…Commends Court of Appeal, Abuja Division For Declaring the Section a Blatant Violation of Constitutional Provisions and thus, Null and Void

Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress and erstwhile National Publicity Secretary of the defunct New People’s Democratic Party, (nPDP), Chief Eze Chukwuemeka Eze has restated that the palpable gloom of apprehension which engulfed the camps of the opposition People’s Democratic Party and other individuals and groups opposed to the Presidential project of the Minister of Transportation, Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, led to the inclusion of the controversial section 84(12) during the amendment process of the Electoral Act.

Chief Eze stated this in reaction to the ruling of the Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja, which described the

section of the new Electoral Law as unconstitutional, null and void and of no effect.

The said section 84(12) provides thus: “No political appointee at any level shall be a voting delegate or be voted for at the convention or congress of any political party for the purpose of the nomination of candidates for any election.”

In a statement made available to media houses in Abuja, Chief Eze said though the Court in its wisdom struck out the suit marked: FHC/UM/CS/26/2022, which was filed before the Umuahia court, It is however gladdening to note that the Three Man Panel of the Court of Appeal in Abuja on 11th May while delivering judgment on the appeal marked: CA/OW/87/2022 filed by the PDP, accepted the fact that Section 84(12) as being pushed by the party is illegal and inconsistent with provisions of the constitution.

The three-man panel of Justices led by Justice Hamma Akawu Barka, held that the high court, from whence the suit emanated acted without jurisdiction in the first place.

The Court, while determining the appeal on the merit, held that Section 84(12) is grossly unconstitutional and inconsistent with Section 42 (1)(a) of the Constitution and denied a class of Nigerian citizens their right to participate in election.

The appeal followed the judgement of the High Court in Umuahia, which in March, struck down section 84(12) of the Electoral Act, 2022 and ordered that it should be deleted by the Attorney-General of the Federation for being inconsistent with the Constitution.

Eze highlighted that the blunt refusal of the National Assembly to amend the offensive section of the new law, even after the President and other enlightened Nigerians pointed out to them that the section is an attempt to deny a group of Nigerians from participating in the 2023 general elections, could be construed to mean a scheme to achieving some mischievous ends which amongst others is to fight the Nigerian project viz the Presidential aspiration of the Transportation Minister, Chibuike Amaechi.

“It is unfortunate that the National Assembly, against history, went ahead to refuse to heed to the appeal of Mr. President and some patriotic Nigerians that the section is illegal and must be amended accordingly, just because the National Assembly and those urging them on this evil mission are afraid of the candidature of Rt. Hon. Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi and a few others”, Eze stated.

It would be recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari had before assenting to the Electoral Act Amendment Bill 2022, expressed his reservations with that portion of the electoral law, which he described as discriminatory.

The party Chief however commended the red chambers for the amendment of Section 84(8) of the Amended Electoral Act 2022 failed to provide for the participation of statutory delegates in conventions, congresses or meetings of political parties held to nominate candidates for general elections.

The move was sequel to a bill sponsored by the Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege (APC, Delta Central), as the upper chamber said the unintended error committed by the omission must be corrected before the start of party primaries next week.

Eze said it would have been more beneficial if the speed the Lawmakers are exhibiting to amend section 84(8) was also deployed to ratify the error in (12) but commended the Court for doing the needful.

Statutory delegates to congresses and conventions of political parties are elected councillors in all the over 8,000 wards across the country, elected chairmen and vice chairmen of the 774 local councils, elected members of state Houses of Assembly, elected federal lawmakers in the National Assembly, and governors of the 36 states and their deputies.

Others include the President and Vice President of the country and executives of political parties at the state and federal levels as well as chairmen of parties at the local government level.

Eze appealed to Nigerians particularly those in dire need of a visionary and result oriented leader like Amaechi to win the 2023 general elections to continue to pray for good to prevail over evil in Nigeria.

