On May 29, this year, it would be exactly one year since you became the First Lady with the victory of your husband and President of the country, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the polls. Certainly, the last 10 months in office have not been a smooth run, and the reason is not far-fetched.
No matter how we try to pretend or play down the disastrous outing of the President Muhammadu Buhari regime, the obvious fact is that that regime will go down in the history of this nation as the most reckless, divisive, as it insidiously pursued prebendalism and its parochial agenda that would have set the entire nation on fire.
Much as you and the president would want to be seen as being nice to Buhari you must come to terms with the reality that until you are prepared to correct those anomalies and in the process step on toes where necessary, nothing much would be achieved at the expiration of your tenure.
As the First Lady, you have the ears of the Mr. President, you must be prepared to tell him the real situation on ground and must not spare any opportunity to do that. This is necessary, because most of those around him may not allow him to see situations as they really are. Many are around him for what they can get and would not want anything that would deny them the source of their livelihood.
However, you as the First Lady, must realise that after your tenure in office when all around him would have moved on you would be left alone with your husband to take the backlash of your wrong decisions in office,
Last week, you were reported to have told Nigerians to take to agriculture to address the problem of hunger in the country.
That advice in itself cannot be faulted. It is a given that we must grow food to feed ourselves, but beyond that, you will agree that the problem of agriculture, especially in the last few years, is more worrisome, dangerous and life-threatening than that.
You maintained that Nigerians have the capacity to grow the food that they eat and that everybody should grow something.
The report also quoted you to have made this statement when you received the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations (UN), Amina Mohammed, in your office at the State House, Abuja.
“The President has made the right decisions. These decisions will help us build a Nigeria that is more respected. We should be more accountable as a people as regards our resources,” you were quoted to have said.
According to you, there’s a need to inspire the youth to think appropriately about the nation: “We have to inspire them to think of Nigeria first before any state.”
Your admonition is appropriate and apt and cannot be faulted, but as we have said earlier the issues limiting and preventing Nigerians from embarking in agriculture are much more deeper than that and it must require the government to put its foot on the ground and address these challenges by dealing decisively with those perpetrating these heinous crimes against the people, to enable them to take to your advice.
For instance, the greatest problem that confronts farmers is their safety. Under Buhari they were maimed and killed like chickens while Buhari and his praise-singers looked away. They prioritised the lives of cattle over that of the farmers because cattle rearing was the preferred form of agriculture under Buhari. Those who engaged in anything else other than cattle rearing did that at their own peril. They were killed with reckless abandon, and their assailants were so bold that they openly justified or rationalised their actions.
A certain editor of a national newspaper nearly got killed when he visited his farm. He narrowly escaped and was lucky to live to tell his story. Several others are not as lucky.
On a recent trip to Abavo in Delta State, some farmers complained that they had since stopped going to farms for fear of being kidnapped or killed.
This scenario is the case all over the country, especially in the north east, north west, north central, and most parts of the south.
Farmers get killed and all we hear is the skewed narrative of the Buhari regime that they are farmers-herders clashes. They were never clashes but a deliberate attempt to annihilate and exterminate these farmers by killer-herders with expansionist ambitions.
That was the level of our hypocrisy under Buhari.
So, would President Tinubu be prepared to safeguard the lives of these peasants from these marauders, many of whom we have been told are not Nigerians? Will Tinubu be prepared to prosecute those parading AK-47 under the guise of being herders? How far can he go to hunt down those who arm these killers?
Added to this also is the fact that for a country like Nigeria with a population of over 200 million people, there is no level of subsistence farming that can keep hunger at bay. It has to be deliberate, mechanized and organized to not only feed Nigerians but also enough to export to break the jinx of our over-reliance on crude oil.
President Tinubu may not have achieved as much as is expected of him, it is still early days, but it is also true that he has shown that not only does he listens, he also will not hesitate to reverse himself when confronted with constructive superior argument and criticism. He has also shown capacity to deal with aides who have been found wanting. All of these attributes were completely lacking in the Buhari regime. He stuck with a losing and non-performing team for eight years and in the process wreaked incalculable havoc on the nation.
Is it also a coincidence that it has taken only 10 months of President Tinubu to prove to the world that nobody is above the law with the recent arraignment of the loquacious and audacious leader of the Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore group, Bello Bodejo?
Bodejo’s arrest on January 23 at the Miyetti Allah’s office in Karu Local Government Area of Nasarawa State over the unveiling of a vigilance group, would send signals to all those who thought under Buhari that they were above the law; that a new Sheriff is in town.
That is how a multi-ethnic, multi-religious and plural society as ours should be governed. The supremacy of the law should be reined in on those who think a section or region of this country is greater and has more stake in the affairs of this nation than others.
When then President Goodluck Jonathan lamented that there were terrorists even in government, many did not take him seriously, but under Buhari we knew better.
How far is President Tinubu ready to go to arrest this nation’s descent to anarchy and lawlessness? Already, some of these lawless citizens have threatened your life; some others are speaking in manners that do not disguise their sympathy for these felons. The question is can we build an egalitarian society where the rule of law reigns supreme if some nonentities can dare to threaten the First Lady and they are allowed to go scot-free? Can we build that nation we will all be proud of if a Nigerian can get killed for just no cause in the name or religion and faith?
It gladdens one’s heart to hear you say you are not afraid to die, but you must not leave it that, because you have a responsibility with your husband, to ensure that the sanctity of the Nigerian life is protected and safeguarded,
May God protect and keep you to support your husband to deliver on his promises to Nigerians.
