Whether it is American politics with its characteristic intensity and sometimes crude and calumnious election campaigns, or it’s the Nigerian electoral feverishness with its jabbering, lies, and bold-faced mendacity, political campaigns in these two climes routinely throw me into a state of electrifying excitement at their onsets. Aside from gruesome killings and kidnapping episodes, and the splurging orgies and cash-carrying wastages of resources, I always look forward to campaign seasons in Nigeria.
The commencement of the season reinforces the fact that I have always known since I cut my teeth in the observatories of global politics. Politicians are half-human and half-beasts. They are half-sane and almost fully and deliberately schizophrenic. To the politician, every ally is a potential adversary; and today’s foe is tomorrow’s potential fanatical friend. In politics, there is no permanent friend; personal interests, in their innumerable verses and versions, are front-and-centre in the think-tank of politicians. To politicians everywhere and anywhere, self-interest is the oxygen they breathe.
In 2014, former President Olusegun Obasanjo threw his godson, Goodluck Jonathan, under the bus and jumped on the gigantic campaign wagon of retired Gen. Muhammadu Buhari. Obasanjo and Buhari’s military backgrounds, not ideas or ideologies, probably brought them together singing like canary lovebirds. I am bold to conclude without any equivocation that neither Sai baba nor Baba Iyabo has clear ideological pathways that younger Nigerians can tread with the hope of one day becoming ideological titans. In months leading up to the 2015 election, Obasanjo said many lofty words about Buhari: “I see Buhari as the next President and Jonathan is aware of that…” Baba voted for Buhari and power changed hands. A few months ago, in a ruthless and radical spin-around, (this was not unexpected) Obasanjo sounded an alarm asking the President not to run for re-election in 2019. Baba has since spoken many awry things about Buhari’s leadership ability or lack of it. And those words of recrimination eventually loosened up the taciturn tongue o the President who wants to remain in power until 2023.
At a private meeting made public in the Villa, Buhari hauled the following jarring jabs and jibes: “…and one of the former Heads of State between that time was bragging that he spent more than 15 billion American dollars, not naira, on power. Where is the power? Where is the power? And now, we have to pay the debts…” Buhari didn’t have to name names. We knew the direction the sword swung. And the target, Baba Iyabo, knew it too. Buhari did not accuse Obasanjo or anyone of corruption. He only asked a generic question: “Where is the power”? And Obasanjo fired back doubling down on his earlier multiple tirades that Mr. President is clueless and unknowing.
Sixteen years before Buhari came aboard, reports had it that a total sum of $29.635 billion or N6.52 trillion was wasted on electricity supply between three presidents from the same party. The administration of former President Obasanjo reportedly spent $16bn (N3.52tn). His successor, the late President Umaru Yar’Adua, expended $5.375bn (N1.183tn). Immediate past President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration spent $8.26bn (N1.817tn). We don’t know where power is; but we have an idea where the money went. Nigerians know where their stolen money goes; they just don’t have the boldness to stop the traffickers. Defenders of Baba Obasanjo’s reported $16bn are now saying that the former President spent only about $4billion on power. Are we saying it is better to waste $4bn than flush $16bn down the drainpipe? Must we now argue over “how much” rather than the ‘how well’? Progress and development come out as still-born twins of metastatic misery and massive mess.
Nigeria has spent at least N15tn on power since democracy showed up with its hydra-headed, dehydrating, debilitating monster self in 1999. But where is the promised power, my friends? China constructed the world’s largest 22,000 MW hydro-electric plant for $25bn. Nigeria spent $35.45bn for 2,500 MW. Nigeria today is in megawatt of darkness with gigabyte of excuses from those who are wont to over-promising that light will soon replace darkness. Money budgeted for power melted like ice cream in the oven of fraud and corruption. Where is the promised power? Corruption and truth aren’t in the same category. They inhabit not in the same dwelling tent. While truth lives in the iron-dome self-defending, corruption lives in a bubble self-defeating. Even if maligned and doctored by experts in espieglerie, truth will always and forever defend itself. The corrupt in Nigeria will continue to try; but corruption cannot be defended even by the cryptically corrupt and their myrmidons. Misery will not end in Nigeria if the mischievous continue to oversee any sector of the nation’s economy.
