by Cheta Nwanze

When your uniformed personnel do not believe that the machinery of the state will serve them justice, there is a tendency for them to take a look at the, err, machinery in their hands, and make use of it to take justice for themselves.

According to Customs, a professor was stopped with the princely sum of $1.1 millions at MMA. The egghead, Charles Ofoegbu, claimed to be going to Kenya to resolve a dispute over oil blocks. Charity begins at home they say, and if Prof Ofoegbu’s claim proves correct, there are a lot of places in Nigeria where his expertise at conflict resolution would be needed, then we can export him to Ghana and the Ivory Coast, before finally sending him to Kenya. That is if the FG will listen to his recommendations at the end of the day..

You see, a few days ago, a court in Port Harcourt demanded that the Federal Government sort the people of Odi the princely sum of N37.6 billions. The court also gave the FG a deadline of 21 days to comply with the ruling. I would ask the good people of Odi to look towards what has become of the N41.8 billions awarded to the victims of another massacre, the people of Zaki-Biam in Benue state. Almost exactly two years after killing an unknown number of Nigerians in Odi, the Nigerian Army killed at least a hundred people in Zaki-Biam, like in Odi, a retaliatory action. Like in Odi, the people who killed 19 uniformed representatives of the Nigerian state have yet to be found, and therein lies the crux of the matter. When your uniformed personnel do not believe that the machinery of the state will serve them justice, there is a tendency for them to take a look at the, err, machinery in their hands, and make use of it to take justice for themselves. It does not help when the state itself refuses to obey legal pronouncements.

Which is why I am wondering why the “Yoruba Unity Forum”, whatever that means is threatening legal action against the FG. Why waste everyone’s time? That aside, and for the records, I think the whole federal character rubbish is one of the issues that pull us back as a country. You have to ask the question, why can a leader not pick either those whom he believes are the best for the job, or better still, those whom he believes he can work with and produce the best results? Even if na the same mama born all of dem?

A VERY recent example would be Papa Eagles who won the Nations Cup. When Big Boss picked the team, there were a few complaints made that most of the players were from one section of the country. But, when they won the golden goblet, ALL OF US rejoiced. Down with federal character!

Not that it makes a difference; our elite do not listen to anyone, much less a lazy hack who is writing from a small village in Anambra state. That is why no matter how much we try, and no matter how much they yab while in power, we cannot remove the PDP from power. Just ask Dame Patience. We do not matter.

Bits and bobs

Since I arrived at the village, there has been electrical power for exactly one hour. I’m not holding my breath that the agreement signed yesterday would kick in anytime soon.

Still on power, but power of another sort, it increasingly looks like Dame Patience is right. The only way to remove one of our bigmen from office is when other bigmen gang up against him. If enough bigmen fail to join the plot, then it fails.

I am very unhappy with GEJ. He has removed a potential source of great jokes. He has made a u-turn on the issue of Kashimawo University. How sad.

Right of reply

In response to Gabriel Osu (yesterday’s newsletter), Kalu Aja wrote

Clearly when I said “anyone” I used that phrase to indicate that the regulation that made power generation and distribution exclusive to the FGN has been reviewed when the Power Sector Reforms were passed in 2005.

Now private Corporations, States and Local govts can generate and distribute power. Note I did not say Transmit. The grid will still be owned by the FGN but outsourced to a mgt coy in this case the TCN.

Still on that issue, and ostensibly as an extension of Gabriel Osu’s input, Otibhor Adeleke wrote,

Also make it clear that when this power is sold to the national grid, it is their prerogative @PHCN to decide who gets the power. So although Lagos, Rivers, Abia and anyother state may generate power, they do not necessarily get it sent back to their state! Also there is the issue of the grid line “collapsing” when it cannot take on the amount of electricity generated due to aged infrastructure.

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Op-ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija.