On Kema Chikwe and the Chibok Girls

On Kema Chikwe and the Chibok Girls

Last week, Dr Kema Chikwe, the PDP National Women Leader and erstwhile Aviation Minister, received some very blistering scathes on account of comments she made during a prayer session of the PDP women. In her remarks, she asked the questions: “how did it happen? Who saw it happen? Who did not see it happen? Who is behind this?” She also went ahead to say “Our hearts are bleeding, not just broken. Please God send the Chibok girls home to their mothers and families. We plead with the school authorities to release their names and their pictures. Let God touch the hearts of those who know and have perpetrated this heinous action.”

The first salvo came from the Gov Shettima of Borno State, upbraiding the ex-minister for the questions she raised, thus portraying her as attempting to cast doubt on the reality of the kidnap, which amounts to insensitivity to the immediate families of the victims and the nation at large. He retorted and boasted that they are able to provide the names and pictures of all of the girls.

The APC also jumped into the fray. The Nigerian Tribune, on May 2, reported thus: “In a statement issued in Lagos by its interim national publicity secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party expressed concern that such an incautious and insensitive statement could be made by a woman, a mother, a grandmother and a top official of the ruling PDP over an issue that was undoubtedly the worst tragedy and biggest embarrassment to Nigeria.” Lai Mohammed was quoted as saying “It has been said that politics should not be brought into issues of national security. How can anyone keep quiet in the face of this glaring assault on the sensitivity of a whole nation by a supposed leader of the ruling party, who, indeed, is attempting to politicise a national tragedy, undoubtedly the worst in the history of our nation, if not the PDP?”. As usual, many Nigerians reproved the lady along those lines rather mercilessly.

But come to think of it. By way of an analogy, only last Saturday a friend of mine parked his and went into church only to come out and be confronted with an empty spot; the car had been stolen. He had had to park outside, as with other parishioners, because of the insecurity which has made the church authorities to keep all vehicles outside the church’s perimeter. By the time I called him, he was at the police station to make a report. The police naturally asked him many questions, ranging from the brand of car, its colour, other specifics, to the time in between when he parked the car and when he discovered it missing. They also must have sought to know if he noticed any suspicious movement when he parked the car. These are valid questions if the police must make any headway in the attempt to help my friend recover his car.

To the best of my knowledge, Kema Chikwe was the first to ask any intelligent question since the Chibok abduction; most of us went emotional, reveling in our grief and forgetting how these girls had to be found, after the recanted ruse from the military that most of them had been recovered – which was quite demoralizing. Only for her to be laid on the slab…?!

The fact remains that at every point in time, a society must construct a narrative that captures its reality especially in difficult moments such as Nigeria finds itself today. Whether or not these girls are all found and in whatever condition, this nation must have a narrative on this issue and unless the questions that Kema Chikwe raised are frankly answered, we can never tell the true story. This about Memory; it is the only way by which sound public policies and national pathways are crafted.

It is curious that it would take the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), Borno, to come up with a list after almost three weeks of the abduction. It is also curious that the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Federal Republic would reveal, during his presidential media chat, that he had asked for names and pictures of these abductees and was told that because of their Muslim background, most of them would not have their faces revealed only for him to later realize that 80% of them were infact Christians. It is curious that the number-one citizen would accept that yarn, under whatever impression, when the girls registered for and were sitting for WAEC examination. It’s strange!

Everything in this saga reeks sinister. Therefore, inspite of whatever her motives could have been, by Kema Chikwe and her questions should every Nigerian stand.

Published on BLUEPRINT Newspaper, May 8, 2014

Man-United, Moyes and Nigeria

Man-United, Moyes and Nigeria

This week’s piece is rather light hearted.

Manchester United football club, on Tuesday the 22^nd of April, sacked their manager, David Moyes, after only ten months into his six-year contract. In many quarters, this was not unexpected. This season, 2013/2014, has been a rather tortuous one for the club and its teeming fans. Going to any viewing centre or joint where people come to watch these matches while downing some beers and isiewu, the Red Devils’ fans have become quite subdued lately. They have approached most of their matches this season, even with non-descript teams, with so much reticence and trepidation for lack of confidence as to the likely outcome as it has been the most shambolic season for the club in the last half of a century. It is more disheartening for the team and its fans that they had entered the season not just as the defending champions but favourites. However, their “noisy nieghbours” and sister Manchester club whom they had always trounced, Manchester City Football Club, deafened and out-gunned them. Their home ground, Old Trafford, which hitherto was theartre of dreams, became a theatre of nightmares as they seemed to even lose more matches there. Beer, at joints, became sour and isiewu tasteless in the mouth of fans as all the Chelsea and Mourinho followers became pestilent with their jeering and a mirage of a wind began to fill in the lungs of Arsenal FC fans too long asphyxiated with lack of silverware, to the point of nuisance.

