Re: Pro-Biafra agitators are only looking for another source of money – Obasanjo

A few days ago one of my co-conspirators writing on Facebook posed the question, "Must they talk?" He was referring to a comment by a prominent public figure which seemed to be out of place at the event at hand. We had a very lively debate on the matter and the jury is still out as to which opinion prevailed. 

Now former president Chief Olusegun Obasanjo is at it again. He has been quoted to have said that "pro-Biafra agitators are only looking for another source of money." I want to lay emphasis on the word ANOTHER. 

It is a matter of public record that Chief Barr Ralph Uwazurike of MASSOB fame started his agitation/movement long before OBJ's second coming as an elected civilian president. We all know that Uwazurike and MASSOB outlived the Obasanjo presidency. Will the former president kindly inform us about what monies that were obviously paid to those pro-Biafra agitators who were already in the "business" at a time Daniel Kanu was perhaps still in diapers?

Meanwhile I recommend to the former president and others a very interesting treatise on MASSOB written by the first civilian governor of Anambra State ten years ago. This was immediately after the movement, without any coercion, successfully shut down all markets, shops and other businesses across the federation. Obasanjo was in office then. I wonder if anyone learnt any lesson from it. 

Re:Biafra agitation could scuttle Igbo presidency. Interesting!

The South East chapter of the All Progressives Congress has reportedly warned against further agitation for Biafra Republic, indicating the agitation could scuttle the quest for a Nigerian president of Igbo extraction in 2023. It is strange that every big man would like to posture, claiming to know of decisions that have yet to be made. So the APC is working towards installing an Igbo president come 2023? Most interesting. That is if the PDP will allow it! The PDP understandably has its own game plan. I don't know what it is.

We now have a very serious assignment on hand, namely surviving the current Buhari presidency which we all, including this writer, wished for ourselves by our own votes. Not only that, we must make a lot of tangible progress in all indices if we have to claw our way out of the cesspit of despair that we currently inhabit. IPOB has absolutely nothing to do with it. Hence it is most unhelpful letting ourselves be distracted from doing the needful and wasting valuable time engaging in the permutation of who will be the next president. Haba! President Buhari does not appear to be in any hurry to vacate the stage. He is also fit. Isn't he?

APC spokesperson, Osita Okechukwu and his group should find more credible propaganda to counter IPOB and MASSOB. Despite the conclusion of many writers including former governor of Anambra State Dr Chukwuemeka Ezeife to the effect that MASSOB and its co-travellers have no interest whatsoever in the Nigerian Presidency, many others do not seem to get it. Try setting a trap for a lion using a tuber of yam. It is as silly as that. 

Who will tell Rivers State Elders that I too am not Biafran; & my family also!

We suddenly have a new industry in town. I am referring to the stampede to disown the still non-violent agitation of probably misguided but clearly disillusioned forty-something year old Igbo youths for the rebirth of Biafra. Apparently nobody wants to be left out. At least not this writer. I hereby stand up to be counted.

I condemn and oppose (not violently) the renewed agitation for the moribund republic which for three years was sustained by the blood, sweat and tears of my age mates. Those of us favoured to still be alive are now between 64 and 73 years of age, proud grandparents. We are grateful to God, but not necessarily to Nigeria in which we have had varied and traumatic experiences these past 45years. We are not complaining. We have mellowed, with reduced expectations.

But the youth are complaining, seriously. They never saw what we saw, the hide and seek in Lagos, the gauntlet at the  Makurdi bridge, the surge of arrivals at the Enugu Railway Station (one without a head, need I remind anyone), and at the various motor parks at Onitsha, Aba, Owerri, Port Harcourt. Since that generation is rightly or wrongly accused of being far less cerebral than its predessessor, it will be safe to assume that it's teeming members most likely never dug into the vast postwar writings of Igbo intellectuals in the mould Fourth Dimension publications. I can boldly ascribe to the Emir of Kano the clear articulation of the realisation that these young scions of Ndigbo learnt the sad aspects of walking the streets of Nigeria "while Igbo", where else, in the streets of Lagos, Kano, Abuja and Port Harcourt.

When the Rivers Elders and Leaders Council (RELEC) distanced itself from the struggle for the realisation of Republic of Biafra, they are not saying anything new. Most governments and citizens of the Southeast geopolitical have said as much. I hereby publicly ask them to count me in. However that does not in anyway indicate my agreement on the proper response from the government's and the security agencies. I have earlier written and actually commended the Rivers State Police command on this. They should keep up their restraint. Those who think otherwise are the real warmongers, looking for blood when none is called for.

Chief Albert Horsfall and his chiefs have faulted organisers of the pro-Biafra protest, IPOB described it as uncalled for, adding that Rivers people were not Biafrans. That's correct. Neither indeed am I.

As for the yet to be proven allegations over the transport of Igbo youths in trailers and buses from the five states in the Southeast zone, to protest in Port Harcourt, I wonder when millions of Igbo youths resident in Rivers State got discounted. One cannot be counted absent in one's presence. Which reminds me, what on earth are the Chibok women and their supporters doing in the heart of Abuja? Don't they know where Chibok is? Or Gwarzo for that matter? I recall that Ogoni activists boarded aircrafts and descended on Shell  and UN offices in The Hague, London and New York. We hailed them for their brave, unrelenting and forthright social and political activism. The Dutch, British and Americans tolerated them or at worst ignored them. But in the case of IPOB or MASSOB we conveniently forget long established and accepted norms. This unwavering knee-jerk reaction to matters Igbo will never get Nigeria anywhere.

Re: Police clash with pro-Biafra protesters in P’Harcourt - Good ending.

Apccording to the report in The Punch,

"The policemen later stopped firing teargas at the protesters and decided to watch the protest march by over 3,000 youths."

This is the smartest move ever made by any police command in the face of public protest by an aggrieved segment of the populace. I presume that the protesters did not proceed to destroy property. Otherwise it would have been gleefully reported. What after all are a few Nigerian flags worth? Let nobody lecture me about patriotism, respect for national symbols etc. None of the serial coup plotters who currently command our undeserved respect seem to have bothered about that.Neither do the thieves among us.

We can always sew new flags when we retrieve the vast amount of loot in the possession of the political class. The peace that followed after the protest would seem to be worth the apparent permissiveness displayed by the police. When the protesters got tired, they obviously went home. Not so?

For goodness sake, do I have to repeat what other commentators wrote about Scotland, Catalonia and Quebec? I guess not.

Then again one asks, does this government have any advisers? It seems to have borrowed extensively from the unrevised playbook of the past four administrations on this MASSOB matter. How effective was the result so far? For a government that has its hands full with the war against self-declared terrorists, the Boko Haram, to willfully open another front, is most baffling indeed.

