The Nation Newspaper

Category: Hardball

  • Rope-a-dope governance

    Hardball had canvassed the issue of finding succour for the victims of the Boko Haram insurgency until he was wearied out by the Federal Government’s seeming rope-a-dope tactics. You remember the legendary pugilist, Mohammed Ali, in his heyday perfected this fighting stratagem in which he leans against the boxing ring ropes, shields his face and goads his opponent to pound the rest of his body. Because a great boxer’s body is as tough as a mass of polythene, you would badger at his body only to your peril. To drill our point home, the Federal Government may (unbeknown to it) has adopted a rope-a-dope style of governance to the effect that it is almost impossible to canvass alternative policy options today.

    The Boko Haram insurgents have launched intense war on a large chunk of the North in the past five years without let. No arm of government is seriously taking records, but an estimated 5,000 Nigerians may have been killed, while about 15,000 may have been inflicted with various levels of bodily injuries. There are huge material losses too in terms of property, businesses, goods and cash. But nobody is keeping tab, which is bad enough, but worse is that government has not considered any response to these hapless collateral outcomes of our current hate and terror regime.

    This callous indifference may have pushed visiting United States lawmakers to make a strident call to the Federal Government to spare a thought for these victims. Being Americans and extant lawmakers for that matter, perhaps government would be apt to listen to them and act upon their appeal faster than it would hearken to a ranting and disgusting Nigerian columnist. But let it be done all the same and quickly. The US congress men and women who came mid-June said they were in town as part of the global effort to ensure the release of the teenage school girls kidnapped in Chibok, Borno State since April 14. Having assessed the atmosphere of disquiet in Nigeria, they opined that the larger victims of terror need urgent help.

    Steve Stockman, who led the delegation to Nigeria, puts it this way: “The best thing that could happen is if we have a fund set up for those that lost their lives and for the families that remain here on this earth.”

    Another member of the delegation, Sheila Jackson Lee, said: “Today, we call upon the government of Nigeria to establish a national victim fund for the victims who are suffering in the hands of the Boko Haram.”

    Nigerians, including this columnist, have shouted themselves hoarse on this matter, which seems rather straightforward and commonsensical. Why has the Federal Government or any government for that matter not deemed it fit to set up a committee and a fund to begin to sort the numerous victims and grant them reprieve? What we have experienced since 2009 is that after each attack, the dead are evacuated and often poured into a mass grave, while the injured are taken to hospitals and largely abandoned to their fate.

    While kowtow and bend over double to appease the terrorists as was done for the Niger Delta militants, we must track and manage the poor victims in order to heal not only the physical wounds, but also emotional and spiritual wounds. It is called atonement.

     

  • Riotous imagination on Ekiti

    Electioneering period is sweet-talk time, and President Goodluck Jonathan demonstrated this reality during his defining visit to Ekiti State ahead of the governorship election of June 21. Not only him, but also Vice-President Namadi Sambo and the Chairman, Board of Trustees of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Tony Anenih.  The heavyweights were in the state capital, Ado-Ekiti, to witness the presentation of the party’s official flag by its national chairman, Alhaji Adamu Muazu, to its candidate in the approaching poll, Mr. Ayo Fayose.

    Apparently, Jonathan got carried away by his sense of occasion. Or what could be the explanation for his utterances? Specifically, he told the crowd at the Oluyemi Kayode Stadium, “When you vote Fayose and the PDP returns to Ekiti again, I will join hands with him to develop this state.”  Did he mean that he had been uninterested in the development of Ekiti because it was being governed by Dr Kayode Fayemi of the rival All Progressives Congress (APC), even though his presidential office was supposed to focus on nation-wide development?

    Whatever he might have meant, he was laughably unrealistic by using the word “When” rather than the more sober word “If”. The suggestion that Fayose would be elected had the appearance of super optimism, not to say misplaced confidence, which is not to rule out the possibility, however far-fetched that could be.

    Also, Sambo was probably in a dream state when he said, “I am aware of the problems of teachers. The moment he (Fayose) enters, the problem of teachers is solved. As you know, in this state there is problem of transportation; the very day he comes in, it will be solved.”  And Anenih added, “We are not competing with APC because they have nothing to offer.”

    A question for Anenih: If the PDP is “not competing with APC”, why is it presenting a candidate for the election against Fayemi who is seeking a deserved second term? As for Sambo’s exaggeration, it is pertinent to point out that Fayose, a former governor of the state from May 2003 to October 2006, failed to make history as a solution provider or problem solver before his four-year term was shortened by impeachment. Perhaps more importantly, he is currently facing trial for alleged financial misconduct while in office as governor.

     It is food for thought that he emerged as his party’s standard-bearer despite the moral burden on his shoulder, suggesting that his party is unbothered by that factor, if not dismissive of it. He is going into the election with the unresolved issue of his alleged fraudulence, and will have to contend with voter perception and behaviour, which should logically work against him. Against this background, it is a wonder that Jonathan, Sambo and Anenih not only spoke of an expected victory for Fayose but did so with suspicious conviction.

    The man himself, speaking of Fayose, was no less self-assured, which is why the narrative should be alarming to right-minded observers. He also addressed the crowd at the stadium, saying, “When I come back, I will give you jobs and do local content.” Curiously, he too used the word “When” instead of “If”.  These characters must have let their imagination run riot, which is permissible as long as the popular will is allowed to prevail.

  • NDDC’s 4,000 littering

    The verb, ‘litter’, has over a dozen meanings, but Hardball is driven under this piece by just two. The first is to give birth, used particularly in cases of animals, while the second meaning is to drop thrash without properly disposing of it. It is this second take that struck Hardball when it was learnt that the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC) admitted to having about 4,000 uncompleted projects in its book. This piece of information was let out as the commission defended its N322 billion budget for 2014 at the National Assembly.

    It is common knowledge that the entire country is a littering of uncompleted projects –  including the national headquarter building of the ruling PDP, which stands like an ugly curse somewhere in Abuja – but that one agency of government could bear such incubus of leftover jobs is beyond believe. Could it be possible that the management of NDDC was just posturing and speaking off the cuff to win the sympathy of the legislators and also win a larger chunk of the national cake? Is it possible that the NDDC chaps could not fathom the enormity and magnitude of the words they issued forth to the legislators?

    NDDC was founded 14 years ago as a body to mediate between the government and the much-deprived people of the oil-rich Niger Delta. It was founded after a few other bodies like it had floundered. Both the federal government and the international oil companies had become so irresponsible and indeed derelict in their relationship with the communities that ‘lay’ Nigeria’s golden egg so to speak that a specialised agency had to be created to pool funds and intervene. But see the result we have 14 years after – 4,000 abandoned projects, a littering of dirt on the landscape of the Niger Delta!

    Bereft of  further ideas about how to tackle what is actually a simple problem, the federal government, in another fit of insouciance, set up another body, a comparative and competing body, the Ministry of Niger Delta, to rescue the thoroughly damaged creeks that spew Nigeria’s very life-blood – crude oil. If you ever doubted that Nigeria was a standing monolith of corruption, the NDDC is the best proof you need. How and why else could a government agency cause even more environmental damage to a region it was set up to rescue?

    To underscore how well the monster has become us, you would think the legislators would fulminate or even faint upon being so casually assaulted with the 4,000 litter caper, but it was water on the back of a big, fat pumpkin; it just runs to the ground. The legislators, masters of the dark game of corruption themselves, just took it in their dirty strides. Our legislators are dead people; or let’s be gracious and say they are living dead to corruption. They can’t see it any more; they can’t hear it and they can’t feel it.

