My last week publication entitled ‘$29.96 BN Loan: Is the South
East still part of Nigeria?’ received both rebuke and commendation. There was
this caller who claimed to be a top government official who said to me ‘the
South-East can go and get their Biafra and stop looking for good things from
President Buhari, after all, they didn’t vote for him’.
I’m still in shock that we have hypocrites in authority who are
still pre-occupied with waging an undeclared war against the Igbo and are
unrelenting in planting very negative messages in the minds of the people,
thereby fueling hate.
On Buhari’s election, I don’t think there was a time the Igbo
sat down in any meeting as ndi Igbo to decide to vote for former President
Jonathan or vote against President Buhari. I think people voted as per their
fancy and it’s left for the APC to determine why its party failed to fly in the
East but fared better in the Muslim- dominated North.
I
have also heard people asked how much the former president paid to earn my
support.
The former president didn’t pay me a kobo. I floated Move on
Nigeria at my risk and expense because I felt we need incremental continuity to
achieve socio-economic stability and after the serial abuse of power by former
President Obasanjo, I was against the recycling of retired generals or former
military leaders. I believed they are not just part of the problem but spent
and will not bring any fresh solutions. I still pray that President Buhari will
be the very last of the former military leaders to come back from retirement to
rule this country.
On the issue of Biafra; to tag Biafra on every Igbo person is as
sick as stigmatizing every northerner as Boko Haram. Yes, I have my sympathy
for Biafra. The people’s demand for freedom is legitimate. I have also called
for the release of Nnamdi Kanu, he is a Prisoner of Conscience. I recognize his
right to demand for Biafra just like it is my right to claim Nigeria, without
prejudice to my concern that Nigeria is not working.
What
Nigeria has become is not the Nigeria of my dream, neither is it the idea of
the nation dreamt and built by our founding fathers, a nation where citizens
shall live in unity, peace and freedom. The sooner we sit down and begin a
family conversation that will reshape our thoughts and ideas of what Nigeria
ought to be, the better for us. I believe we must restructure to achieve our
full potential and greatness or risk losing all we have of our fetish
sovereignty.
Whatever are my misgivings about the current leadership, the
hard truth is that Mr. Buhari is now the President and he holds the key to the
unity, future and greatness of the country. So, much will depend on what he
does or didn’t do within the term of his presidency. I will never seize to
demand fairness and good leadership from him I pray that God will continue to
guide him to do right for the common good of all.
After
former President Goodluck Jonathan conceded defeat and given the nature of the
election, the bitterness and ferocity of the campaign, I had expected the
victor to take deliberate steps to signal unity.
Imagine if President Buhari had called for unity; if he had
pledged to be the president of all; if he had urged those who never supported
him to assist in guiding him; if he had recognized the passion and patriotism
of those that campaigned against him knowing all that went into 2015 isn’t just
about him or Mr. Jonathan but about Nigeria.
Sadly, we allowed anger, vendetta, revenge and vindictiveness to
becloud our sense of judgment hence we lost those useful lessons of the nature
of democracy, otherwise why would the Igbo be denied key appointments on the
account of how they voted?
Why would the FG borrow nearly $30BN on behalf of all of us and
yet exclude the South East from any of the intervention projects? Neither the
technological and manufacturing sector which is the forte of the South East nor
the Second Niger Bridge, the death traps called federal roads and the erosion
sites menacing the zone merited any consideration.
With
this inexcusable omission, how do I explain to my children that South East was
part of Nigeria when President Buhari took $30bn infrastructural loan? How do I
justify the mortgaging of the future of generations of Igbo yet unborn that
this jumbo loan which will eventually be paid by them was taken on their
behalf?
Not even the Federal Government is willing to provide a
reasonable answer. In a statement, issued by the Special Assistant to the
Minister of Finance on Media, Mr. Festus Akanbi, infrastructural projects are
allocated $18.3bn.
The projects to be embarked upon are the Mambilla Hydro Electric
Power Project ($4.8bn), the Modernization Coastal Railway Project (Calabar-Port
Harcourt-Onne Deep Sea Port Segment) valued at $3.5bn and the Abuja Mass Transit
Rail Project (Phase 2) put at $1.6bn.
Others
are the Lagos-Kano Railway Modernization Project (Lagos-Ibadan Segment Double
Track) estimated at $1.3bn and the Lagos-Kano Railway Modernization Project
(Kano-Kaduna Segment Double Track) valued at $1.1bn.
The balance of $11bn will be expended on Eurobond ($4.5bn),
Federal Government Budget Support ($3.5bn), Social Support for Education and
Health ($2.2bn), Agriculture ($1.2bn), and Economic Management and Statistics
($.2bn).
When questioned on the apparent omission of the South East on
the project allocation, Akanbi who obviously had no answer said that the loan
has nothing to do with regional consideration. Hear him ‘I don’t have an answer
to your question. This is just a Federal Government thing that was presented.
It’s not a regional thing. These are strategic things just like intervention
for three year-programme. It’s just for support. It’s not the main thing, just
an adhoc initiative. It has nothing to do with regions”.
I don’t know which god we offended that we are often saddled
with very bad leaders with poor judgment and poor sense of history. Why must
the South East always be an afterthought? Why is it so difficult to give every
region in Nigeria a good sense of belonging?
Those in authority must stop paying lip service to unity. If
they so much hate the East, then let them go. That I believe in Nigeria doesn’t
mean I won’t go with my people if they are pushed out of Nigeria.
My position on equitable distribution of amenities from the
proceeds of the loan does not signify an endorsement. If anything, I am against
the huge borrowing given that the receipted revenue accruable to this country,
if well managed can get us out of the loan trap, especially if we have people
with good and imaginative ideas making top level decisions. But if we must take
the loan, then the utilization must be evenly spread.
For my South East and South-South brothers, who had all along
adopted the attitude of wait-and-see for the current regime in Nigeria, the
waiting is over as there isn’t much to be seen again. The signs of the times
are clear. They hate you and will never love you. It’s time to not just engage
our foes and confront our fears but it is time to speak to ourselves as one.
It’s time to unite and love ourselves even harder. It’s time to think out the
third option. I believe we shall overcome especially if we remember ‘ibu anyi
da nda’.
https://www.today.ng/opinion/217805/29-96bn-loan-south-east
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