Patience Jonathan: A Resurrection Of Lies!

One problem I have, when I comment on goings on in Nigeria, is that I regularly suffer from emotional lows each time something new befalls her!

I have had a succession of that lately!

I have been away from blogging for some months now! 

The latest, was the revelation on national television, by Patience Jonathan, the president's wife, that she died for one week in Germany, last year!

For seven days, four days more than Jesus Christ, and three days more than Lazarus, she claimed she was "dead"!

It is important to note, that when she disappeared last year, unannounced, the media handlers of the president, and all that belong to him, claimed then, sometimes with virulent, and vehement vituperations, that nothing was wrong with her! 

They declared then, that her exertions at the Africa First Ladies' Summit, necessitated her need for rest abroad!

It is therefore sad, and unbecoming of the exalted office of the presidency, would be caught in a lie! The same woman who was hale, and resting last year, according to Dr Reuben Abati, and co, was actually having brunch with death, at a German hospital!

There is a saying, that trust, like the soul, once lost, can never be regained!

The issue here is quite simple! 

Did the presidents people, and by extension the president, lie to the nation then?

If they did, was it justified? 

In addition, if they lied then, how are we sure at this moment, that they are not telling us lies  about things happening right now?

I have said it in over and over again, that the presidency is a sacred trust, it is more than an individual, and bigger than the holder of the office! 

It should not be run like some petty trading concern, where the owner can just jam his way through every transaction!

Integrity, should be the guiding principle for that office, all the time

Imagine what the outcome, and fallouts, would be, if President Obama's spokespeople were to lie about an issue concerning his wife?

The following would happen surely, the people who lied, would resign, and the president would come clean!

Unfortunately, that happens under normal climes! 

I believe we do not have the luxury of normalcy here! 

So the president, his mouthpieces, have egg on their faces, but they think it is a new type of cosmetic!

Shame!

What is Good For The Dame, Is Good For Her Followers

I am an idle man! That is why I have so much time on my hands, to talk about Nigeria!

When Goodluck Ebele Azikiwe Mainasara Jonathan, GCFR, et cetera et cetera et cetera, was running his 100 million naira per day campaign, I remember one very touching thing he said! He declared, I am one of you! I did not have shoes when I was growing up!

Nigerians lapped up this uncanny, uncommon, and I must quickly add, unconfirmed, dose of empathy from leadership!

They all declared that this fellow was humble, he was in tune with the people, he knew their problems, and was sure to solve them!

What type of presidency were we expecting of Jonathan?

Talk is cheap they say, it only costs your breath, and a few muscle contractions! Deeds, on the other hand, show sincerity, or otherwise!

The president has declared that he only eats cassava bread, and Abakaliki rice! That is wonderful! Reuben Abati, who has suddenly woken up from slumber, has also told us, that he does not imbibe ogogoro, the locally produced gin, or Johnnie Walker, it’s foreign counterpart!

We too eat Abakaliki rice, but that is because it is the only option available to us, Thailand parboiled is a long way from our tables; as per the cassava bread, it is insidious, because it is making cassava expensive! And like we all know, it is the raw material that is used for producing the ‘cheapest’, but by no means affordable staples in Nigeria, garri, starch, and apu, making them more expensive!

The president, he declared with gusto, is a very frugal man! He fasts regularly, and seldom eats!  This is quite similar to the fasting by most Nigerians! The difference being that, while they fast because they do not have food, our president fasts in the midst of a billion naira budget on food!

His fasting would mean more to us, if the ridiculous budget on food in the presidential villa, was brought within commonsense!

When we make certain demands of leadership in Nigeria, it is not out of a sinister motive to make them do things that have never been done before! It is because we have seen them done in other places, to good effect!

The British Prime Minister, does not have a presidential jet,he flies commercial!

Nigeria’s president has six! I suspect that if our president flew commercial, our airspace would be safer, and service would be much better!

The American president pays for the food he consumes at the White House, except at state banquets, we will not go to that extreme! Just moderation, we plead! If Jonathan was paying for what he consumed at the villa, would the budget be that sinful? 

And this week, a comedy of errors has been running on the political stage! It seems we have one every week!

It was a game of peek-a-boo of sorts! The dame is sick, people declared! No she is not, Reuben Abati countered!

