THE CHALLENGES OF YOUTH AND POLICE RELATIONS AND PARAMETERS FOR A FREE AND FAIR GENERAL ELECTION

THE CHALLENGES OF YOUTH AND POLICE RELATIONS AND PARAMETERS FOR A FREE AND FAIR GENERAL ELECTION

By Aj. Dagga Tolar

INTRODUCTION

 There can be no better time than now, to speak to ourselves, the police, and the youth in relation, to what is expected of us, as we approach the coming 2011 General Elections, how we must conduct ourselves, of course in relation to what our different interests are, which are in turn acted upon by the existing socio economic contradictions in the country. This for me is the only way to conduct a discourse of this manner, if in actual fact we want to adjudge with a certain degree of accuracy, know how we would all conduct ourselves, before, during and after the elections.

For so long the relationship between the youth and police has been one of unfriendly disposition, this is not unconnected to the fact that the youth constitute the most active layer in any given society, and are therefore bound to be represented in a large proportion in all spheres of life both positive and negative, and since the police is an organ that must act on account against such negative social menace, both parties are immediately on a war path.

But more so is the fact that the police functions in an environment wherein they, like the rest of the working masses, are underpaid, and made to work in the most of unfriendly conditions and still faces enormous pressure to deliver, forces the police to either conduct its work in what in local parlance we would call “gpagpa” and illegally too, so as to argument it paltry earning, even if this means making scapegoat of innocent citizens, what matters is that it must be seen to doing it works, the fall out of the above in most cases finds the youth at the receiving side, and this has meant that for a long time youth have continued to see the police as enemy, rather than as friend.

GENERAL ELECTIONS

But elections are another ball game entirely; we therefore need not come into the arena with our mutual fears and suspicions.

An election as it were provides a society a legitimate and orderly means with which a government can so constituted, or change, as the case may be. For this to come about, it requires that there must be candidates to contest, electorate to votes, and an umpire to see to the actual conduct of the election. And it is from this point of view that like all other issues, elections do have their dos and don’ts and as such the police as an agency of law enforcement must necessary keep watch to ensure that rules governing the conduct of the elections are adhered to by all concerns.

But things are however not as straight forward as stated above, Nigeria is a different league all together. Ours is a country with abundant wealth and yet is characterized as a poor country, not with over 90% of its population living on less than dollar daily1, with unemployment figure placed as high as 40 million, with the 3^rd world highest infant mortality figure, which turns out to be number one in proportional reckoning to population, since India and China have a population above the 1 billion mark, the highest casualty figure of road accidents and death on the roads.  The statistics are horrendous, for the working masses, wages are appalling, compare to rate of inflation, even the so call new minimum wage of N18,000 falls short of the expected minimal living standard possible in Nigeria today, when compared to the dollar value of N125 minimum wage of 1981 which equals 235 dollars, going by the dollar value of N150, this would amount to N35,250. What this translates to is that workers in Nigeria today are earning nearly 50% less than what they earn in 1981.

This is the very pressure at work, deciding what people do and don’t, how they conduct themselves, whether they obey the law or not. In the face of the above fact is a ruling elite, that has become notoriously known by all, not to give a hoot about society, with over 450 trillion of oil money squandered with nothing to show for it, elections have therefore become nothing more than a process by which the very same of the same are returned back to the corridors of power. This is the background that we all must bear in mind, without which we cannot arrive at any scientific prognosis in discussing the relation of the police with the youth at moments of elections

ONE MAN ONE VOTE

Much has been said in this regard, this has been greatly touted as the long expected panacea to a peaceful and free and fair election. This is however far from the truth, because we need first raise the question of political representation, to have a situation, wherein the working masses, which includes the rank and file of the armed forces, and the police, and the youth have no political representation, in the fray to look out for their interest, the so much cry for one man, one votes, becomes nothing more than a cry to keep things as they are…. It is this consciousness that nothing will change, that would generate apathy from a majority of youth and the lot of the working masses. Better still others would develop a disposition, that would demand something, indeed anything, before casting their votes, giving the convictions that after the election, nothing would be heard from the politicians again , until when another election is around the corner.

Elections have therefore become a means by which those who property the public treasury into a private property, seek to continue to be in office to continue to line their pockets, this is the sole interest and motive driving the ruling elites and their quest for powers, aided by their cohorts

And who are these cohorts?

1.     The families and friends of those in power \The families and friends of those seeking political power

2.     Party members whose loyalty would earn them political appointment or an award of contract that need not be executed.

These two categories of persons alongside the ruling elites are the very architect of whatever would go wrong with the coming general elections; the latter are the ones with the strongest of motives, they are the ones who want to retain or want power, so as to retain their hold or have their hands on the national cake. Given the personalization of the public treasury as the private concern of those in power.

They are the very ones, that have encouraged, the youths, party loyalists to engage in multiple registrations during the registration exercise, with the lure and expectation, encouraged or otherwise that their cards would translate to at worst a one day meal ticket. This is why the INEC figure of over 500,000 multiple registrations, is not in any way alarming. And unfortunately there is pretty little we can do about it, the ruling elites have all the aces and jokers in this game, and they would play this game dirty, if that is what is required to ensure that they return back to their looting ways…. They can only truly be held in check by the vigilance of the working masses, who are not politically represented by an independent working people political platform, armed with a working class agenda to wrestle for power, with the aim of organizing running society by ensuring that the resources of society is used for the benefit of all, and not that of Big Business as it is presently. It is rather unfortunately for the working masses, that there exist in name a so call labour party, that as nothing whatsoever to do with workers and is all, a bourgeois formation like all the other ruling elites parties like, PDP, ACN, ANPP, CPC APGA etc.

