In, out, and in again
One of the rarest of all opportunities in this world is to get a second chance. Even in love affairs a second chance is hard to come by, even less so in politics and governance. The opportunity to be in power in Nigeria is rare enough. To be turned out of power after some time […]
One of the rarest of all opportunities in this world is to get a second chance. Even in love affairs a second chance is hard to come by, even less so in politics and governance. The opportunity to be in power in Nigeria is rare enough. To be turned out of power after some time is certain, and the chance to bounce back in power is one of the rarest chances of all.
President Buhari returned to apex power after 30 years in the political wilderness. President Obasanjo was luckier; he was back in power after only 20 years in the diplomatic, anti-Apartheid, good governance seminar and Correctional Services wilderness. Former military governors such as Samuel Ogbemudia, Murtala Nyako, Olagunsoye Oyinlola and Mohammed Lawal managed to bounce back as civilian governors after many years. Some civilian governors of one defunct Republic made it back as governors in another Republic, notably Jolly Nyame, Olusegun Osoba and Bukar Abba Ibrahim. In the Fourth Republic, only three governors, Rabi’u Musa Kwankwaso of Kano, Peter Ayo Fayose and John Kayode Fayemi both of Ekiti, ever walked out of the Government House only to walk back in again after four years. The fourth person that nearly made the same feat was Abubakar Audu of Kogi, but death had other plans.
As this year draws to a close, I have been thinking whether Nigerians and their leaders learn lessons from the mistakes and setbacks of the past,and there is no better place to look than in the case of a man who got a rare second chance. Only yesterday, Daily Trust on Sunday reported that Fayemi, who in addition to being Governor of Ekiti is also chairman of the Nigeria Governors Forum, had called for a restructuring of Nigeria in a paper he delivered last Friday at Oxford University in the UK. It turned out to be a sober call for restructuring, not the one Nigerians are used to, which is usually inter-regional bluster without clear definition. Fayemi instead said there is too much concentration of power in the Federal centre and more of it should be devolved to the states if Nigerian governance is to improve. There are problems even with that, not the least the large number of states that we have, but at least it is a good way to start the discussion.
You see, in 2014 when Kayode Fayemi lost his reelection bid to the PDP candidate Peter Ayo Fayose, he got very bad press nationally because he was said to be elitist, aloof, bookish, out of touch with reality, sacking teachers in the name of quality assurance and meeting with internet bloggers just when the down-to-earth Fayose was meeting with market women. To boot, Fayose created a phrase which immediately caught the national fancy: stomach infrastructure. Fayemi was accused of concentrating on the building of physical and social infrastructure while the people starved, so Fayose instead proposed to shovel money directly into the eager hands of voters, which became a popular campaign slogan. Most of the anti-Fayemi allegations turned out to be adroit PDP propaganda, and I cannot attest to the fairness of the 2014 Ekiti election given what we later heard about the role of masked secret policemen and even of the Army Commander.
Ayo Fayose’s tenure as governor in 2014-18 must have made Ekiti people to have a re-think, assuming they genuinely voted for him in 2014. His was governance by drama, from wild press releases to intemperate outbursts on national issues to shocking claims that APC candidate Buhari will not survive a term in office to creating an Anti-Malu [anti-cattle] security outfit to the “I am in pain” drama. It would have been alright if the drama was not accompanied by tragedy. Fayose, the supposed father of stomach infrastructure, was many months behind in the payment of salaries and pensions, had piled up a huge debt, shamelessly said that EKSG couldn’t pay salaries, and was found by EFCC to have ferried a billion naira in cash from Ibadan to Ado Ekiti.
No wonder Ekiti voters ran back to Fayemi last year, even though again, in fairness, I do not know the role that APC federal incumbency played in the comeback just like PDP federal incumbency most certainly played a role in Fayemi’s banishment. For this man who walked out of a Government House and then walked back in again, I was personally keen to see what he will do with the rare opportunity. Pictures splashed in the news media three weeks ago, of Fayemi attending the wedding in Lagos of Fayose’s son, reverberated across the political scene with a good message of, to remember the late GNPP leader Alhaji Waziri Ibrahim, “politics without bitterness.”
Maybe some Nigerians miss Ayo Fayose’s drama, including the custom-made T-shirt he wore to EFCC on the day he handed over. For Ekiti workers however, it must be a very welcome departure that salaries are now being paid regularly and pensioners are also receiving their dues every month. There is however the matter of accumulated debt. Fayemi has so far paid N31 billion of the inherited debt of salary, gratuities, pensions, subvention arrears and contractual debts but this is only 26% of the debt that Fayose left! There was another heart-warming side to it. Fayemi told workers and pensioners that what government owes them is not bad debt. For members of my generation who remember the Imo Formula of 1984-5, when civil servants forfeited any unpaid salary, this is a great change for the better.
Of course, if all that a government does is to pay salaries, I personally will not count it as a great success. Because too many state governments were far behind in salary and pension payments despite bank loans, federal interventions and Paris Club refunds, it has become the first benchmark of governance success in Nigeria. On October 16, to mark the first year of his second term in office, Fayemi launched two programs, Owo Arugbo and Ounje Arugbo. Under the first, 13,000 old, poor and disabled persons receive N20,000 every quarter, but with a monitoring scheme to ensure that the grant is properly utilized. Under the second one, the governor’s wife Mrs. Bisi Fayemi drives a program to feed elderly, poor and disabled persons everyday. Suddenly stomach infrastructure is back in reckoning. Not surprisingly for this academic/activist governor, he brought in World Bank people to ensure that the program meets “global best practices,” precisely the kind of thing that Nigerians don’t like.
There are other interesting things from this man who came, left, then came back again. He started paying the new N30,000 minimum wage in October. For Ekiti workers who up until last year were not seeing the old wage, one can only imagine the impact. I also think that Fayemi is a different kettle of fish from the man he succeeded as NGF chairman, Abdulaziz Yari of Zamfara. While the latter resolutely stood for a minimum wage of N22,000, Fayemi is quietly paying the N30,000 wage even when the governors’ forum is still ambivalent about it.
Nor is Kayode Fayemi completely sold over to crude stomach infrastructure. In his anniversary speech, he listed many abandoned projects that are nearing completion. They include renovation of Ekiti Parapo Pavillion, now 80% complete; Civic Centre, 90% complete; Ultra-modern Oja-Oba market, 80% complete; and the Fountain Hotel and Ikogosi Warm Springs Hotel, put up for partial privatization. Fayemi is also building the Agro-Cargo airport, Ado-Ekiti Ring Road, Aero-Magnetic Mineral Survey and Knowledge Zone, among others.
This last one is interesting. Ekiti is already a knowledge zone, with more professors per capita than any other place in Nigeria. One hardly notices the impact of that when driving through Ekiti State. I suspect that this upcoming Knowledge Zone will finally turn things around.