By Ikeddy ISIGUZO
DOES Senator Ali Ndume, former Senate Chief Whip, lack table manners, or those he was eating with thought that enjoyment would immunise him against the anger and hunger in the land? Ndume did nothing extraordinary in pointing out that while they feast, compatriots cannot get crumbs.
That he lost his seat as a punishment for drawing the attention of the President to the fact that people were hungry, and that the land was brimming with anger is another indication that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is fully after his welfare alone. His acolytes understand this and run after matters that attend to the needs of a President that many thought had passed the age of scrambling for virtually everything.
Nigerians are hungry. Sending trailer loads of food to the States will not scratch the issues. How many trailer loads of imported grains will we need to feed how many millions of Nigerians? For how long? Does Nigeria even have the money?
Who need the food most? How are we sure that it gets to them? Are we preparing to agonise all over again as we did when billions of Naira voted for palliatives during Covid-19 simply disappeared into private funnels? An identified beneficiary of the Covid-19 pillage has just been nominated to an office where money flows like an ocean.
The government’s justification for its wastefulness is not that it ameliorates the extreme poverty that has mangled the fate of millions of Nigerians who are hit by more crushing misery. Government is quick to pull out World Bank reports that support its cash transfer policy that makes the poor, poorer.
No clear records exist of the beneficiaries of cash transfers. The missing billions of Naira from the account of the Ministry of Humanitarian Disaster tells a bit about the disaster that cash transfers is.
We need food. We need security. The tangentiality of the notoriously anomalous debates on food and security end up neither addressing food nor security. Our farmers are willing to farm. The land is still fertile but bandits, herdsmen, and kidnappers are keeping farmers off the land. Has government forgotten this?
A defiant Ndume on Friday said, “I did not say anything wrong. And therefore I want to state that I stand by all my statements in the interview I granted.
“So, I know that I’m not wrong. The people are not wrong by speaking the truth and standing by the truth.” Ndume said he did not speak earlier because he was mourning the loss of a family member.
The most important thing was for the President to act to protect Nigerians from raging hunger. “And I pray that the President who by now, I expect the message should have gotten to him, looks at what I have said and takes appropriate measures to eliminate the suffering of the people.”
While thinking about silencing people as solutions to the challenges of Nigeria, I remembered Paul Simon’s 1964 epic folk rock song, Sound Of Silence. Excerpts from the lyrics:
*And in the naked light, I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People talking without speaking
People hearing without listening
People writing songs that voices never shared
And no one dared
Disturb the sound of silence
“Fools” said I, “You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you”
But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed in the wells of silence
And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
Then the sign said, “The words on the prophets are written on the subway walls
In tenement halls”
And whispered in the sound of silence*
The song lingers on longings for a return to a humane society with empathy, self-reflection, and authentic human connections that are relevant to society’s communication and by extension, the essence of human existence. How would a President ensconced in his modern jet know the sufferings of those he has sworn to serve and whose resources he lavishes on his unrelenting ventures that are majorly about him and a few who worship him?
Nigeria’s melancholic circumstances and the efforts to bring voices like Ndume’s to sudden silence are imageries that run through the languid beats of Sound of Silence.
The purr of a new jet, the superficiality of the President thinking that a new jet and other luxuries he has immersed himself in are what his presidency is about, produce their own silence that deducts his humanity and makes him think Nigerians cannot possibly be so hungry in the midst of his own vastly improving life. If he had not understood his office only in terms of his well-being, he would dread the sound of silence.
We are heading to a more inhuman society in which those who refuse to conform speak only to themselves, are isolated, and made to understand that invitations to meal times are only for worshippers of one who the electorate supposedly made.
The sound of silence is worse than people speaking. How do we know how terrible the silent feel? Do they not matter?
Senator Ndume should be proud of not bowing to the ephemeral attractions of lining up in a rat race. What does the winner of a rat race want to become?
A rat?
Finally…
DID anything happen to Niger State Governor, His Excellency, Farmer Mohammed Umar Bago? He reportedly ordered securitymen to beat up a cleric who the Governor claimed did not know how to pray. Bago took the title Farmer for supposedly making agriculture his forte. Now that he has added beating to his executive skill set, should he not acquire an additional title of Beater? If His Excellency, in public, in a religious setting, ordered the brutalisation of a cleric whose known offence was praying – to the Almighty, not to the Governor – in a way the Governor found unpleasant, there is little to imagine about how he would deal with people in private. There is no evidence yet that the cleric’s prayer did not please the Almighty.
TWO Commissioners have just resigned from the Abia State Government. His Excellency, Governor Alexander Chioma Otti would be acting in line with his promises of transparency by making the reasons for their departure public. Speculations about why they left are not helpful to the image of the administration, especially as the Governor is being blamed for whatever caused the disagreements.
DAN Bilki Commander, a Kano-based, All Progressives Congress chieftain, has accused Kaduna State Governor, His Excellency, Uba Sani of being behind those who handcuffed and caned him for criticising Uba. “They videoed me while beating and abusing me. I was humiliated to the core,” Commander said. A video of the beating went viral. Governor Sani has denied involvement and ordered an investigation.
THE parish priest of St. Bartholomew’s Catholic Church, Agbani, Nkanu West Local Government Area of Enugu State, Rev Father Linus Okwu allegedly flogged choir members including mothers, young men, ladies and teenagers for failing to cut the grass on the church’s field. July could be the month of beating and flogging.
NO tears, some insist, for impeached Edo State Deputy Governor Philip Shaibu who the Court of Appeal has returned to office. On a television programme, Shaibu was ridiculed about his insistence on Governor Godwin Obaseki obeying the court order. Only the Governor, the arguments run, can decide who his Deputy is. Where does that leave the courts and their powers? It is not about Shaibu who is barely likeable. It is about the ability of our courts to protect and secure our rights. Already, a policeman has been gunned down without the campaigns in full gear.
Isiguzo is a major commentator on minor issues
