My Problems with Achebe’s Personal History of Biafra Part I

“The triumph of the written word is often attained when the writer achieves union and trust with the reader, who then becomes ready to be drawn deep into unfamiliar territories…towards a deeper understanding of self or society, or of foreign peoples, cultures, and situations”- Chinua Achebe

In his new book, “There was a Country: A personal History of Biafra,” Achebe wrote as follows: “The Igbo culture, being receptive to change, individualistic, and highly competitive, gave the Igbo man an unquestioned advantage over his compatriots in securing credentials for advancement in Nigerian colonial society. Unlike the Hausa/Fulani he was unhindered by a wary religion and unlike the Yoruba he was unhampered by traditional hierarchies”(p.74). Let me start out by saying that I have indeed finished reading the book. I am not literary critic and as such this piece is not meant to be a critical review of Achebe’s new book. I will also hasten to add that I had no problems with the personal history of Achebe as he relates in the book, especially his upbringing, education and how he became a successful writer despite all odds stacked against him. I found that part of the book, which is restricted to the first few chapters of the book very informative, instructive and enlightening. In addition, and as I wrote earlier this month, I think it is high time Awoist accept the flaws in Pa Awo and acknowledged the fact that his role in the civil war particularly as it relates to the starvation policy leaves much to be desired. Achebe’s is on point in all of these issues and backed every one of his assertions and claims with facts, figures and interviews with the principal actors. It is a well sourced book on all these scores.

My problems with the book have to do with something that is very common among Nigerian intellectuals and political elites: a resort to worn out ethnic superiority argument to explain an endemic complex socio-political milieu. They often deploy this well worn out card time and time again to prop up their ethnic groups while taking a dig at other ethnic group, without any serious thought on the damaging implications for Nigeria body politics. Let me state here that the idea of one ethnic group as superior to another did not start with Achebe. It is a common refrain among Nigerian elites. You can see variants of these in one form or another from the likes of Dr. Nnamdi Azikwe: “It would appear that the God of Africa has created the Ibo(sic) nation to lead the children of Africa from the bondages of the ages... The martial process of the Ibo nation at all ages of the human history has enabled them not only to conquer others but also to adapt themselves to the roles of preservers... The Ibo nation cannot shrink its responsibility from its manifest destiny.” Chief Obafemi Awolowo: “I have always insisted to myself that my first duty is to the Yoruba nation....And I put that nation first, then the one called Nigeria. The people of the Western Region may be divided roughly into two groups: the Yoruba and the non-Yoruba. The Yoruba are a fastidious, critical and discerning people....the non-Yoruba elements were rabidly anti-Action Group, because they were anti-Yoruba.” Similar sentiments have been expressed by Bola Ige, Ahmadu Bello, et. al and now Chinua Achebe.

First of all, Achebe seems to build this premise on nothing other than his bare assertion. If this assertion were to be true then the British should neither have come up with “magna carta” nor invent the best naval warship; as they would have been hampered by traditional hierarchies. The reality Achebe completely ignores is that the Yoruba traditional hierarchies were not without moderation. A cursory reading of any Yoruba history books about the Oyo Mesi, and the “checks and balances” inherent in Yoruba’s traditional institution will show that it limits the absolutism that would have impeded the advancement of knowledge and development. The discovery of Ife bronze and other Yoruba pre-colonial works also puts lie to such tales. A recent book by Frank T. Kryza also revealed that Sultan Bello was suffused with knowledge about the world before the arrival of the colonialist even though he is deeply religious. Kryza notes that when the explorer “Clapperton reached Sokoto on October 20, 1826, where he was escorted to the same house he occupied on his first visit. He was cordially received by Sultan Bello, whom he found reading an Arabic translation of Euclid’s Elements.” Knowledge, growth and advancement are not unique to any ethnicity in Nigeria.

