Opinion
Who endorsed President Buhari ‘s “APER” Forms? Part 2
By Tunde Olusunle
At no time in Nigeria’s socioeconomic evolution has the economy been on the free fall and downward slide, as has been witnessed under Buhari’s watch. Nigeria survived two recessions under the incumbent administration, and was in the throes of a third affliction. One of these was evidently self-inflicted, while the second was a fallout of the global COVID-19 economic meltdown. Buhari’s tardy handling of his assumption of office processes in 2015, which held up the appointment of ministers and similar functionaries for six months, instigated the first experience. It meant there were no ready-to-run drivers of policy and governance, following Buhari’s May 29, 2015 inauguration, which adversely impacted socioeconomic growth. The Nigerian Chambers of Commerce, Industries, Mines and Agriculture, (NACCIMA), earlier this year, raised fears of a possible third recession in the outgoing year, on account of the economy’s poor performance indexes.
The nation’s inflation rate ascended the highest in nearly 20 years, posting a record 21%. Nigeria’s computational ombudsman, the Nigeria Bureau of Statistics, (NBS) in its most recent report, observed that increases in the food index emanated from the rise in the prices of consumer items like bread, cereals, potatoes, yams, oil and fat. The NBS equally noted that increases in the prices of gas, liquid fuel, air transport, road travel and solid fuel, accentuated the inflationary figures. The NBS observed further, that soaring food prices, disruptions in food supply chain, rise in import cost due to currency depreciation, and increase in the cost of production, collectively account for the galloping inflationary trend. All of these are playing out, when salaries and earnings of Nigerians have remained static for several years now, purchasing power eroded by skyrocketing inflation.
Arising from the above, it is no surprise that Nigeria presently ranks number 103, out of 121 countries in the “Global Hunger Ranking Index.” This position, according to the survey, signifies that Nigeria “has a level of hunger that is serious.” The report which ranks countries by “severity,” ascribed a score of 27.3, a hunger level which places Nigeria in the category of “serious” cases. Sadly, the current assessment is the second consecutive year in which Nigeria’s position has remained the same. Hitherto, Nigeria had been decorated with the ignominious medal of the “poverty capital of the world.”
Nigeria of the Buhari milieu is a curious socioeconomic paradox, against the backdrop of the country’s robust earnings from crude oil sales within the period under review. According to the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries, (OPEC), Nigeria realised $206 Billion, between 2015 and 2019. This works out at an average of $50 Billion per financial year. Yet, the country has been a serial borrower from several global lenders, piling up debts and commitments for generations unborn. As at June 2022, Nigeria’s foreign debt was $40.1.3 Billion. Elsewhere, the Debt Management Office, (DMO), has suggested that domestic debt was $63.24 Billion, as at September 2022.
Under Buhari, Nigeria has recorded its worst ever unemployment rates which has witnessed the addition of 17 million more people, to the unemployment market. The World Bank has noted the sharp upward swing of out-of-job people since the 2015-2016 economic recession. According to the report, the unemployment rate in Nigeria was at least 33.3% in the last quarter of 2020. Tied to this according to the report, is the rate of Nigerian asylum seekers in other countries, including professional and skilled people, questing for better opportunities, elsewhere. The report estimates that as at 2019, migrants from Nigeria had risen to about 1.5 million people, from about a third of the number 30 years earlier.
Conflicting figures suggest that Nigeria has lost between 6000 and 9000 medical doctors and paramedics, to the USA, United Kingdom, Canada and the United Arab Emirates, (UAE), under Buhari’s superintendence. The Kaduna State chapter of the Nigeria Medical Association, (NMA), has put the figure at over 10,000 in the last seven years. Information technology experts are also moving out in droves. The “brain regain” which democratic governance offered during the Olusegun Obasanjo regime and which witnessed the homecoming of many Nigerians, has been reversed under Buhari, into a biting brain drain. People are fleeing harsh economic circumstances at home, where desperation has driven many to explore dangerous routes like stowaway travel on the seas and oceans.
Mental health disorders have become more rampant under this government. Suicides in various forms have become more rampant than ever before. The social media is replete with instances of distraught and despairing Nigerians jumping into rivers or lagoons as the case may be. In other cases, people put a rope around their necks and hang themselves, while others wilfully consume poisonous substances, desiring to punctuate their earthly traumas. The Association of Psychiatrists in Nigeria, (APN) had reason in the immediate past, to exhort President Buhari to give assent to the “Mental Health Bill,” as passed by the National Assembly.
