1st 100 days like no other

I decided to visit the camp for the Internally Displaced Persons across the bridge in Yola. The site at the bridgehead in Vunoklang opposite the Bajabure knoll on the Benue River speaks volumes. It is overcrowded. Every structure I had known has grown larger. The motor park is no longer small, over crowded as it […]

I decided to visit the camp for the Internally Displaced Persons across the bridge in Yola. The site at the bridgehead in Vunoklang opposite the Bajabure knoll on the Benue River speaks volumes. It is overcrowded. Every structure I had known has grown larger. The motor park is no longer small, over crowded as it now is, with a long stretch of parked and open golfs and starlets, and hundreds of commuters pushing boxes and carrying Ghana-Must-Go cases and polythene bags. Hundreds of children noisily scamper to a fro, begging or seeking to help with luggage in competition with the older wheel barrow touts.  I am not therefore surprised to find at the camp, mostly women and children too young to leave camp, carrying on with normal chores.
Do the internally displaced persons know that President Muhammadu Buhari or the Governor of Adamawa State have marked 100 days in office? Their one expectation that could be meaningful would have been a stretch of buses set to ferry the folks home, with a declaration that their lands are now fully liberated. Alas this is yet to happen. It can be seen from  the overcrowding of Adamawa State suburbs, that the people, displaced by the long drawn insurgency in the North East have settled to a new and probably a future life. They do not seem conscious of a 100 day milestone, and may not be as disappointed as many Nigerians are that almost nationwide, there was no fanfare to the 100 days in office.
President Muhammadu Buhari’s first 100 days was left to individuals to assess. In the world today, the determining factor for a country’s direction is the leadership of that one man. In that sense, achievements of Nigeria’s first hundred days of the current administration were cut out by the character of the man Buhari himself. He minced no words at inauguration about the grim task ahead of the nation, subduing the insurgency, waging a war against corruption, and revamping the economy. His personal integrity is decidedly his strongest weapon, he has a reputation for being strictly clean, and this earned him mileage. In the last 100 days, this has helped Nigeria in no small way to restore confidence and a pride of place in the comity of nations. He gave assurances to the member nations of the European Union and the United States which helped in tracing, blocking, and indeed returning some of the funds looted from the economy. His character opened a floodgate of hitherto denied military sales support even for the fight against the Boko Haram.
Economically, the singular decision to operate the Treasury Single Account (TSA) or designated accounts maintained and operated in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has shored up public fund assets in no small way with the nation’s reserves rising from $28 billion at inception of the Administration, to now hovering near $35 billion. Certainly with the operation of the Treasury Single Account, revenues are less likely to disappear akin to “the dish running away with the spoon”, the practice common in the recent past.  Even NNPC earnings in spite of the dwindling price of crude have risen remarkably as every sale is gradually being accounted for to the treasury, unlike in the past.
Electricity supply has stabilised unbelievably, owing albeit to strides made under President Goodluck Jonathan, but more importantly because the incorruptible stance of President Buhari has inspired integrity down the line to reduce sabotage which had hitherto hindered the power sector reforms from being effective.
The bluff of the independent oil marketers has been called, defeated as they were by President Muhammadu Buhari’s mere body language only. Those who can not sell at control price come under a punitive mechanism and Government has decidedly won its way. Thus on electricity and controlled price of petroleum products alone, the last 100 days have seen to increased savings on people’s earnings in no small way.
This week, President Muhammadu Buhari told his Ghanaian counterpart President Mahama, that the fighting capacity of Boko Haram had been roundly degraded to being unable to confront the Nigeria-led International Force in an organised formation. Boko Haram, he affirmed, is now confined to Sambisa Forest. Indeed, it is evident that the counter-insurgency strategies adopted since May 29th have worked. The spate of bombings which peaked soon after Buhari was sworn in, have subsided and public confidence is being restored gradually. Hitherto impassable routes in the North East are opening up more and more and the business of commerce is picking up. A reformed Armed Forces is working meticulously to deliver a defeated Boko Haram to the President in the stipulated 3 months, even as the nation awaits findings of a probe currently ongoing on the over $5.6 billion dollar perennial expenditure on purchase of Military Hardware and Equipment under the last dispensation.
Nigerians remain unhappy that up to now, a cabinet is yet to be named. President Buhari has not been in a hurry to name one, choosing instead to work with the Permanent Secretaries and Heads of Departments, essentially to restore a culture of service and procedure, hitherto derailed by the political class. He has hinted that a fresh framework of service has been laid out to which appointed Ministers would fit. Yet all this time, without a Minister for Finance, especially given the overbearing footprint of erstwhile Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, implies that a fiscal policy for the country under Buhari has not evolved and in today’s private sector driven global economy, it can not be ruled out that the absence of a cabinet all this while, has hurt the nation’s economy in no small way. President Buhari has promised to name a cabinet this month. There is apprehension as he plays his cards close to his chest, indeed being for “everybody and belonging to no one”. When he named the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, the Chief of Staff and the Special Adviser on National Assembly Liason, there was all hue and cry over what was seen as insensitivity to Nigeria’s ethnic and regional mix, but no one could fault the competence of all those that were appointed. In fact if anything, it underlined the fact that in this Presidency quite unlike in the past, there are no pockets of power outside President Buhari.
The Buhari Anti-Corruption Fight became suspect from day one. A hitherto moribund Economic and Financial Crimes Commission suddenly woke up to its responsibilities. Old cases were dusted up and made sensational, and it seems the anti corruption body over arched itself in trying to please the President. The opposition cried foul that it was being targeted, and all President Buhari did was look on. I think the EFCC like all similar institutions in eye service of the President noticed that he was not impressed by their song and dance, and seem to have quietly receded to their old moribund nature.
In the last 100 days, President Muhammadu Buhari has inspired personal integrity among individuals. Nigerians are imbibing the lean look in both character and consumption and there is hope that the anti corruption war will be gain ground. How does it impact on the different tiers of the realm is the fundamental question, for unless the Senate, the House of Representatives, the States Executives and Legislatures adopt the President’s style, and adopt common policies, all efforts could be futile.