Opinion
Undeserving honour for a handy hangman
By Tunde Olusunle
Muhammadu Buhari, Nigeria’s President, was not a happy man on Monday June 27, 2022. Students of “body language methodology of governance, administration and communication,” know what I mean. It was invented into the lexicon of contemporary Nigerian political discourse, following the ascendancy of the Buhari presidency, in 2015. It is a “theorem” which enables aides of the president and government functionaries, deduce from the non-verbal attitudes, dispositions and signs of their principal, what he expects them to do in every situation. The idea is to reinforce the fact of the president being a man of very few words, certified taciturn actually, who expects people to “borrow themselves brain,” as the Nigerian day-to-day expression, says. They are thus expected to get cracking on their briefs in whatever ways, without the benefit of a conversation or exchange of ideas in some form, with their principal. How this has profited the country in Buhari’s over seven years in office, is subject of another treatise.
At other times, Buhari indeed reinforced this characteristic of himself, in his public outings. A visiting French president, Emmanuel Macron in 2018, entertained a press conference in the State House, Buhari his host, flanking him. When the question about the nationwide menace of herdsmen was raised, Buhari looked the other way. It was so visible even on television. He surely was not comfortable with that poser. His spontaneous reaction spoke volumes. You should have also read his discomfiture as he sat in the state box at Eagle Square the other day, at the presidential primary of his political party, the All Progressives Congress, (APC). He wore this kind of “You guys get this thing done quickly so I can get out of here” visage, for most of the programme.
The night of Sunday June 26, 2022, Buhari received an unexpected correspondence from the immediate past Chief Justice of Nigeria, (CJN), Ibrahim Tanko Muhammad. He had notified the president in his mail, that he was retiring voluntarily from office, “with immediate effect,” an expression loaned from our several decades under military rulership. Muhammad pleaded faltering health as the grounds for excusing himself from office. Ordinarily, he was due for retirement in 2023, by which time he would have attained the retirement age of 70 years, for jurists in the Supreme Court of Nigeria. Professors in Nigerian universities are also given such latitude, against the backdrop of the peculiarity of their professions as human storehouses of irreplaceable knowledge, expertise and experience.
Muhammad’s decision caught Buhari by surprise. He had just returned from the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, (CHOGM) in Kigali, the capital of Rwanda, a country which is fast displacing Nigeria as most preferred events destination in sub-saharan Africa. Tanko Muhammad was tactically procured early 2019, by functionaries of the Buhari administration. He was primed the foremost, statutory judicial enforcer of the re-election of Buhari, March 2019, two months away. It was glaring, from the abysmal, multisectoral failure of the subsisting administration which was voted into office in 2015, that Nigerians had totally lost patience with the regime. The party which produced the president, wouldn’t be humoured with a second term in office. Buhari’s strategists, all downstream beneficiaries of his government, spun a spurious narrative to force Muhammad’s predecessor, Walter Onnoghen to resign from office.
The fable was that Onnoghen was in bed with Buhari’s major opponent in the 2019 polls, Atiku Abubakar, of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, (PDP). Onnoghen was rumoured to have held an offshore meeting with Atiku at the latter’s Dubai abode after the PDP presidential primary, late 2018, which Atiku won. As the spin doctors couched it, Atiku would seek legal redress after being trounced by Buhari at the polls. Onnoghen would subsequently deploy his position as CJN and allied judicial instruments, to rule in favour of Atiku and enthrone him president.
As legal proceedings progressed, however, it was the APC government whose security operatives hounded the PDP “Situation Room,” which had all the results of that election, direct from every polling unit across the country. The Independent National Electoral Commission, (INEC), hurriedly pulled down its server which stored the authentic poll results, swearing it never had one. Such was the frenzy Buhari’s associates got themselves into, attempting to legitimise the grossly illegitimate election results. History will yet unravel the complicity of many present public officials in that subterfuge when the time is right.