THE BATTLE FOR LAGOS    

Already in Lagos, we have been treated with the unpresidential comments of the “Rascals” that must be chase out Vs the label of the “shattered umbrella…of the Poverty Development Party”2 that must not be allowed to take over Lagos. In an election of one man, one vote, truly the electorates should decide, Lagos, with the highest registered voters of 6, 247, 845 million, should definitely have nothing to fear or worry about... The electorate would simply decide, but no way, this is not how things would turn out, for there are other unprintable issues involved in the battle for Lagos. And both sides would do everything but in and outside the book to be declared winners.

What one is trying to point out is that electoral offenders are those who have interest at stake, for a majority of youth, little or nothing in relation to their lives is at stake. And these are the very untouchable who themselves are the ones presiding over society, making the rules, is the police as an enforcement agency of the law capable of arresting these untouchables, who with their comments so far are telling us that they can do and undo, would the police not even become a mere observer, while electoral offences are committed by members of the ruling elite or by its agent that is if it is not even dragged into the gambit directly, induced by financial gratification to assist or directly commit the electoral offence on behalf of the ruling elites. And not with the poverty wages, who would ignore such a golden opportunity to make free money

THE POLICE AND ELECTIONS

How many policemen are in the know that they are relieved of escort job to public officials on Election Day? What is the content of the specific programme (if any has been put in place) by the police authority to even educate police men and women on the content of the electoral laws? Is there any attempt to specify how they must conduct themselves during and after the election?

The question of crowd control, either those celebrating an electoral victory or those protesting a lost election, what instrument of crowd control are available to the police, outside of bullets and guns, or is that it is the police that would provide its own working instrument, already police men and women are being made to buy their own uniform, boots, stationeries, etc. if  the scenario so describe were to arise, would the police be left with any other situation than to use what is available to carry out its work, and would this in the face of a very persisting and stubborn crowd, not exacerbate the situation, further present the police in very bad light to members of the public.

How independent can the police carry out its work during a General Election, free from the dictates of those in power, who unmindful of the fact that they are involved in the electoral contest would want to take advantage of the control of the organ of the state to make the police carry some action that would turn to be of advantage to the party of his\her electoral affiliation. Gani Fawehinmi commenting on the result of the National Conscience Party in 2003 General Elections pointed that the election was rigged before, during and after elections. What this implies is that we have largely concentrated on during elections, ignoring the before and after, wherein those politicians in power employ the resources of the whole of society, and the organs of the state and their public officials to influence the outcome of the election to their favour.

 

What is clear is that the police is not in any way so organized that it can independently in a pro-active manner carry out any action against those in power. And this if you ask me is the product of how the police is presently organized, police men and women in Nigeria lack any independent organ of its own with which it can adjudge for itself, its work, how it must so carry it out and what it must therefore define as public or national interest out of the narrow definition of the ruling elites which in most cases is substituted as that of public interest. This is where the question of appointment of the IGP and the top hierarchy of the police comes to play, how free is this process detached from the narrow interest of those in government. This also is where one need to raise the question of the Police Union, there is no reason whatsoever why this does not exist in Nigeria,  and without such an organ for the free assembly of police men and women , so long would it lack the democratic organ to discuss with itself and contribute in defining how it conduct its work for the overall good of the whole of society.

Let me here also state that I am very positive that the police authority is yet to receive from INEC, a state by state figure of the 500, 000 so call multiple registered voters list, so that it can beforehand analyses it, I don’t even see why it should not be a public document, so that the police can monitor such state or locality beforehand. Let me now turn the focus on the youth. 

EDUCATION   

The growing level of illiteracy in country is alarming, with more than a figure of 9-10 million of school age children not in school. 20% of 310,007 students who took 2010 Nov\Dec. WASSCE obtained only five credits in English and Mathematics, in 2009  only 31% of 342, 443, in 2008 only 23% of 372,600. Higher education is not any better off, not one of the existing 109 Nigeria’ universities is listed in the first rated 50 universities in Africa, with more than 1millions prospective youth seeking admission denied university education yearly on account of available spaces you can now begin to wonder, how such a youth would not want to consciously act such an environment as this.

But let us ask, what is the stake of the contesting political parties in relation to education budget, is party ready to commit the demanded 26% of the budget as demanded by UNESCO, is Nigeria not capable of providing free qualitative funded education to all its children and youth, given the wealth of the country, not with oil selling presently at above 110 dollars mark, with 2011 budget pegging oil price at 65 dollars. As we speak approval has been given to 5 new private universities that would all turn out unaffordable millions of youth from working class background…..

In the same vein the OAU was just recently closed done, why? The school authorities, had increased the acceptance fees from 2000 to 20, 000 Naira, and over 1,000% increase… what is acceptance fee? Accept that you want to go to a university, why in the first instances, did this candidates made 5 credits, did JAMB exams and some even losing their lives in the process of criss-crossing the country to do post JAMB, would a school now want to collect an acceptance fee, what can that mean and the ruling elites are not in any way bothered. Not a single party contesting in the coming election as a programme aimed at reversing the ugly trend in the educational sector outside of rhetoric, how then must any youth take the coming election ant serious, when little or nothing is in the offering to positively impact of his conditions. The police therefore need not to worry, a majority of youth would not going the extra mile or sweat themselves out over what in the end would not make any difference to their lives.

