HIS Excellency, Monday Okpebholo, Governor of Edo State, reading a budget on a Wednesday was a bad idea. Why not on a Monday? When your name is a day of the week, you should choose rightly. That was not the only thing that was wrong. Constitutional amendments should be fast-tracked to exempt some Governors from presenting the budget to their State Assemblies in person. They can transmit the budget.
Those who have been heckling Okpebholo to speak since the campaigns heard an earful listening to him rambling through the Edo State Budget 2025. More used to addressing crowds, the Governor was nervous from the beginning. Was he expected to speak to a small gathering?
No need taking a back glance for the assuring, towering presence of Senator Adams Oshiomhole who spoke mostly during the campaigns. He had to carry on, availing us an opportunity to listen to him without a human prompter, the role that Oshiomhole amply filled as he confused Edo State on why he has to be Governor. Nobody still knows why.
Seeing billions of Naira in cash, or listening to others pronouncing it is not the same thing. Okpebholo was already in panic mode when he attempted the task. He began, his hands unsteady and voice quivering in the rarefied surroundings of the Assembly: “The Edo State Appropriation Bill of six billion… 605 billion… 76 million… Let me take it again. 506 billion… 605 billion… sorry… 776 billion… sorry, it’s confusing me”. He was truthful, a rare among politicians.
“Order,” the Speaker of Edo State, Honourable Blessing Agbebaku thundered, daring to deny us a good laugh, the only thing that is still free in Nigeria. He was confusing us. We are unwilling to be confused.
His Excellency has trended since then. T-shirts, caps, mugs, have been produced in celebration of his confessed confusion. A good signal is that Edo State funds are safe, a Governor who is unable to read out billions of Naira would not balloon the budget to trillions? Who would present it?
Governor Okpebholo is not the only one confused. Many Nigeria are in panic whether there would be “Merry Christmas” this year, or “Merely Christmas”. It is confusing us, unlike Okpebholo whose confusion would not have much effect on his joint ownership of Edo State with those who have not ceased beating their chests about how they enthroned him.
Families are in real pain. The confusion is not understandable. For months, just counting this year, families that have not had real meals, have renewed their hope on Christmas being an elixir. What informs this type of hope except, “it’s confusing me”?
Since the days of COVID-19, remarkably marked by government officials allocating palliatives meant for the public to themselves, hope on relief for the hard times have been mainly in vain. It is also confusing that many government officials caught with palliatives are walking around free. There may just be no laws to prosecute such behaviour or too many people were involved that we could run out of if we jailed them.
More confusing is the idle social media debates on why the value that people place on life is so little that parent saw their children die in the Christmas funfair that went bad in Ibadan. Many of us know poverty as a word. We have not felt the innermost recesses of poverty. The N5,000 that Queen Naomi was distributing is a lot of money to many Nigerians. How many Nigerians have it? That is where we are. Even if she was sharing only “pure water”, there would have still been a scramble, and deaths.
Nigerians are hungry – just putting it mildly. Governments are too busy governing themselves that they are after their welfare and security, not the peoples’.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is in Lagos issuing trite orders about investigating the incident. It would have taken less than 30 minutes for him to fly into Ibadan, visit the Governor, address those who lost their children. Some call it empathy while it is actually governance and more useful than those endless meetings that appear more concerned with detaching him from the people.
Would it subtract anything from Tinubu’s presidency if he visits Ibadan? Those involved are children, the future.
It is confusing people that government has minimal concerns for life. Imagine the National Security Adviser, proudly promoted as the first appointee to that position since 1999, without a military background, pulls out his statistics to assure us that he had achieved 80 per cent success against kidnapping.
Statistics are almost meaningless in a country that the Ajaokuta Steel Rolling Mill has been under “97 per cent completion” during the Abacha days. He expects applauses for this magic. Maybe, national security has been reduced to success in lowering kidnapping incidents.
No matter how confusing things are, do not panic, it is still Christmas. Merry Christmas to you.
Finally…
FOR a lawyer, Ezenwo Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, should show some respect for the law by challenging the court orders that people wave at him. His exceeding determination to demolish property or revoke land allocations without looking at the papers of those who claim they have legitimate titles or court orders stopping Wike from acting, leave some people with no alternative than self-help, illegal too as it is. The army general, who allegedly sent his troops to attack Wike’s demolition squad was wrong but where could he get justice? The President will call Wike to order the day he demolishes the Villa.
CHAIRMAN of the Police Service Commission, Mr. Hashimu Argungu, in emphasising the thoroughness that led to the promotion 0f 11 C0mmissioners of Police to Assistant Inspectors-General of Police and 16 Deputy Commissioners of Police to Commissioners of Police, said they took oral and written tests. Media reports indicate that the process was concluded on the same day though the number of participants was no disclosed. Quite a thorough process. Henceforth, Mr. Argungu has ordered, written and oral examinations would be a pre-requisite for promotions at all levels within the Nigerian Police Force.
ON the first anniversary of the five-year $70,041,733.80 and N2,981,739,134.30 contract the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security signed with a private company to supply 2,000 tractors, implements and 100 combined harvesters annually, Honourable Saba Adam moved a motion last Tuesday, for an investigation of the non-delivery of the tractors and implements which he considered a setback to the Renewed Hope Agenda. Not a single tractor has been delivered, according to Adam.
THE Court of Appeal in Kaduna has ruled that it is illegal for Customs to seize foreign rice outside border areas. They cannot therefore seize rice on the Benin-Shagamu Expressway or invade markets or anywhere else to seize rice, Justice Ntong Ntong declared on Wednesday.
DR. David Umahi, Honourable Minister of Works, said on Friday that the Lagos-Calabar Highway would be reduced from 10 to six lanes. He said nothing about a possible reduction in the cost of the 700km project which will cost N4 billion per kilometre. It will be completed in eight years.
THE Power of Nothing, the latest book by Ikem Okuhu, is a lot more than the nothingness of power. He has given society another chance to examine power, its nothingness, and possibly its somethingness.
YOU have your own challenges, but there are people you can give something this season, and always. May the Almighty bless you as you put smiles on faces that are losing hope.
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ISIGUZO is a major commentator on minor issues
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