Tanko Muhammad was therefore elevated to upstage Onnoghen his senior colleague. He functioned first in an acting capacity, beginning from January 25, 2019, when he was first appointed. He became substantive CJN July 24, 2019 and concurrently Chairman, National Judicial Council, (NJC), after discharging his primary task, that of returning Buhari as president. His appearance before the senate for clearance saw him commit an unforgettable howler. His response to the question about whether the apex court under his jurisdiction will rely upon the merits of cases, or technicalities to adjudicate, gave him away as half-baked, possibly mediocre. His analogy about his suitability to “drive an aeroplane” or not, reinforced notions about his suspect capacity.
US-based Nigerian attorney, Emmanuel Ogebe, has proffered that “Tanko came to office with a palpable integrity deficit. Ogebe advanced this in his post-disengagement tribute to Muhammad, which he titled “Justice Tanko’s Resignation: End of an error.” What was to follow, Ogebe noted, “was further proof of his competency deficiency. The judge who couldn’t define “technicality” in his senate confirmation hearing, apparently was technically unfit to be Chief Justice of Nigeria,” Ogebe submitted. Sadly, Nigeria’s “rubber stamp” legislature, led by the never-to-be consensus presidential candidate of the APC for the 2023 polls, Ahmed Lawan, confirmed his nomination with aplomb. This was in total obeisance to the “body language” of the president. Not even the fact that Muhammad studied Islamic law and not conventional law, was questioned at that outing in the Senate.
At the inauguration of Muhammad’s successor, Olukayode Tajudeen Ariwoola, Buhari devoted ample time celebrating the outgone CJN. He noted he was reluctant to accept Tanko Muhammad’s correspondence, because he was confident the former CJN would outlast his own administration and retire December 31, 2023, months after his exit. Buhari extolled Muhammad’s dispensation for ensuring “landmark, jurisprudential and policy decisions by the Supreme Court.” Tanko was praised for dealing “firmly with the issue of reckless and indiscriminate grant of ex-parte orders, which was assuming serious dimensions.” History, Buhari observed, “will be kind to Justice Tanko Muhammad for his modest contributions to Nigeria’s judiciary, the strengthening of our democracy and national development.” He subsequently conferred on Muhammad, the second highest national honour, that of Grand Commander of the Order of the Niger, (GCON).
Tanko Muhammad’s stint as CJN, was dogged by controversies in various forms and shapes. Under his superintendence, the home of Mary Odili, the next in rank and seniority in the Supreme Court to Muhammad, was stormed by agents of government in Gestapo fashion, October 29, 2021. Whereas the stormtroopers pretended to be executing a search warrant, the raid was generally perceived to have been designed to maim and kill the target, Mary Odili. It re-echoed a similar invasion of the homes of some judges in 2016, in Abuja and Port Harcourt, respectively. The earlier raid was carried out by operatives of the State Security Services, (SSS).
For the first time in the history of the Supreme Court, a total of 14 out of 16 justices in the court, authored a jointly signed petition, days before Muhammad’s resignation. They decried abysmal working conditions under his leadership. They drew attention to the homelessness of many judges and the unsavoury conditions they had to work in. The judges listed non-replacement of their aged official vehicles; denial of training opportunities for capacity building and the decrepit condition of the Supreme Court clinic, among other challenges.
They highlighted the cancellation of their foreign summer holidays consistent with international best practices, whereas the CJN regularly obliged his family and personal aides, these privileges. Things as basic as non-payment of subscriptions for internet services and satellite television, also featured on the list of irritants of the Supreme Court Justices, under Tanko Muhammad’s leadership. The Justices equally complained of being forced to exit their chambers by 4pm every day, owing to frequent power outages and the skyrocketing costs of maintenance of diesel generators. Simply put, the correspondence was a tacit vote of no confidence in the leadership of the former CJN. Muhammad allegedly introduced a new tradition of judicial laziness into the operations of the Supreme Court. He was reputed as lacking the basic ability to comport himself to write well-reasoned judgments. Rather, he was notorious for commandeering cases, preempting and dictating outcomes and disallowing dissent.