All these historical facts matter a little to those who think their ethnic group is superior to others. Achebe wrote his new book as if he is still the director of Biafra ministry of information, summoned to fan the embers of ethnic jingoism. I found the book to be an attempt to fight the unfinished civil war business in print, and to lift up his ethnic group as the best there was and will ever be. I am very leery of people that think their ethnic group is the best thing since sliced bread. The fear that some mindless reader may cease upon this theory to forment another Rwanda-like genocide and tribal killings prompt me to write this piece. Every human being no matter the race they come from or belong is endowed with potentials to be the best. In Achebe's book, everything wrong with Nigeria is down to discrimination against Igbos and there is nothing that cannot be put right in Nigeria if we simply let Igbo individualistic spirit we have been holding down since independence free. Even the corruption in our land can be explained away as due to the shackles we put on Ndigbo. If we had only give Igbo people a little leadership in Dodan Baracks and Aso rock we may now be living in Achebe’s Eldorado. Things like corrupt laden Ajaokuta Steel Mills is linked by any means possible to the Soviet participation in civil war and the MIG they supplied to the federal side. It has nothing to do with endemic selfish inhibitions common among political leadership in “obodo” Africa, something the several Igbo governors and local government chairmen since the civil war are as guilty of as any other in modern Nigeria.

The attempt to paint one ethnic group as superior to the other often comes with deliberate distortions of facts or an outright side step of stubborn facts. Achebe played fast and loose with facts in his new book. As Patrick Moynihan argued, we are only entitle to our opinions and not our own facts. In Achebe’s book, the British would still be ruling us, but for the Igbos who drove them out of Nigeria. Achebe of course won't let banal facts- such as the fact that it was in Western Region that the motion for independence was first made-stand in the way of his superior race argument.

He wrote: “This group, the Igbo that gave the colonizing British so many headaches and then literally drove them out of Nigeria was now an open target, scapegoats for the failings and grievances of colonial and post-independence Nigeria”. Excuse me? You meant only Achebe's Igbos fought for Nigeria's independence? I bet Achebe’s Igbo parliament moved the motion for independence and suffer the hardship that the colonialist visited on them. The reality however is that nationalist came from every part of Nigeria, from the Egba and Aba women who rioted, to the Coal miners in Enugu, to people like Ms. Ransome Kuti's, Aminu Kano and particularly Zik and Awo!

In 1955, an American journalist, John Gunther, wrote the following about the nationalist movement for independence: “..at this particular time, a severe constitutional crisis was at its peak. The African ministers representing one important political party, the Action Group, had adopted a non-fraternization policy, and would not accept hospitality from the Governor, although their Northern colleagues did. They were perfectly willing to talk business with Sir John McPherson in Government House, but they would not accept “hospitality” from him, not even a glass of water. There was nothing particularly personal in this. Macpherson was widely liked as an individual. But Government House symbolizes the Crown, and both West and East were at that time boycotting the Crown as a matter of principle.” Gunther also wrote this about an important Nigerian hero: “In March, 1953, came a positively savage crisis. Its effect was to paralyze government. An Action Group deputy, Anthony Eronsele Oseghale Enahoro, (This young man, born in 1923, is a firebrand. He has been imprisoned three times for sedition) rose in the central House of Representatives and introduced a resolution demanding complete self-government by a specific date-1956. … The East and West leaders, “Zik” and Awolowo, who had been fighting like scorpions the night before, publicly embraced, and pledged themselves to make the common cause.”

The tendency to play fast and loose with facts may be a good trait if you are a fictional writer but may not serve you well if you purport to give your reader a deeper understanding of self or society or of foreign peoples, cultures, and situations. Achebe is of course entitle to his opinion but he cannot remake history to continue the civil war in print, and set us back again. There is indeed a critical mass of Ndigbos who are still very bitter about the civil war and rightfully so, and Achebe is one of them. They are right about the fact that Ndigbos suffered a lot before, during and after that war. We should learn from the mistakes made by leaders from both sides so we don't fall foul of them again. I also believed that there might be need for some reparations in one form or another and acknowledgement of wrong by leadership of Nigeria before we can move on. But Nigerians who believe in the superiority of their ethnic group are hindering a full and frank discussion of issues afflicting Nigeria. The disservice this mentality does to our national psyche is telling indeed.
We cannot grow as a nation with this type of mindset. Corruption, nepotism, dictatorship and attempt to scuttle individual freedom reared its head in Achebe’s Biafra just as it continues to pervade our polity even now. Even Achebe alluded to an instance where his brother-in-law was court martial and had to face a death sentence in the new Biafra for expressing an opinion on the lack of preparedness of the military for War. We need to understand that the endemic problem Nigeria face has had helpful assist from all hue and ethnic group in Nigeria, including the leadership of Ndigbos, the Yorubas, the Hausa/Fulani and other ethnic groups. The way out of the logjam we found ourselves in Nigeria is for us to eschew any attempt to pull us apart and stand firm in the fight against corruption, ethnicism, nepotism with a determined resolve to fight for merit in all facets of our national endeavor.

