THE VILIFICATION OF ADESINA: AS I SEE IT – by Frank Ofili

Presidential Media aid, Femi Adesina, is under fire from critics over his comment in an interview on Channels TV on Sunday night that those who are blaming the government for the on-going power outage across the country should hold pipeline vandals responsible.

Adesina had reportedly told Nigerians who were bemoaning the woeful power situation in the country in recent times that “if you are crying that you are in darkness, go and fight vandals.”

I may not necessarily agree with the terse manner Adesina delivered his comment insofar as it is the responsibility of government to apprehend and bring to book those who vandalize government property. However, I do agree that Adesina, like Ibe Kachikwu did on the energy crisis, was spot on, whether anyone agrees or not.

"if you raised not a voice in condemnation of those who blew up gas pipelines, then you have no moral high-ground to blame the government over power outage".

 

Adesina’s comment was obviously directed at opposition PDP and its coalition of professional, mercenary and kindred wailers who have been going about town with the power outage and using it to write off the Buhari government as a failure – not minding that the government still has three more years to go.

It is not that I do not like to have constant power supply, or that I am blind to the blind spots of this government. No, far from it. Like most Nigerians, I am also feeling the pinch of the power situation (I am having a piece done on this soon).  It is just that I find the PDP the least qualified to criticize the government over incessant power outage.

For God’s sake, the PDP was in power for 16 years, with enormous petro-dollar windfall at its disposal, yet it has nothing to show for it. For those 16 years power outage was much the same as it is today. We were all witnesses to the House of Reps power probes that happened in this country – the revelations of the billions of dollars meant for the power sector which eventually vanished into thin air. Even the probe committee itself – most of them PDP men – had their hands sullied. So, the PDP and its supporters should please spare me their predilection to wail and write off a government that is still less than 12 months old and which is trying to right its wrongs.  

Secondly, I find nothing more hypocritical than for some people to lend tacit support to miscreants and ethnic militias blowing up national assets like gas pipelines, and then turn round to condemn government for failure to provide electricity. When you support militants blowing up pipelines that convey gas to power generating stations, did you think there would be no consequence? Part of the consequence is what we are witnessing in the power sector.

That anybody or group of people would choose to maintain eloquent silence over the wanton destruction of public property, all in the name opposition politics, raises profoundly disturbing questions about the political and moral health of such people. That those common sense senators have so far tweeted not a single word in condemnation of that nefarious act more than anything else tells the character and mindset of the “tweetnators”.

Yet these are the same people who accuse President Buhari of keeping mute over the Agatu killings – forgetting that the President had since condemned the killings and ordered security agencies to get to the root causes of the problem. There ought to be a line between genuine opposition politics and rivalry, for while genuine opposition is most times constructive, rivalry is dysfunctional. What we find in Nigeria is rivalry.

The job of genuine opposition is to articulate and proffer alternative solution or courses of action different from government that would benefit the people. Sometimes you even find opposition actually agreeing with government when national interest is involved. But that is hardly the case in our clime. As far as opposition politics in Nigeria is concerned, nothing good can ever come from the ruling party.  

I maintain that Nigeria would be good the day we learn to put the nation above all other considerations. So I say, like Adesina did, that if you raised not a voice in condemnation of those who blew up gas pipelines, then you have no moral high-ground to blame the government over power outage.