How litigations of 2023 Presidential Election’ll affect Nigerian Economy-uncertainty, recession, inflation and devaluation of the Naira
by Dr Orefo Nnamdi Onochie
…..how Tony Blair and JP Morgan deceived Tinubu’s Govt
……Vladimir Putin melt-down and wagner mercenary revolt and treason of 2023
When petrol subsidy was removed, on May 29, 2023, Nigerians were initially confused and bitter that it came too soon on the day of transition to a new federal government. Then it gradually dawned on the populace that the subsidy removal was real: new President, new policies. The uncertainties were magnified, and not quite three subsequent days, and Godwin Emefiele, CBN Governor, was suspended, detained and he was accused of embezzling N89 Trillion Naira; Nigerians were even more perplexed because it was so dizzying to hear the stated amount of embezzled money, yet most impossible to figure in how only one person could have access to such humongous amount of money. Another suspension, this time the Chairman of those who apprehend official thieves, Abdel Bawa, of the EFCC; it was not specifically stated, the reason for his indefinite suspension, except for innuendoes on the evils and corruption of EFCC policy implementation. Then, the villain publicly questioned the legitimacy of the Government that suspended him and its locus to query and suspend him. In the case of Emefiele, it was revealed through the Press that a monthly whopping sum of N500 Billion Naira was disbursed from his Office, to the Federal Minister of Humanitarian, Disaster Management and Social Development, Sadiya Umar Farouq, for onward public distribution and disbursement each month.
Questions: for how long did this practice take place, were these sums captured in the annual budgets and who approved of the payments, to whom as members of the public were the payments made, and what was the total amount disbursed? Government run on suspensions tend to be based on gossips, rumors and tell-take. Who will be the next, and when will it get to the top? How will the Tinubu Government end this type of governance, will it strengthen or weaken the reputation of the government?
ECONOMIC RECESSION FROM 2023 TO 2025
It is difficult not to see the next recession in Nigeria coming, and in progression. The cost of petrol went up on May 29, 2023, by more than double, N220.00 to N360.00, and then NNPCL declared a price of N488.00-N550.00 per liter: as the new Federal Government approached 30-days in office, NNPCL informed the populace that a new Petrol pump price of N700.00 liter will take effect July 1, 2023, which is a Saturday. Question: if subsidy removal was on government transition day, can any new policy of government be any more shocking?
Consequences: marginal increase in intercity transport fares, within the cities, lack of money by commuters prevented equivalent percentage increase in commuters, because the effects were drastically reduced, patronage, long distance walking by customers and the complete avoidance of patronage. All in all, there will be a remarkable slow down in production activities by the populace. It is in itself the incipience of a recession when able bodied persons fail to produce, or have no relevant occupations to contribute to the GDP, gross domestic product. Each added day, increases the rate and level of the recession in Nigeria, and aggravates popular discomfort, suffering and economic downturn. The air is rife again that the prices of goods and services will rise, that inflation will skyrocket: a 40% increase in electricity tariff is also scheduled for implementation in July 2023. If this specific tariff increase on cost of electricity is effected, the impact of same on the economy will be treble form now.
On account of the expected hardships some States in Nigeria reduced the working week to 3-days, and announced increasing monthly minimum wage to N40,000.00, and speculations that the Federal minimum wage would be increased to N200,000.00: which is the problem, the wage or the cost of living? It is the latter, so governments must tackle the latter and overlook the former. That is my position, and reducing the cost of living can be done by humble persons like me. Nigeria must permit me.
LOANS FOR STUDENTS: THE DECEIT OF ELITE DELUSION
Nearly all those who belong to and espouse the progressive politics, in the Government of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, especially those of Southwest YORUBA-BINI-WEST NIGER IBO extraction received FREE EDUCATION from the Government of Chief Obafemi Awolowo. In my family in Asaba, scores of my now demised relatives benefitted from that program. Nearly 50-70 years after, Nigerian children, youths and young adults are being offered financial loans to pay for education, in June 2023, by those who were educated FREE by their progenitors. Why?
