Loud Whispers  with JOSEPH EDGAR

Ali Ndume: Going, Going, Gone!!!

Ali Ndume has suddenly turned into a latter-day activist Senator and an emergency one for that matter. You know when things no longer favour these people, they start shouting from the temporary discomfort.  His outcry started when the CBN started moving people back to Lagos and since then, he has been giving Sahara Reporters a run for their money as the major media opposition to this government.

Oga recently went on air to say that the President has been captured. He didn’t stop at that but reportedly called lawmakers, “kleptomaniacs,” and for his efforts was relieved of his enviable position as Chief Whip. He was even asked to resign and join any party of his choice. Luckily, he finally got the much less glamorous position of Chairman of Tourism or something like that.

Even though the man is saying the right things at these times, I still find it very difficult to give him my sympathy. We are really tired of these insiders running to us for support when they lose out from the struggles within their circles.

It is now that Ali has found his voice, it is now that he has suddenly realised the kleptocracy that he is in the middle of, it is now that the President has been captured. My brother abeg leave matter. You are just a spoilt brat who is no longer gaining access to lucre, hence your crybaby tactics.

We are not moved and can never be moved, better go and beg your people because it is really cold outside here o. Shebi you kuku know how much a tuber of yam is, better go and make peace oo and leave us alone in our sufferings. I have warned you.

Femi Falana and El-Rufai: Rumble in the Sahel

Unconfirmed reports are saying that the Kaduna State House of Assembly may have contracted fiery lawyer, Femi Falana to prosecute the immediate past Governor of Kaduna State, Nasir el-Rufai for huge misappropriation of funds.

What is even bothering me in all of these, is why EFCC has not been pulled into the matter. EFCC is all over the Kogi matter but I have not heard anything about their involvement in the Kaduna saga. Abi na me never hear?

Anyway, the move to get Falana into the matter, if true, is a right step in the right direction. At least, if for nothing else, it would allow for a fair hearing, an equal platform to hear both sides and would go a long way in strengthening the judiciary as it would be free to live up to its expectations without the overriding weight of the federal authorities -if there is anything like that.

If I am to advise El-Rufai and of which I have been shouting since this matter started, it’s to rein in his Twitter-mad son, otherwise, he will be the one that will be bringing beans to him in prison.

What I see in this matter is a clear case of a witch-hunt at the end and political misunderstanding at the other end. All these monies that they are shouting are missing, can easily be explained and resolved at a level-headed arbitration panel. But if we continue to push the matter with hot-headed rascality as personified by El-Rufai’s son, which by all means you should carry out a DNA test on, then we may be finding ourselves sharing a room with some inmates at the Kaduna correctional facility.

Please, let wisdom reign on this matter, let’s push for sanity and maturity and let’s do this very quickly before Mr. Falana buys a plane ticket because once that daddy enters the matter, na fire oooo, I will run away ooo. Thank you.

Dangote and the Curious Case of Crude

Since he came out screaming like a child not wanting to take his bath on the surreptitious moves by the IOCs to starve his giant refinery of crude, I have been asking questions o.

Why is this happening? Didn’t they think of supply at the stage of conceiving the refinery? Was there any contingency plan to mitigate against this? What is the government through the NNPCL which has a stake saying about this and all? What about the NUPRC?

I have been asking questions and a lot of people have spoken but very strategic people that I have reached out to in the oil community and government have preferred to keep their mouths shut.

You see, I do not like trading in conspiracy theories and that is why I will discount all that I have heard but piece together the little that I have heard that makes sense. It is looking like the Dangote Refinery is caught between a complex web of long-standing agreements, government crude for loan policies, weak government regulatory environments, sharp practices by the IOCs and entrenched interests that will see businesses wiped out if the refinery succeeds.

There is no time or space in this column to go through the nitty-gritty of my findings but let me state clearly – all stakeholders need the Dangote Refinery to succeed. It will positively impact everybody from IOCs to their agents, to their home governments, the Nigerian governments, to NNPCL to the ordinary Nigerian on the street, amongst others.

So, buying crude at a premium, making it scarce amongst other artificial challenges being thrown at it is just not the best. To say one thing, IOCs making the refinery buy crude exploited here from overseas agents at a $1 markup as alleged is, to say the least, a continuous slap on all Nigerians and this must be wrestled to the ground by the government.

Can we just sha let this refinery breathe? It is no longer just about Mr. Aliko Dangote but it is about our economic renaissance. Thank you.

