Rossikk: [size=15pt]Nigeria: Is the Country Really Unsafe?[/size]

BY IDANG ALIBI, 25 APRIL 2013

Daily Trust, Nigeria


OPINION

What does it matter if Nigeria is secure or not when it has to do with the rich.Nigeira has no food and job security for its populace so lets focus.

My going around with the National Good Governance Tour team has opened my eyes to the fact that Nigeria is not in any way near the picture of it created, largely by sensational reporting, which portrays her as a possibly dangerous and unsafe place unfit as an investment or tourism destination.

In all nooks and crannies of the 18 states so far visited in the course of the tour, we see foreign consultants, contractors and expatriate workers and business men be they Arabs, Europeans, Americans, Latinos and Asians, especially Koreans, Indians, Chinese and Philippines, going about their business without any sign of agitation or feeling of insecurity whatsoever. Some of these men have fruitful liaison with Nigerian women and seem at home in Nigeria and at ease with the local communities in which they do business. I was pleasantly surprised to see Chinese in some of the remotest parts of Kebbi State which we just visited constructing roads and bridges in some of the most difficult terrains in the state.

But media portraiture often seems to indicate that Nigeria is at war with itself. In some of the most remote parts of the country where you do not expect to find any strangers, let alone complete foreigners, you see them mixing freely with the natives and other Nigerian workers from outside those domains. They cut a picture of a people who are going about doing their businesses unchallenged and unfazed by any threat of danger of any kind. They are not surrounded by gun-toting security men to provide them free movement or to ensure their safety and security.

You do not see any signs of anxiety or concern of any kind on their faces. As I said earlier, some of those communities are so remote that one does not expect even non-native Nigerians to be found in them. Yet, you see these foreigners in those places, clearly passing a vote of confidence on the safety of Nigeria as a tourism and business destination. I was shocked when we saw some Italians constructing the Ogoni-Nkoro-Andoni road which is meant to link those places by road with Port Harcourt. The Rivers' State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, has become so familiar with these contractors that he is on first name terms with them. They emerged from the remote creeks and seemed to be so familiar with the terrain than even the native owners of the land. This is not a country which is portrayed as a haven for terrorists of all hues. Yes, we have Boko Haram and now a breakaway faction Ansaru. Yes, we used to have Niger Delta agitators who used to kidnap for ransom. But that is not nearly as frightening as is portrayed. My humble counsel is that our media must deliberately tone down the reportage of violence in our country, because as we have seen in other societies, violence cannot be completely absent in any place. We just must tone down because we cannot afford to feed others with the ammunition to use to do harm to our country.

There is no denying it that like other countries at this level of our development, we have cases of kidnapping, armed robbery, abduction, senseless murder and rape here and there. But the image of Nigeria created by these criminal acts is grossly distorted. It is exaggerated to the point of a deliberate campaign of calumny against the country. Who is the main culprit? The answer is unmistakeably the domestic media of mass communication. When one who is a journalist says this he is often accused of being bought over by government.

But the truth is that the enemy for this campaign against Mother Nigeria is not the foreign media but the home one. I say so because the foreign media tend to take a cue from what is reported locally.

Many foreigners who defy the usually ugly picture that is painted of Nigeria and come and live here to do business have often pointed out that we tend to be very unfair to our country and by implication, to ourselves. The Honorary Adviser to Nigeria on Investment, Baroness Linda Chalker, has been crying her voice coarse appealing to even our local journalists to treat their country more kindly. We write as if we want to write Nigeria out of existence. To some of our people, bashing Nigeria is another form of patriotism. In expressing our frustration at the failure of some of our leaderships, we must not end up spiting our country.

Let us make no mistake about it. Nobody is calling on the media to gloss over any cases of criminality in our country. They indeed have a duty and responsibility to draw attention to crimes or any other actions that are capable of harming the country in any way. But I dare to say that although we have our fair share of crimes, some of the crimes the media blow out of proportion have not reached the extremely worrying height they have reached in other countries at this level of our development. The few criminal cases we see in Nigeria is not in any way different from what happens in other countries. In fact there are more rapes, more carjacking, more robbery in some African countries than in Nigeria. Nairobi, for instance, is often mischievously called Nairobbery because of the many cases of robbery in that country. We are not by any means calling for them to reach such levels before action is taken but the media must display extreme discretion in the handling of negative news reporting.

What is happening today is that those who are supposed to be media gate keepers throw caution or discretion to the dogs and act as if they are foreign mercenaries hired to run down their country. Nigeria is being deliberately libelled and treated as if a rival competitor is out to de-market the country. Since a country is a corporate person, our government should treat this truly criminal offence as if Nigeria was a gentleman whose name is being dragged in the mud.

Nigeria is a victim of scare-mongering, sadly with local journalists as accomplices. President Goodluck Jonathan must regard this particular threat facing his country as a big one most deserving of a full national retreat in order to be able to find a solution. If the murders and rap.e that take place in the USA and South Africa are handled the way we Nigerian journalists handle some clearly minor infractions, the USA and South Africa would be places where no one would want to visit for business or for pleasure.

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