In Nigeria that now earns treasury revenues in Trillion Naira digits: Nigeria where the suspended CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, has been publicly accused of embezzling N89 Trillion Naira; where the same Suspendee revealed that his Office disbursed a monthly N500 Billion Naira largess to the Minister of Humanitarian Affairs, to distribute to invisible unqualified Nigerians; where ASUU guided all public Universities and they remained closed for 8-months of the year 2022, because the APC preceding Government refused to increase the annual education budget by additional N320 Billion Naira. It is unthinkable, the revelations in Nigeria under the aegis of the APC, and it is said that Nigerians voted in another APC Presidential Government. How can the polity make progress in situations such as this?
The government loans for student education policy is that the new loans to students will now enable government to increase the tuition fees in the institutions. Reality check: all those in the Generations educated in the 1950s-1970s, up to the mid 1980s in Nigeria, did not pay educations tuition, except those from the South East. In the North, especially the core Muslim States such as Ksno, Sokoto, Niger, Bornu etc, students in all grades and cadres were paid terminal allowances to attend schools, and all fees including boarding fees were borne by the State governments. Education was of very high importance and value to the government: enrollment being low, girl/child education was highly encouraged.
In the South, the political heritage of Obafemi Awolowo was the bequeathal of free education to every child, and Lateef Jakande, Bola Ige, Bisi Onabanjo and Michael Ajasin ensured that education was available, and in many cases the schools were of walking distance. In the East and Mid West, Ambrose Ali followed the precepts of Awolowo, thus it was only in the East that tuition and boarding fees were paid by parents and families for their wards. But even at that, the Federal government ensured that student bursaries (essentially grants), and loans were provided and the annual fees in tertiary institutions were as low as N320.00 (Three Hundred and Twenty Naira) per annum, while spending pocket money allowance was N50.00 (Fifty Naira), per student annually. More than 99% of the student loans, we’re written off by the government till date. It comes therefore as a huge surprise that more than 40-years after, the government has announced a student loan program, with an income cap of N500K for families to benefit from the loans, repayment and guarantor sureties of Director level civil servants, or ten years experienced Lawyers; or the defaulting student loan recipient, after two years of graduating will be imprisoned.
FRAUD, ADVANCE FEE AND GANISHY SCHEME BY GOVERNMENT TO FUND UNIVERSITIES
The student loan program proposed by the Tinubu government is a farce and mockery of Nigerian youths and families. It will be double jeopardy when the additional clause of introduction of higher tuition fees is commenced, because the Government openly confirmed that it has no budgetary allocation for funding universities, who must collect tuition fees from students through their loans, to fund the universities: fraud and advance fee ganishy by government against unsuspecting, uninformed citizens. Why will the federal government of Nigeria get involved in this kind of scheme, and the education of all Nigerians not be FREE, if not now, when?
Again, it is impossible to understand how those whose education and development were funded freely by the government, who received freely, refuse to give back freely. Like the adage says, freely you received, freely you shall give. Social public education is general investment in the future wellbeing of the populace, as well as the security of the future of the society through the training and development of the human capital of the polity. There are several instances that prove and substantiate this. The closest is the scope and development of human capital in the old Western region of Nigeria, where we have already noted the quick, pervasive and envious investment in free education which was pioneered by Obafemi Awolowo, followed in pace by those who classify themselves in Nigerian politics as “Progressives “. In irony, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, was a beneficiary of the free education, and modeled himself by adopting and copying Awolowo’s round-rim-Mahatma Ghandi eye glasses, and more importantly in also taking the only traditional Chieftaincy title of ASIWAJU, which Awolowo took, as Leader of all Yorubas. Question: if these appurtenances of Obafemi Awolowo were found worthy of Tinubu’s beneficence, why not the national policy and program of FREE EDUCATION for all Nigerians? The Federal government of Nigeria, has more than sufficient financial resources to enunciate FREE education for all Nigerians, from kindergarten to university level: India has adopted the policy, in 1947, instituted by Jawaharlal Nehru, and Abul Kalam Azad, his Education Minister. The policy invested highly in science, technology and management, and in close to 70-years, it has advanced human capital development in India most strategically and today the world has benefitted from the immense brain resources that India has, and in spite of her huge population, developed first world economies are importing massive numbers of technology scientists, especially USA and Canada, as complement to their own resources. The tragedy of Nigeria is that, conservative politicians in USA, such as Donald Trump has proclaimed that if he wins the 2024 US Presidential election, he would ensure that Nigerians who give birth to children in USA would be denied statutory citizenship guaranteed by US Constitution. Indeed, India is receiving the opposite treatment, from the Europeans and Americans. Thousands of jobs are transferred and outsourced to India, due to the pervasive effects of FREE education, up to tertiary levels funded by the government. Families and individuals who opt to fund the education of their wards, are free to do so. In all events, the society is the winner. It is hereby recommended that the Student Loan Policy of the new Tinubu government should be reviewed, and the student loan scrapped, and education with science and IT emphasis, be granted FREE to all Nigerians in perpetuity.
LOOMING RECESSION, GALLOPING INFLATION AND DEVALUATION OF THE NIGERIAN NAIRA FROM 2023-2025
Removing fuel subsidy, agreeably introduced increase in prices, and it has kept inflation in trajection for the remaining two quarters of 2023. Apart from governments, Kwara and Edo States, reducing working week days to three, instead of five, pronouncements have been made increasing minimum wage in the States, whilst the federal government has increased the salaries of the highest elected officials such as President, Governors etc by more than double to 114% of extant salaries: certainly, in no distant time, perhaps after 90-days, minimum wage of workers in Nigeria will be increased. Thus all three attributes that give rise to a recession, such as reduction in productivity, skyrocketing inflation and reckless increase in wages and salaries, and currency devaluation, have all been enunciated and released in NIGERIA and are currently overheating the economic environment in Nigeria. Tinubu’s government has inadvertently devalued the Naira, by eliminating the multiple exchange rate regimes in a unified sole floated investment and export window, that immediately shot up the exchange rate of the Naira against the US Dollar, from N466.00 to N 760.00 (even higher on off-shore Crypto platforms). The goal had been to create a level rate between official and unofficial black market rates, but the unforeseen consequence has been the trajectory path to be higher exchange rate towards N800.00-N1,000.00 per US Dollar. Whilst JP Morgan has predicted a plateau leveling rate of N600.00 to $1.00 USD, the prognosis appears unrealistic, because rather than restrict forex usage, and dissuade import of foreign goods or invisible personal expenses, the money deposit Banks have been authorized to sell forex for school fees, medical tourism, religious tourism etc. What is the source of the forex to so made available, the same source that Muhamadu Buhari, dedicated to Dangote and some other highly favored cronies? Event he so called Dangote source is now expected to begin production and revenue origination in foreign exchange, speculatively not earlier than August 2023, and even as late as 2025. If the Naira continues to depreciate in value, a recession is assured with uncertainties, instabilities and perhaps renewed policy recklessness on the part of the Tinubu government.
SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF ECONOMIC RECESSION IN 2023
The honey moon of the Nigerian populace with the Tinubu government is holding up, but it will not last long. Reasons are that the tempo of policy enunciated by the new government will wane, while the expectations of the public will elasticate wider. There is no view of a slow down in price rises, and inflation: there has not been a clearly articulated program to reduce the cost of living and the rate of inflation. The months between August-December 2023, will be very crucial, with respect to the level of economic healing and restoration for the populace: certainly foods and goods will be available, but the prices will most likely spike due to the
excesses and reckless policy speed of the government.
2023 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION LITIGATIONS AND JUDGMENTS
Part of the Tinubu honeymoon, and the patience of the Nigerian public stems from the entertainment value that the ongoing 2023 Presidential election Court litigations has been offered them. Further uncertainties, instabilities and vulnerabilities will arise, whether the judgements are in favor of any particular candidate, the concluding hard deficiencies of Buhari’s government will affect the economic direction and fortunes most remarkably. Whereas the goal of the breathless efforts of the Tinubu government in reeling policy initiatives is to buy the legitimacy and acceptance of the Nigerian and international environment, healing the economy will take a much longer time, and better configured economic policies. What the half-established Tinubu Government has fished out so far, calls for greater alarm bells ringing from all corners of the Nigerian economy. All the signs and indices are very bad, and they cannot be hidden.
