By Suyi Ayodele

Isabel dos Santos is the first daughter of Angola’s longest-serving president, José Eduardo dos Santos, who died on July 8, 2022. The late Angolan president ruled the country for 38 years (1979-2017). Isabel grew up in the presidential palace. She became influential in government circles. That transformed her to become rich, not just rich, but wealthy. At a time, Forbes recorded her as the richest woman in Africa. She leveraged on her father’s presidency to corner good business deals. She sat atop Boards of the nation’s biggest companies from telecommunications to oil, prospecting for precious stones and other thriving enterprises.

But now, the ‘Daddy’s Girl’ is in trouble. Forbes, for instance, has deleted her from the hall of fame of the richest in Africa. Why? Shortly after her father left power, the truth of how she became wealthy started coming to light. All over the world, where Isabel has her assets, there are plans to have them frozen. The reason is simple. The ex-first daughter is said to have acquired her wealth through underhand dealings during the 38 years her father ruled Angola.

This is how Forbes, in a May 27, 2022, article, describes her: “As best as we can trace, every major Angolan investment held by Dos Santos stems either from taking a chunk of a company that wants to do business in the country or from a stroke of the president’s pen that cut her into the action. Her story is a rare window into the same, tragic kleptocratic narrative that grips resource-rich countries around the world.” The summary of Isabel is that of a lady who became wealthy without any antecedent of good business in the enterprise world. Her father, the late president Santos of Angola, was the proverbial squirrel that cracked her financial palm kernel.

At home here, we have more than enough shares of our own Isabel dos Santos. Never in the history of Nigeria have we been assailed by the impunity and affluence of the children of our leaders. That ugly trend started with General Muhammadu Buhari, who, as our husband between 2015 and 2023, could not impose the simple discipline of discretion on his children.

In this current political dispensation, we have had an Olusegun Obasanjo as our president. The most noticeable of his children, while he presided over our affairs (1999-2003), happened to be his first daughter, Iyabo. While one may find it difficult to defend the claim that Obasanjo was instrumental to Iyabo becoming a commissioner in Ogun State and later a senator, we cannot deny the fact that the woman, on her own, has all the credentials required for those positions. And, on a general note, besides her foray into politics, Iyabo remained lowkey all through her father’s presidency. I cannot recall here, any inanity she engaged in.

The late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua’s children did not come across as children who were over-indulged when their father was president between May 29, 2007, and May 5, 2010. The best we knew of his children while he was in office is the fact that his daughters, Zainab, Nafisa and Maryam, all married into homes of affluence. His successor, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan (GEJ), is unarguably the only president in this dispensation with no known indulgence of children. Apart from his wife, Madam Patience, who was loud and frivolous like other First Ladies of this era, GEJ succeeded in reining in his children. Majority of Nigerians don’t even know the names of President Jonathan’s children. They were shielded, and still shielded from public glare. “Clueless”, as they labelled the Otuoke-born politician, Jonathan has demonstrated to us that he has full and adequate control of his children.

In contrast, the one they said is the Mai Gaskiya, and epitome of discipline of our era, General Buhari, is the one who first subjected our sensibilities to serious attack with the way and manner he used the State resources to pamper his children. Hanan, one of Buhari’s daughters, took advantage of her father’s position to fly about in Presidential jets to attend the most frivolous of all functions like flying to Bauchi to go and take photographs of the traditional Durbar and the architectural designs in the city!

The Presidency later explained to us that the president’s daughter needed the Bauchi photographs for her fieldwork in her Master’s programme at one of the universities in the United Kingdom. Bunkum! Needless to say, when Hanan touched down in Bauchi with the Presidential jet and the insignia of the president, Bauchi State Government officials were at the airport to receive her.

If we felt that we have seen it all in Buhari’s case, Nigerians have new tales to tell in the attitudes of the children of our current husband, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu. From the first daughter of the president, Folasade Tinubu-Ojo, to her two brothers, Seyi and Yinka, it has been one indulgence to the other. Seyi, until his father was prevailed upon, was said to be attending the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in the Presidential Villa. While Yinka has been relatively self-effacing, Seyi remains loud and ubiquitous! At one time, he was spotted in the Presidential jet enroute to Kano to go and play polo!

The president’s son was present ‘officially’ when the new Chief Justice of Nigeria was being sworn in. Someone said the big boy was learning the rope, that one day may come when the young shall grow and he will swear in his own CJN.

