Olusegun Adeniyi

When a few weeks ago Dr. Chidi Amuta decreed that I would be the reviewer of the book being presented today, he knew I had no choice in the matter which I consider an honour. Dr. Amuta is a man for whom I have tremendous respect and admiration and under whom I have learnt a lot, especially in the last six years that I have had the privilege of working closely with him. However, after listening to the lecture by Chief Ojo Maduekwe – always a tough act to follow – I honestly don’t know what my job is still all about except to recommend to the audience that Writing the Wrongs is a book worth reading because I have read substantial part of it.

However, before I take my seat, I consider it appropriate to congratulate the author for documenting what is, without any doubt, an enriching collection that speaks to both our past and the promise of tomorrow. Even though this collection is what I would call history in-a-hurry, the real message of the book, however unfortunate it may seem, is that we live in a country where history repeats itself again and again. For that reason, let me take a few minutes to take this distinguished audience through the book.

•Olusegun Adeniyi

Writing the Wrongs opens with “Issues of Governance” and there are 22 opinion pieces in the first chapter dealing with such wide-ranging topics as the operations of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) under Mr. Nuhu Ribadu, the rascality of the men and women elected to make laws on behalf of us all and how the late Zairean maximum ruler, Mobutu Sese Seko apparently resurrected and relocated to the author’s beloved Abia State where it was (and unfortunately still is) difficult for the authorities to do simple things. However, the piece that encapsulates the chapter is the one titled “The Generator Republic”, because it brings into clear focus not only the absence of government to an average Nigerian but also the failings of citizens who, in the author’s words, have accepted “all manner of contraptions that add up to a devaluation of our collective self worth”. Now that it would take some local hunters to retrieve from Boko Haram the vast territories that they took from our soldiers, I think the author may even have to tweak that piece to reflect our current unfortunate realities.

In chapter two, appropriately titled “Challenge of Leadership”, the reader is confronted with a collection of 34 opinion pieces each of which tells a compelling story of its own about our country and the rot within. Some of the easy pickings are “The episodic presidency”; “The road to Owerri”; “Babangida’s Lonely Days” and “The Shrinking Sovereign”. While all the offerings are fantastic, as you would imagine from a master of his craft, the stand-out for me is “Running out of Luck” which though published in THISDAY on 14 October, 2010, could actually have been written today.

Chapter Three, “Politics and National Development” contains 35 pieces on issues as diverse as the open ballot electoral system, the never-ending war of attrition between former President Olusegun Obasanjo and his estranged deputy, Atiku Abubakar, the imperative of zoning and how the (mis)management of our geo-politics impinges on national development. While each of the pieces is a must-read, the most enjoyable is “The Immunity of Rigging” which x-rays the Supreme Court ruling on the 2007 presidential election won by my late boss, Umaru Musa Yar’Adua. And here is the punch-line from the author: “When a judicial outcome confirms a political infamy, the polity so affected runs the clear and present risk of enthroning immorality as a directive principle of state policy.”

Chapter four on “Identity and Nationhood” contains such treatises as “Sense and Nonsense of Igbo Presidency”; “The Igbo After Ojukwu” and “Obasanjo and the Prophecy Merchants” which deals with our penchant for glorifying the supernatural. In this section also, the author makes a compelling case for privatising the prison system in our country and I am sure many would say that since every Nigerian has become a government unto himself, it is most fitting that everyone also erects his or her own prison. In a way, we all have. Of course, that is not what the author is saying as his argument is that the rate at which our society produces criminals has overwhelmed the capacity of the state to deal with the situation, and for that reason, he advocates that we borrow from the examples of several countries like the UK, United States, Australia and South Africa. One thing the author did not consider of course is that Nigerians have a way of perverting every good idea and that privatising our prison systems would be abused by the rich and influential of our society if they are ever caught for being on the wrong side of the law.

Chapter five titled “Aspects of National Security” has 11 pieces. From “Disarming Bad People” to “Under the Gun” which is on the spread of small arms and the consequences in our nation today to “Now We Have the Bomb”, it is a chapter that those who manage our security architecture will do well to read. It is also one that will interest those who seek a better understanding of the nature of the challenge we confront as a nation today. However, it is quite ironical that in this section there is also a piece titled “Good Morning General Gusau” published in March 2009 at a time the current Minister of Defence was in retirement. A few months later, Gusau returned to the office of the National Security Adviser (NSA) that he has occupied several times in the past. I am sure readers would query many of the assumptions by the author in the said piece, especially given Gusau’s current position and the state of affairs in our country with regards to national security.

Chapter six is on what would be described as bread and butter issues under the heading “Economics and Livelihood”. There are 20 pieces in the section as the author delves into such issues as the price of petrol, the miniskirt revolution in the banking hall, the subsidy debate etc. Not surprisingly, the era of both the former CBN Governor now Emir of Kano, Muhammad Sanusi and his immediate predecessor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo came into sharp focus. But what I find most interesting in the section is the way the author pitched Soludo against Juju music maestro, King Sunny Ade on the debate of how to treat the Naira. It is not difficult to decipher who the author votes for between Soludo who preaches respect for the Naira and Sunny Ade whose Owambeic enterprise necessitates a measure of Naira abuse. This is how the author intervenes on the issue: “On this matter of how to treat money, I would vote for Sunny Ade if only to challenge the growing culture of capitalist selfishness and deification of money in our society.”

The 14 opinion pieces in chapter seven on conflict and harmony is about unresolved issues within the context of leadership and its failings. “Subsidy: Teachable Moments” reviews the take-away from the 2012 fuel subsidy demonstration across the country while the concluding paragraph says it all: “The government wrestled all of us to the ground. It chose the gas station as the venue for dispossessing us of N32 for every litre of petrol we buy. In return, we have told them in clear terms how we want to be governed and what they should do with the extra change from our pockets. Above all, we caused quite some loss of sleep in high places. Not a very bad week after all.”

Chapter 8 on “Ideas, Values and Symbols of Nationhood” has 30 opinion pieces, including some thought-provoking reflections on what has become of our ivory tower in Nigeria by a man who spent his early working life as a university lecturer. The author particularly speaks to the rot in his alma mater, University of Ife (where he studied and also taught), in the piece “Campus Mobsters and the Endangered University”, using the August 1999 killing of seven students on the campus by cultists as a peg. “When a university system becomes a factory of death, producing serial killers and mindless mobsters with the rapidity that we have seen in recent times, it becomes a veritable threat to the larger society,” the author wrote.