NO serious leader, (Nigeria’s president, Alhaji Bola Ahmed Tinubu, does not qualify as one because he is a ruler), hibernates in two European capitals, first in London (UK), and then in Paris, France, or in any foreign country for that matter, for a very simple and routine task of changing his or her ministers. My recollections may have failed me at this moment, but I do not recall since 1999 when any past president – Olusegun Obasanjo (1999-2007), Musa Yar’Adua (2007-2010), Goodluck Jonathan (2010-2015), and Muhammadu Buhari (2015-2023), going away from the country for weeks on an alleged working vacation to rest and plot on how to sack the persons who are working at his pleasure back home. Not even Yar’Adua nor Buhari who were unfortunately sick for parts of their presidential tenures (Yar’Adua actually died in office midway into his first term) travelled abroad to plot how to sack their ministers. Tinubu’s supporters will have a contrary opinion, but this president is an unserious, and certainly a tired fellow.
The state of Tinubu’s health has been obvious for decades including while he was the governor of one of Nigeria’s wealthiest states, Lagos, between 1999 and 2007. Those who were close to him back then knew this and whispered about their concerns on the man who is now president. The late Yinka Odumakin was an admirer of Tinubu until he stopped being one, and became his fiercest critic. He, perhaps, more than anybody else, dealt body blows on Tinubu including questioning everything about the Alhaji long before others added their voices. But today is not about Nigeria’s president who has no verifiable and ‘certifiable’ information about much of his life until the 1970s. Officially he claims to be in his 70s. Unofficially, he’s said to be in his 80s. Age is a mere number. So it may not matter much. But truth matters. Among the known unknowns are his blood parents, his siblings if any, his primary school(s), his secondary school(s), his university education (fortunately, depending on where you stand in the country’s sharp and deep political divide, there may soon be a Bola Ahmed Tinubu University in Abia state in the heart of the Igbo nation), his certificates, his employment records bar one, among other puzzles. The president epitomises the word puzzle but not the one of Melchizedek, the high priest in the Judeo-Christian legend who was reputed to have no origins. All unknowns about Tinubu are actually known, though not admitted.
Achoba ihe buru-uzo ruo ala, egbuo oba mmiri. If you are interested in killing an abominable animal or reptile, then deal with the crocodile. It is the chief of evil doers. But for the pains and privations inflicted on hapless citizens, the regime of this president aka T-Pain has been a joke. After months of assailing Nigerians with the threats of cabinet reshuffle, the administration finally did so last week. As expected it turned out to be a distraction. For a start, the cabinet change was unnecessary; and the method of effecting it smacks of illiteracy. Before we proceed further let’s quickly put one important issue behind us. If there was any need to sack any minister, the first to go should be the minister of petroleum resources, whoever that may be. Why?
Next to Nigeria’s president in the savaging of the economy in the past 17 months is the petroleum resources minister. The minister failed to warn the president on May 29, 2023, on the foolishness and the dire consequences of his ‘subsidy is gone’ proclamation at the onset of the regime. Since then everything has fallen apart. If the economy is in tailspin (and it is), it’s down to ‘subsidy is gone’. If inflation, especially food inflation, is going through the roof (and certainly it is), it’s down to ‘subsidy is gone’. If about 150 million compatriots (the number could be far more), are living below the poverty line, ‘subsidy is gone’ is implicated. The same petroleum resources minister who should be first in the line for firing is also complicit in failing to quickly arrest the ongoing and brazen industrial scale theft of barrels of our crude oil. It has to be acknowledged, however, that there have been recent claims that the hemorrhaging in that area appears to be abating. Even if the claims are true, it would still amount to too little too late. The minister should have been sacked long before the cabinet reshuffle.
This same minister who is still sitting pretty in the federal executive council of the federation also superintends the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL). Year-on-year studies have shown that this government oil behemoth consistently ranked amongst the most corrupt public institutions in the country. NNPCL has the dubious distinction of spending tens of billions of dollars in the past 10 years, at the minimum, executing turn around maintenance of the country’s four refineries, with no results. None of the four refineries – two in Port Harcourt, one each in Warri and Kaduna – has contributed not even one litre of any petroleum products for domestic consumption in more than one decade in spite of the billions allegedly invested in their rehabilitation. In half of the years of their interminable turn around maintenance, an individual had spent about $20 billion to construct and commission what is reputed and reported to be the largest single train refinery and petrochemical company in the world. Yet, the minister who it must be said inherited the mess was not affected by the cabinet reshuffle.
It is easy and attractive to conclude that the minister who supervises NNPCL has not lifted a finger in the nearly two years that he has been in office because the mess may be beneficial to him. Under a previous petroleum resources minister, the NNPCL boss promised, and gave specific dates for the completion of the maintenance works on the refineries, and their restreaming. He kept none of the promises, not even after moving the goal posts over and over. The previous minister left him untouched. The same NNPCL honcho has been promising the new oil minister the same thing, and failing to deliver. He is still in office because he is a sacred cow. For the appointers and this particular appointee, it’s almost clear that it has been a case of agbata eke. Or a mutually beneficial arrangement.
Google’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) said when asked that “Past dates for the completion of refineries repairs in Nigeria have been a moving target”. It illustrated with the Port Harcourt refinery which it said “has had several missed deadlines”. It said that the refinery’s rehabilitation was initially expected to occur in three phases, lasting 18, 24 and 44 months respectively. These were all under Buhari. But under Tinubu in 2023, the NNPCL pledged in December that the Port Harcourt refinery would commence operations by the end of the same month. It didn’t. Later NNPCL set a new deadline for early August, 2024, “which was also missed”. Yet, again the goal post was moved to early this month. In two days this month will expire, and still no show.
Right now nobody is making any promises about the delivery of the refineries and their products. Rather our oil minister who was not affected by the gale of sackings in the cabinet has been busy quarrelling and making up with the owners and operators of the Dangote refinery over the monopoly of Nigeria’s petroleum products market, its capacity to meet domestic supply needs, the supply of crude, in which currency to pay, the quality of the new refinery’s products, the role of NNPCL as a middle man, and other painful contestations. Our minister has no shame, neither does the NNPCL. A few months ago the duo wildly and weirdly celebrated their lining up of about 200 trucks, with pictures to boot, to lift products from what should be a rival or at best a complementary refinery, for delivery to retail outlets nationwide. It was a grotesque sight. But the irony was lost on our rulers. Earlier, Nigerians were told that a loan had been taken in our name to acquire 20% of Dangote’s refinery. It was a lie, 20% was not acquired, and the minister and the NNPCL did not tell us about the change of plan. It took the president of the Dangote Group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote, a serial investor, to burst the bubble that the money that was paid in our name would earn us only 7% shares in the refinery. Our oil minister is still holding on to the portfolio, and the NNPCL group managing director is still calling the shots. Tell me if agbata eke has any more fitting description or definition?
There are many more reasons why Tinubu is the current problem with Nigeria, and not his ministers. His cabinet is filled with roaches, light-fingered persons, political hacks, and “on your mandate…” choristers. There are not many in there who have credible second addresses who could look him in the eyes, and tell him the truth. And if he would not listen, then tell him to go to hell. Who? Tell me who? Like the principal many of them are baggage – carriers. Many are tainted by corruption allegations. Some of them have live graft cases which leave them with their feet under the fire. They cannot do pim. The same sorry picture appears to run across the board from the governors’ mansions in the states to the national assembly and to the judiciary. Allegations of incitement of the military to topple the democratic order, and treason charges await the rest of the critical citizens. Tinubu is the most insecure president. He has become a hammer, and everything in this country is a nail. Welcome full blown state capture.
