PRESIDENT BUHARI IS ACTING LIKE THE BRITISH CHIEF CLERKS IN COLONIZED NIGERIA

[Salimonu Kadiri]

On Thursday, June 10, 2021, President Buhari in an interview on Channels TV was asked if he thought that gazetted colonial grazing routes for herdsmen was still applicable in modern Nigeria? He retorted, "Do you want me to contradict my Attorney General?" Thereafter, he confirmed plan to resuscitate grazing routes for farmers. https://dailytrust.com/buhari-wants-grazing-routes-recovered-for-herdsmen/ 

To Buhari, Abubakar Malami is the greatest legal luminary on earth whose legal advice automatically is law. However, the quality of Malami's legal counsel to Buhari can be measured from his comparison of banning of open grazing in the South with banning of spare parts trading in the North. To equate a herdsman marauding with his cattle in a farmland to a spare parts dealer who either hires or build a shop to sell his spare parts must sound unintelligent to any normal person. One does not need to be a lawyer to understand that a herder driving cattle into peoples' farms to eat their crops is not equivalent to a man hiring or building a shop to sell spare parts. There was no single case of a spare parts dealer killing a landlord to take over his house by force in order to erect spare parts shop instead. Malami could have made sense if he had compared Bureau De Exchange (foreign exchange marketer), which is  hundred percent controlled by Northerners and spread all over Nigeria, with spare parts dealers spread all over Nigeria but controlled by Southerners. Had he done that he would have discovered that spare parts dealers and Bureau De Change operators do not conduct their businesses at the expense of landlords. But there is no logic in the thinking of self-pitying regionalist like Abubakar Malami who always loves to convert national affairs to sectional interest for personal gains. Here we have a regionalist who so much love his downtrodden fellow northerners, who are herdsmen, to walk on their feet driving cows from Birnin Kebbi to Lagos/Port Harcourt while he himself will rather fly from Abuja to Birnin Kebbi, his hometown, because he feels it is strenuous to be driven in a car fronted and backed by dispatch riders if he travels by road. Of course, none of his children is a herdsman and billions of naira that he has earned while in office pretending to be representing the interest of northerners are to himself and his immediate family and not for all northerners to share. Since May 19, 2021, when Abubakar Malami declared that he was going to retrieve gazetted colonial grazing routes' map for herdsmen, he is yet to find one. Even if the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, had found the gazetted grazing routes' map from the colonial times, of what use will that be when the Land Use Act, Section 1, and the 1999 Constitution vested the entire land in every state in the Governor on behalf of the people? In view of the aforesaid, let us examine the role of Abubakar Malami as the chief legal adviser to Buhari in the current naira redesigned dichotomy, now before the Supreme Court of Nigeria for adjudication, between substantial numbers of APC Governors and the APC led Federal Government by President Muhammadu Buhari.

Recall that three States in Nigeria - Kaduna, Kogi  and Zamfara - all of them from APC governed States, filed a suit at the Supreme Court of Nigeria on Friday, 3 February 2023, requesting the Apex Court to order immediate suspension of the demonetisation policy of the Federal Government being executed through the CBN under the directive of President Muhammadu Buhari until it complies with the relevant provisions of the law. President Buhari had earlier approved the CBN request to shift the validity of old naira notes of 200, 500, and 1,000 denominations from 31 January 2023 to February 10, 2023. On Wednesday, 8 February 2023, the Supreme Court issued an interim order prohibiting Buhari and the CBN from taking out of circulation the un-redesigned naira denomination notes of 200, 500 and 1,000 respectively until Wednesday, 15, 2023, when the suit would be heard. On that date, six more APC governed States and one PDP governed State had applied to be joined in the suit against the Federal Government's short notice for exchanging old naira notes for the redesigned ones. In fact, two PDP governed states, Bayelsa and Edo, applied to be joined as respondents in the APC Governor's suit against the APC led Federal government. The Supreme adjourned hearing until 22 February 2023 and informed the parties that its interim injunction of 8 February 2023 would subsist until final determination of the suit by the Court. The Supreme Court pronouncement implied that the old naira notes of 200, 500 and 1,000 would co-exist with the redesigned naira notes until the Supreme Court had decided the issue before the court. 

