It is a new song and of course President Goodluck Jonathan bared his fangs when he commenced the process to re-jig his security apparatchik last week. George Agba reports that the security chiefs’ sack signalled an emerging new strategy in the war against terrorism.
With the sack of General Andrew Azazi (rtd) as National Security Adviser (NSA) and Dr Haliru Bello as Defence Minister last Friday, President Goodluck Jonathan has upped the ante of his presidency for now. In Aso Rock presidential villa, there appears to be a flicker of hope. At least, the president has demonstrated eloquently that he is in charge of the affairs of state. Some keen observers of his approach to critical issues say if he had been acting decisively in a moment of crisis the way he restructured his security apparatus at the weekend, he wouldn’t have received the kind of deadly knocks he incurred for himself when he travelled to Brazil for the UN Earth Summit.
The angst of Nigerians which heavily fuelled against Jonathan was that he fiddled like Nero while Rome was burning. But as soon as he arrived back into the country from Brazil, he didn’t need a soothsayer to tell him that something needed to be done to pacify an irate and livid populace of a country whose government was upon his shoulders.
But the satisfaction clearly written on the faces of most workers in Aso Rock after the presidential media chat on Sunday suggests that President Jonathan didn’t do badly at all in handling and managing the almost sour relationship between the leader and the led. The thinking is that rather than being clueless as claimed by his critics, the president seems to have a nature that guides his valour to act in safety.
Defending his trip to Brazil at a time the merciless and brutal killing of innocent Nigerians by the Islamic militant group, Boko Haram, was at top gear. Jonathan said while the aim of terrorists anywhere in the world was to disrupt the government and stop the President from functioning, it would have amounted to caving in to the whims and caprices of terrorists if he had decided not to attend the global function in Rio. What he was trying to elucidate was that he must not avail Boko Haram the opportunity of calling him a man only when men are not at home by not attending the Earth Summit.
He said, “If I had panicked and was stopped from travelling to Brazil last week, the terrorists would have achieved their main objective and a wrong signal would have been sent out to international communities that even the President is being held hostage. The day the international community get to know that the president of Nigeria is tied down because of Boko Hram, then we are finished.
“When I was in Brazil, I got a lot of calls from Nigerians expressing worries that the country was burning and I went out of the country. People who got worried that I travelled got worried out of ignorance. The day the international community knows that the president, the vice president or senate president cannot travel because of Boko Haram, then we are finished. Boko Haram cannot bring this country to its knees”.
He further described the country’s security challenges, hallmarked by bomb attacks by the Islamist extremist group, as a worse challenge than the Civil War of 1967 to 1970. But close watchers say if only the president can change from his old ways of handling the situation and begin to match his enemies’ strength for strength and wit for wit in the war against terror; it will save him a great deal from the fangs of critics.
The fear within the corridors of power in Aso Rock had been that when it comes to spiritual fervency and over reliance on the Supreme Being in times of national tragedy, President Goodluck Jonathan stands out among former presidents and heads of state that have ever ruled the country. Keen observers had jokingly noted that if the God of Abraham, Jacob, Isaac and Elijah was truly the God of Ebele Jonathan, then something supernatural may soon happen to bring an end to the Boko Haram scourge. Except that, unlike in the days of these biblical characters, God’s wrath is no more swift and imminent in the present generation.
To be honest with this observers, for the president, the watchword had all this while had been ‘praying without ceasing’ in the face of the growing terrorist attacks that has turned the country to a valley of death. But when will God send down the fire to consume the enemies of the country the way he sent fire to burn up the sacrifice on Elijah’s alter in his contest with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel? Or should one begin to agree with those who have been urging the president to step on toes and take severe measures that would end the scourge the way former President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo did when he ordered shoot at sight during the Zakibiam or Oddi killings, that God help those who help themselves?
But the president’s men have also contended that if Jonathan decides to act as a dictator, the critics will say he has become dictatorial than terms could give out. But even the extremist group called Boko Haram have always held the country spell bound because they match their religious belief with violent actions. Ask them, they will tell you they are fighting the cause of their God. After all, right from the days of the prophet “the kingdom of God Suffereth violence and only the violence taketh it by force”.
Most people say it is quite surprising that President Jonathan has perpetually stuck to his old ways of taking everything to the lord in prayer. This was exactly what he did penultimate Sunday when news of the multiple bomb explosions that rocked churches in Kaduna and Zaria, killing scores of innocent Nigerians filtered in. The special service to commemorate the 2012 Fathers Day at the Aso Rock Chapel, presidential villa was smooth sailing.
Faithful worshipers who flooded the place were all enraptured in the feat of religious fervour until a president who himself became red with anguish broke the news of the gruesome incident to the congregation.
“I was particularly thrilled by what was going on in the church when I got the information that while we were here, there were explosions in Kaduna and since I don’t even know the casualty rate and what is happening, I have been quite sad and I didn’t even want to say something. But when your priest orders you, you must say something”, Jonathan said, as he broke the news of the attacks to members of the Aso Villa chapel when he was invited by the Chaplain, Reverend Obioma Onwuzurumba to give his remarks.
The President added immediately that his consolation was in God, the omnipotent, who is capable of handling every situation and healing the nation. He solicited the support and prayers of every Nigerian for the peace of the nation and for the success of his administration. According to him, what the country needed at the moment was serious prayers. He urged Nigerians to stand by him as he worked towards transforming the nation.
He lamented that some people were not interested in how the country should grow but how they will destroy people they don’t want to govern them. Maintaining a calm but tee-total disposition, Jonathan led a team of male choristers to sing three different songs entitled, ‘Stand By Me’, ‘there is not a friend like Jesus’, and ‘I will give God my life time’ before reading a memory verse from the book of James, chapter 1 verses 2 to 4.
But a week before that day, the president was administering prayers, the Vicar of St. Stephen’s Anglican Church, Otuoke, Bayelsa state, Reverend Mathew Obaze had corroborated what some Nigerians have always insisted that the president must do which is to garner the political will and courage to step on toes if he must pilot the affairs of the country with consummate exactitude.
He told Jonathan out rightly not to chicken out of the storm Nigeria was going through. In the sermon themed: “Hidden blessings” taken from Matthew 43, vs 22, Obaze expressed confidence that despite what he called the great storm Nigerian was going through, the country will not sink in the “river.”
Quoting the Bible copiously, Obaze recounted how God saved the boat of over 500 disciples from capsizing into a stormy sea, noting that every human being was destined by God to go through all kinds of crises and storms at one time or the other.
The Vicar said, “The essence of being human is to face crisis or storm at one time or the other in our lives. Even marriage which God makes compulsory for human being can face crisis which is normal. In the period of crisis or storm, we should not entertain fear but have faith that such would eventually pass away. Fear will sink you but faith will save you. We may find it difficult trying to solve problems all by ourselves. There can be no victory without a war. It is those who run away that lose battles. So, do not be consumed by fear of challenges”.
But will the president adhere to the teachings of God’s servant which enjoins him to be bold and resolute and take decisive actions in the face of crisis such as the one that sent innocent Nigerians to their untimely graves? Certainly not. Some close watchers contend that it is too late for the president to change from his old traits. Old habits die hard. This, they say, affects his administration the way it is at the moment because he makes a decisive pronouncement without reasonable actions to back them up.
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