24-12-2024.

Although I am not exactly in the right frame of mind to say anything coherent enough about President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s first engagement with the media, I however remain convinced that his responses to the questions verging on the welfare of the people he is supposed to lead appear to be of no concern to him. His concern appears to be to accumulate even more money, and serve his foreign masters, at the expense of Nigerians, many of whom defied the elements to ensure his emergence as the number one citizen of the country.

The hate hate of his fellow poor citizens oozing from him during the media engagement yesterday, was enough to convince his die-hard supporters that their idol do not care whether they live or die, so long as he makes some money and satisfies his foreign masters in  the process.

The two most controversial, contentious and contested issues in the country at the moment are the fuel subsidy removal and the proposed tax reform bill before the National Assembly (NASS). About the two issues, the president remained adamant that there was “no going back”.

We are supposed to be operating a democracy where the wish of the majority is supposed to carry the day, and the will of the minority, the category to which President Tinubu belongs, are only supposed to have their say. But in Nigeria’s ‘upside’ democracy, the ‘WINNER’ takes all, and the majority can go to blazes with their majority. Especially NOW that Nigeria is under a STATE CAPTURE, in which all the apparatuses  of COERCION are in the hands of the winner at the centre.

And, unlike in more enlightened democracies, the heads of these apparatuses, appear content to meekly do as the president wants, no matter how brutal or illegal it may be, without arguing against its illegality. One of them is twice on record giving orders that would appear very harsh, even where state is the official policy of government.

A serving Senator, who hails from the Eastern part of the country, complained that there was ‘a total state CAPTURE in the country at the moment’, because the president sometimes did as he wished without so much as informing the NASS of his intention.

The removal of fuel subsidy benefits no one but himself and his cronies around him and in the NASS. It was the reason for the spiraling inflation, excessive high cost of living and the run away crash of the national currency. The money said to be saved every month as a result of the removal of the subsidy keeps on disappearing to only God and themselves know where. 

So also are the unending loans from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which to date amounts to tens of billions of US dollars. Most of the money which the two institutions reluctantly allowed to reach Nigeria is quickly embezzled by those at the extreme top of the Villa, and some of their ‘boys’ in the NASS as well as elsewhere.

CORRUPTION under President Tinubu has been taken to an all time high, becoming for some, the ONLY purpose for being in government, either as president, as governor or as members of the Assembly, at the federal and state levels. Not many rulers appear to care about the voters, who happen to constitute majority of the poll goers.

It was reported by a newspaper that the presidency recently bribed each of the members of the House of Representatives with N1 billion ‘Constituency allowance’ so as to make them agree not to boo the president when he visited the National Assembly to present the 2025 appropriations budget. The president and the members of the House of Representatives were ‘elected’ to serve the people, NOT to serve THEMSELVES.

The president’s UNDEMOCRATIC credentials started manifesting publicly when he singlehandedly spent billions of naira in the purchase of a brand new official aircraft, a brand new yacht and a brand new Cadillac luxury sedan without so much as informing the NASS. And when the Villa was reminded that such purchases needed the approval of the NASS, the Chief of Staff, Right Honourable Femi Gbajabiamila, disingenuously claimed that the president used his personal money to purchase the brand new rides.

It is also a known secret that to get an appointment as head of a money generating agency in the country, some millions of US dollars have to exchange hands from the seeker to someone very high up in the presidency.

President Tinubu also singlehandedly awarded the controversial N15.6 trillion Lagos to Calabar Coastal Highway to the construction company belonging to his friend (front), the Paris (France) based Mr. Gilbert Chagoury, who was said to have purchased the rides that were earlier mentioned in this article.

Today Tuesday (24-12-2024), I received a phone call, a WhatsApp message and a text message from two people in Lagos. All two are ‘daughters of the soil’, and all were complaining about the poverty and hunger in the country. The first, a married lady with children, had earlier sent a text message that I was unaware of at the time. But the moment I saw her call, I initiated the conversation by asking her ‘How was the XMAS preparation?’ She said this year (2024) was the only time in the past 15 years that she was not making any preparations for the XMAS. 

She said her worries were for the little ones (I could hear excited children noise in the background), who had absolutely no notion of poverty. The woman is supposed to be a high flying sales officer with a very big goods company. The company is still doing good business, but I do not think she is still flying high in the company, where she still works her usual work.

The second person, an unmarried 20 something year old, responded to my earlier WhatsApp message of simple greeting and a complaint of the cold weather in this part of the country, saying that it ‘was doubly HOT in Lagos’, on account of the not so cold weather, and the pervasive POVERTY that became the lot of many citizens with the arrival of the Tinubu regime.

The president appears to be a Sadist, a malicious person, and a vindictive person. He is in fact, a toxic personality, who appears to drive immense pleasure in making the life of others, particularly those poor in the country, very miserable all the time.

The immutable and indefatigable Dr. Garus Golobo, who is a bonafide member of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), never gets tired of fighting the party and the uncountable ills it has brought to the nation under President Tinubu. His constant criticism of the present regime should not be read upside down by the supporters of the president, despite the overwhelming suffering of the poor people in the country that was evident for all to notice.

He is not an Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), nor is he a Peter Obi of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA), but a member of the APC, whose interventions are therefore not politically motivated. He is purely motivated by ultraism, for the democratic development and advancement of Nigeria. So it should be our ardent prayer, wish and desire that he succeeds in this endeavour of his.

May God answer our prayers and FREE Nigeria of the rent seeking leaders who seek to enrich themselves with the Commonwealth, at the expense of most of the owners of the Commonwealth.

Malumfashi wrote from Katsina.