A Change is in the Air (A Change is Gonna Come!)

Nigeria stands at yet another cross roads, as the world watches Africa’s most populous country hurtle towards D-Day, February 14, 2015.  This year’s St. Valentine’s Day is the day Nigerians go to the polls to decide whether to give Mr. Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Jonathan another four years as president or change the guard by voting in Mr. Muhamadu Buhari, a retired army General and former military head of State.

Nigeria has never had a more contested election as this impending one.  With the apparatus of government in their control and the popularity of their party bearer, Mr. Jonathan, waning, the PDP is likely to pull all stops to ensure that it is not kicked out of office come May when the newly elected officials will be sworn into power.  The preceding six years during which Mr Jonathan has been in power have been lackluster to say the least.  

The economy has descended into the pre-2000 doldrums it was in before Mr. Obasanjo took power and indeed Nigeria has witnessed some of the most violent terrorist activities since the Nigerian civil war.  Mr Jonathan’s apparent cluelessness and apathy is not helping the matter and many Nigerians would like to see a change of leadership.  However, there are those Nigerians who have enjoyed the largess of the Jonathan administration or have benefitted from its ineptitude and corrupt application of resources and they have vowed to do all in their power to ensure that Mr. Jonathan wins the 2015 presidential elections.  Particularly vociferous and tenaciously behind Mr. Jonathan are ex-leaders of the Niger-Delta militant groups who have in the years since Mr. Jonathan has been in power, enjoyed juicy lucrative security and supply contracts given to them by Mr. Jonathan’s administration as a placatory means to earn their loyalty and support.  

Indeed, two such Niger Delta militant ex-leaders are the buccaneers, Mr. Government Ekpemupolo, aka Tompolo and Asari Dokubo.  They, along with the irascible Bishop David Oyedepo of Winners Chapel have made what can only be described as inciting tribalist statements at the very least, or even war cries, depending on which side of the divide you choose.  While there have been condemnation from many well-meaning Nigerians, the security forces are curiously silent about these, which beggars the question if the Jonathan administration is not behind these threats.

If Nigeria were the true democracy it seeks to be, and the Jonathan administration is confident that it has demonstrated reasons why it deserves a second chance then these threats and acts of blackmail are irrelevant.  Many Nigerians who are old enough to remember the Buhari/Idiagbon administration are nostalgic of that era’s lawful application of government resources and disciplined citizenry as opposed to the jungle that Nigeria has become under Mr. Jonathan where thugs and thieves rule the day in government and terrorists abound in the Niger creeks just as they do in the North eastern states of Nigeria.  A change is desperately needed and indeed a change it is Nigeria must have else she devolves into a failed state of the ilk of Afghanistan and Somalia. 

Nigeria – Boko Haram & The Ebola Virus Scourge

As if the strain inflicted on the Nigerian citizenry by the ignominious Boko Haram terrorist sect were not enough, the Nigerian psyche has been further assailed by the threat of a full blown Ebola epidemic.  With the ineffectual government of Mr. Goodluck Jonathan struggling to get a handle on the scourge of Boko Haram (it’s been almost four months since 278 girls were kidnapped from Chibok) it will be a calamity at best and a catastrophe at worst, not only for West Africa but for the world, should the Ebola outbreak get out of hand.

While Mr. Jonathan cavorts in Washington at the African Leaders – US conference, hundreds of Nigerian troops have been killed in the North Eastern state of Bornu as Boko Haram seizes the border town of Gwoza, the second after Damboa, which it seized on July 21, 2014.  With two Nigerian towns now under its control added to a vast portion of the Sambisa forest, which straddles Nigeria and Cameroun, Boko Haram is quickly carving out a geographical enclave for its proposed Islamic state.

Condemning strongly the “excesses of Boko Haram”, Mr. Jonathan and his PR machinery’s favorite refrain, while not taking cogent steps to confront the problem of Boko Haram leaves many Nigerians to speculate that either Mr. Jonathan is clueless as to what needs to be done about the brutish terrorist group or he is apathetic to the plight of Nigerians and the territorial integrity of the country which he pledged to protect and defend in the oath he took when he assumed the presidency.  The Nigerian Military troops in the battle against Boko Haram have raised alarm as to how under-equipped they are compared to the terrorists.  The Nigerian military is kitted with old, degraded and sometimes fake arms and ammunition that are decades old with ordinances that fail to detonate in their confrontations with the terrorist sect leading to high casualties dealt on the Nigerian Military by the superiorly armed terrorists all the time.

The corruption and rot that has rendered the Nigerian military a glorified vigilante group has also rendered the Nigerian Health care system in near-total collapse and disrepair.  Nigeria is supposedly the largest economy in Africa with a GDP of about $502 billion in 2013 but spends only about $6 billion on its defense. Of this amount, only about $2.33 billion is actually spent on the Nigerian Military with the balance of about $3.7 billion going to fund the Nigerian Maritime Security Agency charged with Maritime security which it conducts through juicy security contracts awarded to former Niger Delta militant leaders (associates of Mr. Jonathan when he was Governor of Bayelsa state) and their private armies of pirates.  Essentially, more than 60% of Nigeria’s defense budget goes to paying protection money to the Niger Delta militant groups.

Recently, Mr. Jonathan asked the Nigerian congress to pass an appropriation bill for $1.0 dollars to pay for training and equipment of the Nigerian Military against Boko Haram.  If Nigeria’s history of corruption and misappropriation of funds is anything to go by, it is doubtful that the $1 billion dollar being sought by Mr. Jonathan will be used for its intended purpose.

Nigeria’s best hope of tackling the Boko Haram and the Ebola virus threats is to ask for help from the international community.  The USA, France, Britain, Israel and even Australia have offered their assistance as regards the Boko Haram scourge as have the CDC in the US and the WHO as regards the Ebola virus threat.  When a government is as clueless, inept and confused as the Jonathan Administration seems to be, there should be no shame in asking for help from those who can save the country from these seemingly intractable problems.  As the Nigerian First Lady, Dr., Dame, Chief, Deacon, Mrs. Patience Jonathan famously put it, "Daris God O!"