    If only they had any breath in them they would have instantly gone raving mad and called for an enquiry into the activities of NDDC in the last 14 years. In a country that is still living, where the Richter scale of corruption still ticks, this 4,000 projects expose would have started a malevolent volcanic eruption that would have blown all scales to smithereens. This is indeed, the land of the dead.

     

  • Bluffing will not bring back our girls

    It is double cause for concern that over 200 schoolgirls abducted by the Islamist terror group Boko Haram in Chibok, Borno State, have remained in captivity since April 15; and more importantly, the Jonathan presidency is yet to address the grave issue with reassuring decisiveness. It is noteworthy that Abubakar Shekau, the militia’s notorious leader, has spelt out conditions for the release of the kidnapped students of the Girls Senior Secondary School, Chibok.  He said : “All I’m saying is, if you want us to release your girls that we kidnapped, you must release our brethren that are held in Borno, Yobe, Kano, Kaduna, Enugu and Lagos states, as well as Abuja. We know that you have incarcerated our brethren all over this country…We will never release them until our brethren are released.”

    Shekau’s words were unambiguous enough, which is why it is puzzling that the Federal Government’s response presents a picture of unhelpful ambiguity. The nearest to an official reaction by the government came through a third party, namely, British Africa Minister Mark Simmonds who gave a clue to President Goodluck Jonathan’s thinking after a meeting in Abuja to discuss an international rescue mission linked with the kidnap, which has attracted worldwide outrage and  condemnation. The BBC quoted Simmonds as saying in respect of Jonathan, “He made it clear that there will be no negotiation with Boko Haram that involves a swap of abducted schoolgirls for prisoners.”

    There has been no contradiction from official quarters, which is not only food for thought but also raises a logical question as to the government’s plan, if any, to get the girls back alive. Perhaps the administration needs to be reminded that it is battling with a murderous group, which has again and again proved to be unpredictable. The inescapable implication is that the government may be running out of time to secure the girls’ freedom, and would need to act expeditiously to prevent the group from possibly having a rethink that might not favour releasing them.

    Understandably, Jonathan is most likely anxious to avoid being perceived as  vulnerable to bullying tactics, particularly against the background that he has often been criticised by the country’s political opposition for alleged weak leadership. However, this is a wrong occasion for him to attempt to change that perception, which may indeed be valid.

    Moreover, given that the concept and practice of prisoner exchange or prisoner swap are not strange, yielding to the idea may not be a bad idea.  Of relevance to the country’s situation is the model of Humanitarian Exchange or Humanitarian Accord popularised by the experience of Colombia in which the government reached an agreement with guerillas to swap prisoners for hostages, an idea that was pushed by the families of the captives.  It is easy to imagine that in the Chibok case the affected families, if not the empathetic public, would readily endorse such arrangement.

    In case Jonathan does not understand, it would be a demonstration of strength to ensure that the girls are brought back alive, no matter the cost. This is not the time for bluffing.

  • Chibok: Haba Baba!

    What was all that about — former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s prattling about Chibok girls: that most of them might never be found again; the few that might still be found might just be those pregnant but who could not be taken care of in the forest and that, in any case, most of the girls would have been married off to their crazed Boko Haram captors?

    Haba Baba! Is this the voice of a reckless and callow youth or that of a sagacious elder who speaks painful truth with comforting tongue?  Except if Baba would play the callow youth in his grey years, it was a most reprehensible statement.

    Yeah, the child could well be the father of the man, as the famous poet wrote. Still, aside from the innocence of the age, it is one father no adult worth his gumption would showcase. If he does, it would be a case of regression, which however appears as nothing but folly.

    But what might have goaded Baba to such unwise prattles? An impatient push to be noticed by a somewhat sleep-walking Jonathan Presidency to wake up to the realisation that, if Baba, the messiah, did not bring back our girls, no mortal born of woman could? Ha, is there no a limit to the politics of relevance?

