He misses the presence of the past; when the world smiled at him and
men bought his deceit. Huddled up over a heap of dusty files and
abandoned sleaze reports, Goodluck Jonathan, Nigeria’s president,
grieves over the metamorphosis of goodwill; the sharpest and shortest in
any recent political history. His friends, most of who, last year,
helped cook up the lies to spite his electoral opponents, had swiftly
become his critics, and even enemies. In his office, furnished to taste
with a rich touch of royalty, he pores through the invectives poured on
him daily by millions of angry citizens. In pains he let out a line of
grief, of a heart broken, like a baby grieving lack of love from his
parents; “I’m the most cursed president in the world.”
Cocooned by a retinue of aides trapped in the box of years of yore,
when secrecy thrived in the seats of power and ignorance weakened the
citizens of nations, he misreads the situation. Aides with mindsets more
pedestrian than those of commoners, intent only on power, privilege and
money, have sold him the commodity of perception. They said perception
is the culprit. He bought it hook, line and sinker. He thinks very
highly of them, as possessing more experience in the politics of public
relations than himself – the taciturn shy man who never was ambitious,
and never aspired to play at this tough stage where the rule entailed
slicing up people to remain sailing.
So their opinions are weighty. He fancies being dressed in the garb
of a “listening president” by these aides. It’s one of their ways of
warming up to his heart, his royal heart. He would have been a great
president if they were right. But they aren’t. He listens, as the only
choice he has, because no alternative thoughts ever emanate from him,
with which to balance their views and schemes. These views become
policies and programmes, unleashed on the public domain, and are pushed
to become laws. You remember the six year single term?
The perception challenge is their view, and he bought and paid. The
work has been done, they told him, but the people have yet to know. Let
us change their perception, they agreed. As though the whole world
suddenly went blind in one fell swoop, they proposed that the work
they’ve done, which no other living soul has seen, be scribbled down in
fancy letters and glossy images. The images are more of the workers –the
president, his Vice, his over-bloated cabinet, and his aides – and less
of the works.
In the computing cloud hangs the book, an 80-page book of
accomplishments. We are dared to read, to find present the projects that
are absent on the streets and in our homes. We are persuaded to share,
to forward to contacts, to carry family and friends along. As we read,
they hope for open-mindedness in assessments and fairness in comments.
Here, there was a slight departure from their 19th century mindsets.
They acknowledge the change in ways information is shared. The internet,
that’s the new village square. They came to the square, to ring the
bell.
But that’s selective appreciation of the powers of the modern world.
We can read and forward, just like we can upload and share damning
evidence of lies said by public servants. It works in both ways, and
works more against one when one chooses to reside on the side of
injustice. On this same cloud we compare notes on how our friends and
brothers and neighbours remain unemployed after graduation, and how
those who oversaw the biggest scams in our history, as well as the
scammers themselves, remain unpunished.
Before I began typing these lines, my friend in Abuja sent me a
message. She was giving up on Nigeria. She couldn’t fathom why she
couldn’t find fuel in filling stations in Abuja, but saw boys hawking
them in gallons near the same stations, and with policemen looking on.
Her friend, a close one with whom she had been at the forefront of the
battle for the rescue of Nigeria from the gang of fuel subsidy thieves
and their backers in government, just took a job with a wrong
organization. She thinks she has lost the battle. She wept, and told me
so.
A day or two ago, another friend on Twitter sent me a message. He
got done with his Masters in the UK and returned home last year. Till
date, he’s been unemployed. No jobs anywhere. But there’s a book, the
book of accomplishments. The book says all is working, just that we’ve
been blind to it.
Aha! Back to the book. I’d have loved to relish in the freshness of
its smell were it physical with pages I could flip through. New books
always smell fresh and predictably arouse the curiosity of the lover of
reading. Sometimes, at the end of the book, you may discover that the
only thing about it was actually the smell. In such a case, the book was
a waste of one’s reading time. In Jonathan’s newly uploaded ebook, Sure
And Steady Transformation, nothing was visible.
