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ACN says not obsessed with wresting power from PDP

One of Nigeria’s main opposition
parties, Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) has declared that the party
is not obsessed with taking power from the People’s Democratic Party
(PDP) in the next general elections but, rather, it is concerned about
getting people’s votes to count.

Lai Mohammed, the party’s national
publicity secretary, said this while on an official visit to NEXT
Newspaper’s office at the weekend to discuss a number of issues. “We
are not obsessed about taking power from the PDP. We are more concerned
and, therefore insisting that votes must count. Nigerians must be
allowed to choose who they want to rule them. They are the ones
responsible to choose who rules them,” Mr Mohammed said.

Opposition party in Nigeria

On the dwindling
strength of opposition parties in Nigeria, despite being over 50
parties, Mr Mohammed stated that the only opposition parties in Nigeria
are the ACN, Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), All People’s Grand
Alliance (APGA) and Labour party. “All the other parties are just PDP
in different names. Or how will you explain 46 political parties
supporting a candidate of the ruling party” he noted, following the
announcement on Friday that 46 parties under a nebulous grand coalition
of political parties declared their support for the candidacy of the
incumbent president, Goodluck Jonathan, ahead of the 2011 polls. “Those
parties only exist to sell their votes to the PDP on the day of the
election.” He also affirmed that talks are ongoing with some of the
parties. “We were recently in talks with the CPC before it collapsed
but consultations have resumed and we are also in talks with Labour
Party and we will be very willing to talk with the APGA,” he said.

Internal democracy within ACN

Mr Mohammed noted
that internal democracy is a strong virtue of the party and this will
be very evident in the forthcoming party convention. He explained that
there will be no consensus candidate on the party’s platform, as every
candidate will be subjected to a very “transparent and due process.”
“People need to understand our history, that AC did not become a
political party until July 2006 and we were expected to submit
candidates within only three months for the 2007 election, hence the
consensus candidate. But this time around, a thorough due process is
what we are using,” he said.

He described the
party (ACN) as a “new factory” that will churn-out “great product.” “We
are working towards building ACN into a great party with strong
foundations, as we now send some of our staffers to South Africa for
exchange courses with the African National Congress to learn and,
therefore, deepen our democratic structures.

Election tribunal

Asked whether the
party will again resort to the court rooms to solve electoral matters
post-2011 elections, he said the party will not go to court at all this
time around. “We have told our members across the nation that the true
results must be determined at the polls. We will sit on the fields by
the ballot boxes and ensure that nobody tampers with the voting this
time,” he said.

“You will agree
with me that in the interest of democracy, it is not proper for five to
six judges to determine the results of elections.” He claimed the party
recorded success in its suits against the 2007 election malpractices as
seen in Bayelsa, Cross River and Ekiti States, where re-run elections
were ordered, but they again lost owing to what he described as
“symptomatic of the same problem everywhere the election was
re-ordered.”

Atiku Abubakar

Responding to
whether the party will again welcome its presidential candidate in the
last election, as he is struggling to get a place in the PDP. Mr
Mohammed said that “he is welcome back as a member of the party, but
definitely not for an elective office.”

“We feel very disappointed for him (Atiku) because his move is
tantamount to a political suicide for him. He would have been a
president in waiting, if he had stayed with AC.”

newstoday

Pakistan’s Taliban threatens attacks in U.S., Europe

Pakistan’s Taliban threatens attacks in U.S., Europe

Pakistan’s Taliban threatened on Friday to launch attacks in the
United States and Europe “very soon.” The warning came after a renewal of
militant violence in Pakistan this week that is piling pressure on a
U.S.-backed government overwhelmed by the flood crisis.

“We will launch attacks in America and Europe very soon,” Qari
Hussain Mehsud, a senior Pakistani Taliban leader and mentor of suicide
bombers, told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.

A suicide bomber struck at a rally in the Pakistani city of
Quetta on Friday, killing at least 54 people in the second major attack this
week.

The attack on the Shi’ite rally expressing solidarity with the
Palestinian people came as the United States said the devastating floods are
likely to hold up army offensives against Taliban insurgents.

“Unfortunately the flooding in Pakistan is probably going to
delay any operations by the Pakistani army in North Waziristan for some period
of time,” U.S. Defence Secretary Robert Gates said in Afghanistan where he is
visiting U.S. troops.

Senior police official Hamid Shakeel told Reuters that at least
54 people were killed and about 160 wounded in Quetta.

Dozens of dead and wounded lay in pools of blood after the blast
that also engulfed vehicles in flames.

Hours later, the al Qaeda-linked Taliban took responsibility for
the attack, saying it was revenge for killings of radical Sunni clerics by
Shi’ites, further challenging the unpopular civilian government. “We take pride
in taking responsibility for the Quetta attack,” Mehsud told Reuters.

Earlier in the day, the Taliban also claimed responsibility for
bombings on Wednesday at a Shi’ite procession in the eastern city of Lahore in
which at least 33 people died. These blasts were the first major attack since
flood waters tore through the country. The Taliban and their allies often
target religious minorities in a campaign to destabilize the government.

The Taliban said the U.S. decision to put it on its list of
terrorist organizations was a sign of being scared.

Aside from its battles against homegrown Taliban, Pakistan is
under intense American pressure to tackle Afghan Taliban fighters who cross the
border into Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas to attack U.S.-led NATO troops.

The United States has stepped up missile strikes by pilotless
drone aircraft against militant targets in Pakistan’s Pashtun tribal lands
since the start of 2010. On Friday, U.S. drones fired missiles at two targets
in North Waziristan tribal region, killing seven militants, including two
foreigners, intelligence officials said.

Pakistan has said the army would decide when to carry out a
full-fledged assault in North Waziristan, where Washington says anti-American
militants enjoy safe havens, at the time it considers appropriate.

