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Why Lai Mohammed Must Be Fired by Julietekekwe1: 1:23pm On Dec 30, 2015 |
Why Lai Mohammed must be fired
December 29, 2015 at 7:25 am in Femi Aribisala
By Femi Aribisala
Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf was the Minister of
Information in the dying days of Saddam
Hussein’s regime in Iraq. Nicknamed “Comical
Ali” by British tabloids, al-Sahaf made a fool of
himself during the Iraqi war by constantly
fabricating victories of the Iraqi army, even as
territory after territory fell to the American-led
allied forces.
What was so ridiculous about him was that his
lies were so blatant, only fools could believe
them. Even when American tanks rolled into
Baghdad, Comical Ali declared: “There is no
presence of the American columns in the city of
Baghdad at all. We besieged them and we killed
most of them. Today, the tide has turned. We
are destroying them. The Americans are going to
surrender or be burned in their tanks.”
Comical Lai
Lai Mohammed, Nigeria’s Minister of Information
and Culture, is Nigeria’s home-grown “Comical
Ali.” It would not be unfair to fashion him as
“the Minister of FABU.” Barely two months of
assuming office, Mohammed has established
himself as an instrument of cheap propaganda
and disinformation. On internet blogs today, he
is now generally referred to by his traducers as
“Liar Mohammed.” Without a doubt, he has
earned this sobriquet by his penchant to be
extremely economical with the truth.
Lai Mohammed’s tall tales have now reached
epidemic proportions. It is a contradiction in
terms that a government that claims to be anti-
corruption, and a president that boasts to be a
man of integrity, should have a “Comical Ali” as
its face and spokesman. It is doubtful that
Mohammed can stop being himself. However, if
President Buhari is interested in redeeming his
now battered image, he needs to admit he made
a big error of judgment in appointing Mohammed
as a minister.
Lai Mohammed must be fired immediately.
Barring which, the only honourable thing left for
the Honourable Minister to do is to resign. A
Minister of Information should not be allowed to
become a Minister of Misinformation.
Fictitious Victory
On 23 December, 2015, Mohammed told a
meeting of editorial heads of media houses in
Lagos that the Nigerian military has met
President Buhari’s deadline to defeat Boko
Haram before 31 December, 2015.
Said Mohammed: “Today, I can report that the
war against Boko Haram is largely won. Today, I
can report to you that the entire 70 plus
kilometres stretch from Maiduguri to Bama and
all the way to Banki which leads to Cameroun
and the Central African Republic are in the hands
of our gallant troops. They have so degraded the
capacity of Boko Haram that the terrorists can
no longer hold on to any territory just as they can
no longer carry out any spectacular attack.”
Rather than call his minister to order, President
Buhari backed him up in the bid to white-wash
the gaffe of predicting Boko Haram would be
defeated before the end of the year. He told the
BBC: “Boko Haram has reverted to using
improvised explosive devices. They have now
been reduced to that. But articulated
conventional attacks on centres of
communication and populations.. they are no
longer capable of doing that effectively. So I
think technically we have won the war because
people are going back into their neighbourhoods.
Boko Haram as an organised fighting force, I
assure you, that we have dealt with them.”
The president conveniently forgot he had said at
his inaugural address that: “We cannot claim to
have defeated Boko Haram without rescuing the
Chibok girls and all other innocent persons held
hostage by insurgents.” We have heard nothing
about the Chibok girls. Nevertheless, the
president now says Boko Haram has been
technically defeated. Are we therefore to
conclude that the Chibok girls have also been
technically rescued?
Boko Haram response
The victory declarations of Lai Mohammed and
President Buhari turned out not only to be
palpably false, but outrightly dangerous. Just
two days after Mohammed’s declaration, the
Boko Haram who he says “can no longer carry
out any spectacular attack” attacked Kimba in
Borno State. They killed 14 hapless people and
razed the village to the ground. According to
eye-witness reports, “not a single house was
spared in the arson.”
One day later, a coordinated fighting unit of Boko
Haram infantry attacked Maiduguri. They came
in a military convoy, precisely the manner the
president boasted is now impossible. They then
dug in for a pitched battle against the Nigerian
army. Thereafter, two female suicide-bombers
detonated explosives in the Jiddari area of
Maiduguri, with casualty figures yet to be
determined.
There is no doubt these attacks were direct
responses to APC’s vain propaganda. Boko
Haram decided to give the lie to the bombastic
statements that it has been defeated either
technically or in actuality. To drive home the
point beyond reasonable doubt, the insurgents
chose to attack Maiduguri, the very command
and control epicentre of Nigeria’s military
operations in the North-east.
