Recent successful strides by the military in the Northeast have raised the hitherto unconsidered question about changing leadership in wartime. Not surprisingly, associates and critics of President Goodluck Jonathan are sharply divided on the issue.
Not even the most passionate supporters of President Goodluck Jonathan would disagree with the general claim that the president took the Boko Haram insurgency with kid gloves at the beginning.
The most profound evidence of the seeming lack of seriousness with which the president and his handlers took the insurgency was in their approach to the kidnap of the Chibok girls in April last year.
Boko Haram, it was suggested in the corridors of power, was a political tool devised by the enemies of the president to project opposition to him.
Such suggestions were not helped by the internal crisis within the president’s Peoples Democratic Party, PDP when a leading chieftain of the party from the north was quoted as saying that they would make the nation ungovernable for the president if he won the PDP presidential ticket of 2011.
No doubt, the nation or at least a significant proportion of the country with a size more than that of Belgium has been practically ungovernable leading to the mounting of the flag of the Boko Haram Islamic sect in that part of the country covering most parts of Borno State, Yobe State and Adamawa State.
Until recently, the suzerainty of the group covered even the local government area of the nation’s number one soldier, Air Vice Marshall Alex Badeh.
However, the tide began to change in the middle of last month just about the time the presidential election had originally been scheduled. The change in tide came with the arrival of new weapon platforms.
Since then, Boko Haram has suffered significant losses leading to the liberation of a number of towns and strongholds of the group. However, till date, the group continues to hold on to a number of the booties of war including the prized Chibok girls and a significant proportion of territory of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The reversal of fortunes has inevitably led to new questions about the president’s doggedness. Some have claimed that the offensive against Boko Haram was directly aimed to win votes for the president alleging that he sat down all the while allowing the group to humiliate the country and only responding at a time he could gain political plaudits.
Even more remarkable is the new debate thrown up by some strong associates of the president that nations do not change wartime leaders.
That argument was first put together by Chief Emeka Wogu, the former minister of labour and productivity. That argument was later taken up by the PDP governorship candidate in Adamawa State, Mallam Nuhu Ribadu and has now become a talking point for some partisan advocates of a second term for the president.
It is also an argument readily pooh-poohed by political opponents of the president.
In pushing the case, Wogu had said: “The ongoing war in the Northeast is undoubtedly a sore point in the nation’s history.
Just as Nigeria is making progress in its economy and has been certified as Africa’s biggest economy, Boko Haram surfaced to test the capacity and content of the Nigerian leadership. The challenge of the insurgency is one that no Nigerian leader has ever had to confront.”
“This is, however, no opportunity for Nigerians to waver in the resolute determination that we have shown towards uprooting this ugly evil from our land.”
Faith in the leadership
“Despite scepticism in some entrenched quarters, President Goodluck Jonathan has ably marshalled our forces in this critical effort to uproot the evil in our land and I enjoin Nigerians all over not to lose faith in the leadership.”
“This is no time for us to pander to political, religious or ethnic sentiments that will distract us from the compelling objective of bringing liberty to every inch of the land.
“Other nations faced with similar circumstances as we are now facing refused to be distracted and kept faith with their leaders.”
“Britain held on to Winston Churchill, America held on to Franklin Roosevelt, Nigeria even during a military regime held on to Yakubu Gowon.”
His point was also subsequently adopted by Ribadu who during a visit to a refugee camp in Mubi, Adamawa State that Jonathan should not be changed on account of his recent successes.
“You don’t change a commander-in-Chief in time of war”, said Ribadu in Mubi during his visit.
“Now, it is about consolidation of this success, on how to restore life in these affected communities and bring about stability. The President has already established the Victims Support Fund, and he has a marshal plan on how to consolidate on this military successes”, Ribadu further submitted.
Dismissing the assertions of Wogu, Ribadu and other partisans, Osita Okechukwu, spokesman of the All Progressives Congress, APC in the Southeast said the president should rather be sanctioned for his actions.
“The Jonathan effort in the Northeast vindicates some of us who are saying that the Federal Government of Nigeria led by Jonathan was rather vicariously promoting the insurgency.
“We are saying that this vindicates us that there was sabotage before. If it were not so, the boys who are now being held for mutiny had said that helicopters used to come and drop supplies to Boko Haram, and nothing would happen to them.
Noting the points raised by former President Olusegun Obasanjo during an abortive reconciliatory meeting with Jonathan in Abeokuta last January, Okechukwu said the president’s alleged unwillingness to frontally confront the issue vexed Obasanjo.
Recent successes
According to him recent successes is “a further vindication of our position that the Federal Government of Nigeria was treating the Boko Haram with kid gloves with an idea to profit from it or harvest it for the election. But when it suddenly dawned on them that the world was looking down on them, that was when they changed gear. It is not about a war general, in a sane country the president should be queried. This was a government that didn’t even believe that the Chibok girls were kidnapped, they doubted it until the international reacted.
“It was when they were being looked on as weak, clueless and corrupt that they reacted.
“So, any recovery should not be a credit, but rather it shows that we should further condemn the administration for treating such a serious issue with kid gloves. President Jonathan and his managers escalated the war.”
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