    If Baba, with all his busy schedule, his foreign travels and his eternal global demands, could deign to go into Sambisa Forest, when even Champs Elysees in Paris with its Arc de Triomphe and Place de la Concorde would have stopped dead at the whiff of Baba’s coming, why hasn’t Jonathan dived from his presidential throne, rolling at Baba’s feet and professing his grateful approval? Or doesn’t Jonathan and his people want to bring back our girls?  Such ingrates!

    Or, after the famous letter, is the Chibok girls’ kidnap another opportunity for public spat between estranged godfather and godson, with godfather spoiling for war but godson becoming war weary and subdued?

    Or, has Baba gone so delirious about his allegedly near-shunned offer to help, at a juncture of grave national angst, to goad the president into approval, so that the old man would not miss a future bragging right that when everything else had failed for Jonathan on Chibok, it was he Baba, like some rejected stone that became a mighty pillar, who made the difference?

    Whatever is Baba’s motivation, his comments on the Chibok girls were unfortunate.  For one, he seemed culpably insensitive to the feelings of the Chibok girls’ parents. That bit about never seeing some of the girls again, or that many of them could have been pregnant from being sex slaves or the painful possibility or even probability of forced marriages — doesn’t Obasanjo think all these painful possibilities have run through the parents’ troubled minds?

    If Obasanjo wants to help on Chibok, let him do so with minimum fuss. If he wants presidential endorsement, he won’t get it on the pages of newspapers.

    It’s painful telling a man to grow up in old age. But with these insensitive statements, perhaps Baba should be told to grow up and stop throwing tantrums.

  • Unexemplary use of influence

    It is becoming clearer, despite claims to the contrary, that there may indeed be puppeteers pulling strings in connection with controversially desperate manoeuvres to have Justice Daisy Okocha occupy the position of Chief Judge of Rivers State. It would appear that these behind-the-scenes manipulators are playing blind to the important fact that she is not favoured by the State Judicial Service Commission which, from all indications, is the body lawfully empowered to make recommendation to the state governor  on the matter.

    The revelation that her younger brother,   Chief O. C. J Okocha (SAN), a former Attorney General of Rivers State and former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), actually wrote a letter to Ogbakor Ikwerre Convention, an ethnic association, seeking its intervention, effectively betrayed his interest in her elevation to the point of trying to take advantage of his connections to make it happen.   Against this background, his claim of non-interference collapsed, suggesting that as Chairman of Legal Education in Nigeria and a member of the National Judicial Council (NJC), he may not be innocent of the accusation by the Rivers State government that his role helped to fuel the appointment crisis.

     There is no doubt that Chief Okocha’s February 3 letter to the President-General of the Ogbakor Ikwerre Convention, Professor Augustine Onyozu, was suspicious, although he reportedly denied that it was written to influence his sibling’s appointment to the preeminent position.  It is noteworthy that the letter personally signed by him appealed for Onyozu’s “kind intervention in the matter.”

    Interestingly, he reportedly clarified the nature of the intervention he desired, saying that his effort was aimed at preserving what he described as “Ikwerre’s good fortunes” at the present time. This appeal to ethnicity could be interpreted to mean that he expected the Ikwerre leadership to prevail on Rivers State Governor Rotimi Amaechi to review his rejection of Justice Okocha, considering the fact that they were from the same ethnic circle.

     If Chief Okocha could employ such means in his ethnic group, it is not difficult to imagine that he could as well do the same in his professional circle. Strangely, the NJC seems hell-bent on having its way in imposing Justice Okocha on the Rivers State judiciary as Chief Judge, and it is going about the mission with ironic contempt for the law. The body’s latest manoeuvre was its communication to Justice Okocha directing her to begin to assign cases and take charge of related administrative duties. It also copied all the Judges in the state, and directed them to accept her authority. In a defensive statement, the NJC stated that it was guided by the need to fill a supposed vacuum that was negatively affecting the administration of justice in the state.

