WE ARE HUNTERS AND NOT GUARDS IN NIGERIA BY ABDULLAHI O HARUNA

By Our voice Our power

WE ARE HUNTERS AND NOT GUARDS IN NIGERIA

By Abdullahi O Haruna Haruspice

Ordinarily, President Muhammadu Buhari is supposed to join the protest going on in some parts of the country because what the people are protesting against is what the man has been struggling to correct.

For everything, he does to free the system of saboteurs, the people trusted with responsibilities turn around to frustrate it. When he came hard on those who looted the arms’ money, he was tagged an oppressor who was out to persecute opposition elements.

When he went after corrupt judges, he was called a despot with no respect for the rule of law.

Collectively, we unite to undermine the wheel of governance by our actions and inactions.

Now let’s go practical, take your local government chairmen, for example, assess their life from 2015 till this moment; what has changed in them? Are they still living in the same house of 2015?

Riding on the same car of 2015? I can bet with my life, everything about them has changed. Same with your House of Assembly and National Assembly members, same with your governors and their appointees, same with your ministers, director-generals etc!

Everything about them has changed for the better but not for once have you queried them on why this change in their lives isn’t getting to the people around them?

Now let’s beam our searchlight on President Buhari; has he changed his house in Daura or Kaduna?

How come everyone around him, in his government, in the states, in ministries, in parastatals and agencies are swimming in fortune at the detriment of the people but the man remains true to himself?

Because you don’t give what you don’t have! Buhari is who he is and others are who they are? And this is our ethos until we change it; we are where we are perpetually.

You will argue, how come he is not wielding the big stick? The law, unfortunately, does not empower him to wield the stick on local government chairmen, assembly members, governors, etc in a democratic setting.

The regulatory authorities are also collaborators in the ruination of the system. We are hunters and not forest guards in Nigeria.

Again, when was the last time you ask about the allocation that comes to your state? Get your answers from your local and state leaders; the constitution has forbidden the president from helping you to ask certain questions from your leaders at the state.

Like you, Buhari is constitutionally handicapped.

But Baba Buhari, you have the power

to control those under your close reach. Your ministers aren’t inspiring, only a few give flickers of hope. We don’t even know half of them neither do we feel their vibes. Kick their ass if they aren’t gyrating.

They bring more scorn to your government than even the opposition. Lastly, what is the explanation exactly in having your personal aide sent as INEC commissioner- nominee?

What an indefensible reality here Mr President!

What makes a nation fail needs no theoretical explanation, we are the summation of our failure. I will tell you how! The policemen on the roads extorting, begging and stealing from motorists are not Ghanaians but full-bloodied Nigerians like you and I.

In fact, they worship as Muslims and Christians and speak to our different ethnicities. What would make a policeman given a gun to protect the people turn around and use the same gun to oppress the people? So disgusting that policemen in Nigeria would force an innocent citizen to the ATM point and extort money from him.

I ask again, who are the civil servants in government? They are people born, brewed and groomed in Nigeria’s water.

That we are where we are today is to the ingenuity or otherwise of these ‘patriots’. Traditional rulers with the touch of royalties lowered their robes and became launchpad for criminal elements – aiding kidnappers, giving them cover while they unleash their venom on fellow Nigerians.

The people elected and appointed into government are people flowing with the Nigerian blood, but what we get from them are what we all complain of. So if these persons from different representations of Nigeria are in government, how come we

are still not doing well?

Have you gone around our individual communities to see the rots and ruins of our personal decisions?

When it rains, we rush out to empty our refuses in the waterways instead of taking them to designated dumpsites. When the rains come with its furies, it floods into our homes and stays put as temporary destructive guests, that time, we now come online to blame the government. And who the hell is this government if not you and I?

Do you know the irony of this lethargy? All the Nigerians mentioned above are quick to echo how bad Nigeria is, why nothing is working and how our leaders have failed us. And I dare to ask who exactly are these leaders?

Abdullahi O Haruna Haruspice