By Efio-Ita Nyok |3 August 2015 |4:07am
Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari recently made a four day visit to the United States from 19-22 July 2015 to meet with his US counterpart President Barack Obama. It's barely two weeks the historic visit was made. The meeting was at the behest of Obama. Whereas, Buhari was there, as they would have us believe, for bilateral talks with both Barack Obama and some leading members of Obama's administration.
Buhari's contingent was said to be allegedly comprised of 220 individuals(the highest by any Nigerian leader) and that visit cost Nigeria's taxpayers about N2.2 billion. Notable among the Nigerian team were the All Progressives Congress(APC) governors like Rochas Okoroacha, Rotimi Amaechi, and Adams Oshimhole, etc. Note that there was hardly any significant presence of a technocrat in this over bloated team. This is rationalised on the thesis that Buhari is yet to appoint any technocrat as minister until now for whatsoever reason.
It is reported that Buhari and Obama discussed the insurgency in the north east of the country and the fight against corruption. It is with regards to the former that President Buhari met with US Vice president Joe Biden , National Security Adviser Susan Rice and Secretary of State John Kerry according to which he requested the sales of superior military hardwares by the American government to which Obama bureaucratically declined on the premise of widespread allegations of human right abuse by Nigeria's armed forces and further hinging his decline on the Leahy Law clause.
Toward the economy, Naij.com report that President Buhari had 'an encounter with the US Secretary of Commerce, Penny Pritzker. One of the most anticipated meetings by Nigerians is to be held with the US Attorney General Loretta Lynch. The officials are to discuss the issue of corruption, in particular –assets looted by the immediate past politicians. Further on, Buhari and CBN governor and the director of the Nigerian Stock Exchange will meet the US Secretary of Treasury, Jack Lew'.
Despite these high-powered meetings, the talks on security assistance on the part of the US failed for reasons already highlighted. However, on the economy of both countries it was discovered that the Obama administration was disappointed in Buhari. The Biafra Herald best represent this sentiment when it reports that, 'The concealed fragments of President Muhammad Buhari’s exorbitant visit to the United State are beginning to emerge, and stakes are not looking too good. Sources reveal that the White House is completely disappointed about a total lack of preparedness by the Nigerian contingent to discuss vital issues about both countries. The Obama administration also decried a
poor presentation of policy needs
and updates made by the Nigerian
leader'. The online facility further quoted an anonymous inside source as saying, “May be we are not reading from the same script, but the overall message by Barack is that they should go get themselves together, then get back with us,”…”We are just being polite about this because your President doesn’t seem to understand a whole lot about government,” confided another source.
To my mind, the supposed ill preparedness of Buhari and his contingent especially on economic cooperation is not an oversight. This is a testament, not just to his (Buhari's) inexperience in government, but to his main preoccupation in the States. Buhari's interest in the US trip was to play true to a concealed agenda of using the fight against the Boko Haram and corruption to procure US assistance in the areas of military hardwares and diplomatic avenues via which the so-called 5% minority who didn't vote for his presidency in the last election(and earlier general elections) would be punished.
If not, while would he, in addressing the Nigerian community in a town hall meeting scheduled within the time frame of this US trip, say that:
"I hope you have a copy of the
election results. Literally constituencies, for example, that gave me 97 per cent, cannot in all honesty be treated, on some issues, [the same way as] some
constituencies that gave me five per cent. I think these are political realities. While certainly there will be justice for everybody; everybody will enjoy their constitutional rights, where the party in constituencies that by either sheer hard work made sure they got their people [to vote] and ensure their votes count, they
must feel that the government has
appreciated the effort they put in putting the government in place. I think this is really fair''?
It goes to submit then that Buhari's quest for America's military hardwares was to be acquired to fight, not Boko Haram, but the regrouping and re-evolving Niger Delta militants. They crave the monetary significance of Nigeria's south-south oil. His fight against corrupt leaders of the immediate past administration was to punish the perceived 5% minority of the country who are dominant in the South-South axis of his country. In other words, Buhari's mission beginning from 29 May 2015 to 29 May 2019 maybe to cause(further) polarisation in the country.
Chinweizu (Ibekwe )is with me when he declared categorically that, "President Muhammadu Buhari’s priority is Genocide-for-oil, not Boko Haram, or corruption or the fuel, power shortages etc. that he claimed in his Inaugural speech on
May 29, 2015,". By this Chinweizu was making reference to the killing of over 300 Nigerians as authorised by Buhari. If we remember, Scannews of 26 June 2015 had reported that, "it has been confirmed that Nigeria Air Force, under the directives of the Buhari-led administration, raided Ikot Obiokut, a border community in Cross River state for reasons not yet clear to observers. He said “An anonymous reporter confirmed that raid by Hind helicopter gunships using incendiary bombs massacred over three hundred villagers and about twenty militants. One observer who wishes to remain anonymous said: “It seems the present Federal Government is avenging for the killed Boko Haram terrorists.”
From all indications, President Muhammadu Buhari in company with his change-touting APC governors and cronies including his son engaged in a N2.2 billion luxury visit to the US that wasn't to the best interest of the country he is leading. There was no clear cut economic interest upon which he would have initiated collaboration and/or assistance with his host. There were no diplomats by whom he would have gained an upper hand in negotiations with the US on security. Buhari went to the US obviously empty, probably just to grin and shake hands with Obama! All that seems to be going on in his mind is how he would punish the South-South of Nigeria from where former President Goodluck Jonathan hails for not voting for him and that would be tagged 'fight against corruption'. Even when one is inclined to think otherwise, one cannot help but be compelled to reason that, President Buhari seems to be playing out an ethnic-regional-religious-partisan agenda. It seems to my mind that Buhari wants to plunder (south-south) Nigeria's oil to the collective detriment of the country but to the lopsided interest of the ethno-regio-religious hegemony in the north of the country. That was the agenda. And when his host could not fathom the main reason for this glaring purposelessness/visionlessness by a 72 years old president, Obama was compelled to preached the gospel of the Lesbian-Gay-Bisexual-Transsexual(LGBT) community. That was a worthy bailout!
The Igbo of south-eastern Nigeria hold that should you find an old woman dancing all alone on a bush path, know certainly that she is dancing to a tune. Buhari is deliberately and obviously playing to a script, but let's see how the Nigerian spirit will manoeuvre against any ideological agenda through 2015 to 2019. Albeit, may God bless this Nigeria to the collective chagrin of both her domestic and foreign nay sayers. May she rise above the whims and caprices of any religious, regional, ethnic and partisan hegemonic leanings/inclinations that are aimed towards her undoing.