By Lanre Adewole

There are 109 senate races across the country and nomination contests are on-going across party lines. But unlike elsewhere, where such an exercise is voter-driven, back home, is at the whim of governors. When they are not retiring to the senate, they are sending equerries to hold in trust. Occasionally, when a different outcome is recorded, it becomes a shock win, particularly at party level. It is also not certain that the winner would end up being the party’s candidate, especially now that the Supreme Court has incredibly held that the deeds of a political party can’t be queried. We will pay, soon, for turning party’s state chapters to governors’ merchandise. I digress.

Despite the gun-point nomination process we have adopted, what is playing out in Nasarawa North Senatorial District and its end-game effects on the local politics of the state and the nuances of the governing All Progressives Congress at the national level should ordinarily push the nomination contest between Senator Godiya Akwashiki and his challenger, Judiciary Encyclopedia, Danladi Halilu, to the centre of political discourse. Between the duo, there is a recent history.

In the early days of March 2019, Godiya, fresh from his election as a Distinguished, was stripped and beaten in Abuja by family members of Danladi for allegedly seducing the wife of the former Secretary of the National Judicial Council (NJC). The senator-elect, was allegedly caught in the act. Lavishly reported in the media, police had to step him, with both Godiya and Danladi, who was a benefactor to the senator-elect when the seduction scandal broke out, being invited and questioned by the police authorities in the federal capital.

Solomon, the great Biblical King should know. He said three things are too wonderful for him in Proverbs 30:18. One, the way of a snake on a rock. Two, the way of a ship at sea and the third, is the way of a man with a maiden. Even in the western world where they practice coated infidelity, as open marriage, men still rage when they sight other men, chosen by their wives as the agreed sexual partners outside marriage. Ejo nbe lorun awi sokun. (Armaggedon is finally here). Imagine Will Smith, slapping Chris Rock, over Jada Pinkett, the same woman with whom he is practising open marriage, simply because the comedian “dragged” her at Oscars. The same woman you signed on other men sleeping with? What exactly is wrong with men?

If Smith could go wild because of a woman like Jada (no disrespect meant), Danladi’s response to Godiya’s obvious indecorous communication with his wife, would be deemed appropriate, only that as an icon of the Judiciary who served eight Chief Justices of Nigeria as the Secretary of the NJC, he should have restrained his own, from taking the laws into their own hands on his behalf. His wife, however, deserves a gold epaulette. Sensing that Godiya, the godson, was beginning to manifest the saying “onibara nbole bo” ( the beggar manifesting kleptomania tendency), she quickly activated the red alert button, but the family agreed to play along, to nab the alleged debaucher on the wrist. She signposts the optimism that marital fidelity isn’t completely lost to the dogs, running the ultra-liberal movement. All can still be well.

Well, Nasarawa elders and APC leaders, sensing a catastrophe if any of the two, is arraigned for assault or enticing a married woman, waded in and the matter was resolved in the manner of a family affair, with Godiya writing to withdraw the assault complaint and Danladi’s clan, letting go, the enticement charge. Everyone went home somehow happy, until police came early in the year, doing their thing, their way.

On January 19, celebrated online medium, Premium Times went to town with a police report clearing Godiya and indicting Danladi and his own. The report said the police probe clearing the senator, was inconclusive, thereby putting the benefit of the doubt in his favour. How do you declare a winner in an inconclusive election? But that is the Nigerian police, which couldn’t obtain call logs to establish the veracity of the recorded conversation between Danladi’s wife and Godiya, but still went ahead to clear a party and indict the other, in a case, both parties, agreed to settle as brothers.

Danladi was enraged when the report hit the airwaves. He promised to fight the injustice. When practically everyone was expecting him to institute cases against Godiya, police and the publishing house, he played a fast one, making a play for Godiya’s seat, which was in the safe column, until the big fish dived in.

What a way to teach “thou shall not ogle.”

