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Tag: Common Man

  • Our govt is focused on welfare of common man – Osinbajo

    Our govt is focused on welfare of common man – Osinbajo

    Vice President Yemi Osinbajo has said the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led Federal Government remains committed to the welfare of the common man.

    Osinbajo on Friday in Abuja made this known via a statement issued by his spokesman, Laolu Akande after receiving a delegation of the APC Professionals Forum at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

    He said that APC is a party of the people and would continually ensure that the common man benefits maximally from the government.

    “This is a party of the common man; a party of the people, a party that takes as its cradle, the importance of ensuring that the common man benefits maximally from the government.

    “Which is why we have the big programmes like the Social Investment Programmes, the largest if its kind in the continent and several of such other programmes that emphasise how serious we take the lot of the common man.

    “While it was formed about nine years ago, the VP noted that the party has made an impact and is determined to improve the wellbeing of Nigerians; the party is also where many young people are.”

    According to him, APC is the ruling party in Africa’s largest democracy which by itself is a phenomenal achievement for such a young party.

    Osinbajo said that the APC is determined to ensure the country’s further growth and development as the party carried with it, the hopes and expectations of millions of Nigerians.

    “The party is not a mere platform for running for political office; it carries with it the hopes and expectations of millions of Nigerians and we must make it a place where they are comfortable, a place where they feel this belongs to us; we can even put our resources into it.

    “It is not just for politicians; it is for us all.

    “Our people, the Nigerian people, need hope; they need to be able to believe in the politicians.

    “They need to be able to believe in their leaders and if the leaders are within the political party, that political party must have an ideology that is attractive to them, that makes them feel wanted, that makes them feel cared for and I think that role is so crucial.

    “It is the role this Professional Forum must take on to itself; and what it entails aside from that logical objective of the forum; what it entails is actually defining in writing in various ways what our party stands for.”

    He acknowledged the significance of the forum in the scheme of things and urged the forum to play more important roles in shaping the party’s ideology.

    The vice president said that professionals are integral to ensuring that the party stayed focused on the wellbeing of Nigerians and its ideals, as stated in the Constitution and Manifesto respectively.

    “If the professionals cannot do that, then our party becomes all comers, anything goes so long as we have a platform to run for political office; but I think that we, especially professionals, have a unique advantage.

    “We have many who have run their businesses, who have professional organisations or who have excelled in their own professions and we know that the only way to do things properly is if we are able to press on without relenting.”

    The vice president said he hoped that the forum would also carry the hopes and expectations of millions of the party’s supporters nationwide.

    He also believed that the forum, made up of professional elites, would be of great benefit to the party and Nigeria because of its leadership and quality of professionals on its board of trustees and as members.

    In his remarks, a former Governor of Bauchi State, Mallam Isa Yuguda, who is the Chairman, Board of Trustees of the forum, said that professionals in the party felt the need to identify with the vice president being himself a professional.

    He invited Osinbajo to the forum’s upcoming event in Abuja.

    The delegation also included Deputy Chairman, Board of Trustees and former APC National Secretary, Waziri Bulama, Board of Trustees Secretary, Barr. Dapo Akinosun and the National Coordinator, Akeem Akintayo.

  • 2021: The common man as my man of the year – By Dan Amor

    2021: The common man as my man of the year – By Dan Amor

    By DAN AMOR

    Undoubtedly, the story of the attendant significance of the average Nigerian – the man in the street popularly known as the “Common Man” has largely been underreported while that of his poverty has largely been exaggerated. Like the proverbial monk walking in the rain with a leaking, or even no umbrella at all, the common man in Nigeria is the symbol of the enduring failure of the Nigerian Dream. Yet, the common man has survived, all the same. Since, in any society, labourers, artisans, peasants, low income earners, etcetera, constitute the majority and also produce the wealth of the nation, there is a sense in which these people are seen as the true heroes and heroines whose needs or interests must occupy the pride of place on the scale of preference of society. But it is a measure of the ineptitude, incompetence, greed, and sheer lack of the capacity for decorum of the Nigerian governing elite that this fundamental contradiction has to be brought before them. I don’t know about you, for you are entitled to your own opinion. As for this column, the Common Man is the Man Of The Year 2021. He is worthy of our celebration.

