November 12, 1984

Do Nigerian press suffer from "Pull-him- down" syndrome?

By Elizabeth Ohene

The press in Nigeria have been variously described as the most dynamic in Africa as well as the most outspoken and diversified until the advent of the military at the beginning of this year. Now, Nigerian Minister of Information Group Captain Emeka Omeruah accuses them of being singularly destructive

Ministers of Information have never had an easy job, not even at the best of times. They are always having to defend the indefensible and praise the kind of things that leave the rest of us quite unmoved. With such a job, it is not surprising that they all fall victim to such bizarre behaviour at one time or the other.

Group Captain Emeka Omeruah the Nigerian Minister of Information is the latest to have been displaying such peculiar characteristics.

To be quite fair to the Group Captain, it should be said that his job requires him to say things that he probably does not believe in personally. At the start of his job, he was announcing the discovery of coups and invasion plans at an average of about twice a week.

The first few times, he caused quite a stir. There was pandemonium in Lagos, the markets were emptied as people hurried home either to hide from the invaders or to take arms to defend the fatherland against the invaders. After a while, however, Nigerians decided that there were more pressing matters to preoccupy them and fugitive invasion plans drew only yawns.

Thus the Group Captain was forced to start looking around for fresh topics. His position has been made even more difficult because even though he is the Minister of Information, he does not seem to be the number one spokesman for the Federal Military Government (FMG). The choicest and juiciest announcements seem to come from Brigadier Tunde Idiagbon, the Chief of Staff or Major-General Muhammadu Buhari, the Head of State himself. In which case Group Captain Emeka Omeruah is reduced to either echoing what has been said or repairing whatever damage he imagined was done by the bosses.

This can put a person in the most embarrassing situation. At the same time if he should decide to simply keep quiet he would think that his position in the government was being demeaned.

One hopes that it is only such considerations that have pushed Group Captain Omeruah into some of his inexplicable statements. There he was the other day, propounding some new theories on the press. According to the good Group Captain, the Nigerian press suffer from a "pull-him-down" syndrome, and are interested only in bringing down the government.

But then if one were considering the various institutions of state in Africa, one will be hard put to find another institution that will equal the military in being totally colonial not only in mentality but in its organisations and corporations. That is the one institution that has not changed in any way since the days of Colonialism

According to his theory, the Nigerian press have never moved from the colonial days when the press was started to help dislodge the colonial masters. The Nigerian press, if the mentality. Minister of Information would have us believe, have only been involved in bringing down governments.

Back in January this year, when it suited Group Captain Omeruah and his colleagues they had nothing but praise for the Nigerian press. If the military felt at that time that the press had a hand in bringing down the previous government, nobody was saying so and those who would say so, did not think that there was anything wrong with it. Far from finding anything wrong with it, Group Captain Omeruah would have been quite ready to grant the Order of the Niger to such members of the press as he would have selected as having played prominent roles in bringing down the Shagari government.

Now, however, here is Group Captain Omeruah talking as though it were the most reprehensible accusation that can be laid against the Press.

Even though some sections of the Nigerian press would undoubtedly claim credit for having helped bring down the Shagari government, such people considered that they were doing their country a service in much the same way as Maj-Gen Buhari and his colleagues also claim to have been doing a service when they took up arms against the elected government.

If Group Captain Omeruah now thinks that the press is involved in trying to bring down his government, he ought to ask himself a few questions, which must necessarily bring him to two conclusions.

Either the press is indeed only interested in bringing down governments without any reference to the performance of the government, i.e. they pull down even good governments for the sheer fun of doing so or else they pull down governments for specific reasons.

If they pull down governments without reference to their performance, then the Group Captain might want to think back and wonder. If however he should conclude that the press bring down governments that are bad then he might also start to examine his own FMG and see whether they have fallen into the same category.

Is it possible that the FMG have become so paranoid that invasion and subversion plots are no longer limited to fugitives? For Group Captain Omeruah has laid no basis for his very serious accusations that he lays against the press, apart from the suggestion that they still suffer from colonial mentality

But then if one were considering the various institutions of state in Africa, one will be very hard put to it to find another institution that will equal the military in being totally colonial in not only mentality but in its organisations and aspirations. That is the one institution that has not changed in any way since the days of colonialism; that is the one institution that played no part in the struggle for independence and always identified itself more with the colonial masters than with nationalist aspirations. If such an institution can have the bare face cheek as to claim not only the right to rule but to being more patriotic than the rest of the populace, how can the press that have always identified with the aspirations of the people be labelled as unpatriotic?

If Group Captain Omeruah should come to the conclusion that the fault lies with the Nigerian press and not with the various governments that they have brought down by his reckoning, then it is quite likely that he owes the people of Nigeria some apologies for having been a party to the last incident the press was involved in. If however he should find that it is bad governments that make the press act in a particular manner then the fault surely lies not with the press but with the FMG. Whatever has happened to bring the FMG to the ranks of the Shagari government (or worse) as to invite the press to treat the FMG in the same manner as they dealt with their predecessors.

There will be other sections of the press that will never accept the dubious accolade or smear (according to your persuasion) that they have ever been involved in bringing down any government in Nigeria.

For much of this section, they have performed their duty to Nigeria and to their profession by simply pointing out the truth and any wrong doings that they see, they have asked questions that the majority of the people ask in their bus queues and in their homes, they have brought into the open such things as governments would rather hide to protect their own interests.

If that is what Group Captain Omeruah interprets as "pulling the government down" then many journalists would gladly plead guilty. That is more than can be said for people like Group Captain Omeruah and his colleagues who sit in the barracks pledging their loyalty to every government while conspiring at night to overthrow them.

One would suggest that Group Captain Omeruah is in no position to tell what constitutes "pull-the-govern- ment down syndrome" since as far as the military is concerned, the only method they know of stating their displeasure about any government is to stage a coup.