ENERGY SECTOR: STILL PETROL, NOW ELECTRICITY TARIFF HIKED
Nigerians are yet to see NWII (local parlance for the unimaginable). The ripples of the “removal of fuel subsidy”, were milder than predicted, perhaps due to the uncertainty whether Tinubu
would be sworn in, as President, or how hard it would be for him to ride the Nigerian Trojan horse. It has taken 30-odd days, and the NLC, the Nigeria Labour Congress, and NANS, the National Association of Nigerian Students etc
have clearly been bribed in, bought over, and are hardly speaking for the populace. Tinubu’s baby steps, harsher than what he mobilized radical civil society organizations and internet savvy NIGERIAN youths, to troop out to Ojota in 2012, against Goodluck Jonathan, has disappeared from the Nigerian firmament, with the appearance of things looking more and more surreal each passing day. So the question is, how far and how much longer will it take for the people themselves to rise, as they did in Ojota? It won’t take long, if the current trajectory of very acerbic conservative policies, recommended again by Tony Blair and the IMF are sustained. Nigerians have accepted the policies, since Buhari, and 30-days into Tinubu, but our close neighbors in Benin Republic trooped out to the streets, in April 2023, and forced their government to rescind price addition of 50 CFA to a loaf of bread, less than 20% increase. Nigerians have accepted addition of 400% increase in the price of petrol ( in Benin Republic the increase in Petrol price is being accepted because the government has not increased the official price of Petrol, despite that the black market price has increased by 200%,and there is no scarcity or line up of anxious buyers). There has not been any protests, unlike January 2012, when Tinubu mobilized Nigerian youths against Goodluck Jonathan: or 2020 when Buhari increased the price of petrol, and still there were no protests until October 20, 2020, when # END SARS, became the lightning rod of the future of popular protests in Nigeria.
The mechanism for determining prices of goods and services in Nigeria has been liberated from the clutches of government? In the case of petrol and foreign currencies, it may appear so, but with the eclectic modus of Tinubu, so far, no one can guarantee how and what fields he will pounce on next. The borders in the Southwest are now opened for trading, in chicken, turkey, tomatoes, toothpick; second hand cars, with duties increased, and foreign currencies now costing N862.00 Naira per $1.00 USD, higher than the classic black market, still at N766.00 Naira to $1.00 USD. Here are the imminent contradictions: trillions of Naira questionably saved through increase in petrol price, millions of dollars wasted in cheap imports of foreign made goods, including toothpicks, onions and ororo (vegetable oils), the staples of Tinubu’s primary constituency market women (Oloja), Mother-Land and Daughter-Land constituency. Yet Tinubu’s main aim is to have only one foreign currency window. To whom will the authorized money deposit banks sell very costly foreign currencies, those who buy from the cheaper black market?
With the prospects and prognosis that any time from July 2023, Petrol price will be increased to N700.00 Naira for a liter of Petrol, what is the linkage between the Dangote Refinery and cheaper petrol prices in Nigeria, would anyone envisage that Dangote will revert to lower prices than whatever is the prevailing market price, knowing the trade history and antecedents of the Dangote Group? Nigerians are truly in for a very uncertain rough ride in January 2020, Buhari increased petrol prices from N97.00 Naira, to N220.00 per liter, it was #END SARS that ignited the popular fury, that burned the South, especially the Southwest, engulfing the Lekki Tollgate, the killing of protesters, that linked Tinubu’s business empire, from collecting taxes and revenues ( excluding the Lekki Tollgate?), to news organizations ( broadcast and print). In the next months, the stakes will be much higher, as the suffering and confusion about the trajectory of Nigeria will even more enlarged. Uncertainty of government policy directions have been an Archille heels in Nigeria: with the speed and contradictions of the policies of the Tinubu government in the last 30-days, our worst is yet to come.
