B Y BY A D E M I L U Y I ADEMILUYI K A N M I KANMI A Blue Wave

“With a low level of financial inclusiveness, we must consider some adjustments. The United Kingdom with all its education and technological adjustment needed three years to “phase in” a newly designed currency. A gradual phasing out option requiring an extension should be considered” more than fi y years on what has gone wrong with the ongoing exercise, why unlike then is it not seamless?

We are not in the business of blame trading, however the ques on needs to be answered. The dislocaon to both the formal and informal economy cannot be overlooked. Lessons must be learnt.

We may care to start with the mindset. There is something suspiciously authoritarian about the approach, civil society and key stakeholders should have been involved at the implementa on stage.

It has become a cliche to state that a currency change is based on the exis ng currency being phased out and not forced out. This posi on of “forcing out” is clearly unrealis c, unhelpful and disrup ve. Right now, people are apprehensive about the exercise an a tude which portends ill for a society in which millions are s ll unbanked. With a low level of financial inclusiveness, we must consider some adjustments. The United Kingdom with all its educa on and technological adjustment needed three years to “phase in” a newly designed currency. A gradual phasing out op on requiring an extension should be considered.

•Aregbesola.

THE The recent announcement of a new poli cal group, “The Blue Movement” brings to the fore discourses about the nature and direc on of what is referred to as poli cs in Nigeria.

This is not surprising for the misinterpretaon of poli cs is founded on a patron-client rela onship to share the spoils, the boun es of the a ainment of poli cal office in a consump ondriven poli cal economy, any a empt to widen the space and incorporate ideology is viewed as a subversion of the established framework. A er all, the machinery is in reality not based on poli cal par es in the conven onal defini on as the concept as solved over the past three centuries but on the use of Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs) to carve up the resources of the state.

For this reason, the announcement of a new poli cal grouping with a clearly mission statement was a short across the bow.

Speaking at the weekly stakeholders’ mee ng of Blue Movement in Osogbo/Olorunda local governments, the group’s Coordinator, Wale Alabi, said they remained the core members of APC in the State.

Alabi described members of the group as Aregbesola core loyalists since they believed in the poli cal ideology of the former Osun governor.

“Aregbesola is a core progressive. The internal wrangling within the progressive folds would soon become a thing of the past, notwithstanding, efforts by some individuals who have been frustra ng the peace move by concerned leaders

“We are not willing to do anything other than whatever Aregbesola is doing and as you can see, he has not even given his support to any other candidate because he was not called and he was not involved in the scheme of things” of the party.

“We are not willing to do anything other than whatever Aregbesola is doing and as you can see, he has not even given his support to any other candidate because he was not called and he was not involved in the scheme of things.”

Nothing should be conten ous about this. Aregbesola remains a pivotal figure in the progressive firmament. Furthermore, there is a need for urgently needed clarifica on of the thrust of progressive poli cs in Nigeria today. Many have actually forgo en that poli cal interven on to be effec ve must be anchored on an ideological direc on.

The Blue Movement is right on course! The progressive movement in Nigeria has lost its so.

The ideological orienta on ma ers. In line with this the Italian philosopher Antonio Gramsci who reached his apogee in the nineteen twenes noted in the “prison notes” which he wrote in the cap vity of the Mussolini fascist regime gulag that “the main essence of poli cs is to alter the territory of the debate decisively in the advantage of one’s posi on”. This is a key point and exactly where the progressives have lost the compass.

I’m in another era the progressives did dictate the territory of the. discourse, theory and the prac cal implementa on of ideas. In what is now a golden age it was research - in - applicaon.

Osun Defender

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OSUN DEFENDER is published by Moremi Publishing House Limited, Promise Point Building, Opposite Guarantee Trust Bank (GTB), Gbogan Road Osogbo, State of Osun ISSN : 0794-8050

The outcome manifested in the. social changes in the Western Region of Nigeria headlined by programs such as the implementa on of the “free” educa on program of 1957, advances in access to healthcare and crucially the acceleraon of capital forma on and aggrega on with the forma on of the Cooperave Bank in 1952 and other development finance ins tu ons such as the Western Nigeria Development Corpora on (WNDC) the finance coropara on and so forth. Such was the force of the intellectual redirec on and interven on that in 1961 there were protests against what were perceived as opportunist tax cuts to enhance electoral fortunate. This is a high level of sophis caon which most socie es have not reached. The electorate had calculated that tax cuts will limit access. and was not therefore not to their advantage.

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The Blue and other movements are obviously trying to raise new cadres as well as a leadership to put the progressive thrust and posi on back as the cri cal driving force and should be encouraged and supported.