The Nation Newspaper

Category: Festus Eriye

  • Crackdown or cock up?

    Crackdown or cock up?

    A little over a week ago, the Nigerian newspaper industry woke to shocking reports that across the country, delivery vans were being seized by soldiers. Troops invaded sales points where publications were being distributed to agents and impounded copies. Hapless vendors were set upon and their products.

    Military authorities explained that their strange action was the consequence of intelligence reports which indicated that Boko Haram was about to use the newspapers delivery chain across the country to distribute its weapons of mass destruction.

    Interestingly, since the operation targeting newspaper sales lines began, not even a firecracker has been found in any of the distribution vehicles. In most cases, even when nothing incriminating was found, the vehicles, their drivers and bundles of harmless newspapers were detained until it was virtually impossible to sell that day’s edition. Bear in mind that the shelf life of the average daily newspaper is roughly six hours.

    After reports of the crackdown emerged, the president’s public affairs adviser, Doyin Okupe, sought to rationalise the soldiers’ action by saying we live in difficult times, and that certain actions that may be taken by security agents could cause temporary discomfort.

    Granted that all over the world where the authorities are battling terrorists there are disruptions. But what has happened over the last one week was not just a surgical security operation. Just take the example of delivery vans seized early in the morning and kept in military custody till late afternoon even when there’s no justification for the detyention.

    It almost like saying you received intelligence that Boko Haram was ferrying its deadly ordnance into Abuja via the road from Kaduna. Such a report would necessitate searching all vehicles plying the road. But would you impound all vehicles and keep them in your custody for the better part of a day when nothing was found in them? What would be the point?

    Even more curious was the assault on vendors found carrying certain ‘marked’ newspapers. They were attacked by soldiers and the papers they had on them seized. In what ways is national security enhanced by such actions or by the disruption of a private company’s legitimate business when it has not broken any laws?

    There is no question that the government and the military have not been thrilled by the critical coverage of the insurgency by the media. Matters have been made worse by the intense presence brought upon the authorities by the searchlight of the international press.

    From the viewpoint of the authorities, daily reporting of the latest atrocities of the Boko Haram amounts to celebrating terrorists, while exposure of the shortcomings of the military operation in the North East is akin to trying to bring down the institution.

    Add to the mix the conclusion within the ruling party and the administration that the insurgency is political and being fuelled by the main opposition APC and disgruntled northern politicians who were determined to wound the incumbent president ahead of the 2015 polls, and you have the perfect setting for scapegoating. And what better scapegoat than an increasingly uncontrollable media?

    The solution would be simple ‘deal with the unfriendly press.’ To do that you don’t need to tamper with the personal liberties of journalists as that would make for even more sensational headlines. Go instead after the businesses, disrupt their operations and hit them in the pocket.

    But whoever came up with this idea might as well have delivered an IED into the innermost sanctuary of the administration itself. No one can convince me that Nigeria is safer today after the pointless seizures of newspaper parcels and detention of delivery vans. None of these actions have brought back the Chibok schoolgirls nor has it prevented the demented Boko Haram killers from rampaging through the remote villages of the North East.

    What the government has only succeeded in doing is shooting itself in the foot. As though it didn’t have enough troubles trying to bat away negative reports about its competence, it has now opened another front against an industry that is better as an ally. What it conceived as a crackdown has now turned out to be an almighty cock-up as it projects the Jonathan administration as insecure, desperate and intolerant.

    Even more damning is that the authors of the clampdown don’t have a proper understanding of the way information flows in today’s world. Even if you shut down all the newspapers and printing presses, you cannot obliterate all the websites. Even if you could, you cannot seize every mobile phone or monitor who is using Facebook or Twitter or whatever.

    The Nigerian media has never been and can never be a friend to terror. We have been some of the harshest advocates of a hardline against Boko Haram – long before the government woke up to declare “total war” against the sect.

    For our troubles, back in April 2012, Thisday newspaper headquarters in Abuja, and a complex in Kaduna housing the bureaus of The Sun, Vanguard and Moment newspapers were bombed. In between we have received threats to our premises and persons because of our coverage of the conflict which the insurgents were less than pleased with.

    This was what Abu Qaqa, Boko Haram spokesman back then said in justification of the attacks: “We have repeatedly cautioned reporters and media houses to be professional and objective in their reports. This is a war between us and the government of Nigeria; unfortunately, the media have not been objective and fair in their reports of the ongoing war; they chose to take side.”

    The Nigeria media has suffered at the hands of the terrorists. The authorities are wasting everybody’s time trying to impress unarmed press men with their power and might. The real enemy is in the Sambisa forest and those charged with responsibility of taking them down need to focus.