This does not however ignore the fact that some youth would not mind to earn N500 or N1,000 Naira on election day, either to vote or thumb print as would be expected to happen in some localities, but then shouldn’t the politician be the one to be held accountable?

THE OCCUPATION OF THE STREET

If anything is likely, it is that band of youth from street to street, would occupied the street on Election Day not to disrupt the election or seize electoral materials but for some other reasons. This occupation of the street from the wee hours of the morning could last in some cases till about mid day. A lot of the youth see themselves as already disenfranchised; they would rather therefore devote their time to the pursuit of entertaining physical passion of football game as the street is temporarily transformed to a football playing arena, with either a five a side or three a side football game. This is one important feature of events that restriction of movement of persons to a particular locality has endeared in the urban space.

The police and there convoys, would definitely have the right of passage, either as part of escorts for electoral officers and electoral materials or as part of monitoring team, the thing to say is that the police, must not see this as an opportunity to carry out false or unwarranted arrest, which could provoke a possible resistance from the boys, rather than engage in what Fela Anikulapo aptly calls power show, the thing to do is even to greet the boys , as the police pass through and allow the boys to continue with the occupation of the street.  

BOKO HARAM

Perhaps one other issue that cannot be ignored, is the Boko Haram phenomenon, not because it is a religious sect or anti – government, but more importantly because It is largely made up of youth. The founder Mohammed Yusuf was killed in 2009 in custody, but this as in no way stopped the Boko Haram from launching unending attacks on state organs and functionaries, with Police suffering more and more casualties.

How prepared is the police to combat a possible attack by the Boko Haram on election day, not with a governorship aspirant of the ANPP in Bornu killed by the sect, if such were to arise without in any creating panic and fear in the general public, or do we just like the governor of Bornu express our helplessness by calling for prayers to God to intervene and save us from “Boko Haram threat to peace”4

We agree in totality with fact that the Boko Haram is caused by socio economic factors, “it is largely populated by young and often educated but unemployed believers who are , in the circumstance, restless and disenchanted with a life of idleness and hopelessness”5. What this implies is that the Boko Haram like the rest of society is out of wit with the ruling elites and it record of dismal failure in the governance of Nigeria, but we must however point out that its method and the absence of work out economic alternative to the policy neo liberalism would not win the working masses in the long run to its rank, if anything it method would again would rebuff more and more Nigerians.

CONCLUSION

We conclude by stating that a free and fair election is imperative for any society to move forward, but then can we dare to ask, free and fair for whom, the same ruling elites who collectively condemn us this living in hell or free and fair for the working masses, youth, the rank and file of the police and the armed forces, who to critical upturn their present conditions of existence wherein basic needs are priced out of the reach of the common people to one where all can access all that is required to live a fruitful and fulfilled life, nature interestingly has blesses us all the resources both human and mineral with which to bring this into reality.

It therefore flows that only the involvement of the working masses in their millions in pursuit of their collective wellbeing, within the framework of their own political platform that would bring to bear their vigilance to bring to naught and neutralize any attempt by whoever to rig an election is whatever form. The absence of such is the tragedy that is bound to befall us all in 2011 General Elections, the result might most likely not be any different from previous uncheerful elections.

To expect anything different is to live in a fool’s paradise, not with over 70 million registered voters, 120,000 polling booths, 360,000 ad hoc INEC staff, 500, 000 multiple voters list, with a police force of 377, 000 members, 8,090 vehicles  or is it that we expect that the police would shut out all other of its statuary duties and focus all its attention and men and women officers on the elections alone, this we know is not possible, the police are humans as the rest of us, and can only bite as much as they can chew. However all is not lost for Nigeria going by recent events in North Africa and in the Middle East, the path of REVOLUTION, of the entrant on the working masses into the arena of struggle and making history by taking their destiny in their own hands by seeking to break the control of the thieving Ruling elites over the whole of society, and begin History anew. From Tunisia  to Egypt and now Libya, the truth is that Nigerians are watching and are increasingly concluding that the way forward is the Path of REVOLUTION. The youth I am confident would blaze the trail and stand up to be counted, even the police as we have seen in a place like Egypt would not stand on the side line, or take position in opposite side of the barricade against the working masses and the youth in a struggle to transform Nigeria into a country, where we all would be proud to alive and be happy to called Nigerians. Thank you for listening. 

ENDNOTES

1.THE GUARDIAN, Wednesday, February 16, 2011

2 . THE GUARDIAN, Wednesday, February 16, 2011

3.     Wanted: A President for Nigeria’s Poor, Vanguard, TUESDAY, MNARCH 6, 2010 Pg. 18.

4.     THE GUARDIAN, Wednesday, February 11, 2011, Pg. 14.

5.     ibid

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MUBI\ALUU KILLING.. Ruling Elites to Blame

MUBI\ALUU KILLING.. Ruling Elites to Blame

 by Aj. Dagga Tolar

 

 

Nigerians woke up on the 6 October up to the news of another horror killings in Aluu, Port Harcourt of River state condemning jungle justice approach that was melted out to four students,  Ugonna Obuzor 18 years old; Lloyd Toku, 19, Tekena Elkhanah, 20, and Chiadika Odinga. These killings taking place when the country was still in a state of shock and yet to come to grip with the killing of 46 students of the Federal Polytechnic Mubi, Adamawa in a no less horrifying manner as seen nearly all shade of opinion molders and makers calling for the perpetuators to be brought to book and the maximum punishment of death be brought than heavy on them, even know campaigners against capital punishment have no less been horrified in singing the same song.

