Dear
Mr. President,
I am
constrained to write this open letter to you before this season of letters
comes to a close.
I
will go straight to the issues at stake. Let’s start with the level of
toxic-ness in the air, sustained to a large extent by the attitude of your array
of spokespersons, who today do little more than insult and dismiss everyone
deemed to be an “enemy” of the President. Just as you have a point when you
said that the easiest way to be deemed “progressive” is to abuse Jonathan, it
has also become that criticising the President quickly earns one all sorts of
unprintable labels from the your camp.
Everyone
in your camp seems obsessed with the fact that the world is against you. One
adviser recently accused everyone criticising you of lacking home training. Another,
who made his name writing brilliant articles that skewered the governments of
the day, recently lamented — without any sense of irony — that all Nigerian
media is in the hands of the opposition.
There’s
a siege mentality at work, us versus them. I can assure you that that is not at
all a helpful attitude to adopt. Let’s get one thing clear – if the Nigerian
media seems to be against you, it is because it has always been that way;
always tending to be deeply critical of the abuse and misuse of power. At the
next Council of State meeting, you might want to ask your predecessors about
their experiences with the media and the “opposition”.
If
the media was unusually “nice” to or tolerant of the self-styled Evil Genius,
Gen. Ibrahim Babangida, why did he spend so much time proscribing media houses?
If it was nice to Gen. Sani Abacha, why was his government obsessed with
hounding journalists? If it was nice to President Olusegun Obasanjo, why did he
once boast that he never read newspapers? The late President Umaru Yar’Adua
earned himself a reputation as “Baba Go-Slow”. Remember the joke that
circulated widely a few years ago, about going into a restaurant to order
amala, shaki and ‘Yar’Adua’ (where Yar’Adua stood for ‘snail’).
My
point is: I doubt that Nigerians and their news media are singling you out for
ill-treatment. It’s not about you being a Southern President, or a Christian,
or an Ijaw man, it’s far more likely to be about the action and inaction of
your government.
Mr.
President, step out of the trenches. Your battle is not against the media, or
ordinary Nigerians wont to express their frustrations and disappointments. I
suspect that your battle is instead with many of those characters who surround
you, claiming to be friends and loyalists, but who imprison you within a
dangerous Bubble and delight in misleading you for their own selfish ends.
I
have slowly come to realise how the condition of power easily sets up the
wielders of that power for incarceration within a Bubble. It’s prison without
the uniform and without the realisation that you’re in prison.
In
that Bubble, you’re cut off from reality, and people come up to you and say all
sorts of things. They give you lists of your “friends” and “enemies”, they
concoct allegations, they worship you, they call you their Alpha and Omega, the
best thing to happen to Nigeria since 1914; they endlessly whisper rumours and
rumours of rumours. They will tell you that everyone hates you because you’re
from a minority ethnic group. They will tell you to ignore what “all those yeye
newspapers and critics” are saying.
It’s
time, perhaps, for you to fight to step out of that Bubble. Your own long walk
to freedom ought to commence now, considering that it’s almost too late.
We
all know that governance is largely a series of perception games. Thus far,
your government has, like many of the governments that preceded you, has played
those games badly. When people perceive your government as corrupt, it is
because they see no evidence otherwise. We all saw fuel subsidy payments rise
four-fold during your first year in power. No one took responsibility, no one
was punished.
When
the Ikeja Police College incident happened, it was an angry you who said the
revelations were the work of your enemies. It was, and is still, puzzling – did
the opposition somehow corner all the funds allocated to the College(s), making
it impossible for the police bosses to spend their funds responsibly? Then,
there was the aviation industry scandal – and I’ve reliably heard that it is
only a tip of the iceberg. The “Oga At The Top” is still sitting pretty,
invoking the “Law of No-Shaking”.
Meanwhile,
that same government wastes no time pushing Prof. Bart Nnaji out for “conflict
of interest’; and hounding the Central Bank of Nigeria Governor, Sanusi Lamido,
on the unproven ground that he “leaked” a letter to the President. Perhaps, you
will be able to explain to us how a Sanusi has managed to embarrass your
government to a greater extent than a Stella Oduah.
With
scenarios like this, you shouldn’t be surprised that Nigerians are angry and
confused.
If
you stood where Nigerians stand, and gave the affairs of your government a
proper consideration, you’d probably – hopefully – come to the same conclusion.
That something is just not right somewhere.
The tragedy
is that someday, maybe in 2015, or 2019, you will step down from the Bubble.
Your eyes will “clear”, and like Obasanjo, you will become an advocate of good
governance. Perhaps, you will even write longwinded letters (or emails) to your
successor complaining about corruption and about how the international
community is deeply worried about Nigeria.
And
we will be forced to remind you of your own time in office, and wonder aloud
what it is about the water in Aso Rock that turns occupants into this strange
species of Homo Sapiens.
Perhaps,
you would like to backtrack a little, to the beginnings of your Presidency. To
the circumstances in which you, an underdog of underdogs, came to power. When
you were at the mercy of the “cabal” that ran Nigeria in the absence of a then
ailing President Yar’Adua.
I,
like millions of other Nigerians, was angered by the antics of that cabal, at
how you, the sitting Vice-President, was treated. You were kept out of the
loop, humiliated. I recall joining protest marches in Lagos and Abuja, calling
for an end to the shameful state of affairs that kept you away from taking
charge of Nigeria. We didn’t do it because you were an Ijaw man, or because
your loyalists “mobilised” us to march for you. We did it because it was the right,
sensible and decent thing to do.
Recall
the promise and potential with which you came to power. A Nigerian President
who came from outside the hegemonic contraptions that have run Nigeria since
independence. No one doubts that your victory in 2011 was legitimate; those
elections, while not perfect, were the most credible we had seen in almost two
decades. I recall describing your appearance on the social media in 2010 as a
“breath of fresh air” – a mantra that eventually became one of your campaign themes.
The
question to ask yourself is: What happened? How did we get here, where the name
“Jonathan” has become a byword for goofs and gaffes, for complete helplessness
in the face of oil theft and corruption?
In
trying to answer that question (and maybe, there are some answers above), the
least we expect is that you will try to make amends. Because that is all that
will really matter, in the long run. You will probably need to sacrifice some
of those Untouchables in your cabinet. There’s news of an impending cabinet
reshuffle. Go ahead and do it. Surprise us.
You
will also need to do something about your communications set-up. Your
achievements – and they do exist (these might form the basis of another letter)
– deserve to do better than get lost amidst the din of mindless propaganda and
abusive language flowing from your spokespersons and aides.
You
would need to come and meet Nigerians where they are – sadly trapped beneath
layers angry cynicism – to directly tell them what you’ve been doing, what
you’re currently doing, and what you plan to do in 2014. A handful of
Presidential Media Chats per year will no longer cut it; not in these dire
times.
You
will have to face up to the difficult questions that Nigerians are asking, and
answer them yourself. Go on TV, get on radio, get out there on the social
media. You can no longer continue to depend solely on a battery of
spokespersons speaking dangerously off-the-cuff, hyper-excited by the sounds of
their own intemperate voices.
The
siege mentality has to go. You’re not the first, and will not be the last,
Nigerian President to feel beleaguered. It is the nature of the task. And,
considering what they receive in compensation and benefits for the job of
ruling or misruling Nigeria, our politicians should generally learn to take all
the heat, or leave the kitchen.
I
have written this letter in genuine concern. I am not currently a member of any
political party, and I do not have anything personal at stake in this brouhaha
– no bids for a marginal field or NIPP power plant or import licence that might
possibly be affected by the way things play out. I do not hate you.
I am
simply an ordinary Nigerian, concerned about the direction in which our country
is headed; concerned about seeing that Nigeria gets the highest quality of
governance that is reasonably possible, considering our very complicated
circumstances.
Thank
you.
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