Conceptualized to serve a predetermined end, the book comes out
vague and dry, unfortunately projecting us as a country that faces a
million problems. It tries to cover everything and ends up covering
nothing. It crawls from the shameful to the ridiculous, and then mocks
us by its existence. That book shouldn’t have been published ab initio.
It is another waste of our scarce resources.
Trust our brand of leadership. Perpetually mouthing a president’s
campaign mantra is an unwritten law. That is why you will find
“transformation” in almost every page of the book. It seems the
president derives the power to become from the sound of that word; and
the energy to live and act from its steady repetition.
“In support of Mr. President’s Transformation Agenda, the Ministry
of Agriculture and Rural Development developed and is aggressively
implementing an Agricultural Transformation
Agenda.”
Transformation. Transformation agenda.
In search of what to point at, we read meetings that were attended.
In almost all the ministries, meetings that were attended by Ministry
personnel were included as achievements.
In the Ministry of Health, we read; “Conducted 55th National Council on Health Meeting in Abuja 16th-20th July, 2012”
Another one, still on the Health Ministry; “Submission of report of
Presidential Committee on a harmonious working relationship in the
Health Sector.”
For the Ministry of Information, we read: “Refocusing of the Vision and Mission of the Ministry.”
The wonder is that somebody in the presidency proofread these things
and approved their inclusion in the final draft. Another wonder is that
they do not hope to persuade people to consider if the “achievements”
are worth being so named, the surprise is the aggression with which it
is being forced down our throat; “I have delivered!”
Part of the delivery is the type you will read on Page 43 of the report.
• Purchase of 3 (No) Staff Buses.
• Procurement of 2 (No) of Hiace Buses.
• Purchase of various office furnishes and fittings.
When the Federal Government boasts of 2 Hiace buses, then a Local
Government Councilor has no business providing anything for his
constituents. And it is rather troubling that nobody in the presidency
cringed when 3 Staff Buses were being included amongst the list of
achievements made by the president of Nigeria.
But we must find the courage to ask the necessary questions: how
many jobs have been created – either directly by the government or by
the private-sector as a result of employment-inducing policies of the
government – in the last two years? If jobs were created, how did they
affect the gross unemployment rate?
Are we aware that the use of okada as a means of transportation is a
sign of a state that is failing? Movement of humans and goods is one of
the essential indicators of a functional society. Why are our roads
still in bad shape? Olumide, my friend, recently spent 3 hours on a spot
at the Lagos-Benin Expressway and witnessed 3 different auto accidents
on the spot. That doesn’t sound like transformation. That is
destruction. But we have a glossy picture of that same road looking well
paved.
How many houses did the government build in the last two years? How
many Nigerians now have access to decent and affordable housing? Where
are these houses?
Have we upgraded the quality of our schools? We did expect that
Almajiri school will litter the pages under the education ministry. We
only wonder what state and local governments will showcase. I heard last
night from the young Nigerian who has been moving our kids from the
slums to schools that Nigeria has over ten million children of school
age outside the school. What future does that leave for us?
If the image of improved healthcare published in the book is true,
where is our First Lady? Why can’t she be treated here at the intensive
healthcare units?
If someone says there’s no money, how many of the thieves who stole
our billions have we prosecuted in the last two years? How many high
profile corruption cases have we successfully pursued and brought to
conclusion?
If there are achievements anywhere, Mr Jonathan will not need a book
to show them to us. Our streets are where these achievements will
resonate. All eyes will see them and lips will confess them. There was a
relatively significant improvement in power generation for about two
months, and everybody commented on that. Nobody needed a book to confirm
that electricity supply in their houses had improved. The bulbs that
were lit up for more hours were the books we needed. Our problems aren’t
as vast as an ocean. Our challenges as a people are few, but
fundamental. Once these few key ones are attended to, the rest naturally
fade away.
Nobody enjoys a song without melody. Nobody enjoys a dance without
motion. A book in which nothing was written isn’t different. Nobody
enjoys an 80-page book that says nothing.
Saharareporters
Four
hundred female pilgrims from Nigeria, who arrived in Jeddah, Saudi
Arabia yesterday for this year’s hajj, have been separated from their
male counterparts and detained by Saudi authorities, the Daily Trust
newspaper is reporting this morning.
