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B N W: Biafra Nigeria World News |
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The public in the private
ONE of the pertinent development issues in Africa today is the degree of collaboration that should exist between the private and the public sectors. The public is represented by the state and its other key institutions while the private can be defined as that non-state based or outside the state institutions such as the NGOs, Community-based organisations and the family among others.
The definition is elastic and in its liberal conception it covers the traditional political institutions. However, in the pre-colonial social order, this later element would be the public sphere, in that the resources " farms, palaces and the paraphernalia of one of a king has brought to the fore once again the exact nature of the relationship between the private and the public.
Whatever poses a threat to that relationship should be of concern to those who are committed to development action. This, because, in the final analysis, the public sphere must seek the collaboration of the private sector if development is to occur and be simultaneously sustainable. It is self-evident that government cannot do all. Even where it can, it needs the private sector to secure the transformer, maintain law and order among other functions. Thus where the relationship is estranged, patronage of government services may suffer and mobilising the people of Owu would be worst off. Not many Nigerians would deny having heard some rumours about the President's private life. There may sometimes be exaggeration of this. He is often portrayed as being temperamental. Even if there were no hard proof of this trait, his public utterances, outburst and invectives that were directed at the Chairman of the Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) in Plateau State could pass for concrete evidence.
The latest in the series of his sometimes irrational behaviour was his private conduct on the occasion of the recent selection of the Olowu of Owu. Nigeria's number one man was said to be bitter at the outcome of the selection exercise that he grabbed the sheet containing the result of the selection and tore it into shreds. How can this school-boy behaviour be distinguished from the behaviour exhibited by some students in one of the universities who after an examination that was considered to be difficult, seized the answer scripts from the lecturer and marched on them. The lecturer had a narrow escape from the rampaging students.
How can the President's threshold for orderly conduct be so low? Didn't it occur to him that whatever he does even in the privacy of his small community of Owu as the Balogun of Owu necessarily attracts the world's attention? For him there is a thin and diminishing line between the private and the public conduct. His private conduct at Owu was an eloquent testimony of his public life, which is adjudged to be less impressive by some commentators.
We must pay tribute to the courage of the five Owu Kingmakers who refused to submit to intimidation by the President of Nigeria and the power that he can muster at "my command". They deserve recognition for their act of courage. They are people of character. Rather than castigating and terrorising them, all Nigerians must support them in their struggle to project the interest of the majority of Owu people that they represent. To do otherwise would pay off in the short run for President Obasanjo but in the long run, the desired co-operation between the public and the private domains would be difficult to actualise. Obasanjo would not be the President forever. His presidency has a life span. The people of Owu and their cherished culture would outlive President Obasanjo. The kingmakers, as the custodians of the people's culture should not exchange their sacred mandate for any paltry sum or transient gain.
The core issue that arises from the foregoing is that of mandate. If Obasanjo was unable to carry the Owu community along even as president, what would be his constituency after Aso rock? What is the status of that mandate that is not freely given? Even if in the end, the kingmakers were frightened into submitting their mandate, this would have been fraudulent in that it was without consent.
There is a more serious sense in which the significance of the Owu incidence deserves to be highlighted. The government under Obasanjo's Presidency has been championing the co-operation of the private sector with the public. Communities are being encouraged to join hands with government in delivering services to the people. And this cannot be accomplished under conditions of threat and bully which are the hallmarks of Obasanjo's approach to the Owu crisis. The world is watching Nigeria.
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