.”

“Yes and No.”

“You know what bothers me?”, one fellow who had been busy battling with a plate of cow leg interjected. “It is this thing they call 3D.”

“It is not new really. It has always been there.”

“But my attention has just been drawn to it. I understand that 3D scanning, the type that airports are now using will capture the human anatomy from all angles and indicate every part of the body, showing if anything is hidden anywhere.”

“Looks like. It is an advanced security check mechanism.”

“But there are ethical and legal issues.”

“How?”

“How? You are asking me how? You tell me how combatting international terrorism or a threat of it should allow any agency to use a see-all, tell-all machine that invades the body of another human being. That is not security; it is voyeurism. Peeping Toms may derive much fun from it, but I don’t like it.”

“As if your opinion matters… A 3D will only show outlines. How do I explain it? It is like the luggage screening machine.”

“You see. I am saying the same thing. It will show every hidden thing.”

“An outline actually.”

“That is unacceptable. My wife travels a lot. She is not a terrorist, not a would-be bomber.”

“How do you know?”

“I know because I am her husband.”

“You are not making sense.”

“I may not be making any sense to you. But what I am saying is that the West should know what it is introducing when it says it wants to fight international terrorism by all means. Using a three dimensional scanner to scan the outlines of the anatomy of a female homo sapiens is immoral. Can you imagine an airport official scanning my wife’s body? If they are not careful, they will create more suicide-bombers, they will turn decent men into international militants!”

“Look Mr Man, go and sit down. World peace and the lives of other human beings are more important than your wife’s outline. Woman-wrapper. The whole world is talking about peace and security, you are reducing everything to 3D scanner and your wife.”

“I know what I am talking about. As a Muslim, I have a duty to protect my wife.”

“That is precisely what visa officers don’t want to hear at this moment. If you go to an embassy as a Nigerian and you declare that your name is Farouk, Sulaiman, Abdulrazak, Abdul, Mujahiddin… You see, the moment those cynical visa officers type your name into the computer and it brings up the names of terrorists and suicide bombers who share the same names, they won’t waste a minute before stamping your passport: No visa, no visa, no visa.”

The discussion soon focussed on the report that since the Mutallab incident, airports across the world have been subjecting Nigeria-bound luggage or luggage originating therefrom to heavy security screening. In effect, many Nigerians arrive at their destinations without their luggage, or when it eventually arrives, it bears all the imprints of tampering, excessive examination and so on, in a few cases, the luggage is declared missing.

“Not funny”, my cousin said. “Do you know what that means in terms of time and cost? If your bags don’t come in when they should, it means you’d have to go back and check, phone calls and all that, time that should be spent on other things will be devoted to a journey that has not been allowed to end because the airline is looking for powder and liquid explosives.”

“That is the Mutallab Effect.”

“But the young man has not even been found guilty yet. Let them punish the offender and not punish a whole country. I don’t even know what a bomb looks like if I see it. So, why punish me?”

“These things don’t work like that.”

“Not fair.”

“The world has never been fair to anyone.”

“If any airline plays around with my luggage, I’d sue. I will go to court. They can only try that at the Nigerian end, not in the United States. You misplace my luggage, you pay for it.”

“Come to think of it,” I said. “May be there is a good side to all of this.”

“What is good in all Nigerians been tagged a Mutallab by the international community?”

“May be Nigerians will now behave better at airports around the world, knowing that they are being closely watched, May be our people will spend less time in aircraft lavatories. Have you not observed that when a Nigerian gets into the lavatory in an aircraft before you, he or she actually settles down there as if it is a sitting room?”

“Get away. You like to criticise everything. Make man no offload?”

“Well, may be all of this will teach Nigerians to travel light. If you know that your luggage may be delayed or you may lose a bag or two, then you’d reduce everything to hand luggage.”

“That will never happen. By the time you buy shoes for Ekaette, perfume for Ngozi; handbag for Mama Silifa, clothes for the children, the ones at home and the ones outside, with special emphasis on the latter, the bags are bound to multiply. It is only oyinbo travellers who don’t buy anything for anybody. We are Africans.”

“I know. Your ancestors were load carriers. It is in the genes.”

“How do you tell Nigerian travellers on the Dubai route not to carry baggage? I once saw a woman with five bags. When customs opened the bags, they found toilet rolls. Toilet rolls from Dubai!”

“I can imagine the Customs officials begging to be given a pack. We blame the Police all the time, but if you know the level of corruption in Customs, you’d scream E-F-C-C.”

“No. I will scream Fari-da Wa-zi-ri.”

“Be careful. That is another man’s wife.”

“What? Mr Waziri has donated his wife.”

“That is interesting. To you?”

“To public service.”

We concluded that after the initial expression of surprise, and the many questions that have been raised, the Mutallab incident is invariably about all of us as Nigerians. It presents government with special challenges, to the extent that the country’s image has been dealt a heavy blow which needs to be managed, and all Nigerians have now become guilty would-be terrorists, they are in the dock along with their compatriot, and Nigeria finds itself in the ugly situation of being classified as part of the axis of evil. The international media is feeding on the story, seeking a story behind every possible lead. By the time they are through, they may discover a lot more that will further tarnish the country’s image. The initial statement by the Federal Government is now inadequate, the world needs to be reassured continuously that Nigeria has not yet become a haven of terrorists.

We, the good ones are in the majority, and we are the real Nigerians not the boko haram, not the kala kato, not the treasury looters, not the sick leaders, not their wives, not the armed robbers and assassins, not the agents of Lord Lugard. Because every Nigerian who loses his or her mind brings shame upon the rest of us, the challenge of rescuing Nigeria is invariably the collective responsibility of the good majority. Those who mouth the rhetoric of citizens’ diplomacy should now do some work; and they need not embark on estacode-guzzling trips around the world to discharge that function. This is the 50th year of Nigeria’s independence, 50 years after the writing of Chinua Achebe’s No Longer At Ease. It is sad that Nigeria is still No Longer At Ease.

By Reuben Abati

I ONCE wrote a piece about the character of the average Nigerian. To be added to that, by way of update is what seems to me to be the Nigerian’s lack of originality. It is a controversial point, but there is no doubting the fact that the average Nigerian is greedy; functioning very close to the state of nature. Aristotle it was who had said that “a child learns by imitation”; there is something child-like about the Nigerian lack of originality. As a people, we like to imitate; we lack the capacity to write our own stories, even if as individuals we are among the most gifted human beings on planet Earth. Why are we the way we are? Forever short-changing ourselves. Reducing the national potential in the process. Subjecting the environment to a curious herd mentality. I speak of majority tendency of course, there is still a minority that keeps the country going with its distinction, but the efforts of that majority are dangerously abbreviated by the omissions of the antithetical minority.

You only need to take a look at the organisation of the Nigerian business environment to confirm this. Start a line of business. Build it up. Make it successful. Before long, every Dick and Harry in town will rush into that line of business. Nigerians don’t know how to give credit to pioneers. “Who does she think she is? Is she the only one? I can do better.” But they are not interested in making anything better; they are attracted by what they perceive to be the profit end of the enterprise. Before long, they’d ruin the business, destroy standards, overpopulate it so much that profit will become impossible. It is natural for human beings to measure themselves against each other and to compete, but social competition in Nigeria is driven mostly not by the search for excellence, but greed and mischief!

Ten years ago, you could count the number of fast food joints on your finger tips across Nigeria . The moment it became a successful business, everyone rushed into it. People resigned from their professional careers and set up eateries. Today, there is a fast food joint on almost every other corner. They are becoming almost as ubiquitous as the churches. Standards of service have not improved, rather they have dropped. Nigerians do not believe in investing their energies in areas where they are most suited.

They would try their hands at anything, with the hope to make profit the way the other man has. As it is with the fast food business, so it is with the churches. Church business used to be a very sober business. The clergy were taken seriously because the average clergy man of old actually conducted himself and sounded as if he had been one of the original disciples of Jesus Christ or a witness to the emergence of the Church at Antioch . The moment someone turned the business of Christian worship into something glamorous and eclectic, everyone else jumped onto the bandwagon.

There has been a competition since then over whose church is the most spirit-filled and with the greatest anointing, resulting in an inversion of the Doctrine and the introduction into Christian worship, of pagan practices that belong more to the province of commerce and deception. It used to be the case in this country that if anyone was found to be articulate, others would say of him or her: you would make a good lawyer”. These days, the first career consideration for such persons is: “You will make a good pastor; you can start a church in the future.” Becoming a pastor is the easiest thing of course you only need to claim that you saw a vision, you heard voices, or you were called (by Satan or Belzeebub, nobody ever bothers to check!) .

Go and ask the first set of persons who established the foundations of Nollywood. Twenty five years ago, actors and actresses in Nigeria were looked down upon as unserious people. The moment a few gifted persons raised the profile of the performing arts and it became fashionable for actors and other artistes to live well, become celebrities and be respected by society, everyone rushed in there. Talent didn’t matter. Engineering graduates, architects and lawyers suddenly discovered that they too could look good in front of the camera, and so began the rush of mediocrity into Nollywood. Today, Nollywood is at a crossroads. Every actress is a producer or a would-be producer. Every actor is a potential Local Council Chairman or Special Assistant to a Governor, or President of the Actors Guild. The few who claim to be committed pay more attention to their good looks rather their skills.

There are actresses whose claim to fame is their exposure of their anatomy and the fact that this has set the imagination of paying audiences on fire. Every week, there is a young lady or a young man seeking to get into Nollywood, not to contribute to art, but to become a celebrity and also make quick bucks. There are fewer persons willing to pay the dues, or come up with original ideas that can move the industry forward. When a committed artiste speaks up and makes a case for improvement in standards, he is shouted down by those who call themselves “the rave of the moment.” That is what most artistes do these days. They rave.

Is there any point reminding us of the number of persons who wished they could play football and actually tried to play it by force when Nigerians gained a foothold in professional football in Europe and elsewhere? And should you assume that I describe an elite tendency, how about the okada business. The okada is a product of both expediency and necessity. As soon as it became a lucrative business, there was a big scramble to get into that line of business. Even University Professors abandoned research and became okada entrepreneurs. When you visit a typical Nigerian university campus these days, I mean those ones that still have staff quarters, you would be pleasantly surprised to discover that the once serene staff quarters populated by contemplative minds and their once upon a time, equally sober families, have been taken over by kiosks, pepper soup joints, recharge card retail sheds. Those businesses are not necessarily owned by the Professor’s wife, but by the Professor himself! The aluminium business is trying to catch up. When ordinary people do not buy the okada, they try to learn how to play around with aluminium windows and roofs. There are fewer persons willing to learn such trades as bricklaying; mechanical engineering, vulcanizing, painting …too strenuous.

As it with trades, so it is with fashion styles. It takes only one woman to wear something nice; before you know it every other woman is copying the same style. That is why fashion pictures and magazines are so popular: female readers are interested in fashion styles. I once attended a society function where more than 20 women wore the same design and this was not the notorious aso ebi, just a display of lack of originality, every Janet trying to look like Jane. The urge to belong, to be seen to be part of the crowd, childishly interpreted in some circumstances as being progressive has also since affected the NGO community.

NGOs used to be extremely effective in this country; their potentials and achievement were demonstrated during the struggle for Nigerian democracy in the 90s. Foreign agencies supported Nigerian NGOs with donor funds. But that was also the undoing of the NGO concept. Before long, too many Nigerians had set up NGOs, so many of them inside the briefcases and bank accounts of their promoters. It became so notorious that every wife of an important government official found it necessary to set up one. In their case, it is a special purpose vehicle for raising funds from their husbands’ friends and associates and the public treasury. Although two or three First Ladies showed how much could be achieved through good intentions.

I assume that it is the same copycat syndrome that drives Nigerians who experiment with homosexuality and bisexuality. And the militants who have adopted Western methods of terrorism. And the latest revelation that there are Nigerian children who are signing up as suicide bombers. Do we say all of this is human, all too human? Perhaps, But it is also a reflection of the corrosive environment in which Nigerians have found themselves. Our society is so dangerously lacking in higher values, the environment is so harsh it allows for very little creativity. Innovativeness is discouraged and so the young and the not so young can be easily recruited onto available bandwagons.

To imitate is human but we can encourage the scope for creativity and originality by expanding the scope for human expression through good governance. In more progressive societies, young children asked what they would like to become in life could answer: “I’ll like to be a fireman.” A teacher. A nurse. A salesman. A diver. A driver. Plumber. Horologist…knowing full well, that whatever he or she chooses to do, society will offer him or her the best opportunity for growth and fulfilment. Should a Nigerian child make such a suggestion, the mother is likely to scream with every ounce of energy within her: “I reject it in Jesus name. No child from my womb will end up as a fireman or plumber in Jesus name!” It is a pity that this is so.

By Reuben Abati

Once upon a time in this country, it was fashionable to consider certain things impossible, indeed un-Nigerian. Before the 1960s, many Nigerians considered military intervention in Nigerian politics impossible. Even when the first military coup in Africa occurred: not here, was the refrain on the lips of Nigerians. But then it happened. In the 70s, many Nigerians also never imagined a day when many Nigerians would eat crumbs from dustbins as a result of poverty. It also happened. There is a long list of “would never happen-s” which have since become elements of rude awakening in the Nigerian experience. I concluded long ago that Nigerians are capable of anything. Nothing in this country shocks me anymore.

Up until recently, I kept only one line of faith open: I could still argue that Nigerians are not likely to engage in suicide bombing no matter how fanatical they may be about any cause. Even when reports made it clear that a group of Al Qaeda fanatics had set up cells in parts of the North, I still held on to that last shred of faith in the Nigerian. Why? Nigerians I would argue love life so much that they would cling to it; their own lives that is, not the lives of others. They could kill and destroy, but that average Nigerian would like to preserve himself. We are the happiest people on earth, not so? And didn’t one dictionary describe a major segment of our population, the Yoruba as “the fun-loving people of South West Nigeria”. Well, even that my resilient line of thought now appears wishful. Boko Haram has shown us that many are willing to die for stupid causes. The latest incident involving the 23-year old Nigerian, Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab has further proven the point that everything is possible in a country and among a people who lost their moral compass.

Abdul Mutallab is a most unlikely terrorist or suicide bomber. He is said to be a student of Engineering at the University College , London and the son of a well-known and well-heeled father. What could have driven him to such extremes, that he would attempt to bomb a Detroit-bound aircraft with 278 persons on board? And he is a Nigerian! He is young, privileged: the kind of silver spoon kid that everyone would imagine was being groomed to inherit a part of the earth. What could have happened to such a young man that he would think he is better off serving the Al Qaeda? He reportedly got the chemical substance that he wanted to detonate from Yemen , and as other passengers overpowered him, they said he kept screaming about the situation in Afghanistan . How is that his problem? Everyone on that flight must be heaving a sigh of relief that the Nigerian-born would-be bomber failed in his mission and that he ended up with burned legs, and the prospect of spending the rest of his life behind bars.

It is not a good story for Nigeria . The would-be bomber’s association with Nigeria further casts a slur on the country’s image. It took only a few Nigerians being arrested for drug trafficking before we all became drug couriers in the eyes of immigration officials in the West. A few Nigerians added a new dimension to con-art, and the world slapped all Nigerians with the label of 419, as if we invented the confidence trick. When next a Nigerian shows up at any airport anywhere in the world, he is likely to be scrutinised henceforth as if he were an agent of the Al Qaeda. Don’t be surprised if in the next few days, the Western media jumps to the conclusion that Nigeria is a major recruitment ground for terrorists, requiring every Nigerian to be treated with suspicion. Our case will not be helped by the acts of terror in the Niger Delta nor would it be helped in any way by the news that barely a week before the Mutallab incident, a local would-be bomber had tried to deliver a bomb parcel at the offices of Super Screen Television in Lagos . Professor Dora Akunyili must be biting her fingers. At a time when she is trying to rebrand the country positively, one Abdul Mutallab has just made global nonsense of all the seminars, all the appeals, all the campaigns, all the slogans, and all her passion about rebranding Nigerian. What is that slogan again? Good people, great country? Mr Mutallab and his failed bomb would not qualify as a good advertisement.

The Nigerian Minister of Aviation, Babatunde Omotoba must also be having sleepless moments. The would-be bomber reportedly started his journey from Nigeria . It doesn’t matter that he was not detected at the Amsterdam Airport and that nobody suspected him while he was airborne in the Western airspace: more questions are likely to be raised about all flights emanating from Nigeria . For, at the heart of the Abdul Mutallab incident is both home and international security. We need not quibble over the Nigerian side of it: security at Nigerian airports is lax. Oftentimes the screening machines do not work. Airport security would go through your luggage with their dirty hands. Many of them don’t even bother to wear gloves. I saw one guy inspecting one passenger’s (I guess dirty) underwear, and then he was to go through my own bag, I quickly moved to another security personnel. Instead of using metal detectors, on many occasions, the officials frisk you with bare hands, pressing your pockets, with some of the mischievous ones trying to touch what they should not. An allegedly privileged child like Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab may not even need to go through security screening. Big men and their wives and children are often piloted through security; they could go straight to the tarmac to board the aircraft, depending on the scope of their influence. With the power of cash, anything can be taken onto an aircraft in Nigeria .

The story is also not good for Islam. The would-be bomber being a Muslim further strengthens a growing suspicion and stereotype, and an established profile of the terrorist in the mind of the West: the terrorist as Al-Qaeda, the terrorist as Muslim. With this incident also coming shortly after the Boko Haram mass murder in Northern Nigeria, it is difficult to blame those who are insisting that Nigerian faces a dangerous threat from Islamic fundamentalism. But our problem is not with Islam, but with bigotry, and demagoguery, and the colour of bigotry is not Islamic, there are Christian bigots just as there are extremists among adherents of traditional African religion. In 1993, some young Nigerians had hijacked an aircraft, they took it to Niger where they were arrested and subsequently tried and jailed. They were defending the June 12 Presidential election and they were not all Muslims. We must be cautious for there are commentators who are already rushing to judgement against Islamic Nigeria. Nor should this become an occasion for Hausa/Fulani bashing. When Nigerians reduce everything so conveniently to an expression of ethnic contempt, they gloss over the facts of a case. Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab was certainly not acting on behalf of the Islamic North of Nigeria. He is most likely either sick or a product of failed parenting, or simply tragically impressionable.

