YES, WE HAD OUR TEETHING PROBLEMS.....

.....and definitely bountiful contradictions with which Ahmadu Bello, Awolowo, Azikiwe and others tried valiantly to contend. Hence the definitive 1963 Republican Constitution. They never claimed to be perfect. To date that document remains the best we ever had, arrived at without coersion, until the rough outlines of The Aburi Accord was hammered out of the ashes of the fire set by the military leading Nigeria down a ruinous path. Now the Nigerian Army PR guru wants some gratitude from us. You create a huge problem out of sheer ignorance and youthful exuberance, then you sit around in my house for two to three decades claiming to try solving the problems you created. And I am supposed to show gratitude for your puny efforts, accompanied by helping yourself from the public till? What nerve?

I used to be an employer of labour. I could have been overawed in 1972 or threabouts by the swashbuckling swagger of a typical army officer. Based on what I now know, I wouldn't hire most of the members General Gowon's cabinet and inner circle for any serious undertaking, especially when a little bit of intellect was required. We still remember the Cement Armada, a total failure in planning and logistics. We were regaled with the false notion that "money was no object" in our efforts at development. We have been living with the dire consequences of that lie ever since. The tragedy was that the speaker was not lying. He simply didn't have ANY idea of what he was talking about.

Even war requires intellect. I have pointed out that whoever drove into that famous Abagana Ambush deserved to be court-martialled.

Now let's get back to the original boast by General John Enenche. The Indian Army in the years following independence in 1948 was a mean fighting machine, feared and respected by the British and it's neighbours. More recently the nuclear and conventional armed forces of the mighty Union of Soviet Socialist Republic, USSR, was supposedly more than enough to cow down any separatist tendencies in the Soviet Union. Even now the Nigerian Army is no match for the Serbian Army, not to mention the combined forces of the post-Tito Yugoslavia. I have gone far and wide to illustrate that these powerful militaries were ultimately incapable of enforcing unity among it's fractious peoples. I therefore suggest that the general should stop kidding himself. Whereas Nigeria may yet remain united and perhaps even peaceful, I however fail to see how the military, which has been a major part of the problem, can claim credit.

On the other hand, the last Nigeria-Biafra War may yet turn out to be a mere rehearsal if we don't mend our ways. You cannot continue to ignore calls for RESTRUCTURING and hope to shoot your way out of the quagmire. That would be hopeless. A discredited South Vietnamese army and political class, even with the support of a whole United States of America, could not stand in the way of the wishes of the masses.

The Nigerian military class should disabuse itself of the false notion that it possess a mandate to define or re-define for the people any aspect of the doctrine of national development. To do so would be highly presumptions. That's the job of the masses and the political class. The military should OBEDIENTLY fall in behind the political class and await it's command. Any one of the officer who desires even to suggest a way forward should simply give up his command, resign and joint the fray.