2021: Separating policies from propaganda

WEDNESDAY COLUMN BY USSIJU MEDANER  

info@medaner.com, justme4justice@yahoo.com

Finally the year 2021 is gone; but not without leaving us with unforgettable moments and events that impact our national and individual lives. When we started the year some 365 days ago, it was with huge expectations from both Nigerians and the government at all levels. And now, as we look back at the past year, we want to ask questions such as: how did we fair as a people in relation to the country and to one another? How did the government fair in discharging its duties to the citizens across all levels?

Undeniably, the country experienced mixed feelings of both the good and bad and probably the worst. The year was a tremendous continuity of unprecedented level of infrastructural development across the board, on the positive side. Even the acute critics and enemies of government are grossly bewildered by the achievements of the government in the course of the year but nonetheless have to criticise to stay in business and for relevancy. But then, the year also has an unpleasant story of insecurity to tell; and some of the critics of the government really hinged on that to project and sell their product, criticism.  We actually spent the year dealing with the onslaught of bandits, killer herders, kidnappers and the adamant Boko Haram. Yet, the year 2021 story of insecurity would not be told without the massive commitment of the government to end insecurity in the country; the massive commitment to the development of the Nigeria Army; the huge and continuous acquisition of arms and ammunition, and the eventual onslaught on the insurgents across the entire length and breadth of the country. The country, despite the ceaseless broadcast propaganda from the critics of the government and allies of PDP, became safer despite the scattered attacks from Boko Haram, banditry and kidnapping gangs that wanted to override the nation’s security network.  

As I look back at the year 2021 and the events that define the year, a quote credited to President Muhammadu Buhari captures my attention; the President said, “They will tell lies about us and we shall tell the truths about them.” In fact, the year, politically, was an embodiment of lies from the camp of the opposition and the desperate politicians who have literally been alienated from access to the national treasury and whose economic and political survival are greatly threatened by the Administration’s commitment to the fight against corruption. This set, a population of questionable men is inclusive of men of the altar who have become mammon worshipers and would do anything to stay relevant to their political inclination and corruption inclined lifestyles.

PDP spent the year round organising its propaganda and lies-peddling machinery, telling Nigerians the Buhari Administration did nothing for Nigeria and Nigerians. Yet, they were not blind to the heart touching infrastructural, social and economic development of the last six years of the present Administration. Yet, when we look around at the facts and sights of the year, we cannot but see the fixed and beautified airports, we saw Nigerians jostling for access to Buhari’s trains, we saw hundreds of thousands of Nigerian youths becoming beneficiaries of N-power, Nigerians traveled home for the yuletide on smooth Nigeria roads, we saw Nigerian local refined rice saturating the markets, and electricity generation and supply becoming more stable, better and constant, than ever before. 

So, these critics who conveniently ignore all the aforementioned tangible products of matter are the same people who celebrated the PDP administration that supervised the general degradation of the quality of life of Nigerians. A party that took pride in the neglect of the common welfare of the people as they greedily diverted the wealth of the country for personal uses. They used power to the benefit of themselves and cronies. A party that literally has no plan for the future of the country; eating everything without consideration for the survival of the current population nor the future generation. Self-serving elements who saw the nation’s rail development collapsed but were okay with it; who saw the roads becoming totally dilapidated across the country but were satisfied with the condition, and even utterly with the development of the Second Niger Bridge on paper. They are the same people who now suddenly turned to the patriotic Nigerians who judge government performance by visible infrastructure, and claim that the present Administration is non-performing. The same hypocritical crew who were jubilating at the sight of PDP’s commissioning of non-existence railway network in Markudi, Benue state in 2014 with train coaches; imagine train coaches without a railway network! And they pretended not to know when some weeks later, the coaches were moved away. That was a performing government. 

Hypocrites! They celebrated the construction of the Second Niger Bridge on paper and sang the praise of the deceitful government to high heavens; and now, calling Buhari a non-performing President. The bridge now 90 percent completed is not an achievement according to them. Nigeria was supposed to have a functional railway system some 20 years ago until PDP happened to Nigeria. Now, with the state of the art railway infrastructure, the rhetoric is now “is it railway we will chop?” No! we will not ‘chop railway;’ we will develop on the back of the functioning rail transportation across the country. 

If they claim construction of a standard rail system, roads, Airports and developing the nation’s security structure aren’t an achievement, we need to ask them, what then qualifies as achievement by their standard?  Perhaps, using 500 million naira to establish cassava bread factory that successfully produced one loaf of bread before closing down, the diverting of $2.1 billion naira meant for arms procurement to fight insurgence and officially engaging prayer warriors to the tune of N200 million naira to pray for death of Boko Haram, the appropriation of $16 billion to purchase darkness for the country among the scores of theft and maladministration of the nation wealth; would be the best definition of patriotic governmental dealings and achievements.

They are telling Nigeria to return to the PDP era; they are promising to rescue the country and develop Nigeria; telling us the PDP era, including the disastrous Jonathan government, was perhaps the best administration in terms of development and security. They knew when the Jonathan government in 2010 awarded the PH-Maiduguri rail line, a project that could have definitely been the major achievement of the administration for the Niger Delta region. The project was broken into three sections and cleverly awarded to cronies of PDP, including a company linked to the then wife of the President. Several companies including Lingo and a UK company with a dormant account were mobilised for work with borrowed money to be repaid with the sweat of Nigerian tax payers. A project planned to be completed in ten years, was hardly started until the Buhari Administration came in and commenced real preparation to award the contract afresh to a serious and genuine contracting company.

Yet, they spent their entire 2021 telling Nigeria the Buhari government has done nothing for Nigeria; begging and wailing to deceitfully push for a support they don’t deserve from the citizens they have never done anything tangible to improve their lives. 

Father Kukah, like many of his kins, worries us the most; and gives us a more disturbing insight into the level of bastardisation of religion in the country. If the leaders would chose the path of lies, aligning with the confirmed destroyer of the sanctity of the country, and threw their conscience to the wind as they back PDP and the corrupt politicians who were openly known as the destroyer of our commonwealth, what would we expect of their followers and parishioners who literally worship them?  Or do we assume Father Kukah and his friends of the altars are unaware of the entire list of the atrocity and under-development of Nigeria by PDP and its members? 

I am sure the only reason the Kukahs of this world would choose PDP over Muhammadu Buhari and APC would, perhaps, be because he was not aware of Dasuki, Diezani, Atiku, and many others atrocities against the country.

GOD BLESS THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA!