We Were Scammed! - The Many Lies of Mr. President

by Eze Eluchie

1ST IN THE SERIES OF THE MANY LIES OF MR. PRESIDENT
I will declare my assets, publicly.
- Muhammadu Buhari.

Conscious of the yearnings by Nigerians for greater level of transparency from those who aspire to lead the country, Mr. Buhari, whilst campaigning to be elected President expressly reiterated in his ‘I Pledge To Nigerians’, ‘to publicly declare my assets and liabilities, encourage all my appointees to publicity declare their assets and liabilities as a pre-condition for appointment’.

Immediately upon being sworn into office, drastic changes, amounting to violent assaults on the pledge to publicly declare assets became pronounced. Recourse was had to legalese, subterfuge under contrived protocols and bureaucracy and even direct insults on the sensibilities of the populace, with some of his aides asking Nigerians to ‘show proof’ that any such ‘pledges’ were made.

By his failure to publicly declare his assets upon being sworn into office (and ensuring that his appointee thus far do same), Mr. Buhari has created an enabling environment for monumental fleecing for self-enrichment of the Nigerian treasury, as it becomes impossible for the Nigerian public and interested parties to gauge his assets prior to entry into office and at the expiry of his tenure.

Over 70 days after his ascendance into the Office of President of the Federal Republic, Muhammadu Buhari has failed to publicly declare his assets.

Muhammadu Buhari, on this score, lied!



2ND IN THE SERIES OF THE MANY LIES OF MR. PRESIDENT
There is no office of the First lady in the Nigerian constitution.
- Muhammadu Buhari

In selecting the falsehoods to be highlighted in this series, generous allowances are made for the usual hot balloons emitted by politicians in the heat of campaigns and focus is had merely to lies that give an insight into the character trait of Mr. President.

The need to reduce wastage in governance by scrapping the Office of the First Lady, a scam that had been transformed to a monumental drain-pipe of public funds, had over the years become an ideal dear to Nigerians. To cash in on this fad, whilst responding to questions from newsmen in Kaduna during the period preceding the 2015 presidential elections, Nigerians were unequivocally assured that such an office was unconstitutional and would have no place in his government, if he won the elections.

The Office of First Lady of the Federal Republic is in 'keeping with the pledge', now non-existent. In its place however, is the Office of the Wife of the President, occupying the very same office space as the Office of First Lady of the Federal Republic, serviced by an equal number of Special and Personal Assistants, security paraphernalia and lavish logistic arrangement all at great expense to the public purse. In addition, a ‘pet project’ of the WotP, the main funnel of public waste, is in the process of being unleashed on the helpless masses who had hoped for 'change'.

Muhammadu Buhari, on this score, again lied.



3RD IN THE SERIES OF THE MANY LIES OF MR. PRESIDENT
We will crush Boko Haram within two months
- Muhammadu Buhari

Coming from an uninformed aspirant to political office, the above statement made by President Buhari would not have qualified for inclusion in any serious ‘list of lies’, as ignorance of the intricacies of overcoming insurgencies would have been rightly presumed. Here, however, we have a retired General and former Commander-in-Chief of a country’s armed forces, who is presumed to at the very least appreciate the nature of tackling amorphous, armed entities. More worrisome is the fact that some elements in our military might have been led by Buhari's comments to mistrust the capability of their then C-in-C and his Military Commanders to lead and proceeded, in one instances, to shoot at their commanding officers, run AWOL from their position and generally suffer from a loss of morale. The comments however served to bolster the terrorists.

Well over 2 months after Mr. Muhammadu Buhari was sworn into office as President, Boko Haram has continued to increase in its viciousness and evil, attacking and killing Nigerians with reckless abandon. Early this week, we lost over 40 of our compatriots to a Boko Haram terror attack in Maidugri, Bornu State – and the only response from the Federal Government remains the much worn-out lie that the terror outfit will be ‘destroyed in no time’. Bunkum!

This lie was treacherous and bothered on treasonable felony.

At the swearing in of the new Chiefs of the various services of the Nigerian Armed Forces a few days ago, Mr. President shifted the goal post and ‘ordered’ the service chiefs of ‘destroy’ Boko Haram within 3 months. Not even the President of the United States or any of the international military powers will dare fix a time-frame within which to destroy terror organizations.

Muhammadu Buhari, on this score yet again, you lied!



Pictures: President Buhari, a poster congratulating an appointee to the Office of The Wife of The President and the Boko Haram insignia.

1. 

Can a beneficiary of corruption tackle corruption?

by Eze Eluchie

Can a beneficiary of corruption tackle corruption?

