Nigerians, the martyred South African journalist and scholar, Ruth First, famously observed are an overwhelmingly talkative lot. You can easily get smothered in “beer parlours” (pubs) and open spaces listening to the endless flow of analyses, anecdotes and political reminiscences. The pity, however, First opined in a seminal book, is that a great deal of the talkativeness generates far more heat than light. The remark is worth recalling in light of the ongoing debate between the presidency and civil society organisations including socio-cultural groups such as Ohanaeze Ndigbo and Afenifere over government slamming of the door against the possibility of a national conference to restructure Nigeria.
Let it be noted that even before this outburst, government spokespersons had made it an article of faith to lambast individuals and groups that dared to speak out or voice complaints concerning the galloping and pervasive insecurity across the land. In the fog of words, one could be forgiven for assuming that the real issues are the critics and not the deteriorating state of the nation in which insecurity is a particular and terrifying symptom. Peruse the accumulating evidence; in the last 48hours, there have been serial attacks in such states as Zamfara where close to 30 lives were lost and several persons kidnapped, Kaduna where a private university, Green Field, was attacked, a member of staff shot dead and 23 students kidnapped. There also are Ondo where three construction workers were kidnapped, Anambra where a police zonal headquarters was razed down among several others. So widespread and regular, almost on a daily basis, are the incidents that the media find it difficult to keep abreast.
It is in this dismal context that the agitations for state police and the convoking of a national conference have been revived. Regrettably, however, the spokespersons for the presidency rather than console a besieged populace engage almost perennially in trading words frequently dismissing critics including opinion leaders who are calling for redesign rather than cosmetic solutions.
Doubtless, there are many unanswered questions and mysteries about what exactly is going on, one of them is to wonder why Fulani herdsmen often fingered in kidnaps especially in southern Nigeria have chosen the very time of the rule of their kinsman to desecrate and put in a tight corner one of their own, namely, the president, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.). It would have been more logical and better understood if that ethnic group had actively sought to support and buttress one of its own in order to ensure he has an easier time of governing an increasingly turbulent country. Ironically, so distraught is their posture and those of groups like Myetti Allah, that some have suggested that a good chunk of northern Nigerians are working towards balkanising the country without openly canvassing a separatist agenda.
That of course is a matter for another day. What is important is that true leadership rather than indulge in carpeting critics, will spend time discussing the issues, reassuring a troubled populace, lowering the political temperature and actively foraging for a way out of the current troubled waters.
Obviously, the current disturbing situation did not happen overnight. It began to build up slowly from the escalating war in the North-East where confident claims of having ‘technically defeated Boko Haram” are almost becoming a joke then moved to the North-West and the North-Central with Zamfara and neighbouring states turned to killing fields accompanied by the near erection of a bandit republic.
From thence on, the South-West and the South-East began to feel, in increasing degree, the onslaught of kidnappers and bandits even in areas which had hitherto been regarded as safe havens. An example is the Ibadan-Ijebu-Ode road which in the last three weeks has been replete with tales of agony by travellers many of whom had escaped from bandits and kidnappers. The same narrative has repeated itself in several southeastern communities where the resurgence of herdsmen-farmers conflict has resulted in deaths and arson in a number of towns and villages. This account does not include the stories of highly placed people such as a former governor of the Central Bank, Chukwuma Soludo, governor of Benue, Samuel Ortom, several traditional rulers and others who miraculously escaped death by the whiskers at the hands of the increasingly assertive assassins. It is hard to remember at least in the lifetime of this writer when the country has been brought to this same juncture, in which life had become cheap, nasty and short with death lurking at almost every corner.
Needless to say that what is happening in the security area has its correlates in the provinces of the economy with the naira becoming more and more cheapened and fast losing value with inflation and unemployment assuming monstrous levels as well as in the social sector where education, health and infrastructure are becoming more and more crisis-ridden. Considering this dire situation, the way out of the woods cannot be lambasting critics and perceived opponents but to provide and put to work an agenda that will resuscitate a nation travelling in perilous straits. That agenda must necessarily include thinking out of the box of official certitudes that have failed us ever so often but must boldly reconsider such options as for example the decentralisation of security institutions in the shape of state police and the imperative of either a national conference or the aggregation of the wisdom and insights of previous conferences.
This columnist’s comment, last week on the needless and not so thoughtful proliferation of private universities, expectedly attracted reactions, most of them of a positive nature from stakeholders in the education sector. To the extent that such feedback indicates the direction of public opinion, to that extent, they are helpful barometers for those who make policy to monitor the swings of public perception. One of the respondents is no other than the Registrar of the Joint Examinations and Matriculation Board, Prof. Isha’q Oloyede, arguably, one of the most redeeming institution builders in our depressed environment. Oloyede called to say that his remarks employed by this columnist as the opening quote was not made in direct response to the licensing of 20 private universities. Interestingly, he did not hide behind the jaded expression of being misquoted but merely pointed out that the statement quoted by this writer was made at a public lecture he had given a year or two ago.
As a university teacher, concerned about transparency, I could not ignore his quibble and mild discomfiture given that the quote attributed to him sourced from another newspaper, not The PUNCH, gave the impression that he was directly criticising the approval of 20 new licences.
The difference of course is minor but important if only to maintain the sanctity and integrity of opinion writing which can be done without doing injustice to persons and sources of writing. The issue is not one of false attribution since Oloyede actually made the comment but of correcting the misleading impression that he was speaking directly about a policy output which came several months after his public lecture. As we say in the newsroom, the error is regretted.
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