Open Letter to Awoist: It is time to Apologize to Ndigbo for that Starvation Policy

“But when I went what did I see? I saw the kwashiorkor victims. If you see a kwashiorkor victim you’ll never like war to be waged. Terrible sight, in Enugu, in Port Harcourt, not many in Calabar, but mainly in Enugu and Port Harcourt. Then I enquired what happened to the food we were sending to the civilians. We were sending food through the Red Cross, and CARITAS to them, but what happen was that the vehicles carrying the food were always ambushed by the soldiers. That’s what I discovered, and the food would then be taken to the soldiers to feed them, and so they were able to continue to fight. And I said that was a very dangerous policy, we didn’t intend the food for soldiers. … So I decided to stop sending the food there. In the process, the civilians would suffer, but the soldiers suffered most.” –Chief Obafemi Awolowo.

We can either chose to live in denial and pretend that Awo never participated in the terrible decision to starve people of eastern Nigeria of foods and medicine during the Biafran War or own up to the fact that he did it to save Nigeria, apologize for it, and then move on. The abuse of anyone who dares to raise the fact that Chief Awolowo was culpable for the death of millions of children as a result of the policy will not make this disastrous policy go away. Awoist and Chief Awolowo family need to stop getting unnecessarily defensive and antagonistic when this issue is raised. Fact is fact and nothing we humans do could suddenly turned facts into fiction or fiction into facts. Fact is Chief Awolowo championed the policy on starvation to win the war to use his words. There is no other way to look at it. It does not diminish the greatness of the man in terms of what he achieved for his people. We can even disagree on what motivates him to take that decision: ambition? Or statesmanship? But what should not be subject to pejoratives and needless harangue is the very fact that the decision happened at his watch.

Some have tried to put the blame on Gowon or the military leaders but Chief Awolowo’s own words is clear: “I decided to stop sending the food there.” It was not a military decision by Adekunle or Murtala. This is a decision made by the Finance minister of the federation, Chief Awolowo. He owned that decision in the interview quoted above. Whenever this issue is raised Awoist and the Awolowo family usually drew umbrage, assailing whoever called Awo out on this issue and generally attacking the character of those who dare to confront Awoist on the frailties of their leaders. It is time for Awoist to realize that Chief Awolowo is not infallible. He made some sound decision in governance as well as other horrendous decisions, one of which is this starvation policy. He might have done it to please the northern oligarchy who had promised to install him as president or he might have had a truly altruistic motive; whatever the case this is a sadistic policy that should never have been put in place by any Nigerian leader.

The impact on Biafra’s children reverberates around the world. It was such that over 40 years later, Steve Jobs referenced it in the interview for his biography written by Walter Isaacson. In fact it had such an effect on him that it turned him against the Christian God that would permit such a cruel injustice on poor children. Lets quote the biography: “In July 1969, LIFE magazine published a shocking cover showing a pair of starving children in Biafra. Jobs took it to Sunday school and confronted the church's pastor. "If I raise my finger, will God know which one I'm going to raise even before I do it?" The pastor answered, "Yes, God knows everything." Jobs then pulled out the LIFE cover and asked, "Well, does God know about this and what's going to happen to those children?" We may not be able to know for certain if God knows about those children but we do know for a fact that Chief Awolowo knows and understand the impact of his decision on those children as evident from the above excerpted interview. To quote him directly, “So I decided to stop sending the food there. In the process, the civilians would suffer, but the soldiers suffered most.”

What is more, Chief Awolowo, as an intellectual should have known better. The 4th Geneva Convention put in place in 1949 specifically require that civilians be protected during wars. It requires parties to the conflict in Part II, Article 15 to make provisions for food supply to the civilian persons in the war zones, either directly or through a neutral State or some humanitarian organization. Nigeria did contract with CARITAS but Chief Awolowo yanked the arrangement after visiting the liberated cities of Calabar, Port Harcourt and Enugu. As he stated in the interview I quoted above he did what he did because he believed the food was being used to feed the soldiers. That may well be true, but Nigeria suffered more public relation damage for that blockade than it gained. At that point in the war it was clear that Biafra had lost. Several strongholds had been liberated and are under control of Federal forces. What do we stand to gain by starving innocent children to death to punish soldiers?

