The Presidential Guards Brigade is an arm of the Nigerian Army saddled with the responsibility of ensuring the safety of the President and the seat of power. Soldiers and officers attached to that brigade are also in charge of security in and around the Federal Capital Territory. They are responsible for military parades inside the Villa or the FCT during national events or during visits of visiting Heads of Government.
Besides the security responsibility, the brigade has a vibrant musical band that supplies music at events attended by the President or the Vice-President. In such instances, it is normal for the soldiers to play melodious tunes as the President or the Vice-President as the case may be, makes his way into the venue of such events.
They will play the tunes until the President or the Vice-President gets to his seat. The soldiers will then quickly play the national anthem to signal the commencement of such programmes before the dignitaries will take their seats.
Thereafter, the soldiers will sit patiently and follow the proceedings up until when the President or the Vice-President will be called to address the gathering. While those in attendance rise up as a sign of respect, the soldiers will play another melodious tune as the President or Vice-President makes his way to the podium. The same tune will also be played when he is returning to his seat after delivering his address.
The Acting President, Yemi Osinbajo, is currently enjoying the brigade’s special treatment to the maximum now. They must have considered his ethnic background in choosing a welcome tune for him. Being a Yoruba man from my home state, Ogun, I have discovered that the musical band of the Presidential Guards Brigade has decided to be playing a Yoruba tune for him whenever he arrives for events.
The soldiers’ preferred welcome tune for Osinbajo is kaabo o, kaabo 2ce, omo abile soro 2ce, kile lanu, kaabo o! The song is for great men. When literarily translated, it means welcome to you, the man who speaks to the ground and it (the ground) opens up, welcome.
As the tune is being played, Osinbajo, sandwiched by security and civilian aides will walk majestically into the venue. He will be acknowledging greetings with a wave of hand as nobody is allowed to move too close to him. That period is always an opportunity for people already inside the venue, especially ladies, to showcase the kind of telephone handsets they are using. Many of them will be seen struggling to take photographs or record the video of the Acting President as he walks in. Maybe they use such photographs or videos to boast at home that they attended a programme where Osinbajo was present. They may also want to use such to update their status on social media.
The tune will be repeated as many times as possible until he gets to where his seat is. Ample time will also be given for him to exchange pleasantries with those already at the table before the national anthem is played. The soldiers are then free to rest a bit.
In choosing the tune they use to usher Osinbajo to the podium to make his remarks and back to his seat after the address, the soldiers this time consider his religious leaning. The Acting President is not only a Christian, he is also a pastor in the Enoch Adeboye-led The Redeemed Christian Church of God.
What then is the tune chosen for this purpose? It is a popular revival song: let the spirit of the Lord come down 2ce, let the spirit of the Lord from heaven come down, let the spirit of the Lord come down.
Whenever that tune is played and Osinbajo moves towards the podium, I am always scared that he would not be carried away and mistake the gathering for a church congregation to the point that he will think he wants to deliver a sermon and start his address with “let us pray.”
This has however never happened, an indication that he has mastered the game.
Sagay and his revelation on customs officers
The Chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption, Prof. Itse Sagay (SAN), is not happy with anybody involved in corruption. He did not hide his anger towards such people on Thursday at the opening of a two-day National Dialogue on Corruption organised by PACAC at the old Banquet Hall of the Villa.
He was fuming with anger when he was recalling recent events including monies recovered from where they were stashed by former public office holders and the ones traced to secret bank accounts. He also did not spare government agencies as he started by descending heavily on the Niger Delta Development Commission which he claimed bought over 70 vehicles recently allegedly with the money it should have used to better the lots of the people of the region.
But the agency of government that got most knocks from Sagay is the Nigerian Customs Service. As the various sins of the officials attached to the service were being rolled out, I looked round the hall to see if the NCS Comptroller-General, Hameed Ali, was present. He was not there.
Sagay made it abundantly clear to his audience that the NCS has refused to align itself to the change agenda of the present administration since May 2015 when President Muhammadu Buhari and Osinbajo were inaugurated. To prove this, he needed to provide examples. As it turned out, he was prepared for it.
He singled out the Customs and Excise Department, which he said had completely ignored the fight against corruption; operating as if it is not in Nigeria. To start with, he recalled that in December 2016, a cousin of his whose family had resided in the United States for 26 years, was coming back home to settle. He said the family was not supposed to pay customs duties for household goods which they brought back for use in Nigeria. Nevertheless, he said bribe was demanded at every stage of custom clearance.
Sagay took his time to list the various sums paid by his cousin as bribes at different points at Tin Can Island. He listed them to include N20,000 paid as PRO to address paperwork for personal effects approval from CAC; and the N1.2m for approval of personal effects which is by law non-dutiable.
He said after physical examination of container, his cousin had to wait for about three hours for PRO and CIU to agree on profit sharing before the physical examination report left CIU desk. He said the profit sharing fee was fixed at N50,000. He added that there was another N10,000 payment for moving the status examination from scanner to physical examination.
“During one of these illegal payments, my cousin feeling embarrassed at openly giving money to these parasites, tried to fold the money in a piece of paper. The shameless extortionist shouted, ‘What are you hiding? Is it not mere cash? Let me have it like that. There is nothing to conceal,’” he narrated.
I am just wondering what would have happened if Buhari or Ali were present at the event. Enjoy your weekend.
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