Sunday, January 22, 2017

USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Buhari’s Gambian Gambit As Borno Burns

A very important correction of a gross error: Sorry,to have misinformed you : Westmorland Street where we lived at number 37 and by "we" I mean, me, my grandmother, mother, step-father three brothers and our dear cousin Malcolm Seisay) that street has been renamed "Siaka Stevens Street" and not "Sani Abacha Street" – which is a very different street. You must understand that I was last in Freetown and only for ten days in April 1970 and then on a plane back to Legon which is in Ghana….



On Sunday, 22 January 2017 14:57:56 UTC+1, Cornelius Hamelberg wrote:

Professor Kperogi,

The points you make are well taken.

As di book-people dem kin say, "Charity begins at home" but in my view, it does not have to be complete peace and happiness at home in Nigeria, before you can extend a helping hand to others; we ought to do what we can, whenever and wherever we can, to help others – even if we ourselves are in need of help. As some Muslim sheikhs teach - Allah subhanahu wa ta'ala is the only One Who helps – and does not need help - there is also Surah al Hajj Ayat 40 which reads

"Indeed Allah will help those who help Him. Indeed Allah is Exalted in Might, All-Powerful."

Some of the rabbis have taught that there are some things that Hashem demands of his people, such as the ritual circumcision, otherwise everybody would be born already circumcised.

It was not all peace and tranquillity in Nigeria before or whilst Maxwell Khobe was helping to put out the RUF fire in Sierra Leone – so, today what was formerly Westmorland Street (for a few years I once lived at number 37 Westmoreland Street, at the absolute centre of Freetown – opposite the Cotton Tree and the Sierra Leone museum - and that street is now renamed Sani Abacha Street - in appreciations of Sani Abacha's commitment to the Nigerian-led ECOMORG helping to end the RUF-imposed war in Sierra Leone.

President Buhari's input - his several visits with other West African heads of state - to meet and try to persuade President Jammeh to relinquish power was crucial - so much was at stake - (we are told that on the first visit President Jammeh kept them waiting for over an hour, before he joined them in his presidential lounge and that he then went up to President John Mahama who had just conceded defeat in the presidential election in Ghana , and told him smilingly, " Your people don't want you ! "

Consider:

2 tonnes of cocaine seized in Gambia

Weapons seized in Gambia

President Buhari's willingness to commit the Nigerian military to the joint ECOWAS force was of inestimable importance in getting the electorally defeated Jammeh to leave power: It's said that he will eventually be on his way to Equatorial Guinea, where at least temporarily he will probably be a lot safer there than in neighbouring Conakry where Ahmed Sekou Toure once hosted Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, Kwame Toure and Miriam Makeba...

Concerning he pros and cons of ECOMORG interventions - now if- God forbid - Brother Buhari were to loose the next presidential elections and he refused to quit, the question is, what ECOWAS/ ECOMORG force in the world would be ready to take military action ( land sea and air) to oust a Nigerian president or to force him to relinquish power? We cannot afford to get too big for our boots, the other saying is "Cut your coat according to your cloth"…

In this case some of your critiques are to the point, but let us give credit where and when it's due : A friend in need is a friend indeed.

Cornelius







On Saturday, 21 January 2017 20:50:18 UTC+1, Farooq A. Kperogi wrote:
My column in today's Daily Trust on Saturday:

By Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.

Twitter: @farooqkperogi


Gambians are our West African brothers and sisters who deserve our help in their hour of need. I get that. But no one can truly help the other when they are themselves in need of help, when they are wracked by internal turmoil. President Buhari has no business being in Gambia's business while his country burns.


Imagine for a moment that Nigeria's current president were a man called Goodluck Jonathan (or, for that matter, any southern Christian), and the military "mistakenly" dropped a bomb on hapless internally displaced Boko Haram victims, killing scores of them and critically injuring many more. Imagine again that such a president didn't deem it worth his while to visit the state where this grievous tragedy happened, but instead chose to go to another country to resolve the country's political differences. What would we northern Muslims be saying by now?


Well, something close actually happened in late 2014. At a time Boko Haram captured Mubi, Adamawa's second largest town and former Chief of Defense Staff Alex Badeh's hometown, Goodluck Jonathan chose to travel to Burkina Faso to resolve the country's political crisis. The public denunciation that followed that presidential indiscretion was swift and massive.


This was what I wrote in my November 8, 2014 column titled, "State of Emergency Amid Worsening Boko Haram Insurgency": "Amid the heartrending humanitarian disaster that Boko Haram has wreaked on Mubi, the president chose to travel to Burkina Faso to 'resolve' the country's political crisis. Which sane person goes to put out another person's fire while his house is up in flames? I have never seen a more cruelly insensitive and clueless response to a grave national crisis than this in my entire life."


