By Michael Egbejumi-David<\/b><\/p>\n
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Late last week BBC News announced that the President, Goodluck Jonathan would finally visit Chibok, the scene of a colossal and ongoing national heartbreak, before jetting off to Paris for a conference.\u00a0 A few hours later, NBC News in America reported that Jonathan has cancelled the visit.\u00a0 Something was murmured about security fears.\u00a0\u00a0 Everything became muddled.<\/p>\n
In the end, predictably, Jonathan did what he has always done: he bottled it.<\/p>\n
Ordinarily, as father of the nation, the President\u2019s visit would have had a reassuring and calming effect on the people of Chibok \u2013 especially those parents whose daughters are still missing.\u00a0 A presidential visit would have helped steady the nerves, it would have given everyone a shot in the arm, it would have helped wipe away some of the bitter tears, it would have encouraged people that the government is on their side and that they are not groping aimlessly alone, and it would have directly connected the government to the people in a very personal way.\u00a0 But here we are; over 200 young girls were abducted on the night of April 14th<\/sup>, and, more than a month later, foreign news media are the ones telling us about our President\u2019s indecisive peek-a-boo.<\/p>\n What a President!\u00a0 What a leader!<\/p>\n Just breaks your heart, doesn\u2019t it?\u00a0 And this is the pattern, I\u2019m afraid.\u00a0 This is what\u2019s been our lot for four years.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Nigerians are people of goodwill; we just need an active and dynamic-enough President to unite behind.\u00a0 Unfortunately, and despite a majority fervently wishing him to do well, Jonathan has persistently dropped the ball.<\/p>\n Government officials rarely resign here. They know the score.\u00a0 Jonathan is only forced to let go of one or two long after the horse has bolted the stable; after much dithering and public hand-wringing.\u00a0 Before the Chibok abduction, the nation had just gone through another tragedy – one solely engineered by the Minister for Interior, Abba Moro.<\/p>\n For our collective memory upgrade: Mr Moro arbitrarily and single-handedly handpicked a private recruiting firm to recruit job-seekers into the Immigration Service.\u00a0 The number of jobs available is 4,000.\u00a0 About 900,000 people applied at N1,000 per application.\u00a0 Nearly N1 billion was raised.\u00a0 Unbelievably, the contract that Mr Moro signed with the recruitment firm stipulated under clause 2.17 that, \u201cThe Ministry shall be responsible for the actual conduct of the examination, interview and selection.\u201d\u00a0 So this means that the private firm is only responsible for selling application forms.<\/p>\n It was only a few days to the March 15 2014 examination date that the Interior Ministry suddenly discovered that they are responsible for conducting the exams, interviews and the selection of candidates.\u00a0 Naturally, Moro dumped the palaver in the laps of the officials of the ministry.\u00a0 The officials rushed off to the private recruitment firm.\u00a0 The firm politely referred the officials to clause 2.17.<\/p>\n With panic setting in, the Interior Ministry decided to scout around for donations.\u00a0 They calculated that at least N201 million was required.\u00a0 Again, Moro\u2019s officials approached the recruitment firm who had pocketed nearly N1 billion.\u00a0 In a fit of generosity, the firm donated N45 million.\u00a0 Only God and a few privileged angels know how much else the ministry was able to raise.<\/p>\n With lack of preparation and severe lack of funds, the nationwide debacle of March 15th<\/sup> was inevitable.\u00a0 Unfortunately, nineteen people lost their lives, including a couple of pregnant young women.<\/p>\n When news of this disaster got to Comrade Moro he immediately blamed the stampede and deaths on the job-seekers.\u00a0 He said the issue of his resignation \u201cdid not arise\u201d and that \u201cthose in the crowd should have been more patient.\u201d\u00a0 Today, in spite of all of that, Moro is still the Minister for Interior of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.\u00a0 I don\u2019t even know if Jonathan set up one of his now customary Committees to look into the matter until perhaps the next century.<\/p>\n This is how it\u2019s been going under Jonathan\u2019s watch.\u00a0 The fact that nobody set up a Twitter account or that heads of governments and their spouses are not holding up signs protesting against Moro meant Jonathan never even twitched out of his normal inactive zone to even want to do something.<\/p>\n The same thing happened during the Stella Oduah\u2019s bullet-proof BMWs corruption-fest.\u00a0 Jonathan\u2019s initial inclination was to protect an ally whose hand was caught deep inside the cookie jar.\u00a0 Ditto with Lamido Sanusi.\u00a0 Sanusi managed the Central Bank like a personal fiefdom.\u00a0 When the erstwhile CBN Governor wasn\u2019t doling out money everywhere like it was his, he lustily propagated his extremist, ultra religious, divisive views.\u00a0 But all of that never bothered Jonathan.\u00a0 It was only when Sanusi branched out and started to reveal how Nigeria\u2019s oil money was growing wings and taking flight by the billions that Jonathan finally shoved Sanusi inelegantly out through the exit.<\/p>\n Joseph Mbu nk\u1ecd?\u00a0 The list is long.\u00a0 When government officials are accused of high corruption or wrong-doing, those officials know that, at worst, they have plenty of time to perfect their alibi.\u00a0 Jonathan usually does nothing – even after his citizens have shouted themselves hoarse.\u00a0 His standard approach is to hunker down and hope that the matter would go away or resolve itself through divine intervention.\u00a0 The President has perfected the art of stealing defeat from the jaws of victory by his general idleness and seemingly indifferent attitude to governance.\u00a0 By the time he is compelled into doing something, it is usually too late, more damage has been done, everyone has lost interest and his reputation as inert is reinforced.<\/p>\n Just a few days ago, in far away America, Hillary Clinton called it \u201cdereliction of duty.\u201d\u00a0 The Americans complained that Jonathan\u2019s response has been \u201ctoo slow.\u201d\u00a0 They couldn\u2019t understand why several weeks on, Jonathan merely ordered his military chiefs to get the abducted girls and went back to business as usual – aka, back to sleep.<\/p>\n Simply bleating ad nauseam about \u2018transformation\u2019 is not it.\u00a0 A leader must let his people feel his passion.\u00a0 A leader has got to let his people know that he\u2019s got their back.\u00a0 Sadly, we don\u2019t feel that with Jonathan.\u00a0 We appear to be lumbered with a Presidency without bite.\u00a0 It is one Committee after another.\u00a0 Either that or we get another statement pressed together by brother Abati.\u00a0 That doesn\u2019t do it for us anymore.\u00a0 It only highlights a lack of dynamism, and citizens are forced to wonder whether they are truly on their own.<\/p>\n And so 19 people dead, nearly N1 billion gone, Mr Moro is still in office as Minister.\u00a0 It was only after the recruitment tragedy that it emerged that though 4,000 jobs were advertised, only 484 spots or so were actually available to the applicants.\u00a0 More than 3,500 slots have been divvied-up and shared out to the usual suspects \u2013 you know, Governors, Legislators, Ministers, Directors and other Party big and small wigs.\u00a0 Mr Moro is of course a lucky chap; he has Dr Jonathan as Guardian.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n