An Abuja based Political Scientist, Statecraft and Preventive Peacebuilding Practitioner, Dr. Ayokunle Fagbemi, has drawn attention to the fact that the incumbent APC-led federal government has some seventy-two hours to enable President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to initiate mediating and mitigating directives, proclamations and policy modulations that can emphatically avert the looming #EndBadGovernance 2.0 tagged ‘Fearless in October Protest’ as a logical response to stabilise the Nigerian-state.
Fagbemi, who is also the Executive Director of Centre for Peacebuilding and Socio-Economic Resources Development (CePSERD), stated this while delivering the keynote at the National Association of Seadogs, Pyrates Confraternity, Zuma Deck organized Citizens’ Forum on “Energy crisis in a biting economy: What citizens say,” held on Saturday, 28th day of September 2024 at the NICON Luxury Hotel, Abuja.
Fagbemi urged President Tinubu to make the necessary adjustments to his speech for Nigeria’s 64th Independence Anniversary to avert the widely-proposed and anticipated “Fearless in October Protest”, scheduled to commence on October 1, 2024.
He pleaded that Tinubu should activate measures that could restore the responsiveness and integrity of his administration as required precursors to renewed citizens’ trust, confidence, and understanding that citizens were only actively engaged in participatory governance with regards to the prevalent energy crisis.
Fagbemi, therefore, requested that as a mark of goodwill and pursuant to the constitutional privileges of President Tinubu’s office, to wit: Section 175, on prerogative of mercy and clemency and within the purview of case law interpretations of relevant components of the subsisting criminal and penal codes as per the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA), the president should consider and implement the following:
1) Issue Presidential Directive to the Attorney General of the Federation/Minister of Justice to enter “Nolle prosequi” in respect of the already charged protesters; and facilitate the release of ALL protesters currently in detention nationwide using the #EndSARs and #EndBadGovernance as case studies.
2) Issue a Presidential Directive to the Director-General (SSS) to move Citizen Nnamdi Kanu to a “protected halfway-house safe haven apartment” under concurrent oversighting of the Nigeria Correctional Service, and with improved visitation rights of unfettered access by his legal and medical teams pending the resolution of legal bottlenecks to achieve his release and probable acquittal by the judiciary.
Fagbemi, as a seasoned statecraft practitioner, made copious references to extant legal and policy frameworks that, if functionally and properly activated by the concerned agencies of government and incumbent public officials, the #EndBadGovernance protests should not have occurred.
He identified and reviewed the mandates of ten of such agencies that their shortfalls in performance negatively led to the protest because of what he called incoherent Nigerian-state governance feedback information (data gathering, analyses, and) management system for proventive response delivery.
As a panacea, he therefore enjoined Mr. President to issue a Presidential Executive Order for activating an efficient Framework on Public Institutions Performance and Citizens Reaction Feedback Monitoring for Proactive Responses to harness the activities of all agencies of government as provided for by relevant legal and policy frameworks such as in that of the National Monitoring and Evaluation Policy (2022),
SERVICOM, PCC, CSI, ReportGov.Ng, NOA, FCCPC, NERC, among others.
He, however, observed that for effectiveness and efficiency, it may require appointing a Senior Special Assistant/Coordinator (Feedback Information and Intelligence Analyses for Proactive Response) and strengthening the Office of the Special Adviser on Performance Monitoring and reinforced direct overseeing by the Chief of Staff to the
President and Secretary to the Government of the Federation.
Dr. Ayokunle Fagbemi had earlier summarized his
understanding of the major thrust of “What Citizens Say” as being that they want to achieve energy security by a holistic resolution of attendant challenges:
➢ Citizens are committed to and desirous of facilitating the demystification of “fuel subsidy regime” and the dismantling and exposure of the cabal responsible for sustained energy crisis in Nigeria for apprehension and prosecution.
➢ Citizens are hopeful that Nigeria can attain optimal levels of energy availability, accessibility and affordability.
➢ Citizens are convinced that the crime and criminalities entrenched in the petroleum and electricity subsectors of the energy system in Nigeria must be unravelled, culprits transparently prosecuted, and appropriately sanctioned.
➢ Citizens affirm that the anti corruption crusade must visit the energy sector if we are to achieve energy security.
➢ Citizens believe that to achieve a meaningful energy availability threshold PBAT must provide leadership required to combat the corruption bedeviling the energy sector.
➢ Citizens feel that the energy crisis is continuously being propelled by the anti-citizens, pro-elite
and anti-development governance frameworks based on a problematic 1999 Constitution, extant legislations, and skewed policy frameworks or regulations.
➢ In lieu of sustainability, citizens are convinced that the FGN under PBAT must provide required leadership for the Nigerian-state to achieve strategic petroleum reserves for petroleum crude and premium motor spirit.
As a seasoned statecraft practitioner, Fagbemi therefore urged President Tinubu to be novel in confronting the corruption, elite conspiracy and ganging up of forces that have held the energy sector captive by issuing Presidential Convening Order for a Research Study Group to actualize the proposed burst the energy security/crisis bubble research study involving academia, civil society, technocrats, media practitioners, among others.
Presidential Intervening Directive for Inter-Ministerial Collaborative pursuit of concerted enlightenment of public officials on the provisions of legal and policy frameworks and citizens’ awareness and public enlightenment thereto for positive action.
Direct the Council Secretariats of the (i) National Defence Council, (ii) National Security
Council, and Nigerian Police Council to prepare appropriate Memorandum for deliberations before each council for the activation of required procedural investigation, apprehension, prosecution, sanctioning and securing of conviction of perpetrators of criminal activities in the energy sector.
In the same vein, Dr. Fagbemi pleaded with the National Assembly leadership under Senator Godswill Akpabio and Rt. Honourable Tajudeen Abbas, strictly stick to their constitutionally mandated oversight and refrain from conducting another form of probe concerning Nigeria’s lingering energy security/crisis.
He opined “that any NASS probe shall constitute a distraction, become
counterproductive, and shall only create sensations that are merely harmonic vibrations that cannot achieve much.”
However, he requested that the Senate President as Chairman of NASS should “request that relevant stakeholders to furnish the NASS with notarized data, reports and answers to specific questions on the operations in the energy sector; and thereto, constitute a research study group to review submissions by stakeholders to NASS for independent verification and validation studies on those submissions, and proffer analytic legislative briefing notes for proactive interventions by NASS.”
This approach “should help NASS to overcome the sensational razzmatazz often associated with public hearing probes and mitigate the negative citizens’ perception on NASS integrity and trust deficit.”
He emphasized that “the proposed approach should help NASS receive expert reports from stakeholders that can easily correlate with the outcomes of our earlier proposed disruptive research from the executive branch convened by PBAT and help NASS insulate the legislature from brickbats while concentrating on how to ensure that they facilitate the enabling environment for efficiency in the sector.”
“The NASS evocation of the stakeholder self-reporting power of oversight, we believe, should help to encourage energy sector to optimally upscale production e.g. increased crude exploration to 2.5 million barrels per day by ensuring that some currently capped wells are uncapped; and ensure that the NNPCL refineries start working to justify the appropriation legislations for their reactivation.
“The same should be applicable to electricity generation, transmission, and distribution to citizens as end users.”
Fagbemi finally recommended that Civil Society and Organized Private Sector Collaboration (particularly IPMAN and DISCOs) should become responsive to citizens’ demands by articulating and aggregating them into synoptic nuggets that can help activate interventions and secure paradigmatic shifts.
He implored them as stakeholders to actively and transparently participate in the implementation of our proposed recommendations and charted way forward.
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