Iyke

By Ikechukwu Amaechi

 

Published: Tuesday, February 3, 2009

 

 

The world is in crisis. That fact is indubitable. Whether it is global warming with the dire consequences of rising seas, expanding deserts and disappearing forests or the faltering world economy, leaders are working frantically to see how their countries could be pulled back from the precipice because they all appreciate that this is a planet in peril. Except, perhaps the leader of the most populous black nation in the world – President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua.

 

At the just concluded World Economic Forum in Davos, they were all there, trying to work out modalities for building a new “global financial architecture” in the face of the pernicious economic crisis. Of course, despite assurances that our country was immune to the crisis, it has become clear that when the dust finally settles, the financial crisis which has been dubbed a “made in America disaster,” may have the most devastating impact on Nigeria. Nigerians are going to be the worst hit.

 

Already we are in a mess. But because we are a people not used to data and immune to shock, we have not been able to fully come to terms with our precarious position. But what economic situation could be gloomier? For a country that earns well over 80 percent of its revenue from oil, what could be worse than an oil market that has collapsed below the budgetary benchmark of $45? For an economy that leans heavily on imports, what could be scarier than the crash of its local currency? For an economy without any industrial base, where the few industries that persevered, thinking that they could weather the storm have finally bowed to the hard realities of doing business in a country where cost of production, despite the glut of cheap labour, is one of the costliest in the world, it is only a matter of time before the economic roof comes crashing on all of us.

 

Nigeria’s stock market is said to be the worst hit globally and suddenly, the only investment platform which almost everybody embraced has literally collapsed. And now, the vibes from the banks, whose consolidation a few years back, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Chukwuma Soludo, told us recently is the country’s bulwark against the global financial mess, are anything but right.

 

The labour market is saturated. Unemployment has reached an unprecedented level. How do I know? No week rolls by these days without almost ten people sending their Curriculum Vitae to me. They are men and women, most with second degrees, who are desperately searching for jobs, which have become very elusive.

 

A country in such dire socio-economic situation ought to have a government that is proactive. The President of such a country should be frowning at the fact that there are only 24 hours in a day because that is not going to be enough.

 

But here we are, at a time like this, debating President Umaru Yar’Adua’s vacation. As you are reading this, the man must be spending the last days of his leave, a time his Special Adviser on Communications, Mr. Segun Adeniyi, told the nation he would spend reading books and reflecting on the state of the nation. This is coming at the time the President told the nation that he is now ready to roll up his sleeve and work, having spent 20 months doing what he ought to have done long before assuming the presidency – marshaling out plans of what to do with power.

 

But as it is wont to do, the government has again missed it. This must be one of the most incompetent presidencies in the world. Why does the Yar’Adua government bungle even the simplest of assignments? To be fair, I am not sold on the argument that the President breached the constitution by not transmitting to the Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives in writing that he was proceeding on vacation as Section 145 of the 1999 Constitution seems to imply. It is not compulsory that he does so unless he wants the Vice President to act as the President in his absence. The implication is that Yar’Adua does not want the Vice President, Goodluck Jonathan, to act as the President. It is his prerogative.

 

But why go on leave at such a critical moment when other leaders are working round the clock? Why go on leave at the beginning of a year that many admit is the most critical year of his presidency having wasted almost two years? Why go on leave at a time the National Assembly is busy padding the Appropriation Bill and does not seem to be in a hurry to pass the budget?

 

The fact remains that the President needed some rest not because of hard work but because his health is failing. I feel very bad whenever the nation engages in this pastime of speculating about the his health. I feel bad because I know how unsettling it can be for a man who is obviously sick, sitting back to read all the comments on the pages of newspaper, some of them very unfair. It casts all of us in the mould of a people without feeling. But can that be true? My answer is no. This is the President of a country; a man in whose hands our fate and that of our children lie. So, his health transcends his person because it is a national issue.

 

I was reliably informed last year when his medical trip to Saudi Arabia was bungled, as usual, that it was agreed that he should come back home to douse the tension, stay a while and then proceed on leave so as to get proper medical attention which he had not been able to get since becoming the chief tenant at Aso Rock. From all indications, it was this leave that he was getting set to embark upon before the story was leaked. In a desperate bid to avert the brouhaha that attended last year’s Saudi Arabia fiasco, the man opted to stay back in the country, preferring instead to convert Obudu Cattle ranch, Cross River State, Dodan Barracks, Lagos State and his home town, Katsina, Katsina State, to Presidential retreat venues.

 

The questions are; for how long must be play this puerile game of ostrich? For how long must we bury our heads in the sand, believing that nobody is seeing us even when the rest of our body is exposed? If President Yar’Adua goes back to Aso Rock this week, will he be rejuvenated to face the onerous task of superintending over our affairs at a time like this as Segun Adeniyi would want us believe? Is it not better the president goes for medical treatment even if it is for two months? Shouldn’t his health be the most important thing? Who is he trying to impress. Shouldn’t there be limits to spin?

 

Truth be told, Yar’Adua is not governing Nigeria. It is in his personal interest and the interest of the country that this farce ends sooner than later.