By Pini Jason
THE Democracy Day observed last week offered many Nigerians another opportunity for a promiscuous criticism of the system. Well, what a better way to celebrate democracy than to exercise our freedom of speech? I am reminded of what an actor once said: “opinion is like an a….h; everybody has got one!”

An American writer once said that when Americans have a liberal president, they want a dictator; when they have a dictator they want a moralistic president; and when they have a moralistic president they want a rogue!

The writer said this during the severe criticism of Jimmy Carter. Carter was elected president after the traumatic Nixon Watergate scandal! Carter the grinning, mild mannered, Bible thumbing Georgian had flopped in the rescue of American diplomats seized by Iranian Islamists and bungled the rescue of the fishing trawler, Mayagueze, seized by the Cambodians. Carter’s answer to these apparent signs of the waning of America’s global power was to diagnose “a national malaise”! After Carter, Americans elected a cowboy, Ronald Reagan!

During the US presidential debate in 2008, Barrack Obama pledged to pull out American troops from Iraq, to close Guantanamo Bay and refocus the hunt for the Al Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden. The Republicans led by their candidate John McCain, a war veteran, cried havoc. They criticised Obama as inexperienced and weak on the defence of America and might jeopardise America’s global power. Obama has since taken out terrorist Bin Laden and the top leadership of Al Qaeda but the Republicans are not impressed.

They are now waving human rights flag and criticising Obama for using drones to target Al Qaeda leaders instead of putting American troops in harm’s way. Obama’s critics include Bruce Fein, who was Deputy Assistant Attorney General under Reagan who planned to assassinate Ghadaffi. Obama has not closed Guantanamo Bay; the Republicans are savaging him for that! That is the nature of party politics.

Temperament that makes politics non- developmental

We are no doubt experiencing a national trauma. But reading through the Democracy Day criticisms, it seemed to me that we ignored the constraint which the structure of the country imposes on our development.

Truth is that in a properly structured polity, most of the house-keeping items reeled out by the President are the responsibilities of states and local governments. I also noticed that there was no effort to separate what we could blame on President Jonathan from what we could attribute to 52 years of leadership failure.

Some of the problems we decried have their origins in 1914; some are products of the military era; others are failures of the last 13 years of democracy. But the most problematic is a temperament that makes our politics non-developmental. Only a few of our present trauma can rightly be put on Jonathan’s desk. And honestly, what miracle could anybody expect in one year of Jonathan’s administration given the circumstances of his emergence as President and the dicey environment we all have created for him in the last one year, in a country as diverse as Nigeria? Yes, he could have made some symbolic gestures which we would have applauded, but they could only have remained mere symbolic gestures and nothing more!

Let us take the classic case of electricity power. I am NOT making an excuse here for Jonathan’s administration. I am only trying to remind us of a few things we, as usual, conveniently forgot. We seem to blame the President for not providing power instantly. We cry about the billions of US dollars spent on Independent Power Project without results. The old adage is that it is easier to destroy than to build. In 1997, a consultant with Afri-Projects Consortium, the Managing Consultants to PTF, told us in Abuja that “in the last 20 years, there has been no investment in NEPA”.

If you count back 20 years from 1997, you will appreciate how far back the damage in the sector went. I think Uncle Bola Ige did not reckon with the level of rot in the power sector when he rather enthusiastically promised us uninterrupted power in six months on assumption of office as Minister of power in 1999! Have we forgotten that promise and the result?

In the 20 years of neglect the gentleman talked about, all the infrastructure of power were dilapidated while, for political reasons, rural areas were being connected to the national grid without appropriate infrastructure to support the scheme. Meanwhile, some of the funds ostensibly meant for NEPA ended up in the pockets of organisers of million-man march for the maximum ruler. We must not forget the past whenever we criticise the pace in revamping the power sector.

The rot of 34 years, including the rot of human beings in the sector, is so much that I do not expect a miracle to happen in one year of an administration! We do not like it. I do not like it, but we must be realistic about the situation. In many states, consumers are not metered and do not pay. In many states, power is wasted by people who believe they are enjoying their resources! We must brace up to a methodical solution to the problem, not compound it by stampeding ourselves in order to ward off political criticism.

