INSTITUTIONAL INEQUITIES AGAINST THE NIGERIAN CHILD By Emmanuel Onwubiko

Nigeria will on Monday, May 27th 2013 mark with the usual make- belief and heavily contrived fanfare in governmental quarters, the Children and Youth Day during which the Nigerian Children are celebrated and in much of the sermons that will characterize the event, the Children and Youth will be admonished by government officials, made up essentially of the same old people that have presided over such events in the last five decades, to be of good behavior and imbibe the essential leadership qualities of honesty, loyalty to fatherland, patriotism, fear of God and respect to constituted authority including their parents and guardians. It must be noted however that majority of the political leaders today are deficient in those virtues of good leadership which they will inevitably mouth out tomorrow at the various children and youth parade in Nigeria.

In some instances, Children in colorful school uniforms will be conscripted by their school authorities and made to stage carefully choreographed match passes during which the political administrators of the various levels of government will take the salute. The private and public television stations will also host series of Children programs aimed at entertaining the large number of children that will be in very convivial mood in the spirit of the Children's Day celebration. These same broadcasting stations have in all honesty failed to play their social corporate role of naming and shaming serial abusers of the rights of the Nigerian children.

At the level of state governments, it is expected that the 36 state governors will be in frenzy mood to outshine each other in rendering some flowery speeches to pour unrestrained encomiums on themselves and their wives [known in Nigeria as First Ladies] for implementing what they will cleverly but deceitfully call Children friendly projects and programs. Some of these so-called First Ladies in the 36 states of the Federation are already used to running very expensive pet programs some of which claim to be championing the human rights of the Children of their beloved states but most people in the states know that these first ladies are only serving their selfish pecuniary interest by using the influence of their husbands' offices to extort money hugely from contractors and other dubious business entrepreneurs who do regular business with these state governments.

One of the states in the South West has even gone to the media market to run series of paid advertisements inviting the whole nation to attend one of its kind Children and Youth Day in the state capital of this state that recently adopted its own flag and anthem. This particular state has invited over ten dozen traditional rulers to grace this Children Day in what is seen as another spending spree. An interesting dimension about the politics going on in this particular South West Nigerian state aforementioned is that the state governor who does not like being addressed as His Excellency as other governors would, recently introduced a feeding program for the school children in the public primary schools. The troubling development about this feeding program is that already the bureaucrats in this state are already brandishing some auditing claims which goes to show that several billions of Naira has already been spent feeding these school children but all of us know that these bureaucrats will capitalize on this feeding program to feed their pockets and fleece the state government of the scarce financial resources that ought to be used to maintain good and qualitative education for these children.  Besides, the state governor will also launch an information technology program targeted at empowering all the school children with designer laptop computers each.

While craving your indulgence dear readers to pardon my necessary digression from the body of the story, I will however state that Nigeria as a nation and the political leadership over the last fifty or so years since Nigeria became an independent political entity from Britain, have not being fair to the Nigerian children because there are so many institutional inequities that exist in the body politic that severely affect the enjoyment by the Children of their fundamental human rights and these institutional inequities will not be addressed or redressed by simply organizing colorful match passes and parades as will be witnessed on May 27th 2013 to mark the Children and youth Day.

First, the Nigerian Children who are caught up in areas whereby terrorism and civil unrests have flared up over the years are usually the worst affected victims of these violence even as most of these children in these troubled spots and flashpoints of terrorists attacks like the North East Nigeria are denied their fundamental right to good and quality education in addition to the fact that their parents and/or bread winners are put out of job because of the violence or are even killed in the line of fire thereby exposing these children to the vagaries of growing up in very harsh and hazardous social environment. In other parts of the country whereby there is relative peace and quiet, most of the children are faced with excruciating poverty because most parents of these children are either out of work or are too poor to enroll these children in good and qualitative educational institutions, they are therefore left with the devil's alternative of either hawking bread, pure and unhygienic water and other variety of wares for their parents or guardians to make a living or they are compelled by circumstances of hunger to loiter around in bus stops to beg for alms. Two things normally happen to these category of children of the poor and the disadvantaged who find themselves on the harsh streets of most state capitals and the commercial and political capitals of Lagos and Abuja hawking and roaming about begging for a living. These two things are either that the children are sexually violated by adult predatory and serial violent sex offenders or they are indoctrinated/recruited into the world of crime and criminality and used by adults to perpetuate evil and other manifestations of crime in the society.

