Nnamdi Kanu and President Muhammadu Buhari
From
historical flooding to earthquakes, mudslides, landslides and
hurricanes; it appears the world might end soon as spoken about in the
book of Revelations in the Holy Bible.
Nigeria might not be experiencing the worst of natural disasters
like the hurricanes Harvey, Irma, Katia and Jose but it appears a
seeming human disaster tagged ‘Hurricane Nnamdi Kanu’ spinning in the
South-east might tear the country apart in the face of President Buhari
in no distant time.
In the latest season of the endless political drama tilted
'Nigeria', President Muhammadu Buhari and the leader of the Independent
People of Biafra, IPOB - Mazi Nnamdi Kanu have taken dominant roles of
the antagonist and the protagonist with their parts alternating
depending on where you stand tribally.
The audience is being tortuously and distractingly entertained with
a show of influence between both parties. Buhari is staging the
cultural Operation Python Dance II right beside the compound of Nnamdi
Kanu's father's house at Afaraukwu Ibeku - Umuahia in Abia State. The
dance isn't by beautiful ladies and energetic men in colourful native
attires showing the flexibility of their body structures while people
wine and dine as we are used to. It's a dance by exasperated Nigerian
soldiers who treat every national assignment with their discontentment
with life and the depressive economic realities in the most populous
black nation in the world. It’s a dance where the music is replaced with
gunshots and horse whips; smiles replaced with hot tears and agony. I
am talking about the dance of widespread fear, panic, flesh and blood.
This is what happens where the python, a reptile that is known to
swallow its preys dances for you.
Before now, Nnamdi Kanu, 50 traversed the polity as an emperor
walking majestically among his teeming followers who found his feet
attractive to kiss; an act that is reminiscent of the master-slave
relationship in the medieval period. Gradually, he gathered momentum and
courage to flout the bail conditions he signed to while Buhari
struggled with his undisclosed illness in London, United Kingdom. His
words against the Nigerian government carried fire, fury and stark hate
thereby threatening the ‘theoretical unity’ the major tribes in Nigeria
share.
Nnamdi Kanu enjoyed the open and unwavering support of some
professional politicians from the main opposition party in Nigeria,
Peoples Democratic Party namely a former minister of Aviation Femi Fani
Kayode and the governor of Ekiti State, Ayodele Peter Fayose. Other
politicians in the Southeastern part of Nigeria on a clandestine note
drummed support for the young man like he was divinely mandated to break
the Igbo Nation out of the ‘Zoo’ which he regards Nigeria as. The
Ohanaeze Ndigbo, an apex Igbo socio-cultural group stood solidly behind
Nnamdi Kanu. A former Niger Delta militant, Asari Dokubo also suddenly
fell in love with making videos to mock the President while the
spokesman of IPOB, Emma Powerful released more press statements than a
media house. The situation was tantamount to the perfect picture of the
fate of your house in the hands of rats when you embark on a lengthy
vacation.
As the pictures of Nnamdi Kanu’s soaring popularity littered social
media platforms, the United Kingdom returnee launched the Biafra Secret
Service and reportedly the Biafra National Guard which he called the
vigilante groups. In fact, his inspection of the guard of honour at the
inauguration of the BSS was spectacular and presidential.
There were social media arguments that Nnamdi Kanu could wield more
influence than Buhari. Kanu even went as far as reiterating that he was
ready to die for the Biafra cause and his followers could burn down
Nigeria if anything happens to him. I remember vividly when he
threatened former President Olusegun Obasanjo as well as his lineage
with total annihilation over some comments of his which Kanu found
unfavourable to his separatist cause.
In the absence of Buhari, a coalition of northern groups, Arewa
Youths Consultative Forum appeared to embark on an offensive crisis
de-escalation move in the inglorious Kaduna Declaration that called for
the exit of the Igbo's from the 19 northern states before the 1st of
October, 2017 or face physical attacks. It took the intervention of
Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State and other stakeholders to make
the infamous group rescind the order which had birthed a hate and
genocidal song against the Igbos in the north. This wouldn't have only
claimed lives but properties of the prosperous Igbos would have been
reduced to rubble by the northerners who have a long history of
restiveness and homicidal acts.
In the light of the foregoing, it was crystal clear that Buhari, a
former military dictator rumoured to have a penchant for wielding the
big stick generously at dissenting voices and being stingy with the
carrot was going to pay Kanu an august visit. It was just a matter of
when and how. All indications showed that Buhari was going to wait for
the court of law to sanction the arrest of Nnamdi Kanu as filed by the
government but the 74 year old retired Major General was impatient and
had other plans. He opted to give Nnamdi Kanu a bit of his military
orientation and the python was called to come dance for him at the heart
of the IPOB headquarters.