    But this veneer of concern is a red herring. NJC’s refusal to respect a subsisting judgment of the Federal High Court voiding its recommendation of Justice Okocha is inexcusable. According to the judge, “The body that is most suitable to make recommendation of a nominee as a chief judge of the state is the state Judicial Service Commission (SJC) because they have local knowledge of the most suitable candidate than the National Judicial Commission.” For unexemplary use of influence, look no further.

  • Jonathan: fear of the media …

    The fear of God, says the scriptures, is the beginning of wisdom — positive fear that drives positive change. But what of paranoia that views everyone as mortal enemies?

    Such paranoia appears to have gripped the Jonathan presidency, with its current war on the media.

    Like crazed but phoney Leviathans, Nigerian troops on the highway flex their muscles, cock their guns and unpin their grenades.  Their formidable opponents?  Harmless newspaper van drivers, speeding off to deliver newspapers in far-flung Nigeria.

    The troops stamp, growl and grunt: Boko Haram has found new allies in newspapers and their transport fleet.  Their winning intelligence, sure banker to sack the dreaded Sambisa Forest, screams and swears Boko Haram bombs nestle among newspaper parcels.  But after searching and searching, and detaining van drivers, and impounding newspaper stock for no less than three days, they have hit nothing but empty air.

    Yet, the Jonathan military braves keep on searching, impounding, and detaining; and keep on threatening, huffing and puffing, even bullying innocent vendors, like some coward who sees a person he could beat up and suddenly becomes hungry for a fight.  Meanwhile, their attention is sorely needed in Sambisa Forest!

    But maybe the troops are looking the wrong way, for the invisible bomb.  Poor dears, they are searching newspaper parcels!  How about some positive suggestions?

    Since news (not newspapers) is the new enemy, why don’t these brave and admirable troops confiscate every hand phone — smart and not-so-smart — every computer tablet, every iPad, and every IPod?

    If they did that, they would perhaps have arrested every facebook post, every tweet, every online story, every breaking news — and gosh! these online media are notorious for “breaking news” without necessarily double checking — and even every subversive music on IPod: yes IPod, for all that sweet music may well be lyric-ised code of Boko Haram ordinance!  Come on boys, the physical newspapers are too clumsy and slow, the real enemy is the nimble social media!

    And if that did not deliver much, why not simply militarily decree and flatly outlaw the use of these smart gadgets — or better still, jam the satellite sites that power them?  And if you are reminded it is a democracy, which outlaws such knee-jerk and brainless military rule tactics, just remind them as Sage Doyin Okupe has volunteered: for security from Boko Haram, citizens’ basic rights must bow, constitution or no constitution!

    Given the Jonathan military goons’ especial focus on this newspaper, in their quixotic war, it is legit to declare: “The fear of The Nation is, for President Jonathan, the beginning of wisdom — or more correctly folly.”

    Yes, folly because what power can a common newspaper have against the all-mighty president who could easily have been a Pharaoh or a Nebuchadnezzar or a General but has graciously refused to do so?

    But before Jonathan’s army got lost in its quixotic maze, this simple reminder: by bullying what it thinks is “soft targets”, while the hard target sits un-harassed inside Sambisa Forest, its tactics are no better than Boko Haram’s.

    But then, it is the age of equal-opportunity terrorism — whether by Boko Haram or Jonathan’s troops!

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • Now that Fani is back home

    It is safe to say that enfant terrible Femi Fani-Kayode (FFK) is back where he truly belongs, in the fold of the ravenous Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. When he was sighted like a strange object a few weeks back in Aso-Rock Presidential Villa, it was obvious that he was desperate to get back on the gravy train. Hardball thinks there is absolutely nothing wrong with that except that he lied, no, he fobbed about it. “Aso Rock belongs to all of us”, he quibbled when reporters confronted him. I will let you know if I want to decamp from my party, he said further about his political status.