In another attack in the northwest, a suicide bomber killed one
person outside a mosque of the Ahmadi sect, who consider themselves Muslims but
whom Pakistan declares non-Muslims.

Attention has focused on the Pakistani Taliban again after U.S.
prosecutors this week charged its leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, in a plot that
killed seven CIA employees at an American base in Afghanistan last December.

Islamist charities, some of them linked to militant groups, have
at the same time joined in the relief effort for the millions affected by the
worst floods in the nation’s history.

U.S. officials are concerned that the involvement of hardline
groups in flood relief will undermine the fight against militancy in Pakistan
as well Afghanistan.

Economic crisis

Anger is spreading over the government’s sluggish response to
the floods, raising the possibility of social unrest.

Pakistan is also facing economic catastrophe, with the floods
causing damage the government has estimated at $43 billion, almost a quarter of
the south Asian nation’s 2009 GDP.

Some relief has come from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
It will give Pakistan $450 million in emergency flood aid and disburse funds in
September to help the economy cope with the devastation.

Talks in Washington with a delegation led by Pakistan’s Finance
Minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh on the terms of an $11 billion IMF loan program
left him satisfied with the country’s commitment to reforms, IMF chief
Dominique Strauss-Kahn said.

Under the 2008 IMF loan program, Islamabad promised to implement
tax and energy sector reforms and give full autonomy to the State Bank of
Pakistan.

newstoday

ABUJA HEARTBEAT: Professional mobilisers in Abuja

ABUJA HEARTBEAT:
Professional mobilisers in Abuja

It is really a sad
thing to say, but when somebody said we need to wipe out at least two
generations of people for us to ‘get it right’ I could not help but
agree with him. But when another person in an entirely different forum
now said we need to annihilate everybody in Nigeria and leave only
those from 10 years and below, I felt uneasy this time because dry
bones have been mentioned and the old woman cannot be comfortable.

It means if we agree to the second or even the first option, yours sincerely may not survive the pogrom.

It is this core
eruption of our moral fibre by the word ‘corruption’. Is there any
government office that does not practice corruption? Even the EFCC and
the judiciary that are the hope of the common man have often been
accused of corrupt practices.

Our case has become
like that of Lot in Sodom and Gomorrah, where Abraham was trying to
plead for the Lord to spare the people. God said if he could find 10
righteous persons in the land, he would not destroy it.

Here in the FCT, a
particular church leader, with over 10,000 members, was said to have
entered the church one Sunday morning, crying and rolling on the floor.
When he finally spoke, he said God told him the previous night that if
the trumpet should sound, right now, they do not have 10 people that
can make heaven. If this is so, what do we expect from those who do not
know or fear God? So it is possible for one bad apple to spoil the
entire apples in the basket; with the hundreds of thousands of church
and mosque goers?

My thrust this week
is our youth that are supposed to take over from our present crop of
leaders. In Abuja, it is common to see near illiterates become rich
overnight. Some of them are the heads of mobilization for political
groupings and they come with different titles in different political
parties: youth leader, mama grass-root, youth mobiliser, head of
mobilization, women leader, market women leader, youth president and so
on.

Some of them have
been given permanent suits in highbrow hotels and to say they are
enjoying will be an understatement; what with the beehive of okpekes at
the snap of their fingers and the luxurious cars they now drive. A lot
of them now masquerade their activities with well registered NGOs and
business is booming as the election approaches.

The most painful
thing is that the same youth leader in party A, for instance, is the
Secretary for party B and the Treasurer for party C. All they need is a
‘face-cap’, dark sunglasses and an agbada to complete the
transformation, and they mobilize essentially the same crowd for the
different political parties. Some of them are honest enough not to
pledge their allegiance to any party. They have become professional
mobilisers. That is why it is easy to see the same set of women or
young men in not less than three different rallies by different
political parties.

Maybe we should advocate for simultaneous holding of rallies to discourage these ‘man must survive’ groups.

Ready for any rally

A friend of mine
said one young man’s speciality is to be ‘anti-anything’. That this
same young man was ‘anti-abacha’ ‘anti-atiku’ during Obasanjo’s time,
later he became ‘anti-third term’, he was ‘anti-cabal’ and now he is
‘anti-zoning’; that it is like the man has an octopus that tells him
which way the pendulum will swing because it always swings in his
favour.

He will mobilize
men and women for an ‘anti-anything’ campaign as long as he is paid. It
doesn’t matter if it is ‘anti-good’. Believe it or not, they are
beginning to have assistant professional mobilisers who can pull out
men and women who would easily leave their work places – okada riders,
farmers, mechanics, bricklayers, motor park touts, market women,
jobless people and even students.

The mobiliser takes the job, for N2,000 to N3,000 per person to
provide 2000 people during their rally, and goes to offer N1,000 to the
individuals per day. They provide maybe 1,500 people and then fill in
fictitious names to make up the number. In the heat of the moment, you
really cannot count to confirm if you have 2000 people. How do we
reverse this kind of thinking, knowing that their patrons are those in
the National Assembly or government houses. INEC and the rest of our
nation will have to reach deep into the solution box for a way out.

newstoday

No evidence Nigeria is broke

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No evidence Nigeria is broke

In 2004, as part of
a reform programme embarked upon by President Obasanjo, which included
the liquidation of much of the country’s external debt, a special
account – the Excess Crude Account (ECA) – was created outside
constitutional provisions, for the purpose of saving all oil revenues
in excess of a benchmark price set in the annual budget.

When President
Obasanjo left office in 2007, the account held $20 billion. The funds
stayed intact until the end of 2008. In 2009 alone, $12 billion was
withdrawn. As at August this year, the account held only $460 million.

The bulk of the
withdrawals have been shared amongst the three tiers of government, to
make up for shortfalls in the national budget. The 2010 budget, worth
4.6 trillion naira, a 50 per cent increase on the 2009 figure, is one
whose scale has alarmed analysts.

“Earlier reforms in
Nigeria had helped to establish the country’s reputation for a
substantial saving of its oil windfall, boosting its external
creditworthiness. The 2010 budget, with the magnitude of increased
spending that is envisaged, will go some way towards undoing that
reputation,” Razia Khan, Standard Chartered Bank’s Regional Head of
Research for Africa said in a March 2010 report.

The government’s
defence is that expansionary spending is needed in the light of the
global recession. “The 2010 budget is based on government’s
determination to stimulate the economy out of the recent global
economic crisis through targeted fiscal interventions,” Iyiola Omisore,
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Appropriations announced last
February.

The Excess Crude
Account, into which the windfall that Ms. Khan alludes to went, is now
at the centre of heated debate about the management of the country’s
wealth, the bulk of which is derived from oil and gas revenues.

“The excess crude
revenue has been used over the years for different reasons that hardly
served the nation’s interest,” Minister of Finance Olusegun Aganga
admitted in July, while canvassing for the establishment of a Sovereign
Wealth Fund in line with global best practices.

In May, when it
became obvious that the government had to depend on the Excess Crude
Account to fund the monthly allocations to the states and local
governments, the Minister of State for Finance, Remi Babalola,
described Nigeria’s expenditure plans for 2010 as “unsustainable.”

“We may thus be
constrained to consider amending the revenue profile of the 2010 budget
or re-negotiate with all relevant stakeholders the monthly
distributable amount pending improvements in the budgeted revenue
profile,” Mr Babalola said.

Since then the
government has asked ministries and agencies to cut their 2010 budgets
by almost fifty percent. But even that has not made a significant dent
on the projected expenditures. “In spite of the recent budget cuts,
capital expenditure for this year still comes in at about N1.5
trillion, which is more than double what was spent last year,” Mr.
Aganga told NEXT on Wednesday.

The size of the budget means that Nigeria is projected to record a budget deficit of more than 5 percent of GDP for 2010.

Quantity versus quality

Bismarck Rewane,
analyst and CEO of Financial Derivatives, a Lagos-based economic
research consultancy, says that a deficit is not the problem. “The
strategy to get out of a recession is to have a deficit budget,” Mr.
Rewane said, adding that the global recession means that most countries
have to resort to deficit budgets until the economic climate improves.

He added that the
real issue is not so much the “quantity of spending” as the “quality”,
and that the question that should be asked is “What have we achieved
with our spending?”

Echoing this view
is Olufemi Awoyemi, financial analyst and Managing Director of
Proshare, an investment advisory consultancy. For Mr. Awoyemi, the
crucial question is: “How much is going [towards] infrastructure?”

Those arguments are
in line with statements made by Mr. Aganga during his screening by the
Senate. “I know there has been an increase of about 50 per cent in the
budget and we are running a budget deficit of between 5-6 percent of
GDP,” he told the Senate. “That in itself is not necessarily a bad
thing. What is more significant is that money is allocated to projects
that will deliver strong social and economic returns which means that
the emphasis is going to be now on implementation, making sure that the
quality and efficiencies of spending are looked at strictly.”

Nigeria is not broke

Analysts say that
national insolvency – as in the case of Greece – is closely tied to
debt levels and the ability to meet interest payments and that
Nigeria’s current debt levels do not warrant the level of alarm about
its financial situation, especially bearing in mind foreign reserves of
$36 billion ($5 billion less than a year ago).

Mr. Rewane insists
that the issue of the management of Nigeria’s finances should not be
sensationalised, and that there is no evidence that the country is
broke. “I think we should be cautious about jumping to conclusions,” he
said.

“Nigeria is not
broke in the sense in which it is being described,” says Mr Awoyemi. “I
have never heard the Minister of Finance say that Nigeria is broke.” He
says the country actually deserves credit for “[doing] better than most
in dealing with the global recession.”

He however
highlights two major problems in the way the Nigerian economy is
currently being managed: a challenge “in terms of (spending)
prioritisation” and the fact that the country “does not have a budget
plan that goes beyond twelve months.”

Commenting on the
implications of the depletion of the Excess Crude Account, Obadiah
Mailafia, a former Deputy Governor of the Central Bank, said: “If there
were to be any sudden external shock in terms of petroleum prices, on
which we depend for much of our earnings, it means we’d have no
cushion.” He added that the depletion of the Excess Crude Account may
negatively affect the country’s credit rating.

A lengthy shopping list

The latest of the
disbursements from the Excess Crude Account was $2 billion withdrawn in
July and shared to the three tiers of government. Before this was the
$4.8 billion withdrawal for the same purpose in March, while President
Jonathan was still Acting President.

Of the almost $20
billion in withdrawals since 2007, only a quarter has gone on specific
infrastructure projects: $5.34 billion withdrawn in 2009 to fund the
construction of new power plants as well as a transmission and
distribution system. The rest has been shared by the Federal, State and
Local governments.

“A significant part
of our budget is going into wasteful expenditure,” Awoyemi says.
Prominent on the government’s expenditure list for 2010 are 50th
anniversary celebrations, the purchase of three new jets for the
presidential fleet, and the conduct of the 2011 elections. Close to $1
billion dollars will be spent on these projects alone. A salary
increase for civil servants and the military and police will cost the
government 267 billion naira this year. Federal legislators are also
seeking doubling of their quarterly allowances. In July the Senate
passed a supplementary budget worth $4.3 billion, from which the wage
increase will be funded.

To meet the persistent shortfalls in distributable oil revenues the
government has, apart from the Excess Crude Account, also turned to the
international markets for borrowings. More than $5 billion dollars of
foreign debt will be taken on this year, more than doubling the current
debt level, apart from a $500 million international bond that will be
launched before the end of the year.

Money

‘Government is responsible for NITEL’s woes’

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‘Government is responsible for NITEL’s woes’

The Federal
Government is responsible for the problems of the pension fund account
of the Nigeria Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) and its mobile
subsidiary, Mobile Telecommunication Limited (MTEL), a senior staff of
the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE), disclosed this last Thursday.

The source added
that in 2001, following the first privatisation process, the federal
government ordered that non-core assets of NITEL be transferred to the
pension fund account of the company. Further, in 2009, the federal
government decided to offset outstanding salary arrears of the
NITEL/MTEL workers and mandated an accounting firm, Olusola Adekanola
& Co, the court- appointed NITEL liquidator, to borrow N3 billion
from the accounts of NITEL/MTEL Staff Pension Fund in liquidation and
use it to pay the arrears with the aim of repaying from money realised
from the sale of the national carrier.

The money was meant
to pay five months from the 27 months salary owed the workers. December
last year, the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) said that the money
would be paid to the workers in three tranches with the first tranche
due that month.

This was done, said
the source, but the remaining two tranches are still outstanding till
date. The agreement reached between the parties appeared to have gone
sour leading to the liquidator formally pulling out in February this
year.

In an advertorial
placed in a newspaper last February, Olusola Adekanola, the liquidator
said, “the monies left in the liquidation account are from the sale of
assets whose ownership was being contested by Transcorp, which has so
far refused to hand over the title documents, even though these assets
clearly belong to the NITEL/MTEL Staff Pension Fund (in Liquidation).

“I am not at
liberty to distribute the proceeds of assets whose sale has not been
concluded, as doing so will jeopardise the position of the buyers of
the assets and subject the liquidation process to serious litigations
from these new owners. It is unfortunate that this liquidation process
and welfare of NITEL/MTEL staff have been caught in the crossfire
associated with the privatisation of NITEL and the entire Transcorp
issue.

“I am privileged to
know that the federal government has fully settled all exposures of
Transcorp to a local bank (to the tune of about N45 billion) and I
cannot understand why these 27 months’ salary arrears of NITEL workers
defaulted by Transcorp were not off-set and reconciled before the
bailout,” said Mr. Adekanola.

Government is holding the papers

However, another
source from the BPE explained that the initial plan of the federal
government was to payoff Transcorp from money that would be realised
from the sale of NITEL and after all debts including workers’ salaries
have been settled.

“You know that the
government was to refund over N63 billion back to Transcorp. I learnt
that the federal government decided to raise a bond to pay back the
banks Transcorp said to have taken loan from to pay for NITEL. However,
I am not sure if that was what the government finally did”.

The source
confirmed the liquidators’ claim that some title papers were still with
the federal government was true and that investigation into the
liquidation of NITEL non-core assets were on.

“The federal
government set up a committee from the technical board to do a review
of the relevant Certificates of Occupancy and reconciliation to
establish those that are missing. Investigation is still going on with
Transcorp management and some of the C of O is with security agencies,”
said the source.

Since 2009,
NITEL/MTEL workers have written letters and carried out protests over
the non-payment of their 27 months arrears. But the question remains
over the fund’s balance and accrued interest, if any. Last week, nobody
was willing to speak at the liquidators office in Opebi, Ikeja, Lagos,
on what has happened to the balance of the N3 billion and how much has
been paid out so far.

“The liquidator is
not in the country to respond to your question. I will inform you when
he is available, so that you can revisit in order for him to grant you
the interview,” said B.O. Ajadi, director of Operation of the firm.

Similarly, Chukwuma
Nwokoh, BPE spokesperson said he does not know the total amount that
was spent by the liquidator to pay the NITEL workers.

“I don’t know about
the total amount that was used by the NITEL liquidator to pay the NITEL
workers their one month salary. So, I don’t know the balance from what
was left from the N3 billion because he did not take the entire N3
billion from the pension fund account, he only paid one month,” said
Mr. Nwokoh.

“What we are
concerned about now is for the presidency to take its decision on how
to settle the workers their arrears,” he added.

Over the last nine
years, controversy has dogged repeated attempts by the government to
get a buyer for the beleaguered telephone company. A report last week
said that the Taskforce on NITEL/MTEL labour restructuring, chaired by
the Minister of Labour and Productivity, Emeka Wogu explained that the
cost of settling outstanding salaries and disengagement entitlements
for NITEL staff is N24.71 billion, while that of MTEL is N4.76 billion
totalling N29.47billion.

In a telephone
interview, Emmanuel Abu, the chairman of Senior Staff Association of
Communications, Transport and Corporations (SSACTAC), NITEL, Abuja,
questioned the rationale for government’s action.

“We wrote to the
presidency on why they had to pay Transcorp N45 billion when the
workers have not been paid and advised that workers arrears for the
period Transcorp was in charge should be deducted from the sum before
paying Transcorp. Whatever the government is doing with the process of
NITEL is not sincere, they should just pay off the workers, so that
Nigerians would know that NITEL no longer exists,” added Mr. Abu.

In February 2010, BPE reported that it had concluded the sale of
NITEL with New Generations Telecommunications Consortium emerging as
the preferred bidder with $2.5 billion for 75 per cent equity of NITEL.
The bid’s fate is unknown as government has been foot-dragging on
handing NITEL over to the firm.

Money

‘No date for stable power’

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‘No date for stable power’

Barth Nnaji,
professor of Robotics engineering and special adviser to the president
on power, in this interview, outlines prospects for the electricity
sector and how he can only promise stable improvement in Nigeria’s
power sector.

