By Ikechukwu Amaechi
I am sure that when his aides bring
to his attention the monthly performance survey carried out by Governance Advancement Initiative for Nigeria (GAIN), which showed that
his job approval rating slipped for the first time last month, President
Muhammadu Buhari will most likely shrug it off.
He does not care about public
opinion.
That is scary. The most dangerous
leader is that man or woman who does not care about public perception, who does
not give a damn (apologies to former President Goodluck Jonathan) about what
the people think.
This is a very dangerous curve for
the country.
The monthly poll, which tracks the
performance of governments at all levels in Nigeria , providing feedback from
the public to their elected officials, indicated that for the first time since
December 2015, more Nigerians score the president low on jobs, economy, power
and rule of law. The most interesting outcome is that for the first time since
he became president, many Nigerians now blame Buhari for the country’s woes
rather than his predecessor, Jonathan. The February result showed that Buhari’s
approval rating dropped from 63.4 per cent in January to 32.8 per cent and a
significant 79 per cent of the respondents rated the government’s handling of
the recurring clashes between herdsmen and farmers poor.
According to the poll, more
Nigerians now hold him responsible for the terrible state of the economy just
as many have been convinced that he may not have the capacity, after all, to do
the job he sought for 12 years.
Of course, the Buhari apologists,
just like their principal, will dismiss the poll result as the machination of
agents of ousted Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) regime or the ranting of
disgruntled elements – the wailing wailers. The more obtuse of the regime’s
spin doctors will brandish it as one more evidence of corruption fighting back.
President Buhari's Aljazeera Interview
But to dismiss this poll result
with a wave of the hand is to live in illusion because for many Nigerians the
result is hardly surprising. In fact, if there is any surprise at all, it is
that there is still an odd 32.8 per cent of Nigerians who still believe in the
capacity of the president to deliver on his mandate.
For some of us who voted for Buhari
in every single election he contested since 2003, disappointment is an
understatement in describing the horror that is dramatically unfolding before
us. It was not as if we were not warned. As the Igbo would say, a man does not learn how to be left-handed
in old age. At 73, it was almost impossible for a man to be “born again,”
we were told. Yet, we believed Buhari when he claimed that he was a changed
person. We gave him the benefit of the doubt. Moreover, the candidacy of
Goodluck Jonathan presented most Nigerians with little or no choice.
But watching Buhari’s interview on Al Jazeera, while on his
official trip to Qatar ,
I had goose pimples all over my body. In the interview aired on Saturday, March
5, he confirmed the worst fears of most Nigerians. He has not changed. He remains
the same Muhammadu Buhari – a man with no finesse, rigid, undiplomatic,
uncaring, vindictive and egoistic.
I found his response to three
critical issues particularly distasteful and pathetic. Asked by Martine Dennis
why he should continue to fund the education of his children in foreign schools
while restricting foreign exchange (forex) for most families that also have
their children in schools abroad, Buhari acknowledges its “tough luck.”
“If the country cannot afford it, so be it,” was his very cold response to the question. When the interviewer
quipped, “Your children will continue
their studies no doubt,” I had expected the president to appreciate the
bobby trap being set for him and side-step it, but how mistaken I was. “Those who can afford it can still afford
it. Nigeria can’t afford to allocate forex for all those who have decided to
train their children outside the country,” was his response.
*Pro-Biafra Protesters |
When Dennis asked him whether Nigeria will join the Saudi Arabia led Islamic Coalition
Force Against Terrorism, he answered in the affirmative. Of course, his answer
contradicted what his aides told Nigerians on the same issue few days earlier.
But that is not even the issue. What he said when he was told that his decision
may have been insensitive to the desire of Christians that make up 50 percent
of Nigeria’s population and may not be comfortable with such a move was rather
instructive.
Referring to such Christians as
religious bigots, our president retorted with undisguised venom and malice: “Why can’t those Christians who are
complaining go and fight terrorism in Nigeria or fight the militants in
the South? It’s Nigeria
that matters not opinions of some religious bigots…” But that is the case
of the axiomatic kettle calling the pot black. What could be more narrow-minded
than Buhari’s response? Is the president saying that right now all Nigerian
soldiers battling Islamic insurgency in the Northeast are Moslems? Are there no
Christians among the thousands of Nigerian gallant service men and women who have
paid the ultimate price in the Northeast?
On the killing of Independent
People of Biafra (IPOB) peaceful protesters by Nigeria ’s armed forces, acting
ostensibly on orders from above, the president refused to watch the video when
offered. The interviewer shouldn’t have bordered. The president knows what is
in the video – the massacre of unarmed civilians. The order to commit those
atrocities must have come from only one quarter.
Told that the security forces have
been very heavy-handed in dealing with the peaceful protesters and asked how he
was planning to deal with the issue of Biafra ,
Buhari could hardly hide his bitterness. His response was virulent. The
protesters were “interfering with movement of troops and the economy,” he
alleged without any shred of evidence even as he declared that IPOB members
were “joking with Nigeria ’s
security and Nigeria
will not tolerate it.”
Then the ultimate question. “Why
don’t you invite them for talks?” His response couldn’t have come as a surprise
to anyone who knows the president’s mindset particularly when dealing with the
Igbo. “Why should we invite them?”
Rather than inviting them for
dialogue, Buhari will not blink an eye if the boys are massacred in cold blood.
Here is a president who has said for the umpteenth time that he was ready to
dialogue with a blood-thirsty group like Boko Haram if their authentic leaders
could step forward asking why he should talk to an armless group only trying to
draw the attention of the government to issues of marginalization and lack of
fair-playing ground in their own country. That was the president at his
narcissistic best. It was prejudice at its worst.
At the end of the interview, the
interviewer chuckled, almost sneering. I could imagine her saying “tough luck
to Nigerians,” because it was almost incomprehensible that the president of a
country could harbor such contempt, hatred, and loathing for the people he
governs.
That interview, to my mind, has
done irreparable damage to the Buhari presidency. What it did was to remove any
doubt harbored by those who were still prepared to give him the benefit. The
interview exposed him as a religious bigot, a leader ruled by prejudice, a
president who is not prepared to take responsibility for self-inflicted faux passes of his government.
Buhari may well be advised that
prejudice is not a presidential virtue.
*Ikechukwu Amaechi is the Editor-in-Chief/Managing Director of TheNiche On Sunday newspaper (ikechukwuamaechi@yahoo.com)
No comments:
Post a Comment