When the presidential magicians saw that it was foolhardy to seek to play magical tricks with a person blessed with the corpulence of the dame, they finally admitted in bits, and stages, at first, that she was resting in Dubai! Then the story changed to, she was being treated for food poisoning! And finally, they accepted that she had actually been misdiagnosed for food poisoning by her doctors back home, when her actual problem, was appendicitis!

This morbid medical madness, is actually similar to what the ordinary Nigerian goes through daily! 

As I write, a loved one is not very well! She has been misdiagnosed more than eight times, in the space of four months, after seeing more than ten specialists in six different hospitals! The missed steps have included asthma, ulcer, enlarged heart, cancer, blocked lung, and hypochondria! From all the enquiries I have made, it will cost me a small fortune to seek treatment abroad!

While my income is above the average Nigerian’s, it is still not easy to achieve!

For the dame however, it comes as effortlessly, as farting!

So how is the president like us?

He lives here, but his help comes from abroad, where there are no medical mistakes, or misdiagnoses!

MAY GOD BLESS NIGERIA, OUR NIGERIA FOREVER!

Letter To Dame Patience Jonathan.

My dear Dame Patience Jonathan, I thank god for your life o! The bad thing that bad people wished on you, food poisoning-appendicitis, did not come to pass! All glory to Jah, the Most High, for spearing your life for Nigeria!

As you are ensconced in the luxurious setting that the German people have created through their building an open, transparent, and democratic society, there are a few things I would like to trouble you with!

The first is the small matter of how you came to Germany in the first place: rumours ( you know I do not peddle them) have it that you were actually being treated in Nigeria for food poisoning! 

May the wishes of the enemies of Nigeria not come true, and may an American submarine run them over anytime they are driving to work! The same alligators (for anyone who alleges anything is an alligator in my book) claim that you were not suffering from food poisoning, but appendicitis! Jesu oyingboooooooooooo!

How can a presidential medical team, miss it so grossly? Could it be that the long-standing medical personnel, who were probably not from your husband's ethnic group, were replaced with new, inexperienced ones, who are ethnically correct? It is not possible, that such vital positions, are now being staffed on the bases of ethnic considerations! I know your husband does not do things like that!

My beloved Dame, please be patient with my "merry-go-rounding", the Yoruba people have a proverb, that when the Moslem cleric, who usually sports a full, and lush beard, is consumed in a fire incident, that it is spurious to inquire if his beautiful beard survived the fire! Also, Ola Rotimi, of blessed memory, also wrote, that when crocodiles begin to eat their eggs, that there is nothing they would not do to the flesh of frogs! 


Madam, if you, the Very First, and Only Lady of Nigeria et cetera et cetera et cetera, could suffer such egregious medical malpractice, you can imagine what the rest of us, your always humble subjects, who patronize the popular side, when it comes to medicare, have to put up with!

We are daily at the receiving end of our own home-grown Jekyll, and Hyde, cum Dr Frankenstein! People go to hospitals for minor complaints, and when next they would emerge after some days, it is in a narrow wooden box, on the way to the cemetery!

I am sure you Remember Racheal Adinoyi Onukaba, the wife of Adinoyi Onukaba, whose case was scandalously mismanaged at the wrongly named National Hospital, Abuja, a supposed centre of excellence! You may also recall the case of Adeola Olulana, the female journalist who died in Lagos two years ago, who was refused medical care, for lack of money at four am in the morning!

My humble appeal to you is this, when next you find yourself lying on the chest of your husband, our president ( I know it does not happen often often, because you are so busy serving Nigeria, and are not given to such worldly matters), tell him to give us hospitals that actually save lives, and not the mere portals to morgues they are gradually becoming!

I thank God for your life o, because it was only food poisoning-appendicitis, that you had! You can imagine what would have happened, if it had been something more serious, like a pulmonary embolism, or a coronary thrombosis, with either of these, Germany would have been too far!

Please give our love to the doctors that treated president Yar Adua, you may be shocked to find out, that the hospital is probably owned by a Nigerian who stole public money, and went to Germany to invest!

I know you, and your husband are not like that, you can never steal Nigeria's money, why should you, you being a permanent secretary, with your pension to look forward to!

As you recuperate with delicate Deutsche delicacies, I bid you, auf wiedersehen!