Buhari must have posted a new record in the length of industrial action, by university lecturers in Nigeria. Under the aegis of the Academic Staff Union of Universities, (ASUU), university lecturers embarked on a strike on February 14, 2022, to press for better working conditions. They sought a review of their remuneration and advocated better teaching facilities. A typically reticent and introverted Buhari could not as much as engage the scholars himself, leaving floundering members of his cabinet to dialogue with the university teachers. The subsequent intervention of the federal parliament brokered a truce which witnessed the reopening of universities, eight full months after they were shut. This is the kind of non-committal leadership Buhari has availed Nigeria.
Nepotism and cronyism have never been as obscene and pronounced over the years like we’ve witnessed in the past seven and half years. A disturbing slant to this practice is the blatant privileging of people who subscribe to the same religion as the outgoing helmsman, in consideration for appointments, deployments, even patronage in business dealings with MDAs. References have been made to appointments to the headship and critical hubs of the intelligence and security system for instance. The figures read like 80% to the North, and 20% to the South. Vacancies in the public service are almost always filled by candidates from the President’s geocultural catchment. It is that bad.
The battle against corruption was one of Buhari’s cardinal campaign pledges, but the malaise has very evidently prospered under his watch. Several so-called poverty alleviation programmes and initiatives of the Buhari regime have been virtual cesspools of graft. From the dubious “school feeding programme,” through the fictitious poverty mitigation “palliatives,” humongous quantums of our commonwealth have ended up in private pockets. What has become of the tradermoni programme for instance? Open-ended, freestyle initiatives by ministries like that of Disaster Management and Humanitarian Affairs meant to reach the poor and needy, have made billionaires of many government officials and their fronts.
Last year, Buhari’s regime declared wanted a certain “Aboubakar Hima” from Niger Republic, who “defrauded” Nigeria of $400 Million, N400 Million and €10 Million, respectively. This adds up to about N200 Billion supposedly frittered by officials of the Buhari government. The said Aboubakar Hima, was allegedly availed the sums, for the procurement of armaments for the military. Despite this singular heist which is larger than the annual budgets of many states, Buhari, the Commander-in-Chief, has not moved against his intelligence and security apparatus. Till date, not one head has rolled. Rather, those who were directly involved, have been decorated with national honours and rewarded with ambassadorial appointments. Should we allude to the ding-dong in the Niger Delta Development Commission, (NDDC), an organisation which has been deployed as an “automated teller machine,” (ATM), by successive interim managements?
The reward system under this government leaves much to be desired. The list of honorees at the recent National Awards event, was a decoration of aides and allies of the President in most instances. The real contributions of several awardees to national development, or indeed their professional callings, is best imagined. How do we explain the beatification of the Education Minister, Adamu Adamu for instance, when he could not resolve a strike by university lecturers, over a stretch of eight months? Residents of the Federal Capital Territory, (FCT) in some districts were bearing protest placards berating zero governance, when the Minister, Mohammed Musa Bello was being honoured. Buhari’s family members and personal aides, featured prominently on the list, underlining the wholesale bastardisation of the process. The question therefore should be asked: What parameters were deployed in the consideration of beneficiaries of the awards?
Buhari’s insensitivity to topical issues bothering on national angst, is legendary. Within the last one month, floods have overrun several states in the country. Six hundred and thirty lives have been lost, property valued at billions of naira have also been washed away by the deluge. Over one million Buhari constituents have been displaced and herded into camps for internally displaced persons, (IDPs). The new King of England, Charles III among other foreign dignitaries, has sympathised with Nigeria. While commissioning a “flood prevention plan” to be articulated within 90 days, however, Buhari travelled to South Korea for the first edition of the “World Bio Summit!”
Directly linked to this is his record for impulsive foreign travel and gross absenteeism since his inauguration on May 29, 2015. Not even Obasanjo, an acknowledged global statesman, came any close to Buhari’s achievements in worldwide excursions. And they are mostly wrong-headed, without concomitant accruals to the nation’s socioeconomy. As at the first week of August 2021, Buhari had spent 200 days in the UK for medical reasons. Indeed, a few weeks to the expiration of his first term in office, he had grossed 404 days, (one calendar year and 39 days), on intercontinental voyeurism, to 33 countries on four continents! Not even the biker- journalist, Moshood Olabisi Adisa Ajala, celebrated in the song with the title Ajala, by the revered juju music exponent, Ebenezer Obey, came any close.
More recently, the President grossed 12 foreign trips within the first six months of this year, raising concerns about the looming inadequacy of the budgetary provision for foreign travel, for the year. This was followed by the September jamboree to the US by Buhari in the guise of participation in the 2022 United Nations General Assembly, (UNGA). Government offices in Abuja emptied into the streets of New York, as hundreds of public servants floated around the iconic city, bearing bulging shopping bags. Instructively, Buhari’s trips almost always, coincide with moments of national challenges requiring minimum concern and empathy from a leader. But he has consecutively failed on this score, underscoring his trademark nonchalance and chronic insensitivity.
For all his pre-election pretences as a “newborn democrat,” Buhari has failed in the development of democratic institutions. The homes of senior judges were invaded in the dead of night by agents of the state supposedly tracking phantom proceeds of corruption. In the same vein, Buhari watched with arms akimbo, as a sitting Chief Justice of the Federation, (CJN), Walter Onnoghen, was framed and disgracefully ousted from office. His successor, Ibrahim Muhammad Tanko, would voluntarily retire, in a hail of accusations and allegations of corruption. The parliament remains attached to the apron-strings of the executive, rarely dissenting, customarily conceding to the bidding and demands of its “benefactors.” While the incumbent legislature has self-adulated as a “performing” one, vis-a-vis the number of bills it has passed, the same assembly has been fingered in “budget padding” and collusion with ministries, departments and agencies, (MDAs). BudgIT Nigeria, a civic-tech organisation early this year announced its discovery of about 460 duplicated projects valued at N378.9 Billion.
It is not in the place of Buhari to festoon himself with medals and accolades celebrating his perceived achievements and successes. No. It is indeed most uncharitable, wrong and absolutely presumptuous for him to be both the student and the examiner, the prosecutor and the adjudicator in a matter which directly concerns him. With the benefit of hindsight, Nigerians have been practically robbed by a President and the platform which granted him leverage. He was elected to serve Nigeria and Nigerians. The responsibility for how his appraisal and acquittal as the case may pan out therefore, lies squarely with the people, the electorate, who put him in office. Our scientific isolation of various strands of governance and administration and their interrogation thereof, unfortunately situates the President in the negative column of the assessment model.
An annual template could well have been applied as the research instrument as with the well known “APER” form, in checking out the President’s endeavours. A more broad-based analytical device in the mould of an Aggregate Performance Evaluation Report, also shortened by the APER acronym, could also have been deployed. Either way, Buhari’s performance is small comfort. His APER forms have not been endorsed both by his immediate supervisors, nor does it have the imprimatur of higher authorities, metaphorically. Nigerians have never wished for a faster denouement to their lachrymose of several years, like they wish for February 2023. They wish for that day like yesterday.
CONCLUDED
Tunde Olusunle, PhD, poet, journalist, scholar and author is a Member of the Nigerian Guild of Editors, (NGE).
As an indigene of Kogi State from Ijumu Local Government, I am always concerned about any issue that has to do with Kogi State’s affairs and I do my best to be involved, even if modestly, in her development. I love my state and I love my people, without necessarily compromising my patriotism to Nigeria, my country.
For some time now, I have come to notice that certain dark interests, often political, like to project all that is negative about Kogi State with a glee that is symptomatic of zonked-out analysts.
The latest half-witted article by Tunde Olusunle on Kogi State and its immediate past Governor, Yahaya Bello, portrays the journalist as seemingly away with the fairies. I will hold forth about it in a bit.
I am not a member of the APC nor a beneficiary of Yahaya Bello’s political largesse while in office. In fact, I’m not a politician in the real sense of the word. I’m an entrepreneur.
The best selling comic play titled ‘Our Husband Has Gone Mad Again’ authored by Professor Olawale Gladstone Emmanuel Rotimi and published in 1977 best captures how to describe Tunde Olusunle as related to his recent article titled ‘Abeg, Where Is “White Lion?”‘
One would have assumed that at his age with decades of professional experience, he would have been circumspect about certain issues. Even if he wished to satisfy his paymasters who must have contracted him to pen trash about his state or an individual, he would have made an attempt not to fritter away whatever little honour he had left.
I know that the country is hard and some individuals whose best lives are behind them would crunch even on faeces just to survive another day, especially those in the category of pretending that all is still well with them when they are actually floundering financially – a typical tragedy of living in the illusion of past glory. That’s quite understandable.
