Decamp or divorce

Read my lips...

Decamp or divorce 

Until last week Jeff Bezos was the richest man on planet earth and possibly the dumbest.

His financial tragedy is however unconnected with the longest government shutdown in the history of America. It has nothing to do with  the pummelling stocks at wall street.  He didn't submit a proposal for the $5.7b wall that Trump intended for the southern border. He is not in the healthcare sector, so Trump's inability to replace Obamacare with the best healthcare is also not a factor.

North Korea is still building nuclear offensive weapons and the Iran deal is still unresolved, on Trump's table.  None of these unfulfilled  Trump’s

campaign promises has anything to do with the abrupt end to Jeff's number one running as the world's richest individual. 

Twenty-five years ago, Jeff Bezos made a campaign promise to secure the heart of his hearthrob( Mackenzie) at an altar in front of largely anonymous people. It remained unclear how long Jeff had been keeping his promise but it was discovered last month that he had been sexting(ask any teenager) with another woman who has been sympathising with his pathetic desires while surreeptiously keeping his wife in the other room. 

Fraternising with another party without officially decamping from the party you’re registered with is a serious offense that  carries an equally deep implications. Unless you are  able to chose wisely and recognise that you cannot solve a political problem intellectually, you are in a biiiiiig trouble. But, it is still possible to defect to another party and not only find succour but also have your sins forgiven. 

For not choosing wisely, Mr Bezos has been hit with a divorce that will cost him an alimony that is about the size of half of Africa’s total GDP. 

To quietly go away,  Mrs Bezos has agreed to the sum of $66b as being half of Mr Bezos’ total wealth of $137b( before Yahoo boys start getting excited, they should know that there is a difference between cash flow and net worth). At age 50, Mackenzie is not likely to start another Amazon, there will be men who are already circling her and whispering that she is the Amazon until they separate her from her new found wealth. 

Nigerians have been serially cheated by her leaders in the last 25 years, but I cannot imagine a break up now. The country is broke. And with litany of unfulfilled campaign promises,  divorce option is too unsavoury to be on the table for the people.  Like Jeff Bezos, we dumbly have not chosen wisely. However, it is time to choose again from limited options.

The bait

The Septuagenarians presidential candidates saved us some blushes by not turning up for their job interview yesterday. The world was watching, and from their antecedents,  it is becoming mentally and morally sapping for the duo to just keep up their appearances. Without a Pastor to interpret the President's tongue talking into rational speech and with every panel looking like a court room to Atiku, there was no way  either of them was going to incur another national embarrassment by swallowing the bait.

More so, there was no way the President will show up when he is technically not even the presidential candidate for his party. He conceded that responsibility at an APC political campaign last week to Chief Great Ogboru of Delta State. It really has been a tragedy of errors all week long for both candidates.

Enough of blaming our systemic errors on these lacklustre elderly gentlemen. They are our cross, to borrow from Sidney Dean, in "White men can't jump” and we should own up and live with it. How do we that? By giving the new kids on the block that lit up the darkness left in the leading parties podiums some chance. Oby’s experience at the world stage, Moghalu’s clarity of thoughts and eloquence coupled with Durotoye's intellectual calmness is a mix that can act as catalysts for the paradigm shift that Nigeria deserves.

Sadly, black as a colour when mixed with another colour will still produce black, it is like blinking in the dark. No one sees it. So, an alliance of these brilliant hopeful candidates will only not gel, but it will not be allowed enough time to hold by the APC’s  political commercials that Channels Television unprofessionally allowed to air intermittently against fairness.

The odds are heavily against these bright candidates but they should take solace in the fact that their gain is our loss. We must have mortgaged our future in the past to the absentee presidential candidates who by their disdain for the political process will still get the job. NaijaBet rewards people on other considerations above merit. God bless Nigeria! And the people say....

Timely visiting visa

Yesterday,  Atiku and his entourage that included the serving number 3 man in the country arrived Washington DC. To receive them at the airport were their friends from the Nigerian community. The US government are aware of the visit but they could not send anyone because they have shutdown, like on strike. The shutdown has nothing to do with Atiku, just like Atiku's visit has nothing to do with governance, maybe campaign.

In the absence of official public statement about the visit, the social media is then free to do what it does best, speculate. Atiku's team which includes Saraki, the Senate President must have a significance beyond scoring a cheap political point and we did not have to look any further. With the selective ongoing war on corruption in Nigeria, selling NNPC  to friends and families may be a bit difficult. Unbundling NNPC however to existing customers in diaspora is not likely to present any sales and marketing challenges. Who else could legitimize this deal than the serving number 3 man? Smart move, you'll say.

