The World Must Cut Insane Putin Down to Size

Ring True BY YEMI ADEBOWALE

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Last year, the federal government spent 76 per cent of its revenue on debt servicing. This may jump to 92 per cent this year as predicted by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Nigeria’s debt-servicing obligation in relation to its revenue is far above World Bank’s suggested 22.5 per cent for low-income countries like Nigeria. The Buhari government has evidently been binge-borrowing. Last year, it took $6.18 billion external loan to finance the N5.6 trillion deficit in budget 2021.

Alrea He cares less about the humanitarian crisis created by his senseless invasion of Ukraine and has now placed his country’s nuclear deterrent forces on high alert, raising global concerns about a nuclear confrontation. This Godless man is threatening to drop nuclear bomb on the rest of us. That’s Russian President Vladimir Putin for you; a beast determined to humiliate the human race. Putin is all the negatives you can think of: killer, tyrant, liar, manipulator, monster, massively corrupt, drug addict and the rest.

Already, satanic Putin’s madness in Ukraine has resulted in millions of people seeking refuge in neighbouring Eastern European countries and beyond. Within nine days of Putin’s invasion, almost 400 innocent Ukrainians were killed and hundreds of homes destroyed. The mad man called Putin has been dropping bombs on civilians. Last Monday, I was left in tears after watching the shelling of residential areas in Ukraine’s second most populated city Kharkiv, resulting in the death of scores of civilians.

Putin is not aiming to annex Ukraine simply because that country is seeking to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an inter-governmental military alliance between 28 European countries and two North American countries, established in the aftermath of World War II. Putin’s dream has always been to restore the Soviet Union’s flag. As soon as Boris Yeltsin named him his successor in 1999, he started dreaming about restoring the power Russia had lost and a neo-Russian Empire. That was why he snatched Ukraine’s Crimea region in 2014.

The Russian President has been fueling separatists in the Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine since 2014, so that they can also join the Russian empire he is fantasizing about. This is the main reason for invading Ukraine. Donetsk and Luhansk, parts of the Donbas region, are under the control of native Russian secessionists since 2014, and so, in effect, by Putin. Now, Putin wants the whole of Ukraine.

Another of Putin’s weird reasons for invading Ukraine was alleged human rights abuse in the Donbas region. Imagine cruel and lawless Putin talking about human rights abuse; a man that brutally repelled separatists in Chechnya, killing thousands of Muslims; defanged the country’s oligarchs and controls the Russian media, with all sorts of restrictive laws. Many independent Russian media have been forcefully shut. Daily, dissenting voices in Russia are dehumanised by Putin’s secret agents.

Did Putin think the world will forget how he poisoned and froze Russian opposition leader/anti-corruption activist, Alexei Navalny? The politician was jailed upon his return from Germany, where he spent five months recovering from a nerve agent poisoning, no thanks to the Russian leader. Navalny is facing fresh charges inside a maximum-security prison outside Moscow that could extend his prison stay by a decade. Putin has simply turned Russia into a police state with zero respect for human rights.

I have heard some people justifying the invasion of Ukraine because the United States also moved against Cuba when Russia tried establishing a missile station there; that it is alright for Russia to resist NATO at its backyard in Ukraine. People who argue along this line still have the mentality of the cold war era. In any case, why would anarchy by the United States be a justification for the invasion of Ukraine by Russia? Ukraine is a sovereign country and it is not the business of Russia to determine its security arrangement.

NATO has failed Ukrainians and the rest of the world in this invasion. President Joe Biden of the United States remains a big disaster in this regard. Before the invasion, all that Biden was doing was to alert the world about the planned date of invasion and make useless verbal threats. Biden and his NATO allies did not take a single concrete step to deter Putin. While the Russians were massing troops along the border with Ukraine, if NATO had responded by moving its troops deep into its Eastern Europe member countries and allies, Putin would have been restrained. This is the only language that would have hindered the Russian President. Because there was no practical response from NATO, Putin confidently invaded Ukraine.

It is not too late for NATO to step in and practically force Putin to pull out of Ukraine. The sanctions placed on Russia by the West and arms sent to the Ukrainian government won’t force Russian troops out of the country. The only language that would move Putin is massive attack by NATO on Russian forces in Ukraine and beyond. Forget about Putin’s nuclear deterrent forces. It is just an empty threat. This brute called Putin is also afraid of being killed. I have heard some chicken-hearted fellow saying this could lead to a world war. Which world war? Russia’s archaic military machines can’t face NATO.

We all can see how Russian troops are struggling in Ukraine. Many thought they would just stroll in and take Ukraine. It did not happen because Russian military machines are now antiquated. A shameless Russia admitted on Wednesday that 498 of its troops had been killed by Ukrainian forces in seven days of fighting. It also admitted that one of its top commanders, Major General Andrei Sukhovetsky, was killed last Wednesday in Ukraine.

So, the other option to ensure that Putin pulls out of Ukraine is for the world to put pressure on the Russian military to seize power from Putin and kill him. This man doesn’t deserve to live any longer because he is a threat to the human race. This should be the world’s clear message to the Russian Army.

