with

Ben C. Abraham.

THAT PRESIDENTIAL PARDON

I remember growing up back in the day and hear our parents use the phrase ‘wonders shall never end’ to describe implausible situations. Those words never ceased being spoken by people. Today, now parents, we say those same words when hard-to-believe events occur or stories are told. A wonder is an event that elicits amazement, astonishment and incredulity. Incidentally, Nigeria is a domain of wonders; a place where wonders are commonplace such that wonders cease to be what they should be. So, for something to be truly a wonder in Nigeria it must be taken a notch higher in disbelief. That higher notch came on the 10th of October when Nigerians woke up to the announcement of President Tinubu’s pardon for dead and living Nigerians. The list contained 175 persons some of who are deceased. No sooner was the list released than all hell let loose. Nigerians were treated to a show of bewilderment. The list of Nigeria’s presidential prerogative of mercy contained deceased Nigerians like Nationalist Herbert Macaulay, the Ogoni nine and Military General cum poet Mamman Vatsa on the one side; and ex-convict Farouk Lawan, convicted killer Maryam Sanda and convicted kidnapper Kelvin Ezigbe on the other side. There were also convicted drug barons, oil pipeline vandals and fraudsters on the same list, all of them beneficiaries of our President’s mercy; the patron ‘Saint’ of mercies. Nigerians have run out of adjectives to describe the exact nature of insanity that this Government suffers from. As expected, Government spokesman Bayo Onanuga defended the choice of beneficiaries lauding the decision as based on remorse, good conduct, old age, vocational skills and educational programs. In addition, the Presidential Advisory Committee on the Prerogative of Mercy chaired by the Federal Attorney-General Prince Lateef Fagbemi stated that the beneficiaries were selected and recommended after careful considerations. How do you justify lumping Herbert Macaulay and the Ogoni nine with Maryam Sanda and Kelvin Ezigbe on the same list? It’s utter desecration at the least. And in response, the descendants of Herbert Macaulay have asked the Federal Government to remove their father from the list and grant him pardon on a standalone basis. So many others have spoken, absolutely horrified at the show of shame. In quick retreat, Nigerians have been told that the last has not been heard of the list and that some tinkering is going on. Isn’t that too little too late? Again, the thought processes of this Government have been made manifest in that list, this not being the first time they are indulging in shocking decisions. As one commentator stated, this is where mercy becomes madness. Indeed, wonders shall not cease in Nigeria.

PAUL BIYA – AFRICA’s ‘ROLE MODEL’;

Presidential elections happen in Cameroun once every 7 years; that Central African Nation with 30 million inhabitants. 2025 has witnessed another cycle of elections and the ‘results’ are being awaited. While the electoral body is preparing to announce the official results, the unofficial tallying points to 92-year-old head of State, Paul Biya as the winner. Mr. Biya has been in power for 43 years and if God permits his life, by the time this term finishes he would have ruled his country for 50 years. By that time, Biya would be 99 years. Paul Biya holds the record as the world’s oldest President and has never lost an election since 1982 when he assumed power. Before becoming President, Biya served as Prime Minister from 1975 to 1982. For effect, I was in primary one when Paul Biya first tasted power. Since then, Biya has reinforced his chokehold on Cameroonian politics and people; a people famished, backward and in utter despair. Sometime this year, rumours had it that Biya had kicked the bucket after a long battle with age-induced sickness. But just as a cat with nine lives, he bounced back and bounced into the election arena. In a post on his handle, he told Cameroonians to be rest assured that ‘my determination to serve you matches the urgency of the challenges we face.’ He added that his decision to offer himself for service was rooted in calls from many Cameroonians at home and abroad; popular lines you know. Pray, what urgent challenges facing the Cameroonian people can Paul Biya bring solutions to after 7 years as Prime Minister and 43 years as President? What kind of system produces and props up characters like Paul Biya? What does this say about the Cameroonian people? Paul Biya is at the head of a ‘cult’ of stay-put heads of Governments in Africa who manipulate their country’s constitution and dig in with the help of external powers who are rewarded with unlimited access to whatever natural resources the country has. Last week, a picture chart of leaders in the Cameroonian Government trended online. There were pictures and ages of the President, Paul Biya, Senate President, Head of Judiciary, Head of Police etc. None of them is below 80 years old. The President is indeed in good company. All hail Paul Biya, Africa’s poster boy for ancestor-leader.