Power agenda

A lot is different
this time around. First, this government has produced a holistic plan
on how to drive the reform process to completion. That reform plan
comes from an Act made in 2005 called the Electricity Power Sector
Reform Act of 2005. So government now has a plan for electricity and
the plan includes everything from generation of the power, transmission
of power, to distribution of power, to the regulatory issues
surrounding all these. That is different. Now, as part of the
implementation of the Act, generation and distribution will be private
sector driven from next year. That’s also a major shift because that is
now bringing the will of government to bear on the Act in moving it
forward. So you are going to see actual private sector participation
not just by talking about it, not just by going to various countries of
the world and saying come to our country to invest but actually getting
the private sector to become investors and drivers of the power sector.

Power generation

Currently,
Nigeria’s installed capacity is over 5,000 megawatts while actual
generation is in the neighbourhood of 3,500 but sometimes we get up to
3,800 megawatts. That is available generation. You have installed
capacity, you have available generation capacity, and you have actual
generation capacity. The installed capacity is the amount of power that
the plant is supposed to generate but is not able to generate because
it has one turbine damaged or some equipment damaged. That lowers it.
But what is available for generation is what the plant can actually
generate if everything is okay, in terms of say gas supply. The actual
generation is when for instance you have enough gas to generate and you
can evacuate what you generate as installed generation. Sometimes you
have available generation but you are not able to evacuate it, maybe
due to problems with the transmission network. Sometimes the power
plant can actually generate this but it doesn’t have enough gas. That
is the sort of problems we encounter. So what you end up having is the
actual generation. What we would like to have as government is for the
actual generation to match installed generation. When you have prepared
your plant, you have the gas and you can evacuate what you produce.
Then the actual will match the installed.

Specifics

The country needs
close to $5 billion per year on the average over the next 10 years to
reach where it wants to go for Vision 2020. You are right, we require
foreign investment in this sector but foreign investors are sceptical
as they have all the world to invest in. They look at Nigeria, they
look at Brazil, they look at India, they look at Japan, they look at
China and there are so many other countries. But Nigeria is now saying
we are going to make the various indices for investment such that they
attract what an investor would be looking for internationally. It’s a
different ball game. Part of it is that the tariff for gas should line
up with the tariff for generation of electricity. When you have a whole
value chain incentivised to perform, then investors will be listening.
When you say the regulatory commission is legally constituted and given
authority to perform then something different has happened. When you
say that you are privatising generation and distribution so that
distribution will become credit worthy, then people will begin to
listen to you.

Central Bank Intervention fund

The intervention
fund is a very good one. It is a way of showing that government is
serious and saying I put my money where my mouth is. But of course,
that is a stimulant because we require many times more than what the
CBN is putting down. That amount would not address problems of the
power sector. Don’t forget the amount is for both power and aviation
and it amounts to just about $2 billion. It is good but it is not
enough and it shows the will of government. But there is a lot more the
government is doing in terms of policy approach. All what the
government announced has shown the will of government to tackle the
problem. An example of what government should be doing in the future is
research, to seek ways of improving the sector so that we can help the
private sector to improve this sector because it benefits this country.
Government needs to lead the way in developing renewable energy to
build power plants, nuclear energy, solar, wind and others.

Challenges

The good thing is
that everybody in Nigeria knows that the country does not generate
enough electricity so it does not need a lot of convincing to let
people know that something needs to be done. But what is difficult is
getting them to understand specifically what needs to be done. In that
regard, we have sometimes encountered problems but that is normal. It
is our responsibility to explain clearly and transparently how the
policies would be implemented to achieve the goal and the need for them
to go along with us.

The PHCN workers
have two unions, senior staff union and junior staff union. The senior
staff union is manned by actual workers of PHCN and the junior staff
unions are manned by professional unionists. All in all, the intention
is to listen to what the union officials are saying in order to satisfy
the workers. Government is listening to them. The payment of arrears of
monetised benefits is an indication that government is listening
because for seven years these arrears had remain arrears. But this
present government has found the will and found the money to pay them.

What is
disappointing is that at the point of doing this, the PHCN officials
ordered their workers to go on strike and that was on the day before
the president was to announce the road map.

Interest groups

We don’t need to
overemphasise it but these various interest groups incite the union.
Unfortunately, it is not the workers that have this problem. The
workers have been extremely wonderful. All the workers want to earn a
better living and for their interest to be protected. But there are
various interests at work. These interests are yet to get to the
realisation that they can do better by rechanneling their interests
into more productive endeavors in the power sector. The power sector is
opening up. We have so many business opportunities. You don’t have to
be selling generators. You could be selling transformers, capacitors,
switch gears. You could even be manufacturing these things here. There
are many companies now manufacturing transformers in Nigeria. That is
the sort of things we expect. Re-channel your business rather than
cause obstructions. If you are a diesel importer, you could get into
gas production and transportation. These are things that are opening up
now. So there is really no need to hold the country to ransom, or try
to keep us in darkness because of personal interests. There is no
reason for that.

Stable power supply

I will not give you
date but you will begin to see improvement. Going to next year, end of
next year, 2012, we will continue to see improvement. It is better to
see improvement than promise and get disappointed. People have to see
that there is competent management of the power sector and competent
management will translate to better and efficient power with time.

Other sources of power

The government is
doing feasibility studies for eight plants, be it hydro or coal or gas.
Government is doing feasibility study for Mambilla Hydro, for Zungeru
and for Gurara. These are three key power plants that government is
undertaking. In the case of Mambilla, it will be initiated by the
beginning of next year and by the time it is completed in six years
time; it will generate about 2,600 megawatts. The project will consist
of a dam, power plant, high voltage transmission line to substations.
Then you also have the Zungeru power plant which is a 700 megawatt
power plant and Gurara which is 300 megawatts power plant. Then we have
coal-fired power plant which we are beginning to initiate which we hope
will come on in the next five to six years. Then there are plans but
they have to be initiated by the private sector.