Indeed in May this year, a former Supreme Court judge, Ejembi Eko, alluded to the festering sleaze in the judiciary, under Tanko Muhammad. In his valedictory address upon retirement, Ejembi Eko spoke about the “vandalisation of the budget of the judiciary, culminating in the lack of basic needs of justices.” He expressed his bewilderment about the pauperisation of the topmost rungs of the judiciary, despite remarkable increases in budgetary allocations. Eko invited the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, (EFCC), to investigate the accounts of the Supreme Court. Such has been the quantum rot and decay in the nation’s uppermost court in recent years, especially under the jurisdiction of Tanko Muhammad.
The former CJN reportedly spent recent weeks in recent months being variously scrutinised for all manner of malfeasance. There was a report to the effect that Muhammad was queried by the SSS over a $10 million bribe reportedly collected on his behalf by one of his children, for a favour requested by Aliyu Wamakko. The erstwhile governor of Sokoto State and ranking member of the upper parliament, who was said to have made the payment, reportedly squealed when his request was not being prioritized nor addressed.
June 22, 2021, Messrs Malcolm Omirhobo and Co, legal practitioners sent a correspondence to Muhammad, requesting for “certified true copies of certain public documents.” The attorneys said they were acting “pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act 2011.” Among others, they requested “proof of receipt of total funds disbursed by the National Judicial Council, (NJC), to the Supreme Court, since January 2019.” They equally requested the Financial Statements of Accounts of the Supreme Court; Proof of the Total Expenditure and Payment Vouchers processed by the organisation, since 2019. Omirhobo and Associates, equally requested information about Internally Generated Revenue within the period; Proof of Expenditure; Salary payments and so on.
Arising from the dust and whirlwind of petitions, complaints and controversies thrown up by Muhammad’s regime in the Supreme Court, the Senate has shown interest in interrogating the tenure of the former CJN. Senate committee chairman on judiciary, human rights and legal matters, Opeyemi Bamidele, brought this up as a “Matter of Urgent Public Importance,” on the floor of the uppper parliament, Tuesday June 28, 2022. Irrespective of Muhammad’s resignation, complaints against Muhammad will be investigated as part of efforts to restore the integrity and public confidence in the judiciary. Himself an attorney, Bamidele is concerned that at no time has the credibility of the judiciary being so mindlessly rubbed in the myd and rubbished as it has in recent years.
Almost immediately after the inauguration of Ariwoola as acting CJN, Monday June 27, 2022, the ever sleepless social media threw up a collage of photographs. A particular photo shot pitched the president’s mien at the inauguration of Tanko Muhammad three years ago, with his facial expression at Ariwoola’s. While it was an uncharacteristically bright, bubbly Mr President, flashing a gap-tooth smile of accomplishment at Muhammad’s swearing-in, it was a visibly, evidently dour, drawn president, who shook hands with Ariwoola. That sense of loss of a trusted ally, a handy hatchet man, was inscribed all over his face. Motion pictures of the event captured a president who almost couldn’t wait for press photographers to complete their job, so he could retire to his trademark closet. A new CJN from the south of the country for that matter, may be bad business ahead of 2023.
Sadly, history cannot be fair to Tanko Muhammad, the way the president desires, irrespective of the “GCON” necklace he was adorned with. His legacy of laziness, imprimatur of ineptitude and trenchant treachery, did not cover him in gloss at all. A very bitter Ogebe has advanced that: “The worst president of Nigeria appointed the worst Chief Justice of Nigeria…That Tanko would be a failure was expected. How disastrously he failed, was the surprise. Never in the history of Nigeria’s legal system have all 14 justices in the Supreme Court, petitioned the CJN this way.”
Hopefully, Tanko Muhammad will be guest of a number of intelligence and investigative agencies and bodies, in the coming weeks and months. That is hoping there wouldn’t be a reenactment of the “off the mic” episode during the House of Representatives inquisition into the affairs of the Niger Delta Development Commission, (NDDC), not too long ago. Such media trials have become the trademark of our corruption and crime-busting departments. And whether such bodies will be sufficiently courageous as to dispense appropriate penalties and sanctions, as deterrence for future offenders is another matter.
Olusunle, PhD, poet, journalist, scholar and author, is a Member of the Nigerian Guild of Editors, (NGE).
By Prof. Mike A. A. Ozekhom, SAN, CON , OFR, FCIArb, LL.M, Ph.D, LL.D, D.Litt, D.SC, DA, DHL
Labour has literally grounded Nigeria – from airports, hospitals, tertiary institutions, to electricity which has plunged the biggest black nation on earth into total darkness. I am in full, complete and total support of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and the Trade Union Congress’ (TUC)’s current national strike for upward review of the FG’s proposed minimum wage of N60,000 per month. NLC and TUC had also demanded that the government reverses the increase in electricity tariff to N65/KWH. When talks broke down with none of the parties shifting grounds, Labour commenced a strike action on the midnight of Sunday 2nd June, 2024. FG’s proposed meagre salary is certainly not a living wage in today’s Nigeria. At the current parallel market exchange rate of N1,470 to one dollar, the wage being conceded by the Federal Government to labour is a mere $40.82 per month (N60,000), while the NLC and TUC are asking for a whooping N615,500 per month.
By way of comparative analysis with some other countries globally, the monthly minimum wage in the United States is US$1,160 ( N1,705,200); UK £1,376 (N2,528,950); Canada 2,464 CAD (N2,710,400); France £1,539.42 (N2,847,927); Ghana GHC 2,904 (N292,548.96) Rwanda RWF 56,668 (N64,602); South Africa R4,067.2 – R4,412.8 (N322,406.944 – N349,802.656); Botswana P1,168 (N122,056); Germany £1,985.6 (N3,673,360) Australia AUD3531.2 (N 3,490,414.64); Kenya is KES15,201 (N172,683.36). In UAE, there is no general minimum wage as it differs from profession to profession. However, for skilled Labourers AED 5,000 (N2,019,435); people with University degrees AED12,000 (N4,846,644); qualified technicians AED 7,000 (N2,827,209); South Korea is 2,010,580 Won (N2,161,574.558). China differs from city to city. However, Shanghai is RMB 2,690 per month (N551,181) and Heilongjiang RMB 1,450 (N 297,105). Singapore does not prescribe a general minimum wage for all its workers. However, the minimum Singaporean wage is averaged at 6,792SGD/Month = N7,464,408).
Even though Rwanda and Botswana’s minimum wage per month which is RWF 56,668 (N64,602) and P1,168 (N122,056), respectively, appears meagre, the two countries have since put in place social services that cushion the masses’ suffering and put them on a developmental path. Imdeed, they are two of the fastest growing economies not only in Africa, but also in the world. We do not have such in Nigeria. Nigeria is perhaps the only country in the world that brazenly defies Isaac Newton’s Law of Motion to the effect that “what goes up must come down”. In Nigeria, once prices of good go up, they never come down.
Are these countries and us not living on the same Planet earth? We are, of course.
With the present spirally inflation, N60,000 cannot even buy one bag of rice which today sells for between N80,000 and N120,000 depending on the grade and quality.
What is the way forward from this FG-Labour face-off and stalemate? Part of the solution lies in steering a middle course between labour’s N615,500 per month demand and the FG’s proposal of N60,000 per month. This is more so having regard to the impossibility of the private sector, especially small scale businesses and private professions, having the capacity and economic wherewithal to pay such exorbitant wage. Another solution lies in public office holders making deliberate sacrifices in the midst of public angst and disenchantment by cutting down their ostentatiously vulgar lifestyle of ugly display of opulence and their sheer exhibitionism of wealth in mindless convoys of vehicles in the midst of grinding poverty and wretchedness of the masses. The Nigerian people are not happy at all. Anyone who advises the government to the contrary is nothing but a fawner, bootlicker, ego masseur, toady flatterer and clapper.
By Ehichioya Ezomon
Has the political heat in Rivers State simmered in the past week to suggest perhaps – just perhaps – that conventional wisdom has taken hold of the dramatis personae in the crisis to pull back from the precipice they’ve pushed the state in the last eight months?
There’s nothing on the ground to suggest otherwise, even as Governor Siminalayi Fubara and Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Chief Nyesom Wike, played their brand of politics at separate locations, trying to undo each other in showcasing achievements in their official jurisdictions, to mark one-year in the saddles in Rivers and Abuja, respectively.