The most recent of the explorations and exploits was the trip by Seyi and Yinka to Maiduguri, Borno State, last week. They were said to have gone to the flood-ravaged state to commiserate with the victims of the self-inflicted pains caused by the failure of government to do what is right. In the one-minute and 18-second video of the visit in circulation, not less than 20 Borno State Government officials received the duo at the airport. And before you ask if the Office of Sons of the President is part of our government structure, Seyi and Yinka were driven straight to the Government House to see Governor Babagana Umara Zulum; and from there, they were moved to the Palace of the Sheu of Borno, Alhaji Ibn Umar Garba, in a state-visit style. On that trip were a handful of aides, whose duty was to attend to the nation’s First and Second Son!

I tried to rationalise that trip. Someone, however, said that my attention should be on the kindness Seyi Tinubu demonstrated in Maiduguri. The president’s son was said to have donated N500 million to the victims of the Borno flood, in addition to other items. Wao! I think, like it was suggested to me, Seyi deserves our accolades. He is such a generous son of our husband. His mum, (or, step-mum), Mrs. Remi Tinubu, also donated the same amount (N500m) to the flood victims, days before Seyi breezed into Maiduguri. Nigerians are fortunate to have such a generous First Family. We should not ask how Seyi made his money. That will amount to what my people call etanu (malicious envy)!

When you have a father who was once a senator, who once ruled Lagos for eight years, and still appoints who rules the state to date, you cannot but be rich. When the man who sired you transformed from being a kingmaker, National Leader of an opposition-turned-ruling party, and becoming the president of the most populous Black nation, N500 million is nothing. Why? The elders of my place say that when the madman is given a hoe, he makes the heaps in between his two legs.

Nobody begrudges a child who resembles the father (Omo ò lè jo baba ká máa bínú omo). Seyi cannot have a father like Daddy Tinubu, who does not know the tribal marks money has, the Ninalowo (Money is meant to be spent), and be stingy! “What is money? Money is nothing. Premium or Nothing.” Those are lyrics of Flavour the Afro-pop star in his Big Baller Single. The aides and officials who were on that trip would also ‘lick’ their fingers; I take a bet on that! My friends, Seyi’s fans, told me that he is a “self-made man”, and I agreed with them. Most children of our politicians are “self-made.”

One of the “self-made” children of our leaders was also in the news last week. His name is Abdulaziz Abubakar Malami, son of the immediate past Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF), Abubakar Malami. If the video is real and its content true and correct, Abdulaziz is just 29 years old, but he already has a conglomerate that runs into billions of Naira. The narrator in the video, where Abdulaziz’s wealth is flaunted, said that the young man has in his employ, over 2,000 staff. The narrator added that besides being a lawyer with a law firm located at Sani Abacha Road, Birnin-Kebbi, Kebbi State, there was nothing else about the one described as “the third youngest Nigerian” managing one of the richest conglomerates in Nigeria.

The junior Malami is said to own a secondary school, a university, a clothing line, hotels, a rice mill, supermarket and others. His father, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), and former AGF is just 57 years old. Before the senior Malami became a minister under Buhari, he was not known as old money. But the God of transformation smiled on his family. There is nothing God cannot do. Today, his son, who is not 30 years yet, is said to sit atop a conglomerate that employs over 2,000 Nigerians. All we are required to do is to praise the boy’s ‘industry’ and his sense of ‘patriotism’ in establishing companies that have taken away a full 2,000 people off the job market. Some children came to this world with the star of fortune! Juxtapose the aforementioned against this story from the days of my childhood.

We were three little primary two pupils of Local Authority Primary School East (LA East), Ikole Ekiti. The first is a cousin. He will not be reading this because of his present circumstances. The second, my childhood friend, and twin brother, is an officer in our state’s local government service commission. Then, yours sincerely was the leader of the ‘gang’ that day.

Our Eskisi ma, (teacher), had a presence. We knew her as Eye Pelu (Pelu’s mother), that’s what the locals called her. Pelu, her son, was our classmate too. It was harvesting time. The older pupils in the higher classes worked on the school farm and harvested groundnuts. A basket of the groundnuts was kept in our class. We had the mid-day break, called “long break”, and Eskisi ma stepped out of the class. Pelu took the advantage. He went to the basket of groundnuts, took a handful, and beckoned on us to come forward for our ‘shares’. He attached a condition. He took the mother’s cane and announced that anyone who accepted to be flogged by him would partake in the groundnuts.

In my little head, I knew that taking the groundnuts in the first instance without permission was wrong. I was taught that early in life. Besides, I could not reconcile why Pelu should flog me first before giving out the groundnuts; we are of the same age bracket. Then, something also told me that the items belonged to all of us, and Pelu was just an Omo Tisha (the teacher’s son).

