Our gradual descent to anarhy

Apart from sending bills to the National assembly to borrow money to finance projects, while failing to give account of what he has done with Nigeria’s depleted crude and foreign reserves; Mr. President has now began an international junket to tell the world how he is going to rig the April elections – all at […]

Apart from sending bills to the National assembly to borrow money to finance projects, while failing to give account of what he has done with Nigeria’s depleted crude and foreign reserves; Mr. President has now began an international junket to tell the world how he is going to rig the April elections – all at taxpayer’s expense. His foreign minister, Odein Ajumogobia has been flying across continents and many of his special assistants are holding courts. What the president has failed to inform anybody is how he is getting the money to finance this. Thankfully, he is not obliged to do so.
It is also curious that the president would protest to the CPC for being heckled in Bauchi and intriguing for Muhammadu Buhari to issue a warning to his supporters to stop using heckling the presidential campaign train. For one, Jonathan carries on in his campaign in areas where there is crisis and where he has failed to act as if nothing happened. We can easily talk about the crisis in Plateau and Bauchi as examples. Two, I did not recall the president warning any of the belligerent state governors who either tore down the posters of opposition parties or shut down their campaign offices for non-payment of tenement rates. Practically, the level of political intolerance is skewed in favour of the PDP. Neither did the President find it expedient to apologise to a whole Yoruba nation for calling their elected leaders ‘rascals’. Such uncouth gutter language is not dignifying for a president talk less of a presidential candidate.
Generally, the business of running a country has been suspended and remains suspended until May 29. The level of social dissonance and insecurity is perhaps at the highest, but then Aso Rock is still the safest place to be for now. In an era when global insecurity is at its highest, the level of ethnic tension is palpably worrisome and one does not need to be a doomsday prophet to say that Nigeria is on the brink – but all that bothers the schemers in government is how to perpetuate themselves in office come May. The Federal Executive Council still awards contracts on a weekly basis, what is lacking is where all the money goes and what projects are being actually executed.
In an accountable system, two months to handing over, this government would have given a comprehensive account of its stewardship detailing where governance started with Umaru Yar’adua and where the good luck of Jonathan took over. It would then tell us the level of completion of any on-going project and its completion span. Then, and only then would any electoral promise make sense – but we live in the jungle and the rulers believe that we are idiots and indeed judging by the din of political illiteracy being expressed practically and on social networks, it does not matter. What matters to the few loud beneficiaries of the ruling elite is that their bread is daily buttered. But the massive disillusionment; the endemic poverty around the nation; the level of complete disconnect with governance shows to anyone who has ears and eyes that anyone living well right now is living on borrowed time. Yes, we may not witness the same level of massive revolt that is now sweeping across the Arab world, but the level of suspicion and hatred among the various ethnic and religious divide exacerbated by a non-impacting government shows that we are on the brink of a major social catastrophe.
Evidently, there are enough arms and ammunition in the hands of ethnic and quasi-religious mafia to cinder a country gummed together by the British with scant regard to its differentials. Our security agencies have shown a level of incompetence hitherto unknown and yet nobody has bothered to investigate and no minister or chief of any of the security forces has been sacked or asked to resign for incompetence. As the month of April draws near, it is palpably becoming clear that we might be kissing the entity known as Nigeria goodbye, four years before its predicted apocalypse. This should be a cause for concern for anybody who is monitoring events in our country, but evidently, it is not a cause of concern for the ruling class.
Corruption, the cancer that has finished with the flesh of our nation and is now eating up its marrows is highest within the ruling class. A minister fingered in N11.2 billion bribe scandals and penned for prosecution is back in office and commissioning projects. This government is not ready to discipline anyone now who is strategically important to rigging in April – that is the message. The officials know this and so, they are helping themselves to the common teal. This government sent its defence minister to go and welcome a returning thief without scruples and has not apologised to anybody for doing so. In normal climes, if that minister had gone on his own volition, he would have been forced to drop his resignation as soon as he left the venue, but we have swept it under the carpet and sent a strong signal to those who are looting on behalf of the government that they would be accorded a heroic welcome after serving term – if they are stupid enough to get caught.
Our National Assembly has taken a cue; it passed an electoral law that removes the power of the courts from torpedoing any governor who gets to office by rigging. What better signal is there to prove that there will not be free or fair election in April? Assassinations and attempted assassination of political figures, journalists and government hecklers is at its highest. If this is the price that people pay for democracy, it is a heavy price indeed.