By Emeka Nwagwuna
In societies where human life is accorded its true value, wherever there is a major distortion in social harmony involving loss of lives, the president or whoever is the head of government immediately visits the place to condone with the locals.
And also reassure them of their safety and government’s determination to bring culprits to justice. In Nigeria however, our president needed to be cajoled, begged and harassed before he visited the state of Benue where hundreds of farmers and their families have been invaded, maimed, raped and killed by Fulani herdsmen. Not even the gory pictures from the crime scenes that provoked a worldwide outrage in the media could move the president to either visit or do follow ups on developments there for over two months. When he finally visits two months later due to political exigencies rather than a genuine response to the call to duty, he leaves critics and supporters more embarrassed, disabled and helpless.
The people of Benue had waited for Buhari for months to empathize with them and reassure them of safety in their homeland. They waited for Buhari to prove critics wrong who say that he is handling the killer herders with kid cloves because they are his Fulani kinsmen. They waited for the president to take impartial decisive action in ensuring that these terrorists are identified, rounded up and brought to justice. These expectations were scoffed on the slab of a strange excuse by a president who shows up two months later to blame the continuous killings in Benue on a recalcitrant IG of police who refused to take orders to relocate to Benue. What does Buhari want the people of Benue to do? To go and arrest the IG whom he (Buhari) employed or what? The people of Benue did not vote the IG and so can’t directly hold him to account.
By the way, how could Buhari expect anyone to believe that he is unaware that the IG of police did not relocate to Benue as he publicly ordered? Is it possible for a president in contemporary times to give orders without any machinery in place to appraise its execution? Can he or his supporters still claim that he is on top of his job? Can Buhari in all honesty claim to be serious in bringing the herdsmen to justice in Benue? Why did he not tell us the about the scores of herdsmen arrested and prosecuted on account of Benue killings? Why did he not visit the very spots where the killers massacred Benue peopls?
This statement by Buhari that he is unaware of IG’s disobedience has several implications on the security and good governance of this country.
First, the statement by Buhari has further exposed how marginalized and unfortunate we have been as Nigerians to have a president who abdicates his duties only to plead ignorance as an excuse. Is it not possible that Buhari will one day claim ignorance of other important matters like rising unemployment, delayed pension payment, perennial fuel scarcity, continued subsidy payment on fuel, continued police brutality, inter agency rivalry, lopsidedness in federal appointments just to mention a few of his damning legacies?
Another implication of that Buhari statement is that In spite of informed concerns raised by stakeholders that the killings in Benue require more than police intervention, Buhari still thinks that the continued killings in Benue is a matter for police action rather than needing a coordinated military response. This total disconnect from the feelings of the people is indicative of a deeper problem of bias, ineptitude and callousness. If IPOB with its non-violent posture was meted with aggressive military operation code named “Python dance” why is it difficult to unleash the Military on the killer herdsmen?
Informed observers are sure that the surprise which the president expressed in Benue over the refusal of the IG to relocate to Benue will not change anything. If the president was sincere, the IG would have been asked to go home the next day. The query issued the IG will not amount to anything if recent happenings are anything to go by. Recall that the IG was not sanctioned for the false presentation he made to the president in the first instance wherein he described the January killings in Benue as a mere community clash. So why expect that the same man will obey a relocation order? It is either he has become emboldened by the lack of reprimands for wrong doing or he is simply acting in synch with the president’s body language which is tilted towards inaction, excuses and bulk passing.
Buhari continues to score low on all indexes of good governance. As an ex-military general, one expected better score on security. Believe it or not Buhari is simply not in control.