Some Awoist have argued that Professor Achebe excused Dim Chukwuemeka Ojukwu; my response to them is to wait until Achebe’s book is out before rushing to judgment. And by the way, when does the other guy is also bad becomes a defense to genocide? The starvation policy led to the death of millions of innocent Igbo children and civilians. It is a moral disaster for the federal government of Nigeria and until the leaders of Nigeria own up to the depravity of that decision we will continue to drift as a nation. It is often said that a nation that will not learn from its history is bound to repeat it. If we can’t learn from such monumental loss of judgment by our revered leaders, our standing in the comity of nations will continue to slide, and our unity will remain a mirage.

I believe it is now incumbent on Awoist and the Awolowo family to finally accept the frailties of their leader before they trot out the many things he did to help the Ndigbo. Fact is Chief Awolowo helped many Ndigbo recover their properties in Lagos after the war. This is why the abandoned property saga is not as pronounced in Lagos as Port Harcourt. But all these will pale into insignificance if Awoist and the Awolowo family do not summon courage to confront the fact that Pa Awo was wrong on that starvation policy. You cannot deny the glaringly obvious inconvenient facts and expect others to appreciate your other good deeds. It is time for Awoist to stop living in denial. War is evil and the only true debt we owe posterity is to tell the truth about our past. When we do that we honor the memories of the dead and prepare ourselves to face the future with fortitude. It is only then that the labors of our heroes past will not be in vain.

Jonathan’s Administration: Confronting Simple Problems with Drastic and Complex Solutions

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” ~Leonardo DaVinci

A good summary of Steve Job’s autobiography by Walter Isaacson could be aptly put: “simplicity”. Job committed his entire life to turning complex human technological problems into a simple easy to handle tech marvel anyone and everyone can use. No wonder people of all hue will readily pay any price to lay their hands on any Apple products. The current regime in Nigeria on the other hand could easily enter the Guinness Book of Record for turning simple problems into nightmares for everyone. The regime is well known for recommending complex palliatives to simple problems. Some of their recipes for what ails our land are often mostly “hit and miss” badly thought out proposals without a grand view of the impact on the society.

One can run through a gamut of the current government’s miscues since Jonathan’s election to the highest office in the land. For instance, when it found it was paying too much to oil barons who are exploiting the oil subsidy to make quick money. What did they recommend? Their first thought was not to apprehend the criminals but to abruptly remove oil subsidy. When the Central Banks discovers that the cost of printing notes is too much, the first thought was not to find out why foreigners own the patents to the notes in the first place, and how the cost of printing the notes could be reduced. They came up with an unconstitutional policy restricting how much notes Nigerians could withdraw from a bank, all in the name of cashless banking. And now the same Central Bank thinks that the new solution is not to address the systemic inflationary indices, but to print more notes in higher denominations.

The Central Bank imbroglio is atypical of Jonathan’s administration ineptness. The regime has never found a problem they can’t turn into a hydra-headed monster even if it comes to them with a simple solution wrapped in a manger! Their pronouncements on economic structures of the country are as firm and arrogant as some of the religious fanatics they are fighting in the northern part of the country. Whatever problems lurk on the horizon, be it economic, social or structural are imagined primarily as hydra headed political problems, orchestrated by the enemies of the regime and the only way out is to “settle” the opponent by throwing the poor and the dispossessed under the bus. It does not matter if such opponent is a terrorist. The victims of their nefarious acts must be made to pay the cost of transporting their abuser to Aso rock, where the killer will be feted and received with pomp and pageantry. Of course, what inevitably pass as governance in Nigeria is money changing hands between politicians and top civil servants of all hue. No thoughts on building infrastructures and systemic structures that can stand the test of time. Inevitably while the politicians and their accomplices in government shower money on themselves and their children the poor masses in our country pay dearly for the cost of such inept governance.

Sad as this may appear, this problem do not begin with the Jonathan’s administration. The genesis could be traced to his predecessors particularly the infamous Obasanjo regime. Obasanjo’s adventures in power could at best be termed the lost decade for the country, more because of the opportunity lost than any other factor. He had been in power in the 1970s and many thought his second coming would at least be a corrective one, albeit with lessons learned. Sadly, his eight years as a civilian president could serve as a public administration case study on the pitfalls of visionless leadership. What began with hope and pageantry with an unusual inclusion of many of Nigeria’s best technocrats’ home and abroad, mutated into corrupt, bloated and wasteful regime that left more Nigerians in poverty than any other civilian regime in the history of our country. Obasanjo’s neglect of the institutions and infrastructures that he inherited will take Nigeria at least another decade to repair and restore. For those who doubt this assertion just take a drive on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, or the eyesore called the Asaba-Onitsha bridge gateway.

