Sahara Reporters Latest News Wednesday 26th June 2019

Sahara Reporters Latest News Wednesday 26th June 2019

Sahara Reporters Latest News Today and headlines on some of the happenings and news trend in the Country, today 26/06/19

target=_blank>My Monthly Salary Is N750,000, No Jumbo Pay In National Assembly, Senate President Lawan Claims

Ahmed Lawan

Ahmad Lawan, President of the Senate, has claimed his monthly salary as a Nigerian senator does not exceed N750,000.
A former senator, Shehu Sani, in 2018 had disclosed that lawmakers received N13.5 million every month for running costs, apart from their basic salary.
Lawan made the claims when members of the Senators’ Forum paid a courtesy visit to him in his office on Tuesday in Abuja.
He said: “What I want to emphasise here is that I never believed that there is anything called jumbo pay to the national assembly.
“The National Assembly members, both the Senate and the house (of representatives) receive what is their salaries and I receive N750,000 as my salary.
“But I need to function as a senator, my office needs to be properly funded.”

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target=_blank>Ahmed Lawan, Festus Adedayo And The APC Mob By Reuben Abati

Reuben AbatiReuben Abati

Reuben Abati

Paradigm Nigeria

Senator Ahmed Lawan is the incumbent Senate President of Nigeria, having won the election into that office, 79 -28, beating his rival, Senator Ali Ndume of the same ruling All Progressives Congress (APC). Lawan was the anointed candidate of his party, the APC, but he worked hard to negotiate with and secure the support of other members of the Senate across party lines. He secured a bi-partisan victory in such a convincing manner that has caused turmoil in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Nigeria’s main opposition party. The PDP has since ordered an investigation into how its National Assembly members voted contrary to the party’s directives. The PDP must pursue that course with extreme caution in order not to shoot itself in the foot. But what has Ahmed Lawan done with his victory and what has been the fall-outs?
Immediately after his declaration and inauguration as Senate President of the 9thNational Assembly on June 11, he and his equally “anointed” Deputy, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege went straight to the Aso Rock Presidential Villa to pay homage to President Muhammadu Buhari. When they got there, Ovie Omo-Agege whose role in the 8thNational Assembly was controversial, knelt down before the President as if he was in front of a demi-god. In Africa, some Presidents consolidate power so much in their persons, that people actually worship them. Ovie-Agege knelt down; Nigerians cried out in criticism. I didn’t join that needless outcry, because from the looks on Omo-Agege’s face, he came across like the kind of guy who would even have preferred to prostrate before the President, and if he was asked to jump up in the air, he would gladly have done so.  It is part of African culture to pay respects to elders, but a “Kabiyesi syndrome” as poet laureate Niyi  Osundare once put it, persists in Nigerian politics. Men and women of power are treated like monarchs and there is never a short supply of acolytes, relying on culture and custom, curtsying and genuflecting, masking what is in reality, opportunistic sycophancy.
Ahmed Lawan’s first act in office (his urgent and prompt visit to the Presidential Villa)  became an issue because he had promised that he would not run a rubber-stamp Senate, and that the 9thNational Assembly (the Senate President is the Chairman of the National Assembly) under his watch, while seeking a harmonious and qualitative relationship with the Executive arm of government, would act only strictly in the interest of the Nigerian people and in line with the legislature’s Constitutional mandate. Rushing off to go and “kiss” the President’s feet, just hours after being inaugurated didn’t send the right signals to an observant public. The newly elected Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives would soon follow in tow, but those ones at least allowed one or two days to pass. The dynamics of power in African democracies more or less subordinates one arm of government to the other, structurally and unjustifiably, but the sad part is how those who should ensure the integrity of spaces wilfully violate them.
Shortly after President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration was inaugurated for a second term on May 29, 2019, his first assignment in office was to jet off to Saudi Arabia for a meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). Barely 10 days before then, he was shown observing the Umrah (lesser hajj) in Makkah, Saudi Arabia. The incumbent Senate President, Ahmed Lawan and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila have both followed in the President’s footsteps, visiting Saudi Arabia, either before or after their emergence as heads of the National Assembly.  The number of trips that have been made to Saudi Arabia by the Nigerian ruling elite, before, during and after the 2019 general elections deserves an independent and rigorous study of its own for all its connotations. These trips are not limited to religious observances, there have been reports of interactions with Saudi officials. Even Christian officials working for the Buhari administration have had to visit Saudi Arabia, decked in traditional Saudi garbs. For more than the reasons of spiritual pilgrimage, Saudi Arabia has always been Nigeria’s strategic partner, but the kind of Saudi Arabian sycophancy that the current government has been demonstrating is the most bizarre that I have seen. Our embassy in Saudi Arabia must be the busiest mission that we have. Were Saudi Arabia to allow dual citizenship, many of our political leaders would have since joined the queue to beg for Saudi citizenship. For now, they have just turned it into their second London and they go and return, and do not fail to flaunt the trips in our face.
But whereas, we may cite the aforementioned illustrations as evidence of Senator Ahmed Lawan’s attempts to be like the boss, he eventually took a significant step to assert his independence and demonstrate that he has a mind of his own. The fact that he abandoned that attempt in the face of harassment and intimidation, indeed his cowardice in the face of pressure, and how that could well be a sad indication of what to expect, is the bigger point of this commentary. Six days ago, the Senate President Ahmed Lawan, unlike President Buhari, “hit the ground running” by announcing the appointment of his aides. President Buhari is yet to appoint any personal or official aides, his former aides continue to work for him by conduct in utter violation of Sections 151 and 171 of the Constitution. Lawan took the right step of announcing his aides. He retained three media aides who worked with his predecessor, Senator Bukola Saraki – Senate President of the 8thNational Assembly. These are Mohammed Isa, special assistant on media and publicity, Olu Onemola, special assistant on new media, and Tope Brown, special legislative assistant on photography. He retained another Saraki aide: Dr. Betty Okoroh. He further announced Dr. Festus Adedayo, former Special Adviser Media to former Governor Chimaroke Nnamani (Enugu State) and Senator Abiola Ajimobi (Oyo State), and a journalist with the Nigerian Tribune newspapers as his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity.
By retaining former aides of Senator Bukola Saraki, a former Senate President who had been declared persona non grata by the Presidency and the ruling APC, Lawan was obviously looking at continuity. He didn’t want to start his career as Senate President on a tabula rasa. It helps to have in place persons with institutional memory who may know where all the corpses in the office are buried. Part of the problem we have in the governance process in Nigeria is that every new person who assumes an office believes that the first thing to do is to get rid of staff who may have worked with the predecessor and who may still be loyal to that predecessor. Lawan took the moral high ground. He showed confidence by re-appointing some of the persons who worked with Bukola Saraki. Then, he chose as the head of his media team, a man who has been very critical of the Buhari administration and even of him. By Adedayo’s account himself, Lawan said he was looking for a man who could get the job done. Certainly, Festus Adedayo has the experience and the skills to deliver on the job. When I was approached about two years ago to provide a shortlist of persons who could act as spokesperson for a government agency, he was one of the top favourites on the short list that I submitted.  Festus Adedayo has the know-how, the intellectual heft, the street wisdom, the personality, and the courage to do a job that I consider, in retrospect, the most suicidal job in government.
As things have turned out, Festus Adedayo’s appointment as Special Adviser, Media and Publicity to Senate President Ahmed Lawan became the latter’s first major test. An APC mob crawled out of the woods to demand that this was an unacceptable choice. Adedayo was accused of having written a series of anti-Buhari, anti-Lawan, and anti-APC articles in the Nigerian Tribune where he runs a column titled “Flickers” and also works as an editorial board member.  Social media herdsmen pursuing this line of argument created a #sackFestusAdedayo handle online and within 24 hours they were in everyone’s face urging that Festus Adedayo does not deserve to get such a high office in a government that he had consistently disparaged and under a President for whom he seems to have no respect. Passages from Festus Adedayo’s writings were copied, pasted and distributed. He was accused of trying to reap where he did not sow. Those who claimed they worked to ensure APC’s victory and Ahmed Lawan’s emergence as Senate President protested that they had been insulted and marginalized.
