JONATHAN, NATIONAL CONFERENCE AND TRANSFORMATION

For an advert daring to compare President Goodluck Jonathan with great world leaders such as Martin Luther King, Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore, Nelson Mandela of South Africa and Barack Obama of the US, Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola, was quoted to have described the publication as “blasphemous.” His political ally, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai, who thinks the advert was “cheap and brassy”, joined yet another political ally and presidential aspirant, Mr. Sam Nda-Isaiah, in calling on the former Singaporean President to drag Jonathan to court for the comparison.The reactions from these opposition leaders show clearly their level of intolerance and degree of resentment against President Jonathan. Why? First, the advert does not say that Jonathan has already accomplished the achievements of the world leaders; simply that he is on a similar path of transforming Nigeria, the way those leaders transformed their countries. Secondly, the advert does not claim that Jonathan is the only Nigerian capable of changing the country. And thirdly, it does not even arrogate to Jonathan any claim that he is better than all the previous Nigerian leaders.

Perhaps, the only claim implied in the advert is that President Jonathan has the good luck of being around at this critical point in time and that he has the opportunity and capacity to make a difference. Would Fashola, el-Rufai and Nda-Isaiah regard this as an offence? Certainly, no member of the just-concluded National Conference would say so because they, too, are men and women of good luck whom destiny has chosen to play the important role of moving Nigeria to the Promised Land. Which is not to say that they are better than other Nigerians who were not chosen to participate in the Conference? When, on Thursday, 21st August, 2014, the report of the National Conference was submitted, in 22 volumes, to President Jonathan, it became obvious that the most critical part of the President's transformation agenda was being accomplished by these delegates representing the people of Nigeria. The work of the Conference is, indeed, the most critical component of the change that Nigeria needs to move to a new level. And, what's wrong in saying that, like President Lee Kuan Yew did for Singapore, Jonathan is working to take Nigeria from Third World to First World?
But before considering the role of the Conference in taking us to the Nigeria of our dream, the question to ask is: why are some Nigerians so perverted in their assessment? In my opinion, the only reason critics like Fashola, el-Rufai and Nda-Isaiah think we cannot even credit President Jonathan with anything positive is because they believe that Jonathan was never divinely chosen to rule this country. As far as they are concerned, he is an interloper, a misfit and a usurper, occupying a position meant for someone else. This arrogance is built on a false sense of cultural or historical superiority manifested every now and then in the conduct and utterances of many of our opposition leaders.

Otherwise, why would an el-Rufai or Nda-Isaiah ever perceive Jonathan as an intellectual inferior? For the benefit of those who may not have reflected deeply on the matter, it is this mentality that is responsible for almost all the challenges confronting Nigeria today – the problems of inequality, injustice, lack of fairness, corruption, economic and other material deprivation, ethnicity, social and political marginalization, illiteracy and educational backwardness, poor infrastructure development, etc. Many participants at the Conference might not have realized that they were taking on the challenge of revolutionizing Nigeria; that they were doing a major restructuring of the economic, social and political institutions and that they were working to change the mindset and conduct of Nigerians. The over 600 recommendations contained in the report of the Conference are not about road construction or electricity generation or construction of houses or production of goods and services; they are about reforms in our value orientations, mode of governance, structure of political institutions, moral attitudes, beliefs, inter-personal and inter-group relationships. Above all, they are about reforms in the laws that govern this country. There can be no doubt that the greatest challenge to the unity and continued survival of Nigeria is the problem of social injustice, inequality, oppression, exploitation, etc. To state the point clearly, Jonathan's transformation agenda is driven by the quest for equity and social justice. Nigeria is a country of extreme wealth and extreme poverty. It is a fact that the bulk of the wealth of the entire country is in the hands of a few individuals and corporate organisations. The national economy is mainly extractive, with petroleum as the dominant source of revenue on which the entire country depends. Unfortunately, the Niger Delta region where the resource comes from is grossly neglected and its environment degraded and polluted. This has been a major source of social injustice and cause of friction between Government and the communities.

For many years, the imbalance in the structure of states and local government councils across the country has been perceived as unjust. For instance, Lagos and Kano States have almost the same population size. Yet, whereas Lagos has only 20 Local Government Councils, Kano has 44. This is plain injustice, especially as revenue allocation to States is determined on the basis of the number of the existing Local Government Councils. In a number of other areas, such as access to education institutions, qualified students from some states are denied admission whereas less qualified ones are admitted, thus violating the principle of merit as a legitimate criterion. A similar form of injustice is perpetrated in the areas of scholarship awards and appointments to civil service jobs and political offices. These forms of social injustice are the sources of ethnic conflicts and social tension. What the National Conference handed over to President Jonathan on Thursday was a package of instruments with which to transform Nigeria. Not to have faith in the on-going process is to be self-centered, if not mischievous. Today, Jonathan is the Messiah. We do not need to love him to accept the salvation that he brings to our land. He deserves commendation for setting up the National Conference.

Written by John Udumebraye.