The Jonathan’s regime is hell bound in outdoing Obasanjo record of nonperformance in office. At the height of Obasanjo’s debt repayment hypocrisy, he famously referred to the cell phone “GSM” revolution as perhaps his greatest achievement, an achievement for which his regime contributed nothing in terms of infrastructures and policy mechanism other than setting up proxy telephone companies owned by retired military officers. And now Jonathan’s is on the cusp of making such claims with power distribution in the country, even though all it did is to collect rent for foreign corporation who will gouge ordinary Nigerians in the guise of providing electricity.

“Why is our country in such a dire straits?” a friend of mine asked me casually on a recent trip back from the heartland. My first retort is to point to other countries in Africa undergoing the same pain, but realizing that my friend will not take such a pessimistic answer from me while we are on 15 hour flight together I decided to take my time to answer him. More so, when he knew that my knowledge on public administration in developing countries is well known. So I gather my thoughts and pointed out to him point blank that no developing countries will ever get out of doldrums if it spends 90% of its income on payment of salaries to politicians and public servants and less than 10% on infrastructural development. He immediately asked me what should we do, I told him what we need is a public will and constitutional amendment to force every government in Nigeria to raise taxes it will use to pay salaries for itself out of a general fund, while all income accruable from our natural resources and dedicated levies are paid directly into an enterprise account for building and maintenance of infrastructures, like hospitals, roads, educations etc. Politicians and their comrade in civil service salaries will only be paid by the people impacted by the structures they build. This may not be a perfect fix to the problems of leadership in our country but it is at best the best place to start. Of course, for this idea to work, we need to make governance a community affair. The closest government to the people is often the ones that impacted them most. The days of sitting in Abuja to preside over the cost of repairing water-works and drainage in Ilesa should be over.

The federal government as currently set up is over bloated and needless. If we need a legislature at all, we do not need a bicameral body, membership there should also be part time with a strict instruction to meet for three months to set policy direction for the executive, approve budgetary allocations unless there is a special session called by the executives. The executive arm should also be pruned; the federal and state governments should have no business managing sports and cultures. These are practical simple solutions to anemic problems, but our governments are used to chasing shadows.

Between Commercialization of National Awards and an Attempt to Humiliate Justice Kayode Eso

“The essence of the rule of law is that it should never operate under the rule of force or fear. To use force to effect and act and while under the marshall of that force to seek the court’s equity is an attempt to infuse timidity into court and operate a sabotage of the cherished rule of law. It must never be.”

 –Hon. Justice Kayode Eso (retd) in Government of Lagos state v. Ojukwu (1986).


The Goodluck Jonathan regime in Nigeria is either downright daft or playing roulette with the fate of our nation. This is one regime that continues to jump from missteps to miscues, from one disastrous decision to self inflicted catastrophe. It is as if the government is hell bent on antagonizing his friends and ingratiating himself with his enemies by every means possible. It is difficult to point to one sound judgment by this government since its violent electoral victory. It is hard for anyone not to conclude that the election of GEJ has operated more like an elixir for bad decision than a call to good governance. The list is long and growing but we can list a few for those who may not be abreast with things in Nigeria. First is the announcement that the president is scheming to amend the constitution to permit a six year term for the executive arm of government, then the oil subsidy saga that nearly set the nation ablaze, no sooner had that abate that the government plunged itself into a security nightmare on the Boko Haram issue- by first backing its erstwhile security chief who accused the president’s party of culpability and then tossing him aside a few months later, while the nation burns. The illegal sacking and refusal to reinstate Justice Isa Ayo Salami also comes to memory, not to talk of the bungling of the simple act of renaming a university governed by statutes after the late Chief M.K.O. Abiola.