  • Now that the Americans have come

    A couple of weeks ago in this column, in the euphoria of foreign assistance flooding in from the United States, United Kingdom and other quarters, I wrote that even with the arrival of international assistance, the war against the insurgents would not be a walk in the park.

    This is part of what I wrote back then: “While the renewed global focus on Boko Haram is a positive thing as it will limit their room for manouver henceforth, we should not forget that a similar US effort to track down the brutal Ugandan warlord, Joseph Kony of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), has not yet resulted in his capture. Just this March, the Barack Obama administration announced it was sending in more troops to assist in the operation.

    “We must all hope and pray that the intervention by the Americans and others yields better results in the North East. Anything short of the success of this multinational initiative would only further boost the mystique of a band of killers who have survived everything thrown at them so far.”

    Several weeks have passed since the entry of the Americans into the conflict theater, but what has changed? From the outset it was clear that they were not going to put boots on the ground. But what has been the impact of their much vaunted technological and intelligence edge? Was that what led to the identification of the “location of the Chibok schoolgirls?

    Obviously, certain things will not be shared on the pages of newspapers. But time will tell what the real value of the foreign intervention has been.

  • Not just Sri Lanka, Algeria too

    Reports in the last few days say military authorities are studying tactics used by Sri Lanka to crush the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) rebels as a model for dealing with the extremist Boko Haram sect. The Sri Lankans fought the Tamil Tigers in a see-saw war for almost 30 years until achieving military victory in 2009.

    Perhaps more than the Sri Lankans, the military high command should also understudy how the Algerian state overcame a decade-long civil war in the 90s against several Islamist rebel groups. The conflict which started in 1991 is believed to have claimed as many as 150,000 lives.

    The Boko Haram insurgency bears an uncanny resemblance to what the Algerian Islamists did in the 90s, although the two conflicts had different roots. In the case of the North African country, the rebels were driven to take up arms after the central government annulled elections that they were on course to win.

    Just like the insurgents in North East Nigeria have been doing, the Islamic Salvation Army, the Armed Islamic Group and sundry groups engaged in terror attacks and brutal massacres of innocent people. The insurgents would target entire villages or neighborhoods without consideration for age or sex of victims. People were killed in tens, and sometimes hundreds at a time.

    Along with its military campaign, the government threw in an amnesty for repentant Islamists who were sick of the conflict. The war ended with a government victory, following the surrender of the Islamic Salvation Army and the 2002 defeat of the Armed Islamic Group. There might be something here from the administration to learn from.

  • A protest and its politics

    A protest and its politics

    Imagine if there were no relentless #BringBackOurGirls protests, the unfortunate 276 Chibok schoolgirls whose story has captivated the world would have long been forgotten – another statistic in an brutal insurgency which government informs us has claimed 12,000 Nigerian lives.

    Imagine if the hashtag activists and the local and foreign media had not stayed on this case, the Chibok girls would have disappeared from the radar of national discourse to be replaced by politicians jostling for 2015 ascendancy.

    Who, for instance, remembers that a few months ago 19 job-seeking youths perished after a badly-bungled Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) recruitment exercise? One or two weeksof outrage and a country used to Boko Haram killing hundreds for fun, quickly returned to business as usual.

    In some other land someone would have taken responsibility for the scandalous exercise and done the decent thing by resigning. In April, South Korea’s Prime Minister, Chung Hong-won, quit over the ferry tragedy in which over 180 died. He offered his resignation over criticism of the government’s handling of the sinking of a passenger ferry.

    Announcing his departure, Chung said the “cries of the families of those missing still keep me up at night”. The right thing for me to do is to take responsibility and resign as a person who is in charge of the cabinet.”

    Both President Goodluck Jonathan and his Minister for Interior, Abba Moro, consider it a light thing that 19 Nigerians are killed by the acts of omission and commission of government officials. That is why no one has been called to account.

    All over the world whenever a politician or government is caught up in some damaging scandal or controversy, their desire is that the issue quickly disappears or that the media would lose interest. Sometimes they get their wish as something more newsworthy breaks and the media moves on.

    But it doesn’t always work that way. Occasionally the public is transfixed by an issue and once the press sinks in its teeth it doesn’t let go easily. When that happens, those on the receiving end quickly resort to blaming imaginary enemies for their errors of judgment.

    The Chibok schoolgirls saga is one such matter that is not going to disappear from the front pages irrespective of what the president, his party or the military think of the #BringBackOurGirls protests and those they imagine are driving it.

    Nothing will please the president and his party men more than if the protesters disappeared from Abuja parks where they have been keeping the plight of the girls alive in the world’s consciousness. Their persistence is so un-Nigerian given that we are a people blessed with conveniently short memory. We hardly fight for anything – especially if the process would cause us pain.