As for the Ukrainian Army, my message to them this morning is straight forward: Start firing missiles targeting military facilities and personnel on Russian soil. Some of them will escape Russian missile shields and hit targets. Palestinian militants did this against Israel and got a great deal of respect. When Putin starts getting bombs at home, he would take a second look at his senseless invasion of Ukraine.

Also, the world is back to the old arms race no thanks to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. The competition between nations for superiority in the development and accumulation of weapons has resumed. Humanity will suffer as NATO and other developed nations increase spending on arms.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has already pledged that Germany would allocate €100 billion to its armed forces as it looks to increase defense spending in the light of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine: “It’s clear that we need to invest more in the security of our country in order to protect our freedom and democracy,” Scholz said early this week while delivering a statement on Ukraine at a special parliament session.

He added that the country would invest more than two per cent of its Gross Domestic Products (GDP) in defense every year “from now on” and accused Putin of planning a Russian empire to change Europe. Criminal Putin has taken the world back to the ugly era of spending big on arms. The human race will be the biggest loser as resources are diverted to arms instead of human beings.

Bureau of Statistics’ Voodoo Inflation Figures

Whenever the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) rolls out figures showing that inflation is on the decline in Nigeria, I tend to wonder if it’s another country this statistics agency is talking about. More often than not, these figures don’t tally with the realities on ground. This insanity started last year when for eight months, the NBS reported that Nigeria’s inflation was on a steady decline. I had to persistently go back to check the meaning of inflation. In simple terms, it means a general increase in prices of goods and services over a given period of time, more often, as a result of a fall in the purchasing value of a country’s money and declining productivity. For almost seven years now, Nigeria has been experiencing creeping, walking, galloping, and hyperinflation, because the Naira has been crashing, with productivity deteriorating. Then, the NBS gets up and turns in declining inflation statistics.

After seeing the latest inflation statistics released by the NBS i.e. January 2022, I became convinced that these NBS guys are high on something. Only God knows what it is. The agency reported that The Consumer Price Index (CPI) which measures inflation moderated to 15.60 per cent (year-on -year) in January, 2022, compared to 16.47 per cent in the corresponding year.

For me, the NBS persistent story about inflation being on the decline in Nigeria is a ruse and politically-motivated. The appointment of Simon Harry as the new Statistician-General of the Federation and head the National Bureau last year has compounded the folly of the agency. Harry now dishes out politically-motivated statistics. It’s preposterous reading the NBS reporting that “urban inflation slowed to 16.17 per cent year-on-year in January 2022, from 17.03 per cent recorded in January 2021, while rural inflation rate also moderated to 15.06 per cent in January from 15.92 per cent in January 2021.” I don’t know the urban area in Nigeria Harry is talking about.

The key drivers of inflation in any country like exchange rate depreciation, value of a country’s currency, liquidity challenges in the forex market, high cost of transportation, security problems and disruption of production (particularly agricultural activities) would always have a significant impact on headline inflation. Nigeria is persistently on the negative on all the indices listed, yet, the useless NBS is reporting declining inflation.

Perhaps, the officials approving these figures are simply following the directives of some powerful guys in government who want to positively project the federal government on the economic side, even when it is obvious that they are failing. Releasing politically-laced inflation statistics creates further crisis for Nigeria’s prostrate economy. The government will be planning with fake figures; that is if they have any planning agenda.

Wike Should Respond to traumatised Pensioners

overnor Nyesom Wike has been building flyovers at the expense of human beings. This aptly sums up his almost seven years tenure in Rivers State. This governor has spent about N80 billion on flyovers amid suffering in the state. This morning, I am drawing attention to the plight of those devastated Rivers State pensioners who have not been paid gratuities and pension arrears since 2014. Those who retired from 2014 and further have also not been paid pension. These seniors are suffering. Some have died waiting for annuity.

The Chairman, Nigeria Union of Pensioners in the state, Collins Nwonkwo remarked: “No gratuities or accumulated arrears have been paid so far except for monthly pension. All other benefits that we have been fighting for like gratuities, arrears of pension and harmonisation have not received any response yet. Wike’s tenure is ending; he should start the payment and wherever he stops becomes a starting point for the person coming after him.

The National President, South-South Youths Initiative, Imeabe Saviour adds: “The governor of the state should make deliberate effort to pay our retirees. We have witnessed repeated protests by these elders who served the state with all their strength and time. It is painful that we still see this class of people on the streets demanding what belongs to them that should have been paid with ease.

“We condemn in its entirety the idea of reckless spending of Rivers money on other states. This, the governor does in the form of donations. Within two years, the governor has donated N1.5 billion to three states. N500 million to Sokoto State, N500 million to Benue State and just last week, the governor donated N500 million to Bayelsa State. This is happening when our pensioners are protesting, the education system is not functioning well, and the primary healthcare system is going down the drain. We see this as a slap on the people that gave him all the support he needed.”

My dear Wike, you must slow down on your spirit of flyovers, and touch human lives directly. I challenge you today, to pay all pension and gratuity arrears. Forces of good in Rivers State must put pressure on Wike to do the needful. He must learn to spend more on human capital development instead of splendor projects.

Wike is building very expensive flyovers and multi-lane city roads while public hospitals and schools are in tatters. The citizens lack access to things as basic as public water supply and drivable inner streets, while billions are sunk into flyovers. Only a few homes have access to public water supply in Rivers State.