Buhari is Fighting Corruption from the Front by Abdul Mahmud.

Babachir. Ikoyi Dollars. Baru/Kachikwu saga. Kyari MTN sleaze. Paris fund bailout theft. Illegal Recruitments. Ekiti-Fayemi N13b saga. Timipreye Sylva. Amaechi/Rivers/APC Campaign slush fund. Maina.

The list is calendar-long.

"Buhari is fighting corruption from the front".

Yes, he is, dear Buharists!

Have you taken your medication today? Try another sanatorium, perhaps a better-equipped psychiatrist can help you out of this illusion: "Buhari is fighting corruption".

Take Neurontin. 

Don't forget to swallow one tablet daily (after a meal).

It is an antipsychotic.

It will help your condition,

dear Buharists.

Lawyer, Columnist, Poet, Contrarian & the Oracle. Educated at Jos, Nigeria; Durham & Reading, England.

AWKWARDNESS by John Chizoba Vincent.

carving their names on the world’s flesh like scars,

they won’t waste their breath on the news of dead men.

if there are things humans should learn, it is how to

leave their emotions out of the equations uncourtly,

Keep an eye on their flank, naturally and neutrally.

under a worried sky, the wind striped, blood shattered,

not in this rat hole shall children learn to sip passage of

rotten loyalty from their fathers. through sun and

through shadows, we’ll walk by the side of the sun.

the sky, the earth’s fate is bound till eternity,

If that up goes down, the other is a reminiscence of

forgetfulness which is seen in the heart of women.

we can heal each other, we can reclaim perpetuity,

a fable told from the book of Azra, trust issues but

not in the cuddled care of mother fate whose template

Of love swells and faints at the sight of an oblong face.

let’s man this forest of people that beloved hatred,

let this castle of cruelty home you after the night.

  

we’ll watch the black linen of the stars across

the eyes of the Eagles in the sky for boring of nature,

we’ll book Edom for the sins of Moses when time

takes part in the howling of the oceans could be

So devastating and a loved one ineptness delayed.

the clumsiness of the moon is what made the sun,

let those without mouth render a theme of odium

to another forgone yesterday but remembered today.

we are the fault in the skin of the humble stars.

we are back from where we began our journey,

we smelt the fragrance of yesterday’s fire now. the

slavery of every torn garment is awkward of peace.

you heard our voices through the wind when you

listen to it over and over again without a double ear.

every one of us that leaves finds a place in the skies’ body.

a curse. A spell. A magic. A bound. Every spell cast

was horrible and ghost hunting among men of the past,

yet, our fathers betrayed us with lack and backwardness.

take a walk pass memory lanes, we’ll leave our voices

at the back of the moon before morn awakes freedom.

how we built shatter for broken souls, how we pulled gorily

and miseries from their eyes, how we heard their agony

shrieked yesteryear was something unspeakable.

we’ll see our imagination again at their feet and eyes,

taught the flowers how to carry our smell to tomorrow;

we’ll not make the mistake of selling our children into poverty again

but, we’ll carve a new world around not in awkwardness  

John Chizoba Vincent is a prolific poet, writer, and cinematographer. He has written several books which include Hard Times.

World Bank, Buhari, and Presidential Subnationalism By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

World Bank president Jim Yong Kim, in a news conference on October 12, reported President Muhammadu Buhari as having said the World Bank should “shift our focus to the northern regions of Nigeria.” Several commentators, particularly from the South, said the revelation provided evidence of the president’s prejudicial northern sub-nationalism. The president’s defenders, on the other hand, said he actually meant the “northeast.”  Rather strangely, both the president’s critics and his defenders are right. Here is what I mean. According to the transcript of the conference on the World Bank’s website, the question that elicited Kim’s response was, “what is the World Bank doing to support those ravaged in the northeastern part of Nigeria by the Boko Haram terrorists?” In other words, the questioner specifically wanted to know what the World Bank was doing about northeastern Nigeria in light of the devastation that has been wrought upon the region by years of Boko Haram insurgency.

It's therefore not unreasonable to assume that the World Bank chief meant that the president told him to focus attention on the northeast. Most non-Nigerians have no awareness of, or interest in, our arbitrary cartographic nomenclatures such as “northeast,” “northcentral,” “northwest,” etc., although the World Bank’ chief’s reference to “the northern regions [note the plural] of Nigeria” at best complicates and at worst invalidates my observation. But since we didn’t hear these words directly from Buhari’s mouth, it’s sensible to believe his spokesperson who said the president meant the northeast, which every Nigerian agrees is in desperate need of a massive infrastructural renewal. 

