Folarin Kehinde

President Bola Tinubu on Tuesday, November 28, urged the Senate to consider and approve his request to obtain a loan of $8,699,168,559 and €100 million as part of the 2022 – 2024 external borrowing plan of the federal government.

Tinubu’s letter of request was read at plenary by Senate President, Godswill Akpabio.

The president noted that the World Bank and African Development Bank have indicated interest to support the loan with $1billion and N1.5billion respectively.

Tinubu in his letter titled: “2022-2024 external borrowing plan” said: “I write in respect of the above subject and to submit the attached Federal Government 2022-2024 external borrowing plan for consideration and early approval of the National Assembly to ensure prompt implementation of the projects.

The Senate may wish to note that the past administration approved a 2022-2024 borrowing plan by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) held on May 15, 2023.

“The project cuts across all sectors, with specific emphasis on infrastructure, agriculture, health, water supply, roads, security, and employment generation as well as financial management reforms.

“Consequently, the required approval is in the sum of $8,699,168,559 and €100 million

I would like to underscore the fact that the projects and programmes in the borrowing plan were selected based on economic evaluations as well as the expected contribution to the social economic development of the country, including employment generation, and skills acquisition.

“Given the nature of these facilities, and the need to return the country to normalcy, it has become necessary for the Senate to consider and approve the 2022- 2024 external abridged borrowing plan to enable the government deliver its responsibility to Nigerians.”

Senate President Akpabio thereafter referred the executive request to the Senate Committee on Foreign and Local Debts for further legislative work and to report at plenary in one week.

In the spirit of the Yuletide, leading financial institution, Fidelity Bank Plc, has announced plans to host the maiden edition of the Fidelity Family Weekend.

Scheduled to hold on Saturday, 16 and Sunday, 17 December 2023 at the Fidelity Grounds, Oniru, Victoria Island, Lagos, the event is designed to create a fun and relaxed atmosphere for children to play, parents to relax and young adults to unwind during the festive season.

“The Yuletide season is all about coming together and spending quality time with loved ones especially as we wind down the year in anticipation of a new year.

As a bank committed to providing memorable experiences for its clients, we pioneered the Fidelity Family Weekend to fete host our customers and clients to two fun filled days of family entertainment.

We believe this is one more way of thanking our customers for a successful year,” noted the Divisional Head, Brand & Communications, Fidelity Bank Plc, Meksley Nwagboh, Ph.D. in a chat with journalists.

The Fidelity Family Weekend would run from 10am to 10pm daily and would feature dedicated fun activities for children including dancing competitions, bouncing castles, train rides, Santa’s Grotto, balloon games, amongst others.

Similarly, the programme for the adults’ section would feature exciting activities like karaoke competitions, games arcades, couple games, musical performances and so many more fun games that are geared towards providing a memorable experience for guests.

Entry into the event is free but guests are required to pre-register at www.fidelitybank.ng/family-weekend before 12 December 2023.

Commenting further, Dr Nwagboh said, “As a bank dedicated to helping individuals grow, businesses thrive and economies to prosper, we boast of an array of products and services for our diverse client base.

These include the Fidelity SWEETA account for young children below the age of 17 years, Fidelity Flex for teenagers and undergraduates; and even the Fidelity Vintage Account for senior citizens; all tailor-made to meet our customer’s specific needs. The Fidelity Family Weekend is therefore another demonstration of this devotion to provide platforms for our customers to fulfill their lifestyle requirements”.

Over forty coalition of Civil society Organizations (CSOs) has supported the ongoing reforms at the National Assembly orchestrated by the Clerk of the House, Sani Magaji Tambuwal, however described recent unverified media report as unfortunate and fraudulent.

The group expressed concern on the negative story sponsored by some individuals and group in National Assembly management without proper investigation by media houses before going to the press.

Speaking to newsmen in Abuja over the weekend, the Chairperson of the Conference of Civil Societies, and Coordinator of Civil-Military Cooperation (CIMICO), Comrade Adams Otakwu stated that while the management of the National Assembly is not immune from investigations, the media practitioners should not allowed itself to be used as pawn in the political chess game by those who lost out in any contest in National Assembly management leadership.

Comrade Otakwu noted that the activities of these individuals and groups who hide under the umbrella of Civil Societies to blackmail and extort public officials, perpetrate heinous crimes and indulge in reactionary and fraudulent activities, portray a bad image of the civil society, and undermine national security.

He expressed concern over incessant blackmails of the Armed Forces, Security Agencies, National Assembly and other critical institutions in the country, by subversive elements and so-called ‘coalition of civil societies’ or ‘concerned citizens groups’.