This is the question that will haunt the incumbent President of the Federal Republic as he continues to pontificate on his plans to ‘confront corruption’.

The answer to the question asked is ‘yes’! 
The ‘yes’, however, comes with a huge caveat – there must be conscious efforts by the beneficiary of corruption (Mr. President) to distance himself from the corrupt who funded his ascendance into Office. In the absence of a discontinuance of camaraderie between the beneficiary of corruption and his corrupt sponsors, all talk about ‘confronting corruption’ can be dismissed as inconsequential and mere hallucination.

In his recent trip to the United States, the official delegation of the Nigerian President comprised of some quite shady characters who occupy or occupied high political offices in Nigeria, positions which they use(d) to horrendously fleece the public treasury in Nigeria. It was thus no wonder that when the US President Barack Obama announced that he was ordering the American security and investigating agencies to collaborate with the Nigeria Government to ensure that looted public funds emanating from Nigeria and deposited in US financial houses or such outfits subject to US laws, were returned to Nigeria, there were a lot of bemused faces in the audience – men who knew that all such talk would amount to naught so long as they had good access to their man, the Nigerian President, whose campaign for presidency, they had bankrolled and ensured was ‘successful’.

The irony is that some of these characters, like the former Governor of Rivers State and major financier of Buhari’s presidential campaign, openly brag about their prowess in graft (see Blog Article: ‘The Audacity of Thieves’ http://ezeluchie.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-audacity-of-thieves.html) and yet others have sought to transform the opportunity of their entry into the White House and ‘golden handshake’ with the US President into tools to further fleece the hapless populations over whom the rule.

President Muhammadu Buhari must, somehow, find the courage to divest himself of the excess garbage that surround himself and purge himself of long established, though salient, nuances which may becloud whatsoever ideas he might have nurtured to leave an anti-corruption legacy and confront corruption.

For the sake of our contraption, it is hoped that genuine non-partisan, non-sectional and non-parochial actions be initiated and pursued to rid the Nigerian State of the scourge of corruption which has served to diminish us, blur our visions and enthrone poverty in our polity.

We simply cannot afford to continue the way we have been going on.

Picture: Two high profile sponsors of the Buhari presidency, ex-Governor Amaechi (Rivers State) and Governor Okorocha (Imo State)

Buhari's 'Reputation of Integrity'

by Eze Eluchie

'Buhari comes to office with a reputation of integrity'
- U.S. President, Barack Obama.

The stretch, mileage and mountains some in our clime have sought to build with the above quote, coating it as one of the major 'benefits to Nigeria and Africa' of the recent private visit of President Muhammadu Buhari to the United States, exposes a worrisome desperation for external acceptance and endorsement. 

When one realizes that clergymen, teachers and others imbued with fiduciary responsibilities, who {sexually} molest persons in their care and trust also had a 'reputation of integrity' prior to being exposed for the miscreants they are, the fact that the U.S. President merely put his mastery of the English language to good use by not openly endorsing a man he had no real personal knowledge of in any way whatsoever, suddenly hits one like a bolt out of the blues. 

That you come with a 'reputation of integrity' has no bearing whatsoever on whether one has integrity or not - you have to prove you have integrity!

Surreptitiously restricting inquiry and investigations into past corrupt practices to periods that craftily eliminate inquiry which could unearth corrupt practices which implicate President Buhari, his fellow military officers who had ruled Nigeria in times past and some of his key financiers; Appointing your former associate (Ms. Amina Zakari) as Chairman of the country's Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and another kinsman (Mr. Lawan Daura), who had acted as member of his political party's 'Campaign Intelligence Committee' as the Director General of the Department of State Security (DSS); Failing to make available to the public the detailed inventory of personal assets despite explicit and trite promises during the electioneering periods to make same available, amongst several other non-altruistic acts, tend to derogate from the persona of a 'person of integrity' and rather present an inner, perhaps long hidden from most others, character of bigotry, untruthfulness, opportunism, deception, selfishness and a total absence of integrity.

Integrity is the fulcrum of leadership and good governance. Integrity flows from actions and mannerisms and not merely from utterances of people far removed from your environment.

It is hoped that the present administration will focus more of its energies in proving the presence of integrity than getting stuck in the perception of a ‘reputation of integrity’.

Picture: Muhammadu Buhari (as a presidential candidate) with Lawan Zakari (member of Buhari’s political party's Campaign Intelligence Committtee) who President Buhari has just appointed Director General of the Department of State Security {DSS} - the equivalent of the American F.B.I. The opposition PDP has accused the DSS of embarking on partial witch-hunting of its members.