The invisible enemy

Agbo Agbo

These are extraordinary and sobering times. Suddenly everywhere is quiet – factories, schools, offices, airports, the streets, are all quiet. Things that matter weeks ago are irrelevant for now. All the atomic bombs, nuclear powered submarines, Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs), aircraft carriers, radar evading stealth bombers, high caliber rifles, night vision goggles, infrared lights, IEDs, landmines and other lethal weapons created by man are now temporarily inactive – except in war zones. These weapons have the combined capacity of destroying the earth a hundred times over. But they are all unable to face the “new sheriff in town” (apologies to Femi Adesina). COVID-19 – the invisible enemy – has indeed humbled the world.

The emptiness of life is now laid bare. Our cars are parked in the parking lots with nowhere to go. Yachts and private jets are lying idle at the airports and quays. Some are confined to a room in their expansive mansions. The designer shoes, clothes, bags, wristwatches, perfumes etc. are useless this season. A celebrity shared pictures where she dressed for ‘the kill’ with the inscription “nowhere to go.” I can go on and on. What about those “very important meetings” that the heavens would fall if we do not attend? Am I forgetting our expensive and expansive church and mosque auditoriums? What really matters today is simply basic: food to eat and air to breathe. Some can’t breathe because they need ventilators which are grossly in short supply globally. Even the advance nations are frantically looking for ventilators!

COVID-19 is also serving as an anesthetic for the harsh post-COVID-19 economic terrain that we will soon wake up to. Oil is hovering at between $20/$30 per barrel. Some economic analysts predict it will plummet further. All things being equal, some predict 2025 as the year things may pick up fully for the oil industry. For a country that depends so much on oil, we are in trouble. Recall that the 2020 budget was predicated on $56 per barrel of oil. It has now been reviewed. OPEC and the Russians are meeting to find a workable solution that would benefit all. Even the much touted shale oil revolution in the USA is dangling in the balance.

The wonder virus is not just killing humans; it is wrecking businesses and brands as well. Many companies and startups in the USA and Europe are filling for bankruptcy or are under siege and silently counting their losses in these uncertain times. Mondelo Group, brewers of a popular beer brand in Mexico have stopped the brewing of ‘Corona’ beer. Your guess for the stoppage is as good as mine. What an unforeseen and brutal enemy!

Sports stadia’s are now being turned into makeshift emergency hospitals. The bars are empty, venues for music shows are equally empty, so are the large malls, cinema houses, and even miracle centres are eerily quiet. Books in the sci-fi section of bookshops in the west are now virtually empty. Who would have predicted this? That a time would come that an unseen virus, and not a world war, will shut down the world? It is simply incomprehensible! It respects no border and does not need a passport to freely move. All it needs is to invisibly attach itself to an individual and wreak havoc anywhere it went. Hospitals and medical personnel are overwhelmed as the bodies pile up with cremation being the option for burial due to lack of space like in Italy.

As the bodies pile up, I watched an Italian doctor on television almost tearfully narrating how difficult and painful it was for him to determine which patient gets a ventilator at the expense of others who are simply allowed to die. He said this period will live with him for the rest of his life. It will certainly live with us all especially those that lost loved ones – loved ones they were not even privileged to bury.

Desperate times like these are also periods that throw up leaders. World War II brought out the best in Winston Churchill; the Rwandan genocide unveiled Paul Kagame. Globally, leaders are showing what they are made of in this COVID-19 crisis. While some are faltering, others are forthright. As the battle to contain the virus rages, some commendations are necessary. Step forward Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State for recognition. You’re doing your best in instilling hope in a very difficult period. I know your job is being made less tedious because you have a qualified team behind him – like Prof Akin Abayomi and your communication team – nevertheless, you still deserve our commendations. Though there’s still much to be done.

Take a bow Dr. Chikwe Iheakwezu and health officials at the frontline of this difficult war that has no defined frontlines. The National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) that you head also deserves commendations. The officials handling calls and giving guidelines and encouragement to callers and potential cases are equally worth commending. I read a story about a typical day in these centres and I doff my heart for them. One thing weaves all these together – quality leadership on all fronts.

Leadership is an essential feature of all government and governance. Weak leadership contributes to government failures, and strong leadership is indispensable if the government is to succeed. Wise leadership secures prosperity in the long run; foolhardy leadership brings about catastrophes. To influence events and affect outcomes, leaders need to be prepared to abandon policy instruments and ideas that no longer work in a new environment. They need to be able to embrace the new and reevaluate the old, if the circumstances call for it.

I strongly believe that a successful leader chooses a particular course of action and then in some way gets others to go along; or more subtly, the leader encourages the led to ‘choose’ the course that the group will follow. The co-determination of the two parts of the leadership–followership system means that leaders are, to a significant extent, created by the led. In the complex leadership quotient, followers matter a great deal; indeed leadership, as a process, is greatly influenced by following.

As the race to defeat this invisible enemy rages, tough decisions would need to be taken. The federal and state government must, as a matter of urgency, reevaluate and restructure their 2020 budgets by freeing and diverting funding meant for capital expenditure to the healthcare sector. They must all focus completely on the health and well-being of Nigerians. Financial resources must be deployed to hospitals, clinics and makeshift isolation centres springing up across the country. This is a life and death situation.

More resources are also required for test laboratories. Unfortunately, there are not many in the country. The target should be one in every state of the federation, if possible. Ventilators, healthcare workers, ad hoc personnel, protective gears, gloves and masks, among other medical supplies are urgently needed. Mr. Innocent Chukwuma, chairman of Innoson Motors said he is willing to tamper with his production line and produce ventilators if the government supports him. This is an opening that should be explored giving the importance of ventilators in the battle ahead. This is not the time to play politics of looking at where the company is situated or who owns or runs it.

In my reckoning, the only areas of infrastructure that can and should be funded at the moment are the utility sectors comprising power and water resources. Without electricity and pipe borne water necessary for keeping the hospitals and makeshift isolation centres functioning and preventing spread, the fight against the wonder virus will be futile.

A critical challenge I foresee relates to the lockdown and social distancing. Already we are beginning to see agitations from citizens whose means of livelihood does not warrant them to stay indoors for long. This has already started in Lagos following the botched distribution of food. Thankfully, the governor said they’re back to the drawing board to fine-tune the process. If a holistic strategy is not put in place on how to reach and assist these vulnerable citizens we might risk them defying the stay at home order, or worse still, we may have large scale looting or riots on our hands.