|
PEOPLE AND POLITICS BY MOHAMMED HARUNA Mixed reactions Over the last couple of months I have received mixed reactions to my articles in this column. I thought I should share a few of them with you this week. Here they are, some edited for space, grammar and spelling. On “Agwai’s and Anenih’s warnings” Sir, It was with interest that I read a section of your recent article titled “Agwai’s and Anenih’s Warnings to Politicians”. The Purpose of this comment is to use the opportunity to highlight implications of some of your observations and offer constructive suggestions. You observed, “As the army chief himself knows, he ought to have left the army in March last year. His immediate boss, the Chief of Defense Staff, General Alexander Ogomudia, ought also to have retired in October 2004. The Chief of Air Staff, Vice Marshal Wuyep ought to have gone in October last year. Ditto the police Chief, Mr. Sunday Ehindero. For some not-so-inexplicable reason, their commander-in-chief decided to retain them.” You also stated that, “The rules of retirement say both rank and file must leave the military after 35 years of service or 55 years of age, which ever comes first.” While you are certainly entitled to read politics into it from your point of view, what these observations unmask, in my view, is the poor institutionalization of career planning. The sheer number of generals that are retired periodically (to inflate our pensions and gratuities bill) betrays the fact that the Nigerian Armed Forces (particularly the Army) is top and middle heavy. Rank-distribution imbalances inherited from the military era are aggravated by bi-annual or annual “promotion board” rituals, with the underlying principle being to spend a specified length of time at each rank, after which Performance Evaluation Report triggers a promotion, vacancy permitting. Nevertheless, too many individuals are getting to very high ranks before age, age-on-rank, disciplinary, vacancy, medial, operations casualty and other mechanisms of attrition kick in. When it is recalled that the difference in seniority between sequential cadres of regular officers is only six months, the implications of this problem become apparent. If officers “must leave the military after 35 years of service or 55 years of age, which ever comes first”, no matter what, there is a danger that the country can find itself appointment new Service Chiefs every six months or every year! On average, all over the world, barring unusual circumstances, Service Chiefs serve for between 2 and 4 years. The median tenure is 3 years. In other words any President that serves for two full terms of eight years (total) will typically appoint 2 – 4 Service Chiefs per Service, if such Service Chiefs will have any chance of being able to settle down into the job, understand it and make an impact before exit. From this perspective, the current President, six years into a so far constitutionally mandated maximum stay of eight years in office, with effect from May 1999, is on his second (2nd) Chief of Defence Staff, third (3rd) Chief of Army Staff, third (3rd) Chief of Naval Staff, and second (2nd) Chief of Air Staff. He is still within the Bell curve, although I would not be surprised if he decides to made changes within the next one year. The problem in Nigeria, however, is that the tenure of a Service Chief is not specifically stated anywhere, which creates uncertainty for both the holder of the office and the service concerned. This is unhealthy, at least in part because it means there is always an undercurrent of real and imaginary lobbying for those positions on the part of its holders and those who see themselves as potential candidates. The other angle to the problem is that unlike the case with lower ranks, the duration of minimum or maximum service at the top ranks of Lt. General and General (or equivalent) is not explicitly stated anywhere in relevant Nigerian documents – although this is not by itself unusual internationally. Lastly, by tradition, Service Chiefs – in any country – serve (within reason) at the pleasure of the C-in-C. There is no doubt that the conflict of these opposing traditional, policy, legal, historical and institutional tendencies in career dynamics has created its own set of peculiar problems. For example, except in the Navy, where there was a massive (some say Tsunami-like) clearing of several generations of senior officers to simplify matters for an officer from the 12th regular course, the gap between the current Service Chiefs and the next layer of “not yet retired” officers in the Army and Air Force is widening. Further, in all three services, senior Colonels (or equivalent) completing mandatory coursework at the War College (or NIPSS), find themselves due for promotion to the rank of Brigadier-General or equivalent, with only a few years left in service. After that kind of investment, Nigeria is then denied their services just when they are maturing. This is not very wise, and is even less wise when one considers that there are pressures to increase the number of officers admitted to the War College, irrespective of the distribution of vacancies for appointments requiring officers of the rank of Brigadier-General (or equivalent) and above. My point is that politics or politicization is not the only potential explanation for the current situation. Nevertheless, in the Nigerian climate, rightly or wrongly, politics is often read into non-political exigencies. So what to do? The above outlined scenario means that Nigeria should: 1. Conduct better projections of personnel requirements to maintain a streamlined pyramid of officers from 2/Lt (or equivalent) to General (or equivalent). Tighter screws need to be put in place to enforce attrition after mandatory courses, promotion exams, Command and Staff College entry and graduation, War College (or equivalent) entry and graduation. Similar personnel projections should be made for other ranks. These issues can easily be resolved with computer models to get around the “Nigerian factor.” 