The precis of Olusunle’s uninformed article is that it is a worthless vituperation of a frustrated and failed political wannabe whose attempts at political relevance in Kogi State have met with catastrophic denouement. I don’t want to bore the reader with bouquets of unsupported asseverations imputed by Olusunle against Yahaya Bello. Investing valuable time in such would be counter-productive. I just want to address the obvious elements of insanity in the article.
During the 2023 presidential election, a lot of the people who unleashed negative propaganda against candidate Bola Ahmed Tinubu did so out of implacable personal hatred for the man.
The hatred in their speeches and writings was so clear. It was aggressive hatred without substance. It was so bad that some people were praying for him to die! Many fake prophecies from agitated prophets saturated traditional and social media on a daily basis. But the man weathered all the storms, beat them silly and eventually emerged as Nigeria’s President.
Not that his detractors have stopped, but they have been decimated significantly by the shame they bear consequent upon his victory. Former President Muhammadu Buhari also suffered the same fate.
Buhari would be the first presidential candidate in Nigeria to read his own obituary while still alive. A sitting Governor then, Ayodele Fayose, took front-page advertorials in major newspapers in the country and added Buhari’s picture to the list of Nigeria’s dead presidents and heads of state.
He claimed that Buhari might not last even one year in office. Therefore, why burden the country with such a walking vegetable? The hatred was that bad! Buhari went ahead to complete eight years in office and departed healthier and younger than he came in.
Yahaya Bello is the latest victim of deliberate personal hatred and relentless blackmail by his detractors and those he has trumped in the slick, yet complex terrains of Kogi State politics. A lot of political cavilers in Kogi State have yet to come to terms with the divine intervention that produced Yahaya Bello in 2016.
Kogi’s ethnopolitical warlords who have arrogated to themselves the permanent mandate to govern the confluence state found themselves suddenly vanquished by higher terrestrial forces beyond human comprehension. They could not believe that Yahaya Bello, from where he came, could be such a candidate for divine benevolence.
They rebelled and kicked. From day one, they chose blackmail and crude propaganda as weapons of foul warfare. For these ignoble characters and their ubiquitous social media goons, every woman who suffered a miscarriage did so because of Yahaya Bello. If their dogs died, it was Yahaya Bello. If they failed to prepare well for an election and lost, Yahaya Bello was their ready scapegoat. It was a loathsome circle of certainty.
The hatred in Olusunle’s baseless article is poorly disguised, if at all. Authentic professional journalists base their submissions on hard, indubitable facts. They do not orchestrate a bum steer, as the Americans would say. But this is what someone who, to all intents and purposes, should be a respected veteran in the field of journalism has chosen to do for survival stipends.
His claims that Yahaya Bello is in hiding are particularly spurious and nauseating. I live in Abuja and I can confirm that Yahaya Bello has been in his Zone 4 residence for a long time. He has been seen observing Taraweeh and receiving guests for Iftar throughout the Ramadan period. He goes to the Mosque for Jumat prayers every Friday.
For goodness sake, the man left Abuja for Okene to celebrate Eid in the full glare of thousands of Kogites, and entertained hundreds of Muslim faithful and his political associates for Sallah before returning to Abuja two days later. He even travelled to Lagos to pay homage to President Bola Tinubu for the Eid-el Fitr celebrations. What a way to hide!
Olusunle claims that Yahaya Bello is on the run and hiding under a bed. My question is “For what in particular?” Security agencies are not the types to base their investigations and arrests on phoney allegations as all those raised in Olusunle’s mucky script are.
They don’t pay attention to hideous misinformation being peddled by discombobulated political midgets in desperate search for long-lost relevance.
Olusunle seems to be suffering from nomenclature attachment syndrome. Psychologists have impressed on us from time immemorial that a person’s name is more than just identification.
They have educated us that when we hear our names, it triggers a unique psychological response. In this case, we may be dealing with a syndrome called pervasive egosyntonic sadistic behaviour.
In Yoruba language, Olusunle means “Olu has burnt the house”. And the Yoruba say “orukọ ọmọ lo n ro ọmọ”, meaning a child’s name influences his/her behaviour.
But if Olu must burn anybody’s house, he should choose his father’s house to burn, not another person’s house of honour. Meanwhile, Kogi State is a house that no jackass can burn down.
Exacerbated insanity defines the character of purveyors of allegations that cannot be substantiated. To answer your question, writer Olusunle, White Lion is everywhere, going about his normal activities, and discerning Nigerians are aware. But blind, frustrated critics won’t find him.
