The General, GEJ Voltrons and Hyperboles

I used to admire General Mohamadu Buhari a lot. In him, I saw an Incorruptible Nigerian, whom given the chance, could rid our country of its greatest challenge—corruption in high places.

My view of Buhari’s incorruptibility remains unchanged, but in view of his actions and inactions in the wake of the crisis that followed the April 2011 elections, I do not consider him qualified to air ideas about Nigeria’s snail paced crawl towards political and economic emancipation from the brigands that now hold her captive.

Buhari, I have said before, lost all rights to talk when elder statesmen are called upon, just as he has lost the goodwill that has ensured he returned time and time again to compete for that exalted but oft raped position of this nation’s president. While I still say that Buhari did not ask his supporters to take to the streets and slake their rage on innocent Nigerians, doing nothing to call them to order painted him in colours that are not so different from those he was seeking to oust.

Anyway, this post is not really about what the man did, or didn’t do, after the elections last year. This post is about what the man is doing now and what he intends to do come 2015. Buhari as he is wont, warmed his way back into national consciousness by declaring in no small words that come 2015, naija masses will revolt if INEC does not allow for free and fair elections.

Hmm...here we go again, was my reaction when I saw reference to the statement on twitter, knowing the dams would soon burst and all hibernating GEJ Voltrons, as tweeps call them, would awake and be up in arms. My, my, was I right? Reno Omokiri, a young man most armchair activists like myself have come to expect the most uncouth behaviour possible in the course of defending his government pay cheque did not disappoint—kind of reminds one of pre-activist FFK’s brashness. Reno attacks on Buhari’s audacity to attack the hallowed PDP machine signalled other hibernating voltrons into action and the battle to ‘call Buhari to order’ was on in earnest.

While I think the PDP, and GEJ’s camp, are right to defend themselves if someone wrongly accuses them of wrong doing, in this instance they are absolutely wrong.

Why? Simple.

First: Because Buhari, though he might have accused them of rigging elections in the past, was only warning of the fall out of any attempt to rig the 2015 ballot. Second: Other, both highly and lowly placed, Nigerians have issued similar warnings in the past, and no one bothered to send out the verbal attack dogs.

I think GEJ is still missing the whole point of being president. He has to understand that as president he is number one and therefore the first target when things go wrong, and also the first when praises for things being done right are dished out.

Also, most of the technocrats drafted into government to help this unassuming man navigate foggy landscape of government-citizen relation are still dozing in the zombie days of military dictatorships, where any and every ‘his/her Excellency’ is sacred. Gaddem! This is a democracy, no matter how flawed, and people should be allowed to have opinions. I think it would serve GEJ and those who purport to speak for him to stick to the substance of opinions, not insinuations and hyperboles.

For PDP and its supporters: you may have ruled naija for the past 12 years, but you are not Nigeria and do not represent the masses. It is not given unto you to react to every statement from perceived political opponents as if you are Nigeria.

For Buhari: you lost your chance when it was clearly there for the taking. Go home, rest and advise younger protégées on how to take political opportunities. Also, talk smart, you are no longer in the army.

For the naija people: it is coming again, and we are losing ourselves once again to that sectional divide. When did Boko Haram stop being a PDP invention abeg? We need to wake up and smell the beans before it burns once again.

The Nigerian Police and ineptitude

What comes to mind when you think about the Nigerian Police? Surely not smartly dressed law keepers, making sure the society’s wheels are oiled – well enough to see to the smooth running of things – and the protection of you and yours.

I will not be far from the truth if I state that the image that comes to the average Nigerian’s mind, following questions of this nature, is that of an AK47 toting, ill-fittingly-dressed bugger whose major objective is to collect illegal tolls from commercial drivers.

I will also not be incorrect if I go further to add that what comes to mind when you behold them during crisis is not a feeling of relief, but mind numbing fear that compels you to take off faster than the guilty party, or risk becoming a victim. Little wonder witnesses who would have been instrumental to solving cases seldom turn up when called to do so. Even when they do turn up, or are compelled to do so, accompanying tales of sordid experiences in police cells make it difficult for would be witnesses to toe their path.

These and other more horrifying images have for years remained the general perception of the police, and despite cosmetic attempts by the government and police authorities to change this, it has so far remained thus.

How did the police, an institution that in other climes exude perfection and is many a nation’s pride, get to the sorry state where it is being viewed with the same consternation one does a terrorist organisation? The answer, and consequently, the truth, is the fact that the police in Nigeria has never been a people-centric institution. From its early days as a colonial enforcer, the police have acted as an enemy of the people and a friend to the subjugating authorities.

The Nigerian Police has for years, whether institutionalised or not is a question for another day, maintained the image of brutality that have become synonymous with them by implementing very little attitudinal changes – beyond pasting the slogan “the police is your friend” on the walls of their offices, and cars.

They are more likely to shoot suspects in cold blood, than thoroughly investigate crimes – the present Boko Haram crisis is traceable to this heinous penchant. Even when they arrest suspects, they are apt to dump them in the nation’s equally pathetic prisons, where they add to the number of awaiting trial inmates whose cases stalls for months on account of missing or non-filed case files.

The rot in the Nigerian Police Force touches all strata of the institution. I am personally yet to meet a police officer who would not take a proffered bribe or demand for such. However, this is not to say that they do not exist, it only shows that they are very rare and the practice is in effect, a culture. Furthermore, the professionalism that one would expect is largely absent. Records are still being kept in old style file cabinets – in this age of info technology when seamless coordination is at the beck and call of even secondary school students.

However, the most visible evidence of the state the Nigerian Police Force, as well as the mindset of its leadership and rank and file, is exemplified by the state of their vehicles, which, after a few months of use, look nothing less than moving scraps. A situation that portrays a dearth of maintenance culture, especially when similar vehicles belonging to other security agencies, bought or donated at the same period, remain in prime condition.

The lack of entrenched professionalism in all cadres, unwillingness to adjust to present realities by the police authorities, and the consistent resort to the force attached to their name while dealing with the man on the street, makes the Nigerian Police ill equipped to deal with the realities of the day.

However, like in most problems that afflict the world we live in, there are solutions.

For starters, modernising the Nigerian Police Force; this can be achieved by connecting all police stations in Nigeria to the Internet and providing basic IT knowledge to the men.  This will go a long way in addressing the lack of coordination that result from the widespread use of archaic filing methods, which make it impossible to share information between stations at the click of a button.

Another thing that needs urgent and serious checking is the penchant for plain-clothes policemen to be indistinguishable from armed robbers, or how else would one describe men in shoddy tee-shirts and jeans, toting AK47’s?

That brings us to another salient point, manning the police with intelligent, dedicate officers. There are thousands of intelligent, dedicated and resourceful graduates currently walking the streets of Nigeria looking for any job to do; harnessing this ready manpower would go a long way in addressing many of the issues relating to image and intelligence.

I doubt, however, that the police, as presently constituted, is geared for change. If that hunch is infallible, then Nigerians have no option but continue existing in a society where their avowed protectors are already incapacitated by ineptitude.

Wrote this article last year for DailyTimes.com but thought to re-post here after the event described by the picture below culled from Sahara Reporters

The Inheritors (#occupy Nigeria)

They walk in death's shadow

The evil they should've feared
live within their hearts
Bidding them heed darkness residing inside


The gun is their strength
Through it our is obeisance is obtained
As they rampage through this valley
Before them we stand


Trembling hearts caught
In-between chattering dental
Bladder loosened by fright
Body taut in heartless readiness
waiting for hot lead to strike


Do they not laugh?
Teeth sparkling ever thus
Behind tinted glasses they slyly cough
As hunger pushes us towards them
in servitude


They know not the gods' name
Therefore, beseech them in vain
They hearken only to their hate
That hunger that knows no sate
Their god is money