Plus, saying “focus” should be put in one part of the country doesn’t necessarily imply an order to exclude other parts of the country. In any event, a breakdown of the World Bank’s projects in Nigeria shows that the South isn’t excluded. However, it would be escapist, even dishonest, to ignore the fact that Buhari’s personal politics and symbolic gestures both before he became president and now that he is president conduce to the notion that he is an unapologetic provincial chauvinist. Before he was elected president, he made no pretense to being anything other than a “northern” sub-nationalist, which has no precedent for a former or incumbent Nigerian president or head of state, at least in public utterances. Former president Goodluck Jonathan is an exception here. He once publicly defended the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta’s self-professed terrorism against Nigeria when it detonated two bombs in Abuja that killed 12 people and injured 17 others on October 1, 2010. Although MEND’s Jomo Gbomo sent out an email to the news media warning of the attack— and actually claimed responsibility for it after the fact—Jonathan said MEND couldn’t be responsible for the bomb attack because it would not sabotage the administration of a fellow Niger Delta like him.  “We know those behind the attack and the persons sponsoring them,” he said. “They are terrorists, not MEND. The name of MEND that operates in Niger Delta was only used. I grew up in the Niger Delta, so nobody can claim to know Niger Delta than [sic] myself, because I am from Niger Delta.” But he forgot that Niger Delta militants bombed his house in his hometown of Otueke on May 16, 2007 in spite of his being a Niger Deltan. Jonathan’s defense of Niger Delta terrorists out of sub-nationalist solidarity caused me to write a caustic column on October 16, 2010, titled “A MENDacious President.” 

Like Jonathan, Buhari also had his own moment of sub-nationalist solidarity with Boko Haram terrorists. In June 2013, Buhari told Liberty Radio in Kaduna that the sustained military assault on Boko Haram insurgents while Niger Delta militants were being mollycoddled by the government through “amnesty” was unfair to the “north.” And, although, he recanted and later redeemed himself after his infamous “97%” versus “5%” gaffe in Washington, D.C., it’s nonetheless legitimate to contend that it was a Freudian slip that betrayed his genuine thoughts, especially in light of the pattern of his appointments, which I once characterized as undisguisedly Arewacentric. There are other symbolic miscues that feed the notion of Buhari’s provincial particularism. 

For instance, when he canceled his planned visits to the Niger Delta and to Lagos, he didn’t send personal apologies to the people. But when he canceled his visit to Bauchi, he recorded a video apology in Hausa to the people of Bauchi State. Again, during his sick leave in London, he recorded a personal audio Sallah message only for Hausa-speaking Muslims. Yoruba, Auchi, non-Hausa-speaking northern Muslims, etc. were excluded. He picked and chose even among Muslims. Buhari’s interpersonal discomfort with, and perhaps contempt for, Nigerians who are different from him—often expressed through awkward snubs and linguistic exclusivism—go way back. 

On page 512 of Ambassador Olusola Sanu’s 2016 autobiography titled Audacity on the Bound: A Diplomatic Odyssey, for instance, we encounter this trait: “I was asked by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs… to accompany Major-General Buhari on a trip to West Germany when he was Petroleum Minister in 1978,” he wrote. “During the flight, to and fro, [he] did not say a word to me even when we sat side by side in the first class compartment of the plane. When we got to Germany and went to the Nigerian Ambassador’s residence, [he] spoke entirely in Hausa throughout with the Ambassador-in-post. He did not speak to me throughout the trip. I was deeply hurt and disappointed.”

Interestingly, Ambassador Sanu actively supported Buhari in 2015, and probably still does. “Time is a great healer and I bear Buhari no malice,” he wrote, pointing out that, “I believe Buhari is now a changed man and Nigeria in decline is in need of disciplined, honest, focused and purposeful leadership to turn it around.” Well, you are the judge. 

Now, let me be clear: there is immense merit in speaking our native languages. I actually applaud people of President Buhari’s political and symbolic stature who show pride in their native languages by speaking it anywhere without apology. But that’s not the issue here. In a complex and plural country that is torn by the push and pull of competing for cultural, ethnic, and linguistic fissures such as Nigeria, there are moments when linguistic sub-nationalism from leaders can become fodder for untoward fissiparity. Buhari’s insularity may be a consequence of his limited education and socialization outside his comfort zone, but a country whose political leaders perpetually proclaim that their country’s unity is “settled and non-negotiable” needs a leader who consciously works to unite the fissiparous tendencies in the country; who puts nationalism above sub-nationalism; who recognizes that to favor one’s own people is an instinctive impulse that is effortless, but that what requires effort is the capacity to rise superior to this base temptation and to be dispassionate, cosmopolitan, and fair to all. So while Buhari most probably told the World Bank to focus on the northeast, which is defensible, his history of ethnic-regional chauvinism provides grounds for people to be suspicious of his utterances, even silences, and motives.

Dr. Farooq Kperogi is a professor, journalist, newspaper columnist, author and blogger based in Greater Atlanta, USA. View complete profile. 

TINUBU: POLITICAL ELEGY FOR A 'DEFRAUDED' SALESMAN By Samuel Ajayi.

Bola Ahmed Tinubu

The noise was deafening and the emotions were overwhelming. The "Sai Baba" crowd took over space and common sense took a flight.

Tinubu might not have made Buhari president, but he made him ELECTABLE!

