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Continued from Part IV

eakness and wickedness seemed to go together in the character and person of Mr. Jonathan. His weakness is demonstrated in his inability to vigorously pursue goals, sustain action and grind out results while his wickedness is embodied in his reckless inertia and aloofness in his repeated failure to respond to the plight and poverty of the Nigeria people. It is not that he does not know the difference between what is wrong and what is right, rather it is his restriction cum confinement of empathy to his own family and personal needs. To underscore his wickedness, he rescheduled his programs recently because of a personal loss, the death of his sister, something he has never done even when citizens were killed and maimed by Boko Haram and more than 200 girls abducted. The town of Baga was ravaged and more than 200 people killed with streets littered with bodies in recent days, but Mr. Jonathan was not touched; he felt nothing and he was not bothered by the plight of the people of Baga. The news made headlines around the world the BBC, CNN, Reuters, Aljazeera and hundreds of newspapers around the world but it made no news with Mr. Jonathan.

I observed early that Mr. Jonathan will go to any length to fend for, provide at state expense through budgetary allocation, defend and act on every need and want of his family while at the same time remain disinterested, aloof and unconcerned about the hardship and suffering of those he pretend to represent. The word service has no place in the wolfish world of Jonathan; it is always give me, bring me, let me have, and provide for me - the language of a self-centred and greedy man. Despite the long list of planes in the presidential fleet, Mr. Jonathan is earnestly asking for another presidential jet in the 2015 budget, the budget of austerity! The austerity measure, a result of the steady fall in the price of crude oil in the global market, has not slowed down the give-me, I-need-this-and-that obsession of Mr. Jonathan. His wants take priority over the basic needs of Nigerians. I guess the consequences of childhood poverty can mean a gargantuan level of greed never seen before; about twelve presidential jets have now replaced the shoeless experience of yore years. But you would have expected the request for another presidential jet to be of concern for the finance minister. Unfortunately, we have nothing to show that she expressed any concern to the man who made her the prime minister of Nigeria, a job she seems to treasure so much and for which she now appear to be a card carrying member of the most corrupt political party in Africa, the PDP.

Nigerians have invested so much into democracy and they deserve some rich dividends to justify their investments. Since June 12, 1993, the Nigerian people have laboured, sweated and shed their blood to ensure that something worthwhile and fruitful comes out of their sacrifices to secure a better society, a society that will be responsive to their basic needs for jobs, good roads, social and medical infrastructure that will see to it that they are well looked after and ensure that everyone is treated equally, and provide health and social services for every citizen without having to resort to medical tourism in South Africa, India, Europe and America. Most gave Mr. Jonathan a chance; they put their bet on him and hoped that he will understand their plight because he told them he never had a shoe as a kid. Now they can see that that trust has been betrayed, brutally betrayed and haplessly abused. I have in recent past referred to Mr. Jonathan's Aso Rock as very sick and very corrupt (URL: http://nigeriaworld.com/feature/publication/babsajayi/080114.html). I also pointed out in a previous article that Mr. Jonathan attaches zero value to the lives of our people (URL: http://nigeriaworld.com/feature/publication/babsajayi/051614.html ) and showed the seemingly endless corruption in the mismanagement of the nation's oil and gas industry under the direct supervision of Mr. Jonathan and his sidekick Diezani Alison-Madueke in another article (URL: http://nigeriaworld.com/feature/publication/babsajayi/053014.html). Every citizen can now feel the wickedness of Mr. Jonathan, his wife and their errand boys cum sidekicks such as Doyin Okupe and Mrs. Sodipo-Clark, who have recently suggested that the Nigerian people should give Mr. Jonathan more time in his disinterested search for the more than 200 Chibok girls. You are left wondering if these people are still human beings and if they are sane. Opportunism and sycophancy has smothered the heads of many of the sidekicks and rented crowd in the Jonathan kleptocracy. Many of them will say and do anything to be relevant and be seen to be working for their master. Honesty and integrity have deserted Aso Rock while greed took over.

The security of the nation particularly its crude oil is another area where trouble looms. An ex-militant and area boy in the Niger Delta, Government Ekpemupolo (aka Tompolo) was the supplier of motor torpedo boats (MBT) to the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA). NIMASA director general, Patrick Akpobolokemi told the nation that the boats (some even said they were war ships) were purchased on behalf of his agency by Tompolo's company, Global West Vessel Specialist Ltd. A Warri rat and thug is now the supplier of fighter/patrol boats to the nation? Wonders will never end in Nigeria! Every right-thinking person will now begin to wonder how come it fell to an area boy to supply sensitive security equipment to the same government he's done everything to sidetrack, stole crude oil from and whose pipelines he had spent his adult life vandalizing. It all just does not add up, but this is Mr. Jonathan at work - the work of bad luck - along with his appointed misfits who run government agencies across the nation.