By African standards, this must be a great tragedy for his parents and other members of his family. The Devil has used their family to discredit the whole of Nigeria and bring shame upon the land. Would they disown him and claim that he is not a member of their family, not even a Nigerian? Most parents would give anything to have their children go to school in England . Children are expected to do well and bring joy to their parents. That is the African way. But to have a child from a well-known family end up as a terrorist is quite revealing. If he had succeeded, I doubt if his parents would feel that he would be on his way to Heaven surrounded by seven virgins as the myth says! Now we know: it is not only the children of the poor who engage in criminal activities; the rich also cry; and in this regard, poverty does not always explain deviant social conduct.

The incident reminds America again of how much it is hated by bigots and fanatics around the world and how vulnerable it is. We live in the American century, but with the enemies of America recruiting agents from all over the world, and the most unlikely places, shows how dangerous the American century is. World peace is threatened. Hate is the dominant spirit of the age. The shape of war has changed: it is no longer on the battlefield; it could arrive in the shape of a pillow, a syringe and a pack of powder and liquid that is designed to kill 278 persons if it works. Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab could have succeeded. He was inside the aircraft; the flight was on its way, effectively inside American territory. Either a fortunate stroke of serendipity or amateurishness foiled the plan. But there is something in all of this about the vigilance of the American intelligence system. They knew about Mutallab, the terrorist. He had been on their watch-list although they didn’t consider him high-risk. Could they have followed him to and from Nigeria ? Even if he escaped the security system in Nigeria (trying to be charitable here), and the more efficient system at Amsterdam Schipol, was he possibly walking into a prepared net? The agility with which someone sitting close by jumped over other passengers and wrestled him to the ground was more than coincidental. Who was the expert Good Samaritan? “They took him out and it was really quick”. A CIA officer on duty? Within an hour, the White House had been informed and a statement was issued with President Obama’s authority; who is also personally monitoring the investigations. There are other angles to this story that are not yet in the public domain.

The Nigerian government has acted properly by issuing a statement. The Ministry of Information and Communications has said that the “Federal Government of Nigeria received with dismay the news of an attempted terrorist attack on a US airline. We state very clearly that as a nation, we abhor all forms of terrorism. The Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria , Dr Goodluck Ebele Jonathan has directed Nigerian security agencies to commence full investigation of the incident. While steps are being taken to verify the identity of the alleged suspect and his motives, our security agencies will cooperate fully with the American authorities in the on-going investigations. Nigerian government will be providing updates as more information becomes available.”

To keep quiet would mean that the Nigerian government does not really care if the Mutallab incident turns all of us into potential terrorists in the eyes of the world. But the statement does not go far enough. It should include a direct condemnation of the would-be bomber and a declaration that Nigerians are peace-loving people. The Nigerian Government must take a keen interest in the details of the investigations at the American end, and also conduct its own investigations as promised. President Barack Obama snubbed Nigeria during his maiden visit to Africa as American President. Mrs Hillary Clinton later visited only to abuse Nigerian leaders. The other day, she classified Nigeria along with Cuba as a country that is able and capable but unwilling to make progress. What other things do the Americans know about us that are not yet public knowledge?

Mutallab, a former Federal Minister and bank chief, and father of the terrorist with Yemeni connections, has been quoted as saying that Mutallab, the son, is a problem child and that months ago, he had reported him to the US authorities. He is also said to be in Abuja assisting the Nigerian security agencies. Mutallab, the father, deserves our sympathies. This is at a private level, the story of his own failure and a lesson to all parents.

By Reuben Abati

“YOU gotta cry to laugh” is the title of a book by Peter Enahoro. Looks like that is what Nigerians are going through, this Christmas. There is so much excitement across the land, people trying to enjoy a two-day Christmas holiday and a weekend, but deep down, the people are aching. When the Lord Jesus Christ was born more than 2, 000 years ago, his birth was heralded by comets which drew the attention of three Wise Men from the Orient. Something phenomenal had happened, and the Illuminati had taken notice. The arrival of the Lord Jesus, Master of the Universe, was to mark a turning point in the destiny of humankind. For God so loved the world that he gave his own begotten son, as sacrificial lamb, so that the rest of humanity may enjoy the grace of eternal salvation. In Christendom, this singular act stands on the same template as the story of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden as part of the extended story of Creation in Christian eschatology. The Birth of Jesus, celebrated today soon came to define the value-system of one of the world’s most popular religious orientations. There are Christians who do not agree that Jesus was born on December 25, Jehovah Witnesses for example, and there have been writings pointing to the claim that the Feast of December 25 has its roots in ancient pagan rites of the Essene Cult or the Great White Brotherhood.

Some students of ancient mysteries insist that Jesus Christ is not God per se, but a Master, one of the enlightened souls in a long list of chosen Avatars, a Master of His Age in an evolutionary chain. But whatever is the true date of the birth of Christ, or the conception of His mission, there is hardly any doubt about the significance of His Life, and the lessons that he taught. Jesus Christ was the Divine Consciousness in Human form, teaching humanity the path to salvation, and the link between man and God. His life and mission as reported in the New Testament were distinguished by high values: humility, compassion, love, selflessness, duty, service, temperance, honesty and honour. These same values are in very short supply in Nigeria which ironically is one of the most religious countries in the world. Close to half of the country’s 140 million population is Christian. Every day, Nigerian Christians wear their religiosity on their sleeves. Nearly every street has a church.