And now, the latest saga is the announcement of the Federal government National Honors Award. The Nigeria Honors Awards was established by the National Honors Act No. 5 of 1964, during the First Republic, to honor Nigerians who have rendered special and outstanding services in their various callings. The legislation empowers the President of the Federal Republic to make provisions for the award of the honors. The abuse and commercialization of the honors by successive presidents and head of state in Nigeria is an issue that has worried many. President Jonathan has not only joined the list of Nigerian leaders who made mockery of the honors but he has actually gives Nigerians a reason to perceive the honor as a commercial enterprise of the ruling People’s Democratic Party.

Let me hasten to state, that no one is directly accusing the president of receiving filthy lucre before honoring the awardees but some of the proposed recipients give cause to raise the commercialization accusations. Take for instance, the proposed award of the highest honor GCON on the president’s party financier and government contractor, Otunba Mike Adenuga. A few years ago, Otunba Adenuga was on the run and had to relocate to Ghana on a self imposed exile given the warrant obtained by former President Obasanjo’s anti-corruption commission. The warrant and the corruption accusations were never publicly resolved in the court of justice, everything was swept under the carpet, partly because Otunba Adenuga, a multi-billionaire came back and contributed financially to the current president’s electoral campaign coffers. Even if one could concede that the president has absolute discretion in determining who to dish the awards to, one is still left with questions on the “quid pro quo” of giving the award to a citizen under investigation for corruption.

Perhaps the one that befuddles the mind is the attempt to humiliate Justice Kayode Eso (retd) with a CFR award. This is an award that was once given to the disgraced former speaker of the House of Representative, Patricia Etteh. Justice Eso is an eminent jurist that has contributed a lot to the development of Nigeria judiciary, the rule of law and the establishment of constitutional democracy in Nigeria. In the infinite wisdom of President Jonathan, Eso is to share this CFR award with none other than the wife of former governor of River State, Justice Mary Odili (the first wife of a politician with the fastest meteoric rise to the Supreme Court of Nigeria). This is a subtle humiliation Of Eso by an inconsiderate Jonathan regime given the history between Justice Eso led panel on Rivers State Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Governor Peter Odili, the husband of Mary Odili. Many would recalled that the commission was set up by Governor Rotimi Amaechi to “investigate the sources of dissension within the state, forge reconciliation and make recommendations to the state government. The panel met with hundreds of witnesses, sat in Port Harcourt and Abuja, and in the report that has since been submitted by the Committee, Justice Eso minced no words in speaking the truth, as he saw it, including referring to Dr. Peter Odili, the past immediate Governor of the state, as insincere.” The presidency cannot claim that they do not know about this history as the penultimate quote was sourced from an article written by the president’s own media aide, Reuben Abati and published in May 2009.

Justice Eso, commenting on a baseless accusation of impartiality by Governor Odili said

“With reference to our integrity, it is sad that our integrity has been so glibly attacked, or put in doubt, by Sir Odili, without producing or attempting to produce an iota of evidence in regard to his ominous accusations. He did this to the hearing of the world qua NTA, which aired our proceedings, and we are obliged to answer this accusation here now at our only opportunity, lest silence be taken as consent. If the former Governor, Dr. Odili, had convinced himself that our integrity was in doubt without evidence. The rules anywhere in the democratic world, practicing the rule of law, do not permit a slaughter of people’s integrity, without at least, trying to justify the accusation by the production of some evidence however infinitesimal. These gentlemen and lady, whom I have the honour to lead, have the highest reputation and their integrity is untarnished. On integrity, they have won their spurs ever before being asked to come into this commission. As for our humble selves, it is with the greatest humility and praise to God, that we are able to declare that, on record, throughout our public life, which has spanned over half a century, nobody, friend or foe, domestically, nationally or internationally, has ever cast doubt on our hard earned integrity. With us, it has always been the Shakespearian melody of – Set honour in one eye and death in the other and I will look at both indifferently. That is how much premium we put on honour and it is that credo that advised us to have accepted this assignment, notwithstanding its being set within the din of battle, insurgency and threats of death. However, having regard to the delicacy and sensitivity of the work in hand, it is our decision not to be ruffled by this ridiculous accusation, nor influenced to bend out of our objectivity and impartiality. No one among us could be moved to do the wrong thing by blackmail.”

This is why I called on Justice Eso, to reject and shun this award as Professor Chinua Achebe did last year. It is nothing but a cruel joke to give an award bestowed on Patricia Etteh on Justice Eso, who for many years was the “Shakespeare of our Supreme Court”. As my friend, Mutiu Ganiu and I wrote some years ago,” Justice Eso frame cannot hold his fame in judicial excellence and does not need an award to validate his legacy”. It is high time Nigerians start sending resounding signals to this pernicious political party, that we would not condone trivializations of our national institutions. Justice Eso is an institution, which should not be demeaned by a measly award!