Clearly, the defeat of Boko Haram only exists as
figments in the imaginations of APC
propagandists. Having won the election by
manipulating the press, they now seek to govern
by employing a cacophony of jobless youth
whose charge is to post “SAI Buhari” comments
on as many internet blogs as possible. They also
have the mandate to attack anyone who refuses
to buy the many-splendored FABUS of the APC
government.
APC’s bogus propaganda is partly responsible for
the deaths and destruction in Kimba, Aladuwari
and Maiduguri, the full extent of which are yet to
be determined. The false victory procession of
APC chieftains provoked the Boko Haram to
contradict them at the cost of Nigerian lives. It
is way too early to call for the impeachment of
Mr. President. But it is high time to call for the
retirement of Lai Mohammed. We must not
allow this local “Comical Ali” to continue to use
Nigerian lives to score cheap political points.
While the APC was busy celebrating the
fictitious death of Boko Haram, the New York-
based Institute for Economics and Peace
declared in its latest Global Terrorism Index that
Boko Haram “has become the most deadly
terrorist group in the world.” The day before
Mohammed’s bombast, UNICEF declared that
Boko Haram has succeeded in keeping over one
million children out of school, warning that this is
likely to add fuel to the insurgency by
radicalizing the youth in the North-east.
Campaign recantations
It was Lai Mohammed who told Nigerians the
promises of the APC during the election were
actually not from the APC. The APC denied its
key presidential campaign documents: “My
Covenant with Nigerians” and “One Hundred
Things Buhari Will Do in 100 Days.” Buhari
himself presents one of the documents in the
first person, saying: “The covenant is derived
from the manifesto of my party, the All
Progressives Congress. It however represents my
pledge to you all when I become your president.”
But once he became president, Mohammed
denied them. He swore that: “Buhari never
promised to do anything in 100 days, that’s the
honest truth.” However, when APC Senators
were forced to vote against their own campaign
promise to provide N5,000 monthly to 25 million
unemployed Nigerians, Mohammed declared that
the government already has 1.4 trillion naira
recovered from banks through the TSA ready to
fulfil the promise. He said we should expect it in
the 2016 budget.
These are his words: “The non-implementation of
the payment policy so far is due to the fact that
it was not included in the 2015 budget. The
Muhammadu Buhari administration has been
busy putting in place measures that will make it
possible to start the implementation of this
project.”
This has turned out as usual to be another tissue
of lies. The 2016 budget has now been
announced, and there is nothing about the N5000
stipend for the 25 million unemployed.
Presidential doublespeak
The government of President Buhari is replete
with contradictions and doublespeak.
At the APC South-East rally in Owerri, Buhari
declared he would make the naira equal to the
dollar if voted into office. He continued: “It is
sad that the value of the naira has dropped to
more than 230 to one dollar. This does not speak
well for the nation’s economy.” How does it
speak for the economy now that the value of the
naira has dropped under Buhari to 280 to the
dollar?
Buhari said: “Boko Haram is a typical example of
small fires causing large fires. An eccentric and
unorthodox preacher with a tiny following was
given posthumous fame and following by his
extra-judicial murder at the hands of the police.”
What then are we to say about the extra-judicial
massacre of over 300 Shiite Muslims in Zaria at
the hands of the Nigerian army under this Buhari
administration?
Buhari said during the campaign: “You are all my
people; I will treat you all as mine. I will work for
those who voted for me, voted against me and
those who didn’t vote at all.” Then he said after
the campaign: “The constituents (that) gave me
97% cannot in all honesty be treated on some
issues with constituencies that gave me 5%.”
On his election, the president said: “Our long
night is over and a new dawn has come…
Democracy and rule of law will be put in place.”
“I pledge myself and the government to the rule
of law, in which none shall be so above the law
that they are not subject to its dictates, and
none shall be so below it that they are not
availed of its protection.” But under his
administration, democracy and the rule of law
has continued to be violated. The DSS ignores
court verdicts with impunity, as happened in the
case of Dasuki and Kanu.
Justice Muazu Pindigi was summarily replaced
by Justice Ambrosa as chairman of the Rivers
state governorship petitions tribunal and PDP’s
victory was quickly annulled. Pindigi said: “The
Supreme Court has said that for an election to be
annulled, the petitioner has to prove that
elections didn’t hold at the polling units where
the winner was returned elected. I’m not sure
that the Ambrosa’s judgment arrived through that
route.”
During the election, Buhari declared the
maintenance of the presidential fleet of aircrafts
a colossal waste of money. He said: “For me,
when we come into office, all these waste will
be blocked and properly channeled into our
economy.” However, since he became president,
not a single plane has been sold. Billions of
naira continue to be spent as the president has
gone on one international junket after the other. |
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