I stayed back. My cousin and my friend likewise. The three of us shared the same bench in the class. When Pelu was through with those who volunteered to be flogged, he came to us. He asked why we didn’t get up to collect groundnuts. Trust yours sincerely, I was the spokesman for the ‘rebels’. I answered by saying that the groundnuts were not his’ and he had no right to take them or flog anyone. The devil took over Pelu. He landed the cane on me. Mine was a natural reflex. I leapt on him like a leopard. The two other rebels joined. It was a commotion. Sacrilege! Nobody would dare touch an Omo Tisha those days! A classmate once told me that he nearly fainted the day he saw his teacher answering the call of nature! Teachers, then, were regarded as deities, not mortals. Pelu’s yell attracted those in the adjoining classes.

Eskisi ma and two others rushed in. They saw the ‘abomination’. The fight stopped. The three of us stood up, we knew we were in trouble. One of the Eskisi mas that followed Eye Pelu wanted to descend on us. Eye Pelu restrained her. Our Eskisi ma asked what happened. We explained. She confirmed from one or two other pupils if Pelu indeed took the groundnuts, and she got an affirmative answer.

It was like a flash. The next thing we saw was that Pelu was on the floor. The mother, with her heavy presence on top of him. She was beating, pinching and kicking the son. Then she burst into tears. We were alarmed. Other Eskisi mas and sirs came and took her off the boy. The three of us, musketeers, lost colour. We were shaking like a virgin seeing ‘it’ for the first time. We knew we were finished. If Eskisi ma could handle her son, Pelu, the way she did, there was nothing she would not do to us. We waited with bated breath.

Normalcy was restored. Eskisi ma simply went back to her table without looking in our direction. She ordered everyone back to their desks. The three of us stood where we were. She looked at us and asked us to go back to our seats. We obeyed her. Minutes later, class resumed, and Eskisi ma taught us as if nothing happened. That session ended and we moved to a higher class. Eskisi ma did not change her attitude towards us, she never mentioned that we once beat her son. No other teacher reprimanded us for beating an Omo Tisha (teacher’s child).

The lesson registered in my heart in an indelible manner. I got to know from that cradle incident that it is the responsibility of every parent to teach his or her children ethics, morals and good discipline. Pelu’s mum felt bad that her son would go and touch the groundnuts kept on her watch. She knew it was wrong to use the community’s patrimony to indulge her son! No leader should do that! She felt she had failed; that was why she cried while beating Pelu. Wonderful woman, our Eskisi ma, Eye Pelu! While on this script, I asked my friend about Eye Pelu. He answered that our Eskisi ma is healthy and kicking. I owe her a visit; I intend to make that happen as soon as possible. Such a treasure must be honoured! Do we still have leaders like her around?

It is obvious our “self-made” children of today are lucky. They did not grow up when we had many teachers like my old Eye Pelu. He did not sit under the tutelage of a no-nonsense Eskisi ma, who had the orientation that State property is different from one’s personal effects. They don’t have the picture of their school Eskisi mas or sirs, beating up their children for daring to touch what belonged to the entire school without permission.

They did not grow up under a mother, like Eye Pelu, whose philosophy is, ohun tí a fi ńké omo wà lórí àte Òyó (what one uses to over-indulge a child is only gotten in the wares of an Oyo trader). Growing up, they were probably not told to differentiate between government property and assets and family belongings. From the State House in Lagos to Aso Rock Villa in Abuja, the philosophy is, gbogbo ejò ni jíje (all snakes are edible). So, leaping to Kano from Abuja in the presidential jet for a polo game is no big deal. Donating N500 million from an inexhaustible bank account is as easy as A B C!

As for those who think that these children are like Angola’s Isabel dos Santos and would want to interrogate their wealth and the tax or taxes they pay, I have one piece of advice: Tell your own old man to join politics and conquer the world like Alexander the Great, Napoleon and yes, our Nigerian husbands!

By Tonnie Iredia

With several dramatic developments such as political violence, mudslinging, commercialized processes, threats and other incidents which reflect what is known as ‘federal might’ in Nigeria during elections, yesterday’s governorship contest in Edo State can easily qualify to be the story of the moment but it is certainly not the best story for posterity. This is because there is no difference between the said Edo governorship and any other Nigerian election.

Unknown to many people, there are numerous bizarre events in our country other than electoral malpractices that are always swept under the carpet but which really deserve to be heavily publicized. One of such matters concerns the wilful destruction of the career of fellow citizens by some people in authority. The story of an innocent jurist, Walter Onnoghen, Chief Justice of Nigeria CJN (2017-2019) aptly fits in here.

