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The government should urgently arrest the colossal tragedies that have brought Nigeria to her knees, writes MONDAY PHILIPS EKPE
President Donald Trump of the United States of America, a man not given to conventional international diplomacy, announced last week, toeing the line of Senator Ted Cruz and co., that Nigeria was guilty of genocide against Christians. His administration also promptly tagged Nigeria a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). Trump’s trademark incendiary tweets also didn’t disappoint: “If the Nigerian government continues to allow the killing of Christians, the USA will immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, and may very well go into that now disgraced country, ‘guns-a-blazing,’ to completely wipe out the Islamic terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities.
“I am hereby instructing our Department of War to prepare for possible action. If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our cherished Christians! Warning: The Nigerian government better move fast!” Back at home, the Trump government has been shut down for weeks because of the federal lawmakers’ inability to cross party lines to pass the enabling budget but he had the liberty to make declarations that have now significantly triggered and disrupted public discourse in Nigeria.
The official response has, as expected, been that of denial. Other entities have also joined our government to reject the albatross being hung on the neck of this already overburdened country; while some others have hailed the plan of ‘gallant’ Trump to come to the rescue of his beloved brethren. For long, Nigerian political leaders have exploited our fault-lines, notably religion, region and ethnicity, to secure advantages over their rivals. But never in our history has any superpower publicly threatened to directly intervene in the nation’s domestic affairs on any of those counts. All of a sudden, a problem most probably not anticipated has dropped on the laps of the government of President Bola Tinubu and the stressed people of Nigeria at such a difficult time.
We’re clearly unprepared for this period. There are slippery grounds here to worry about. The military hierarchy is being rejigged in the midst of a coup scare that’s unprecedented since the commencement of the current democratic dispensation. The masses now watch helplessly as politicians demonstrate crass opportunism in the form of unconvincing and dubious defections from ‘sinking’ parties to the one that controls the centre and, by implication, every machinery or resource which guarantees access to power and more power, thereby undermining opposition severely. The same disempowered people are aware that they can only hope to survive today’s painful socio-economic realities while facing an uncertain tomorrow.
Most Nigerians are actually staying afloat courtesy of the sheer grit they’re known for. Attempting to grapple with the possibility of a foreign-powered warfare on their soil with all the challenges translates to psychological torture. Now that the Chinese leader, President Xi Jinping, has countered Trump, the picture of the future may have become even foggier. These two elephants mustn’t fight in whatever manner on our fragile soil.
Trust the internet-savvy local population. Tinubu’s own tweet in 2014: “The slaughtering of Christian worshippers is strongly condemnable. It calls to question the competence of (President Goodluck) Jonathan to protect Nigerians” has resurfaced and gone viral as a reminder of yesterday’s missile from a set of political power seekers to a besieged and demonised sitting head of state. Then there was a ‘clueless’ administration to remove by all means. After all, propaganda is always cosy for the person dishing it out. Some commentators have since concluded that the Law of Karma is at work; that, for the treatment he meted out to Jonathan, the combined forces of nature and ill-luck have returned to serve him his own bouquet of troubles in full measure.
But, quite frankly, there’s no time to gloat. Neither is it even sensible to. For, this matter is bigger than Tinubu and his open ambition to clinch another presidential term in 2027. At stake, mainly, are Nigeria’s sovereignty and the reinstatement of the sanctity of human life being constantly and savagely eroded. At least three critical requirements apply here. One, selfless, visionary leadership. Two, the capacity of the statutory institutions to rise above their present underperforming levels and protect lives and property. And, three, the willingness and capability of the citizens to rise above their differences in order to fight a common cause, not to talk of any enemy from within or outside.
Sadly, however, the arguments out there centre mostly around who between Christians and Moslems have suffered more casualties. The complexity of the situation in accentuated by the fact that the key variables which appear conflicting are indeed all true. At no time has the body of Islamic worshippers in Nigeria declared war on their Christian counterparts, thereby making any generalisation or profiling unfair and dangerous. The terrorists and insurgents – spearheaded by Boko Haram – have used their faith as pretext for the bulk of these criminalities. Many of the defenceless people and communities that have been brutalised, traumatised and wiped out have cogent reasons to trace their travails to religion and language. Their cries must, therefore, not be silenced. The calamities that keep befalling the nation have so far been liberalised, having touched Nigerians regardless of their affinities. And more. Ours is truly an unfortunate cocktail of woes.
Genocide, slaughter or massacre? The Convention on Genocide adopted by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in December 1948 defines genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group”. Hair-splitting over the semantics, theatrics and politics of the evils that confront us at this point is self-sabotaging. Must the barbaric treatments experienced by some Nigerians first fit into the moulds of those perpetrated by the Nazis during the Holocaust, Janjaweed in Darfur, Sudan and Tutsis and Hutus against each other in Rwanda to qualify for heinous crimes against humanity? And why should it take a Trump moment to jolt us into action?
President Tinubu has now seen the need to appoint individuals to head our diplomatic missions abroad. He has also declared a state of emergency on our security, whatever that means. In God’s name, let’s get help if our own strength has failed us. Nigerian citizens are tired of meetings and pronouncements that produce little or nothing. The silly debates about the religion that has lost more people must stop. It’s time to halt abruptly ending precious lives like flies.
Dr Ekpe is a member of THISDAY Editorial Board
