NIGERIA NEWS :: THE OPTIMIST VOICE

Independence Celebration at Abuja

It is also important to call attention to the role of the press in such security issues. The Press, especially those run with glaring sectarianism are the backbone and supporting framework for the cancer. While on some occasions some Nigerian press are part of the problem directly, through incitements and half baked stories, at other times they take such divisive and explosive events they did not initiate further by adding fuel to it. This they do by sitting on the fence, ignoring credible evidences that may diffuse and quell the crises, and sometimes blatantly creating non existent evidences and witnesses just to fan the crises. The militancy of some of the dailies, weekly magazines and others could be traced all the way back to the era of nationalism and fight for independence. But since independence, half a century later, those papers have failed to wean themselves away from militancy. Some go further to label themselves as crusaders or guerilla journalists.

In a study (Olukoyun, 2004), the author described the militant Nigerian print media positively as “imbued with a self-conscious tradition of outspokenness, which at the limits sometimes teeters on anarchy. The “crusading” names of such titles as; the Vanguard, the Punch, the Guardian, and the Champion, testifies to a militant press ideology dating back to the nineteenth century.”

Such labels have made Nigerian Press a laughing stock abroad, because no genuine journalist in the mainstream and professional world openly bases his publication on subjective goals. The author of the widely acclaimed book “The Africans” Professor Ali Mazrui, whose series based on the book ran on American Public Television in 1986, sees such divisive press tendency as contributing to the nation’s lack of development by strapping it in constant battle against itself.

Professor Mazrui in an online article described such South Western prejudice in favor of their ethnic group (Yoruba) as “Ethnocracy in South-West Nigeria” further tagging it as “deeply worrying.” The Nigerian press must join its colleagues worldwide in nation building and responsible journalism not destruction and fanning divisiveness. Nigeria is not the only nation faced by heterogeneous challenges, but its press stands out as one that insists on divisiveness and other goals underlined by personal gain and serving individual interest at times through crisis, and contributing to the killing of their brothers and sisters. In other words actively contributing to the retrogressive way its nation is limping.

Finally those in leadership positions, including the nation’s security and media should as a matter of urgency stop serving as proxies for external interest, organizations, ideals and governments at the expense of the country and its people. This is a very serious issue, and stands as a serious threat to the unity and security of the nation. Nigerians should not allow greedy politicians, zealots parading themselves as nationalistic and religiously upright, enriching themselves at the expense of the nation’s security, prosperity and progress.

Everything being equal, the United States of America especially, has a vested interest in seeing the Nigerian second experimentation with its Presidential type system of government succeed. That should be one of its leading Foreign Policy priorities on the continent, as Nigeria is not only the most populous (one of every four African is a Nigerian), it is one of the most influential. The United States owes its citizens who generally lean towards legitimate and bilaterally sound economic and foreign policy, such relationship that is mutually beneficial.

The U S government should extend their ties with Nigeria ahead of commercial interest based on oil, to other sectors such as political as well as economic interest. It serves neither to continue to at the very least witness chaos and destruction. That relationship should be transparent and positive. I am however, neither advising nor in support of U S stationing its forces in Nigeria. The African Union has already worked and continues to work towards its common regional interest and continental agenda on all fronts including security.

Already Nigeria being the world’s sixth largest producer of Oil among the fourteen nation oil cartel OPEC, has the United States as its leading market, and with serious energy solicitations from Asia and other developing nations becoming industrialized at a rapid pace, there in no such guarantee for future alliance if the United States remains trapped in old foreign ideology towards the continent and Nigeria in particular. The U S government must step up positive and transparent roles.

NIGERIA NEWS

The Elephant in the Room:

Nigeria at 49

Hadiza Wada, DBA

October 3, 2009.

The most urgent situation Nigeria faces at this point in time, when it turns 49, one that has the potential to destroy it completely by turning it into a ghost nation, the likes of Somalia and Afghanistan is the lack of resolve by its leadership to seriously take up and crush the challenge to its security. And I am not talking about the Boko Haram, Dar –us-Islam and others who those in leadership in Nigeria and abroad want us to believe are the real threat to security in Nigeria. I am talking about the elephant in the room which no one wants to acknowledge. By that I mean the elected leaders that continue to kill their people under one guise or another. How can a nation with all the apparatus and might under its wing, choose to play the disabled and castrated role unable to face the serious security challenges it face.

Some local elected civilian leaders since 1999 have made a calculated choice to dwell on dormant sentiments to cause catastrophic crises that led to thousands of lives being lost in their localities. What is most abhorrent is the fact that, even within the present administration, a decade after running a civilian administration, the nations is still held hostage to the refusal to deal justifiably with the situation. Many lost souls still cry for justice, and as if plagued by its curse, the nation is still virtually running its engine with no visible progress since then.

The federal government is yet to define and execute a targeted and swift method of punishing and ultimately controlling rogue leaders. Joshua Dariye still runs free, so also those behind the Shagamu, Zaki Biam crises etc. People with visible roles are going about their business with the blood of thousands on their hands as if nothing happened. To crown and make matters worse, the fact that the ruling party, a national party the size of Peoples Democratic Party can continue to allow shady leaders to run under its umbrella controlling millions of people is another enigma. I am referring to the present leadership of Plateau state and the recent crisis we saw under it, for which the present Governor Jonah Jang has not been completely cleansed of blame.

Nigerians are generally smart people. But they have refused, for reasons best known to them, to contemplate the magnitude of what they allow themselves to be gradually led into, by some greedy few. Can we take a cue from countries like Iraq today, whose own citizen like Ahmed Chalabi worked literally to invite a foreign government into his nation, which resulted in such catastrophic consequence for its people, while the government that was invited including its policy makers are now seriously reexamining the validity of the rationale behind its taking up the offer?

Nigeria since 1999, has seen a marked escalation of civil strife, after reestablishing for the second time, a Presidential system of government the likes of that practiced for two centuries in the United States of America, in preference over the British parliamentary system used only once immediately after Nigerian Independence from Britain in 1960. These recent crises that led to ten of thousands of lives lost were mainly ignited along ethnic and religious lines. While many reliable sources close to the events have laid the blame on the elected leadership within those communities, including the Nigerian President and its Senate in 2004, who sanctioned the State governor of Plateau State, by suspending him because of his role, no one is effectively addressing such serious threats.

I knowingly used the words ignited because to be candid such crises do not just erupt, they were engineered through the stirring up of local sentiments known to be in existence within the affected local communities. These sentiments have laid dormant owing mostly to local religious and traditional control of the situations, and the cooperation of those with genuine interest in maintaining peace, fairness and justice under the law within those communities, and largely with the cooperation, ironically, from the much despised military governments.

The cancer Nigeria now faces literally is the existence of a group of people, who are allowed to get into positions of leadership, but who in reality exhibit irresponsible attribute, as far as the safeguarding the life and property of citizens, a key element of democratic ideals is concerned. These cliques of people generally label themselves as messiahs, but those who have access to revealing documentation know it is a charade masqueraded under the guise of local patriotism. The real motive is greed, evidence of which were blatantly carried on the pages of our national dailies, where the same self-righteous state governor Joshua Dariye responsible for thousands of innocent lives, was apprehended by British security over the loot he was sneaking abroad. He was officially charged with money laundering, which literally means trying to legitimize illegally acquire funds. How can a nation with such intellect go blind to the real motive (greed and selfishness) for the indiscriminate taking of lives; talk less about the radiating security threat that ensued based on corrupted sentiments to other sections of the country.