For the Mubi killings, the spokeperson of the Boko Haram has been quoted to stating that they have had no hands in the killing and latest revelation pointing accusing fingers to the rivalry among various groups on campus over the recent held student union elections. That things have degenerated to such a situation on campuses in the country is not unconnected to the state of teaching facilities and the continuous underfunding that university education have had to suffer all these past years, a fall out of the neo liberal policy thrust of the ruling elites, making learning one of the most harrowing and the least activity of interest in our educational institutions for students, given the greater battle for survival and paying the outrageous fees.

We must also not forget that ruling elites as well as school authorities have in the past used rival student groups and indeed cult groups in some cases like with William Obong in UNIBEN and OAU 5 in Ife to hack down known student activists’ who were identified as leading a mass resistance against the introduction of fees on their campus. That this pattern is now been enacted is also not unconnected to the long years of government and school management wield the student union government under its influence, rid it of its independence from left incline activist students, in some cases banning the student union and left ideological and intellectual incline organizations from functioning on campus.

This the very background that has laid the roots for the worsen conditions of things on our campuses, inspite of the spirited attempt by ASUU to draw attention to all of this in series of strikes and strikes, the ruling elites time and time after every strike betray the very agreement it signed to improving conditions of learning on campus.

Added to the above is the various activities of killings and bombing by the Boko Haram in the North, which has increasingly instituted killing as a pattern to adopt in opposing whoever or whatever, instead of the more appropriate mass mobilization and involvement in a struggle to win or demand redress of the issue involved, the resort to means of arms is seen more as the way to turn to. Matters are further not helped by the conduct of the Joint Task Force (JTF) which adopts unwholesome methods in carrying out its activities of containing the scourge of the Boko Haram, through its discriminate arrest, and harassment of innocent youths, further driving more and more youth to adopt the Boko Haram method or to out rightly join its ranks. This explain why the speculation was high that the Boko Haram was involved in the Mubi killings given the fact that the JTF had a week earlier or there about raided Mubi and made arrest, the thinking was that both were link, and the fact that some of those arrested have been accused of being members of the sect, did not in anyway allow for this reasoning to be dismissed entirely

Which explain why the DSM has long been calling for the withdrawal of the JTF from the streets of Maiduguri and the whole of the north and its replacement with the formation of Community Defense Committee to be democratically run and managed by elected representatives of the people on a street to street basis, or community to community basis in the north with the right to bear arms as means of defense as oppose to the JTF, which in most cases comes heavily on the innocent victims.

With regards to the Aluu killings the NLC’s President, Abdulwahed Omar has been quoted to having condemned the killing describing it as “most cruel, dastardly and barbaric”, and calling for arrest to be made which is exactly what has happen with the arrest of the traditional ruler of Aluu and some other 20 other persons, how best can the cause of justice be served, without any attempt to halt the very conditions that led to the kind of killings that have taken place. If anything, the Aluu killings help confirm the fact that southerners can as well be brutal if given the opportunity in the same way that the Boko Haram killings and the Mubi killings have made glaring to all.

The fact of the Aluu killings most however not be lost, the four students had gone to retrieved a debt, and the debtor unable to pay had screamed “thief, thief!”, and before long a crowd and the vigilante group in the neigbourhood had pounced on them, paraded them round town, winning the support of more and more restive and unemployed youth and others to commence the roasting alive of the four students. And with such a crowd already held hostage by the failure of the police to effectively curb the rising crime wave in the inner communities, and the growing statistics of police ineptitude and in some cases freeing known criminals from prosecution, you cannot from that kind of circumstances understand the mentality of instant jungle justice, even when interrogation or proper investigation would free any innocently accused person. But then whole question of the failure of death sentence to curb crime in any of its form …without a conscious attempt to combat all of the socio economic factors like unemployment, poverty etc is lost on any such crowd already worked and all ready to take action against the caught victims.

But may we ask more and more communities are turning to form vigilante groups to protect themselves from the social menace of robberies in the communities. First is the complete inability and ill equip nature of the police to handle the viral spread series of social menace emanating from the continued dislocation arising from the state of things in the country which itself is not unconnected to the continued misgovernance of the ruling elite, that the question of a debt repayment would result into a scare and the shouting of “thief, thief!” and immediately see a crowd (of restive people who themselves are virtually unemployed) and the vigilante swing to action says much about the alarming figure of youth unemployment conservatively placed at a figure of 24 millions going by official statistics says much of the conditions in our communities.  

This explains why much the DSM condemns the killing and hope against hope that this would not be reenacted, we are however held back by the fact that their seems to be no other way out for the working masses than to continue to retreat into further barbarism, if a struggle is not launched to overthrow the ruling elites and replace them with a working people government that would place the interest and wellbeing of the masses as the basis of governance, engineering the necessary development that would lift and improve the living conditions of the masses. This it can so easily achieve with the nationalization of the commanding heights of the economy under the democratic management of the working people government.   

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AFTER THE ONDO ELECTION: What Next For The Working Masses?

