For weeks, I had resisted the urge to write. So
many landmark events have transpired in the
last few weeks and despite the persistent
prompting by two editors to put my opinion into
words, I chose not to. I just wanted to clear my
mind for the task ahead.
However, it took less than a minute to make up
my mind to pen some words after reading the
unbelievable speech our president, Goodluck
Jonathan, gave on the first day of the year.
Now, Mr. President has a long repertoire of
terrible choice of words. As a matter of fact,
you could make a tidy bundle if you wrote a
book exclusively on GEJisms. But, this one takes
the cake, the baker and the bakery.
The question to Nigeria’s biggest challenge is
the easiest to answer.
Even the mute, deaf and blind know corruption
is at the root of our problems.
However, on
January 1st 2015, exactly 1670 days after he
was first sworn in as the President of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria, following the death
of Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, Mr. Jonathan
confirmed to the world he had ignored fighting
corruption all along.
Hear him: “There are two main problems
confronting us as a nation: The issue of
insecurity in the North, where we have the Boko
Haram terrorists and in the South where we
have commercial kidnapping. The next thing that
people worry about after security is the issue of
corruption.
“We are coming out with programmes and plans
to clean up. These are things that you don’t
just use a magical wand to wave off, otherwise
even before I became the President, there
wouldn’t have been corruption in Nigeria.”
This one shook me to my core. Here is the man
elected into power admitting to the whole world
that he had wasted the mandate given to him
doing nothing to stem the tide of looting in the
country. And, he said it with a smile.
He said it
in the most laid back, off-handed manner you
could imagine. Like he was telling his drinking
buddies why a fly was in his beer.
Imagine your security guard proudly telling you
how he went out to party every night you left
the house in his care and says he plans to get to
protecting the home pretty soon. Or your driver
admitting he had always driven your children to
school while drunk and high but had plans to
kick the habit in the near future. Let that
thought sink in.
Never in my life has someone admitted his own
failure so glaringly without even a little sense of
irony or responsibility. Never has a leader
soaked his own feet in soup and then go on to
suck firmly on it.
Was Mr. President drunk when said those words?
Clearly, no one can say those words while in
complete control of their senses. I refuse to
believe the man trusted with leading the most
populated country in Africa admitted
deliberately ignoring arguably the most
important part of his job and allowing the wolves
to run wild over our collective till.
Did Mr. President know that, standing on that
stage, he was admitting his inability to fight
the Subsidy Thieves that fleeced Nigeria of
trillions? That he was admitting that all the
work the anti-fraud agencies have done in the
last five years have been merely cosmetic?
That he was admitting that every word the
opposition had said about his reluctance to fight
corruption was a fact?
Frankly, despite the modest but largely
incomplete physical work President Jonathan has
put in, I can’t wait to see his back. I – and I
speak for about 80% of Nigerians here-–am
embarrassed to have Goodluck Jonathan as
president. Febuary 14th can’t come soon
enough.
Booting this man out of office would give me
more pleasure than a thousand orgasms.
_______
Gbenga Olorunpomi is on Twitter as
@GbengaGold
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