We know their oppression
Is only for this while
We hoped for death's call
Its call whispered song
For them, not us


Alas, we hoped in vain for
Fate holds back our saving rain
They knew death's name' thus
Planned all along to cheat him
did they


When their progeny return
from across the sea where they're groomed
Away from empty classrooms where
They hoped to keep us blind and doomed
While theirs seek the light


Alcoholics and addicts
Infused with ways foreign
Speaking white tongue whitely
Speaking ours strangely
If they speak at all


Our culture repulses them
Our dances bemuses them
Their roots cut off
Replanted in cities far away


To them it's said our future is given
To carry our flag, write our laws,
Fight our wars, and rule our land.
To them, for who we are
Another piece of inheritance


Our land is bequeathed

The Worth of a Nigerian Life and a Nation Lacking Compassion

A few weeks ago, shamed by the inaction of the police after I had reported the presence of a rotting corpse in a gutter not far away from a police post in Ikeja, I wrote an article entitled “the worth of a Nigerian life”. Some of those who read that piece criticized it; perhaps because of the rather critical tone, while others; who felt I had a right to be critical of government failings, praised it.

Despite the article—which I endeavoured to post to several national and international group pages on facebook, published in my blog and two leading Nigerian online media—it took about three weeks to move the body, then thoroughly decayed, from the gutter where it lay. It was a painful episode for me, for overcame with self-doubt, I constantly tried to reassure myself that by reporting to the police, I did enough.

Though it is surprising that a corpse would occupy a busy road with people walking and driving by with only a shake of their head, but even the police, who I presumed were mandated to handle matters like that, were culpable in the general apathy that pervades the Nigerian sphere.

I know it might sound absurd to anyone who does not live in Nigeria or has not spent considerable time in the country, but in truth, seeing dead bodies by the roadside is common enough to elicit the earlier mentioned reaction from the populace. Proof that this statement is factual can be inferred from the fact that on 15 December 2011, a few weeks after publication of “The Worth of a Nigerian Life”, I was again at a police post reporting another corpse lying in the middle of a busy road, this time in Agege.

The intention of again writing about this issue is to bring to light my attempt to find answers to why our society have gotten so thick skinned about death and even kids are allowed to look at death and think of it as commonplace. The issue on discuss here is not the fact that many of the police officers at the station were baffled at my taking the time to report the incident even though the dead man was not an acquaintance, a friend or a relative. The issue I intend to address is the extreme laxity with which everyone—yes everyone—handles issues of corpses on the streets on Nigeria.

Unlike what I did during the other incident, this time I reported to an established police station and went as far as seeing the DPO and getting him to instruct that the DCO go to the scene and investigate. It does not bother me much that it took the police about one hour to get ready to go investigate something that is a short walking distance from their station. It also was not much of a bother that I was asked to write my name, address and phone number or that the tone many of the officers used when addressing me sounded more like an interrogation than conversation. However, it bothers me that there appears to be no laid down procedural guide for police officers to follow on matters such as this, or if there is, many do not know it or choose to ignore it.

Yes, many of the police officers sounded and acted sorrowful about the apparent demise of a fellow citizen, but they were not willing to put off their personal plans to do anything about it. Therefore, after explaining why I was at the station repeatedly, I got remarks like, “why not go and report at the general hospital? They have ambulances for things like this”; “you should have gone to the local government or Alausa”. Baffled, I had thought to myself then, these guys are the law keepers, how come they are sounding like I should be doing their job?

However, some police officers felt I did the right thing and it was with two of them, The DCO, a female plainclothes officer and a female photographer (most probably a civilian) that I finally went back to the place where the corpse was.

The DCO who gave his name simply as Mr Thomas inspected the body and declared that there was no visible injury and judging from the emaciated nature of the corpse was probably a case of “sudden and unexplained death”. As we walked back to the station I inquired from Mr Thomas about something that has been bugging me for years, “who exactly has responsibility of removing corpses from the streets of Nigeria?”