First the presidency scandalized the nation by announcing that indeed the occupants of Aso Rock instead of spending their time (paid for by WE THE PEOPLE) in handling the business of governance, listen to Radio Biafra. What a waste! Whereas Chief Ralph Uwazurike has been in and out of detention over twenty times, the government does not seem to know what to do with him. What then is the point in adding another martyr to the growing list of non-violent refuseniks? I wonder. Love for Nigeria cannot be achieved by force or intimidation.

Should the US Military Come Home?

A few weeks ago I watched former US ambassador to NATO, Kurt Volker on tv weighing in with the long list of politicians and senior ex-military officers who have publicly expressed their opposition to what is often regarded as the "sudden" or "precipitous" withdrawal of US troops earlier from Iraq and now Afghanistan. Everyone now claims to have known clearly in advance that things would turn out exactly as they recently have - aka "I told you so!" 

Was the collapse of Iraq and now Afghanistan inevitable? If that is the case, how much more resources in men and material will the US taxpayers of both political parties be prepared to invest in these foreign lands? For how much longer? Five more years, or perhaps fifty? The answers are far from obvious even for those who claim to be far more knowledgeable than the average man. 

In short, are there any prospects of US troops ever coming home even if, as has now happened, President Barack Obama has succumbed to sustained pressure and suspended indefinitely the complete withdrawal of troops from Iraq. The US at the same time is beefing up its involvement in the fight against ISIL in the large swathe of territory spanning northern Iraq and Syria. 

IRAQ

In the case of Iraq, opponents of President Obama's policy direction have yet to explain what they mean when they complain that the US administration "should have" bargained "much harder" to be allowed to retain a sizable fighting force in Iraq. Almost nobody points an accusing finger at the now discredited former Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki, who resolutely refused to grant the terms that the US rightly or wrongly demanded for such a force. Based on American concept of exceptionalism, all known hosts of US forces overseas have in the past granted such terms covering legal and other issues. The same critics would be the same to cry foul and "surrender" if indeed the US bent over backwards and accepted less liberal terms whilst continuing to expend billions of dollars, and the blood of its youth to protect an ungrateful Iraqi nation. It was clearly a no-win situation. 

Everyone who had the interest of the long-suffering Iraqi at heart was hoping that the corrupt political class, having stolen enough, would get their act together, bridge the wide Sunni-Shia divide, and save their own nation. Al-Maliki and company adamantly refused to do that. Instead of leaving them to their own devices, diplomats from all over rallied to save a situation that is essentially beyond redemption and railroaded the restive and much maligned Kurds in the north into an unsustainable arrangement that is unravelling by the day. If the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Czechoslovakia could partition thereby presenting a better promise for good neighbourliness, then the same privileges should be extended to the Iraqi factions. These budding nation states are more likely to cherish their freedom dearly and hence show more patriotic keenness to fight in its defence. That is exactly what the Kurds are doing. On the other hand, the Sunni of the west of Iraq will not be found dead fighting to defend the Shia of Basra and Karbala. And vice versa. In the unlikely event that the Shia of Iraq want to submit to Iranian rule, they should be free to do so if that will bring that region peace.  

AFGHANISTAN - BOMBING OF MSF HOSPITAL

And now the attention has shifted even if briefly to Afghanistan, especially with the shameful fall of Kunduz to the Taliban. Fareed Zakaria on his CNN programme Global Public Square (GPS) and also in his recent article in The Washington Post has pointed accusing fingers at nuclear armed Pakistan, known to hobnob routinely with the Taliban. The truth of the matter is that the security agencies of both Pakistan and Afghanistan have been gravely compromised. This much I shared over a year ago with pundits in Foreign Affairs Journal who had imagined that the current situation would arise not now but sometime in the remote future. I am very surprised that no one has come public with the simple notion that the targeting co-ordinates that led to the bombing of the hospital of Medecins Sans Frontieres in Kunduz must have been deliberately fed the US Air Force by rogue Taliban elements embedded within the Afghan military. I came to that conclusion the very day that I learnt of the event. Yes, in the fog of war, the US forces accepted the co-ordinates in good faith, without cross checking them. You are supposed to trust your allies. Right? Wrong! Not in Pakistan, Iraq or Afghanistan. 

With the announced indefinite suspension of the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan, with an implied potential for a new build-up, the hawks have clearly won the argument this time around. Meanwhile the military contractors are smiling all the way to the bank. 

Tony Elumelu at the UN - Progress in Africa will help ease the global migrant crisis. - A Rejoinder

Nigerian banker, philanthropist Tony Elumelu said this in an opinion piece  originally published in Time.com on 29th September 2015. He had also been speaking in the same vein at a United Nations economics and development event in New York, one of many surrounding the 2015 General Assembly.

It is not a secret that Europe has kept Africa underdeveloped by unfair trade and investment practices. The un-Equal Partnership Agreement which is designed to ensure open customs borders for goods and services but closed borders for labour has been proposed to ensure that the terrible statusquo is retained. This writer has earlier described the whole scheme or scam as a "poisoned chalice."

I am surprised that Elumelu with his exposure and intellectual pedigree did not commence his address by giving full credit to Dr Charles Chukwuma Soludo. It is only in Nigeria that development intellectuals and activists deliberately ignore foundations laid by their forebears. The same is sadly true of our government processes. No wonder we stagnate. We keep re-inventing the wheel!

At this stage one would have expected Elumelu to offer new prescriptions and/or amendments to the clear road maps advanced by Dr Soludo and his ilk. To have ignored Soludo completely is a disaster. At the very least, Elumelu should have DISAGREED with his prescriptions. In that way they would at least be talking TO each other instead of PAST each other. Benefits can only accrue from robust debate.

We cannot keep covering the same old ground by repeatedly "identifying" our predicaments. A few days ago I watched a documentary on bictrailer.com detailing the work of US entrepreneur and philanthropist Manoj Bhargava. He stated, and I agree wholeheartedly, that awareness (of a problem) is good BUT is not the same as pursuing and ultimately procuring a solution. He committed his organisation to address just a few. Readers are encouraged to check this out.

ON REFUGEES

Elumelu also wrote, "European countries (who) must offer refuge or other types of protection to asylum-seekers who can show that they are fleeing war or persecution . . . are under no such obligation, however, to those looking to improve their prospects." 

Really? Europe created and continues to create the mess in the first place. On the other hand, it a tough job trying to differentiate between the two classes of migrants. As Soludo rightly pointed out they must share in the burden of stemming and if possible reversing the flow of migrants by bold investment and trade policies going forward. Otherwise the EU should be prepared to deploy the same military that it has shown  reluctance to call up against Russian aggression in Ukraine simply for the futile effort to keep out African economic migrants. They will fail.