Amid “all the distractions from those that want to draw Rivers State backward,” Fubara invited prominent persons from within and outside Rivers – including Abia State Governor Alex Otti of the rival Labour Party (LP), and former Rivers Governor Peter Odili – to launch projects he “executed in record time, and with full payments to the contractors” – an obvious dig at Wike for allegedly failing to pay contractors for their services.
As is the routine in Rivers governance, especially since the Wike’s helm, Fubara, using his “State of the State” address to render account of his one-year stewardship, revealed the “huge debts to contractors” that Wike left behind for his government.
At the Dr. Obi Wali International Conference Centre in Port Harcourt on Wednesday, May 29, Fubara said his administration “inherited 34 uncompleted projects, valued at over N225.279bn in 13 local government areas of the state,” adding that the contractors, who executed the 34 projects, have come to him for payments.
Fubara stated that though he inherited a state, “whose economy was on a declining trajectory despite its growth potential,” his government has changed the narrative for the better by “increasing astronomically internally-generated revenue from N12 billion to between N17 billion in off-peak periods and N28 billion during the peak months.”
“Our liberalized business-friendly economic policies and programmes are boosting confidence and attracting local and international investors and investments into the State, judging by the expression of interest offers we receive every month.” Fubara said.
“We have kept our taxes low, frozen the imposing of taxes on small businesses across the State, and increased the ease of doing business by eliminating bureaucratic bottlenecks. No request for the signing of a certificate of occupancy (CoO) remains in my office beyond two days, except if I am otherwise engaged beyond two days or out of town.
“We have established a N4 billion matching fund with the Bank of Industry (BOI), to support existing and new micro, small, and medium-sized businesses (MSMEs) to grow their businesses to drive economic growth and create jobs and wealth for citizens. Over 3,000 citizens and residents have applied to access this loan to fund their businesses at a single-digit interest rate, and a repayment period of up to five years.”
Commissioning the completed projects – mostly inherited from the Wike administration (2015-2023) – the invited guests heaped praises on Fubara, not only for achieving commendable strides within a short time, but also for “liberating Rivers State” from Wike’s stranglehold – the same Wike that some of the invitees had praised to the heavens barely a year ago.
For instance, Dr Odili, an erstwhile ally of Wike, noted that Fubara “has taken full control of governance in the State,” stressing that the governor is “focusing on the people” in line with his chosen mantra: ‘People First’. It’s on Saturday, May 25, at the inauguration of the dualised Omoku-Egbema road in Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni local government area (ONELGA) of the state.
An elated Odili even predicted a seamless second-term election for Fubara in 2027, and urged him to remain focused on the people, giving succour to the less-privileged and hope to those who do not have anyone to help them go through life’s challenges.
“I can tell our people that the next election is very far, but what the Governor has done so far, is enough to secure the support of Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area going forward,” Odili said. “Thank you, Your Excellency, because the greatest assets of the State remain the people, not oil and gas.
“The people of Rivers are behind you, rallying support for you because they trust you, believing in what you say and convinced that you mean whatever you say,” Odili said, adding, “I want to agree with you that the sky would become the takeoff point of your administration.”
Relatedly in Abuja, it’s Wike’s days in the sky. Though he didn’t have the luxury of throwing brickbats at Fubara – and there’s no surrogates to do same for him – Wike had the rare privilege of enlisting President Bola Tinubu to launch some of the projects that were “abandoned for decades,” and received applause from Tinubu for returning and restoring Abuja’s Master Plan, and transforming the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
On Tuesday, May 28, at the commissioning of the Southern Parkway, which Wike proclaimed as “Bola Ahmed Tinubu Way” – a crucial infrastructure project that’s dormant for 13 years before Wike’s intervention – the President described the minister’s vision as “inspiring many and yielding remarkable results in the FCT.”
Tinubu said: “Barr Nyesom Wike, ‘Mr. Project,’ thank you for giving us this home and for your sincere commitment to shared values. Your revolutionary vision is inspiring many and yielding remarkable results in the FCT.”
