What Face Will Osama Show To God?

“God bless America!”

“God bless Nigeria too.”

“I am talking about America, the United States, A-mer, God’s own country, Obama’s country, land of milk and honey, not your Nigeria, this our Nigeria where nothing dey work, where na so so mumu dey government.”

“Be careful, you could be charged for treasonable felony. How can you put down your own country like that while you are busy praising another man’s country? You should be a patriot, I won’t be sentimental, I will personally recommend that your Nigerian passport should be withdrawn. Yes. Yes.”

“I beg. Come and take it. Have you not seen what the Americans have done to Osama bin Laden? They have been on that man’s trail for ten years; they refused to give up until they got him. For me, that says something about how seriously a country should take itself and there are lessons in that episode, no matter what you think, for a country like Nigeria where we don’t ever seem to get anything right.”

“No. We got the 2011 elections right. Yes we did. How has the US Navy SEALS assassinating Osama bin Laden now become an excuse for abusing your own country?”

“You don’t get it. The lesson the Americans keep teaching us again and again is that the life of an American citizen is the main reason the country exists. In 2001, Osama bin Laden was the mastermind of the 9/11 attack on the Twin Towers in New York, a life-changing historic tragedy for the whole of America, lives were lost, scarred, the national grief remains fresh, a ground zero was created, America was shaken to its fundaments. That was not an act of God. It was the handiwork of a group of terrorists who thought they could teach the United States a lesson on its own soil. It has taken the United States ten years to retaliate, by cutting off the head of the man who ordered the attacks. Osama bin Laden demystified the US. The US has fought back. For the ordinary American, that is very reassuring.”

“Yeah, yeah”

“Like?”

“Leadership. Take a look at the picture of Obama and the top US security and foreign policy chiefs in the situation room that was set up to monitor the assault on Osama bin Laden codenamed Geronimo. They were monitoring the situation via satellite. And those soldiers who went in to take Osama out knew that they were not alone, that the will power of an entire American state was behind them.  Such little things matter. When a nation faces a defining moment, its leaders must stand up and be counted.  Your Nigeria? Ha ha. Have you not heard that over-flogged line about how leadership is the bane of Nigeria’s development, and do you know how true it is?

“We have leaders too.”

“I know. And many of them have just won elections. You’d recall that in 2008, during the US Presidential campaigns, Obama promised that his administration will get Osama bin Laden. He has kept that promise. That is leadership. Here in Nigeria, our leaders at all levels make promises they don’t intend to keep.”

“George Bush Jnr would have loved to be the US President that got Osama bin Laden.”

“It doesn’t quite matter. The victory is America’s. The glory is a national one, not just Obama’s and that is why although the killing of Osama bin Laden has increased Obama’s popularity ratings, nobody has said that it will automatically get him a second term as US President. The average American has no reason to give credit to one individual, but to the American state, to his country, and the strength of its institutions. When a country has strong institutions, and the right men and women to lead them, it can do great things.”

“I concede that Nigerian institutions are weak, our processes are bad, our leaders are unserious.”

“Do you know how many times persons and other countries have taken Nigeria and other Nigerians for granted, and our country is unable to stand up for its people? If tomorrow anybody bombs Abuja, they may get away with it. Nigeria lacks the capacity to stand up for its people.”

“You are using the word may? They will get away with it! We can’t even check internal terrorism. Ten years after Chief Bola Ige’s assassination, the authorities have no clue. Chief Bola Ige was this country’s Attorney General and Minister of Justice. If you ask the police for the file on that case, you can be sure they won’t be able to locate it. Notorious armed robbers from Niger, Cameroon and Chad are perpetually wreaking havoc on Nigerian soil, to date Nigeria has not been able to break the back of the syndicates involved. There has been repeated sectarian violence in parts of the North, organized by known groups, there is also an al Qaeda franchise operating in the Northern part of the country, and yet the Nigerian authorities have no clue.”

“Thank you.  You are beginning to get my point. Third lesson: the triumph of intelligence gathering. For ten years, the Americans kept tracking Osama bin Laden and his associates until they tracked him down to a house in Pakistan. Our own intelligence agencies here can’t gather useful intelligence to help national security. Okay, let’s be fair. They are trying.”

“They are not doing enough. We should be able to say that. By the time all the details on the Osama operation come out, you’d be impressed.”

“You know if Osama bin Laden had been Nigeria’s enemy, one of the top security officials would have tipped him off.”

“Well, Americans could have done the same too. That is why it was meant to be a classified, top secret operation. It  is also why the Pakistanis who are very much like Nigerians, if the annual rankings on Transparency International’s Corruption Index, are to be used as yardstick, had to be shut out of the operation.”

“I don’t believe that story about the United States not telling Pakistan it was invading its territory. There are sovereignty issues involved. But it makes sense to tell the world that Pakistan is innocent, in order to prevent a reprisal attack on the Pakistani government by its Muslim population.”

“Well, sovereignty is not an issue where terrorism is involved. We live in a new world driven by new standards of shared morality. Tomorrow, if the United States traces an al-Qaeda operative to any part of Nigeria, we would just wake up one morning and hear that US Navy SEALS have taken over a section of Nigeria to flush out some terrorists. If you don’t want that, then Nigeria must pay careful attention to internal security. And as for Pakistan, it is shameful that they couldn’t fish out Osama Bin Laden, living about 800 metres away from a top Pakistani military academy. Pakistan is guilty.”

“But I don’t believe Saudi Arabia rejected Osama bin Laden’s corpse.”