    Nigeria as a nation entered into the year 2021 on January 1 on the cusp of uncertainties and anxiety in the wake of the worst economic recession so far experienced in the annals of the nation and the disturbing magnitude of the Covid 19 pandemic which started ravaging the human race since November 2019. If truly the Nigerian poor now speak with one voice, it is certainly the evidence of hunger and poverty in their lives and daily existence. In the Second Quarter of the year, the recession graduated into a depression. From the First Quarter of 2021, hunger became the greatest teacher in the land. Many Nigerians severely beaten by the prevailing realities, now started chaining their gallons of fuel, the minute and miserable type of generating sets known in local parlance as ‘I better pass my neighbour’, their pots of soup and other essential commodities in the house to their legs to guard against theft while sleeping. This is because these items are now targets by those who can no longer afford them in their homes. The stealing of pots of soup is now a common experience in most Nigerian neighborhourhoods due to the prevalence of austerity or recession in the country.

    Indeed, the common man has been at the receiving end of all the blunders and the executive delinquencies going on in this country. It is incredible but true that certain categories of Nigerians have had to sell some of their children into slavery and the proceeds used to feed the rest at home. The common man has gone through an indefinite period of self denial just for the privileged few in positions of authority to feed fat at his own expense. This is the true meaning of recession. Despite this, Government is still very comfortable with its shameless policy of poor baiting. The news trending all over the country has it that a company owned by the former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, David Lawal claimed that it spent over N200million to clear grasses at the various Internally Displaced Persons camps in the North East. This is more so as hundreds of trailer loads of relief materials for these unfortunate Nigerians are being diverted by those we all know are driving the Change Agenda of President Muhammadu Buhari. It is an evil day! Corruption is no longer corruption; it is correction by the saints hacking around the president’s court. And like a mediaeval bear, the common man is tied to a stake and subjected to all kinds of insults and indignities by those who should know better.

    In spite of the fact that the idle, gluttonous governing elite have stolen and are still stealing the national patrimony into their private pockets, the common man still buys from the same market with them. As social parasites, the rich and privileged, without shame or remorse, are emigrating in droves to the most unlikely places, in search of easy money and leisure. On the other hand, the poor have no other home except the shanty, slum settlements, the urban blight and ghettos scattered all over the urban centres across the country. These poor Nigerians still make use of bucket latrines or still defecate openly in bushes around their settlements and drink from well and mud water in the overcrowded ‘face-me-I-face-you’ homes without electricity. But the rich are indeed, completely different animals. They are a socially unique species, who evolve strong strategies for ensuring dominance and submission. You need to observe carefully their flourishes of display behavior , the intricate dynamics of their pecking order, as well as their unorthodox mating practices.

    Worst of it all is the unprovoked and incessant killings of the common man all over Nigeria. Nigerian rich men are killed by accident but the common man is killed deliberately. The Chibok girls who were abducted since 2014 are all children of the poor who are used as Guinea pigs by politicians whereas the children of politicians are never seen anywhere. Of the over 14 million children who are dropped out of school, none is from a rich home. All the children of the rich including governors children are in private schools or are schooling abroad. Even those who give up their future to the service of terrorism, those who are given free guns and bombs to kill innocent people, are all children of the poor. Why are children of the poor used for political experimentation while children of the rich are in private schools or in Ivy-League universities abroad? In spite of the persistent holocaust and pornography of violence visited on the poor, they survive all the same.

    At a critical period in our national life when there is glaring scarcity of men and women of honour and high moral standing, it is therefore imperative that we note the untiring sacrifice of the man in the street whose love for the country is beyond easy question in the face of all odds. When the true story of the year of our Lord 2021 will be told; when the story is told of how the Nigerian poor became the ideal heroes of the Nigerian condition, in one of the most trying years in the history of the country, the common man will surely be remembered with immense retrospective gratitude. We are even short of words to describe the nobility of the common man. Daily pensioners who had served this nation meritoriously are shabbily treated even by a government that rode to power on the altar of a Change mantra, with some dying in queues, while waiting to collect just a bit of the huge arrears of their very meagre pensions. Is it not surprising therefore that the common man still survives the holocaust of this engulfing recession? He is this column’s ultimate hero and Man of the Year 2021.

     

    Amor, critic and journalist, lives in Abuja.

  • Fuel subsidy not beneficial to common man – FG

    Fuel subsidy not beneficial to common man – FG

    The Federal Government has again reiterated that subsidy on petrol will soon be withdrawn because it is not beneficial to the common man but favours a few rich individuals and firms.

    Minister of State for Petroleum Timipre Sylva told reporters on Tuesday in Abuja that there is no going back on the decision because the government can no longer afford it.

    Sylva explained that although withdrawal of subsidy will be painful initially, it will pay off for the poor in the long run.

    “Subsidy removal will come with some pains but the question is, can we continue with petroleum subsidy as a country? If we cannot continue, what options do we have?