Yahaya Bello: Be a Man About it

I hear that oga is still hiding and fighting his case in court through proxy. This is in total contrast to the pictures and videos of him in a gym pumping iron and doing like Power Mike all over the place. Now he is looking like a mouse, hiding all over the place instead of coming out to face the music. Music that will not even play well. Mbok, which governor has been jailed? Apart from one or two out of hundreds, which other ones have gone the whole hog and entered jail, make I ask?

My brother, this notwithstanding, has decided to hide under his wife’s wrapper and be causing people that no reach am to be talking about him anyhow. Abi, where was the EFCC chairman when he was contesting for Presidency? Who born the EFCC Chairman when Buhari was begging him to step down from the Presidency abi don’t they know that without him, Tinubu would not have been president today?

Now that EFCC chairman who was doing a missionary pilgrimage and preaching the bible at Shomolu busstop is now the one calling a press conference on his head. To the point that he sent people to Abuja where he was enjoying himself with some-you-know-who-and-what, to try to abduct him. If not for the quick intervention of his successor who used his agbada to cover him, that was how they would have pulled him half-naked into detention.

Please, there is nothing better than dignity, especially when you have reached that level. See, when EFCC came for me, I wore my best suit, held my head high and walked in like a man and entered the detention. That na me oooo, talk less of you former Governor and Emperor of Kogi. Shebi all your people will follow you; they will enter the cell with you, serve you and make you very comfortable.

I don’t understand all of this. So N82billion is not enough for us to ask you questions. Better don’t annoy me and leave wherever you are and go and answer these questions before I lose my temper. If I lose my temper, you will not like it o, because I will just enter that place and drag you the way we drag drunken sailors from whore houses to church.

Be a man abeg and come out. You are not the first. Thank you.

Governor Umo Eno on the 18th Floor

I am not talking o. The other day one Akwa Ibom State parastatal invited me on an advisory and immediately the place went wild. I later heard that I had been very critical of the governor and as such, the person who approached me was accused of being politically naïve. My people, na so dem drive me commot o.

So since then, I decided to ignore them until a meaningful government comes into place. Nothing Governor Eno will do that will concern me again. Even if he bans afang and asks us to stop eating it, I will just be looking at them. Shebi it is what people deserve they get abi.

Then in my lethargy, I just saw news that daddy was planning an 18-storey building in Lagos. Although unconfirmed, you will agree with me that there is usually no smoke without fire, hence my decision to come out of verbal exile to shout o.

My dear Governor Eno, I really do hope that this is not true, and if it is, that this project should be only for investment purposes and not another white elephant project that will bear your mother-in-law’s name and would be used for church services and wedding reception for your friends and family, or God forbid, one of your Happy Centres.

If it is true, then it should be used for rental income to generate more revenues for the state. The state, despite its huge resources, has really suffered in the hands of rudderless leadership and this 18-storey building, if it’s true, will just be taking the piss.

I will go on my knees and pray against it. I will look for virgins above 18 years in Akwa Ibom, which would be a daunting task, and I will move them to an island with only me. We will cry naked to the Lord to make you change your mind and instead divert the funds to more credible projects within Akwa Ibom that will be better for our people.

Lagos that has all the buildings that they are even tired of, abi you have not heard that they are bulldozing them because they are too much, you now want to bring your own when your people are still living in huts.

Except it is not true, that Jehovah will not step in. Thank you.

Bola Tinubu: Forex Tax, Let’s Do it

President Tinubu, we hear, is mulling a forex tax. That is blowout taxation on forex earnings by banks to fund a supplementary budget to the tune of about N6 trillion. I hear they have already submitted the thing to the National Assembly.

I support this one wholeheartedly; the banks have played the market and have made a killing kai. The amounts they have made are sinful in just hedging the markets.

Yesterday, I was in a small bank with a director looking for a loan with a client and the woman told me something which sent cold waves down my spine.

“Edgar, I cannot lend you at 40%, inflation index is 34%, meaning I will be at a loss if I lend at the prescribed 32%, so what do I do, I play the markets. I go do treasury bills which are risk-free.”

My people, this is the simple reason why the real sector is starved of funds but do you blame the banks who have shareholders to report to if they take risks and cannot come out profitably? So, they run to the safe havens of TBs and Forex where the volatility is one side – Naira crashing. They bet against the naira and will always win.

So, it makes sense for the government to take 50% of the earnings there and redistribute it. Simple. Abi if you won’t give us funds to do our business, we will collect it through the back door na.

The only problem here is the fact that the government in its usual “jankariwo” way will fritter away the gains. Already, unquoted reports have said they intend to use 50% on infrastructure which is good, but the second half will now be used for recurrent expenditure meaning more N1.5m fuel for six cars for Madam Minister.

Any which way, the average Nigerian is messed up. Recolonisation loading.