IS IT NOW IHEJIRIKA'S TURN

IS IT NOW IHEJIRIKA'S TURN - by John Okiyi Kalu

There is this piece circulating online on army promotions under General Ihejirika. The author, apparently sponsored by faceless failures, alleged that Ihejirika was promoting his Igbo brothers over Northerners to achieve an "Igbo agenda".

Lt. Gen. Onyeabor Azubuike Ihejirika

Nigerian Chief of Army Staff

Here is what I know.

Unlike other past Army Chiefs, Ihejirika insisted on competence and merit as a basis for promotion to very senior positions in the Nigerian Army. To give teeth to that policy and engender competence and professionalism, he invited an external body to administer promotion examination for those within the relevant cadres.

If Igbo or Yoruba man passed that exam and the author's sponsors fail to make it, should we promote the olodos and sacrifice competence and professionalism? All the while "federal character" and "we we" were used as basis to promote all manner of misfits in the army, how did Nigeria benefit? Apart from coup plotting induced pot bellies and class looting of the nation, what did we gain from past promotions?

Let the author of that vile piece summon the courage to publish all promotions made in the Army from 1979 to date. It will help the whole world see why everything is wrong with Nigeria. Don't forget that even out of power, militicians replaced themselves with their civilian minions made up of slightly more incompetent people at all levels. Even then they still find themselves retiring and contesting elections to continue the suffocation of Nigeria to death. To them, merit is haram.

For Christ sake people should also stop insulting our sensibilities by flaunting fake population figures in public discussions. We are not in the dark ages and anyone who cares to know the truth about Nigeria's population should simply go to google earth and see how many buildings are there from Abuja to Sokoto. Even the British have long accepted complicity in this census fraud. I challenge any living Nigerian to swear that those figures we bandy about as census figures truly represent Nigeria's population distribution. If you lie let your story be Nigeria's story. Great potentials but negative growth for 52 years.

Let it be known that any system that is based on merit will favor the Igbo man and competence driven Nigerians, naturally. If the rest of the country is not ready for merit based progress let them reconsider keeping Igbos in Nigeria. It is wrong to force them to remain in Nigeria while living in mortal fear of them. Like I've said severally, a key reason Nigeria is not moving forward remains her fear of the Igbo man. That mind set have led to a situation where every single national system must have a viral program that says "keep Igbos down". A country committed to keeping one section down will remain down to keep that section down. It is better to seat down and tell them to go and form their own country so that those who choose to remain will progress (or retrogress) without Igbophobia.

Even our national football team is now a victim of this "I love, I no love" attitude towards Igbos. One so called activist recently posted thrash on how the match allowance paid to the national ogbono team mean enriching the Igbo nation. The emergency activist forgot that the glorious USA 94 team was also an "Igbo team". With the exception of Yekini and 2 others,, the rest of those who made up the first team were of Igbo Origin. I can tell anyone without fear of contradiction that the team excelled because Westerhoff made his team selection based on merit. All the coaches after him were forced to operate under the "national agenda".

Not long ago, we saw similar propaganda being circulated against the former head of immigration. She was sacked two weeks ago. It was also deployed against Barth Nnaji and he lost out. Such propaganda is hardly deployed against the locust and cankerworm of the Nigerian nation. They can steal N37b police pension money and get 2 years with option of N750k fine. Billions of new naira notes can disappear at CBN and nobody will talk about the CBN governor but EFCC will look for Soludo over N750m contract awarded by Obasanjo.

Sincerely, if Nigeria is not ready for merit based growth and development, let's sit down and talk. Lord Luggard's 100 years expires next year, 2014. If because of hypocrisy we cannot shake hands and say "you are still my brother no matter your new republic" let us agree a regional government where each region pursues the type of development suited to it. While some might choose the Sharia model, others will be free to pursue Awolowo style development socialism or apply the American Capitalist model based on merit and competence. If one region is making progress others will copy or at least visit that region to borrow wisdom. Who knows, after AD 2140, our great grand children might decide to come together and propagate and pursue merit as a basis for reward, promotion and appointments..

God forbid that my children will belong to a country where merit and competence are punished.

Make una respect una self with Ihejirika. To avoid "in those days when Igbos were here".