It is absolutely certain that most Igbo campaigners for outgoing President Goodluck Jonathan are so thoughtless that they have lost all forms of self-dignity. When a serious issue is raised about, for instance, the utter deception of Ndigbo by Jonathan through statements like that he would go into exile if by 2015 the second Niger Bridge is not completed, they enthusiastically resort to uncultured utterances like “you are an idiot”, “you are a buffoon”, etc. These are utterances which do not depict good breeding. Nor do they address the critical issues raised.
People of other ethnic groups who are paid heavily to defend Jonathan in the social media do not display the kind of uncultured behaviour which defines the conduct of these Igbo folks who probably receive far less than their counterparts from other parts of Nigeria in compensation for their role as rabies-infested attack dogs. In the last few days, these attack dogs have been abusing Fr. Ejike Mbaka for alleging that the president and his wife are planning to kill him for revealing a message from the Holy Spirit that the president cannot be reelected in the forthcoming election. The priest has also been explaining how he rejected a bribe from the president through the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu.
Instead of seeking to establish the veracity, or otherwise, of the allegation, the Jonathan Igbo defenders have gone into a frenzy of hurling insults. Even Catholic ones among them have not displayed a different level of civility. This is, in a way, not altogether surprising. When Festus Odimegwu joined issues with Jonathan, the same inelegant characters reacted violently, questioning his Igboness. Yet, here is someone who has done more than any Igbo CEO of a multinational to develop Igboland. As the Nigerian Breweries (NB) CEO, Odimegwu sited at Ama, on the outskirts of Enugu city, the biggest NB plant anywhere. He also led NB acquisition of dead and dying breweries in Igboland like Life Breweries in Onitsha and Hercules Brewery in Arondizuogu, thereby enabling the owners to have good values for their investments.
Odimegwu empowered such Igbo firms as Chisco Transport in a way no one, including Chidi Anyaegbu, founder of Chisco Transport, thought possible. He also empowered Senator Anyim Pius Anyim, the current Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), and many others. Not to be forgotten is that Odimegwu began the process of radically upgrading, expanding and modernising NB plants and facilities in Aba, Enugu and other parts of Igboland. Still, some mercenary Igbo writers have the temerity to question not just his judgement but also his Igboness, simply because he stated what the whole world has known for long: Jonathan is an awfully incompetent president.
Before these hack writers turned their puerile heat on Odimegwu, a near genius based on his achievements, they had written nasty things about Obiageli Ezekwesili, a former World Bank Vice President who has also been an eminently successful minister in Nigeria. Her offence? Oby had the temerity to lead the #BringBackOurGirls campaign, which enjoyed the support of such people as Mitchell Obama. When some 276 female students of Government Secondary School at Chibok in Borno State were kidnapped last April by Boko Haram terrorists, Jonathan and his sidekicks like Mujahadeen Asari-Dokubo denied that the event ever took place. How could our commander-in-chief live in such denial? For asking our C-in-C to sit up, these shameless Igbo hack writers descended on Oby, a woman of great integrity.
This is not the end of the story, a story of pity and sadomasochism. When former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, Prof. Chukwuma Soludo, did a brilliant x-ray of the development programmes of the two leading political parties, the same pro-Jonathan Igbo elements abused him thoroughly. It is self-evident that they do not possess the mental and ethical abilities to understand Soludo’s call to arms made in the overriding public interest.
Worse, when erstwhile Vice President Alex Ekwueme granted an interview showing how Jonathan had been treating him with utter contempt, despite that he practically formed the PDP, the unconscionable hack writers went viral, accusing him of being afflicted with senility. This is a man the whole nation calls “venerable” on account of his great role in the restoration of democracy. And as former Education and Health Minister, Ihechukwu Madubuike, also a foremost literary critic, has stated times without number, no person has done as much as Dr. Ekwueme during the time he was vice president from 1979 to 1983 to restore the Igbo to glory.
No person will be surprised if the lynching Internet Igbo mob soon turns its cudgels in the direction of Pat Utomi and other decent Igbo men and women who have the courage to say no to sacrilege, as Chinua Achebe would put it.
It is a shame that the Igbo are not being taken seriously in Nigerian politics due to the lack of strategic thinking by Igbo prominent politicians who are more interested in creating paranoia among our people and stirring raw emotions against the North and South West in particular, even when our people live in these parts than elsewhere. The Igbo, under Jonathan’s presidency, are not heading the judiciary or the House of Representatives or the Senate. Nor is there any Igbo in the country’s Security Council. Raw emotions cannot take any people far in the 21st Century. Strategic thinking and building alliances will. We are now in a knowledge era.
There is something fundamentally wrong with Igbo fanatical supporters of Jonathan. History will certainly accord them a status far less dignifying than that of saboteurs. They have no truth in them. Nor do they possess a sense of the sacred. They are all engaged in an orgy of debasement of reason because of the filthy lucre they receive from inelegant fellows like Femi Fani-Kayode and other self-professed Igbo haters. This madness will soon come to an end.