By Aj. Dagga Tolar

But for the media hype over the acrimonious campaigns and mudslinging between the Mimiko led Labour Party in Ondo state and the Bola Tinubu led ACN, the Ondo elections could have passed as a non-event as far as the majority of the working peoples in the State are concerned.
Like other working but suffering masses across Nigeria, they have become used to the deceit of millionaire politicians whose achievements are often more recorded on newspaper pages and TV screens than on the streets and neighbourhoods where motor-able roads, functional schools and hospitals, public conveniences etc continue to be a rarity. The attitude of the mass of the people in Ondo state to the elections is indeed reflected in the fact that less than 60% of the registered electorate actually voted. The total votes cast was 624,659 out of 1.6million registered voters according to INEC.
The declared winner, Olusegun Mimiko of the Labour Party (LP), also did not even score up to half of the votes that were actually cast as he got only 260,199. This suggests that if the masses had had a genuine alternative in the form of a truly working class political party, they would have opted for it.
On the other hand, Olusola Oke of the People Democratic Party (PDP) and Rotimi Akeredolu of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) respectively scored 155,961 and 143,512 votes indicating that the voters did not really distinguish or see any fundamental difference between the two and their platforms.
This should not come as a surprise as both the PDP and ACN governments across Nigeria have shown their true colours in the form of commitment to anti-poor policies. At the Federal level the masses cannot easily forget the hardship of the increase in fuel prices, huge costs of higher education and health care delivery in a country that on the basis of its huge wealth as well as human and natural resources can actually afford free education and free health care at all levels.
For the ACN, the Ondo masses didn't need to look too far. In Lagos State, the minimum wage of N18,000 is implemented under a so called "Oracle contraption" that leaves workers worse off making nonsense of levels and grade with no one in the know of the criteria employed to arrive at the figures. This is why teachers, doctors, lecturers have at different times gone on strike with that of doctors attracting ruthless reaction from Fashola's government including mass sack. Similar brutal tactics, akin to the military dictatorships of yesterday, were deployed by the Fashola government to suppress protests against the collection of tolls in Lekki, the introduction of astronomical fees in Lagos State University etc. Currently, thousands of Okada – motorcycle - commercial riders are being bloodily attacked for supposedly congesting the roads whereas the state lacks good roads and real mass transit system.
In Ekiti State local government workers have just called off a strike over the non-implementation of minimum wage while recently also, higher institution students pelted Osun State Governor with stone during a protest in the state capital over non-payment of bursary awards that students normally use to cushion the effects of high cost of learning, living and feeding in the absence of free education and affordable accommodation.
These, no doubt, were major factors that weighed on the mind of the few voters in the Ondo elections. However, Mimiko's victory must also be weighed against the fact that incumbents rarely lose elections in Nigerian bourgeois politics where access to state treasury often provide a huge war chest of funds during elections. As it has been in PDP and ACN controlled states, particularly during local government elections, so it is now in Ondo State.
Yet, the situation in Ondo State might have been radically different, if the Labour Party had been built as a genuine working class alternative offering public ownership and democratic control of the commanding heights of the economy in place of liberalization and privatization. Neither Mimiko nor the official labour leaders - both of the NLC and the TUC – who were active in his campaigns, have such commitment. The same Labour leaders had some months back in Edo state campaigned for Oshiomhole of the ACN in his bid for a second term. This implies that the party actually is of no consequence and Labour would continue like before to remain uninvolved in the political process; outside of supporting one supposedly "progressive" candidate or the other while unmindful of their political platforms and their bourgeois orientation. This is despite the fact that the January 2012 anti-fuel price increase protests which labour led actually demonstrated more than ever before the urgent need for a mass workers' political party that can fight to take political power from the corrupt capitalist ruling elite.
This is a consequence of the fact that the capitalist ruling elites will not bulge and have continued to insist that there is no alternative to condemning the people more and more into poverty and sub human conditions of existence through its neo-liberal policies of deregulation and privatization, so as to guarantee super profit for the exclusive rich.
It is therefore an exercise in futility for labour leaders to expect to convince or force the capitalist ruling elites to adopt a more working people-friendly policies and programme especially at this time when the focus should be on building an alternative party that represents millions of the working people and that can be used to build a mass movement to dislodge the ruling elites from power. This was why the DSM welcomed the formation of the Labour Party in 2001 and canvassed for the party to be built to defend the interest of the working masses while vying for power on the basis of socialist programmes of nationalization of the commanding sectors of the economy under working class management and control to free the resources currently being stolen in the name of the capitalist public private partnership for real development via a programme of massive public works in education, health, roads etc .
Despite the urgent need for workers and poor to have their own independent political party that genuinely represents their interests, it is sad to note that the idea of building the LP is apparently not on the agenda of the labour leaders, and the party has largely remained unattractive to the working masses given the series of undemocratic conditions for membership and monetization of the party's internal elections thus making it extremely impossible for working class members to emerge as candidates on its platform.

