Politics is ideally about the acquisition and application of power for the public good. Over the years, people have converted it into the acquisition of power for personal and parochial interest. The fact that we are still receiving dividends from Abacha-Investments, 22 years after his death attests to this. We also have organisational politics, which is perceived mostly in the negative, even though there are some inherent positives in it. “Political” is a derivative from politics, which is about everything that applies to politics. Of late, the term “political” has been reconfigured to mean any views and actions by an interested party. So, if I defend the intere of Ndi Igbo, ASUU, the Catholic Church or Anambra state, the first interpretation is that I am being political, and that is even if what I have said and done is as obvious as 1+1=2!
Everything in Nigeria is dressed in the political garb, even though at times, some of them are done jocularly. Last week, there was a post in the ubiquitous and tyrannical social media that even in the COVID cases, South East is marginalised. This is because, as in almost everything, it had the least of active cases. As at the date of that post, (29/4/20) the spread was SW-965; NW-191; NC/FCT:174; NE:137; SS,57; SE-8. When I asked why South West/ Lagos took the first position instead of South West/Katsina, I was told to just “wait and see” and following developments in Kano, I am already seeing. So, I decided to look at various strange and weird happenings in the coro front from a political prism. But as I as preparing a background to the study, I found that there is also a coro-politics in the global arena and that is how decided to take it from there first.
I will start from the elephant in the room; no, the bull in the china shop, which is what America has become since the onset of Trumpocracy (Democracy as defined and practiced by Trump). As the entire world is being decapacitated by Coro, Trump believed it was the best time to incapacitate WHO, which is the Commander in Chief of the anti-COVID forces, by strangulating it financially. This action, which Andrew Gawthorpe of The Guardian (15/4/20) describes as an “extraordinary act of moral abdication and international vandalism”, undertaken because of “self-destructive nationalism”, was all about China, the greatest frenemy of the US.
He accused WHO of being pro-China, putting political correctness above life -saving measures and being a piper who is playing the tunes dictated by another person other than the sponsor (US being the biggest WHO funder. It is all about Sino-US multipartite war. Even within the US, the same politics was at play. Democrat Senator Leah describes Trumps action as “cutting off ammunition to an ally as the enemy closes in”. The House Oversight Committee, sees the anti-WHO utterances by Trump as reflecting an “astonishing level of hypocrisy”. Meanwhile, Trump had declared that Coro was a strategy by China to scuttle his re-election campaign and his party is designing their entire political campaign around China. What can be more political than this? And this is despite the warning and advise of the WHO DG that the world should “quarantine the politicisation of COVID-19” because using the pandemic to score political points will only result in “many more body bags” But it is not just the US. China is also making efforts to score diplomatic point, by arguing “we beat the US” in this one!
Earlier on (26/3/20), Kashish Parapiani of the Observer Research Foundation, zeroed in on the Trumpian politicisation of the whole pandemics as a boost for his re-election campaign, exploiting it as an “opportunity to actualise the ‘America First’ agenda vis-à-vis China, Mexico and Iran”. In 2016, Trump capitalised on the business and blue-collar displeasure against globalisation, from which China “over-benefitted” and now, he also wants to use the China Virus as an opportunity to build his campaign once more around China. He also continues to tighten the noose against Mexico (with only 2271 deaths as against the US, the global epicentre) through his suspicious border control measures, as well as against Iran, by more sanctions, which have adversely affected Iranian management of the pandemics.
So, it is COVID; it is also politics. But there is some sense in the madness because everything is being done strategically. Next week, if Oga-Coro agrees, we shall x-ray the political dynamics of Coro management in Nigeria
All these are aimed at boosting his Ameirco-Centric policies, building on existing socioeconomic anxieties and promotion of his re-election. Meanwhile, Abraham Weintraub, Brazilian Minister of Education joined the fray, saying that the COVID-19 was a part of Chinese plan for world domination, a view that got China outraged to the extent of demanding official explanation from Brazil.
Yohanes Sulaimanan, an Indonarsian academic and political analyst unequivocally sees Indonesia as an example of how politics, personal rivalries, and social media, dominated by partisan buzzers have cause havoc in the COVID-19 crisis management. While other governments were issuing travelling advisories, Indonesian Government was promoting its tourism, to which it committed Rp72 billion, ($4.77 million) just to pay “influencers”. So, while others were closing and barricading their doors, President Widodo (of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle) widely opened his own doors, advertised this openness and downplayed the rampaging COVID crises.