Background

It’s because I have
worn the shoes and I know where it pinches. I know what it takes to
conceive, design, construct and operate a power plant. I know about
distribution networks and I know the challenges that the private sector
will encounter when doing this. One of the key challenges, especially
for the private sector is getting money. You can buy anything but
getting the money requires having bankable project and bankable project
means that that thing has to have been worked out to a level that a
lender will give you money or an equity investor will give you money
and it is very challenging. When government is doing it, all it does is
go to the treasury and allocate the money and build. When private
sector person is doing it, he has little money. Every real investor in
power will not use his money but will source for money. For instance,
to build a hundred megawatts power plant costs at least $100 million,
that is about N15 billion. What they do is to put down some equity and
go borrow the rest. And for somebody to get a lender to give you money
many of the things we are doing now have to be in place.

Affordability

That is the whole
idea. Reliable quality electricity that is affordable, to have enough
reliable and affordable supply so that the small entrepreneur, the
urban poor and rural dwellers will be able to have power at the flick
of the switch.

Money

Much more than vanity

Much more than vanity

In July some
African First Ladies met at a summit called ‘Forum of African First
Ladies against breast and cervical cancer’ in Accra, Ghana. According
to them, the reason for the summit is to draw the attention of leaders
in the region to what they described as, ‘‘the growing burden of
women’s cancers, especially cervical and breast cancer-in the world’s
poorest nations,’’

The ladies are
wives of presidents and heads of state and include – Ernestina Naatu
Mills (Ghana), Djibo Saalu Fati (Niger), Momsa Matsebula (Swaziland),
Tobeka Zuma (South Africa), Zainab Yayah Jammeh (The Gambia), Janet
Museveni (Uganda) and Thandiwe Banda (Zambia).

At the meeting
they all decried the rising wave of breast and cervical cancers among
women on the continent where studies have shown that the two diseases
are the commonest and leading causes of death among women.

In a statement at
the end of the summit they lamented, ‘‘cervical, breast and other
women’s cancers take a tremendous toll on women’s health in developing
countries. Over 80% of all cervical cancer deaths occur in developing
countries where girls and women do not have access to prevention
services such as education, vaccination and lifesaving pre-cancer
screening and early treatment. Breast cancer, once relatively unknown
in developing countries, is rising rapidly, often appearing in women 10
to 15 years earlier than in developed countries.’’

This observation
needs proper and detailed attention and one study after the other in
the last two years has endorsed this fact: It is no longer an ailment
of the West or of those accustomed to that lifestyle.

We agree with that
enlightenment on cancer issues is very poor in Africa and there is a
crying need for our health authorities to step up education on the risk
factors that predispose our women to breast and cervical cancer.
Because many do not know what they should do or how to check themselves
for signs the ailment is allowed to fester and patients only report at
hospitals at a point when the case has become terminal.

At the Ghana
summit the ladies pledged to mobilise their diplomatic and public
health leaderships to ensure women’s cancers feature prominently at
this month’s United Nations General Assembly Development Summit on the
Millennium Development Goals and at the United Nations High Level
Summit on non-communicable Diseases (NCDs) scheduled for September next
year. They also stated their plan to work with other international
agencies to help champion and focus on these challenges of bringing to
the fore the need to see cancer as a threat to the health of women and
the populace in general.

To our mind, the
important thing is not for the United Nations to discuss it at its
summit, the home front is where the real action is. By now the seven
first ladies who attended the Ghana summit have returned to their
bases. What they do with and how they push the Accra commitment forward
is what should be of concern. Too often summits are held and
declarations made are soon forgotten. This should not be.

As much as we are
wary of the use to which the office of first spouse, let us not forget
that Liberia made history by electing Ellen Johnson Sirleaf president,
has been put in some parts, our hope is that this initiative will not
be allowed to become another avenue for vainglory and little else. It
is far too serious and much too important.

It is regrettable
that some initiatives to combat cancer have been launched with fanfare
in the past and have not survived beyond the razzmatazz of the launch.
A case in point is the billions of naira that was donated to Mrs. Turai
Yar’Adua, wife of the late president, for her much hyped International
Cancer Centre, which was to be built in Abuja. As of the last count,
land had been allocated for the project and a board constituted to
oversee the running of the centre. However, shortly after the launch
Mrs. Yar’Adua’s attention was understandably diverted by her husband’s
sickness from which he never recovered.

We believe that since the money was collected from government
ministries and companies it is important for purposes of accountability
for an account to be rendered and if Mrs. Yar’Adua is no longer
interested in carrying out the project it should be handed over to
another group or agency that can. This is the only way this project can
be of benefit to the majority of Nigerians and make the Accra
declaration a reality for all.

Taking on two missions impossible

Taking on two missions impossible

President Barack
Obama is embarking on something I’ve never seen before – taking on two
Missions Impossible at the same time. That is, a simultaneous effort to
heal the two most bitter divides in the Middle East: the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Shiite-Sunni conflict cantered in
Iraq. Give him his due. The guy’s got audacity. I’ll provide the hope.
But kids, don’t try this at home.

Yet, if by some
miracles the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that opened in Washington
on Thursday do eventually produce a two-state solution, and Iraqi
Shiites and Sunnis do succeed in writing their own social contract on
how to live together, one might be able to imagine a Middle East that
breaks free from the debilitating grip of endless Arab-Israeli wars and
autocratic Arab regimes.

Obama deserves
credit for helping to nurture these opportunities. But he, Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton, the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, the
Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu, and the newly elected leaders of
Iraq need to now raise their games to a whole new level to seize this
moment – or their opponents will.

Precisely because
so much is at stake, the forces of intolerance, extreme nationalism and
religious obscurantism all over the Middle East will be going all out
to make sure that both the Israeli and Iraqi peace processes fail.

