Your Excellency Sir: There is urgent need to reorganize our party—the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) at every level, from the grassroots up to the national level with the active participation of youths in the decision-making and implementation processes! There are urgent and necessary actions to be taken for posterity sake.
Your Excellency Sir: There is urgent need to reorganize our party—the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) at every level, from the grassroots up to the national level with the active participation of youths in the decision-making and implementation processes! There are urgent and necessary actions to be taken for posterity sake.
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The national board and leadership of our party can, as a matter of expediency, dissolve all states and local party leaderships and boards. The current state of the People’s Democratic Party is pathetic, and we must acknowledge that we have deviated from the basic principles in our party constitution; we initially stood for a fairer and better society devoid of governmental wastage and to uplift the rule of law as well as the sanctity of a genuinely amended constitution and national unity. However, prior to the 1999 democracy, there were visibly conflicting interests even at that formative stage, but the urgency of getting the military out prevented us from conceiving unified ideologies that can be protected and defended through decades or centuries. Thus, many state and local council leadership are strongly under the control of heartless hegemonic crooks whose sole motivation in governance is to cease and thwart the electoral processes to their advantage with unlimited control of state resources and national allocations for their exclusive luxuries while millions of masses suffer and starve! The party is infected and infested by many individuals who can kill, maim, and destroy at the slightest of provocations. Human lives have become meaningless and worthless due to this brand of politicians. The youth in the party have been transformed and confined to thuggery. Many political delegates feel excited to sell and resell out to highest bidders during various primary elections. Many individuals seek strange yet barbaric means through voodoo oath-takings to subject favored public office candidates to a lifetime selfish allegiance above the oaths to serve the fatherland. This norm is not exclusive to our party alone; rather, this is visible in many opposition parties.
Many politicians cross over to various parties in perpetuation of these acts.
This is a trend! This trend has become a cankerworm and poses monumental
disaster to our democracy and national security if left unchecked. Our party leads the nation; hence, we have to set and achieve a standard that can be seen to be exemplary and patriotic to our fatherland. There is urgent need to reorganize the party and conduct a peaceful yet free internal democratic elections to party leaderships at all levels; only until this is instituted can we entrench the practice of genuine democracy in the Nigerian polity.
The party cannot stand and watch prominent members and its elected officials indicted and prosecuted for corrupt charges without any wide-scale investigations independently initiated by the party’s national disciplinary committee. Many PDP governors have underperformed and even thwarted the efforts and policies initiated by the national PDP-led presidency yet seek and were cleared to re-contest for second terms. Many PDP governors have corruptly embezzled hundreds of billions in national allocations yet parade the landscape of the nation in loud sirens, convoys with tight security, and thugs. Individuals like these are the direct reason our party is failing and may soon become unpopular. Many blames and accusations have been shifted all too easily at ex-President Obasanjo, yet we fail to realize the collective dynamics within the party and nationwide that inhibits progress and frustrates the efforts of national patriots. Obasanjo relied and trusted various governors to deliver on promises and federally initiated policies but little did he know that these individuals would in fact subvert his efforts, yet they (governors) garner support from sycophants like various royal fathers, community leaders, youths, influential politicians, etc., who totally sold out for cheap use. The nation is worse off due to these practices.
Consider the state of the agricultural sector; please feel free to carry out a simple investigation—take a stroll out of the luxurious presidential villa with one hundred naira in your wallet and without any siren blaring convoy.
Please proceed on cab to any local market and see if you can get a loaf or
tin of garri (Nigerian staple food) for less than one hundred naira, instead these are available for about a dollar. You may also notice the wide variations in prices of agricultural products, which in effect does not influence market competitiveness; rather, it compounds inflationary trends. This is so in many areas of Nigerian life, but this is a good reason why the agriculture and productivity minister deserves the sack! This ministry, like many others, lacks purpose-driven leaderships; hence, policies are lukewarmly conceived and executed, personal interest and politics have become the guiding principles by which many ministries are run. Well, on your return back to the comfort of the presidential palace, you may wonder what can be done to provoke visible change. The answer is simple—carry out drastic reforms!
The system is contaminated, full of economic and political saboteurs. Your
advisers are either too timid to admit this or are equally part of the nation’s problems; otherwise, they will press you on for urgent credible reforms.
The fall out of a public sector reform is a huge pension and payoffs bill. That is because the nation has no clear pension policy and administration, but that is why as president, it’s your job to fix that. The nation can either continually pay pensions to crooks who labored hard enough over decades to fleece her resources or set in motion processes, procedures, and policies to alter this trend in the face of the anticipated reforms. As the number one citizen ofNigeria and its chief security officer, you must muster enough courage and determination to take decisive actions even though sacrificial to some interest.
There must be stronger political will to enforcing economic policies;
otherwise, your government’s seven cardinal agenda will be as good or
worthless as the paper on which they are written. It is very important to
appoint persons with good knowledge or understanding of public service
institutions’ capacity building and deliveries as against individuals who
continually flood government ministries with family members, friends, and
kinsmen. Government processes and procedures can be strengthened but
not with the involvement of these individuals and many known serial looters
or saboteurs. There ought to be more executive roles for the youths. This is the best way to rebrand Nigeria, but why is it unconstitutional that even at thirty-five years, a person is considered too inexperienced to run this country regardless of his or her beliefs, ideologies, and personal vision on the destiny of this nation? There are thousands of young Nigerians with burning desire and zeal to turn things around for good, yet there are equally several thousands of oldies who see no reason why things should turn around so soon. Nigeria has had numerous “experienced” leaders who have left us far worse off than we started off since 1960. Are members of the national assembly not experienced enough to realize that the Nigerian Human Development Index (HDI) stands at merely $2,156 annually and that it is commonsensical and expedient for them to earn at most four times of the nation’s GDP per capita which may amount to about $11,000 annually as against the senseless amount of $1.7 million annually per member? Mr.