Atiku's supporters have not been magnanimous in their victory lap. But, who can blame them, fulfilling campaign promises is a very difficult thing for politicians these days, so, there is overwhelming sense of victory when one is fulfilled, especially before elections. After all, the reason Atiku will not be able to meet with any US official apart from the border patrol that searched him at the airport  is because Trump shut down his own government because he hasn't been able to build the wall he promised during his campaign for two years. Sounds typical, right.

There are more pictures of the beaming team in different postures than messages since they touched down for their excursion trip. While they are in Washington, they are advised to visit and take selfies in front of the White house, Smithsonian museums, National mall and the Capitol Hill may be of interest to our Senate President. They are all closed. The team should however stay off 935 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in DC for security reasons.

And if you still think there is no big deal in going to USA with a rap sheet on your neck, try and steal a phone and see if you will even be allowed out of Nigeria at all. God helps you if you’re not an APC card carrying member. The bottom line is when you are big, you’re big!

Divisive campaign

President Buhari has never been a fluent person in speech, so when he slipped on his way down at one of his campaigns and the opposition made a meal out of it; that he collapsed due to Ill health, I found that sickening. If this kind of hate does not reawaken you to the new climate the divisive campaign being run by both supporters had unleashed on our polity, nothing else will.

Equipped with the best smartphone that daily levies  from the multi nefarious garages in the country can buy, but simply unable to use it, the gentlemen enforcers that sometimes double up as security outfit at Bourdillon have announced their presence with a bang using devices everyone is familiar with at the first APC campaign in the commercial capital of the country without any casualties. This among other diplomatic messages passed on that day,  is a gentle reminder to the opposition that this indeed is going to be the freest and fairest elections in the country, if they behave.

In the light of this refreshing arrangement singlehandedly put together by the godfather to ensure the security of ballot boxes, votes cast and not cast,  it is obvious that nobody can guarantee any other thing apart from clear victory. This is probably why somebody has wisely decided to have future Q and A sessions, campaign and debates by proxy. You don't become a general by fighting all battles yourself.

In similar vein, I have thought it wise to leave my opinion on Nigeria elections in the experienced hands of the executive arm of the APC as represented by the transportation sector, so as to be able to concentrate on the more violent American government issues happening also by proxy.

Two weeks ago, President Trump decided to pull out American troops from Syria without Congress authorization and without the support of his national security advisers, on the basis of the fact that his government has defeated ISIS.

Not known for rhetorics, the brutal Islamic extremist organisation has responded yesterday by killing 4 Americans in a restaurant at Manbij without announcing to the press but violently sending a message that the battle is not over.

It has been said that the premature untimely victory call by the President may have emboldened the terrorists in motivating them into the deadly attack that led to 19 avoidable death. This is exactly what happened when you count your chickens before they are hatched. Well, you can forgive Trump, he has no military background. This would never have happened in Nigeria. I miss my country.

Solving by substituting

America and Americans are sharply divided: the country along latitude and longitude lines (that is why there are more than one time zone within the country), and the people along party lines (that is also why there are two parties and few independent of political  philosophies), respectively.

They are therefore angry at both phenomena, but with no one in particular.

Some two years ago, Americans in their unending quest for naivety decided to let the Presidency be a first time job entry and Donald Trump hurriedly applied. After eight years of the colour contrast in the white house, Americans were ready to welcome any white person, not woman, though, into the white house again. Trump was surprised nobody checked his resume, it must be mentioned that he didn't have one. It was shocking  even to Mr Trump himself that his background check result was swept under the carpet. He lost the debates, lost the popular vote but won the elitists' political gimmickry called electoral college.

America and Americans already have light that is not dependent on a super minister. They also have fantastic road infrastructure that you can actually drive on. They have telecommunications that works even when the owners are not in town and political structures that is not founded on ethnic considerations. So, Trump ran a provocative campaign that will make America great again by promising to provide what they lack - nationalism,  white immigrants, walls, obnoxious taxes, and peaceful Muslims.

Two years into his administration's controlling all arms of government, and with his family members in sensitive governmental positions, apart from nepotism, nothing has been achieved. With Democrats back in the house, Mexico's  blunt refusal to pay for a wall they didn't order for and 17 days into an infamous shutdown of government that has render 800,000 federal government workers unpaid, Americans are beginning to get impatiently edgy.

Belatedly, Americans have taken to the malls, compulsively shopping in protest. Activities have also increased  at the diners and take-outs as more Americans are seen letting out their frustrations on different cuisines washed down with cheap wine because the economy is not so good. You cannot blame them, managing this political situation for the next two years online is a better prospect than burning tyres on their streets.