Danladi’s entry into the nomination battle simply changed all permutations. The three A-lister leaders of the party in the state are now involved. APC national chair and former governor of the state, Abdullahi Adamu has no scruple showcasing his affection for Danladi. With uncharacteristic wide-mouth smile, the always glowering Adamu almost cuddled Danladi at the unveiling of his nomination form. Adamu’s arch-rival and former governor, Senator Tanko Al-Makura is likely, still smarting from the drubbing he got in his (Adamu) hand, well, with presidential support. While Al-Makura’s ticket for Nasarawa South is almost assured, the Danladi/Godiya contest, is an opportunity for him, to test strength again, with his conqueror for the national chair seat. This time, without the mighty presidency, Al-Makura will try to deliver for Godiya, to even score with Adamu. If Al-Makura succeeds, he may be opening a floodgate of eyeball-to-eyeball against the chairman, from other places, especially in the presidential contest where aspirants are already being compelled to sign undated undertaking, withdrawing from the race that has barely started. APC wonderment, you say.

To prove his community value, Adamu must-win for Danladi. Then, there is the state governor, Abdullahi Sule, who, by APC’s arrangement, is the leader of the party in the state. He has been hoisting Danladi’s poster, dancing to funny local beats by his side. But the music that politics dances to, isn’t the everyday R&B. But if Sule has truly joined the Danladi train, then Godiya is likely stranded. Just because he couldn’t look elsewhere?

Credit:tribuneonlineng.com

Inside Stuff With MARTINS OLOJA

When I read the other day that some powerful patriots in the governing party, the APC had concluded plans to return former president Good-luck Azikiwe Jonathan to power, my soul magnified the Lord that at long last, the most populous black nation on earth would fulfil destiny sooner than later. I hope most right-thinking members of the public would recall part of the last words of the iconic Nelson Mandela on how the destiny of the black race and indeed the future of Africa could be tied to Nigeria’s ecosystem, sorry development. The respected old man, Madiba had noted to a Nigerian diplomat who visited him before he joined his ancestors that: ‘The world will not respect Africa until Nigeria earns that respect. The black people of the world need Nigeria to be great as a source of pride and confidence…’

It is even on record that Madiba granted the interview in which this quotable quote emerged to Dr. Hakeem Baba Ahmed, then permanent secretary, foreign affairs ministry when Dr. Jonathan was in power. It was again unfortunate that some artful dodgers and powerful campaigners in APC outwitted the then ruling party, the PDP and plotted the defeat of President Jonathan who sources said had in April 2015 prepared a blueprint on how to fulfil the vision of Madiba for Nigeria.

I understand that the man of destiny from Otuoke, Jonathan took those Mandela’s words on marble seriously because the leader whose tenure prepared South Africa to be a member of both the G-20 and BRICS did not predict his country to lead Africa and the black race. He saw Nigeria as the authentic Giant of Africa. Again, the APC moneybags we didn’t see as ‘enemies of Nigeria’ truncated Nigeria’s dream of becoming the undisputed leader of the black race when they plotted the strange defeat of Jonathan in 2015. Meanwhile, top sources in Abuja have said that a few oracles in the ruling party have seen that some angry patriots are prepared to sue the party and indeed those who packaged the presidential candidate then for truncating Nigeria’s destiny through the 2015 presidential election.

I understand that those who are in the vanguard of revamping the party’s rickety structure before restructuring the country within the construct of the much-needed federalism everyone is clamouring for are behind the risk, sorry expediency of bringing back Jonathan. They want to bring back the good man, the first president who came to office with a doctoral degree. They want to return him with a mandate to take Nigeria from a Third-World, debtor nation to a First World. It is understood that the arrowheads of the right-the-2015-wrong strategic campaign for Jonathan’s return have bought hundreds of copies of Lee Kuan Yew’s auto-biography, ‘From Third World to First: The Singapore Story: 1965-2000’, which details how the legend, Yew led Singapore from Third to First World. The copies of the book are said to have been distributed to members of a shadowy implementation committee of the #Bring-back-Jonathan campaign.

