If this was mathematics, it would have been so nice to see how today’s musings would have looked like as a mathematical formula. But here are musings of a worried Nigerian who is wondering how two extremely opposed voices from one stable are jiggling our minds so badly. These men are teasing our brains on one matter in which one from their house spoke unequivocally and the other tried to spin out of simple comprehension and cognitive control.
Does it not rankle the brain that the PBAT/APC 2027 Presidential Campaign Council (APC- PCC) is struggling hard to turn a regular submission of one of its spokespersons, Alwan Hassan, into an optical illusion spiral? Right before our eyes, and in broad daylight, a Coordinating Deputy Director of the campaign, Mr Felix Morka, who is also the National Publicity Secretary of the APC, tried to turn the submission of Hassan into a hypnotic spiral. To achieve what really…? To deflect the matter or hedge it? As learners, we have heard journalism scholars and elders in the profession talk about obfuscation and hair-splitting. Mr Morka’s outing post-Hassan might have been to bring all these in.
Unfortunately for the usually sound Morka, it didn’t work. Nigerians were not buying it because his best efforts at spinning that narrative crumbled right before his curious submission that he would discuss the matter further with Hassan. Watching a recording of that outing again, Morka himself would see that he only managed his quibbling best to explain the heavyweight accusation. It is not easy to convince one that black is white even in a magical wave.
So, today is about one unequivocal Alwan Hassan and the quipping Felix Morka.
Alwan Hassan said without mincing words that the ministers we have in the government of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu paid (in billions of Naira) to get to their positions. He was unequivocal and he was assertive. Being a spokesperson of the party’s presidential re-election campaign, he cannot be regarded as a toddler in the business of speaking for a group. Hassan spoke smoothly and had all the platitudes in place for their presidential candidate. His mouth too was running smoothly and fast in the discharge of his spokesperson duties, but it appeared that it ran faster than his mind at that point.
He was being interviewed by a suave Charles Aniagolu and not a rasping Rufai Oseni. So, he got the question, to which he gave an answer, in Anioagolu’s usually measured words. The question did not come to him as a barrage. ‘Charles, a lot of ministers pay billions and billions, and you know, to get themselves appointed. The first thing they think of is how to recoup that money.’ Hassan also said: ‘Whatever it is a budget is supposed to do in this country in the last three and a half years, Asiwaju has done it by himself. Why do we need ministers? Why do we need a budget to be given to ministers?’ He guaranteed that what he was saying was the truth and looked surprised that Charles Aniagolu and other Nigerians did not know this.
Even if Nigerians knew, how can such cases be substantiated? Even if the cases can be substantiated, where would you go to substantiate your case? Who would listen to you? What would be its outcome? Would you be the one to appoint the adjudicators? Are you the one in charge of the courts? Or, where exactly would you take your case if you plan to present your evidence – the same Nigerian courts? Or, is it the National Assembly?
What happened after reports of other such weighty allegations? In 2024 a Sokoto cleric alleged that President Tinubu northern clerics that he bought his seat with money. If that has been forgotten, what about the fake agencies’ saga of this year? Mr. Adeniyi Adeyemi, who named principal government officials, and that of George Nwabueze discovered in the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation. These scandals sucked-in three permanent secretaries and a few other officers in the federal civil service. The man behind the celebrated fake agency has been charged to court by the ICPC. He is in a lonely place, oblivious of the machinations of the big cats who gave him assurances. So, the institutional foundations for such deep due diligence failures have not been highlighted. They remain – like the underworld to sprout again in some other pattern. These are pointers to what cash and carry means in government operations.
If we had a country where basic standards of morality in leadership are thriving, the government and the APC would have retched at this period. Had we proper institutional standards, the claim by Alwan Hassan would have been enough to ground the APC, and Mr. Felix Morka would not have been courageous enough to even attempt to defend the indefensible. He would not have had the nerve to come out in the open to explain what Hassan said or meant. But in Nigeria, even when an elephant is swept under the carpet we carry on as though nothing happened.
But it was flattering that the APC-PCC saw the extent of damage done by Mr. Hassan, and thought the best foot forward was for the courageous Morka to step forward to chest it, and make a mess of our heads by explaining it. He did what he could by muddying the waters but even an elementary listener would know that he was in a very tight corner. And when the frog missed his way to the stream, he turned it into an enterprise of confusion.
By claiming that cash-for-position predated this administration, Mr. Morkahas added a valid endorsement to the conclusion that the preceding administration of Muhammadu Buhari is also complicit. He cannot reasonably stretch this accusation beyond his APC. If Morka and his band of erudite spinners want us to look beyond the APC for samples of this utter mess, I think that would fall flat.
Cash-for-position is novel. It is today’s news, otherwise it would have been one of the most ear-filling discussions in the Nigerian polity when the APC was not the party in power. When one remembers how much the APC did to the administration of Goodluck Jonathan, a matter like this would not have escaped their attention. Think of what ministers like Deziani Allison-Madueke and Stella Oduah went through as fire set to their hindquarters by aggressive propagandists and unremitting spin doyens. Look back at what the APC made Nigerians think of the administration and it can be seen that this cash-for position would have been among the juiciest talks. Something as grave as that could not have slipped through the nets of the APC propaganda if it existed.
So, it is surprising that Mr. Felix Morka acted surprised. He too might have heard that people were paying money to get into important positions in the country, but the matter heavy for mouth a la Omawumi. Now that Alwan Hassan, a player within the power circles, announced it, the best response is not for Muoka and those who prodded him to deny it or muddy the waters about it. We know that it is a tough job mopping such up because it is like clearing a heavy thicket. Morka has been assigned to take the fall for Hassan’s equivocation. I think they should just let this slide and spare us the explanations. The thunder which strikes a smooth talker didn’t do the community a favour because what he did cannot be reached by the thunderbolt. There are limits to what power can give, but there are no limits to what power can take from an individual.