Barth Nnaji’s Resignation is Testament to the Need for Public Declaration of Asset

“No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and not improbably, corrupt his integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a body of men are unfit to be both judges and parties at the same time.”  -James Madison

Earlier this year, President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan, came out with a mind boggling argument on why he is not a big fan of asset declaration. In a widely published interview he asserts: “The issue of asset declaration is a matter of principle. I don’t give a damn about it, if you want to criticize me from heaven. The issue of public declaration I think is playing to the gallery. You don’t need to publicly declare any assets. If I am somebody who wants to hide it is what I tell you that you will even believe.” And now with the resignation of Professor Barth Nnaji as energy minister, over the issue of his conflict of interest in a power distribution company, we can conclusively say that the chicken is finally coming home to roost and the president may have committed what we Nigerians often calls “foot in the mouth disease”.

One can unmistakably surmise that Nnaji’s imbroglio would not have happened if he had been made to publicly declare his asset before his appointment as energy minister. Corruption is a big threat to democracy everywhere and anywhere; it hinders good governance, democratic processes, fair business and political competition. A recent joint report by Anti Corruption Network and Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development recommends that a public declaration of asset by politicians and political appointees will help: “ increase transparency and the trust of citizens in public administration, by disclosing information about assets of politicians and civil servants that shows they have nothing to hide; help heads of public institutions prevent conflicts of interest among their employees and to resolve such situations when they arise, in order to promote integrity within their institutions; help monitor wealth variations of individual politicians and civil servants, in order to dissuade them from misconduct and protect them from false accusations, and to help clarify the full scope of illicit enrichment or other illegal activity by providing additional evidence.”

Let me hasten to state here that Professor Nnaji has not been accused of any wrongdoing and may have actually acted above board in all his dealings as Nigeria’s power and energy minister, the problem here has little or nothing to do with impropriety but an appearance of such. For months, the workers and labor unions in his ministry have been making insinuations about his financial interest in some companies bidding to buy some of the assets of Power Holding Corporation of Nigeria. According to the Guardian newspapers, “Nnaji’s resignation may not be unconnected with revelations at last Friday’s meeting of the National Council on Privatisation (NCP) that companies allegedly owned or linked to the former minister made bids for the Afam Generation Company Limited and Enugu Distribution Company Limited.”

One can only rue what could have been, if the president and his ministers as well as all political appointees had been made to publicly declare their assets in an open and transparent manner. For one the general public would have known that the minister has an interest in a company bidding to purchase Afam power plant even though he has put his shares in what he called “a blind trust.” As one senatorial candidate from Massachusetts once quibbled “The blind trust is an age-old ruse.” In the United States of America where we drew the fountain of our constitution and democracy, the first elected official to use a blind trust was President Lyndon Johnson, he did this so he could hold on to his interest in a Texas television station, an industry heavily regulated by the Federal Communication Commission. Most of Johnson’s successors followed his lead, but only in 1978, with the passage of the Ethics in Government Act, did blind trusts become a formal option for executive-branch officers seeking to avoid conflicts of interest. The Act requires that trustees must be independent of the official, that such trust must be free of restrictions on sale or transfer of assets, and that the official is to receive no information except for quarterly updates on cash value and income or loss, needed to file income-tax returns. We do not have a similar legislation in Nigeria, the closest policy we have in Nigeria is the People’s Democratic Party’s “Manifesto, Programme and Policy Trust for 2011-2015” which commits the party and its members to “to ensure that its elected officials openly declare their assets.” We all know that all PDP officials, including the president flagrantly fouled this policy.

President Jonathan often allude to US president Obama as a good study on governance, in fact his entire campaign for Nigerian presidency seeks to mirror President Obama’s own campaign four years ago. His oft reference as a man without a shoe becoming the president of Nigeria is an attempt to draw parallel with Obama’s campaign of hope in a black man with foreign sounding name ascending to the presidency of the United States. It is not enough to campaign like Obama if you are not willing to follow his actions. As Todd S. Purdum argued in his article in Vanity Fair last month, “as a freshman senator, Barack Obama—whose wealth comes almost entirely from his book royalties—set up a blind trust but later that same year sold all of his stocks and closed the trust because he decided that even such an arrangement could not protect him from the appearance of a conflict. Most of his wealth is now invested in U.S. Treasury bonds and diversified funds—about the most transparent option available. What’s good for the country is good for Obama, and vice versa, to coin a phrase.” We can also say that what is good for Obama is good for Jonathan and his ministers.