    That is why a succession of rulers who understood our psyche never took our “uprisings” over petrol price hikes and sundry matters seriously. They always took the cynical position that in a mere three days people would run out of steam. As hunger pangs begin to bite the ranks of the would-be “revolutionaries” will start to crack. In these instances mass poverty in the land became a tool in the hands of the rulers.

    Now that the hashtag activists have refused to stop making government uncomfortable with their protests, the tried and tested Abuja formula is to use thugs ostensibly exercising their own right to protest to muscle out the original demonstrators. That was essentially what played out last week when a bunch of clowns parroting the narrative of the government set upon #BringBackOurGirls protesters.

    After Oby Ezekwesili’s group decided to march on Aso Villa with the campaign to free the girls, President Jonathan headed off a potentially awkward confrontation by sending his Minister of State for Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and a couple of others to tell the protesters that they had better address their demands to Boko Haram.

    It was also not surprising to find Chief of Defence Staff, Air Marshall Alexander Badeh, addressing very supportive “protesters” last week. The very friendly bunch he spoke with bore banners singing praises of the military and denouncing its critics. It all lines up perfectly with the narrative emanating from Defence Headquarters which views every unflattering portrayal of its handling of the war in the North East as part of some dark conspiracy.

    To top it off, everyone from the president to very senior figures within the ruling People’s Democratic Party (PDP) have reverted to the old line that the insurgency was not only manufactured by the opposition, the undying global #BringBackOurGirls campaign was another sinister maneuver by the ever resourceful All Progressives Congress (APC).

    Information Minister, Labaran Maku and Senator Ita Ennang have suggested, incorrectly and mischievously, that the protests have been led largely by members of APC. They also claim that they only happen in states controlled by the opposition!

    The other day I noticed Mrs. Maryam Uwais, wife of the former Chief Justice of Nigeria, speaking for the campaigners. That clearly means she’s picked up an APC membership card unbeknownst to many! There are lots of decent Nigerians backing these protests and they should feel offended by this attempt by desperate Abuja politicians to dismiss their genuine concern for these innocent children who are in their second month of captivity.

    In any event, being a member of the APC does not strip a Nigerian of his constitutional right to protest. Since the ruling party insists on pushing this ludicrous line, I would suggest they start their own global #Boko HaramReturnOurGirls campaign. That will put APC in its place, give Jonathan a good night’s sleep and make Abubakar Shekau drive back to Chibok to deliver the girls posthaste!

    First Lady, Patience Jonathan, obviously ventilating what the thinking in the corridors of Aso Villa was, famously set the tone when in the early days of the protests she warned demonstrators to “keep it in Borno State.” Unfortunately for those who would like the protesters to disappear even when the Chibok girls have not returned, the dog has long bolted from the kernel.

    This thing can no longer be contained by the usual crude strong arm tactics or by demonising the opposition. The powerful human story of these girls still trapped in the grip of an unstable terrorist has become an international cause célèbre. The only thing that will end the protests is the safe return of the girls. Those who say we should direct our protests to Boko Haram just don’t get it.

    As terrorists the group has done its ugly bit by snatching the girls. It is the responsibility of the government to protect Nigerians and to bring the girls. The buck stops at their table and it is to them that our demands will continue to flow. The direction of the calls for action can only be reversed once the government says it has ceded its constitutional responsibility to the sect.

    License to torture

    It’s been a long time since I looked with such anticipation to getting my picture taken. In the age of the selfie you would think that a snap or two would be no big deal. But this was no ordinary photograph. I was rushing to a Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) office on Lagos Island to get my visage “captured” as part of the final phase of the long process of renewing my driver’s license.

    I had heard horror tales from many who had managed to snag the new license, but nothing prepared me for the sight that greeted me that wet morning. My heart sank as I entered a hall where a tense crowd of between 200 and 300 persons was anxiously waiting for proceedings to take off. Helpfully, the official directing affairs assured that some of us might be there till 8.00 pm!

    As the process chugged along slowly, I tried to make sense of the seemingly chaotic comings and goings – convinced there had to be method to what was unfolding before our collective eyes. Predictably, it didn’t take long for frustrations to boil over.

    The longwinded official was having a hard time controlling a bunch of obdurate Nigerians who wanted to be served immediately. But even the more amenable were getting irritable because they had been coming and going, and today did not look like it was going to end well.

    At some point, a bunch of us were asked to return later in the afternoon. I dashed across town only to return to be confronted with a crowd that had only marginally shrunk. By this time some were already cursing a country where nothing works – wondering why they had to spend days just to get a picture taken.

    When it was 4.00 pm a group of us were informed that it was in our best interest to return the following Monday. Shoulders drooping we trooped out dreading the prospect of another day going through the same process.

