Effective communication is critical for the existence and sustainability of every organisation. It helps to share the vision, mobilise the citizens for a coordinated pursuit of objectives, manage change and relate with stakeholders. Whereas bottom-up communication has attracted significant attention of late, nobody can underrate the role of top-down communication, which sets the pace and ensures a seamless strategic management process. Stakeholders of every organisation are thus always expecting to hear from the leaders so as to get a first-hand response to the critical questions of ‘where are we going and how do we get there’ as well as an analysis of anticipated challenges and strategic responses to them. As it is with organisations, so is it with countries
Since the emergence of the Buhari Presidency, top-down communication has been a great challenge, with the people yearning to hear from their president who is reluctant to speak to them. We are either told to watch his famed body language, or that it is not his style to speak often or to ‘take it’ from his various spokespersons, who most often generate more questions than answers. Unfortunately whenever the president speaks, we the people feel let-down, taken for granted or that he is leaving the substance to chase the shadow.
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Yet, I do not know why, despite the fact that his speeches, few as they are, usually deal a fatal blow on public morale, the people always earnestly ask for these speeches. For instance, 12/6/20, the President told us how excellently Nigeria was performing on all fronts, especially, security, corruption and economy. But when I looked at the Front Pages of our news media within the week, I was left wondering whether I was in the same country of which he spoke so glowingly about (See Ik Muo; Buhari’s June 12 Speech: A Front-Page Analysis; 26/6/20). It was around that time that Nosa Igiebor lamented that the Buhari Administration operate ‘in a parallel world where alternative facts rule and reality is totally distorted….. their narrative, collides violently with our own reality’.
During the EndSARS crises, the nation was on fire but the president kept his cool. We begged him against his style to address us and when he eventually did, very reluctantly on 22/10/20, there was no empathy, no assurances and no outlines for actions; he didn’t calm frayed nerves and he ordered the youths to go home and told them in a coded language: try it again! He did not even mention the Lekki bloody affair, which had caused local and global outrage neither did he mention the infiltration by thugs. But he had time to boast of his landmark achievements, including tradermoni and other such integrity-challenged programmes (See Ik Muo, A nation in turmoil, A president who doesn’t speak often & giving the monkey a cup of water!29/10/20)
The key outcome of this Arise outing is that he knows what he is doing and that all his agents, including Malami, Minister of Defence, IGP and Lai are carrying out his instructions
Of late, our security situation has become so precarious that cries for help have echoed nationwide as it appears all our defences have crumbled (Isaiah,22:5&8). Nigerians, forgetting their previous experiences, started demanding and begging their president to address them and he has done so again and he did not disappoint. Using the LIFO principle,( Last In First Out) I wish to start with his June 12 outing. I did not ‘see’ anything in the speech, except that his commitment to ‘bequeath a sustainable democratic culture remains resolute, his pursuit of a fair society remains unshaken and his desire to see that Nigeria remains a country for each and every one of us has never been stronger. That he acknowledged the notions of marginalisation and agitations for constitutional amendments, and lifted 10.5m people out of poverty in the past 2 years.
For most of these avowals, we all know the reality but on poverty lifting claim, The World Bank and BusinessDay responded on our behalf. They did not say that PMB lied; they rather proved statistically that he was economical with the truth. Anyway, he was not the one speaking; he just said what he had been asked to say.
The day he actually spoke was on the AriseTV outing; where nothing was pre-recorded and there was nobody to urge him on, when we heard from the horse’s mouth and when he spoke out of the abundance of the heart (Luke,6:45). He asked the governors to go and sort out the security challenges themselves (when his agents are undermining their efforts) and yet he agreed with Malami on open grazing; ordered the reopening of the grazing routes (a northern law that has nothing to do with the South), with its divisive properties and that the murderous herders, whom he has refused to brand as terrorists are foreigners. He distinguishes foreign from local, criminal from non-criminals Fulani; he also knows that not all Hausas or northerners belong to the Boko Haram.
