GUARDED MISSILES WITH GP
ODE TO A MINISTER OF MIS-INFORMATION
Disclaimer: It is in the words of a sage that I first heard that there are times you speak your mind and there are times you mind your speech. I tender my “reserved” and “insincere” apology to any who may consider this piece a slap on their face. It is in the interest of my fellow Niger-areans who possess a nonnegotiable right to first hand information. It is a fictionalized memoir and thus should not be taken with hard feelings. It is a literary and fictional pogrom directed to change all those concerned.
Once upon a time, there lived in a country called Niger-area, a well respected woman who managed the National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) under the administration of an ironical elder states-man who with utmost insincerity fought corruption and has landed the country in her present day of leadership mishap. This woman was a legend and a figure to be reckoned with. Children in schools when asked who they would like to be like in future, they would say I would like to be like Prof. Rado Ayinkuli. That was her name. A name that became a household a name. She fought corruption in the pharmaceutical industries and fought industries that engaged in harmful food items. She saved many lives from death, even at the expense of her and her family security. She lived up to her profession as a veteran pharmacist and a teacher of Pharmacy. Little wonder she received a lot of accolades from within and outside the shores of the Country.
A new book of history was opened for our dear Mama NAFDAC when she was appointed to run the Ministry of Information. The news of her acceptance of the appointment was a startling one on the totality of the countrymen. On hearing this, the first thing that occurred to me was A .E Housman’s poem; “An Athlete Dying Young.” It was in this poem that I first realized that it is better to die holding laurels and praises than to continue to run and be outrun. Prof Rado Ayinkuli thought she would be able to use the same skill, dexterity and enthusiasm she used in her former appointment in this new one. If I were her but God forbid (uwasombaic allusion), I would have resigned from the affairs of politics and go back to classroom. Instead, she opted to be used as a political tool in the hands of the power that be. One of her giant “strides” in the affairs of the country that Niger-areans are yet to recuperate from is the re-run election of a State in the western part of the country. Mrs. Rado Ayinkuli acted in the most brazen way by ordering the Returning officer in that election to come out of her hiding. She had series of close doors meeting with the former refused-to-go- chairman of the Electoral commission. Another Professor of national shame. The “unholy romance” of the two professors during that time led to what we have today in that part of the country: an electoral misgiving.
It was under the nose of this same woman that a particular country abroad described this country as corrupt and symbol of shame yet the minister herself said nothing drastic to retort the statement. The most sickening thing to be thought on planet earth was what she came up with: Re-branding. Prof Rado Ayinkuli came out to deceive us that we are good people and great nation. Yes we are, aren’t we? With the like of the shameless politricians who care less of the common man in the streets, who enrich themselves and impoverish the poor the more. Yes, we are good people and great nation but not with the unreachable election rigging, high rate of militancy, insecurity, corruption and with the signs of world terrorism as manifested in one of our northern brothers very recently in the United States of America. Why won’t this madam re-branding just make us feel bad and corrupt so that we can strive towards change instead of misinforming us, thereby making us disbelieve the evidence of our own eyes. I guess she has forgotten that only the sick need a physician.
Between November 23rd last year and February 23rd this year when the Late President of this “great” country who was sick in body but sound enough in mind to understand the implication of resigning as a President, went on three months “paternity leave,” we understood this minister of misinformation better. All through the President’s “leave” until his demise, the people of this country never knew the true state of his health. It is obviously due to our poor Ministry of Information and Communication that a foreign news agency will broadcast worldwide that our Ex-President was dead even when he was very much alive. “This is an aberration on the letters and spirit of our sacrosanct constitution” as the Union boys will put it. A six man delegate was sent to find out the state of health of the Late President. But on getting there, they found out that our deceased President had been discharged. The Late President of our country was discharged and had begun his journey back home yet the Minister of Information and Communication was not informed and communicated. What a shame! The delegates got there only to be told he had left. What an insult!
At the outset of the Late President’s sojourn, this Minister of Misinformation appeared as a core loyalist of the bedeviled erstwhile President. She antagonized all attempts to impeach him, became the leader of the Federal Executive Council, boycotted attempts to give more powers to the Vice President and insisted that our Late President was still and will still be our President. On seeing the Vice President on the verge of being enthroned Acting President, this madam mis-information carpet-crossed to the side of those supporting the Vice President and began to speak in favour of the Vice President. What manner of woman is this! A political belladonna and a good example of a bad woman. It was just on the 3rd of March, 2010 that some members of the cabinet urged Mr. Acting President (now President) to caution her against what they called persistent inflammatory remarks. This woman is a perpetrator of political rancour in this country. It was in her case I understood the biblical injunction that women should keep quiet in the church. The church here is the political terrain of this country and one of such women is Prof Rado Ayinkuli. Many interest and pressure groups are sick and tired of her motor mouth and dicey attitude. Permit me to quote verbatim what a particular pressure group said about her “we have watched with utter dismay the unrestricted manner that the Minister of Information has become overly vociferous and galloping without breaks into the pathetic arena of political gamesmanship by talking without consideration for the unity of the country." Why won’t this woman just keep quiet or better still be on one side. If the departed President had fully recuperated, definitely this woman would have assumed a new stance. Before the assumption of the erstwhile Vice President as Acting President, this woman acted so swiftly that she escaped the fate that befell the former Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation. Her attitude is flirtatious and somebody should please help me tell her to change.
The leadership of this country has disappointed me so much to the extent that I feel like crying. But I won’t cry because men do not cry in my father’s village. I almost died of chagrin the day I learnt that this same woman was restored like a deleted document from the recycle bin to the same Ministry were she has failed before. The point however is not that she came back to the Ministry, but that she was not totally dropped from helms of affair in this country. Why on earth are our politricians treating us like this? If we write, they will gaol us for libel, if we speak, they will confine us for slander, if we act, they will detain us for sedition. God please help us to address the case of bad leadership in our country with special attention on the life minister of misinformation. This is my note of supplication.
FINIS
I hope the Minister of Information and Communications of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Prof Dora Akunyili reads this story of mine.
Paul Akpomuje (GP)
08035271972, 08051446022 (sms only).
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