Dele Sobowale
“Mr President, , you are the Commander-In-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. You appoint the IGP. You appoint the Chief of Army Staff, Chief of Naval Staff, the Commissioners of Police, the Director of Department of State Security and other heads of security. Which one do we appoint? How can people appointed by Mr President be under me?
Governor Nyesson Wike, of Rivers State responding to President Major-General Muhammadu Buhari [rtd]’s call on governors to protect their people.
Increasingly, Governor Wike is emerging as the Governor-leader of the Southern States during Buhari’s misrule. He has two predecessors who have written their names in gold into the history of Nigeria since independence in 1960 – late Chief Obafemi Awolowo, former Premier of the old Western Region and Obong Victor Attah, former Governor of Akwa Ibom State. It is an extra-ordinary achievement for any public figure to be ranked with those two. They all have demonstrated three qualities which are rare in Nigeria – courage, quest for justice and rare vision for the development of the political entity they governed.
To be honest, I least gave Wike a chance to emerge as one of the heroes of this era. His open antagonism to the former Governor of Rivers State, Rotimi Amaechi, who first brought him into lime-light, when the latter had his disagreement with the Jonathans, was to me excessive and smacked of ingratitude. That is one characteristic I don’t approve of even if the victim is my worst enemy. I thought he could have handled that situation better.
ENTER GOVERNOR WIKE
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr,
Once he was elected Governor, I opened a new Fact File on the man. Until then, even as Minister, he was somebody’s glorified errand boy – however that role might be perceived by others. He was from that day the Chief Executive Officer, CEO, with the authority to act on his own and be held accountable for his words and deeds. Governors of three South South zones, whether they are conscious of it or not, compete for leadership in the zone and command the most attention – Akwa Ibom, Delta and Rivers. Among the 1999-2007 set of Governors, Attah was by far the leader of leaders. That was partly what made his struggle for a fairer deal for oil-producing states so successful. He published the book ATTAH ON RESOURCE CONTROL demanding for a higher percentage on derivation; supported the quest with adequate financial resources and won 13.5 per cent instead of 1.5 per cent for all the Niger Delta States. Since Attah’s departure, no other Governor had stepped up to lead the South South – until now.
To begin with Wike had a different battle to fight than Attah. The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, was in power at Abuja and was in the majority during Attah’s tenure. The party had lost control of the Federal Government by the time Wike came to the helm. The PDP was (is) still in disarray. New leadership was needed if the party was to survive till the next election. Wike provided the support required to ensure that a two-party system exists today in Nigeria. Granted, it is not as easy to discern how monumental that achievement was, because there are no metrics to measure the value of democracy, unlike 13.5 per cent. But, I pray we don’t lose our freedoms to those now wanting to gag the Nigerian media. Then, we will join hands in building monuments for Wike for keeping hope alive. He could have decamped as other dishonourable elected Governors have done. But, he stood firm and provided leadership.
THE GREAT BUILDER
“Ideas are capital; the rest is just money.”
Wike became Governor when the golden Age of Oil had come to an end. He was not Governor when the price of crude was over $120 per barrel. He arrived just in time to see it tumble to under $60 per barrel. To be quite candid, there was nothing to suggest that he would come anywhere near the known achievements of his predecessor in office. That was exactly where he never ceases to amaze me. Apparently working on the basis of his own prudential guidelines, he had managed the financial resources of the state better than any civilian Governor – even before Bayelsa was carved out of Rivers. He will certainly leave more lasting legacies than any of them.
How do I know? With the exception of 2020, Rivers has been the third most visited state for me since I first stepped there in 1974. Most of the developments occurred right “in front of my eyes” – so to speak. Furthermore, I have the largest network of friends and informants in the state. They tell me the truth which politicians want hidden. By all objective standards Wike has performed creditably. Yet, Rivers has far less debt to service than poor cousins – Cross River and Edo states in same zone.
THE PRESENT STRUGGLE FOR EQUITY
“Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide; in the strife of truth and falsehood, for the good or evil side.” J R Lowell, 1819-1891.
Attah called it RESOURCE CONTROL and I agreed with him totally. Others call it RESTRUCTURING of TRUE FEDERALISM and to me we are engaging in semantics; all are synonyms for the same form of government. Incidentally, one recent event has thrown into clear relief the difference between the FG and the entire South – Open Grazing. Buhari’s position, including the earnest search for grazing routes which don’t exist in the South, has revealed the deliberate attempt at internal colonisation. Since 2015, Fulani herdsmen had moved in droves to the South; destroying farms, killing people, raping women, abducting people. The FG had ignored the growing menace. With Buhari’s open support for the vandals, Southerners have come to realise that Fulanis want to seize their lands and colonise it.
