Remembering Iyalode of Yorubaland

By Dimeji Kayode-Adedeji

Precisely 365 days today at about 6. 45am, a telephone call I first received came from the home of Alaba Oluwaseun Lawson. My heart skipped…and listening to the voice from other end of the phone, It was sad news… Mama has gone to the Lord.

Honestly, I was immediately confused and still on my Jalamia, (Pyjamas) I drove straight to her private residence at Quarry Road in Abeokuta. Reality dawned on me on arrival and I couldn’t hold back tears which rolled down my face and I became speechless.

It was a Saturday I used to appear on live radio program on fresh F.M between 9-11am. When I regained my consciousness, I put a call across to management of the station, that I can’t make it because I was bereaved. As I was still trying to comport myself and further regain my strength as a man, there were torrential phone calls from my colleagues in the pen profession, knowing that I was her media adviser, trying to confirm authenticity of the sad news.

 I had no choice I had to issue a press statement early enough to avoid speculations and wrong news dissemination. I must confess in my career as journalist of over three decades that was my first time I will be writing a press statement on a demise of any individual.

 I must again openly say this, late Iyalode Alaba Lawson, Iyalode of Yorubaland, I knew for over 30 years was my great benefactor and I will continue to appreciate her even in death. She was there for me all time, a reliable mother, a sister and aunty from another womb.

 I have no regret knowing her, if there is opportunity to keep relationship in heaven, I will keep that relationship with Alaba Oluwaseun Lawson (Omo Jiboku Tanatana). Its exactly a year today you left this sinful world to rest in the arms of the Lord. The legacies you left behind speak volume. I pray you continue to rest in perfect peace. Adieu

Prince Dimeji Kayode-Adedeji is founder of Penpushing Media and Media Adviser to late Iyalode of Yorubland, Iyalode Alaba Lawson

I saw Makkah and wept; you would, too, by Hassan Gimba

My recent visit to the holy city was the second time I was there, courtesy of the benevolence of Honourable Mai Mala Buni, the governor of my state, Yobe. The first was when I was practically wheeled there as a result of a debilitating illness that required first-class medical treatment.

The recent visit was for a follow-up treatment, and happily, my doctors attested to my improved health condition.

The governor has made it a state policy to provide free medical services to anyone who can come to Yobe State. To that end, he has upgraded the state health system to among the best in the country and, most likely, the best in the North, as attested to by no less a person than the Katsina State Governor, Alhaji Umar Dikko Radda, in an interview with the BBC Hausa Service.

Where the medical solution for an indigene can only be found outside the country’s shores, Governor Buni’s administration has implemented a policy to facilitate that opportunity for those who apply and receive approval from a competent medical advisory committee.

Yet, in both instances, I wept for Nigeria, my country. Yes, it is possible, desirable, and acceptable for a Muslim to shed tears, especially in the presence of the Ka’aba, driven by longing and love for Allah and the Prophet of Islam, Muhammad (SAW).

However, my tears were for Nigeria and the feeling, or fear, that we were not getting it right. I found myself questioning whether we might have lost direction and are just groping in the dark with evil lurking at every turn.

First and foremost, there is no fear of insecurity whatsoever in the place. There was a time I was at the hospital until 1 a.m., sensing that I might have to stay the night due to various tests being carried out on me. So, I asked my son, who was with me, to return to the hotel, about 70 kilometres from the hospital, to bring some medication for me.

I felt no fear or doubt in allowing him to return to the hotel alone in a taxi, Bolt, or Uber ride that late at night because I knew no evil was lurking about. In this place, you can go to bed with your doors wide open.

In Makkah, it is common to see a motorist park in front of a shop, leave the engine running with the air-conditioning on—which means the key is in the ignition—and go in to buy necessities, returning to drive off after loading their purchases in the boot.

There is even a strong assurance that any person who stole the car, or anything for that matter, would be apprehended quickly. Not only does a criminal never remain free after a crime, but their justice system is a real definition of justice because it is meted out appropriately.

Everything works almost perfectly there. The hospital staff carry out their duties without expecting any appreciation from patients, and the patients themselves do not feel pressured to offer anything in return.

Regardless of one’s ideological, religious, or political beliefs, one cannot deny that the welfare of citizens is paramount in their leaders’ policies. A good example of this was when the Kingdom’s leadership responded to the global increase in oil prices, which particularly affected oil-producing nations and pushed up the cost of imported goods like food.

Among many other far-reaching measures to ease citizens’ lives, the government imported essential items, stabilising prices. This stability extends to their currency as well: it holds its ground against the dollar or euro. Unlike the naira, which trembles before them, the value of the Saudi Riyal six months ago is the same as today.

I witnessed fully air-conditioned pedestrian crossings with lifts at both ends! I thought to myself that in Nigeria, such facilities would be turned into makeshift homes or places for selling wares and for beggars. That is if the lifts and air-conditioning units had not already been cannibalised! Do we even have working air-conditioning units in key public offices and facilities, let alone for pedestrians?

Only a benevolent leadership imbued with empathy would contemplate putting in place such facilities to make life easy for citizens. And so we ask, can such edifices be erected in Nigeria by its leaders in the first place?

But then, one must ask, “Why?” And once you find the answer, you too will cry for the country as I did.

This is because there is a significant difference between Nigeria’s and Saudi Arabia’s leadership styles. One is focused on deliberately withholding what makes life easier, while the other prioritises making life better for its citizens.