    “I think the best is take out subsidy. From the government of ex-Military President Ibrahim Babangida in the 80s, it has defied all efforts to withdraw petrol subsidy. Diesel is now deregulated, Kerosine is now deregulated but petrol has defied deregulation. Should we continue with this subsidy?

    “The Federal Government does not lack courage, our President does not lack political will.

    “ Who is really benefitting from subsidy? It is confusing. Some people are benefitting but certainly not the common man. Though it does not really benefit the common man, when you try to remove it, the common man comes out to defend it.

    “ Now, can we carry on with subsidy if you consider the amount of money swallowed by subsidy? If you want to carry on with subsidy, how do we get the money to fund it? The best way out is to take out subsidy because if we don’t, we will continue to beg the question,” the minister said.

    “It was practiced for a few months, but when the prices began to move up, some people started threatening and we had to return to it.

    “ This is a democracy and having deregulated for a few months, we had to step back because this government has listening ears,” he said.

    “The price differential is a major incentive for smuggling and it is very difficult to police the borders. We must find a way out of it; if not, you will continue to keep your price down in Nigeria while the neighbouring countries will continue to feed fat on subsidised fuel from Nigeria,” he said.

    “The PIB is fully on course. We’ve had many meetings with the National Assembly and other stakeholders. Although the National Assembly had earlier promised to pass it in April, but that did not work, I believe that the passage will not go beyond June,” he said.

    He said the administration of President Buhari had attracted about $16.3billion Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) to the oil and gas sector.

    He explained that the Nigeria-Morocco gas pipeline which had been on the drawing board will cost $21billion.

    He said the Federal Government will soon disengage from managing refineries.

    The refineries will either be handed over to Operation and Management Contractors (O and M) or allow Nigerians to decide if the government should sell them or go public at the stock exchange.

    “The refineries in Nigeria have been the weeping babies of the industry but we believe that it is important that they are at least made functional before we can say this is the direction to take.

    ‘So if you have a dead refinery, how do you sell a corpse? It doesn’t make sense. Some people say no it is a dead refinery, so why are they fixing it? So what am I going to do with it?

    “Is it not better for me to at least resuscitate the dead refinery then look for the option of what to do with it? If I sell it, they will say he is selling a dead refinery but now you say let me resuscitate before selling and they say why are you resuscitating it? So whatever you do they will talk.

    “The so called dead refineries were sold by the administration of the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, they shouted and it was reversed.

    “So now we said this time let’s try and fix it and they said why? So you can see the dilemma.

    “What we want to do is ensure that the refineries are functional and when it is, the first thing we want to do is not to run it as a government. We want to put an O and M contractor.

    “At some point, we will put out the advertisement for professional refinery managers to bid for managing it. So, it is not going to be subject to government issues anymore when it begins.”

  • 2019 Election; A Triumph Of The Common Man And A Great Blessing For Nigeria, By Obong Victor Attah

    A submission by Arc. (Obong) Victor Attah at a press briefing on

    Tuesday, 19th March 2019 in Lagos.

    Let me start by asking the question, “who is the common man; who is the average Nigerian Family”? It reminds me of an incident in 1974 when I participated in the design of an office building in Lagos. When I was trying to calculate the required number of car parking spaces, a member of the team reminded me then that “ the average Nigerian family owns two cars”. Stupefied, I asked “the average Nigerian family”?

    As elites, we can become so cocooned in our comfort zone that we foolishly think of ourselves as the average Nigerian, or the common man. President Buhari knows better and his iconoclastic disposition towards the elites is what endeared him to the common man. He is their hero. So Buhari won the just concluded presidential election not as an elite and certainly not because he was the APC candidate but because he is Buhari. Without a doubt it is a personal victory. But what effect will that have on his party the APC.

    Throughout his first tenure, nobody can say that he was truly a party man in the conventional sense. Because of this there were rumblings within his party. Some very big wigs were said to be considering leaving the party. Infact some even thought that by the time we get to the elections, the party would suffer an implosion. As it happened that was averted.

    In his second coming, it is my conviction that he is going to pay even less attention to the party. With some serving governors being suspended from the party by the NWC for anti-party activities; with the earlier schisms that had gone to spawn new parties or swell the ranks of the PDP; with the evident shift in the support calculus, it is clear to me that, in the no distant future, we will be singing its dirge. APC is going to be scattered – dead.

    If Atiku had won, it is possible that he would have atikulated this country to the next level – to borrow from the slogan of both parties. But I also had the fear that if Atiku wins and the PDP gets back in the saddle, this country would be plunged into an orgy of intolerable excesses. Besides, if we remember that the relationship between Obasanjo as President and Atiku as Vice-President was bad and so had many unsavoury consequences for the country, let us consider what would happen with Atiku as President and Obasanjo as his self-styled, letter-writing godfather. I shudder to think. With what has happened now, it is obvious that the fortunes of the PDP is also most likely going to change.

