Buhari And His Embarrassing Gaffes During His Foreign Trips - By Favour Afolabi

So President Muhammadu Buhari wants to appoint “noise makers” as ministers – very interesting! Apparently, if this man had his way, he would appoint no ministers at all – he would simply continue running Nigeria from “his palace” (which is he is now complaining of being too big for him) with his “Multi-purposed Daura Task Force!”

 

Then again – why has Buhari now made it such a bad habit of “intentionally molesting the image of Nigeria” when he travels abroad – all in a bid to paint the picture to the global community that “I am the only holy Nigerian that exists; all the others including those from my party are corrupt” – when he is not suggesting to the world that “Nigeria is the most corrupt nation on earth” he is ridiculing the Federal Executive Council (FEC) – a constitutionally mandated institution meant to help the elected President to run the nation as composed of “Noise Makers who do no work whatsoever” – in far away France – in full glare of the international media – does this man realize at all that “he is now the President of Nigeria and no longer, the leader of the opposition movement?”

 

He is here suggesting that “Civil servants do all the work while the ministers make noise” – why then has the civil servants (who some already label as EVIL Servants) not turned the nation’s institutions and infrastructure into what is obtainable in other competing nations compared to what we currently have? How come the same Buhari that has been busy releasing all manner of directives to the Civil service since he resumed Office to beat them back into shape – at home in Nigeria is the same person that goes to France – to play the politics of “Civil servants are gods while Ministers are devils” – all in an apparent desperation for self-preservation in responding to the question of “why he has not been able to form a cabinet more than 3 months after resuming Office and after 5 months of winning the elections?” An issue which of course is something the international community already considers to be some sort of a fraud considering the reactions to that within the economy as regarding investors from outside the nation.

 

Please, Buhari should stop all these cheap grandstanding – it looks bad on him – you are in France telling the international media “We are already discussing with Boko Haram to release Chibok Girls BUT they want us to give them a Bomber in place of the girls BUT we have rejected the deal BUT we need to know we are discussing with the real Boko Haram” – did you notice how many times I used word “but” in that statement? Thrice! That is how meaningless the entire construction is – coming from Buhari – it amounts to nothing – how can you be negotiating deals already with a sect that you still consider might be fake? Has Buhari forgotten so fast how his party – APC mocked Jonathan to stupour during the last failed negotiation process with these terrorists as they went about suggesting to the world that “if APC/Buhari were in Power, they would have sought out the real Boko Haram; dealt with them and brought back the Chibok girls to their families.“

 

So all of a sudden, Our dear President has now become “a CNN Political Analyst on Nigerian Matters” – he grants interviews to the global media – playing to the gallery as though “he was Iesha Sesay reporting on #BringBackOurGirls” – he doesn’t seem to have an iota of the responsibility expected of him to be “the No. 1 Chief Marketing Officer [CMO] of Nigeria to the global community” as an Obama or Cameron or Kagame would do for their nations – how does our own CMO go seeking “Foreign Investors in the US and France” yet you are suggesting to the investors there – in the same room:

 

“Dear intending investors, my nation is very corrupt; in fact, we have more than $150bn stolen and stashed in your banks; even I can’t find non-corrupt officials to work with me; so you will be coming to do business in a very corrupt nation but don’t worry, we are dealing with it; you just come and you won’t be disappointed.”

 

Yet you sincerely expect these investors to run and follow you to Nigeria to do business – simply because “you have placed yourself in perpetual campaign mode” – Oga, the elections are over; you have won – become the President the nation expects you to be – live the dream you have carried in your belly for more than 30 years – to lead Nigeria; and convert into a bigger story than Singapore – but, please, do so without making a mess of yourself and the nation that you are now leading.

 

And back to the Ministers – I recall how Ayo Obe dealt with the subject on CNBC Africa yesterday, she posited that “if you keep suggesting to the nation that you are finding it difficult in finding the right ministers, after you have already picked all the so-called trusted hands you have for other jobs, then you are beginning to insult the intelligence of 180 million Nigerians” [not her exact words] – these Ministers are now coming into Office “as suspected/intending criminals that would also be noisemakers doing nothing while the civil servants do all the work but of course need to be constituted because the man employing them is being forced by the law and norms to do so” – who have emerged as the last remnants of good people in a very corrupt society called Nigeria – and would now have their actions under microscopes as though they were prisoners – who would also not likely have “executive mandates” to carry out the responsibilities expected of their offices but would have to gather around the School Principal that tells stories to his grandchildren in a typical Tales by Moonlight or Feyikogbon setting – I therefore use this opportunity to welcome these to-fulfill-all righteousness-and-placeholder Ministers as they come in to help Nigeria achieve its Lee Kwan Yew dreams as being postulated and driven by President Muhammadu Buhari.

 

Favour Afolabi is a political commentator who runs fbablogs.com in his spare time; and owns a real estate brokerage services company. He tweeted from @favourafolabi.