Now is the time for the National Assembly of Nigeria to pass a comprehensive legislation similar to the US’s “Ethics in Government Act” which would make it mandatory that all executive, judicial and legislative office holders declare their assets openly and publicly before their swearing in. And as the OECD paper pointed out, a public declaration of asset without verification is meaningless, given the prevalence of corruption in our polity. It is imperative that the media and the public should have access to means for verification of such assets through the Freedom of Information Acts. Any public officials who may falsify their assets or hide assets in any way should be sanction in addition to the certain public opprobrium that would follow. Our democracy is too fragile to leave in the hands of politicians with skeletons in their cupboards.

The Case for Obamacare: Opening Statement

John Bull, is not a decent hard-working citizen, he is not a shining example of the American Dream. John Bull is an all American worst example of a broken system. He is black, homeless, nameless, faceless derelicts that wander aimlessly through the streets of our country every day by the thousands. We step over them in doorways, we cross the street in order to avoid actually coming into contact with one of them. We look at them with a mixture of pity and contempt and fear. We don’t want them hanging around the sidewalks of our hospital, churches and places of worship, and yet people like John Bull fell sick just as you and I do and need to use the hospital or pray in churches. We choose not to see that under their ragged blankets and their filthy clothes, is a frightened, lost human being. Just like you and me.

John bull was not a hero, he is often weak and unable to walk because of a broken hip until few weeks ago when he finally got the attention of a kind surgeon who helped performed surgery to repair his hip. He often had to go to jail to get access to medical treatment. He also hear voices in his head some of which tells him to destroy himself as no one cares. We will show that John Bull lived in a world where a little attention by medical personnel make a world of difference between intense pain and emotional turmoil.


Testimony will show that in the afternoon of 11th of March 2012, Mr. Bull had been having intense pain at his hip for more than 1 to 2 months, he had tried to take to see a doctor to no avail. He tried to lessen the pain by drinking beer, when he couldn’t find any medication but the pain soon flood back with vengeance.

Testimony will show that he finally summoned enough energy to make it to the ER at Sacred Soul Medical Center. He requested to see a medical doctor about his hip but he was wheeled to the mental health area. Evidence will show that hospital staff then forcibly removed Mr. Bull and dropped him off at the sidewalk, where he laid in agony and pain.

Testimony will show that security staff repeatedly asked him to leave the sidewalk and he refused. Evidence will show that when police officer asked him to leave, he sat up and immediately laid back down due to pain on his hip. Officer then told him he would be arrested and take to jail and Mr. Bull sat up and immediately request to be taken to jail knowing that he will get the needed medical attention at Spokane County jail. He was then transported to jail without any incident.

When he was released from jail, he contacted New Port Radiology and they completed a scan of his hip where they found severe degeneration that requires surgery. That surgery was recently done and Mr. Bull is recovering.

And all the evidence and exhibits in this case will point you to the inevitable conclusion that Mr. Bull is NOT GUILTY, our state law allows the defense of necessity. He was commanded to leave the side walk of the hospital when he could not walk, he stood up but fall back down due to the excruciating pain on his hip, which also contributed largely to his inability to think clearly and follow instructions.

I am now ready to begin the trial. As you listen to the evidence I hope you will keep this in mind: You have the grave responsibility of deciding whether Mr. Bull is a criminal, because he could not walk away from the sidewalk, it is as simple as that, and I urge you to be careful in making that decision. In choosing you for this jury, this humble courtroom took on the status of the highest court in the land and from this moment forward becomes one of the most important in Mr. Bull’s life. In asking you to assume this burden, we have entrusted you to do the just and right thing, to render the only just verdict this evidence and exhibit allows: A verdict of NOT GUILTY

*this is a real life case but the opening statement has been prepared with helpful assist from Cher's character in the movie "Suspect". The real names of characters involved was also edicted to protect their privacy.

Is Goodluck Jonathan incompetent or just too scare to dare Nigerian tormentors?

“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.”

― Albert Einstein