Nigeria’s centenary: Reality Vs Optimism

President Goodluck Jonathan made a statement I found too optimistic and less realistic. He was quoted as having said, at an interdenominational service to mark this year’s Armed Forces Remembrance Day at the National Christian Centre in Abuja, that Nigeria would celebrate its 100 years of existence as an independent nation united and undivided.

According to media reports, the president dismissed the insinuations in some quarters that Nigeria would disintegrate very soon. He compared the doomsday prophecies on Nigeria’s imminent disintegration to a mad couple that chooses to divorce after 100 years of marriage. He said emphatically that Nigeria was not mad, and, therefore, would not disintegrate in another one year, when it would mark the centenary of its existence.

Let me quote an excerpt from the President’s speech to enable us to better appreciate his emotional disposition on the matter: “In 2014, we will celebrate 100 years in existence. It will only take two mad people to stay in marriage for 100 years and say that is the time you will divorce, and we are not mad. If there are issues that have been brewing over the period and we have been managing, we will continue to manage.”

In short, it was a long, emotional speech, which space may not permit me to reproduce in whole. The central theme of the President’s speech was the urgent need for Nigerians to dismiss the evil machinations of the enemies of Nigeria, who wished it bad, but rather should work concertedly for its unity and progress.

I must confess that I admired Mr. President’s optimism. I enjoyed his sermon, particularly the areas that bordered on encouragement for security agencies. He spoke so glowingly of them and requested every Nigerian to support and pray for them.

Now let us look critically at Mr. President’s speech to see what we could make out of it. It was motivational, inspirational and patriotic, and delivered with overflowing emotionalism. But beneath the beauty and glamour of that speech lies its lessons. It was in order to locate the lessons and arouse the consciousness of Nigerians that I chose to entitle this week’s piece the way I did.

Two things were manifest in that speech. One was reality and the other, optimism. Let me ask: how realistic was Mr. President’s optimism and how optimistic was the reality of his postulations? This question may appear somewhat clumsy. Nevertheless, it aptly captures the crux of the entire speech.

As I indicated at the beginning of this piece, the speech was beautifully crafted and emotionally delivered. However, one thing was clearly missing: Mr. President did not delve deeply into the historical facts that belie our development as a nation to be able to properly marshal his argument. It was not enough to compare the calls for Nigeria’s disintegration to a mad couple that chooses to divorce after 100 years of marriage. That analogy was not sufficient to paint the picture he had in mind. There should have been a more pragmatic dramatization of his beautiful thoughts or a more convincing espousal of his finite ideas about how to sustain Nigeria’s unity. This is the point.

I am sure some persons will certainly disagree with the President in some aspects of his speech. To me, the general applauding of the performance of the security agencies was overstretched and unrealistic – to say the least. Not every Nigerian would agree that all the security agencies performed very well to keep the nation united. In my thinking, what the President should have done would have been to commend those security agents that had truly worked for the sustenance of the peace, unity and progress of the nation. Definitely, not the blanket commendation! No Nigerian is unmindful of the excesses of some of our security agents and the horrors some Nigerians had undergone in their hands.

I wish to state quickly that my objection has nothing to do with my relationship with the security agents. My position is based on conviction and in the belief that working for the unity of Nigeria is a collective effort. I do not argue the fact that the security agents have worked assiduously to keep Nigeria united. But I can safely state that some of them have worked antithetically against the progress of Nigeria.

My grouse about the activities of some of the overzealous security agencies is that they have done more harm than good. We are as well aware of many cases of extra-judicial killings and other inadequacies committed by these security agents, which are yet to be resolved up to this day. Governor Adams Oshiomhole of Edo is one man grievously groused about the police. He has, in fact, called to question the integrity of some officers of the force over the killing of his Principal Private Secretary. We wait for the outcome of this interesting drama.

