Please Tell a Friend about this article.



Written by:
Prince Charles Dickson,
Abuja FCT

Gani Fawehimi Made In Nigeria Not By Nigeria —The Masses Brand!


Days back, Plateau state capital Jos, played host to launch of the rebranding programme at the Zonal level. While that was happening, the entire Ondo state was celebrating Gani in death, Lagos had honoured the man, and Edo was not left out.

Foes poured encomium on the man; he was a great man…understatement, a legal luminary…true talk. Human rights activist and that is merely stating the obvious. I am not an expert in doing tributes but in one word Gani was simply a brand in a brand-less nation.

A man in a country with very few role models to look up to for the current generation.

Gani represents all that we should aspire to as a nation, he had his flaws no doubt but he was a brand. We could argue that he was autocratic, yet he fought for democratic ideals. He was a man you would love to hate.

And truly that is all I would want to say. While we have produced a Gani, there are still the Maitama Sules, Soyinkas, Achebes, Emeka Anyaokwus, and a few others still alive. The fearful truth is that gradually these brands are slowly going extinct.

We have a brand that is replicate with government stealing…and mediocrity, in Jos, it was the usual speeches, Dora presented a 9 page, 26 paragraph, 300 lines and an empty color brochure and political jobbers will smile to the bank. The consultants, balloon decorators, government drivers that got their night allowance, road allowance, speeding allowance, and siren allowance.

The replacements are the likes of Ibori, Igbinedion, public officers that forge from birth certificates to the ones that did not attend any school. Bankers that give questionable loans, and business people that refuse to pay same.

We as a nation do not possess any brand that is why a Sony advert went with the only brand the world knows of us.

The brand we see everyday is one with a government that is determined to see that its population remains largely uneducated. A brand with a University system that has been on strike for over two months and still counting.

Presently in over 10 states, teachers at Primary school level are on strike and the Education Minister brands his wife of over 20 years with tax payers’ money and nothing is wrong.

A brand that has become synonymous with kidnapping, we all saw the boko haram brand and we are still being treated to the Nigeria banking brand.

A brand where the Electoral body tells the public via newspaper report that it gave out contracts worth 2BN plus in two days. And we see nothing wrong, after all the rigging and landslides require plenty money. Besides what more do we expect when the body is headed by a ‘Wuruwuru’ brand called Iwu.

The brand Nigeria is one where millions of Naira is spent on diesel at Aso Rock to power the seat of power because they equally do not have light. A brand where we get an average of 45 minutes of electricity nationwide.

Even football or soccer as it is called; one of our very few brands is almost lost. Because we just cannot get it right.

Our brand is the execution of Nigerians in Libya and Equatorial Guinea; we are a nation of leaders and equally followers that do not have conscience.

In leveraging on the death of Gani, the Minister For Information and Communications, Prof. Dora…insulted our intelligence by referring to him as a brand.

But was he treated as one, all the imprisonment, incarcerations, and we are singing his praise and the least I can say is that we are brand of hypocrites. The same people praising did not have the ‘balls’ to stand with, stand by nor stand for him.

Strange people, strange nation…that should be added to the branding slogan. We forget very quickly, during the 2003 elections Gani contested for Presidency under the NCP…he pulled barely 3000 and we are crying…Indeed we are a comical people.

Maybe we just preferred Gani the activist but could not stand Gani the leader. What a brand of people.
A comrade raised a point that at least in the last 10 years we have seen professors, or at least doctorate degree holders hold sway in education, doctors in the health sector, yet we still battle the same problems.

In the Nigerian brand, a man is elected from Lagos…He represents somewhere in Mushin, and he grew up there and the first thing he does is a ‘familiarity visit.

Indeed we are a brand, the National Assembly is there doing nothing apart from enriching themselves, with Senators that get a basic Salary of 2,484 242.50. Furniture Allowance @300% = 7,452,736.50. Newspaper @50% = 1,242, 122.70.

Wardrobe @25% = 720,000. Recess @10% = 248 424.55. Accommodation @200% = 4,968,509.00. Entertainment @30% = 900,000. Hardship Allowance @50% - 1,242 122.70.

They get hardship allowance, that I have never understood, and then they get money to read their misdeeds in the newspapers. And you expect that those men and women will understand what the problem with Nigeria is?

It is sad that Gani is gone, but he has gone the way of all mortals, painfully while we pour the praise let us reflect and ask which way Nigeria.

We have given away Bakassi, our electoral system is rift with inconsistency, the health sector is worse, and education has collapsed. Labour is in painful labour unable to deliver, everything is in a state of comatose.

We are moving anywhere ‘belle face’. What a brand, I watched as the Delta State Governor chairing a committee for the Anambra gubernatorial primaries of PDP refer to the party as a dog eat dog arrangement.

In the same Anambra, 39 persons have picked up PDP forms. At N5M each plus the N250K each for intent that comes up to almost N200M. In the face of reality and we see nothing wrong in this.

Despite all the rubbish that the Chinese do…they have created their own brand, we bought Chinese satellite, and we are building Chinese railway…many Nigerians have to brush their teeth with Chinese brush after we eat Chinese meals in the many Chinese restaurants…When will made in made in Nigeria be a good brand?

Please Tell a Friend about this article.