Highlighting the significance of the road, the President said, “The Southern Parkway not only connects vital areas within the FCT, but also symbolises our collective aspirations for connectivity, ease of livelihood, and progress. This road will enhance mobility, ease traffic congestion, and spur economic development for residents and visitors alike.
“Infrastructure is an enabler of jobs, economic growth, and prosperity. We are committed to building a world-class capital city, and the completion of this road is a testament to that commitment. Making our citizens the central focus of our development is crucial for Nigeria’s success,” Tinubu stated.
Earlier, Wike noted: “This landmark project is the first amongst nine visionary projects scheduled for commissioning by Mr. President in the coming days. It represents a significant milestone in our collective efforts to enhance the infrastructure and livability of our great capital and her inhabitants.
“As we mark the first year of your transformative leadership, Mr. President, this event underscores our shared commitment to progress, innovation, and the enduring prosperity of Nigeria.”
Yet, the make-for-the-cameras pomp and ceremony, razzmatazz, accolades, hand-pumping and backslapping by politicians in Port Harcourt and Abuja are but a temporary relief or diversion to mask the “real politic” in Rivers, where Governor Fubara’s fighting the battle of his life to cage Chief Wike, and save his governorship and political career heading into the 2027 General Election.
The fourth installment of this article on Monday, May 27, 2024, examined two strategies that Fubara could adopt to handle Wike and his sacked loyal members of the Rivers Assembly, and local council chairmen, whose tenure ends in June 2024, but have vowed to remain in office until “elected officials” were installed in the Rivers local councils. Below’s a recap:
First, Fubara could evict the lawmakers from the Rivers State House of Assembly Residential Quarters in Port Harcourt – where they and their families domicile, and use as a legislative chamber – to deny them the venue and avenue to make laws and/or plot his impeachment.
Second, Fubara could copy his counterparts, and withhold the lawmakers’ emoluments, and allocations to the legislature – as he’s allegedly done to the April 2024 allocations to the councils – to checkmate the legislators, whose seats have lately been redeclared “vacant” by a Rivers High Court.
Let’s now proceed to interrogate the remaining measures, beginning with the Third, as follows: When push comes to shove, Fubara could muscle the pro-Wike lawmakers by physical attacks on them, their homes and businesses, the aim being to overraw, and hound them, to sabotage their plans to make his government ungovernable, and pave the way for his impeachment – the aim of the lawmakers from onset of the Rivers crisis.
Recall Fubara’s declaration about the lawmakers early in 2024: “I think it has gotten to a time when I need to make a statement on this thing, so that they (lawmakers) understand that they are not existing. Their existence and whatever they have been doing is because I allowed them to do so. If I don’t recognise them, they are nowhere. That is the truth.
“I can say here, with all amount of boldness, I have never called any police man anywhere to go and harass anybody. I have never gone anywhere to ask anybody to do anything against anybody.
“Even when I have all the instruments of State powers, I have shown restraint, I have acted as a big brother in the course of this crisis. I have not acted like a young man that may want the house to be destroyed but, I have behaved like a mature young man that I am.
“This is because I know that no meaningful development will be achieved in an atmosphere of crisis. And because our intention for Rivers State is to build on the foundation that had been laid by our past leaders, it will be wrong for me to take the path of promoting crisis.”
Interpreted, the pro-Wike lawmakers – already in the lurch over series of court rulings sacking and re-sacking them, and voiding all legislative actions they took in the course of the Rivers crisis – shouldn’t underrate Fubara’s powers and resolve – if pushed against the wall – to roar like the lion, attack like the hyena and bite like the crocodile!
Barring any “political earthquake” this week in the Rivers crisis, the remaining measures Fubara could deploy to arrest Wike’s alleged hegemonic hold on Rivers State will be interrogated in the next installment of this running header!
- Mr Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria
Sent from my iPad. Ehichioya
Ezomon.