The threats to national security are real and should not be trivialized or swept under the carpet in a fit of sentimentalism. I am glad that the President made reference to the daily security briefs he was privileged to receive. That is his right as the Commander-In-Chief. Nobody begrudges him that. However, going by the realities on the ground, I can safely state that if nothing is done, and fast too, Nigeria will face a difficult future. The level of insecurity in the country is frightening. From where should we start the assessment? Is it the cases of kidnapping, armed robbery, banditry, insurgency, restiveness that confront us daily, which are seemingly suffocating the security operatives, or the vandalism of NNPC pipelines or the activities of the dreaded Islamist sect, Boko Haram? The Boko Haram insurgency in the North, for instance, has become a recurring decimal on the nation’s social, economic and political life. Indeed life in the north is almost at a standstill, and there is no hope in sight. The intricate nature of the activities of Boko Haram has left the security agencies in quandary.

There is no question that some security agents spend sleepless nights in the course of securing the nation and its citizens. That is the primary function of the police, anyway. In this case, we are talking about the good ones among them. What about those who turn night into day and day into night? There are certainly some bad eggs in the security agencies that give them the notoriety they grapple with at the moment. These are the ones the Federal Government should make conscious effort to weed out. What about those that aid election riggers and commit other condemnable acts on day of election, in the name of providing security? There is, therefore, an urgent need to reform the security agencies in Nigeria to bring them at par with their counterparts in other climes.

I think Nigeria’s military is among the finest in the world. Sadly, some folks have vowed to smear their hard-earned reputation by assigning them duties not meant for them. It is common sight today for military men to carry hand-luggage for politicians and other ‘important’ personalities. This is not a constitutional role for the military. Their basic function is to defend the territorial sovereignty of Nigeria and, in some cases, provide internal security, particularly in times of acute threat. It is awful to see military personnel junketing with politicians, when they should be apolitical and carry themselves with dignity and candour. This is one area I expect the President and the Service Chiefs to take drastic action to curtail.

I wish to align myself with Mr. President’s optimism that Nigeria will not disintegrate before 2014 or any time near. This is possible if this administration can sustain the fight against corruption, poverty, infrastructural disuse, injustice, insecurity and unemployment. I am glad President Jonathan has fashioned a transformational agenda to reverse the ugly trends in our national development. But how much cooperation is he getting from his team? The Patriots (a pressure group) drew attention to this flaw at its recent meeting in Lagos. The eminent Nigerians urged the President to take immediate measures to address the insecurity in the country and check its steady drift to a failed state.

It is very easy to dismiss the call by the Patriots, but you cannot wish away the truth in its message. For any right-thinking person, the warning by the Patriots was a wake-up call to action by the President. It was not the usual ranting by armchair critics seeking cheap political point. After all, the patriots are elder statesmen whose primary desire, in their old age, is to see the emergence of a nation devoid of sectarian or political crises. That was why they deemed it proper to alert the President.

The real fear is not about 2014. Those that had predicted Nigeria’s disintegration must have hinged their fear on the election of 2015. Negroponte – the renowned American diplomat, for instance, had predicted that Nigeria would disintegrate in 2015. Probably, he based his argument on the volatility of Nigeria’s elections. But in my own thinking, the real danger for our nascent democracy lies in events building up to the 2015 elections. I have said it at different fora that the success of recent governorship elections in Edo and Ondo, for instance, is not a true measurement of what awaits us in 2015. The two elections in question were held on different days, with all security personnel in the country mobilized to each of the states. What happens when all elections are held the same day? That is where the real problem lies.

My position above does not detract from the fact that it is possible to have a free and fair election even if all the elections were held the same day. In fact, holding all elections the same day and producing authentic results is possible. The question, however, is: Will election-riggers and other miscreants and their collaborators allow this to happen? This is the wahala.

If I am asked to dissect further the President’s speech, I might be tempted to state unequivocally that President Jonathan loves Nigeria deeply. He is very passionate about Nigeria, which was why he expressed interest to succeed Umar Musa Yar’Adua in the 2011 presidential election. Indeed he speaks about Nigeria with so much optimism and hope. But the trouble is that Nigeria is a very complex and difficult place to administer, especially if one is not sufficiently ready for the challenges.