    There is something dreadfully wrong with the way the driver’s license is currently being processed. It is crying for urgent reform. Whatever it was designed to achieve, it is also resulting Nigerians being treated in way that is akin to torture. Valuable man hours are being wasted on the process and it doesn’t have to be so: except if we are being told that making the process cumbersome is an end in itself. FRSC help!

    Rebasing revisited

    I am one of those who took a positive view of the rebasing of our GDP – an exercise that saw Nigeria overtaking South Africa as the continent’s largest economy. That said I refuse to get carried away and join those who now think we are a rich country because a handful of individuals own private jets.
    Perspectives like this one by British Member of Parliament, John Redwood, might help. In a blog not too long ago, he said: “We have recently learned that following a recalculation of GDP for Nigeria, it emerged last year as Africa’s largest economy with a GDP of $509 billion. It overtook South Africa in terms of total output, but still remains a long way behind in per capita income given the much greater population in Nigeria.
    “What should give us pause for thought is how small this output still is for a country of 170 million people. It means Nigeria’s output is still lower than London’s, with just 8 million people. It should put our criticisms of the UK economy into context, and reminds us how much more there is to do to tackle poverty in other parts of the world.”

  • The military and its ‘enemies’

    The military and its ‘enemies’

    The Nigerian military finds itself in an unusual position. Over the last fifty odd years it has often been cast in the role of saviour. It fought the Biafran secession and preserved the Nigerian federation – a feat that many Civil War veterans would never let us forget.

    It has, for the bulk of our years as an independent nation taken it upon itself, to ‘rescue’ the country in moments of ‘drift’, plunging headlong into the extra-constitutional role of governance. Truly, on many of those occasions when the soldiers stepped in the populace were only too relieved to see bungling politicians tossed out on their ears.

    Even when the military was not meddling in government, its competence was often celebrated internationally as Nigerian troops excelled in a number of continental and United Nations-sponsored peacekeeping operations.

    For such an institution used to receiving plaudits, it is hard to be humble. It is even harder when you have come to accept your billing as this great fighting machine, to suddenly be at the receiving end of trenchant criticism that raises questions about your competence.

    Dealing with this awkward situation has proven a test over which the military and its spokesmen have not handled well. Suddenly, they see grand conspiracies and enemies everywhere.

    Against the backdrop of unprecedented international focus on the country following the bombing at the Nyanya, Abuja motorpark, as well as the abduction of over 270 Chibok schoolgirls, the most readily identifiable “foes” of this powerful institution have become the media – local and foreign – and the hashtag activists seeking the release of the abductees.

    This last week, Director of Army Public Relations, Brig-Gen. Olajide Laleye, repeated statements that suggest the military truly believe some people want to destroy it as an institution. Speaking in Abuja at the monthly briefing on the activities of the army in the North-East where the Boko Haram insurgency has been raging, he said: ‘The Nigerian Army has been under a deliberate and concerted effort by some individuals, bodies and organisations to tarnish its good image.

    “These groups and their international collaborators are trying hard to portray the Nigerian military as corrupt with myriad of problems and challenges ranging from morale of troops, equipment and troops welfare.”

    The general argued that the campaigns were calculated to undermine the corporate existence of the army and downplay its achievements. The army which he said was one of the binding forces uniting the country was far from weak and ineffective.

    Interestingly, the same week when Laleye was thumping his chest, the army’s Chief of Account and Budget, Major General Abdullahi Muraina, while speaking at the opening of the 2014 training week of the Nigerian Army Finance Corps (NAFC) for Warrant Officer/Senior Non-Commissioned Officers at Jaji, Kaduna State, said current budgetary allocation to the military was inadequate to meet the contemporary security challenges and cater for the welfare of the army.

    Muraina broke it down for journalists this way. “The army budget for this year is just N4.8billion. Now, to provide only one item for the troops engaged in the operation in the North-East… Assuming we committed 20,000 troops, the jacket and the helmet is on the average of about $1,000. If you change that to naira, it is about N150, 000. This means they are going to spend about $20million and that is about N3billion.

    “N3billion as a percentage of N4.8billion which is the capital budget for this year is more than 50 per cent and that is just one item.  We are not talking about uniforms; we are not talking about boots, we are not talking about structures where they will stay. We are not talking about training – because training is key to enhancing the capability of the force.”

    The issues of adequately funding and proper equipment was alluded to by Borno State Governor Kashim Shettima a while back and defensive Federal Government officials – including President Goodluck Jonathan – laid into him for suggesting that Boko Haram fighters were better equipped than our troops. Now we have the army’s purse keeper going on record to say they have issues with money.