……AND ONE OTHER THING:

ASUU AGAIN;

Another round of academic unrest is loading. Last week, the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) embarked on a 2-week nationwide warning strike after failed attempts to get the Federal Government to honour their agreement for improved funding, welfare and autonomy of universities. As usual, there have been accusations and counter-accusations and the back and forth between ASUU represented by their National President Prof Christopher Piwuna and Federal Ministry of Education officials. ASUU has often referenced the 2011 agreements with the Federal Government as the bone of contention. They demand specific performance or at least an acknowledgement of the issues and a phased tackling of same. Initially, the Ministry disagreed, stating that what happened in 2011 wasn’t an agreement but a kind of non-committal understanding. Later they recanted acknowledging the agreement. But the issues keep compounding and increasing in complexity while retaining the same flavor – funds or do we say, lack of it. ASUU is demanding the payment of withheld salaries of its members, unremitted pension deductions and the release of N50bn revitalization funds withheld by the Ministry of education. They lament that the Government has pauperized lecturers noting that Nigerian lecturers are the poorest in Africa and cannot attract scholars from outside the country. They added that colleagues in even Uganda and Zimbabwe earn more than lecturers in Nigeria. While a professor in South Africa earns N6m monthly and his colleague in Ghana N1.5m, a Nigerian professor earns N500,000 monthly. It is the same in welfare and working conditions. The saying is true that when two elephants fight, the grass suffers and so it is at the moment as students have vacated campuses and gone home or elsewhere, anywhere. ASUU has warned that time is ticking and after the 2 weeks, they will decide on a total indefinite strike. Unfortunately, this Government takes more pleasure in funding bloated coastal roads and white elephant infrastructure while education, the bedrock of any development, suffers; in any case, they have their children in schools abroad. Well, the Senate Committee on tertiary education and TETFUND has intervened in the matter promising to whip the Government into line. How they intend to achieve that I do not know. Let’s keep our fingers crossed.

Sheik Ahmed Gumi, popular Islamic cleric recently polluted the National stream when he made a post on social media using a video which showed a helicopter dropping supplies to bandits while incredibly stating that there was no need killing the bandits. Hear him, ‘The truth has come out! Here are the bandits enforcing their support. They are not politicians; they are people of ketare. We are fools, we are just wasting away our brothers’ blood, and we are burning the fire of war. The solution to this is to save the people being used; we show them brotherhood through reconciliation, not war.’ The post quickly went viral drawing all manner of caustic retorts. What Gumi was saying is that the bandits deserve our sympathy and embrace; killing them was out of it even as they went about killing, maiming and pillaging wretched natives. Gumi was directly celebrating the successful supplies which the bandits enjoyed as shown in the video. For him, it was proof that the Government was losing the war against terror and that continuing to fight them was a foolish thing hence his ascription to the Government and the military as fools. Hear him again…’we are fools.’ Meanwhile a check on FactCheckHub, an online fact check portal showed that the video was false having been earlier ascribed to an event in Darfur, Sudan. In May 2025, the Sheik was barred from entering Saudi Arabia to perform the hajj even though he had a valid visa. The Saudi authorities stated that he was barred based on his political views. He returned to Nigeria and continued in those political views. Do we need to be reminded that Saudi Arabia holds the rare privilege of housing the holiest sites of Islam hence the pilgrimage from every part of the world to Saudi? Yet the Saudi Government refused Gumi entry for the hajj even though he is a popular Islamic cleric. The rejection spoke volumes but not for Nigeria to learn from. The extant post was not the first time Gumi would pander to these blood-sucking men. He had visited them in their hideout, advocated for them and now called the President and his men fools. Yet Gumi struts about freely, free from DSS harassment and military squelching. Recently someone called President Tinubu a criminal and all hell was let loose. Definitely Gumi knows a lot more than we do. When you join this to what former Governor now-turned-attack bulldog El-Rufai and ex Labour party vice presidential candidate Datti Baba Ahmed said recently about banditry in Nigeria and the Buhari connection, then you begin to see why Gumi is freer than every felon in Nigeria. It is time we canonized this phenomenon as the patron ‘saint’ of bandits.