“You can believe whatever you want. The truth is that America has achieved its objective. It has eliminated Osama Bin Laden, it has avenged the 9/11 killings, and it has sent out a strong signal to all terrorists that where terrorism is concerned, it is an eye for an eye.”

“But al-Qaeda considers Osama bin Laden a martyr. It says it will avenge his death. Killing begets more killing. We have to be more concerned about a new world reality where the theology of murder, suicide bombings and homicides has become so open-ended. The grievances and injustices that fuel these should be addressed, globally and locally. On the global stage, why is the Muslim world angry? Why is America so hated? Locally, why Boko Haram? Why would anyone kill because of elections or Western education?”

“America has said it has no problem with Islam. In Nigeria, we are dealing with criminal elements who continue to prosper because the state has allowed them to do so. Yes, there are inequities in the world, but I think Nigeria needs to learn to take itself seriously as a country with the potential to become a major power. American leaders don’t joke with the status of their country in the world. And it didn’t start with Osama bin Laden. In 1941 when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, America waited till 1945 and it bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki with very devastating consequences for Japan. Israel, Germany, Russia and other countries have taken similar steps over time. But a country cannot stand up for itself if it is not united and if its people are not loyal to it. Have you seen how all Americans are united on the Osama bin Laden case? If it were here, there would have been a vocal majority insisting that their faith has been assaulted. Internal cohesion is very important.”

“President Goodluck Jonathan is going to work on all that. That is why he went to Obudu to relax after the elections to see how he can come up with a team that can turn Nigeria into a serious country.”

“If he is looking for serious people, I am sure he can find them. But I know those that he must not bring into his team- anybody who cannot be traced when Nigeria faces a defining moment and is in urgent need of leadership direction; he must avoid such persons who abdicate responsibilities when they are needed most.  When there was a midnight massacre in Plateau state, the other year, all the important officials of state whose job it was to mobilize the forces to were said to be in bed, and their phones had been switched off; they could not be reached until thousands of people had died.  Such people cannot move Nigeria forward. Two, he must not fill the new cabinet with failed politicians, all those people who were disgraced by the electorate and who think they must remain in power. Three, he must not accept nominees from political Godfathers, or state Governors, or traditional rulers. Four, he must be prepared to work hard like Barack Obama and match words with action, and even if tomorrow a Nigerian asks for his birth certificate, he too should be able to produce it.”

“What are you talking? Which birth certificate? I don’t think there was a birth registry in Otueke the year our president was born. And do you know whether he was born on the farm, or on palm fronds?

“I used that example only as a metaphor. Nigeria needs to pull itself together. And what we have is a fresh opportunity. Obama just made history as the slayer of Osama, the terrorist. Jonathan should have his eyes on history.”

“But the politicians have started. I don’t see examples of loyalty to the state. I see desperation and opportunism. The only thing that has impressed me for now, is the ACN and the CPC saying that they don’t want to be part of a Government of National Unity, they would rather be in the opposition.”

“You want to bet with me?”

“Why?”

“All that the PDP needs to do is to offer juicy appointments to some key members of the ACN and the CPC, you’d be surprised such persons will immediately cross the carpet and join the PDP. They will rationalize their choice and abandon their parties. Nigerian politicians are not loyal to any public cause.”

“Such persons should be named and shamed.”

“To such people, it wouldn’t matter. Look, if Osama bin Laden had been Nigeria’s enemy No 1 as he was to the United States, there would have been so-called Nigerian leaders who would have recommended that Nigeria should go and beg him and even offer him money! And by now there will be people protesting that the Osama bin laden operation should not have been codenamed Geronimo, because it is an assault on the integrity of an ethnic nationalist. Geronimo is the name of a Native American nationalist.”

“You like to exaggerate. Yes, even native Apache Americans are protesting, but that does not change how the average American feels about Osama bin Laden’s execution.”

“Okay. But do you agree that our people have no high values? Look at what is happening with the National Assembly. There is very desperate jostling for positions. Every zone wants the Senate presidency and the Speakership of the House of Representatives. The South East wants the Senate Presidency, the North East says they deserve the seat, the North Central has not asked for it, but former Senate President David Mark says continuity is important ot national stability, the East says it wouldn’t mind the Speakership of the House of Representatives if it cannot get the Senate Presidency, and so on and so forth.”

“I support the North East. They deserve the seat.”

“Senator David Mark is my friend, and he is from North Central”

“I think the Yoruba should retain the Speakership of the House of Representatives.”

“So what will the Igbo get?”

“And what will the Ibibio get?”

“You see. This is the real problem with Nigeria. We should be thinking collectively of how to move this country forward, we need to be united, there must be a meeting of minds on the national agenda, instead of every group looking for quick gains”

“Well, you know something? I think I want to go and watch the Chelsea and Manchester United English premiership match today. To many Nigerians, that is what is important. Up Man U.”

“Up Chelsea.”

“Down down, Osama, the Arsenal fan. Osama is a Gunner! You see?”

“Leave Osama alone. If his spirit was crawling, it should be close to the outposts of Hell, by now.”

“And to think all the time the West was looking for him, the man was living comfortably in a luxury house, with his wife  and children, not in any desert anywhere as we thought, but in a town.”

“The important thing is that America got him. I await the day the Nigerian authorities will parade the hardened criminals in our land and put a bullet through their skulls.”

“They should be charged to court first.”

“Of course. But God’s court, where there is no appeal, and no return. I wonder what face Osama bin Laden will show to God.”

“He will be received by 72 virgins, have you forgotten?”

“Good for him.”