Many of the people familiar with other recent security blunders of Mr. Jonathan will say why not. Why can't Tompolo supply naval boats if Moujahid Dokubo-Asari and other ex-militants cum thugs are government contractors charged with the security and protection of the nation's oil fields and pipelines? Why not let the area boys at Tinubu manage the security of the Central Bank and other adjourning banks on Marina Street in Lagos? With the security contracts given to the self-trained oil pipeline vandals, Mr. Jonathan had compromised the main source of the nation's income and allowed it to be held captive. This single act is not what you will expect from a man who laid claim to a doctorate, any doctorate at all, even a doctorate from a Bolekaja University. By allowing these miscreants to hold the nation's oil industry captive, Mr. Jonathan has further confirmed to the world that he is clueless and has no idea about matters relating to safety and security - and he is not ready to learn, which surely made him a misfit for the position he occupies. That he desire to continue to hold the position just shows how hopeless and thoughtless he really is, except, of course, when you consider his desire to maintain his kleptocracy, which by itself has brought him and his fronts and agents untold wealth.

Strangely and sadly, the Nigerian Navy was quick to react to the story about the surveillance boats acquired by Tompolo for NIMASA. One Austine Oyagha told the nation that "No individual has acquired gunships into this country, the gunboats being alluded to actually belong to NIMASA (Nigeria Maritime Administration and Safety Agency), and these boats are currently being manned by the personnel of the Nigerian Navy." The whole business smacks of dishonesty, deception and corruption. It makes mockery of a government that is trying - and making a terrible job of it - to dislodge Boko Haram while encouraging the South-South counterparts of Boko Haram to thrive and dig in. Lawlessness has thrived under Mr. Jonathan so much so that nobody is safe in the nation, not even Jonathan himself, and that is the reason why he cannot move around freely and he cannot travel or visit certain parts of the nation, having ceded some regions in the North East to Boko Haram and other areas in the South-South to the Egbesu Boys, who issued an ultimatum, the Kaiama Declaration in December 1998 and have attacked oil installations ever since, and forced many multinational oil companies to abandon oil blocks and operations. Most of the international oil companies have since abandoned oil fields in the troubled areas.

Officers and men of the Nigerian Armed Forces who used to provide security in the oil producing region have been forced out and withdrawn largely by Mr. Jonathan. In their place the government has retained the services of militants such as men from Dokubo-Asari's Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force and several other sister forces that dot the Niger Delta landscape. This is a time bomb that was packaged by Mr. Jonathan and he is not in any way equipped to withstand the fireballs that will result from the bomb he built. The Niger Delta has suffered decades of neglect and denied access to the oil resources it generates on a daily basis, but Mr. Jonathan's approach to sharing oil wealth with militants is by any means the worst solution imaginable. His preference for short-cuts and temporary measures at the expense of long lasting solutions are just shocking and retrogressive. Creating small scale enterprises to support the oil industry should be the main focus of any initiative to bring wealth to the people of the Niger Delta. Ensuring that the oil industry develop local skills and build parts, equipment and materials required in the upstream and downstream oil business in the Niger Delta will transfer wealth to the region and help it to move into the mainstream of economic freedom and prosperity. Sharing money and paying militants (a minority group in the various Niger Delta Communities) monthly allowance will teach them to be dependent and teach them how to eat fish without knowing how to fish. This will only exacerbate the problem of the region and heighten the level of unrest, and Mr. Jonathan lacks the mental acuity and will to tackle unrests.

Postscript - Fani-Kayode: The chichidodo who hates maggots but feeds on excreta

It was Professor Ayi Kwei Armah in his novel The Beautyful Ones Are Not Yet Born who used the analogy of the bird chichidodo to illustrate the deceit and delusion surrounding corruption in Ghana. Chichidodo hates excreta but feeds on maggots. But where are the maggots made? This picture is extremely true of Femi Fani-Kayode, the modern day chichidodo. He represents the sordid and ugliest of Nigerian politics, and he is just truly being himself but his ways are just not our ways, being too slimy and dirty. The stench oozing out of this guy is just unimaginable. The nasty odour nauseates everyone, even the people around him, but he who carries the terrible odour around is unaware of his load! The guy who repeatedly moved government funds into his personal account with a bank in Apapa Wharf, Lagos and faces imprisonment is suddenly the spokesman and media monger for Mr. Jonathan.

There is no doubt that they belong together except that Femi Fani-Kayode has no choice but to do the bidding of Mr. Jonathan if the court case must go away - one way or the other. If kleptocracy represents light in Fani-Kayode's world, then we need not wonder why things are so bad and corruption is the reigning king in Aso Rock. I think I will prefer the kind of darkness that Buhari represents, the darkness that will wipe out kleptocracy and corruption, and move Nigeria forward. Let me suggest that Femi Fani-Kayode should leave Nigeria now on self-imposed exile before he runs his mouth into further perfidy. I truly pity the guy. He is lost and in need of redemption. He is the star chichidodo of today's Nigeria. Continued from Part IV