President Goodluck Jonathan
Speaking at a press conference during the latest African Union jamboree in Addis Ababa, President Jonathan sounded an optimistic note concerning the government’s latest assault on the Boko Haram insurgency: ‘The military intervention...is going well. I am optimistic that with the level of success already being recorded, the emergency rule in the affected states may not last up to the six months stipulated by the Constitution.’ He also took the opportunity to reassure us on the safety of the civilian population: ‘There is no human rights abuse and there is no collateral damage with regard to security of individuals.’
It’s
possible that Jonathan believes his own ‘optimistic’ prognosis, although, as I
argued in an earlier blog, it’s questionable whether he believes in anything
beyond the unlikely fact of his presidency, which perhaps still seems like a
daydream and would explain his fundamental lack of seriousness. So it was, for
instance, that even as he found the time to reassure the world that all was
well on the terrorism front and that Nigerian soldiers had suddenly understood
the necessity of treating Nigerian citizens with courtesy, it was also reported
that Mr President failed to deliver his address to his fellow African rulers,
ostensibly because he was too drunk. Nor was this his first no-show. He did the
same at the 2011 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Auckland because
he was too busy celebrating his wife’s birthday.
But
not to worry. This, after all, is the War on Terror and the US Secretary of
State was close at hand to endorse the latest development – ‘Boko Haram is a
terrorist organisation, and they have killed wantonly and so we defend the
right completely of the government of Nigeria to defend itself and to fight
back against terrorists’ – at the same time as he assured that he had ‘talked
directly about the imperative of Nigerian troops adhering to the highest
standards and not themselves engaging in human rights violations and atrocities’.
Given the scandal surrounding the drone attacks by the Obama administration on
suspected terrorist hideouts in faraway lands, along with the continuing
outrage of Guantanamo Bay, Jonathan – to say nothing of the army - clearly has plenty
of latitude. Who knows? We might even yet see drone attacks on suspected
mountain hideouts in Adamawa State, and anyone accused of terrorism will have
a difficult time proving their innocence.
Boko
Haram, for its part, was not slow in refuting Jonathan’s claim that the
military had made any significant inroads with this new, more muscular approach;
according to their leader, ‘My fellow brethren from all over the world I assure
you that we are strong, hale and hearty since they launched this assault on us
following the state of emergency declaration.’ He also claimed that ‘in some
instances soldiers who faced us turned and ran away,’ and promptly invited
Islamists from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq to join them in creating an
Islamic state in Nigeria: ‘We call to us our brethren in these countries I
mentioned. Oh! Our brethren, come to us.’
It’s
impossible to believe who is telling the truth in any of all this given that
the military has cordoned off the affected areas – no mobile phone access, no
free movement of people – but there is no reason to think that an insurgency
now entering its fourth year without any appreciable results will suddenly
collapse within six months because a few more troops are on the ground for a
limited period of time. Moreover, the administration’s conflicting signals
about how best to deal with the problem - now sabre-rattling, now appeasing -
continues even under the emergency, with the President’s peace committee still
touring parts of the north seeking dialogue with a group which has told them
point-blank that it couldn’t be less interested. Or, as recently
reported, releasing fifty imprisoned suspected insurgents from detention as
a goodwill gesture. It was for this reason, perhaps, that the same peace committee
was snubbed by the Commandant of the Jaji Military Cantonment, which
was itself attacked last year by Boko Haram members in one of its more daring
operations. Either fight them or settle with them.
The
nightmare scenario, of course, is that Jonathan is in effect overseeing the
final disintegration of Nigeria as we approach the centenary of what was never
anybody’s baby. That this should be so is not directly his fault given the deep
fissures in the state he inherited after decades of misrule, but there would
seem to be some sort of irony in the fact that it should happen under a person
many believe to be the most incompetent head of state the country has ever
laboured under, military or civilian. Reports emanating from Aso Rock paint a
picture of an administration which is paralysed by the myriad problems facing
it, and which perhaps accounts for the persistent stories concerning Jonathan’s
drinking problem. Moreover, he is particularly badly served by his special
adviser on media and publicity, the ubiquitous Dr Reuben Abati, whose
increasingly intemperate language against his master’s detractors –
‘medieval-era ignoramus,’ ‘mental indolence’ - is itself a sign of an
administration which has lost its grip.
Given
all this, it seems unlikely that Jonathan will survive even his
current first term, never mind getting himself re-elected in 2015, although, as
I also argued in a previous blog, the opposition is hardly inspiring. This,
too, is the result of the deadly politics we have been playing this
half-century of an independence which has merely been an extension of indirect
rule by other means, in large part because we have allowed it to be so, hence
the importance paid to the opinion of the US Secretary of State, but that is
another matter entirely.
© Adewale Maja-Pearce
Adewale Maja-Pearce is the author of several books, including Loyalties
and Other Stories, In My Father's Country, How many miles to Babylon?, A
Mask Dancing, Who's Afraid of Wole Soyinka?, From Khaki to Agbada,
Remembering Ken Saro-Wiwa and Other Essays, A Peculiar Tragedy, and
Counting the Cost, as well as the 1998 and 1999 annual reports on human
rights violations in Nigeria. He also edited The Heinemann Book of African
Poetry in English, Wole Soyinka: An Appraisal, Christopher Okigbo:
Collected Poems, The New Gong Book of New Nigerian Short Stories,
and Dream Chasers.
Click here to see Maja-Pearce's amazon.com page: http://www.amazon.com/Adewale-Maja-Pearce/e/B001HPKIOU
Good piece.I now return here, every other Saturday
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