I am into communications. It is my turf. And I know the power of what is called RIGHT MESSAGING. What it does is to primarily target your EMOTIONS. And when it captures your emotions, REASON, and COMMONSENSE usually take flight. You find it difficult to ask pertinent questions and interrogate certain claims. It is a young man who overwhelmed a teenage girl with sweet words that made the latter feel she was on Cloud Nine. Words of caution from a third party were always "rantings of haters".

Tinubu used his massive media and propaganda contacts to recreate Brand Buhari. And what was the outcome? Even educated, intelligent and exposed Nigerians, especially Yorubas, suddenly fell in love with Buhari and suddenly saw in him a little god that could do no wrong.

Tinubu was naive, though. He played into the hands of the Northern Establishment. They knew Buhari would always be a hard-sell in the South. Very obvious. Therefore, they needed someone to serve as his salesman in the South and that person must have considerable political clout in the South. Tinubu fitted perfectly into this. He too wanted change!

BUT THE "CHANGE" BOTH OF THEM WANTED WAS NOT THE SAME: TINUBU WANTED HIS INFLUENCE TO GO BEYOND LAGOS, NORTHERN ELEMENTS WANTED THEIR MAN TO RECLAIM THEIR 'POLITICAL BIRTHRIGHT': NIGERIAN PRESIDENCY!

What we had was a convergence of conflicting ambitions but criminally united in the target of one prize: power!

But unknown to Tinubu, he outlived his usefulness on May 29, 2015. WHEN HE COULD NOT NOMINATE EVEN A SINGLE MINISTER FROM THE SOUTHWEST, HE SHOULD HAVE KNOWN!

He will want to fight back. His silence is not golden. But mark my words: those in charge of state powers today are not Goodluck Jonathan. They know the meaning of power in a country like Nigeria and the potency of its deployment They will come after Tinubu. I repeat: they will target him. They will keep him 'busy' he won't have time for any politicking.

FOUR NIGERIEN SOLDIERS DIED By Pius Adesanmi.

The way I am responding to invitations by TV stations for news segment appearances about Africa, I fear I may soon be blacklisted and the invites will dry up.

1

Dear Professor Adesanmi, there is an ongoing incident in Somalia and we would like to have you on at 7 pm blah blah blah...

I reply that I am indeed able to comment on the tragedy - not the incident - that had happened that day in Somalia. However, will the conversation allow me to mention the strides Rwanda is making in the education sector? No response. 

End of Conversation.

2

Dear Professor Adesanmi, there have been reports of a monkeypox outbreak in Nigeria and we were wondering if you would be available to come on air...

I reply that I am indeed able to make the appearance. However, the President of the African Development Bank, a Nigerian, has just won the World Food Prize. Any chance our conversation could extend to that issue? No response.

End of Conversation.

3

Now there is another invitation to come on national television this evening and discuss Mugabe's appointment as a goodwill ambassador by WHO. Now, I don't like Mugabe but the email I am reading says that the appointment is "being heavily criticized by the whole world" and every sentence of the invitation expects me to come on air and rubber stamp this critique. The whole world here, of course, means the West. I am likely going to reply that I have a more nuanced understanding of "the whole world" and I do not like it when TV stations prepackage Africa and invite me to legitimize a particular slant. I will also offer to discuss Ghana's remarkable recovery from power cuts.

You could say I should just go on air and stylishly veer into the things I want and need to discuss Africa. Last time I tried it, the news anchor brutally cut me off.

That is why I wrote that viral piece asking that freaking continent to develop at least one global information brand that could tell her stories at the level of CNN, BBC, Al-Jazeera, etc.

How can an entire continent not have something close to Al-Jazeera for her own stories at the international level? SABC in South Africa is a local champion deluding herself that she is a brand beyond SA, Ghana, Nigeria and a few other countries. Nigeria's NTA International is a disgrace and an embarrassment. Not a single global information giant, owned by the continent, that could power our stories from our manifold viewpoints.
Do you know that four Nigerien soldiers were killed and eight wounded in the attacks that killed four US soldiers in Niger? Try to ask Google about how many Nigerien and African lives were lost in that attack and Google will send you the first 15 pages about four US soldiers killed. Not a single mention of the African casualties.

Do you know that when that Somalia tragedy happened and we lost that many numbers of African lives, CNN was showing stories of courageous dogs that escaped the California wildfires?

And look at Anthony Bourdain and the rubbish he went to do in Lagos. Next, he will fly to Kibera and scream: this is Nairobi!

That freaking continent must stop the feeding bottle mentality of expecting the enemy to tell her story. The enemy doesn't owe you jack! Get your freaking act together and develop at least one global information brand for your stories.

End of Conversation.

Pius Adesanmi, an acclaimed literary and cultural critic, was born in Nigeria and now lives in Ottawa, Canada, where he teaches literature and African studies at Carleton University. He is one of Nigeria's major intellectuals and writes two weekly columns for the influential Sahara Reporters and NEXT newspaper. His first book, The Wayfarer and Other Poems, won the Association of Nigerian Authors' Poetry Prize in 2001.