One uncanny thing about Buhari is his level of unpredictability.
You hardly know his direction and it’s debatable to say this attribute
must have detrimentally affected his handling of the recuperating local
economy. He loves to spring surprises and it’s almost impossible to know
his enemies from his few words or physical reactions. In the last two
years of being verbally attacked and mocked with his health by Fayose,
Buhari has never mentioned his name in the media but the war between
them is colder than Iceland. That is who the leader of Fulani descent
is. The preparation of the dance of the python - Egwu Eke II has thrown
Kanu's defiant and compact camp in disarray. His supporters have been
reportedly subjected to inhumane conditions of military brutality while
others have been killed. Kanu in a phone call put to him by Channels TV
yesterday evening claimed the Nigerian Army invaded his house and killed
22 of his followers as well as his dog with his elderly father
threatened with a gun. The IPOB has been declared a terrorist
organization by the Nigerian Army and to compound their woes, the
South-eastern governors in a fresh resolution have proscribed the
pro-Biafra group which has been labeled a security threat. The
self-styled Southeastern warlord has been relegated to the level of
someone seeking public sympathy as he hides from the Nigerian Army. He
is presently calling on the United Nation, European Union, and other
members of the international community for intervention.
Buhari's militarization of the South-east has become a hot topic of
political discussions across the country. While some have termed it as
reasonable, others believe its unwarranted and reckless. Some accidental
human right activists and armchair heaping criticisms on him have
forgotten that you can’t beat a child and simultaneously teach him or
her how to cry. You can’t hurt me and also guide me on how to revenge
although two wrongs don’t make a right and fire doesn’t quench fire;
water does.
Those criticizing Buhari for making Kanu relevant following his
initial arrest are only making a mockery of the wise saying that you can
only trim the branches of an Iroko tree when it’s at the tender stage,
it will demand sacrificial exercises to control when it reaches full
maturity. No wise man finds rest in a room when a small snake is
parading because the size can never be undermined when considering the
grave danger it poses. The neglect and condoning of the nefarious antics
of the late Boko Haram founder, Mohammed Yusuf by security operatives
and the Borno State government today has birthed the cancer of terrorism
leading to the death of over 100,000 people (Shettima, 2017),
displacement of about 2.7 million people taking refuge at the Internally
Displaced People's camps, destruction of infrastructural facilities in
the northeast, setback in the aspect of agriculture and other crises
which are chain reactions to public unrest. Remember that Nnamdi Kanu
once attempted to talk an Igbo group in diaspora into raising funds for
him to acquire arms to battle Nigeria for the independence of Biafra. He
was like a ‘loose cannon’.
No sane leader will watch Nnamdi Kanu pollute the minds of his
people through the Radio Biafra which was illegally being transmitted in
the country from the United Kingdom. Another state was technically
created inside Nigeria with emblems, flags, passports and currencies.
The group even grew wings that it had the effrontery to declare that no
election will hold in the Southeastern part of Nigeria and stakeholders
started trembling with fear. They were forced to hold emergency meetings
with their recalcitrant son pursuing a cause outside the dictates of
legitimacy.
The last thing Buhari would want to be remembered for is the
break-up of the Nigerian entity. Former President Goodluck Ebele
Jonathan through an act of political expediency avoided being associated
with that by history. This is the last detail Buhari would like to be
associated with in his Wikipedia page.
Right to self determination by a group of people isn’t illegal. It
is recognized by the United Nations charter which Nigeria is a signatory
too. The problem I have with the cause is that it has an egomaniacal
outlook. There has been a proliferation of pro-Biafra groups following
the success of Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of
Biafra, MASSOB and IPOB which the leaders are drawing money from in
exploitation of sympathizers. MASSOB is like a company run for 18 years
by Ralph Nwazurike without a concise direction which is on purpose.
Covert and overt followers are made to contribute to a common purse
which is never accounted for just like the constituency projects of
federal lawmakers and security votes of state governments.
For every statement in support of Biafra, you will see five others
against it from the same people reported to be marginalized. The Igbos
have never spoken in unison and this is a historic problem that could be
traced to the failure of the British Indirect Rule system. There are
claims that the voice of Nnamdi Kanu doesn't reflect the yearnings of
the people which is a fact as he is not a constituted authority. The
referendum he is seeking for is alien to the Nigerian constitution. His
efforts shouldn't be originally directed at Buhari but the National
Assembly for the amendment of the 1999 constitution to facilitate a
referendum. Our constitution says in Section Two that Nigeria is one
“indivisible and indissoluble sovereign state” to be known by the name
the federal republic of Nigeria.