    There are serious problems hampering the effectiveness of the military’s campaign in the North-East – and they are not limited to finance alone. Those challenges are the real enemies to be attacked, not the media, #Bring Back Our Girls protesters and their so-called “foreign collaborators.”

    For anyone to suggest that the media are the issue is downright ludicrous. What would be the motive driving this imaginary agenda of destroying the military?

    For these charges to stick motive must be established. Anyone who understands the way the media works knows that it is virtually impossible to get them to rally behind one agenda because of conflicting proprietary interest, political affiliations and worldview.

    The real problem for Nigeria’s military is that it is yet to understand that intense scrutiny is inevitable in the relentless 24/7 news cycle. Does anyone honestly expect the media not to report when troops turn their guns on the General Officer Commanding (GOC) as reportedly happened in Borno recently?

    What newspaper worth its salt would refuse to report the Nyanya bomb blast that claimed 100 lives? What sort of news medium would not analyse the context in which the attack happened and ask questions about the role of the military and political leadership?

    The snatching of over 270 Chibok schoolgirls from their dormitory by brutal terrorists is unprecedented anywhere in the world. It is a gripping human drama that no news organisation can ignore. It is the power of the story that attracted the CNNs, Aljazeeras and BBCs of this world. They have not focused on an anonymous village in Southern Borno ‘just to destroy Nigeria’s military.’

    Whatever they have done over the Chibok story, they have done in Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine and in their own countries. It is almost two years since Libyan gunmen stormed the United States consulate in Benghazi, killing the ambassador. The story of that tragic incident has refused to die because of media and congressional scrutiny. The same thing with America’s intervention in Afghanistan… No one has suggested that this scrutiny is intended to destroy the US military.

    It is this same mentality that led spokesmen of the Jonathan administration to accuse the opposition of treason just because they made certain caustic and critical comments!

    Unfortunately for our political establishment who don’t want to be accountable to anybody, intrusive reporting and uncommon scrutiny of their actions is here to stay. Terror is the issue of the 21st century and the world is interested. Thanks to Boko Haram’s brutality Nigeria has become the latest terrorism frontier – meaning she’ll be trapped in the global spotlight for years to come.

    Politicians, the military and all those managing this insurgency must be prepared to answer questions. We opened the door when we failed to tackle what we had advertised as a local issue. Now that we have begged for foreign help, we must realise it is not a freebie. It comes with a price: scrutiny and accountability.

  • Jonathan, 2015 and Armageddon

    Founder of the Oodua People’s Congress (OPC) and chairman of the newly registered Unity Party of Nigeria, Dr. Fredrick Fasehun, says there might be ‘crisis’ in Nigeria if President Goodluck Jonathan is pressured into dropping his ambition to seek a second term.

    After reminding us of the president’s constitutional right to contest, he warns of the likelihood of militant groups in the Niger-Delta returning to violent activities if the President is denied the chance to run again.

    His comments are not novel. Compared to the verbal grenades lobbed by the likes of one-time militant leader, Asari Dokubo, they are relatively mild. Dokubo, for his part, has threatened war if Jonathan fails to win at the general elections! In other words Nigerians have to vote for his kinsman or else.

    The use of threats and intimidation to pursue dodgy political agendas is usually rife in times of transition in Nigeria. When the late General Sani Abacha sought to transmute from military dictator to civilian president, his promoters sold the lie that he was the strongman who could prevent the country from breaking to pieces because of the bitter fallout from the annulment of the June 12, 1993 elections.

    But against everything that had been scripted, Abacha expired unceremoniously. Sixteen years after his death the country has not fragmented.

    At the height of the campaign for a third term for former President Olusegun Obasanjo, we were again beaten over the head with the hackneyed line about him being the only one that understood Nigeria.

    When we are not being bullied into voting for Jonathan, we are made to listen to silly statements claiming the only alternative to the incumbent is chaos. I think his marketers have got things mixed up because what we have right now is utter chaos.

    In coming months we can expect to hear more of these execrable comments. The reality, however, is that nobody can force Nigerians to re-elect anybody by bald threats. Until we begin to challenge some of these inane comments we might just end up with a self-fulfilling prophecy.

    I can understand an Asari Dokubo returning to the creeks if Jonathan loses out – after all he’s done well for himself under this dispensation. But there are millions in the Niger-Delta whose lives have not been transformed in any special way by this administration, who will carry on as though nothing happened if a new president is elected come January 2015. Friends, depend on it, the heavens will not fall.

  • The political wife as disaster

    The political wife as disaster

    While campaigning for the office of President of the United States back in 1992, Bill Clinton regularly told voters that if they elected him Americans would ‘get two for the price of one’. He was referring to the widely acknowledged accomplishments of his wife, Hillary, who many felt was bright enough to be president someday.