HOW TONY BLAIR AND JP MORGAN DECEIVED THE TINUBU GOVERNMENT
One week before taking oath to serve Nigerians, Tony Blair paid a repeat visit to another Nigeria struggling for legitimacy to lead Nigeria. In very bad light, Tony Blair offered to work for and with Tinubu. Working for whose interest, the Nigerian Peoples or the British? If after more than 55 years, Nigeria’s Independence requires very early chaperoning by British former Prime Ministers, why did our Founding Fathers remove British Imperial Government? In all his erudite oratorical prowess and political sagacity, would Jawahalal Nehru have invited or received Winston Churchill to “learn” how to deliver India, from British Colonialism, and in 2022, a Prime Minister of Asian India parents was elected to deliver the United Kingdom from the fiasco of Brexit and incapable contradictory economic policies heaped on the people of the UK by Oxford-Cambridge trained politicians like Boris Johnson, Theresa May, Liz Truss, and Tony Blair? How deceiving Buhari in 2015, by the same Tony Blair, brought Nigeria to its knees through a recession the type of which never saw Nigerians committing daylight suicide by jumping from the Third Mainland Bridge into the Lagoons of Tinubu’s Lagos? Was Tinubu not a witness to the economic recession of Nigeria, from 2015 to 2018, through advise he received from same Tony Blair? Was Tinubu not aware that the same Tony Blair visited Buhari in Abuja as Buhari was gearing up to lead Nigeria, and the political and economic collapse of the country after that period? If it did not augur or go well then, how can it go well now? Those who repeat HISTORY, by not learning from it, will reap the reward of their low scholarship. The parents of both the current US Vice President, Kamala Harris, and the UK Prime Minister, Rishi Sunak, were beneficiaries of the FREE EDUCATION of Nehru, domesticated and localized in India, not by former UK Prime Ministers like Tony Blair, who visited from London, but politicians of the new independent India, who lived in New Delhi (Tinubu is setting a pattern and settling like Buhari, to lead Nigeria from London, 18-days in Abuja, 28-days in London). Did Obafemi Awolowo, whose round-rimmed eye glasses, and only traditional Yoruba title Asiwaju, Tinubu has been copying enunciate or learn Africa’s first ever FREE EDUCATION program from the British, and did he not succeed immensely and added other first ever programs, such as TV and the Cocoa House Ibadan projects to his name, and did Tinubu not benefit from that FREE EDUCATION project? Would Obafemi Awolowo, or even Tunde Idiagbon have accepted and received Tony Blair to validate and legitimize his government? Why is Tinubu approving and granting education loans to Nigerians, youths and adults, to get educated and owe monies (gbese, local parlance for unmerited debt), before earning any, is it not modern-day local slavery? Did Tinubu begin adult life like that, or he also wants an all illiterate, NIGERIAN almajiri population? I have advocated, as s 2023 PDP/PRP Presidential Aspirant, and I am still insisting that we must educate all Nigerians free of charge, from Kindergarten to the a University, and if not now, when?
All the above are the reason for the current confusion, contradictions and uncertainties that has bedeviled Nigeria in the last 30-days: we must free ourselves from what the British will like Nigeria to be or look like, because the deceit is too glaring, real and apparent. To remove the lint in my eyes, you must first remove the wool that is in your own eyes, before mine!
JP MORGAN DECEIVED TINUBU BIG TIME
Probably the only Bank in USA, close in strength to the US Reserve Bank (the richest financial institution in the world), the JP Morgan, deceived Tinubu big time, less than 2-weeks from his oath to serve Nigerians. Seeking international validation and legitimacy, Tinubu has been in hot heels and dizzying speed, promulgating government policies, that rather solve the problems on ground, are stultifying and complicating them more. Tinubu exposed the hardly believable corruption and ineptitude at the CBN, the Central Bank of Nigeria, and suspended the Chairman of the EFCC, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Abdulrasheed Bawa, 43-year-old, supposed to be the catcher of treasury thieves and corrupt government officials, himself now labeled a highly corrupt thief stealing from thieves. From the unofficial space, Tinubu’s pace and intensity appeared very clear and impregnable. Especially with respect to financial and monetary issues, Nigeria needed to be rescued from the myopic angles and views of bankers, clubbing around, programming self centered policies to enrich themselves, while impoverishing the rest of the population.