They talked about the soup that they had prepared and now that the food was ready, it would be most unfair to invite an enemy to the table. Festus Adedayo was accused of having no shame, to have done so much damage condemning a party and a government, and to have the temerity to attend an interview for a job under the same government and believe that he could be allowed to take the job. He was labelled an enemy and an unprincipled person. He was asked to go and get a job from the PDP. “You can’t eat where you did not help to prepare the food”, they told him! The way the APC mob was talking about “soup”, “food”, and “juicy positions”, an outsider following the entire saga would think the Nigerian political arena is one big kitchen where Nigerians fight over food, soup and fruit juice, rather than a democracy.  There was so much talk about whose stomach should consume the food that the APC had prepared in Ahmed Lawan’s kitchen. We were even told that the APC has seasoned media managers who have worked and suffered and now that it is dinner-time, outsiders should be kept out.
In less than 48 hours, there was a press statement relieving Festus Adedayo of his appointment. This must be one of the shortest-lived appointments in Nigeria since 1999. Senator Lawan acted too prematurely and cowardly. He succumbed to blackmail. He may have been intimidated by the fact that the wife of the President, Aisha Buhari also waded into the matter with a widely circulated tweet, but he should have restrained himself from rushing to judgement. He interviewed Festus Adedayo. He didn’t just appoint him without a prior check. To sack him so hurriedly just because of the harassment of the APC mob shows cowardice, lack of principles, and an abject moral stature. He says he will not be a rubber stamp Senate President. He has just rubber stamped the wish of the APC herdsmen on social media. So, if tomorrow an opposition candidate opposes an Executive motion on the floor of the Senate, and we have the APC Senate gang screaming, what he would he do?  A man who cannot stand by his own choice and principles is a weakling whose politics cannot be trusted.
Senator Ahmed Lawan, who was brought to office on a bi-partisan basis must show greater confidence going forward. He must be the Senate President of all Nigerians not a Senate President that shakes and dithers when either the wife of the President or a frustrated APC mob sneezes. I have been told by a guest on The Morning Show – which I co-anchor on Arise News, Channel 416 on DSTV – (I will not mention the guest’s name because we intend to invite him again) that it would have been better if Festus Adedayo did not accept the appointment in the first place, and that persons in the public place should always stand by their own beliefs and not seek to benefit wherever there is food to be served. Festus Adedayo has already defended himself in characteristically sturdy and lyrical prose. But I told the fellow I hope the professional political class will also abide by the moral code that he prescribes. He merely repeated his position.
It seems to me, overall, that the ruling APC is mismanaging its success by adopting in most cases a winner-takes-it-all attitude, sheer intolerance, post-election and the needless dictatorship of the APC Headquarters. The only exception to this rule is probably the Dapo Abiodun administration in Ogun State where after the election, all stakeholders have been invited to be part of an inclusive process instituted by Governor Abiodun. I am told, however, that he is also under pressure from the APC to keep “enemies” away from the “kitchen.” The situation is worse in Edo and Bauchi states where infantile politics, and ego-conflict are on full display over the inauguration of the State Houses of Assembly and the election of principal officers. The APC must be reminded that Nigeria belongs to all of us whatever creed we subscribe to. The prevalent Manichean interpretation of power: them vs. us; winners vs. losers belongs to the age of Thomas Hobbes. There was a time after the 2019 general elections that President Muhammadu Buhari talked about inclusion – but there has been nothing inclusive so far since he assumed office for a second time. It is dangerous that other levels of government are beginning to emulate and mutate the arrogance of the APC.
When there is inclusion, the advantage is a no-brainer: when a so-called enemy is brought into the fold, he automatically becomes a friend, because clearly, there is no way a Festus Adedayo as spokesperson for Ahmed Lawan would have continued to criticize and condemn either Lawan’s Senate Presidency or the Federal Government. Nobody saw that or they thought it didn’t matter. Alimentary politics blocks vision and reason. Perhaps seeing how Adedayo has been treated, Olu Onemola, who used to work for Saraki, has rejected his re-appointment by Lawan. This is not a good sign- Lawan should note that. I urge Senator Ahmed Lawan to avoid this kind of situation in the future. Critics are not destroyers. They are also part of the national common project. Nobody should be subjected to an apartheid treatment or the politics of segregation just because they express a different opinion. Central to all of this is the failure to understand the difference between the job of a journalist and the job description of a spokesperson. I reserve the commentary on that subject for another occasion.