    Clinton’s remark underscores how a spouse can be an asset for a vote-chasing husband. Indeed, handlers of many a dour politician have perfected the art of getting their challenged candidate to bask in the reflected glow of the wife’s star shine.

    As candidate of the US Democratic Party in the 2000 general elections, former Vice President Al Gore often came across as stiff as a corpse. All through the campaign season, his staff sought ways of humanising him using his then wife, Tipper. The climax of those efforts was an awkward smooch between the couple on the convention floor.

    From former French President Nicholas Sarlozy and his celebrity wife, Carla Bruni, to the Ghanaian power couple, Jerry and Nana Rawlings, to the royal match-up of Britain’s Prince Charles and his late wife, Diana, a popular or accomplished spouse is often viewed as an asset.

    But a political wife can be a two-edged sword. Her positives are a help to her husband, just as her negatives constitute a drag on his appeal.

    In the early days of the Clinton presidency Americans were fascinated by the promise of the bright, young couple who had taken up residence in the White House. But the romance faded as an unelected Hillary started to intrude more and more into the process of governance.

    The final straw came when her husband handed her the critical assignment of overseeing healthcare reform. The failure of the project had as much to do with the complexities of the US health system as they had to do with antipathy to the then American First Lady.

    Things would go from bad to worse as Hillary became embroiled in the Whitewater scandal which originated from their home state of Arkansas. Many Republicans were keen to turn the controversial real estate deal into the Democrat’s version of Watergate. By then the First Lady whom Bill Clinton once advertised as an alternate president had become a liability who could not be fired.

    Former US President Jimmy Carter respected his wife, Rosalynn’s, abilities so much he had her sit in on cabinet meetings. He also sent her out to different countries as an envoy.  But by allowing their wives such freewheeling roles in their administrations, Carter and Clinton paid a price politically.

    This brings us to the most overtly political wife in the history of Nigeria’s democracy – Patience Jonathan. Critics have long bemoaned her excesses, but the First Couple have largely ignored all criticisms of her presumptuous intrusions into governance.

    This last week she overreached herself by intruding into the process of rescuing the 276 schoolgirls kidnapped from their hostel beds in Chibok, Borno State.

    The meeting she summoned in Abuja to hold court before an assorted collection of women office holders and camp followers, has since become an internet sensation. Her dramatic tears, wild gesticulations, pidgin exclamations and all-round assault on the English language, have become the butt of a million jokes across the globe.

    Today, those who printed “My Oga at the Top” T-shirts for sale have rolled out the “Na Only You Waka Come?” edition and are doing brisk business. What next? Ringtones?

    In that one outing, Madame First Lady dealt her husband’s political goodwill a devastating blow with her comments and carrying-on. If she was trying to project empathy, she only succeeded in coming across as insincere and hectoring. Her tearful ‘breakdown’ would have shamed a fifth-rate actress in a badly-produced Nollywood home video.

    Were Madame First Lady to be truly concerned, she would have headed for Chibok, Borno State where the grieving are located. She would have left Abuja unannounced, under a security blanket. In less than 30 minutes of an helicopter hop she would have been there to meet the sorrowing parents. Her photographs comforting the families would have been all over the newspapers and TV. Even if she didn’t utter a single word to the press it would have been a PR coup.

    But what did she do? She sat in a cosy room in Abuja summoning the grieving to come to her. She railed at those who failed to turn up for not appearing before the one who had the power to help them locate their children. Such hubris!

    To compound a calamitous outing, she then insinuated that the girls were not actually missing because of the discrepancies in the accounts of different stakeholders. In her paranoid world this was no mass abduction but the latest conspiracy against her husband’s rule by the usual suspects. She then gave them friendly advice: stop playing games and keep the demonstrations in Borno.

    But while madam was busy playing circus mistress, the #BringBackOurGirls protests had swept the globe. Some of those driving it in distant parts of the world do not even know where Nigeria is; they were just moved by a powerful human story – the very sort that didn’t stir the Nigerian government until the world started crying out.

    What Mrs. Jonathan forgets is that there’s a time for post mortems – and it is not now. A time is coming when the actions and inactions of the Borno State Government, West African Examination Council (WAEC), the military and others would be examined. At that time also what the President and his wife did and said would also be scrutinised. What the world expects now, however, is government action to rescue the girls. Anything that doesn’t help that cause is just self-serving drama.

    As First lady, Patience Jonathan is one of the president’s informal personal advisers. He is free to use her counsel as he deems fit. But he should always remember that she wasn’t elected by us. Her office isn’t recognised by the constitution. He should know, if he’s not already aware, that at this point she has become one of his biggest liabilities.

