Tinubu and the journey of Ife Akintunde, by Dare Babarinsa

It’s a good thing that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu now has time to concentrate on his historic assignment of repositioning the country. The legal challenge was daunting and relentless. History would always remember former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the last general elections, as a determined and dogged fighter.

Who could imagine that in his struggle for power, he would open an American front! Now the battle is over and Tinubu has the full backing of the law to do his job. His mandate is assured and he has four years, in the first instance, to prove that Nigerians have made the right choice.

Election is decided by the simple act of voting at the polling booths. All attempts at technicality and other legal instruments to distort the decision of Nigerians at the polling booths will not serve the interest of the country. It is the candidate who can prove that he has the majority votes at the polling booths that should be vested with power.

When politicians plead something different from what happened at the polling booth, then they want to seize power by default and put democracy in danger. Therefore, each time a presidential election is challenged at the Supreme Court, the court has always sided with the decision of the majority at the polling booths.

The length of time it takes for the court to dispense with an election petition is worrisome. Sometimes, it takes years before petitions are determined and the wrong person may have been enjoying the fruit of power illegally for many years. As of now, many petitions challenging the elections of governors, senators and other officials are coursing their zig-zag ways through the judicial process. Some of them may even take up to three years.

This is not good enough. Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, the Chief Justice of the Federation, and his colleagues should rise to the challenge and give us a faster process so that all electoral petitions are concluded before swearing-in of candidates.

Delay in the court process has always been an untidy part of our democracy and it is time this is addressed. During the Second Republic, many cases were still in courts and before the tribunals when the military seized power on December 31, 1983.

In Ondo State, after the Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO), declared the candidate of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN), elected, Governor Adekunle Ajasin decided to challenge the verdict. On October 1, 1983, the Commissioner of Police in Akure, told Chief Ajasin that he cannot preside over the Independence Day parade on that day, because his petition had not run its course. In the end, Ajasin won his petition and he was eventually sworn-in for a second term in November 1983. A month later, Buhari seized power and the Second Republic became history.

Now the petitions against the President have been concluded and Tinubu needs to fulfil his promises to turn Nigeria around. There are many things to be done, but without doubt the main priority is the economy.

Everyone in Nigeria expect Tinubu to perform magic, though his wife, Oluremi, says her husband is not a magician, but the expectation is not misplaced. The gravest danger to the economy and stability of the country is unemployment, which is said to be almost 40 per cent. Therefore, every activity of the government should be directed at creating employment and improving the economy.

One is not so sure that why foreign firms appear to dominate the construction industry. This certainly is not in Nigeria’s long-term interest. Today, almost all our airports, rail stations and important highways are built by foreign firms whose interest may not be identical with that of Nigeria. We should be wary about a situation where Chinese are brought in to build toilets at our airports. This is not a sign of development. It is actually a sign of retrogression.

No country is built by outsiders. We have to build Nigeria ourselves when we wake up. It is the duty of President Tinubu to wake us up. Those in the frontline of this assignment are Nigerian engineers, artisans, builders, farmers, scientists and other professionals.

One of our leading lights is Ifedayo Akintunde, an engineer, who celebrates his 90th birthday today in Ibadan. He is a holdover from the era when Nigerians were proud of their engineers and engineering feats. He is a former Vice-President of the World Federation of Engineering Organisations (WFEO). He had served as the President of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), and he is a distinguished fellow of the NSE.

He is also a fellow of the Nigerian Institution of Civil Engineers. He is a fellow of the Nigerian Academy of Engineering and a chartered engineer in the UK. He is the first African to win WFEO’s Medal of Engineering Excellence. He has been a dominant force since the era of the old Western State, where he supervised the construction of many roads that has endured till today.

I first met Akintunde in 1995 after the execution of our friend, Ken Saro-Wiwa, the Ogoni writer and environmentalist, who was killed along with eight of his compatriots by the military junta of General Sani Abacha.

Chief Bola Ige had brought in Akintunde as a member of the Alpha Group, the political Think Tank that we formed to tackle the Abacha dictatorship. Ige was our chairman and I was privileged to serve as the secretary. Akintunde was one of the elders brought in by Uncle Bola Ige to moderate the radicalism of younger members.

Among the other elders were the likes of late Chief Ajayi, former Managing Director of the old National Bank, the late Chief Asao of Aramoko-Ekiti, late Giwa Bisi Rodipe, the founder of Nigerian largest indigenous furniture company, Bisrod, late Dr Wahab Dosumu, former Minister of Housing under President Shehu Shagari and Dr. Femi Okurounmu, a former Commissioner in Ogun State.

Occasionally we had the late Justice Adewale Thompson in our midst. Later we were joined by three formidable elders: Chief Bisi Akande, Lt. General Ipoola Akinrinade and Dr Amos Akingba.

Though he was involved in activism against the military, Akintunde’s core calling and passion remains engineering. He was involved everywhere where honest service was required. He was the one who supervised the construction of the township roads of Ilara-Mokin, which was financed by Africa’s number one automobile salesman, Chief Michael Ade-Ojo, the founder of Elizade University, Ilara-Mokin, Ondo State.

When Governor Bisi Akande decided to build the largest state secretariat in the Southwest for the people of Osun State, the man invited to supervise it was Ife Akintunde. It is to his eternal credit that all these projects were done without reckless review of cost or hidden charges.

Ironically, it is such integrity and competence that makes the likes of Ife Akintunde so unattractive to politicians running the show today. In Nigeria of today, governors and top government officials use scarce foreign exchange to import doors, beds, tables, chairs, fittings and other items of furniture from China and Italy when Nigeria has one of the best developed furniture industries in Africa.

Almost all the Government Houses in Nigeria today are using foreign furniture. Our leaders ride foreign cars, wear foreign clothes, eat foreign food and when they have toothaches, they rush to Europe to see foreign dentists. Yet we complain that the naira is daily depreciating in its unfair wrestling contest with the dollar. We need to ponder on why we are facing a foreign exchange crisis.

President Tinubu needs the services of honest and competent men and women like Ife Akintunde, an engineer, to fully domesticate our economy, create employment and boost demand. The three industries that can generate massive employments in Nigeria are today comatose or in the hands of foreigners who are indifferent to our plights. These are construction and manufacturing, entertainment and sports.

How can any country tolerate a situation where Multichoice, Africa’s largest pay-television company, would rather show Big Brother than Nigerian League? Yet they show the football leagues of South Africa, Ethiopia and Zambia to Nigeria from where the company is said to derive 60 per cent of its overall revenue.

President Tinubu needs to apply knowledge and courage in the service of Nigeria. There is no need beating round the bush in a country that has the likes of Akintunde, a living legend in the field of engineering. Congratulations Baba! You are a blessing to our country.