Some Nigerians were at their
fawning best when the wife of
the President, Patience Jonathan,
returned from her
unannounced overseas trip
recently. A crowd of hangers-on
in the Presidency trooped to the
airport to receive her amid
singing and dancing. Some wore
T-shirts proclaiming their love
and solidarity for the President’s
wife.
Though Mrs. Jonathan’s well-
wishers reserve the right to
celebrate the return of a woman
who is probably their
benefactor, it is awkward and
bizarre for senior cabinet
ministers to join in such banality.
The main issue here is not about
Patience Jonathan’s health but
about misuse of public funds,
abuse of power and lack of
transparency.
In the United States where
Nigeria borrowed its presidential
system from, the Office of the
First Lady is part of the
Presidency and is maintained
with tax payer’s money. Though
unelected, Nigeria’s First Lady is
also regarded as part of the
Presidency. In the official website
of the State House, Abuja, the
Office of the First Lady comes
immediately after that of the
Vice-President and precedes the
Federal Executive Council.
According to Wikipedia, an online
encyclopedia, the Office of the
First Lady of the United States is
accountable to the First Lady to
enable her to carry out her
duties as hostess of the White
House, and is also in charge of
all social and ceremonial events
of the White House. It adds that
“The First Lady has her own staff
that includes a chief of staff,
press secretary, White House
Social Secretary, Chief Floral
Designer, etc. The Office of the
First Lady is an entity of the
White House Office, a branch of
the Executive Office of the
President.” Mrs. Jonathan enjoys
similar perquisites of office.
Some online media outlets had
reported that Mrs Jonathan was
flown to a German hospital for
an undisclosed ailment.
Speculations were rife that she
was being treated either of food
poisoning allegedly contracted in
Dubai, or appendicitis. Some
even claimed she went for a
“tummy tuck” — medical surgery
to reduce the size of the
stomach. The Presidency stoked
up this fire of rumour when it
refused to clearly disclose her
health status. Rather than make
her return a quiet affair knowing
that Nigerians were not informed
about her real reason for going
abroad, the Presidency decided
to hold a carnival-like reception
for her and there were reports
of a grand reception being
planned.
It is not as if Mrs. Jonathan’s
health condition has any critical
bearing on the running of
government. But when secrecy is
baked into the government
culture, public trust takes flight.
It is only in countries where
openness is a luxury, like North
Korea, that such things can
happen. Incidentally, the North
Korean First Lady, Ri Sol-ju, has
also disappeared from the
public for more than a month
now, fuelling speculations about
her fate. Some reports say she
may have fallen out of favour
with the ruling Communist Party
in the country; some say she
may be pregnant. But North
Korea is a totalitarian, single
party state while Nigeria is a
supposed democracy.
Nigeria has gone through this
cycle before. Former President
Umaru Yar’Adua was in a Saudi
Arabian hospital for months, but
Nigerians were kept in the dark
about his trip and illness.
Ironically, President Goodluck
Jonathan was his deputy then
and directly suffered the
consequences of the secrecy
and lies that surrounded
Yar’Adua’s absence. It took the
intervention of the National
Assembly which invoked a
“doctrine of necessity” to bring
sanity back to the country.
Like in Yar’Adua’s case, public
funds were wasted in the
inglorious trip of the Mrs.
Jonathan. A Presidential jet took
her to Germany and brought her
back. The cost of whatever
treatment she underwent in
Germany was likely borne by
Nigerian taxpayers. Shouldn’t
these taxpayers then be
informed about her condition?
As if to insult Nigerians the
more, Mrs Jonathan has denied
ever going to any German
hospital. As she put it, “I read in
the media where they said I was
in the hospital. God Almighty
knows I have never been to that
hospital…I do not have terminal
illness, or any cosmetic surgery,
much less tummy tuck. My
husband loves me as I am and I
am pleased with how God
created me.”
She missed the point here. We
do not think that any rational
person would want to contest
the love her husband has for
her. Nor are sane Nigerians
praying that she develops a
terminal illness. Being the wife of
our President and a public figure
whose welfare is taken care of
with public funds, she owes it as
a duty to Nigerians to explain
her whereabouts. If she is ill, it
only means she is human and
will elicit the sympathy of
Nigerians if she makes it public.
If she said she didn’t go to the
German hospital, then where did
she disappear to for almost two
months? And why did she say
Nigerians gathered and prayed
for her and God listened and
heard their prayers? Mrs
Jonathan’s health controversy
has entrenched the climate of
secrecy in government.
In saner countries, the
Presidency would have been
answering some penetrating
questions by now. The United
States taxpayers, for instance, do
not pay for their First Lady’s
private trips abroad. And it
would have been a return to the
Stone Age for Americans to
troop out to sing and dance for
Mrs Obama for travelling
overseas secretly and returning
with a swagger. The female
ministers and other government
functionaries who went to the
airport to sing and dance with T-
shirt-wearing aides of Mrs.
Jonathan should be ashamed of
themselves. Where in the civilised
world do senior ministers leave
their job to welcome the first
lady from a private trip?
In a democracy, it is argued, the
principle of accountability holds
that government officials —
whether elected or appointed by
those who have been elected —
are responsible to the citizenry
for their decisions and actions.
Transparency requires that the
decisions and actions of those in
government are open to public
scrutiny and that the public has
a right to access such
information. Both concepts are
central to the very idea of
democratic governance.
Nigerians should begin to
demand accountability from
their public officers. There
should be transparency in
government. A transparent
government plays a critical role
in a functioning democracy. Our
public officers should learn
some lessons from countries
that run an open and
transparent system. Earlier this
month, the Colombian
President, Juan Manuel Santos,
informed his people that he had
prostate cancer and would
undergo surgery. His people
wished him well. The Duke of
Edinburgh, Prince Philip, was
taken to the King Edward VII
hospital, London, in June this
year for a bladder infection and
that was also made public.
The world no longer operates
like a secret cult. That is the
civilised trend our leaders
should emulate.
Source: Punch Editorial Board
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