"Africapitalism" backed by $100m seed money is a good start, but it is still infinitesimal compared to the missed opportunities, the leakages entrenched in the current structures of trade, thievery, investment and tax avoidance regimes which Europe has perfected over the past six decades. $100m, more like Elumelu's life work, can be cleaned out and it's potentially positive impact undermined by a simple project meeting gone bad. The NLNG Limited contract bazaar is a case in point. Over $180m vanished into thin air.

Yes, Small and Medium Scale Industries have a major part to play in Nigeria's future growth and job creation prospects. However we must be able to get the advanced world to domesticate some of the high end, advanced technology and large industries to soak up the output of the SMSI. Otherwise we will spend the next half century manufacturing plastic flip-flops. That is not the kind of growth we should bequeath our grandchildren. Anybody who cannot undertake or understand a proper analysis  of the failure of say Dunlop and/or Michelin in Nigeria, has no business sitting in where Nigeria's industrial future is being discussed.

If we fail, the northward trek will continue. 

Turing Pharmaceuticals Acquires Daraprim and Hikes Price From $13.50 a Tablet to $750, Overnight - Where do we go from here?

 I wonder how many Nigerians are aware of the landmark event that took place at the Indian Supreme Court on April 1, 2013. The apex court ruled on that day that the Indian drug companies Cipla Ltd and Ranbaxy were in the right for "infringing" on the drug patent of the global giant Norvatis for the cancer therapy Glivec which had hitherto been out of the reach of the generality of patients.

The drug patent was about to expire, hence opening the door for much cheaper generics, when Norvatis tweaked with the delivery mechanism and filed for another patent. The aim here was to extend the life of the previous patent thus freezing out the other drug manufacturers waiting impatiently to get into the fray. Cipla Ltd and Ranbaxy ignored Norvatis  and proceeded to make generics to the cheer and relief of long suffering Indian patients, not to mention the  large army of medical tourists from all over the globe. Predictably Norvatis sued. What followed  was a long drawn out legal battle during which the likes of Aventis and GlaxoSmithKline were left shivering uncertainly in the wings. The legal fight ended on April 1, 2013, with the Indian Supreme Court throwing out the challenge. Note that Cipla and Ranbaxy (Montari)have operations in Nigeria.

The battle for Glivec and many other drugs are by no means over and continues on European and US courts and multiple drug administrations. The medical superpowers are currently in damage control mode, to ensure that this virus does not spread any further. It is however very unlikely that Europe and US will go to war over such a matter. That notwithstanding, one can imagine the fear and consternation at the very prospect of Cipla and other copycats selling cheap drugs into the Chinese market, the rest of Asia, Africa and perhaps South America. That is why US and Europe are extremely keen on writing very strict rules in the current spate of global and regional free trade treaties. The interest of the so called third world is hardly ever taken into consideration. Like this low blow by Turing Pharmaceuticals.

At this point it will be instructive to remind Nigeria that nothing in the so called new world economic order comes on a silver platter. We have to fight for every perceived advantage, or even a place at the table. Anyone with any doubt should read Dr Chukwuma Soludo's analysis of the poisoned chalice presented to Africa in the name of Equal Partnership Agreement (EPA) which appeared in The Financial Times of London and most of the leading Nigerian media in early 2013. He has had cause to revisit the issue over snd over again.

Africa remains just an observer in these developments. In many of the sectors and technologies, African countries, especially Nigeria, seem to be blissfully unaware of what is going on and the likely endgame. It is therefore not strange at all that we do not have a properly articulated viewpoint going forward in these matters. The people at Nigeria's Office of Intellectual Property  (NOTAP) probably imagine that their job is actually to take care of the economic interest of other nations and their citizens. A cursory look at China will educate NOTAP about the way to go.

In the health sector we have been so rightly focused on the fight against fake and substandard drugs that we seem to have forgotten to gear up for the next level whereby we domesticate the primary backbone without which we will forever remain compounders and tableters of active ingredients sourced from other climes. That's not what progress looks like.

DARAPRIM

And now this. The future is no longer out there in any nebulous sense but has come crashing down on us with what has just happened to the price of a basic anti-malarial staple like DARAPRIM. A price gouging hegde-fund led group, Turing masquerading as a moral player in the medical field, has recently inreased the price by 5000%.  Apparently this story has not made any blimp on the radar of Nigerian journalists on the medical beat.

We all grew up with cheap Daraprim over the past 50years. Together with treated mosquito nets, Daraprim has been a reliable ally on the prevention front in the battle against malaria.

The second line of defence is actual treatment. Any development that undermines prevention makes the battle to treat and eliminate malaria all the more difficult. I hope that all the collaborators, including our health ministries, the Carter Foundation, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and other stakeholders are following this development closely. Thankfully, Mrs Hillary Clinton, a presidential candidate in the current campaigns for the US presidency, has recently lent her support to the effort to rein in the excesses of the global drug companies. It is going to be a tough battle against a determined cartel.

In this last weekend edition of The Wall Street Journal, September 19 - 20, 2015, ahead of the visit of Pope Francis, leading Republican and former Presidential aspirant Newt Gingrich coauthored, with former ambassador Jim Nicholson, an open letter to His Holiness. The duo tried to disabuse the mind of the pope of the widely held notion that there is something inherently rapacious about the current brand of unbridled capitalism practiced in the United States and most of the western hemisphere. When the above story finally broke a couple of days ago about the shenanigans of companies like Turing Pharmaceuticals, it only helped to confirm a most unhealthy trend.   Against this background in the drug industry among others, Speaker Gingrich and his friend obviously have a lot more convincing to do. I wish them luck.

Re: FG to reduce tariff on imported rice; - TARIFF AS A WMD; TARIFF AS AN ACT OF WAR!

In a recent report, (1Q, 2014), the Minister of Finance, Mrs Ngozi Okonjo-Iwuala, said that the existing 110 per cent duty on the importation of rice was encouraging smuggling of the commodity into the country. “We increased the tariff to 110 per cent, and it encouraged some people to go and grow rice and we grew 1.1million metric tonnes of the product. But it also encouraged smuggling from neighbouring countries because they immediately dropped their own tariffs to 10 per cent,” she said.

And we don't know what to do? Russia invaded The Crimea in Ukraine for reasons that are quite flimsy compared with the blatant enemy action by Benin Republic over this rice issue.

Our Minister of Agriculture, Dr Akinwunmi Adesina and others are working their butts off taking our rice production up, closer to where it should be. And the government and people of Benin Republic fearlessly undermine that. If that is not a declaration of war, I honestly don't know what war is.