    Goodluck Jonathan on leaving office as the President on that party’s platform could not establish himself as the rallying point for the party even after Makarfi had so ably wrestled it out of Sherriff’s clutches. It took Atiku Abubakar, as its presidential candidate to provide that focus. Given his age and history of past attempts, this surely was for him a last ditch. With him off the scene, PDP is completely rudderless and with no anchor. It is safe to say therefore that PDP too, which had also splintered in the past will soon be scattered – dead.

    There was yet a third group – the Military Block. They did not hide their support for Atiku and the PDP. They openly showed their hand and have been spanked. Their influence therefore is bound to wane. It is my prediction that from now on we are going to witness less and less of those pilgrimages to Abeokuta and Minna. With this loss of influence, it is also safe to say that the military oligarchy is dead.

    These were the three power blocks that constantly exerted their manipulative wiles on the country. If they did not approve of you, be as wise as Solomon, as brave as David, as strong as Sampson, you will not get anywhere and that is what has kept Nigeria down. The system has never allowed us to put forward our most capable.

    Buhari’s victory is the death knell to these power blocks. It has started the process of dismembering these menacing Behemoths, pulling out their fangs, blunting their claws and neutralising their sting. Buhari’s victory has returned power to the common man. Positions negotiated in Abuja and Lagos over the heads of the people can no longer be guaranteed. His victory has therefore given Nigeria a long- delayed but much needed opportunity for a new life; an opportunity to chart a new course. That is why for me his victory represents not only the triumph of the common man, but indeed also a great blessing for Nigeria.

    An opportunity has now been created for fresh hands, an opportunity for a new leadership, to take over. Nigeria can now look forward to a new birth. The phoenix can now rise out of the ashes and attain its destined glory.

    Now that Buhari has won, what should be the Agenda for his government. I have my suggestions:

    1. First and foremost, Buhari must put a stop to all and every agitation to split up this country and there is only one way to achieve this. He must see to it that we re-enact and reinstate the terms and conditions of the agreement that caused all the various peoples of this country, at independence, to agree to come together and form one country – Federalism. Anything short of this is to court a disaster of unimaginable magnitude. The popular word today that describes this is RESTRUCTURING. My prediction is that unless this is done, by the end of his tenure in the next four years, there may not be a country called Nigeria as we know it today.

    Every time restructuring is discussed, every part of this country insists it can survive on its own without the other. Indeed that is what will have to happen in the event of a break up. What I am advocating is that we put that into practice; as federating units we learn to survive each on its own while staying together as a country. That is what federalism is all about and that is what restructuring means.

    1. The second item on my agenda for the Buhari government is POWER. We must work relentlessly to see that in the shortest possible time every hamlet, every corner of this country enjoys twenty four hours constant supply of electric power. In today’s world, it is not a luxury but an absolute necessity.
    1. Third on my agenda is the fight against CORRUPTION. The fact still remains that if we do not kill corruption, corruption will kill us. This time the fight must be total and unsparing.
    1. Next, President Buhari must put a stop to all the KILLINGS whether by Fulani herdsmen, or Libyan mercenaries, marauders, cattle rustlers or whoever. Already human life has been degraded enough and if the killings continue and farmers stop going to their farms, all the gains made so far towards food security by this administration will come to naught and we will again be faced with a major disastrous phenomenon.
    1. The final item on my agenda is the release of LEAH SHARIBU and the total annihilation of BOKO HARAM. My granddaughter of about the same age is called Leah but that is only a coincidence. That innocent little girl must not be allowed to continue to suffer any longer amongst a hoard who can only be described as beasts. Similarly no citizen of this country should be forced off their land into an IDP camp. Boko Haram, even if we must resort to a scorch earth policy must be smoked out and destroyed. It is time to say enough is enough firmly and with determination.

    Not a few will wonder why I have not included in my agenda such vexed issues as the broken economy, falling standard of education, poor health care, decaying infrastructure and even such matters as nepotism. For me, these are mere symptoms of a major debilitating ailment. The underlying problem being the dysfunctional federal system that we have been operating with a heavy overlay of unitarialism. Once we restructure, so that the federating units become coordinate with, rather than subordinate to, the centre, all these associated ills will begin a process of auto-correction.

