In order to uncover Farooq Kperogi's level of latent prejudice against the APC and Muhammadu Buhari, in particular, I must start from his post on this forum from Saturday, 17 November 2018, out of many he has posted on Buhari's APC government in the last three years. In his post: Ethnic and Religious Bigotry as Buhari's 2019 Campaign Strategy of 17 November 2018, Farooq wrote among other things, "But after (APC) ascending to power, ….//…. They chose, instead, to govern or, more accurately un-govern, in drama - drama of endlessly flippant blame games, ceaselessly brazen falsehoods, tedious propaganda, unremorseful bigotry, crass hemorrhaging of the economy, crippling national fissiparity, in-your-face hypocrisy and fraud, setting the bar of governance to the lowest imaginable watermark, and embarrassing idiocy at the highest reaches of government." Farooq Kperogi did not share with us, his readers, which blame games and falsehoods Buhari's led APC government have committed and how APC has haemorrhaged the economy. The heart of Nigerian economy is crude oil export from which Nigeria under the 16 years of PDP government (1999-2015) earned $ 862 billion (US dollars). The breakdown is as follows: under Obasanjo and Yar'Adua, 1999-2009, Nigeria earned $481 billion from crude oil export while under Jonathan, 2010-2015, it was $381. Under Buhari from June 2015 and hitherto, Nigeria has earned $112 billion.
When APC ascended power in 2015, the international price of crude oil per barrel had fallen from over $100 to under $30. Buhari met purposeless transactions totalling $359 million and he inherited $63 billion foreign debt from Jonathan. Boko Haram was physically occupying 50, 000 square kilometers land area in Nigeria and since 24 August 2014, had declared Gwosa in Borno State as the Capital of their Islamic Caliphate. Billions of dollars meant to buy weapons and to equip Nigerian soldiers to fight insurgents had been shared by PDP politicians and Service Chiefs of the Armed Forces. Although there was general economic recession in the world, the dependency of Nigeria's economy solely on crude oil export made the recession worst in Nigeria. Most of the States could not pay their workers because the incoming Governors met empty treasuries. At the same time that Buhari reorganised the Armed Forces and equipped them to drive out Boko Haram insurgents from occupied Nigerian territories, he was forced to take foreign loans for bailouts of bankrupt states' government so that they could pay their workers and maintain essential services. In the midst of all the problems Buhari inherited from Jonathan era, serious illness befell him. Had Buhari disclosed the cause of his illness to Nigerians, he would have earned the sympathy of all good-hearted Nigerians. In spite of the hopelessness of the economic situation, worsened by dwindling crude oil export earning, Boko Haram has been incapacitated from holding any territory in Nigeria even though they can still launch sporadic attacks from their hideouts along Nigeria's volatile borders with Cameroon, Chad and Niger Republics. That is neither falsehood nor tedious propaganda but the truth. It is not a blame game either by Buhari's led APC government to endlessly ask the PDP leaders that governed Nigeria for 16 years what they did with $862 billion US dollars Nigeria earned from crude oil exports during their era. What economic haemorrhage is Farooq Kperogi talking about when the PDP regime spent $50 billion US dollars on power to produce darkness for Nigerians? Going by the title of his 17 November 2018 essay, Farooq Kperogi inferred that Buhari's led APC government had done nothing in the past three and a half year and thereby proclaimed a chest beating balloon of prophecy that Buhari's 2019 campaign strategy would be ethnic and religious bigotry. He backed up his prophecy thus, "In a December 2017 video, for example, Buhari thanked Kano people for coming out en masse to welcome him and said, 'saboda yan kudu su san har yanzu inada gata.' Rough translation. '...so that Southerners can see how favoured I still am." How genuine was the December 2017 video cannot be verified and for those of us who are not verse in Hausa language, we must be very sceptical about Farooq's rough translation of the purported statement of Buhari in Hausa language in Kano. That is even more so if we remember that in his post of 4 November 2018, he claimed that the word JÀMBÁ in Yoruba language is a corrupt word derived from the Hausa language ZAMBA, meaning fraudulent. Yet the true meaning of JÀMBÁ in Yoruba language is havoc, or calamity, or mishap. However, few days later, the APC punctured Professor Farooq Kperogi's chest beating balloon of prophecy by making public what it called NEXTLEVEL. It stated, "We are committed to deepening the work we started in this first term, such that Nigeria's assets and resources continue to be organized & utilized for the good of the common man. Join @ Prof Osinbajo and I on this journey to the NEXT LEVEL of a prosperous, strong and stable Nigeria." Disappointed professor Farooq Kperogi reacted.