It is easy and tempting to enumerate very many bankers in Nigeria who are indeed sumptuously rich. All of them made their billion-trillion Naira from forex, and have continued to underdevelop Nigeria by devaluing the Naira currency, which astronomically balloons the quantum Naira that they get. What is called Ways and Means, is the authorised policy of Government to print more currencies that must be backed up by productive efforts and work of the population, to give value to the new printed currencies. Printing currencies alone is not equal to creating wealth, it enunciates the opposite, and skyrockets inflation, because people will have money that is not related in value to work, productivity or creation of wealth or assets. This aspect of devaluing the Naira, and releasing stored US Dollars, and gaining more Naira, and planning to print new Naira notes, has been most damaging to the Nigerian economy: the populace has no access, to such wild wealth, and so remain very poor, whilst only a few persons continue to amas so much wealth. The route by these bankers is through foreign exchange trading and round tripping.
When JP Morgan backed Tinubu’s efforts to “cleanse” the CBN, even the most professional bankers and financial experts in JP Morgan believed that the Naira would soon appreciate and stabilize at N600.00 Naira to $1.00 USD. Instead, the depreciation has persisted and in 14-days his widened, and the official (Investment & Export Window) bank rate is currently at N862.00 Naira to $1.00 USD.
Questions: why is the black market rate now N762.00 Naira to $1.00 USD? Has the congruence been established between the official and black market rate, with only one exchange rate in the economy? How can this money market, market force instrument be established? Is the market force the determinant factor in this pricing principle, and who is controlling it? Who is funding the current cheaper more patronized black market?
Has JP Morgan not deceived Tinubu? Is it possible for the price of any commodity in Nigeria been reduced or stabilized once it zooms up, and can we list any? From the current status of the economy, Tinubu has already lost control of the financial and monetary policy framework, even before naming a Cabinet. Is there a chance that the Cabinet handlers of the economy will assist to regain control? The prognosis is low, and so the question is, how and why did JP Morgan fail? The answer is in fact that the local banking institutions have persisted in reining in the handles of financial nozzles in the Nigerian economy, and have preserved their place in the minds of elite politicians. The surgical clearing of bankers, to govern the CBN, and use only non professional bankers, who have no endemic interest in their profit books, at the headquarters.
3. VLADIMIR PUTIN MELT-DOWN AND THE WAGNER MERCENARY REVOLT AND TREASON OF 2023
For the first time, global audiences were shocked to see a blue-bloodied and very angry Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, accusing the mercenary military group of “stabbing……. and of treason”. If the war in Ukraine was going as planned and victorious, the open quarrels between the Russian leaders and mercenaries funded and hired by them would be impossible. Yevgeny Prigozhin, founder of the Wagner Group ( pronounced, Vagner), rich soldier-business mogul, and influence peddler in the Russian Kremlin, had suffered enough let-down in the hands of the Russian Defense Minister, Sergei Shoigu, and Commander of the Russian Military in Ukraine, Valery Gerasimov, of refusing to “acknowledge” Wagner Group victories, successes and even presence in Ukraine, especially in the early capture of the Eastern Ukrainian city of Bakhmut, which gave Russia and Putin, the semblance of seriousness and power. The second issue that led to the treasonable stab in Putin’s back, was the denial of the Russian Military of arms, ammunition and revictualing for prosecuting the war in Ukraine. In my early assessment of the war, I showed concern on the level of acidity, in the public exchanges between Shoigu and Prigozhin. The latter was shouting insults openly against the head of a statutory Department of a Regional Super power. It was clear that sooner than later, something would give, and did it broke on Saturday June 23, 2023. Putin addressed his shell shocked nation so angrily, against the advancing war tanks heading to “capture” Moscow, that for the umpteenth time, Putin looked very weakened, frightened and completely melt down. Rather than Ukraine surrendering on its knees, Russia suddenly was close to defeating itself.