In his protest, Trump has decided  that he may declare a national emergency that will help him embark on his own shopping spree by bypassing the Congress in building a wall of his promise. For me, it is comforting to have a spare country that has been relatively peaceful in the last three years due to the fact that that we have not been paying attention to the devil in the details of our political dialogue.

House of Commons

Against wise counsel and having ran out of ideas on how to handle immigration issues and have Mexico pay for a wall that is not in their budget, President Trump decided to join me on my short vacation by just shutting down government so that nobody will loot the shop before we come back.
Well, nobody came, but rumours and gossips were rife on the internet to keep me distracted from the artificial peace that drink and laziness bestowed while the vacation lasted. In the era that everyone with a smartphone is now a journalist of some sort, caution is advised in assimilating online news from itinerary smartphone publishers.

Weighing the equities and the dynamics of governance since Trump stumbled into power, it is logical to assume first, that the Presidency is not a first entry job and secondly, that the House is the easiest way of checking a moderate presidency with an overbearing supporters base.

The standoff today is more as a result of the riling of Trump supporters than the outcome of the President's critical reasoning. Having frittered away the goodwill that comes with his party controlling all arms of government in the first half of his tenure, his days look horrifically numbered with the Democrats seizing the initiative from the House in this second half.

Buhari enjoys much more privileges than Trump in the sense that like his anti-corruption crusade, he has zero level of opposition. The rantings from PDP is at best a feedback from an internal political system arising from a symbiotic relationship between the ruling party and the party on the bench that provides substantive substitute for injured politicians like Dino.

If you’re in doubt, take a look at the team list submitted for the 2019 Presidential campaign council - all familiar names and are all from the same feeder team.  So, to the supporters at the popular stand, the difference between APC and PDP, is in the alphabets and not the jerseys!

This election is already decided, again by the elitists as prophesied based on probability by their frantic colleagues in the religious sector. The only democratic way out of this conundrum is for the masses to change destination and head for the House. After all,  charity, oversight functions, checks and legislation all start from the House.

Lastly, this piece does not feature on Sahara Reporter, so it may be missed by Sowore. But, whoever sees him on campaign trail should let him know that activists are at their functional best in a House that is built from the foundation and not from the roof. He will understand.

The law.

The interpretation of the law can be perplexing and exhausting, at times. Otherwise, Atiku and Ganduje will not be  tottering around the nation with an all paid tax enabled privileges. Like the blindfolded Lady Justice, the President has also turned blind eyes to this. Believe me, that’s the best the President can do with the present circumstances.

If  Lady Justice was to remove her blindfold and the President was cured of his ear infections and Lady Justice and Mallam President are both able to see, hear and persecute those that have odiously stolen us blind (No pun intended). We may end up with not only crumbs but also a state of utopia.That we don't need.

Can you imagine if indeed we decided to honestly pursue the President's agenda of zero tolerance for corruption with all the state apparatus of justice. The President will be without his creative cabinet members, states' governors will languish in jail, Houses of Assembly may have to serve as temporary prisons for the honourables.  Local council executives will all be remanded in prison by magistrates courts in their own locality and the entire Justice Department will be suspended for corrupt practices  while we bring Rwandans to dispense justice. My people, open your eyes, it won’t happen.

This is Nigeria not China.
However, the hypothetical situation recognises that it is not right for man to be alone and so the President will have to make do with the present saints that surround him and let's assume Lady Justice is truly blind from the blindfold, and if wailers removed the blindfold, the situation  will not change significantly  because Fashola has ensured that the government will not be held liable if Lady Justice still cannot see.

Interestingly, Buhari has not been able to infect either his cabinet or his supporters with his integrity. The affable general has continued to maintain that the economy is not good in spite of the fact that all road constructions, energy and transportation infrastructures going on, online. Also and allegedly too, one of the President's men is also on tape to have resonated(though as expected he denied it) what almost all Nigerians feel daily.

You really don't need a witness to prove  to anyone that you are hungry. The symptoms are too conspicuous not to be seen.

The government proves they may not be listening, but they at least see, and that is why the Pastor Vice President has been entrusted with the responsibility of turning the remaining five pieces of fish and bread in the shop into collateral free loan to be distributed to the people as he deems fit before elections.

While Dino the detractor is cooling off in police custody "for booing the President".  The Vice President should not be deterred by  any other armchair critics, after all it is those that will not benefit from  the dividend of democracy that are shouting themselves hoarse.

Whoever that is not satisfied should seek redress in court of law, where hopefully the advocate Vice President awaits with Lady Justice in tow. Musing, right?