There is therefore a sense in which we can understand the born-again patriots who have specialised in choosing our leaders that have taken us to where Madiba recognised us, to bring back Jonathan for a strategic rebound from the brink Ambassador John Campbell, a former American envoy has written about several times. That member of the United States Council on Foreign Relations, Campbell is a ‘prophet of doom’. We should not allow him to weep more than the bereaved anymore about the most populous black nation on earth. Campbell has been part of the people who were looking askance and standing akimbo when Jonathan’s government was being pilloried by the then opposition party, APC, which asked Jonathan to resign because of the level of insecurity confined to the North East then. The then opposition party pointed out through the then national publicity secretary (today’s minister of information and culture) that Jonathan’s administration’s attempt to tag the Boko Haram insurgents as terrorists, was clearly illegal.

What was worse, the Obama administration then citing our anti-gay marriage law, failed to sell arms to Nigeria. And when the same Jonathan’s government went to a black market in South Africa, to procure arms to defeat Boko Haram, the same opposition elements tipped the Jacob Zuma-led government off and the money for the black market deal and the aircraft chartered for the operation were seized. Who understands till the present that the man of God whose Mission owns the chartered airplane hasn’t recovered from the trauma of demonisation of the dark time for Jonathan and the Word of Life Ministry of Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor. That is why I feel that critics of the bring-back-Jonathan campaign should deepen their understanding about the ingenuity of the masterminds behind the deal. It is good for their remorseful moment especially now that they too are beginning to note that people can now understand the artful packaging they did in 2015, which has led to the present darkness. They need to rehabilitate, sorry return Jonathan who recruited foreign mercenaries that once squared up with the insurgents the present administration rejected. They want to bring back Jonathan who constituted a remarkable cabinet comprising some of the brightest including a Princess, an architect and oil-industry aficionado who turned around the oil and gas industry and institutionalised fuel subsidy as sweeteners and slush funds for party and election management. Now that the fuel subsidy has gone haywire on the watch of the 2015 packaged candidate whose integrity they now know has been grossly overrated, they can bring back Jonathan who can also bring back Diezani Alison Madueke who though is still facing trials on massive corruption charges and has quietly exploited plea bargaining mechanism to return some dollars to the EFCC treasury being investigated. They can bring back our Jonathan whose wife, a famous wordsmith, an impresario can excite the nation again with some quotable quotes that can make a way for millions of dollars worth of gifts she once confessed to the court she got from executive admirers of her artistry and effervescence.

Don’t we need that kind of First Lady again who would not need to disturb, sorry court the apex bank for forex to make wealth? Would you recall the thesis of that wizard called Chinweizu (Ibekwe)? In a remarkable book, ‘The Anatomy of Female Power’ during the IBB wonderful regime, he notes after a reality check, that we should live with a ‘thesis’ that although men rule the world, women actually rule the men that rule the world. It thus appears that the ruling party’s masterminds have just studied Chinweizu’s un-putdown-able book and come to terms with its reality.

Don’t get it twisted please, the bring-back-Jonathan campaigners are post- #EndSARS protest patriots who would like the country to fulfil its destiny. Can’t we all see that what the iconic Chinua Achebe noted in 1983 in his classic, ‘The Trouble With Nigeria’? Achebe the prophet, had in that pocketsize book noted that, “the trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership”. The ruling party’s restructuring committee may have just realised that the trouble with the Nigeria they now govern is simply and squarely a failure of leadership.

Yes, failure of leadership that has lost control over insecurity they promised to deal with in 2015. We need to understand their dilemma: they may have just realised that though they promised to deal with corruption as a bad ulcer that thrives on the medications applied to it over the years, their regime has woefully failed to deal with it. What is worse, for them, even the (unconfirmed-by-the-senate since 2015) head of the anti-corruption agency, EFCC they have relied on to deal with the public enemy called corruption has been dealing with only few enemies of state actors. And behold, the then anti-graft acting chief executive even curiously faced corruption charges. Anyway, he has been promoted (AIG). Why won’t they look for Jonathan’s return, after all, as they may have realised that, in the main, corruption index in his (Jonathan’s) administration was more favourable. Or so it seems.