On weekdays, the unemployed, widows, widowers, the sick, the aged, the depressed, the unmarried troop to the churches in search of God and salvation. They are quick to call upon the Lord Jesus Christ. “Blood of Jesus” is probably one of the most popular phrases in the country, and definitely one of the most abused. There is also “In Jesus Name” or simply “Jesus Christ!” Some offices in Nigeria do not start business in the morning until Jesus has been summoned to take charge of the affairs of the day. Every meal is handed over to Christ to guide and bless. In Christian homes, Jesus Christ is said to be in charge, he is in fact the unseen landlord. Government functions usually begin or end with the name of Jesus. Nevertheless, as we celebrate Christmas 2009, I think of how un-Christ-like Nigerian Christians are.

They relate to Christ as a talisman. He makes meaning to them as an OPC, or Egbesu, or as a symbol to be called upon for the purposes of ensuring balance between Muslims and Christians. Considering the number of churches in this country, if the Christian doctrine was being taught and observed, this should be a different land. Christians, in or out of government, do the exact opposite of what Jesus taught. They know very little about His life or the values that He represents. They don’t love their neighbours. They are impatient. The Lord Jesus taught us to shun materialism and not to engage in evil deeds. Many of the looters of the Nigerian treasury are big men in Nigerian churches. Among those accountants who falsify company reports and mislead investors are Christians. Nearly every bank chief that was indicted in the recent shake up in the banking sector is a Christian. And so today, as Christians celebrate in Nigeria , the hypocrites among them should search themselves. They should ask themselves probing questions: am I worthy of the title Christian? Am I His disciple or a mere pretender? Judas Iscariot followed Jesus Christ everywhere, but for a few shekels, he betrayed him. Verily, verily, we are in the age of Judas.

It is, sadly, his example that has endured among men and women who for filthy lucre will sell their kith and kin and ruin the community. They have taken over the church, encouraged by equally guilty clergy. The church of Nigeria , as a general body must ask itself whether or not it is making a difference. Many Christian leaders in Nigeria have latched on to the miracle aspect of the ministry of the Lord Jesus, and so they claim that they see visions, they can heal the sick, they sell olive oil and white handkerchiefs, but in reality they are not teaching the Word, rather they are promoting sorcery. They have forgotten that Christ did not set up a church. His Ministry was not a family business. He did not own a private jet. He didn’t travel first class. He had no bodyguards. He was not a spiritual consultant to presidents and company directors. They call His name, but they do not know Him. Many Nigerians go to church to worship the Pastor not God.

On hypocrisy: as it is with Christians, so it is with Muslims and other religious groups. There is a great need for soul-searching among all who call upon the name of God. God is the source of unity. He is One. The consciousness of God that is shared by all Nigerians should translate into bigger achievements in the community, better behaviour and greater enlightenment. We have lost touch with Him. He no longer speaks to us; we no longer hear his voice. The spirit of Judas has blinded us to the path of faith. And so on Christmas day, we can only cry and laugh. We laugh because we are prisoners of hope. We are forever hoping that the dark clouds in the horizon will clear and that our tomorrow will be brighter. Hope without effort is in vain. We cry because our country is a veritable symbol of faithlessness. A friend and his family have gone off to Dubai for the Christmas holiday. The moment they arrived in that enchanting land, they could not hide their excitement. They called to exclaim that Dubai is ten times better than London ! They abused Nigerian leaders for wasting our oil wealth and turning Nigeria into a big question mark. The children said they would rather live in Dubai , not Nigeria .

It is not difficult to know a country where God still speaks directly to the people. We are a forsaken nation. But don’t blame God, blame the hypocrites. My friend and his family would soon return to Nigeria : they will be returning to fuel scarcity, irregular power supply, a life dominated by sundry criminal activities: kidnapping, armed robbery, accidents and grand corruption, widespread poverty and frustration. Our Lord Jesus Christ loved the poor. He talked about their special inheritance. In Nigeria , the poor are forever poor; they have neither this earth nor the world beyond to inherit. They cry and laugh in their helplessness. Christmas, so close to the end of the year, suggests a certain closure but it is only a year that ends; not the people’s suffering.

The halo of tragedy with which every year has ended since 1999, and beyond, makes life and living in Nigeria such a harrowing experience. Every year, nothing changes. The substance of tragedy is in the interplay of opposite values. Our self-pity makes no difference to the fears that haunt us. We are playthings not of fate, but inept leadership, and our own hypocrisy and self-indulgence. The Master Teacher told his disciples: “I am giving you a new commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you… By this all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love among yourselves” (John 13: 34, 35). If the Lord Jesus were to resurrect a second time today, he would tell Nigerians: “enough of your deceit!…”

By Reuben Abati

AMERICANS have been both lachrymose and hypocritical about the private life of Tiger Woods, and now they have forced the golfing genius to lay down his club, as he proceeds on an indefinite leave to sort out his family matters and be a better husband to Elin Nordegren and their two children. It is like the Clinton saga all over again. And very much like that Governor in New York, Eliot Spitzer, who bedded prostitutes, except that in this case Tiger used his own money and time. In all instances, America’s moral police doesn’t spare blood in reminding everyone of how the mighty has fallen. Tiger Woods’s case is made worse by the black blood in his veins. I imagine White America sniggering: “what do you expect? The man has black blood. It doesn’t matter what those guys achieve in any field of human endeavour; their real brain is somewhere else.” Such racist assertions do not match the facts.

But Tiger Woods has not made his own case easy at all: the list of women that he has taken to the car park, to the back of a car or to his own home, on the couch, in the kitchen accentuates such animalism that is bound to annoy decent members of society. Thirteen mistresses at the last count and more bimbos are putting their foot and mouth in the story to enjoy the limelight and make a few quick bucks! If the frenzy is sustained, I see the list reaching 50 by month-end. (Oh Tiger, that’s incredible!) But shouldn’t the women be subjected to lie-detector tests, to separate fact from fiction? Our dear brother seems to have a thing for white girls, slim, gorgeous, tempting even in photos, but mostly white trash: waiters, porn stars, nightclub hostesses, so-called media personalities. Water finding its level? Tiger has good looks. He is wealthy. His pedigree is rare and distinguished. But he still has to crawl back to the mud and now he has been splattered all over with it. He won’t play golf for a while. He has told us that he is sorry (sorry for cuckolding his wife and making adultery look like the sin that it is); some of the companies that used to endorse him are pulling his adverts; there is no hotter topic on golf courses than the fall of Tiger Woods. It must be painful that a man so gifted, could be so human.

