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From Nigeria to ‘Liegeria’: Goodluck Jonathan and Nigeria’s Successful Return To The State Of Nature By Olumuyiwa Amao

November 21, 2014

The world was treated to a macabre dance, with ‘Honourables’ and the Police throwing caution into the wind. Canister of teargas flew freely at anyone in sight, while some Parliamentarians also showcased their different acrobatic and fence-scaling skills. When the ensuing hullabaloo eventually subsided, the National Assembly (NASS) had already become a House of Commotion, while Nigeria’s already dented image, plummeted further within the international community.

In what appears to be a scene re-enactment of the Western Nigeria legislative crisis of 1962, where supporters of both the rivalry groups within the Action Group (AG) violently clashed on the floor of the Parliament building, in Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria’s National Assembly (NASS) was on Wednesday, thrown into confusion and chaos. However, unlike the 1962 Legislative crisis, which was mainly between rival politicians the warring factions this time were the Nigerian Police and the House of Representative members, particularly, parliamentarians from the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC).

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The world was treated to a macabre dance, with ‘Honourables’ and the Police throwing caution into the wind. Canister of teargas flew freely at anyone in sight, while some Parliamentarians also showcased their different acrobatic and fence-scaling skills. When the ensuing hullabaloo eventually subsided, the National Assembly (NASS) had already become a House of Commotion, while Nigeria’s already dented image, plummeted further within the international community.

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A number of arguments have been advanced for the sudden turn of events at the NASS. Some have argued that the despicable scenario which climaxed on Wednesday, November, 19, 2014 has its aquo est impositum from the recent defection of Speaker Aminu Tambuwal from the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) to the APC; a development which led to the withdrawal of the latter’s security details on the orders of the Inspector General of Police, Suleiman Abba.

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To some others, the massive police deployment at the NASS was a politically motivated attempt by the Presidency to avert “the motion for the impeachment of the President at plenary, which the PDP members in the House got wind of, and were mobilized along with the police’ to stop.

The most ridiculous of these explanations, for what has now become the ‘November 19, 2014 invasion’, was the one which emanated officially from Nigeria’s Presidency and the Police authorities. Speaking through its Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs, Dr. Doyin Okupe, the government rose in defence of the show of shame, arguing unconvincingly that the action was meant to defend ‘the laws of the land’ while Force Public Relations Officer, Emmanuel Ojukwu, argued that the police action was necessitated by an intelligence report of a likely invasion of the House by thugs which it received, and that it was in the course of the screening of the House members and visitors, that Speaker Tambuwal arrived with “a motley crowd and assaulted the Police operatives on duty.” Of course, the rest, as they say, is now history!

From my standpoint, what is particularly interesting is not just the invasion of the NASS, but the picky/selective nature of current governments’ response to issues of far more significant importance than this no-issue. To be sure, my attempt in this piece is not to vindicate the actions of the fence scaling Honourables who turned the hallowed chambers of the NASS to a gymnastic field. As far as I am concerned, their actions not only exemplifies the sad commentary the Nigerian state has become, but also presents us with a more telling description of the quality of representation a people so rich in terms of human resources, now enjoy.

But again, when situated within the confines of the first-cause argument, the actions of the lawmakers, no matter how crude and dishonourable it seems, stems from the executive lawlessness and a culture of misplaced priorities which have become the defining characteristics of the Goodluck Jonathan Presidency in recent times. For the purpose of this article therefore, I shall attempt to borrow a clue from the argument adduced by the Presidency and the Police Authorities, and use same to demonstrate how unimaginably clueless and increasingly irresponsible the Goodluck Jonathan government has become.

To begin with, the government, claims that the Police were there to prevent the breakdown of law and order, following the intelligence report it received, but the questions which follows are: why was it only the Speaker and members of the opposition that were prevented from gaining access to the chamber? How come even after those members forced their way into the premises of the National Assembly, they were still teargased? And more importantly, how many times have we seen the Nigerian Police and other security agencies “show up” proactively to prevent the breakdown of order in other parts of the country experiencing more acute security issues?

The answer to the above questions are, perhaps, firmly located within the precincts of President Jonathan’s handling of the events that have played out in the country in recent times. Beginning with the on-going Boko Haram insurgency, this government has failed intentionally to bring the perpetrators of these heinous crimes to justice. By the President’s own admission, more than 12000 Nigerians have been killed by a bunch of rag tags masquerading as Boko Haram, yet this government under the authority of the C-in C, did not see the need to maintain law and order in the North Eastern states of Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states. Today, Bama is still firmly in control of the insurgents, with Chibok, Mahia, Mubi, Hong, Vitnim, Pela and Gombi exchanging hands between the security forces and Boko Haram.

Even when the insurgents took the battle to the nation’s seat of power, Abuja, which is the operational base of Nigeria’s security force, who now appears to have realised their constitutional responsibility of maintaining law and order, they were conspicuously missing in action. As at the last count, and according to the Norwegian Refugee Council and its Internal Displacement Monitoring Center, there are at least 3.3 million displaced persons in Nigeria, And the country now holds the unenviable record of having the third largest number of displaced persons in the world, after Syria and Colombia.

