When Will The President Go To Yobe There is a sense in which President Jonathan is his own worst enemy: he continuously leaves undone what he ought to have done but relishes doing what is not critical to his job as president and commander-in-chief of the armed forces, thereby giving credibility to his critics’ charge of cluelessness and incompetence. Every day, both the local and international media are awash with gory stories of the tragedy playing out in the north-east of Nigeria. Law-abiding citizens are being murdered in their beds; there is no consideration for gender or age. The bandits who routinely depopulate entire villages leaving corpses and flames in their wake had, before the recent military re-awakening, virtually succeeded in Afghanistanising that part of Nigeria, Taliban style. The governors of the affected states have been shouting themselves hoarse, calling on the president to tackle the problem with the seriousness it deserves but their cries have been continuously lampooned by the president’s aides and hangers-on. Although the security agencies have been working hard to defeat the terrorists, it is clear that there is still a lot of work to be done. The most urgent crisis now is the humanitarian one. The traumatised people of those areas are being left to their own devices while the president jets around the country mending political fences and preparing grounds for his eventual declaration to contest another term. Perhaps the president is encouraged in this unfeeling behaviour by the declaration of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, that elections may not be conducted in conflict areas in 2015 if the security situation does not improve. Could the president be saying to himself, “Why bother with areas where there may be no elections?” All Nigerians of good conscience must insist that President Jonathan live up to his current mandate instead of spending valuable time and resources on a future election he has no guarantee of winning. As commander-in-chief, he ought to be holding the hands of widows, orphans and hospitalised survivors, assuring them that the federal government is manning their corner. He should be telling them that the rest of Nigeria is behind them and that the terrorists would soon be put to flight permanently. The last time the president paid a flying visit to Maiduguri, it was on the heels of the visit of APC governors who had gone to show solidarity with the people of Borno State. Would it take another visit of governors of the main opposition party for the president to show up in Yobe State to score political points? Elsewhere, presidents promptly fly down to disaster zones and mobilise resources to alleviate the attendant humanitarian crises. That is what we expect Dr Goodluck Ebele Jonathan to do as president and commander-in-chief of the Nigerian armed forces. ?
Posted on: Fri, 21 Mar 2014 21:24:26 +0000
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