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Tuesday, October 4, 2011

WHAT I REMEMBER AND WANT TO REMEMBER PRESIDENT JONATHAN FOR – written by Japheth Omojuwa

Posted by Lanre Olagunju at 7:28 AM – 0 comments
 

The Goodluck Jonathan administration recently went to town with a list of its achievements over the first 100 days since the new mandate from May 29, 2011. That was a document that never should have been released because releasing those wishes, plans and joke achievements as real achievements shows the kind of grandstanding that has never and will never serve us right as a nation.


There is nothing wrong with a government showing off because if they don’t, the opposition will sell their failures to a public that often depends on what it hears instead of what it sees. What is wrong with showing off is the act of doing it over nothing or intangible achievements. What they should have thought about is the reaction from the ordinary Nigerian if the achievements were translated into their local languages and may be pidgin. No doubt you’ll get reactions like “na inflation I go chop,” “how contract wey dem no award me be my business?” and “so na wetin dem don dey do since May be dis?” and related shuddering rhetoric questions from Nigeria’s tangibly downtrodden masses. Nigeria is a nation on the brink. You don’t have to agree with me. I bet you will agree with the realities you see all around you – except you live in a Government House and never come out of it.


The biggest problem is not the problems but the fact that those who should solve these problems are obviously in denial. I know this for sure because in releasing their achievements, they did not talk about how many jobs they were able to help the private sector create or that which they created directly. The document released looked to dilute the herculean challenge of insecurity despite the fact that today’s Aso Rock has the highest number of military and police men guarding it than at any time in history. Any government that fails to provide adequate security fails in its primary responsibility as a government. Where this failure is the norm and the order as is Nigeria’s, then we have a nation running at the speed of neutrinos to the black hole of oblivion. Irrespective of the government’s strategies to curb insecurity, whatever they do that does not address the spate of unemployment in the country as a whole would be like addressing the effect instead of the cause. As long as the cause exists, we will continue to budget over 35 per cent of our yearly budgets on security and still fall short of providing any semblance of such. Imagine if only half of the over 1 trillion budgeted for security had gone into an Entrepreneurship and Innovation Fund. Just imagine how many potential Boko-Haram recruits would be taken off the streets. They say we write without proffering solutions, I say you read without looking for solutions because solutions abound even in the most negative of articles.


Like security like every other thing you can think of. We are far short of where we ought to be and the least you would expect from the government is to be sincere enough to admit this sobering realities. The denial of a reality cannot wish it away. I already shared my thoughts on Rubbin’ Minds last Sunday on Channels TV as to what my submissions are on the first 100 days. Whoever says 100 days are too short to assess a government, remember to ask if 500 million naira per hour of every day of the 100 days is too small to produce tangible results. Every 100 days this year, President Jonathan’s government is expected to spend N1.2 trillion! Is that also too small? Yet nothing has been achieved. Nothing has been done except you consider the ability to draw a pail of water out of the Atlantic Ocean a success when you are billed to dry it up. Nigeria’s challenges are that daunting and I will not deny that. I also accept the fact that most of these challenges have been passed on from previous administrations but the present administration has not shown signs of its readiness to solve them.


Unlike President Olusegun Obasanjo’s much criticised war against corruption, President Jonathan’s government will not get criticised for any such wars because there is no war against corruption. Corruption has resumed normal schedules and we are being milked dry more than ever before. The beauty of a good war against corruption is that it has a psychological effect on corrupt officials to be more careful when stealing something that then helps to check wanton stealing and sleaze. That that is not in place means nothing has happened to those that listed now non-existing projects in the budget, got funding for them from the government and the apparent Prime Minister of this administration herself Dr. Ngozi Okonjo Iweala admitted that such sham projects exist in their numbers. Monies for such will be transferred to other project she said, but nothing was said about how that could have happened or those who could have been responsible or how they will be brought to book. Where people steal and the worst that could ever happen to them is to get caught and just lose their loot without any form of punishment, stealing would be a culture as it is in Nigeria’s civil service, as is the culture in every arm of our government and as it is in Nigeria as a country – except you are a petty thief like those who stole chickens and have been imprisoned for 7 years still awaiting trial.


When will President Jonathan (as EFCC’s. Farida Waziri seems not interested) take up the challenge of fighting corruption? He looks like he cannot hurt a fly (except the fly answers Salami), but as long as his cronies and party members are allowed to do away with Nigeria’s wealth, the wrench and seamy side of his government’s corruption would be so bad even flies would not want to hurt themselves perching on it by the time he leaves office. If he does not want to break new corruption records, it is never too late to start prosecuting ex-Governors that have questions to answer. It is never too late to start the fight against corruption and fight it to a standstill. Nothing should be spared on this front. We have the means to fight corruption; all we need is the will.