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target=_blank>Internet Fraudster Forfeits N230 Million To Nigerian Government

Federal High Court in Ikoyi, Lagos has ordered the final forfeiture of the sums of N210,287,697.45; N5,320,373.40; N15, 008,809.79 and $80.59 belonging to one Dehinbo Oluwatobi Reuben, an internet fraudster, to the federal government.
Justice Saliu Saidu gave the order on Tuesday at the hearing of the forfeiture application brought by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Justice Saidu had, on May 16, 2019, ordered an interim forfeiture of the various sums of money, following an ex-parte application filed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
In granting the application, Justice Sai’du had ordered the applicant, the EFCC, to publish the interim forfeiture order in any national newspaper for the respondent, Reuben, or anyone who was interested in the money to show cause why the money should not be permanently forfeited to the government.
In compliance with the order of the court, the EFCC had published the interim forfeiture order in The Nation newspaper and subsequently filed a motion on notice dated June 19, 2019.
At today’s proceedings, the judge, upon hearing the applicant’s motion on notice, supporting affidavit and written address, ordered the final forfeiture of the various sums of money found by the anti-corruption in the various accounts of the respondent domiciled in Guaranty Trust Bank to the Federal Government of Nigeria.
The respondent, a member of a syndicate of fraudsters who specialize in identity theft, wire fraud, and mail fraud, had been arrested following intelligence report received by the Commission.
Investigation revealed that the syndicate obtained the stolen Personal Identification Information of over 250,000 individuals in the US and used the details to file fraudulent Federal and State tax returns.
It was further revealed that the syndicate obtained monetary value on the fraudulent tax returns, using prepaid cards registered with the stolen information and third-party bank accounts.

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target=_blank>Emir Sanusi: Nigeria Is Bankrupt, We Must Face Reality

Muhammad Sanusi II, the Emir of Kano, has raised the alarm over unfavourable economic policies leading the country to bankruptcy, urging President Muhammadu Buhari to remove the fraudulent subsidy regime.
Sanusi, who was former governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, made the revelation on Tuesday while speaking at the ongoing 3rd National Treasury Workshop organized by the office of the Accountant General of the Federation holding in Coronation Hall, Government House, Kano.
He said, “The country is bankrupt and we are heading for bankruptcy. What happened is that the federal government do pay petroleum subsidy, pay electricity tariff subsidy, and if there is a rise in interest rates, Federal Government pays.
“What is more life-threatening than the subsidy that we have to sacrifice education, health sector and infrastructure for us to have cheap petroleum.
“If truly President Buhari is fighting poverty, he should remove the risk on the national financial sector and stop the subsidy regime which is fraudulent.”
“Since I have decided to come here, you have to accept what I have said here. And please, if you do not want to hear the truth, never invite me.
“So let us talk about the state of public finance in Nigeria. We have a number of very difficult decisions that we must make, and we should face the reality. His Excellency, the President said in his inaugural speech that his government would like to lift 100 million people out of poverty, it was a speech that was well received not only in this country but the world-wide.
“The number of people living with poverty in Nigeria are frightening. By 2050, 85 percent of those living in extreme poverty in the world will be from the African continent. And Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo will take the lead.
“Two days ago, I read that the percentage of the government’s revenue going to debt services has risen to 70 percent.
“And then, you continue subsidizing petroleum products; and spending N1.5 trillion per annum on petroleum subsidy. And then we are subsidizing electricity tariff. And maybe, you have to borrow from the capital market or the Central Bank of Nigeria to service the shortfall in the electricity tariff, where is the money to pay salaries, where is the money for education, where other government projects.”

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target=_blank>AMCON Seals Off Victory Park Estate In Lagos

Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON) on Tuesday sealed Victory Park Estate at Lekki, Lagos, in the enforcement of a court judgment issued by a Federal High Court in Ikoyi.
AMCON is taking possession of the luxurious estate having been used as collateral in multiple banks by its owners.
AMCON had earlier notified residents of the estate of the court judgment and its plan to take possession.
The statement sent to the residents read: “AMCON hereby notifies all Occupiers, Residents and all persons laying claim to any portion of land comprised within the Victory Park Estate, Lekki, Lagos that on 3rd June 2019, the Court of Appeal (Lagos Division) in the Appeal No: CA/L/146/18 dismissed the appeal filed by Rev Olajide Awosedo against the Judgment of the Federal High Court delivered on 3rd October 2017 in the Suit No: FHC/L/CS/744/17 – Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria v. Knight Rook Limited & Ors, by which a judgment sum of c. N12,966,510,191.00 (Twelve Billion, Nine Hundred and Sixty-Six Million, Five Hundred and Ten Thousand, One Hundred and Ninety-One Naira) was cumulatively awarded in favour of AMCON against Knight Rook Limited, Grant Properties Limited, Rev Olajide Awosedo, Olawunmi Olajide-Awosedo, Abimbola Olajide-Awosedo and Fibigboye Estates Limited, which Judgment also specifically foreclosed the Defendants’ right to the assets of Knight Rook Limited comprised within Victory Park Estate, Lekki, Lagos, among other assets, in satisfaction of the Judgment, which Judgment has been executed by AMCON.”
The Statement further directed all persons affected by the Judgment and enforcement to contact AMCON through its Solicitors or its Receiver/Manager.

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target=_blank>Ilicit Drugs Make Herdsmen Invade Farms, Destroy Crops, NDLEA Boss Abdallah Claims

The National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) has attributed the consumption of illicit drugs by herdsmen as a reason nomads invade farms and destroy crops.
Armed herdsmen are reportedly responsible for 3,094 deaths in Nigeria since 2018.
Col. Muhammed Abdallah (rtd), NDLEA Chairman said at the agency’s sensitization campaign in Abaji Area Council of the FCT on Tuesday that ignorance on the part of the herdsmen led to the consumption of drugs.
He said, “Our decision to embrace you as a target group is for the simple fact that you constitute a larger percentage of the population, coupled with the fact that the food security of the nation rests squarely on the shoulder of farmers. We need to create a critical mass from the farmers and hunters by increasing their stake in the Drug-Free Nigeria Project.
“It is in furtherance of the Agency’s all-inclusive and shared responsibility approach to curbing the drug menace.
“We in drug control are concerned about the high rate of drug abuse among farmers, hunters and herdsmen, a development that has often diminished their productivity and has negatively affected their health and life span. Study has revealed that ignorance of the grim implications of drug abuse has led farmers and hunters into believing that drugs can energize them to withstand the stress of their work whereas reverse is the case.
“The implication of the unfortunate involvement of farmers, hunters and herders in drug abuse is enormous. Some researchers have attributed the persistent clash between farmers and herders to drug abuse.
“For instance, under the influence of drugs herders lose control of their stock which often invade farms to destroy crops. The resultant effect is the bloody feud between the parties. Cattle equally become very aggressive when given certain drugs to make them strong to cover distances and in the process they invade farms.”

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target=_blank>Drug Abuse Education In Nigerian Schools Not Enough To Help Teenagers, Says Group

A group, Reclaiming Futures in Northern Nigeria (REFINN), has said drug abuse education in Nigerian Schools is not sufficient to help teenagers who are most vulnerable to the scourge.
The group, which is a project of four alumni of the United States-sponsored International Visitors Leadership Programme (IVLP), made the revelation after a one-week training workshop in Kaduna state.
The workshop, according to McBishop Ogueji, coordinator of the project, is a preventive education programme to equip the teenagers with life skills required to deal with their vulnerabilities and avoid turning to drugs.
Experiences
Some students who participated in the workshop spoke on their exposure to the subject of drug abuse.
Sharing her experience, Stella Danjuma, a final-year student of Government Girls Secondary School, Kabala Costain, said she had never heard about the names of drugs commonly abused by youths and what the drugs do to the human body.
She revealed that her school talks generally to the students on drug abuse occasionally during assembly time in the morning before classes begin.
Her counterpart at De Victory International School, Abubakar Kigo Road, Anaekwe Kenneth, said the school teaches drug abuse as part of Basic Science in the junior secondary school.
“But we’ve never heard about the names of these drugs and their effects on the body, especially the brain,” he said.
REFINN noted that none of the 80 senior secondary school students selected from different schools in the state capital could explain properly the negative effects of drug abuse.
And while most of them could define drug abuse, they had no clue about addiction and the dangers it poses, or how to fight motivation for drug use.
The group which is sponsored by the Alumni Engagement Innovation Fund of the US Department of State with support from the US Embassy in Nigeria called on stakeholders to do more in ensuring drug abuse education in all Nigerian Schools.