However, only a season ago, Man- United had been the team to beat under the stewardship of the legendary Sir Alex Ferguson. For twenty-six year they dominated English football and the English Premier League trophy practically became theirs, with other teams only managing to have a feel of it for one or two seasons only to return it to the certified “owners”. But like with everything in life, an end must come and Ferguson had to go. He chose Moyes as successor on whom the sobriquet “The Chosen One” was dubbed. One guesses that nobody expected that Moyes would easily fill the shoes left by Ferguson, for they were very big indeed, but as it would turn out, these shoes became just too big for him. People, fans especially, probably did not expect that he would win any trophy and they did not hope for any, at least for now; but at least they expected some promise. They were ready to give him time to build his own system and carve his own niche in the club as it had become clear that United had become Ferguson and Ferguson, United. But as much as the season has gone so far, Moyes never sparked much promise. It is easily conceivable, therefore, that the management of the club lets him go. In life, no matter how low anybody can go, there are irreducible minimums; and for a club of the pedigree of United, Moyes has performed below its irreducible minimum and go he had to.

Irreducible minimums: this is what brings the question of Nigeria into all of this talk about the sack of David Moyes. Even though Nigeria could not quite be said to have flown the heights that Man-United had done before the coming of Moyes, everybody had always seen her potentials and she had towered above many others in Africa and beyond. We have been in this democracy thing since 1999 and it has been absolutely evident that this country has been very under-led and at no time has the impact of this mis-leadership been more manifest than now. This problem is not just at the federal but at all levels of our national life. Just as with United, erstwhile “noisy neighbours” whom, as a nation, we were head and shoulders above and who used to look up to us as big brother now laugh at us and treat us even with disdain and scorn. Small countries around no longer take us seriously. The other time, Robert Mugabe took a passing swipe at Nigeria and it would take the Nigerian government three solid months before they would realize and attempt to respond; an eloquent proof of the quality of leadership in the country.

The difference between United and Nigeria is realizing who the boss is. In a democracy, the people are the boss but the Nigerian people have failed to accept the fact that they are now the boss. These bad Nigerian leaders actually are the ones playing boss. Nigerians have also allowed themselves to be hoodwinked by these bad leaders with religion, ethnicity and all manner of sectarian devices, therefore they do not have the incentive to be able to identify bad leadership and deal with it appropriately.

We must learn to fire people in leadership positions if they fail to deliver regardless of whatever. There must be irreducible minimums, below which we must be prepared to take nothing else. The bosses in Man-United were able to fire Moyes after only ten months into a six-year term. Most offices in Nigeria are for less than six years and so non-performing holders may damn well be fired at anytime.

Published on BLUEPRINT Newspaper April, 2014

Wanted: A Dutiful Nigerian

Wanted: a dutiful Nigerian

With the pains of the continued missing of the Chibok girls gnawing this nation, but their respective parents, one cannot but notice the leadership deficit in the nation today. Below is a piece I did, October 2012, which I find relevant to harp the leadership morass we are saddled with. Enjoy.

Last Sunday, the nation woke up to be greeted with the tale of the killing of some 26 persons in Dogon Dawa in the Birnin Gwari area of Kaduna State. During the course of the week, emerging reports have indicated that the attack was indeed a well advised act: a group of Nigerians unleashed it on the community in reprisal for an alleged violation on others of theirs. A policeman has even been fingered as an accomplice.

Earlier, four University of Port-Harcourt students were brazenly murdered in the most despicable and barbaric manner by a community, Aluu, in Rivers State for allegedly stealing laptops and mobile telephone sets. While all the humiliation and eventual killing was going on, people had the all the time to video the ongoing – probably even without revulsion as we have become numb to such horrors – and we still had a police force in place in Nigeria. Feelers even have it that the police actually got to the scene and then left off before the young men were finally roasted alive.