    Her meddling in Rivers State damaged the president’s relationship with Governor Rotimi Amaechi. Like an elephant in a shop full of china she’s at it again trying to install Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) governorship candidates in several states – putting her at odds with incumbent governors who don’t appreciate her forwardness.

    This is what it boils down to. Over the last six years we’ve seen the Jonathans under different situations. In the Chibok crisis we’re seeing a cold, calculating and unappealing side of the First Couple.

    As we edge ever closer to the 2015 election year, many are beginning to address their minds to whether they want to go through another four years of Jonathan’s rule. But the president’s qualities would not be the only factor influencing voters.

    After the First Lady’s display last week in Abuja, many will be asking themselves whether they can stomach another four years of Patience Jonathan’s histrionics.

  • The limits of foreign intervention

    The limits of foreign intervention

    The offers of help flooding in from the United States, France, China, Britain and others are a rare serving of positive news in a period of unrelenting gloom hanging over the country because of the atrocities of Boko Haram.

    Available evidence shows that beyond the bluster, Nigeria lacks the knowhow and technology to bring the insurgents to heel. So you could almost hear a collective national sigh of relief when news broke that the government had accepted offers of foreign assistance.

    Now that we’ve acceded to outsiders coming in to help sort out the mess we have made, it is necessary to rein in expectations. This isn’t going to be like a Hollywood movie where some American Rambo character swaggers into the Sambisa forest and takes out Abubakar Shekau before his awestruck followers.

    The Americans and others have made it clear that they are not putting boots on the ground. The much-hyped help will remain in the realm of using tremendous US intelligence assets and expertise built up from many years of fighting these sorts of criminals. It was that kind of intelligence gathering that helped them track down Osama bin Ladin to an anonymous building in rural Pakistan.

    While the renewed global focus on Boko Haram is a positive thing as it will limit their room for manouver henceforth, we should not forget that a similar US effort to track down the brutal Ugandan warlord, Joseph Kony of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), has not yet resulted in his capture. Just this March, the Barack Obama administration announced it was sending in more troops to assist in the operation.

    We must all hope and pray that the intervention by the Americans and others yields better results in the North East. Anything short of the success of this multinational initiative would only further boost the mystique of a band of killers who have survived everything thrown at them so far.

  • The real terror of Chibok

    The real terror of Chibok

    Today, world attention is riveted on Nigeria for all the wrong reasons. As you read this 276 girls snatched by Boko Haram insurgents from their dormitory beds in a government secondary school in Chibok, Borno State remain in captivity.

    Their kidnapping has triggered a string of protests from women and civil society groups across the country. It has produced the usual promises of deliverance from President Goodluck Jonathan. The military high command have weighed in with assurances that they were doing everything to set the captives free.

    But neither the demonstrators’ outrage nor the threadbare platitudes of government officials have brought the prospect of freedom any closer for the unfortunate girls.

    Reports say three of the girls may have died, while some others are in very poor health. No one really knows what is happening to the rest. Once upon a time we would have been stunned by reports of 20 people killed in a single terror attack. These days not even the killing of hundreds causes us or our leaders to pause in shock.

    That is why the Chibok kidnapping represents something of a watershed in Nigeria’s dark hour. It has galvanised the country in ways that huge body counts and gory pictures have failed to do. This is no longer about North or South, Muslim or Christian – it is about a shared humanity. Imagine if one of these hapless teenagers was your daughter?

    Chibok is a sad chapter, but it is also a metaphor about present day Nigeria. For starters, it speaks about a country where confusion reigns. For close to two weeks we have been working with the assumption that 234 girls were missing. Now, Borno State Police Commissioner, Tanko Lawan, says well over 300 were actually spirited away on the night of April 14, 2014. Of that number 53 managed to escape – leaving as many as 276 in captivity.

    In the early days after the abduction, the picture of confusion was best captured by the fiasco that saw the military claiming that the bulk of the girls had been rescued. They were forced to retract after the principal of the school attacked by the insurgents spoke up.

    The ordeal of the Chibok girls underlines the embarrassing helplessness of a country the size of Nigeria. So far, everything that has been thrown at the insurgents militarily has only had limited effect. In the days and weeks after President Jonathan declared a state of emergency in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe, a bombing campaign that targeted the militants’ camps in the Sambisa forest seemed to have broken their spine. Now we know better.

    Even the prospect of a special operation to rescue the girls cannot proceed for fear that they have been converted into human shields by their captors in anticipation of an attempt to free them militarily.

    As recent as two years ago administration officials were still arguing at the US State Department that Boko Haram was a Nigerian phenomenon that could be brought to heel using local solutions. Increasingly there is talk of getting foreign assistance to secure the release of the girls. This would suggest that the administration is finally admitting it lacks that capacity to prosecute this special fight.