He should gather the South eastern governors, senators, House of
Reps members in the Southeast, House of Assembly members, traditional
rulers and representatives of dominant socio-cultural or political
groups to speak in a common tongue and prosecute their demands of
secession. This will give it a more far-reaching face and not his
purported collaboration with an Osita Chidoka who is hoping to be an
Anambra governor come November 18 under the banner of the United Peoples
Party, UPP or a Senator Eyinnaya Abaribe (Abia-South Senatorial
District) who plans to dig his grave at the Red Chamber where he has
spent over 10 years making uncommon laws.
The level of hypocrisy in Nigeria is alarming and the country is
built on lies. The country is cursed with ‘political entrepreneurs’
investing the angers and despondency of the downtrodden in their
political businesses. The only business venture that strives well is
politics where the act of sleaze is not a sin. The Igbos claim to be
marginalized but I have always argued that there is no challenge faced
by the Igbos that is not evident among the other tribes. The bitter
truth is that the country is sick without an available serum. The Igbos
have argued that appointments in the country have been lopsided which is
very true but in the real sense the issue of the reflection of the
federal character principle in the area of public appointments has never
translated to national development. The north has produced more
political leaders than any other tribe today but the region has remained
perpetually impoverished and starved of formal education which is the
light every generation needs to move forward.
The truth of the matter is that everybody is fed up with Nigeria
where a First Class university graduate is not even guaranteed of
anything in the labour market. I have a very young friend who almost
graduated with a First Class from a federal university and she has been
forced to settle with a teaching job where she is earning a meagre
salary that can’t cater for her transport costs pending on when God will
‘pick her call’. Yes, the clerics are now are like the hope of Nigeria
seeing our problems from the spiritual perspective.
People are hungry and angry despite the fact that some even have
executive jobs. The high rate of inflation in Nigeria has rendered the
greenback worthless and figures of economic projections churned out by
the National Bureau of Statistics every month have failed to connect
with the realities on ground. Inflation rate in Nigeria for the month of
August has dropped to 16.01% but the surge in food prices at the local
market is astronomical. This is part of many issues interwoven with
poverty, unemployment, illiteracy, healthcare, power, potable water,
good roads and legendary corruption. Nigeria is truthfully a plague we
should be divorced from but looking at the situation that way is like
cutting off the head because of a disturbing migraine instead of
settling for drugs.
I must admit that President Buhari’s body language has further
divided Nigerians as he appears to have a score to settle with the
Igbos. Buhari in 2015 told an American audience that he was going to
treat Nigerians unequally, that is according to the support they gave
him during the presidential election. What a gaffe! We all know Nigeria
has never been united and we have been wired by documentation
procedures to think about our Local Government Areas and States of
Origin first before considering ourselves as Nigerians. That is what our
resumes even teach us except for those that have upgraded theirs to the
latest standard.
President Buhari’s lopsided appointments are reprehensible,
provocative and condemnable. It hurts more that the government has
refused to prosecute the self-acclaimed youths behind the infamous
Kaduna Declaration which almost tore Nigeria apart. I personally wish
the Operation Python could be directed at the irate Fulani herdsmen
committing all manners of atrocities across the geopolitical zones with
the my-brother-is-in-power feeling. There is no special law for any
ethnic nationality in a democracy and preferential treatments will
always breed discord. The bad news is that Buhari doesn’t care and he is
not ready to be politically correct. This was expressed in the tone of
his presidential speech on his return from London, United Kingdom after
staying for about 103 days.
With the 2019 presidential election less than 18 months away, it
seems Buhari doesn’t care about the reputation of his party or himself
in the South-east with gory pictures of killed IPOB supporters and
sickening videos of civilians being tortured by the army on the
streets.
The reports have been laced with serious propaganda and it’s
working positively for the IPOB members. The truth is that the
international image of Buhari and Nigeria is also being sacrificed on
the altar of ego here. As the United States of America whose political
system used to reek of perfection at the surface level is dealing with
the character of President Donald Trump acting against the norms, I
think Nigerians should also conform and adapt to a Buhari who has a
military ideology which has worked in crisis de-escalation to an
extent.
The Igbos might not like him but I will not encourage the Igbos to
hate him as he is the pilot flying the Nigerian plane and it will be
suicidal to help him crash the big bird conveying us into the Red Sea.
His time will probably expire in the year 2019 but the Nigerian entity
which is bigger than all of us continues.
Osayimwen Osahon George is a political scientist and journalist. He writes from Lagos State.
0 comments:
Post a Comment