– Olorunfemi Obadofin Braimoh, a security consultant and public affairs analyst, wrote from Abuja.
By Ehichioya Ezomon
While most Nigerians still clink wine glasses in toast to Abia State Governor Alex Otti for belling the monstrous cat of life pensions for former governors and deputy governors, three Abia ex-governors have punctuated Dr Otti’s enviable limelight, by denying drawing pensions, and the accompanying perquisites of office.
Under the repealed law, former governors and deputies were to be paid lifetime salaries; get houses in Abia and Abuja; receive 100 per cent of annual basic salaries of the incumbent governor and deputy; get two brand-new vehicles worth N20 million every four years; and have three police officers and two operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS), and cooks, stewards, drivers, and gardeners.
The denial by immediate past Governor Okezie Ikpeazu (2015-2023) came on March 20 – a day before Otti signed into law the bill repealing the pensions. A statement by Dr Ikpeazu’s chief press secretary, Onyebuchi Ememanka, refuted reports “mischievously couched to give the false impression” that Ikpeazu’s among former governors receiving pensions from Abia State.
Ememanka stated: “Dr Okezie Ikpeazu wishes to make it abundantly clear that since after handing over the reins of power as Governor of Abia State on May 29, 2023, he has neither requested for, nor received from the Abia State Government, any dime under any guise whatsoever, and has no intentions of doing so.
“Former Governor Ikpeazu has since moved on with his life and is currently engaged in other areas of interest to him and advises the Abia State Government and her various organs to face the business of governance and desist from engaging in needless media sensationalism. The general public should be properly guided, please.”
Former Senator and ex-Governor Theodore Orji (2007-2015) also debunked claims of benefiting from the pension largesse, saying on March 21 that, “he hasn’t received any pension, he hasn’t asked for it, and he’s not interested in it.” Orji spoke via his former chief liaison officer, Hon. Ifeanyi Umere.
Umere said: “Nobody should link Senator Orji with the said pension law because nobody has paid him any pension after leaving office as Governor. He transited from Governor to Senate and he made it a point of morality that he will not, and he didn’t ask for any pension or question anybody about it because he is not interested in it. He didn’t receive any pension from Okezie Ikpeazu and he didn’t pay anybody, too.”
And Sen. and former Governor Orji Uzor Kalu (1999-2007) – whose government established the pension law in 2001 – said he didn’t receive any pensions since 2007. One of Kalu’s aides was quoted: “As a former governor of the state, T. A. Orji did not pay him (Kalu) a dime as pension, and Okezie Ikpeazu continued in the same manner.”
Recall that Dr Kalu, fielding questions from journalists at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport (NAIA) in Abuja on February 20, 2017, distanced himself from the 108 ex-governors that a national daily claimed were “living off their states through pensions and other entitlements.”
As reported by Vanguard on February 21, 2017, Kalu said he hadn’t received “any payment, entitlements or privileges of any sort from his successors (Sen. Orji and Dr. Ikpeazu), adding that the Abia State government had “withheld and refused to pay his pensions and entitlements, making him the only ex-governor in the 36 states that does not receive pension.”
Kalu said on leaving government on May 29, 2007, he left behind “all the government vehicles and every other thing that belonged to the government,” and that, “none of the privileges, like security details or vehicles that accrue to former governors has been extended to him.”
Asked if he’s broke because of non-payment, and his next line of action, Kalu said: “It is not about being broke or not. The pension law of the state did not exclude me from being paid as expected. In fact, it is illegal, according to the law, to deny one his rights and privileges.”
Also reacting to the abolished pension benefits, former Deputy Governor Ude Chukwu, under the Ikpeazu regime, said: “Nobody has given me a dime. I am aware of the law. For me, it (the law) is as good as not being there. If all past governors said they have not been paid anything, what is the essence of the existence of the law?”
Relatedly, former Lagos State Governor and ex-minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola (SAN), has revealed that his monthly pension is N577,000, after eight years in office (2007-2015). Mr Fashola, appearing on ARISE TV programme, ‘Perspectives,’ on January 20, said:
“The benefit I get, I think, is a N577,000 monthly pension from Lagos State. So, in spite of all the stories that we got several billions of money (after leaving office), I’ve come out to deny that repeatedly. Well, I don’t know how long it lasts, but all I know is that I get N577,000 per month consistently,” without stating if he’d enjoyed the “full package” pre and post-effort by the Lagos State House of Assembly (LGHA) to halve the pensions in 2021.