I can understand a country like Sierra Leone, with over two centuries of rice production under its belt, deciding to utilise its comparative advantage to have a legitimate share, like India and Thailand, in supplying Nigeria's large and growing population. But Benin Republic? Excuse me! The only way is for the government of Benin to subsidise rice production. In effect their government will spend part of its budget in feeding Nigerians. Can Benin Republic afford that?

The current action of Benin Republic in bringing in several multiples of its rice needs for next to nothing in duty and organising a quasi official smuggling train into Nigeria is a sabotage that no self-respecting nation can condone. There is no way the ECOWAS trade protocols would have allowed such

patently unfriendly action. It is actually futile highlighting the obscene collaboration by our own Nigerian Custom Service and other security agencies in this criminal enterprise.

WHAT SHOULD BE NIGERIA'S SENSIBLE RESPONSE?

I recommend that a flotilla of the Nigerian Navy pays a not-so-friendly visit to Cotonou at the same time when about five brigades of the Nigerian Army undertakes a 2 to 6km hot pursuit incursion into Benin Republic after "criminals, smugglers and car snatchers"! There will definitely be a diplomatic uproar with explanations and apologies flying all over the place. Upon withdrawal of Nigerian troops, we then close our land borders with Benin Republic for a minimum of six months. I would very much love to see them squirm under the load of rice that they cannot eat. The above looks drastic, but our very survival is at stake here.

Prof Bolaji Akinyemi has stated time and again that Nigeria must extract respect (and possibly fear) from its neighbours. It does not need to be loved.

NORTH DEMANDS NEW NATIONAL CONFERENCE - Northern leaders reject Jonathan’s confab report

It has been reported that prominent Northern leaders, on Tuesday, rejected the implementation of the 2014 report of the National Conference convoked by former President Goodluck Jonathan. They had claimed that it did not address the key issues affecting them. . Really?

I begin to wonder whether the North was actually represented at that discredited conclave. I now recall that some delegates, especially the traditional rulers were busy arguing and protesting ovet the nonprovision of allowances for their aides, drivers, horse-handlers and trumpeters. What a distraction! No wonder they did not know when important resolutions were passed.

The rest, mainly gerontocrats, slept right through the exalted deliberations, or worse still, died on duty in the hallowed chambers, in the service (?) of the fatherland! Will somebody please bring down the flag at half mast as we sing the first stanza of the National Anthem.

The report continued: 

"In its place, the northern leaders are asking President Muhammadu Buhari to convene a FRESH conference that would take into cognisance the challenges facing them and proffer solutions to them.

"The northern leaders who are mostly former political office holders under the aegis of Northern Reawakening Forum (NRF) and headed by a former member of the House of Representatives, Mohammed Kumalia, said:

   . . . (that) IT WOULD BE WRONG FOR BUHARI TO IMPLEMENT THE REPORT OF THE CONFERENCE CALLED BY THE FORMER LEADER!

And former military president Babangida routinely and glibly talks about settled issues. Is any issue ever settled in this God-for***en land?

I must confess that the above proposal is a very good one. Furthermore to make sure that the the membership of the NRF and Arewa Consultative Forum (ARF) feel comfortable and completely at home, the proposed brand new conference must take place in Daura, Sokoto or Maiduguri. The composition of the membership must be front loaded with the Arewa delegation having a 2 to 1 numerical advantage over the rest of the country. That will guarantee a 2/3 majority at the very first votes.

Finally, a law must to be rushed through the current 8th National Assembly requiring the implementation of the predetermined outcome of the new national(?) conference before the end of the first term of office of President Buhari. That is the only way to play safe. Otherwise the next administration can willy-nilly jettison the brand new decisions that we are about to bulldoze through the proposed new conference. The enemy or the other side (take your pick) cannot be trusted not to spring the same surprise in the (likely) event that it does not like the outcome of this new conference. And so the merry go round continues! . Please dear reader, take a brief time-out and pray for our grandchildren. They are in serious soup.

While going through the above motions, the president might as well save us both the time and trouble by issuing a no-nonsense decree expropriation the revenue from the oil resources of the South (meaning Niger Delta) for the long deferred development of the North. I am making all this addendum on the authority of Aliyu Gwarzo (alias: It is either the Koran or the sword) who had earlier clearly indicated some of the things the North wants OR ELSE!

To support the educational renaissance of a resurgent North, teachers would also need to be (forcefully) conscripted to take northern kids through their ABCs and beyond. Oh yes I nearly missed this; renaissance and Reawakening actually mean the same thing. Welcome on board Mohammed Kumalia. Our people say that whenever one wakes up constitutes morning for him.

The North must be developed no matter whose ox is gored.

The above is serious business. Did anyone hear me laughing?

THE DEBT THAT NIGERIA OWES BLACKS - Re: Mandela Was Angry With Nigera

The following article is derived from an open letter that I wrote to Prof Randall Robinson the renowned Afro-American teacher, activist and writer two years ago. I had known about him from his two "controversial" works THE DEBT - That America Owes Blacks, and QUITTING AMERICA, the later chronicling the odyssey, both mental and physical, culminating in his emigrating from his own country the US to the Caribbean island nation of St Kitts & Nevis. Prof Robinson has been quite busy as his literary output shows. Because of his unrelenting push on the matter of reparations, I had reminded him of the work of the late Chief M K O Abiola and also mildly cajoled him to join forces with the Nigerian intelligentsia in that effort.

That was almost two years ago in December 2013. Much as I had widely distributed  my commentary, it was never published in the Nigerian press. I am therefore resurrecting the ideas in the firm belief that they are as relevant as ever.

Since reading THE DEBT, I had continued to look up to Prof Randall Robinson for incisive analysis of the black situation in the US and beyond. And I told him so. In addition, my reading of QUITTING AMERICA among other things helped formulate my own views about the punitive and absolutely unprofitable US foreign policy  stance towards Cuba. History shows that Black Africa has not fared any better despite nice diplomatic noises to the contrary, as illustrated by events in the Congo/Zaire, Rwanda, Angola, Namibia and apartheid South Africa etc.  On Cuba, we have apparently both been vindicated by the bold steps quietly pursued by the Obama administration and which have come to light in the last couple of months culminating in the reestablishing of diplomatic relationships.

THE DEBT THAT NIGERIA OWES BLACKS. 

My thesis remains the following. While a new generation of activists led by Ta-Nehisi Coates are fighting for and waiting for the white man in America, to acknowledge and perhaps pay up his DEBT, others including this writer have pointed out that Black Africa (often meaning Nigeria) owes Africa, especially Africa in diaspora, a resounding success today at home, now. Success in getting our act together, against all odds, will be very good, nay uplifting, for black pride and psyche. And confidence too.

All the stories about Mansa Musa, Ashanti, Meroe, Timbuktu, Zimbabwe, Askia are validly in the past. We need new authentic Africa heroes and success stories for today.

Writers like W E DuBois, DeGraft-Johnson, Walter Rodney, Howard French and lately Tom Burgis (author of The Looting Machine), have rightly chronicled how Africa always ended up with the short end of the stick. The huge burden of underdevelopment with which Africa has been and continues to be shackled by deliberate policies and sheer brigandsge by the European world of which the US is an integral part is a fact of life. Unfortunately here in Nigeria the revelations by bleeding heart colonial-era civil servants like Harold Smith are dismissed and treated as non events. Can we ever learn?

In his writings, Prof Robinson briefly mentioned Dr Dudley, a long time Jamaican ambassador to Nigeria and doyen of the diplomatic corps. As a regular contributor to the Nigerian press in the 80's, Dudley's constant lament was the DEBT that Nigeria owed and still owes blacks.

Dr Dudley wrote long before the black US ambassador, Walter Carrington, in the 90's, took up what was obviously a very personal mandate, namely to shake Nigerians, especially the elite, out the lethargy of underdevelopment and poor governance in which they are complicit. Both men had stridenty maintained that unless Nigeria succeeds, and is seen to succeed, the rest of Africa and Africa in diaspora can hardly imagine pulling themselves up by the bootstrap as may be necessary.

In short, Nigeria owes its very success almost as a religious duty to the rest of the continent. Our black brothers in America can currently claim as alibi, "You guys were never enslaved, or dispossessed, or had your family structure blatantly destroyed, or had to face Jim Crow laws. You have been free. If you can't make progress, how does the world expect so much of us?"

As a graduate student almost forty years ago, I used to be quite dismissive towards the low achievement of the average black male in the US since I met almost none in my academic environment. Not anymore. I do not accept what I currently see, but I am a lot more understanding. So we owe them too. That was exactly what I tried to explain to Prof Robinson. I wanted him to keep up the demand on Nigerian by engaging them.

Without bothering to elaborate on the regular contribution to this discussion by our own Profs Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe, I want to draw our attention to a not so recent lecture by Prof Bolaji Akinyemi, a one time Foreign Minister of Nigeria. He dealt once again with the DEBT that Nigeria owes blacks: NIGERIA- The Blackman's Burden. I commend the learned professor's lecture once again to my dear countrymen and women.

http://anwarkazaure.blog.com/2012/08/01/nigeria-the-blackmans-burden/

As the whole world was falling over one other to align with the values attributed to Nelson Mandela, it is appropriate to remind ourselves again what The Madiba had to say about the DEBT that Nigeria owes blacks; what grieved him so much.

http://mobile.saharareporters.com/article/mandela-was-angry-nigeria-dr-hakeem-baba-ahmed

Dr DeGraft-Johnson and others like Basil Davidson (The Blackman's Burden) have had their say. Others like Prof Richard Joseph have more recently wept publicly for Nigeria. Nigerians must therefore continue from where these most eminent personalities stopped until victory is achieved.

When Nigeria cannot undertake simple operations like making petroleum products available for its population, in a world awash with oil, it says a lot about our discipline, commitment, and sheer resolve to engage in activities that are not only difficult but complex upon which our national survival and pride may depend. My disappointment would have been the same even if Nigeria produced no oil, like Mali.  Black Africa and Africa in diaspora is watching Nigeria with bated breath.

Re: Database for Nigeria - John Tosin Ajiboye

All the government agencies mentioned by Mr John Ajiboye are perpetually involved in an internecine turf war that has absolutely nothing to do with service delivery. Their only aim is to retain and if possible expand their individual budgets. Each superfluous agency has its champions and protectors in both the Executive and Legislative arms of government. Hence the current impasse. The management and staff of these agencies with overlapping functions are certainly not so blank as not to see what Dr Orosanye (erstwhile Secretary to Federal Government of Nigeria) and his colleagues saw. The name of the game is to use all means fair and foul to maintain the status quo.

Let us take a few of the agencies one by one.

FRSC: This agency almost got away with its new scam surrounding Vehicle Registration, Vehicle License Plates and Driver’s License. Despite the strident public outcry and the intervention of the Legislature, the FRSC still had the temerity to go back to court to continue fighting the issue against WE THE PEOPLE. This is very strange indeed.

The POLICE: I wonder who will advise The Nigeria Police that in this day and age, the Central Motor Registry or CMR is not a place, like in a physical building, but an electronic data repository, the kind banks maintain and secure routinely. No Nigerian will trust The Police to properly archive any data for him. It is as bad as that. So long as The Police has unfettered access to the data, it has no reason to complain.For all the data at its disposal, when was the last time The Police came knocking at anybody’s door to announce “Sir, we have found your missing car”?

NIMC: By whatever name called, the NIMC has consistently had a bad reputation starting from the tenure of the late minister of Internal Affairs dinner etiquette at the table of governance became the topic of many editorials and beer parlour talk.

NPC: The results of the many enumeration efforts in the past by The Nigerian Population Commission has always led us into strange territories. Schools have been built in locations where there are very few children of school age. On the other hand inadequate health facilities are provided in localities with teeming population. How do we address this monster? One way is to entrench much deferred fiscal federalism without which Nigeria cannot make any headway. Since we pretend to copy the Americans, we might as well go the whole hog. I recommend that all personal income tax should accrue to the Federal Government. The demographic information derived from the tax returns will then constitute invaluable input for rationalising the raw census data.

Re: As Ambode lusts after Walmart - WHAT POSTURE SHOULD NIGERIA ADOPT IN DEALING WITH FOREIGN INVESTORS?

In a recent article in her very popular  column, Ms Abimbola Adelakun wrote among other things:

"The Lagos State Governor, Akinwumi Ambode, can do with (that) wisdom as he lusts after foreigners bringing their businesses to Nigeria. Recently, when he met officials of the retail chain, Walmart, he expressed such unrestrained enthusiasm about their berthing in Nigeria and the potential for jobs they would generate for the economy. Walmart is not a charity organisation, why should it care about Nigeria’s employment figures? Walmart’s advent in Lagos cannot be sheer altruism. . "

The misgivings expressed here is on correct grounds. However one of the jobs of every right thinking government is to channel the "greed" and extreme capitalistic propensity of each and every multinational towards serving the national interest. Are we up to the task?

Milk and yogurt, that would otherwise be wasted (or perhaps not even produced), are now available to grace supermarket shelves in Lagos and Abuja. We have Friesland WAMCO and the so-called white Zimbabwe farmers of Kwarra State to thank for that.

Whether it is through Dole, Del-Monte, Transcorp or Walmart, the same situation is about to evolve in the area of fruit juices. There is more to come. Fresh all season corn on the cob, avocados, mangoes, oranges and papaya.

For example, without surrendering to say rice smugglers, Nigeria still needs to lean on organisations that know what they want to do, based on track record. Right now we are leaning on Olam and others for rice. These companies must however be ready or be made to share the benefits. We must sharpen our negotiating skills. To keep them honest, we must keep some competition in the game. Best practices are not learnt overnight, especially in our dog-eat-dog business environment.

Having said that, I can now aver that the berthing of Walmart and similar organisations in Nigeria can and should be a good thing. Nigerian companies are pretty advanced in merchandising, both retail and online and also in logistics. However applying that to perishable agricultural products is a whole new ballgame. Inadequate electrical power supply has rendered the vital cold chain a most unreliable link in the many vast enterprises that the nation must rely on for increased productivity and hence growth. Add bad roads and the nonexistent railway network and you have a situation akin to middle China in the 1940s during the Japanese invasion. That is how bad I read the Nigerian situation.

One writer recently took the trouble to explain how a broiler chicken bred in Sokoto and sold for N300 apiece to wholesalers gets resold at Lagos at N1,600. The reason was quite simple. The losses are routinely in the region of 60-70%. And we are not talking about bird-flu.

India is a country that, despite wide spread endemic poverty, is still much more advanced than Nigeria on all fronts. Even before the new Prime Minister Nahendra Modi took office, the nation was involved in serious soul-searching in the matter of allowing the Walmarts of this world set up shop there. The merchant class were understandably up in arms, while pro-growth analysts harped on  the same arguments that I have tried to deliver above.

Let me draw attention again to this statement by Ms Adelakun: "Recently, when he (Gov Ambode) met officials of the retail chain, Walmart, he expressed such unrestrained enthusiasm about their berthing in Nigeria and the potential for jobs they would generate for the economy. . etc"

Fortunately or unfortunately, that is the way such business is initiated. Investors must be made to feel welcome. Even in the US, counties will tempt investors with various sweetners and local tax holidays. At this very moment, New York state has introduced a 10 year tax holiday scheme for new investments covering most of the state. Other examples abound.

It would be instructive to find out from those who should know, (and that includes Nigeria's ambassadors), how Alhaji Aliko Dangote is received when he lands in most African capitals. I can easily visualize the fawning. What with the decades-long benign neglect by both the Blue Circle and the Lafarge groups. That's the power of capital for you. That does not mean that we have to hand over the family heirlooms just because foreign investors express an intention to invest in our economy.

Nigeria is still in the very easy stages of engaging the megabusinesses and conglomerates with whom we must do business to sustain the 5 to 10% growth rate that we so much desire and covet. I have written extensively in the past on power, gas development, coal mining and the mining industry in general.

The truth is that we have not really started. When we do start, there is no way BHP-Billiton, Rio-Tinto, Anglo-Gold Ashanti, Vale, Newport etc will not be involved. One should also add to this list Glencore (Trafigura) who have to date only shown interest in trading in our underpriced crude oil and selling us refined petroleum products that we normally shouldn't import. With the sad economic developments of the past few weeks, these mining behemoths seem to have bitten more than they can chew, for now. We still have no choice but to cultivate them.

Kellog Brown & Root, Fluor and Bechtel will have to get on board in engineering and construction to join the Japanese and Koreans. The incestuous relationship we have had all these years with the Bilfinger-Berger group is definitely not sustainable.

For our railways Bombardier,  Alstom and the Chinese must be seen competing for transport infrastructure projects.

A big and fast growing economy requires big investors with access to huge capital. We are in for a very long and turbulent ride with all sorts of sharks in order to move Nigeria forward. Does the government have the requisite legal manpower that can pilot the nation through the legal minefields we must necessarily cross in the course of the negotiations? Unfortunately the track record  so far does not offer any basis for confidence. But we must move on.

One should therefore note that the "teeny-weeny" $1b investment that General Electric has put down in Nigeria is, to use the local expression, "cikiny moni," - chicken change. What in a country where, rightly or wrongly, a single individual is routinely accused of pilfering $5b!

To keep Nigeria on the desirable growth trajectory, we may often have to stoop to conquer, whilst still not losing our heads in the process.

To conclude I wish to paraphrase a statement by Dr Pat Utomi at an event hosted by the Indigenous Quoted Group of the Nigerian Stock Exchange some 20 years ago. In his paper he had lamented the "inexplicable mixture of timidity and brashness" exhibited by our public officials while dealing with foreigners. Striking a proper balance is essentially what Ms Adelakun should be asking for.

Can Buhari appoint Dr Martin Fregene as Minister of Agriculture?

Reading Jon West's comments (on the article by Dr Martin Fregene), makes it clear that we will always recall the Jonathan regime with a large measure of ambivalence. I however beg to disagree with his assertion that the former President's mistakes or deliberate errors were few or minor. However nothing can devalue his administration's impact on the agricultural front. 

The same ambivalence applies to our early reading of the nascent Buhari administration for which we have so few data points to hazard a (premature) judgement at this stage. All Nigerians, including those in the new ruling party, the APC, agree that President Buhari's take off is excruciatingly slow. The original bright promise has been undeniably dimmed. Perhaps we are being unduly hasty, but we are entitled to our expectations. It has been said time and again that GMB's administration would hit the ground running. Some rather uncharitable commentators have accused him of hitting the ground and sitting exactly where he landed.

That said, I must observe that I have found Dr Martin Fregene exceedingly fluent in the subject matter, agricultural transformation, that he chose to address. If I knew him any better, I would immediately conclude "There goes our new Minister of Agriculture!" I believe that he was a good understudy of Dr Adesina, the new boss at AfDB. . . I wonder if the Buhari administration has a more suitably qualified candidate in mind. Time will tell.

Federal Government to increase VAT to 10%? Just don't do it.

Whose idea is this? How much universal coverage has the Federal Inland Revenue Service achieved based on the current 5% VAT rate? Has the FIRS given up and chosen rather to tax only the hitherto compliant some more? That would be a disaster. 

Moreover the media is creating the false  impression that the idea of an increase in VAT rate lies within the administrative purview of only the Executive in general or the FIRS in particular. If you run out of money, just increase taxes. This is not correct. 

Taxes, any taxes, just like budgets, are based on bills passed by both houses of parliament signed into law by the President. Hence we have long way to go on this issue. Government(s) with poor record of accountability should expect strident opposition to this proposal. If the free-loading members of the House approves it, to shore up their profligate lifestyles, they would have clearly re-confirmed their anti-people stance. 

The FIRS and their beggarly state government counterparts should close all tax evasion and tax avoidance loopholes and extend the taxation net to rope in more and more people especially at the upper end. 