The rest of the world watched on, the US, it’s allies in Europe, and the rest of the G-7 countries, fretted to open up on what they knew was the reversal of fortunes in Russia and in Ukraine. Alexander Lukashenko finally ended the long wait of that day, by announcing that Wagner leader Prigozhin had ordered his troops, merely 200-kilometers away from Moscow, to turn around back to Rostov on Don, which they had captured without a shot, “to avoid bloodshed”. Prigozhin’s force headed to liberate Russian Military Hierarchy had collapsed: Putin had agreed to allow Wagner soldiers and leaders to seek exile in Belarus, or be absorbed into the Russian regular military units. What indeed were the deeper reasons for the one-day failed march against the Russian kremlin? How threatened were the power base of Vladimir Putin? Now that Wagner had been defeated in the power tussle in Moscow what are its prospects as a power broker in the world order sought by Putin? Where else does Wagner have capacity to offload the excess military might and power it had acquired in Russia, and in it’s efforts to hand back, a chunky part of the old Czarist and Soviet empire to Putin?
WAGNER IN WORLD POLITICS AND POWER
To regain Crimea in 2014, Putin used and relied enormously on Wagner and Prigozhin, not the Russian
Military alone, and indeed paid $1 Billion USD, to the Group, to execute the speedy capture of nearly half of Eastern Ukraine. The Group made Barack Obama’s officials so upset, Wagner leaders suffered visa bans and economic sanctions on business entities and transactions that suddenly had become an embarrassment to both the Russian leaders, and NATO and its allies. Wagner was in Syria fighting yo secure oil and gas fields, recommended by Putin. Wagner was in Libya supporting the forces of General Halifar Haftar’s troops, to drive off the internationally recognized government: Wagner was in Mali, fighting ISIS and ISWAC jihadists, Wagner was in Sudan, protected Omar Bashir, helped to implement the Russian Agreement to build a naval base in Port Sudan on the Red Sea that had been the strategic goal and desire of Czarist, Soviet and Russian governments for more than 100-years. When al Bashir was deposed in a coup, Wagner began to support Abdel Fattar al Burhan, who deposed al Bashir, and at the same time supporting al Hemedti, rival to Burhan, both of whom now have reduced Sudan to a new Somalia-in-the-middle of Africa. What is the Wagner Group from all this? Securing Sudan’s gold mines, ferreting gold out through the Central African Republic, CAR, where the same Wagner has been controlling diamond mines and smuggling for several years now. Where else are Wagner forces fighting or safeguarding in Africa, and with antecedents such as these, is Wagner ready to exit the struggle for the soul of Africa?
LESSONS: IS THE WAGNER GROUP OPERATING IN NIGERIA?
Putin has not been shy against Islam, and has backed the Bashir regime in Syria, using Wagner. Same in Libya, and so with the vulnerabilities of Nigeria,especially the 2023 Presidential election litigations, there have been reports and sightings of Wagner-looking and Russian speaking security advisers and operatives in Abuja, Nigeria, with suspicious aircrafts lifting and landing at suspicious hours: indeed there were speculations that these were the prompts and false flags that compelled the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken to accept the overture of the US Media Consultants of the Tinubu government, and to begin discussions between the US and the Nigerian side.
There is so much at stake in Nigeria that the Wagner Group will not hesitate to accept offers and opportunities that may be available from any of the multiple fragmented factions in the ethnic, religious and business interests and divides now plaguing Nigeria: the Wagner Group will respond positively to invitations from anywhere in Africa, including Nigeria (outsiders can only call your plates and pans any names you paste on them). Wagner is only interested in scarce resources such as oil, gas, gold, tantaruim, uranium, diamond etc, and anywhere the demand for men and munitions are needed, they ferry them in, using the huge Soviet made Ilyushin II-96 transport wide body planes, once the Agreements are reached; otherwise they sneak in with many small comfortable luxury private jets, operated by the Group, for covert operations. The greater concerns must stem from the northern Sahel region fringes, where the Islamic factions seek to outsmart themselves. With the Chinese competitive interests in many vulnerable African countries, in-spite of shared goals, Russian assisted Wagner Group infiltration, the Nigerian National Security Adviser/Council and the National Intelligence Agency, must in light of current reports that the Bandits still operating in Nigeria were imported into the country in 2014, by agents of the APC, to “recover” Nigeria for the Fulani ethnic nationality.
Nigeria must be more transparent in handling religious and ethnic issues of critical significance, in order to strengthen the country’s heritage, territorial integrity and her scarce economic resources.
This piece was written by Dr. Orefo Nnamdi Onochie, Convener/Chairman NACOPPIN NIGERIA 2023.
