President Muhammadu Buhari

By Bola Bolawole

Human rights activist and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Femi Falana, has described our senators as “insensitive, irrational, and immoral”. He is damn right! The senators are also selfish and self-serving. They are irresponsible, irresponsive, audacious, and pugnacious. Their impunity is first-class. But it is not only the senators that are this reckless and vexatious; the “Honourables” in the House of Representatives are also bitten by the same bug of self-centredness. Senators and Honourables are beds of a feather. In this time of economic depression, all they care about is their own comfort and a life of obscenity. Senators have bought Jeeps for themselves; Honourables are insisting on Peugeot 508 or Jeep. These are people who already have fleets of cars; who take car loans they seldom pay back; and who, as their terms expire, auction cars bought with tax-payers money to themselves at give-away prices.

In addition, they are muting the idea of giving themselves immunity. They want to be above the law. If they get away with it, they will be the first and only such law makers in the whole world. In addition, they want life pension. These are a class of people already enjoying salaries, perks, emoluments, and allowances that make them the highest paid legislators in the whole world. Yet, they are not satisfied. Many of these law makers have stolen their states and other government MDAs blind before they landed in the National Assembly. Many of them already collect pension from other sources. The severance package of many of these people from their states and other previous places of work is enough to accord them the benefits of kings. Yet, they are insatiable. These characters are worse than Oliver Twist. While Oliver asked for more to satisfy his hunger, these ones grab more to ingratiate their unquenchable and insatiable wants and greed.

Yet, the country is broke. There is no money to throw around as before. But they care less. They will not give a boot because they say the Executive arm of government is no less gluttonous and rapacious. It is therefore a competition between these two arms of government to see who can grab the most from the public till. Truth be told, the Executive is not a better shade that the Legislature. Ministers go about in long convoys of cars. Despite that salaries cannot be paid in most of the states; many governors still maintain their opulent lifestyles as well as keep their retinue of hangers-on.

The testimony of many is that their councillors and council chairman usually abandon their low-profile constituency to live in opulence in high-brow areas of town the moment they whack enough government fund. Corruption in the Executive branch of government has not abated; despite the CHANGE mantra that gallivants in broad daylight. The audacious padding of the 2016 Appropriation Bill otherwise called the budget is an eye-opener. A minister is said to have “loaned” over N130million from parastsatals under his watch. Will such monies ever be paid back?

The president himself has become “Ajala travel”; he is said by a state governor to spend at least US$1million on each of such trips and he has already made how many of them? We are talking of billions of naira here. A fortnight ago, the president again took off for Britain on what Presidential aides said was not a medical trip even though the president would see medical experts in London. There are three leaking holes that keep gulping much-needed foreign currency. One is education tourism, in which thousands of Nigerians seek quality education abroad. “Abroad” here has now come to include countries like Benin Republic, Togo, and Ghana.

Billions of dollars are wasted on this every year; money that should have gone to improve facilities here. The second is holiday tourism, in which Nigerians in droves seek relaxation spots abroad, neglecting the fine spots that we have back at home. Here, again, billions of dollars are wasted yearly; whereas we have very excellent tourism\relaxation spots at Yankari, Ikogosi, Obudu, to mention but a few. The third is medical tourism, which also gulps billions of dollars annually. Not only Britain, France, Germany, and the United States are the destination these days but India, the Middle East, and Israel now rank high on the radar, especially for the upper middle class who cannot afford Europe and America. Now, whichever of these that the president went for is still bad enough because it qualifies as a waste of tax-payers’ money at a time the same government is telling us there is no foreign exchange to pay for fuel and other imports.

Have you seen a video trending, of a Nigerian lady, obviously, miffed by the way our leaders are so callous in their abandonment of Nigerians while taking great care to minister the very best treatment to themselves? The lady was so upset and enraged that she enjoined every Nigerian to say “Amen” to her prayer that whenever Nigerian leaders abandon our decrepit medical facilities at home and junket abroad with their family in search of the best medical facilities “they must die… I say they must die…Yes, they will die…Let them die!” She reminded everyone that human beings like our leaders, not spirits, made it happen abroad. Why not also make it happen in your own country rather than run abroad at the least provocation? I must confess to you that I had difficulty responding “Amen” to her queer prayer. What if I, too, one day become a Nigerian leader and…

Thank God the President is back, hale and hearty and fit as a fiddle; such that he even challenged a journalist to a wrestling contest. Good! Let us arrange one between him and Ekiti state Gov. Ayodele Fayose or his River state counterpart, Nyesome Wike!

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