While I was expecting the usual shifting of responsibility, Mr Thomas agreed that the police have a lot to do with it but that much of the responsibility lies with the local councils who have a unit for that. My intention was to stay with the police and make sure something was done, but Mr Thomas promised to contact the council and make sure the body was moved immediately.

The lady in pink is a police officer and Mr Thomas's hand is to the right of the picture

I continued onwards to my office, feeling elated, that I had put the wheels in motion and left the right designated drivers with the steering wheel. As with most things Nigerian, it was not surprising that my elation turned out to be premature, for heading back home later that evening I passed the body, laying there, on the same spot. After a not very happy night I woke up with a determination to give the day over to finding out exactly why corpses are left to rot on the streets of Lagos even though a law was passed not so long ago to curb situations like that.

The Ojokoro LCDA office is located in street-ward facing flat on the first floor of this building. the sign post is the green one with white lettering

My first port of call was the Area Development Council office at Ojokoro where an attentive staff told me they were not aware of the situation and immediately put a call through to what he said was the phone number of the person in charge of matters of that nature in their LGA headquarters at Ifako/Ijaiye. With the person at Ifako/Ijaiye admitting that he was aware of the situation, having being informed by the police the day before, I asked what was holding them back from removing the body and was told that they were waiting for a police report before they can act.

Baffled by the dilly-dallying when hundreds of schoolchildren must have been exposed to the unflattering scene on their way to school and back, I thanked the helpful LGA officer and decided to check back with the police station. There, a visibly annoyed Mr Thomas expressed sadness that the body had not been removed even after he had expended his personal phone credits to get in touch with the person responsible in the Local Government office. 

My decision to go to the seat of the State Government in Alausa Ikeja after talking to Mr Thomas, stemmed from a sense of helplessness and a determination to find answers about the actual arm of government responsible for cases like this and the right procedure when confronted with such. One tricycle and bus ride later, I was in Alausa proper and was immediately conscious of the aura of importance that perpetually hung around the place. Quick questions, deft responses and pointed fingers led me after several false self-starts to the office of the Lagos State Environmental Health Monitoring Unit (SEHMO). Before then, someone had given me an emergency number (767) that was to my surprise answered at first ring by a female staffer that courteously took details of the incident and promised to dispatch someone to go pick the body. At the SEHMO proper, one Mrs Oyewumi who attended to me informed me that I was actually at the right place and that they had just received information about the body from a dispatcher. To reassure me that they were on top of the situation, she took me to their head driver who was at that moment arranging to go pick up the body, apparently the lady from the emergency office called them with the information I gave her.

I left Alausa happy, envying the bags of Christmas rice that could be spied here and there, knowing that the chances of the body being moved was this time more closer than before.

Not that this justifies laxity, but as I left Alausa, I wondered at the crisp environment and the professional manner of the Lagos State Secretariat workers compared to the grimy, dilapidated nature of the police station and the local government office I went to before. I took one thing away; the working condition must surely play a role in how workers perform. The people at the SEHMO lived up to their promise as the body had already been removed by the time I passed that route on my way home later that evening.

The well groomed environment of the Lagos State Secretariat, Alausa

The promptness of the people from Alausa was a breath of fresh air, and a reaffirmation of the mantra that Lagos, even if only at the state government level, is working.  However, one prays that something drastic is done about the way the citizens of Nigeria and the Government treat the dead. This is not just a call to heed the health implications of leaving animal and human corpses to rot on the streets, but also that we remember our culture and what should be human nature—respect for the dead, who, lacking the ability to HELP themselves, depend on us. 

Gains of being Nigerian

As Nigerians, we subsist in a country that grants us more headaches than broad-lipped smiles. Many here try to live above board, try to be different, but the society makes that very difficult, throwing numerous fetters across the road they tread.