By Tunde Olusunle
When he flung Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, (SLS) out of the window of the Emir’s palace in Kano four years ago, Abdullahi Ganduje would have least imagined what is playing out today. Ganduje was the “Lord of the Manor” in Kano State, the all-powerful chief executive. Recall video clips of Ganduje allegedly stuffing wads and packs of crisp, mint-fresh dollar bills into the bottomless pocket of his babanriga ahead of the 2019 general elections. They were reportedly gifted to him by some contractor ally of the erstwhile Kano governor who was repaying a good turn. Graphic and unassailable as that short motion picture was, former President Muhammadu Buhari who rode into office on the camelback of now suspect integrity in 2015, volunteered a baffling defence for Ganduje. He swore Ganduje was most probably participating in a Kannywood movie, the way the film industry up North is described. Buhari who has never been known to operate a tablet, nay a notepad, suggested that advanced technology could actually simulate what we all saw in that short clip!
Ganduje was the prototype alagbara ma m’ero as we say in Yoruba. This interpretes as the “maximally muscular, minimally reasonable.” He fought a few other prominent Kano leaders during his heydays in Government House. Recall he carried his unabated squabbles with one of his predecessors, Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso to the State House, Aso Villa, during the early weeks of the Bola Tinubu government. Told on one occasion that Kwankwaso was in a particular section of Aso Rock same time as he was in the complex, a vexed Ganduje said Kwankwaso should consider himself fortunate. He said he, Ganduje would have slapped Kwankwaso if he sighted him in the Villa! That would have caused a scene in Nigeria’s seat of power. I’m now just imagining how Tinubu would be trying to restrain Ganduje, in the forecourt of the office of the President, while Vice President Kashim Shettima will be pulling at Kwankwaso’s agbada in a bid to manage the situation.
Ganduje reportedly considered Sanusi too independent-minded and outspoken for a natural ruler. Sanusi was governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, (CBN), before being appointed Emir in 2014. He had always had a radical streak about him which culminated in his suspension as CBN head in 2014 for blowing the whistle on the theft of $20 Billion in accruals from crude oil sales. As Emir he considered aspects of the religious and cultural practices of his emirate repugnant. He opposed the “ultra-conservative interpretation of Islam” in some parts of northern Nigeria, which discouraged girl-child education, family planning, even inoculation against potential healthcare afflictions. He had reservations about the style of Ganduje as governor and didn’t put a veil over his dislike for the return of Ganduje to Government House in 2019.
He believed Ganduje shouldn’t have made it back if the poll was fairly and transparently conducted. March 9, 2020, Ganduje upended Sanusi. He was accused of negatively impacting the sanctity, culture, tradition, religion and prestige of the Kano emirate, and disrespecting the governor’s office. He was also alleged to have disposed of property belonging to the state and the misappropriated of the proceeds. It was a case of digging several manholes for a prey in a bid to ensure he falls into one of the several traps. He was summarily banished to Nasarawa State for effect. Sanusi sought reprieve in the courts which ruled it was an overkill to fling him to a remote community faraway from his family and more accustomed home in Lagos. Within a few days, Nasir El Rufai, Sanusi’s longstanding friend who was governor of Kaduna State, personally enforced the evacuation of Sanusi from Awe local government area in Nasarawa State.
For whatever his contributions were to the emergence of Tinubu as president after the 2023 polls, Ganduje believed he would be compensated with a ministerial slot in the former’s regime. Like Nyesom Wike, David Umahi, Mohammed Badaru Abubakar, Atiku Bagudu, Simon Lalong, former governors of Rivers, Ebonyi, Jigawa, Kebbi and Plateau states, Ganduje dusted his curriculum vitae to pitch for a slot on Tinubu’s federal executive council. His five colleagues in the “2015 – 2019- 2023 class of governors” made the cut, not Ganduje. Tinubu spontaneously made him chairman of the All Progressives Congress, (APC], the vehicle which delivered him as president. Abdullahi Adamu his predecessor and former governor of Nasarawa State was, as has become standard practice in Nigeria’s notorious political rule book, schemed out and compelled to resign from office.