The lessons of his travails and trip to purgatory are quite clear: men no matter how gifted are fallible after all. Public figures have no hiding places: Tiger Woods is the victim of tabloid scrutiny and of the greed of the women in his lives. There are no perfect lives. Not even Woods’: he the old picture of a perfect husband and family man, with his wife and daughter hanging on to him as he won the Majors. To think that after all that role model-ish, photo sessions, the genius was always anxious to hurry off to one of his numerous bimbos and download more unspent energy. This Tiger could not resist returning to the wild of the woods. Man is deceptive. Did the Almighty not look at his own creation and shake his head? However, I think the point on Tiger has been well made, and hypocritical America should spare us the racist insinuations.

America makes too much fetish out of this kind of story. Perhaps we all expect too much from the stars in the public arena. We expect them to be perfect. We expect them to be God-like. We imagine that they are unlike us, ordinary mortals. Yet, always, we are awaken to the reality that human gods have feet of clay. And in skewering them in matters of romantic indiscretion, we are often unsparing with all kinds of frustrated commentators projecting their own problems onto the topic. But what did we expect? Tiger Woods is a creation of the media and a victim of his own success. Corporate America seeking to cash in on his success turned him through their brand adverts into the ultimate picture of perfection. He is supposed to be as perfect as his legendary shots on the golf course. We were all told to be the Tiger or aspire to be like him. Now all of a sudden, Tiger Woods has become the latest poster boy for adultery in America.

All that point about marital fidelity is forever okay, I have no problems with it. But the anti-Tiger noise level is deafening. The other day, his mother-in-law took ill, the way the American press latched on to the story, you would think he caused the illness. A sense of realism is sorely needed. Tiger Woods’ condemnation must be balanced with the equal condemnation of those opportunistic bimbos, those kiss and tell freaks who enjoyed every moment of their dalliance with Tiger and are now telling it all, turning it into an opportunity for sales(wo)manship and profit.

If every pretty lady goes to the press to confess her trysts with prominent men, for a fee, the world will be upside down in a matter of hours. And should men also decide to kiss and tell? Tiger Woods is not a Catholic priest. He is not suffering from acute pericarditis. He has not been accused of turning his golf club into a weapon of assault. He is a healthy, 34, alpha male, full of energy, one of the best athletes of our time. Many of those who are condemning him are plainly hypocritical. They are making it seem as if the man has committed a crime against humanity. Some commentators say he is fake and stupid. Bill Clinton must be shaking his head: “Poor Tiger, Poor Tiger, Oh Tiger.” Tiger probably needs Bill Clinton’s knowledge, and Elin, a few counselling sessions with Hillary Clinton: “Whatever happens, Elin, stand by your man; we must protect the institution of marriage against straying husbands and the long-legged bimbos.”

In matters of this nature, Africans seem to be ahead of Americans. Africans decided long ago, that it is in the nature of men to stray. So they developed polygamy into a way of life. Even in monogamous marriages, heavens don’t fall; careers don’t crash just because a husband is caught in the act. The same may not be said for wives though, because the same African worldview that grants latitude to men insists that a woman is the soul of a marriage, the spirit that must wield it together and keep it pure. In Swaziland, the king takes a new wife almost annually. The late Chief MKO Abiola, symbol of Nigeria’s struggle for democracy, had a wife from every chieftaincy district in Nigeria. Nobody had any problem with that and even the women in the Chief’s household seemed to be very happy with the arrangement. There is a state Governor in Nigeria today who has three wives, a judge, a PhD holder, a lawyer, and all three women run a division of labour system. There is no story there. The difference is in the relative definition of love. Woods went with other women. He does not love his family? One principle that was long established in Africa is that a man can love two women, even ten women, at the same time. Can anyone imagine a woman coming forward to advertise text messages between her and Abedi Pele of Ghana, or Kanu Nwankwo of Nigeria? She will be labelled a blackmailer; the athlete will be hailed for being sound in body and mind!

In Nigeria, polygamy, even bigamy, is taken for granted. I recall one fellow boasting that he had two and a half wives. The half is a mistress who could also end up as a wife. The car crash in front of Tiger’s home may have been due to disagreement between him and his wife. If a wife tries that in Nigeria, she may be returned to her parents immediately: “Do you want to kill the father of your children because of a text message from another woman? If you kill him who will help you look after your children? What is your problem? Are you hungry? You don’t have clothes to wear?” Worse, she could be turned into a punching bag. In The US, the police were nosing around to find out if there had been a case of domestic violence at the home of the Woods.

Tiger wants to take a leave of absence; his own way of dramatising his travails. Let him come to Nigeria. There is a fine golf course in Ada, Osun state, there is another one in Uyo, Akwa Ibom state and if he so wishes, he could serve purgatory at Obudu Cattle Ranch in Cross River State, far from the madding American crowd. And since he does not like dark-skinned, African ladies, Elin needs not worry at all. But should this brother of ours decide to be a little adventurous (not good in purgatory though), he will find Nigerian girls quite understanding and civilised. They will keep his secrets safe. They are not likely to go about selling his text messages to the media, and even if they blab to their friends, the friends know that certain things are better left unsaid. America encourages kiss and tell. That society loves dispatches from the bedroom. Such things provide such instant excitement that is beyond Hollywood. No one should be surprised if some day we wake up to see a line up of pretty ladies in Obama’s life, all looking unlike Michelle, with the media feeding on it. Even secondary school sweethearts could show up to report how they were once kissed in the woods.