A major institutional inequity in all of these atrocities committed against the innocent Nigerian children born into poor and disadvantaged homes is that the state governments and the federal government have no effective remedy in the event that they suffer such monumental crimes against humanity such as violent rape and other violations such as initiating or recruiting them into the World of crime and by so doing destroy their livelihood forever. 

The courts of competent jurisdiction as provided for in section 6 of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria ought to be charged with the sacred duty of redressing any of such violent sexual violations of the Nigerian Children but the administration of criminal justice in Nigeria is afflicted by the evil of compromise, corruption and serious systemic failure even as the institutions of law enforcement made up essentially of the Nigerian Police Force have shown total disregard and lack of interest and patriotic commitment to protect innocent children who fall prey to these sexual predatory animals who roam the streets of Nigeria as adult members of the communities whereby these children are born and bred.

The Nigerian Police Force is so notorious for lacking professional excellence and proficiency in effectively and efficiently prosecuting rapists of all dimensions because of a number of factors which include corruption, bribery and the lack of skills to carry through the constitutional job of ensuring that the Nigerian Children are protected from sex offenders and indeed are allowed unfettered opportunities to enjoy their fundamental human rights as enshrined in chapter four of the constitution of Nigeria. The lack of professionalism and the overwhelming presence of corruption and indiscipline among the operatives and officers of the Nigerian Police Force have all but contributed to the high rate of  rape of the Nigerian Children by adults and majority of these cases are either thrown out in the courts for want of diligent prosecution by the Police or the sex offenders escape with very lenient punishment that is not commensurate to the gravity of such crime of primitive sexual violations of the innocent Children. In some instances, the police close investigation of rape cases if there are accord on the parts of the Parents and the relations of the sex offenders and the innocent children are denied justice and left with the scar of being sexually violated and maimed forever.

But why is there no institution created apart from the notoriously incompetent Police Service Commission to monitor the performance of the operatives of the Nigerian Police Force and to ensure that Nigeria establishes a national crime data bank whereby all sex offenders are captured and clearly identified in the media to stop them from reoffending especially against the Nigerian Children? Why is the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and social development which supervises the Nigerian Children not clearly led by skilled persons who could monitor closely the performance of police prosecutors that handle rape cases involving the Nigerian Children? Why is there no Child welfare centers all around Nigeria and why has the National Human Rights Commission not yet opened functional desks across the country for the purposes of monitoring the prosecution of sex offenders accused of violating Nigerian Children? Why is it that since the year 2003 that the Nigerian Child Rights Act was promulgated by the National Assembly only a few states across the federation have domesticated this very strategic body of law that ought to protect the human rights of the Nigerian Children? Why has the Senator from Zamfara State  [Mr. SANI YERIMA] who blatantly violated relevant sections of the Child Rights Act by illegally marrying an alleged 13 year old Egyptian Girl Child not prosecuted even when groups of civil society organizations including the Human Rights Writers' Association of Nigeria cried out louder to the Federal Attorney General and the National anti-human Trafficking Agency [NAPTIP] to initiate the prosecution of this Senator?  Why did the anti-human trafficking agency give this Senator a clean bill of health even when allegations were widespread that he indeed married an alleged 13 year old Egyptian girl child? These are some of the deeply entrenched institutional inequities against the Nigerian Child. 

What makes the situation so compelling and sad is that the holder of the office of the Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development in today's Nigeria- Mrs. Zainab Maina seems to have resigned to the unfortunate fate that the Federal Government is too weak to compel the state governments to domesticate the Nigerian Child Rights Act of 2003.