I am working on a piece that Mr. President will find very interesting. It is like a roadmap for 2013 for him. If he adheres to it strictly, it will be of immense benefit to him. However, in the context of our current discourse, I advise the President to quietly assess each of the threats to our national existence to see their complexities and character. He should endeavour to do thorough checks on them, in collaboration with his security chiefs, to be able to decode their potentiality and capacity to cause displacement of national peace and order. It does not matter how optimistic he may be. He should see every threat as having the capacity and propensity to lead to anarchy. This is the only way he would be able to deal with these threats as pragmatically as possible.

He should not also dismiss with a wave of the hand the possibility of foreign collaboration in the wicked plot to disintegrate Nigeria. Certainly, not all of the numerous crises that bedevil our nation are homegrown. Some of them are sponsored by foreign terrorist groups that see Nigeria as a potential breeding ground for their devious antics. Crises in many countries in Africa take this familiar route. Countries such as Sudan, Cote D’Ivoire, Somalia, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo and, of recent, Mali are today faced with one security challenge or another. Each of them is smarting from the onslaught by different rebel groups with foreign collaboration.

The bare truth is that Nigeria has been simply lucky to have continued to survive, despite the persistent plots of the wicked ones to destroy it. Should we take this luck for granted and continue to wallow in ignorance and self-pity? Who told you that Nigeria cannot go through what the countries mentioned above are currently experiencing? The diversity in language, culture, religion and ethnic cleavages is enough to fuel crises that can consume Nigeria. This is why government should do something swiftly to deal with the various insurgencies across the country.

I am aware of the invaluable importance of peace, which was why I offered to mediate peace between government and Boko Haram. Take it or leave it: Boko Haram is the biggest threat to our national existence today. For three good years, it has held the nation at its jugular, almost asphyxiating it. The worrisome thing about the group is that the more you fight them, the harder they come. And this means that they are formidable and have the capacity to cause more collateral damage. It is on record that the selective amnesty declared by the federal government sometime in 2011 could not stamp out the inglorious activities of the group. That being the case, it makes sense to advocate peaceful resolution of the impasse.

Let it be told today: Nigeria cannot make any meaningful progress unless there is peace, unity and tranquility. And these basic ideals can only come in an atmosphere devoid of hate, repression, oppression and insecurity. If we want Nigeria to remain united and indivisible, we have got to work for it. Nations in war today were once peaceful and united. All it takes for war to erupt is for good men to fold their arms and watch evil thrive without doing anything to exterminate it.

Those planning to destroy Nigeria will have destruction waiting for them at the sentinels of their doors. As Mr. President rightly said: Let us work together to make Nigeria a better place for us and for future generations of Nigerians to live and to cherish.

THE EAGLES AND AFCON 2013

The African Cup of Nations (AFCON) begins today in South Africa, and ends on February 10. The tournament, which is the largest soccer fiesta on the continent of Africa, lists Nigeria in the same group as Ethiopia, Burkina Faso and defending champions, Zambia. As I wrote in this column last week, Nigeria will do well at the tournament, but not enough to win it. My prediction has nothing to do with patriotism or lack of it. It has to do with reality of what is on ground. We all saw what happened when the Eagles played a friendly against Cape Verde, which ended in a barren draw. Though Cape Verde came into the match with an impressive record of eliminating Cameroun to qualify for AFCON; it was not enough to terrorize the Eagles the way they did. Eagles would have lost the match if the Cape Verdeans were not shy in front of goal.

Now that Stephen Keshi has named his team, let us hope they will live up to expectation by, at least, reaching the semi-final or final of the tournament.


Follow Us@Greaterabia
Facebook.com/Greater.Abia
Email:Greater.abiamovement@yahoo.com
www.Greaterabiamovement.com