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Rejoinder: The Hypocrisy Of Yesterdays Men By Amene Ter'Hemen

February 3, 2013

Mr Reuben Abati, I read your article of February 2, 2013 and to be fair in assessment, I would say I was disappointed with you and your reasoning. I was angered that you described Reuben Abati (that is yourself) of few years before he joined the Jonathan government and made it look like you were describing someone else. What these people you described are doing today, you did yesterday before Jonathan invited you over. Are you telling us you were wrong then? When they were in your place, you were in theirs; now you are where they were and they where you were.

Mr Reuben Abati, I read your article of February 2, 2013 and to be fair in assessment, I would say I was disappointed with you and your reasoning. I was angered that you described Reuben Abati (that is yourself) of few years before he joined the Jonathan government and made it look like you were describing someone else. What these people you described are doing today, you did yesterday before Jonathan invited you over. Are you telling us you were wrong then? When they were in your place, you were in theirs; now you are where they were and they where you were.

There is a lot in your write-up to discuss, but I guess my article will become too lengthy if I try to, so I would select just a few.

In your opening paragraph you started, as is your custom, by naming the people you wish to talk about; "A loosely bound group of yesterday’s men and women." This is hardly surprising. You, like everyone else in this government, have developed a penchant for tagging and name-calling, a habit that has robbed you of every element of respect I once had for you (the you is plural meaning you, Abati and all the others in Jonathan's administration with that same habit). After attaching a derogatory name, you decided to make a statement that you were going to contradict later; "... pick issues with virtually every effort of the administration..."  

"Arrogantly" you said, referring to your so-called 'loosely bound group of yesterday’s men and women'; "they claim to be better and smarter than everyone else in the current government." Is it surprising to you that these educated men believe they can do a better job? Look, the uneducated kid on the street thinks he has better ideas to move Nigeria forward than what you PhD holders are doing in Aso Rock. This is not far fetched; almost every plan that comes out your government of smart and educated people leave one wondering whether the people that approved such plans sent their brains on an accumulated leave to Germany or UK. I know you know what I am talking about, but a few examples should not be such a bad idea: look at the subsidy issue (punish the masses but not the cabal), consider the phones for farmers project; etc. If anyone fits the mold of one who claims to know all, it is you who surround and trudge the corridors of Aso Rock.

"In the same advanced societies ... People are called upon to serve; they do so with humility and great commitment..." Was your principal being humble when he told a bewildered nation, 'I don't give a damn'? May be that was metaphorical! Is it humility to keep calling people names just because they disagree with you? Humility is not same as slow speech or wearing an ever-smiling face; and one is not proud just because he talks fast or openly disagrees with other people's views. But wait a minute, is it not this your government that is fast to cite examples from developed countries; that of the oil producing countries, only Nigeria subsidises fuel (but will not tell us the earning power of the citizens of such nations); of how there are no okadas in Tokyo (but won't tell us they have trains there and we don't), etc.

"They ... manipulate the public’s desire for improvements in their daily struggles as opportunity..." I agree with you on this one, but I need to ask 'who left that vacuum that your 'loosely bound yesterday's' people are utilising? If the government of the day is seeing to be addressing the needs and aspirations of the people, I am sure those opportunities wouldn't be there. Don't blame lizards for invading your home, blame yourself for bringing ants infested firewood home.  

"Power blinds them to the reality that ... we have a unique opportunity to do well for the taxpayers and hardworking electorate that provide every public official the privilege to serve." I would give you a word of advice, copy that sentence, paste on an A2 sized paper, enlarge it and print for your principal, Mr President. It is possible he didn't know we the electorates afforded him the PRIVELEGE to serve and that was why he told us to our faces, 'I don't give a damn';  may be he wasn't aware and that explains why he thought it better to punish us with fuel price hike rather than the oil marketers who were in the wrong, collecting money for products not supplied; may be he doesn't know that's why our cries to him usually go unheard.   

"It is in the larger interest of our country that the point be made that the government of the day welcomes criticism and political activism." Do you believe this statement that you yourself wrote? I know you would say yes. If you do believe it, how come about this; "A loosely bound group of yesterday’s men and women... pick issues with virtually every effort of the administration..." If you welcome criticisms, why are you complaining that people are picking issues with your efforts? From the way I see it, your 'government of the day' hate to be criticised.  The governmeent of the day called Madam Oby Ezewesili names and went digging her past because she dared to criticise the government's way of spending; why were some youths shot dead during the subsidy protest? Because they criticised the government's fuel price hike without consideration to their welfare. As a matter of fact, you resorted to name calling in your piece because some individuals voiced criticisms to your government.  If you seriously believe this government takes kindly to criticisms, then I would give you your words to chew for dinner, you "must be told to stop hallucinating".

"The former Ministers, ...  who have been busy quoting mischievous figures, spreading cruel propaganda must be reminded that the Jonathan administration is in fact trying to clean up the mess that they created." This is a new low, even for you. Just in case, you are not able fall back to journalism, this statement has qualified you for the club of comedians. Which mess are you cleaning? Seriously I don't see any cleaning happening anywhere! Rather, I see more and more dirt being poured into an already dirty water. Is it the mess in the oil sector that you are cleaning? Oh I see, it is the one in the Nigeria Police that you are cleaning and that explains why a committee that gulped millions didn't see the rot at the Lagos academy; may be it is the rot in the health sector you are cleaning (that's why one must go outside for treatment). I don't see a thing that resembles cleaning the system happening!

