But, owing to the constant abuse of roundtable discourse by this, and previous Administrations, who will blame us for becoming habitual pessimists? A lot has happened that we should learn from, thus I don’t accept the argument that “we should give it a try”. And by the time we are done trying, our time and resources vanishes, and the effort ends up in Mr. President’s Keep-In-View files!
But the trend with which the dialogue is being forced on us amazes me. Forced confession often produces the wrong result, because a tortured mind speaks only to be set free, not really to state the fact.
If a Governor is not free to air his voice in this country, then we are finished!
How can one explain the irony of preparing for a National dialogue where people will only say what others want to hear, and not what they have in mind? Its is not even as though Governor Adams were the President, who has the final say on the matter. He only aired his view.
Those who don’t have any idea what ADAMS has been through, contending with Governments who are known not to honour agreements were the first to attack him. ASUU agreement is still on the table, ASUP is back on strike. Let me leave OPUTA PANEL, IDRIS KUTA PANEL, SUBSIDY PROBE, NIKI TOBI Confab, etc. They attacked him because we play politics and ethnicity in everything..
Adams is one man who put his life on the line, while he was Nigeria’s labour leader, to fight for the right of Nigerians. A Governor who could not get justice when his aide was murdered sometime ago. If there’s anyone who understands the need for a National Dialogue, it the comrade Governor; yet, if there’s anyone who knows the fate of Dialogues in this country, it is also Adams.
If the dialogue has not started, and people are molested and hushed for expressing their views, what will happen when the “selected” people gather to say “what people want to hear”? Is this not an indication that the conference will add nothing to our body politic?
I have played and replayed the Town Hall meeting on YouTube, I now understand what is Idi Amin of Uganda meant when he said “I can guarantee your freedom of speech, but I cannot guarantee your freedom after your speech”.
Another pointer to the fact that the dialogue is doomed to fail is that the Town Hall meeting slated for Owerri, Imo, as we learnt, has been moved to Abia State, obviously, to avert chances of Imo State people saying “what the people do not want to hear”.
If therefore it is a meeting only for the “I concur”, then we need not call it dialogue, it had better been called Nationwide Broadcast, where the speaker says what pleases him and we sit and mope and helplessly concur.
The undisputed fact remains that “Silence has probably killed more Nigerians than corruption but we may never know because silence doesn’t tell its stories”
Some of us keep quiet in fear, others in confusion, yet a lot more other opt for silence just to secure their pockets.
But someone has to bail the cat. It is only a fool that does the same thing over and over and expects a different result.
come to think of it… Has the previous Dialogues, Confanb and Panel report reached their expiry date? why don’t we start by implementing them, if we really mean well for this country?
Wait a minute… Obasanjo’s Niki Tobi led confab cost almost a Billion Naira, right? and that was over 5years ago… This one will cost… (calculate inflation)… Am just thinking aloud.
Francis Udoka Ndimkoha
francisndims@yahoo.com
