Another Failed Attempt to Paint Us Bad

By Philip Agbese

It is now glaring that whatever we may think, the claim that there is an international conspiracy to derail Nigeria could have some element of truth to it after all.

Part of that claim is that there are concerted efforts to report the country out of existence. Students of International Communication and World Press in journalism or mass communication classes can easily identify the destructive slant in the way their country is reported as an outpost of some superior economy whose every problem must be blown out of proportion and achievements derided as inconsequential.

The Financial Times (FT) "Special Report: Investing in Nigeria - Domestic battles expose Nigerian army’s vulnerabilities" that was recently published fits the bill perfectly. The summary of that report was not short of scare mongering aimed at scaring off investors by claiming that Boko Haram insurgency has not been defeated. Not only did it try to justify its vision of the terror group's so called potency, it went further to issue a compendium of other security breaches that would have anyone thinking of investing in Nigeria scampering off elsewhere.

At a time when the media, international platforms like the Financial Times, should be considering face saving measure in the face of the disgrace from the failed prediction of a Trump win, it is worrisome that this publication, and a lot of those commissioned to deliver specific slants on global issues, continue in this business of prediction when it barely has the facts. As the US president-elect, Donald Trump himself would say, these are crooked media.

The report in question acknowledges that progress has been made in fighting Boko Haram insurgency. But this admission does not tally with the agenda of reporting Nigeria into deeper crisis. So it shopped for pliable experts, talking heads and resource persons to speak with; who of course spoke to the desired point.

This was convenient. Few people, if anyone, ever bothered about making inquiries about the background and intentions of the so called analysts, whom in many instances have been found to be on some form of retainership with the neocons outfits behind the quest for the dissolution of Nigeria or any other country of interest.

If the FT report were to be about a country deemed as friendly, it would have proffered solutions side by side with the problems it identified, or at least offered the way forward in the same article – using real experts who make useful suggestions for policy makers. This is better understood against the reality of how FT and other western media corporations would have reported the US elections with the whole of the venom spewed if it were to have been the election of an African country.

Even the pockets of protests after a Trump win would have been fuelled by way lining up opposition figures – often prepped by foreign interests – to call on more of the brainwashed hordes to precipitate a breakdown of law and order. 

But we did not see FT or any of the others making such calls or asking those leading questions that would prompt their paid analysts to offer up jaundiced analyses that will turn everyday occurrences into launch pads for country wrecking crises.

With the conundrum of the US election now over, it is time to turn attention to the next round of global crises which FT sadly thinks Nigeria should be part of.

On the upside for Nigeria is the fact that things are not as bad as this publication painted them, so it became impossible for FT to acknowledge the positives about Nigeria.

It however tried its best to make the negative overshadow the positives, like when it claimed that the official claims that Boko Haram has been defeated are premature. The terror group has been degraded and scores of reports in the mould of the one referenced cannot change that. The citizens want it so and they are supporting the government and military to make it happen. If the US based paper wants something remarkable to report and its editors have a mental block, one may suggest that they investigate and report on the foreign backing that is trying to revive the terror group by providing backing to its remnants.

Should it be able to do this, it would have left the comfort of stereotyped reporting that allowed it to claim that the military is ill equipped without shedding light on the cause of the problem. It might be that this publication could not be bothered to do a detailed report on why the military remained unable to get much needed equipment to fight a problem that the world is eager to deal with or that it knows the truth and cannot for the sake of political correctness expose a conspiracy of western economies to reduce Nigeria to a raw-material site by refusing to sell much needed military hardwares,  a decision premised on the flimsy excuses of abuses.

The redeeming part of the report was when it appropriately accepted that the outlawed Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) had “a battle with the army last year”. But even this seeming filament of truth was undone when it predicted shockingly that the supporters of the outlawed IMN could take up arms again, which raises the frightening prospect of  what FT knows about how the outlawed Shiite sect in Nigeria is being teleguided to confront the government forces towards a predetermined outcome.

There must be something the author or the publication knows that is not in the public domain even when this admission confirms what Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN) sympathisers have always insisted that it is a non- violent group.

Even more appalling was the attempt to plead poverty as a justification of the Niger Delta Avengers' attack on oil installations, which exposed the agenda and true intent of the article that can only be intended to create fear among investors and further impoverish Nigeria towards the larger goal of disintegration. In the run up to the US election there were militias that were training in some remote regions of that country. One wonders why FT did not accord them the same publicity it is now freely giving to militants that would be branded criminals in other countries.

The disintegration drive became even more strident with the claim that herdsmen/farmer clashes are the products of religious divides with the perverted suggestion that farmers are Christians and herdsmen are Muslims – anyone with such deficit in reasoning may want to take a tour of the north-west and north-central where farmers are Muslims too. The intention became loud with the attempt to label the Indegenous People of Biafra's (IPOB) Nnamdi Kanu a freedom fighter: where was FT when the so call agitation was simmering under the different administrations including the immediate past one.

If using questionable analysts raised eyebrows, quoting Amnesty International in substantiating its casualty figures did irreparable damage to that FT's article. It tallies with the aforementioned theory that there is that unholy alliance to cripple Nigeria's security agencies from being able to respond to threats. Amnesty International cooks up the material and the likes of FT amplify them for international policy makers to hold onto as the reason for not selling arms to Nigeria to fight terrorism and the circle of travesty grows wider.

There is nothing to stop such flawed reports from being published. What must happen is for the federal government to wake up to the reality that the list of those that qualify as Nigeria's friends must be redefined in line with prevailing realities and that traditional lines may have to be cross to get what we need to deal with all these sponsored threats. For the citizens, the earlier we decide to give up on the diet of propaganda, the better. Afterall, these same propaganda outlets sold the lies that left most of our population in that misguided optimism of a Hilary Clinton presidency, thankfully there is another country where the citizens have awoken to free themselves from corporate lies.

Agbese, a student writes from the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre, Middlesex University, London.