The poser: If Otti’s predecessors in office denied receiving any pensions, why the Labour Party (LP) governor’s bravado to sign into law the pensions repeal bill passed by the Abia State House of Assembly (ABHA)? Was it to score political points by painting black Dr Ikpeazu of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Sen. Orji (PDP), and Sen. Kalu of All Progressives Congress (APC)?
Perhaps, Otti wanted to fulfil a campaign promise, and guard against any governor resurrecting the dead law in future. Signing the law on March 21, Otti stated: “Even before this new law came into place, a lot of people, who have followed our views in the national discuss (discourse), understand that we were not going to continue the practice of paying pensions and allowances to this set of former government officials.”
That said, pensions for former governors and deputy governors aren’t “illegal,” as the issue is perceived in the public. What Nigerians detest and question is the morality of and insensitivity in awarding huge severance pay, lifetime pensions, allowances and material benefits to former governors and deputies.
Some former governors-turned senators or ministers also receive emoluments in a couple of places: pensions from their states, and salaries and allowances from the National Assembly (NASS) or the Executive, against the rules that exempt farming as the only avenue to possibly earn extra pay, while boosting the country’s food production and security.
In 2023, some members of NASS were enticed by the mouth-watering pension packages for federal and state executives, and proposed same for the President and Deputy President of the Senate, and Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives – an incentive for State Houses of Assembly to follow suit. But the bill was shot down due to public outcry.
In the oft-quoted Lagos High Court judgment of November 26, 2019, in suit no: FHC/L/CS/1497/2017, filed by Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), Justice Oluremi Oguntoyinbo queried the legality or validity of pensions for former governors and deputy governors, but pushed the burden of discovery to the Attorney General of the Federation.
Justice Oguntoyinbo had differed from the position of then Attorney General Abubakar Malami (SAN) that, “the States’ laws duly passed cannot be challenged,” and said, “I do not agree with this line of argument by the Attorney General that he cannot challenge the States’ pension laws for former governors.”
“In my humble view, the AG should be interested in the legality or validity of any law in Nigeria and how such laws affect or will affect Nigerians, being the Chief Law Officer of the Federation,” the judge said, and then gave the following commands:
“AN ORDER of mandamus compelling and directing the Attorney General, AG, to urgently identify former governors and their deputies collecting pensions from their states and to seek full recovery of public funds from those involved.
“AN ORDER of mandamus compelling and directing the AG to urgently institute appropriate legal actions to challenge the legality of states’ laws permitting former governors, serving as senators and ministers to enjoy governors’ emoluments while drawing normal salaries and allowances in their new political offices.”
Based on the orders, SERAP asked President Bola Tinubu, in a letter on March 23, “to immediately obey,” to recover pensions collected by former governors, and to challenge the legality of states’ pension laws permitting those involved to collect such “outrageous pensions.”
Equally instructive is an Appeal Court ruling, in suit no. CA/A/810/2017, against the Kogi State Government seeking pensions and severance packages in the state, which’s referenced by Alex Enumah in an opinion piece, “Pension Laws for Ex-Govs: The Abia Example,” published by THISDAY on March 31, as follows:
“The court held that the fact that elected public office holders and political appointees were paid huge amounts of money as monthly salaries and other forms of allowances while in office makes it morally wrong for them to demand pensions, gratuities or severance allowances for holding such an office for four to eight years as the case may be.
“The three-man panel of the appellate court, which had Justice Emmanuel Agim, Justice Abubakar Datti Yahaya and Justice Tinuade Akomolafe-Wilson, submitted that it amounted to gross social injustice, and unjustified in the context of the nation’s present social realities.
“The lead judgment, which was delivered by Justice Agim (now JSC), said it was wicked and morally wrong for political office holders and political appointees, who helped themselves to public funds while in office, to claim entitlement to pension and severance allowances.
“He submitted that it was wrong for political appointees and elected public office holders, who do not work as long and as hard as career civil servants to quickly get paid huge severance allowances upon leaving office, in addition to the huge wealth they acquired while holding such offices and without having been subjected to any contributory pension schemes.”
So, controversies trail pensions for former governors and deputies not for being “illegal” but because they’re overbloated, and a huge drain on the lean resources of many states, which owe months and even years of backlogs to retirees, some of who spent over 35 years in service and retired into penury, as their pensions are withheld by governors, who are “qualified” for hefty pensions and adds-on for life, and even pay themselves upfront part of the packages before they leave office.