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target=_blank>Rape Of 2-year-old: Court Sends Chrisland Supervisor Back To Prison

Justice Sybil Nwaka of the Special Offences Court Ikeja, Lagos has revoked the bail granted to Adegboyega Adenekan, a supervisor at Chrisland School, VGC, Lekki, Lagos.
Adegboyega was accused of defiling a two-year-old pupil of the school.
The little child gave a detailed description of how Adegboyega had defiled her.
The 47-year-old supervisor was arraigned before the Court in January 2018.
According to Titilayo Shitta-Bey, the state Director of Public Prosecution, the defendant committed the crime in November 2016.
The child had given a detailed description of how Adegboyega had defiled her in an interview with Adenike Ayanleye, the Police investigative officer in charge of the case. The police officer told the court: “The child took us upstairs to the defendant’s office. She identified his seat out of three seats in the room and she identified the restroom in the office where the said incident happened.”
In a video clip of the interview he had with the child shown to the court, the little girl said the supervisor put his “wee wee” in her “wee wee” two times.
However, Adeola Adebola, Deputy Headteacher of Chrisland School, said the mother tutored the 2-year-old on what to say.
She claimed that when the school interrogated the child, she took them to open space where such action could not have happened.
“When we got to the place where we have our assembly, she said, ‘This is the place’. “Her mother was visibly embarrassed and we were shocked. The mother said to her that there was another place she told her, and the girl looked at her and started walking toward the canteen area. We got there and it is a more open place, and the child said, ‘This is the place’, and her mother got more jittery. These areas the child showed us are open and very busy with people going out and coming in,” Adebola said at the time.
However, when the case came up for hearing on Tuesday, the presiding judge revoked Adenekan’s bail just as he concluded giving his testimony against the allegations levelled against him.

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E2%80%93central-bank-nigeria target=_blank>Nigerian Banks Lost $175 Million In Value Since Last Capitalisation –Central Bank Of Nigeria

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) says the minimum value of Nigerian banks have dropped from $250 million, at an exchange rate of N100 to $1, during the recapitalization from N2 billion to N25 billion in 2005 to today’s rate of N305 to $1.
Speaking at a strategy meeting for his next run of five years as Nigeria’s central bank governor, Godwin Emefiele claimed that Nigerian banks had lost $3.5 billion, making another revaluation of the country’s commercial money lenders necessary.
Besides the planned revaluation, the CBN said it would seek to achieve a single-digit inflation rate by reducing the price of agricultural commodities while extending more credit lines to Nigerian entrepreneurs.
“If you relate N25b billion with 2004 exchange rate which was about N100 (to $1), N25 billion was about $250 million. Today, if you relate N25 billion at N360 (to $1) you will see that it is substantially lower than $75 million,” the CBN governor said.
“In the next five years, we intend to pursue a programme of recapitalizing the banking industry so as to position Nigerian banks among the top 500 in the world. Banks will, therefore, be required to maintain a higher level of capital, as well as liquid assets in order to reduce the impact of an economic crisis.”
In giving weight to the need for a revaluation, according to the central bank, Nigerian money deposit banks badly need to be able to finance large transactions.
“Recall that it was Governor (Chukwuma) Soludo in 2004 that did the last recapitalization we had. He moved the capitalisation from N2bn to N25bn. And I must commend those efforts because it resulted in positioning Nigerian banks not only in Africa but among the top banks in the world in terms of capitalization,” Emefiele stated.
“We are confident that when implemented, these measures will help to insulate our economy from potential shocks in the global economy.
“In my second term in office, part of my pledge is to work to the best of my abilities in fulfilling these objectives.”