    None would be surprised at FFK’s flagellation; it has become his stock-in-trade to return to his sputum. And among serious circles, none would take him serious because he has no real political value or enduring character quality. He is only rich in nuisance value which unfortunately, is what sells in today’s Nigerian politics.

    What rankles, however, is FFK trying to put a credible veneer to his jump to PDP. He ought to know that it does not matter anymore; Nigerians already know him for what he is, a hollow gong that makes strident noise seeking notice. Making up some phoney excuses for his ‘great’ jump has only diminished his gung-ho, swashbuckling qualities. One would have expected him to simply hold out his chest and announce to the world that: I am out of here; I am going back to my people.

    It is cheap and very low for FFK to add blackmail to his devious peregrinations. Hear him on why he is dumping APC for PDP: “I cannot remain in a party where a handful of people that have sympathies for Boko Haram and that have a clear Islamic agenda are playing a leading role. This is made all the more untenable when some of those people are working hard silently and behind the scenes to impose a Muslim/Muslim ticket on the party for the presidential election next year.

    “I cannot be in a party where a few of its leaders are more interested in playing politics with the whole Chibok issue and hurling bricks at our military for not doing a better job. I cannot be in a party in which the role of one of its governors is not clear on the Chibok issue.”

    A few questions here: was FFK in APC in the real sense of it; did he have any weight? FFK must tell us who are these people in APC who have sympathies for Boko Haram. Who is this governor he indicts so brazenly? When did a Muslim/Muslim ticket become a grave offence in Nigeria’s politics to force a man to quit his party? Lastly, FFK is now the defender and spokesman for the Nigerian military that we must never criticise because he says so.

    Gee, we thought FFK’s trajectory was rough and dirty but it seems we ain’t seen ‘nuthing’. Now that he is back in familiar trenches he portends to be more dangerous than ever; he is going to spray muck like never before. Hardball would suggest that APC does well to ignore him and nevers respond to his tantrums. FFK is like a blank slate that must be filled every morning. Why help him fill it?

  • Tattered army? Tu fia kwa!

    Tartan Army is Scotland’s equivalent of the Nigerian Football Supporters Club, chief supporters of the Super Eagles.

    But the team the Tartan Army supports is rather tattered, having never gone beyond the first round in the FIFA World Cup, despite qualifying for five consecutive championships between 1974 and 1990. Even in the UEFA European Championships, Scotland has never gone beyond the first round, the two times (1992 and 1996) it had qualified.

    But the Nigerian Army, flagship of the Nigerian military, ripples with stellar records in international peace keeping campaigns and admirable muscles in imposing democracy in both Liberia and Sierra Leone, even if it almost always sabotaged democracy at home. A concrete piece of exporting what you yourself don’t have?  But those were the halcyon days of political power as institutional poison.

    So, it is absolutely understandable if, no thanks to the Chibok girls kidnap crisis, Nigerian “bloody civilians”, the merciless foreign media and just about everyone now suggests the once-upon-a-time gung-ho Nigerian military is now so tattered, to even become jelly.   Tu fia kwa!.

    The other day, Air Marshall Alex Badeh, chief of defence staff (CDS), the bloke who while assuming duty as CDS was so upbeat he boasted Boko Haram would be history by April, was near-hysterical while appealing to protesting women calling for the Chibok girls’ freedom from Boko Haram’s den.

    Good news: the Nigerian military now knows where the girls are!  But not so good: they couldn’t go in there with force, except the protesters wanted the girls to return in body bags. So, came the martial lecture, everyone should stay calm and allow the military to do their work — for which they were able and capable.

    Sounds, doesn’t it, like a tiger proclaiming its ‘tigeritude’ (apologies to Prof. Wole Soyinka)?

    Nigerians, he warned, must be wary of insulting or putting down their military: for on them rests the country’s security. True.