It’s reassuring though that former Governors Ikpeazu, Orji and Kalu have denied receiving pensions, and challenged Otti’s sweeping statement that, “we were not going to continue the practice of paying pensions and allowances to this set of former government officials.” But can hundreds of other former governors – accused of drawing huge pensions and entitlements from their states – emulate the Abia trio by disavowing the allegations against them? The ball, as they say, is in their court!
Mr Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria
By Ehichioya Ezomon
Abia State Governor Alex Otti’s the rave of the moment among his peer governors, and most Nigerians, for “infrastructural development,” and particularly for signing into law a Bill passed by the Abia State House of Assembly (ABHA) to repeal life pensions for former governors and deputy governors of the state.
Under the repealed law, former governors and deputies were paid lifetime salaries, and got houses in Abia and Abuja, prompting ex-Head of State and former President Olusegun Obasanjo – on a visit to Dr Otti to commend his novel move – to describe the life pension laws by state governors as “rascality” and “acts of daylight robbery,” and urged other governors to emulate the Otti example.
But did retired Gen. Obasanjo, Ph.D, also send similar entreaty to President Bola Tinubu and the National Assembly (NASS), to repeal pensions and entitlements for former presidents, vice presidents and heads of state? Or only former governors and deputies should curb their appetite for free money and materials after “retirement” from government?
Obasanjo’s advocacy should touch all former elected or appointed executive officeholders, as we shouldn’t have a “special breed” of Nigerians: former military heads of state, presidents, vice presidents, governors and deputy governors, who enjoy government’s freebies, and live in luxuries at the expense of toiling Nigerians in need of the bare essentials of life.
It’s as well to recall that in a valedictory session of the Federal Executive Council at the State House, Abuja, on May 24, 2023, then Vice President Yemi Osinbajo called for an upward review of pensions for former presidents and vice presidents.
Osinbajo, referencing President Muhammadu Buhari’s “personal integrity,” said: “Part of the problem with that is that sometimes, you and I end up getting the very short end of the stick. If you look at the laws today, our retirement benefits, yours (Buhari) will be N350,000 a month by law and mine will be N250,000 per month.
“Those, of course, as you can imagine, are very tiny amounts of money. And I think that one of the things that we must do is to, perhaps, see how we can amend that law so that I will not come to you in Daura (Buhari’s hometown in Katsina State) and ask for some of your bulls to sell in order to survive.”
As Sunday PUNCH findings, first reported on May 28, 2023, indicate, “severance packages for Buhari and Osinbajo, state governors and other political appointees leaving office in 2023 might cost the country about N63.45bn,” adding that, as stipulated by the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Allocation Commission (RMAFC), “President Buhari will get a severance pay of N10.54m, which is 300 per cent of his annual basic salary, while Vice-President Osinbajo will receive N9.09m.”
In a manner of, “What a man can do, a woman can do it, and even better,” then First Lady, Mrs Aisha Buhari, also solicited increased out-of-office benefits for ex-presidents and vice presidents, and for the incorporation of former first ladies “among the beneficiaries.” She spoke on May 25, 2023, in Abuja, at the launch of a book, ‘The Journey of a Military Wife,’ written by Mrs Vickie Irabor, wife of then Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Lucky Irabor (retd).
Mrs Buhari’s plea: “The Federal Government should consider us as people that need help not as magic makers. And on the privileges given to the former presidents of Nigeria, they should do more. It is still not enough considering what people go through in that house (Presidential Villa). And at the same time, I want them to incorporate women, the former first ladies, among the beneficiaries.”
Many Nigerians have lent voices to the Otti gesture, especially coming at an time of economic strangulation of the average and below-average citizens since the advent of the Tinubu administration, following the withdrawal of subsidy on petrol, and floating the Naira, which’s crashed against major foreign currencies, and sent inflation and the cost of living sky-high.
The Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) has asked President Tinubu to swiftly obey a court judgment, which orders the Federal Government to recover pensions collected by former governors, and to challenge the legality of states’ pension laws permitting those involved to collect such “outrageous pensions.”
Following a SERAP suit no: FHC/L/CS/1497/2017, Justice Oluremi Oguntoyinbo in a 20-page judgment on November 26, 2019, granted “AN ORDER of mandamus compelling and directing the Attorney General, AG, to urgently identify former governors and their deputies collecting pensions from their states and to seek full recovery of public funds from those involved.”