    We are coming to that realisation five years after it became evident that we had a serious problem on our hands. In that time we could have built our capacity to fight the terrorists more effectively. Rather than do that we were seduced by the delusion that we could sweet talk a maniacal band of killers who had made it clear over and again they had no interest in talking to a government they regarded as illegitimate.

    Even if the limited Boko Haram of 2009 had not transformed into today’s full-blown insurgency, we had sufficient warnings that because of her endowments, her strategy place in Africa and the world, Nigeria would become a prime target for jihadi groups that were already active in the Maghreb.

    That should have informed a change in our defence and security planning and expenditure. There is no evidence to show a shift from the conventional. At a time when terrorists are using cells of a few people to inflict massive damage on cities and communities, we are still stuck in the thinking that just driving tanks into the Sambisa will be enough to solve the problem.

    For me the real worry is whether the nightmare will end in Chibok. Once terrorists conceive of some evil, they will seek ways to actualise it. They have shown that their preferred targets are vulnerable places like Chibok and Nyanya. Just thinking of other potential Chiboks is terrifying. What is our contingency plan?

    The abduction drama should not stop us from thinking about preventing a repeat. The territory over which the terrorists operate is wide and hard to police. How do we guarantee that similarly vulnerable schools are not visited with such terror again?

    Posting solitary military guards to watch over the institutions is a non-starter because they can be easily overwhelmed by the terrorists who operate in large numbers. We don’t have enough soldiers in the Nigerian Army to post platoons to protect every secondary school in the North East. In any event what sort of learning environment would that be with soldiers all around?

    The key is to take out the terrorists before they can organise and launch their operations using better intelligence and technology. The repeat bombing of Nyanya, Abuja less than two weeks after an earlier attack that killed close to 100 people is confirmation that for as long as the perpetrators walk free these crimes will continue.

    Nigeria needs help with intelligence and know-how. For all of the size of our conventional military we still don’t have the capacity and expertise to contain the terrorist campaign being waged by Boko Haram. We need help and must swallow our pride to get it.

    It may even mean signing a pact with the United States to allow its drones to target these terrorists. The advanced intelligence assets that such an arrangement would provide will enable us strike hard at the killers where we can’t presently reach. Sure, the drone policy has its flaws and has taken out many innocents; still it has proven its potency from Yemen, to Pakistan and Afghanistan.

    Such drastic steps need to be taken on the military front while we are thrashing around for more permanent solutions. But let there be no doubt that the help we need now is from countries with proven experience and success in containing terrorists.

  • Inside Jonathan’s rich Nigeria

    It is not only terrorists that our embattled leader has to contend with these days. He is equally struggling to make sense of contradictory statistics. A couple of weeks ago the government rolled out with maximum fanfare new GDP figures that made Nigeria’s economy the largest in Africa, and thrust it into the ranks of the top 25 in the world.

    That GDP rebasing exercise triggered a furious reaction from large sections of critical opinion who felt it didn’t alter the existing reality that ours was still a largely impoverished country.

    That position was confirmed by a recent World Bank report which listed Nigeria as one of the five poorest countries in the world. The President was less than pleased. Addressing workers at last Thursday’s May Day rally in the Eagle Square, Abuja, he dismissed the nation that the country was poor. By his analysis, we are actually a rich country that just needed to redistribute its wealth.

    He said: “Nigeria is not a poor country. Nigerians are the most travelled people. There is no country you go that you will not see Nigerians. The GDP of Nigeria is over half a trillion dollars and the economy is growing at close to 7 per cent.’’

    “Aliko Dangote was recently classified among the 25 richest people in the World.

    “I visited Kenya recently on a state visit and there was a programme for Nigerian and Kenyan business men to interact and the number of private jets that landed in Nairobi that day was a subject of discussion in Kenyan media for over a week.

    “If you talk about ownership of private jets, Nigeria will be among the first 10 countries, yet they are saying that Nigeria is among the five poorest countries.”

    By Jonathan’s yardstick a handful of private jets owned by a few in a country of 170 million people makes us a rich nation! The vast majority of that huge number live on less than $2 per day, have no access to potable water, healthcare and electricity.

    Millions of young graduates in this ‘rich’ country of ours can’t find jobs; that is why hundreds of thousands crammed the Abuja Stadium and other centers during the last tragic Nigeria Immigration Service recruitment exercise. Nineteen of those jobseekers died that day in their desperate search for work.

    There may be no poverty in Aso Villa but on the streets it is a different story. Nigeria is a potentially rich country. She is greatly-endowed with natural resources but bungling rulers till date have ensured that she remains mired in the ranks of the wretched of the earth. Any leader who subscribes to a different reality is just burying his head deep in the sand.