BY SIMON REEF MUSA
On the eve of the state visit to the United Kingdom by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu on Monday, Maiduguri, the Borno State capital, was rocked by explosions from Boko Haram. Before this week’s bombings, the area had gradually regained its fame as the epicentre of suicide bombings, culminating in collateral deaths and monumental destruction of property. By the time the casualty figures were released, no fewer than 25 people were declared dead, while over 100 were injured. The military response has been prompt, just as the condolence visits by top government officials who have shown empathy and paid solidarity visits with the bereaved and injured victims of the dastardly attacks.
The torrents of criticisms against the state visit by the president to the UK have left discordant tunes over the appropriateness or otherwise of the visit, which is coming 37 years after former military president, Gen Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida, undertook such a visit in 1989. For a nation that has been plagued by insecurity for nearly two decades, some people had argued, postponing the visit wouldn’t have amounted to anything positive for the country. Given that certain defence agreements were slated to be signed between Nigeria and its former colonial masters, the need for the visit to go ahead should have been seen as a determination by the Nigerian government not to allow terror groups reverse its resolve in saving the country from the clutches of terrorism.
Against the criticism of the visits, championed by the opposition elements, the President reneged on calls to cut short the visit and return to the country. A cross-section of Nigerians had contended that Tinubu should have summarily demonstrated empathy by returning to the country to take full charge of the tragedy. Those privy to the visit rose in defence of insisting that Tinubu stay through the visit to sign pacts and agreements for the country’s economic and security. With the President’s return to the country in the early hours of yesterday, there’s no doubt that the visit yielded results in investment prospects and the signing of security-related pacts for collaboration in the war on terror. Nations involved in war offer the least favourable climate for investments. When millions of citizens are not safe, as is in Nigeria, with terror groups resorting to enforcing religious domination over others, then the road to realising foreign investment becomes a thorny path to be trodden upon.
Nigeria presently faces grave dangers of not only rising insecurity, but hardship caused by high prices of goods and services, following the spiking of crude oil in the international market due to the current Iran war that has entered its fourth week. Citizens have been thrown into a pit of despair due to the hardship caused by spiking fuel prices in the country. This incessant instability in fuel prices has translated into higher prices of foodstuffs and other essentials. While the government provides naira-for-crude sale to Dangote remains inadequate in dealing with the problem, the attendant hardship has robbed people of dignity and thrown additional millions of citizens into the dungeon of poverty.
The present spike in insecurity follows a regular pattern of the past, ahead of the national general elections. Monsters of insecurity have always deployed their arsenal to portray governments as having failed in defending the people from armed men. Ahead of 2014, these merchants of death were brought to swing the pendulum against former president Goodluck Jonathan, who said his ambition was not worthy of the blood of any Nigerian. During the 2019 polls, the power of incumbency proved defining as Muhammadu Buhari sailed through his re-election bid.
As the drumbeat of 2023 sounded louder, it was obvious that Tinubu was not the favoured candidate, as several measures, including a change in the nation’s currency, were targeted against him. With the Muslim-Muslim ticket championed by the All Progressives Congress (APC), many thought Tinubu was simply walking into a dead end of his political career. Against prediction, the former governor of Lagos State, against all odds, emerged as president in 2023.
One of the arrowheads of the same-faith ticket and former governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai, has vowed to incinerate Tinubu’s hold on power. Though presently facing sundry allegations of corruption, the end of his travails in the hands of both the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) is not yet in sight. With the accusation of the ruling party plotting for a one-party state, those opposed to the present government must find means to realise their ambition to wrest power from the incumbent.
Insecurity and boycott of the polls have become veritable means of compromising the polls. In the event that the Inter-Party Advisory Council (IPAC) carries out its threat to boycott next year’s polls, the credibility of the election could come under severe questioning. However, in response to that threat, the president has said that, while in a democracy, the minority would always have its say, the majority would have their way.
No nation, under a military dictatorship or democracy, can survive insecurity for long. When terror groups challenge the legitimacy of the state, then nothing should be left to chance to defeat them. The proliferation of terror groups and attendant criminal activities of banditry and kidnappings have threatened the corporate existence of the Nigerian state. Lack of political will, aided by the commercialisation of insecurity, has left long shadows in combating insecurity. The state visit to the UK should translate into concrete measures to rescue our country from terrorists and to make Nigeria safe for investment.