However to him, every Onye-Igbo, including Onyeama Ngige, Allen Onyema, Chidi Anyaegbu, Innocent Chukwuma, Obianodo Soludo Okonjo Iweallaa, Ogbonnaya Onu, Stan Ekeh, Okwadike IgboUkwu, Engr Edu Okeke and Chika Nwobi, are profiled as IPOBians, who do not know what they are talking because they have properties all over the country He also stated that IPOBians (Nd’Igbo) do not have the training, competence and experience to command the army, lead the NNPC et al because the positions are earned and that even seniority does not matter. And then, he made the unfortunate but insightful DOT declaration. He explained how his actions or inactions during EndSARS improved the climate for FDI and reminded us that the EndSARSers wanted to ‘coup’ him out of office, that the youths should behave if they wanted jobs. He blamed the PDP government for dwindling economy and unsustainable debt burden and informed that his Niger-Centrism is because he has cousins there and that we will benefit from their economy. Instead of unlocking the humongous wealth within, we are looking onto Niger Republic. Niger can only give what they have, which is poverty! An example of our economic collaboration with Niger is the case of the Nigerien youngman, Aboubakar Hima who further impoverished us by vanishing into thin air with our commonwealth to the tune of $394m, €9.9m and N369m( you can calculate the billions involved). He also averred that dividing Nigeria is not a solution(and he will adopt an inclusive mindset that will make us want to stay together) and that there is no way each breakaway republic would become a paradise.
Before then, he had spoken boldly through body language by banning Twitter. I am not on Twitter but I know that they usually delete offending posts and even yank of some customers as they did to Trump, a sitting US President. But when he was punished for his offenses, he banned twitter, a prelude to the intensified onslaught against social media and free speech. And then they started looking for excuses, accusing Twitter of bias and other related crimes. How can a government that has bias as its principal policy (bias against IPOB, South East, Non-Fulani Muslims, the south etc) accuse anybody of bias? PMB ignored our worsening insecurity, economic collapse, youth unemployment and poor governance to show off his power against Twitter, disempowering Nigerians whose businesses are twitter-based thereby cutting our noses to spite our faces
He had said that he won’t restructure; that those seeking restructuring are ignorant of war and its consequences (so restructuring is a call to war), that he would speak to his IPOB enemies in the language they understood (and that was as the government went to negotiate with Tompolo, a person they declared wanted and allow Gumi to be the Minister of Bandits), that rude shock awaited some Nigerians, that BH is fuelled by unemployment and poverty (there is no unpemployment and poverty in other parts of the North).
Sure, the president has spoken. The key outcome of this Arise outing is that he knows what he is doing and that all his agents, including Malami, Minister of Defence, IGP and Lai are carrying out his instructions. It also shows that we are not coming out of the woods soon especially in terms of herdsmen and banditry, that he would continue to be focused on Niger republic, that the Igbos or SE should not expect much from him and that his focus is on herdsmen and grading. In the days of yore, the people of Israel asked their king Rehoboam to lighten their yoke, make things easier for them as a condition for their support. He replied that he would increase their woes, use scorpion and spiked lash instead of ordinary whip to afflict them . Go see 2nd Chronicles, 10.1-16 for the outcome. Note that just as elders of Israel, the elders of today are still advising this King to take it easy but the reply is: we shall never do it as exemplified by the Laiish declaration that ‘we shall NEVER unban twitter’
Meanwhile, while our National discourse is all about cows, grazing routes, bandits and kidnappers, shoot at sight and the language they understand and war with Twitter, Nayib Bukele’s El Salvador has become the first country in the globe to adopt bitcoin as legal tender. Here is a president that thinks strategically. He may not get it totally right; there may still be more questions than answers but he is TAKING some reasoned and coordinated steps; and unlike most our knee-jerk policies, this was debated and adopted by their legislature.