If Ganduje ever thought his chairmanship of the APC was going to be a walk in the park, he was thoroughly mistaken. Indeed, he’s grossed sufficient experience in his present office to know that there are sharp differences between wholesale insulation in Government House, and the inevitable overexposure of party leadership. Last April, a faction of the APC in Ganduje’s primary “Ganduje ward” in Dawakin Tofa local government area of his home state, Kano, suspended him from the party. Haladu Gwanjo, legal adviser of Ganduje’s ward led some party leaders to pronounce the suspension. They advocated the return of the national chairmanship of the APC to the north central zone, where Ganduje’s predecessor, Adamu, hails from. The young Turks canvassed due process in party administration, consistent with the “renewed hope” mantra of the APC. Ganduje made a hurried recourse to the law courts for momentary reprieve.
Thursday May 23, 2024, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi was reinstated as Emir of Kano by Ganduje’s successor in Kano State, Abba Yusuf. His cousin and successor, Aminu Ado-Bayero, was unceremoniously removed from office. The splinter emirates created by Ganduje in his bid to whittle down Sanusi’s authority as prime monarch in Kano, were similarly dissolved. The edifice which Ganduje built four years ago was apparently built of straw and spittle. Governor Abba Yusuf is a product of the Kwankwasiya political tendency in Kano politics, a creation of Rabiu Kwankwaso. Those who know a little about Nigerian politics will recall that Kwankwaso’s emergence in our politics, predates the fourth republic. He was an ardent student of the talakawa political orientation, pioneered by the venerable Kano-born leader, Aminu Kano. Kwankwaso was Deputy Speaker in the House of Representatives of the Ibrahim Babangida political experimentation of 1992 to 1993.
Whereas the Kwankwasiya movement had long been entrenched, it was not until the run-up to the 2023 elections that Kwankwaso adopted a new platform, the Nigeria National People’s Party, (NNPP), on which he is espousing the populist philosophy of the Kwankwasiya brigade. Abba Yusuf rode to office on the back of this invention. It was the same way Chukwuemeka Odimegwu Ojukwu the famous Biafran war lord, established the All Progressives Grand Alliance, (APGA) in Anambra State. The party has remained a force in the politics of the state and indeed the south east. It has produced three Anambra governors in succession, notably Peter Obi, Willie Obiano and the incumbent Chukwuma Soludo.
Abba Yusuf has made no pretences about his disdain for Ganduje and everything he represents. Much as some of Yusuf’s early actions in office were generally perceived as wasteful, he nonetheless brought down as many edifices in Kano as bore the imprimatur of Ganduje. The “Kano golden jubilee roundabout” built to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the creation of Kano State and structures built inside the filin sukuwa, (Kano race course), were hewn on Yusuf’s orders. The hajj camp which was reportedly bastardised by Ganduje who allegedly parcelled parts of it to his friends and associates was equally felled. There were suggestions that the value of the demolitions carried out by Yusuf could be in excess of N200Billion. Such is the anti-Ganduje sentiment in contemporary Kano State.
The way and manner the legacies of Abdullahi Ganduje are unravelling in Kano State should serve as a lesson to the shortsighted, incapable of seeing beyond the bridges of their nose. History is replete with the deconstruction of many leaders after their rulership and indeed keeps repeating itself in our sociopolitical experience. Those who are not circumspect, however, are too distracted by the allure and bliss of their immediate office, to think. They continue to drift, blunder and flounder, unmindful that time is their ultimate nemesis. Ganduje is just one year out of office, yet many of the decisions he made while in power for eight years are being unmade and thrown at his face like rotten tomatoes.
Until I joined him on the table he was seated at a wedding reception we both attended in Lagos a few weeks back, Rotimi Amaechi, governor of the oil-affluent Rivers State for eight years and Transportation Minister for another eight years was a lonely man. It turned out we flew back to Abuja on the same flight same evening after the event and sat not too far from each other. He opened the overhead locker atop his seat to bring out his luggage himself. Is anyone following the Yahaya Bello saga? He mindlessly trampled upon the hapless heads of his constituents in Kogi State for eight unbroken years? He left office last January and life has not been the same again. He has been declared wanted by at least one anti-graft agency. He will be arraigned in the rectangular, wood-panelled cubicle of the courtroom in a fortnight. A lesson for all.
Tunde Olusunle, PhD, is a Fellow of the Association of Nigerian Authors, (FANA)
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