AFTER THE VICTORY WHAT NEXT

But what happens next? The standard attitude of second-term governments in Nigeria is that of harsher anti-poor policies and stealing of the resources of the state for the future comfort and wellbeing of the political gladiators cannot be entirely ruled out. What this would imply is that the wellbeing of the working masses would further worsen as government not expecting the vote of the masses again now reveals its real and brutal anti-poor character.
Is there any prospect for the LP to act any differently from the way it has conducted its affair so far? Would Mimiko and Co. not ultimately feel the bug of isolation and crave to return back to the PDP, with no conscious attempt to build the LP as a national force outside Ondo state?
As stated before, the result of the election itself makes a large statement, with nearly two-thirds of the registered voters not deeming it necessary to vote; a pointer to the fact that the majority of the mass of the people are in no way deluded as to believe that the parties that partook in the elections, including the LP, fundamentally differ from one another.
While we would welcome and support the campaign to drive the moneybags out of the Labour Party and start to build it as a party of and for the working masses, it is clear that this is not a task for those labour leaders who are in agreement with neo-liberal capitalist agenda and would not lift a finger to bring about building Labour Party as a pro-working peoples' party. This explains why the trade union leaders choose the pro-establishment parties like ACN and PDP other than LP to contest elections when they decide to participate in politics. Therefore, a struggle to reclaim the Labour Party has to be waged side by side with the struggle for fighting trade unions with genuine pro-working class leadership. All trade union officers must be elected and put on the average wages of the workers.
The fact that the Labour Party's decision making and internal elections are completely monetized is just one indication of how it is run like all other pro-capitalist parties. Today the Labour Party is totally integrated into Nigeria's rotten political system. Despite opposing Jonathan's attempt to remove the fuel price subsidy, the Labour Party Chairman Chief Dan Nwanyanwu, said during last January's mass strikes and protests that "the party had no regret in supporting the President" during the 2011 elections (Punch, January 7, 2012). But statements such as these go unchallenged by the trade union leaders. Even the very few lefts who hold positions in the party are silent about the party's anti-poor policies and monetized internal life.
This explains why the DSM has taken the initiative to commence the process of the registration of the Socialist Party of Nigeria (SPN), as a step forward for the campaign for a new mass workers alternative. While building the SPN, the DSM will continue to argue in the labour movement and among the Nigerian left for the formation of such a new mass workers party as ultimately necessary to build a mass political movement that can wrestle power from the grip of the capitalist ruling elites.
We are confident that the over one million registered voters who turned their backs against all the bourgeois parties, and the LP, and all those who because of no credible alternative and acting on the doctrine of the "lesser evil" voted in the election, would in all regard welcome the formation of a genuine mass working people political party. This explains why we feel justified not to have in anyway called for a vote, even a critical one, for the LP in Ondo as the labour leaders and a few other left activists have so done. Ahead of 2007 election, of course, we had canvassed for LP to be built into a genuine workers' party, with a fighting programme, that would have been at forefront of the struggles of the working masses against the capitalist ruling elites.
But the LP's subsequent evolution has shown how it has become a "normal" Nigerian party, despite having among its national leadership a leading socialist activist who has neither been seen or talked no evil about the party in the face of its egregious anti-poor character. This is a betrayal of those who initially had hopes in the party and something which underlines the need to start to build a genuine party of working people and poor.

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“THE PRESIDENT IS NOT IN A GRAVE OF MANY ERRORS”