On Saturday, 24 November 2018, professor Farooq Kperogi titled his essay as : APC's Next Level of Fraud, Incompetence, and Sorrow. Commenting on the cartoon with the inscription : WE ARE ALL GOING HIGHER, Farooq wrote, "Buhari appears as a clumsy, clueless leader who can't even get his steps right, unlike Osinbajo, he skips a step on the staircase as he leads Nigerians to what seems like bottomless perdition. Buhari is two metres tall in hight and with his long legs, it is biologically and physiologically reasonable, if not compelling, that he should skip over a step on the staircase unlike the short-sized Osinbajo who must skip a step at a time unless he desired to overstrain himself. And not so surprising, the star gazer sees Buhari leading Nigerians to bottomless perdition through the APC ROAD MAP - NEXT LEVEL. About Buhari, Kperogi wrote, "The only quality Buhari proclaims is an inscrutable integrity …. yet his government was ranked the second worst in the world in 'government integrity' in 2018 by the US-based Heritage Foundation." What a patriotic Nigerian would have demanded to know from the Heritage Foundation is why the US is keeping over $600 billion (US dollars) stolen by Nigerian officials beginning from the era of Ibrahim Babangida and kept in the US banks and why is the US government demanding that the Nigerian government should engage the services of American lawyers to approach American Courts for decisions before the stolen Nigerian assets can be repatriated to the Nigerian government? Is Heritage Foundation not aware that American lawyers were demanding two-third (2/3) of the stolen amount to be repatriated to Nigeria as fees, a behaviour which professor Farooq Kperogi would have described as in-your-face hypocrisy and fraud if Heritage Foundation were to be a Nigerian based organisation? Are lions credible when they lament over the deaths of impalas? Probably, Farooq Kperogi would agree with the US-based Heritage Foundation that US government is ranked best in the world in government integrity in 2018 even though Black Americans are protesting daily, under the hashtag : Black Lives Matter, against being systematically murdered and persecuted on racial ground.
On 26 November 2018, the definition and meaning of the word orphan was twisted by Farooq Kperogi in favour of the PDP presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar, in the 2019 Presidential election. He quoted the PDP presidential aspirant, Atiku Abubakar, as having said on 19 November 2018, as follows, "I started out as an orphan selling firewood on the streets of Jada in Adamawa, but God, through the Nigerian State, invested in me and here I am today." Nigerian puritans and absolutists objected to Atiku's reference to himself as an orphan because he did not lose both parents as a child and his mother died when he was 38 years. They regard Atiku's claim to being an orphan as a political gimmick aimed at hoodwinking Nigerian voters. Clipping the tail of the fox like that in the public attracted the ire of Farooq Kperogi and caused him to exhibit what psychologists classify as three objectionable character traits - hyper-choleric disposition, disdain for other persons and excessive flaunt and application of bombastic English vocabularies. During the time Atiku Abubakar was selling firewood as an orphan, he was not the only orphan in Adamawa, not to talk of entire Nigeria. There is no evidence that he was the most brilliant orphan in Adamawa at that time which is why he said that 'but God, through the Nigerian State invested in me.' The fate of all Nigerian children either as orphans or not is up till today decided by absurd raffle-draws among identical and brilliant children whereby few are selected to be educated while majority are denied education. Why should God make the Nigerian State to educate Atiku Abubakar and not other children in his situation at that time? Atiku Abubakar, like most Nigerians educated with public funds, considers himself a lottery winner and he has utilized every opportunity in public service to satisfy his gluttonous appetite for overconsumption of Nigeria's wealth. He was the first Deputy Director General of Nigerian Custom Service to become a millionaire. In 1999, President Obasanjo made Atiku not only his Vice but head of privatisation of public enterprises. Quarrel soon began between Obasanjo and his vice who apportioned to himself lion shares of the privatised public properties and he, Obasanjo, getting only fox shares. Among foraging gluttons there is no code of conduct. Obasanjo and Atiku's fight was dirty and open to Nigerians. I still have Nigerian newspapers' cuttings from 2006 where Obasanjo accused Atiku Abubakar of stealing public funds and the latter charged back that Obasanjo should explain his source of wealth since his bank account contained only twenty-thousand naira when he came out of Abacha's gulag in 1998 and his Otta farm was in total ruin. By the time their two terms of eight years constitutional tenure expired in 2007, Obasanjo blocked Atiku's chance of partaking in PDP's presidential primary. During their tenure in office, Olusegun Obasanjo and Atiku Abubakar spent $16 billion on electricity but by the time they left office in 2007, they had invented a dozen of acronyms for electricity with which they succeeded to envelope Nigerians in constant darkness. In year 2000, the duo of Obasanjo and Abubakar led federal government signed the Millenium Development Goal initiated by Western World controlled UN. Therein, Nigeria accepted responsibility that all Nigerian children of school age would have access to compulsory and free primary education by the year 2015. Although they left office in 2007, PDP continued to govern Nigeria until 29 May 2015 and there were no free primary education for all Nigerian children of school age even when funds sourced internationally and internally for the project disappeared. While Olusegun Obasanjo built his private Bell University in Ogun State, Atiku Abubakar erected his American University in Adamawa where ordinary Nigerians cannot gain admision, no matter how brilliant they are.