Already, on Thursday, 9 February 2023, the Attorney General of the Federation and Federal Minister of Justice in the APC controlled Federal Government, Abubakar Malami, told Nigerians through the media that he had filed objections relating to the Supreme Court's jurisdiction to entertain the Governor's suit. The objection could not be heard as everything was adjourned until 22 February 2023. The following day after the Supreme Court had adjourned the Constitutional case brought against the Federal Government, President Buhari addressed the nation on Thursday, 16 February 2023, about the redesigned new naira notes and the impending elections in the country. In item 11 of his broadcast, President Muhammadu Buhari said, "I am not unaware of the obstacles placed on path of innocent Nigerians by unscrupulous officials in the banking industry, entrusted with the process of implementation of the new monetary policy. I am deeply pained and sincerely sympathise with you all, over these unintended outcomes." The reason why the APC Governors have gone to the Court to seek redress against their APC President was not because they were against redesigning of Naira but that enough time was not given to citizens to exchange their old currencies for new ones. Innocent Nigerians are not responsible for the employment of those who Buhari identified as UNSCRUPULOUS OFFICIALS IN THE BANKING INDUSTRY who had implemented his monetary policy to impoverish innocent Nigerians and deprived many of their life's savings. It is not enough to be pained and to sympathise with those who are being ruined by his unscrupulous bank officials but to extend the date of exchanging old naira notes for new ones.

Having admitted in his item 11 that inability of innocent Nigerians to get redesigned naira notes was due to unscrupulous officials, one would have expected President Buhari to state in his item 12 how those who are still in possession of old naira notes could still change them for new notes. Instead, Buhari said, "To stem this tide, I have directed the CBN to deploy all legitimate and legal means to ensure that our citizens are adequately educated on the policy; enjoy easy access to cash withdrawal through availability of appropriate amount of currency; and the ability to make deposits." What type of education does Buhari want to give to innocent Nigerians whose hard-earned money had been declared untenable in the market because of unscrupulous bank official? The tide that Buhari should stem is that of monetary policy which has imposed poverty, hunger, desperation and chaos on the people. Instead of the deeply pained and sincerely sympathetic Buhari to announce the extension of date for the exchange of all old naira denominations in question in order to ameliorate the suffering of his citizens, he went on to issue a decree in item 16 of his broadcast that he would only permit old N200 notes to be in circulation up till April 10, 2023. By his pronouncement, President Buhari overruled the Supreme Court order of 15 February 2023 that retained the validity of un-redesigned 200, 500, and 1,000 until the case brought before it has been determined.

Many Nigerians have wondered why the outgoing President is insisting on executing naira redesigned now and within extremely short period of time? In item 21 of his broadcast, President answered thus, "Fellow citizens, on the 25^th of February 2023, the nation would be electing a new President and National Assembly members. I am aware that this new monetary policy has also contributed immensely to the minimization of the influence of money in politics." Drunk in self-praise about the effect of his new monetary policy (naira redesigned), Buhari claimed in item 22 of his broadcast as follows, "This is a positive departure from the past and represents a bold legacy step by this administration, towards laying a strong foundation for free and fair elections." From that part of Nigeria that I grew up, it is often said that only a thief can trace the foot-print of another thief on a rock. Was the influence of money responsible for the victory of Buhari's APC in the 2015 and 2019 presidential and national assembly elections? So far, none of the presidential aspirants is complaining of cash crunch and some of them even own banks. It is ordinary Nigerian electorates that are in penury as a result of naira recolouring. Therefore, Buhari's monetary policy has created condition where it will be much more easier for politicians with big access to redesigned naira to buy votes from impoverished and vulnerable Nigerians who are starving and hungry because they have no money. Buhari's monetary policy has destroyed the informal sector of the economy in one fell swoop and that is likely to promote and encourage vote buying more than ever before. Ironically, while APC governors and their presidential candidate are opposed to the rush to implement new monetary policy within a very short time by the outgoing APC president, the opposition party's presidential candidates, Atiku Abubakar (PDP) and Peter Obi (Labour Party) are fully in support of Buhari's not to give ordinary Nigerians time to exchange their old naira for new ones. With Buhari's monetary policy being implemented against the will of his party, the APC, one wonders in what esteem does Buhari hold APC as a political party? Buhari's behaviours remind one of part of what Brigadier Joshua Nimyel Dongoyaro gave as reason while announcing the removal of General Muhammadu Buhari as Military Head of State, on August 27, 1985. Brigadier Dongoyaro said, "The concept of collective leadership has been substituted by stubborn and ill-advised unilateral actions, thereby destroying the principles upon which the government came to power. Any effort made to advise the leadership, met with stubborn resistance and was viewed as a challenge to authority or disloyalty. ... a few people have arrogated to themselves the right to make decisions for the larger part of the ruling body." In a saner clime the action of the President in overruling the decision of the Supreme Court would have resulted in inpeachment but not in Nigeria. In the meantime, we await the appearance in person of the Attorney General of the Federation and Federal Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), at the Supreme Court on February 22, 2023 to defend the constitutional rights of his principal to implement naira redesigned regime as he did. (Concluded)

 

[Augustine Togonu-Bickersteth]

Ha ha Mr Kadiri what are you trying to suggest?

My great grand father Mr. Carrena was chief Clerk at the Federal secretariat lagos

i always thought he must have been as powerful as a gate man to a  certain coca cola factory in ibadan.  please permit the anachronism. and the typos. coming from the great grand son of a clerk.

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