The opponents want
to destroy the idea of a two-state solution for Israelis and
Palestinians, so Israel will be stuck with an apartheid-like,
democracy-sapping, permanent occupation of the West Bank. And they want
to destroy the idea of a one-state solution for Iraqis and keep Iraq
fractured, so it never coheres into a multi-sectarian democracy that
could be an example for other states in the region.

I hope that one of
my personal rules about the Middle East is proved wrong – that in this
region extremists go all the way and moderates tend to just go away.

Obama was right to
keep to his troop-withdrawal schedule from Iraq. Iraqi politicians need
to stand on their own. But this is tricky. The president will not be
remembered for when we leave Iraq but for what happens after we leave.
That is largely in Iraqi hands, but it is still very much in our
interest. So we need to retain sufficient diplomatic, intelligence,
Special Forces and Army training units there to promote a decent
outcome; because all the extremists are now doubling down.

Last week,
insurgents aligned with al-Qaida boasted of killing 56 innocent Iraqis.
On Tuesday, Palestinian gunmen murdered four West Bank Israeli
settlers, including a pregnant woman; Hamas proudly claimed credit. In
Israel, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who heads the largest ultra-Orthodox party,
Shas, used his Shabbat sermon to declare that he hoped the Palestinian
president and his people would die. “All these evil people should
perish from this world … God should strike them with a plague, them
and these Palestinians,” Yosef said.

Trust me, this is just the throat clearing and gun-cleaning. Wait until we have a deal.

Even if Israel
agrees to swap land with the Palestinians so that 80 percent of the
Jewish settlers in the West Bank can stay put, it will mean that 60,000
will still have to be removed. It took Israel 55,000 soldiers to remove
8,100 Jewish settlers from Gaza, which was never part of the Land of
Israel. Imagine when today’s Israeli Army, where the officer corps is
increasingly drawn from religious Zionists who support the settler
movement, is called on to remove settlers from the West Bank.

None of this is a
reason not to proceed. It is a reason to succeed. There is so much to
hate about the Iraq war. The costs will never match the hoped-for
outcome, but that outcome remains hugely important: The effort to build
a decent, consensual government in Iraq is the most important democracy
project in the world today.

If Iraqi Sunnis,
Kurds and Shiites can actually write a social contract for the first
time in modern Arab history, it means that viable democracy is not only
possible in Iraq, but everywhere in the region.

“Iraq is the
Germany of the Middle East,” says Michael Young, opinion editor of The
Beirut Daily Star and author of a very original book about Lebanon,
“The Ghosts of Martyrs Square.” “It is at the heart of the region –
affecting all around it – and the country’s multi-ethnic,
multi-sectarian population represents all the communities of the
region. Right now, what is going on in Iraq represents all the worst
trends in the region, but if you can make it work, it could represent
the best.”

The late Israeli
leader Yitzhak Rabin used to say he would pursue peace with the
Palestinians as if there were no terrorism and fight terrorism as if
there were no peace process. That dual approach is one that Iraqi,
Arab, Palestinian and

Israeli moderates are all going to have to adopt.

I hope the forces of moderation are up to it.

Testing microphone

Testing microphone

As kids, a musician
named Marvel from Uromi town used to torment us. Marvel enjoyed the
monopoly of being the only highlife musician around. News of a
performance by Marvel would spread like fire on dry grass. Boys would
be scrambling to tailor’s shop to sew new outfits and treetop Afros
would spring from girls’ heads. The news of an upcoming Marvel concert
could whip the eight villages that make my clan into a whirlwind of
euphoric anxiety.

“Marvel go come
so?” We would ask, seeking support and reassurance from one another
because it was not unusual for him to take advance payment and go to a
more profitable venue like the burial ceremony of a wealthy patron’s
mother. On several disappointing occasions like that we would sulk to
bed dreaming of the aborted fiesta in our sullen sleep.

After we had
thoroughly stewed in our anticipation, the same way we waited for
politicians to redeem their promises of pipe borne water, electricity,
good roads, and had our hopes dashed like eggs carried by a leper,
Marvel would magically show up with his band members in a beat up
Peugeot 404 pickup.

This motor was a
combination of hard jagged metal and wires on wheels, a relic that
belonged more to the Museum of Natural History if Nigeria had one. Then
again, Marvel’s pijoti was built for the unpaved deadly roads to my
village. The driver would blast his horn and rev the engine that
emitted black smoke into the air to announce Marvel’s arrival. We would
let out ear shattering screams, jumping up and down – “Marvel vale,
Marvel vale, Marvel vale! Marvel has arrived!”

Marvel would remain
inside the pickup, wearing dark sunglasses like Ray Charles
nonchalantly smoking a Gold Leaf cigarette, while his boys unloaded the
musical equipment.

Catching a glimpse
of his weathered, battered, red guitar was like seeing Jesus Christ
walking on the River Niger from Asaba to Onitsha.

Speakers and
keyboards and drums and the most taunting instrument, the microphone,
would be unloaded by men with cigarettes hanging from their quivering
lips. Then the pickup door would open, and Marvel would gingerly test
his steel-toed stiletto shoes on the red earth, before heaving himself
out, slowly. Standing up full length, you would think Elvis Presley had
risen, except Marvel was as black as Idi Amin. He never smiled; he
would just walk straight to a cool-off area reserved for him by his
host, downing bottles of hot Crystal lager beer, until his men finished
setting up.

At about 8pm, the
atmosphere would be aromatically frothing like fresh palm wine. If the
clouds were kind, we would have moonlight, otherwise fireflies provided
enough illumination to help us wander round the venue. The only
electricity lights were a few bulbs powered by Marvel’s small Yamaha
generator, whose sole purpose was to run the musical equipment. In any
case, light was not required, for at Marvel’s highlife party, things
not meant for illumination usually took place.

