THE COCK CROWS AT DAWN The casualties are not only those who started A fire and now cannot put it out. Thousands Are burning that have no say in the matter JP CLARK This poem by John P. Bekederemo Clark aptly describes the current situation in Nigeria. In the past few weeks, Nigeria have lost young, bright and promising military officers in the states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa more than we lost in all the peacekeeping and peace enforcement operations in Palestine, Somalia and Yugoslavia. Unfortunately, there is no promising sign that the situation would improve in northern Nigeria or that corruption which is the primary cause of these conflicts would abate. It further irks my probing mind that the architects of this state of anomie in the person of Chief Obasanjo - Godfather of corruption and notorious election rigger, IBB – a notorious pilferer and murderer, Danjuma, Anenih, oil subsidy thieves, police pension criminals and all the political and economic criminals in our society are sitting nicely in the comforts of their houses while the innocents are paying the price of their profligacy and kleptomania. Corruption is a cancer that eats gradually until it destroys the victim. How could one explain that a rich country like Nigeria where billions of dollars were stolen by our politicians and military dictators could not provide fund to fight insurgency? This is in spite of the fact that billions of naira have been allocated to defense over the years. Isnt it a contradiction that our military and police are underpaid, undervalued and under motivated to fight insurgency? What a shame! What happened to our defense budgets over the years? Does the Federal government under GEJ have the political will to probe the system and find out what the money was used for? Never! Not after calling IBB his boss, OBJ his godfather and Alamiesaghe his benefactor. As it is presently, Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states have been taken over by Boko Haram. Every serious leadership around the world restructured their security network and operation after the September 11th attack on the World Trade Centre in the USA due to the trend in global terrorism which is a moving target but Nigerian leadership was too preoccupied with oil well allocations and embezzlement of public funds to see the dangers ahead. It did not occur to them that we have porous borders especially in unstable regions of the north where we needed to acquire the most up to date equipment in border patrol and develop bio-metric data of foreigners to monitor movement of people. They never thought that our military needed modern training and equipment to meet up with challenges in asymmetric warfare like terrorism. The argument is not whether Boko Haram was sponsored by politicians or not, the reality is that we did not prepare against it. So the laziest and irresponsible action to take was to invite those who have better brain and better understanding of how to organize and lead a nation, those who have zero tolerance to corruption and a functional justice system and so today we have multinational terrorism experts from Europe, USA, Middle East etc giving directive to our military commanders. These are countries that used their God-given brain and skill to make life worth living for their subjects while ours are agents of destruction. The number 1 terrorists in Nigeria are the politicians whose kleptomanic diseases have killed more people than Boko Haram. The main problem with our politicians is that they are afflicted with an incurable disease of the mind to the extent that they don’t study history and observe events in other parts of the world so as to build a viable future for their subjects. Many books and documentaries on the effects of corruption on failed states in South America and Africa are available but our leaders chose to ignore the key revealing facts in these books which would have saved Nigeria from this sorry state. A casual observer of events in Nigeria runs the risk of heaping the woes of the present state of terror in Nigeria on Boko Haram and militancy but it is deep rooted issue of long years of corruption perpetuated by the elites - for it is well established that since independence Nigeria have never had a truly elected leader but rather puppets and puppeteers rigged into office to do the whims and caprices of their criminal groups (refer to my book -The Frozen Democracy: Godfatherism and Elite Corruption in Nigeria) which was mainly to share the spoils of office among themselves leaving the masses to suffer. I did warn in this book that Nigeria is approaching Armageddon and urged our politicians to do self-re-examination and exorcise this evil of corruption. It was the corruption of the elites that instigated the unrest in the Niger delta which eventually gave rise to militant groups such as MEND that introduced kidnapping for ransom into our society – a malaise that has refused to go till date. It was the wickedness perpetuated by the Nigerian leadership especially the northern elites which refused to utilise the funds stolen from our national vaults during the long years of military tyranny to develop their region and educate their subjects. The Almajiris and the Fallahins became willing tools of destruction in the hands of their wealthy masters. Thousands of productive Nigerians have lost their lives and properties in the north due to religo-political riots often planned and directed from the mosque by their religio-political leaders. Why was it that no northern elite fought for a sharia state until a southerner and a christian became president in 1999? In year 2000 they went ahead to kill more than 3000 innocent Nigerians in 2 days to actualise their dream of a sharia state. The incidence of bomb throwing and mind blowing murders became prevalent once another southerner took over from Yar Adua. Why was it that no notable northern leader condemned the activities of Boko Haram rather they pressurised us to negotiate with them while they kept murdering innocent Nigerians? They even idealised that Boko Haram was a pressure group like MEND and her leaders should be flown to Abuja in private jets to receive handshake from our president and place them on salaries and rehabilitation course. Curiously, when external forces landed in Nigeria to assist the government fight Boko Haram, the same northern elites suddenly came out en mass to condemn Boko Haram – a gesture too late. Millions of innocent, productive and industrious southerners who traveled to northern Nigeria in search of better living and to help develop the region have returned to their regions after witnessing the orgy of violence perpetuated against them by those they call brothers. I am sure not many southerners would like to move to these regions again to work or live. So what is the essence of Nigeria when some people cannot live peacefully in some parts of Nigeria without harassment or even risk of death after more than 50 years of independence? It just shows that something is not right? At this stage there is an urgency of demand for us to go back to the table of dialogue. To this end, we must not miss the opportunity presented by the current National Conference on-going in Abuja. The Yoruba cultural group has come up with what is arguably the best option for Nigeria which is to go back to regional government. I dare say that this is not a suggestion but a necessity for Nigeria as it would give each region the opportunity to determine her future rather than the present Federal arrangement which is riddled with corruption, wicked opportunism and moral opprobrium. I pity those who say that Nigeria’s unity is non-negotiable. We can negotiate this unity on the table of dialogue or in the battle field. The blood of sustaining this nation is not just acceptable. Regionalism is not new and many states of the north already got autonomy since 2000 when the Sharia legal system usurped the Nigerian constitution in the region. Nigeria has gone beyond redemption. There is no justification for sustaining a system that keeps killing its citizens, that lacks the will and means to fight corruption, that could not provide affordable health care or education for her citizens, that cannot organize a free and fair election, could not provide security, cannot provide a social cushion for the poor, that encourages and idealizes corruption, protects criminals, encourages flagrance disregard to the rule of law etc. We must try another system and regionalism is the best viable option unless somebody comes up with something better. Whosoever is against it does not have the good of Nigeria at heart. Yugoslavia, Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Sudan Ethiopia and Eritrea, Indian and Pakistan etc separated to avoid further shedding of blood. Even the Irish Republic broke away from the United Kingdom and a referendum is about to take place in the Scotland which would determine if the Scottish people want to remain part of the United Kingdom. The time has come for us to do what is sane. If we fail to maximise the moment, it is not only the blood of the ‘baboons and the dogs’ that would be shared on the streets to borrow a line from Gen. Buhari. Be informed therefore, that the blood of the horses and cows are not sacred in the battlefield that will eventually come out of this devious contraption if sanity does not prevail.
Posted on: Sat, 24 May 2014 11:52:51 +0000
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