Last week, the media was replete with reports that the Court of Appeal Ibadan Division had approved a proposal by the federal government to settle out of court with Justice Walter Onnoghen, a former CJN who was challenging his premature removal from office in 2019. The Code of Conduct Tribunal had convicted the former CJN for failure to correctly declare his assets as a public official. Although Onnoghen appealed the judgment at the time, it is only being heard now! One of the first things posterity stands to learn from the case is that some 5years ago, the Nigerian judiciary did nothing about the decision of the executive branch to illegally disgrace the head of their own arm of government out of office.

It was not the first time that politicians had attempted to so act, but in other similar cases, the judiciary decisively and promptly struck down the plan. In 2009 for instance, the then Kwara State Governor and the State House of Assembly had acted together to remove the Chief Judge of the State, Justice Raliat Elelu-Habeeb. The judiciary however rejected the attempt for the fundamental legal reason that the Chief Judge of a state “cannot be removed or disciplined without the input or participation of the National Judicial Council NJC.” Interestingly, Justice Walter Onnoghen was one of the 7 justices of the Supreme Court that heard the case. The Apex court had taken the same position when similar attempts were made to remove or appoint the Chief Judges of Rivers, Plateau and Ekiti states.

Each time the executive and the legislature attempted to remove a Chief Judge (CJ) without involving the Judiciary, the NJC did not only reject the action, it went on to penalize any judge who accepted to be sworn in to act as CJ because every judge was expected to be reasonable enough to reject being part of an unconstitutional transaction. For example, in 2018, the NJC at its 85th meeting expectedly rejected the purported removal of Justice Theresa Uzokwe as the CJ of Abia State. It also penalized Justice Obisike Oji “for allowing himself to be sworn in as acting chief Judge thereby colluding in, and aiding an unconstitutional process.” With the handling of the cases in Kwara and Abia, which were followed in dealing with similar cases in other states, the NJC had set a standard no one expected it to depart or shy away from no matter whose axe was gored. 

But in 2019, when the then CJN, Walter Onnoghen was wrongly removed from office, the executive branch headed at the time by President Muhammadu Buhari also proceeded to appoint and swear in another justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Tanko Muhammad to serve as Acting Chief Justice of Nigeria. The NJC neither rejected Buhari’s action nor did it penalize Tanko Muhammad for accepting a constitutional breach which favoured himself.  Indeed, the Judiciary relying on the technicality that usually a court trial is never stopped allowed the trial of the nation’s Chief Justice at the Code of Conduct Tribunal. The NJC also ignored the petition by the erudite Olisa Agbakoba SAN to extend to Tanko Muhammad what it applied to Obisike Oji a year earlier. Instead, the NJC after a few months took two steps, first, it recommended an extension of Tanko’s illegal acting appointment and second, recommended a few months later, that the appointment be confirmed.

Now that the federal government is seeking an out of court settlement over the removal of Justice Onnoghen, one is tempted to ponder over what the sacked CJN did not do before that he has now done to deserve the olive branch that is currently being offered to him. Could it be that the earlier charges against Onnoghen were fake? Of course, it can’t be otherwise because the government has no business seeking to settle out of court with a judge it removed from office after a conviction by its favourite court – the Code of Conduct Tribunal. The only other way to look at the subject is to accept the thinking in many circles at the time that Onnoghen was coerced to face trumped-up charges to stop him from playing any role in the election petitions that would follow the nearby 2019 presidential elections.

Posterity would consume much time to marvel at the role played by certain actors in the saga. To start with, why was the nation’s top most judge subjected to media trial? Onnoghen was accused of submitting an inaccurately completed assets declaration form to the Code of Conduct Bureau. It was also said that the former CJN naively admitted that it was an error on his part which made the government feel justified to arraign him to face prosecution at the Code of Conduct tribunal (CTC). Virtually everyone perceived Onnoghen as a crook especially as government indicated that it had uncovered many of his hidden assets which reportedly included 55 houses and several bank accounts. It was in fact stated that the former CJN in breach of extant laws, maintained foreign accounts.

Forgetting its foremost ethical value of balance and objectivity which demands that all the sides to a story must be published, the media indiscriminately opened all its organs for several uninformed commentaries. Some legal professionals actively joined in the unfortunate media trial which they knew to be an undue interference in the process of justice delivery. In fact, one senior judge who claimed to have been in practice forabout half a century said his own assets were a little fraction of what the former CJN allegedly had in his accounts. Yet, no one, be it journalists, lawyers or average citizens bothered to get the views of the suspect who had become indicted before trial. The nearest the nation got to hear from the accused was what people said Onnoghen claimed to have said.