In The Guardian of Sunday May 26th 2013 the Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development was quoted as saying that the Nigerian Children have been denied the full enjoyment of their rights in their states because the state houses of assembly have failed to pass the Nigerian Child Rights Act even as she stated that the Child Rights Act was introduced because Nigeria's national Government felt the need to give a legal backing to the commitment made by Nigeria under the United Nations convention on the Rights and welfare of the Nigerian Child. Why have these state governments failed to domesticate the Child Rights Act to fulfill Nigeria's obligation to the International humanitarian laws or are these components of the Nigerian federation not part of the whole federation? Again, since the Federal Ministry of Women Affairs and social development is so weak to wage advocacy programs in the 36 states of the Federation to successfully convince and persuade them to pass the Nigerian Child Rights Law in their respective States to benefit their children, why do we still waste so much tax payers money running that office of the Federal Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development? What is the relevance of this ministry when Nigeria does not have functional social welfare departments all across the Federation thereby allowing all criminal syndicates and charlatans to invade the sacred responsibility of running motherless homes and other child welfare schemes as business enterprises and most of these private children home owners are now in the illegal business of turning these homes into babies factories whereby couples with issues of childlessness can pay huge price for their choice babies? Why do we sell and buy little babies in this modern age even with the abolition of slave trade?

Government at both the Federal and State levels have spectacularly disappointed the Nigerian Children and unfortunately, these government officials are getting ready to dish out some lies as speeches during these public events to mark the Children and Youth Day on May 27th 2013 all across Nigeria.

The state Governors that have failed to persuade their state houses of assembly to pass the state version of the Nigerian Child Rights Act should ask themselves the soul searching question of why they are deceiving their people by staging Children and youth Day parade when deep inside their hearts they hate these Children? To show how hypocritical these state governors are, one only need to know that their children are all schooling in Europe or America whereby these nations have long promulgated and are enforcing strict child rights laws but yet they have failed to give the children of the poor this opportunity of enjoying their human rights just like their children that they have taken abroad for the best things that money can buy.

In the North, the state governors sometimes argue on the basis of religion for not promulgating the Child Rights Act and I ask is any component part of Nigeria practicing any religion as state religion even when section 10 prohibits such illegality, absolutely? Why will the Northern state governors not permit the child rights law that prohibits early marriage but can not come to terms with the fact that early marriages inflict grave health problems such as [Virginal deformity] VVF and other severe diseases that results from early marriages especially given the fact that these children are given away in marriages to men that are twice older than their biological fathers and are forced to give birth to babies that they can barely carry since they themselves are still little children? 

In the South East, the children of the poor are all out of school because the state governors have diverted the Universal Basic Education fund which ought to be used to provide free, compulsory and quality primary and junior secondary educational opportunities for the children of the poor. The rate of boys drop out of school in the South East is a major national catastrophe which must be institutionally addressed and redressed fundamentally before we produce a generation of youth that are half baked educationally and therefore can not drive the process of information technology and industrialization that will see Nigeria through in an increasingly competitive World.

Interestingly, Mr. Vijay Mahajan in his intellectually nice book titled 'Africa Rising', he argued persuasively that in Africa there is a huge population of the youth who if well groomed can drive the process of development.  His words; " Africa is one of the youngest markets in the World, with 41 percent of its population under the age of 15, according to the population reference Bureau's 2007 World Population Data sheet. This can be compared with 33 percent for India, 28 percent for Brazil, and 20 percent for China".

But I ask, how can Nigeria benefit from the strength of her large army of Children when the majority of these children are born into poor homes whereby they are brought up in such a way that they are denied the educational opportunities that children of the rich get on a platter of gold? No nation will make it in our contemporary times if it fails willfully to educate their people and empower the children with the requisite skills to competently compete with their peers around the globe. We must make hay while the sun shine or we will forever regret this institutional inequities that we have criminally failed to dismantled so our children can have the best things that money derived from our rich natural resources can afford. Let us stop stealing our national treasury but invest wisely in the educational and skill empowerment of our children.

