’Sola Fagorusi
| credits: File copy
| credits: File copy
The
easiest current affairs question any primary or secondary school
student would trounce is one that requests the name of the President of
Nigeria. The answer would be chorused –Dr. Goodluck Jonathan. Social
media users and buffs would remember how the doctrine of necessity
emerged and changed the story of the incumbent’s emergence in the
post-Yar’adua era.
By 2011, in what was termed a
controversial election, the Ph.D. holder and former Governor of oil-rich
Balyesa state emerged as President.
Jonathan’s tenure expires by May 28,
2015, but the body language is clear. He still wants to be President
after that date. Nothing is wrong with that. Forget the rude posturing
by some cliques in northern Nigeria and criticism from progressives in
the south-west and eastern part of the country.
The constitution allows the President two
terms And he is entitled to being elected given chapter VI, section
137, sub-section B of the 1999 constitution.
However, it is high time the President
took a good selfie; possibly one with a smart phone with high
resolution. I will suggest he takes it the Ellen De Generes way.
For the uninitiated, a selfie is that
photograph taken with a hand-held device – most times a smart phone –
and shared on social networks.
Selfies are usually taken at a stretched arm length or with the use of a mirror to bounce off the image(s).
However, selfies are solo photos of
oneself. Social networks like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook are the
dump yards of selfies. Ellen De Generes, Oscar host, broke records
earlier this year when she had Bradley Cooper, an actor to take a selfie
featuring several A-list stars. The picture was retweeted more than two
million times on Twitter. Besides being the most retweeted selfie, it
is also the most retweeted tweet on Twitter.
So why should the President take a
selfie? There is a social psychology to selfies. It is a self-image and
it allows for closer introspection. It allows us decide how we want to
be seen since the photographer is the same person as the one being
photographed! Therefore, Jonathan needs one.
Nigerians and members of the
international community are united in thoughts that this is not the best
of moments for Nigeria. Until now, we had our issues. We had our failed
and failing institutions but not massive insecurity.
Before now, our lives were not threatened
but today that has changed with the several instances of kidnapping,
ritual killings, strikes in education and health institutions, bombings,
unemployment, stampedes and a host of others. Let the President gather
his cabinet to his side before he sets his smart phone to work. Let him
have Labaran Maku, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Abba Moro, Akinwunmi Adeshina,
Bala Muhammed, Nyesom Wike, Boni Haruna and his sea of ministers be his
A-list of political actors as he takes this all-important selfie.
The President may need to look closely at
the picture and also read opinions about his team afterwards. He will
be told of the ministers simply occupying spaces, he would be intimated
of those who are managing to colour his administration. He would see
some of his ministers who are only flicking their tongues over their
lips given the next commonwealth they plan on stealing.
He will see some who possibly do not
understand what public service is about. Those are the categories that
have refused to know that their inactions are actions that cause untold
hardship. He will find the same man who planted non-explosive bombs at
stadia around the country and eventually led to the death of about 20
young Nigerians and has yet refused to honourably resign.
Aso Rock is not the right place for the
kind of Selfie I am suggesting. Mr. President should get on the street
of any of Nigeria’s state capital for this all important selfie. As to
retweet, Mr. President need not worry. It would be the most retweeted
selfie in the world. We have the population. We will beat De Generes to
the record.
What are we the Giant of Africa for if we
can’t make a success of such simple assignment? If the President takes
the selfie on the streets he would see at the background the hordes of
unemployed and disenchanted young people. He may possibly also find on
the street millions of polytechnic undergraduates who have had their
schools shut for more than six months now and thus roam the street. He
will also find the police officer pounding away on the citizen he is
meant to protect; or the naval rating who takes delight in shooting
unarmed citizens. Mr. President should please take a selfie at the mouth
of Sambisa forest in Borno state. He would feel and possibly not see
the fear that resides in the forest and this is the same place where
about 200 girls who have been forcefully torn from their parents and
relatives are now resident.
We all remember when, in December, 2013,
President Barack Obama of the United States, Prime Minister David
Cameron of the United Kingdom and Denmark’s Prime Minister Helle
Thorning-Schmidt took a selfie on the request of Obama at the memorial
service for late Nelson Mandela. It is the turn of President Jonathan to
take one and let him seat back and listen to the hyper assessment of
his administration by tweeps and dedicated Facebook users.
The President may find instances of good
efforts by his administration in his selfie, but the failures overwhelm
his effort. Depending on what the President believes, he may also find
ghosts in his selfies; ghosts of thousands of Nigerians who died simply
because the government refused to protect them against the vendors of
death.
The technology that allows for selfies
leaves room for us to decide what we want to see in our pictures. If
these images are to change then the President needs to do more than
being a good man. He needs to provide good leadership. The President
needs to be told that the world has moved on beyond issues of power,
good road and provision of basic needs. Nigerians would love to debate
more exciting subjects on social media. We certainly would love to get
into arguments as to why we think our prisons are a paradise and so
ain’t a good form of punishment!
Maybe this assignment is above the ken of
the President; maybe not. Although a few would criticise the President
for being vain if eventually he takes a selfie but then the President
would have more people back his view at honest self-assessment through
the simple use of a selfie. Whether or not the President listens to me,
the truth is that almost nothing can be hidden again in this new media
age!
Culled from PUNCH
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