Oreva: Hehehehehehe! This handshake has gone beyond the elbow!
Okoro: Who is having a handshake with you beyond the elbow?
Oreva: The President is looking for a long stick to kill the snake!
Okoro: Is that what you were referring to? The President is NOT looking for any stick, short or long! Bishak: You are so charitable, unnecessarily charitable with the Man in Aso rock.
Iyortem: How so?
Bishak: The President is not even aware that there is a snake inside his house; so, looking for a long stick does not arise at all!
Bankole: It’s an open secret isn’t it? The president is unaware of his environment!
Oreva: that cannot be true. How is he able to lead the country?
Bishak: Is he leading the country? He is not even following the country, not to talk of leading it!
Okoro: We are in serious trouble in that case!
Bishak: Are you just coming to that conclusion? Last week, the scoundrels who attacked Kuje Prisons and the train between Abuja and Kaduna threatened to abduct the President and Kaduna State governor. The cheek of it! Bandits threatening to kidnap the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed forces of Nigeria! The President is yet to issue a statement or give an order that the band of thieves should be arrested!
Bankole: To make matters worse, Kaduna State governor El Rufai says that one week after the threat was issued, the President had not been briefed, or he was not aware of the threat! Buhari didn’t get to know until El Rufai told him about it!
Iyortem: This is unbecoming! Most unacceptable! What are the security men doing? How could they not have briefed the President?
Oreva: It is possible they didn’t take the threat seriously!
Okoro: Or the president forgot the details of the briefing!
Bishak: Not possible fa! No one briefed him. My worry is that the Army High Command or the DSSS did not make a counter statement. No order was given to arrest the scoundrels. What exactly is going on?
Iyortem: Good question. What exactly is going on in the country? Is the conspiracy theory that the federal government wants to cede Nigeria to Muslim fundamentalists true?
Bankole: Preposterous! That’s palm wine bar talk, please!
Bishak: That cannot be true. If those extremists take over Nigeria (God forbid) nobody, including all current office holders will be safe! So, perish that thought!
Iyortem: Why then is the president lukewarm on the issue of terrorists? Why has he not gone after the terrorists who have made life unbearable in Kaduna and are now threatening the federal Capital Territory?
Oreva: Are you aware that federal government colleges in the FCT have been closed down? S
Bishak: They sent a threat letter to Law School in Bwari in the FCT. The soldiers who were deployed to keep guard were attacked.
Bankole: there is something sinister about a national army that refuses to attack or dispel a band of thieves and terrorists who are assembled to wreak havoc? Is there a subsisting order that the Army should not attack the scoundrels except they are attacked?
Okoro: As far as I am concerned, if the Nigeria Army wants to kill the terrorists, it will be achieved within a week. But there is a reluctance to attack them.
Bishak: Although I usually don’t agree with the Little Man of Kaduna, on his suggestion that they locations of the terrorist be bombed I am in total agreement. If a band of scoundrels, armed to the teeth are planning to launch an attack, you go after them. Period! Decimate them.
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Iyortem: That is common sense. Pragmatic! Sometimes, I remember a statement credited to Citizen Buhari when he declared that any attack against Boko Haram is an attack against the north. Is he still persuaded thus? Does he still want to protect men who almost wiped out his advance team only three weeks ago?
Oreva: I was happy when some senators developed the balls to move for Buhari’s impeachment on account of his failure to deal with the security situation. Almost unbelievable to hear ‘All we are saying, Buhari must go’ in the hallowed chambers of the Senate! I wonder what woke them up from slumber.
Bankole: The future of Nigeria is at stake. All persons in power at all levels must remember that they are in office in trust and must take the correct decisions. To place individual interests above the national one is selfish and dangerous to the survival of the country.
Okoro: Right now, Nigeria is like a woman being ravaged by different men until she will have no flesh left to entertain anybody. Stealing is going on right left and centre. We no longer speak of stealing in percentages. Whole sums are which are budgeted for projects are carted away by individuals. For a government that came to power on the platform of anti-corruption fight, it is a double tragedy, an irony of gargantuan proportions. These old men in power who have a short time left on earth should not be allowed to toy with the destiny of millions of youths!
Iyortem: Feeble old men running a nation with a population that is predominantly youthful; indeed some have put it at 70%. Everyday thousands of youths besiege embassies struggling to leave Nigeria. Even the professionals among them have given up in despair. Doctors and IT specialists are escaping from Nigeria before the house collapses! The United Kingdom is bursting with Nigerians who are doctors, nurses, health care assistants, postgraduate students and IT professionals.
Bishak: These are persons who ought to be in Nigeria to help grow the economy. But with the free fall of the naira against all international currencies, any Nigerian working abroad is a king in naira terms.
Oreva: Yes oo. Seven hundred naira to the dollar! There is no effort to stem the fall. The politicians are busy spending dollars in Nigeria to further devalue the naira!
Okoro: The latest is to blame the NNPC for refusing to remit dollars to the federal government! Who is in charge of the economy?
Bankole: Who is in charge of Nigeria?
Oreva: The President says he is tired!
Bishak: Then in the words of Arewa Consultative Forum, he should just resign and go!
ALL: Yes, Mr. President should resign and just go!
Bishak: Chikena!
•Professor Eghagha is a member of The Trumpet’s Editorial Board
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