Tiger Woods was last sighted in a yacht preparing to go to Sweden, his wife’s native country. There should be a happy ending to his story, all the same. I don’t think he is the villain he has now been turned into. Thanks Nike, for being loyal. The current unveiling of his indiscretions will not diminish that which Tiger Woods represents in his sport. No one can take that away from him. He is one of the finest golfers of all times, and he may still return to win more than the 18 Majors that he seeks. Golf without its biggest player is not the same. Whoever wins any Major in Tiger’s absence, is not really a winner. The question: What if..? will hang over his prize. On or off the field, the image that will endure will be that of Tiger Woods putting phenomenal strokes and doing the impossible with the golf ball. In losing, Tiger still wins. It is not Rachel Uchitel, Jamie Grubbs, Jamie Jungers, Holly Sampson, Kalika Moquin, Joslyn James, quite a long list, better to cut a long story short by saying and all the others, known and waiting to come out, that will define him, not even the withdrawn endorsement deals, but golf. Our Tiger will return from the Woods.

Have A Merry Xmas

HAVE a Merry Xmas, my dear compatriot/Our President is in Jeddah at the King Faisal Hospital/They say he is responding to treatment!/We thank the Almighty for this/And if you have seen the pictures of the hospital, you will thank God for our President/Vice President Jonathan says he cannot sign the Supplementary Budget/ He cannot sign the National Merit Award list/He cannot summon a Council of State of Meeting/ He cannot sign Budget 2010/One SAN even says any Federal Executive Council meeting chaired by the Vice President is illegal/What then can Jonathan do?/Still, thank God my compatriot/ The roads are bad/FRSC says 4, 620 lives have been lost in 2009/2, 428 were injured/over 12, 000 vehicles were damaged/It is Xmas, many Easterners are not going home/They are afraid of kidnappers/Still, let us thank God/Power supply is epileptic/Government says it can no longer deliver the 6, 000 MW it promised/Still, we thank God/As we thank God, armed robbers and assassins are on the prowl/Ritual killers are flourishing/Thousands are jobless/Millions are homeless/Hundreds are searching for crumbs/We thank God still/Even the weather has changed/It is raining heavily in December/No harmattan/We must thank God, compatriot/It could have been worse/It could have been worse than worse/It had always been worse/Fuel queues are returning to the stations/It could have been worse/So, thank God/And have a Merry Xmas if you can.

By Reuben Abati

Fanfare of drums, wooden bells; iron chapter;

And our dividing airs are gathered home.

This day belongs to a miracle of thunder;

Iron has carried the forum

With token gestures. Thunder has spoken.

Left no signatures: broken

Barbicans alone tell one tale the winds scatter.

- Christopher Okigbo, Path of Thunder: Poems Prophesying War (1968)

Peter Enahoro’s father, Asuelimen Okotako Enahoro had written in a letter to him at Government College , Ughelli: “I do not want a mediocre in my family. Even if you choose to become a thief steal something big so people may say of you, he’s a thief, but what a rogue!” (p.105) The younger Enahoro’s life would seem to have been guided all through by this admonition, evidenced by a determination to do everything in a big and dramatic manner, backed by immense talent and a great capacity for distinction and survival. His collection of satirical pieces, How To be a Nigerian (1972) is considered a Nigerian classic, but his latest book, the 743-page Then Spoke The Thunder (presented in Lagos on December 1, and in Abuja on December 7), the publication of which is supported by GT Bank, is an amazing tour de force, a classic in its own right. In it, Peter Pan tells the story of his life and times in the past 70 plus years, its twists and turns, from his princely beginnings as the descendant on both parental sides of illustrious men of royal valour and two diligent parents who brought up their ten children with strong instruction in values, tradition and Christian piety, to a life-time career as a journalist that is no less distinguished and eventful.

This is Peter Pan in his most expansive flight as a recorder of events. It is not difficult to see why more than five decades later, he is still highly regarded for his terrific pen: a pen that has taken him round the world, into exile, to some of the exotic haunts across continents; a pen that has brought him both friends and enemies in high and low places alike, and which has brought him close to danger, despair and tragedy. Peter Pan says this is not an autobiography but that is precisely what the book is. It is his view of the coin of African, Nigerian and world history; his life as he has lived it, the fact that it is an ongoing life notwithstanding. With this publication, Peter Pan should have immense cause for self-congratulation; if he had not written it, we probably would not have missed it, but now that he has written the book, given its scope and flavour and extraordinary literary value, it would have been a sad loss if it was not written. Enahoro’s narrative is sustained by the staying power of his sturdy and lyrical prose, his sharp memory, attention to detail, and his deft deployment of the raconteur’s multiple devices.

It is most appropriate that this book has been published in the run up to the 50th anniversary of Nigeria ’s independence, and more than 50 years after many African states made the transition from colonial rule to independence. From the royal roots of the Enahoro lineage, the encounter of his ancestors with British colonial rule, Lord Lugard’s imposition of an artificial country up to the golden moments when Nigeria was a decent society, Enahoro sketches the Nigeria of old with its proud citizens, and decent schools and communities, all the way to the moments of gradual failure and eventual collapse. His riveting description of the “Gathering Clouds” in the 60s conveys a descent into anomie, the failure of the professional political class, and Nigeria’s intelligentsia, the destruction of esprit de corps in the military, the rise of ethnic and sectional sentiments, rank corruption and how a country which was once held up as the pride of Africa, became like the other failing states across the continent in the 80s and 90s.

The tragedy of Nigerian nationhood looms large in this narrative, but in spite of that tragedy and the various occasions in which Peter Pan, and members of his family, the Igbos, democratic rule and Nigeria itself show up as victims of that tragedy, the author remains bound to the land of his birth by the force of destiny. But this is not just about a struggle with the native land, and conversations with it, Peter Pan’s canvass covers the African continent and beyond: his many travels particularly in Africa . He offers interesting profiles of African leaders and insights into the roots of underdevelopment in post-colonial Africa in Ghana , Uganda , Ethiopia , Tanzania , Liberia , Libya , Sierra Leone , Gambia , Congo , and so on. But Peter Pan is not always fair. He is a man whose prejudices are as strong as his convictions and he does a poor job of displaying his prejudices. He should be prepared for many of the targets of his cynical conclusions or their descendants insisting on their right of reply. He is kind to those he considers his friends, notably members of his family, particularly his parents and his brother, Tony whose stardom is a recurrent refrain, Wole Soyinka, Sam Amuka Pemu, J. P. Clark, Christopher Okigbo, Don Abili, Fred Egbe, Henshaw Olawale Danmole but he is brutally unkind to those who may have offended him or those he considers pretenders in the corridors of history.