Otakwu who further described such needless and mindless machinations as “inimical to the country’s progress” also cautioned against them, and disclosed plans by the Conference of Civil Societies to collaborate with the Armed Forces, Security and Intelligence Community to clamp down on these elements in the interest of National Security and development.

National coordinator of the PYF, Otunba Bamidele Adigun, and National Organising Secretary, Musa Isah, on their part stated that since Tambuwal’s assumption of office as the CNA, there have been a telling improvement in staff welfare and communication in the National Assembly bureaucracy.

“It is a fact that since Mr. Sani Magaji Tambuwal’s emergence as the CNA in November, 2022 and his eventual confirmation in March this year, there have been marked improvement in staff welfare and communication with top management within the National Assembly bureaucracy,” Adigun and Isah stated in the statement.

According to the group, “the payment of N3.7bn CON-PECULIAR and other outstanding entitlements within a few months in office and the upgrade of the NASS clinic with plans for the state-of-the-art equipment, easing the transportation needs of workers with eight new buses and effecting the payment of N35, 000 palliative grant, from September,2023 are few of the pragmatic leadership of Mr. Tambuwal this past one year in office.

“We wish to further state that, we have diligently followed his leadership and management style, it is gratifying to know and see that all outstanding workers welfare packages and entitlements are been cleared as well as increase in trainings and retraining for all cadres of staff in the NASS service.

“It is on this note and many more, we call on Mr. Tambuwal to remain focused, accountable and ignore mischief makers and those given to blackmail and trading in spurious allegations.”People should be guided by their conscience in all that they do so as not to impugn on the integrity and reputation of honest leaders, desirous for the right things to be done.” they added.

The Nigeria Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA) has suspended all the wet-leased aircraft under the United Nigeria Airlines (UNA).

This comes a few hours after one of the aircraft of United Nigeria Airlines (UNA) diverted to Asaba International Airport on Sunday rather than the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport (NAIA).

According to a source close to the NCAA, the regulatory body took the decision on Monday via a letter communicated to the Chief Operating Officer (COO) of the airline.

According to the source, all the wet-leased aircraft in the operations of the airline would remain suspended pending the outcome of an investigation on the Sunday incident involving one of the wet-leased aircraft in the fleet of the airline.

It was gathered that immediately after the incident gained traction on social media on Sunday, the Director-General of Civil Aviation (DGCA), Capt. Musa Nuhu called an emergency meeting of the agency, where it was resolved that the excuse given by the airline was not tenable to the authority.

It was further gathered that the report obtained from the Air Traffic Controllers (ATCs) of the Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA) contradicted the airline’s claim on poor weather situation in Abuja at the time of the diversion.

No fewer than two wet-leased Airbus A320-200 aircraft are in the fleet of United Nigeria Airlines.

Only last Sunday, this column engaged its readers in the search for an elephant in the room of police reforms in Nigeria. The engagement turned out to be quite intriguing with many readers querying the imagination of an elephant in just a room, while urging me to disclose the exact location of the elephant. In truth, i was only alerting Nigerians that we all seem to be perpetually in love with the exogenous; forever looking for objects outside without a peep within. What reforms can help an organization in which leadership directives are permanently flouted without sanctions? Our police will improve whenever those in charge desire it; but not when they continue to present a posture of helplessness in embracing reforms
 
When foremost good election management advocate – Yiaga Africa, started creating fresh awareness for more electoral reforms in Nigeria, one had no option than to argue that Nigeria’s electoral problem is not due to lack of reforms. Our real dilemma lies in the deliberate refusal of actors to embrace the reforms we have been churning out since 1999. Reforms do not function on their own, they are usually implemented by relevant actors. It amounts to doing the same thing while expecting different results if in the game of politics and elections, political parties continue to ignore internal democracy just as supposed election umpires progressively show that they are incapable of being neutral in the process.
 
Some years ago, when the need to end impunity in the management of political activities became inevitable, the parties were barred from substituting winners of their primaries. Indeed, one contentious issue was the decision to select Celestine Omeha as the flag bearer of the PDP instead of Rotimi Amaechi who won the party’s governorship primaries in Rivers state.  The judiciary however pronounced Amaechi the winner of the election though it was Omeha that was on the ballot. In due course, a new reform provided that political parties must have verifiable reasons for changing their candidates. Another reform was later introduced that for a candidate that won a primary election to be changed, such a winner must voluntarily and formally withdraw from the race.  Yet, the situation did not improve.  
 