This appalling scenario notwithstanding, we are yet to see the Jonathan Presidency respond to the cries of its citizens who have been displaced in their own country the way it has tactically attempted to deal with members of the opposition party. In Nasarawa state, the Ombatse and the Eggon tribesmen have been on each other’s neck for over two years, killing hundreds of innocent Nigerians and displacing thousands more, yet, President Jonathan’s security forces have consistently failed to maintain law and order in that state. In Benue state, the Tiv and Fulani tribes men have relentlessly committed genocidal atrocities against each other, killing and maiming with reckless abandon, but we are yet to see GEJ’s security forces respond with the same alacrity it showed when it laid siege on Tambuwal and the members of the opposition on November 19, 2014.

In Jos, ethnic cleansing has become the closest companion of the people, so much so that the sight of a dead man on the street means next to nothing; the people have become accustomed to a Jonathanian state of nature. Where life is not only brutish, but incredibly hellish and nasty, yet this Presidency has failed to direct his attack dogs to maintain law and order, as it did during the dying days of the (emperor in chief), Joseph Mbu as Police commissioner in River state. Mbu’s impunity went so much unchecked that the man boasted so openly to have tamed the ‘Leopard in Port Harcourt’, in apparent reference to the Governor, Rotimi Amaechi.

Under this Presidency, as it had been under the previous PDP-led governments, Nigerians have witnessed unimaginable terror in the hands of kidnappers, ritualists, and armed robbers, but we are yet to see the police rising to the occasion to perform its constitutional responsibility of maintaining law and order as it did in the National Assembly. But when the President’s Uncle; Chief Inengite Nitabai and a sister to the Minister of Petroleum—Mrs. Osiya Agama were kidnapped, the Police and DSS rose to the occasion. But in President Jonathan’s state of nature (Nigeria), this government has shown that the life of its citizenry is meaningless, and it has done so with the highest degree of impunity.

This impunity in some instances has been graduated to outright lies, as evident for example in the proceeds this government claimed to have made from the cut in the subsidy of petroleum products in 2012.  Although the government did claim that part of the monies saved from the subsidy removal will be used towards building new refineries, the moribund refineries in Delta, Rivers, and Kaduna states are the only ones the country could boast of. Very recently also, the Goodluck Jonathan government ‘duped’ at least 693,000 of its citizens through its Ministry of Interior when it advertised non-existent jobs in the Immigration Service.

In all, the sum of N693m was realised as proceeds from the purchase of application forms, with at least 20 Nigerians dying in the stampede that followed. Till date, No job has been given to any of the aspirants, including the 3 slots each, which the President announced as compensation to the families of the victims of the tragedy. So how then do you explain when a government which has a mandate to maintain law and order, abandons its duty, and instead obtains money by false pretence from the same citizenry whose lives it has failed to improve? Who does that? And where in the world can this happen other than in Jonathan’s Nigeria?

As I write, Abba Moro remains the Minister of Interior, while President Jonathan looks on to another term in office! Such is the comedy which Nigeria has become under the Jonathan Presidency. When a government which ought to be a solution to the myriad of challenges bedevilling its citizenry, becomes the problem, then we must realise that such a country has become a ‘Banana Republic’, where the only constant, is the worse. In Jonathan’s Nigeria, government businesses have become personal properties, while patronage has become the defining rule of engagement in the conduct of official responsibilities.

More than any other time in our history as a people and as a nation, corruption has been so glorified, so much so that the President’s former political benefactor, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha; a man convicted of stealing millions of dollars while serving as the state governor of his Bayelsa state was given state pardon. But the ordinary man on the street who stole the handset belonging to the Governor of Osun state, Rauf Aregbesola was jailed for 50 years. Where else would you see that happening other than in Goodluck Jonathan’s Nigeria? 

In this state of nature called Nigeria, and more importantly under the Jonathan Presidency, the PDP last year demonstrated its disdain for mathematics, when it divided the Governors Forum led by Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi. The latter had beaten Jonathan’s candidate, Jonah Jang of Plateau state for the chairmanship of the forum, by 19 to 16 votes. But the camp loyal to President Jonathan insisted that 16 must be greater than 19. Again, the rest is history!

And only very recently, 7 members of President’s Jonathan’s PDP just successfully impeached the Speaker of a 26 member House of Assembly in Ekiti State, with the full support of the Police which deployed its men in droves to oversee the aberration. Yet there has been no official condemnation of this anomaly by the government or the party! As a matter of fact, I read in awe, when the Governor of the state, Ayo Fayose, a man believed to be of questionable character, justified the impeachment and congratulated his party men for a hatchet job, well executed! How worse can it get for Nigeria under the Jonathan Presidency?

Today, and according to Nigeria’s National Bureau of Statistics (which is a government owned-institution) more than 60 % of Nigerians live on less than 1 USD a day, tens of millions of its citizenry remain largely unemployed, the nation’s health system has become so terribly bad that the President himself had to go to Germany to treat a ‘headache’, while critical infrastructure in the nation’s Universities are nothing but a perfect description of a state of nature. How else do we describe Jonathan’s Nigeria, other than a country with all the trappings of one of the worst places to live on earth?

A country where corruption has been simplified and rebranded by the President himself as mere public stealing, a country where 276 of its brightest young females were abducted in Chibok, and 7 months down the line, they are still cooling their heels, and perhaps warming the bed of their abductors. The sad commentary goes on and on, but at least, there is an opportunity for Nigerians to either wriggle their way out of this state of nature called Liegeria through the ballot box in 2015, or choose to perpetually remain under siege.

 As a citizen, I know where my votes are headed, but the question is, do you?

Olumuyiwa Babatunde Amao is a doctoral candidate at the Department of Politics, University of Otago, New Zealand. Email: [email protected] ,Twitter: @talk2smat