No discerning practitioner or observer of socio-political activities in Nigeria will, consciously, discountenance the unfettered contributions of Bishop Matthew Hassan Kukah, who is presently the Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese. When it was not fashionable to be seen to counter the draconian policies and programmes of the then dreaded General Sani Abacha junta, Bishop Kukah and his fellow civil society activists were on the rampage waging a war of nerves against the maximum leader and his apologists.
Bishop Kukah’s belief in and commitment to the Nigerian Project is better understood in the context of his being a highly-visible Catholic cleric who is not encumbered by some people’s notion that he should be seen but not heard. It is on record that this commitment to foster peace and harmony among Nigeria’s diverse ethnic or tribal and religious configuration, drove his resolve to convene the National Peace Committee as a vehicle to ensure peaceful and violence-free elections before, during and after the last electioneering exercise.
When this body of eminent Nigerians met President Muhammadu Buhari recently, it did not do so at the behest of any person either in or out of government, supposedly on account of the ongoing probes or rumours of probes. Unfortunately, that visit has suddenly become controversial. What may have prompted the rash of ill comments from some quarters about the mission and agenda of the Committee, is the reported opinion canvassed by Bishop Kukah that the current anti-graft crusade should be conducted within a backdrop of the Constitution and the Rule of Law and not on a monarchical set up that ensures that the President’s word is inviolate. Bishop Kukah opined that while the war against corruption and economic pillaging is in full steam, care should be taken to ensure that due process is not set aside in the bid to play to the gallery and leave the duties of state to go fallow.
It is pertinent to mention that the preponderance of informed opinions on the on-going wide probes in the country is that the formation of the Presidential Anti-Graft Advisory Committee headed by Professor Itse Sagay, may be both extra-judicial and unconstitutional. The argument is that it goes against the grain of the need to investigate and prosecute proven cases of corruption by constitutionally-recognised bodies which should be strengthened and fundamentally-restructured to confront the ogre of corruption and corruptive activities in the country.
Therefore, Bishop Kukah’s views about the ongoing cacophony of innuendoes and insinuations of high-falutin corruption and graft, is that it may actually distract the President’s focus from doing what he was elected to do in the first instance. He said, inter alia: “Everybody knows that things are not the way they ought to be. We are just trying to encourage people that let’s get on with this business of fixing this country. Let’s get to the business of realising the change that we dreamt of. And also, most importantly, let’s get down with the business of co-operating with God so that Nigeria can move forward…I think that is what ordinary Nigerians are expecting. This is what they voted for. The truth of the matter is that time is not on our side. Our responsibility is to encourage politicians to do what they were elected to do.”
This and other pan-Nigerian views expressed by Bishop Kukah, are not patronising or tongue-in-cheek but a timely homily delivered in the national interest and not one constructed in the warped imagination of his (and by extension, the National Peace Committee) traducers, who are finding “solution” to corruption and graft through witch-hunting, media-prosecution and trial by ordeal. After all, Bishop Kukah has an inalienable right to hold personal views or opinion on any subject as far as it does not impinge on those of other people. That he is a priest does not detract from the primary fact that he is also a concerned Nigerian committed to the welfare of its citizens.
Some people have maintained that the main focus and thrust of the much-hyped probes and rumours of probes are directed against the former administration of Dr Goodluck Jonathan. This is the more reason why the President will do well to diffuse the gathering storm of the rehearsed persecutions and witch-hunts and face actual governance. He should also offset his campaign promises without necessarily, wittingly or unwittingly, fuelling any distractions and its attendant media razzmatazz as we are now witnessing. The kernel of Bishop Kukah’s homily is that real focus and attention should be placed on pressing national issues that need urgent and holistic solutions. And there are several issues begging for attention.
‘We must avoid the vilification and demonisation of those who, out of their patriotic zeal, are contributing to the pool of ideas that will move the country up the ladder of progress.’
Quite understandably, the president is doing his outmost best to stamp out terrorism in the Northeast of the country. The recent appointment of new Service Chiefs and National Security Adviser have, indeed, upped the ante in the war against the Boko Haram terrorists who have virtually paralysed the socio-economic well-being of that part of the country. But the president needs to do more to convince Nigerians that they did not make a wrong choice on March 28, 2015 when they trooped out to cast their votes for him at the presidential election.
One particular area that readily comes to mind is the area of infrastructures including roads, schools, hospitals and all that. For instance, nothing seems to be happening anymore on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway which reconstruction work has suddenly stopped. Besides, most of our hospitals have remained, if I may borrow from the late General Sani Abacha’s coup day broadcast on December 31, 1983, “mere consulting clinics”. Nowadays, people go to hospitals, especially government hospitals, not for succour or any healing, but simply to go and die. As for schools, the whole thing has gone from bad to worse as pupils and students now study under terribly unbearable conditions fit only for animals. I can go on and on.
While Nigeria is not running or operating a Saudi Arabia-type of “democracy” where the King is virtually infallible and a “political island”, President Buhari and his party, the APC, as well as his advisers, should imbibe the virtue of assimilating or adapting the positive contributions that will provide a reservoir or pool of alternatives but useful advice necessary in driving his nascent administration to success.
Therefore, the current virulent and bileful riposte by the president’s men smacks of a deliberate leakage of what transpired between the President and the National Peace Committee at the recent meeting held at the Villa. This is what has triggered the laughable and ill-conceived demonstrations to Aso Rock Villa and other public places. The spontaneity of the reactions to the views expressed by Bishop Kukah by some interested members of the Nigerian public, appeared programmed and sponsored to convey a populist rejection of those pan-Nigeria opinions and suggestions raised by the erudite cleric, as they were not in sync with those held by some interested parties who are in favour of ‘mob justice’.
It is imperative that Nigerians should be spared a resurgence of the orgy of “solidarity marches” that defined and characterised the Abacha despotic years which some concerned Nigerians believed was not indicative of the junta’s popularity rating. And if these “million-man marches” are being sponsored with tax payers’ money, then corruption, by other means, is at play.
The truth is that all patriotic Nigerians should endeavour to contribute viable ideas that will move the country towards the realisation of corruption-free governance, sustainable development and the equitable distribution of the dividends of democracy. We must avoid the vilification and demonisation of those who, out of their patriotic zeal, are contributing to the pool of ideas that will move the country up the ladder of progress.
