BY LAWRENCE IKWULONOR
Last Wednesday, the Speaker Yakubu Dogara’s led House of Representatives committed what many assumed as an unpardonable howler. It delved into the league of the litany of half-hearted and mischievous Nigerians who idly hurl jibes at the Nigerian Military and the Service Chiefs over the ongoing insecurity challenges in the country.
The Green Chamber was debating a motion raised in plenary by a Benue lawmaker who drew attention to recent killings in his home state and other parts of the country. The House reached a resolution, summoning President Muhammedu Buhari to appear before it. The President is to explain what the legislators presumed to be some loopholes in the security situation in the country. Nice enough!
However, where the national parliamentarians appeared to have committed a malapropism was the vote of no confidence passed on Service Chiefs and the eventual call for their immediate removal. One could figure the mentality of legislators draping with biasness and malice against the Nigerian Military and its leadership hierarchy.
There is something clearly discernible by basic logic with the House’s invitation to the President to appear before it. It is indicative of something still vague, foggy or every other thing, but clear to the lawmakers, who are seeking official elucidation from the Presidency.
Nevertheless, it belittles sound wisdom and mocks conscience to understand that Reps were yet to be afforded this sought explanation by the Presidency. But it proceeded to condemn Service Chiefs and angled for their removal. It’s akin to conviction before trial or the analogy in the jargon of putting the cart before the horse.
The haste to convict the military and Service Chiefs in public court, smacks of undisguised persecution. And the message this condemnable and grisly action has communicated is the image of a House in pathetic confusion.
More to it, it projects the Reps members as Nigerian representatives who have scanty details about the severity or progression of the insecurity challenges in the country and the efforts to tame its monstrous effects. They are least knowledgeable about the patriotic sacrifices by the military for Nigerians to savour the shadows of respite from armed local conflicts which have endlessly decked some parts of the country.
Sometimes, as proud citizens, it’s difficult to obfuscate the feeling of Nigeria as a hapless nation. The harder you try, the more obstinate the feeling sticks and shadows. This is a country where supposed leaders only find convenience and justification to an otherwise neutral issue, when it is politicized, even when such adamantly resists it.
Perhaps, the motivation of the lawmakers for the summary condemnation and “death sentence” on the military and the military chiefs, may be far from patriotism to the country. It could be that some of the legislators want Security Chiefs sacked to create room for them to push or lobby for the appointment of their lackeys as replacements.
Therefore, the incumbent holders of such positions must be demeaned and condemned to lay fertile grounds for a thoughtless Presidency to fall for the trick. Unfortunately, imaginations are not necessarily actionable and President Buhari is a different kind of leader, who does not work on sentiments as glaring as portrayed by the lawmakers.
Yes, accepted as chorused by the Reps that there are daunting insecurity challenges confronting Nigeria. But the conclusion that the military, which is often playing complementary roles in aid of civil security, should be singled out for unfair vilification is certainly in bad taste and provokes anger.
Nigerians often recite how security is everybody’s business. So, deep scratch of the issues would reveal many other underlying issues. It was more sensible for the parliamentarians to have been patient enough to wait for the President’s expositions before taking a decision on the leadership of the military. But they bolted out meaninglessly.
But outside the rhetoric of motions and resolutions, what else have these legislators done in their individual capacities as leaders to lessen the burden and bring succor to the people? The guess is very obvious, nothing!
An Africa adage says, “He who ties the lion, knows how best to untie it.” Some of these national parliamentarians have forgotten their past ignoble roles which have created and nourished the prevalent, enervating security problems in the country.
It is open secret that some of these lawmakers allegedly armed these youths, during the 2015 general elections to haunt down political opponents and rig elections. These armed youths have morphed into militias and are tormenting everybody. It is indisputable that guns alone do not end conflicts; dialogue or diplomacy is equally as important as warfare.
With elections over, these armed youths have turned the weapons in their possession against themselves and the state, which is responsible for the widespread insecurity in the country. Have some of these legislators ever thought of going back to their constituencies to apply diplomacy in retrieving these arms in the hands of the youths? It will help the cause of securing Nigeria better than condemnations and making Security Chiefs scapegoats for their complicit actions. The blame game is no solution either.
In spite of the biased position of the Reps members on the military and Service Chiefs, majority of Nigerians know that the armed forces are addressing Nigeria’s security challenges through a patriotic lens. The military have not fiddled on this important national assignment, even though, it is apparent they are overstretched.
One is tempted to believe truth has not gone on sabbatical leave in the Green Chambers. If not, the parliamentarian’s ought to have seen the impact of the Service Chiefs in repressing these local armed conflicts and insurrections in the Northeast, Southeast, Northwest, South-South and in parts of North central.
Even if the senses of the lawmakers are blurred by partisan inclinations, it is easy to notice that each time the military is drafted to assist; it means the security threats have overpowered conventional security. To think that such level of explosion in criminal violence should cease automatically is unrealistic, in the same magnitude, it does not support calls for the blanket sack of Security Chiefs.
It is easy for lawmakers who have no knowledge of the dynamics of the battlefield to claim the military is conniving with the attackers. It is proclaimed just to give the issue some thickness to the admiration of their constituents to earn votes in 2019.
But the military has remained unruffled and it shall continue to perform its national assignment conscientiously and patriotically. Could this so-called pact on collusion with armed invaders also include cold-blooded killing of military personnel in ambushes by the attackers? This is sheer persecution of the military which is doing much to end these armed conflicts.
Lastly, it is however, crucial to remind that the House of Reps members should not push the excuse for their shortcomings as representatives of the people to either the military or Service Chiefs. If this is the concern, the parliamentarians have failed and betrayed themselves overtly by elevating their interests, manifest in the resort to playing the political card, instead of a thorough approach to the matter for an appropriate remedy.
But the military are believers in the article of unshakeable faith in service to fatherland. And as usual, it shall come out of the present quandary stronger to the veneration of the Service Chiefs and for enduring peace and security to reign in Nigeria.
Ikwulonor a student of peace and security studies wrote from Abuja.
