Federal republic of inequality and oppression (II)
This is a continuation from last week. Whether our people are aware or not, we have to keep making cases for them that inequality is increasing in the land, and the average Nigerian is thoroughly beat down. The Federal and State governments agreed to increase minimum wages but it’s debatable if they intend to pay. […]
This is a continuation from last week. Whether our people are aware or not, we have to keep making cases for them that inequality is increasing in the land, and the average Nigerian is thoroughly beat down. The Federal and State governments agreed to increase minimum wages but it’s debatable if they intend to pay. Let us look at other issues:
The poor underwrites bad loans and are ignored
Then last week we saw the list of recalcitrant, nonchallant debtors published by AMCON. I never understood the idea of a bad bank in the first place. So when Jonathan created that bank (AMCON) and transferred all the bad loans from our banks to them, while giving taxpayers money to these banks, I watched in amazement. People went to press to hail the idea but I am used to the fact that many of us middle class people are behind the problems of Nigeria. Greed. Selfishness. Well, today there sits at least N5.4 trillion worth of taxpayers money in AMCON while Mr Fowler in FIRS says we are not paying enough taxes. That is N5.4 trillion that should have been used to construct roads and give our children better education. That is 63% of our proposed 2019 budget in the hands of 350 ‘big boys’ and they are telling us all to go to hell. We have 13.2million of such children on the streets on a daily basis; almost 10% of Nigeria’s population. Our very future is out of school and roaming around. Jonathan’s government, and by extension Buhari’s government, and by inference, right-leaning capitalist Atiku whom someone described as the crown prince of crony capitalism in Nigeria, believes that this is a great way to spend taxpayers’ money. In the world of finance and economics, what Nigeria has done and keeps doing is called ‘TRANSFER OF WEALTH FROM THE POOR TO THE RICH’
It used to be that serious, humane countries and their leaders think daily how they can take a little bit more from the rich to help the poor. But not Nigeria. Here, it is the reverse. Our leaders disconnect from the people immediately they get into office, so maybe they don’t know just how terrible our people find life; 90million of them. They sleep in the open and in shanties. Millions sleep inside their own urine and faeces in our hundreds of ghettos. Millions have no idea where their next meal will come from. That is why almost 15million children roam the streets from north to south, that is why 10,000 Nigerians have been deported from Libya this year alone, and why 10,000 Nigerian women escaped into Italy alone in 2016 for prostitution. That is why hundreds of our young boys languish in Asian jails and tens of thousands of Nigerians are in asylums all around the world; held in pens like animals, crying daily to be freed. How many have died crossing the Sahara desert or swimming the Mediterranean we cannot tell.
In all these, we saw in the list of bad and recalcitrant debtors that AMCON published, whose loans have been underwritten by the Nigerian taxpayer, the usual suspect. Ifeanyi Ubah’s Capital Oil is owing poor Nigerians N116 billion, Jimoh Ibrahim is owing N60 billion. Babalakin is owing N69billion. Donald Duke’s Tinapa project is owing poor Nigerians N36 billion. Barth Nnaji is owing Nigerians N30 billion. We saw all sorts of real estate companies and oil companies who have ignored the loans insured by the sweat and blood of the Nigerians people. See here for details; https://www.thecable.ng/full-list-ifeanyi-ubah-jimoh-ibrahim-here-are-amcons-105-top-debtors. The money that poor Nigerian people should have used for a morsel of garri, was brutally yanked from their hands, put together to ‘save’ colluding banks by the government of Jonathan, condoned by the government of Buhari, while these guys ride around in private jets. Many of them are in politics, trying to get into office in order to probably use political power to obliterate their debts and steal the country blind further. Nigeria is a mafia society no doubt. But we must push back someday soon. No one runs a nation like this. One of the bad debtors, owing N4 billion, Chief Pius Akinyelure, was appointed by Buhari into the board of NNPC. These people should declare bankruptcy at least – with full consequences. How can a bad debtor be appointed into such public position. Well, Buhari continues to feign ignorance as usual. Yar’adua did not have the stomach for these bankers and their friends. He gave Sanusi Lamido Sanusi the authority to pick them up and travelled out of the country. That was a good man. Nigeria hates good men.
For starters Nigerians should call for full disclosure from AMCON. We want to know the names of all those whose bad loans are in AMCON. Then we should question why those published are refusing to engage with AMCON or service their loans. Not a word from most Nigerian pundits since the list was published. Indeed some ‘famous’ economists like Bismarck Rewane are asking for AMCON 2! Oh my God. The vaults of the banks are again bursting at the seams with bad loans and would want to push them down the throats of Nigerians once again. This is man’s inhumanity to man! Nigeria’s case must be taken to the international court of justice, human rights and public opinion. The people of this country are sort of being prepared for slaughter. Someone should please inform me what is going on.
Oil company staff cooperatives ripping off poor Nigerians?
The one that drew most of my ire from the list of criminals published – because by their neglect of their loans they have defaulted against the people of Nigeria – were the staff cooperatives of Shell Producing, Mobil Producing and Chevron Producing. These are some of our major oil companies. Their staff are some of the luckiest people ever created, to have secured great jobs and to live very soft, privileged lives. Between these three, they have N40 billion worth of loans with AMCON which they have refused to service. They are also among those entities ignoring the loans and ignoring long-suffering Nigerians. I wish to inform them and their parent companies that they are irresponsible. Nigerian people, most of whom sleep in ‘houses’ made of straw, nylon bags, discarded polytene sacks or mud, and most of whom sleep in uncompleted buildings have paid for the luxury houses that these oil executives live and the various luxuries they secured with these bad loans. We must reverse that inequality and oppression immediately. We the people are instituting a class action against Mobil, Shell and Chevron and their cooperatives. We need our money. We have borne enough already in this country. Let us start from here, because staff of Shell and co, are ordinary citizens like us. They will never get away with such nonsense in any other country but here. I am aware that when banks publish bad debtors there are other cooperatives in there. All cooperatives must pay Nigerians back. You cannot live in houses financed by these millions of poor, luckless people, or buy yourselves luxury cars on our sweat, tears and blood. I am saying that I, Tope Fasua, am refusing to sponsor staff of some oil company while I struggle through life. Enough already!
Later we will come for the Jimoh Ibrahims, Barth Nnaji, Akinyelure, Dukes and Ifeanyi Ubahs of this world.
I hope we see what this country is doing to its people. Nigerians, please choose wisely, wake up. You are not slaves. I stand for you to reject slavery in your own land.
Concluded.