Separation of Nigeria Through a National Conference jonathanDavid Bonaventure Mark, Senate president, is not known for being frivolous with words. Perhaps that is why he commands the respect of the 108 men and women he leads in the Upper Chamber of the National Assembly. It is against that backdrop that his recent call on Nigerians to hold a national conference must be examined critically by President Goodluck Jonathan. Mark, whose Senate has in the past severally opposed a national dialogue, premised his call on these very precarious times, “a world increasingly made fluid and toxic by strange ideologies and violent tendencies, all of which presently conspire to question the very idea of the nation state.” One of such strange ideology is that of the Boko Haram, which has a disdain for Western education. And since their insurgency began, thousands of innocent people have been killed either through suicide bombing or outright military-like assault. Only recently close to 200 people were killed on the highway in Benisheikh in Borno State by Boko Haram. These were people going about their normal daily routines. And how can we forget the about 50 students massacred in their hostels by the same insane group. In Nasarawa State, the Ombatse cultists recently overwhelmed about 60 policemen and State Security Service operatives who were on a mission to arrest their leaders. Many of the corpses of the slain policemen and security operatives are yet to be recovered. The same group, very recently, allegedly killed two people and buried them along with their car. One morning a few months ago, some villagers in Anambra State got to their village stream only to find about 20 floating corpses. Till date how they got there is still a matter of conjecture. All over the country, hatred walks on four legs. And it has found a ready accomplice in all manner of crime. Robbers and kidnappers are having a ball. Rapists, especially paedophiles, are wreaking havoc. As if all this is not enough, politicians are busy heating the polity as 2015 approaches. That 2015 which has been earmarked by a doomsday prophecy as the nation’s year to reach Golgotha. Mark recognises that Nigerians’ discontentment and alienation have become the fuel for extremism, apathy “and even predictions of catastrophe for our dear nation.” Thus he advocates that the nation should not “like the proverbial ostrich, continue to bury its head in the sand and refuse to confront the perceived or alleged structural distortions which have bred discontentment and alienation in some quarters.” It is this dire state of the nation that informed The Patriots recent call on President Jonathan to organise a national conference before the 2015 election. The group made up of elder statesmen made the call when they visited Aso Rock late August. Professor Ben Nwabueze, the octogenarian leader of the group, observed that, “Nigeria is a wobbly state in part because it stands on a very weak foundation, which creates a necessity to transform it.” Thus it is necessary for the many ethnic groups in Nigeria to agree on how to co-exist in this marriage because of the future of the country which has floundered for 53 years like a ship without rudder. Because the present activities of the nation’s leaders forebode ill for the future, raising no visible hope, that is why thousands of angry youths have embraced all manner of crimes and other violent tendencies. President Jonathan who agrees with The Patriots on a national dialogue is right at the threshold of history to re-birth Nigeria. Will he do it?
Posted on: Sun, 06 Oct 2013 05:15:26 +0000
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