President, this is the reason why our politics have become so enticingly
lucrative and fraught with “cash and carry” processes. This is why the ongoing electoral reform is failure-bound even prior to conception. As president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, it is well within your power to insist that all wages to public servants be interpreted and disbursed in local naira currency as against dollarized expressions! Do you enjoy watching some categories of public servants allocate these millions of dollars to themselves while ordinary public servants earn a minimum miserable wage of $100 per month? Are these corrupt lawmakers any better or superior or more patriotic in national service? If you think it is reasonable for them to be paid in dollars, then do not hesitate to pay all Nigerian academic professors the same wage obtainable overseas. The biggest problem of our democracy is not the actions of some poor ignorant individuals who choose to sell their voting rights. In fact, that only makes slight impact on the overall outcome of our elections but can be addressed easily. However, the biggest obstacle that damages our democratic processes is the actions of compromised electoral commissioners and returning officers who are easily influenced to falsify or alter results for various highest bidders or sitting officeholders. This is why many other men are ruthlessly desperate to kill, and kill again yet maim another day in a bid to subvert and derail the electoral processes.
This is the reason why impoverished youths are armed or easily induced to sell their conscience and votes. This is the reason why the agitations in the land and bombings by restive Niger Delta youths remain constant. This is equally the reason why religious and political conflicts are prevalent in some areas. The issue of the Niger Delta area, like elsewhere, may seem complex, yet the solutions may not be farfetched. There exists a widened gap or, in many instances, a breakdown of communication and mistrust between government and the people even at the grassroots level. Various communities, tribal groups, and individuals clamor for attention via agitations for more states or councils or resource control because the prevailing government institutions have hugely failed on service delivery.
Mr. President, you may realize that Obasanjo’s government made credible efforts by creating the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) as well as increased funding to various oil-producing states, yet the inefficiencies and failings of these actions at curtailing the restiveness of the Niger Delta youth was inevitable in the face of our weak judiciary and porous national funds management systems.
Hence, accountability by various public officials was lukewarmly enforced or largely subverted; stolen funds recovery processes is fraught with unnecessary bottlenecks made possible by some Nigerian legal practitioners and other Nigerians, but the federal government of Nigeria ought to realize that ensuring credible leadership at the local councils especially in oil regions must be part of any long-term developmental plan that can disarm youth, reintegrate, and empower the people as well as sustain a system of peaceful developments. In addition, compel them (the youth or the people) to the observance of constituted authority.
Proposed Niger Delta Plan
Under Yar’Adua’s government, an amnesty program was initiated. This
was a welcomed decision; however, its timing, contents, and implementation
processes were ill-conceived. Why does a government think it is applaudable
to set up temporary rehabilitation camps to train and hand cash to ex-militants or even send them abroad for training then assume the problems
are solved? After the skills training and monetary inducements, are they
(ex-militants) expected to return to the devastated creeks they call home?
Are they meant to return to communities that lacked good housing
schemes, employment, nonexistent basic infrastructures, and polluted
rivers? Even with the acquired skills, where are the jobs or patronages when the developmental efforts of the federal government are undermined by
the activities of various public officials and contractors under the NDDC
and yet again the ministry of Niger Delta. Mr. President, sir, based on
my short experience few years ago as a youth corp member attached to a
governor’s office coupled with observations over decades, I am certain that
the problems are not within the policies but the institutional framework
by which government seeks to achieve its developmental plans. Firstly,
the Nigerian federal government must be mindful and deal severely with
various saboteurs (politicians, serving or ex-service chiefs, public officials, traditional kings, illegal oil bunkerers and illegal refinery operators, etc.) inhibiting its developmental efforts. Then the government should ensure that leadership at every local council especially within the Niger Delta area is strictly in adherence to the principles of genuine democracy. The vast population of youths, women, and men should be allowed to put forward credible candidates who they know and trust to deliver. These councils’ leadership or institutions would form the bedrock for a federal government’s impact investment, rehabilitation, and infrastructural development plan.
The council leaderships will ensure that various councils in this region are well reorganized, suitably staffed, departments developed, and equipped
but strengthened for operations. The plan can be funded under the
Niger Delta Development Commission as well as funds from resources’
derivation allocations instead of the creation of a parallel public ministry or payments to state governors. Under this plan, many stakeholders, including multinationals, can work with the federal, zonal, and local governments to ensure capacity building, infrastructural, and manpower development at the grassroots level. The processes, guided by accountability and fairness, can offer various developmental contracts to companies with operations in those zones or others willing to set up operational bases in the Niger Delta areas. There can be verifiable evidence of local employment records (not contract employments please) before tenders are even accepted, subcontractors who are ex-militant youths (with their newly acquired skills) can be asked to register with the various councils’ respective departments for small and medium contracts. Mr. President, you must accept that the current practices where many inflated contracts are initiated and influenced by Abuja or the hierarchy of governing bodies is inhibitive to progress in that region in particular and around the nation. The grievances of the Niger Delta people is not about controlling national oil resources; rather, it is aimed at stimulating a well-planned long-term communities’ regeneration efforts by the federal government instead of uncoordinated programs and projects that leaves one wondering whether the government is in so much of a hurry to get the people quietened.
This open letter to Nigeria's President is an abstract from the book; 'Lost Legacies and Broken Promises of Our Fathers', written as a medium to communicate the critical desires and want of several millions of oppressed grassroots citizens who ought to be empowered and developed as viable instrument for a new Nigeria!
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