In local Nigerian parlance, stratagem or the plan for deceiving
otherwise trustful people is rendered euphoniously and even metaphorically as
“lie, lie” or “connie, connie” (both of them amusing and melodious phraseology
for graphically depicting the foible of cunningness, craftiness or guile). The
Nigerian political or governmental practice has been largely characterised,
particularly these four or so years, by an observable trend in posturing or cunningness
by officials of state. These ones have perfected the art of refusing to take
personal responsibility for their bumbling, blundering trajectory even as they
lament or heap their failures on some extraneous or exogenous circumstance,
situation or personage.
As is normal with the nature and manner of a facile or
convenient resort to lie-telling, every excuse or reason for the happening of
one event or another, embarrassingly conflicts with an earlier expressed
position taken on the same subject matter. Two or three clear indications are
visibly discernible. The actors are not unanimous in their explanation of the
occurrence of the event for which they speak for the same principal; they
operate at cross purposes; and they betray their lack of co-ordination in a
situation where coherence is key. For them, to begin to take personal
responsibility is also to begin to recognise or admit that The Boko Haram scourge, the Fulani herdsmen militia siege, the continuing rising political tension in the land, the visible fractious division among the nation’s ethnic nationalities, the provoked or aroused anger among our teeming jobless youth population, the unabating indignity being suffered by pensioners or persons who have duly paid their civic dues, the requirement to put the country back on track respecting the practice of true federalism, etc. are all live matters requiring the decisive intervention of a responsive, guile-less government. President Buhari has, in an opinion unique for its indifference to the state of siege in which Nigeria has been subjected to persistent violent attacks by some sectarian forces with the intention of forcing her to surrender to their whims or strange ideology, unabashedly informed his august audience in London that the spate of violent attacks on sleepy communities in several states of Nigeria resulting in thousands of dead, maimed and displaced people was masterminded by the late Libyan strongman, Muammer Gadaffi. We are strangely learning that Gadaffi who died some seven years ago is responsible for our woes, even as an independent sovereign state. Gadaffi is Buhari’s fall guy!
Buhari’s puzzlingly alien reason for what is truly the Fulani herdsmen militia
affront, for instance, has set the whole world buzzing for some analytic
reconstruction. What are the social bonds of primary significance in the
attacked local societies and their relationship with foreign attackers as
neighbours, or as people of differing mien or mood? Localism is an important
element in both the social experience and the mentality of a people. The
diversity of the Nigerian rural society is contained within a strong framework
of a desire for national integration. At the most intimately local level, the
real strength of social ties must be understood to imply that it could not be
disturbed by some nebulous foreign forces. Both the fact of a lack of
geographical propinquity and their constellations of local institutions make
the interactions of Nigerian and Libyan inhabitants difficult to surmise.
Absence of shared relationships, concerns, speech, manners, etc. makes
President Buhari’s postulation baseless or unfounded. He may need to provide
further proofs. Village communities, the unsparing objects of the Fulani
militia men, are not social isolates. It suffices to emphasise that a steady
turnover of population even though a vitally important structural
characteristic of a local society does not destroy the essential fabric of the
community. One not uncommon suggestion is that the principal social bonds
within local communities are the ties of kinship. Each is in a sense an
aggregate of kinship groups, sometimes co-operating to serve or promote mutual
interests, etc. The predominant household form of the simple “nuclear family”
consisting of husband, wife and children found in other climes is notable by
its comparative rarity among us. Our people live in large and complex
households containing resident kin, or even several cohabiting conjugal
families. So how is it possible for “Libyans trained to attack Nigerian
communities” to live among the locales for so long without being detected or
found out by the people?
Buhari’s faus pax is made even more ludicrous
by certain verbal expressions involving some peculiarity of manner or idiom.
During his visit to Benue
State in the wake of the
murderous attacks by the herdsmen militia at which many people had been killed
or displaced, Buhari preached an impassioned sermon of brotherly accommodation
of fellow Nigerians who are legitimately seeking grazing land for their cattle.
His Minister of the Interior, Gen. Abdulrahman Danbazzau insensitively
described the siege on many farming communities as “a (mere) law and order
matter.” Other prime members of the President’s government, including the
Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris have peculiarly re-created the
meaning, intendment or objective of the Fulani herdsmen militia attacks just to
lead us into a responsive awareness of the “inevitability” of the situation or
of our plight.
They all have attempted a re-construction of the series of events, of
personages, the spirit of a past age and the evolution of a new cultural conflict
scenario. Buhari’s contrived and unconvincing Libyan dimension story is one
such effort too many. It is hollow; it is vacuous; it is untrue. In fact, it is
capable of further straining the taut diplomatic and other relations between Nigeria and several countries in the Sahel region and beyond.
Historically, stratagem or a plan for
deceiving a people or of gaining an advantage over them as a policy of
government has been found to be counter-productive. The Goebbelian tactic
during the Nazi interregnum in Germany
is an eloquent example. The moment the people identify their government as
over-indulging in emotion or untruths especially the conscious effort to induce
emotion in order for the people to be lulled to sleep or of an over-optimistic
emphasis on its ingenuity or prowess even as it demonises others as depraved or
incapable of the exercise of good judgement; or of a failure to restrain or
evaluate emotion, the people lose their ability to sympathise with the
government’s plight. Lie-telling, grand-standing, buck-passing or inability to
accept failure or mis-judgement are the concomitant self-repudiation of the
people’s projected ingenuity or wizardry of the Buhari government. So much hope
and passion had been invested on the APC government. The people have however
come to recognise that much hype and an over-promotion of the government and
its party have un-subtly de-marketed the presumed prowess of a putative
intervention effort and have particularly presented the party as a
will-o-the-wisp or as a deceptive contrivance.
Even as righteousness is enjoined to exalt a
nation, only truth and an abiding faith in the transcendental goodness of
openness and transparency on the part of leaders will endear the people to
their government.
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