Having explained that people who are socialized in Muslim culture understand an orphan as someone whose father died before the age of puberty, Farooq Kperogi averred, "Atiku is a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment. There is no reason why he should use Western cultural lenses to describe himself." Nigeria is not a theocratic state governed by priests of the supposedly dominating religious creeds in Nigeria, Islam and Christianity, and through Sharia and Mosaic Laws. The constitution of Nigeria does not compel citizens wishing to engage in politics to present testimonial of their religious creed and practice. Atiku's choice of Islam as his religion is his private affair that has nothing to do with how he is going to govern Nigeria, should he become President. In this case, Atiku is not canvassing to become Sultan of Sokoto or Emir of Adamawa but President of Nigeria. It must be noted too that the people of Sokoto and Adamawa are not Arabs. Therefore, official communication with the people of Sokoto and Adamawa from Atiku on any issue cannot reasonably be conducted in Arabic language. While it might be a worthwhile mission to teach us what is the meaning of an orphan in English language, the mission was betrayed with mischievous intent when the teaching turned out to be about what is the meaning of an orphan in Arabic language. To be fair to Atiku, he did speak in Arabic on 19 November 2018, but English which is the official language of governance in Nigeria. Farooq Kperogi is touting Atiku Abubakar as 'a Muslim who grew up in a Muslim cultural environment' which is another way of saying that 'he grew up in Northern Nigeria.' The same Farooq who in his 17 November 2018 article had suspected that Buhari's 2019 campaign strategy would be ethnic and religious bigotry is now projecting Atiku Abubakar, the Presidential candidate of the PDP, as a Muslim Northerner to Nigerians. It is high time to stop this fraudulent claim that office holders in Nigeria hold positions on behalf of their ethnic groups and religious congregations when constitutionally and legally they are responsible and accountable to all Nigerians for their actions and inactions.
While Atiku Abubakar was still the Vice President to Olusegun Obasanjo in 2006, he joined the Action Congress (AC), the political party led by Bola Ahmed Tinubu, in order to contest the 21 April 2007 Presidential election. He came third in that election with a total vote of 2,637,848 against Umaru Musa Yar'Adua (PDP) who won the election with 24,638,063 votes. When Yar'Adua fell sick and it became obvious that even if he recovered, he would not be able to contest in 2011, Atiku abandoned AC and returned to the PDP in early 2010. Following the demise of Yar'Adua, Vice President Goodluck Jonathan became the substantive President. Atiku and his cohorts had thought that Jonathan would only complete the remaining two years left of the joint ticket with Yar'Adua before power returned to the North according to PDP internal arrangement of rotational presidency between North and South. Atiku contested PDP presidential primary election in December2010, against Jonathan and lost. Jonathan won the presidential election of 16 April 2011 and Atiku and his clique thought that federal government power would return to what they term the North in 2015. Meanwhile, CPC, ACN, and part of APGA had collapsed into a new political party called APC in 2013 to challenge the PDP hegemony to power in the 2015 presidential election. Towards the middle of 2014, Jonathan had proclaimed his constitutional rights to two terms à four years presidential tenure and the hope of PDP advocates of power returning to the North was dashed. Once again, Atiku left PDP and joined APC where he contested presidential primary election in 2014 against Buhari which he lost to Muhammadu Buhari who subsequently became President. He stayed in the APC for a while and waited until it became apparent to him that Buhari would seek second term and he crawled back into PDP for the third time to purchase the Presidential ticket of the party. Atiku Abubakar's slogan should be : A serial political harlot for President.
S. Kadiri
Skickat: den 25 november 2018 22:04
Till: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Ämne: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Atiku and the Meaning of an "Orphan" in English
Sunday, November 25, 2018
Atiku and the Meaning of an "Orphan" in English
School of Communication & Media
Kennesaw State University
Cell: (+1) 404-573-9697
Personal website: www.farooqkperogi.com
"The nice thing about pessimism is that you are constantly being either proven right or pleasantly surprised." G. F. Will
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