Bruce Fein, the US attorney that blundered on the Nnamdi Kanu trial and started shooting from the hips, must have read a lot of Tarzan tales as a child.
Or spent too much of his adult time in the bubble of CNN, The Economist of London and sundry western media, with their skewed and paternalistic tales; and their avid penchant for pushing the predictable African hell in contrast to own utopia in the Western Hemisphere.
True, some of these tales are fairly told. Still, you couldn’t deny these media griots’ pleasurable embellishment; their predictable merry hyperbole, to make it all look like some eternal tale that never, ever changes.
On the reception side is a sorry House Negro mindset — among the African elite, no matter how hyper-educated — ever ready to lap up the worst told about them and theirs; and their eager pride to re-broadcast that ruinous stuff, just to prove — sorry souls! — that they “belong”!
Reggae great, Jimmy Cliff was right when he crooned: “Poor slave, they take the shackles off your body … Poor slave, they clamp the shackles on your mind …!
That appeared the Bruce Fein abiding temper when he started blowing his tops, just because he wasn’t granted access into the trial courtroom: “I will petition the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention in Geneva, the International Court of Justice in The Hague. I’ll be going to the United States Congress. I urge that sanctions be considered against Nigeria for gross violations of fundamental humans rights.”
Big deal! And what conceit! And yet, more bluster: “It is clear that I am the target in particular. That’s the reason why this proceeding did not transpire today. I’m here to tell Nigerians and the international community that I’m taking this to the international tribunals. It is clear that the Nigerian tribunals are compromised.”
Now, who the hell is this bloke? Because he is Nnamdi Kanu’s lawyer from America, the court should scramble at his feet and kiss his arrogant toes? And what does Fein know about Nigerian courts to feign the all-knowing and declare “Nigerian tribunals are compromised”? What combative ignorance! What utter nonsense!
To be clear: Justice Binta Nyako, who is handling the case, made the rules very clear: if you want to observe her court proceedings as Fein craves, you must do a formal, written application, to which the judge is at liberty to accept or reject. If Fein wants to observe, he knows what to do. All that empty posturing and media theatrics just won’t wash.
And if Fein would just climb down his haughty high horse, he would know that even in his America, Nigerians out there hold better college, first degree and advanced degree credentials than even White Americans. So, what makes Fein think he could come down here, in the homeland, and talk down on people?
And that crap about reporting Nigeria to the US Congress — is Nigeria now the 51st state of the United States? What unvarnished arrogance!
Justice Nyako’s court should please help purge Bruce Fein of his Tarzan delusions. Nigeria is neither some jungle where Tarzan held court swinging from tree to tree; nor some banana republic where some American lawyer would feel free to run his mouth on sacred institutions.
If Fein must observe a court proceeding in Nigeria, he must first respect the Nigerian judicial institution. That should have been common sense — except that common sense is not always common!
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