+   Emmanuel Onwubiko is Head, Human Rights Writers' Association of Nigeria and blogs     @www.huriwa.blogspot.com; http://www.huriwa.org/.

27/5/2013

MINISTER ADESINA AND HIS 700,000 FARMERS By Emmanuel Onwubiko

In contemporary Nigerian journalism, The Guardian newspaper is arguably the flagship in the area of devoting at least three pages every Sunday dedicated to the extensive coverage of the agricultural stories and development in Nigeria and around the World.

One of the beauty of this kind of developmental journalism is that in the case of The Guardian, the pioneer Agriculture pages' line editor for many years is a professionally trained physician – Olukayode Oyeleye , a man who brought excellent touch to bear in those agriculture pages.

This gentleman has moved on to join the minister of Agriculture Dr. Akinwunmi Adesina as his Special Adviser on media and all indications show that he is indeed a square peg in a square hole because as can be seen, the minister is busy making the right pronouncements and the media is generously extending their coverage to his activities.

The above story takes us logically to one of the most innovative programs of the current Agriculture minister which is aptly titled as presidential initiative on Agricultural revolution aimed at creating about 700,000 young farmers all across Nigeria. Well, in a nation of over 30 percent unemployment among the younger population, the agricultural initiative to create 700,000 young farmers may be dismissed cynically as too little an effort or a drop in the ocean.

Mr. Adesina, [who dresses often in his European made suits] had in a lecture delivered at the Federal University of Technology Akure (FUTA), said the initiative, tagged ‘Youth in Agribusiness’ would attract the youths to agriculture.

According to the minister, since the three tiers of government need to create jobs for many unemployed youths, the agriculture sector holds the greatest potential to create millions of jobs.

“These will be farmers of the future, under mechanized agriculture, who will make Nigeria’s agriculture competitive for decades into the future”, he said.

The minister who was quoted in the media, said in order to achieve the objective, the federal government would work in partnership with the state governments to set up technical training facilities, business skills acquisition centres and entrepreneurship development centres, adding that the government would complement these by access to land, finance and mechanized centers.

The minister lamented that agriculture graduates rather than practice what they were taught in schools, run away from the profession and look for jobs in other areas.

“Agriculture is changing rapidly. Today, only countries that move into commercial agriculture and agriculture as business have a chance to compete, we must change the way we train students, how we train them and what we prepare them for.”

“Look at any profession, lawyers practice law because they were prepared for it; doctors practice medicine; they were prepared for it, but the agriculture graduate does not practice agriculture. They run from it, they look for jobs in other sector.

“We must train our students to become job creators and not job hunters. The faculties of agriculture and the universities of agriculture need to change their curriculum to be in line with the realities of the labour market and prepare students with practical technical and business skills they need to set up agri-businesses”, he said.

But he failed to say whether government will actively involve the various agriculture faculties in Nigeria in implementing this new idea.

I am glad to note that if this revolutionary idea is carried  through, it would not be the first time that government has attempted to diversify our mono-economy and make Agriculture as a credible profession for the youth.

In the late seventies, the then military government of General Olusegun Obasanjo introduced what it called “Green Revolution”, aimed at growing the agricultural sector to compliment the dominant crude oil sector as one of the fastest foreign exchange earner for Nigeria. Again, successive administrations also played around with such wonderful concepts as “back -to- land” among others which were targeted at uplifting the agricultural sector. Regrettably, due to failure on the part of government to properly lay the ground work for a durable legal framework to sustain these wonderful pro-agricultural programs, these programs were abandoned by successive governments.

The best way to sustain this new effort by the ministry of Agriculture is for the participating states to pass enabling laws and set up durable structures on ways and means to sustain it. The reason why such a noble idea needs to be sustained is that agriculture if developed and galvanized, could provide the single largest employment slots to our Nigerian youth and also make Nigeria the food basket of the black world given our comparative advantages of large younger population and huge agrarian lands spread across the country.

