Maj.-Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, President-elect

Buhari Presidency: The critical first 100 days (2)

Continued from Monday

The celebrative victory party for Muhammadu Buhari and the All Progressives Congress will be over by May 29, 2015 when he is sworn in as President, and the countdown to 2019 general elections when the party submits again to the electorate’s verdict would have begun. The President-elect has accurately identified the demons of corruption and insecurity as the twin evils   bedeviling Nigeria which must be wrestled down. Nigeria has gone through cycles of euphoria and disappointments as the promise of any new government soon turns a mirage. This has bred what scholars have identified as the phenomenon of unfulfilled rising expectations leading to rising frustrations in many developing countries and occasioning a state of near permanent crisis. But Nigerians are hopeful that this time round, there will be CHANGE, for the better. The first part of this write-up took up the issue of security and why the Nigeria Police and the Federal Road Safety Corps must be overhauled and made to deliver on their mandate for public order. This concluding part deals with the issue of corruption and the place of the media in the development effort as The Buhari Presidency embarks on the mission to make Nigeria stand tall, again.

A POPULIST ANTI-CORRUPTION WAR.

The Buhari Presidency will face its toughest challenge in the war against corruption. This is because over the past four decades, beginning in the 1980s, corruption has assumed the status of a cultural norm and as such will require not just a mechanistic legal approach, but a cultural re-orientation that must have a revolutionary fervour. So many people are on the corruption take, to the extent that even the economy runs on corruption. The new President may not be on the same page in the corruption war with some people, including those he may appoint to office. For “President” Buhari, therefore, tackling corruption will, as in the title of Alhaji Babatunde Jose’s media memoir, amount to walking the tight rope. He had stated he won’t delve into the past. But the past cannot be de-linked from the present and that would present a dilemma should people want to hold him by his words. However, the dilemma is not insurmountable. Buhari can stay in the background as the SYMBOL of the anti-corruption campaign while his appointees in the relevant regulatory agencies become the point-men manning the barricades against the corrupt.

Lifestyle Monitoring

Because of corruption’s deep taproot in the society, any hope of a successful war against corruption must involve the mobilisation of the people to see it as the people’s war. The primary inducement to corruption is monetary and material wealth acquisition. A helpful habit is that many who acquired resources through corruption cannot seem to resist the temptation of ostentatious living. They brazenly flaunt the “dividends” of corruption before our very eyes, without any fear of retribution,- thus making the honest worker look stupid. It is this impunity that has encouraged a bandwagon effect where virtually everybody is now scrambling to get on the corruption train on their way to El Dorado undisturbed of opulence. But since the corrupt live among the people, many of who feel offended by the put down attitude of the corrupt rich, such people would gladly expose the economic parasites. A people-oriented approach will assuage the anger of the people while also giving them the feeling of being part of their own salvation. Before now, the culture of most ethnic groups in Nigeria was to have no regard for those seen to have amassed illegitimate wealth, often barring their children from marrying into such families. Children grew up nurtured into a culture of not taking things which did not belong to them, with parents querying any lifestyle considered beyond the legitimate earnings of their children. All that have changed – parents now even show contempt for their children who are not into corruption, citing the affluence of their children’s corrupt age mates. That is how far down the sewer of corruption Nigeria has sunk. It is therefore imperative that people must be made to account for their affluent lifestyle and fat bank accounts. Also, those who enjoyed collateral benefits of corruption – wives/husbands, adult children and friends – should also be charged for aiding and abetting corruption.

The Media

The media is of critical importance to the Buhari Presidency.   The reality of the moment is that a President Buhari needs the media more than the media needs him, since the media slant in projecting the activities of his government to the public can substantially make or break his presidency. There are glaring excesses in the media, part of which manifested in the presidential election campaigns where many media outlets became platforms for hate and incitement, so much so that there was palpable fear of post-election violence that forced many to temporarily relocate to their ethnic enclaves. However, in spite of the negativism of many media establishments, print and broadcast, the Buhari Presidency will need to formally reach out to the media with a view to mobilising them as partners with his Presidency. To signpost the importance his administration intend to accord the media, a Presidency-Media Summit holding within the first few days of inauguration will go a long way to establish mutual rapport. The Presidency needs to key the Nigerian press into Prof. Dennis McQuail’s Development Media Theory where journalists are made to understand their strategic role of being agents of positive change. This media mobilisation does not detract from content analysis of media fare with a view to presenting empirical evidence of media excesses, during periodic media reviews, to rein in zealots. Of course, the Buhari Presidency would have to accommodate media criticisms, including that of specific office holders, as necessary feedback mechanism for better service delivery. Buhari cannot afford to be irritable with the media so as not to prompt the taunt: There he goes again – a throw back to his military regime days which saw journalists clamped in jail. However, in extreme cases where media recklessness and irresponsibility present a clear and present danger to the stability of the state, then the administration can invoke the declaration of Britain’s Chief Justice Blackstone in the 18th century that while there should be no prior restraint of what the media could publish, journalists must be ready to face “the consequences” of their “temerity” when they put the state in jeopardy.

Indiscipline

The Nigerian populace look forward to an eventful and momentous first 100 days of the Buhari Presidency characterised by a frenetic pace of activities, not a slow-paced learning process. One area that the government can make dramatic impact is confronting indiscipline in government and among the people, with a President Buhari leading by example by being punctual at ALL official engagements. The War Against Indiscipline is needed now more that 30 years ago when his regime introduced it. Indiscipline in time management is symptomatic of an irresponsible leadership and a sick society, a disposition that inflicts heavy toll on work hours, productivity and social relations. When governors, minister, and top government functionaries begin to attend scheduled functions ON TIME, and the people are compelled to embrace discipline on the road and other public engagements, it sends a powerful message on CHANGE. If this seemingly intangible action can be implemented WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT, it will enhance salutary positive perception of the Buhari Presidency in its first 100 days. But the reality on the ground, given the rot in the system, is that President-elect Buhari faces a tough challenge in the days ahead as he takes the hard road to Nigeria’s redemption. However, he can take solace in the lyrics of singer Jimmy Cliff’s 1967 track: Hard Road To Travel:

   “ I’ve got a hard road to travel and a rough, rough way to go

     But I can’t turn back, My heart is fixed, My mind is made up

I’ll never stop, my faith will see, see me through”.

Well, the Die is Cast, and Buhari cannot turn back on this rough road ahead, perhaps buoyed on the conviction that his faith, in the course he has chosen for himself, will see him through.

Dr. Olawunmi, a Lecturer, Department of Mass Communication, Bowen University, Iwo, wrote in via olawunmibisi@yahoo.com0803 364 7571