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A Tribune At The People’s Tribunal By Ifedayo Babalola

‘How are you keeping these days? It’s been quite a while.’ Lanky queries as his stocky pal sinks in the semi-cushioned chair opposite.‘Acting out all my security tips, bro….. Don’t talk to strangers, stay away from animals, don’t stay out beyond 5pm, inform no one of your movements, inform ten people of your movements at all times……bal bla bla….You know the whole works.’‘Good boy, good boy-‘ Lanky nods‘They can’t silence us!’ Shorty explodes. ‘They can’t cage us! It’s a free country. They can’t tie us down!’Silence. Lanky is unsurprised at his friend’s outburst. They sip from half-filled cups.‘That reminds me.’ Says Lanky with a stolid face. ‘We have missed matters of national importance. Do you know they have been trying to silence some important personalities?’‘You mean our tribune? A fighter for better society and defender of the plebeians of the earth?’‘You are right on the money, buddy. The man with the mighty pen.’‘They can’t silence him, they dare not. We, the people, won’t let them. Otherwise, we are all lost.’ Shorty declared.‘Methinks though that the plebeians of this nation missed an opportunity to have them represented at the highest level by the incorruptible tribune.’‘Third to the highest level, you mean?’‘Fourth, actually-‘‘Whatever..’Shorty called for a bottle of Alomo. ‘He did not want the job anyway,’ He sneezed dismissively.‘That’s what he went to tell the senator at the interview?’‘He attended an interview? I thought he was consulting with friends and family…you know, …to determine if to accept or reject–‘‘He attended and performed excellently. Brilliant man. I’m proud of him.’‘Yeah…… But I’m confused.’ Shorty frowns. ‘No one attends and performs well at a job interview they don’t want…unless he went there simply to see what kind of man The Senate President is. I hear he is full of praises for the seasoned senator.’‘Typical of his tribe, you see?’‘What is, you tribalist?!’‘I mean no harm.’ Lanky said defensively, both palms laid forward to prove his mind was clean. ‘I mean spokespersonship for men in power is the stock in trade of his tribe. Remember the big uncle of Babangida era?’‘Yeah. History.’‘Then there was The Guardian Angel?’‘Yeah. History book 2‘Ok. How about this for current affairs….. Mr. Your Land or Your Life?’‘Alright! Alright! Point of correction. His tribesmen are masters of spokespersonship for and against men in power.’‘Well. The ”against” bit always precedes the appointment, or should I say cultivates the appointment, and ends with the appointment.’‘Take it or leave it. They were all seasoned professionals.’ Shorty continues his defense of the tribune’s tribe.‘I suppose so, and I suppose no seasoning is ever complete till one’s been garnished at Abuja. It’s the final transfiguration, the ultimate silencer.’‘That’s so uncharitable, you incurable cynic! It’s unfair. Imagine if you have fought for a people all your life, yet starved yourself the ownership of political party membership cards.’‘No party card, but ready to work with every party. Great sacrifice, I should say.’ Lanky said with a cynical smile.‘Yeah. Keeping his options open. What’s wrong with that, eh?’‘Oh yeah? Is the bat a bird or a rat?’‘A cat it is, Mr Wise.’‘You siddon dia.’Shorty swallows a big gulp and looks thoughtful for a while. ‘ You know what?’‘No. I don’t know.’‘I can murder some seasoned beef right now, except our tribune would have none of that. In fact, I’ve been boycotting beef since I read one of his powerful essays. That’s another reason we won’t let him go to Abuja. How will we know what he’s being served over there, hmmm? Abuja ke? The suya capital of the world. Home to twenty-four-hour barbeque, seasoning and garnishing. No prophet will put me on a dry fast and jet off to Las Vegas. No! We’ll stay here together and boycott all boycottables!’‘Calm down, mate. He is not here to witness you breaking fast. As for me, my lips are sealed. You can take some orisirisi pepper soup, if you want. The shaki, liver and intestine are no cow beef anyway.’‘You may be right, but I’ll take a bite only because your wish is my command.’Laughs.Lanky calls for two plates of orisirisi pepper soup and two more bottles of their favourite drink.‘I still believe in him though, whatever you say.’ Shorty mumbles through a mouthful of bovine entrails. ‘He is a man of the people, a tribune for the plebeians. That’s why we, his teeming fans, stopped him from going. Thrice beaten, a million times shy. Once we prevented him from taking the job, that translates he doesn’t want the job. Same thing.’‘We can’t silence him then?’‘No. They can’t!’‘Power to party then.’‘No. Power to the people.’‘Yeah, buddy. Power to the party people!’(Ifedayo Babalola, satirist and social commentator can be reached at ifebabs@hotmail.com).

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Ifedayo Babalola

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