“Justice Oguntoyinbo also granted ‘AN ORDER of mandamus compelling and directing the AG to urgently institute appropriate legal actions to challenge the legality of states’ laws permitting former governors, serving as senators and ministers to enjoy governors’ emoluments while drawing normal salaries and allowances in their new political offices.'”
Then Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), had argued that “the States’ laws duly passed cannot be challenged.” But Justice Oguntoyinbo differed, saying, “I do not agree with this line of argument by the Attorney General that he cannot challenge the States’ pension laws for former governors.”
“In my humble view, the AG should be interested in the legality or validity of any law in Nigeria and how such laws affect or will affect Nigerians, being the Chief Law Officer of the Federation,” the judge said, adding, “I have considered SERAP’s arguments that it is concerned about the attendant consequences that are manifesting on the public workers and pensioners of the states who have been refused salaries and pensions running into several months on the excuse of non-availability of state resources to pay them.”
Justice Oguntoyinbo didn’t expressly pronounce on the legality of awarding life pensions to former governors and deputy governors. Perhaps, the plaintiff, SERAP, didn’t include that in its averments and prayers. Which somehow left the judge to push the responsibility to the Attorney General – “being the Chief Law Officer of the Federation” – of finding out the “legality or validity of any law in Nigeria and how such laws affect or will affect Nigerians.”
But the National Industrial Court – as posted on the African Law eJournal on March 25, 2020 – had ruled that pensions for former governors and deputy governors are legal, as nothing in the amended 1999 Constitution of Nigeria precludes or prevents state houses of assembly from enacting laws to give such benefits to former state chief executives.
Michael Dugeri of University of Ottawa, Canada, posted the court’s ruling in the case of Incorporated Trustees of Human Development Initiatives & 39 Others v. Governor of Abia State & 73 Others, which borders on “legal validity of state pensions laws for political office holders in Nigeria.”
“The National Industrial Court, in this case, was invited to determine the question of whether any law, especially by the State Houses of Assembly, that stipulates pension of such public officials already covered by the constitutional mandate of the Revenue Mobilization, Allocation & Fiscal Commission (RMAFC), is ultra vires, null and void. The Court answered in the negative,” the report said.
Yet, as first reported by Vanguard on March 24, SERAP, while noting inaction by the Buhari administration on the Justice Oguntoyinbo judgment, urges President Tinubu, in a March 23 letter by its Deputy Director, Kolawole Oluwadare, “to emulate the good example of Governor Otti by urgently obeying the judgment.”
“Unless the judgment is immediately obeyed, former governors and their deputies, including those now serving as ministers in your administration and members of the National Assembly who receive pensions, would continue to evade justice for their actions,” SERAP says.
“Immediately obeying the judgment would show the sovereignty of the rule of law in Nigeria and go a long way in protecting the integrity of the country’s legal system. Obeying the judgment would also show you (Tinubu) as a defender of the Nigerian Constitution of 1999 (as amended), the rule of law, and public interest within government,” SERAP adds.
SERAP lists former governors, “who continue to collect double emoluments and large severance benefits” from 22 states, including Lagos, Akwa Ibom, Edo, Delta, Ekiti, Kano, Gombe, Yobe, Borno, Bauchi, Abia, Imo, Bayelsa, Oyo, Osun, Kwara, Ondo, Ebonyi, Rivers, Niger, Kogi, and Katsina.
As reported by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on March 20, the Abia pensions repeal law isn’t the first, as a few states had moved to abolish the law, but “many states showed nonchalant attitude toward doing so.” Still, the “Abia State Governors and Deputy Governors’ (Repeal) Law 2024,” which took effect immediately on Thursday, March 21, 2024, after Governor Otti signed it, forecloses former governors and deputy governors earning pensions.
But did the Abia repealed pensions law include other perquisites of office, which make the pensions per se to look like pocket money for a boarding-house student, who doesn’t really need extra money, as their parents or guardians have settled accommodation, feeding and provisions for them?
This and more will be explored in part 2 of the series, amid denial by two former governors of Abia State, Sen. Theodore Orji and Dr Okezie Ikpeazu, of receiving pensions since they left office, even as Governor Otti continues to enjoy the limelight of abolishing pensions for former governors and deputy governors of Abia State!
Mr Ezomon, Journalist and Media Consultant, writes from Lagos, Nigeria
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