By Ochereome Nnanna
WHEN the petrol subsidy strike took place in January this year I was one of those initially opposed to it. Apart from the fact that I take the activities of some non-governmental organisations (NGO’s) with a pinch of salt because they are sponsored agents, I am a genuine believer in deregulation, especially of the petroleum downstream.

My mind became locked against the protests, especially the ones at the Gani Fawehinmi Square in Lagos, for reasons to be discussed later.

However, I must confess that the protest did produce a very useful outcome in the overall interest of the nation: it spurred the House of Representatives into action. The House suspended its holiday, convened on a Sunday and before long, the petrol subsidy probes were born. Based on the mind-bending scale of corruption exposed in the probe, I am now looking forward to the impending street protests being proposed by civil society, but subject to terms and conditions that will shortly be discussed.

First of all, let me summarise my reasons for believing that a wake-up strike on the President Goodluck Jonathan regime is now a matter of utmost national importance. It now one year after Jonathan was sworn in following his election. It is equally two years since he assumed full powers as president of Nigeria and two and a half years since he started calling the shots in the absence of then ailing President Umaru Musa Yar’ Adua.

The question is: what has changed? What has been the GEJ impetus? Almost everybody is now saying perhaps we made a huge mistake in giving him our support, though the opposition parties, especially the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) and the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) did not give us better options.

Economy from bad to worse

The economy has gone from bad to worse, with our domestic and foreign debts climbing higher and higher in spite of the rising income we reap from our national primary economic product, crude oil. Jonathan hired some of the supposedly best hands available in the areas of finance and the economy (Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala), agriculture (Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina), power and steel (Prof Barth Nnaji) and investment and trade (Dr. Olusegun Aganga). No impact has been noticed. In fact, our fortunes in the power sector have dwindled since Nnaji took over, with empty excuses as our daily staple.

GEJ also hired some of the supposedly best hands in security and counter-terrorism. These include the over-decorated General Andrew Owoye Azazi (National Security Adviser) and Lt General Sarkin Yakin Bello, his assistant on counter-terrorism, yet Islamists have continued to widen the scope of their attacks on innocent Nigerians all over Northern Nigeria, with no sign of abatement. What we hear from GEJ, the Minister of Defence Alhaji Haliru Bello and the spokesperson of the State Security Services, Marilyn Ogar, is that the terrorists would “soon” be overcome.

Apart from the perceived inability of the Jonathan government to curtail terrorism and protect the lives and property of Nigerians, corruption has ballooned in this dispensation perhaps more than at any other time in our history. The subsidy probes have unearthed a new kind of corruption. It is no longer ten per cent “kickbacks” for which regimes were toppled in the past. It has gone beyond inflation of contract sums and deposit of people’s money in banks for personal gain. It is now bigger than creating ghost workers and pensioners. The subsidy probes revealed the new dimension whereby people were given papers to go and collect billions of naira, JUST LIKE THAT! For that, the government and people of Nigeria were milked to the tune of over 2.3 trillion Naira in 2011 alone.

The massive fraud was perpetrated in within the agencies of the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, with another supposedly “best hand”, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke in charge! This lady, who is never short in tons of sibilant grammar, has transferred her serial incompetence which was noticed when she presided over the Federal Ministry of Transport to Petroleum after a stint in Solid Minerals; her major strong point being that, apart from being from a favoured tribe, she is also highly connected to the ruling families.

Just as the shock of these corruption disclosures started sinking in and Nigerians started asking for action against the looters of our treasury, we started seeing groups of rag-tag youth protesting in the streets of Port Harcourt and Abuja asking us to leave Diezani and the Managing Director of the nest of corruption, the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr. Austin Oniwon, alone! It was at this point that I decided that the real Nigerians must march to reclaim their country from the hands of those who are determined to finish what is left of the economy.

This resolve became even more urgent when the Political Adviser to President Jonathan, Alhaji Gullak Ali, discredited the subsidy probe, describing it as “lacking credibility”. This was in total contrast to the President’s pledge to implement the recommendations of the probe ensuring there would be no sacred cows. I am left to wonder whether Ali’s kite is not the real posture of an administration that permitted the sponsorship of protesters in support of Diezani and Oniwon? If this is the real mindset of the regime, then efforts will be made to paper over the subsidy probe and the offenders will go unpunished. And where will that leave our country and our economy?

Prepare for the civil society marches

That is why we must prepare for the civil society marches. However, there is a caveat emptor. Some vested political interests are already getting set to hijack the protest. The Pastor Tunde Bakare-led so-called Save Nigeria Group (SNG), which is now the rabble-rousing platform of the CPC, has served notice that they would organise a march within two weeks unless government acts on the subsidy probe report. In January, it was the fouling of the petrol subsidy strikes organised by Labour that eventually foiled the protests, simply because the CPC and ACN in Lagos coalesced to hijack the Ojota protests, calling for “regime change”. They tried to get through “regime change” what they failed to get at the polls of 2011.

The CPC and ACN must restrict themselves to their democratic roles as parties in opposition and allow Labour and civil society to continue to organise the people whenever necessary (as it is now) to give the government a piece of their minds. Any attempt by politicians to hijack this event must be resisted. Let politicians keep out of these protests!

“Everything is turning around…”

PENULTIMATE Saturday, I joined other friends and well wishers of Mazi Alex Otti, the Group Managing Director of Diamond Bank Plc as he received a Doctor of Science Degree (Honoris Causa) conferred on him by the University of Port Harcourt.

I was overcome with sadness when the bandstand started singing the stirring gospel song: I can see everything turning around for my good, and the over five thousand graduands, young men and women, joined in a joyful chorus and dancing, obviously claiming that prophecy for themselves. And yet they were about to be let go into a world full of despair, joblessness and hopelessness.

From the sheltered care and financial support of their parents and guardians, these youth would henceforth lose the right to ask for pocket or upkeep money. Currently, Nigeria has 117 universities, and most of them will be similarly graduating thousands of students into a labour market that has very little space for newcomers.

I wondered whether the same feeling that was going through me was going through the Minister of Education, Professor Ruqqayatu Rufai and Mr. Nyesom Wike, her counter part Minister of State, as well as the Governor, Chibuike Amaechi? Or, perhaps, these government officials are so used to scenes of this nature (as doctors are used to seeing sick people die) that they no longer feel anything? I hope the University, which prides itself as an institution that trains entrepreneurs giving its students the competitive edge, does live up to its billing.

Otti is a rare testimonial to this. A First Class graduate of Economics and Best Graduating Student/Valedictorian of UNIPORT in 1988, Otti is the first and only alumnus of the University to be conferred with its honorary degree, apart from also having recently completed his tenure as a member of the University’s Governing Council.

Otti shares similar achievement traits with Governor Amaechi, who also graduated with him from the same University in 1998. While one became a governor the other became the chief executive of one of the nation’s stablest banks.

That relationship, which remained unbroken over the years, was confirmed with a banquet in honour of Otti at the Government House later that evening.

With this in mind, the graduating students should take heart in the fact that though the job situation out there is bleak, there are still quite a number of people surging ahead in spite of the odds.