Birthdays are for sharing of cakes, but to offer one for a nation like ours that have spent all of its years of existence in a grave of unending errors is so grievous a mistake on the part of one whose original function is not that of an undertaker but of a midwife, from there forth on to the function of nurturing and catering, and teaching how to live, much akin to the role of a mother and a father over their offspring, this is the summed role of a ruler, not the reverse.
For there are more than assumed differences between a birth and a death, yes there was a birth of a nation dated October 1, 1960, (even though January 1, 1914 is more like it) and indeed we have since then never stopped the dying, when from this date forward, living is what is expected of us. Every one of the midwives on assumption of duty has deemed it fit, to continue on the path of its predecessor and function as an undertaker. This is the very unmaking of Nigeria whether at 52 or at 98.
But here our concern is much in relation to the celebration of the working masses, at their effort at nation building not merely in their daily sweating to produce the wealth of the nation, but their rising to consciousness to understanding that there every expectations from the ruling elites for the country to be built and developed in a way and manner that the working masses would benefit from their sweat rather than have all of it appropriate to feed the ego and luxurious life of the elites and that of their cronies would always be betrayed. The task of nation building can therefore not commence without a successful pulling down of the ruling elites and their neoliberal regime by the direct movement of the working masses into the arena of struggle, this is the very the reason that makes the January 2012 protest against the fuel price increase of great significant.
And like we all know with the protest that there was a birth, the birth of the possibility of a new beginning for the nation, and a new way of governance with the working masses and their interest at the heart and act of governance.
With Nigerians from all works of life establishing a common symmetry, with state function suspended and the street in their full control, even the dreaded Boko Harem felt no need to throw any bomb, these Nigerians indeed could not have been ordinary in the way to successfully showed to all of us the possibility of how unity can be built through working class unity from across all ethnic nationality and religious divide. Can you imagine Muslims providing a shield round the church while Christians do their thing and Christians do the same while Muslims were praying, oh no these cannot be Nigerians, not to now talk of the fact that they are ordinary Nigerians, to accomplish such a feat, when the elites continued to labour at it unsuccessfully, which is why the President seems not to have been wrong when he said these were not “ordinary” Nigerians, not with the demonstration raising the slogan of power, regime and system change just less than 9 months of a massive electoral turn out to elect him as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
There was the possibility of a death to all the old ways of doing things and running the country to feed the pocket of the ruling elites and their cronies. This death did not arise and yet there was a death and the killings. All of these the President seems to ignore in his recent outburst on the January protest, since it was clear there was no need whatsoever to acknowledge the role played by him in the death of the protest by sending an occupying force to take over the street neither did he deem it fit to apologize for the killings. He did not command any force to Lagos to occupy the Ojota’ Gani Fawehinmi Park, neither could the DPO of Pen Cinema Police Station, Agege, Segun Olubunmi who shot and killed Ademola Aderinde have acted on orders of the president, the IG or is it the Commissioner of Police made that clear enough there was no order to that effect to shoot and kill innocent peaceful protesting Nigerians not when the protest were entirely peaceful. Nor does the president need to weep over the death of Abdul Malik Rabiu Badawa, and Bashir Musa Zango, in Kano and many others who were mauled down including that of Mustapher Muyideen in Ilorin even days before the strike was to officially kick off, do we need any other evidence that these Nigerians were not acting on their own or is it more easier to say that the police men and soldiers who carried these killings and cleaned the street free from its occupation were not Nigerians!
Flowing from the above we cannot all but see reason with the President that the “protest in Lagos was manipulated by a class in Lagos and was not from the ordinary people”. Such profound wisdom from the president should and must not go unacknowledged by us all and indeed we can with this welcome him to the Olympian height of cerebrum functionality never before attained by any other Nigerian ruler. This is why the comedy of error would be more on the path of this writer to conclude that the President is in a grave of many errors and expect him not to want to stretch the luck in his name of Goodluck to cover all the years of the won mandate and the one still to come. The good days cannot so soon be so very early over; Nigerians only need to learn how to wait and wait for good governance to come. The delusion therefore is not on the part of the President to the extent that his regime is filled with good intentions for the country.
We cannot therefore pick a quarrel with his paid apologists... or even with "our own" Rueben Abati, only that they are spending our money, very good money to educate us all of how things would all be better tomorrow! We are the ones who are failing to be good students to heed the professorial teachings of the president, of why government “must act in the public interest, no matter how tough, for the pains of today cannot be compared to the benefits of tomorrow.” But no, history is such a very bad subject to learn from when it comes to cataloguing all the promises of all other regimes that have forces on us a regime of increase in fuel prices. Is it that the kitchen cabinet crew of Abati and co are failing to school the president or is it the president that is proving to be an unrepentant bad student of history, given the bad nature of our history on this account, or he is simply stoop down low to the level of the unschooled and unlettered ordinary Nigerians that he is governing or history as a subject has been “manipulated” by those the President is accusing for fueling the protest in Lagos.
We must therefore take it for granted that Nigerians are so much used to suffering and fuel price increase (imagine since 1989 SAP days of IBB) that they have indeed fallen in love with the act of periodic hiking of fuel prices and all its added suffering, better to buy it at whatever sky rocket price than suffer the more heinous palpitation of no fuel at all… Don’t go minding the crude oil. This is available. This is black gold. But what use is gold, black and unrefined …. To have knocked vehicles all over the road would be more of an indices for a failed Jonathan regime, which would not be good for counting luck for Goodluck, so in fulfillment of the spirit of electoral juggernaut and campaign of no promise whatsoever, “everything would be done to make fuel available at the appropright upping of the price at fuel station in line with the price at the international market”. So goes the thinking and wisdom of the presidency.
And must we forget that there is nothing local or national about our crude oil, international oil Barons and companies, do the discovering, the drilling and of course the doctoring of the figures of barrels in the face of stacked illiterates Nigerian public official oil experts who know nothing of the numerology of oil drilled outside of the figures handed over and added kickbacks both under and on top of the table deals and raw cash inserted into “carry go bags”. So then there can be nothing else than the local equivalent of the international price, given that we must be seen as doing our own fair share of gratitude to the international oil barons by paying them back in kind through patronization of their refined products of our own crude oil, how is this not a boost for our economy to use our own crude oil, unmindful of where ever it is refined. This would boost sales figures and provide the downstream jobs of importing fuel, for the local boys, of course make funds available for donations to be made into party funds, and what better way than a subsidy regime. This is free give a way, the mistake must not be made, our surplus most be duly spent to built and encourage a class of enterprising entrepreneurs that we can hope in future would do the good job of replacing the monsters and their foreign sharks of so call international oil barons. Our own enriched and rich enough bourgeoisies would see the need to built and maintain new refineries at no cost whatsoever to the State, to free more of our resources for our cherished pastime of the ruling elites and you know what I am drifting at.
