{"id":26602,"date":"2014-05-15T09:32:46","date_gmt":"2014-05-15T08:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/?p=26602"},"modified":"2014-05-15T09:32:46","modified_gmt":"2014-05-15T08:32:46","slug":"why-the-president-must-sack-his-media-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pointblanknews.com\/pbn\/articles-opinions\/why-the-president-must-sack-his-media-team\/","title":{"rendered":"Why the President Must Sack His Media Team."},"content":{"rendered":"

By Dr. Prosper Ahworegba.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

These have not been the best of times for President Goodluck Jonathan. Since the Nyanya bomb blast that consumed over 70 souls and the abduction of nearly 300 teenage school girls from Chibok in Borno State, the President has been at the receiving end of well-aimed barbs.
\nAs he confessed recently, it is impossible for him to sleep. The President cannot sleep because he is obviously dazed from uncountable blows carefully aimed and delivered on his head by cerebral
\npugilists from Nigeria and across the world.<\/p>\n

From acerbic press conferences and\/or statements by international icons to scathing editorials by media houses, both local and foreign, the President has been ridiculed, vilified and maligned using all
\nknown literary weapons \u2013 caricature, burlesque, lampoon, mimicry, parody, travesty, and even outright abuse to maximum effect. Indeed, no known President in history has been so rubbished. I sympathize with him.<\/p>\n

The Guardian, renowned for its fierce independence and from whose stable the President\u2019s spokesman got elevated to his current position, fired the first damning salvo in a searing editorial entitled, \u201cThe insensitivity in Kano\u201d. This opened the floodgates of vitriolic editorials and
\npress statements. The Economist of London and the New York Times followed suit with \u2013 \u201cA Clueless Government\u201d and \u201cJonathan leads a corrupt government that has little credibility\u201d.<\/p>\n

Sen. Hillary Clinton, America\u2019s immediate past Secretary of State, and Senator John McCain completed the routing from the US end. This is apart from comments by numerous other international figures, other local newspapers\u2019 editorials and satellite TV news reviews in which the President is
\nrepeatedly and continually called names.
\nBut, \u201cif you must blame the hawk for being harsh\u201d, says an African proverb, \u201cyou must first scold mother-hen for exposing her chicks to danger\u201d.<\/p>\n

The immediate cause of this barrage of abuses is the seeming nonchalance of the government at rescuing the kidnapped girls. No government, however misguided and incompetent, will go to sleep when
\nsuch a huge number of her young citizenry are abducted.<\/p>\n

Without a grain of doubt, the government must have been doing her best to rescue these young students, but President\u2019s media team failed to live up to expectation. The President is not expected to brief the nation daily on steps the government is taking
\nto rescue the abducted girls. It is someone\u2019s duty for which he lives off the government and is handsomely remunerated.
\nYet the President is lampooned for the ineffectual rescue efforts because the buck stops on his table. Even the military spokesman that claimed that the
\nmilitary had rescued nearly all the abducted girls, a day after the incidence, when the contrary was true, didn\u2019t help the image of Jonathan and his government.<\/p>\n

The President\u2019s image makers (Dr. Doyin Okupe, Dr. Reuben Abati, Mr. Labaran Maku and Mr. Reno Omokri; and the PDP spokesman, Mr. Olisa Metuh) have been both ineffectual and ineffective in their
\nduties. Indeed, the team\u2019s performance has been woeful and shamefully disgraceful. Whereas the President is sincere and determined to improve on the fortunes of Nigerians, the opposition hung the tag of
\n\u2018cluelessness\u2019 on his neck.<\/p>\n

It is the duty of his image makers to repeatedly inform and educate the public that the President is not what he is called by the opposition. This is done through persuasion not the abrasiveness and gutter language that Abati and Okupe employs in tackling critics. A presidential spokesman represents the President and must thus appear presidential in carriage, speech and demeanor, at all times.<\/p>\n

On CNN, both Dr. Okupe and Mr. Labaran Maku, the Minister of Information, caught a pitiable picture. They were unsure of their answers when interviewed by Isha Sesay on the actions taken so far by the government to rescue the missing girls, so much so
\nthat in order to cover up their inadequacies, they resorted to shouting to intimidate the journalist who stood her ground.
\nBoth were abrasive, unpresidential in comportment and incoherent. Like millions of viewers, I was also baffled when they confessed that three weeks after the abduction of the school teenage girls, an
\ninformation centre was yet to be set up.<\/p>\n

When are we going to learn to get things right? Is the President to set up an information centre? What is the duty of Mr. Labaran Maku, Dr. Okupe, Dr. Abati and Mr. Reno Omokri, if they have to wait on Mr.
\nPresident to personally direct them to set up an information centre on the abducted girls? The President is being insulted because of the failure and gross incompetence of his image makers.<\/p>\n

Most bewildering was Mr. Labaran Maku\u2019s
\nunmitigated incoherence on the allegation that the military was informed some four hours before the attack on Chibok began, but did nothing. Hear Labaran Maku, \u201cI will investigate\u201d. \u201cNo, we will investigate\u201d. \u201cNo, I will investigate\u201d, \u201cI will investigate\u201d, \u201cWe will investigate\u201d. This was most ignominious.<\/p>\n

Dr. Okupe, on the other hand, said that they have not being relaying to the public the actions of the government because they (the government) are not showbiz people. So how do the citizenry get to know what the government is doing when they are kept in
\nthe dark? Would you then blame the citizenry, who because of lack of information from the government, accuse it of nonchalance and incompetence?<\/p>\n

Political communication strategists aver that politics is war in which munitions are not deployed. Like the prosecution of war that involves tactics and propaganda, politics also involves these two key tactics.<\/p>\n

Josef Goebbels, the head of the Nazi propaganda machine, once quipped that \u201ca lie repeated a thousand times becomes the truth\u201d. The opposition hung the tag of \u201ca clueless President\u201d on the neck of
\nGoodluck Jonathan and it has been so oft-repeated that it is turning into the President\u2019s middle name and gradually becoming the truth.<\/p>\n

This is \u201ckitchen sink\u201d that was poured on the
\nPresident by the opposition, as American political communications strategists would say, and it is embarrassingly disconcerting that it has stuck because of the ineffective and ineffectual media team of Mr. President.
\nIt is discomfiting and shameful that the President\u2019s media team has not been able to wash this off with huge budgets and national electronic media \u2013 TV and radio \u2013 at their disposal.<\/p>\n

If the negative perception of the President\u2019s
\npersonality and performance is to change, he must wield the big stick. His \u2018clueless\u2019 team of image makers that has no answer to the opposition propaganda machine must be sacked. They are to blame for the vilifications Mr. President has been visited with. They are dead woods and must be fired without delay.<\/p>\n

Finally, seasoned political communications
\nstrategists have of late being at work for Gen. Buhari (retd.), and the difference is evident. Who would have imagined that such persuasive press statements crafted in sweet prose and perfumed diction, would have emanated from the table of the strong-talking Buhari?<\/p>\n

Gen. Buhari\u2019s two statements in the past three weeks have helped his approval rating which has soared going by the comments of readers of Nigerian online newspapers. Following the release of the first press statement on the Nyanya bombing,
\neven the President hailed Gen. Buhari as a respected statesman.<\/p>\n

That is the effect of a good media team \u2013 to shore up and sustain a positive image of their principal. Given the fierce urgency of the moment, the President needs a good team of political communications strategists and consultants to replace his current
\nfailed media team.<\/p>\n

By,
\nDr. Prosper Ahworegba
\nPhysician, Healthcare Consultant and Political Communications Researcher is the author of The Nigerian 100: The Most Influential Nigerians of All Times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Dr. Prosper Ahworegba. These have not been the best of times for President Goodluck Jonathan. 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