Some gossips and fake news carriers in the country have been spreading some incredible items around why Jonathan has to return to Aso presidential villa to rebuild the country’s ruined walls. Some have said that it is a masterstroke by some northern elements who want to bow to the clamour for a southern president in 2023 and Jonathan fits in as he can spend only one term having spent one legal term from 2011-2015. The ordinary analysts are saying that in this plot, there will be a strong vice presidential candidate from the North who will eventually succeed Jonathan and spend another eight years. Other mere risk analysts (not oracles) in this regard who claim to be close to the power house in Abuja and the north are saying at different pepper-soup joints that Jonathan’s name has cropped up at this time for a strategic reason: that president Buhari has come across so many documents of some corrupt transactions (in Jonathan’s government) that the former president might not be aware of while in office. So, they want to blackmail him to accept some terms that are still hazy on the 2023 presidential election. I don’t believe in these conspiracy theories at this time. What should be discernible to all is that a game is on. Those who have been playing their beautiful game with Nigeria are at work again. They have seen some good in the man of destiny from Otuoke. They have suddenly remembered the magic wand and statecraft he used to confine insurgency to only Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states in the North East. In Nigeria, their Nigeria today, banditry competes with insurgency and kidnapping everywhere we go in the 36 states. We can’t go home for Christmas and New Year because even the government is saying it is hazardous to travel again. Even the years the locusts ate in Jonathan’s time were not as perilous as we have now. Why won’t they campaign for the man they demonised in 2015 while repackaging a man whose body language they told us could produce electricity megawatts? Since that is the limit of their understanding and knowledge of where they think we should be, let’s doze off again as the artful fixers continue with their sophistry that will lead us to where Mandela would want us to be on behalf of the black race.

• The original texts of this relevant article appeared here (Inside Stuff) on Sunday December 6, 2020

By Afe Babalola SAN

THE Nigerian political space is gradually getting saturated with the gradual dawning of the 2023 General Elections. Unsurprisingly, the news media have be filled with the political campaigns and interviews of Presidential, Governorship and Legislative Houses hopefuls who have tried to curry the support of the electorate. These efforts are, of course, backed by party delegates, political godfathers, and influential people. Ahead of the elections, politicians will have no qualms promising absurdities and outright impossibilities to a populace that, while tired of politicians’ poor performance, has yet to demonstrate a genuine willingness to hold them accountable for failing to deliver on previous electoral promises. It is expected that these campaign promises will be centred around the yet-to-be-resolved issue of security, infrastructural development, health, employment, electricity generation, agriculture, and education. Politicians will promise millions of jobs, the construction of schools, the rehabilitation of roads, the revitalisation of the educational sector, and the revamping of the medical sector, all of which appear to be doable and indeed expedient on the surface except for the lack of any intention to carry them out.

False assurances

Regarding education, promises will be made to build new schools, free schools, and provide free food while current schools continue to be deprived of funding for salary payments and facility repairs. Many roads in Nigeria are now in appalling condition. Nonetheless, cases have been documented in the past in which a road that is completely inaccessible to any type of motorised vehicle is reported in the government’s archives as having been restored or reconstructed time and time again. Many politicians will forge paperwork pertaining to their eligibility to run in the elections even before winning their party’s primary. To be certain, the phenomenon of lie telling by Politician is not peculiar to Nigeria alone. It pervades the whole planet so much so that academic studies have been dedicated to study just why Politicians lie.

In his article entitled “Six Reasons why Politicians lie”, Jim Taylor Ph.D. stated as follows: “I’m constantly amazed by how often politicians lie and then, of course, their unwillingness to admit that they lied. The euphemisms that politicians use for what is, in many cases, bold-faced lies are legend. Politicians misspoke. The biased media misinterpreted what they meant. Politicians’ words were distorted, misrepresented, twisted, exaggerated, or taken out of context. They overstated, understated, or misstated. But, of course, politicians never lie, at least that’s what they say. Yet, the unvarnished truth is that politicians do lie about things substantive…The $64,000 question that is constantly asked is: Why do politicians believe they can lie and not get caught?”

He then identified the six reasons why Politicians lie as:

Many Politicians are narcissists.

Narcissists are arrogant, self-important, see themselves as special, require excessive admiration, have a sense of entitlement, and are exploitative. 2. Politicians know their followers will believe them, even in the face of irrefutable evidence to the contrary. 3. People don’t want to hear the truth. 4. The Internet never forgets. 5. Cognitive biases. 6. If a lie is told enough times, people will assume it is true. Another school of thought contends that politicians must lie in order to maneuver within the political and leadership environments in which they find themselves. Arguing this view in his article titled “Why Politicians lie”, Dr. Ichak Adizes stated that: “The theme of lying politicians is not exclusive to the USA. In the fifty-two countries in which I have worked, I hear the same complaint: “We cannot trust our leaders. They are evasive. They hold back from telling us the truth, etc.” So why is it a global phenomenon that politicians lie? Because they have to.

I got this insight from working with prime ministers and presidents of various countries, while at the same time working with CEOs of very large companies. Leaders of major conglomerates and of countries exhibit very similar leadership styles: They are evasive, play their cards very close to the vest and do not share information if they can help it. They use big words to obscure their real intentions. They often “lie,” skirt the truth, too.

Why? The higher you ascend up the hierarchy, the more political the environment becomes. Those you are interrelating with have their own interests—be they personal, or of the unit they manage—and there is a struggle between all these interests. As a leader you have to manoeuvre between all these pressure groups and powerful individuals and survive the manoeuvring. If you are truthful about your intentions and make them known, you are giving information to those who want to unseat you, who want you to lose so they can gain. You lose the capability to manoeuvre politically. It would be like a military leader making his battle plans known to the enemy during a war. And folks, up there in the organizational hierarchy, whether of a country or a corporation, it is a war.”

There are times when lying is not a crime and when it is essential. However, the reality is that in this region of the globe, politicians’ lying has grown so common that care is required. When a falsehood is repeated, people come to believe it is true, according to Dr. Taylor. Furthermore, as he pointed out, it is quite simple for a falsehood to persist on the internet in this day and age, to the point where many people would regard its existence on the internet as conclusive confirmation of its validity.

Links between lies and lack of trust

The argument must also be underscored that deceiving the electorate into voting based solely on lies is fundamentally immoral. Such actions invariably result in a loss of trust between the government and the people it governs. It explains why many Nigerians have always believed, even before independence, that the government cannot be trusted and that everyone in government is entitled to a piece of the “national cake.”

Explaining this, Martin Meredith in his book, “The State of Africa”, stated as follows: “The misuse of public funds in Nigeria had deep roots. During the colonial era, many Nigerians regarded government institutions as olu oyibo – whiteman’s business, an alien system that could be plundered when necessary. Government’s business is no man’s business, ran a popular Nigerian saying.” Explaining the practice, Eghosa Osaghe, a Nigerian academic commented: ‘there was thus nothing seriously wrong with stealing state funds, especially if they are used to benefit not only individual but also members of his community.

Use the power and resources

Those who had the opportunity to be in government were expected to use the power and resources at their disposal to advance private and communal interests.’ The attitude prevailed with the coming of independence. The state was regarded as a foreign institution that could be used for personal and community gain without any sense of shame or need for accountability. Plunderers of the government treasury were often excused on the grounds that they had only ‘taken their share.’ What added to the problem was the notion that the government was in effect, a reservoir of ‘free money.”

As elections approach, I encourage politicians to examine the consequences of their deception. While it may earn them political office, it will cause them to lose the faith and trust of people they rule, and the country will suffer as a result. I can only hope that the country’s fortunes and the urgency to protect it will one day completely resonate with our policymakers.

AARE AFE BABALOLA, OFR, CON, SAN, LLD. D.Litt.