Also, days before all that, in the dead of night in Mubi, students, 26 of them, were cut down by persons wielding guns and machetes and axes, with many others gravely injured. These killers, as with many others before them, took their time; they went from room to room; identified their victims and hacked them down. This was only days after the claim by the nation’s security system that it had combed the area for terrorist threats and was satisfied that all was fine. On the night in question, they – the security – were nowhere to be found, and never showed up during that whole length of time it would have taken to go from room to room, identifying human beings and perishing them. It is a tragedy; a huge indictment on the state.

Almost a year ago, the Nigerian Meteorological Agency warned the nation of impending incidences of massive flooding this year 2012 across the country. Nobody expected anyone one to be able to stop an occurrence of nature, but at least high risk areas could have been identified and people relocated, even if forcibly. Since early this year, signs began to manifest as to the seriousness of that forecast as isolated floods began pummelling Nigeria and Nigerians. Nothing was quite done until things got to a head. Now we are running from pillar to post with relief materials. We seem to be so verily enamoured of the “relief” bit of emergency management and response. May be because money is what we understand and we love every opportunity to throw it at anything as has been done in this occasion.

There is crass dereliction of duty at every stratum of the Nigerian national life. The wonder is whether it is because it is easy to abandon responsibility or it is just that we deliberately cast off our responsibility because we choose to be profiteers of disorder. Whichever way, we are the worse off in the long-run because society must quake with the effects of our failure and either we or our children must suffer. When the state fails to provide security for citizens, citizens will naturally improvise and that means taking laws into their hands. If the Aluu community were certain that the police will duly investigate and prosecute those murdered four for the alleged robbery, they surely would have handed them over. If the group that attacked the Dogon Dawa community had been confident that their grievance would be properly attended to by the Nigerian security system, they most likely would not have taken matters into their own hands. If people who have been arrested in the past over various offences and crimes had been seen to be duly prosecuted, convicted and punished, where necessary, and without heed to their socio-economic estate, ethnicity, religion or whatever consideration, the worst of us would not have so brought out. If someone had acted dutifully and promptly on the early warnings of the Nigerian Meteorological Agency, many Nigerians would not have been out exposed in the elements, displaced persons without homes and with livelihoods lost.

But surely ours is a nation of abandoned responsibilities by virtually all: political leaders, civil servants, security operatives, public officers and also the private sector. People are sure that if you forward a concern to some appropriate quarters, it is sure to be frustrated as someone, for whatever reason, just fails or refuses to act upon it and suffers no consequences for such dereliction. But we all suffer as a result as a society. The concept of the butterfly effect is instructive here: a seemingly innocuous ripple out in the ocean finally causing a tsunami. This is why many a Nigerian looks at our country today and wonders whether it is not an exercise in futility to entertain any hope for a better society. For the older people who feted the nation’s independence with great expections and especially those of them who have worked tirelessly, with sincerity and integrity to make sure that Nigeria might become the great nation that its potentials poised it for, the feeling must be one of excruciating misery as they cannot recognize this country. As for the younger generation, surely the feeling is of anger and frustration. For them, this must be a society that does not care for its own. Indeed they could not deem themselves any more than orphans. No one, therefore, has the moral legitimacy to question their lack of (or is it refusal to...?) commitment, and even hostility, to the nation.

But hope is not lost. We can save Nigeria for our children... but only if we want and we are determined. Regardless of our status, we must commit ourselves to our simple duties in our own little corners of Nigeria. Mr President, and all elected leaders, must be eloquently seen to be at the head of the move to salvage the nation. As an erstwhile leader of this country, IBB, once rightly called out, for their tomorrow we must give our today.

Published on BLUEPRINT Newspaper, May 1, 2014.

What does the Future Hold for Our Children?

What does the Future Hold for Our Children?

Sam hails from Kaduna state. He was born in the late sixties in Tudun Wada, a suburb in Kaduna. He has lived all his live in that same city. He attended primary school in one of the public LEA schools in that same suburb with children from different backgrounds. The area was quite cosmopolitan in nature and all peoples lived together in good neighbourliness. His closest friend in school was Hussaini, from a Muslim home; with whom they would alternately attend Islamic Religious Knowledge and Christian Religious Knowledge classes together, Sam being from a Christian home. It was not a consciously agreed arrangement except for the fact that they both enjoyed each other’s company and would rather not split when it was time for the two religious instruction classes which took place separately. This friendship of theirs and the manner in which they attended each other’s classes were not special or unique to the two of them, for there were many other children in the school who had the same relationship as they. They simply saw each other as human beings and friends and regarded their respective religions and ethnicity as nothing other than mere differences occasioned nature’s chance arrangement – if there is anything as chance in nature.

At home also, Sam, as well as other children, lived and played with children from different ethnic and religious backgrounds. They played street football together. They played all manner of childish pranks and mischief together. Among his many non-Christian friends was Mamuda. During Christmas, Mamuda and other Muslim kids would follow Sam to the local parish for the midnight Mass, after which they would move from house to house gaily dancing and singing with drums till day break in celebration of the feast of Christmas. Sam and other non-Muslim kids also followed Mamuda and other Muslim children to the local Islamiyya every other day. One of the reasons was probably that the children did not want to have fun at play without their peers who had to be at the Islamiyya because their parents rightly wanted them to get sound moral upbringing in the faith, so they accompanied them and, afterwards, they all went to play football or whatever fun activity they laid their hand on for that evening together. Infact Sam, a Christian, learnt how to recite the Suratul Fatiha and other basic teachings his friends learnt at that time. In all of these, the children’s respective parents never minded; they were happy to see their kids play together and were only too eager to correct them all together should the falter, even if it meant disciplining with some lashes of the cane. All children belonged to all parents, irrespective of tribe and religion.

The above account looks like some exercise in romanticism but all children who had a childhood in a northern Nigerian town like Kaduna before sometime in the late eighties into the a bit of the early nineties recognize this environment, and I bet, with a lot of nostalgia in view of the hell that has unabatedly become of our society. Unbeknownst to these children and most of their parents, while they were busy being children and having innocent fun and simple pleasures, some people with dubious agenda were busy plotting mischief: some of which they – these plotters – probably never envisaged the ultimate impact. All they cared about was the immediate gratification. Some of them actually had grander sinister motives and ambitions for which they were ready to sacrifice the futures of those innocents of yesteryears without batting an eye.

So much has happened, unfortunately for the worst, and today Sam lives in the southern part of the city of Kaduna, just as many others like him have relocated to the northern part, all along ethno-religious lines. Sam would think twice before venturing into areas of his childhood for fear of the unforeseen in spite of fond memories which he still treasures inside of him and ditto for other children like him who are on the “other” side. But that is not probably the worst even. Sam has a family now with two beautiful children. While he is occasionally able to talk with Mamuda and Hussaini, who also have their respective families, on phone or when they chance into each other, their children do not know each other. Sam’s children attend some privately owned school that is basically Christian in character – of course due to the area in which they live and also for the fact that public school system has totally collapsed and no serious parents would risk sending their children there. He also hopes to send them to some missionary run secondary school in the near future.

The implication of this is that Sam’s children have probably never met a Muslim child much less befriend one. They perhaps only hear that some people are Muslim only from textbooks, and God only knows how else with whatever colourations and misinformation. Chances are that they will never get close to any until they get into the university, and with the way the public universities are today, many parents already prefer to send their children to private ones and with the many faith-based run universities, they may never have that rainbow opportunity until full adulthood when they must meet them in the larger society. The trajectory is the same for Hussaini and Mamuda’s children. The question is: how will these children’s Nigeria pan out?

The fact is that even with some lingering memories of a rainbow Nigeria, this country is already messed up as it is; what with the wanton killings and maiming along sectarian lines. Every Nigerian is defined in terms of which side he comes from. And all of these owe to the failure of the past, with injustice and impunity running in endless circle. The northern Nigerian society is the worst hit in this tragedy and as it stands no one is ready to listen to anybody because there is a serious dearth of courage to confront Truth. The level of social, economic, structural and legal injustice is enormous and it has destroyed and is still destroying our society. What we have failed to realize is the fact that, as Martin Luther King Jnr once said, injustice anywhere in the world affects everyone everywhere. While we sit idly by in our little perceived comfort zones without doing anything to address these injustices that seem to affect others, we wallow in self deceit as it they are inching in on and will surely catch up with us. The Boko Haram demon that is now tormenting us from left, right and centre started and many of us did not do anything, believing that it is “their” problem, or probably even secretly happy that the demon is here to deal with “them”. Well, now we know better.

This generation of Nigerians must stand up for posterity. We must do something to redeem the future for our children else our memory will forever remain an anathema in their hearts. We must rebuild the broken bridges. We must decide that every Nigerian is equal before the law. We must accept that everybody is indeed a human being created in the image and the like of God the almighty. This is the only way by which we can avert the impending doom that awaits our children.

Published on The Nigerian Newsday, April 27, 2014