The Information Minister, Lai Mohammed, also told us not too long ago that when this administration assumed office, available power on the grid totalled 2,690MW, transmission capacity was around 5,000MW and distribution capacity was 4,000MW. As of September 4, 2017, the available power that can be put on the grid was 6,619MW; the transmission capacity was simulated at 6,700 MW (up from 5,000 MW in 2015) but the distribution capacity was 4,600 MW, which was what was put on the grid. On September 12, 2017, production of power reached an all-time level of 7,001MW. President Buhari said in his New Year speech that the nation’s generating capacity was at 7,000MW; and just over 5,000MW was distributed in December. But where is the power? When will Nigerians stop hurting Nigeria?
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What manner of bank charges?
By Victoria Ngozi Ikeano
Often we are told of the advantages of cultivating a savings culture. But with dwindling purchasing power due to inflationary trends that leaves you with practically nothing to save, our banks are coming up with promotional offers that offer depositors mouth watering gifts, all in a bid to lure them to open accounts with them. Also, the cashless policy which practically forbids cash transactions with concomitant fines for high volume cash transactions has egged many people, not least employees at all levels to open bank accounts. Coupled with this is the rather irresistible allure of digital banking that is being sold to us which is indeed the unique selling point of banks.
With it you can send and receive money to/from anybody in any part of the country in a jiffy, as well as purchase items on line. This has made it compulsory for virtually everybody to get an automated teller machine (ATM) card better known as a debit card. With it even students, the unemployed and semi-literate can easily get people to ‘dash’ them money by simply paying it into their bank accounts and then going to withdraw it at anytime with their ATM. Alas, the convenience and comfort of modern day digital banking comes with a cost that is making many people, especially the average Nigerian, long for the good old days of cash transactions when they can get their salary or gift money intact. The cost comes with the plethora of bank charges associated with internet/telephone banking and compulsory use of your ATM. Bankers should not tell me that these charges are relatively small for, as a saying goes, little drops of water make an ocean.
Consider that for every text message notification sent you, for each of your transaction, whether debit or credit, the bank charges you N10 instead of the N4 recommended by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). And for each transaction, they send you two text messages consecutively – one notifying you of the successful transfer (debit) and another notifying you of a N52 tax on it. Surprisingly, even for buying recharge cards you are charged for the message! For example I have a Diamond Yello Account (DYA) and although I do pay some money into this account, all I do with it is for buying of MTN cards for my phone. However, once in a while I receive messages from Diamond Bank intimating me that X amount has been deducted from my DYA for text messages. Once when I phoned the Nigeria Communications Commission to complain of being charged money for buying recharge cards through the bank I was advised to take up the issue with the bank itself.
Now when you transfer money to someone, the banks charge you for doing so. When that person goes to withdraw the money, the bank charges him/her for that action. At the end of it you find that the money sent is actually reduced. In order for the recipient to receive the actual cash equivalent you have to add something to the real cash amount, taking into consideration, the anticipated bank charges which you now pay in advance with the additions to the actual cash amount you wish to give the person. Thus while the person withdraws the actual amount for him/her, the extra you topped on it will be deducted subsequently by the bank by way of text and other bank charges. Whereas our financial institutions are quick to deduct customers’ money for their plethora of bank charges including text messages, they are reluctant to provide toll free telephone lines to customers for queries. Why? Are they so profit-minded?
Consider these multiplicity of charges by our banks, namely, N10 for every debit/credit alert they send to us, N1000 every year for the ATM card they issue to us, 65 kobo each time we use our ATM card in other banks, N100 for every transfer to other bank accounts we make with the card, N3,000 for security tokens they give us for internet banking; N50 stamp duty charge for every transaction of N1000 and above made via electronic transfer or cash/cheque book; then there is the “transaction maintenance fee of N1 per N1000 on all debit transactions carried out on current accounts”. They also charge monthly ATM fee of N52.50. These are in addition to value added tax (VAT) and withholding tax. Are our banks so profit minded?
All 36 states and the federal capital territory are looking to expand their tax net, to increase the number of people and items on which tax is paid. More indirect taxes for especially the self-employed and under-employed are being contemplated as states and the federal government itself scramble to increase their revenue, especially internally generated revenue. These and other utility bills are to be/ being paid through the banks. The average Nigerian would be willing to pay whatever taxes are imposed on him/her if what he/she is paying is commensurate with the services being rendered.
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