Putative politician in policeman’s garb?

However, my thoughts were deceived that one of the reasons for this unfortunate exhibition is informed by illiteracy and deep-rooted ignorance. After a critical analysis of the current situation in the country under the leadership of the most educated president Nigeria has ever produced, I realized that I was only being hypothetical.It was indeed, a […]

However, my thoughts were deceived that one of the reasons for this unfortunate exhibition is informed by illiteracy and deep-rooted ignorance. After a critical analysis of the current situation in the country under the leadership of the most educated president Nigeria has ever produced, I realized that I was only being hypothetical.
It was indeed, a very memorable day on Saturday, January 18, 2014, when I watched with keen interest, the rally organized by a group of some Rivers State citizens with the theme “Voice of Orashi Region Solidarity Rally” held in Omoku. The purported rally which according to the organizers, was meant to garner and publicly display support for one of their own, Dr Goodluck Ebele Jonathan was attended by politicians, youth activists, clergymen and traditional rulers that constitute the Orashi region.
As expected, all the speakers at the event never hid their disgust and condemnation over the decision of the Rivers State Governor, Rt. Hon. Rotimi Chibuike Amaechi to defect to the newly formed APC, which according to them was a grave sin to the people of South South. I took particular interest in one of the speakers at the rally even though his English sounded like that of Nigeria’s popular comedian, Chief Zebrudaya, I managed to hear some of his comments when he alleged that Amaechi was being used by ‘some Northerners to fight Goodluck’. I quickly concluded that APC was a national party and aside that, if Amaechi chooses to form alliances with the North, it won’t be out of place or for the first time.
One of the first political alliances in Nigeria was between his kinsman, Chief Harold Dappa Biriye of the defunct Niger-Delta Congress and Sir Ahmadu Bello’s Northern Peoples Congress which formed the federal government in 1960. This was in the first republic and the political marriage continued till the second republic in 1979 when Shehu Shagari, a core Northerner garnered more votes in Rivers State during the presidential election than his native state of Sokoto. Interestingly, Melford Okilo who together with Shagari worked as parliamentary secretaries to the Prime Minister was elected as Governor of Rivers State. If Governor Amaechi, out of principles chooses to re-embrace those old days, does that amount to political persecution as being done to him?
One of the most surprising actions at the rally was the prominence of Mr Mbu Joseph Mbu, the Commissioner of Police in Rivers State; all those who addressed the rally spoke glowingly of him, aside the heap of insults meted on Amaechi, eulogies to Mbu dominated the event. Those who eulogized him attributed their outburst to his professional skills and competence in confronting the security issues in the state. To show their overzealousness, songs were chanted where Mbu’s name was described as an emancipator; to crown it up, all the speakers called for his retention as the Commissioner of Police in the state, unlike some people who are clamouring for his redeployment.
One basic issue that can be raised here by any rational thinker is that, is it morally or ethically right for a serving police officer to be deeply involved or prominently featured in a political rally? Is it professionally correct for a political group to determine which commissioner of police to be posted in a state? It is pertinent that the battle between Amaechi and Mbu which is believed to have received the blessings of the villa was instrumental for the rally so as to further misinform Nigerians. For all the speakers never hesitated speaking their minds in support of Jonathan and Mbu whom they claimed is working in accordance with the popular desires of the people as a police officer.
President Goodluck Jonathan, with his vast educational background, should have realized the implications of such practices but regrettably, he seems to be hapless as the events unfold; he has never done anything to arrest the situation. This is why I have come to the conclusion that illiteracy and ignorance are not the major problems of Nigeria as we were made to believe in the past. Nigerians, under the most educated president, have been made to believe that 16 is above 19, we are now being made to believe that the police commissioner, and not the governor, is the Chief Security Officer in a state.
Nigerians are so unreal that they believe God can also be tricked; when I watched the closing part of the rally where one evangelist was called to pray, I almost shed tears as the supposed Man of God went on saying things that were far from reality, one of which he claimed that Jonathan raised Amaechi from grass. I felt so disgusted, but was consoled with the biblical injunction in Matthew Chapter 7 Vs 21 to 23 that:  Not everyone who calls me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter the kingdom of heaven…
 This injunction is a reference to these kinds of acclaimed clergymen who deceive people and, by extension, think they can deceive God as well. The rally which went successfully uninterrupted was in sharp contrast to what the police did when some APC members gathered a fortnight ago. If a Commissioner of Police, who is supposed to be apolitical, chooses to be blatantly partisan in his duty, and is ipso facto celebrated as a hero, then it has informed us that Nigerian laws have been interpreted in reverse under the reign of the most educated president Nigeria has produced, and history will be our final judge.
If Mbu is the best commissioner of police in Nigeria who can resolves conflicting issues, he should be posted to Maiduguri, Kano or any of the states, taken over by Boko Haram; if he ends the insurgency, then we will confirm his competence being clamoured by the Orashi people. If he is seen as the best person to fight Jonathan’s political opponents, he should be posted to Kano, Sokoto or Adamawa to fight Kwankwaso, Wamakko and Nyako as he is doing to Amaechi in Rivers.

Mnenga wrote from Basel, Switzerland <[email protected]>;