In addition, the nation did not get to know how the relevant law expected Onnoghen’s alleged offence to be handled. Meanwhile Section 3(d) of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act which is a public document specifically provided that where a person who failed to document all his assets makes a written admission of his non-compliance, no reference to the Tribunal was necessary. In other words, the immediate intention of the law was to first ensure compliance rather than rush to punish non-compliance without an opportunity for the wrong doer to effect corrections to his error. If so, why was Onnoghen summarily sent to the tribunal for prosecution instead of being offered a second opportunity to collect fresh forms to include his alleged previously undisclosed assets.

There are more important questions. First, why were some publicity-seeking senior lawyers calling for Onnoghen’s resignation as if that was the exact punishment legally prescribed for anyone with incomplete assets’ declaration? Second, why did analysts keep quiet when it became clear during the kangaroo trial that government was unable to identify up to 5 of the 55 houses earlier said to belong to the former CJN?

Third, why did the protagonists of ‘Onnoghen must be punished’ go dumb when it was revealed that what the former CJN only operated government approved domiciliary accounts for public officials and not foreign accounts?

Fourth, why was Buhari’s government not condemned for what my favourite Professor Milo Moro would describe as devious opprobrium? Fifth, will the present government that has shown good disposition to Onnoghen’s case, appropriately immortalise him through the naming of one major national edifice after him? Anything less would be ungodly.

Many concerned Nigerians have taken to the streets and various social media platforms lamenting how difficult it has been for them in feeding their children, let alone sending them back to school to kick start their fresh academic session.

In Lagos State for example, students had gone on a long vacation after the 2023/2024 session ended on July 19, 2024.

Accordingly, Primary and Secondary schools in many parts of Nigeria resumed for the 2024/2025 academic session Monday, September 19, 2024; especially in Lagos and Delta States. No doubt,the resumption literally sparked debate on the growing challenges faced by parents and guardians as well as the country’s education sector. Schools are also not spared from the shocking consequences of the trending scourge as patronage significantly dropped in many private schools.

In the face of high living costs, families are struggling to provide basic educational needs such as school fees, transportation, and materials whilst the minimum wage is just N70,000 amidst rising inflation which is currently at double digits.

It is recalled that UNICEF, the UN agency for children, reported in June 2024 that around 11 million Nigerian children were experiencing severe child food poverty. The report says this translates to one in every three Nigerian children under five years old.

UNICEF defines severe child food poverty as consuming no more than two out of eight food groups.

Globally, 181 million children under the age of five are considered to be facing severe child food poverty. Nigeria ranks among the 20 countries that account for 65% – almost two-thirds – of these children.

The UNICEF report further indicated that four out of five children experiencing child food poverty globally are fed only milk or a starchy staple, such as rice, maize or wheat. Less than 10% of these children are fed fruits and vegetables. And even fewer, less than 5%, are fed nutrient-dense foods such as eggs, fish, poultry or meat.

This is utterly worrisome, heart-rending and preposterous.

However, to function well in this dire strait, the Nigerian government needs to take proactive, responsible, responsive and well-informed decisions in tackling the many socio-economic conditions that are disrupting education across the country, bearing in mind the potential long-term and short-term negative impacts it could have on children’s education and the future of the country if not quickly nipped in the bud.

While it is important to applaud the long-term benefits of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s economic reforms across many sectors of Nigeria’s economy, his team also needs to look inwards and give priority to short-term benefits as well, so that the citizenry can have a breather. Understandably, Mr. President is barely sixteen months (16) in office, he can still make a difference in the shortest possible time for the greater good of the downtrodden and other vulnerable segments of the society.

It is a well-known fact that the youth of any country is a great asset. They are indeed the future of the country and represent it at every level. The role of youths in nation-building is more important than one might possibly think. In other words, the intelligence and work of the youth will take the country on the pathway of success. As every citizen is equally responsible, the youth is too. They are the building blocks of a country.

It therefore becomes imperative for governments across the board (Local, State and Federal), corporate organizations, religious bodies and other critical stakeholders in the society to embrace a purposely paradigm shift by investing heavily in the education of Nigerian children, so that the future of Nigeria would be remarkably great and desirable. May God bless and prosper Nigeria.

Ajibulu, an infopreneur, social media influencer, writer, communication consultant and publisher of veracitydesk.com wrote from Abuja. He can be reached via [email protected]

By J.S Okutepa, SAN

Section 285 of the 1999 Constitution establishes Election Petition Tribunals to adjudicate over electoral disputes for governorship, National and state Houses of Assembly elections in Nigeria. In the same way, the Electoral Act 2022, gives the Federal High Court the jurisdiction to decide pre-election matters. Appeals in all these matters both pre and post elections go in most cases to the Supreme Court except for post elections disputes where the appeals in National and State Houses of Assembly terminate at the Court of Appeal.