To bring an end to fake party primaries, the Electoral Act 2022 provided for INEC to monitor the events – a reform that was immediately bastardized. To stop political parties from undermining rules and regulations, only the relevant national officers of a party were then empowered to enter into correspondences with INEC. Again, this was severally breached. In the circumstance, it became hard to find reforms that can compel political parties to be honest with their own members. In other words, any reform that hinders Nigerian political parties from using illegal arrangements to win elections can hardly work.
 
Nigeria’s electoral bodies have over the years had their own share of reforms. At first, the emphasis was on nomenclature. During the second republic, the body was known as the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO). In 1987, president Ibrahim Babangida’s administration called it the National Electoral Commission (NEC) and it remained so till the famous June 12 1993 Presidential Election. During the Abacha years, it became the National Electoral Commission of Nigeria (NECON). In 1999, the new commission had the term ‘independent’ added to its name to become the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).  All these efforts directed at name change notwithstanding, the greatest challenge of our electoral bodies remained undue interference by government and the ruling parties at federal and state levels.  
 
Elections have also remained poorly organized, with each voting day witnessing multiple ballot papers that were pre thumb printed. Most polling centres likewise encountered late arrival of human and material resources. Again, voter’s registers were filled with multiple registrations making it difficult to use them for effective planning purposes. We all heaved a sigh of relief when the commission introduced what was known as the ‘card reader’ that was designed to first, recognize a voter’s card as one validly issued by INEC for a particular polling unit and second, to verify that the holder of the card is the true owner before such holder can vote. To nullify the reform, politicians aided by INEC officials made sure that the card reader was not put into use in certain sections of the country on voting day – a typical fate of electoral reforms in Nigeria.
 
Other new electoral technologies also failed on voting days.  The eulogised card reader was later said to be unknown to law despite the consequential amendment to the Electoral Act signed into law by president Goodluck Jonathan before the elections. In 2019, INEC’s server suddenly vanished and no one accounted for the millions of naira used for its procurement. In other words, reforms were just for fun – another way of understanding the introduction of senior university lecturers as returning officers to declare election results. The goal was to use respected academics, previously known several decades ago as role models of society to sanitize INEC’s electoral process.
 
Analysts who had become familiar with happenings in several universities shouted ourselves hoarse that the reform was redundant, but we were ignored. One would have expected INEC to know that the reform would be ineffectual since all a returning officer was to do was just to read figures presented to him from the field. The indictment of many returning officers for manipulating the system was probably the last evidence that eventually showed that those who could not stop malpractices in their own internal examinations were virtually incapable of stopping election malpractices. In fact, one professor was later jailed in Uyo. The lesson here is that as INEC was evolving reforms, political parties were a step ahead in circumventing them using whatever means.
 
Those who imagined that the often quoted last hope of the common man – the judiciary would change the situation by ensuring true justice did not know that they were merely sending Nigeria from democracy to a newly discovered system of government known as kritocracy. According to Professor Anthony Kila, seasoned political analyst and Director of the Commonwealth Institute of Advanced and Professional Studies CIAPS, kritocracy is a system of government “in which judges ignore voters’ wishes and decide what is good for all us, without elections.” In reality, many Nigerian judges have of recent become the most active actors in our electoral process, sending almost everybody into a season of political anomie in the country.
 
Only last week, the Court of Appeal delivered two versions of the same judgment, one oral, the other written. In the oral version, our ruling party won, while it lost in the written version. Among others, two important people made remarkable comments on the subject. The more titillating one credited to the court’s registrar suggested that the problem was due to typographical error. What type of typists work in our Appeal Court that can commit celebrated typo not in one or two or three words, or in one or two or three sentences but in more than 3 paragraphs? The second comment was that of celebrated elections lawyer Wole Olanikpekun SAN who inferred that our appeal court no longer knows the meaning of ‘functus officio.’ 
 
It is thus not enough to reiterate the popular suggestion that the judiciary should only help us identify faulty elections; its powers should no longer extend to the determination of winners. But, bearing in mind that not every judge has gone mad, it makes sense to call on those who are still sane to join Appeal Court Justice I. K Amadi in admonishing INEC “to stop dancing naked in the market, pretending that no one is seeing its nakedness and its dancing steps.” Put differently, the judiciary minus its bad eggs can still serve as a veritable tool for social change; provided commercial politics can be downplayed.
 
A major reason why our reforms don’t work is because our political system is too lucrative. We neither have the resources to maintain a bicameral legislature nor can we meet the excessive financial demands of our political office holders especially legislators who should only earn sitting allowances. It is indeed time to play down on acclaimed great reforms that the relevant actors are incapable of implementing. Let’s digest, comprehend and strategize for implementing existing reforms before advocating new ones.
  
November 26, 2023