JONATHAN'S LACK OF A LUCID INTERVAL

As one year draws to a close, it is customary to take stock and look ahead to the incoming one. The most important aspect of looking ahead is two-fold: look ahead with trepidation and forlorn expectations, or look ahead with confidence and hope of a better year ahead. To surmise that most Nigerians will fall into the former category is a no-brainer. If the truth be told, the year 2013 was infinitely worse than 2012 in reality for, or in the subconscious of, most Nigerians. However, as difficult as it is to believe, among the havoc wreaked on our country by the thieving political elite, some promising developments have occurred. First of all, the frequency of the revelations of gross misdeeds by politicians and public officials has gathered pace; what about the CBN governor revealing gross shortfalls of some $50b in the NNPC's remittance to government coffers? What also about fiasco of two bulletproof BMW cars illegally procured by Oduah? It is true that nothing remotely resembling retribution has been meted out to the culprits (that's Jonathan for you, I'm afraid), the mere fact that whistle-blowing is seeping into Nigeria's public life is a development worthy of acknowledgement and applauding. Of equal importance was the inevitable, long-overdue and welcome fissure in the PDP. This writer has always had the strong belief that old alliances would have to be broken for this country of ours to finally embrace the immense opportunities with which God has blessed us. Our woes as a nation have been mainly due to the unwieldy power and influence of the PDP. Unchecked corruption has been the death knell of our progress in social and economic terms. One doesn't need lecturing any longer on the debilitating effects of this monstrous party on our nation. The splintered opposition finally got their acts together and has now coalesced into quite a formidable party capable of matching the might, stride for stride, of the PDP. The debate of which party is best placed to alter the fortunes of our country for the better is a separate one. The APC still has a lot of convincing to do before Nigerians can be persuaded to embrace it; it is not enough (and actually politically inept) to think that Nigerians would vote for them just to get rid of the PDP. Policies have to be advanced to enable Nigerians gauge whether it can make a difference and not be an extension of the horror show they have been fed since 1999. Nigerians want to know what the APC as a government is going to do to tackle corruption and corrupt practices; how it is going to tackle the rot in the education and healthcare systems; improve the job prospects of scores of millions of Nigerians; what alternative approach it has to tackle the seemingly intractable power outages; what options it has in tackling the Boko Haram and the Niger Delta conundrums; what steps it proposes to take to reposition Nigeria as a major economic force in Africa. All these, and more, we need to know before we can decide to pitch our tent with it; criticizing this discredited army of political bandits alone is not enough, we don't need reminding how bad they are and how worse they can get. We want positivity and a sense of a clear direction for our country and people.

You see, human beings get scant regard in Jonathan's world: the President's zoo being appropriated N37.5m and N1.6billion to purchase the 11th aircraft in the President's fleet! Can anyone name me which other President or Head Of Government in the world has more aircraft than most of their domestic airlines? There is simply no method in his madness. The guy is giddy with power and there's a distinct lack of a lucid interval in his rapid descent into the inevitable coma.

This is not a time to hunker down. We need to batten down the hatches and put a stop, once and for all, to these bandits in political garb battening on us. We must make 2015 count. We cannot afford to be indifferent any longer.

I wish all and sundry a much happier 2014 and our country, a brighter and more prosperous future.