"For the first time since 1999, the Nigerian Railway Corporation is up and running... They couldn’t do this in their time..." I think you are being unreasonably arrogant with your so called achievements. Is government no longer a continum where you build on the foundations of past ones? And if you did built on another's foundation, why do you make it look like you did everything yourself?

This next issue surprised and made me to wonder if indeed you wrote this piece or someone else did and appended your name to it; "... now they are busy looking for money that is not missing with their teeth. When questions are asked, they claim they invented the ideas of due process and accountability". Haba, Abati this sort of thing shouldn't come from a figure like you. This mud slinging shouldn't be associated with an occupant of a public office. No matter how angry you get, please put a lid on it next time. You vent such anger on someone who criticised you and yet turn around to say you welcome criticisms? Give me a break! We all know who you are referring to here, and she has placed her credibility on the line by calling for a debate. If you know and are convinced the money is not missing, what's holding you from meeting her up the podium to disgrace her for the world to see her lies? No name calling will change anyone's impression about this, only the debate will. For as long as you refuse the debate you have something to hide. By the way, why is this government always afraid of debates anyway? How did they defend the papers, projects, thesis for all the degrees they have? One more thing, looking at the way this government spends and plans to spend, no one needs a seer to see that the money is truly gone.

"They once promised to solve the crisis of electricity supply in Nigeria... They managed to leave the country in darkness with less than 2,000 MW; ... Today, there is greater coherence in the management of the power sector with power supply in excess of 4, 200 MW;..." I thought it was 5,000 MW, when did it drop to 4,200MW? I must give credit to Jonathan for this feat; but if truth be told, the lies that this administration has spurned concerning the power sector have completely destroyed her credibility and eroded benefit of the additional Mega Watts. We were told the nation is generating 5,000MW (that was immediately debunked) then recently we were told "power is stable in Nigeria". As a matter of fact, no government needs advertise its achievements on TV; if they are there, they'll be seen.

"They complain about the state of the roads. Most of the contracts were actually awarded under their watch to the tune of billions!" Is that why your government has left them undone? Do you know why your boss got the overwhelming support of Nigerians? You must have heard of "I am voting for Jonathan not PDP"; he was voted to fix things that his predecessors could not fix, and not to talk about his predecessors spending billions without any visible results.

"They talk about corruption, yet many of them have thick case files with the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, ..." Now you have exposed the lies of your government that it is serious about fighting corruption. If these people have thick files of corruption, what is your government doing about prosecuting them? It is the duty of your government to nail them. For you to write now when the government is almost two years, that individuals 'have thick corruption files with EFCC' is a self indictment that your government only makes noise about fighting corruption, but it in real sense pampers corruption; keeps a lid on the corruption profile of individuals just to keep them in check but exposes them as corrupt if/when they take a stance that runs against the government. This is not surprising at all, your principal said recently that corruption is not our problem but that our attitude is our undoing. I guess that explains why it is not necessary to 'tackle corruption frontally'.

"... so that we don’t end up continuing to make the same wasteful mistakes." You sure know how to get on my nerves! What do you call the kind of spending going on, if not wasteful. What do you call buying thirty new planes, when the recently privatized airline has folded up? If it is not wasteful, what would you call the billions you need for the VP's official residence? Tell me, what you would call the billions you are asking to build a secretariate for African First Ladies'? How about the one to build two gatesin the FCT?  Tell me, if it isn't a waste, what is it called that you spend N161bn in three weeks for fuel subsidy only to have longer queues at fuel stations? It is okay for you to think we don't know but please don't tell us we don't know because we know! You may think we are stupid and have short memories but please, don't tell us we are stupid, don't even make us feel stupid.

"... and to that the people have spoken in unison – they have had enough. Nigerians are wiser and are now familiar with the trickery from these persons..." I think Nigerians are not just tired of these your "loosely bound group of yesterday’s men and women", we are also tired of all of you in government who want us to believe what is not; who would tell us bare faced lies just because they are in government; those who would tell us electricity is stable when we have not seen to use a single Watt of light in weeks. We are tired, tired of paper achievements without visible impact on our lives.

"We have too many yesterday men and women behaving too badly." Quite frankly Mr Abati, I would rather have a yesterday man behave badly than have a today man behave in a manner unbecoming of an occupant of a public office. It is alright that you see yesterday men behaving badly, I see that too; what I don't understand is how you managed to miss the lies that the today men have been spinning right under your nose. May be it is alright for today's men and women to lie, that is why you have not noticed their lies.

By now I guess you would be wondering why I refused to address you appropriately as Dr Abati. I am sure it is painful to you that even though you paid your due to rightly own the doctorate, someone still calls you a Mister. Well, that's how painful, though much more painful, we the Nigerian masses feel everyday, to be deprived daily of the good life we rightly deserve because of poor judgment of the needs of the nation; sadly you have refused to tell the truth to those who should hear, lest you fall out of favour. You have turned your caustic tongue that was once directed at your principal the president on the masses,  just so he and those concerned can see you have enough and even more balls  than they have given you credit for.

Mr Abati, you can sing the achievements of the administration from now to eternity, but the fact is we the masses that dwell at the end of the line know better than to bite into this sugar coated cake of stone you are offering us.

Thank you for you patience.

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The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of SaharaReporters
 

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