To begin with, the National Assembly in partnership with President Jonathan must reform Nigeria’s land laws to enable rural farmers fall back on their landed assets as collaterals to procure good credit facilities from the banks to enable them go into mechanize agriculture. Religious and community based organizations must also play significant role in this because studies have shown that most Nigerians are on paper, regular worshippers at their respective worship centers of the two dominant religions. Nigerians also listen to their religious leaders. Rather  than these religious leaders use their resources to procure exotic private jets, it will be good if they set up large functional mechanized farms whereby their young members will be trained and assisted to start up making use of all available credit lines in the commercial banks to become self employed.

In conclusion, it is a notorious fact that without effective land reforms, it is almost impossible for the federal government to sustain this good program and if land ownership revolution is actualized, the number of young farmers may increase to about 20 million because out of an active population of over 60 million youth in a population of over 160 million, the paltry number of 700,000 farmers is grossly inadequate to feed the nation and also export their produce.                       

*  Emmanuel Onwubiko, Head; HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS’ ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA, blogs@ www.huriwa.blogspot.com; www.huriwa.org.

20/5/2013

GROWING 'TOILETIZATION' OF NIGERIAN POLITICS From Emmanuel Onwubiko

Two international callers, one from the United states of America and the second from the United Kingdom, who have had sufficient patience to follow through the advocacy activities of the human rights platform that I currently works for-HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS' ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA [HURIWA] successfully put several calls across to me not long ago to express their divergent opinions regarding the state of the Nigerian Nation.

These callers, one an American Caucasian citizen and the second, a Nigerian- born but British naturalized scholar expressed consternation that Nigeria is speedily sliding towards the precipice of anarchy and doom because of what they analyzed as the overwhelming dominance of the political public space by characters they considered as social misfits and persons with dubious credentials who are only in public life for what they can maximize and steal for themselves from the public treasury.

I tried all I could to convince them that their observations may not be the accurate representations of the reality on ground in Nigeria and I used examples of some good Nigerians that are today holding public offices in Nigeria not necessarily for self -enrichment but more particularly for the positive impacts their contributions to the enthronement of democracy and respect for the rule of law could go in transforming Nigeria's bad international public image.

I even went as far as listing out some names of great minds that are today engaged in one public function/office or the other just as I reminded my callers that these statesmen and great iconic women figures are not in the category of the never-do-wells that they had earlier said dominate the public political space in Nigeria. But these persons stuck to their guns and in effect stated that it may take a revolution to change the nation of Nigeria for the better. 

My American caller, a lady in her mid thirties appeared more informed about the political development in most parts of the country than most of us who live in Nigeria. She has been a frequent visitor to Nigeria.

She took me on a guided oral but powerful tour of the political scenarios in the South Eastern states in the last four years and particularly narrated the bad development in much of these South Eastern States whereby according to her assessment, democracy has not actually improved the living condition of the majority of the citizenry just as she concluded that the collapse of respect for the rule of law and constitutionalism coupled with a weak civil society have collectively contributed to the unprecedented corruption in these South Eastern States. She singled out the state of Abia as a case study where the current administration has elevated bad governance and deception to an art.

She was of the considered opinion that the current governor of Abia state- Mr. Theodore Orji has spent more time in the United States of America than he has done in Umuahia, the grossly underdeveloped rural capital of Abia state. Each foreign trip he embarked upon is marked with fun and staged fun-fare on take off point and on his return. 

Speaking about the agricultural and industrial potentials of Abia state which she said were yet to be galvanized, my American caller said Aba stands in a unique position to become the Japan of modern day Nigeria if the enabling environment is created and the functional social infrastructure of roads, electricity, good security and other essential services are provided by the political administration and that institutions such as the Small and Medium Scale Enterprises Agency [SMEDAN], the Nigeria Industrial Bank [Bank of Industry] and other commercial banks are compelled institutionally by the Federal Government to provide their services and credit facilities on liberal but protective terms to the thousands of talented shoe makers in Aba, Abia state. Recently, the garrulous Central Bank of Nigeria's governor Mr. Sanusi Lamido Sanusi was the guest of the Abia state governor who organized a public lecture on youth empowerment but sadly because of the suffocating state of affairs in that state, the ordinary traders in Aba and Umuahia were not allowed to ask probing questions to the nation's top banker to respond on why he hasn't done anything positive to make commercial banks to offer genuine services to thousands of local talented investors in Abia state.

Gladys Fitzgerald [names unreal], my American caller also told me in clear terms that the practice in most South East states as in other states of the Nigerian federation whereby state governors single handedly appoint their foot soldiers and post them to man the respective local council areas as sole administrators is a breach of section 7 of the constitution of Nigeria which clearly stated that the system of government at the local council stage must be democratic. She used Anambra state as a case study whereby the state governor, Mr. Peter Obi failed to conduct or supervise the free and fair conduct of local council elections in the last seven and half years that he has ruled as the state governor in spite of the fact that  he relied on the courts of competent jurisdiction to reclaim his mandate which was stolen by the Peoples Democratic Party [PDP] controlled in Anambra state by pockets of illiterate and dubious rich political god fathers who were milking the state dry out of the Federally shared allocations due to the state monthly.

The caller from the United Kingdom who ironically is a woman also spoke about the bad shape of politics in the Northern states of Nigeria and blamed the political elites for failing to implement programs rich in contents that ought to halve the high rate of poverty in those states. Using Jigawa state as an example, she reminded me that recently the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] arrested the first son of the state governor for alleged money laundry and that the father defended his son for having in his possession over $50,000 USD and claimed that his son was on his way to Egypt to convey his two year old daughter to a Cairo-based hospital for treatment for sundry illness. My British caller  who incidentally was born in Kaduna state of Nigerian Parents but later naturalized as  a British Citizen, then questioned the rationale of the justification by the Jigawa state governor of his Son for seeking foreign medical attention for his daughter even when the state governor of Jigawa state failed to erect a standard and well equipped hospital facility in that state since he came to power in 2007. What an iron?

My conclusion to both of these foreign based callers is that Nigeria is unfortunately witnessing what I may call growing 'toiletization' of Politics and that indeed it will take the collective action of all lovers of Nigeria to stage series of  organized but peaceful civil unrests and/or revolution similar to the middle East or North African revolution to chase away these social misfits that have captured political power in Nigeria through the corruption of the electoral system and manipulations of the electoral body that conducts elections- the Nigerian Electoral Commission [INEC].

Here is my hypothesis- Nigeria is indeed experiencing the growing phenomenon of toiletization of politics and by this I mean that the Nigeria's public political space is dominated dangerously by characters whose shady and shoddy criminal past were overlooked before they emerged on the political scenes and as the old saying goes, it is too late to teach an old fox new tricks. In the same vein it is too late in the day to expect that a convicted fraudster or bankrupt elected into political offices whereby the enforcement of anti-corruption laws are weak and compromised, to become a clean and repentant person who would run or administer the resources of the public kept in his/her custody with transparency and accountability.

Toiletization of Nigerian politics is derived from the fact that in Nigerian politics of today, the good, the bad and the ugly are engaged in fierce battle of their lives to control the organs of governance and in most cases the ugliest and the very bad people emerge 'victorious' in a political race that is heavily polluted by money and other corrupt practices. To be more precise I got the concept of toiletization from the word toilet which in the words of the Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, means a sanitation fixture used primarily for the disposal of human excrement and urine, often referred to as a toilet/bathroom/lavatory.

One place whereby this toiletization of politics is noticeable is in the election into the national and state assemblies. For instance, the Bauchi state House of assembly recently suspended the lone female member of the Bauchi state House of Assembly just for the so-called 'offence' of standing for what is right and just by opposing the transfer of the local government secretariat of Tafawa Balewa Local government area council from where it has always been situated dominated by Christian minority Bauchi citizens to another dominated by the Hausa/Fulani Moslems. She simply got chased out literary for speaking out in a political assembly whereby the elected legislators are expected to express their opinion without let or hindrance.

My readers may be wondering why I used Bauchi state House of Assembly as a perfect example of where growing toiletization of politics has become dominant, but they need not wonder or too long because I drew my conclusion upon reading the recorded document and minutes of the plenary sessions in which the only female member of the Bauchi state House of Assembly member was recently suspended and the dozens of grammatical errors I noticed showed me that we indeed have a long way to go to ensure that only square pegs are put in square holes and to make sure that politics is dominated by some of the best minds in the mold of philosopher kings as documented by ancient Philosophers such as Socrates, Plato and Aristotle.

Did I hear you say that I am spreading wrong stereotype of what most people say about Northern political space dominated by half baked graduates? You are dead wrong because I can tell you now without any fear of contradiction that in my beloved Imo state, there was a time that a certain governor of the Peoples Democratic Party was quoted to have regarded the installation by a private telecom company of telecom mastheads as part of his Imo state government 'democratic dividends' or achievements made by his government with the several billions of fund that accrued to the state coffers from the federation account and the internally generated revenue. In much of the South East states such as Abia and Ebonyi states, the state government uses fronts to place generous media commercials to congratulate the state governors for drilling boreholes which cost less than five percent of the total cost of those glamorous commercial advertisements sponsored dubiously with taxpayers' money by the stooges of these never-do-wells who parade around as governors.

So just like in Northern Nigeria whereby state governors spend huge sums of public fund junketing around the globe while their people wallow and die out of poverty, the Southern Nigeria is replete with instances of growing toiletization of public politics and sadly, the populace are too busy chasing bread and butter and are not bothered to ask probing questions from their elected politicians to give proper account on how the peoples money are used to serve the people. In Lagos state for instance, there is even what may be called growing toiletization of the civil society because only recently a study showed that last year alone, the populace spent N1 billion naira to stage series of social get-togethers or what is known in local parlance as 'OWAMBE' social meetings.

In a drunken state of mind, how can the members of the civil populace fully understand their roles as the real owners of the Nigerian sovereignty who ought to watch the activities of politicians to ensure that the nation is not ruined through corrupt practices? If majority of the people living in Lagos state alone have developed this deadly gluttonous tendency as to have spent a whooping N1 billion naira on social and highly unproductive ventures, how then will the growing toiletization of Nigerian politics not exacerbate?  The other day, a yacht hotel belonging to the Lagos state ministry of tourism purchased reportedly from the UK worth several billions, disappeared into thin air and the people have not asked from the state government the whereabouts of this priceless assets. 

Sadly, what makes the toiletization of Nigerian politics much more dangerous is the ignominious roles played by religious leaders who encourage these corrupt politicians to go on stealing spree without checks and balances. Recently, a certain pastor acquired a choice private jet even when about 70 percent of his members are impoverished and to make matters worst, the President of Nigeria Dr. Good luck Jonathan was the Chief Guest of honor at the unveiling ceremony of this exotic private jet. On the last count, over five pastors own private jets in a nation whereby over 85 percent of the citizenry are too poor that many die from malaria and typhoid.

In Niger state, the state governor was shown in some media cruising in an exotic private jet celebrating his birthday not too long ago and this state is one place whereby the state of infrastructure in the rural primary schools have deteriorated to animalistic level so much so that pupils receive lessons under trees or seat on the fallen debris of their derelict school buildings from where lessons are dished out by their highly impoverished teachers.  Anambra state is warming up to hold another governorship elections and the majority of those running for office are money bags who can not account for the sources of their wealth including one of them facing prosecution over alleged participation in the monumental heist of petroleum subsidy running to nearly N1 trillion Naira. Nigerians; wake up and stop this bad phenomenon of growing toiletization of Nigerian public politics. It is now or never.

+Emmanuel Onwubiko is head; Human Rights Writers' Association of Nigeria and blogs @www.huriwa.blogspot.com.

20/5/2013