    But about the same time, a hitherto unknown group, Citizens’ Initiative for Security Awareness (CISA), well-kitted, well-bannered and well-armed with their own hash tag, #we trust the Nigerian military, bring back our girls#, did their own thing: dancing, strutting and singing, insisting the Nigerian military can and will bring back our girls — whoever said they couldn’t or wouldn’t?

    CISA could be patriot-citizens drumming support for the embattled military. They could also be economically distressed citizens hustling for the odd coin. Either is no crime, given the democratic space and the mass hunger in the land. And if the cowardly “Fellow Nigerians, I Col …” is so glaringly out of fashion, nobody in all good conscience should blame a lobby, trying to shield the military from battery, in an evolving democratic culture.

    Yet, if the military were true to themselves, they would admit the present institutional battery as fair comeuppance for what a few rascals, among them, had done in the past — painful payback time!

    But the military need not play the hurt comic tiger, proclaiming its own ‘tigeritude’.  It should rather go get our girls. That feat should proclaim it the tiger — and Nigerians are bound to affirm.

    A tattered military?  Tu fia kwa!

     

  • Mbu, the puppet

    Mbu, the puppet

    From all indications, those who thought they had seen the last of Mbu Joseph Mbu were terribly wrong and must now have a rethink. Four months after his redeployment to Abuja from Rivers State where as Police Commissioner he proved to be a thorn in the flesh of the governor, Rotimi Amaechi, he is back in public consciousness and, as usual, in controversial circumstances.

    Now Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Commissioner of Police, Mbu’s latest outrageous manifestation was his ban on Bring Back Our Girls protests for reasons that may not be unconnected with political considerations, or more precisely, for reasons that may lie in the realm of political influence. Understandably, the protests have been held daily in Abuja by the Citizens Group led by Dr. Oby Ezekwesili, a former minister of education, in response to the April 15 abduction of over 200 students at the Girls Senior Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State, by members of the Islamist terror gang Boko Haram.

    Significantly, the ban has been reversed by the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Mohammed Abubakar, who diplomatically called it “an advisory notice enjoining citizens to apply caution in the said rallies, particularly in the FCT and environs.”

    Perhaps not surprisingly, Mbu cited security issues as the grounds for the prohibition. He declared to reporters in Abuja, “Information reaching us is that too soon dangerous elements will join groups under the guise of protest and detonate explosives aimed at embarrassing the government.” He added that the Fountain of Unity, the place where the protesters gathered in the city, was unacceptably being turned into a space for “cooking and selling.”

    Curiously, Mbu’s move appeared to be an extension of official displeasure at the protests in the presidency. Specifically, President Goodluck Jonathan in a media chat last month alleged that the protests were calculated to bring down his administration; and last week, Information Minister Labaran Maku accused the opposition of funding the protests to damage the reputation of the Jonathan administration. Was it a coincidence that Mbu’s act followed these remarkable instances of far-fetched reasoning? Or was his action a next-level progression that was meant to give force to the utterances of Jonathan and Maku?

    If anyone was puzzled, Mbu supplied the answer that gave the game away. He said: “People have been protesting over a month now…it is the issue of terrorism, it is not solved in one day. Then, when you continue to do it persistently, it becomes nuisance to the government.”

    Aha! So the protesters have become a source of irritation to the administration and cannot be tolerated any longer, even if their campaign is inspired by social conscience and the need to push for the rescue, or release, of the kidnapped schoolgirls.

    This is certainly not the kind of attitude, or measure, expected of a sensitive and empathetic administration; and it gives the government away as a circle of small-minded and self-serving characters.

    More importantly, the ban had the quality of irresponsible high-handedness, not to describe it as tyrannical; and it had no place in any truly democratic environment. It needs to be emphasised to Mbu and the puppeteers that banning peaceful assembly of any group of persons represented a primitive and outdated approach to governance, and could only further ridicule the country in the eyes of the world, especially with the global interest in the fate of the abducted schoolgirls. The most important thing is: Bring Back Our Girls.