The presidency next forages into the realm of sociology and culture to tell us of our love for music and comedy. Hear the president “They go and hire the best musicians to come and play and the best comedian to come and entertain”. This is excellent wisdom ...though not new at all… And the masses in their own foolish wisdom would not expect a tasking of the resources of the state to be expended on a public official in the Culture or Tourist ministry for this almighty and allknown piece of sociological information, not less would they expect their president in all his wisdom to pedal such streetwise and indulge in a waste of public fund. The president would not dare do that; someone must be making a mistake! But not to worry... Nigerians can dance, we love to celebrate, see the way we bury our dead … our weeping must be as short as possible, the sad countenance in most cases is for the public view, especially when it brings into view the question of succession, The Civil Societies, even so called Oppostion with base in Lagos rose in defense of an official handover in January 2010, given the then incapacitation of the president, Lagos streets then was not occupied by some too rich boys and girls who could never go hungry, never bottle water drinking lot to add their voice to the call of an end the rule of the kitchen cabinet Cabals, who held power on behalf of the president in full disdain of the constitutional provision that the Vice President should act in the absence of the president... except that we don’t know, if Jonathan can educate us all that it took him financing all the bottle waters that were drank on that march in Lagos to demand that the Vice President be allowing into acting capacity for the in capacitated President.
Fela Anikulapo Kuti remains the foremost and number one of all musicians at the Lagos protest, there were a list of those who wanted to win their way back into the hearts of Nigerians that they so disappointed, when they were all falling over themselves to line their pockets with cool cash for their faces and voices to line unrehearsed songs endorsing Jonathan for President, they came up so disappointed, but who ever made any promise, except to the Godfathers abroad and home to continue things as they were. So how much was paid to bring Fela from out of the grave to become the very living wire of the protest? This calls for a probe panel, both a Natioanal Assembly and an executive probe panel to determine the amount of public funds that have been diverted from budgeted expenditures by the “class in Lagos” to line the pockets of the Lords of the Underworld to allow this “bloody civilian” some fresh flesh for his already rotting bones! The wisdom of the President cannot here be on recess, and not to worry there is no need to wait forever, another charge can be brought forward like the question of violating code of conduct bureau which is constitutional provided for.
How was it possible for Fela to so synchronize with the mood of the people that were on the street protesting, and not a warrant was issued for his arrest, or is that they “the (Ruling) class in Lagos” had also manipulated the police not to see the havoc Fela was capable of doing and was doing in mobilizing the street thick and strong, or is that the presidency (No! this is not possible) does not know ..that music is a veritable tool in the act of mobilizing support that you would expect the President to know something as simple as this, which came in handy in his electoral campaign and was heavily budgeted for, then what is happening… where is the failing in the presidency in this regard. Over to the Civil Societies in Lagos, this is a good enough campaign to call for the sacking of some of the boys and girls both at the media unit or some of the special advisers for not doing their job properly.
Why fail and delay in the introduction of music, dance and comedy into the school curriculum, why is the president wasting time, compulsory music and comedy playing sessions in all work place… the excellent pre-electoral performances of the drafted and paid music boys and girls who told us all of the beauty of a Jonathan Presidency and all the good it would do our nation. Why not legislate a permanent job for them all and have Nigerians all the time routing their love this presidency… Nigerians love music and comedy and in turn anyone who does as much as making this available to them..except that in their household the culminating phenomenon of the permanent panopano PHCN leaves them with no other option than seek the option of daily walking distance of kilometer to hear and exercise their love for music and comedy which is literarily impossible in their dark shanty enclosement of a home.
Why not break the monopoly of the use of these cultural instrument and employ the mighty weight of the resources of the Nigerian state to show this good for nothing “ (Ruling) Class in Lagos” , how it can properly be done, Oh no! The presidency is scared of founding new frontiers for good for nothing politically controlled media houses in Lagos. Then they would say we have an unserious president who wastes the resources of the country providing good music and comedy to the enjoyment of the people who love good music and comedy! Why must the advice to the Malawian president come in handy for the president himself “not bother, forget the critic and go on”.
On the charge of free food, there is no need erroneously concluding that the President thinks that Nigerians are so wretched and so too hungry that we all woke up very early to walk Mushin, Orile, Ipaja, Agege , Ajegunle, okota, Ketu, Ikorodu, Amuwo (etc) to Ojota to eat one meal that was being handed out to complement the music and the bottled water, who is soon forgetting how hospital we are..when the budget speaks volume of our hospitality bearing in mind the huge figure allotted to refreshment by the presidency.
What is criminal in an opposition doing something that would put it in the good instead of the masses that it would count on their vote the next election around… or is that Jonathan never ever been in opposition does not know the book and rule on which opposition parties leverage on. But then are ordinary Nigerians not capable of fending for themselves, but their little drops to support their expectations and indeed the truth which is no good tale to the ears of the presidency was that millions of Nigerians were out there on account of the quest for running things differently from the rot that presently pervades governance in Nigeria.
Which is why we need not then go and conclude that the mock coffins and the effigies that were carried on the street during the protest were all self made, all came from the humble and simple quest for an end to corruption, and end to importation of fuel, and end to non functionality of refineries, an end profiteering from the sweat and blood of the working masses, an end to the regime of neo liberalism. But the president must be told that all manners of sins can be forgiven, even the use of innuendoes against the “(ruling) class in Lagos” (and also forgotten by the them with the appropright upping of the sharing formula in favour of cash flow or oil well equivalent personalized in the behind for the them). This is why the whole hue against the opposition is more of wool out for a dyeing look, no more than an embarrassing stunt to win the listening earn of the president for bargaining at the table. Is there any section of the Ruling Elites who are in anyway opposed to the fuel hike or the idea of making more money as much as possible even if it means further pauperizing the working masses.
But when the president states that “people were given bottled water that people in my village don’t have access to”, this should not be seen as a shocker but a thesis from the erudite of the president at the boldness in putting forward a political treatise that could earn some PhD student a doctorate in political philosohpy if elaborated upon, governance cannot and must not conducted on an ethnic bases, those who cling to this theory that development would go round the country, if all the sections of the ruling elite are allowed to take turn, should learn from the president and his village afterall people from his village still do not have access to bottle water, so the Igbos can as well forget 2015, the North should not even think of it!
Now that we all share the same knowledge with the president in relation to his village, can we go further to ask why this is so, is it that the roads are not good enough to ferry those products down there without being bugged down by unmotorable creek paths or being waylaid by some masked faced guns boys who are still on the waiting for the amnesty to fit them into the list for their monthly pay cheque, and while they wait they can do with drinking some luxurious clean water.
“Look at the demonstrations back home, look at the areas these demonstrations are coming from, you begin to ask, are these the ordinary citizens that are demonstrating? Or are people pushing them to demonstrate?”
The president is not in the know that the people are feeling the pinch, that the so call middle class has literally been wiped away or reduced to much of pretense status still held onto only for the mere fact of ego.. that people could drive all the way from places like Ikoyi, Lekki, VGC, FESTAC, Sateline Town, etc and join in this sing song against a regime that had promised them a debate …only to assume that it won the debate and go on ahead to implement an increase when to all reason and fact the discourse was still on, and the government had failed and was failing to convince anyone except itself and the local oil barons who stand to benefit from the increase, why they must go on with an increase that ..they are yet still thinking how they would again increase it…

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