This was because “the issue is heavily politicised as opposition politicians and ambitious individuals are seen as having seized the opportunity to score political points against the government”. Thus, while Governor Anie Basweden of Jakarta (Independent /opposition) was speaking and acting against Coro, pro-Widodo elements sought to undermine his efforts, which they interpreted as a strategy to boost his chance for re-election in 2022 and running for president in 2024 by undermining the public’s trust towards Jokowi.
So, it is COVID; it is also politics. But there is some sense in the madness because everything is being done strategically. Next week, if Oga-Coro agrees, we shall x-ray the political dynamics of Coro management in Nigeria.
Other matters: KITA, by-fire-by-force and the management of Covidity:
One of the things for which we remember Buhari’s first coming was WAI. It was a militarised process of FORCING people to be disciplined. We all learnt, or we pretended to have learnt, how to queue. I believe it was good for us but we had no choice. Queuing appeared to have become an inseparable part of our lives. However as soon as GMB was kicked out by his friends (I am sure he would have muttered “Et tu, Brute?”), the practice died irretrievably. It died because it was not ingrained into our culture; it was punishment-based. A few years ago, Nigeria introduced the cashless policy. It was a wonderful policy, beneficial to all the stakeholders. But again, its implementation was punishment based: Nigerians were and are punished for depositing, withdrawing and spending their money. Not much was said about the benefits of going cashless. And so, people obey, not because they want to obey but because they are coerced to obey! And this is in an environment where our Vice President was sharing trader-monie cash to traders while the “Ministeress” of Disaster Management, was sharing raw cash to the lucky few the other day. And they did not maintain any distance; social or physical!
Now, we are here again. As a prelude to “gradual easing” of internecine lockdown, the PTF issued the following guidelines and “enforceable actions”: Mandatory use of facemasks, provision of handwashing facilities, and temperature checks; prohibition of interstate travels and public gathering of more than 20. Those who violate the directive on facemask, curfew and interstate travel or crowd size as well as institutions that fail to comply SHALL be prosecuted. Orders! Threats! By fire by force! That is what Herzberg termed KITA (Kick in the ass) strategy, an approach based on the Theory X paradigm that people need to be forced to do what they ought to do (Herzberg, (1968). One more time, how do you motivate employees. Harvard Business Review 6 (1), 53-61).
I declare once more that people are never FORCED to change because people convinced against their wills are of the same opinion still (Dale Carnegie/ Samuel Butler). The war against COVID-19 is all about social change; it is about attitudinal and behavioural change. Washing of hands, physical distance, and new coughing and sneezing methods, are behavioural issues that cannot be commanded. People should be persuaded and convinced with provable doses of WIIIFM (What is in it for me). When people are convinced about the benefits of these behaviours, they undertake them because it is in their own best interest.
If people were persuaded as to why they should stay at home, they would not have shared spaces with goats and allowed themselves to be containerised just to break the travel ban or stormed the banks in such intimidating numbers on the first day of the easing. It is also this order-from-above attitude that has boldened security men who have killed and brutalised many in the name of enforcement, including an ordinary security man who killed somebody over facemask at Onitsha the other day!
Already, the PTF is bemoaning the failure of its easing strategy: no physical distancing, no face masks, and poor spatial arrangement in busses. It should be expected. And on top of this by-fire-by-force strategy, they would just stay in the comfort of their homes and situation room and issue orders, without minding the affordability of some elements of these orders. They should learn from the Professor-Governor of Cross River State, who ordered the wearing of facemasks, and provided the facemasks to everybody arguing “I cannot, at this difficult moment when you are asking people to stay at home, also task them to put on masks at a cost. We as a government have to find a way to reduce the burden on the people. One more time, KITA does not work with human beings. Persuasion, involving inducement and WIIIFM, is the way out. I have made this argument in the case of cashless policy, which involves massive behavioural change and that argument still holds (See: Ik Muo (2019). Strategic Options for Nigeria’s Cashless Policy. Journal of Research in Management & Development,17(1), June).
Our people say that ending up in the mat is usually preceded by negotiation and persuasion. We have known-what, know-how and know-why. We are humans because we ask WHY. The greatest factor in human motivation is known-why. When people understand the WHY, they become willing participants in the process. People MUST be told persuasively WHY they must do some of these strange things. It is indeed strange to order me not to embrace my ‘wife’ (includes every woman married in my kindred) if I met her in the market square and not to shake hands with my class mate when we meet at church. Those in charge must humbly come down from their high horses and explain WHY, including the resulting benefits. Then, we take it from there. I have spoken.