Another issue confronting us today is security. My suspicion is that people expected Jonathan to trip on the terrorism problem, take precipitate action that could either trigger off impeachment or military coup to “kick him out of the place”. I also recall the uproar when President Olusegun Obasanjo was presented with a similar security minefield with the declaration of Sharia in some Northern states. We wanted him to declare a state of emergency in the affected states for violating the constitution.

We wanted him to crack the whip on the behind of the errant governors. But you see, what a President or Governor ought to do appear very easy when you do not have all the facts or the security reports he has. Nigeria’s culture of crisis did not start in the last one year. We all are contributory to what our country is today because many of us want Nigeria governed according to our dictates.

That is not to suggest that the President is completely blameless. He said in his address to the nation: “As President, it is my solemn duty to defend and protect the Constitution of this country. That includes the obligation to protect life and property”.

Therefore he should raise his game and reduce indiscipline in our country and let’s hope Nigerians will not complain! The “beauty of democracy” is not lawlessness! As I said in this column last week, we are very ambivalent about solving our problems. That is why Jonathan should embrace a cross-cutting policy and approach our problem from there. Law and order is the only cross-cutting policy that can sanitise this country.

Subjected to the same law

The President said: “This nation exists because we are one”. On the contrary, Nigeria does not exist because we are not yet one. Nigeria cannot exist until we work to be one. Religion cannot hold this country together because we are people of different faiths.

Culture cannot hold us together because we are a multicultural society. Politics cannot hold us together because we are a people of excesses and our politics is rooted in ethnicity and religion. Nigeria can only exist on condition that we are ALL subjected to the same law! Many Nigerians would easily say that corruption is the bane of our development.

I view things differently. The problem of Nigeria is that we are terribly weak in LAW and ORDER. You can trace virtually all our ills to lawlessness. Corruption has thrived simply because criminals get celebrity treatment instead of languishing in jail. In China such crime carries death sentence.

In Japan, they disgrace you so that you commit hara-kiri! Mr. President, enforce the laws, then we shall know those who are stumbling blocks to our progress!

Let me use an example we are very familiar with in Nigeria. What is the difference between the Nigerian Premier League and the English Premier League? Why is it difficult to fill our stadia on match days? Why is it difficult to win away matches in Nigerian Premier League? Whereas in Nigeria you can steal public fund, bribe or beat up a referee and nothing happens, in Premier League, if you as much as criticise a referee, be you Sir Alex Ferguson, you answer for it.

If you make a racist remark against anybody, you are charged to court because racism is a serious matter in a multicultural Britain. If a fan is unruly, he or she is charged to court and may be banned from entering a football arena for life. It is the strict application of the rules that has made the Premier League and other European Leagues so exciting that some Nigerians earn a living parroting the names of the players on television while others stab one another to death in defence of their favourite clubs!

A country of law and order

This country can take a quantum leap to progress in four years of Jonathan’s administration if he becomes a law and order President. This will also include holding those who heat up the polity by purveying hoax accountable for their actions.

It will not amount to infringement of human rights. Even in the United States where we rush to for examples, the First Amendment only guarantees you pre-publication freedom.

It is unlawful to abridge your right to say or publish anything. But once you say or publish, you are held accountable if you offend the law. The nation is often set on edge by volatile but unsubstantiated statements by politicians. He who alleges must be prepared to prove it.

Like the symbol of justice, President Jonathan should wear a blindfold and enforce the existing laws. I believe that that could help Nigeria even with our military constitution. He should lead by example. For instance, free and fair election must not begin and end with the election of the president.

President Jonathan must  see to it that every aspirant for an elective position in his party, the PDP, is given the chance to contest for the post, unimpeded, in an election devoid of violence, coercion, bribery or manipulation. Other political parties critical of the President and his party will surely follow.

That way he would have left Nigeria a great legacy of deepening democracy through the enthronement of internal democracy. And this is the quickest and surest route for Jonathan to chuck up incredible record of achievement in four years! Seek ye a law and order society and all other great things will be added unto Nigeria!