President Mohammadu Buhari Needs to be Surrounded by more “Tunde Idiagbon” than sycophants -By Okike Benjamin

Muhammadu Buhari and Tunde Idiagbon

The man ‘Tunde Idiagbon’ is a household name not only in Nigeria military, but also to all Nigerians during his generation. He left an unequalled indelible mark of honour in the Nigeria political arena. He was the Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquarters. In other words, he occupied the position which Professor Yemi Osibanjo is occupying in the present government under the same boss. He was a de-tribalized Nigerian. During his military career, he was never found wanting when it relates to issues of tribalism, nepotism, sectionalism, favouritism and cynism, which have characterized today’s APC-led administration. He was a man of honour during his life on earth (September 14, 1943 through March 24 1999). May he continue to rest in the bosom of the Almighty God.

Tunde Idiagbon implemented all the 5 phases of War Against Indiscipline (WAI) to the letter without fear or favour starting with queuing, followed by Work Ethics, Patriotism and Nationalism, Anti-Corruption and Economic Sabotage and finally Environmental Sanitation. The fourth phase, Anti-Corruption and Economic Sabotage was as successful as the previous phases since the man (Tunde) at the stage centre was himself not corrupt. This phase ought to have taken the country, Nigeria to the next developmental level. However, the government of the day surrounded herself with more Economic Saboteurs than one can imagine. These “Nigerians” are involved in money laundering, the peak of economic sabotage to the tune that may be used to fund the country’ s budget for years and yet once they decamp to APC, they automatically become the ‘jackals and cabals’ of the government in power.

I can recall vividly when President Buhari was announced as the winner of 2015 general election, contractors who have collected huge sums of money to execute various projects mobilized their staff and equipment to sites. Traffic lights which were awarded over ten years ago in Abuja were been worked on then. Also, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the Minster of ‘Misinformation’ told Nigerians that there was a new sheriff in town. When Nigerians waited to catch the sight of the new sheriff in town, what they saw was not only an old sheriff, but a sheriff who sleeps all day and night, leaving robbers to operate freely at all times. Sheriff is a county police in the United States. County on the other is like Local Government Area (Council) in Nigeria. Sheriffs are usually close to the people and do easily nip crimes in the bud. With sheriff’s equivalent in Nigeria, the activities of Fulani Herdsmen and Boko Haram can easily be curtailed since sheriffs ensure that new comers to an area are monitored seriously. The clarion call for restructuring of Nigeria may likely produce sheriffs in Nigeria with whatever name that may be given to them. Eventually, when Nigerians observed that the so called ‘new’ sheriff in town operates business as usual (status quo) principle, even those contractors who had gone back to site went back to recall their staff and take their equipment away from the site.

Afterwards, whenever a robber is on rampage and the old sheriff in town is woken up by some concerned Nigerians, he will ask series of questions such as: what is the robber’s political party, tribe, name, state-of-origin etc? Depending on the answers to the questions, the old sheriff will decide to carry out “eyes left or right” pending on side the robber is operating. With this form of attitude, change became practically impossible to effect. Well, all hopes are not lost since the government of the day may still use her change slogan to turn the sycophants surrounding her into “Tunde Idiagbons” who will shun materialism and greed and work for the overall interest of our dear country, Nigeria. May God help us all.

Okike Benjamin

A teacher in the Department of Computer Science
University of Abuja