By now the band would have finished setting up the equipment, plucking at their guitars (not Marvel’s) in tuneless succession.

There were only two
microphones, one for Marvel and one to be shared by three backup
singers. There was no proliferation of microphones back then, it seemed
you had to earn the right to use one because other band members just
bellowed away with their God given throats.

With a bulb
dangling above his head in the shaded area, Marvel would strap his
guitar round his shoulder and adjust the belt a couple of times, all
this while a cigarette would be hanging from his lips tremulously.
Eventually, he would pull a long drag on the Gold Leaf and drop it
disdainfully, grinding the butt viciously with his stiletto. Grabbing
the microphone, the very first words that would come out of his mouth
would be “Testing Microphone…one, two…testing
microphone…one-two.”

While we waited for
the real show to start so we could gyrate in the corner because we were
not old enough to hold girls by their waists and grind the night away
in the middle of the dance floor, Marvel would continue to test the
microphone for an eternity. He would fiddle with knobs in the old
amplifiers and twang his guitar endlessly. At some point, we would have
fallen asleep on benches in the fringes. Earlier excitement would have
worn our young minds out by the time Marvel was done with “testing
microphone”.

We did not know the extent to which this endless testing annoyed grownups, until one night.

Agoslow, a man
whose head was the size of cinder block, walked straight to Marvel,
seized the microphone from him and cleared his throat: “The microphone
is working, play me music and let me dance and enjoy myself, I come
from a far village.”

And today as I wait
for Goodluck Jonathan to declare his intention and he is still dilly
dallying and meeting with the Buharis of this world, the immortal words
of Agoslow come to me. So I am telling Mr. President to stop testing
the microphone and declare his intention and let the dance begin in
earnest.

Enough of this waiting game.

Nasir the man, El-Rufai the myth

Nasir the man, El-Rufai the myth

Nasir Ahmad
El-Rufai. It is almost impossible to remain neutral at the mention of
this name. Few personalities in Nigeria evoke as much passion and
debate. Mention his name anywhere and you’re likely to get responses
ranging from outright dislike to extreme adulation. One thing is clear
though – he has as many admirers as he has detractors.

El-Rufai stirs up
so much passion that any effort to contextualize him becomes embroiled
in controversy. Any writer voicing an opinion about the man is accused
of either being on his payroll or is branded a hack writer, paid to rub
the man’s name in mud. I am not a praise singer, and obtain no gain
from rubbishing anyone’s reputation. This is just an attempt to
separate Nasir the man, from el-Rufai the myth.

The most invariable
accusation against el-Rufai is that he is arrogant. I almost titled the
piece ‘the criminality of arrogance’, but avoided the distraction.
Being arrogant is not a criminal offence anywhere in the world.

But that aside, how
does one define arrogance? Ask most people why they think el-Rufai is
arrogant and they will be stumped. They have probably never met the man
and are only passing on the myth of el-Rufai.

Nasir, the man
carries his luggage and laptop himself. He would rather be called
‘Nasir’, not any of the multitudes of flattering names and titles that
abound. He is first to extend greetings, mixes with all and quick to
assist even people he has never met.

El-Rufai the myth is arrogant; Nasir the man has no pretensions.

Critics say he has
been indicted in the disappearance of N32 billion from the sale of
government houses. But the FCT itself and the Finance Ministry
confirmed that the money is intact. That explains why the EFCC case
against him is crumbling. In truth, the entire case against el-Rufai
was a vendetta by the Yar’Adua cabal who saw him as a threat. So
hurriedly put together were the allegations that they actually accused
him of breaking laws that had been repealed years earlier!

Those who object to
el-Rufai with a passion will say that he allocated lands to his family.
True, there may be ethical issues, but he broke no laws of the land.
That aside, anyone with something to hide would have used fictitious
names to allocate the lands to his family. That real names and
identities were used, when el-Rufai himself made the process open to
public scrutiny is not indicative of hidden motives.

For objectivity, it
is important to look critically at the nine years he served in the
public sector and do a ‘before’ and ‘after’ analysis. Only those who
lived in Abuja before 2003 would appreciate the level of sanity
el-Rufai brought into the territory. Was he wrong to demolish houses
built on sewage outlets? Was it arrogance to revoke illegal allocations
of lands on public parks?

Did he lack vision
to have banned commercial motorcyclists from the city centre? Ask
commuters what they think of ‘el-Rufai buses. Was it an offence to have
eliminated the mafia around land allocation? What it criminal to
facilitate home ownership for thousands of people and relieve
government of unmanageable burdens?

Criticism of
el-Rufai is not different from that of other achievers in Nigeria. Many
claim to desire positive change, but turn around to demonise change
agents. Consider these examples: Awolowo was one of Nigeria’s most
principled politicians, but some people vilified him till death as an
ethnic jingoist. Gen. Murtala knew development was impossible without a
thorough shake-up of the bureaucracy. Today, some people accuse him of
destroying the civil service. Buhari’s War Against Indiscipline served
to reverse the moral decay and decadence that stifled public conduct
before he became head of state.

Today, people call him a fanatic.

Similarly, for the
first time in Nigeria’s history, we had a public officer that stood his
ground and arrested some of the biggest crooks in the land. Today, some
people accuse Nuhu Ribadu of waging a selective anti-corruption
crusade. So if people call el-Rufai names for executing his various
tasks with vigour, it is in line with a trend.

The freedom of the Internet age makes it possible for us to assume all sorts of aliases to insult and malign others.

This will be no exception. But if we truly want change in Nigeria,
we must recognize agents of change and appreciate their vision, if not
their person. In the case of Nasir el-Rufai, we should start by
dispassionately separating Nasir, the man from el-Rufai, the myth.