The position of 16 Southern Governors (minus the outcast in Osun State) has called for a leader. Granted, we are still just shouting across the North/South divide. But, if the conflict is escalated, the South needs a reliable leader. In that connection if strangers from another clime were to tell me “Take us to your leader.” There is only one place to take them now – Wike’s Office, Portharcourt.
Before, and after, the Southern Governors’ Declaration, Wike has been the most consistent and vocal leader of the South. Being a member of the PDP might make it easier; but, it is not the entire explanation. I strongly believe that the man has guts — the great courage, which is the rarest of all human attributes.
On the issues in contention now, where he goes I will gladly follow.
A WORD FOR THE REST
“Better a declared enemy than a doubtful ally.” Napoleon Bonaparte, 1769-1821.
In the entire South today, only two Governors speak out loud and clear about the injustices visited on the South, now made worse under Buhari – Wike and Akeredolu. The rest exhibiting various shades of cowardice apparently are willing to sacrifice their people to please the transient holder of power in Abuja.
First, Southerners will write the obituaries of those who want to turn our ancestral lands into cattle ranch for strangers. Second, those who are in position to lead the struggle now, and fail, have already started their retreat into oblivion.
THE NORTH HAS ALREADY DESTROYED ITSELF – 2
“WORSENING INSECURITY: Kaduna, Benue, Niger, Borno struggle over three million IDPs.” News Report, June 27, 2021.
The report went on to point out that Borno State alone is struggling with 1,000,007 people in Internally Displaced Persons Camps. Altogether, four states out of thirty-six in Nigeria now account for more officially recognised destitute persons than one quarter of the member nations of the United Nations Organisation, UNO. There are hundreds of thousands more still undiscovered and uncounted. There might be a couple of millions more as bandits sack more Northern communities in Zamfara, Katsina and Kebbi States.
When in February last year, the deposed Emir of Kano proclaimed that “the North will destroy itself”, I published an article titled “The North has already destroyed itself.” Today, before recalling parts of that column, I want to ask a question. “Who now is in any doubt that the North has destroyed itself?”
Already, two pillars of a modern society, agriculture and education, on which rest civilization and development have been set back by more than twenty years since Buhari became President. And, the self-destruction is just beginning.
On education, let me remind “Fellow Nigerians” – especially the Northern elite who are not yet aware of the calamity ahead of them a message from 2020..
THE NORTH HAS ALREADY DESTROYED ITSELF.
“We have been saying this for 20 to 30 years. If the North does not change, the North will destroy itself. The country is moving on. The quota system that everybody talks about must have a sunset clause.”
The Emir of Kano, Muhammadu Sanusi II, PUNCH, February 19, 2020.
The Emir of Kano is leading the pack of modern Northern thinkers and leaders who can now see the handwriting on the wall. But, even he is hesitant to go the full distance to tell his fellow Northerners the truth. He talks as if the destruction of the North is something still to occur. That is totally false. At least from the standpoint of economic development, the North has already destroyed itself. It only remains for it to destroy the South as well. That is a distinct possibility within the next three years as Buhari takes the nation deeper into the debt trap.
“EDUCATION. If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilisation, it expects what never was and never will be. US President Thomas Jefferson 1816. “
Many of the Northern children, still in school, will certainly not return next year. The “leaders of tomorrow” have become the losers today. They have nobody to blame but their “brothers” – the bandits, the kidnappers and the official collaborators.
On agriculture, read the words of a sage. “FARMING. Burn down your cities and leave your farms, and your cities will spring up again as if by magic; but, destroy your farms and the grass will grow in the streets of every city in the country. William Jennings Bryant. 1896.”
The North was making its money from agriculture and was poised to become the major revenue earner for Nigeria as the Age of Oil gradually comes to an end. The stigma of “parasite” would have been removed. It will not happen any time soon – if at all in our life time. The same Northern vandals have turned back the hand of the clock for decades. At least 70 per cent of those now in IDPs were farmers; they fed themselves and the rest of us. Now about 2.1 million of them are asking for hand-outs from governments.
But, Nigerians were warned last year. Read again the warning which was ignored in Abuja and observe where we are now. The North is finished.