For a country that have over the years fought – even if only by proclamations – to extradite itself from the negative image it has somehow managed to garner over the years, Nigeria appears to be losing more credibility than it garners as the days go by.

The reasons for this is not as simple as most people think. Though it is easy to point accusing fingers at the ruling elite that have undeniably held the country to ransom for years the fact remains that even the accuser is guilty of some form of illegality or another.

In seeking scapegoats, people overlook a very important factor that serve the entrenchment of corruption, those acts of illegality that though widespread, have come to be accepted as the norm by a society that has, in effect, become as lawless as the fictional banana republic.

In any society governed by the rule of law, it is illegal to do anything outside the law. In Nigeria reverse is the case, here the law is tilted easily by people to suit whatever suits them in a particular time. Here the constitution exists only as a means to the self serving ends of the ruling cabal, who juggle its interpretation at whim. The masses that are expected to checkmate the excesses of the leaders are either too complacent or after their own pockets – without access to the national cake, they loot their brother poor, who left with no option, succumb to the dictates of a disjointed society, either that or go to blazes.

It may baffle foreigners how easily people here set their own rules and appears to get away from it, but it is as normal as breathing exhaust fumes in the city. Here, transport fares fluctuate according to the transporters’ whim, having little to do with the petrol price they base their assertions on or the distance travelled. Also, it has become fashionable to hike transport fares during religious holidays, sometimes by as much as 700 percent – Those who have cause to travel to the east during the Christmas period are very familiar with this.

Then there is the question deregulation that though not yet signed into law is already common place at filling stations. Even when the elusive regular supply of petroleum products is obtainable, the petrol stations subject customers to extra costs that have no bearing to their purchase. One wonders where the now popular ‘nozzle money’ originated from (nozzle money refers the extra N20, N50 or N100 pump attendants charge customers before or after selling products to them. This nozzle fee is usually higher when you are buying in a lower middle class or ‘poor’ areas. The filling stations also charge about N50 extra for those who are buying with a gallon. No explanation is given for these extra charges other than ‘na moni fo nozzle now’)

Perhaps more confusing is the strange tenancy rates that effectively make it impossible for anybody below the middle class range to afford a decent accommodation. This is truer of Lagos where a single room with a small bathroom/toilet attached goes for about N100, 000 a year, and the tenant is required to pay two-three years rent advance and an between N50, 000-N70, 000 for what is commonly referred to as agent and agreement fee. At a total cost of N400, 000, one wonders how a fresh graduate earning the current minimum wage can afford it.
At the moment, the Lagos state house of assembly is considering a bill that is expected to check the excesses of landlords, but the bill have received knocks from stakeholders for being defective in some key aspects like: amount charged a new tenant, number of years advance for a new tenant and the vexing issue of agent and agreement fees that are usually collected by the same person, the landlord.

The antics of Nigerian Police are another issue that the Nigerian masses have had to contend with. The police are known for their almost fanatical hatred for the man on the street, the very people they are paid to protect. While they fawn on the rich, answering their every whim, including arbitrary arrest of the poor and brutalization of any perceived enemy, they fail continually to protect the masses from oppressors, looking the other way while the poor are milked dry by transporters, filling stations, landlords and the ruling class. They only stretch forth their hands for the usual egunje that the Okada and bus drivers are forced to proffer then look the other way. The only thing that strikes one as funny is the fact that the majority of the police also subsist in abject want, at par with those whose suffering they aid. It has been said that they too are victims of the same oppressors.

We exist day by day, wondering when the change will come, when we can worry only about mundane things. We ask questions, but get no reply, because our answers only echo in the air, to rebound off the ears of those who are supposed to make a difference.

Will Nigeria survive without the common man, the man on the street, the salt of the earth? I doubt it, and I am sure even the greedy politicians do too. If we can’t get even a decent one room apartment, if we can’t exist without been subjected to the whims of corrupt people, if we can’t get a little protection from those assigned that duty, then it may be time for us to take our affairs into our own hands.