Buhari's situation is actually worse. The military he is commander-in-chief of, not Boko Haram, was singularly responsible for "mistakenly" killing scores of vulnerable, hungry and serially cheated IDPs, and all he has done is issue a "regret" through his Twitter handle. He didn't physically travel to Borno State to condole with and comfort the people. He is more concerned with and consumed by what is happening in the Gambia than the humanitarian tragedy that is unfolding in his own backyard.


To be clear, I don't think the Nigerian air force deliberately targeted the IDPs. I don't see what purpose that would serve. It is entirely reasonable to agree that it was genuinely an accident. But it's a monumental, unprecedented national disaster nonetheless. It should have invited a solemn presidential national broadcast, not a mere tweet, which we all know the president didn't even compose.


It's true that even well-trained military personnel like America's have had occasions to accidentally bomb wrong targets in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere. But we are talking here of a nation's military accidentally bombing its own fellow citizens in their own country—and in their weakest and most helpless state!


A Facebook friend of mine by the name of Solomon Wise captured the tragedy this way in his comment on my wall: "Ravaged by Boko Haram and forced to live in an IDP camp in their own country where Govt officials steal their food. Now mistakenly bombed." This caused me to shed a tear. Call me a wimp if you like, but it did make me cry.


Now, a presidential national broadcast to mourn this tragedy and a personal visit by the president to give emotional strength to the bereaved won't bring back the lost lives, but it would show respect for the dead and show that the president cares and takes responsibility for the fatal error of the people he is commander-in-chief of. In no serious country in the world would a president fly to another country in the face of this unexampled tragedy and ask his Chief of Staff to represent him in condoling grieving families.


I am not by any means minimizing the horrendousness of other humanitarian tragedies that the president has unwisely chosen to justify (such as the bloodcurdling military mass murders of Shias in Zaria) or ignore (such as the absolutely condemnable butchery in southern Kaduna and Agatu), but the accidental bombing, by the Nigerian military, of the survivors of Boko Haram's unspeakable savagery amid the unconscionable governmental neglect they already suffered deserved a swifter, less insensitive, and more humane response from the commander-in-chief.


There is no way to sugarcoat it: Buhari's response is at once clueless, cruel, and condemnable. Unfortunately, it fits a pattern that is emerging in his attitude to and relationship with the poor. He has a profoundly ice-cold contempt for the poor.


Although he has traveled to virtually every continent in the world and has budgeted hundreds of millions of naira this year to travel to even more countries, he has never visited the theaters of Boko Haram insurgency. He simply sits in the luxury of Aso Rock and proclaims the "technical defeat" (whatever in the world that means) of Boko Haram and talks to soldiers on the front lines via closed-circuit television.


What would it cost the president to pay a symbolic visit to the northeast—and elsewhere? When he was soliciting votes from potential voters, he traveled to every state except Yobe. He campaigned in Borno and Adamawa, which were gripped by a fiercer confrontation with Boko Haram than now.


Why won't the president visit Borno now, especially in light of the quick succession of tragedies that have hit the state? Before the "accidental" bombing of IDPs, a University of Maiduguri veterinary medicine professor and 4 others were murdered by a 7-year-old Boko Haram suicide bomber.


Well, you know, the victims are poor, unknown people who are of no consequence to the president. When former Vice President Atiku Abubakar's daughter got married in Adamawa, the president braved out the "odds" (never mind that he says he has "technically defeated" Boko Haram) and physically attended the wedding ceremony. Nobody represented him. He even said his wedding-induced visit gave him a glimpse of the suffering of the people of the state and caused him to shed tears, hopefully not crocodile tears.


Had a humanitarian tragedy struck Adamawa, you can bet your bottom naira that the president won't personally go there. Apparently, poor people don't matter—unless their votes are needed as ladders to climb to power. Perhaps a rich, politically connected Borno man should marry off his daughter and invite the president. Maybe that is what it would take for the president to visit Borno. All people who want the president's presence in their states should replicate this stratagem.


It appears that, for President Buhari, who had been falsely thought of for years as a defender of the talakawa, only the rich matter.  That's why he attends rich people's festive occasions outside of Abuja and instructs his media aides to issue presidential birthday wishes on the occasion of rich people's birthdays, but picks and chooses which tragedies involving poor people he comments on or commiserates with.


To be fair to Buhari, most, perhaps all, Nigerian politicians deeply disdain the poor. We only thought Buhari was different. He obviously is not. Sad.


Farooq A. Kperogi, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Journalism & Emerging Media
School of Communication & Media
Social Science Building 
Room 5092 MD 2207
402 Bartow Avenue
Kennesaw State University
Kennesaw, Georgia, USA 30144
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
Twitter: @farooqkperog
Author of Glocal English: The Changing Face and Forms of Nigerian English in a Global World

"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will

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