    Have we forgotten how the Sarduana rather sent Sir Tafawa Balewa to the centre as Prime Minister while he remained to take charge, as the Premier, of his federating unit- the Northern Region. The truth is that in a proper federal system the central government is largely immaterial to the common man. What touches his life most and matters most to him are the state and local governments. I sometimes forget that there is now a large population of young Nigerians who must have difficulty understanding what I am talking about because they have not known any other than military or present system of governance. But those of us who are old enough cannot have forgotten how the harmonious relationship and the healthy rivalry that were engendered by our practice of true federalism spurred every part of this country to an unprecedented height of development. All that is needed is for all of us to accept the imperative to go back to something that had served us well in the past; to accept that RESTRUCTURING is now an idea whose time has come and cannot therefore be resisted or delayed.

    Given where we are now, there is a need for us to define the way forward. For me the way forward lies in a new beginning with a complete change of ethos and orientation. To achieve this I suggest the immediate formation of two NATIONAL MOVEMENTS.

    1. The just concluded elections have done a lot to return power to the people and they have demonstrated that Nigerians want power to be held by people with integrity to which we should also add capability. Nigerians are completely fed up with people who seek power and positions just for the tyranny of controlling the treasury for themselves, their masters their investors and contractors rather than for the development of the real stakeholders, – the people.

    I have no doubt that there abounds within our population of nearly two hundred million people, a sufficient number of quality people to whom the leadership of this nation can be trusted. So, the first movement, which I have suggested must be nationwide and not under the aegis of any political party, must be to search out the Moghalus of this nation. There must be quite a few of them. We must search for them, find them, groom them, assess them so that in less than the four years of this tenure, there will be no doubt in anybody’s mind as to who the people would want to be their next president. I should caution that this exercise, imperative as it is, would amount to an indulgence in extreme futility unless we also firmly re-establish the country.

    1. The next movement which must also be nationwide and not sponsored by any political party must therefore be the movement to restructure this country in a painless, equitably manner. I have already said a lot about restructuring in this presentation so I will say no more on it.

    Conclusion

    As one who has already celebrated his eightieth birthday, I can only continue to counsel and pray that God will continue to show me mercy and grant me enough days to see my country attain the lofty aims of our founding fathers.

    Long live a fresh Federal Republic of Nigeria under a fresh leadership run by fresh hands

    Signed

    (Obong) Victor B. Attah

  • Obaseki’s victory: Oshiomhole hails judgment, says judiciary remains hope for common man

    Obaseki’s victory: Oshiomhole hails judgment, says judiciary remains hope for common man

    Immediate past governor of Edo State, Mr Adams Oshiomhole, on Friday commended the judgment delivered by the Election Petitions Tribunal on the Edo 2016 Governorship Election, affirming the election of Governor Godwin Obaseki.

    Speaking to newsmen in Benin, Oshiomhole said the judiciary still remained the hope for common man.

    “The judgment is sound and a testimony that the people of Edo never voted for the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).

    ‘‘The petition was a busy body one to distract the electorate; this was just like ‘Mama Akara’ judgment going to see over non-issue.’’

    Oshiomhole further said that the judgment has shown that there were still men and women of good character in the judiciary.

    ‘‘This will serve as a deterrent to some people who can say whatever they like about the judiciary.

    ‘‘But it has shown it (judiciary) has men & women of good charter of courage and knowledge,’’ he said.

    In a relayed development, the counsel to the All Progressives Congress (APC), Mr Victor Ohiosunua, has appealed to PDP chieftains to support Obaseki to develop the state.

    Ohiosunua made the call in in Benin after the Election Petitions Tribunal in Benin dismissed the petition filed by PDP candidate, Mr Osagie Ize-Iyamu, challenging Obaseki’s election.

    “I want to appeal to the petitioners to joining hands with the governor to develop and carry the state to the next level.

    ‘‘The business of the governor is tedious and the few five months the present governor has spent in the office, shows his capability and focus to take Edo to the next level.

    ‘‘The logical order the tribunal made today is the right one for them to make.

    ‘‘We are happy that the votes and wishes of the Edo people who voted on Sept. 28, 2016 has been restored,” Ohiosunua said.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that the Justice Ahmed Badamasi-led three-member Tribunal had dismissed the petitioners’ claims based on no credible evidence to prove their case.

    The tribunal, therefore, upheld Obaseki’s victory in the governorship election of Sept. 28, 2016, as announced by the Independent National Electoral Commission.

    On his part, Ken Muzia (SAN), counsel to Obaseki who also commended the tribunal’s judgment, said the tribunal did a proper review of the evidence.

    “The tribunal has done a fantastic job, what we should be thinking of is the development of the state,” Muzia added.

    TheNewsGuru.com reports that the Ize-Iyamu and his party, PDP has however rejected the the ruling of the tribunal with a promise to appeal the judgement and also pursue the case to the Supreme Court.

     

     

    NAN