2. Specify minimum and maximum tenure in various military appointments, including Service Chiefs. In this way, conditions of service can be appropriately worded along lines such as, “retire at the age of 62 years or following the completion of three years of tenure, whichever is earlier…” as is the case for Service Chiefs in India. In India, the previous retirement age of 60 was raised to 62 to deal with some of the issues I have raised in this discussion. Whether 55 years of age is really appropriate for Nigeria is a matter of policy that should be opened to debate. These and other aspects of the regulation of the higher managements of defence fall within the constitutional purview of the National Assembly. Although Section 218, subsection (1) states, “The powers of the President as the Commissioner-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation shall include power to determine the operational use of the armed forces of the Federation.” And subsection (2) states, “The powers conferred on the President by subsection (1) of this section shall include power to appoint the Chief of Defence Staff, the Chief of Army Staff, the Chief of Naval Staff, the Chief of Air Staff and heads of any other branches of the armed forces of the Federation as may be established by an Act of the National Assembly,” subsection (4) is very explicit. It states, “The National Assembly shall have power to make laws for the regulation of (a) the powers exercisable by the President as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federation; and (b) the appointment, promotion and disciplinary control of members of the armed forces of the Federation.” Thank you for providing the opportunity to discuss these matters. Dr. Nowa Omoigui Columbia, SC USA On “Bode George and Nigeria’s demography” Sir, Reading your article titled Bode George and Nigeria’s demography, I was fascinated by your arguments which are not empirical at all. Of all other indices to measure Nigeria population everything point to south being more than north. 1. Comparative geographical location of the North with other African countries in the same location. 2. Elementary, secondary and university enrollments. 3. Internally generated revenue by every state. 4. Lately GSM coverage of the South compared to the North Aside from any other examples you gave in your article can you please give me any empirical ones? Thanks Abi Awolesi
Sir, I have read some articles on GSM footprints and Nigeria’s population and wish to say that there is nothing new in the arguments advanced to challenge the fact of greater population figures of northern Nigeria. Decisions on cellular telephony taken by the GSM companies are based largely on economic rather than demographic considerations. The GSM operators are profit oriented concerns; they are not engaged in demographic data collection. Teledensity, GSM rollouts, Higher Capacity Switches and Cell sites, number of phone calls, etc, can never be basis for arriving at population figures. Yes, everything about cellular phones could be taking place in the south of Nigeria but as we all know the networks are rolling out in a gradualist fashion. They began from southern Nigeria, where, today, their largest market is. Although they have probably covered most parts of southern Nigeria, they are far from covering northern Nigeria, which is 78 percent of Nigeria. There is no sensible demographer who will use data from GSM companies to arrive at population estimates, particularly where the geographic coverage is only partial. Nobody questions the higher income and educational levels in southern Nigeria. More Southern Nigerians are aware of and can afford cellular phones and their services. Southern Nigeria is more urban and more densely settled than northern Nigeria. Northern Nigeria is certainly less densely populated than the south, but that does not translate in to larger southern population. Some people think satellite imageries can be used to ascertain population size. This is wrong. Satellite imageries can show you structures on the ground, but they would not show you human beings. Satellite imageries are NOT SUBSTITUTES for population census. Some people also think that the settlement pattern in the South gives it an edge over the North. Again this is wrong. In many southern Nigeria localities with its linear settlement pattern, compared to the scatter settlement pattern in the North, there are many buildings whose owners/occupants are in major cities and use them only during Christmas and other holidays. Most of the time the houses are habited by one or two house-helps and maigadis. Visit localities in states close to Lagos and those in south eastern Nigeria during a typical work week and you will understand what I am saying. As for those who compare Nigeria’s population pattern with those of countries like Mali, Algeria, Chad, Mauritania and Niger, you cannot say that northern Nigeria, whose vegetation and rainfall pattern ranges from rainforest to savannah in large part is the same as those of these countries. Besides because polygamy is much more prevalent in the more conservative North compared to the South, the fertility rate in the North tends to be higher. Finally, I continue to wonder why the so many southern Nigerian demographers and geographers that have attained international repute and have traveled in Nigeria are not talking. Why have they left the field to non-professionals such as engineers and laymen to talk about what is certainly a specialized field? Yaro Dantsoho Kano. On “Malu at the ACF: life imitating fiction?” Sir, You did it again!! I was anxiously waiting to read from you on this very topic, and true to form, I’m not a bit disappointed. Just what I had expected coming from you. My point is Malu’s remarks about the organization not doing ANYTHING for the North is expected. You don’t have to be an ex general to see and know that. I’m sure ACF is too busy trying to make sure the Presidency comes back to the North to worry about some minor stuff like the North being the most backward part of the country, with so MANY ex head of states as her citizens. If Malu was so patriotic, he should have resigned from the Army when he had the disagreement with his Commander-in-Chief. That is what a real General would have done. For him coming back now saying he should have done something else is sour grapes. In a civilized society, the man would be court-marshal led. Can you imagine Colin Powell saying what Malu had said? I’m sure you know that Colin Power had some major disagreements with President Bush. As for Chief, I bet you if he had gained what he was looking for from OBJ, he will be singing OBJ’s praise now. To him OBJ would have been a god with small g. Julius Abey USA. On “Dr. Edugie Abebe and the NPI” Sir, As one of your regular internet readers that usually picks bone with you on many issues, I must also give you your due when it is called for. On this article, I would say thanks and well done. Not that it matters to you, nonetheless it is a right thing to do on my end. Keep up the good work sir, as I have told you before, Nigeria needs many positives inputs from all of us. Julius Abey USA |