By Ken Tadaferua
ABUJA (Sundiata Post) “We must understand that these are the dying days of the Boko Haram and what they intend to do is to embarrass the government because they have been degraded, they have been pushed out of Sambisa forest.
– Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaj Lai Mohammed
“The government is still wondering the criteria or facts used by the anti-corruption watchdog to arrive at its very misleading and unfair conclusions in its assessment of the federal government’s efforts in this anti-corruption crusade.
“In the end, this whole episode may turn out to be just a political distraction, given the strong views some of TI’s patrons have expressed against the Buhari Administration.”
– Shehu Garba, Senior Special Assistant to the President on media and publicity.
The two quotes above are typical of the agama lizard psychology of the Buhari’s APC led federal government: Focus on self praise which it cements with dodging responsibility for failure, conjuring funny excuses and sacrificing scapegoats for their sins.
When Boko Haram kidnapped Chibok girls in 2014, was the purpose to embarrass government? One remembers Lai Mohammed’s blistering attack on the then government as irresponsible. Boko Haram are terrorists who attack soft targets to inflict maximum damage on victims and the state. This fact and past lessons ought be enough for government to provide effective security for large gathering of vulnerable people as the Dapchi school girls in Yobe State. But no. So over 100 of the girls were reportedly kidnapped. To say Boko Haram wants to embarrass the government is a joke.
So too is the hoopla by the government over the Transparency International report of worsening perception of corruption in Nigeria. Suddenly the government is questioning the criteria for TI’s ranking. Worse, it is finding sacrificial scapegoats by insinuating that Obasanjo who is on the advisory board of TI influenced the 2017 rating of Nigeria. And scooting around for excuses it points to the purported N738.9 billion the EFCC claims it has recovered.
Unfortunately the Presidency cannot impugn the integrity of TI built up over long years of ranking countries globally. Unlike Nigerians, TI is not influenced by smoke and glass claims. All discerning minds know that Buhari stakes his anti corruption reputation on war against elite (of the opposition) corruption with produce as opaque as mud.
Corruption continues to rage not only among the elite of the ruling party but mushrooms in all spheres of Nigerian life, not least its public institutions. The non institutional approach to fighting corruption makes this government a joke.
The presidency should chin up and take responsibility for not spreading its dragnet effectively. It ought abandon its media blitz, populist, Gestapo style attack on targets to adopt a scientific approach to dealing with institutional corruption, sparing no cronies. Then the accolades will pour in and TI will give it kudus. The presidency’s agama lizard self praise will not do.
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