The reasons parliament gives jurisdiction to the judiciary to determine these electoral disputes are not far-fetched. It is believed and assumed rightly in my view that the judiciary being an unbiased arbiter will ensure that democracy is not truncated by political hoodlums and rascals. It will decide electoral disputes without fear or favour, affection or ill will. Judges are not politicians. Partialities are not parts of the attributes of judicial officers.

Parliament then reasoned rightly in my view that the judiciary is best suited to call political actors to order and will act as checks and ensure that the will of the people or the sovereignty of the people which is the basis of any legitimacy in electoral context is not undermined.

The judiciary was therefore expected to team up with the people in adjudications so that the mandates of the people are not snatched by processes that lacked legitimacy.

Unfortunately, the experiences over the years showed that despite these laudable legislative initiatives, political impositions and rascality, which are contrary to democratic norms always get the judicial stamp of legitimacy in most cases. It is observed with profound respect that despite the laudable legislative interventions to give justice to victims of electoral frauds and manipulations in Nigeria, the judiciary appears to have effectively blocked access to electoral justice by the kind of judgments it gives in most cases in electoral jurisprudence in Nigeria.

The roadblocks to justice in electoral jurisprudence are based on bad judicial precedents set, which precedents have enabled political actors to rig and bypass due process with audacity of arrogance and impunity. These precedents have enabled electoral rascality to thrive in the most barbaric manner in the Nigerian brand of democracy. These precedents acquired notoriety from 2003 and became more terrible under the 2015 to 2023 general elections in Nigeria.

The concepts of demonstration of documents, dumping of documents, calling of polling units by polling units agents, certified true copies of public documents must be tendered by the makers and to the now requirements that no subpoenaed witness can testified unless his or her frontloaded statements on oath are filed along with the petitions within 21 days allowed to file petitions are such judicial precedents that have effectively put spanners in the wheels of electoral justice in Nigeria.

As a lawyer who has consistently prosecuted election petition cases for “losers” over the years, my experience show me that no matter the volumes of evidence, the judiciary appears to have taken stand and seems to be siding with the people who have no regard and respect for the sovereignty of the people. This is clear in several decisions that emphasised more on arid anachronistic legal jargons and technicalities that are rooted in caricature justice.

No matter the best of efforts, by legal practitioners for the petitioners, most decisions hide under what the judiciary called sui generis, to cause havoc and deal terrible blows to democratic processes. Judiciary in most cases developed blind eyes to many fraudulent manipulations either because it is overwhelmed or there are some other considerations that are not truly visible for some of us outside the judicial system to comprehend.

For me, until the judiciary decides to see wrongs where wrongs are visible even for the blind to see, and then overrule or is prepared to depart from road-blocking precedents it has set as shown above, there is no need for anyone to waste time, resources and energy to file election petitions in Nigeria.

Let everyone who has what it takes to write results write it and then approach the compromised and commercialised institutions of INEC and security agencies to enter the results on the relevant forms and then announce the “winners.”

This way, there will be no need for judicial officers to be moved from their normal stations to Election Petition Tribunals. Judges will then be focused on their normal judicial cases. This will also reduce the waste of state resources to pay huge amounts of money to defend fraudulent electoral victories. There are some people who are experts in blocking access to electoral justice and are making huge money from petitions filed who don’t deserve this money.

It is therefore my proposal to all “losers” of elections in Nigeria not to waste time and resources to file election petitions because it is earlier for an elephant to go through the eyes of the needle than for anyone who was robbed of victories in our elections to get immediate remedies and electoral justice. Technicalities are now being used to aid and abet the fraudulent democratic processes in Nigeria. This is the reality of the matter.

by Lasisi Olagunju

Are Nigerians hungry because they’ve been drinking too much free beer and now the brewery is bankrupt? I ask because President Bola Ahmed Tinubu waxed rhetorical Thursday last week as he dissected the very bad hunger wracking his country and its more than 200 million people. “I understand we are hungry, but no free beer parlour anymore,” he said. Except the president is suggesting that we are a nation of drunkards, I am tempted to wonder what shred of meaning connects “hunger” and “beer” here.

What the president said was a rhetorical gaffe that deserves a rebuke. When a person says what he said and in the context he said it, the Yoruba would look at him and wonder why he is talking ìrù (tail) when we are talking irú (locust beans). What are we saying, what are they saying? We are begging for bread; they are belching beer. The old man saw liquid when his people cried solid. The president’s ‘learned’ supporters will insist that ‘beer’ is the president’s metaphorical substitute for ‘food’. That will be interesting. We’ve always suspected that metaphor serves as a ready refuge for the flawed – especially in the very slippery terrain of politics. But the Emilokan rationalists should remember to tell the president that a successful metaphor is one that is apt. When the vehicle and the topic cohere in semantic peace, we congratulate the metaphor birther for a successful delivery.

His preference for “beer parlour” where ‘food bank’ should be was a tragic subversion of aptness in metaphorical deployment. A mandatory credit pass in Literature is recommended for whoever would be president after this one. ‘Beer’ does not collocate with ‘hunger’.

The beer-parlour talk of the president may be one of his lasting contributions to language and the field of political rhetoric. You never can tell. He already, during the 2023 campaigns, dropped ‘balablu’ as one of his hit singles. Sometimes, what the enemy thinks is blemish ends up embellishing one’s memory. We call it èébú d’olá in Yoruba. William Archibald Spooner lived between July 1844 and August 1930. Between those years, he served as a clergyman, author and professor of ancient history, divinity and philosophy at the University of Oxford. He was described as “a well-liked, respected, genial, kindly, hospitable man” but blessed with “a head too large for his body.” Spooner was brilliant but was equally very absent-minded, and he got famous for it. He, in 1879, from the pulpit, famously gave out the first line of a popular hymn as “Kinkering Kongs their titles take” (instead of ‘Conquering Kings Their Titles Take’). And he did it, not intentionally.

When Spooner died, his obituary in the 1 September, 1930 edition of Manchester Guardian contains this passage: “All sorts of stories, probable and improbable, were invented… Of the well-worn ones, the best are those which made Spooner declare that he was leaving Oxford by ‘the town drain,’ that some unauthorised person was ‘occupewing his pie,’ that at a marriage it was ‘kistomary to cuss the bride,’ and that he was tired of addressing ‘beery wenches.’ Much better authenticated and not even a Spoonerism is his famous reply to a young lady who asked him if he liked bananas. He is said to have retorted, ‘I’m afraid I always wear the old-fashioned nightshirt.’”
That Guardian obituary was not only how Spooner was remembered. Because he said all he said, before he died, the English Language got enriched with one more permanent word – spoonerism. The word proceeded to get a barge of honour as a rhetorical device in literature – and a mention in neuro science.
Who knows, courtesy of our president, ‘beer’ may enter the English Dictionary as a synonym for ‘food’ just as the president’s social media enemies, irreverent children of anger, use ‘agbadoan’ as a collective name for his long-suffering fans. Agbado is the Yoruba name for corn. The president, before his election, recommended it as a solution to the hunger on the streets.
Now, more seriously, let us ask the president and his defenders: Can beer replace dinner? Or could it be that we are hungry because our leaders have been taking too much freebies from our liquor bank? Or could it be that our president has been too far removed from the caked reality of the scorched earth for him to know that the world is about to end courtesy of his apocalyptic policies? When the president said what he said and ended it with a demand for patience from the hungry, I heard a loud applause from his fawning followers. The president enjoyed that applause. How I wish he would read Shakespeare in ‘Pericles: Prince of Tyre’. The playwright says: “They do abuse the king that flatter him.” He says again that “kings should let their ears hear their faults.” Clapping when the leader spoke beer when food was needed was distressing; it numbs the soul. But you would ask who made up that adulating audience? Former principal officers of the National Assembly. They are plaintive ex-eagles desirous of new feathers for fresh flights and feasts. They are men who are ready to kneel lower than their knees. A high-five for what the president said shames all – especially the eight million plus who elected him last year.

The president also spoke about “free bowl” which he said hungry Nigerians “cannot just take”. Then he spoke about the closure of Nigeria’s “free beer parlour”. The tone, texture and context of Tinubu’s beer-and-bowl statement trivialized the people’s travails. Who will help Nigerians tell their president that their hunger is not for beer and the inebriation it offers? That the starvation cries in town are not a craving for free meal. That Nigerians do not seek, and are not demanding indebtedness to charity. All they seek are policies with a human face, a government that cares.

The town writhes in agony because government has lost its meaning. Every citizen has a personal reason for voting in elections. One of those reasons is what English philosopher, Bernard Bosanquet (1848-1923) explains as the hope by the citizen that the government would help him to become “what he has in him to be.” Not all who voted for Tinubu last year did so for party, tribe or money. Some genuinely thought he would make a positive difference in their lives. Now, everyone is stranded because the government crashed the car.

The country is in deep trouble. What is broken in our economy is brittle beer bottle, not calabash. It cannot be mended. It doesn’t look like the government is worried as we are about the present darkness. Where leaders do not care, we would be right to inquire what they have where a heart ought to be. If there is a heart there, then it must be made of something very hard. William Bascom wrote of the Yoruba concepts of the wicked and the hard-hearted: “A hard-hearted person is bad-tempered, easily offended, willful and stubborn, doing what he likes and paying no attention to what others say. When an ordinary person in anger would throw a small lump of dirt, a hard hearted person throws a large stone. Worse than the hard-hearted person is one who is ‘wicked’ (ìkà).

