By Jide Ajani, Deputy Editor

Even before he was sworn in, problems were there waiting for him.

But, just imagine!  Imagine President Goodluck Jonathan in combat gear, swagger stick in hand, walking with briskness and barking out instructions!

Imagine President Jonathan ordering the sacking of a top government official for manifest incompetence or dereliction of duty or corruption!  Imagine President Jonathan going on national television to read out his own version of a fatwa on Boko Haram, threatening to bring down the roof!  Just imagine President Jonathan paying an unscheduled visit to one of the ministries in the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, and, discovering that more than half the staff are not on duty, orders a pay cut! Just imagine.

That is the picture of the President of Nigeria that most people would love to see.

However, former President Olusegun Obasanjo came in 1999 with much promise, issuing an executive order that all military officers who had had political postings should retire.  Nigerians applauded.  Obasanjo set up panels to probe white elephant projects and other sundry malfeasances of past administrations.  But nothing, absolutely nothing came out of all these.

Some Nigerians have opined that Obasanjo’s speed got Nigeria nowhere and, therefore, the country should not just rely on speed and brashness alone.

Perhaps, it is this counsel that may have informed the steady though verging-on-the-sluggish approach of President Jonathan.

MAKING THE NEWS FOR MR PRESIDENT

However, one very glaring challenge that President Jonathan appears to have walked himself into is the unnerving situation whereby he allows news to be made for him, rather than he making the news.

And, there are many examples to point at on this issue.

Take zoning in Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP.

In the affairs of men, nothing can be said to have been etched in stone.

Therefore, Jonathan should have simply changed the dynamics of the zoning arrangement in his party instead of burying himself in a controversy that was needless and silly – but he took the plunge.  He lost and, therefore, from the very first days of his administration, controversy President Jonathan wrote.

His singular issue and its associated egregious collateral issues took a better part of the president’s first 20 days in office – what with the arrest and arraignment of former Speaker Dimeji Bankole for alleged corrupt practices. Mr. President spoke of the election of the speaker as democracy in action.  This was on June 6.

Even as leaders of the party were still attempting to resolve the matter, Boko Haram threw itself into the mix with the bombing of the Police Headquarters, Abuja.

Had President Jonathan stolen the moment, he would have sent the type of signal Nigerians love.

Take: On October 1, 1986, during Nigeria’s celebration of her independence anniversary, then military President, General Ibrahim Babangida was on the Tafawa Balewa ground when the heavens opened.  His ADC at that time, the now late Lt-Col U.K. Bello got an umbrella to shield his boss from the downpour. Babangida rejected the offer, insisting instead that if the other people on the grounds could be drenched by the rains he, too, could spare the luxury of having an umbrella over his head.

That was a piece of showmanship that earned Babangida plenty of applause. It was only the fiery Lagos lawyer, Chief Gani Fawehinmi, of blessed memory, who lampooned Babangida for that show, insisting that only a cunning man would be offered genuine and deserved help but would turn it down.  In truth, until the needlessly labourious transition programme of Babangida appeared unending, he could do no wrong because he was almost always doing what some believed was the right thin.

KNOCKS UNENDING
To be fair, Jonathan appears to be his own man in one singular way and, therefore, should not be expected to run Nigeria like Obasanjo or Babangida: That is doing things in his own way.

But when a President is being accused of incompetence in the manner the Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari, did, then there ought to be a rethink on the matter of style.  Said Buhari: “They said they have arrested some people; where are they? Did they not say that after the bombing of the Police headquarters that they arrested some Boko Haram members?

In which court were they prosecuted?  These people are reducing governance to a child’s play.  They are making us a joke to the world.  Is this how a serious government should respond to this kind of national carnage?”

Then there was the issue of constitution amendment.
Now, whether it was a mere attempt at testing the waters or not – the test results which proved woeful – only President Jonathan would know!

At a time when the issue of insecurity had taken over the land, electric power problem was continuing to mount with other issues begging for government’s attention, President Jonathan hinted at a proposal to ensure a single term of six years.  For a people, especially those from the North, who are  still smarting from the fallout of the crisis on zoning, such a matter was never going to sell.  Even the opposition parties pooh-poohed the idea before it landed.

Hardly had that matter fully died down than  two Justices, Aloysius  Katsina-Alu, then Chief Justice of Nigeria, and Justice Isa Ayo Salami, then President of the Court of Appeal, reached for each other’s jugular, with the National Judicial Council, NJC, playing the role of a biased umpire with its recommendation that Salami stood suspended and should be removed from office.

President Jonathan wasted no time in quickly accepting NJC’s recommendations.  But some Nigerians were again quick to point out that had President Jonathan’s swiftness in sacking Salami been applied to finding solution to the power problem, or the Kerosene scarcity, or the resolving Boko Haram menace, Nigerians would have been singing forever the praises of Jonathan .  Even as he celebrates 100 days in office tomorrow, the Katsina-Alu/Salami tango is still hanging.

The latest in the seemingly growing list of flops is Nigeria’s position on the crisis in Libya.  Without due consultations with other African countries, and African Union, AU, as a body, Nigeria broke away from AU’s position on Libya to hurriedly recognise and even praise the exploits of the ”rebel” National Transition Council, NTC, which the West, specifically United States, Britain and France had propped up, after NATO had destroyed whatever was left of the country in the name of bombing raids against Colonel Muammer Ghadafi.  Ironically, but for some foreign television reporters, some Nigerians picked up by the NTC-inspired rebels would have been killed because “they were dark-skinned and were rumoured to have been recruited by Ghadafi to fight the rebels.”

ANOTHER AGENDA- TRANSFORMATION
And, whereas President Jonathan was quick to tell Nigerians that his agenda is one and single and it encompasses all, there appears to be a disconnect between the realities of achieving the transformation agenda and desire.

First, it should be clearly stated that there is a world of difference between a desire to perform and the capacity to deliver. In a country where an appointee that would oversee Nigeria’s attainment of the Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, is yet to take off, where the power sector remains comatose and where corruption of all kinds continues to ravage the polity, transformation can only happen in the breach.

On the long dream of Vision 20:20 20, there is yet any positive step that can inspire confidence that even Vision 20:2050 may be a mirage.  Were it to be about the African continent, Vision 202010, may be more like it.

Pray, the question to ask is:  The countries Nigeria seek to topple from that top 20 list that are not relenting in greater, more stable and sure-footed strides of development, would they arrest their development just so Nigeria that continues to wobble would catch up with them?  And, even were they to arrest their development, the minute Nigeria joins their league, whenever that would be, those countries already have plans of full take off.

HOPE FOR 1,360 DAYS AHEAD
After these first 100 days, whatever is to happen in the next 1,360 days left in this four-year tenure should inspire hope and confidence.

As people have come to say, with patience, you have goodluck and so with Dame Patience Jonathan, Nigeria’s First Lady, we have President Goodluck.  Unfortunately, patience is not a virtue Nigerians are known to possess.

But in the area of policy and direction, the cabinet team selected by President Jonathan received good reviews.  Whether the right policies would be introduced with a view to moving the country forward is one thing; and whether the few technocrats in the regime would be allowed to work is another.

Maybe a shock therapy would inspire hope and confidence.
There would be a need for President Jonathan to move faster, though not at a break neck speed.
But if truth be told, most of what President Jonathan is still planning to do today and tomorrow ought to have been done yesterday.
So, what have we achieved in the first 100 days?