OPINION: Nigeria: Fair Vote To avoid Beginning Of The End

SYRIA: Picture the Human Tragedy of Extremism & Civil War

-Attorney Patryk Utulu**

The Year 2011 was the Political BEGINNING of Nigerian Election 2015. As strange as that might sound it is NOT unlike in the United States where the electioneering “season” for the very next Election Circle starts even before ballot boxes are emptied out. As a fiercely proud Nigerian it is a painful truth that the world has correctly summarized and dismissed Nigeria as a dysfunctional nation whose political system has been permanently damaged by many illiterate military coup plotters with absolutely no idea what to do with the powers they seized and their enablers — devious unpatriotic politicians who invite military coups as indirect extension of civilian misrule. Still I have been willing to believe that if somehow freed from the mental captivity of our shame-avoidance culture, which breeds a culture of refusal to accept defeat thus, the willingness to sacrifice the lives of other people’s children for post-election violence, Nigerian political leaders can become no worse than the effective politicians in many Second World nations.

The Political END OF THE BEGINNING comprises of the shameful drama that most of us have just witnessed and some still remember: the ostentatious headlines of cross-party “defections-defections-defections,” the phony political party conventions, the pretend public selection of pre-selected presidential candidates, the reassuring half-truths, the contemptuous outright lies, the not-so-secret foreign donors who poured over $700 Million to funded campaigns, the resultant crippling of the spirit of Nigeria’s national coexistence, the Boko Haram scheme to occupy every physical space created by our ever-widening regional divide, the barely-concealed anger of Nigerians who love to reference Boko Haram as evidence of politically machinated genocidal plot but strangely hate any mention of Boko Haram’s self-proclaimed link to Middle East terrorist group, ISIS; the irreversibly damaged Christian-Muslim inter-religious trust and the loss of good friendships by Nigerians foolishly fighting the fake war for the good name of two $Billionaires (General Buhari and Dr. Jonathan) who will hug each other and make nice to each other even before the political dust settles.

The week before and after highly charged elections are collectively known as the Political BEGINNING OF THE END. It is not hyperbolic to suggest that the Nigerian Presidential Election 2015 will be the most consequential — perhaps the last consequential — election that many Nigerians alive will ever witness. Life does not always reflect previews and if that happens on our election night I feel certain that millions of Nigerians will be proud and grateful. Yet as we hope for the best let us not forget that so far, political office buildings and party cars are being burnt all over Nigeria. The Nigerian President has even been stoned by unwashed political thugs who were then cheered by Nigerians who seemed to NOT understand that once the Presidency is diminished for partisan reasons no Nigerian who ever holds that position can be the President of All Nigerians. Even some well-guarded State Governors have been too afraid to show their faces to campaign in the state they govern. Finally, leaders of various tribal, regional, religious, and political stripes are threatening sedition and suicide if they are not awarded the national electoral mandate. Each group is feeling quite “justified” in threatening violence, death, destruction, nightmare and secession.

In the last two months the number of Nigerians [mostly children and families of politicians] arriving in the United States became so high that it put the CIA, the FBI and other U.S. Security agencies on alert. So even as the U.S. Secretary of State, John F. Kerry and President Obama were forced to call for peaceful election, contingency plans are being finalized to quickly invalidate all Nigerian International Passports to stop Nigerians from entering the U.S. in the event of civil war. Don’t be quick to blame the United States. We are also aware that European nations are making similar arrangements. No nation on earth would readily accommodate millions of refugees from the seventh (7th) most populous nation on earth. It is a nightmare scenario that many nations are dreading.

Yet it is the “talakawas,” the poor illiterate Nigerians — the ones who cannot find refuge in Canada or Cameroon — that are marauding Nigerian party offices in preparation to fight and die for men whose children are already safely relocated to the United States, Canada, Dubai and Saudi Arabia. Ever wondered why the week before and after explosive elections are collectively known as the political “beginning of the end?” It is because those two weeks can be the start of the diffusion of post-electoral insanity or they could just as easily become the very BEGINNING OF THE END of the nation itself.

I once wrote that the greatest difficulty in Nigerian politics is how to know who is NOT lying. I can also tell you that the ONLY assured truth in national political situations is that the moment a nation slides into civil war top politicians quickly vanish to their mansions in foreign capitals. I have a list in my head of the 22 nations that would grant immediate Permanent Residency on deposit of certain amounts of money for “investment” purposes. Yet Nigerian leaders seem to be modern incarnates of Emperor Nero who fiddled while his nation (Rome) burned NOT because he loved the music (as many historians history erroneously tell it) BUT because he wanted to test the limits of his absolute power to command his subjects (Romans) to action — or INACTION — according to his primitive will. NATIONS AT CIVIL WAR BECOME HAPPY PLAYGROUNDS FOR ISIS, AL-QAEDA AND OTHER JIHADISTS [see: Syria, Libya, Iraq, Yemen]. Boko Haram is hoping and praying that our greed and petty brinkmanship will push us into Nigerian Civil War II. NOTE: Since the end of World War II (1945) only few nations have avoided disintegration after a second civil war and none of those nations is stable today. A civil war is the most primitive type of war because a civil war has no “war fronts” or “safe zones.” Every city and street becomes a death zone as there are no rules of engagement or even real “commanders.” For good or bad reason — mostly out of fear — “neighbourhood” militias maim and kill all real or imaginary enemies for fun or to settle personal vendettas.

Have you ever seen the intoxicating effect of an AK-47 Rifle in the hands of a 10-14 year old boy who finally discovers that he has the power to take lives, to make adults tremble before him and that brutality gives him “respect?” In war, even the faint whispers of conscience can still connects some adults to their desperately disappearing humanity. Less than a year of war and young children forget everything they have ever known except how to maim, rape and kill. Why do you think Boko Haram deliberately recruit Almajiri children as well as kidnap little boys from villages they invade? So those Nigerians who flippantly call for civil war may yet discover that they have neither enough tears nor enough time to regret it before Boko Haram sweeps from Adamawa to Abeokuta and Bama to Bayelsa showing off slaughtered sons and raped daughters as emblems of victory.

SO, FOLLOW NIGERIANS:

1. Go out early, vote peacefully and get back home as fast as possible.

2. Try to keep at least 3 days to one week’s worth of food at home

3. Keep your children out of school till you know the situation is safe

4. Stop discussing politics around where you live, especially with people who are affiliated with different parties (they will be the first to direct the mobs to your house if violence spreads to your neighborhood)

5. A good transistor radio with new/spare batteries is the best information tool in a crisis situation (OK, you can still charge your cellphones but if things really get bad the Government will protect radio stations, not MTN Phone Card office).

6. Be wise. Keep clean water. If the situation has not improved in 3 days start rationing water to your kids. (You will laugh about it later, I hope).

*Vote peacefully

*Vote for the Nigeria you want for your children to inherit tomorrow

* Do NOT die for men whose children are either surrounded by well paid armed guards or are safely relocated to foreign nations.

*****

Attorney Patryk A. Utulu

U.S.-based Attorney & Strategic Communications Specialist

Global Defense Analyst and Global Events Commentator

Executive Vice President, Nigerian Diaspora-North America

Executive Director, The Center 4 Community Empowerment & Lifeskills, Inc

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OPINION: Nigeria: Fair Vote To avoid Beginning Of The End