Buhari and the Fifth columnists

ACCORDING to Wikipedia, a fifth columnist is “any group of people who undermine a larger group from within, usually in favour of an enemy group or nation.

The activities of a fifth columnist can be overt or clandestine. Forces gathered in secret can mobilize openly to assist an external attack. Clandestine fifth column activities can involve acts of sabotage, disinformation, or espionage executed within defence lines by secret sympathizers with an external force.”

President Muhammadu Buhari must not allow some politicians constitute clogs in the wheel of his progress knowing that masses’ confidence in him is at stake. Election is over. This is the time to be strict and focused on service delivery to earn accolades after exit from politics in 2023.

Those that preferred conceited interests and ambitions to public interest should be laid off. Second term in office by Nigeria’s constitution precedes retirement. But the retirement, fulfilled, glorious or otherwise will be determined by some dynamics.

The Oath of Allegiance in the 1999 Constitution, Federal Republic of Nigeria for public officeholders, provides for recitation, “….I will discharge my duties to the best of my ability, faithfully, and in accordance to with the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and the law, and always in the interest of the sovereignty, integrity, solidarity, well-being and prosperity of the Federal Republic of Nigeria…..; I will not allow my personal interest to influence my official conduct or official decisions ……; I will do right to all manner of people, according to law, without fear or favour, affection or ill-will …….”.

These are the social contracts by which anyone, from the president down to a commissioner, can take up any official responsibility from the constitution. Unfortunately, whilst the drafters of the constitution took it seriously, politicians take it as mere recitals or formality.

Scores of citizens that devotedly enrolled in a government institution, National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN), and graduated since 2013 have been subjected to redundancy and idleness, roaming the streets without vocations by designs of some privileged persons in government.

Pondering on the unending ugly dramas regarding the admission of NOUN law graduates who had been encumbered from proceeding for their vocational training in the Nigerian Law School for no crimes committed can only make any patriotic person weep deeply for the nation.

The commonest question that must come to mind is can the country freely move forward with such actors as public officeholders? The most horrible challenge any government can face is harboring fifth columnists that pursue selfish agenda distinct from the government they constitute.

This is, indeed, unfortunate. Lack of continuity, unity of purpose and open-mindedness in government is the major task in governance. Any system where personal interests are placed above public interests will collapse.

Anywhere a principal and subordinates pursue different interests, it is doomed to fail. It is sad that whilst President Buhari even with old age is passionately a workaholic, always on the move, attending to all important tasks  within and from country to country to make ends meet for common good, some of his subordinates prefer to clandestinely add to his stress.

Detractors within the system should be discharged in the best interest. Thus, let the needful be done.

Carl Umegboro,

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