His version of Bini and Yoruba history and the connections between both, his commentaries on Emmanuel Ifeajuna’s character and his role in the January 1966 coup, Walter Ofonagoro, Chief Ike Mokelu, General Olusegun Obasanjo and the Daily Times, his put-down of Julius Nyerere (he dismisses the famous Nwalimu as “a hypocrite”), his account of his relationship with Raph Uwechue, and his justification of his opposition to Chief MKO Abiola and support for the annulment of the June 12 Presidential election could stir more than the hornet’s nest, even as he suggests that he is “setting the records straight” (p.412). Whose records? But taken together, Peter Pan’s assessment of the leadership crisis that Africa has had to endure since the exit of the colonial authorities rings true. This is the account of an observer-participant, an outsider with more than a close inside-connection. It is in many ways Peter Pan’s own way of getting back; there is much self-accounting, a review of previously held positions and honest admission of his own inconsistencies, and “a degree of naivety” (p. 244), and a little settling of scores, subtle and not so subtle, as well as a re-interpretation of received truths and official history, both colonial and post-colonial.

Regret however: Peter Pan directed that Emmanuel Ifeajuna’s handwritten account of the Jan 15, 1966 coup in his possession be burnt and he is unable to fully recall its contents. The adopted style of telling it as he sees it, and the courage to be brutally frank was the hallmark of the Peter Pan column, but it was also what led to his problems with the military authorities who came to power in July 1966, and the beginning of his many years of exile. When the thunder struck, Peter Enahoro found himself in its path, and long before the NADECO route became famous he opted for it. He conveys in graphic detail, the madness that seized Nigeria in 1966, culminating soon enough in the civil war and his role physical and intellectual in it all, and how military intervention, corruption, and loss of innocence prepared the grounds for the floundering of Nigeria all through the years.

Peter Pan describes himself as eclectic in his philosophy, you can add radical, progressive and non-communist, and although his world oscillates between Roman Catholicism, spirituality and ancestral worship and traditions, there is no mistaking the ironies of his own life, the twists and turns that have turned him into a perpetual wanderer. He sounds in his Peter Pan column as having supported military intervention in the General Aguiyi-Ironsi months, but he soon fled when the Northerners took over in July 1966, then as an exile he showed sympathies for the Biafran cause, but he would in the future return to serve the military and accept positions under a military government; he would in one breath express support for democracy and federalism, but under other circumstances he defends the annulment of an election that was universally adjudged free and fair. But placing his cards face up, Enahoro does not spare himself either.

This is also as well, a journalist’s story well told. “Success as a newspaper columnist has its show-business glamour but journalism has its cruelty”(p. 227). Quite apt, and the author’s journalism career, which defines his life fully, and at every turn, illustrates this in great detail. We are reminded reading him of the role of both the media and the intellectual in society. His quotations from the Peter Pan column and the combination of fame and anguish that it brought him indicate just how delicate and risky the business of public affairs analysis could be. Peter Pan was the candid and prophetic columnist, the oracle of his time, and one of the most original promoters of the power of the pen.

Both man and persona became intricately fused, and whereas Peter Enahoro went on to become an international author and journalist: Deutshe Welle, African, New African and founder of Africa Now, he is highly regarded for his power of analysis. His great talent is an open tribute to the education system of old, in a country where the school system has virtually failed, and his likes are now in short supply. Peter Pan tells the stories of the Daily Times, of publishing an African magazine from abroad, and the intrigues of journalism practice, in a manner that they have not been previously told. It is again ironic that he was part of the Daily Times at the height of its glory, and also Sole Administrator in the winter season of the once great institution. There is no mistaken the manner in which the story of the Daily Times parodies the story of Nigeria itself; the failure of the latter so painfully reflected in the collapse of the former. Daily Times was a victim of the lack of enlightenment of the military elite and its own internal contradictions.

There is however one point with regard to Peter Pan’s journalism; he describes himself as being non-partisan but there is no doubt that he enjoyed an unusual closeness to authority figures and actually revelled in it; this rather than his brother, Tony’s politics probably accounted for the attitude him towards in certain official circles. How much distance should a journalist keep between himself and the subjects of his reporting and analysis? So much display is made of dinner at Presidential palaces, officially arranged trips to parts of the world, a flight being delayed on one occasion to await the arrival of the great Peter Pan, receiving “one half of a slaughtered ram and a large hand-woven Fulani cloth …” from the Sardauna of Sokoto, being a Guest of the Premier, phone calls to Babangida, private meetings with Aguiyi-Ironsi, Abacha and other world leaders.. In other circumstances, this could raise questions about objectivity and professional ethics: to wit – how much intimacy should exist between the Fourth Estate and the Establishment. Nonetheless, Peter Pan comes across as a defender of press freedom; but the more important value are the unmistakable lessons that younger journalists can learn from the details of his career as international correspondent, editor, columnist, author and media entrepreneur, and the vagaries of journalism practice.

Peter Pan has played a significant role in the development of journalism as role model and mentor and as reference point in the history of Nigerian journalism, but his account of exile is of a different flavour from similar accounts, even if he pays attention to racism and the complex nature of human beings. Sustained as he was in exile by his talent and cosmopolitan outlook; his is not the exile of beggarly dreams but a consciously sustained choice. He writes about the journey of his own becoming, linking the past to the present, and the private to the public in various dimensions, and through memorable characters that crossed his path and humorous circumstances, his own joie de vivre and many travels and interviews, he reawakens interest in those pertinent questions: Quo vadis Nigeria ? Quo vadis Africa?, never ever losing sight of that question forever posed by his mother: “Don’t you know who you are?” The author of Then Spoke the Thunder leaves us in no doubt that he surely knows who he is, and in reading him, we discover a sense of humanism, of family values, and strands of the stories of our own lives. Reading the book may require some effort considering its length, but the reader will not be disappointed, every page along the way.