The PDP has not only failed Nigerians, it has failed even itself. It has failed to keep its own promises let alone help Nigerians realise their dreams. Despite their shambolic endless years of shame and waste, we want them to give what they don’t have by providing good governance and good leadership. How will they do these? They can start by listening to the many voices of reason that seek to lead them through that uncharted course of rightness and excellence.

Different Administrations are often remembered for specific things: Chief Olusegun Obasanjo will be remembered for the liberalisation of the Telecommunications’ sector (amongst other achievements and evils),General Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida will always be remembered for June 12 and the Structural Adjustment Programme (some would add Dele Giwa and Vatsa to the list but I also remember Third Mainland Bridge), Chief Ernest Shonekan’s tenure will be remembered because it cannot be remembered for anything meaningful, Gen. Sani Abacha’s memories make me want to eat apples and so on. So far as a young Nigerian, these are the things I remember Dr. Goodluck Jonathan for


1. The Presidential Lunch where money was shared to young Nigerians in a clandestine and disgracefully illegal way.

2. The annoyingly slow pace of governance (almost at a state of inertia but for the fact that the wind blows in their offices)

3. The ability to defy number two above by swiftly upholding the removal of The President of The Court of Appeal Justice Ayo Salami and the fact that he would benefit from that removal when Justice Salami’s successor Justice Dalhatu Adamu eventually pays back the payer of the piper by playing the right tune which is declaring the payer the winner of the 2011 Presidential elections. That is the end of the whole drama and presidential braggado.

4. The palpable feeling of regret by gullible Nigerians for buying the tales of a shoeless candidate and the thickening state of hopelessness across the nation’s horizon.

5. A bogus and duplicative cabinet with many unnecessary appointments at the cost of the people’s welfare.

6. The most disproportionate distribution of Capital and Recurrent Expenditure at 1:3 against Capital Expenditure which literally means that our national budget is not being used to build our nation but to enrich and build the individual wealth of a privileged few.
7. The fact that I got N40,000.00 as outstanding allowance after the President virtually doubled Corps members take home from N9,725 to N18,000. A major achievement considering the absence of other notable achievements.

8. Saying that “Not only Nigerians are angry, those of us in government are,” which gave me the impression of how the President sees Nigerians and ‘those of them in government.” An impression of an all-conquering Emperor and members of his privileged court against a conquered people.

9. Having a Special Adviser who consistently harasses and abuses me on twitter through customised twitter handles created and dedicated to that purpose and through his friends and beneficiaries of the so far clueless government.

10. Paying lump sums to celebrities to record songs and dance away their withered conscience as they looked to cash in on the gullibility of the Nigerian masses. I’ve got more but these will suffice.


WHAT I WANT TO REMEMBER PRESIDENT JONATHAN FOR AFTER HIS DEPARTURE IN 2015

1. The first Nigerian President that made Nigerians to enjoy at least 18 hours of power supply per day for at least 1 year before May 2015.

2. The Nigerian President who recouped the most loots from corrupt government officials and this must sum up to at least N10 trillion for me to pay attention.

3. The Nigerian President who helped to ensure that lives and properties are safe and secure in a peaceful environment.

4. The Nigerian President that allowed for the Rule of Law to prevail 100 per cent of his remaining stay in power from today and rescinded previous acts of injustice like Justice Ayo Salami’s case. The man despite his own convictions allowed for our courts not just be “courts of law but not of justice.”

5. The government that helped Nigeria produce more than enough food and resources for its people with a positive Balance of trade in a truly liberalized economy benefitting from productive and effective Universities.

6. The President that saw to the full automation of the Electoral process where the room for human complicities are reduced to the barest minimum.

7. The President that finally learned that he was no longer the leader of a tribe or region but of a country.

8. That President Jonathan finally stopped campaigning after this piece and got to work on delivering the goods to the teeming Nigerian population.

9. The President that Nigerians will always remember for many good reasons and achievements.

10. The very last product of a ruling class that has failed Nigerians in the past 12 years and the first amongst that group to apologise to Nigerians if – God forbid – he fails. There is more but I guess this will do.

Obviously anyone appointed by the government or those who feed off the crumbles of their table will see the first list differently but those are the realities from an ordinary Nigerian like myself. If your reality is different or similar, you have the comments section below to state them. Twitter also offers a good avenue to continue the “engagements.”

This is MY STAND!

You can Follow the writer @omojuwa on twitter.
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