A wicked person loves no one but himself; he advises others to sell things for less than he knows they are worth; he injures others and destroys their property without cause…” I agree. The wicked counts the number of stars he shoots down. Last week, US vice president, Kamala Harris, told talk show host, Oprah Winfrey, that a leader’s real strength lies in “who he lifts up, not who he brings down.” She said the same, and much more, in another interview in April this year, long before she became the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate:

“We need a protector”, the interviewer told Kamala Harris.

And she replies:

“Yes. Sadly, over the last many years, there has been this kind of perverse approach to what strength looks like, which is to suggest that the measure of one’s strength is based on who you beat down instead of what we know that the true measure of your strength is based on who you lift up. You know, and if you ever want to measure, if you ever want some objective indication of your individual power, see what you can do to help other people, people in need. It could be some simple act, like just listening to how people are feeling and to sincerely, sincerely have some interest and concern about their well-being or their suffering. That’s what we want from leaders…That’s really what strength looks like and that’s the kind of strength that we want.”

That is the kind of strength Nigerians demand to see in their president. They do not desire a leader who sits somewhere far in the sky and speaks in tongues about hunger and patience; about beer, bowls and booze. A leader should not preen like a god while his people reel in pain.

We also read the president declaring last Friday that he was in government to work and not to make money. I read him and said great! A leader should take less and give more. “The less a man needs, the nearer he is to God who needs nothing,” said Socrates. But we read of our leaders’ stories of grasping and taking that leave us to wonder if some people’s needs have a limit.

About 50 years ago, Sakara music legend, Yusuf Olatunji, had cause to sing: “You said there is no food but your own children feed to satiation (E ní kò sí, kò sí, omo yín ńyó…).” Between the 1970s when the song was sung and now, what has changed is that things have grown worse. Our presidency is famed as the most powerful in the history of presidential democracy. It is also sadly, the most unfeeling. Ghanaian writer, Ayi Kwei Armah, asks: “Is it always true that it is impossible to have things strong and at the same time beautiful?” Our Federal Government is strong and powerful but so are wolves and lions in the jungle. We think our president should be king – or god – and we have him so invested. That should explain why a president says the wrong things and all palms turn zombie, clapping.

In a careless republic as ours, a president can easily become a virtual monarch, or even a god. We will soon be there – if we are not there already. It is possible some people have a shrine where they make offerings of kola and liquor to the Nigerian president. If they do, they would have several pages of history to guide them. One of them is in the West Africa magazine of March 3, 1945 which published a piece in celebration of the memory of an Alaafin who had just joined his ancestors. “The highest oath that an Oyo man could take was to swear by the head of the Alaafin,” the magazine wrote, and added that the people believed the late oba was divine. The oba himself thought himself so and he said so and acted so. How?

Eshugbayi Eleko was deposed as the Oba of Lagos in 1925 by the British. He was subsequently banished to Oyo town but he didn’t go quietly into the night; he went to court. During the ensuing celebrated case, evidence on some historical issues was needed in support of the deposed oba. It was to the Alaafin of Oyo that counsel to Oba Eshugbayi went.

The Alaafin was asked to swear before his evidence was taken.

Alaafin queried in anger:

“By whose name?”

“God’s name or by the name of your idol,” the lawyer told him.

“I myself am God!” the oba replied.

By calling himself god or God, the Alaafin of 1925 had not said what no one had ever said.  About 300 years earlier, King James I of England uttered something weighty about the king occupying a throne almost as powerful as God’s. King James told the English parliament on Wednesday, 21 March, 1609 that “kings sit upon God’s throne, but even by God himself they are called gods.” A king, he said, could make anyone “beggars or rich at his pleasure; restrain, or banish out of his presence…” And he used that power, and faced resistance – from the Catholic Church and from other churches. He fought and won. He enjoyed exercising that divine right, quashing opposition, bringing people up, casting people down. But his son, Charles I, who succeeded him didn’t have the grace he had. History says Charles was fought, defeated, arrested, tried by a parliamentary court and found guilty of charges which included devising “a wicked design to erect and uphold in himself an unlimited and tyrannical power to rule according to his will, and to overthrow the rights and liberties of the people”. At his execution at about 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 30 January, 1649, Charles insisted that he did no wrong, that the people were his subjects who should really have no “share in the government.” He stressed that “a subject and a sovereign are clean different things.” May God give Nigerians the sense to continue to have a share in their government.