When people understand that nothing that makes life worth living will be made available to them by those with authority over them, they lose their sense of self-worth. Anyone in this state can descend into moral depravity. Furthermore, they often scramble to meet their needs by any means necessary. This is why we see people, like locusts, descending upon warehouses, broken-down trucks carrying foodstuffs, and scooping petrol from fallen tankers, even though they know they are just a hair’s breadth from horrible death.

What is the way out? Everything boils down to leadership. Our leaders must recognise that sauce for the goose is also sauce for the gander. No one will begrudge them their ₦160 million SUVs if ordinary citizens can easily and affordably move from point A to point B.

No one would care about their salaries and allowances as long as putting food on our tables does not feel like a struggle. Most importantly, we must feel secure in our land and no crime should be overlooked or criminals allowed to roam the towns or forests freely.

Hassan Gimba, anipr, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Neptune Prime.

The Log in Our Eyes, by Hassan Gimba

“The trade of governing has always been monopolised by the most ignorant and the most rascally individuals of mankind.” — Thomas Paine (1737-1809).

Last week, we examined how certain leaders tend to overlook their inadequacies while scrutinising the failings of others. We likened them to individuals whose cerebral configurations had been exchanged with those of donkeys upon their ascension to leadership. Consequently, one may never succeed in restoring their cognitive faculties, no matter how fervently one endeavours to reboot their senses.

One such leader endeavoured to persuade his audience that Nyesom Wike’s appointment as a minister in an opposition party government was not an aberration, citing the precedent of 1999 when President Olusegun Obasanjo appointed several All Peoples Party (APP) chieftains to his cabinet.

In 1999, Obasanjo’s actions were predicated on the belief that politics should not manifest as a winner-takes-all scenario. Such a political ethos, whereby the defeated are entirely excluded while the victors reap all benefits, is a principal catalyst for political upheavals, particularly as no single party holds a monopoly on the most capable or patriotic intellects.

Thus, he formally invited the APP to nominate representatives for his cabinet, a hardly novel gesture. Two decades prior, Alhaji Shehu Shagari, as President of Nigeria under the National Party of Nigeria, extended a similar invitation to the other four political parties. At that time, the political landscape was composed of five parties: the NPN (which triumphed at the federal level), Chief Obafemi Awolowo’s Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), Chief Nnamdi Azikiwe’s Nigeria Peoples Party (NPP), Alhaji Ibrahim Waziri’s Great Nigeria Peoples Party (GNPP), and Alhaji Aminu Kano’s Peoples Redemption Party (PRP).

The pertinent question is, was the PDP officially asked to nominate any members into the current federal government, or did the President pick those who worked to help him snatch victory from the jaws of defeat in their states? This is why Wike is the only publicly known PDP member in the government.

It is either ignorance or sheer malice for an individual, particularly a governor, to excuse such an anomaly on the grounds that “Obasanjo” acted similarly without acknowledging the differing contexts surrounding each occurrence. Indeed, one can hardly wonder why Nigeria finds itself in its current predicament, with individuals at the helm who exhibit a disconcerting lack of political history or awareness of contemporary affairs.

This type of leadership, characterised by scatterbrained figures devoid of comprehension regarding Nigeria’s historical trajectory and indifferent to its future direction, has severely undermined the integrity of our nation through the degradation of its institutions.

Consequently, these leaders routinely subvert the Constitution and enlist like-minded, morally bankrupt lawyers and judges in their endeavours to obliterate the nation’s moral compass. The Independent National Electoral Commission and security agencies, too, become complicit instruments in their hands.

I propose that our foremost course of action should be to uphold the Constitution as long as it remains in force, for it ought to serve as our grundnorm as a nation. To realise this aim, it may be prudent to incorporate a special module on morality and patriotism into our law school curriculum.

There exist instances where the principle of “innocent until proven guilty” should not apply, and lawyers would do well to disavow such notions, irrespective of the financial allure of a brief.

A struggling, average citizen who transforms into a multi-billionaire and establishes vast businesses after a few years as a minister, ought not to be permitted to deceive the nation with claims of that “innocence,” as we have frequently witnessed.

The framers of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria dreamed of a morally upright nation with leaders guided by the fear of God and their consciences. This is why they always ended with “So help me, God.”

When they said that a legislator who defects, for example, loses his seat, the issue of court pronouncements over such was not even envisioned because the framers thought they were addressing people who would come to office with integrity, conscience and the fear of God.

However, it is so sad to see party men who owe their ascendancy in politics to their party turn round and stab the party, not in the back as people of old with shame used to do, but in the chest looking eyeball to eyeball with the victim (in this case party). These days, we see people who have placed their inordinate ambitions and interests above those of the nation and its people. These people turn a blind eye to truth and decorum, glamorising undemocratic and progressive acts detrimental to democracy.

But the way we are behaving in this country, one day, a person will just be sleeping at home without participating in any electoral process but will go to the court and be declared the winner. And INEC will produce the result to back that up and the courts will affirm it with some clever verdict.

Yes. Not long ago, Tony Okocha, a former chief of staff to Rotimi Amaechi, former governor of Rivers State, confessed in an interview with Channels Television that he, on several occasions, wrote election results in his office, handed it over to INEC and that result was announced as valid. And the security agencies have not grabbed him for confessing to a crime!

To get it right, we, especially those in authority, must remove the log from our eyes and strive to make the Constitution our guiding principle.

Hassan Gimba, anipr, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of Neptune Prime.