Finally, we must realise that taxes from the bottom of the pyramid also matter a lot because of the huge population base. The truth is that the poor(?) are often forced to pay a ruinous plethora of "taxes" and levies which end up in private pockets. Ask any Okada or Keke rider or danfo or molue driver or market stall trader or street vendor, etc. .  If only the state can get 20 to 30% of what these victims shell out routinely to the many mafia in our midst! I do not expect the mafia to give in without a fight. But fight we must. 

Telcos lament 50% revenue loss to WhatsApp, Skype, etc

See who is complaining. 

I continued reading the above story to see at which point the writer Ozioma Ubabikoh would deliver the punchline that the behemoth telcos namely MTN, Airtel, Glo and Etisalat are suddenly on the verge of going under due to competition from outside of the cartel. Of course no such thing is about to happen. I do not see a Chief Pascal  Dozie (among many others) divesting from MTN and plowing back the proceeds into Diamond Bank! 

Simply put, the telecom operations remain an Eldorado, a goldmine, competition or not. That was exactly why a Chief Mike Adenuga saw an opening and exploited it, to the cheering approval of long suffering overcharged Nigerian consumers. Thankfully research and innovation in Silicon Valley and others across the globe ensured that there was still more to come. Hence BB-calls, Skype, WhatsApp, We-Chat, etc, etc. 

By the way, I am yet to see anyone shed a tear when the true pioneers on the CDMA platform were relentlessly pounded into the ground with nary a whimper from the government and the regulators. Engr Ernest Ndukwe and Dr Eugene Juwah are living witnesses.  

For those who are too young to remember, I hereby make a roll call of some of the dead entities: Intercellullar, Multi-Links, Mobitel, Celtel, Zoom, Starcomms, EMIS, MTS-1stWireless, VGC Communications, etc. It is quite easy to deduce why and how Tony Elumelu's Visaphone has not only survived but managed to thrive, sort of. A deep pocket?

I have just cross-checked the above list on the web-based IT Telecoms Digest. So I am not making this up. This is simply history. I had earlier briefly commented on this (sad) development from the standpoint of our non-existent Anti-Trust legislation. I had hoped that someone smarter and/or more committed than me would run with it. Sadly, nobody did. 

I was not trying to reveal anything new to either the government, the regulators or the big telecoms operators. They cannot pretend not to know that the days of scandalously large returns are over. Perhaps, the telcos will now be in the mood to finally admit ordinary folks into their stock ownership scheme, which the government foolishly(?) forgot to write into the original investment scheme. Better late than never. 

FEMI AND HIS SEVERELY IGNORANT LIES: by Dr. Samuel Okafor,

The below article is by Dr. Samuel Okafor in response to Femi Fani-Kayode . Full credit is given to his authorship. I have shared it here in my continuing desire to educate the population.

FEMI AND HIS SEVERELY IGNORANT LIES:

•Femi Lies About the Yorubas Being Nigeria’s Earliest Graduates:

From his myopic bubble Femi FaniKayode claims the Yoruba were the first to acquire Western education; the first ever known record of a literate Nigerian in the English Language is the narrative of an Ibo slave who regained his freedom and documented his life history as a slave from the time he was 11 years old in present day Ibo land till the time when he gained his freedom in the middle of the 18 th century. He later married an English woman and had 3 children. He died in 1795.

Femi, a basic Google-research will do you good here; check out the name, Equanoh OLAODAH. Further Femi claims that the Yoruba were the first lawyers and doctors in Nigeria. This is again a big falsehood. The first Nigeria doctor was an Effik man Silas G. Dove who obtained a medical degree from France and returned to practise medicine in 1840 in Calabar. This fact can also be verified from historical medical records in Paris.

I would also ask that you google the name BLYDEN – Edward Wilmot BLYDEN – an educated son of free Ibo slaves who by the mid-19th century had acquired sound theological education. He was born in Saint Thomas in 1832. He is one of the founding missionaries that established the Archbishop Vining church in Ikeja. Before the next time you succumb to your long-running battle with logorrhoea, Femi please do some research.

What about the third president of a free Liberia – President J JRoyle – again, a man of Ibo descent. Please take some time to do some research so that we can discuss constructively. It is wrong to peddle lies to your people. It is academic fraud to knowingly misrepresent facts just to score cheap points with people who do not have the discipline to do research and accept anything you pour out simply because they say you are well educated. To again quote the great Nobel Prize Winner in Economics Joseph Stiglitz; Femi fits into the category of third rate students from first rate universities with an inflated sense of self-importance. Let’s go on!

Who was the first Nigerian Professor of Mathematics – an Ibo man – Professor Chike Obi – the man who solved Fermat’s Last Theorem. He was followed by another Ibo man, Professor James Ezeilo, Professor of Differentail Calculus and the founder of the Ezeilo Constant. Please do some research on this great Ibo man. He later became the Vice Chancellor of the University of Nigeria Nsukka and one of the founders of the Nigerian Mathematical Centre. Who was Nigeria’s first Professor of Histroy – Professor Kenneth Dike who published the first account of trade in Nigeria in pre-colonial times. He was also the first African Vice Chancellor of the University of Ibadan. Who was the first Professor of Microbiology – Professor Eni Njoku; he was also the first African Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos. Anatomy and Physiology – Professor Chike Edozien is an Asaba man and current Obi of Asaba. Who was the first Professor of Anatomy at the University College Ibadan? Who was the first Professor of Physics? Professor Okoye, who became a Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1960. He was followed by the likes of Professor Alexander Anumalu who has been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Physics three times for his research in Intermediate Quantum Physics. He was also a founding member of the Nigerian Mathematical Centre. Nuclear Physics and Chemistry – again another Ibo man – Professor Frank Ndili who gained a Ph.D in his early ’20s at Cambridge Univesity in Nuclear Physics and Chemistry in the early ’60s. This young Asaba man had made a First Class in Physics and Mathematics at the then University College Ibadan in the early ’50s. First Professor of Statistics – Professor Adichie who’s research on Non-Parametric Statistics led to new areas in statistical research. What about the first Nigerian Professor of Medicine – Professor Kodilinye – he was appointed a Professor of Medicine at the University of London in 1952. He later became the Vice Chancellor of the University of Nigeria Nsukka after the war. What about Astronomy – again another Ibo man was the first Professor of Astronomy – please, look up Professor Ntukoju – he was the first to earn a double Ph.D in Astronomy and Mathematics.

Let’s go to the Social Sciences – Demography and statistical research into population studies – again another Ibo man – Professor Okonjo who set up the first Centre for Population Research in Ibadan in the early ’60s. A double Ph.D in Mathematics and Economics. Philosophy – Professor G D Okafor, who became a Professor of Philosophy at the Amherst College USA in 1953. Economics – Dr. Pius Okigbo who became a visiting scholar and Professor of Economics at the University of London in 1954. He is also the first Nigerian Ph.D in Economics. Theology and theological research – Professor Njoku who became the first Nigerian to earn a Ph.D in Theology from Queens University Belfast in Ireland. He was appointed a Professor of Theology at the University College Zambia in 1952.

I am still conducting research in areas such as Geography where it seems a Yoruba man, Professor Mabogunje, was the first Professor. I also am conducting research into who was the first Nigerian Professor of English, Theatre Arts, Languages, Business and Education, Law and Engineering, Computer Technology, etc. Nigerians need to be told the truth and not let the lies that Femi Fani-Kayode has been selling to some ignorant Yoruba who feel that to be the first to see the white man and interact with him means that you are way ahead of other groups. The Ibo as The great Achebe said had within a span of 40 years bridged the gap and even surpassed the Yoruba in education by the ’60s. Many a Yoruba people perpetually indulge in self-deceit: that they were the first to go to school; to be exposed to Western education; that they are academically ahead of other Nigerian cultures of peoples. Another ignorant lie.

As far back as 1495 the Benin Empire maintained a diplomatic presence in Portugal. This strategic relationship did not just stop at a mere mission but extended to areas such as education. Scores of young Benin men were sent out to Portugal to study and lots of them came back with advanced degrees in Medicine, Law and Portuguese Language, to name a few.

Indeed, some went with their Yoruba and Ibo slaves who served the sons of the Benin nobility while they studied in Portugal. These are facts that can be verified by the logs kept by ship owners in Portugal from 1494 to 1830. It is kept at the Portuguese Museum of Geographic History in Lisbon.

Why then would several Yoruba people peddle all these falsehoods to show that they are ahead educationally in Nigeria? The true facts from the Federal Office of Statistics on education tell otherwise, showing that 3 Ibo states for the past 12 years have constantly had the largest number of graduates in the country, producing more graduates than Ondo, Osun, Ekiti and Oyo states. These eastern states are Imo, Anambra and Abia. Yet he calls Ibos traders. Indeed, the Igbos dominate because excellence dominates mediocrity – truth.

Let me enlighten this falsehood’s mouthpiece even further: before the civil war Ibos controlled and dominated all institutions in the formal sector in Nigeria from the universities to the police to the military to politics:

•The first Black Vice Chancellor of the University of Ibadan was an Ibo man

•The first Vice Chancellor of the University of Lagos was an Ibo man

•The first Nigerian Rector of the then Yaba College of Technology was also an Ibo man

•The police was run by an Ibo IG

•The military as a professional institution was also run by elite-ilk Ibos.

Facts can never be hidden. To be first does not mean you would win the race; let us open up all our institutions and may the best man win. Let us not depend on handouts or privileges but on heard work. Let us compete and give the best positions to our brightest – be it Ibo, Yourba or Fulani, and then we shall see who is the most successful Nigerian.

I find it difficult not to respond to some of these long-held lies that are constantly being peddled by Yorubas. One is that the Yoruba have the largest number of professors in the country. I would again ask that we stick to facts and statistical records. The Nigerian Universities Commission has a record of the state with the largest number of professors on their records and as at 2010 that state is Imo State followed by Ondo State and then Anambra State; the next state is Ekiti and then Delta before Kwara State. I am sure you Yorubas are surprised. When you sit in the South-West do not think others are sleeping but I wish to address another historical fact and that is who were the first Nigerians to receive Western education. It is important that these issues be examined in their historical context and evidence through research be presented for all to examine.

I have continued my research for as the great sociologist and father of modern sociology – Emile Durkheim – put it, the definition of a situation is real in its consequence . What this simply means is that one must never allow a perceived falsehood to become one’s reality and by extension individuals who accept a defined position act as though the situation is real and apply themselves in that narrowly defined perspective.

Why is this important to state it is because for long the Yoruba have peddled lies that have almost become accepted as the truth by other Nigerians but it is important that we lay down the facts for others to examine and come to their own conclusion for facts are facts. Let’s go back to education. Historically, Western education resulted as a product of indigenous ethnic groups interacting with the whites through trade. The dominant groups sold slaves, ivory gold and a host of other products to their European counterparts in exchange for finished goods – wine, tobacco, mirrors, etc.

The Bini who were the dominant military force from the 15th to the 19th century raided and sold other ethnicities to the Europeans. Top on the list of those they sold were the Yoruba, Ibo and Igala. Various other ethnicities suffered as a result of the Bini military expansion. And the Benin Kingdom stretched from present-day Benin up to what is now geographically referred to as Republic of Togo. Indeed, the influence of the Benin Empire extended to the banks of the river Niger to present-day Onistha. There are huge Yoruba settlements in the Anioma part of Delta State who fled Yoruba land as a result of these attacks and constant raids. Yes, there are Yoruba people who are currently living with Ibos in the Ibo-speaking part of Delta and they are full citizens of the place no one refers to them as strangers and there is no talk about the Ibos being the host community like we hear from the Governor of Lagos State. But let me return to research. Slaves were moved from the hinterland to the coast and many were sold through Eko to the New World. These slaves were the first to encounter the Europeans and by extension their way of life – this included education in a Western sense. The Bini King had taken pains to establish a diplomatic presence in Portugal and the relationship developed into areas that extended beyond trade in the late 15th century and lasted well into the early 19th century. Scores of young Bpni youth were sent to Portugal and studied there, coming back with advanced degrees in various disciplines. The next set of people to receive Western education were the slaves themselves. Some of them managed to buy their freedom and develop themselves further.

For the Ibo it does not matter who your father is; the question is: Who are you? Who was Obasanjo’s father? Was he the most educated Nigerian? I am sure the answer is no. Yet this Great Nigeria led this nation two times as a military Head of State and as a civilian President. What about GEJ? Who was his own father? Was he the first Nigerian to go to London? The answer is no. In fact, he had no shoes, yet he is fully in charge. So it does not matter if your father was the first Lawyer or first Doctor in Nigeria but rather what matters is what an individual does with the talents the Almighty has given to him. Let us open up Nigeria for competition. That is the solution to our problems. Those who want privileges keep reminding us that their fathers were the first to go to school in London. Every generation produces its own leaders and champions. Like Dangote who is the biggest employer of labour in Nigeria today and the richest man in Africa. Was his father the first to go to study in London? Yet he is the master of people whose parents gave them the best. My brothers, the answer to the Nigerian problem is that we should establish a merit-driven society. “I get am before” no be property.

Dr. Samuel Okafor,